The Immortal Dream

by Czar_Yoshi

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Alternate Universe, Science Fiction
Length: 1166922

In the lands north of Equestria, three young ponies reach for the stars.

For eighteen years, Equestria's northern neighbors have been at peace.

Despite instability further to the north and far to the east, the Theocracy of Yakyakistan and the technological powerhouse of Ironridge have walked the road of friendship, sharing their best and brightest minds in the remote mountain research colony of Icereach. An underground city built by scientists, for scientists, Icereach is the crucible of the most advanced technology in the world, as well as some of the loftiest dreams: sending ponies into space, and perhaps setting hoof on the moon.

But Icereach has never even sent up a rocket, let alone a random teenager like big-dreaming me. It feels like we've been months away from a proper launch for years now, and no one quite seems to care why. For that matter, there are a lot of things no one questions about Icereach, like why there's an ancient chapel in the deepest part of the caves. Or why historical data in our libraries is censored seemingly at random. Or what we even expect to find out there, beyond the stars.

Maybe it's because I'm not a real scientist, but I feel like I'm the only one more interested in the big picture than getting my name on some invention or other. They say Icereach is the pinnacle of civilization, but there has to be more to life than this...

This story takes place eighteen years after the events of The Olden World and can be read fully standalone. Having read The Olden World is not required.

Chapters are currently posted weekly.

Published 2021-03-12 01:20:02 UTC
Last updated 2025-02-15 05:30:53 UTC

Project

Paper crackled as a column of light illuminated the space between a shelf of manuscripts and the wall, one of the books being pulled carefully free. Cradling my prize, I got back on all fours, instantly flipping it open and pinning down the table of contents with a wingtip. My eyes scanned it feverishly, the light of revelation burning somewhere within their emerald rings, and I quickly paged further in, before I read a few passages and frowned.

"Gah! What do you mean, redacted?" I complained aloud to the quiet library air. "Seriously, how's anyone supposed to pass down knowledge if you take what the last guys knew and throw it out just because they were dirtbags? Ergh..."

"Shh!" An irate librarian poked his head around a corner, holding a wing aggressively to his lips.

"Whoops!" I instantly caught myself, realizing my mistake and lowering my voice to a whisper. "Sorry."

He accepted my apology and retreated, and I reddened slightly, usually proud of my library etiquette. Still, it wasn't like anyone was sleeping in here, or anything.

Rolling my eyes, I put the book back and wandered through to the next aisle... and instantly ate my words.

"Corsica?" I craned my neck forward and tilted my head, staring at the pink mare. She was in a reading chair next to a rounded table in a corner between aisles, and had a book held cleverly in her hooves that would hide her eyes from almost all angles... a pose I had practiced myself sometimes in school, and one no unicorn with a functioning horn would ever want to use naturally.

"Mmh?" Corsica grunted, barely budging.

"Are you sleeping?" I whispered. "In the middle of the library? Don't you have more comfortable places to be?"

Corsica lowered the book, her eyes open, though she had clearly at least been cat-napping. Her bleary gaze bored into me, asking if I really wanted to say she looked like she had been slacking off.

I stared back. She did, but it wasn't the most important thing she looked like. For as long as I had known her, Corsica was a genuine and unflappable mare, who never pretended to be someone she wasn't, never put on airs she didn't want to and never let any troubles stick to her or make her worry. And that day, I could tell that Corsica was wearing a mask.

"...Are you alright?" My jaw hung slightly, and I tilted my head. "You look kinda... you know..."

She raised the book to cover her eyes again. "Please, Halcyon. I'm very busy. Leave me alone."

"Well, alright then." I turned and wandered away. "Have a nice nap, I guess."

Time began to speed up, my hooves retreading a familiar scene and my brain deciding I didn't need to be there for all of it. Truth be told, I had found Corsica in that chair over a dozen times in the last two years, and every time it had gone exactly the same. Some parts of my life were apparently more worth remembering than others, and I didn't get much of a say in what they were.

Yep. This was a memory, one from two years ago, when I was a sixteen-year-old nerd wearing the previous iteration of my big coat, just as skilled at using my special talent to be seen the way I wanted yet with a much less-mature grasp of what that vision was. And for some reason I never really understood, when I slept, I didn't dream. I remembered.

Three days passed before I saw Corsica again.

My memory skipped through them like the minutes and seconds were flakes of falling snow, drifting by in an unintelligible haze, far too quick and packed together to focus on any at a time. When it slowed, I was in the library again, sorting through books with an annoyed determination. All I was learning was that someone didn't want me knowing all the things I was curious about... My pacing carried me through aisle after aisle, hunting down index markers I had looked up ahead of time, in search of history texts - any history - concerning the batponies who had lived in Icereach before it became a research colony, but especially what they used the chapel for.

Instead, I found Corsica, propped up in another reading chair and skimming through a book without turning any pages, the blankest of all looks on her face. She hadn't noticed me yet. Did I want to try this again?

"Something sure looks enthralling," I carefully commented, drawing near. "What are you reading?"

"I'm busy," Corsica mumbled, not answering the question.

I leaned closer and tilted my head, reading the book's spine for myself. "Architectural building analysis and weight distribution for underground structures. Huh. Looks fascinating." I straightened up, staring at her vacant expression with a skeptical look. "Who's makin' you read that?"

Corsica paused, which was impressive considering she hadn't been doing anything. A few emotions ran across her face, mixing together and all manifesting as a tiny frown. Then she shut the book and slid it away across the floor.

Picking up the book and dusting it off, I thought about how to take that. "Are you alright?" I asked eventually, lifting my ears in concern. "No offense, but ever since you woke up, you've been working every single time I see you. I can tell you're hiding something, and I think you're getting burned out." I showed her the book she had been reading. "I know you just got your special talent, too, and that's a big deal and all, but is this really making you happy?"

"So what are you working on, then, Halcyon?" Corsica countered. "You're here in the library too."

I glanced back to my list of new references to check, and then showed it to her as well. "Me? Looking for any sort of history about that old chapel where they built the ether pump. I... had a rough few days while you and Ansel were in the hospital, and hiding out down there really helped me make it through. So now I feel like I ought to know more about it. Maybe I'm coping, or maybe I'm returning the favor." I met her eyes. "How about you, eh?"

Corsica looked away.

"Hey, I know I'm the last pony who's really qualified to give you advice, especially these days..." I shuffled uncomfortably. "And I get if you're a little messed up by nearly having died, but you gotta get a better way to cope. You're not acting like yourself, and I'm worried about you. You'd have to be blind to miss it, but I've looked up to you since forever ago, and I don't really like this new point of view."

"Deal with it," Corsica sighed. She didn't say anything more.

"...Well, I won't overstay my welcome," I said, beginning to back away. "Just take care of yourself, alright? I always thought you were cool because you never seemed to get down or bothered by anything. Whatever's got your mood in a twist, I'm sure you've got it covered. Take it easy."

I didn't even have to wait until evening before I saw Corsica a third time.

A long elevator rumbled to a halt, its doors opening to a half-natural room where carved, ancient rock intersected glittering crystals, and timeless runes and etchings shared space with racks of processing equipment and metal vats and hoses. At the end of the room, the wall was missing, a crystalline plinth extending out into a vast natural cavern, the blackness barely illuminated by a sea of starry ether below.

I had come down here to stare at the chapel and think. I hadn't come to find Corsica already doing the same thing.

"Halcyon?" She looked up, acknowledging me before I could do the same, looking slightly more alive than she had in the library.

"Surprise?" I walked closer, but not enough to get in her personal space. "It's pretty down here when you don't mind the machines. Any chance you're here because of me?"

"Maybe." Corsica hid her face with her mane, pretending to be absorbed in a carving on a wall.

"Might be a stupid question, but do you wanna talk?"

Corsica stiffened, but after a moment, talk she did. "You can't blame Ansel. He has partial amnesia. But he still feels like a completely different pony. And Father is... We had a fight. Some way to welcome me back, right? The only one who even seems to care about me right now is an annoying twerp like you, who's been following me around like a second shadow since filly school. My entire world is turned on its head. So you'll have to forgive me for reading into finding my special talent and thinking I can overwork my way back to normalcy. Satisfied?"

"Yeah, well, life is rough when you lose your stuff." I shrugged. "You want to call me a tagalong and say I was a third wheel for ages? Go ahead. Might have hurt, a month ago, but I had plenty of time to doubt myself while you two were unconscious. If your world's upside-down, I can relate." I stuck out a booted hoof. "The whole accident was my fault anyway. Let me help you. If you've got stuff on your mind, I promise I won't tell anyone."

Corsica looked at my offered hoof and snorted, and for a second, I couldn't tell if she was crying or laughing. "How did my life even come to this?" she whispered as she took a breath, hanging her head.

"What, the two of us hanging out down here? Luck." I sat down and retracted my hoof, curling my tail around my legs. "Dunno yet if it's good or bad. Probably both. Or maybe fate."

"You believe in that?"

"Beats me." I glanced back at the rest of the chapel, at the mystical ether flowing slowly by below the edge where the room dropped off. "But I sure would like to know whether whoever built this place believed in it."

Corsica contemplated that for a while. "...Whatever," she eventually said, though it was more approving than dismissive. "If this is a coping project, your reasons sound more interesting than mine anyway. Tell me about it."

"Well, there's both a ton and basically nothing to say," I began, her invitation feeling almost surreal. "Mostly, I'm curious. It must've been real hard to get down here before they put in the elevator, but someone still cared about something enough to come all this way and build it, and from the wear on the floor it's been visited very heavily throughout the ages..."

I didn't come to all at once, memories of myself explaining to Corsica all about my curiosity in the chapel mixing in my brain with the reality of the waking world, leaving me in a half-asleep haze. But that reality was that our next-door neighbor was a budding musician with a current passion for elevator music, and such a reality was inevitably going to prevail.

Even when it did, I didn't immediately get out of bed, savoring the last dregs of the dream. Once upon a time, Ansel and Corsica had been close, and I had been an unwanted extra, an oblivious fool who told herself day in and day out that she wasn't being treated unfairly. Since I got to hang out with my idol, I thought life was automatically good. And then the accident happened...

I didn't know how, but we had rebuilt differently from that. Corsica was my friend now as well as my idol, Ansel no longer considered me a bitter rival, and the two of them were no longer joined at the hip. I had gone from being the third wheel to the bridge that linked them together. For a good two years now, everything had miraculously been better. And while the accident was the force that tore the old way of things down, my curiosity about the chapel had been the spark that started us building back up.

There was no way I was letting that spark meet an ignoble end on Graygarden's desk. The fault plane research paper had only been a spinoff of our project - we had plenty more material to draw on. And now, with a full night's rest behind me and my dream as a fresh reminder of the project's importance, it was time to get up, fix this and make things right.

...Fortunately, it was a weekend and I had my whole life ahead of me and Corsica seemed more annoyed about my half of the work being wasted than hers, so all things considered it wasn't so urgent that I had to run out the door without even getting dressed.

The dilemma I faced certainly didn't seem impossible, I reflected, already planning as I stared at my reflection in my mirror. The research paper that was the source of my worries had mostly been a harpoon to try to draw in funding, interest or support from the rest of the institute. Almost all of the central project was kept off the public record so that Graygarden didn't try to rain on our parade, so the big problem was that now he negatively associated that paper on fault plane dating with Corsica. It would be harder now to slip other portions of the project in past his biases. And we needed funding, most of all...

I certainly wasn't going to find that funding in the empty boot I was holding. Although, I had made it myself... Maybe I could get a real job and sell stuff for cash? Ansel worked part-time at a grocery store to help make ends meet, after all.

That idea got laughed off with a shake of my head as I slipped on my coat. Real work? No way. If only there was a way to patch up Graygarden's spat with Corsica... I wasn't about to underestimate that again after how I got into this mess. Even though I had mostly been joking the previous night about trying to con him into funding us, it honestly sounded more effective than asking nicely and directly. Corsica's idea of making him think there was legitimate economic interest in the ether crystals in particular held promise. Now that I thought about it, though, what if there were other parties who would find value in our work? The institute's official power structure was a bureaucratic monolith that answered only to our sponsor nations, but it wasn't too rare for third-party donors and patrons of the sciences to get involved.

A simple trip to the mirror ensured that I had sufficient bed-head to keep my scruffy mane going strong for the day, and I nodded, satisfied at my appearance. Yes, maybe I could try to subvert Graygarden entirely by building enthusiasm for our project with Icereach's wealthy donors and investors. If ponies with money cared about the project... I grinned at my reflection. See? I could do this. Time to get to work.

Shadow sneaking brought me under my door, and I rose silently, noting that Ansel was still asleep on the couch and Mother had left her bedroom door wide open yet again. I couldn't resist a glance, spotting her with the covers tossed off and her pillow cuddled like another pony, her mane a fright and some drool leaking down her cheek as she snored.

I shook my head and suppressed a smile. Someone aggressively didn't want to have grown up.

In the kitchenette, under a framed picture of Mother when she was my age and two ponies who looked like family, I found the breadbox and raided it. A look inside a cupboard revealed... three open, half-full jars of peanut butter, and nothing else. All creamy.

Apparently this was my breakfast, then.

I didn't take the time to properly eat my meal, carrying it along in my mouth as I left our apartment to wander the subterranean halls of Icereach. It felt like early morning, the pre-dawn hours where the sky was just beginning to tinge, but for all I knew it was already afternoon. I hadn't bothered to check a clock before leaving.

Water hissed through distribution pipes bolted to the tunnel ceilings, tube lights occasionally flickering in complaint of being at least two decades old. The walls weren't carved rock - they were concrete, molded into the tunnels over top of layers of insulation to protect us from the stone of the cold mountain core. I knew this because when I was young, some construction issue had caused them to dig out a portion of one of the tunnels, leaving a makeshift wooden bridge for us to cross as they did open-access repairs.

Back then, this place had been much newer than it was now. I had watched, year by year, as the bunker aged, its pristine concrete corners becoming stained and worn down as its lights grew dimmer and more flickery. The facility had already existed when Mother and I arrived, myself not yet old enough to speak and Ansel still in the womb, I knew that much. And sure, they'd expanded it since then. We had practically grown up side by side, the bunker and I.

An upside of that was that I knew the bunker's tunnels almost perfectly, having explored it for so long as a foal. A few shortcuts involving shadow swimming and an unblocked air duct later, and I was at Corsica's lab, the site of most of our actual science done in the name of understanding the chapel. I let myself in using the biometric hoof scanner, a gift from her father back when relations were better between them. The interior was half orderly workspace, with diagrams of crystal slices pinned to corkboards on the walls and a pristine metal desk for doing chemistry experiments, and half musty archive, stacked with boxes of old newspapers we had rented out from the institute archive library and combed through by hoof. I stared at the boxes, stared at the two empty chairs, stared at the half-dissected crystal cluster on the desk, and knew I had to make this right.

The lab's terminal was already on, for some reason. Decorated with pink and yellow trim, it was a fancy custom version of an early third generation model, sporting three whole input ports and a matching number of outputs - another gift from Graygarden, in the days when he still treated Corsica like family. I stepped over to the shelf where we kept our pattern cards, wondering if we might have a registry of notable Icereach donors in a format more convenient than sheafing through reams of paper.

No dice. I moved on to the archive stacks, shuffling papers and using my metal glow bracelet for light. Was this what I wanted? No, wrong box. How about... Hmm, this looked promising...

"You do know it's a weekend, right?"

"Waaugh!" I jumped in surprise as Corsica spoke up, realizing that she had been sitting quietly in the room the whole time. "Is sneaking up on me a game, now?" I frowned, clutching the papers to my chest with a wing. "And was it that predictable that I would be here?"

"Yes." Corsica shrugged, then tapped her slender horn. "And I keep the door trapped with an alerting spell. It lets me know if anyone touches the thing I last cast it on."

I squinted at her, skeptical. There was no way a door alarm could have allowed her to beat me here, and as far as I knew, she didn't know how to teleport. And now that I thought about it, the terminal had been on...

She stared at me for a moment. "So... you know our research paper is finished. You turned it in yourself. And we haven't started working on the next thing yet. So why here?"

"Well, just because we haven't started yet doesn't mean now is a bad time," I replied, rolling my shoulders and folding the donor registry papers into one of my coat's many pockets. "It's a brand new day and everything."

Corsica said nothing. I imagined she was giving me a look that asked if I was really dense enough to make her spell out that she forgave me.

"You don't have to help," I offered. "I mean, I'd appreciate it if you did, but this problem's all on me. I've been thinking about our options, and it's best to start while your brain's already working the circuit, right?"

A thick bead of sapphire telekinesis formed around the scruff of my neck as Corsica left the lab, lifting me up and dragging me behind her without a shred of dignity. "Nope," she announced, closing the door and locking both of us out. "Wrong."

I sat outside the door and blinked at her, because there wasn't much else for me to do.

Corsica stared me down, preparing to lecture. "First off, you're not officially employed. You don't draw a salary, don't report to a manager, and don't have anyone expecting you to show up on time who will turn their horn inside out from yelling if you slack off. So when you say you have a problem and you need to fix it, the first thing you need to ask yourself is who cares."

My face scrunched. "You make it sound like I'm not allowed to do that myself."

"Exactly." Corsica mussed my mane. "It's only a problem to you, so you get to say exactly how much of a problem it is. And that means you get to decide when it's no longer worth stressing over and working yourself to the bone to fix."

"Do I?" I deadpanned, glancing wistfully at the lab door. "First off, this isn't stressing, it's a work ethic. Second, I can't be working myself to the bone since I haven't even started yet. I'm well-rested and raring to go. And third, it sounds an awful lot like you're trying to decide that for me."

"Because you're being silly and not taking care of yourself," Corsica countered. "And I'm going to intervene before I spend all day relaxing while you pull your mane out over screwing up that report submission. It is the weekend. Get on your hooves and come have some fun with me. Let's celebrate finishing our paper, wait a while, and then sit down and figure out what we're doing about the bigger project. In that order."

I stared at her helplessly. "I just spent the whole night sleeping!"

Corsica matched my stare. "Weekend."

"We work weekends all the time," I pointed out. "Motivation is a good thing."

"Ah ah ah," Corsica chided, silencing me with a hoof. "Vacation first, work later. You might think you're fine now, but we're currently on the back hoof with this paper. When you have an emotional investment that goes beyond investigating for the sake of curiosity, it's not a good idea to work on a problem that's hard enough to have beaten you before. I'm not waiting until after you burn yourself out to take matters into my own hooves."

Burning out, huh? It was almost like she knew what I had been dreaming about last night. Or maybe she was remembering those conversations too... She probably thought our roles were reversed now, compared to back then. And if that was her mindset, whether it was an accurate one or not, I realized then and there that I would never be able to win.

How was it that I could be so envious of Corsica's ability to shrug off problems, yet when she sat down and physically dragged me through the motions, I wanted to resist? My brain didn't make any sense sometimes.

"Alright," I sighed, "have it your way. We'll go and slack off for a day. But just so you know, I need to make this right. And I'm not going to forget about it just because we go and get our adrenaline pumping, or whatever." I fixed her with my gaze. "And you know dead why. This isn't just some random paper, Corsica. It's the project that let us become friends. This is personal."

Corsica met my eyes with a stare of her own. "Two days. The whole weekend. And after that, I'll help you get back to work. You'd better not forget about it, because it's personal for me, too. Deal?"

I offered a hoof. This time, in contrast to our reluctant start two years ago, Corsica took it, and I straightened up, getting off my rear. "Deal. So what's your glorious plan for the day, eh?"

Just like that, Corsica's attitude was back. "First, we find Ansel. Second? You'll find out."

With a rattle of old gears, an elevator rose with me inside, lights flickering to show the floors as they passed. I was poring over the donor registry I had snatched from the lab, awake and just as scruffy as I liked to be. As far as I was concerned, everything was normal.

To my side sat Corsica, inspecting an errant strand of her mane with narrowed eyes, a more elegant version of my own satchel worn around her shoulder. Also normal.

And then there was Ansel, who looked like he had been roused on three hours of sleep. Though, to be honest, that was pretty normal too.

"Rough night?" Corsica asked coyly.

"Don't even get me started," Ansel warned, slumping. "Mother dearest wasn't kidding last night when she said our toilet went belly-up. I'd like to see you not sleep in after staying up past the witching hour patching together that pile of tin."

"Tin?" Corsica blinked. "You have a toilet made of metal?"

"Welcome to Icereach, Princess Porcelain." Ansel rolled his eyes. "Best watch your step. Around these parts, we have such mythical horrors as day jobs, metal toilets, and meals that serve bread instead of cake. I think we also have... Yes, I seem to recall rumors of an evil filly who treats her poor ex's beauty sleep like a pirate treats a chest of jewels..."

Corsica whistled innocently.

I raised an eyebrow at her with a probing grin. "Looks like not everyone has the same definition of slacking off, aye now?"

"The only ones who are slacking off are Icereach's plumbers," Ansel groused. "Must be in that profession because they were too lazy to make it as scientists, I swear. You'd think this place was built a hundred years ago."

"The bunker was started in the year nine hundred eighty-six," Corsica replied with a shrug. "And under construction for at least seven years. It's younger than I am."

"That narrative is demonstrably false," Ansel yawned. "Perhaps it's what they teach you in princess school, but my birth certificate is dated that very year, and stamped to the very apartment where you just dragged me out of bed. You're the ones who always complain about how slow Icereach gets things done. Do you really think they could have rigged up an entire underground apartment block in barely a few months? If you ask me, the bunker's older, and someone's got something to hide. Like a real age that's too embarrassing to utter..."

I actually could believe a construction crew would work that fast... though, granted, I knew nothing about construction. But rather than try to argue, I poked at the wall of the elevator, papered with a diamond pattern of beige, tan and brown that looked like it was trying to be fancy on the cheap but was starting to peel and lose its luster. "For real, though. I remember when they were building, when I was young. The place looked a lot newer back then. But these days, it seems like there's a lot more repair crews than construction crews around. Like everyone just wants the place to hold together until we can reach some milestone rather than build it up anymore. I don't care where the building came from, but it's kind of important, where it's going."

"Well." Ansel straightened up. "I can't rightly blame you. It's pretty funny, when you think about it. This place was designed to facilitate equine space travel, and at this rate we're going to need a whole new bunker before we even get our first living hoof off the ground."

"Hey!" Corsica snapped, flicking up the fringe of his mane with a hoof and making him flinch. "No pessimism about work. Halcyon's been stressing about that and she needs a vacation."

Ansel blinked owlishly at her. "I'm all for a vacation, but if my living room couch is to be such a forbidden Elysium, at least tell me where we're going?"

"To the surface!" Corsica winked as the elevator slid to a stop. "I thought we'd hang out with the yaks."

"Wait, are you seri-"

Our ascension ground to a halt, and the sliding doors interrupted him with a beam of blinding white and a blast of chilly air. We were at the surface.

"Ouch! What the blazes has gotten into you, bringing us up here without warning!?" Ansel hugged himself and aggressively shivered, the sun glaring off a plowed road and several massive snow piles before us. "You know I'm no good out here without a coat!"

I nodded in sympathy, brought back to reality by the cold. Corsica was Yakyakistani, and blessed with naturally thick fur. I never left home without my clothes. But for Ansel, being out on the surface could get a little nippy at times.

But Corsica only gave a cheeky giggle, strolling out into the white with her fur fluffed against the cold, wearing nothing but her ear ornaments and her dainty, noise-making shoes. "Oh, stop overreacting and run around a little. The exercise will warm you up."

"Of all the foulest and most indecent ways to bring a young stallion to his knees..." Ansel gritted his teeth and followed along. I glanced at him out of the corner of my eye. My coat was big enough to share... but he was the type of pony who seemed to enjoy complaining. No reason to ruin his groove.

Crimson Valley. That was the name of the mountainous cleft in which Icereach lay, so named because of the spectacular sunsets that beamed in from Yak Hoof Glacier to the west. During perfect conditions, the sun would reflect off the lowland ice sea as it set, sending its red and orange light straight up the valley's length and coloring the snow in ways that were impossible to replicate outside of Yakyakistan. Yakyakistan itself was shaped like a titanic horseshoe, a strip of developed and livable land curving around a seemingly-endless plane of ice, of which Yak Hoof was our own little corner at the far southeast edge.

To the east, an old, abandoned road wound up through Crimson Valley toward a distant pass. The valley's northern wall housed the bunker itself, a sprawling complex that had been built from a pre-existing system of natural caverns running through the mountain's core. The floor of the valley mostly played host to an array of huge underground rocket silo hatches, lidded with retracting doors to keep out the weather and snow. Don't ask me why we had so many silos when we were so bad at getting a launch together. Maybe during the construction phase, there had been ponies around who could actually achieve their ambitions.

Aside from the silo hatches, the one functional thing Icereach's surface was home to these days was a small military installation. Wedged against the northern mountain wall, it was a palisade compound housing a barracks, armory, mess hall, squat command tower with an airship dock, and two fields for drilling and training. All of Icereach's yaks lived there, much preferring the cold surface air and plentiful opportunities to smash things to the precise life of a scientist, along with a few of the hardier Yakyakistani ponies who were more at home with the rugged lifestyle as well.

In all the years I had been in Icereach, they had never been called into service, and I doubted they ever would be. To the north and west were vast, empty swaths of Yakyakistan, ruled by a friendly government and comprised of harsh mountains or else flat ice that left no cover from storms. Far to the east, once you made it out of this mountain chain, we were friends with Ironridge as well, a geographically small city-state that nevertheless possessed massive control over the world's central airspace. And there wasn't anything to the south - just a chain of mountains called the Aldenfold, so tall that even airships couldn't pass them, which everyone knew formed the edge of the world.

I wasn't sure who financed our military, as unnecessary as they were, but they existed. And the end result was a fortress so relaxed that the front gate was open and unguarded at all hours of the day.

"Ahoy! Balthazar!" Corsica strolled proudly through the entrance, hailing a group of yaks that were buffing their tunics outside the mess hall.

The yaks looked up and grinned. One disengaged, striding forward across the ploughed, flattened courtyard with hooffalls that sent tiny tremors I could feel in my chest.

"Squishy science ponies!" Balthazar the yak stomped up to us, giving Corsica such an affectionate pat on the head that her legs gave out and she collapsed in a heap. "Balthazar friends do too much eggheading and need to get out and feel like real yaks again?"

Corsica pushed herself back to her hooves, making a show of fixing her ear ornaments. "She did." She pointed over her shoulder at me. "Too much stressing about work. What kind of friend would I be if I didn't try to fix that?"

"Graaah hah hah!" Balthazar let out a deep belly laugh, turning and waving us back over to the other yaks by the mess hall. "Good! Come. Is swapping stories about yak ancestors who fought in war sixty years ago. Good for adrenaline."

There was something about yaks that put me at ease, I noted, following along. I was a pony who always lived in my head, consciously filtering how I saw the world and controlling how I acted, preferring the company of my own thoughts to most others, often dealing with trust issues... but I wasn't even sure Balthazar knew what duplicity meant. The yaks were bigger than me, tremendously strong, generally good-natured, and had relatively simple goals with no disconnect from their actions. They were coarse, uncouth, and overall a balm to someone who pretended as much as I did.

"It was heroic battle," a yak with a long, droopy mustache was narrating, his blue eyes smouldering with the memory of an ancient fire. "Grandfather Tolten was stationed at Fortress Anemo when Yakoso region revolted. Anemo stay loyal to Imperial Yakyakistan, but deep inside separatist territory. Besieged for months! Tolten could kick boulder so far, was famed for boulder-kicking skills. Once took out entire enemy trebuchet with perfect shot..."

A yak with shoulders that looked like slabs of concrete chuckled, his face so flat he didn't have a muzzle at all. "Tarkov grandfather fought for separatists in Yakanova! Joined with forces for first failed assault to liberate capitol. Then fell for young refugee lass on way who became grandmother and eloped from army before battle. Probably saved life. Hahah!"

All the yaks roared with laughter, and I relaxed, the cold mountain air brushing through my laid-back ears. All I knew about Yakyakistan's civil war, I had heard from the soldiers here: it marked the collapse of Imperial Yakyakistan when their territory grew too big to manage, and the surviving nation had reshaped itself into a pacifistic theocracy ever since. As odd as it was to think about a society of rough-and-tumble yaks swearing a collective oath of military non-aggression, the proof of it was right here before me. Only sixty years later, and here were these soldiers laughing together about how their ancestors had been on different sides of their nation's most recent conflict in history.

"How about squishy science ponies?" Balthazar asked, scratching himself with a hoof. "Have any ancestor with heroic deeds?"

"Eh, you know." I shrugged. "Mother's a refugee from the Griffon Empire. It was the big war eighteen years ago... batponies versus griffons and other ponies, so it was getting real dangerous for us down in the griffon-majority south. We had to scram while things were still heating up, right when I was an infant. No idea who Dad was. But anyone who can live through something like that's gotta be a hero, right?"

"Hah!" a fourth yak with a pear-shaped face bellowed, thumping his chest. "Questionable ancestry is only real yak ancestry. Nicov mother not know who father is. Say tracking these things for eggheads."

Tarkov chuckled. "Nicov tell ancestor story first. That make Nicov biggest egghead."

Nicov kicked Tarkov in the face.

Balthazar and the mustache yak both roared with excitement, quickly and carefully grabbing us and spiriting us across the courtyard so that we wouldn't get trampled in the ensuing melee. In seconds flat, the five of us were arrayed across from the brawl, Nicov and Tarkov's horns locked as hooves flew and meaty thuds and insults rang across the compound. Hooves collided like blows from a jackhammer, the other yaks picking sides to root for and cheering and booing as Tarkov got a hoof under Nicov's chest, slamming it upwards and making his adversary wheeze.

That was the edge he needed, and he caught Nicov with his horns beneath the smaller yak's shoulders, lifting from below and hoisting until Nicov was on two legs, then staggered over backwards and tipped over, defeated.

Any other scientists in Icereach would have been dumbstruck by the suddenness and ferocity of the brawl, perhaps blinking or stammering now that it had ended just as fast as it began. But I was far too used to this for that, and was loudly cheering Tarkov on instead.

"Really?" Corsica scowled at the loser, fishing through her purse as Ansel grinned smugly beside her. "I had money on you..."

"True tragedy." Balthazar shook his head sadly as the fighters brushed themselves off, Tarkov helping Nicov to his hooves. A casual observer would think that all animosity had been forgotten, but there had never been any in the first place - this was just the way of things. "Now have to buff tunics all over again. Third time this has happened today. Going to need more stories at this rate..."

"Still not convinced egghead scientists not secretly yaks," Nicov grumbled, stomping over to us and sporting a black eye. "Normal scientists never give yaks time of day."

"That because normal science ponies not know time of day," the mustache yak rumbled. "Too much living in caves. Cannot see sun. Intelligence is questionable sometimes."

All the yaks laughed.

It was true, though. I wasn't sure if somehow the military was a secret none of the other scientists were privy to, or if the three of us really were different. Everyone I had asked about it didn't find the soldiers of value to their research, or else was put off by their unrefined mannerisms and dubious grasp of grammar, but to Corsica and Ansel and I, hanging out here was good entertainment. The fights were fun, you got to see the sky, and sometimes...

"So, Nicov," Corsica began, shifting all her weight to one foreleg. "Want to soothe your ego with an easier battle for a change?"

Yep. That was us. Three against one, us with training weapons and them unarmed, they held back so as not to hurt us and we had yet to win a single fight after two years of trying. But we hung out with the yaks, watched the yaks, even exercised with them from time to time, so it wasn't that nonsensical for us to challenge them occasionally as well. According to us, at least. I doubted anyone else in the bunker felt the same.

"Eggheads spoiling for fight with Nicov too?" Nicov stretched and rolled his shoulders, a few joints popping. "Hoo... Feels like everyone want patented Nicov punch today. Bring it on."

Less than two minutes later, we were already losing.

"Hah... That all eggheads have?" Nicov flexed as Ansel went sailing through the air. I stood my ground and whistled as he arced over my head, not even trying to catch him or spare him a hard landing. I knew from experience how that would go.

"Ouch!" Ansel groaned, rolling to a stop. "I'm okay...!" He lifted his head, blinking owlishly at Corsica and I. "What are you clods standing around for? Capitalize on my... ow! My opening!"

Corsica blinked between him and Nicov, who was standing perfectly at the ready, pumping his biceps and posing as he waited for us to make the next move. "He doesn't look all that open to me. Get up and we'll attack together. Otherwise I'm going to be the one flying through the air like that next time."

"Yes, heavens forbid you should become the party tank..." Ansel got shakily to his hooves, propping himself up on a pair of reinforced hoof braces dedicated to a fighting style of punching, his training weapon of choice. He pointed a brace straight at Nicov. "You hear that, you walking carpet? Here I come!"

I stepped into action, following him and looking for an opportunity to flank. Out of the three of us, I was definitely the worst at fighting, having not even found a weapon I liked yet - my initial infatuation with cool, massive broadswords failed to pan out when I realized how hard it was for a mare of my stature to lift them. But I had a decent mind for tactics, and was still an expert at controlling how others saw me. The best way for me to contribute was convincing Nicov that I wasn't a threat, then getting in close...

Or maybe I just didn't want to stand where I could get hit because I was mentally running through a list of tactics for shaking down Icereach's third-party donors for money, once I could find a spare minute to read the list I had snatched. Not that I couldn't take a few solid whacks, but I really, really didn't want to lose my train of thought.

Corsica and Ansel ran at him side by side, swerving and switching places several times to obscure their approach. Corsica's weapon was a large, wooden lance, something she braced against her side like a jousting rod and maneuvered properly with her telekinesis. Her style was both the most creative of the three of ours, and also the most tailored for what we were fighting, the only thing we had that could hit Nicov from farther away than he could hit us. Her lance and Ansel entered the yak's reach at the same time, forcing him to prioritize.

Whud! Nicov chose the lance, stepping on it and rending it from Corsica's grasp. But she had already dropped it from her telekinetic grip, her aura now surrounding Ansel instead, grabbing him and propelling him with a last boost of speed as he rammed into Nicov's chest with his hardest punch.

My eyes were vacant, too busy sorting strategies for wealthy families and generous businessponies and organizations and brainstorming leads to easily focus on my surroundings, but the back of my head still managed to analyze what was going on. If that punch was hard enough to make Nicov rear up, and I went for one of his hind legs, maybe we could topple him...

It wasn't hard enough. Nicov puffed out his chest, and Ansel bounced ineffectually off, and by then I was too committed. My quarterstaff rammed into a joint at the back of his hind leg, and he met me with a halfhearted kick, flipping me hard. I spun, tumbling backwards, all sense of orientation and direction and soon vision lost as I rolled and rolled and hit something hard, acute dizziness fogging all of my senses.

"Ouch!" Ansel yelled a moment later. "I'm okay...!" He paused. "Wing-ears, would it kill you to follow up on my pressure from time to time?"

"At the rate you're getting pummeled, probably," Corsica's voice replied. "Good game, Nicov. We surrender."

"No! Don't surrender on my behalf! Look how much fight we've still got in us!"

His protests fell on deaf ears, the other yaks cheering and stomping around now that the fight was officially over. I stayed put for a while, until a pink hoof rolled me upright. "You okay there?" Corsica asked, her face swimming in my vision.

"I'm sure I look worse than I am," I muttered, staggering drunkenly to my hooves. "Thanks for the assist. Who knows, maybe one day we'll really get 'em?"

"Someday," Corsica agreed. Self-consciously, I ran a wing through my mane: somehow she hadn't taken a single hit in the fight, and her appearance was perfect. It would have been enough to make me sympathize with Ansel about her being the first one to throw in the towel, if I hadn't been too dizzy to surrender myself.

"Huh huh." Balthazar lumbered amiably up to me and Corsica, Nicov goading Tarkov into an eating contest in the mess hall and wandering away with the mustache yak to judge. "Squishy science ponies fight very stubborn. Reminds Balthazar of snow."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Beautiful when we're fresh, and with a tendency to get walked on?"

"Haha! No. Yaks eat snow for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Second breakfast too. Also supper, brunch, teatime, midnight snack, and nameless unscheduled meals that are just as important. You know how is." Balthazar shrugged. "But no matter how much yaks eat, more always fall."

I slumped my way over to a bleacher that had been set up at the edge of the courtyard, ostensibly for when fights drew big enough crowds to demand special seating, and flopped down on it, Corsica and Balthazar following. "Well, what can we say? Life gets boring down below sometimes."

The yak squinted at me. "Boring sometimes? Other science ponies fight like first place in mess hall line is prize, but egghead Halcyon barely paying attention. Something else clearly on mind. Balthazar know this."

"Perceptive little carpet, aren't you?" I leaned back and looked at the sky. The compound's lone tower also served as Icereach's main airship dock, though only two ships were moored there today, leaving plenty of space for me to stare into the cloudless heavens.

Corsica spoke up for me. "It's just politics. The kind of stuff you'd think is pointless to worry about."

"Which is why science ponies are on surface, hmm? For distraction?" Balthazar raised an eyebrow. "Many things in world are pointless to worry about. Is age-old yak wisdom. Very wise and sensible." He shuffled, getting comfortable. "But sometimes brains refuse to be wise even when know wise thing to do. Happens to everyone. Tell Balthazar of your worries."

I blinked, but Corsica nodded at me, so I sighed. "It's not politics and I'm not worrying. I just made a mistake on something I care about, and now I've gotta think of a way to fix it. Took a risk that didn't pay off, basically. Tried to get something I wanted, and didn't think it through and lost some other stuff. So, my brain's a little busy with trying to find a way to get back to normal."

Balthazar grunted in thought. "Ah. Easy answer is to treat self to something else nice. Go take bath with bubbles and lots of perfume. Balthazar hear that is all rage among female ponies. Then eat lots of unhealthy food and sleep in. Is weekend, no? Very important to convince self that is not end of world. Will be many good things in life other than missed opportunities. And will be much easier to solve other problems once no longer sad about missed chances."

"See?" Corsica winked. "He gets it."

"No, hold on, though." I scrunched my shoulders and frowned. "It's not that I'm bent out of shape about losing any chances, I just want to clean up after myself. We've got this project we've been working on for two years, and... well, it takes a while to explain, but it means a lot to me."

Balthazar rubbed his chin. "Does problem get worse if Halcyon do nothing? Pony could break favorite weapon, and only consequence is not being able to train until repair it. Or pony could drop food on floor. Dropped food become very unpleasant after days of not being cleaned up."

"The first one," Corsica answered for me. "And it's a weekend, so we shouldn't be working anyway."

I huffed.

Balthazar frowned. "Still stand by advice to do something nice for self. Science pony clearly not really feeling it when fighting. Even if problem is little, still is problem." He turned it into a grin. "And then back to work! Balthazar once had friend who suffer humiliating defeat in contest. Smashed many things in rage. Then got good so could smash opponent next time. Better than would have been if not defeated in first place! Halcyon seem to have same spirit." He raised an eyebrow at Corsica. "Pony clearly care about friend Halcyon, but it sound like she not need Corsica to hold hoof. Strong enough to learn from experiences."

Corsica went beet-red. "I'm not hoof-holding! I just don't want her to work herself to the bone to drown out all her problems!"

"Thanks for the backup, big guy. You do get it," I said to Balthazar with a grin of my own, sitting up, ignoring Corsica, shaking off the last of my dizziness and looking around. There had to be something nice I could do for myself that wouldn't require my focus to be away from the research... "Hey, where's Ansel?"

"Went home in a huff to wash up." Corsica shrugged. "Turns out getting thrown across a field gets you a little dirty."

I gave myself a better look, now that I could see straight again. The military compound was regularly cleared of snow, but it was impossible to avoid at least a little wetness getting left behind, and rolling across the packed earth floor had absolutely muddied my coat, wings, and tail. The garment didn't look too bad, since it was designed to be rough, but silver and gray really wasn't a color scheme that mixed well with copious stains of brown, and I imagined if I could see my mane, it wouldn't be much better.

"Eh heh..." I held my tail self-consciously. "You know, maybe you've got a point about the bath thing."

Corsica blinked, an idea hitting her. "Come over to my place. You want to treat yourself well, Father has the best accommodations in Icereach. And then you won't have to wait for Ansel to finish! See if he calls me Princess Porcelain again after seeing how good you smell when you treat yourself to real acommodations."

Balthazar laughed, straightening up and preparing to stroll away. "Perfect plan! Go treat self like princess. Then smash problems. And once problems are smashed and everyone feeling good again, come back and hang out with yaks more. Maybe swap guesses about ship that showed up this morning!"

I grinned thankfully and followed Corsica, glancing up as I did. Now that I looked twice, one of the ships moored at the tower definitely wasn't one I had seen before - sleek, dark and lacking a dirigible, it was smaller than a cargo liner and had no flags or insignias whatsoever. Something like that had to belong to a group or individual with lots of money and a willingness to use it... Probably one of the third-party sponsors I had just been brainstorming about. How hard would it be to find the owners, introduce myself to them, get them excited about the ether crystal research, and have them make up for the bad first impression I had given Graygarden about what we were doing?

Heh. It seemed obvious my train of thought wasn't giving up on this soon.

"You know," I said to Corsica as we navigated the top floor of the residential district, an area reserved for larger houses and apartments for anyone with the station and income to afford one, "I don't think I've ever actually been this way before. To your place, that is." I always figured it was because of her father and never pressed, but... "Why the sudden change of heart?"

Corsica shrugged carelessly. "You'll see."

I blinked and tilted my head. "Eh?"

We turned a corner, and I sensed that she was thinking carefully about how to word something, an action completely at odds with her usual reckless behavior. But I followed and waited, and eventually she spoke.

"Just so you know..." Corsica hesitated as we approached a large, solid-oak door, standing in sharp contrast to most of the bunker's steel-and-concrete construction. "It's not that you don't need a bath, but I want you to see this because you need to stop beating yourself up over that research paper. If you're so hung up on it that the yaks can tell from the way you're fighting... Well, go right on in."

She unlocked and cracked the door open for me, motioning me in first. I frowned. "A normal thing to say to your friend before inviting her into your home, that," I quipped, pushing on the door. "Don't go out of your way to brace me for the skeletons in your closet or anyth..."

My jaw wouldn't let me finish. Neither would my eyes, and I lifted a hoof to my chin to stifle a laugh. "This is your house? Are you serious?"

It was large, first off. I counted at least four doors in the first room alone, which was already as big as my entire apartment. It was bright, too, and meticulously styled and clean... and also overwhelmingly pink.

A table sized for two sat in an alcove, set with lace doilies and a vase with a single fake orange rose. Framed poetry hung from the walls, and where a couch should have been was a white wicker bench set with tiny velvet pillows, the whole thing looking far too delicate to take more than a foal's weight. The walls themselves were a perfect strawberries-and-cream, accented by pure white trim and doorways, a tiny chandelier with heart-shaped bulbs provided illumination, and the whole thing looked more like a life-sized dollhouse than anything a real pony would live in... let alone a proud, balding, middle-aged science executive like Corsica's father. I burst out laughing.

"Bwahahahaha! You're pulling my tail!" I doubled over, holding my stomach and leaning against a flowery wall. "Did you steal this from a five-year-old's princess fantasies? Have you secretly been the girliest mare in all of Icereach and were holding out on us? I can't believe Graygarden would actually sleep in a place like..."

I trailed off, blinking. "You decorated your home to look ridiculous just to take a swipe at your father. Since you know you've got more free time to mess with it than he does. Does he just sleep in his office, or something?"

Corsica gave me a flat look. "Actually, it's the other way around. What did you think I was doing at the lab early enough to chide you for showing up there on a weekend?"

My laughter slowly subsided.

"Take a seat." Corsica motioned toward the flimsy-looking bench, closing the door with her tail. "The bath is still the best in Icereach, and I meant what I said when I invited you here. You'll feel like a queen. But first, I want you to see this. Take it all in."

I watched, waiting for an explanation, and rubbed at my eyes. The room didn't give them anywhere to rest...

"Father has a mistress," Corsica said plainly. "She lives in Ironridge and visits sometimes, and the place is like this for her. They've been seeing each other for about two years. Think a little about what that means."

My backwards ears slowly fell even further. "So he wants to disown you as his heir, because... The way he treats you never even was about you, was it? That's why things changed so suddenly after the accident two years ago. I always thought it was because of that, but you're saying it's just a coincidence they happened at the same time?" I shifted my gaze. "I suppose it's a secret, then. Let me guess, you have a secret half-sibling now, too."

Corsica shrugged, sitting on the pale wood floor. "Disown me? Sure feels like it. It is a secret, and it's not one that would improve my relationship with him if he ever knew I let it get out, so keep it to yourself or else. And as far as I know, no half-siblings yet, but who knows how long that will last?"

I stared. "I'd offer you room in our place, but we're not exactly overflowing with guest rooms..."

"It's fine." Corsica shrugged. "I prefer sleeping in the lab anyway. But do you get this?" She motioned insistently to the garish decorations. "Do you get that my relationship with him has nothing to do with either of us and there's nothing we can do to change it, and that if you're feeling like you messed up with the paper, it's not your fault that your plan didn't work?" She pinned me with her gaze, preventing me from even trying to look away. "That if anything, it's mine for not giving you a better idea of my situation? Now lighten up and stop beating yourself up over this."

"Hold on," I interrupted a thought suddenly striking. "Are you projecting on me?"

Corsica blinked. "What?"

"You are, aren't you?" I pressed. "You're thinking my plan fell through because you should have done more to convince me it wasn't worth trying, so now you're insisting I'm handling it poorly so you have someone to make it up to." I smiled coyly. "Sly filly."

"No." Corsica snorted. "I'm just looking out for you. Didn't you come here to use the bath?"

Bingo.

I lifted a filthy, mud-caked boot and grinned. "If our heights were reversed, I'd be ruffling your mane right now, you scallywag."

Corsica held her mane away from me. "Not with that filthy thing, you won't. I just cleaned this! I can't believe this is what I get for worrying about such a curmudgeon..."

I stuck out my tongue. "Actually, you just walked out of a brawl with a yak. Fair's fair that you get as dirty as the rest of us. Come on..."

"Ugh," Corsica groaned, only offering token resistance as I proceeded to ruin her careful grooming. "How are you the same timid thing that used to live in my shadow? It's like you're a completely different pony."

"Are you complaining?" I shrugged, letting up. "You're pretty different yourself, and look how it's worked out for us."

Corsica glanced at an ornate wall mirror, her mane endearingly frightful with askew hairs and a speckling of chipped mud. The fluffy carpet around us had started to turn brown.

"I'm looking," she said. "And I see you helping to clean this up before Graygarden straps us to the underside of a rocket."

I looked at the floor. "Oops."

"Go take your bath." Corsica shook her head, lifting me in her telekinesis and pushing me toward a fancy door. "You'll just make it worse if you try to help right now. I'll go see if the Icereach clinic knows any emergency resuscitation procedures for carpets."

"Heheh... Thanks..." I opened the door, suddenly a lot more aware of how dirty I was. "Good luck?"

"Don't mention it. Seriously." Corsica snorted, but gave me a nod. "Try not to get overwhelmed by the stock of conditioners, and speaking from experience, don't mix more than three unknown fragrances at once or even look at the curlers. Smell you later."

Yaks, I reflected, had to be the wisest creatures in the world.

The bath itself had just been a nice treat. Spending two hours teasing dirt out of the carpet after both of us had cleaned up, however, had served as a reminder to both of us that there were some things in life that had to take precedence over our project and its needs and failings. Somehow, Balthazar's advice had gotten us in a situation where neither of us could do what we wanted, yet there was plenty of time to talk and mellow out.

Which wasn't to say the bath wasn't divine. My fur still felt warm from the lengthy soak, like a shell that kept out distractions and cold so I could think in peace. It was especially impressive considering I was outside again, at night and even up high, wearing only my signature coat, a scarf, oversized earmuffs, a fluffy hood and two extra layers of padding to protect against the chill. Granted, there wasn't any wind, but still. Bath? Good.

Now I was back at it, my spirits high and my mind fishing for ways to relieve Graygarden of his cash. That was why I had snuck up to the airship docking tower in the military compound, watching the dusky sky and praying that inspiration would strike.

"Squishy science pony going to catch cold up here at night. Critical wool deficiency, yes?"

I looked up, my tail dangling off the side of the aerial dock extending from the tower. "Eh? Oh, hey, Balthazar." I waved my friend over, adjusting my scarf. "Nah, I'm gonna go back inside before it gets too cold. I'm all bundled up nice and proper. Thanks for the advice, by the way. It really helped."

Balthazar made a rumbling noise deep in his throat. "Difficult not to notice. Pony smells just like Corsica with soaps and shampoo."

Caught me red-hooved, he had. What, was I supposed to get an invitation to use Corsica's own cosmetics and not try to figure out her precise combination? Learning these sorts of things was my special talent...

"Doing better now, yes?" Balthazar tilted his head. "Yak advice is best advice. Never fails to improve quality of life."

I shrugged. "Well, it didn't exactly make my problems go away, if that's what you mean, but I do feel a little better. Better able to handle them, that is. Back to brainstorming now."

Balthazar gave me a flat look. "Then why science pony trying to turn into night air popsicle? Temperature at night drop faster than yak when pushed off cliff."

I pointed at the sky, the last vestiges of twilight visible out over the glacier on the western horizon. "Eh, the weather's nice. I've got a few more minutes before I freeze. The bigger question is, why isn't everyone else? For a town of scientists trying to send ponies to space, a whole lot of us spend basically no time looking at it. It's like they're not even curious. Maybe that's why we keep stalling out trying to transition to live tests, no matter how much everything works in theory."

Balthazar watched, sensing I wasn't done.

"Personally," I continued, pointing a hoof up at the purple emptiness between the stars, "I think there's something out there, bigger than all of us. You've probably never seen it, but there's a thing deep in a cave called a river of ether, and it looks exactly like the night sky if you stare at it for long enough. There's an ancient chapel down there too, like someone wanted to pay respects to it hundreds of years ago. I bet whoever built that knew something about the world that's since been forgotten, and we could be on the verge of rediscovering it if only everyone would care just a little about what's out there to be found."

I curled my tail tightly around my hooves, thick layers of padding cushioning all my movements. "So, that's what I'm risking getting popsicled for. I've had a setback, I took today off and might do the same tomorrow. But I've gotta keep going soon, and staring at the sky is just my way of psyching myself up for it. Think that's a good reason?"

"Huh huh," Balthazar chuckled. "Make good points. Balthazar always think it silly how ponies think they can touch sky from inside cave. And world is big in every direction." He glanced toward the mystery ship I had noted earlier in the day, hovering idly at the dock with a single light on in the bridge. "Always new things to learn about. Is science pony job to learn things, yes?" He got up and turned to leave. "Just make sure not accidentally learn what is like to be pony popsicle. Huh huh."

His wisdom hadn't let me down so far, so no reason to start brushing off the big yak's advice now... Stifling a yawn, I took a last look at the sky, my eyes lingering extra-long on the new moon that was low on the western horizon, and got up, heading back into the tower to find the staircase back down.

I could keep thinking about how to redeem our project in Graygarden's graces in my dreams.

"Hey! Hallie! Wake up in there!"

A loud knocking forced me from my slumber, dragging me out of a dream where Ansel and I were playing as foals and forcing me into the unwelcome reality of a weekend where I didn't get to sleep in.

"Oi, knock it off, I'm having a decent dream!" I grunted, my legs flailing about under the covers in a doomed effort to lift my head without sacrificing my comfortable position. "Whatever it is, I'm not interested!"

"Corsica is at the door!" Ansel's voice carried through my own, heavily-barred bedroom door, making me frown in confusion. "She says it's urgent!"

"Oh, of course it's urgent," I snipped, falling out of bed and extracting myself from the covers as I searched blindly for my boots, forgetting for several seconds to turn my bracelet on. "First it's paramount that I spend the weekend slacking off, but of course sleeping in is against the rules because it's too urgent that I relax and...!" I tripped over a boot and hit my head on my vanity. "Arrgh!"

"Her words, not mine," Ansel echoed, leaving me to wallow and get dressed in peace.

Eventually, I got my boots on, feeling a bit of dried drool at the corner of my mouth and very aware that my fur was rumpled, but if Corsica wanted to make an unsolicited early-morning visit, she had better be prepared for what she got. Shadow sneaking under my door, I nearly tripped as I got back to my hooves, already on an internal tirade about how the only reason I was going out there was to give Corsica a piece of my mind.

Or Ansel, if she wasn't really there and this was a prank...

I quickly ate my words, though, as I saw that not only was Corsica here, she was in our living room, sitting on an armrest of the couch and staring at me with a raised eyebrow.

"Look," I began, "if this is payback for me ruining your mane and the carpet-"

"Do you sleep in those boots?" She cut me off, staring.

I blinked. "What? No! I just don't like anyone looking at my legs! Now seriously, there had better be a good reason you changed your mind about me taking the weekend off."

"There is," Corsica promised, her tone instantly businesslike and my tall boots forgotten. "I don't know what happened, but something changed Father's mind about the fault plane research. He thinks there's money in it. How quickly can you groom and meet me at his office to back me up?"

Well, I was awake now.

Homeland

For the first time in three whole months, I had brushed my hair.

My mane and tail actually straightened up rather nicely, I thought, though it gave a completely different feel next to my usual scruffy visage. Checking myself over in a mirror, I looked slightly shorter, moderately smarter and a whole lot more entitled. A quick trim and a few well-placed hair clips ensured I had something resembling a straight bang, completing the look. Usually, these weren't qualities I cared to cultivate, but if we had any chance whatsoever of getting a fair chat with Graygarden face to face, I needed to play his game, and that meant appearing the part, too.

I kept the coat and boots, though. Those weren't going anywhere.

Corsica led the way, flanked by myself and Ansel. I wasn't exactly sure why my brother was here, as he had nothing to do with our ether crystal research, but we had woken him up early so if he wanted to see what all the fuss was about, it was fine with me. We paced through the concrete corridors of the bunker's administrative wing, the third time I had been up here in three days... only this time, it seemed we had actually gotten somewhere.

"Permission to enter?" Corsica rapped on a door, labeled briskly as belonging to Head Scientist Graygarden.

"Enter," a well-worn voice called from within.

An orange telekinetic aura gripped the handle, opening the door for us. Graygarden's office was a lavish affair, though in a completely different fashion to the eye-searing apartment he called a home: painted with maroon, burgundy and dim gold accents, it had a barrel-vaulted ceiling and a lengthy carpet leading up to his desk. The walls held paintings of distinguished ponies and Icereach's surface, with golden support columns hidden behind potted plants that obscured light sources and helped promote a dusky atmosphere without actually making the room too dim to see in.

Graygarden himself sat behind a wide oak desk at the rear, shelves and filing cabinets arrayed behind him below a massive portrait of himself in his earlier years. Four doors flanked the room, which I assumed led to waiting areas or storage rooms yet had never been inside myself. Now that I thought about it, unless Graygarden was colorblind, maybe that was where he slept while his posh mistress was away...

All things considered, the room was significantly grander than its owner.

"About time you showed up," Graygarden sighed. "Brought your friends again, I see."

"If that is an issue, I'm sure they would be happy to wait outside," Corsica replied with a curtsy, her usually-dismissive voice much more formal in the presence of her father. "I thought it would be useful to have anyone tangentially related with my work nearby."

"That doesn't sound like a problem," a new voice said from one of the side doors, and it swung open to reveal a yellow-maned mare in a dark, plated garment I couldn't tell whether was armor or fashion. "You must be Corsica."

Corsica turned her focus to the newcomer. "I am. But I don't believe we've met?"

"Not in person. But I sure know your reputation!" The mare stepped forward, her robes shifting slightly to reveal a hint of pegasus wings, and she offered a hoof. "Leitmotif. If that's too much of a mouthful, you can call me Leif."

She had a welcoming smile, subdued enough to pass for formal yet warm enough to drive home that she was no bureaucrat. Next to Graygarden, it almost seemed to be deliberate; I could see him watching her, as though he were looking for a reason why anyone who might want to hire Corsica wasn't up to code. Yet she never even spared him a glance. Her eyes were only for my friend.

I tilted my head in thought. Friendly and earnest, yet I suspected she was as well in control of her presentation as I liked to be... Until I could get a better read on her, I would have to watch her closely as well.

Corsica was evaluating her too, taking her hoof neutrally and then shaking with a nod. "Well. Hello then, Leif."

"...Hm." Leif nodded respectfully and stepped back, as two new stallions entered through the door to flank her, both dressed like she was. I sized them up next: a thin one with the face of a scholar, but a bearing more military than academic, and one with a wide, square jaw and nice mane who clearly worked out. Square Jaw looked confident, and the beanpole looked wary, his sunken eyes flitting around and evaluating every pony in the room.

Graygarden shuffled his papers. "Let's get to the point," he sighed, setting down the papers and rising to his hooves. "Corsica. Two days ago I told you there was no money to be found in chasing the history of dusty crystals found deep beneath the earth. Icereach is about empiricism, not mystical so-and-so." He walked out from behind his desk, motioning to the trio aligned along the wall. "I also told you I'd reconsider if you could prove there was money in it. Well. It seems you work quickly."

Leif squinted at him, as if his introduction had just grossly violated a cultural taboo, but then shook her head and brushed it off. "Okay, then." She lifted a hoof, gesturing for her friends to introduce themselves.

"Vivace," the scholar said with a slight bow, his voice quiet and carrying a hint of a noble bearing that clashed with his gruff look. "A pleasure."

"And I'm Rondo!" the stallion with the wavy hair and the chiseled jaw proclaimed, pumping a hoof. "Nice to meet you! I can already tell we'll get along great."

"Sure." I nodded in return, noting idly that it wasn't just Leif: all three of them were completely ignoring Graygarden in favor of us. "I'm Halcyon, and blue mane there is Ansel. You seem alright."

"Indeed." Ansel bowed respectfully. "Might I ask to what we owe this visit?"

"A prudent question," Vivace replied, his voice softer and more disinterested than Leif's. "We've heard, lady Corsica, that you're the closest thing there is to an expert on the crystal formations that occur near ether deep underground. We've found a cave about half a day's flight by airship away, and we want you to come take a look at it to help us decide if it's worth anything."

A bag flew out from Rondo's cloak and hit the ground between us, bigger than Graygarden's head and ringing with the unmistakable jingle of coin. "Half the payment up front to sweeten the deal, and we provide the transportation! How about it? Sound fun?"

My jaw hit the floor. "How much is in there?"

Vivace opened his mouth to explain, but was cut off by Graygarden, his orange telekinesis closing around the bag and lifting it toward his desk. "We accept," he announced with a nod.

Before the bag could reach him, there was a gust of wind, and Leif had disappeared.

She reappeared in a flash, flipping through the air in a show of dexterity and snatching the bag from his aura, landing on her hooves with the money slung over her shoulder. "I'm really sorry!" she nervously laughed, backing away and waving her wings apologetically with a tinge of red on her cheeks. "But this job means a lot to us, and since appraisals are subjective, we need to make sure the appraiser is as gung-ho as possible. That means it's Miss Corsica's offer to accept." She tapped the tips of her wings together, smiling awkwardly at Graygarden. "Not yours."

Corsica whistled. "I like your style."

Graygarden frowned, but said nothing.

"What do you mean to do with this cave after the appraisal?" Ansel asked, trying to move the discussion along.

"That depends on the result," Vivace replied, nodding. "We don't have a lot of use for such an area, ourselves. But from our understanding of your operations, Icereach does. So if it proves valuable, we might sell you the coordinates and more than recoup our losses for hiring you. On the other hoof, if you have no use for the cave, we'll simply leave and reveal it to no one."

Corsica's look soured. "So this money isn't really a payment. You want me to give it all back to you and more, to keep the cave if I want it."

"Oh, I don't think that will be necessary." Leif amiably shook her head. "I doubt you have the kind of money we're looking for, and this cave could benefit all of Icereach, so I think it's fair to pose the sale to the entire institute instead. You can keep your service fee either way."

Corsica brightened again. "Alright. You have yourselves a deal."

"I suppose you'll be blindfolding her, then?" Graygarden narrowed his eyes. "Seeing as otherwise, anyone could have her misrepresent the cave's value to you and then lead anyone back there on her own?"

Leif shrugged, casually tossing the money sack to Corsica. "No, it's an honor system. If you did cheat us, we would know, but does it have to come to that? Icereach is supposed to be the best and the brightest, a symbol of international unity and stuff. If we can't trust you, we've got bigger problems to deal with than getting a little ripped off. Plus, we're gambling this money either way. If she says there's no riches, it's a loss for us whether she's lying or not."

I tilted my head. She trusted Corsica like this, but didn't trust Graygarden with Corsica's money?

"Besides!" Rondo thumped his chest with a hoof. "We're new to the area and still learning who's who around here. A little goodwill from a deal gone well would be a sight for sore eyes. But if you were the kind of ponies who would cheat us out of some coin, better to learn that with a paltry sum like this!" He winked. "A little financial risk up front is a small price to pay when scouting out long-term business partners."

"It's worrying that you should even need to ask that," Vivace added. "It sends the impression that we shouldn't trust you. One could be forgiven for thinking you don't really want this deal."

Graygarden sighed and got to his hooves. "You should be aware that even this filly's most glowing recommendation may not be enough to sway the finances of Icereach into the deal you desire. Her research is new and not peer-reviewed. It takes years for these kinds of things to pan out, especially when we have more pressing priorities on our plates. This being said, I hope your find proves lucrative. Work out the details yourselves. I shall take my leave now."

Internally, I bristled. This filly? He may have disowned her as his daughter, but would it really be so much to ask for him to at least treat Corsica like an adult?

Graygarden left through a side door and closed it behind him, and the mask I had detected on Leif slipped a bit, more of the small tells I usually used to read ponies' emotions appearing on her. "Worry not," she proclaimed to Corsica, "we're used to bigwigs like that. Officially now, want the job?"

"Of course I do!" Corsica hefted the money bag, giving her a look that politely asked if she was crazy.

"An important question," Vivace interrupted to say. "These other two, Halcyon and Ansel. You said at the start they were related to your work. Are they partners of yours, who need to be present for you to do your job?"

Corsica immediately glanced at us. I gave her puppy-dog eyes. Ansel gave me a don't-you-dare glare.

"What if they were?" Corsica asked, turning back to the three visitors. "They might have some involvement."

"Hmmm..." Leif tapped her chin with a wingtip. "Well, our ship is hardly crowded, but we're not paying extra for more hooves. If you two wanted to come along... We'll need to think on it. But we weren't planning on leaving until tomorrow evening at the earliest, anyway. And Corsica is an exception, but you two do look a little young for scientists..."

"Hold on," Rondo interrupted, catching the look I had shot Corsica, "I see what's going on here. This is like three best friends all wanting to do their first internship together! It's practically poetry, Leitmotif! They were meant to join us!"

I decided I liked him.

Ansel loudly cleared his throat. "Actually, I think thinking on it for a day or two really would be the best course. You've come out of rather nowhere, and a few discussions are warranted on our end as well while we take all this in."

Leif gave him an approving nod. "That's a good head on your shoulders. We need to stretch our legs, too, since we've been flying for a bit and don't just want to take off again without a siesta. So you've got at least until tomorrow. In the meantime, why not drop by our airship later on and say hi? No guarantees we'll all be there at once, but at least it won't be hard to find, right? We've got a pretty distinctive look up there."

"Have fun," I encouraged, a question pressing on me now that Graygarden had left the room and the atmosphere felt lighter. "Hey, so by the way... how did you find out about us? Did the old stallion really tell you? Because we kinda had this project under wraps until real recently..."

Leif chuckled and shrugged. "Oh, we get around. Believe it or not, apparently someone was singing about it at a concert in the mess hall the other day. What I wouldn't give to have heard that!"

Corsica somehow kept an innocent face. I reddened just from imagining myself in her shoes. And yet, if her new employer was this lax about silliness and goofing off... hopefully Leif could soon be my employer too.

"Well then," Vivace said, the first to open the door to leave. "Let's be on our way."

We followed suit, and Graygarden's reception room was empty once more.

An hour later, I wandered the halls of Icereach, listening to the sound of old, buzzing lights and water gurgling through the pipes strapped to the ceiling, my mane properly mussed again to get rid of the careful grooming. I had things to do, important ones. Chief among them was talking to Ansel... After the promise I had made not to immediately go flying off on an adventure, doing so now without his blessing felt like a good way to burn a whole lot of bridges.

Ever since the accident, my brother had been terrified of change. Most ponies who knew about it, chiefly Corsica, wrote it off as a side-effect of his amnesia: he had lost a lot, and any prospective shift in the status quo felt dangerously close to losing more. I could somewhat relate, though I was more averse to the idea of changing as a person rather than changing my physical surroundings. My talent made me so pliable in what I could do that I felt hard to define at times.

I had a good hunch Ansel's reticence went deeper than just that, but both of us had promised never to talk about the accident and his period of recovery, so it was difficult for me to find out for sure. But if the accident had made him want to stay home, it had only given me and Corsica the opposite... Trying to be a middle ground between his caution and her wanderlust was hard, especially when I yearned to come down on Corsica's side of the issue, but someone had to be the glue that held the three of us together. If I didn't do it, who else would?

Leif's job offer wasn't the same as leaving Icereach for good, but with an airship ride and an off-site destination, both of my friends sure would see it as a stepping stone. I'd have my work cut out for me, smoothing this over, especially when I wanted it so bad I practically had bias dripping out of my ears.

No, there was no way I could mediate this in this state, a scruffy little pony-shaped balloon of excitement who needed a talent in acting to avoid bouncing all the way through the halls. Before I could convince Ansel that the result I wanted wasn't so bad, I needed a firmer grip on my emotions. So while I waited, I had decided to get the blessing of a different target: Mother.

And the best door to Mother's heart was food.

Everyone needed food to survive, and not everyone cared to use the cafeteria for every meal. Icereach may not have offered much space for material luxury, but its jobs did pay well, and so a surprisingly well-equipped service sector had sprung up on Market Street, filled with a mix of permanent and rentable fixtures, rotating merchants, hardware stores, salons, game shops, art galleries, pawn shops, and, of course, good eating.

...Seriously, though. It was an underground street. Someone had liked the idea of a main street so much, it was as if they had taken eldritch powers and teleported a chunk of roadway from a normal city far underground. It had pavement with planters forming a traffic divider and everything, buildings rising up from the sides, yet curving into the tunnel roof instead of capping off in roofs of their own. Imagining the design discussions that must have happened before building this place almost made me laugh.

I folded one of my wings into the crudest possible imitation of a sock puppet, ventriloquizing for it out of the side of my mouth. "Oh, do you think we should build a road to nowhere underground?"

My other wing folded to respond to it. "Oh, I don't know, I found this big old cave while exploring that would be the perfect size for a road, why don't we-"

I clammed up, realizing Mother was staring at me with a raised eyebrow. Maybe that was a conversation that didn't need to happen when ponies were listening... I reddened slightly.

Although, the only way Mother had agreed to let me take her to lunch was that she got to keep wearing her bathrobe, so it wasn't like we weren't going to get strange looks anyway. If we weren't already at the entrance to market street, I would very much have changed my mind and looked for a way to butter her up from the privacy of our own home...

"Hey, there it is!" I broke the silence with a pointed hoof, indicating a door across the way that advertised noodles, soup and noodle soup. "This place is brand new, and I've been meaning to try it out ever since it opened. Looks worth the trip, eh?"

Mother processed this for a long, long while, chewing a wad of bubblegum. A casual observer would think she was slow, but I had a good hunch she had just been through so much in life that she felt entitled to make others wait on her, and got some enjoyment out of it to boot.

"Noodles." She eventually nodded. "Sure, why not? They have a dress code?"

"Probably should have checked beforehoof to make sure, but who cares?" I put a confident wing over her back, clad completely in my usual tall boots and tryhard-cool coat. "If they do, I'll probably be kicked out way before you are. Come on, let's go show them some style."

A sign promising Varsidelian cuisine with an outline of a bowl of steaming broth hung over the door we made for, and a bell chimed when we stepped inside. The noodle cafe looked about half-full, which was perfect for me: not crowded enough to make me uncomfortable, yet not so empty as to create the impression that there was a reason no one was there. A well-fed stallion with an apron and a nice mustache motioned for us to sit wherever we chose. It didn't seem attire would be a problem.

I glanced around, spotting a couple preparing to vacate a spacious corner bench and instantly deciding that corner would be mine. "Hey, guard that seat, could you?" I whispered to Mother, pointing out my spot of choice. "I'll go order for us. What do you want?"

Mother shrugged. "Noodles."

"Alright," I muttered, wandering over to the counter. "Anything goes, then. Hey, err, what's your menu?"

The stallion who had waved us in nodded from the other side of the counter, his voice laden with an exotic accent that made me think of desert oases and gentle wind. "Well, we have the special and the extra-special. For you, I would recommend..." He studied me and held his chin. "Hmm. I think you would like them both. One is bigger and the other is less expensive."

At least it wouldn't take long to decide... "Eh, how about one of both?" I asked, fishing around in my satchel and pulling out some money. I wasn't completely broke, thanks in large part to Corsica occasionally trying to hire me for random, made-up jobs that we both knew were a slightly more dignified excuse for her to keep me in the green than flat-out charity. Where she got the money, I had no clue. "How much do you want?"

"Give me one moment, please..." The stallion already had his back to me, opening a giant, steaming vat and floating up some bowls.

I held my money and tapped my hoof, not expecting the service to be so fast. The entry bell jingled again, but I didn't turn to look, too busy mulling over in my head how this lunch could go. I wanted Mother's blessing to go flying with Corsica, and of course taking her out to lunch couldn't be a terrible start, but how would I lay my argument out? I needed to establish-

"One special and one extra-special," the noodle stallion announced, dropping two bowls in paper heat-pads on the counter and starting to look through my money. One of them was twice as large and had a richer-colored broth with more floating spices, but other than that, they both looked like noodles. I took a quick sniff and decided that the extra-special was mine.

"Thank you kindly." I took back most of what he had left, pushing a little more across to him as a tip. "Now let's see..."

"Careful with them. They are hot," he warned me, turning to the next customer who had just entered. "Hello, sir. Order here, sit anywhere, and welcome to Noodle Land."

I balanced the bowls on my back with my wings, grateful for the insulation my coat provided, and turned back to Mother to-

The stallion in line behind me was Vivace.

I barely managed to avoid jumping and spilling my noodles, but my ears still stood straight up in shock. "You? What are you doing here?"

"Like we told you," Vivace replied in his quiet, gruff voice. "Stretching our legs." His eyes drifted to the bowls on my back. "I see you and I had the same idea. Here with one of your friends?"

In the split second I took to think of how to answer, he looked up at the room, and Mother was the only pony watching me. I guessed that answered that.

"Eh, you know." I waved a dismissive hoof, careful not to spill any hot broth on my back and rationalizing that this was one of the few areas of Icereach ponies could go for entertainment, so this really wasn't that impossible of an encounter. "Gotta talk to my mom and make sure she's on board with me maybe flying off on an airship for a day, depending on what you decide..."

Vivace nodded. "I'll be frank. I don't have any strong feelings regarding you coming along either way. But parents aren't likely to be the same, and we only gave you a brief overview of the situation to see if you were interested, without the details. So give a yell if you need backup..."

Well, that was generous of him. And an invitation I might need, too. "Thanks," I replied, taking my food and heading back to Mother, who was waiting for me with a raised eyebrow.

"Friend of yours?" she asked when I drew near, finally getting rid of her gum and nailing a perfect toss into a trash can across the room. "He's closer to my age range than yours."

"Not like that," I protested flatly, setting the bowls down and congratulating myself briefly on not spilling anything. "We just know each other for business. It's the thing Corsica was here at the crack of dawn about. You like spicy food, by the way? I forgot to ask, and this smells spicy."

Mother nodded, accepting her bowl as I slipped into the very corner and helped myself to mine. "Sure," she decided. "Makes me feel tough to eat it and not complain."

"So..." I paused, savoring my own spices and thinking how best to phrase my request. "On the topic of her being at our place in the morning... She kind of just got hired."

"Congratulations," Mother mumbled, talking with her mouth full.

"And it's a job that's out in the mountains, so it kind of involves taking an airship out of Icereach for a day or two, and it's sort of related to the stuff we're always working together on, and you know..." I fidgeted with my wings. Why was this so hard?

As if she could read my mind, Mother's eyes met mine with all her usual lack of intensity... yet knowing her at all, even the most vacant eye contact felt intense. "You want to go with her?" She chewed. Slowly. "You're acting like there's a reason you can think of that you shouldn't."

Well, how many reasons did I have? One, I didn't want to annoy Ansel. Even without talking to him, I knew he didn't want me setting hoof aboard any airships with strangers. Two, Ansel might actually be right. He might be paranoid, but our status as refugees proved that the world could be a dangerous place. Three, I got a good look every day at just what kind of a toll the journey here had taken on Mother, and while I could easily entertain dreams of traveling abroad, actually asking her permission...

At the same time, a short trip with my best friend by my side, for paying work and not even beyond the borders of Icereach's mountains was about as safe of a baby step as I could take. And I really wanted to go.

"I just don't want to annoy Ansel," I eventually managed, taking the lamest excuse. "And, you know, Icereach is safe and I don't want to be disrespectful of the sacrifices it took for you to get us here..."

Mother gave a single chuckle. "Do I look like I have enough self-respect to care about being disrespected? Be who you want to be. You're old enough to think for yourself." She loudly took another slurp. "Ain't on me if the world ends because of it."

There it was. I had her blessing. But still, I didn't feel satisfied. Probably because she really was trusting me to think for myself, and simply hopping on an airship because I wanted to follow Corsica was a whole lot less effort than she had put in when it was her turn to keep me safe... No, more likely it was because this entire conversation was an excuse to avoid talking to Ansel.

My face must have reflected the way I was feeling, because the next time I glanced up, I realized Vivace was walking away from the counter with his own noodles, and had an eye on me.

Perfect. I earnestly waved him over. If I was feeling like I wasn't being responsible enough, what better than to introduce Mother to one of my employers? Provided it went well, of course... and she was still in her bathrobe.

Great. Doubting myself already.

Mother watched him slowly as he approached, and he stopped before the table, greeting her with a slight nod and looking to me for introductions.

"Err..." I straightened my spine, well aware that it was too late to turn back now. "Mother, this is Vivace, who I sort of just told you about. He's one of Corsica's employers. Vivace, this is my mom."

Mother sipped slowly from her noodles, nodding to the bountiful empty space on our large corner bench. "Nehaly," she eventually said. "But most ponies call me Halcyon's Mom."

I reddened slightly, unsure if that was a jab at me forgetting to introduce her by name... even though it was technically true.

Vivace glanced between the two of us, probably looking for a resemblance. There wasn't really any to be found, though. Dyed mane color aside, Ansel was a spitting image of Mother, but I had been told I got all my looks from my father instead. Not that Mother ever talked about who that was.

Mother took another slurp at her noodles. "So, you know my kids."

"Kids?" Vivace gave her a questioning look as I sat there awkwardly, wanting to steer this conversation in a productive direction, yet hesitant to speak up when they already seemed to be talking. "I believe I've only met Halcyon."

Maybe the resemblance wasn't as strong as I thought... "Oh, Ansel's my brother," I cut in, explaining. "The other one with Corsica and me this morning."

Vivace raised an eyebrow at Mother. "An earth pony?"

Mother snorted, not taking her usual slow time to respond. "I mated beyond my species? Yes. Sue me."

"Apologies if that's a fraught topic. I didn't mean to pry." Vivace nodded, turning back to his food. "I was raised on the eastern continent. I'm sure things are done differently in Icereach, but it's hard to sever my mind from the old ways."

My ears shot up. "You're from the far east? From the Griffon Empire and Mistvale?"

"I'm sorry to hear that," Mother replied, ignoring me. "I was too."

Vivace arched an eyebrow, giving me a nod but clearly more interested in Mother. "That quick to abandon the teachings? Some ponies would rather die than lose those shards of their old lives. Or did you turn away out of spite?"

Mother just shrugged. "I owed the Night Mother nothing, and needed friends to survive."

I was surprised to see them getting on as quickly as they did, especially to see Mother actually talking at a normal pace for a change, let alone finding common ground with another pony. And yet, I had no idea what they were talking about, and that couldn't stand. "Wait, wait, hold up," I pressed, putting both forehooves on the table. "The 'can't learn two things about it because Icereach is dumb and censors stuff' east? Where they call their founding figures goddesses?"

"Yes..." Vivace gave me a wary look, sipping at his broth.

"That's awesome," I began, the rush of excitement from my horizons suddenly broadening leaking into my voice. "It's one of the sites of interest for that research paper me and Corsica were doing that got her on the map for your ether crystal stuff, and it's also my homeland, so, you know, no personal bias, but-"

Vivace cut me off with a raised hoof and a lowered head. "Sorry. My history there is kind of personal, and I don't really like to talk about it."

My eye twitched so hard it felt like it was going to explode.

"Can't you just ask your mother?" Vivace asked, seeing my look.

Well, I wanted to, but after his response to my eagerness, it would be pretty lame to say I respected her boundaries and she didn't like to talk about it either...

Argh. I was almost too annoyed to be embarrassed. See, this was why always wearing a mask between my feelings and my actions was useful, and why I hated letting mine slip. A level of detachment really helped with the emotional whiplash of times like these... and now I couldn't even ask what he was on about with the old ways and Ansel being an earth pony. Was it taboo in the east for batponies and other ponies to have children together? Not knowing why that mattered was already burning a hole in my head...

Get a hold of yourself, Hallie. I stared at my dour reflection in my noodle broth, enough noodles slurped out by now to see a clear picture of my cheeks in my hooves and my eyes half lidded, my ears back far enough that I couldn't see them at all. I poked the broth with my tongue, and the reflection was gone. There we go.

Mother said something, and I totally missed it, but Vivace was talking again.

"Don't worry about that," Vivace said with a dismissive wave, though his eyes were serious and reassuring. "We all used to be more sympathetic to the Night Mother than Garsheeva, so we don't have a lot of those sentiments. I swear on my honor your daughter won't come to any harm under us."

"Eh?" I lifted my ears again, feeling like I had missed something big. "What are we talking about now?"

Mother shrugged. "You said they were hiring Corsica and you wanted to go with them, right?" She paused to swallow, took another bite and kept talking. "Anyone who remembers the Empire before the war has strong feelings about batponies, one way or the other. Just making sure they weren't on the side that would shank you."

"Shank me?" My fur prickled along my spine, memories of things I had heard long ago stirring in my mind and telling me I shouldn't be surprised. Memories like these were ones I wished I could forget, and even though I succeeded in dwelling on other things most of the time, they were still there. And these memories boiled down to one thing: Ansel sometimes had a point. There probably were ponies out there in the great, wide world who would shank me for nothing more than my slitted eyes and webbed wings.

I hated being reminded of stuff like this. All I wanted was to see what more to the world there was than Icereach...

"And like I said," Vivace muttered, snapping me out of it. "She will be safe with us. You have my word on this."

"I'm a vet, you know. I could take you with one hoof tied behind my back," Mother remarked nonchalantly... and then suddenly the temperature in the cafe dropped by twenty degrees. "So you'd better keep your promise."

And just like that, everything was back to normal. Except for the look on Vivace's face.

Mother's demeanor hadn't changed at all, yet I could see him quietly giving her a second evaluation. She deserved it, I thought to myself. Physically, even I could probably beat her in a fight ten times out of ten, what with the state her body was in, but she was still one of the strongest ponies I knew. She wore her weariness the same way I wore my own masks, most days, but on the rarest of occasions, it cracked, and a premonition of her old spirit shone through.

Figuring any lingering tension could do with defusing, I spoke up to change the subject. "So, are your other friends from the east as well?"

Vivace gave me a look that suggested I wasn't very good at paying attention. "Didn't I just say that? All of us are." He shook his head and turned back to his noodles. "Go find Rondo if you're looking for story time. He loves to talk. His hobbies are ships and weightlifting, so he's probably on the surface."

"Have fun," Mother urged, waving me along with her good wing. "I'll get the bill..."

Would she? I tilted my head. She had watched me paying up front, and was probably too sharp to forget a thing like that... I glanced between the two of them, and got the strangest feeling I was being shooed away so they could reminisce about their homeland in peace. Here, I would just be an unwelcome outsider.

Whatever. If Rondo was more talkative, all the better for me! Chugging the remainder of my broth and nearly coughing from the overwhelming spice, I nodded and waved, slinging my satchel over my shoulder and jangling the bell again as I left through the door.

Ships and weightlifting... It sounded like it was time to pay Balthazar and the yaks another visit.

My ears pressed back against the chill as I strode through the always-open gate to the military compound, the main courtyard conspicuously devoid of yaks. But shouts and cheers echoed from the training ground one area over, making it quickly obvious as to why.

I poked my head through the next gate to see a stack of yaks stomping and roaring in excitement as a stallion with a wavy mane squared off against a squat yak I recognized as the quartermaster, a friendly fellow with a rare grasp of grammar and a fiery underdog complex known as Darius. Balthazar, his perception keen as ever, spotted me from where he was cheering with Tarkov and earnestly waved me over, motioning for me to stick close to the wall as I approached and give the fight a wide berth.

Yep. It looked like Vivace had been right about where to find Rondo. The traveler met his opponent with a grin as I sidled around to join up with Balthazar, his fashion-armor-garb beaten and smudged. A gash on his cheek and a heavy black eye completed the look, while Darius was completely fresh. Inwardly, I smirked, looking forward to watching someone other than me get trounced by the yaks for a change.

Darius returned the grin, a stripe dyed in his mane that he had gotten me to add for him to make his appearance more distinctive. He lowered his horns and bullishly charged.

Rondo was ready. With a smoothness that almost seemed to defy inertia, he sidestepped and turned around, planting his forehooves and lashing out into the passing yak's side with a vicious buck. Muscles coiled, and Darius's eyes bugged in surprise at the strength, but he kept his balance, his low center of gravity putting in work as he pivoted and tried to smash Rondo with a forehoof.

The stallion kicked off his opponent and rolled away, but Darius dropped flat on his chest, sticking his legs all the way out and kicking Rondo's out from under him as he tried to rise out of the roll. Rondo collapsed in a heap and rolled again, leaving both of them to get to their hooves and neither with any momentum.

"Whew," I remarked, making it to my friends in the crowd. "That was a nice hit."

"Fighting pony very good," Balthazar rumbled, his shaggy head nodding in greeting. "But money on young Darius. Only so much one pony can take."

Darius broke into another headbutt charge the moment he was able, apparently trusting the strategy again even though it had gotten him kicked. I squinted as Rondo slipped into motion with the same counter. They were engaging again exactly the same... Both of them were probably trying to predict the other based on what had happened last time. No longer distracted by the research paper like I had been yesterday, I could give the fight my full attention, running through scenarios in my mind where Darius purposefully tripped and tried to crush the counterattack, or where Rondo grabbed him instead, or-

Rondo's kick impacted, and Darius actually tipped over, defying every advantage his center of gravity had given him. My jaw dropped. And apparently Rondo was caught just as surprised by the result, clearly expecting to have to force back some sort of shoulder slam and now off-balance as a result...

And then Darius was back instantly on his hooves, springing out of the fall like those training dummies with weighted bottoms. He whirled once, and Rondo didn't have the stance needed to dodge out of the way as a cloven hoof impacted him squarely, sending him flying all the way back into a wall where he collapsed in a heap.

"Yo, that was brilliant!" I exploded with the rest of the yaks, cheering the battle's conclusion as two of Darius's buddies ran out and started flexing with him and showing off. "Rondo knew from the first move that there was no way he would actually tip him with that attack since his physique was wrong, so for Darius to actually let it work and then counter was the last thing he was expecting!"

"Huh huh." Balthazar affectionately patted me so hard I collapsed in a heap on the ground, then proceeded to muss my mane. "Science pony sound like professional commentator who paid to say things everyone already know. Glad to see Halcyon in better spirits."

I reddened a little. Did I really say all that out loud...? "Yeah, good to see you too, big guy."

Tarkov raised an eyebrow at me. "What Halcyon visit alone for? Stick friends with work so could slack off like real yak?"

"It's a weekend, shaggy," I quipped, giving a friendly roll of my eyes. "We've got no work. Nah, I was looking for that guy who just got kicked into a wall. Is he alright?"

Already, I could see Rondo getting shakily to his hooves, scanning the crowd and spotting me with a knowing look. Well, that saved a little time... He hoofbumped Darius as he staggered past, making straight for me, Tarkov and Balthazar.

"Ponies know each other?" Balthazar asked, curious.

"Ahoy! Halcyon, right?" Rondo pointed a hoof at me and nearly tripped from the loss of balance as he approached, still managing to grin even though he was beaten black and blue. "These guys are pretty tough! Only managed to take down three of them before they got me good!"

I stared, a politely jaded expression overtaking my good mood. Here I thought I was about to become not the only one to get my rear handed to me in combat with the yaks, and he beat three of them? Without even a weapon?

It must have been his armor. Yep. Totally the armor, it was an unfair advantage...

"Ow, my aching mane..." Rondo groaned, seating himself near us and beginning to tend to his wounds.

"Yeah, we've met. But should someone get him a medic?" I asked, re-tracking my train of thought. "Looks like you really gave him a good one."

"Worry not!" Rondo cut us off with a raised hoof and a wince. "I'm too rough-and-tumble to be cowed by a few bumps and bruises. Besides, it's fun making Vivace yell at me about needing to patch me up every time."

Tarkov and Balthazar just nodded, watching us with interest.

I quirked an eyebrow at his state, wondering if I should tell him Vivace was likely to be indisposed for a while. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah. He used to be a doctor, you know!" Rondo patted his armored flank, wincing from the motion. "You should see his brand! Lets him bring back ponies even from their deathbeds with barely a glance. He just doesn't like needing to do work."

My eyes tracked the hoof to where his cutie mark probably lay. A talent that let someone heal ponies off their deathbeds? It was true that not all talents were skill-based like mine. A good portion of them had real and measurable magic that could affect the physical world, like a batpony I knew in Aerodynamics who could make a quill write down everything he said without even touching it. But this sounded abnormally strong... Rondo was probably exaggerating.

Oh well. It was his discomfort, not mine.

"So what brings you up here?" Rondo asked, his cheerful tone at odds with his battered appearance. "Looking for us? Or just of the mind that fresh air and these fine fellows make better company than caves and hallways?"

I nodded at the yaks. "Both, really. But yeah, I was also looking for you in particular."

Balthazar and Tarkov nodded, the latter wandering off towards the armory where Darius and his crowd had gone to roughhouse and celebrate. "Sound like yak cue to leave and allow ponies business with each other," Balthazar remarked, stretching and setting off too. He glanced back over his shoulder as he left and winked. "But science pony should come to mess hall hour or two before dusk! Is yak speed-eating contest today. Need impartial judge to ensure Nicov not rig system to keep winning streak. Huh huh."

"Sounds like a fun evening," Rondo remarked once they were both lumbering away. "Well then. What can I do for you?"

"Yeah, so it's like this," I began, making absolutely sure my expectations were tempered to avoid baiting myself like I had done with Vivace. "I heard you three are all from the eastern continent?"

"Once upon a time, we may have hailed from that place, though we cut ties with it long ago," Rondo sighed, a hint of regret lingering in his voice. "A different lifetime, it feels like. What about it?"

Still struggling not to get my hopes up, I nodded. "So the east is kind of relevant to my studies, but Icereach's libraries are pretty bad and there's no material on the place about the war or what it was like before that, and I don't really trust what it has to say about after the war either. Call me curious, and I heard you like to talk."

"Oho ho!" Rondo winked, jumped to his hooves... and abruptly winced again, the motion proving too much for his battered body. "Ouch! A request for sore ears. You wouldn't believe how annoyed some of the others get listening to the same tales again and again..." He glanced up at the compound's tower, serving as Icereach's airship dock and still playing host to the sleek, mysterious vessel I had wondered about the day before. "But what do you say we make ourselves comfortable first? I could do this all day!"

My ears rose, and it started getting much harder to keep my eagerness in check... "You mean aboard your ship? The new one that just showed up the other day?"

Rondo laughed, shrugging off his injuries to lead the way. "The look on your face says you've never been on one before, have you? Fear not, she's as smooth of a ride as they come."

I had seen the ship from below several times, and had been up closer last night, when I came up to the dock to watch the stars come out, but this was the first time I had gotten a good look at it during the day. Sleek and dark, it was made from black metal with burgundy highlights and gold trim covering the seams and rivets, and had a militaristic feel that was simultaneously composed and threatening. Its construction reeked of money, far above what normally would go into an airship, yet all invested in the little details and overall quality and intricacy instead of gimmicky features that nobody needed. The whole thing gave off the air of a classy, tasteful noble who knew they didn't need to dress up or raise their voice to command everyone in the room.

Among airships, among machines, this craft was a princess. I decided I was very much in love.

The ship had a sloped roof that didn't look ideal for hanging around on top of, but some narrow deck space was still present in front of the windshield, halfway up and indented into the ship like a U around the prow. Sheltered and recessed, this shelf was where the gangplank led, and I could see a door on the side leading properly into the ship's interior. It wasn't an unusual arrangement for dirigible aircraft, the slower, cheaper and vastly more energy-efficient type of ship compared to newer models that hovered using propellers or some type of mana thrusters. What was unusual, however, was that this ship didn't have any sort of visible lift mechanism whatsoever, yet was hanging in the air as casually as though it were seated on the ground. In fact, it even had the metal frame for a dirigible, a sturdy wire mesh forming a tapered cylinder and suspended from supports over the main body, yet with no canvas or casing applied.

All I could do was squint, my earlier adulations having somehow missed this oversight... except that it clearly wasn't one, since the ship was still flying. "How... How does..." I stopped to sneeze, my throat slightly scratchy from the altitude and the cold. Maybe I shouldn't have stayed out the previous night... "How does she stay in the air? The dirigible's missing!"

"You like her?" Rondo waggled his eyebrows at the ship. "We call her the Aldebaran! It's also sort of our group name. Means The Follower, or one who chases! She's a special one, not made with your usual technology. I'm the engineer! And if you're interested now, stick around until we fire her up for real!"

I followed him towards the door, my eyes still more on the ship than the narrow gangplank I was walking to board it. The follower, huh? Maybe they followed rumors of treasure. It would certainly be one way to afford a beauty like this... There were probably treasure chests of jewels stacked up in the hold. I stepped onto the deck and rubbed against one of the support posts connecting the railing and the roof. Not even a little weather damage. As curious as I was to hear about the Empire, getting to see this ship up close and in the daylight was something else.

Rondo pulled open the door opposite the boarding walkway and stepped inside, waving me after him. I followed with wide eyes. The ship's interior was much bigger than I had imagined it, largely bronze-colored and lit softly from above and below. We were in a room that covered the whole width of the ship and most of the length, and at least half the height as well, with facilities like a small galley and a map table tucked against the walls toward the rear. Lounge tables sat against the windows toward the prow from the side door, and the command area up front looked sharp and precise, twin chairs overlooking a huge console of technology before the windshield.

"Were you picking fights out there already?" a disapproving voice said the moment we entered.

I looked up to see a middle-aged, heavyset earth pony I didn't recognize wearing the same garb as the rest of the visitors, sitting at one of the twin window tables in a cushy chair and playing cards against no one. Rondo huffed at her. "Of course I was. But who asked you?"

The mare rolled her eyes, then zeroed in on me instead. "Who are you, then? The expert for the cave? You know we're not leaving yet, right?"

I blinked, her tone very much one of a respect-your-elders grandmother, even though a conservative guess would place her around forty. "Err... Well, you said to stop by any time..."

"...Hmph." She stared at me, then shook her head and went back to her one-sided card game.

"That's Tempo. Don't mind her," Rondo remarked, motioning me toward the plush, reclining chairs at the table opposite from hers and sinking into one himself. "Ahhh... She got the short end of the stick when they were handing out personalities, so she stayed behind to hold down the fort while we handled negotiations."

"At least I didn't get the short end in manestyles, muscle colt," Tempo snipped from across the room. "You'd think you were hosting a concert, not trying to hire someone for a job..."

I gave Tempo one last look and then shrugged. "Well, okay. Nice place you got here, by the way."

"I know!" Rondo winked. "I'd offer to give you the tour if my bones didn't have something to say about it. So let's relax instead. You came here to pepper me with questions about the eastern continent and whatever else, did you not? Pepper away!"

"Roger." I whipped open my satchel and withdrew a sizable pad of notes that had been my primary research tracker for the Griffon Empire portion of the fault plane paper. If I was going to get a chance like this, I needed to do it right... "So, err, this might be a silly first question, but the Night Mother and Garsheeva... Were they just founding figures who were revered as goddesses, or were they actually immortals?"

Rondo raised a very concerned eyebrow, and at the opposite table, Tempo did a double-take and choked on her tea. "What kind of sarosian needs to ask a question like that?"

I sheepishly tapped my forehooves together, figuring that if I was going to drive home how much of an ignoramus I was on this, it was better to question the easy stuff and do it all in one blow. "Sarosian? That's the eastern word for batpony, yeah?"

Rondo lowered his head and sighed. "You mustn't've been kidding about good info being hard to come by if you find even that worth confirming. But yes. The goddesses of the north and south were very much real, very much visible and very much divine. The Night Mother ruled from the shadows in the north, speaking to her children through altars in the night and granting advice and wisdom that could only be born of an all-seeing eye. And Garsheeva was a sphinx the size of a building, soaring the southern skies and demonstrating her power for all to see by destroying the ferocious storms that would roll down from the mountains. Their nations revolved around them, Mistvale and the Griffon Empire. They were the first and greatest facet of life in the east, their visages inescapable and their laws absolute, something all ponies and griffons would know." He looked up at me. "They reigned for centuries without end. Their influence spread even as far as Varsidel in the north. How do you simply know naught about them so?"

I was too busy scribbling on my notes to answer. It wasn't that information about the east was impossible to find, just impossible to verify, since primary sources were never available and the materials I did have were rife with conflicting, typo-riddled accounts, enough of which referred to the goddesses like they were no longer around...

"...Studious," Tempo remarked, grudging approval in her voice. "Looks like you've found a willing student, muscle colt."

"If you could feel the benefits of working out like I do, you wouldn't be so keen on making fun of it," Rondo grunted, taking my silence for no answer. "Oh well. This must be their yak church's influence. Probably pretending to your city that the goddesses never existed. Really can't make up my mind how I feel about those guys."

I chewed the tip of my quill, writing feverishly. "Eh, not really," I said around it, crossing out several lines Rondo had just debunked. "They call Yakyakistan a theocracy, but I dunno any tenets of what they preach. Never get any missionaries out here, and only the yaks believe in them. And even then, I think it's a hundred percent ideology. But, like..." I trailed off, a realization hitting me that maybe I should have had long ago. "Huh. I wonder if Icereach just really doesn't like anyone talking about anything... supernatural..."

My eyes slowly widened. I had never heard enough about the yak church to suspect it was more than a guide for healthy living built into a governing body with a flashy name. The eastern continent's historical representation was woefully spotty and incomplete, which could happen if something utterly integral to every aspect of life there was forcibly removed. No one had any records of the chapel by the ether river, and for that matter Graygarden didn't seem to like our project on the place, either...

"Arrgh! Crystal kittens, how did I take so long to notice that?" I stomped a hoof, my face tinging at the accidental swear. "It's anything supernatural! There's no random censorship, it's just Graygarden's biases towards... empirical data, or some garbage. Bluh."

I rubbed my face with my forehooves. Well, this was a fine howdy-do. Especially when what drove me were the things we couldn't explain and the questions we didn't already have answers to. Just another thing that made me want to leave Icereach...

"You alright there, kid?" Rondo asked, tilting his head.

"Nah, I'm fine, just putting two and two together..." I rubbed at my ears, wondering how this made so much sense, yet took me until today to realize. "Whatever. Yaks. Griffons. Err..." There would be plenty of time to extrapolate this and see if I could glean any new insights about holes in my knowledge later: this was the time for filling the holes I already knew about, and none were bigger than my homeland. Forcing my curiosity and frustration into check, I put back on an eager face. "So! For someone who knows basically nothing, what would be entertaining to hear?"

"Hah. Putting the burden of choice on me, are you?" Rondo arched an eyebrow. "How about the tale of Giovanni Goldfeather, the cursed lord of money, who nearly eighty years ago attempted to take over the Griffon Empire through wealth and avarice alone? It began with a small improbability: he bore a daughter, who was far too headstrong to assent to a political marriage for his own gain..."

"...And thusly was the great heretic Yanavan sealed away in the mountains of Mistvale, the treasures he stole clasped in hoof, his location left to the winds and tales of his deeds enshrined as the great folklore bogey of our time," Rondo finished, the horizon beginning to turn yellow as the sun started its descent toward the boundless glacier. "Never to be heard from again. Now, who next? Shall I spin the legend of Wallace Whitewing, Izvaldi's invincible champion of equality? The single-day crusade, in which the armies of the province of Gyre attempted an invasion of the north? Or perhaps..."

I had no idea how to respond, my head utterly swimming with names and dates I would never be able to remember if not for my notes. And even then, with how many times I got lost in the stories and forgot to keep writing, I would be lucky if I had material on even half of what he had told me.

Fortunately, it was all just for entertainment, most of his stories taking place decades before I was born. My scientific interest in the east extended to exactly one event: one of the fault planes Corsica and I had dated corresponded precisely with the start of their war eighteen years ago, and while Rondo hadn't straight-up refused to talk about it, several hours of subtly poking and subtly being rebuffed was leaving me with the strong impression that even for someone who liked to talk as much as this stallion, that conflict wasn't an experience with many pleasant memories attached. I knew it had been a conflict between batponies and everyone else, and I knew Icereach's libraries were lying at least by omission when they mentioned no supernatural forces involved. I knew it had been bad, far worse than an ordinary war, but not exactly why. And that was about everything.

Maybe I should just focus myself on the prospect of the cave they had found. Having a second site to produce samples from could give us any amount of invaluable information, and it was impossible to predict what discoveries that might preclude. And unlike ponies, caves and crystals wouldn't care in the slightest if I had to be pushy to learn-

"Hey there!" Rondo called, fishing for my attention. "You look a little zoned out! Any preferences, kiddo?"

I pressed back my ears, realizing I had absolutely been caught slacking off in the middle of a conversation. "Err, well..." I didn't want to admit that I had forgotten the options, and looked around, searching for an escape. "How about, let's see..."

The door opened, and my prayers were answered as Vivace tromped inside, immediately stealing Rondo's attention.

"...You look like trash," Vivace commented dryly, locking Rondo into a staring contest.

"Healsies?" Rondo asked in return, holding up his battered hooves and plaintively sticking out his lower lip.

Vivace didn't appear moved by his plea. "This city has no riffraff, and most of the residents can barely lift a briefcase. You had to have gotten hurt on purpose."

"What can I say?" Rondo shrugged. "Those yaks looked like good sport, and I have a most excellent medic on my side! Besides, I thought you'd be grateful for the chance to keep your skills sharp."

"But I'm not so thrilled about coming back from my vacation to find you making me do work." With a heavy frown, Vivace reached out and touched Rondo's face with a hoof. A faint, ghostly glow surrounded it, and I inched closer to see, my mouth open in curiosity. Was this that healing talent at work?

"Oh. Pfft. Work," Rondo scoffed. "This, coming from the stallion who can supposedly bring ponies back from the brink of death? These wounds are mere scratches by comparison."

Vivace didn't budge, looking bored. "Only for wounds that are fresh... within a minute. The longer you wait, the harder it gets, and the less I can do. And you took these hours ago." The glow faded, and he pulled back his hoof, Rondo's face no longer marred by a split lip and a scrape along one cheek... though a dark ring persisted around one eye. "Hmm. I think you can keep that as a souvenir. Where else did you get walked on?"

As Rondo pointed out his pain points, I watched with wide eyes. "Seriously? You can heal ponies just by doing that? Even if it has drawbacks, that's awesome..."

"It isn't awesome. It only causes ponies to be more reckless, because they think they can get away with it." Vivace frowned as he worked, poking and prodding Rondo a little harder than was probably necessary. "And no matter how many ponies you heal, more will always get hurt."

I blinked. "Well, that's a cynical way of putting it. Couldn't you take a talent like that and become a really good doctor?"

"He was a great one, once... Ouch! Watch where you're putting your hooves," Rondo grunted in pain. "A yak sat on me there..."

Vivace looked annoyed at having his past talked about for him. If he had once been a doctor... well, it wasn't too hard to put together that he wasn't one anymore. Maybe the war had overwhelmed him with ponies he couldn't save, or done something else to break his spirit? I didn't want to press, but I had a hunch the reason he got along with Mother was because he hadn't escaped from that conflict unscathed either.

Maybe it was time to go. Balthazar's eating contest was almost here, and my time for listening to Rondo ramble was probably up now that Vivace was back for the evening. Though Tempo had retired to her quarters long ago rather than listen to the stallion recount any more tales, and maybe Vivace would be the same...

I shuffled through the notes I had taken, fairly sure I had organized them as best as I could without sitting down and pouring real, proper effort into it. Rondo had given me stories from varied enough time settings that I could probably at least cross-reference their dates to fact-check all my previous materials for whether they were blatantly made up. The day had been wildly entertaining, and I both had fun, learned a lot, and made a friend I was fairly sure would vouch to Leif for me to be allowed along. So if it was time to go, it was time to go... but I had still saved my most important question for the end.

"Well, it's been real," I announced, getting to my hooves and fixing my satchel and setting my sights on the door, psyching myself up for the thing I wanted to know most. "Probably gotta make sure Mom's got dinner, and all that. Really hoping I can come along with you and Corsica, you know?"

"Fear... Ow! Fear not!" Rondo winced visibly as Vivace cracked something in his spine back into place. "I'll put in a good word for you to everyone involved. No lover of history is an enemy of mine!"

I made it three steps toward the door before I spoke. "Thanks. But, err, I was wondering..." I flicked my ears. "Every time you talk about the goddesses, Garsheeva and the Night Mother, it's always in past tense. Are they not still around somewhere?"

Rondo sighed and didn't answer. But somehow, Vivace did.

"I'd understand if you haven't heard this phrase," he began. "But the war eighteen years ago isn't called the 'Twilight of the Gods' for no reason."

My heart slowly sank. Apparently, the information Icereach had on the east after the war didn't feel less censored and more complete by accident.

"North versus south. Sarosians versus everyone else. Goddess versus goddess... or so the story goes," Rondo lamented. "To be honest, I don't remember much, myself. I was out at sea when it happened, and missed the whole thing. Whatever the case, there was fighting in the Empire. Mistvale invaded and their invasion was ultimately crushed. And when the dust settled, there were no more sarosians and no more goddesses."

"Sounds like it stinks," I commented lamely. "Well... anyway. See ya around."

Noise roared in my backwards ears as yaks stomped and applauded, a server in the daintiest apron imaginable depositing fresh new trays of roast mushrooms before Nicov and his opponent, a yak I was mostly familiar with in passing called Dimitri. The shrooms smelled impossibly scrumptious, five polished platters serving as towering records of progress beside each contestant, and I was cheering and pumping my hooves from atop a small wooden judge's throne, egging on the contest to the full extent of my abilities.

At least, that was what my body was doing. Inside, I wore my actions like a shell, the bright colors and sensations of the mess hall muted and distant as I came down from the high of Rondo's stories, still processing everything I had heard.

The things they knew about my homeland could fill some gaps in my knowledge, but none that were critical. The war, the Twilight of the Gods, was the event that matched dates with a fault plane, and that was the one part of the east they either didn't know or wouldn't talk about. And the eastern goddesses were gone... Gone within my lifetime, even, if by a few weeks or less.

I wanted to hold my head in my hooves. There had to be more meaning to the world than just my life and science, something bigger than me that was out there to be found. I couldn't just sit here, content with the way things were, when the world beyond the bunker kept calling out my name. And these stories had reinforced that assertion. There really were beings out there that could make the world revolve around them, beings I had a burning curiosity to find. But the stories also hadn't actually gotten me any closer to anything tangible. They were just entertainment, and nothing more.

No. I had distracted myself with the fact that these visitors were from my homeland. I had gotten curious, endulged my curiosity, and had a great but ultimately unproductive time. And now it was time for me to get my head back in the game and re-focus on what really mattered: there was another cave they had found, another real, tangible link to the ether river, to our research, maybe to the chapel, and most likely a step on the road toward getting out of Icereach and seeing the world as a whole.

I put my game face on and let the world slide back to focus, mushroom trays piling up as the contest continued to rage. I already had Mother's approval, and Rondo's. I definitely needed Leif's and Ansel's. Tonight, I would party with my yak friends, and tomorrow... Back to work.

Balance

"From the east, huh?" Corsica asked around a mouthful of breakfast salad. "You look like you had a field day. What did we learn?"

I swallowed my own food, practically upside-down in my chair, my hind legs on the table and my eyes on a corkboard diagram hung from the wall. The diagram held a map of the known world with pins on all our best guesses for the locations of historical events that coincided with the formation of fault planes, and I had spent many a day slaving away to get it as intricate and accurate as it was now. "Pretty much everything," I said with a lazy glance, not in a mood to do any real work until it got a little later in the morning. "Vivace and the fourth one whose name I forgot didn't really want to talk about it, but Rondo invited me to their airship and told tons of stories. Folk tales and stuff. Not a lot to do with the war, unfortunately. I think that's a sore subject for everyone who remembers it. But you should have heard him going on about all the feuding lords and border fights they used to have! I wouldn't want to be there in person, but they make awesome stories."

Corsica gave me a look. "You're never this excited after hitting a dead end."

"I'm not such a workaholic that I need to be doing something productive to have a good time. Even if it's just folklore, I always wanted to hear about my homeland." I shrugged. "And it's still not a total wash. I took notes, and learned plenty I was curious about. But most importantly, that Rondo guy knows my face, and I think he'll put in a good word for me being able to come along. Imagine that, if we both get to have our first real trip outside Icereach together?"

"We were both born outside of Icereach, you know," Corsica pointed out. "Father only took the position here when I was two years old."

I waved a hoof. "Yeah, but that doesn't count! Come on, aren't you excited?" I leaned over, grinning in her face. "Tell me you didn't spend all of yesterday nerding out about how cool this is going to be. A whole new access point to the ether river! Imagine if it's got ruins, too. Maybe they'll be more intact than the chapel here, even!"

"Actually, I spent yesterday getting a lecture from Elise," Corsica replied dryly. "She found out about this deal too, and wanted to warn me it wasn't going to make things better with Father. Also told me I shouldn't be getting you dragged into this because you were too young."

"What the...?" My eyes slowly crossed, and I rolled to my hooves. Elise was usually on our side! "Oh, that little killjoy! I'm not too young! And it's not like things are gonna get any better with your dad if you don't go, right? Not if you're serious about all that stuff with his mistress."

"I don't even know anymore," Corsica huffed. "I had another chat with Father too, behind closed doors, and he actually sounded supportive for some reason. Maybe he doesn't want to see me make accomplishments, but he's perfectly fine with me being gone."

I kicked back again. "Weeeird. Mega weird. Anyway, I don't officially work for the institute, and I've got Mother's blessing, so it's not like anyone can tell me not to go, right?"

"Ansel?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Right." My slump returned. Not like I hadn't spent the last night dreaming about the days when we weren't friends and I could act without a care for what he thought, or anything. Friendship was hard work... "I totally probably might need to go talk to him, still. Hey, how mad do you think he would be if we snuck off without telling him?"

"I think he'd deface all the carvings in the chapel with mustaches just for revenge. If he was feeling merciful."

Well, Corsica might do that, but Ansel tended to be a lot more direct... "Eh, then I've probably gotta go talk to him. Better sooner than later." I tossed my empty cafeteria tray onto the pile in the corner, which really was supposed to be returned someday when we stopped being lazy about it. "Hey, here's my notes from Rondo's stories, by the way, if you've got nothing better to do and wanted to catch yourself up. See ya around."

I finally tracked down Ansel after several hours of searching, up in a seventh-level corridor between work areas for the coolant compound synthesis and coolant flow loop teams. Colored lines traversed the walls in flaking paint, intended to help ponies find their way around, and some of the lights didn't flicker. The steel support girders that held up the roof were encased in rugged concrete, and there were no distribution pipes bolted to the ceiling - this had once been one of the fancier workspaces in the bunker, but after reorganizing a dozen times over the years, the ponies who currently worked in this wing were here more by chance than design.

"You know," my brother greeted as I approached, "when you promised not to go running off the very next day, I wasn't expecting that to mean you'd just wait two days instead."

I grinned limply. "Guess I'm not that good at seeing the future, eh?"

"Seeing the future has nothing to do with it," Ansel replied, voice quiet. "Nobody's making you do anything, here. You just got an unexpected opportunity. Still up to you whether or not you take it."

And just like that, I was already trapped. Why did I have to make that promise? Trying to finagle with definitions and precise wording didn't matter. Thinking for myself and choosing a path for my own future without trying to please everyone was one thing, but directly and immediately breaking a promise to one of my best friends?

I sat down against a wall and hugged myself with my wings. "You, err... really feel that strongly about it, then."

Ansel sat down beside me and thought for a moment. "I'd ask the same, but from the look on your face, I already know the answer."

"I promise I'm not just gonna break my earlier promise and run off without your say-so." I nodded. "Even if it's just a day trip, and it's not like I'm flying off forever. But, yeah. I really wanna go."

The silence resumed. I had spent the entire time I was searching for him thinking about what to say, and I was sure he had spent his time much the same, lurking and trying to think of anything before I found him. Apparently, both of us had drawn blanks.

"Bitter irony," Ansel eventually said. "Back before the accident, we were constantly at each other's throats, at least to hear you tell it. And yet in those days, we didn't yet have much in the way of goals for the future. Now, we're close friends. And yet our aspirations couldn't be more opposed. I don't know what to make of that."

"Ponies are complicated," I said with a shrug. "Maybe that's just part of growing up. You get more complicated, so some things are bound to be harder, right? But you get better at dealing with the things that used to be hard, too."

"If that's true, I wish Aldebaran would shove off and go darken someone else's doorway for a year or three," Ansel grumbled. "And that Corsica's dad would stop being such a prick. And that you could find something you really enjoy here for a change." He stared across at the opposite wall, where a doorless entry led into a side room that had once offered drinks and refreshments, and now stored fold-up portable seminar tables. "If growing up can magically give you answers to conundrums like these, I'd like a few more years under my belt before I tackle this one."

"You could always come with us," I offered. "I dunno what scares you so much out there, but if you're worried for my safety, nothing like being there in person."

Ansel lowered his eyes. "What I'm scared of is change, Halcyon. Can you truly not relate? Discarding a known present in favor of an unknown future... I like this present. It's the best way things have ever been for me. Stepping out our door, looking beyond our city, prodding at our horizons... Don't you worry about losing the way things are now?"

"I like the unknown," I replied, rubbing at a booted foreleg. "Love it, even. Stuff you don't know, you don't need to worry about. And when you find something new? If it's bad, you run away, but if it's good, good for you! Yeah, this is the best my life has ever been too. But I can't stay this way forever."

"Can't you?" Ansel asked. "Because I sure wish I could. Maybe my standards are lower than yours, but if I'm happy, is that so wrong?"

"It's not about standards. It's..." I hesitated. "Well, I'm not happy. Actually, maybe that's not the right word. I'm happy, but I'm restless. I can't sit still, here. There's something out there I've gotta find, and I dunno what it is, but there's definitely more to life than whatever it is we do down here."

Ansel shook his head. "Alright. Suppose for a moment I'm worried purely for your sake and this has nothing to do with me being selfish and not wanting you to whet your wanderlust even harder. What if you go exploring, and what you find is some gruesome accident that kills or maims you? Need I remind you, we have a precedent."

The accident. Two years ago. "Do you really think it's that likely, though?" I probed. "I'll be careful, I swear it. Not like I wanna see myself in a weeklong coma, or forgetting everything about the ponies I know. And besides, Leif and her friends are professionals. They should be able to keep me safe."

"Exploring an unknown cave system?" Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Cave-ins, falling rocks, flooding, asphyxiation, nothing you can possibly think of that could go wrong?"

I flexed my wings. "Batpony, remember? I'm pretty sure I could swim through a cave-in the same way I sneak under my bedroom door every day. As far as caving goes, I'm probably in a whole lot less danger than most ponies would be. But even if I do get hurt, that guy Vivace? He's got a talent that can heal injuries, just like that. You should go meet him. Everyone else was saying he can even bring someone back from the brink of death, if he's fast enough."

"All the same, my heart would sit much more at ease if you were far removed from that danger in the first place."

I frowned. "See, I'm still not that sure we're unprepared for the danger. But if you are, why not talk to Corsica about it instead of me?"

"Because talking to Corsica is awkward," Ansel complained, sounding strained. "Or need I remind you that not only am I her ex, but I have no memories of our time together? Never trying to fake a relationship is a personal rule of mine, and it's put a world of weird into our interactions. So I apologize if this sounds harsh, but she is a few rungs lower on my priority ladder than you, Sis."

"Well." I fixed him with my most pointed stare. "I have had one too many experiences in my life where you and Corsica were comatose and I got off without a scratch. I'm not exactly keen on doing that again. So if you want me to stay at home because it's dangerous out there, then you're gonna have to convince her, too. I still think these Aldebaran ponies know what they're doing and it'll be fine, but if I did think it was going to be dangerous, my reaction wouldn't be to make everyone stay home, it would be to come along too."

Ansel blinked, realizing what I was saying, and groaned.

"...Sorry if that was a bit short," I added, sitting back down. "This is just the kind of thing you never really get over."

"Well, scratch that argument, then," Ansel sighed, rolling his shoulders. "So here's a different angle: what if Aldebaran aren't so altruistic as they claim? Think about it for a moment. They're an unknown third party trying to hire the daughter of the head scientist out for an off-site job with far too much money up front and a rather wobbly explanation for how this whole thing benefits them. Assuming our physical safety has absolutely nothing to do with it, which I still very much doubt, what if we're getting rolled into some racket or con job? And don't say this is Icereach and that stuff is par for the course."

"They sure looked like they were doing things their own way, I'll give you that," I replied. "But who says it's nefarious? I mean, look at them! Small band, tight-knit, custom themed names and matching garb, cool airship that probably cost a fortune... I'll bet you they pull in so much treasure, it's not worth the opportunity cost to be picky about getting the best value out of every last thing. Maybe they invited the rest of us along because they're free spirits and can do what they want. Which is exactly what Corsica wants, and what I want too. Ansel, these are professional adventurers." My eyes shifted back to the folding-table storage room. "I don't think it's suspicious. I think it's cool."

Ansel nodded. "All that could completely fit what we've seen, yes. My hypothesis does too. So can you really be certain?"

"You've spent like fifteen minutes with them in Graygarden's office," I pointed out. "I introduced one to Mother at lunch and hung out at their airship for hours. I'm pretty sure I've got more interactions to base my take on than you. But even if they had formal certificates of purity and honor, would it really make you feel any better? I feel like we're just skirting the real reason, here."

"Well, I suppose you've got a point there," Ansel admitted. "That said, even if this is only one of the reasons I'm worried, it is still a reason. And me having not seen as much as you doesn't mean I haven't seen what I've seen. Halcyon, is it too much to... What if we just did decide to skip this opportunity and do something later? What if both of us talk to Corsica, ask her to turn down the job, and in return, I'll promise that the next such opportunity you have to leave Icereach, I'll come along too? I know it's a gamble, given how unexpectedly this one turned up, but just tell me what if."

"Are you actually offering that?" I asked, the back of my mind still thinking about Ansel's suspicions and reminding me that Elise hadn't liked this job offer either.

"I don't know," Ansel sighed. "I don't know if I can offer that, but I'm trying my best, here! Just tell me what you think would happen."

I looked at the floor. This might actually be what I wanted most - I couldn't stay in Icereach forever, but like Ansel, I badly wanted the three of us to stick together as friends. Could I sacrifice this present opportunity to... to put him in the same situation I was in now, later? Right now, I was torn between what I wanted and a promise I had made to do what he had wanted. And I hated it. Was he offering to let me turn the tables?

Who said our next opportunity might be remotely as good as this one, though? This was the perfect baby step. We wouldn't be gone for long, we'd be in the care of some very competent ponies, it was immediately relevant to Corsica and my research, and of course I was very eager to hear more of Rondo's stories...

But it was a way to keep our vastly different goals from making us grow apart.

"I suppose..." I began. "I suppose I'd say yes. But you'd have to be the one to talk Corsica out of it now. I'm not staying home while she leaves if there's anything I can do about it. But I don't have it in me to throw cold water all over our plans. You want this so badly, the dirty work's on you."

I stared at the ground. The concrete was slightly sloped, leading to a small grate in case the floor got wet. Letting go of Leif's offer and resolving to keep my promise and stay home was like watching my hopes drain away through that grate, a bright, shrinking puddle on the floor. It occurred to me that this might be how ponies who dreamed normally felt - a dream could come out of nowhere, vanish just as quickly, leaving you awake and sober. Most ponies, I had heard, weren't nearly as lucid in their sleep as me.

What a strange sensation.

"...Having to see that look in your eyes sure makes this victory ring hollow," Ansel said.

"Had to happen to one of us," I replied. "Besides, I'm older. It's my responsibility to look out for you. It'll be fine, anyway. Not like I'm losing anything I didn't have two days ago. So, you wanna make that promise?"

Ansel looked away. "...No. No, go on your adventure with Corsica. Get some money to your name. Take care of yourselves, and prove me a fool for worrying. My utopia isn't worth it if everyone but me is paying the price."

"Ansel..."

"See you when you get back, chum."

He had already gotten to his hooves and was walking away.

I slouched into the lab, hardly feeling like I had won a fight. Ansel thought victory felt hollow when he got his way? Well, he was noble enough to give me his blessing on the journey, but not quite enough to spare me from the same fate.

"Mmmphu uu?" Corsica guessed, a box of take-out from the shopping district open on her desk next to a topographical map of the world and all my notes from Rondo.

"Your mouth's full," I said, tossing myself onto my chair and letting it spin from my momentum. "But yeah, I found him. We had it out a little."

Corsica had the sense to swallow. "And?"

"We butted heads until it got so obvious how much both of us care about it that neither of us could walk away with a victory without feeling like a jerk," I sighed, rotating. "Anyway, I've got his blessing. Even if it cost me a good chunk of enthusiasm. How much longer until they want us there?"

"An hour or two. They just said evening." Corsica lit her horn and grabbed the base of my chair, forcing it to stop spinning. "So, things got awkward because neither of you wanted to accept a sacrifice the other was making on their behalf, huh."

I frowned and paddled the air with a wing, trying to start the spinning again. "Yeah, that's a good way to put it."

"Gross." Corsica made an overexaggerated face. "That stuff's too sappy and intimate for me. Tip from a pro: if you ever find yourself in that situation again, the best thing to do is tell a bad joke or start bragging like crazy to kill the mood. Nothing gets you out of trying to make up with someone you disagree with like reminding them why they disagreed with you in the first place."

Manipulating how ponies saw me in conversations to avoid things I didn't like was a tactic I was perfectly used to, but... "He's Ansel. Maybe if it was some random goon I bumped into in the hallway, but I care about him."

Corsica stretched, getting up and arching her back before walking over to one of the room's many shelf racks of things. "That just means he'll forgive you. That's what family's for, right?"

I rubbed at the back of my neck, watching as she floated out a giant duffel bag and settled it across her back. To a normal Icereach scientist, it would probably have been unimaginably heavy, but she managed it without even straining.

"What's in there?" I asked, tilting my head at the change of subject.

"My stuff." Corsica glanced at me. "Don't tell me you waited until the last second to pack."

"Oh. No, it's in a bag at home." I got the door for her, stopping to discard the last few remnants of her lunch before following her out. "I guess this is really happening, then, isn't it? Hard to believe how long I've been daydreaming about this day."

Corsica adjusted her duffel bag, leading the way. "Assuming you made a good enough impression, it's happening alright. Now come on! Let's go get your things and make it to the ship before Graygarden changes his mind and tries to crash our party."

On the surface, the sky was a soupy gray devoid of texture and feature, and not even the slightest wind blew to ruffle my mane. Ansel was still on my mind; I felt I owed him an apology, though I had a feeling that right now it wouldn't help. He had let me off the hook in a way neither of us were perfectly happy with, and I had a good hunch that the best way to clear up the awkwardness between us was for me to do as he asked, go on a very short adventure and then present myself back home, safe and sound. Me fumbling over words by trying to be sincere instead of pretending wouldn't make his waiting any easier.

My satchel and a duffel bag - much smaller than Corsica's - rode at my sides, stuffed with all sorts of utilities. A spare copy of my coat and boots took up the most room. If we were going spelunking, I wouldn't be surprised to find puddles of ice water, and falling in without a backup would be very bad for my habit of never being seen without my clothes. Behind that, there were my notes, or more accurately the equipment for taking a lot of them. Then there were more mundane things, like an ocarina - I couldn't bring my piano, of course, and you never knew when an instrument might come in handy. My cosmetics kit was along for the ride too, because I felt more secure having it around, and I had even brought a chess set in the event that I did lose my coat or otherwise need to convince someone of the cover story for why I had an upside-down crown as my cutie mark... but also because I liked playing chess. Even the inertial stabilizer rotor was along for the ride, just because. If I got to see the world, why shouldn't it?

"Hullo, ponies!" a dutiful Nicov greeted, saluting us from his post guarding the gate.

"Guard duty?" Corsica raised an eyebrow as we approached, giving him a cheeky grin. "In trouble for something? They don't usually post anyone here."

Nicov shook his shaggy, pear-shaped head. "Gate was damaged in big storm last Friday. Builder pony look at it and say leaving it open in snow not good for moving parts until gate can be repaired. So Nicov stand watch to close gate in case of snow." He motioned to the cloudy malaise with a curved horn. "Probably not big deal. Yak damage walls all of time during brawls. And what is to keep out? Flying science ponies not care about walls. Nicov think builder pony have too much Sosan moonshine."

"Sounds like a real important job you've got there," I added with a grin of my own, hearing the distant sounds of sparring coming from the adjacent training field. "Sure would be a shame if someone smashed the gate entirely. No reason to protect it from breaking if it's already broken, yeah?"

Nicov turned away, muttering under his breath and leaving us to enter. "Science ponies think strangest things..."

"Squishy science ponies!" a familiar voice called out as we began crossing the compound. It was Balthazar, flat on his back and bench pressing a roughly spherical yak I felt like might have been called Milton. Million-ton Milton, right... "Setting off on epic voyage beyond skies?"

"That's the plan!" I called back, strolling up to the not-very-unusual spectacle. Milton almost looked like he was meditating... "Wish us luck?"

Balthazar sized us up, Corsica stepping up beside me. "No Ansel pony. Hmm. Unfortunate."

"Just the way the cookie crumbles." Corsica gave an exaggerated sigh. "If he spends too much time loitering and asking are we back yet, throw Milton at him for me. Apparently Hallie gave him every chance to join us..."

Milton gave her the most serene of all glares. "Yak using yak for weapon is secret technique passed down through Yakyakistan for two whole millennia, invented by founders themselves," he muttered stoically as he bobbed up and down with Balthazar's hoof pumps. "Cannot be used without terrible price. Balthazar throw Milton at pony and forfeit dessert rations to Milton for entire week as decreed by ancestors. This is price of power."

Corsica winced. "Steep."

Balthazar burst out laughing. "Hopefully Ansel pony does not loiter! Balthazar will heed Corsica request, but ponies owe week worth of dessert as service fee. Now go enjoy sky."

His blessing received, we strode on into the tower, my mind a little lighter. Balthazar was someone I trusted intrinsically, almost like the dad I never had growing up... if he was looking out for Ansel on our behalf, that made running off like this feel a little lighter on my shoulders. We'd have an adventure, make the money to finance more, get some leads to pursue on those further adventures, and give Ansel hard proof that we could take care of ourselves out there, all in one little trip. This was going to be great. Perfect, even!

We tromped up the staircase, the lower floor a cross between a barracks, barn and tavern for the yaks to hunker in during storms. It struck a sharp contrast with the upper floor, a cushioned lobby filled with seats and scientific posters that served as the entry point for all dignitaries and officials visiting Icereach. We barged out onto the airship dock, a lengthy, suspended pylon of wood, our hoofsteps perfectly in sync. I gave Corsica a victorious grin, the elation of the situation finally getting to me, and she returned it, the two of us breaking apart and me taking the lead on the narrow gangplank to the entry. I raised a hoof and punched the door, giving it my most enthusiastic knock.

It wasn't closed properly, and bounced off its frame with a hefty clang, swinging outward and hitting me in the nose.

My eyes watered in pain as I fell back on my rump and bit my tongue to avoid saying anything uncouth. Slowly, the door swung open, giving me line of sight to Vivace, who was sitting in a chair and pointedly reading a book while watching me with one very raised eyebrow.

"Errr..." I rubbed my nose, trying to ignore the fact that Corsica had almost fallen off the gangplank from laughing. So much for not taking a scratch... "Hi there?"

Barely a second passed, my nose itching from the impact and the chill mountain air, before Rondo appeared before us. "Well hello, kids!" he greeted with a salute, his face, mane and the better half of his body absolutely caked in black grease. "What can I do for you? Pro tip, it's a bad time to ask for a hug."

With a will stronger than Balthazar's biceps, Corsica forced herself to stop laughing and offered a little curtsy, stepping again up beside me. "Yesterday morning, you said tomorrow evening. Here we are, right on schedule."

"Oh. We did?" Rondo blinked, looking slightly awkward. "So we did! One moment, please!" He bolted back inside, and we could hear him distantly call out, "Leitmotiiiiif?"

A minute later, Leif appeared, the mare looking doubly embarrassed. "You really showed up now?" Her cheeks reddened, and she rubbed the back of her neck with a hoof. "My bad! Absolutely my bad for not being more clear. I meant we weren't leaving before tonight, not that we were setting out now... Wanted to give you a guarantee on the time you'd have to make your decisions, since you wanted to think about things and all. Are you really ready to shove off now?"

I gave Corsica a sly did you really not triple-check this look. She whistled innocently.

"So, err..." I straightened my shoulders, seeing that she had no intention of speaking. "We did just prepare and everything... Dare I ask how much longer?"

Leif shrugged. "Well, we've been flying for a while before we got here, and I think everyone's enjoying stretching their legs for a bit. And there's this noodle place Vivace has been going on about that he wants to stop by at least once more..."

My ears folded. For real?

"And Rondo's been doing some engine maintenance work," Leif finished, pointing over her shoulder at the stern of the ship. "The ship's brand new, so she deserves a little fine-tuning as all the components break in. That's the only hard blocker, if you're really raring to go. Hey Rondo, how fast can you get the thrust back online!?"

"You ask much of me, Leitmotif!" Rondo's voice called from out of sight. "But say Halcyon can join us, and I can do it by this time tomorrow!"

Oh. Right. I still wasn't officially cleared to go. But Rondo had just thrown down the gauntlet in my support! But we were delayed at least a day, meaning at the very least I would have to prolong Ansel's discomfort, if not have another awkward conversation before we could take off for real... My mood tried to rise and fall at the same time, and the whiplash left me reeling.

"A full day," Corsica repeated, nodding.

"Yeah... Sorry about that!" Leif apologized again, stepping aside and beckoning us through the entrance. Giving me an additional glance, she added, "And I don't see why you're not on board. Come in, though, you're welcome to leave your things here now so you don't have to carry them back up again."

"I was just about to ask." Corsica tossed her mane and accepted the invitation, her back laden with at least twice as much gear as I was carrying. Probably legitimate science equipment... I bowed and followed her inside.

"Impressive place," Corsica remarked as she looked around, reminding me that I was the only one so far to see the inside of the ship. It was still royalty among aircraft, more of an edgy princess than a dignified queen, yet with a sharp and capable air that suggested its station was earned and not inherited. Idly, I noted it was still hanging in midair with no obvious lift apparatus even with Rondo in the middle of an engine job... My eyes wandered to the stern, where a ladder near the rear cabin doors had lights flickering and sparking from above.

"Any chance Rondo went that way?" I asked, glancing at the ladder. If we really were delayed, no reason not to make the best of a poor situation and listen to some more stories...

Leif followed my gaze. "Looks like it. And she's a beauty, right? We fly in some knowledgeable circles, and get our hooves on all sorts of tech that no amount of money can normally buy. Wait until you see her when she's fired up!"

I nodded in thanks, bounding over to the ladder and leaving Leif and Corsica to discuss the ship. Not too enthusiastically, though; I had just bonked my nose, and really didn't need anyone to see me fall off a ladder after that...

Up the ladder I went, sticking my head up into the room above. "Hey Rondo-"

I should have expected it from the rest of the ship's quality, but the sight of the engine briefly took my breath away. Apparently, the Aldebaran's curved roof wasn't just for show: in the domed enclosure over the rear, a machine unlike any I had ever seen stood, a convoluted, twisting cloud of thick metal rails that sparked and crackled with cold teal energy. I rubbed my nose, still aching from the bonk, and stared out of the rimmed hole in the floor at rack after rack of meters and equipment the metal cloud was connected to, several of their case fronts open. In front of one of the open ones, a trolley was parked, Rondo on his back and using it to reach deep into a machine's workings.

"Woah," I breathed. Whatever science this was made from, it wasn't known in Icereach.

Apparently, he heard me. Wheels squeaked, and the stallion rolled himself out from the case, a wrench in his mouth and the source of his grease stains now obvious. He waggled his eyebrows in greeting.

"Uh... hi," I greeted in return. "This place is crazy."

"Yo," he mouthed around the wrench. "Car oo wmff me worr?"

Oh. Right. Rondo wasn't a unicorn, so he had to use his mouth to work... So much for an extra day of story time. But the engine room looked far too cool for me to slink away in defeat just yet, so I nodded and took him up on the offer. "Sure. Look don't touch, I'm guessing?"

He winked, rolling back into the machine frame.

Well, now I had an awesome machine to look at, and no idea how it worked. Time to spend some guesswork fixing that... The setup had three obvious components. Most striking was the twisting cloud of metal rails suspended from the ceiling, energy crackling between them. It was fairly homogeneous in design despite its chaotic shape, with no distinct areas or components. Something single-functional... It could be an energy core, if the ship didn't run off mana. Or some kind of reaction chamber, or even a lifter... but probably not the latter, since it wasn't located at the ship's center of gravity. But it was bigger than the rest of the engine put together, so it was clearly the most important part.

Then there was a box on the ground, cubic and about the length of a pony in each dimension, made from a smooth, purple, faintly rainbow-tinged metal with thick wires linking it to the machine rack. If anything looked like a power source, it was that. But how did anyone get in to service it, and where was the fuel input? I circled it curiously, wondering if this was somehow a perpetual machine that didn't need fuel. That would defy science, but my incredulity had already been thrown out the window long ago. If there was ever a place for doubting the limits of technology, this had to be it.

So then that left the machine rack Rondo was servicing, which was covered in dials and meters and had to be the processing component that took whatever the rails and the science box did and made it functional. Probably the most conventional stuff in there. It would almost certainly be the interface to the ship's controls, and provide power for heating and lighting, wires branching from it to the other components and out to the rest of the ship. Maybe it could provide some clues to what the other two parts did...

"H-Metal core temperature. Comet injector internal pressure. Comet stabilizer integrity for stabilizers one through twelve. Antiharmonic weather dissonance? Harmonic plasma temperature..." I tilted my head, reading off the labels on some of the case meters. Disappointingly, they all seemed to be disconnected at the moment, with a zero reading on everything. "I have no idea what any of these mean. Comets? The only comets I know are from space, and what does harmony have to do with plasma? For all I know, even temperature has a second meaning, here. Wonder what H-Metal is. This stuff?" I turned, focusing on the shiny box I guessed was the fuel source. Or maybe it meant the mesh of metal rails...

"Careful!" Rondo warned from inside the machine frame. "Might be a nasty static shock coming if you're near those when I hook this baby up."

I jumped back just in time to see all the dials spasm and briefly freak out. "Eh heh..." I giggled nervously at the sight. Okay, maybe it would be better to just ask him how it functioned when he was finished...

With a thud, I landed at the base of the ladder, glancing around. Corsica was nowhere to be seen, Vivace was still reading, and Leif was just standing there, staring off into the distance.

She focused on me quickly, though. "Hey," she greeted, spinning around with a flip of her yellow mane. "Your friend just left. Said to tell you to find her at her lab when you're done, but not to rush on her account." She quickly sized me up. "Starstruck? I'm guessing you're the kind of pony who knows enough about tech to be more impressed by that thing than a normie who just thinks it's magic."

"Yeah, I sorta do, and it's pretty impressive," I admitted. "But it still kind of looks like magic."

"Trust me, it is magic," Leif assured me with a wink. "A priest would have an easier time understanding it than a mechanic. You just have to belieeeeeeve it works." She reared up and spookily waggled her forehooves. "The tech's been around for two decades or so, but it never became mainstream due to some major challenges with mass production. Don't ask me what all's going on with it, though; all I've got are jokes."

I relaxed a little. Vivace and Rondo I had met properly, but I had yet to get a read on her, and from what I was seeing, she was easily a pony I could be friends with. Might as well ask to be sure while the going was good... "So, err, earlier you implied I could come, yeah? Just making absolutely certain..."

"Oh, you're in." Leif waved a careless wing. "We were only like 'Hmm, maybe we should think about this' because your Head Scientist was giving us the stinkeye earlier and I totally thought he was listening through the door after pretending to leave so he could find an excuse to throw us out. Ponies in charge, right?" She rolled her eyes. "Kid, bureaucracies have no home here. There's four of us and three of you, and we don't need a complicated power structure to get by. You know who to listen to in an emergency, you know not to mess with whoever's on cooking duty, and you're good. Still no extra pay, of course, but you don't strike me as the kind of pony who's in this for the money."

"That's pretty cool of you. I get it," I agreed, nodding thankfully. I had suspected as much, but it was good to hear it made explicit. Still, Ansel's earlier worry was just a little on my mind, so it wouldn't hurt to ask... "So, not like I'm complaining, but why bring me along? Corsica's your expert, and you've said twice you're not paying me. Aren't I just gonna take up room?"

Leif gave me a knowing grin. "Because you're a scientist who believes in ghost stories. How cool is that?"

I slowly blinked. "What's that got to do with anything? And says who?"

"You, just a minute ago." Leif shrugged. "You were up there ogling our engine, trying to figure out how it worked, no? I said it was magic, and you just took it in stride."

A confused frown crossed my face, and I glanced back at the ladder to the engine room. "Yeah, but so what? And I just did that now, not yesterday when we were meeting in Graygarden's office."

"Call it a hunch confirmed," Leif glibly replied, stepping up and staring at the engine room hatch with me. "It's your eyes, though. You've got this look of restless dissatisfaction, like someone who thinks the status quo is for losers. Well, maybe not that arrogant, but you get the idea? You've got places to go and things to see. So, I thought you were interesting and that maybe it would be fun if you tagged along."

"...Seriously." I smirked a little, realizing just how right I had been about this being a group that did what they wanted, because they wanted to. "You're letting some kid come along on a business trip just because you think it would be entertaining. Come on, flex your freedom a little harder. Who said I was jealous?"

Leif pursed her lips and sized me up, then leaned over to whisper in my ear. "Full disclosure mode? My crewmates aren't the most... socially normal ponies. You probably noticed. Cabin fever has been an eternal thorn in my flank since we started flying together. So, I see someone who has a fresh, interesting set of stories to tell, and it's not like you're raring to ditch us..."

I grinned sheepishly. "Actually, I'm more of a story listener."

"What a coincidence, so am I!" Leif straightened up and winked. "Which is how I know you've got something good to say. Ponies who are all talk and no ears never pick up anything new to tell. But the more you've listened, the more you've got rattling around in your brain."

I raised an eyebrow.

Leif returned it. "What? Think I'm bluffing? That there's no way a chatterbox like me could be the attentive type?"

I looked away, reddening slightly at being called out. What was wrong with her being a chatterbox? I really was in a mood to listen, so this was a good thing!

"...I get the impression you get teased a lot," Leif eventually decided, sizing up my expression. "Well, worry not. Thing is, when you want ponies to talk to you and tell you their stories, the best way I've found is to strike up the conversation yourself. Nothing against being the quiet type, but I make of myself what I must to get what I want. Being friendly pays, yeah?"

"That's pretty cool," I replied, feeling vaguely like I was being propositioned. "I bet you're about to offer to trade stories, aren't you? I tell one, I get one back. Fair's fair, or something?"

Leif grinned an innocent, hungry grin. "Right on the nose! You first. Give me Icereach's finest local lore."

I thought about it for a minute. Badly curious about this place she had never been to? Working her demeanor and self-presentation like a tool to get other ponies to treat her the way she wanted? Leif really was like me, even beneath the superficial similarities like us both being fans of heavy clothing. And yet she had so much I wanted, too. An airship. Freedom to follow her whimsy. That genuine confidence...

She was swiftly becoming my favorite of the Aldebaran ponies, if not adding herself to the elite list of ponies I looked up to, like Corsica, Mother and Elise. Alright. If this was the game she wanted to play, I was in.

"Sure," I answered. "But gimmie a prompt. We've got a lot of local lore."

Leif stared out the window in thought. "Ansel and Corsica. Tell me about my new shipmates from their friend's point of view. How much have we gotten ourselves into?"

Well, time to think about Ansel again. "Ah..." I looked away. "Ansel might be bailing on us, by the way."

"Seriously? Drat," Leif sighed. "He get cold hooves, or something?"

I loped over to one of the cushy chairs by the table where I had listened to Rondo yesterday, hoping this wouldn't become the story of why he was staying behind. "Why? You wanted him to tag along that bad?"

"I just told you, didn't I?" Leif took the opposite chair, putting her booted hooves up on the table. "We've got a little cabin fever, and you've got bright eyes and fresh new perspectives. Personally, I was looking forward to meeting a non-batpony with a batpony mother. Vivace might have mentioned it, but that doesn't happen where we're from. Ever."

"Oh yeah, that's what they were on about." I leaned forward, curiosity piqued by mention of my homeland... Clearly deliberate on Leif's part, but did I care? "Yesterday when I introduced Vivace to my mother! Is it taboo there for batponies and other ponies to... you know... get it on?"

Leif chuckled. "About as bad as you could get. The Night Mother and Garsheeva, rival goddesses? That was the one thing they could agree on. No inter-racial kids. Always did wonder why. My best guess is they didn't want any romances causing their constituents to have split loyalties. What an upstanding pair."

"You're not that fond of them, then?" My ears perked. "Have a bad history with their followers?"

"Ah ah ah!" Leif waggled a hoof and flashed an evil grin. "Particularly juicy stories like that one are far from free. If you want to hear it, pay up." She pulled a coin out of her robe and started flipping it repeatedly with a wing.

I gaped, mouth slightly ajar. This was starting to feel like extortion! Be the bigger pony, Hallie, don't use your talent just to figure out how to impersonate her tactics and give her a dose of her own medicine...

"Or, if talking about your friends is awkward, why not tell me a little about yourself?" Leif shrugged, reading my reticence. "I dig your fashion. You dress like this often? What's the story behind your look?"

Well, there was something I could talk about. "All the time," I answered, shifting my oversized coat on my back. "You really think it looks cool? The point is to make it look like I'm trying too hard to be cool. There's no better way to get left alone than by overdoing it when fishing for attention."

Leif grinned and nodded. "Wicked smart. But do you think it looks cool? You make it sound like it's an invisibility cloak, or something. I bet it would feel cool to go around in an invisibility cloak."

"Isn't that kind of personal?" I flicked my ears. Yes, as a matter of fact, I did think it was a cool coat, but I wasn't just going to go out and say it... "I'm not all that concerned with impressing other ponies."

"You fancied up your mane when we met at Graygarden's," Leif pointed out. "And you kept wearing the coat. Come on, it was a job interview. Don't tell me you weren't trying to make a good impression."

I tilted my head. I had dressed up in spite of the need to look professional, not for it... "What are you angling at, here?"

"Oh, nothing." Leif leaned back casually. "Just feeling out whether I could get you to strike a dramatic pose and say something edgy in a foreign language. Most folks who dress like us have always wanted to do that, deep down."

I tried to say something and trailed off, my mouth half-open. "Do you think I've never heard of dignity?"

Leif shrugged. "Who needs a sense of shame when you have an epic longcoat? It's fine, you're not there yet."

"Oh yeah?" I narrowed my eyes and pointed a wing. "Prove it. Why don't you strike a dramatic pose and say something edgy in a foreign language?"

I wasn't sure what I was expecting, but Leif reared up on her hind legs, crossing her forehooves in front of her face and stretching her wings around herself like a shroud, causing her armor-robe to billow dramatically. "Padruge!"

Barely a second later, the sun came out, reflecting low off the glacier, so close to the horizon that it shone in under the cloud cover and cast her in a blinding silhouette.

"...That's cheating," I meekly complained, sitting back down.

"No. It's called being aware of your surroundings and having a sense of dramatic timing. You could have done it too!" Leif got back on all fours, fixing her robe. "So, how long has this been your style? Any good stories behind how you picked it up?"

"Err... At least ten years..." My eyes still followed the sun. I was outside, wearing no special cold gear, and the moment it disappeared below that horizon, things would start getting chilly.

Leif followed my gaze. "Oh. Let me guess. Curfew?"

"Nah, just the cold," I sighed, getting back to my hooves. "Listen, you owe me one for next time. I gotta get inside before it gets too nasty out there, unless you've got an industrial welding torch I could carry with me for warmth."

Leif stuck out her tongue. "No way! I did that pose for you, so now it's your turn again. Hold up, though, I've got a present before you go."

"A present?" My ears perked, and I watched as she moved to the ship console and started rummaging around in a drawer. "What kind?"

"Here." Leif withdrew something small and shiny, offering it to me with a wingtip. "Half token of friendship, and half consolation prize so we're not technically hiring you for nothing. Take it."

"An... earring?" I sized up the little gem curiously. It was very small, and a faint light seemed to gleam from within...

"An enchanted earring," Leif corrected with a wink. "You're from the east, right? Probably got a short coat like us." She tilted her head and parted her fur, showing me a similar one in her own ear. "This little doohickey will help a smidge with the symptoms of cold and high altitude. It doesn't actually warm you up, so don't abuse it and get in danger because you misjudged the conditions, but it could make the trip a bit more pleasant. Keep it, it's yours."

I stared at the thing, giving it a sniff. Properly-cut gemstones could hold standing mana waves in stasis, I knew, but that could only act as a catalyst or it would gradually lose energy... Did this really work? That would be surprisingly functional. I clipped it on to see what would happen.

All of a sudden, there was a faint draining sensation in the back of my throat and nose, and a scratchiness I had written off as an after-effect of banging my nose on the door lifted entirely. "Wow," I remarked. "This thing actually does make a difference. You seriously just have these laying around to give away? It's awesome."

Leif shrugged. "It was cheapest for us to get them in bulk, so we have a lot of extras." She nudged me toward the open drawer, where I saw at least a hundred earrings massed together. "You want spares for your friends?"

"Eh, why not?" I held open a pocket on my coat. "Corsica's pretty much impervious to cold, though, and like I said Ansel's not coming."

"Well, here, help yourself." Leif dumped at least five into my pocket, then closed the drawer and moved to get the door for me. "Think hard about your stories, now! The more you give, the more you get!"

"Yeah, yeah," I complained, stepping out. She was the kind of pony I wanted to be like, but that only meant she knew how to run me around in circles.

The earring wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

Having a control variable was pivotal to any good experiment, and when I tried to reach up and remove it to get an unbiased idea of how cold it was outside, my wings were already too frosty to support that level of fine motor skill... Fortunately I was already most of the way to the elevator entrance by that point, and I made it back underground without turning into a pony popsicle.

Another long soak in Corsica's bathtub left me feeling properly warmed up, and my hooves carried me to the lab, remembering the message that I should go there but forgetting precisely why. Maybe I had forgotten to ask in the first place... Yawning heavily, I reached up and tapped a hoof on the lab door.

It slid open, and Corsica greeted me with a weary smile and a silly little nightcap with a big puffball on the end. "You showed up!"

"Uh... hi," I replied, my brain catching up with the situation. She told me she slept in the lab, right... "What's up? I got your message from Leif, but I hope it's not too-"

"Perfect timing, come on in." Corsica grabbed me, yanked me inside, and closed the door, leaving us in total darkness.

Frowning, I turned on my bracelet, bathing the room in emerald. Corsica was there, looking pleased with herself. There was an open crate of junk food, but someone had returned our collection of used cafeteria trays and taken out the garbage, and stacked our chairs out of the way on the desks, and a bunch of other things I knew were different yet couldn't put my hoof on that made the lab look that much cozier and tidier. Oh, and there were two sleeping bags tossed out on pads on the floor.

"Slumber party?" Corsica whispered in my ear.

"I..." I stared at the setup. Was that what this was?

"Awkward conversations with Ansel, remember?" Corsica shrugged. "Not that I'd support shirking your sibling duty, or any wild ideas like that, but you looked like you'd be happier if you didn't have to go home and tell him takeoff's been postponed. So, I thought I'd offer to let you crash here tonight."

"You know what?" I glanced at the sleeping bag that was closest to me, feeling cozy after the bath and down to give new things a try. "Sound logic. So what does one do at a slumber party? This might, err... be my first time."

Corsica raised a skeptical eyebrow, then decided I wasn't bluffing and gave me a pitying look. "We're probably too old for braiding each other's manes and talking about who we have crushes on, but if you missed the opportunity when you were younger..."

"Crushes?" I stuck out my tongue. "No thanks. I kinda like my privacy, you know? Having friends is nice, but someone closer than that? I like the idea of keeping myself to myself."

"Just as well," Corsica said with a shrug. "I wouldn't have anything to say except complaining about Ansel, anyway. Forgetting everything changed that colt so much... Hard to believe he's still the same smooth operator I used to pass cheesy poetry to in school."

I gave her a sideways glance. "You actually did that?"

"Of course!" Corsica didn't look as if she felt this the least bit unnatural. "We were kids having fun pushing the rules and doing things that used to gross us out, like making kissy fish-lips at each other when the teacher wasn't looking. What else are you supposed to do with a flirting buddy?"

"I dunno." I frowned, squinting in thought. "I thought you were supposed to, like, share everything and stuff. Carrying each other's burdens and all that."

Corsica chuckled. "That only happens in too-fluffy romance novels, or when you get married and live sappily ever after. You wouldn't catch me dead doing that. But I'm too old for whatever I was doing with Ansel. Guess we'll have to settle for being a pair of bachelorettes instead, huh?"

"Happily married to science instead of flesh-and-blood ponies," I agreed. "Much nicer that way."

"Speaking of science," Corsica said, "I hunted down a projector. Movie night? I brought snacks." She levitated the crate of junk food I had spied earlier and set it down between the two sleeping bags with a crunch.

"Yeah?" I paced over to look inside, dipping a wing in and pulling out three different flavors of unhealthiness. "What have you got?"

"An old horror flick about eighties Ironridge." Corsica made a show of backing into her sleeping bag, snuggling in and laying atop her hooves, floating her ear ornaments and dainty shoes away with a shimmer of blue. "Come on, let's get comfortable."

I probably should have followed suit, but instead I stared, munching absently on something carroty and sweet. It was almost never that I got to see Corsica let her guard down and her mane forward like this, and I knew her guard was down because she suddenly looked visibly tired. In all fairness, it was the end of the day and I probably looked the same, but still. Never mind that she'd probably have a bedhead in the morning-

"What?" Corsica gave me a bemused look. "Coming?"

I looked again at my sleeping bag, then shuffled off my coat onto my own desk. Then I looked back at the sleeping bag. And then at my boots.

Corsica smiled innocently.

"Ugh, seriously?" I snapped my head around to face her. "You set this whole thing up because you wanted to see if I really did sleep in my boots, didn't you?"

Corsica coyly tilted her head. "Not my fault you made me curious. Well? Come on, filly, let your mane down and relax! We trust each other, right? Half the fun is to forget about appearances and go without your regalia!"

Suddenly, I felt very awkward for thinking about how unusual it was to see her like this when I wasn't prepared to do the same. "It's... real personal," I sighed, hanging my head. "I really do sleep with them off, I'm serious. And I'll take off my coat, which I don't do all that often either. But I just... don't like ponies looking at my legs. For reasons."

"I get it." Corsica held up a hoof, stopping me. "The whole point of a slumber party is to ditch your worries for a night. I promise I won't judge, but if that won't help, you'd know better than me." She turned off her horn and faced the other way. "There. No peeking while you undress and get in the bag. If that's not good enough, then get your own bedding. Mine isn't rated for spiked combat duds."

I turned down to the sleeping bag. Yep, this definitely wasn't material I wanted to wear boots inside of... "Thanks," I mumbled, quickly extinguishing my own light, doffing my decidedly not-spiked boots and crawling rump-first into the sack, now wearing only my bracelet and Leif's earring. Eventually, after a moment of shuffling in the dark, I nodded and turned it back on, light projecting like an emerald beam from the front of my sleeping bag. "All good now."

Corsica was still looking away when my light came on, but turned back to me soon after. "If you're certain. But whatever. Look at this!" She switched the projector on, pulling a thick pattern card from its case and tossing the case my way. "Major Rockbellows and the Green Menace. Horror, unrated. A patriotic stallion finds himself in a new job to which there's more than meets the eye... Looks like the good kind of cheesy, right?"

I caught the case with a wingtip and looked it over, a dramatic pasted-together cover with lots of camerawork shot from below and big, cartoony letters. "Looks more like a comedy. Sure. Let her rip."

Corsica's telekinesis fiddled with the projector once more, and a rectangle of light appeared across the lab's chalkboard wall, overlapping with dozens of figures and calculations outlining triangulation principles and methods for determining margins of error, sound slowly kicking in as a troupe of hooded stallions marched through a nighttime jungle in the middle of a rainstorm...

First came the deja vu. The movie wasn't very good - kind of offensive, actually, as the sole batpony was the 'monster' - so I wasn't paying the keenest attention, but I was starting to feel like someone had shot certain scenes twice, or there was a time loop plot point I had spaced out through the introduction of, or even Corsica's recording was broken and it had skipped back a ways.

When I tried to ask her about it and couldn't move my mouth, I realized the truth: I had nodded off, and my brain, ever the comedian, had decided to give me a replay dream of literally less than an hour ago. Internally, I sighed. Time to tune out the projector and sit alone with my thoughts for a while. There were dozens of things I had filed away over the past few days to think about later, after all. And there was no time like the middle of a very boring dream...

Then again, dreams this recent happened about once a month, and I could never figure out if there was rhyme or reason to them. Could this be important? Sometimes, I felt like my dreams were showing me something I had forgotten or needed to recall, but just as often they were completely unrelated and random. Occasionally they could be triggered by me being worked up about something before bed, reliably enough that I doubted it was a coincidence but rarely enough that it was hardly a useful correlation. Once or twice, they even seemed to predict the future, but the confirmation bias was heavy on that one, and I was practically accredited as a superstitious pony. This time... It was supposed to be a horror movie, right? Maybe I could scare myself awake.

The problem was, it wasn't scary. Despite waves of artificial smarminess, despite heavy-hoofed foreshadowing that felt like bias in disguise, the batpony villain was a far more relatable character than the chauvinistic protagonist. Jump scares and sinister clues came and went, lighting flickered ominously and villainous cackling filled the speakers, but all I could see was some director or screenwriter standing behind the camera, calling the shots. And if I was alone, with no one to stop me from doing what I wanted, where non-batponies thought I would make a good monster for a horror film just from a casual glance? I would be tempted to embrace my dark side, too.

In fact, I probably would have, and I probably would have been a lot more frightening than the mare in the movie, thanks to my talent and a proper understanding of how shadow sneaking worked. Honestly, they hadn't even done their research on how batponies functioned! What would that writer think if I made a movie where unicorn horns were short, inert spikes only usable as swords?

No, it wasn't scary, it was sad. If I could talk, I would have been openly rooting for the so-called monster, but alas. And so my thoughts drifted, settling on a conversation not two days ago where Mother and Vivace had first met, and the topic of the treatment of batponies came up.

Anyone who remembered the Griffon Empire before the war had strong feelings on batponies, Mother said.

Don't worry, Vivace had assured, we're on your side.

After talking so long with Leif and Rondo, I had no doubts we were in good hooves, if slightly eccentric ones. But even if this movie was fiction, it had been produced by a real pony in Ironridge. Mother wasn't kidding, I knew for a fact, and here was evidence of it, right before my eyes.

Maybe Ansel was right to worry. Not that I was dissuaded from going, but I quietly resolved to take his advice a lot more closely in the future.

"Well, that was terrible."

Corsica's words cut through my sleepy mind, the trigger my brain was waiting for to stop that redundant dream and regain waking consciousness. I grunted incoherently, wondering if it thought it was helping, making me skip half the movie just to watch the other half twice.

"Sorry I made us watch that. I thought it would be a different kind of bad when I found it at-" Corsica cut herself off. "Are you sleeping?"

"Sure was," I made my mouth say, not sure if I even wanted to kick my body back into wakefulness. "Snooze fest, I guess. But isn't that the point of a slumber party?"

"You catch on quickly," Corsica declared, approval in her tone. "Staying up too late, eating too much junk food, watching terrible movies? It's all about indulging yourself by making bad decisions so you can laugh it off in the morning."

"I meant sleeping."

"...Oh." Corsica hesitated. "Should I let you sleep?"

I forced my eyes open. "Nah, it's fine," I yawned. "I wanted to wake up, anyway. You'll never guess how bad of a dream I was having."

"Bad enough to want to wake up to that movie?" Corsica looked genuinely concerned. "Are you alright?"

For a moment, I managed to keep my face grave. And then: "I was dreaming about watching that movie."

Corsica stared for a solid two seconds before she burst out laughing.

"Wow, thanks," I snarked, rubbing my eyes with a wingtip and yawning again. "You're all apologetic until I tell you that you pranked me good, aren't you...?"

"Sorry," Corsica managed, not sounding particularly remorseful. "Well, I had to watch the ending, so there."

"Dare I ask?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Probably better if you don't." This time, she really did look serious.

I set my chin on my pillow, my hooves all tucked very thoroughly inside the sleeping bag. "Kind of a wake-up call," I muttered, offering my earlier hypothesis. "I guess there really are some strong feelings about batponies out there after the war."

Corsica nudged the movie case with a frown, still sitting by me where she had left it. "Actually, this was produced in 982. Three years before the conflict in the Empire."

"...Oh." I stared at the case. "I guess... we might have been unpopular before that too. Sure makes you feel dandy, doesn't it?" My thoughts instantly went to my disguise kit, sitting in my luggage aboard the Aldebaran. One of the items in there was a set of colored contact lenses, including ones that could round out the slit of my eyes. I didn't have feathered wing coverings, but getting them wouldn't be impossible. If we did go on an adventure to see the rest of the world, maybe it would be more convenient for me to disguise myself as a...

"Like I said, I'm sorry I chose this one," Corsica sighed. "I-"

"Leif is a batpony in disguise."

"What?" Corsica stared at me sideways. "Say that again? Where's this coming from?"

I shrugged. "It just makes too much sense. I was thinking about what I'd do if I was flying around, meeting a lot of ponies who might think like that movie producer. What else but disguise myself as a pegasus?"

Corsica frowned, not buying it yet, so I continued. "Her group seems almost excited to meet us, too. Which is weird, since I'm a batpony and you're not, and if they're from the east, you'd think they'd be solidly on team batpony or team everyone else. Besides, Leif reminds me enough of myself that I'll bet you she knows a thing or two about disguises. And I'm guessing her instead of anyone else because she's the only pegasus. It's no proof, but I'll bet you anything they were friends before the war, felt like they couldn't be after, and flew away because of it."

"Or," Corsica gently suggested, "I found this movie in the free junk basket at the pattern disk shop because the producer was a pig, and not because the world is so full of his ilk that batponies have to wander around in pegasus costumes."

I stared at the case, noting the complete lack of awards or decorations... and pouted, letting go of my fantasies. "Yeah, you're probably right... Boooring."

"Boring?" Corsica giggled. "You'd prefer to live in some sort of chauvinistic, speciesist dystopia?"

"No." I stuck out my tongue at her. "What kind of question is that? But it'd make a good story."

"Go on, then," Corsica pressed, grinning. "Tell me a story about a place like that. Staying up late and telling stories is a critical part of slumber parties. Ball's in your court."

"Once upon a time," I began without missing a beat, "there was some batpony called the Green Menace who rolled around a place where literally everyone had it coming and scared the you-know-what out of 'em. Boom. Awesome story."

Corsica rolled her eyes. "Did you just try to turn the villain of that awful movie into a self-insert?"

"She was the most relatable character!" I shrugged innocently. "And the only one I could root for. Don't tell me you didn't want to see that guy get what-for."

Corsica just snorted. "Unbelievable..."

The conversation carried on in much the same fashion well into the night, any pretense of heavy topics getting shamelessly brushed aside in the name of lighthearted, excited banter. I didn't remember falling asleep, and the movie thankfully didn't return to haunt my dreams. But waking up, however, was memorable, because it came far too early and courtesy of a knock on the door.

Who even did that? My room was my room. Ansel knew I didn't like to be disturbed, and Mother didn't care enough to bother me, and I especially didn't want to be disturbed right now because my stomach felt like trash after all of Corsica's junk food, so... Oh. Right. This was the lab, wasn't it?

Seconds later, a very asleep Corsica stumbled past me, grumbling about how early it was with words that made me blush. I lifted my head to track her, some always-on portion of my brain reminding me that I wasn't wearing my boots and shouldn't come out of my sleeping bag, and she had better not open the door-

She flung it wide open, light from the hallway falling squarely on my face and blinding me, and stared out like a saggy, scruffy, raspberries-and-cream gargoyle. "...Can I help you?"

Staring back, holding a characteristic clipboard and cup of tea, her mane blowing quietly behind her, was a very wide-eyed Elise.

For a moment, they stared in silence, and I started to frown, wondering exactly what Elise thought this looked like. Eventually, she was the one to break the silence: "It is one in the afternoon."

"This is my lab," Corsica croaked, "and in my lab, I say what time it is."

"I shall update my notes on your business hours accordingly." Elise bowed and took a step back. "Will you still be here if I return in an hour?"

"...Make it three hours." Corsica blinked owlishly.

"Duly noted." Elise turned to retreat. "I merely thought not to put you in a time crunch for your endeavors this evening. Please both be present, if possible. I will write a primer and slip it under your door for you to read before I return. This concerns your job with the Aldebaran ponies. Sweet dreams..."

She stepped away, leaving Corsica standing blankly in the doorway before closing it and slumping inside.

The lights were off with the exception of Corsica's horn, and half of my friend's usually-meticulous mane nearly blocked her face. Her barrel sagged on her shoulders, the ends of her mane hairs hung limp and uneven, her fur was scruffy and matted from laying on her side, and her eyes were probably just as cloudy with sleep as mine. She shuffled towards her sleeping bag like a pink zombie. A small part of my mind wondered if her offer from earlier to braid each other's manes was still good.

Equally tired, and maybe a little resentful that she had actually opened the door instead of waiting for Elise to go away, I decided that if I wasn't going to go that far, at least I'd run my mouth a little. "Who would have thought pretty Corsica looks so cute with a bed-head?"

"Shut up," Corsica grumbled, crawling facefirst back into her sleeping bag and leaving her rump sticking out. "You're cute. I ate too much junk food and have a stomachache. Need a nap..."

Victoriously, I smirked, drifting off again. I'd probably get bludgeoned awake with a pillow for that in the morning, but it was totally worth it.

"Hallie..." Corsica was the one to wake me, but it was a lot more gentle than I had feared. "Halcyon, get up and read this."

"For real...?" I rolled over in my sleeping bag, somebody shaking me gently. "What time is it...?"

"Four thirty," Corsica replied curtly. "Elise isn't back yet, but whatever. Read this letter Elise left and tell me I'm not hallucinating."

Seriously? We must have stayed up past the crack of dawn. I yawned, lifted a wing to scrub at my eyes... and blinked, Corsica's sapphire aura holding a clipboard right up to my nose. "Back off a little," I mumbled, "that's too close for me to see."

Corsica moved it into better focus, and I started scanning it, reading aloud under my breath.

Corsica, Halcyon and Ansel,

I have been looking into the legal basis for your contract with the Aldebaran group. Ironridge maintains an employment contract with Icereach administered by the Ironridge Fair Employment Commission and Regulation Authority, with which I am affiliated. In recent years, the commission has begun conducting regular audits targeted specifically at moonlighting and third-party subcontracts. While these audits are meant to catch unlicensed work that may be leaking trade secrets or interfering with paid employee time and thus contributing to delays, neither of which concern your situation, I am worried that the unusual nature of this contract you are taking will raise flags and create trouble for you that would better be avoided. As such, I am conducting my own audit to try to head any illegalities off at the source.

Corsica, section 6.7 of the employment contract concerns requirements we place upon third-party vendors with whom we subcontract employees, among which is a background check conducted by the commission in Ironridge for vendors with no prior history of dealings. Halcyon and Ansel are likely exempt from this as they have no legal employment affiliation with Icereach, but your ceremonial Chairmare position puts you into a legal gray area that would almost certainly cause this case to be flagged for further review. Getting a background check to resolve this safely would likely take in the realm of six weeks.

Halcyon and Ansel, section 5.3 concerns special cases in which employment contracts are to be placed under extra limitations. Title VII in particular would apply to you, and as it specifies residents of Icereach instead of employees, the previous loophole would not apply again.

All legal bases aside, I am personally concerned by the unprecedented circumstances surrounding this employment. Between your collective ages and level of experience, the opacity and unfamiliarity of Aldebaran, and the advertised nature of this excursion not requiring as many of you as are being hired, this is not an endeavor I will put my stamp of approval on. Understand that as this business is being conducted entirely outside of any affiliation with Icereach and I am not your mother, I have no real authority to stop you. However, this is not the time for such a job, no matter how much you may want a source of further funding for your research.

As I believe you are likely to ignore this missive and depart regardless, I will be conducting my own background check of Aldebaran. It may not hold conventional regulatory standing, but a legal hazard is better than a safety hazard. Whether or not the result changes my opinion on the matter, I will talk with you in person once it is finished. I hope you choose to pursue a safer line of funding, and firmly believe that despite your relationship with Head Scientist Graygarden, this will not be your last opportunity.

Elise

I read the full thing twice, yawning and flashing my fangs in the light. "Fancy legalese... Pretty much nothing new I haven't heard from Ansel. Hey, could you turn that light back out? Gotta get just ten more minutes..."

Corsica pulled away the clipboard and raised an eyebrow. "Halcyon, I think she might be serious."

"Well, yeah..." I rubbed at my eyes. "At least give me some privacy to get out of this sleeping bag?"

For a moment, Corsica blinked in confusion, before catching on and extinguishing the lab's lights. "Fine. I'm not looking..."

Moments later, I was on my hooves, my boots back where they belonged and my fur smoothed out enough to start the day. Corsica was half-groomed too; she clearly had done something, but not used a bathroom or a mirror. The lights were on again, the letter was face-up on a desk, and we were both standing over it, reading it repeatedly.

"You know, you said she was being a killjoy about the job, but this sort of still sounds like she's on our side," I remarked. "All this lawyer stuff isn't 'Oh, it's against the law, so I'm going to kick your tails,' or anything. It looks like she's trying to head off bigger trouble."

"I can handle an auditor or two," Corsica replied, slightly huffy. "Who do you think I am? My genius intellect could run circles around paper-trail sniffers. What I want to know is if she actually has a point about this being a bad idea."

"You mean for safety reasons?" I tilted my head. "I dunno, what are you asking me for? She's Elise. Second ranking pony in Icereach, and the best friend we have in the administration! You want me to second-guess her?"

"Know what your problem is?" Corsica said stiffly. "You put too much stock in what other ponies think. You cost yourself that paper because you put Father's opinion of me above our own success, you wear those boots everywhere because you don't want ponies looking at your legs, your entire personality does a one-eighty whenever you're around someone you're not friends with. But..." Her brow shadowed. "I-I'm the opposite. I don't care about lawyers and I don't care about Elise's objections, but I do care about not having a repeat of the accident. So given the unique circumstances, I'm deferring to the expert."

I stared, jaw slack. In all the time I had known Corsica, even the two years we had been friends, I had never seen her put more stock in my judgement than something she wanted this bad before... let alone do so before my judgement had been delivered. I reached back and rubbed an ear. "Uhh... Wow. I dunno what to say."

"Ideally, you would tell me your read on things," Corsica replied, not meeting my eyes. Was that a hint of embarrassment I detected?

No. I pulled my head out of the clouds, dragging my thoughts together and taking a breath. "First off, that's not really fair," I began. "I want to go just as much as you do, and you know it. Second, I've spent the better part of the last few days hanging out on the Aldebaran, and I feel like I've got a pretty good read on those ponies and what they're like. Maybe not Tempo, but Leif knows exactly what situation we're in and she'll have our backs no matter what. Also, Vivace has this crazy special talent that can heal injuries just like that, so even if there was an accident and even if it hurt us, we might not have a scratch by the time we made it back to Icereach. So by my assessment, it's practically even safer than it is here in the bunker. We get in brawls with yaks all the time, remember."

I wasn't finished, though. "But that's my take on things. Elise... doesn't know half of what I do about them. Might not even know about Vivace's power. So from her perspective, she might be right to be concerned. I told Ansel the same thing. This is an unusual situation, after all. So. I'm in a position where I'm certain I know better, but... saying you know better than your superiors is always a recipe for chaos. And I really don't like betraying the ponies I look up to." I hung my head. "And I'm sick of pretending to be impartial in debates where I really care about one side. I know you're looking to me for guidance, but I don't wanna choose. Please don't make me."

Corsica sat down and sighed. "Well, this is a mess."

"So what was that rule about me and Ansel, anyway?" I asked, glancing back at the letter and changing the subject. "The law that supposedly could get us in trouble for going?"

"Haven't the foggiest." Corsica shrugged broadly. "You curious? She's more than half an hour late, so I don't see a problem with leaving a note and heading down to the library to look for that contract."

"Sure." I got to my hooves. "Give me one minute to fix my mane, and let's go check it out."

"Here we go." Corsica approached me at a low, round reading table nestled in an intersection between several back aisles in Icereach's main research library, a hefty tome carried in her aura. "The Icereach-Ironridge employment contract, as maintained by the Ironridge Fair Employment Commission and Regulation Authority, revision 1.0.1. Doesn't look like it gets perused often."

With a dusty slam, she set it out on the table across from me, took a seat and started paging through.

"Section three... four... Here we go." Corsica paused her leafing through to read. "Section five, hiring criteria for Icereach employees. Point one, two... four, too far... Three. Special exceptions that may limit the scope of a contract."

I leaned in close, curious to see exactly what Icereach had on the books that could bar an unimportant, easily-overlooked little mare like me from wandering off to do her own thing. Corsica gave an annoyed grunt, trying to separate two pages that were stuck together, which just so happened to contain the law we sought. With the sound of peeling paper, they came free, falling open to reveal... a hated little word that I had seen far too many times in my life.

I stared. I blinked. I scratched the back of my head. "Is this a practical joke?" Unless it wasn't, which would mean...

Corsica was a lot less civil. "Who even does this!?" She slammed her forehooves on the table, eliciting a sharp clack from her noise-making shoes and instantly making my angry librarian sense wince. "Hallie, slap me and tell me Icereach doesn't refuse to tell its ponies the very rules they expect them to abide by."

"Err, you might want to put a sock in it..." I whispered earnestly, hearing approaching hoofsteps an aisle over. "Can we please not get thrown out? We need to consider the implications of this!"

"Does Elise know about this?" Corsica wasn't listening. "Does she have some privileged version unfit for the lowly masses? I'm half tempted to say we are going anyway, since someone obviously wants there to be no reason you-"

A pony rounded the corner. It was Ansel.

We stared at each other with surprised expressions, Corsica too busy ranting under her breath about Icereach's state of affairs to notice. "Ehhheheh..." I feebly waved, caught entirely off guard. "What's up?"

"...Well." Ansel slowly nodded in greeting, slogging through his surprise. "It seems to be my sister and charismatic ex. I must admit, a heated study session between you two wasn't the first thing I expected to find down here today. Delayed, canceled or already home?"

"Crazy coincidence, isn't it?" I shrugged. "One of the former two. Dunno yet. Look, about yesterday-"

"Water under the bridge. Next time, at least come home for the night, then, so I know you're fine?" Ansel dusted his shoulder with a hoof, giving me a look that clearly said we'd talk later when Corsica wasn't around. "So what's the present bout of consternation about?"

"Long story short, Elise told us there's a law that could get you and Halcyon in trouble for going, and apparently it isn't on the books." Corsica huffed, apparently having noticed him after all. She still didn't look up, though.

Ansel leaned all his weight on one leg. "Which I'm sure has only been taken as a taunt and boosted your resolve to fly. What's the latest date of departure?"

I glanced at a clock. "Well, it would be in about an hour, but I'm kinda... maybe thinking we should take her seriously."

This was enough to shock Corsica out of her glaring match with the redacted page. "You are? This changes your mind in that direction?"

"Depends." I nodded, moving to take a seat before the book. "I've got an experiment I want to try."

Both of my friends moved aside. I bookmarked the redacted page, closed the volume, and opened it completely at random.

"Nothing censored here," I announced after a quick glance. "Apparently procedures for resolving conflict-of-interest disputes aren't interesting enough for them to strike from the books. Let's try again." Close. Open. "Nope. The official job listing used for hiring interviewers isn't either." Close. Open. Same result.

I flipped through the book like this about ten times, each time finding multiple pages covered in laws that hadn't been stricken or modified in any way. Finally, I opened to section 6.7, the home of the rule that Elise had mentioned for Corsica's sake, scanned every single entry, and determined there was no foul play there either.

"Yep. See for yourselves." I closed the book, stood up and stepped away. "It's not random, and if it is, it's really rare. Someone must have gotten rid of that particular rule for a reason."

Corsica and Ansel stood, waiting for me to elaborate.

"Now read Elise's letter again," I pressed, picking up the document and showing it to them. "She was way more specific about the contents of the rule about Corsica than the one about me and Ansel, right? And think about how she approached us and what she asked us to do. I'm guessing us going to the library to look all these up wasn't high on the list of things she thought we'd be doing. We're supposed to be waiting for her in the lab, after all." At a look from Ansel, I added, "Still would be, if she wasn't way tardy."

I started to pace. "Basically, what I'm getting at is that I think Elise knows this law is censored. Furthermore, not letting ponies know about a rule makes no sense if they're expected to abide by it, which means it probably only applies to ponies who are important enough to need to know about it. In fact, it would probably be the kind of rule big-shots would know off the tops of their heads, without needing to look it up." I turned to Corsica. "Now why would a rule like that apply to an unemployed little nobody like me? The more I think about it, there's only one thing I can conclude: somehow, completely by accident, we've poked our noses into something really, really big."

Corsica's eyes widened, and she whistled. "You're good."

"Just doing my job," I replied with a shrug. "So? What do you think?"

"I think you overlooked some things, but they might support your idea," Corsica carefully replied, taking the ledger and tapping it. "Remember when I was commiserating the other day about Elise trying to be a killjoy? She showed up about an hour or two after we first took the job, and one of her points was specifically that you were too young for me to get you tangled up in this. But she didn't make any legal arguments, which means she hadn't hit the books yet. But she still had a reason to want you specifically to stay away, off the top of her head. The point is, whatever they redacted here is important enough that she knew it without needing to look it up."

I blinked, staring. "Now that you mention it, I remember you saying that..."

Ansel stared to. "Does... this mean it's safe to conclude the job is canceled?"

"The only conclusion I have is that I want to talk to Elise," Corsica replied, shutting him down. "Yes, I'm taking this seriously, no, I'm not walking out on a huge bag of cash just because someone smells a fish." She turned back to me. "Although... What's that self-deprecating catchphrase of yours? You know, the reason you started us researching the chapel in the first place?"

My ears prickled at the jab. "Because I'm a very superstitious pony...?"

Corsica nodded. "And remember what you were telling me yesterday about an idea for the reason Icereach censors things? What was that reason again?"

My pupils slowly dilated. "They censor things that are... supernatural..." My butt hit the ground. "Oh."

This wasn't just really, really big. It was even bigger. Like a sleepy dragon, my curiosity reared its indomitable head.

Ansel groaned aloud, giving Corsica a death glare. "Why did you tell her that!?"

Corsica gave him her smuggest smirk. "Because she had a point, but I still want my job."

My breath caught in my throat. "You know what? Just for that, no. I'm absolutely going to harass the daylights out of Elise until she tells me what this law's all about, but I'm not gonna do a one-eighty just because this got more personal than it already was." I lowered my voice. "You asked me my opinion because you know I'm the more cautious of the two of us. Well, there it is."

Corsica frowned, and eventually nodded. Ansel looked immeasurably relieved.

"Tell you what," Corsica said. "We'll need to tell Aldebaran we had a change of heart, and our luggage is up there anyway. Besides, that's where Elise said she'd be in her letter. So what say you we head up there, grill Elise about it if we find her, and base our final decision off that? And if she doesn't show up, we do what you said."

"Yeah, that's probably smart," I agreed. "Wouldn't want them flying away with my stuff. Ugh, this is gonna be awkward, isn't it...?"

"When in doubt, blame everything on Elise." Corsica put back the treaty book with its redacted rule, strutting towards the library exit. "If she's costing us this opportunity, she's the one who gets to talk us out of it. Just let me handle this once we get there."

Ansel bowed, following. "Getting out of this suspicious gig, regardless of the means, is all I ask."

"Well," Ansel remarked, the three of us standing on the surface, "would you look at that."

"Guess we won't be flying tonight no matter what Elise says," Corsica added, staring at the sky.

Up above, near enough that it looked like you could touch it from the roof of the guard tower, a boiling carpet of black clouds raced north, rumpled and heavily textured and laced with sheet lightning. I picked a point and watched, and in less than ten seconds it was gone from the tall horizon: these clouds poured like frothing water toward a waterfall, an ultimate storm ready to unleash the fury of the mountains wherever it decided to break. No snow yet fell, but Nicov the gatekeeper hadn't waited around: the fortress gate was closed and abandoned, lights shining from the guard tower within.

"Hello, inclement weather," I breathed, craning my neck at the ferocious majesty. Something about the storm seemed to reach deep into my heart, and I might have gotten lost staring if Ansel hadn't bumped me to get me moving again.

We reached the gate, locked and closed. "...Wonder if Elise got locked inside?" Corsica guessed, eyeing the sturdy construction with a shrug. "Telekinesis is hard when you can't see what you're looking at, but you think I can find the opening mechanism?"

"Don't bother. They've probably got it closed for a reason." I eyed the crack between the wood and the ground. It was plenty dark out here, the sun thoroughly blotted by the river of clouds... "You know, actually, I've got another way I wanna try."

My friends both looked at me, so I explained. "You know about shadow swimming, right? I've heard batponies can take passengers, but never had reason to try. Wanna give experimental magic a shot?"

Corsica shrugged, walking up to me. "Okay."

I swallowed, putting a booted hoof over her back and quietly hoping that this would work. "Alright, hold your breath, don't think too hard about what you see, and kind of lean forward when I do. Okay?"

"Ready."

I fell forward, feeling the familiar sensation of dipping into the darkness, like a strange little ripple that was forced to accept my body. Corsica hit the ground with a smack.

Instantly, I surfaced again, realizing I had failed and wincing at the result. "Err... experimental... sorry..."

For a second, Corsica lay there with her eyes closed and a grimace on her face, before she picked herself up and dusted herself off. "Whatever. Better to find that out now than when we actually need it."

"Well, time for a new idea." I looked around, studying the gate. "Hmm. Maybe we do need to use your telekinesis to-"

The gate cracked open, and Ansel beckoned from the other side.

"Hey, how'd you get there?" I trailed off, seeing Corsica ask no questions and just slip through.

Once we were on the other side, Ansel closed the gate again and explained. "There's a hole in the wall that got knocked out just yesterday during a scuffle. Repair crews being what they are around here, it was only covered by a flimsy bit of plywood."

"The more you know..."

I gazed around the empty compound. It was thoroughly deserted, the sounds of an uproarious yak party breaking through the storm from the tower. Not like I could blame them. What else was there for them to do?

We got a glimpse of the nearby training area as we walked across to the tower entrance. It was completely taken up by Icereach's official institute airship, a vintage junker dubbed the Navarre. Everyone I knew who had flown on it said it was three decades old and several technological revolutions out of date... Why we still had such a bucket of bolts was a true testament to just how much Icereach's leadership cared about the sky, I supposed. At least they were smart enough to moor it on the ground for the storm.

But no, I looked up and there was the Aldebaran, floating free with its windows shining, right up scraping the clouds. Either Leif liked living it on the edge, or Rondo had some seriously impressive stabilizer tech in his engine and was taking the opportunity to show off.

Not a word was said as we navigated the tower's upper story, its panoramic windows giving a perfect view of the clouds tearing past overhead. Ansel coughed; I was reconsidering my opinion on Leif's earring now that we were actually in a storm and I could see how my brother was faring. Corsica didn't seem bothered as usual, but only by the cold: we stepped out onto the swaying, raised airship dock, and I had a feeling it was mostly the lee of the Aldebaran that kept us from being blown away.

"Maybe she just didn't want to make the trip back underground in this weather..." Corsica gritted her teeth, lifting a hoof to knock.

The door preemptively swung open. It was Elise.

"There you are!" Her eyes surveyed us, making important note that all three of us were here. "Get inside, quickly. This isn't weather for standing around talking under the elements."

Not like we needed an invitation, though I was hoping we could get back in the bunker before the storm got any worse...

The moment we were all inside, Rondo stepped over and bolted the door, testing the seal with his cheek and looking pleased when he didn't detect any flows of cold air. To my surprise, almost everyone was here: Leif and Vivace were both lounging around, with only Tempo visibly absent. It didn't look like a tense conversation had been taking place, either. Everyone kind of looked like they had been... hanging out.

"Hey, kids!" Leif greeted with a wave of a wing. "Ready to shove off?"

Ansel blanched.

"What?" Corsica looked taken aback. "Hold on, what's she doing here?" She pointed a hoof at Elise. "I thought you said we needed to talk, and that this could mean legal trouble for us. What's the deal with that one contract term? You know the one... And that aside, have you seen the weather out there?"

"Forget that! Have you seen the weather in here?" Rondo countered, slapping the floor. "Rock-solid, this ship! We've got her sturdier than the inside of that tower! This kind of engine, weather immunity comes with the technology. Not resistance, kid. Immunity."

I stared at the floor, which really did feel as steady beneath my hooves as the inside of Icereach's tunnels. Not like I was perfectly confident, but he seemed to have a point...

"My little pony, please." Elise cut in, her face serious. "I said I would be conducting my own check on the nature of the ongoings here, and that is what I have done. But it seems I substantially misread this situation."

"Eh?" I twitched my ears. "How so?"

"These are, in fact, ponies we have done business with before," Elise continued, standing at her full, petite height. "They work for Ironridge, and it is a matter of national interest that this expedition goes through in a hurried and timely manner. As such, I am coming with you."

The Tower

"You're... coming with us."

"I believe that is what I said." Elise nodded, surveying the three of us as Rondo finished securing the door against the weather. "I see you three are all present, and that you had luggage delivered ahead of time. Are you ready to depart?"

Ansel overcame his surprise and stomped a hoof. "Now hold on one crazed moment! You can't just pull an about-face on us like that! What about taking due time to consider? Not four hours ago, you apparently wrote us a note telling us this was a terrible idea."

Elise regarded him seriously. "I understand your reservations, my little pony. It is wise to give things consideration. However, as I said, the situation is substantially different than I first assumed. May I ask you take my own assessment as sufficient in this matter and allow us to explain further while we are on the way?"

"It's not so urgent that they couldn't stop to tune up their engine and stretch their legs, first," Ansel pointed out. I found myself agreeing. However Elise felt about this job, apparently Vivace didn't think rushing it was worth skipping out on a repeat visit to that noodle shop.

"Kid's got a point," Leif said to Elise, leaning on one side with her forelegs crossed. "I'm not fully keyed in on the dynamic between these three, but this job isn't smiles and rainbows for everyone involved. We can wait around and explain here. The likes of us have all the time in the world."

Elise raised an eyebrow. "Be that as it may, I do not. My position within the institute has a demanding schedule."

"None of us are forcing you come," Vivace noted. "I shouldn't have to lecture a grown mare on the importance of prioritization."

"And I have decided that this mission is an urgent enough priority that it is worth carrying out with all due speed," Elise declared. "Needless to say, I also outrank you. Corsica, Halcyon, Ansel?"

I stared around the room, dumbstruck. Leif looked downright chagrined at being usurped aboard her own aircraft - at least, I assumed she was the leader. Vivace seemed unspecifically grumpy, and Rondo wore a poker face. Elise looked... tense, but she was hiding it well. Something big had clearly happened here before we arrived.

"How about no?" Ansel raised an aggressive eyebrow. "I'm pretty sure you can't just change your mind so quickly about something and then ask us to trust that you haven't lost your marbles before giving any semblance of an explanation. Not that I know you all that well, but aren't you supposed to be a bureaucrat who's level-headed and procedural?"

Elise glanced at me and Corsica. "May I assume you speak for your friends on this matter as well? This is, after all, Corsica's job."

"Ansel's our voice of caution," I responded, stepping up at his side. The last thing I wanted was to doubt Elise, but... "I think I've gotta be with him. What's going on, here?"

"...This is suspicious," Corsica agreed. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not about to walk away." She looked at Elise. "But after the runaround you gave us with that letter, this'll cost you major street cred if your explanation's not up to snuff."

Leif banged a booted forehoof on a table. "Democracy rules! This ship's not going anywhere until everyone's happy with what's going on."

Ansel relaxed a little, and I nodded. "Well?"

"Yeah." Corsica nodded. "Let's hear it. Why's Elise acting so... whatever?"

Elise stared crossly at Leif for a tense moment, then eventually sighed. "Very well. This is your duty to explain."

Rondo looked at Vivace. Vivace looked at Leif. Leif straightened her shoulders and shrugged.

"To make a very long story short," she began, "we're undercover auditors from Ironridge, and no, this isn't a job to investigate an ether cave for potential sale value. I'm sincerely sorry for any misrepresentation when we met at earlier ventures. Some form of cover story was necessary for our operations, and we were hoping we could get you to visit and stick around longer to explain all this before the moment before departure."

I let that sink in, remembering how Corsica had apparently left early the previous day while we were here. Had Leif been planning to broach the subject then, and we just didn't stay long enough? My own departure had been abrupt, as well...

"Anyway," Leif continued, "the reason we're here is to investigate a serious potential breach of treaty by Yakyakistani officials in the Icereach administration. You likely know some of this already, but the set of rules both nations agree to abide by in the governance of this research colony are extremely complex. This isn't your ordinary loophole finagling, though. We have compelling evidence that someone high up is using Icereach talent and time to covertly design highly advanced weapons."

I felt my eyes widen. Really?

"...What kind of weapons are we talking about?" Ansel asked skeptically. "Rockets are just fast flying machines that can go really high, right? Doesn't seem like it would be that hard to pack one full of dynamite and fly it over someone you don't like. The same bit of technology can be used all sorts of ways. Or do you have something with evil weapon literally written on it?"

"It's easy to feel that way before you've seen it," Leif warned. "Just a disclaimer before we show you this so you don't freak out: our boss in Ironridge assembled this from ninety-two percent complex parts that have been patented in Icereach within the last five years. The remaining eight percent is a custom control system just to make sure we haven't accidentally built something we'll really regret giving life to. Rondo?"

Rondo tapped his hooves against the floor in a quick, rhythmic pattern that sounded like some sort of code, then nodded towards the stairs that led down to the hold. "Take a look."

A cold light flashed, and something emerged from below, almost a pony and yet very much not. Sleek, gleaming, silvery metal covered its body, fitting tightly enough to be skin instead of armor. Its legs reinforced the perception, slightly more spindly and angular than all but the slightest schoolfilly, and its entire body felt blown back and streamlined, the effect accentuated by thin, glowing conduits of teal that coursed in sleek patterns down its neck and across its chest and sides. Fine mechanical ears turned delicately to face us, and it surveyed the room with pupilless, glowing eyes that had no whites, only teal.

But none of that was what caught my attention the most. No, what I was fixated on was that its wings, flexing with sturdy hinges and transparent crystalline blades, were very clearly inertial stabilizer rotors.

"What the...?" I gaped.

"Is this for real?" Corsica seared it with her eyes, clearly noticing the same thing I had.

"Impossible," Ansel whispered, eyes wide. "It moves just like a pony..."

I nodded, realizing he wouldn't have the same background as us. "Yeah, and that's Icereach tech, alright. I literally found one of those wings laying around the other day."

"You recognize it?" Leif looked slightly surprised. "Well, that will make explaining significantly easier. We call this a Whitewing unit, and it's exactly what it looks like. This one is perfectly loyal to us - to Rondo, specifically - but you don't want to mess with it in a fight. Our mission at large is to figure out who designed this, how they were able to pull it off, and what they intend to do with them. If you've got questions before we get on to how this relates to you, then shoot."

"You're saying Yakyakistan commissioned this?" Corsica asked, a lot more alert now that the Whitewing was in the room.

Vivace shook his head. "Strictly speaking, we don't know for sure. It was made using parts designed by unrelated teams all across Icereach, each one with a separate function ostensibly tying it to Icereach's space mission. That means the only person who could have coordinated the necessary parts to all be designed, with strict enough specifications to ensure they could all be put together, would have been a senior project manager or higher. Someone with the ability to set design agendas all across your institute. And since it wasn't Ironridge, that doesn't leave a lot of options."

Corsica, Ansel and I all looked at each other. "So why us?" Ansel pressed, apparently able to put aside the fact that we had just been told our home might be designing mechanical, weaponized ponies.

"Yes, why you." Leif retook the floor, stepping forward. "We will be exploring a remote mountain cave. However, instead of ether crystals, it leads to a secure underground hideout that looks like a doomsday shelter for someone fairly influential. The first time we went there, we took care of all the security, so physically it should be completely safe. What we weren't able to defeat was a terminal controlling a genetic lock of some sort that functions via unicorn horn analysis. We analyzed the analyzer, though, and are fairly confident it's imprecise enough that a close family relation could still de-activate it. Are you following?"

Corsica frowned. "No?"

"Are you saying it belongs to Graygarden?" I asked, squinting. Corsica was the only unicorn among us, and he was her only blood relation...

"We've seen strong indications it belongs to a head scientist of Icereach," Leif replied. "Given the secretive nature of Icereach's administrations prior to the current treaty, a negative match would be almost as interesting to us as a positive one. You've got the right of it, though. We're thinking that if this does happen to be some sort of hideaway for your father, Corsica, and he as the chief representative of Yakyakistan is behind this project, unlocking this terminal could provide invaluable evidence for our investigation."

I glanced quietly at Elise. Suddenly learning that her Yakyakistani counterpart was suspected of being a traitor? That sure must have been a lot to take in. Maybe it explained why she was acting as antsy as she was. Although some things still seemed strange to me...

"So you're just casually asking Corsica to commit espionage against her dad," Ansel said, seating himself. "Not that I doubt she'd be all over the idea, but isn't that a little...?"

"Lacking in class? Perhaps." Rondo shrugged. "We were considering being a bit more discreet in how we asked, but after seeing you two interact in person, we decided you wouldn't appreciate it."

"...Hallie." Corsica turned to me. "You're the terminal expert. Have you ever heard of a security system like that?"

I shrugged. "Don't look at me. A terminal's just a switchboard with a fancy screen to show you what's what. This would be up to whatever machine's doing your the scanning. I've never heard of analyzing genetics based on a unicorn horn before, but biology's pretty far from my field..."

"The best security systems are the ones that you don't let anyone practice trying to crack," Leif pointed out. "Anyway, did that clear anything up?"

"In some areas. But riddle me this," Ansel said. "If old Graygarden really had something hidden out in these mountains, and he knew about it, how did he not catch on to what you lot were up to? The way I heard it, it sounded like he practically threw Corsica out the door to go on this job."

"Perhaps we were suitably convincing in our presentation," Vivace suggested.

"As Rondo alluded to, we've heard there's something of a rift between you two," Leif said to Corsica. "My condolences, by the way. The pessimistic answer would be that he's hiding something, assumes we found it and wouldn't mind seeing you on the opposite side of any conflict he thinks we might create, yet doesn't think anything he can do could stop us from investigating. The optimistic answer is that it's not his hideout and he knows nothing about it."

Ansel frowned. "Well, that's fine and all, but you still only explained why Corsica needs to be there. What about Hallie and myself? Inviting us along on a happy little pleasure cruise to hang out with our friend is one thing, but this sounds like the kind of affair where the fewer ponies are involved, the better."

"...Do you really want us to answer that?" Leif averted her eyes. "You say you do, but if you haven't figured it out yet, this is the uncomfortable part to explain."

Ansel stared levelly at her.

"It's simple," Vivace said from the side. "Whoever is responsible for this Whitewing design holds a lot of sway in Icereach. We're hiring Corsica to assist us in working to uncover them. In the event that she draws the ire of an influential criminal, we decided it would be prudent to close off as many avenues for retaliation as possible."

My eyes went wide, and I stared at Leif. "Wait a minute, so when you were pressing me for stories the other day, you just wanted to see if we were close enough that someone might...?" I trailed off, the reality of his words sinking in.

"In the interest of disclosure, yes," Leif sighed, "though that doesn't mean I didn't legitimately enjoy our conversation. Now, I want to be crystal clear that we're not trying to scare you into coming along. If any of you stay in Icereach? We've already left Tempo behind to keep an eye on things, but we might leave an even larger presence just to ensure no trouble starts while we're away. You aren't being obligated to come. Either way, it's our job to make sure you kids aren't accidentally caught up in the nastier side of all this. We just decided you might prefer the opportunity to stick together."

I swallowed, feeling slightly cold. "So say Corsica does unlock this machine. What then? Everything goes back to normal, right?"

Ansel mutely nodded.

"That's where it gets complicated," Leif apologized. "There are so many ways this could shake out that it's difficult to speculate. And it depends on a lot of things we likely won't learn down in that cave and may not know for a while. Best case for you is that there somehow is a third party responsible for this instead of Yakyakistan. That would mean everything can go back to the way it was in Icereach once we find them and take them out. Another possibility is that this is coming from Yakyakistan, but not the highest reaches of their government. In that case, the perpetrators would still have to get rooted out, but the treaty itself would still be intact and Icereach would continue to function under new management. But if it came to a situation where Icereach and its treaty were no longer feasible... Let's cross that bridge when we come to it. But if it does happen, Ironridge will look out for you."

Ansel looked pale. "What about Mother?" he asked. "You're saying we'd transplant our lives from one city to another, aren't you? But we have family in Icereach."

"She'll come too," Vivace muttered. "And in the meantime, remember that we left Tempo. She'll make sure there are no nasty surprises for anyone you care about in retaliation for messing with the powers that be."

Retaliation. There that word was again. I adjusted my bracelet, hiding it in my coat's short sleeve as a nervous tick.

Corsica looked spooked. "How did we even get involved with something like this? Not why; you just explained that. But, like, why?"

"We're in over our heads," I hollowly agreed. "I don't..."

This wasn't how I imagined my first trip outside Icereach going at all.

"We're not past the point where you can back out," Leif reminded, standing straighter. "Halcyon, Ansel. I'm sorry we've had to drop this on you all at once, but this is the way things are. If that's too much, you can stay home, and Tempo will look out for you as well. Corsica-"

"Corsica's presence is required," Elise apologized, breaking her long silence. "I am sorry to make this mandatory, but it is critical to the security of Ironridge and Icereach that we see this investigation through. As you are affiliated with the Institute, you fall under my jurisdiction and authority. You must come."

Corsica blinked, then scoffed. "Oh, you mean my title as Chairmare of Nothing? What are you going to do, fire me?"

"I was going to say," Leif said through gritted teeth and a polite smile, "that if Corsica wasn't comfortable with the situation, she can walk out as well, because we are a competent and flexible group of ponies who know how to find other ways to pursue our goal should the one we're working on fail to pan out. And she can of course keep the down payment for this job as an apology for getting her all caught up in this. But you know best, administrator."

The tension in the room felt like static crawling through my fur, and I quickly pulled myself back together in order to intervene. "I think we've got the picture," I announced, nudging Corsica's side. "It sounds like the three of us need a private huddle to decide what we're gonna do, yeah?"

Ansel nodded solemnly, and Corsica looked all too happy to get in the final word with Elise. The other ponies respectfully moved over, giving us a corner of the ship where we could discuss in slightly more private.

"Well?" Corsica whispered once we were all hunkered down.

"I'm only going to say this once," Ansel breathed. "I'm a hundred and ten percent against this. Whether or not they're telling the truth, this is something we don't want to get mixed up in, and I have a bad feeling that no matter what we do here we're not going to have heard the last of this. That said... Hallie, I think I finally understand what you were talking about yesterday, and I feel the same. If the two of you are going, and there's nothing I can do to change that, I'd rather join up than sit at home and do nothing. We go together or not at all."

"Thanks," I murmured back, nudging him in appreciation. "But don't write us off as going for sure. Corsica, what do you think?"

Corsica shrugged. "She literally just told us she'd let us take the money and run. At this point, I'd say screw this job, if it weren't for Elise. The last thing I need is two Icereach executives breathing down my ears."

"What's up with her, anyway?" Ansel quietly pressed. "Usually, you two talk about her like she's one of the more reasonable higher-ups. Got a head leveler than the Yak Hoof, and all that."

"I dunno." I scratched my ears. "I'm pretty sure I trust these Aldebaran ponies. If I were in their position, I would have made an alibi too." Besides, I lived behind a mask most of the time anyway, so how hard could I fault someone for lying to me when their intentions were purely beneficial? "And I usually trust Elise. She's one of the most trustworthy ponies in Icereach."

Ansel nodded. "I sense a 'but' coming..."

"But this isn't how a level-headed pony should behave," Corsica answered. "So she's got some startling news and she's shaken. Big deal. I bet you it's happened before. Even if she was getting some nerves, is she the kind of pony who would show it?"

"Yeah, you're right," I whispered. "And there's a few other things that don't add up about her either."

"Like, why wouldn't she know about this already?" Ansel agreed. "If she's the Ironridge top brass, you'd think they'd tell her they were sending someone to stick their noses in this, or at least that Leitmotif's team would tell her ahead of time themselves."

"Hmmm..." I frowned. "I dunno. I could see them having reasons not to, I guess. But maybe. Anyway, what about that censored law? How would anything Leif told us explain why Elise originally cared about keeping you and me away? How would it explain why Icereach censored that law in the first place? And why isn't Elise telling us this stuff herself? It was like she was making Leif and her crew do the work of explaining everything."

Corsica nodded firmly. "Something's definitely off with Elise. What do you think she knows that we don't?"

"Honestly, it feels more to me like she's forgotten things than learned things," Ansel pointed out. "Or don't you have a giant letter full of legal cautions and arguments she hasn't referenced one time since we got here? The smart way to go about getting us back on board would be to go through the individual things she said in there and explain why they've changed. Not let someone else drone on about how high the stakes are."

I stared at the ground, squirming a little inside. There were few things worse than doubting the ponies you looked up to, and a part of me wanted to cling to what Elise said and take her word at face value, but... my friends had made good points. I had made good points. The best explanation I could see was that maybe, somehow, Elise was behind the Whitewings and Leif didn't know...

Maybe Elise wasn't acting strangely, and we were just misreading the situation. That would be a comforting thought. On the other hoof, what if...?

"Hey, Ansel," I conspiratorially hissed. "What if that isn't really Elise?"

He blinked. "How do you...?" And then, slowly, his eyes focused as he caught my meaning. "No. Not a chance."

"What?" Corsica stared at us. "What if Elise isn't actually Elise? How can a pony not be themselves?"

Ansel waved a dismissive hoof, his serious demeanor evaporating in a heartbeat. "Oh, nothing to worry your pretty head about. Maybe we'll tell you when you're older."

Corsica bristled. "This is no time for-!"

"Settle down, you two." I pushed between them before anything could start. "Listen, what I'm thinking is this. I dunno about Elise, but I definitely trust Leif, Rondo and Vivace. Let's say we assume there's trouble brewing and it's coming whether we like it or not. We could be at home with only our wits and a sack of cash, or we could be on an airship with some folks who have strong ties to Ironridge, a great medic, and know a lot about fighting. I've kind of gotten the image that these Aldebaran ponies care more about honor and playing fair with us than obeying power structures or following the rules. So by that logic, maybe we should go with them just to stay safe. Besides, they literally said that was why they invited us."

Ansel slowly, unhappily nodded. "I suppose when you put it that way... But exactly how much confidence do you have in these ponies? Any charitable acts and good first impressions aside, it still stands that you've known them for barely half a week."

I paused, giving that as much consideration as I was able. "I'm not sure," I eventually decided. "But, I've had a lot longer and a lot more reasons to learn to trust Elise, and right now my instinct's saying that maybe I should slow down and think about her. Instincts are powerful. And I've got a good feeling about Aldebaran."

"Instincts are powerful," Ansel agreed, "which is why it sure isn't helpful when yours say the opposite of mine. I'll give you that they sure seem more on the side of the common folk than Elise is right now, but what if it's all a good-cop-bad-cop routine? You heard them saying how dangerous it would be for us not to come."

I frowned. "You say that like Elise and the Aldebaran ponies are literally in cahoots to kidnap us, or something. I know Elise is behaving weird, but isn't that way far out there?"

Corsica flicked her tail. "What she said. There's gotta be a simpler explanation for this."

Ansel shrugged. "If you ask me, one boatload of fraudsters and Elise having a temporary break with reality is a lot simpler than Icereach being the stage of a vast conspiracy. Outside of this ship, can you name even one thing you've seen to back up their claims?"

"How about Icereach's constant research delays?" Corsica offered. "Sure would make sense if they're not getting in the air because some project manager is having them unknowingly design Whitewing parts instead."

"I'll do you one better," I added. "There's literally a Whitewing wing in my bag over there. It's called an inertial stabilizer rotor, and it's one hundred percent Icereach tech. I always thought it was odd, how pretty it looked when no one was ever gonna see it. The fact that it's actually meant to be a wing makes way more sense than any other explanation for how it looks like that."

Ansel gritted his teeth, then thought for a moment. "...Well, I suppose you have a point or two. So where does this leave us?"

Corsica hesitated, averting her eyes. I frowned. Usually, she was the kind of pony who made a decision and rolled with it - seeing her put this much thought into something was unusual and almost as worrying as everything Leif had just said. My friend's reaction made it more real.

I had to do something. "Let's look at this logically," I began. "Who do we trust, across all of Icereach and excluding each other? Mother's my number one, but she's in no shape to deal with any of the stuff we're talking about, here. Second is Elise, most of the time, but not really right now. Third is Balthazar. So why don't we go with him on what to do?"

Both of them nodded. "Sounds good, with one tiny problem," Corsica decided. "Has anyone else got a funny feeling Elise wouldn't want us talking about this investigation to the local army?"

"Isn't that another reason not to trust Elise?" Ansel pointed out. "You just assumed in cold blood that she'll try to block us from doing the smart and safe thing."

"I'm not saying we should trust Elise," I pushed back, waving a hoof at him. "I'm saying we should trust Balthazar. And the Aldebaran's been moored here for the better part of a week, and Rondo's been hanging out with the yaks, and last I talked to him Balthazar seemed pretty gung ho about this trip. He may not know the full details, but he's a pretty good judge of character who usually doesn't need them to figure out the important stuff. What I'm saying is, I trust him, I trust these ponies, he trusts these ponies... Ignoring Elise, I'll bet you anything that if we go, we'll be in good hooves. Right?"

Corsica still looked conflicted, but eventually she spoke up. "All I know is, I wish we get back safe and in one piece. I wanna know what's up with Elise, and I think going is the best way to get to the bottom of this. And worst comes to worst, we're a bit better at taking care of ourselves than most of the ponies in Icereach. So don't worry, okay? I'll watch your backs."

"Sounds like that's it, then," Ansel sighed. "We're in. I wish your wish comes true, and that we've chosen wisely. Although I'm willing to bet that if we get screwed, it wasn't because we chose wrong, but because there was no right choice in the first place."

"Buck up, you little pessimist." Corsica tousled his mane, earning a strangled noise of surprise, and straightened up from the huddle. "We're not gonna get screwed. Hey! Decisions are final, we're in!"

The adults all looked up from a discussion they had been holding - at least, the adults sans Elise, who was standing in an opposite corner. Leif winked. "Hey, that's the spirit! Remember, if any reservations come up halfway through, just talk to me and we'll sort something out. So, think we should start with our itinerary for the trip?"

"Hold up," I interrupted, pointing a wing at Elise. "One thing first. As a show of good faith, what's section 6.7 of the Icereach-Ironridge employment contract?"

Elise tilted her head. "Is this in regards to the letter I left you?"

"Yeah," I replied primly. "We went to the library to look it up, but they didn't have an available copy. I was wondering what it was about?"

Elise shook her head. "Unfortunately, it's classified. There isn't much I can do to elaborate."

Corsica raised an eyebrow in surprise. "You really remembered that?"

"Of course." I shrugged. "Not like me to give up when hitting a dead end."

I was silent as both of them dropped it. I had remembered the numbers, but 6.7 was the rule that applied to Corsica, not to me. Hers wasn't classified. Elise had explained it in the letter. And, as Corsica had pointed out in the library, Elise seemed to have been familiar enough with the censored rule that she had it on her mind before doing any legal research, indicating its number wasn't one she was likely to forget.

Maybe, somehow, this was an innocent mistake, but... as much as I trusted the Aldebaran ponies, something was badly up with Elise.

"First off, our schedule," Leif was saying, Rondo having descended from the engine room again and everyone gathered around to participate. "The facility we found is only about four or five hours away, thanks to our fast ship. Problem is, it's night, there's a storm, and the area is pretty poorly mapped, so while we have landmarks, it could take any number of extra hours to actually find the place again. So the current plan is to get to the general vicinity overnight, find it, and then descend at the crack of dawn. We'll aim to be back out before dusk, though it's a long climb so be ready for anything. You'll get back to Icereach either very late tomorrow or very early the next day, depending on our luck with spelunking."

"Question. How fast is this thing?"

Leif nodded at Ansel. "The ship? Under present conditions, we're about a seven-day flight from Ironridge, if that gives you an idea. She's about twice as fast as your typical commercial freighter at normal cruising speed, but a whole lot more maneuverable and weatherproof. Crazy-fast burst speed if we wanted to wreck our power supply, though. If you want us to floor it to see what it feels like, it might not hurt to stress-test Rondo's work on the engine."

Ansel glanced warily at the engine room. "Let's not and then tell everyone we did. I'd rather not see us impact the wrong end of a mountain."

Rondo chuckled. "With the material this thing's hull is made of, it's more like the mountain would impact the wrong end of us!"

Ansel slumped his plush reading chair. "Hardly reassuring, but suit yourselves..."

"We're all practiced pilots," Vivace promised, sitting in the pilot's seat. "And we're not about to wreck this ship. But just in case, that's one of the reasons we've left ourselves all night to get there. If the speed doesn't sit with you, we have time to slow down."

Rondo waved a grease-caked hoof. "Eh, it's not like you know how fast you're going in a ship anyway. Once, a great philosopher put herself in a box and had it moved around, all to prove it was acceleration that-"

"As lovely as that is," Leif interrupted, "how about we fire her up for real just to show you what we're dealing with? I promise she's as smooth of a ride as they come."

"Agreed," Vivace grunted, turning to the control panel and pulling a conspicuous lever.

The ship awoke, and anything I might have said was swiftly lost. A pair of previously-invisible conduits that lined the ceiling came alive with teal, transforming the ship's interior from a cozy, dimly-lit bronze to a room illuminated bright as day. The floor pulsed with a passing wave of vibration, and suddenly I could feel us moving, still resisting the wind yet now drifting up and away from the dock outdoors. I rushed to a window to see the clouds twisting, breaking their northern march to flow nearer to us, as if constrained by a massive magnetic field.

"Looks like all systems are go!" Rondo shouted, racing back to the engine room. "So, how about that stress test?"

Corsica shrugged, taking a loose stance. "Bring it on."

"Maybe we could not?" Ansel suggested warily, sinking into his chair.

"How about half a stress test?" I offered, bracing myself for anything and thinking about how much more fun I could be having if it wasn't for Elise. I was certain there was something up with her, and someone who could do something about it needed to know. Maybe Leif, if I could get her alone...

Vivace sat up straighter in the captain's chair with a nod. "Half a stress test. Unless you've practiced your sea legs, you might want to take a seat."

"Nah, just brace yourselves," Leif encouraged, taking a stance like me. "Acceleration is fun!"

Seeing even her prepare made me redouble my posture. No matter my thoughts or concerns, I wasn't about to be felled by a lowly burst of thrust.

Corsica raised an eyebrow at me, making no move to brace herself. Ansel hugged his anchored reading chair.

Slowly, we continued rising, turning east as the ship dipped into the billowing sea of clouds... and Vivace floored a lever, and we were gone.

Several things crashed around me, and I felt my boots skid a good few paces along the floor as Leif whooped in excitement and Vivace put Rondo's work to the test. Half of a test, allegedly, but it sure didn't feel like it. A hollow rumbling filled my ears, and I leaned forward, dug in, and somehow stayed upright as we evened out from our mad burst of acceleration. Even if I was crouched low enough to be only a few inches off the floor.

"Oh, baby!" Rondo cheered from up above. "The metrics on this thing are ludicrous, Leitmotif! Do it again! I think that tune-up squeezed out a whole extra three percent...!"

"Maybe let's let one time be enough," Leif encouraged, her mane blown back as she offered a wing to help me up. I took it and glanced around: Ansel was slightly dazed, a box near the galley had fallen over, and Elise was standing perfectly at ease, a bemused expression on her face. Corsica, however, had capsized and was laying against the back wall in a blushing heap.

"You could have warned me better," she grumbled, staggering to her hooves and beginning the daunting task of fixing her tail and mane.

Vivace shrugged, sitting fine in the captain's seat as we streaked through the heavens, coasting on momentum as we returned to a much slower speed. "You could have taken the warning I did give more seriously."

Part of me was still dwelling on Elise, looking for reasons to second-guess my decision for us to come along. Part of me was still terrified for Leif's depiction of what might be going on under the surface of Icereach's quiet local leadership. But stronger than either of those was the part that saw that we were honestly, truly flying. I wanted to rush to a window and glue my face to it and stare at how high up we were.

Unfortunately for all three, stronger yet was the part that saw Corsica, remembered her reaction when I hit my nose while trying to knock, and saw an opportunity for revenge.

"I could laugh," I whispered, sidling up to her and grinning stupidly. "And then we'd be even for yesterday with the door. Or perhaps I'll be the bigger mare, hmm? How about we-"

Corsica bopped my nose with a sucker punch, sending me reeling. "Ow, ow, fine," I admitted, rubbing it with a wing. "Killjoy."

"I'll bite you," Corsica threatened, removing her ear ornaments one at a time and brushing her mane.

Mission accomplished. I moved to a window to watch as Leif started talking again.

"Anyway, if that's cleared up, let's move on to the rules for the ship," Leif declared, looking slightly embarrassed. "First, a tour of where is where." She pointed to the two ladders that led up above, the back one first. "Engine room. That's Rondo's domain. Whatever you do, look, don't touch, unless you want to have a kiss-kiss-slap relationship with gravity. With a side of charred fur." She turned to the forward ladder, about halfway along the main cabin. "Observation room, and my private quarters. The observation room, help yourselves to; the view is great. My quarters? They're mine. Private means private, so no entry under any circumstances. Got it?"

I nodded, looking more at the window than wherever Leif was pointing. We were skimming so close to the clouds, it felt like we were hanging from them, like the storm was a giant zipline and the ship was a gondola. Below, the jagged, snowy spike of a mountain slowly drifted past, white around the base and slopes but turning gray as it got higher up, the needle-like tip too rigid for snow to easily cling to. In fact, most of the mountains here looked the same, a collection of tall, spindly spires that were nothing like the bunched ridges of Icereach...

"Main level." Leif moved on to the area we were presently in. "This is the living area, where you'll probably spend most of your time. Make yourselves at home, but stay out of the pilot's chair and don't touch the control panel unless you want to find out whether Rondo was exaggerating about what would happen if we rammed a mountain. Got it? Controls are only for Rondo, Vivace and me."

Corsica nodded too. How could the terrain already be this different? Was it the high-up view? I felt like I was shrinking progressively the more I looked, entire mountains small enough to fit in my living room...

"Outer deck." Leif stepped up right beside me, pointing to the two doors to the U-shaped area around the prow. "We don't have much of a walkable roof, so if you want some fresh air, it's there or bust. However, I personally advise not doing it at night, during a storm, while we're moving at these speeds. But that's just a preference, you do you!"

Wind whipped around the outer deck so hard I swore I could see it. The ship was so steady, I was almost starting to take it for granted, but now that she had reminded me... I was very glad we weren't aboard the junker Navarre.

"Galley." Leif pointed to a small kitchen unit across from several racks that I noticed held the luggage Corsica and I had dropped off earlier. "If you're a cooking savant, try it out. It's the best way to become a local celebrity. If you're not, try it at your own risk, because the chef has to taste-test all their creations."

I eyed it with interest, finally breaking away from the window. A chance to cook, huh? With better ingredients than Mother's pantry, maybe? I could do something with that. Courtesy of my doppelganger talent, I was actually a pretty mean chef... Peanut butter and tinned fruit just didn't give me the greatest opportunities to practice.

"Now, here, we have the cargo hold." Leif moved on to a wide staircase leading down, near the back of the room where the Whitewing had emerged. "It's full of... well... cargo. Not really, because we travel light and the ship is new, but you know. If you ever need anything, you can try looking down there, but there's honestly not a lot we have that's useful. Nothing private, though, so feel free to explore it."

She shook her head. "And then we have the rest of the cabins here at the stern," Leif finished, indicating two doors on the main floor and two that were visible at the bottom of the staircase into the hold. "Four rooms, plus mine up top. Tempo's and Rondo's on this floor, Vivace's below, and the other one down there is a special case."

"So where are we sleeping?" Corsica asked, now pretending she had never tripped at all.

"A perfect segue again!" Leif chirped, spinning on her hooves. "Elise got Tempo's room; we negotiated it before Tempo headed out an hour before you showed up. The rest of you..." She blinked, rubbing the bridge of her muzzle. "Are you good sharing a room? I was about to say you can have Room Five, but figured I should ask."

"Err..." I glanced at Corsica and Ansel. On the one hand, Corsica and I had just tried this the previous night. On the other, she might try to get revenge for me calling her bed-head cute. Assuming she remembered. And the more ponies I was around, the more likely I was to give up and just spend the night in my boots... but I would much rather have a room of my own than sleep in public, where I'd have to wear my coat too.

"We slept in today," Corsica volunteered. "We'll probably be up for hours anyway. If Ansel has a more normal schedule, we can share a room in shifts."

Ansel nodded, accepting this as fine.

"Well, okay then!" Leif declared, looking relieved. "You three can have Room Five. So, the deal with Room Five is that we only have four official members, but there's a fifth provisional member who sometimes flies with us and usually doesn't. But she has her own room. It's complicated, but the important part is, she's not here right now. And we're not especially close, so if someone else used her room while she wasn't here to defend it? Stinks to be her. Just try to, like, roll with the decor and not completely remodel the place for me. It might be a bit eccentric, but everything looks the same with the lights out, yeah?"

Okay, now I was morbidly curious.

"Just to make it obvious, though, we take our rooms pretty seriously," Leif continued. "Tempo's and Five are special cases because their owners aren't here, but mine, Rondo's, Vivace's? Absolutely off-limits. The same courtesy applies from us to you, of course. While you fly with us, yours are yours. We all need our me-space sometimes, and this is the best way to keep everyone happy and getting along, so that's one of the ship's only two hard rules. The other being that the pony in the captain's seat has final word on anything, but that's just in case of emergencies so we have a chain of command. Whew! I think that's everything, so any questions or objections?"

"I wanna see this room we've signed up for," I spoke up, stepping gamely forward. "You make it sound like a skeleton closet. What are this mare's tastes, eh? Is she really into colt bands?"

Leif stepped aside with a twinkle in her eye, motioning to a door at the foot of the stairs that was evidently unlocked. "Oh, you'll find out."

Ansel bowed out, opting to let Corsica and I handle the horrors. Grimly, we marched in lockstep down to the completely unassuming wooden door. Why was Leif building suspense about this? Maybe it was some sort of joke to break the tension from earlier...

"Any predictions?" I whispered in Corsica's ear as we stopped outside it. "Watch it be totally empty and they're just trying to prank us."

"No comment, money's on you're wrong," Corsica whispered back, taking the handle in her aura. "Together?"

"Yeah." I tried to quiet my adrenaline.

Corsica swung open the door. We both took a single step inside and blinked.

The room was simultaneously dainty and a huge mess, as if it belonged to someone with the money to afford a lot of baubles but not the wherewithal to take care of them. But on second glance, it appeared a lot more messy and claustrophobic than it actually was, courtesy of a huge number of posters covering the walls, ceiling and every available surface. And every single poster was about mares.

Mares singing. Mares with lustrous coats and manes showing off hygiene products. Mares in business suits. Mares in poofy ballroom attire. Mares sailing or riding airships. Mares dancing with other mares. Mares standing underneath star-strewn skies. Mares in the rain. Mares surveying grand vistas, mares sitting in elegant, modern rooms, mares eating cucumber sandwiches, everything...

There was so much, I wasn't sure that even given an hour I could take it all in. But every last one depicted something either grand or refined. There was nothing wasted, nothing low-effort, nothing dull, inelegant, or even unkempt, despite so many of them being set outdoors. It was an odd contrast, when all the posters clearly showed off the owner's ordered definition of beauty, yet the curled corners and overlapping edges and wanton disregard for order in actually putting up the posters gave the presentation a childlike chaos. I got the faint image of a pony looking in from the darkness through a window...

This place was a portrait of who someone wanted to be, and all the distance they had to go to get there. It was exactly like my room.

Corsica still hadn't spoken.

"...What do you think?" I turned slowly to glance at her, for some reason feeling slightly defensive.

"I don't get it," Corsica said after a while, scanning the posters thoroughly. "There's nothing dirty. Not even a little smooching. It's a private room, and it's obvious what the owner has on her mind, but everything here is completely and utterly in good taste."

"Obvious what she's got on her mind, eh?" I went back to regarding the posters. "Then why's it confusing, what they're about?"

Corsica tried to say something, and trailed off, stumped.

I shook my head. How could such a brilliant scientist be so emotionally dense?

"Well?" Leif asked, standing two steps outside the door. "Think you can deal?"

Corsica flicked her ears. "I'm still trying to figure out what's so wrong with it. Other than that there's only one bed. This doesn't look that private to me."

Yep. She had completely missed it.

"Yeah, we'll take it," I agreed, figuring that Corsica wasn't about to back out and the room would probably be happier with at least one pony around who understood.

"Cool! Let someone know if you need us to dig out a spare bedroll, if you're not comfortable sharing." Leif turned her back and left, leaving us alone in the poster shrine.

Corsica turned to me and shrugged. "I guess she prefers her sapphic fantasies to be E-rated. What about you? See any I missed?"

I walked up to the wall, feeling like I had to speak up in the room's defense. "Yeah. I dunno about sapphic fantasies, but look at this."

It was a picture of a filly sitting in a chair, her mother carefully brushing her long, shiny mane. They were in a pool of light in a large, dim room.

"Now check out this one," I continued, moving along and pointed at another, a larger poster showing a mare standing atop a parapet and looking out over an immense valley of rolling greens and yellows without another township in sight, a distant mountain chain almost lost on the blue horizon.

"And this one, even." My wing landed on a mare who stood on a stage, dancing, for an empty audience. "Rich. Grand. Physically gentle, but emotionally harsh. Sometimes romantic, and sometimes dead opposite. These were clearly chosen by someone ambitious. She's a mare who likes money and status, but is too familiar with it to have been born into it, if that makes any sense. Someone who spends a ton of time looking at things, probably from the outside in. I'll bet you she's traveled against her will, too, because she likes epic scenery, but a lot of these feel crazy lonely, like someone who might not have a home to return to. You see all the ones for beauty products? I'll bet you she thinks she's the best and only tool she has, and is used to working and persuading ponies to get what she wants. Maybe even a little pushy, which could explain why the others didn't seem extremely fond of her. Furthermore, it's all very classy. Look at this fancy attire! And even though this is supposed to be a private room, you're right that there's nothing dirty to be seen. Nah, she's way too proud for that. I'll bet you her pride's real important to her, because it's all she has. Because if she really had all the rest of the stuff in these posters, why would she keep them around?"

Finally finished, I took a deep breath, spun on a hoof, and stared Corsica in the eye. "I'd say you missed quite a bit, eh?"

Corsica was staring at me with her jaw hanging. "It feels like you just yanked someone's soul out through a painting."

I shrugged. "Can only do that if they put it in there in the first place. That's why it's a private room."

Corsica averted her eyes. "Are you sure we should be staying here, then? Maybe that's why Leif takes everyone's rooms being off-limits so seriously."

"...I think it'll be alright," I decided, chewing my lip. "Better that we're ponies who understand instead of some barbarians, and the original owner wouldn't have left all this stuff here if it was too important to let the others go flying around with. Besides, between you and me, I've got a lot of posters in my room, too. So I can kinda relate."

At that, Corsica looked contemplative. "Maybe I should get some posters for the lab."

I looked up. "Yeah? What kinds?"

"Dunno." Corsica shrugged. "That's the point. It sounds like they're useful for learning about yourself."

"Fair enough," I admitted, surprised to hear that sentiment coming from her. Honestly, that was why I kept mine, too...

"Hey, how's it-?" I poked my head up the staircase to the main level an hour or so later, scouting for options to take my thoughts off of Elise and finding a story already in progress. Predictably, this one was being told by Rondo.

"And shockingly, that one actually worked," Rondo was narrating in his serious, dramatic tone. "Who would have thought you could make bank selling ice on the black market, of all things?"

Leif lounged in the captain's chair with her hind legs crossed and a lazy look on her face, and Vivace was on the other side of the room, so I crawled stealthily up to Ansel to avoid interrupting. "Selling ice on the black market? What are we talking about?"

"How this lot wound up working as auditors for Ironridge," Ansel muttered back. "I couldn't very well let it go unquestioned."

"Yep!" Rondo threw me and Corsica a huge grin in greeting. "Ironridge's climate has warmed up a lot in the last two decades. Not so good for food storage, or just plain comfortable living. Our old ship may have been a beater, but heading up west, filling the hold with snow and hauling it back down the mountains paid nicely for fuel and mooring."

"The black market, though?" Corsica pressed, curious. "Is it somehow illegal to sell snow in Ironridge?"

Rondo shrugged. "Well, there might be certain competition rules vendors are expected to abide by..."

"The governing entity of Ironridge is Cold Karma Incorporated," Leif explained from the front, gulping from a thick mug of something foamy. "Guess what their primary product is."

Rondo nodded sagely. "Climate control. There's such a thing as a free market, and then there's trying to undercut the government on the service it uses to legitimize its rule."

"Huh. Weird." I stared into space, thinking about it. On the one hoof, anyone who literally made the land more habitable probably deserved to rule it, and I doubted I'd question them if I was there. On the other, the idea of rulership via selling ice sounded flat-out ridiculous, when Icereach's surface temperature was below freezing all but a precious few days of the year. And when it was right on the edge of a boundless sea of the stuff. And when it literally had Ice in its name... I laughed.

"Silly, isn't it?" Rondo agreed. "Eventually, we did get busted, but Cold Karma isn't a very wasteful place. Why squash your competition when you can have them work for you instead?"

"So they hired former smugglers to audit their partners for breaking the law?" Corsica raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"Well, that was just our hoof in the door," Rondo explained. "One day, there was a dust-up with some sky pirates who were a little too far south of Varsidel for comfort. We got involved by proximity, and wound up saving Cold Karma a considerable amount of resources. That got us some executive notice. One thing led to another, and we discovered one of their backstage second-tier execs had similar Imperial expatriate ties as us."

Leif played idly with the ship's wheel, twiddling her wings as the storm barreled past unabated outside. "Or, more accurately, they discovered we had similar ties to them."

"Hey, this is my stage!" Rondo shooed her with a hoof. "Anyway, a few stiff drinks later and we were practically bosom buddies. And it turns out when you've got friends in the big cheese's inner circle, you can get pretty much whatever company work you want."

I blinked at that. "You mean you specifically asked to come poke around Icereach? How come?"

Rondo shrugged. "Well, we had our reasons. It was an excuse to visit! Who doesn't think space rockets are cool?"

"Ponies who build them in Icereach," Corsica snarked. "You can't have missed how little optimism there was around the place. Or did you know about that in advance and choose the job because you wanted to breathe down our backs and make that dream actually happen?"

Leif winked. "Would that be so bad?"

I glanced at her. No, actually. If these ponies had the clout to get Icereach working a little more smoothly, that would be fantastic... Assuming it survived their investigation, of course. Leif's accusations against Yakyakistan were taking their sweet time sinking in.

"Anyway," Rondo finished, "that's where this job of ours comes from. Same for this ship, the Whitewing, all our cool swag... Our boss in Cold Karma is generous. We even picked our themed names together! Let me tell you, this is the life..."

"I did notice your names were all music-related," Ansel remarked. "You seriously fly under call signs because you and a middle manager thought they would be cool?"

"Jealous?" Rondo waggled his eyebrows. "You could make some too, you know!"

As my brother reddened and prepared a retort, I stepped back and tried to relax. So they were detectives, and had concealed their true purpose because they had to to do their job. But I also hadn't been wrong in any of my earlier assessments. These ponies were free, adventurers, who could go where they wanted because they wanted to and find their own answer to the world. If they could make up code names and then joke about it, then their personalities had never been lies. Worry over the seriousness of what we could be involved in continued to bubble at the back of my mind, but... their job was really cool.

"That's awesome," I said aloud, pulling myself back to reality and approaching Rondo. "Hey, so while we're telling stories... Think it would be too much for me to ask about the Empire again? I can't have ran you dry after only one day."

Rondo wiped his mane back with a hoof, realizing I was standing there with eager, gleaming eyes. "Oh, well... You know I'd love to, but how long do you think I'll keep going for once you get me started on the good old days?"

"All night?" I asked hopefully. "I sorta slept in pretty late today."

Rondo shuffled in his chair in embarrassment. "Loath as I am to decline such a generous request, I did just pull an all-nighter putting that engine back together just for you... I'm afraid I've got one or two more tales in me at most."

"Go to bed now, muscle colt," Elise commanded, opening Tempo's door and poking her head out. "I'm expecting everyone to be well-rested come morning, and you need it more than most."

Rondo pouted, but I tilted my head, giving her a funny look. "Muscle colt? Isn't that Tempo's nickname?"

Elise shrugged. "I picked it up while waiting for you. It turns out to be an effective way of getting his attention."

Interesting. The tension between Leif and Elise had been physically tangible when we got here earlier, but apparently Elise and Tempo got along well... Probably the reason why Elise was currently put up in her room? Tempo was the crew member I knew the least about, and I didn't really have a read on her.

"Fine. No more stories from me tonight," Rondo yawned, getting to his hooves and accepting his fate. "I suppose I'll leave you to Leitmotif's ever-capable tongue instead. But be warned, she can drive a hard bargain."

Corsica gave him a sharp look. "There had to have been a better way for you to phrase that."

I tilted my head. What?

Rondo just saluted, staggering off to his room and pretending to be far more tired than he actually was. "That guy's a clown," I declared when he was gone. "Likeable, but a clown."

Leif chuckled. Elise went back inside and closed her door.

"Well, kids..." Leif stretched in the captain's chair. "Looks like your evening of free entertainment just hit the sack. You know the drill, Halcyon. You want my stories, pay up."

"What!?" Corsica blanched, instantly distracted from whatever she had been thinking about Rondo. "We have to pay literal money to hear what you have to say?"

"Nah," I sighed, rolling my eyes and rising to my hooves. "She means we gotta trade a story for a story. Thing is, I recall I paid up front last time." I raised a challenging eyebrow at Leitmotif, preparing to haggle. "Come on, then. You first."

Leif gave me an innocent, winning smile. "Sorry, kid! You cashed that in when I did that pose for you right before you left. Back to your turn!"

I thought about that for a moment, and decided that my thoughts were too heavy for any proper narration. "Oh. Well, I guess I'll pass. Got a lot on my mind, and all."

Leif looked visibly disappointed. "Seriously? Drat. Well, understandable, I guess."

"So how's this work, story swaps?" Corsica asked, stepping in where I had retreated. "So like, we scratch your back, you scratch ours? That's your game?"

I sat back and let her go. If she was excited about the prospect...

"Only if they're interesting." Leif winked, then went back to piloting the ship. "Bonus points if they're about you and your friends. You game too? You look like a mare with a big mouth, if you'll accept the compliment."

"Oh, I am all over this. Move aside, Halcyon, I've got the floor." Corsica tossed her mane and straightened her ear ornaments, clearly a lot more gung ho about the talking aspect than I was.

"Well, okay. Fine by me, I guess." I sagged back into a cushy chair. Not like I didn't appreciate someone else doing the work for me, but I had a strange feeling Corsica wasn't going to care as much as she could stand to about the returns.

"...Completely ridiculous. That was the one and only time we actually kissed. Have you ever actually kissed someone inside a school supply closet? Because looking back, it can't have been worse than what we wound up trying. Let me tell you, it was the least-romantic thing ever."

Long enough had passed that I was starting to get tired again. Vivace had swapped the pilot chair with Leif, and Rondo and Ansel had gone to bed, leaving just me and Corsica chatting with Leif in the cushy reading chairs. The only problem was, Corsica was enjoying this far too much, and never made Leif drop a story in return.

Predictable. But, at least it gave me time to think.

"Hah. I didn't go to school." Leif waved a lazy wing, draped over the back of her chair like a rug and spinning slowly in circles. "Sounds claustrophobic, though. Can't say I can relate. My first filly crush turned out to be a griffon, and surprise surprise, that's illegal..." She rolled her eyes. "Big Sis had to sit me down hard to explain that one. Griffons, ponies and batponies? No can do, friend. The forbidden triangle. Second crush? Never got up the courage to ask. Third crush? Was too busy with work to get serious. Fourth? I moved again before we could get to know each other. Fifth? Tried to do a thing, fell apart due to a conflict of interest. Sixth? Already taken, and hoo boy that conflict of interest issue returned with a vengeance. No closets involved in any of them, though I did try to date someone in a sewer once. Really don't recommend that as a backdrop for this sort of thing. Really."

Okay, I took it back. Leif was dropping plenty of stories, but they all turned out like... this. Who cared about romance, anyway? Having friends was great, but the idea of someone intimately understanding me sent a shiver down my spine. There was such a thing as privacy!

Corsica burst out laughing. At least she was having a good time... "For real? How'd that come about?"

"Long story. Not as interesting as it sounds," Leif apologized, sounding wistful. "Short version, the Empire is pretty old, things get built on top of other things, a lot of tunnels get buried and left behind, and the underground is more private, you know?" She leaned forward, returning a question. "So, I tried a date in a sewer. Care to one-up that? I know, I know, only one flame for you, so I'm at an advantage. Forget about that. Embellish if you need to. Give me a romantic catastrophe."

Corsica reddened. "I just told you about making out in...!"

Leif shrugged. "And then I returned the favor! Ball's in your court, girl. We're all mares here, right?"

Corsica glanced to the side. "Did you happen to see... a big stone tower when you were flying into Icereach? From Ironridge, out to the east?"

A big stone tower. Those words cut though my funk, and I instantly lifted my head, guarded and alert. "Wystle Tower? You really wanna tell stories about that place?"

Something in my voice must have betrayed my feelings, because both of them looked up, Leif glancing at me in confusion. "What's she got to do with it? Your date was catastrophic because of your flame's sister and an old ruin? Come on, this I've gotta hear."

"Well..." Corsica looked at me, suddenly realizing what I was thinking. "On second thought, maybe some things are better left unsaid."

Leif gave her a cross look. "I will wake Rondo and ask him to give so-late-it's-early yodeling lessons."

Corsica winced. "Please don't."

Leif glanced to the front of the ship, where Vivace was pretending not to listen. "I will bribe Vivace to make this ship do a barrel roll."

"No," Vivace grunted.

Leif pursed her lips. "...I'll pay you money." She reached inside her armor robe and drew out a pile of coins that looked almost big enough to restock all the reagents for the chemistry set in Corsica's lab.

Corsica eyed it, then gave me a guilty look.

"I wasn't gonna make you not tell it. And we do need the money," I sighed. "But give it to me, not her. She's already making piles of cash from this trip, and I can barely afford to take Mother out to get some noodles."

The coins landed on me, and I scooped them all together and into my coat, keenly aware that they were winding up in the lab's finances either way. Yet something about being the one to get paid just felt... fulfilling, even if it was for something as stupid as this.

"So that tower," Corsica began, straightening her back. "Real ugly place. It's three stories high plus the basement, and they put it right at the top of Mt. Wystle. The highest mountain that borders Crimson Valley, at the far northeastern edge? Huge dropoffs everywhere, and the best view of the Yak Hoof Glacier for hundreds of miles. Even a good view of the Aldenfold. I'm not good at describing landscapes, but take my word that if you don't have an airship, it's as good a look as it gets. See where I'm going with this?"

"You chose an old ruin for a date." Leif nodded, at least sensing that this story was more serious than the others. "Daring."

"This tower was built a long time ago," Corsica continued. "We're talking decades. Probably about fifty or sixty years, but there are no records to know for sure. In the beginning, Icereach was a colony of batponies cut off from the world, but long before the Yakyakistan-Ironridge treaty and the institute and the bunker, Yakyakistan decided to make this a research colony on their own. They didn't have the resources to excavate this place, so that tower was built by the first administration to work in instead."

She leaned back, only partially relaxing. "No one knows what those scientists did for sure. Everyone who's in charge now says they were unethical, and 'we're not going to space on a foundation of unethical research', whatever that counts for. And there are urban legends, of course, about mysterious disappearances and monsters and something to do with a black meteor. These days, those scientists are long gone, the tower's been thoroughly looted of anything of value, and now it's just a haunted house where nobody goes on the far outskirts of town. Great place for a date, right?"

Leif whistled appreciatively. "Sounds like the Empire. There are abandoned castles and ruins with crazy histories there pretty much everywhere you look. So what happened? Got spooked?"

Corsica's brow shadowed, gauging how much she needed to say to satisfy Leif. "There was... an accident. It put Ansel and I in the hospital with comas for more than a week. Let's just say we stopped dating after that."

"Wow. Sorry I asked." Leif sounded genuinely apologetic. "Must have been rough. Guess I owe you one, now? Anything you like."

Corsica glanced at me, letting me have this, and I in turn thought for a moment. Anything I wanted, huh...?

"The one you wriggled out of yesterday. You've got a bad history with the goddesses, or something? Spill the beans."

Leif whistled, laying back in her chair and glancing conspiratorially at Corsica. "That one? I'm warning you, it's a long one."

Corsica shrugged. "Go for it."

"Well, let me try to explain." Leif settled herself and started. "My foalhood was... less than enviable. I was born in the Imperial province of Gyre. It was, in the words of an old friend of mine, a frankly horrid place that nobody should ever go. Corruption and mismanagement at their worst, you know? The Griffon Empire wasn't exactly the fairest and most just nation in the world, but at least in Gyre, you knew that everyone was equal... equal at the bottom of the barrel."

I curled back up and listened. "Sounds harsh."

"That's one way of putting it," Leif agreed. "There were two things that kept me going. One was my goddess, the Night Mother, an absolute in the world that I could count on. The other was that when your life is as hard as it is in Gyre, surviving makes you strong. Eventually, I was able to leave the province and carve out a space for myself in the world. Maybe not fairly or ethically, but it's what I did." She frowned. "But let me ask you this. What do you do when you hate the circumstances of your life?"

"I dunno. What did you do?" Corsica muttered, pushing the story along.

"Blame the ones in charge, of course." Leif shrugged, as though it was obvious. "The same thing everyone does when they're hurt by things outside of their control. Now, what do you do when you hate the circumstances of your life and also get strong enough to do something about it?"

We were quiet.

"Well, you do something about it," Leif continued. "So I found some like-minded friends, and together we decided to take it out on the sphinx lords and nobility - Garsheeva was a greater sphinx, and the ruling class in the south was the lesser sphinxes, if Rondo forgot to explain that."

"Hold on," I interrupted, finally realizing something that was bothering me. "What are you now, twenty-five? Thirty? The Empire fell eighteen years ago. You can't have been more than a filly back then."

Leif sighed. "Like I said, it was grow up fast or don't get the chance to grow up at all. Anyway, us versus the lords. Some would have called me a seditionist. Others, a freedom fighter. Historians today would usually have made the final call... except the war swept aside everything we were trying to change, and now they have new things to remember and write about."

"And?" Corsica pressed.

"The Night Mother and Garsheeva." Leif nodded. "I was with the Night Mother. I figured I'd throw my hat in with the side that didn't claim Gyre as their territory, you know? But all the time I fought against those corrupt lords, I thought of it in terms of our side and their side. Sides oriented around the goddesses. Their peoples were constantly at odds with each other. Those two commanded absolute physical might, and cultural authority where that grew thin. They could have stopped the war, if they wanted to. They could have made themselves something other than symbols of opposition to each other. I realized that, and... I found them wanting."

She looked away. "Having someone to act in the name of, having friends united around a common cause... It was like having a roof over my head. But I was too young and too indoctrinated to see that my appointed enemies saw it the same way. The two goddesses, banning relationships between different species? It was like they wanted us to be unable to connect. They brought about that war. The lords and nobles were the symptom, not the source. Near the end, when everything was falling away, I lost everything, that feeling of justice and all, and I was finally able to see that our true enemies were the ones at the very top."

"...Huh," Corsica said.

My thoughts tumbled. I trusted Leif, but... did I trust this? She was so biased, but was it for good reason, or was she an accidental victim of something else? Goddesses were supposed to be perfect. Maybe it was possible that the Night Mother and Garsheeva just weren't the real things, but... I found that I really wanted her to be wrong.

Not like it mattered, if the eastern goddesses were gone.

"That's sort of the end," Leif admitted. "Hard for me to go on without getting soapboxy about my views on power structures and all that. You can probably guess, but I wasn't too impressed by Graygarden when I met him. He's a far cry from an immortal sphinx goddess, but he's still the highest ruler and authority around."

I frowned. "I mean, I know he's not the nicest, but you really think everything that goes wrong in Icereach is somehow his fault?"

Leif gave me a knowing look. "Well, in case you've forgotten, that is the premise of why we've hired you."

Corsica looked troubled. "You're comparing my father to a pair of goddesses who started a continent-wide war? I'm the last pony who will defend him, but that sounds... extreme."

"It's a much smaller scale," Leif admitted. "Icereach has hundreds of ponies. The east had hundreds of thousands. But he is still the highest and most responsible authority to be found. Even if this investigation turns out to be nothing, are you fully satisfied with how he's done?"

Corsica chuckled dryly.

Leif hesitated, looking uncertain. "I wasn't sure if I was going to say this," she eventually said. "And it's something that might just be coming from my history, and has nothing to do with my work for Ironridge. But you two are locals who can't live the way you want to live because of bad blood with the powers that be. Depending on what we dig up tomorrow in that cave, if you decided it was your duty to your home to step in and find a better way, I wouldn't stand against you. Better someone who cares than another cold, apathetic boss pony to rule the roost."

"Us? Leaders? No way." I hugged myself and shuddered. "Thanks, but no thanks. I don't need that many eyes on me, you know? Kind of the opposite of what I'm going for."

"And I've got plans for my life," Corsica added. "Ones that don't involve sitting behind a desk all day."

We glanced at each other, on the same page and definitely uncomfortable.

"Not that this is a request, or anything," Leif clarified, seeing the look. "It's more of an offer, subject to change based on what happens in those caves. I wouldn't want to put you on the spot. Speaking of which, we're getting very close to the area where we start searching."

"We're almost there?" Corsica perked up, then yawned. It seemed Leif was willing to let the subject drop.

"Impossible to say how much longer it will be," Vivace said from the front, reminding me that he wasn't asleep at the wheel. "Like I told you earlier, this region is poorly-mapped, and it's hard to make out landmarks in these conditions. If you want to get any sleep before we get there, do it now."

Corsica glanced at me, then nodded. "Guess I'll go tell Ansel it's our turn."

"Yeah. Thanks." I waved her along and got up, then looked back at Leif. Me, lead Icereach.

Somehow, that thought bothered me more than anything else I had heard this evening. Other ponies could be the power players in the world, making decisions that mattered. They could even be suspect, or nefarious. But I'd still be more comfortable with it than if I was the one making decisions.

And yet, what if there were decisions that needed to be made, and no one else could make? Being in a situation like that was easy to imagine, because I was there right now.

Swallowing, seeing that it was just me and Leif, with Vivace working the controls in the background, I made my decision and spoke.

"Hey," I said softly. "Before I go, there's something you need to know about the way Elise is acting..."

I passed Ansel on the way down, Corsica having roused him and told him it was our turn to get some sleep. He looked half-awake, and I was still thinking, so we let each other be.

Inside the room, a bedroll was already spread out, the lights on and Corsica standing before the vanity, removing her ear ornaments and adjusting her mane. "Nyegh," I yawned, closing the door in my wake.

"Whoever owns this room has good taste in fragrances," Corsica remarked, nudging a bottle of perfume with her aura and acting like the previous conversation had never happened. "Ever wanted to try a new one? I bet this would fit you."

"Rooting through her cosmetics, are we?" I shrugged off my coat and hung it on the door, then stepped up beside her wearing only my boots and illumination bracelet. "Eh, sure, why not?"

Corsica passed me the bottle, a little squeezer at the top to blow the perfume that didn't look like it was proofed for batpony fangs. "This is the kind that requires your mane to be wet to stick, but I've got some at home if you like the scent. Father's mistress has literally everything that's here."

"I guess they run in the same circles," I said, feeling slightly awkward at the small talk. "Can't be too many different beauty product lines in the world."

"It's a small world." Corsica nodded. "Works out in our favor, though. Now we'll get to smell the part when we take over Icereach."

I raised a sharp eyebrow, trying to work the perfume with my wings. "You really think that?"

Corsica strolled to the bed and flopped spread-eagled on her back, mane strewn beneath her. "I haven't decided what to think. They flat-out said earlier that they asked for this job. They just asked us if we want to take over from Graygarden. Elise is off her rocker. Who even knows what's up with the Whitewing? Don't forget that censored law supposedly keeping you grounded. Feels like there's too much going on here to be sure of anything right now."

I hesitated, standing at the bedside. "I... told Leif that something's really suspicious with Elise."

"Oh?" Corsica lifted her ears.

I sighed, taking a seat near the bedroll. "Have you ever heard of a pony who's really, really good at pretending to be someone they're not?"

She tilted her head. "Is that what you meant when you asked Ansel that thing earlier? About Elise maybe not being Elise?"

"Yeah. Have you?"

"...Beats me." Corsica frowned. "Elise looks pretty distinctive, doesn't she? How would someone even do that? Magic?"

"Well, just take my word for it that it's possible," I said, rubbing self-consciously at my talent with a wing. "I don't wanna think too much about the implications, or what someone could do in Icereach by pretending to be important ponies, but... I asked Elise some trick questions she really should have known, and... I told Leif I think she might be behind this Whitewing stuff. Or, at least, the Elise with us now. And Leif kind of believed me."

Corsica's eyes widened a little. "What's she going to do?"

"I dunno." I shrugged. "She said she'd take care of it. I really hope I was right, but... I'm scared and needed someone to trust, alright? Ansel's got a point about not wanting to travel. I just want to go home and get our old, boring lives back."

"Hey," Corsica cut in. "Can I tell you a secret?"

I looked up.

"Sometimes," Corsica whispered, turning off her horn so that the room was dark, "I think my luck is cursed. I succeed at things I never should have succeeded at, for no reason, whether the result is a good one or not."

I blinked in confusion. "You sure you're not just that good? And, I mean, you sure haven't succeeded in getting Graygarden to like you."

"Wow, thanks," Corsica snarked, and I realized my faux pas. "I thought you said you liked being superstitious, right? Well, I'm a lot less of a fan than you are, but I figured I'd tell you that I sort of believe in this too. Maybe my luck will bring us home safe and sound, who knows? You need something to trust in, boom. Right up your alley."

"Huh." I smiled a wry smile. As far as credible higher powers went, this was about the weakest legend I had heard, and yet the sentiment behind it made more of a difference than I was expecting. "You know, that's a lot sweeter than I was expecting from a prickly cactus like you."

Corsica snorted. "I'm not prickly! I'm like... dark chocolate. Bitter and sweet at the same time, right?"

I tilted my head, then grinned. "So you're saying you're sweet, is that it?"

"Once things are back to normal, I'll slap you," Corsica grunted, rolling over in the bed. "But for now, whatever gets you through the night. Now get some sleep."

For a moment, I stood there. "So, err... You're taking the bed, I guess?"

"I take the floor every day in the lab. Tonight, it's your turn."

Well, alright then... I turned around, lit my bracelet again and checked the spread on the floor. Unlike the ones in the lab, this one actually did look durable enough to handle my boots. I'd need a good shower and a chance to air them out when we got home, but that could be arranged.

Before turning my light back off, I took one last look over the posters on the walls. A low-down one stood out to me, one I hadn't caught before: the Firefly Sisters, a performance advertisement for a Griffon Empire band. Back from before the war. The poster looked pretty old, but seeing it made me smile a little: I had one for exactly the same group back in my own room, a little fragment of the continent of my birth. Seeing it made me feel just a little more at home.

"Sure is a beautiful day out," Corsica remarked, strolling down a slushy street and tossing her mane. In these days, she had been in a phase where she grew it even longer than it was today... the length where it got on the ground if she bent her head over to look at something, but it hadn't done so for long enough yet that she got fed up and cut it. "Hey, Ansel. You wanna... go for a hike?"

Ansel glanced over his shoulder at sixteen-year-old me, wearing the previous iteration of my coat and the same boots as ever. "Are you sure about that? I am on sister duty, after all."

Corsica huffed, a metal platform to our left with a chain-link fence that housed machinery for opening the lid of the rocket silos. "But you're always on sister duty," she pointed out, giving me a look that asked why I couldn't have stayed at home with Mother. "And it only gets this warm a few days every year. Come on, let's hike up to the old research tower and look at the view. Maybe we can make out on the roof."

Ansel gave me an uncomfortable look. "Does it have to be with her around, though? We always let her tag along..."

"Because she's my biggest fan." Corsica rolled her eyes. "And because if you ditch her so we can be alone, your mother goes to my father behind both of our backs, and you know how that works out. Why couldn't you have been the favorite child instead?"

I bit my lip, internally as well as in the dream, knowing exactly when and where I was. To sixteen-year-old me, there weren't a lot of prices that weren't worth paying to spend a hiking trip staring at a pony whose boldness I desperately admired, even if she didn't want me there... I opened my mouth and offered a compromise.

"How about you let me come with you, and I'll just stay behind outside the tower and you can be alone there?" I smiled, trying to make my terms as generous as possible. "And then I won't tell Mother. I really want to go hiking. But you can have your kissy alone time."

Ansel frowned, but Corsica kicked him. "It's a good deal. We'll take it. Now come get your kissy alone time, loverboy."

And so we set off, my past self's hoofsteps speeding and melding into a blur as the memory skipped by what wasn't important. I didn't want to follow. I didn't want to watch this for what must have been the dozenth time. By now, I should have been numb to it, but my dreams were so vivid that they even reproduced shock and adrenaline and other states of mind. And I especially didn't want to feel that buildup, knowing what was going to happen and being powerless to control it... This time in particular, it was far too close to the feeling of inevitability I had in the waking world, like circumstances were snowballing and there was precious little I could do.

Tonight, my dream had sent me to the last day we weren't yet friends.

Time advanced as we walked east up the valley, following a slanting road that had once been built into the northern mountain wall. A long time ago, this road had been wide and clear, built some sixty years ago when the old tower was new and Icereach had been freshly chosen as a research colony. Corsica's words from the present-day evening drifted through my head, until my mind started narrating in her voice all of its own, telling stories about abandoned experiments and haunted buildings that never even came close to the real and present dangers of a derelict tower and the narrow path to get there.

And narrow it was, the broad, heavy-duty trail of the old days eroded on one side and encroached upon by glacial ice and snow down the other. The path of my memory's days was slushy, courtesy of the warm weather, and just wide enough for Corsica and Ansel to walk side by side, occasionally sharing a nuzzle.

I trudged stiffly behind them, wishing the slush wasn't quite so cold against my boots. Crimson Valley tapered off at its eastern end, the road running up and out through Wystle Pass after a substantial elevation gain, the tower visible to the left if I looked almost straight up at the sky. Behind me was an awesome view, the whole valley spreading out before me, but a last, short hill concealed something even greater up ahead. Corsica and Ansel rallied, and we crossed the mountainous divide.

This wasn't my first time up here, especially now that I visited this place on unlucky nights in my dreams, but memory or no the sight of it always took my breath away. A tremendous canyon ran from north to south, its opposite rim nearly as far away as the glacier behind me. You could fit an entire Crimson Valley inside and not even span its width. The length was even more impressive, stretching for three miles to the north and losing itself in the shadow of the Aldenfold to the south. But the eastern wall was lower than we were, letting me see on to the next range beyond, and yet more mountains rose past those, extending out for infinity until they were lost in the clear blue sky.

The rift's official name was Trench of Greg, after a yak mountaineer who had scaled both walls around fifteen years ago and overwritten whatever it used to be called. Most ponies just called it the Trench. A pointed, rocky spur jutted out from the pass, extending the road into a natural viewpoint that made it feel as if you were flying, completed the view, letting me stand in the middle of the Trench and feel the wind and the mountains all around me. Silverhorn's Plummet, the spur was called. There were a lot of named locations around this place. It must have meant a lot to a lot of different creatures before. I let my mane blow. When this memory was made, I had been imagining what it would be like to have my name stamped here as well. Now, it felt like a lot more of me was tied to this place than just a name.

"You're just going to wait here?" Corsica poked me in the shoulder as she walked past, making sure I was paying attention. "Good. We're going on to Wystle Tower. If we're not back by the time you get bored, don't bother waiting around."

I glanced over my shoulder at the road, which turned sharply and followed the cliff face north, spiraling up towards the peak of Mt. Wystle. The tower stood at its peak like an old stone monolith. The view from up there, I knew, would be even better.

"Or I could come too," I offered. "It's pretty here, but it does get kind of windy..."

"You promised," Ansel warned, giving me a dark look.

I nodded. I had what I had asked for... Of course, I wanted more, but if I was going to work my way into their good graces, keeping my word was an excellent place to start. "Fine. I'll meet you here, then. Once you're ready to go back home?"

"Sure." Ansel shrugged, not even making eye contact as he began to wander further up the path.

"Hold it!" I stopped him with a tug on his own hiking boots. "You have to promise properly. Otherwise you're going to find another way back down or something, and leave me here until sunset as a joke."

"Fine..." Ansel exaggeratedly sighed. "I solemnly swear to meet you here on my way home. No hidden meanings or falsehoods. Happy?"

"Relax," Corsica assured, already several steps ahead. "We're not going to leave you all on your own forever. Now hurry up! I want my date in a haunted tower."

I stood on the spur and forced a smile as I watched them go. The air stirred around me, and the sun beat down, its faint warmth creating a heavy glare off the dense Wystle snowpack...

Too dense a snowpack, and too shiny in the summer sun. My past self's eyes were on my friends, but the only thing I could see was right above them, a frozen wave of white paused in time on its way down the mountainside. Past Halcyon stared, my body giving in to the relaxation of boredom. Present me relaxed as well, but more from resignation than-

Something sharp and tingly slapped my cheek, distracting me, and a moment later I felt restrained. "Hallie! Wake up!"

"Nnngh...?" Light broke in through my eyelids, and I realized that my dream had been interrupted... in the form of Corsica leaning out over the side of the bed, preparing to slap me again with her telekinesis. "Why's it nguhhh..."

"Nightmare?" Corsica guessed, sounding groggy.

"Yeah. Thanks." I didn't even try to rub the sleep from my eyes, quietly praying that I could go back to bed and get a little more sleep before we arrived. "Did I wake you?"

"Don't mention it." Corsica retreated back into her bed. "Just what friends do..."

If it wasn't morning for her, it wasn't morning for me. Hopefully I would be able to get a little more sleep without the dream starting right back up where it left off.

"Assemble for landing!" Leif called, marching down the length of the Aldebaran with her armored robe flapping around her. "Rondo, stabilizers! Vivace, there's been snowfall, we need to secure the entrance and make it safe! Whitewing, form up!"

I staggered up the stairs from the hold, scrubbing at my eyes, Corsica leading me by a good distance. We had stopped moving, though the storm still raged; I couldn't see much more from the back of the ship.

"Hallie!" Ansel appeared quickly at my side, giving me a once-over and frowning. "You look out of it. Bad sleep?"

"Yeah, something like that," I admitted, self-consciously tugging on the rims of my boots and making sure they went as high up my legs as they would go. "Only had half a night, and half of what I did have wasn't so restful. But I'm up now."

Ansel nodded sympathetically, his voice slightly raspy. "Anything I can do to help?"

I yawned heavily. "Just give me an earful if I look like I'm sleepwalking before I get on the wrong end of a frozen puddle, or something..."

"Only if you'll return the favor." Ansel nodded honorably. "Can't say I'm well-rested either, what with all those posters watching me."

Hey, I thought the posters were nice... Dropping it, I nodded in assent and moved to join Corsica up front, where Leif was working the controls while Vivace and the Whitewing crowded outside on the narrow forward deck. A misty gray light shone down through the billowing, churning storm, which was now blowing directly at us. As best as I could tell, we were partially hemmed in by mountains, with at least one substantial ridge to our left and a sagging line between two peaks dead ahead.

That line, I quickly realized, was actually so far bent forward as to be the roof to a massive cave, like a lean-to with two corners grounded and two raised on poles. The wind blew toward us up the slope, curling snow drifts and icicles over the lip like a menacing upper jaw. I couldn't see how far down the cave bottom was, but it went back enough that the wall was black and barren, nothing but unlit mountain stone protected from the ice and snow.

Leif frowned in concentration, nudging the ship forward and to the side... and with a rocky crunch, she drove the prow ever so lightly into the lip of the cave.

I watched, disbelieving, as Leif eased at the console levers and the ship began to strafe to the side. Snow cracked and billowed, icicles shattered and fell, and with a precision that should have been impossible for an airship in any conditions, let alone a storm, the prow made its way along the ridge, clearing off the excess snowpack like a plow.

She took avalanches seriously. It was heartening. And yet seeing the ship used in such a manner, even seeing it attempted, was beyond my comprehension entirely.

When Leif finished, my jaw was too far down from the display to even register surprise when the Whitewing jumped off the deck, extended its inertial stabilizer wings, and glided into the cave.

"Looks like we're in good hooves," Corsica muttered quietly. "...Did you get back to sleep?"

"Yeah." I was barely paying attention, far more captivated by what Leif had just made the ship do. "You have that fine of control over the thing?"

"They don't call it state of the art for nothing," Leif replied, craning her neck keenly to see the Whitewing, hovering in the air and pulsating with what looked like a coded signal. "Better to knock it down now and see what height we have to work with than risk a big fall snowing us in. But this doesn't look too bad."

"The height we have to work with?" I asked, watching the Whitewing. It drifted to our side, its wings spread and beating, as if they actually contributed to its flight. In theory, inertial stabilizer rotors had an effective inertia that varied with the level of mana charge you applied to them, so if you gave them high inertia on the way down and lowered it on the way back up, what I was seeing was actually scientifically possible. And a way more creative use for them than retroactively canceling vibrations around the core of a rocket engine. Almost like they hadn't just been artistically designed for this purpose, but mechanically invented for it too...

Leif adjusted two more levers, and we started flying into the cave.

I stammered something sleepy and incoherent as Leif sank the snip down and turned its port side towards the entrance, eyes constantly on the signalling Whitewing. We strafed to the left, and the sound of the storm changed, the winds becoming less of an unchanneled, endless roar and more like someone was pouring a bucket of thunderclouds through a pipe. The dark cave lip passed over my sight, and then we were inside.

"There we go!" Leif locked the console, looking pleased with herself, though the ship was clearly still on. "Bring only what you think you'll need. It's a long walk down and back up, and everyone gets to carry their own things. No bulky saddlebags; there are tight corners. And remember that we're here for the security system on a machine we found, not an ether cave. So no need for research equipment. Rondo, we're heading out! You'll be right behind!?"

"Aye!" Rondo called from the engine room.

"Right then." Leif opened the port side door and waved us on.

Corsica went first, but Ansel paused on his way out. "By the by, where's Elise?"

Leif shot me a knowing look before turning to Ansel. "She won't be joining us, actually. Personal matter. Related to why Rondo will be late. Vanguard is just you three, me, and Vivace!"

Elise wouldn't be joining us, or even seeing us off. It sounded like Leif had taken my concern more than seriously... Once again, I said a quiet prayer to anything that might be listening, wishing that my judgement might be for the best. And then I followed the descent party outside.

Despite Leif's commandment to bring only what we needed, I shouldered my entire duffel bag. The bulk of it was a backup coat and spare pair of boots in case I got soaked, and taking along the whole thing would be far easier than extracting only those and carrying them loose. This was only what I had guessed could happen while packing back in Icereach, though. Maybe we should have taken some time during the previous night's storytelling to go over what we really should be prepared for...

I shook my head and walked down the gangplank after Ansel and Corsica, both of whom carried nothing. Time to get this strange job over with and hopefully return to our normal lives.

Deep Down

I didn't realize how well the Aldebaran retained its heat, even with the side door open, until it was too late.

"Argh!" I knelt on the deck, my legs locking instantly with cold, staring down the sharply-sloped gangplank to an outcropping in the black rock floor below. "Why's it so chilly out!? Shouldn't we at least be sheltered in this cave?"

The enchanted earring I had received from Leif pulsed against my earlobe with a tiny bead of warmth, and I somehow managed to get down without falling, bolstered by the small solace that Ansel had it worse. Even Corsica looked bothered by the cold. Both of them had gone first, and were looking back past me at the ship with unreadable expressions... Why was it so windy in here?

I turned to follow their gazes, and fully tripped from what I saw.

Outside, the massive storm clouds rolled north, crashing and roiling and weaving into each other like the froth of river rapids before a waterfall. The cave mouth faced the same way, a wide enough berth to house the entire Aldebaran, giving me a landscape window of the clouds as they retreated. Only some of them didn't retreat: a funnel of cloud broke downward, billowing and spiraling with terrible ferocity, knitting itself together like the strands of a rope, and then turned, twisting down into the cave toward us. The cord of flowing storm clouds turned again, pouring right in through the front of the device I had taken for an uncovered dirigible frame.

Four rings of metal, the center two wider than the ones at the ends, hung above the Aldebaran, and the clouds drove directly down and in through the front, running the length of the ship through each ring in turn. The clouds lit up as they passed, rumbling internally with brilliant teal lightning, arcing out and hitting a series of glowing gemstone nodes along the structures, each ring coursing with ghostly energy. They howled, sending out cascading ripples and waves of wind that were almost visible, screeching like an angry whinny, and then burst out the back, flowing in another sharp turn out of the cave mouth and back to rejoin the storm in its march to the north.

It was like an umbilical cord, pumping down from the storm and through the ship and back to rejoin its origin. It was like a zipline, the ship a gondola designed to slide along the storm's underbelly, still connected yet temporarily pulled out of place. It was unnatural in how perfectly it held its shape, so dense it was a solid object, not even see-through at the edges. And every time my eyes found that curve where the clouds bent and turned into the ship's rings, my heart froze up and told me they were coming for me instead; that I was about to be run down by winter in all of its fury.

Growing up in Icereach, the first thing you learned was not to underestimate the power of mountain storms. And this was the most disturbing, unnatural, alive storm I had ever seen.

Leif patted me on the back as she passed, snapping me out of my trance. "A sight to behold, isn't it? The bigger the storm, the creepier it gets... but the better she performs and the faster we go. She still runs without a storm, of course, but this is why we say she's weatherproof. Can't get blown about by the winds if you are the winds."

I shook my head free of my thoughts. Forget about the Whitewing, whoever designed something that looked... like that had some serious egotism. Either they were the world's biggest fan of nature's power, or just a little evil. Or both.

"Is this undercover Icereach tech too?" I asked, trying not to be gobsmacked.

"Nah. This predates the institute by a year or three." Leif shook her head. "The core concept was invented in Ironridge, and it's been refined a bit since then, but I'm fairly sure the work was done elsewhere."

I squinted at the cloud funnel. She said that, but the teal lightning was exactly the same shade as the glow from the Whitewing... The first thing anyone learned about magic in foal school was that color was usually indicative of origin.

"Let's not dally," Vivace announced, interrupting my thoughts. I barely had time to look to him, over by the cave's shallow back wall, before he disappeared.

"Eh?" I trotted closer, shivering from the chaotic gale generated by the ship's 'engine'. He had been there one moment and gone the next! Corsica moved up to investigate.

"There's a cleft in the rock," Leif explained. "I'll go last. Be careful; it's narrow."

Sure enough, there was a cleft, but it seemed barely deep enough to poke my head into. I could see the back from Corsica's hornlight, clear as day! How...?

"Sharp left turn," Corsica reported, sticking her face in to see. "I can see why you didn't want us to bring bags. Hope no one's claustrophobic."

"It turns right again, then widens out," Leif promised. "Vivace is waiting on the other side. We'll help you if you get stuck."

Corsica huffed, then exhaled, making her barrel as narrow as it would go... and tried to wriggle her way into the crevice.

"Ugh!" she complained, stopping halfway around the first bend. "I knocked an ear ornament off! This is... nngh... Barely wide enough for my head!"

I walked closer. She was obviously struggling, but there was so little room, her hindquarters couldn't even move from side to side. I could see the interior of the first corner digging into her barrel as she thrashed, immobilized, trying and failing to back up so she could presumably see the ground.

"This stupid cave! I can't... get back to see it... Uraaagh! I chipped my hoof!"

What was this? Corsica was the definition of lean beauty. How had an adult stallion like Vivace gotten through so easily, and how was Rondo going to follow? And the more I watched my friend struggle, her tail the only thing that wasn't immobilized, the more I began to feel like I was claustrophobic too.

Actually, this was probably why Rondo had stayed behind.

"Stop trying to back up," Leif gently urged. "I'll get what you dropped when I go through. You can't turn around in there. You have to keep going."

I was watching closely this time, but it still felt unnaturally abrupt. Corsica didn't slowly grind her way through, she just disappeared. Like the cave had swallowed her.

"I-I'm going next," I announced, deciding I would much rather watch ponies making it through on the other side than stay where I was out here. And with my coat and wings padding out my width and the duffel bag on my back practically voiding my maneuverability, I was absolutely cheating my way through.

A little shadow sneaking later, and I was in, the entrance an impossibly tight S-curve that I couldn't believe anyone had willingly explored to discover for the first time. Corsica was dusting herself off under her and Vivace's combined hornlight, cheeks red with irate embarrassment.

"Here's your thing," I mumbled, passing her the fallen ornament. Behind, Ansel arrived far more easily than Corsica had, and then Leif brought up the rear, also making it through without issue.

Corsica took it and gave them a reproachful look, fixing it in her mane. "You could have at least pretended to have trouble."

I averted my eyes, unsure how to agree without sounding like a hypocrite. I cheated, but I had luggage. How were all of them making it look so easy...?

"Thankfully, that's the last one of its kind," Leif promised, sighing in relief. "But if you didn't enjoy that, I don't advise becoming a professional spelunker. Next up: stairs. A whooole lot of them."

It was true, I realized with a start. The room we were in now had far more definition than a random cave: its ceiling was flat, its walls were square, the angles formed something resembling lines and corners... and in the back was an old, straight, darkened, militaristic stairwell, just wide enough that we could descend single-file.

We took up the same marching order as before, except Corsica and Ansel swapped places to spread out the light. I hadn't turned on my bracelet; there were two horns in the party, and my survival instinct was telling me that I needed to keep as many tricks in my pocket right now as possible. I didn't know why. It wasn't like the cave was watching me or could be caught by surprise. But it was a strong instinct, so I kept my bracelet hidden.

The stairs went down a flight, banked sharply, and switched back, no railings to catch any missteps. I guided my hooves carefully around the first switchback, noting that the floor we had stood on just a moment ago was a platform: the stairs were wedged into one wall of a massive, very deep shaft. If I slipped off the wrong end, there would be nothing to catch my fall.

No railings. No nothing. And the aged concrete stairs were so narrow. I kicked a pebble off into the abyss, and listened for several seconds before I heard a sound. It was a long, long way down.

"Claustrophobia? No problem." I rolled my eyes. "Here's hoping nobody has a fear of heights..."

Then Leif flew out over the pit, hovering along about half a flight below us and matching our descent. "Halcyon, how confident are you with your wings?" she asked. "I can either wait here to catch anyone if they slip, or ferry us one by one to the bottom to speed things up. Think you could lend a hoof so we can do both at the same time?"

I averted my eyes. Showoff.

Leif whistled. "Shame. On well. Don't worry, I got your backs."

We climbed for two or three minutes in silence, long enough to get me thinking again. This place had obviously been constructed, but how, and by whom? They had a few iron support bars and a lot of concrete, and that seemed like everything. Placing aerial concrete molds for this staircase would have been a fairly daunting task, but I wouldn't imagine it impossible for a unicorn with a talent in concrete-casting to be able to use their aura as a mold. And then they had the tech needed to cut a shaft this big into the mountain, and to reach this spot in the first place.

Something seemed hurried about its construction. The material palette should have been broader for a well-funded project, yet the scale should have been smaller for a poorly-funded one. What kind of conclusion was I supposed to draw from that? Either it had been made by a very small group of ponies specifically selected for their construction abilities, or it had been made by a larger organization under extreme time pressure, especially during the planning phase. I didn't know enough to pick between the two. But judging by Leif's assessment of why we might be here, the former felt more-

The stairs were missing.

I put my hoof down, too lost in thought to check, and immediately flipped forward, tumbling into a spin. My limbs all flailed, trying and failing to control my spin, flipping and smashing facefirst into... Leif's forelegs.

"Hey, watch it!" She put me down gently, then hovered back up to where a single section of staircase had collapsed, preparing to help the others across. Sheepishly, I realized I hadn't even noticed that we were slowing as Leif aided ponies in taking the jump one by one.

Get out of your mind, Hallie. Focus. Think more once you're out of the cave that's trying to kill you.

Eventually, the stairs ended, leaving me feeling like I had climbed from the peak of a mountain all the way down to its roots. Knowing where we were, I probably had. The room at the bottom was empty and full of crumbled rubble, everyone stopping to take a break after the long climb down. In the combined light of everyone's horns, I could see now that the walls as well were made from concrete. Long, thin metal beams formed the structure that the switchback stairs were braced upon. Yet the walls looked even more sloppy in their pouring, slightly warped or bulged where the mold shaping it while it dried had been removed slightly too early. They were also heavily cracked and run down, yet how much of that was from age and how much from hasty construction, it was impossible to say.

"That's going to be fun to climb back up," Corsica remarked once she had caught her breath. "I'm scratching caving off the list of things I want to do in the future. The spelunking life is not for me."

Leif chuckled. "Once Rondo and the Whitewing catch up, we'll have an easier time of it. That thing can fly us up these stairs in a jiffy."

Ansel pouted, massaging his legs. "Perhaps we should have waited for them before descending. What are they doing, anyway?"

"And how's Rondo going to fit through that stupid hole?" Corsica groused. "Probably just hanging back so he doesn't have to have everyone staring at him while he's stuck. Cheater."

"Rondo is taking care of business." Vivace didn't seem keen on elaborating. "They'll be along momentarily."

Right. Business. Apparently, Elise was now business to be taken care of... I wondered if I had made the right decision in outing her.

Silence fell. I took the opportunity to check over my friends. The remnants of my dream still had me on edge, and between the sight of the Aldebaran's power source in action and watching Corsica get stuck in the entrance, I wasn't feeling any better, but overall I was okay. Shaken, but okay.

Oh, and I nearly fell and broke my neck. Maybe I was a more than a little shaken.

Ansel had a perpetual frown on his face, and a minor case of the sniffles. Understandable, given what he thought of this mission and how he didn't have a magic earring like I did. "If it makes you feel any better," I muttered to him, "I'm starting to think I won't be agreeing to anything like this again for a lot more years than I was this morning."

He nodded in understanding, blowing on his hooves to warm them up.

"...So," Leif eventually said, breaking the silence. At first I thought we were getting ready to move again, but her tone felt just a hair too serious. "I bet you're all wondering what happened to the other half of our crew."

"Elise, Rondo and the Whitewing?" Corsica looked up. "Or do robots not count?"

"Rondo and Elise." Leif shook her head and took a breath. "It was... brought to our attention that Elise was behaving much more erratically than expected, given her disposition. One of you tipped us off. I'll leave it to you if you want to tell each other who that was, but suffice to say we've never actually met Elise before this and trust your judgement as ponies who have known her longer and in a more official capacity. You trust us to keep you safe on this trip, and as they say, trust runs both ways."

Ansel's ears tilted forward in concern.

"That's why I want to update you three on where the situation now stands," she continued. "Within Cold Karma's governmental structure - the company that runs Ironridge, if you forgot - there is a dedicated organization that oversees our end of the Icereach contract and logistics. Our own sponsor is higher up the command chain than the level of things like these. Our sponsor made the assumption that these Whitewings couldn't be coming from Ironridge. But, if Elise's behavior is suspect, especially if this trip doesn't turn up any links to Graygarden, our next move is going to be to return to Ironridge and push for a deeper internal investigation. It's entirely possible that whoever planned this is hiding right under our noses. I'd like to say this is a good result for you, where everything goes back to normal."

Corsica slowly frowned. "It wouldn't be?"

Leif sighed. "You remember late last night, when I told you about why I hate the eastern goddesses, right?"

I blinked. "What's that have to do with it?"

"I have a bias against authority," Leif admitted, shifting her gaze to the side. "A pretty strong one. Actually, all of us do. It's one of the things that brought us together as a group. Anyway, we spent some time asking Elise a few more questions, and in the end we decided there really might be something going on with her. And, so, we... sort of restrained her."

"You restrained her," Ansel said. "Like, tied her up."

"You tied up Elise?" Corsica's eyes widened.

"Comfortably!" Leif protested. "Nothing barbaric. But, well, yes." She shook her head. "The important part is, if we're right, we did the right thing, but if we're wrong - not if you're wrong; you only tipped us off, we're the ones verifying it - this has the potential to create an Incident. With a capital I. Not with Yakyakistan, fortunately, because only Ironridge personnel are involved, but the point is that we're biased and it's hard to be certain if that's interfering with our decision-making. And if anything does blow up because we misjudged something, we want to make sure you three are as far away from the fallout as possible."

"Sounds pretty on the surface. But what's that entail?" Ansel asked cautiously.

"No hard plans yet." Leif shook her head. "Everything still depends on whether we can unlock that terminal, and on what we find there. We're still thinking, but I wanted to keep you updated on what we're thinking about."

I wasn't listening. I was imagining Elise literally tied up, trying to imagine it being done comfortably, and suddenly doubting myself with double intensity. Sure, I had been pretty sure that the mare accompanying us wasn't really Elise, but had I been one hundred and ten percent sure? Would Elise forgive me if I was wrong? Asking forgiveness was a scary concept, throwing yourself at the mercy of someone you had no control over... I felt cold just thinking about it.

"Anyway," Leif finished, "once we get to the end of this tunnel, we'll have a much better place to break and wait for Rondo to catch up. It's a long walk, so I hope I've given you enough food for thought to last the trip. Everyone rested enough to get on our way?"

Apparently, everyone was. And so we continued.

My fears of frigid puddles proved founded after all.

The next leg of the journey was a long, straight, rectangular corridor, running long into the darkness. Unusually thin rusted iron girders supported a hewn rock ceiling, the walls in some places concrete, and others bare, hastily constructed and looking as if they had been left unfinished. Now I was even more sure that whoever built this had a shortage of raw iron... A haze seemed to restrict my vision, preventing our light from reaching too far down the tunnel - Vivace assured us it wasn't mine gas, and was safe to breathe. It smelled pretty stale to me.

The most decrepit part was the floor, however, once made of rectangular concrete slabs that had partially cracked and disintegrated, buckling and ramming up against one another and leaving abundant potholes in the floor. Water dripped slowly from chinks in the ceiling, likely causing the destruction by slipping into cracks before refreezing, widening them. And that very same water pooled in the potholes it created, which Ansel was the first to accidentally experience.

"Arrgh! Colder than winter's foot...!" He clambered out of the puddle after a chunk of concrete gave way, sliding him down and dipping a hoof in the water. Shaking the hoof off, he nursed it and swore under his breath. "Luckily shallow..."

"You good?" Leif asked. "There's a better place to rest up ahead, if you can keep going. And watch your steps, everyone."

Colors were hard to discern properly in the dim, two-horn rainbow of light, but Ansel was practically turning blue. "As if I couldn't handle a little cold..."

And so I pressed on through the unfinished corridor, minding my hoofing, thinking once again about the hasty architecture and trying to distract myself from Elise, and now the impending climb back to the surface.

It was hard to say how long we walked. Our pace was uneven, and I had nothing by which to track the time. There was no conversation, and the best metric I could work by was my own body's tiredness, but between two effective hours of sleep, my heavy load, and the adverse conditions, it was impossible to get an accurate estimate. About a mile was the best I dared guess.

The tunnel grew more complete as we continued on, never bending or changing. There were no lights in the ceiling. Had they not been installed yet, or was this place only intended for unicorns? Some of the walls had big, blocky arrows chiseled roughly into the concrete, pointing back in the direction we had come. Perhaps they were there to help orient anyone who lost track of which direction they were going, like a primitive imitation of the color guides in the Icereach workspace where I had found Ansel the other day. Or perhaps they were a warning to turn back.

Shortly after the arrows began, a huge mound of something materialized, nearly blocking the tunnel, sitting ahead in the gloom. What was that? From a distance, it looked like scrap metal, like part of the ceiling had caved in and dumped the contents of a rooftop cable compartment along with it. But no, it had more form than that...

The mound came into better relief, and once again my breath was taken away. It was all a machine, or had once been, a sturdy metal core surrounded by three evenly-spaced protrusions that looked like tree roots, big enough to take up most of the tunnel. Closer to the top, its cylindrical chassis took on a more defined front and back: the thing had a domed metal roof that stuck out like a thick-stemmed mushroom, four metal arms affixed to the sides, though one was a stump that had been torn free. At its back, pointing up, was a massive, thick-based conical spike encased in rings, though one of them had been shattered and another torn free. The whole thing was scorched and scarred, covered in chinks, dents and slices... What was this? I looked at the roots again, comprehending the complex hinge mechanisms connecting them to the trunk, and how the two more intact ones had tread belts looping along their bottoms and within them. Those were wheels. Or legs. Or something in between.

"...What's this supposed to be?" Corsica asked, studying it warily from a distance. "You had a point with the Whitewing, but it sure doesn't look like Icereach tech to me."

Leif chuckled. "Beats me. We weren't able to identify it either. It used to be this place's security, the first time we came here. Let's just say we changed that pretty good."

I paled. All four arms, I noted, were mangled at the ends and looked incomplete... like they had once held weapons and those had been removed. Suddenly, I could imagine this thing complete and upright and sparking with energy, rolling down the tunnel with glowing red eyes atop its mushroom dome...

"Yes, but what in Tartarus is it?" Ansel demanded, clearly not accepting the security as a good enough answer.

I was more preoccupied with how Leif and her friends had managed to do this much damage to something that looked more than capable of returning it. A little voice in my head also pointed out how much newer it looked than the rest of the surroundings.

"Like I told you." Leif shrugged. "Beats me."

"It was an experience that makes you glad you have a Whitewing." Vivace picked his way past the sentinel, barely sparing it a glance. "And makes everyone else glad they have a doctor. Why did you think the floor is so broken in this tunnel?"

I swallowed. Apparently my water-freezing theory was just a bit too ordinary for reality.

Beyond the sentinel, our destination was finally within sight. The tunnel stretched out about five rusted support sets longer, one of the beams bent and twisted out of place. We passed an alcove in the wall just big enough for the sentinel to hide in wait, and then sure enough, the floor grew much more intact beyond. And then we were there.

The tunnel widened out, approaching a wall of blueish rock that struck such a strong contrast with the black rock of the tunnel and mountain core that it was like we had found some massive, independent buried structure. And indeed that was what it was, an iron door set into the blue stone. The handle had some sort of complex password lock attached, clearly intended to keep intruders out. It also looked like it had been broken with a very prejudiced sword.

"Here we go," Leif sighed, yanking the handle and swinging the door open. "Break time at last. In we go, and then we wait for Rondo to catch up."

I wasn't sure exactly what I was expecting as I stepped through. Some sort of evil lair? Racks of machines and equipment? Another cave? But what I found made so much sense I felt like I had been told about it before and just forgotten: it was a snug, cozy, well-furnished and perfectly normal doomsday bunker.

A light glowed merrily on the ceiling, not an industrial floodlight or some dim power-saving thing, but the same kind of mana light one could find in any home richer than my own. The rounded walls and polished floor were all made of the same strange, sparkly-blue stone, but the floor was covered by a big fluffy rug, and metal shelves lined the walls, empty and awaiting contents. I could see a hidden vent that had to be running some sort of climate control system, since the air was both warm enough for a living space and much fresher than the cave outside... though it still held a strange, metallic scent that hinted at magical processing. Two doors led to adjacent rooms, and a painting of Yakyakistan's capitol adorned the wall opposite a nice-condition couch in a style that would have been fancy several decades ago.

"It's like..." I blinked, taking it all in. "A panic room. It's a safe house. Somewhere far away where someone could retreat and literally be safe until the end of time."

"Not on any map." Leif nodded in agreement. "Well-stocked with food that will never perish, too. Feel free to look around while we wait on Rondo. This mare, however, needs to rest her hoovsies."

Yeah. That sounded like a good idea. I tipped over on the couch and crashed, worn out from the long hike, repeated surprises and poor sleep. Corsica and Ansel could check over the place for danger if they wanted, but Leif had apparently already taken out the sentinel and what safer place could you find than a doomsday bunker? Down here, we could probably ride out the end of the world.

I didn't sleep, but came close, stuck in a half-awake daze where my body wanted to rest but my mind still thought I needed to be at the top of my game. Eventually, however, Rondo arrived, banging open the door and strolling in with the Whitewing, the machine expressionlessly regarding the room around us.

"Right, then." Vivace got to his hooves from where he had been working on his armor robe, nodding at the door to the left. "All of us are here. The terminal we need unlocked is one floor down. Follow me."

The Whitewing didn't wait, following his command and opening the door just like a real pony before heading down the staircase inside. Corsica stood as if to follow, but ignored Vivace, instead giving Rondo a skeptical look. "Okay, I have to know. How did a meat barrel like you fit through that cave at the entrance?"

Rondo flexed and gave a studly grin, nodding after the Whitewing. "With a whole lot of pushing from the rear!"

I shook my head, ditching my bag on the couch and scrubbing sleep from my eyes. All I knew was, there was probably a reason he had been the one to wait and cross alone, and it was probably an embarrassing one...

"Come on, then," Ansel interrupted, goading us along. "Let's get this lock business over and done with so we can finally get some suspense off our plates. What did we even wait for him for, anyway?"

"We like doing things together." Leif shrugged. "It's part of our code. Besides, everyone looked like they could use a chance to warm up after that hike."

It was pretty warm in here, I noted as we started to drain towards the staircase, which had a switchback going down. Not even close to uncomfortable, but between the heat and the lights and the air ventilation, it was obvious this place had a permanent power source. But mana wells were supposed to be extremely hard to make at high latitudes... Just how far down were we?

The staircase opened out into a room under the main one, this one less homely and more businesslike. A long metal desk stretched along one curved wall, unused corkboards recessed into the wall all along its length. In the center was a terminal, fancy and built into the wall, its screen extruded a ways and with gilded corners. A chair sat before it that hadn't been pushed back in. At its side was a boxy device that looked like a pencil sharpener sized for a unicorn horn, and empty filing cabinets lined the entirety of the back wall.

Everyone stood back, giving deference to Corsica.

"...Alright, then." Corsica stepped forward and took the chair. "This is your big, bad genetic lock? If it bites my horn off, you owe me your airship."

As if reacting to her weight on the chair, the terminal turned on. Most of us crowded around, though Vivace and the Whitewing hung back to keep watch.

"Access privilege level," Corsica read from the screen. "It says you can access it as a guest. No dice?"

Leif shrugged. "Give it a try if you're curious."

Corsica did so. Scrolling text crossed the screen.

Terminals were pretty simple in concept. Their capabilities changed by generation, but fundamentally, they were switchboards. You could route a text input to a pattern card, or a magical lock to a powered door, or a control system to some hazardous lab equipment. The screen provided a simple visual for what you were doing.

Rigging up some sort of access control input like this would take at least a third-generation model, the same as Corsica had in our lab, which were first invented twelve years ago. A lower bound for a date this place was still in use by, then. I filed this information away as potentially useful and then leaned over Corsica's shoulder, reading.

"Locked to the head scientist's daughter," I read aloud, the screen displaying the contents of the only pattern card Corsica could switch to without an access level. "Huh."

Rondo nodded at the device on the desk next to her. "Well? Pretty sure you stick your horn in that and see what happens!"

"Hold on," Ansel cut in, narrowing his eyes. "You said you had evidence this place belonged to a head scientist, not a head scientist's daughter. What happened to Corsica being close enough to her dad to fool this kind of genetic thingamajig?"

Leif shuffled uncomfortably. "Listen, things were pretty tense when we were explaining back there. Would you have believed us if we said it specifically mentioned Corsica by name? The fact still is that we brought Corsica to unlock it."

"But it doesn't mention her by name, though," I pointed out, less concerned about the omission and more curious about this note. "How many head scientist's daughters have there even been in Icereach? It reads more like a riddle. But who secures a terminal with a riddle?"

"Not Graygarden, that's for sure." Corsica rolled her eyes. "And besides," she added, "What kind of security system flat-out tells you where to find the key? Who signed me up for this? This sure doesn't look like legitimate corporate enterprise."

Vivace cleared his throat. "We never said we suspected anything legitimate was going on here."

"So that's the scanner?" I asked, moving around to pick up the little box. It was physically part of the desk, despite looking distinct, and wouldn't budge. Physically, it was a lot harder than one might think to hack a terminal by swapping in your own input devices, due to the analog signals they worked with, but something about the keyhole just sitting there on the desk felt... unprofessional to me. I couldn't quite place why. This felt like the first idea someone who wanted to secure a terminal would come up with, rather than an industrial standard tried and tested by time.

Rondo shrugged. "Sure looks like it."

"Well." Corsica pulled back, lowered her head, and inserted her horn into the genetic security machine. "Here goes nothing."

The screen flashed. Access elevated.

Corsica's name appeared under the list of access types, alongside the guest. She opened it. A single pattern card input appeared, this one titled A message from Aldebaran. She frowned harder, and opened this one, too.

Hello.

I sincerely hope you aren't reading this. However, in recognition that my hope is likely in vain, I must write it regardless. I am an anonymous member of Aldebaran, an elite mercenary group in the service of many clients throughout the world. Our most recent contract involves the incitement of a revolution in Icereach, overturning the existing leadership with a new guard.

We came by ownership of this cave as payment for a previous contract. It is ours. Anything you've seen here relating it to Yakyakistan was placed here by us. The Whitewing has nothing to do with Icereach. The security on this terminal was our doing as well. This place is a trap with the singular purpose of convincing you, Corsica, through purely planted evidence to turn on your father and attempt to 'liberate' your hometown, with our backing, as per our employer's will.

I am no saint. Most of us were some manner of criminal in the Empire before the war, myself included. However, I find that this goes too far. I recognize that leaving an open letter like this-

Rondo put a hoof through the screen.

With a cascade of glass and a burst of energy, the message was gone forever, several paragraphs still unread. Corsica hissed and blocked her eyes with a hoof. Ansel looked thunderous. Vivace was silent. Leif was repeatedly swearing under her breath.

It took several seconds for the realization to set in. When it did, I was shaking.

"Didn't see that coming." Rondo was the first to speak, slowly withdrawing his hoof from the shattered screen.

"Well." Leif straightened up, snapping back to her senses. "That's one way for this to end." She turned to Rondo and Vivace. "Pack it in, boys. We need to get out of here."

"...Pack it in," Ansel said limply, his fury draining away. "So that's your response, then. You're not going to deny any of that?"

"Platitudes would mean nothing when we have a traitor in our midst," Vivace said, voice cold. "Believe what you like, but we're not the kind of ponies who would settle this with bystanders around."

Leif weakly shrugged. "That, and, ever heard the phrase 'you know too much'? Someone wanted you to be a liability we'd have to get rid of. Until we know who that is, hard to keep you safe when one of our number secretly wants us to kill you."

"Besides," Rondo growled darkly, "barely a tenth of that is true, but fat chance you'll trust us on which is fact and which is fiction. Come, Whitewing! To the Aldebaran. This score must be settled..."

It felt like my understanding of reality had fractured, and then someone took the peaces, tossed them in a bowl and presented them back to me as a tasty chaos-and-crushed-dreams salad. "But... you can't... You mean...?"

Leif looked back at me, all three of them trying to climb the stairs at once without leaving anyone alone with us. "It wasn't lying about this place belonging to us. An indefinite lease, technically, but the point is, don't worry about some bad guy coming to check on their vacation home and finding you here. We'll come back and get you home once we've sorted all this out. Or we'll tip Icereach off on where to find you. Sorry it had to end like this."

"No, hold on!" I ran after them and stopped halfway across the room, a hoof outstretched. "You're... supposed to be better than that..."

Leif met my eyes. "Hey. I've got a question for you," she said. "Do you believe that a chronic, serial liar can still be a good pony?"

I lost my voice again.

"Over the years, that's a question I've found myself asking," Leif went on. "It comes with the territory. When we got here, we were supposed to be on your side, behind all the faking. I was on your side, though I can't speak for anyone else anymore. Now... you're not the first pony to look at me like that, and I've been where you are too. Actually, you remind me of someone very dear to me from a long time ago. So, I just wanted to make sure you know I'm sorry."

And then she, too, was gone.

"I didn't want to be proven right," Ansel whispered. "Damn it all, I didn't want to be proven right! Halcyon, what happened to coming back safe and sound and proving I was a silly goose who worried too much about dangers that weren't real?"

"But we are safe and sound, see?" Corsica pitched forward, stumbled and caught herself, looking like the shock on top of the day's stresses had flattened her halfway back to her burnt-out self of two years ago. "What did I tell you? My crazy luck kept us alive..."

A minute ago, everything had been fine. And now, I had nothing I could say.

I wasn't sure how long we stayed there, exactly where they had left us, without so much as lifting a hoof.

It felt like all the willpower had been drained from my body. One moment, we were on an adventure, and I had plenty of concerns and risks, but I still had agency and ground to stand on. The next, everything was just gone. It wasn't quite the same feeling as the aftermath of the accident - this time, after all, my friends were still very much alive. But the shock was the same. The absence of foundations, I knew like a familiar hole in my heart. What could I do? It was hard to even think about what had just happened.

If I felt like I had been sapped of will, Corsica looked it. I would have expected my feisty friend to be ready with a quip or insult or even encouragement to counter our situation, but she just stared into the distance with a strange, wry smile, the kind you wore when you were the victim of a very un-funny yet still masterful joke.

"So," Ansel eventually said, "what about Elise?"

"What about her?"

"You think she was in on their plan, or she was being a grump because she suspected something, or what?"

I shook my head. "Their plan? You'll have to explain it to me, because I'm still trying to wrap my head around how this looks from my point of view."

"What if it's a good-cop-bad-cop routine, I said. I trust them, they'd never do that, you said..."

"Shut it, you."

Eventually, my hooves carried me to the shattered terminal screen. I peered inside, the part of my brain that could do science not at all distracted by silly things like shock and emotions and whatever else was going on right now in my head. It had some pretty classy vintage hardware! Hardware that was now ruined. Was that a triple-crystal laminated wave function imprint board? Could make good salvage. One of the mana frequency scalar plugs was smashed, but there was another that looked good, if a little big for modern standards. And there was a pattern card just sitting there, hooked up to the imprint board, in a cheap pink plastic case with 'Corsica's Horn' written on the cover in black sharpie.

I detached the cable and pulled it out. However that sequencer machine worked, it probably just unlocked the terminal by matching whatever pattern was stored in here. Hacking this security would have been as simple as taking off the side panel and swapping in a card with a scan of your own horn. There was another pattern card with no label - probably the one the message had been stored on - so I took that, too. Not like I was above stealing broken hardware from Aldebaran after what they had done.

It was like a dam broke in my mind, holding this physical, tangible proof that the setup in front of me had been cobbled together by someone who knew nothing about security and just wanted to put on a show. This bunker? Fake. The job's so-called real purpose of investigating Graygarden? Fake. The money they paid us with? Who knows, probably fake as well. The dumb earring consolation prize Leif gave me a few days back? I almost was tempted to take it off and assume it was fake too, but at least a fake magical earring was still a fine non-magical earring. All this, and our prize amounted to some terminal parts and an earring.

"I'm gonna... go upstairs and look around," I announced, slipping the pattern cards in my pockets and noting that there was another door in this room as well to explore. "Try not to have any world-shaking experiences while I'm gone, okay?"

In the main lobby, bound and gagged and laying unconscious on the couch, was Elise.

For a moment, I was almost surprised. But my brain had regained the ability to put two and two together, and more pieces started sliding into place: of course Rondo had stayed behind to descend without everyone else watching. He had been carrying Elise. They were probably planning to stash her here all along to get her out of the way, or at least they were after I warned them about her.

What did that mean about me and them? Did that mean Aldebaran really were on my side, if they trusted me enough to take my word like that? I wasn't sure I wanted to be on their side. Then again, I wasn't even sure what their side was. I wished I could reread the letter, even if Leif did have a point about it probably not being written in our best interest. I mean, its existence had caused us to get stranded here! Who even knew what was going to happen to Icereach while we were away, or how we would get back?

Stranded.

I looked back at Elise. What had been going on with her? The enemy of my enemy wasn't necessarily my friend, I knew that much. I also had no idea yet how I thought of Leif and Aldebaran, whether their betrayal stung horribly or felt like nothing or both at the same time because I was numb. Maybe it wasn't a betrayal at all. After all, the main thing they were guilty of was lying about everything over and over. Didn't I do the same, wearing a mask between my thoughts and words whenever I interacted with someone? I didn't know what went on in their heads. Was I even allowed to judge them for that?

No, they had also stranded us here. But what if it was for good reason? I knelt down, whimpering from the pressure of the thoughts in my head, and for a moment I was almost overcome. I had wanted so much to trust them, because I thought they were like me. But what if ponies like them just weren't trustworthy? Ponies like... me.

Whatever had or hadn't been happening with Elise, I decided that I wasn't going to become a captor as well. I carefully undid her restraints, removing the rope from her hooves and the cap covering her horn, and then checked her vitals with first-aid skills I had used my talent a while back to pick up. She seemed stable. I quietly prayed that this wasn't another entry in a long string of mistakes, but after what had happened with Leif, I badly needed someone to put my trust in again.

On my way through the next door, I looked over my shoulder and noticed that my duffel bag was open and somewhat deflated near the exit. Had they really robbed me on their way out? Seriously?

...Whatever. I almost wished they had. If I could outright blame them for anything, without reservations, it would make settling my feelings so much easier.

I found a bathroom. It had running water.

Wetness on my face helped. I was still thinking about 'what Leif and Aldebaran had done,' but was having trouble putting words to exactly what that was. What all had happened? What had they done? They came to Icereach, hired us to investigate an ether cave. That was normal. Then we learned they were Ironridge auditors, actually here to get our help breaking into a security system. A little crazy, but still believable. And then we got into that system, and...

And they disappeared in a heartbeat, leaving us behind. I wished I could go back and reread that letter, re-watch the looks on their faces, re-listen to the things they said. In my mind, it was such a blur that it felt like they just spontaneously abandoned us.

Yes. Abandonment. That was the word for what they had done. We came in, something shocked us so much that we couldn't act or resist, and in barely five minutes' time, they were out the door and gone, with stories about how we knew too much or how it would be pointless to try to explain. They were gone in a heartbeat, and never gave us enough time to let it sink in.

Working hypothesis: they came here to ditch us. I drew myself up straighter, finally finding an idea that could explain everything I had experienced: Aldebaran wanted us out of Icereach and locked up in this hideaway. They were probably all in on that letter, probably rehearsed their responses for maximum tension, were always planning on making such a quick exit. Just look at Leif! If she had done a bad guy laugh instead of trying to apologize on her way out, maybe we would have snapped out of it and resisted.

It all made sense. All the parts that didn't make sense, it made sense that they didn't make sense. They left us here on purpose, and I didn't know why, but I knew that was what had happened. And I also knew that whatever we might have in common, that wasn't a thing I was about to do to anyone else any time soon. This, at least, I could be mad at them for without getting tangled up in the reasons I had wanted to trust them in the first place.

...So where was here?

The bathroom had a hot tub, I noted, the ultra-fancy kind with bubble jets. An idea crossed my mind, and I stepped into the tub, impulsively ramming a wingtip up the water intake for the bubble vents. It came back with a few hairs of yellow fur.

Huh. Not colored like any member of Aldebaran. Leif had a yellow mane, but this was pretty clearly coat fur... Maybe the previous owner who supposedly gave the place to them? I wondered what to make of that.

The bathroom was separated from the lobby by a hall with five doors, the lobby door at one end and two on each side. Immediately across from the bathroom, I found a squat kitchenette, with a stove and a countertop and an array of cookware that suggested it catered to someone who was a pro at boiling water and opening cans. The bathroom was pretty luxurious, but this place definitely wasn't built to house a five-star chef. Disappointing.

One door over from the kitchen was a pantry, crammed with a mountain of canned food at least twice as tall as I was. "Woah," I breathed, picking out several from the top and examining the massive cache of edibles. "Someone really was meaning to survive the end of the world in here..."

Both of the cans had pack dates of 993. Ten years ago, assuming they used the Yakyakistani calendar. That was an unusual time, I mused, checking a few more and finding them exactly the same. Had they not been updated since this place was made? It was a similar age range to the destroyed terminal. Apparently, neither Aldebaran nor this place's previous owner had been much concerned with upkeep.

The cans also had heavy branding and looked like commercial products. I didn't recognize the company names or logos, but odds were, that meant they were made in Ironridge.

Finishing with the pantry and deciding I wasn't yet hungry, I closed the door and turned to the last one. It was a staircase leading down, probably to join up with the other door from the terminal room... Interesting. Good architectural sense, making multiple ways to get through the bunker in the event of damage or a partial collapse. And yet, batponies could shadow swim through fallen rubble quite easily. Apparently, this place hadn't been made with my species in mind.

I trotted down amid the sparkly blue stone, getting a fleeting sense of purpose from trying to suss out the original owner, far preferable to having nothing at all to do. The room at the bottom was another hallway, circular and with four doors: I immediately checked the one to my right, and found Corsica and Ansel again, still sitting in the terminal room. The other two doors contained a small study - empty - and a bedroom with a very plush four-poster, also empty. My thoughts weren't ready to let me take a nap, but when my exhaustion finally won out, I knew where I would go.

That was it. I had explored the whole, entire bunker.

"Have fun?" Ansel asked as I rejoined them in front of the smashed terminal. "Find anything that'll make this notably better or worse?"

I told them about Elise, and then proceeded to lay out my theory that Aldebaran might have intended from the very beginning to dump us here and run away. Ansel was skeptical. "What do a bunch of underclass refugees like us have that would possess a criminal syndicate to waste time and effort stranding us here?"

"I dunno." I shrugged. "Maybe it was never about us, and they just thought they could use us to bait Elise."

"Wouldn't there have been, like, a million easier ways to do that, though? They were pretending to be from Ironridge, so they could have pretended to mandate her out as well."

I shook my head. "Beats me. All I know is, they sure left in a hurry. Didn't even stop to consider their options."

"Wish we could see that letter again," Ansel grumbled.

"Yeah," I agreed. "You know, you're taking this better than I expected."

Ansel gave a harsh laugh. "Only on the outside, and only because there's no one to take it out on. Pure liquid rage is the only reason I'm not a heap like Corsica there."

Putting aside the worrying implications of that statement, I glanced at my other friend. "Hey, are you alright?"

"Just got some stuff on my mind." She blinked, focusing. "As if anyone wouldn't. You need something?"

"I, err..." I frowned. What did I need? Food? A nap? Space to sort things out? Someone to talk to?

No, what I needed most was something to do with myself.

"You know what you need?" I straightened my back. "A hot bath. There's a sweet bubble jet tub a floor up, and you look like a mess after all that spelunking. Swear on my honor it'll make you feel better, at least a bit."

"I think we all do, after crawling through that entryway," Ansel agreed. "Might as well get the basics out of the way if we're going to be here for the long haul. Once we're a little more comfy, we can see about planning our revenge on those vile dastards."

The last two nights, I had spent in the same room as Corsica. She had shown no qualms about doing her mane in front of me, got confused by my reluctance to doff my boots, and the extent of her concern for personal privacy only seemed to go up to hogging the bed on the airship all to herself. So, it wasn't terribly surprising that she left the door open when she bathed.

"They took my coat," I announced, going through my duffel bag on the floor beside the bathtub, mostly there for the company, the high rumble of the bubble jets running in my ears. "Of all the things they possibly could have stolen, they took my favorite backup coat."

"Relax," Corsica encouraged blearily, floating on her back in the steamy water with her regalia piled off to the side. "At least they didn't make off with literally everything you brought. Some of us actually listened when they said to leave our things back on the ship."

"And my backup boots, too," I complained, ignoring her. "I went to all the trouble of lugging a second set all the way down here just in case I fell in a puddle, or something, and they swiped it."

Corsica shrugged, her mane bobbing in the bubbles beside her like a raspberry rag. "Well, they did tell you to bring spares of anything you wore, right? I'm pretty sure I had copies of these back on the ship." She gestured to the pile of clicky-clack shoes and ear ornaments. "Maybe they were just jealous of your style."

Leif had expressed appreciation for my coat, but... "If they were gonna bilk something, why not take this?" I held up the inertial stabilizer rotor, so obviously meant to be a pegasus wing now that I had seen the whole Whitewing put together. "It's probably worth a fortune, and they even had something they could use it for. I don't get it."

"Maybe they're insane," Corsica offered. "Sure fits how I see the picture."

"You're not taking this too well either, huh?" I guessed, glancing out the door toward the kitchen, where Ansel was sorting through cans to find the products with the longest shelf lives. "He's doing fine on the surface, but it feels like everyone's hiding in their own heads right now."

"And you're doing any better?" she countered. "How am I supposed to take it? I told you we'd be fine, and we are. What's not to like? Everything's awesome and peachy..."

I frowned. Sure, my thoughts and feelings were all mixed up. Part of me wanted to hate Aldebaran, and part of me wondered if that would make me a hypocrite. I kept drawing parallels to the accident and my experience living through that. Not many would call my situation enviable. But, precisely because I had been through that, what if I was stronger and really was taking this better than my friends?

Most of the time, I was great at reading ponies. Usually. Unless they pulled a fast one on me like Leif. Okay, maybe only sometimes. But right now, it felt like there was a wall in my mind where I would usually try to empathize with others and understand how they were thinking, like the part of me that did that was temporarily unavailable. Maybe that was a part of my own coping mechanism. Maybe I only felt like I was doing better than they were, but was actually running on ten percent capacity without even realizing it.

Or maybe I was just exhausted.

The bubble jets thrummed in my ears, and the air felt noticeably warmer from the bath's heat. Maybe I needed a turn in there once Corsica was done. Warm water, followed by that plush four-poster in the downstairs bedroom... Just a chance to exist without thinking for a while, to recharge myself and get some distance from the whiplash of our sudden stranding. Funny how I trusted this place enough already to make that my highest priority. We all probably should have been on full alert, but I was just too tired.

I stared at the sparkly blue wall, and a thought suddenly struck me. Running water, fresh air, power, heating... I hadn't encountered any sort of utility room while exploring the hideout. You couldn't just conjure these things out of thin air. They took machines, and if the mana wells powering Icereach were any indication, they probably wouldn't fit in any old closet. I had checked all the doors and hallways, but apparently, I hadn't actually explored this place all the way.

"Be right back," I told Corsica, getting shakily to my hooves and realizing my legs had fallen asleep on me. "I've got a sudden wanderlust I've gotta get rid of..."

An ordinary pony might have tried to look for a secret maintenance area by checking for trapdoors, looking behind paintings and under rugs and scouring every inch of the walls for hidden passages. Actually, an ordinary pony probably wouldn't have cared about where the power was produced and the water was heated, but I had always found machines to be the best company, and felt compelled to seek them out.

I was also a batpony, and knew how to use that to my advantage. So, to find the ventilation system, I simply went down to the terminal room, shadow snuck through a grate, and started following along inside an air duct.

What did I have to gain from this? It didn't matter. I was curious, and too tired not to indulge. A warm wind blew against my face as I half-crawled, half-swam, indicating I was moving in the right direction. Just had to find an outtake vent somewhere else...

I found it, and dropped into a darkened room that was soon lit by my bracelet. A rough-carved, vaulted ceiling twice the height of any room in the bunker proper loomed over me, and all around me were piles of quietly humming equipment: metal cylinders and stacks of fans, insulated pipes along the ceiling, big, chunky, monolithic machines that chugged away without a care in the world. It was cooler and draftier in this room, the large space seeming to act as some kind of air reservoir or heatsink, but near the machines, it was pleasantly warm.

"Hey there," I said, slumping against a water heater, glad to be in some company I knew I could trust for a change. "How's it hanging? Bet you had a pretty ordinary day today. Or maybe not, now that there are ponies down here who actually need hot water."

I rolled my shoulders, a branching forest of pipes up above that quietly clunked and clattered and went about their business. "Must be nice, being a water heater," I told it. "You probably don't ever have to wonder who you are, or what you're supposed to do with your life. You've got it all written out in your name. Me, I just found out some folks I looked up to and thought were like me were... you know..."

The emerald gloom deepened as I partially covered my bracelet. "I can't believe it. The first time I saw them, I thought they were what I wanted to be, but as we hung out, I started to see we were pretty similar already. Overdone clothes, wanderlust, loving technology, born in the Empire, wearing faces in public..."

My voice started to crack. "And now they lied to us like a million times over, and then ditched us here. Just like that. If I thought we were so similar, why didn't I know they'd be like that? I mean, I hide stuff all the time. Not to hurt anyone, or anything, but... My talent? My legs?" I rubbed at my boots. "How about the... things... I remember from my dreams, or what I did after the accident? Hey, I'm even hiding that I'm thinking about all this from my friends, right now. I should have known they'd be like this too."

I hung my head, resuming after a pause. "I mean, I guess I did know. Subconsciously, at least. See, I've always wondered, when you've got a talent like mine... are you meant to be a bad pony? Or at least a morally gray one? Sure, there might be ways to use identity theft that are nice and wholesome, but I'm asking are you meant to be, not will you be. Is this what whoever made me had in mind when they designed my talent? I guess I ignored the warning signs on purpose because I really wanted them to be the ones who could show me what to do with myself when I grow up. Should have... Should have listened to Ansel and figured maybe they weren't what I wanted them to be."

But what if, despite the secrets, Leif and Rondo and Vivace really had been acting in our best interest somehow, and it just looked bad? I didn't say it, even to the water heater, but I still thought it. I sure had done things for my friends' sakes that they could never understand, at least not without my unique point of view. Part of me lectured that it was unhealthy, but another part of me wanted to keep giving them the benefit of the doubt. Besides, hating them for doing something I might have done - something I might actively be doing - sounded like an uncomfortable middle ground between hypocrisy and hating myself, two places I had no intention of venturing near as long as I had a say about it.

And that left me with no outlet for what I was feeling and no one to blame. Weakly, I pounded a hoof against the water heater, slumping to the ground. It could take it. "Stupid machine," I mumbled, exhausted and yet still far from able to sleep. "You just have to get the good life, not caring a bit about who to trust or how to judge or all these other issues..."

A pony in any position but my own, my thoughts told me, wouldn't even think about giving Aldebaran the benefit of the doubt. They'd ditch them like... well, like how Aldebaran ditched us. This probably meant that I was wrong and it would be perfectly possible for me to blame them without simultaneously condemning myself. But those ponies weren't me and didn't have my unique problems, and so knowing what they would do helped me overall very little.

It was circular thoughts like these that prevented me from getting any sleep. "You're not much of a help," I grumbled up at the water heater, which had been as stoic a conversation partner as I could have asked for. "Why not give me some kind of sign, eh? If Leif and her cronies are all that bad, give me some weird coincidence to back it up. Or the other way around. You can do that, right?"

A detailed look around the room didn't reveal any mysterious coincidences. It did, however, show me a door, a large and sturdy one I had missed before that looked more like it was for transporting things than ponies. Probably how someone got all the machines down here in the first place, and ostensibly leading somewhere else I hadn't been. Did I want to try it and keep exploring?

Not like I was going to get to sleep soon either way.

The door took more strength to open than I was expecting, and swung forward into darkness, my bracelet slowly casting its brightness. At first, my blurry eyes didn't quite adjust to what I was seeing, but soon it came into focus: an entire wall of the room was a machine.

Or rather, the interface for a machine.

A vast array of terminal screens stretched from end to end, four high and at least ten wide, built into a burnished metal frame and angled gently toward a focal point in the center, a commanding, high-backed chair. The array was split in two by a central screen, the biggest I had ever seen, taking up the space of nine smaller ones, and those were already quite generous.

I walked towards it, agape. Icereach had terminal banks reminiscent of this, for those experiments that required displaying huge amounts of data in real time. But they were all cobbled together, built from individual machines and scalable wire frames to conform to the needs of the moment. This thing... It had bezels sculpted to join the screens seamlessly, and a front console trimmed with chrome and equipped with a dynamic pressure stick, the fanciest and most expensive input device a unicorn could buy.

What did this do? Why was it here? The cohesiveness of the interface design suggested someone knew far in advance what the requirements would be - a level of planning that I typically didn't expect from Icereach. The polish and eye for detail told me it was designed to be used by someone important, not just a scientist who prided function over form. This machine had both in abundance.

In absence of a reason to do otherwise, my legs carried me to that big chair, and I sat down.

It was a hard chair, stiff enough to force me to pay attention and sit up straight, yet still comfortable enough I could probably sit there for hours without getting cramps. Had it been sat in much before? I couldn't tell. But as I settled my weight in, it reacted to my presence, and the screens slowly came alive.

They woke one by one, like an ancient thing testing each muscle to see how it had fared during hibernation. The room's main lights began to rise as well, and slowly each screen flashed, settling out into an endless wave of snowy static. The big center screen was the last to wake.

Project Nemestasis Central Access Terminal

Project Nemestasis is permanently disabled. Go away.

I stared for a long, long while. I didn't go away.

"Huh," I eventually said. "That's a lotta emotion for a status message. Wonder if you're banished down here, too. Bet it gets lonely, even for a machine."

The terminal did, I noticed, still seem to be fully operational despite everything it was connected to being 'disabled'. And it also had some input ports on the front console, standard sized.

If I had been jealous of the water heater, then for this machine, I felt nothing but kinship. It might have gone a whole decade without being used. Well, maybe I could fix that.

I reached into my pocket, pulled out the unmarked pattern card from inside the destroyed terminal in the living area, and plugged it in, wondering if I might get to read the entirety of the message that had landed us in this mess in the first place. A second passed, and the screen refreshed, recognizing it. There the letter was, no security access or horn shenanigans required. A message from Aldebaran, the title read.

So, I opened it, unsure whether to brace myself or resign myself and simply starting to read.

Hello.

I sincerely hope you aren't reading this. However, in recognition that my hope is likely in vain, I must write it regardless. I am an anonymous member of Aldebaran, an elite mercenary group in the service of many clients throughout the world. Our most recent contract involves the incitement of a revolution in Icereach, overturning the existing leadership with a new guard.

We came by ownership of this cave as payment for a previous contract. It is ours. Anything you've seen here relating it to Yakyakistan was placed here by us. The Whitewing has nothing to do with Icereach. The security on this terminal was our doing as well. This place is a trap with the singular purpose of convincing you, Corsica, through purely planted evidence to turn on your father and attempt to 'liberate' your hometown, with our backing, as per our employer's will.

I am no saint. Most of us were some manner of criminal in the Empire before the war, myself included. However, I find that this goes too far. I recognize that leaving an open letter like this will place you in a disadvantageous situation, one in which you find yourselves in limbo for knowing too much. Better that than working unwittingly against your own interests.

Fortunately, I know Leitmotif's temperament and doubt she will allow you to come to harm, even if tempers run hot among others in our crew. It is likely that we will settle for imprisoning you somewhere you cannot interfere with our operations until they are finished.

If this sits ill with you, know that you are not powerless. We members of Aldebaran hold our secrets close for a reason, and you need merely to put yourselves in a position to threaten us with their release to gain considerable power. In gaining such a position, I cannot help. However, I can tell you how to exploit it to the fullest.

Ask yourselves this. When we instructed you on how to pack for this outing, we recommended doubles of all important or essential clothing you wouldn't want to be seen without, to guard against accidents. Where is your luggage now? Aboard our ship, as we asked that you leave it behind. This was deliberate. We don't want your trinkets, equipment or souvenirs. In the contingency that we had to leave you behind or could not secure your loyalty, we wanted your clothes.

Ask yourselves further. If you had doubts about the authenticity of our offered job, or perhaps any implications that accompanied it, who assuaged those so that you eventually joined us? Was it a trusted figure from Icereach whom you look to for authority? And while they may have been adamant or encouraging about our job for you, did they have any unusual personality changes or lapses in memory since we arrived?

Ask yourselves one more time. Corsica, I assume you are present, and likely others as well. Who are they? Do you know each other well? Are they, perhaps, the ponies in Icereach most likely to notice if you underwent a similar change?

We may have told stories about the old east while warming you up to join us. It is true that we hail from there, making it a natural conversation topic. You likely heard tales of a great war in which two goddesses fought and the sarosians were wiped out. And, Icereach being the insular and isolationist society it is, you likely did not have the context to know that this, too, was a lie.

The east was brought down by shape-shifters today known as changelings. They used the element of surprise to devastating effect. We are they.

Knowing this, you can prepare for our subterfuge yourselves, or warn others and dull our edge there as well. And this prison is not so inescapable as it might seem. Fight, and protect your hometown.

Cold Mist

Lights blinked slowly and rhythmically, in time with the heart rate monitor attached to the hospital bed.

My ears drummed with the sound of my own heart, beating far faster than the blips on the screen. All I could feel was a frigid burning in my forehooves, one my boots weren't able to banish. A burning from frantically scraping at freshly-fallen snow, shoveling huge amounts of it, while knowing I was far, far too slow.

I shivered, even though it was hot in the room. Someone had decided turning up the thermostat was better than blankets for ponies who had just been caught in an avalanche. I probably would have turned it a few degrees higher.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

It didn't feel like it was Corsica's life the monitor was measuring. It felt like it was my own. After all, what was I supposed to do now?

Corsica lay across from me, her side rising and falling, sans any shoes or ornaments, face far from peaceful. Eyes closed. Exactly the way she was in my dream.

After writing out the letter word for word and bringing it back for my friends to read, I had washed up and proceeded to nearly pass out in a hallway. That was the trigger I needed to finally convince myself that I couldn't do any more productive thinking without getting some rest, so I had moved to the plush bedroom and started trying to sleep. Progress was mixed: somehow, I was dreaming and aware of the waking world at the same time, in an overlapping haze that made it feel like I wasn't really a part of either. And I was still tired.

For her part, Corsica had come in to crash a while after I did, apparently deciding that the bed was big enough that she didn't need to evict me to avoid it being awkward. I probably wouldn't have woken even if she had suplexed me across the room.

Ansel was one room over. I wasn't sure why they put him and Corsica in separate rooms. His setup was much the same; the care he needed identical. It was probably to force me to make a choice: sit at one bedside or sit at the other. Probably not, actually, but that was how it felt at the time.

"I should be with Ansel," I muttered to an unused oxygen tank, sitting alone in the dead minutes when the nurse was checking on other patients. "He's my brother. I've got a duty to my family..."

But Ansel was never nice to me. I was Mother's favorite, and he knew it. Corsica was the one I idolized, following around like a second shadow. He resented me, and while I knew on paper that we were family, I didn't care for him at all. It made it easy to choose which room to haunt, which bedside to never stray away from. But it didn't make it easy to feel good about it.

Elise was awake. It had happened sometime after Corsica had turned in as well, and only Ansel was still up to greet her. Corsica had forgotten to close the doors on her way in, and now a conversation between the two of them drifted in from the terminal room, loud enough for me to make it out.

Predictably, and much to my chagrin, Elise knew what changelings were. Of course she got to know all the things that were censored from ordinary folks like me... But she had also ditched her aloofness from the airship, which was a good sign that she wasn't still an impostor. Now, she was actually talking about them.

Part of me wanted to wake up and go join the discussion, my curiosity trying to kick me out of bed like an unwelcome, muddy boot. But I needed sleep, and I could listen from here. And besides, if I woke all the way up, there was no guarantee I'd go back to having this dream again once the conversation was done. It wasn't that it was a good dream - it was a pretty bad one, actually. But of all the bad dreams today's stresses could bring about, this one wasn't so bad that I was eager to try my luck with another.

"...No change in her vitals," a thin nurse said, wearing a medical cap over her pointed, bony jaw. "No new bruising, either. That's good. I don't think there's anything more we can do for her except hope she makes it through the night."

I nodded from a chair in the corner. Looking back, it was obvious I was in shock. Why hadn't anyone bothered checking me over, too?

"You look like you've got a lot on your conscience, sweetheart," the nurse remarked, finally turning to me, crouching down so that she was on my eye level. "I know it's hard to see friends and family like this. But if you hadn't gotten them back here, they'd both be dead for certain. Now they've got a chance to make it through, thanks to you. So focus on the good you did, okay?"

The nurse's words bounced right off me. Her heart was in the right place, I knew, and she was saying the right things, but it was like she was running through the motions without really trying to put herself in my position and understand what I had gone through. I knew this because if she had thought about it even a little, she would have questioned how a sixteen-year-old filly had dug two unconscious ponies out of an avalanche, carried them up a sheer mountain wall, and then all the way back down the road from the tower to get them home to Icereach. She saw that I had done it, and so she accepted it, but she didn't stop to think about it or really understand.

If she could have looked a little further, she would have seen me struggling down that road, trying to strike a balance between carrying them quickly and carrying them gently. She would have felt the burning in my hooves from digging through the snow, berating myself for my lack of speed. She would have realized that I knew nothing whatsoever about avalanche first-aid, despite having a talent that could let me learn it in a heartbeat if I had ever previously cared about pretending to be a field medic. She would have felt just how much I was willing to give to have a talent that could simply let me pull expertise from the void instead, without needing something to learn from or time to learn it.

Was this guilt I was feeling? Was I weighed down first and foremost by the sight of my broken friends, unconscious on those hospital beds? No. It was the anticipation of guilt. My time to act was over, and all I could do was wait for my actions to be judged.

"I was powerless," Ansel growled, sitting in the terminal room with Elise, two doors away. "I did everything right, and it didn't matter. Knowing they were up to no good? I had them ratted out from day zero. With a little help from you, I even had Corsica and Hallie on board! But how do you play against someone who can literally pretend to be anyone they want? Should I have done something different? We are still alive, but our fate is in limbo..."

"I doubt you could have done much," Elise apologized. "The fault was ultimately mine for being captured by their tricks. Without my visage at their disposal, I doubt they could have convinced you to come at all. This was not your mistake."

Strange, seeing Ansel now thinking the same things I had thought two years ago. This wasn't over yet, not by a long shot - we were captive, but still alive. He had tried his hardest to protect us, and now all he could do was wait, helpless, for results that may or may not come. I knew that feeling like an unsavory ghost. And I also knew that if we somehow did make it home to Icereach, the changelings gone, everything back to normal, shaken but eventually fine? We would probably be treated exactly the same as I had been in my dream.

We would be cooed over and pampered, and everyone would talk about how much we had been through. But to them, our problems would have started the moment we got back to Icereach, not the moment we left. Because that was when our problems would enter their lives, become visible to them. After all, how could they worry about things they didn't know? I couldn't blame them for not understanding, really. It was just the way ponies were.

This time, thinking of the well-meaning platitudes didn't bother me nearly as much as before, and not just because I knew it was coming. It was also because I wasn't alone.

"You're not alone," Mother said, standing at Ansel's bedside and chewing a wad of gum. She looked exactly the same as in the present day, gaunt and wearing her bathrobe with her mane over one eye, the hairs stiff from being bleached and redyed far too many times.

Ansel's heart-rate monitor beeped quietly in the background. This was only the second time I had visited his room since the doctors had finished and left him to rest. "He was my brother. And Corsica was my best friend."

Half true. Ansel and I had never liked each other, and our relationship was mean and resentful, with me as a smart little prick and him as an aggressive showoff. Was that what a sibling relationship was supposed to be? I honestly had no idea. But we were definitely related, and it was easy now to wish that something between us had been better.

But I still had no understanding of the difference between idol and friend.

Mother chewed thoughtfully, putting on no more airs for her son at his hospital bed than she did for his birthday parties. "Was your brother. Was your best friend. Something happen to change that?"

I bristled, shocked out of my stupor.

"I'm not a psychologist." She blew a bubble and popped it, somehow not getting gum on her face. "I'm not good with making points gently. But I had friends once. From the east. All dead." She chewed. "Of course, I gave up on them before they were gone all the way. Maybe if I had said something different, they would have lived. Regret's a dangerous thing."

Was this really the most appropriate story for-

"Way I see it, you've got three options," Mother said, speaking slowly around her gum. "Get used to the idea of making new friends. There are hundreds of ponies in Icereach. Or, if you care, don't let these two go so fast. They're not dead yet, are they? You're capable of more than you think. Never too late to make a difference until you've given up." She shrugged. "Or do nothing again, and grow up to be like me."

I furrowed my brow, my heart urging me to rebel against everything she had said. "Again? What are... Oh." I looked away, ears stuck to the back of my head, trying to fold them when they were already naturally down. "What are you so concerned about me for when I'm not the one who's injured? Isn't Ansel your son too? And what am I supposed to do, anyway? If there's really something someone can do, why not lead by example?"

Mother turned to his bed, sitting and rubbing her injured foreleg, as if merely seeing him made it ache. "That's what I'm doing. An example for you to be better than." She shook her head, as if this was terribly obvious, and she hated it for being so. "I don't have the strength for this anymore. Just gotta prioritize where I can..."

It hadn't come instantly - not until Corsica and Ansel were fine, of course - but I forgave her.

Despite that, I still wasn't entirely sure what she had been talking about. Parts of it made sense - death was irreversible, and the difference between being in perfect health and at death's door was far smaller than the difference between there and being all the way dead. You could come back from an injury, but never from death. But what was a kid like me supposed to do about it?

I didn't have some talent in saving lives like Vivace, which could have let me change things two years ago. I cringed as I realized my instincts still pulled him up as a model for me to look up to... I also didn't have a talent in super ninja battle skills, which I probably would need if I wanted to do something about yak-busting Rondo and his scary Whitewing, which would surely be obstacles we'd need to remove by force. All I could do was sit on the sidelines and wait for things to resolve one way or another. All I had was a talent for pretending to be someone I wasn't.

...Actually, wouldn't that be the perfect talent for dealing with a squad of armed changelings? I would never be able to approach them in a fight, despite two years of training with Balthazar, but my heart sped up a little as I realized I had maybe the one talent in the world that would let me play them at their own game. I wasn't helpless.

Corsica's vitals were holding steady, the nurses told me. It wasn't very helpful news. What I wanted most was a way I could actually contribute, something better than sitting around in the gloom and listening to the beeping of the heart monitor. My nerves had held out on the long trek back home, but sitting here and waiting for my efforts to be judged was too much. I needed a way to do more.

Not only did such a way elude me, but I didn't even believe them that she was plateauing in the first place. It had been several days since the accident... Probably. I wasn't keeping a sleep schedule. And over those days, she had grown gaunt, her cheeks shallowing out and her ribs becoming visible and her blank pink flanks losing their smoothness to a hint of bone. Breathing and temperature and heart rate didn't matter if you were unconscious and couldn't eat. I needed to eat, too...

Ansel was going downhill. He was also the second one I had freed from the ice. I tried not to read into that.

"Why?" I whispered, staring at my idol. Why couldn't I protect her? Why did this have to happen to her? Why did this have to happen to me? I'd probably be much better off right now if I was as nonchalant about her as she always was where I was concerned.

...For that matter, since it did hurt so much, why did I care for her so much in the first place? What was in it for me?

I turned to the heart-rate monitor beside her bed, which was still monotonously beeping. "I don't get it," I quietly murmured.

The monitor didn't do anything different, but it might as well have asked the same questions I was asking. Corsica would tell jokes at my expense, side with Ansel when he and I got into arguments, act like it was a privilege for me to follow her around... Well, I acted like that was a privilege too, but why?

I had put her first and foremost in my life, so why was this my reward? Why were those things my reward before the avalanche had fallen? Why had I made her so important to me in the first place? Everything I had taken for granted in my life felt like it was drifting, untethered and directionless in a deep ocean. And the monitor had no words of wisdom to see me through.

...Well, some things hadn't changed. I was still talking to machines as if they were people. But still. I just didn't understand...

I wanted to reach back through time and reassure my past self that it would all work out in the end. With two years of hindsight, some of the questions that had cascaded down on me at Corsica's hospital bedside were clearer, now. Others still eluded me, yet didn't seem so pressing as they once had.

Something about myself I had only really begun to understand in the time since the accident was that at my core, I was completely blank. Most ponies - at least, I liked to imagine - had something immutable inside that made them them. Some traits that were foundational to who they were, that couldn't be changed and would always be reliable. In my case, I didn't have anything like that, perhaps because my talent made me adaptable enough that anything that would be unchangeable for someone else, I was able to change. I was nothing, but not a bad nothingness - a potent one, like a blank canvass that I could fill with whatever I wanted, and that meant I got full choice over what made me me.

But I never looked deeply enough at myself to realize this until those days soon after the accident, when my life was upended and I found myself without a foundation. These days, there were things I could do to take care of myself with that in mind, like building a shrine to myself in my room and holding my quirks stubbornlessly close, even if it might be advantageous to change them. But my younger self didn't yet understand, and made some painful mistakes as a result.

Getting hopelessly attached to a peer and leader, finding a place in the societal pecking order, all those were things I assumed were just normal parts of adolescence. The problem was that most kids, without their peers, would still be themselves. I was entirely dependent on what I chose to be defined by. So, logically, if nothing plus Corsica equaled me, then me minus Corsica equaled nothing.

Without doing anything wrong, I had set myself up for that fall.

"Why did it have to be changelings?" Ansel whispered, suddenly drawing my ears back to the conversation. "It's hard enough as it is, trying to get Hallie to appreciate the present and not play risky with her future. The kid's got such awful survivor's guilt, pretty much any entreaty to stay safe will bounce right off her. I ran afoul of that just yesterday. Or was it two days ago? Point is, with those monsters in the mix, you can't even trust the ground you stand on, let alone build a logical argument. I did talk her out of it, and they made it count for nothing..."

Elise nodded, listening.

"Well?" Ansel looked at her. "You've probably got a million secrets rattling around in that head of yours. Tell me what's so special about Icereach that brought those swindling pirates in to ruin our lives."

Elise returned the look, face passive. "What do you think?"

Ansel frowned. "What have I got to do with it?"

"You were mislead and captured by them," Elise pointed out. "I think that gives you full right to have an opinion on their motives. Besides, you likely spent much more time around them than I."

"Well, that's fine and dandy, but I asked in the first place because I haven't the foggiest what their deal is." Ansel shrugged. "Maybe they just find sadistic pleasure in pretending to be somebody they aren't. I can't imagine why else they'd want to steal my identity. I'm like a puzzle piece from the wrong puzzle, slapped into a spot where it doesn't belong. I sleep on the living room couch, for crying out loud! They'd have to be real desperate to swipe that out of necessity. Granted, it's still leagues better than what their kind deserve."

I squeezed my eyes shut. Ansel, don't say things like that...

"You have great reason to dislike them," Elise was saying. "I, however, am curious. I wonder what it must be like to be a changeling."

"What?" Ansel sounded disgruntled and confused. "They're a bunch of pirates and vagabonds. You'd want to imagine yourself in their shoes?"

Elise chuckled. "Banditry has nothing to do with it, though I was often considered a vagabond in my youth. A usurper, actually. So I can somewhat relate. But the changelings were originally-"

"You?" Ansel interrupted. "A usurper? I thought you were supposed to be, like, pure and honorable and all that."

"In a succession dispute over a corporate dynasty in old Ironridge, before the aerial revolution," Elise said airily, apparently letting the comment about purity and honor slide. "It's a long story, and mostly belongs to distant history. As I was saying, when the changelings first appeared, they were docile and listless, except when under the close control of their sovereign. The ones we saw in Aldebaran clearly evolved a long way, to be capable of speech and complex thought."

Ansel hesitated. "So that letter wasn't full of it, saying they showed up in the east during the war."

"No," Elise replied. "I do not know of any sightings of them prior to eighteen years ago. Which leads to some interesting speculation. Primarily, that if our captors also took time to develop into full and independent beings, they are likely very young. Much younger than any of you three."

Ansel was silent, thinking. "Or the same age, if you're saying they were basically livestock back then. I mean, have you ever seen an infant? They're not exactly much for rational expression."

That was a thought. I remembered confusing myself trying to puzzle out Leif's age earlier, based on the experiences she recounted from the Empire and getting baffled when they didn't add up. What if the reason her numbers made no sense was because she made them up? I had pegged Aldebaran as being similar to me, but what if they were literally my age as well?

"Believe me, I am aware," Elise laughed. "I have raised many children, both those of friends and my own. It may be a very apt metaphor. And so, I am curious what kind of creatures they have grown into."

"But why?" Ansel interrupted. "You've already seen what they've become! Captors, criminals, identity thieves... Are you pointedly avoiding condemning them?"

"I am," Elise said, eliciting a strangled snort from Ansel. "Primarily because such judgement would not accomplish anything productive, while keeping an open mind may yet let us discover something about our situation. But, also, because on the scale of events I have lived through, the fate we have fallen to here is a surprisingly tame and cozy affair."

My heart sped up. Her logic sounded much more grounded and reasonable than my own, but it was nice to know I wasn't the only one having trouble writing Aldebaran off as villains despite getting duped and abandoned...

"In what world is this tame and cozy?" Ansel protested, not at all sold. "We're practically in jail, here!"

"A jail with no guards, plentiful food and amenities, and apparently an entire wing our jailers failed to explore," Elise calmly explained. "Have you ever been in a real jail?"

Ansel was quiet. I got the impression he wanted to ask have you, but didn't want to get cornered if she said yes.

"...Look, whatever," he eventually said, backpedaling. "You want to know what I think they've grown or evolved into? I think they haven't evolved enough. Not if they're still doing what they were created to do. It's almost hard to blame them, when you think about it. Imagine being born with the ability to steal others' faces. You've basically got 'become a criminal' written all over you."

I froze, every inch of my body tensing up.

Ansel wasn't finished. "Oh, they tried to hoodwink us through other means first," he continued, my heart beating out of control, "before using their sneaky powers. But it doesn't change for a moment what they were doing. Overthrow the east, overthrow Icereach... Who cares if they can talk now? They haven't changed a bit."

"The world is quite a large place," Elise said, a heavy pressure weighing on my chest. "I have seen crimes and disingenuous acts from ponies from all walks of life, from those with sterling reputations to the ones who are completely ordinary and unassuming. I have seen them carried out for every reason from greed to loyalty to bare necessity. I have also seen great heroics from ones from whom society expected only ill. Do you think it is really fair to blame the changelings for what they are capable of, instead of what they do?"

"But I am blaming them for what they did!" Ansel stomped a hoof with a sharp crack, causing Corsica to stir. "You can't tell me being here counts as an act of goodwill."

"My mistake," Elise apologized. "I understood your meaning to be that you didn't blame them, and instead believed their actions to be a foregone conclusion based on factors beyond their control."

For a moment, Ansel struggled with words. "That is what I... Look, where are you going with this?"

I heard a few hoofsteps as Elise paced away. "Did you know that your mother worked for a criminal syndicate in the Empire before the war?"

Ansel stopped dead.

"It was not such an unusual occupation," Elise continued. "In the Griffon Empire, conditions were such that in order for batponies to have substantial say over the direction of their lives, they needed to work outside the established system, and frequently formed extralegal groups to band together in their efforts. As many of them saw it, they had little reason to obey the rules when the rules were not made with their well-being in mind."

She turned around. "My point is that she, like many, had society expect the worst of them, and gave society what it expected. She also is one of the bravest and most courageous mares I know, and grew into an excellent and upstanding pony despite having every reason not to. I won't say more on this, because it is her story to tell at a time that she sees fit. It may be true that the changelings possess innate abilities or circumstances that would be easy to use nefariously. It may also be true that they have used what they have in ways you disapprove of. But before you condemn them for that, stop and consider that so do ponies you love."

Yeah, I wanted to agree. Like me.

I had just been thinking about my talent, feeling a rush as I contemplated how it might actually be a usable advantage that would be worth something against our captors - a rare feeling, when I usually wished my talent was something different and less mercurial. Now Ansel had gone and flipped all that on its head. I wanted to go out and slap him, tell him to knock it off, but my own thoughts were far too unsettled about Aldebaran to have a real argument about it, and Elise had explained things far better than I possibly could have, without even getting me involved.

How did she know all that about Mother, anyway? Did she just know everything? Or was this just part of actually being older than the institute and remembering things from outside its fortified censor walls?

...I mean, technically, I was older, and my memory-dreams did go back that far. Just not often, and my senses were undeveloped enough that most of those dreams were hazy and useless. Still, hearing Elise's defense was almost enough to make me want to go tell her everything that was on my mind, about what my talent did and how confused I was feeling about Aldebaran. If only I wasn't also mad at her for knowing so much that wasn't readily available for me.

"What are you, their mom?" Ansel asked eventually, taking a moment to get his bearings. "You sound like you're less concerned about what they've done to us and more concerned about them, like, in general."

"You are correct about my priorities," Elise agreed. "As I explained, this fate we've met is not nearly as bad as it could be, and ruing it will do little to improve our circumstances. This leaves me with abundant time to think. And, remembering the aftermath of their appearance, I am quite curious where they will go now that they seem to have agency over their actions."

Ansel just grunted. "Don't hold your breath."

For a moment, Elise paused. And then she said the last thing I was expecting. "Ansel, are you a changeling?"

Ansel nearly fell over in surprise. "What darkened corner of Tartarus did you get that idea from? Also, no. In case you didn't notice, I detest changelings."

"Yes," Elise mused, "I noticed you had very strong feelings about them that seem to extend more to their species than to the group that we encountered. I wondered if you might know of their kind from somewhere."

"That's some pretty flimsy evidence, yeah?" Ansel pressed. "Listen, don't go giving me a heart attack, here. The last thing I need is to consider the possibility that they might have swapped one of us out for a mole."

Elise hummed in consideration. "I do not think that is a terrible danger," she eventually said. "What would they have to gain from continuing to deceive us when we are already at their mercy? Furthermore, there are four of us and likely five of them. Were they to sacrifice one of their number to spy on us while keeping up appearances of our presence in Icereach, they would be greatly restricting their capacity to impersonate anyone else as the need arose. That, I believe, is a logistical disadvantage they would give some weight to avoiding."

"Then why'd you bring it up?" Ansel asked, still sounding a little scared.

"Because I was curious," Elise said. "And I did not ask if you were a member of Aldebaran. I asked if you were a changeling."

"Rather baselessly, I might add."

Elise regarded him coolly. "Two years ago, doctors were baffled by your sudden and inexplicable recovery from the brink of death. Your vitals exited a long, steady decline and sharply stabilized. Furthermore, you suffered substantial amnesia that never abated upon regaining conscience, accompanied by an abrupt personality switch."

"They called it a miracle," Ansel agreed. "What's that got to do with anything?"

"A nicer personality switch," Elise pressed. "I studied some medicine in my teenage years. Survivors of brain trauma who experience personality changes often become more irate or unstable. Their friends frequently describe them along the lines of 'shadows of their old selves'. It is rare indeed that damage could improve one's higher cognitive functions."

Ansel firmly met her eyes. "I don't like what you're implying."

Elise shrugged. "Then I shall cease my implications and trust you. As I said, I was merely curious."

The conversation ended, and I heard Ansel's hoofsteps climbing the stairs as Elise wandered into the nearby office room and sat down. A million thoughts swirled through my head, Ansel's anger at the changelings landing too close to home and mixing with my already unsettled opinion on what Leif and her friends had done. And then everything Elise had said piled up on top of that...

Eventually, the dominant feeling wound up being jealousy. I wanted to know how Elise could stay so cool and rational while laying out for Ansel how his anger had led him to err. Maybe a part of it was that she wasn't as directly impacted by what he said as me, but... I was still jealous. Being able to copy her mannerisms and act it out wouldn't be enough. I wanted to feel as calm as she had sounded, with respect to Ansel and everything else. We were locked up in a remote bunker, but she was perfectly at ease.

I bumped Elise up several places on the list of mares I looked up to, and tried to get back to sleep.

Ansel's readings were down. Again. At this rate, he could be dead within a day.

"It's not fair," I whispered to his bedside, my gaze hollow. "Still no change for Corsica, but nobody thinks you're going to make it. I dug you out second, you know. Searched where Corsica fell first. Just had to leave that on my shoulders on your way out, didn't you?"

No response, of course. Just the beeping of the heart-rate monitor. It was noticeably less steady than two days ago.

"Why couldn't we have been a normal family?" I breathed, tears in my eyes. "I dunno what Mother's problem was with you, but I... I've been a prick. I do feel alone. And... I should have tried a little harder, knowing I was the favorite, not to rub it in your face. So, I'm sorry."

I bowed my head. "Heh. Doubt you'll appreciate it. Probably would find it condescending. But I'll remember you, okay?"

It was almost enough for me to laugh, from stress if nothing else. Ansel was dead because of me. Well, dying, but it was the same thing. And here I was, doing... what. Promising to remember him. That was it.

But this was the best I could do. Whether he would appreciate it or not, my life would never be the same.

I still didn't know what to do with that. Questions about how I had let myself get here - and where I was in the first place - continued to plague my mind, to a backdrop of impending emptiness as I tried to imagine a future without my closest maybe-friends.

There had to be something more than this. Something beyond everything I was feeling, that wouldn't change at the drop of a hat. Or the drop of a mountainside, in my case.

"I'm... going down to the chapel," I told my dying brother. "Guess I need to stare into the abyss for a bit. Try not to kick the bucket while I'm gone, okay? Or do, if you wanna make me feel like a jerk for not being here. If anything stares back, I'll put in a good word for you while I'm there..."

I awoke before Corsica. That was probably a good thing, considering I had slept with my boots on - no need to get into yet another conversation about that.

My mind felt marginally clearer; my body marginally more awake. I still had no idea what to do with myself.

I set about touring the living area again, washing up and making myself some shroomcakes in the kitchen from tinned mushroom sauce and some sort of preserved grain cake. They tasted metallic, but filled me up and didn't kill me, so I counted them as a success.

Ansel was in the lobby room, and I gave him a wide berth. No matter his reasons, I was still mad at him for his earlier insistence that being good at identity theft meant you were destined to be a bad pony, and it would probably take time and a close talk to fix that. A talk that couldn't happen now, while we were all on edge.

Also, I was curious myself about whether he was a changeling. Elise had a better point than she knew. But this definitely wasn't the time for talking about it, so I moved along.

Elise herself was in the study, doing apparently nothing. We nodded, acknowledging each other's presence, and I moved on.

I walked two more laps of the bunker, and nothing changed. There was something hypnotic about just walking in circles, mirroring the movements of my brain. Didn't I have questions from that conversation I overheard that I wanted to ask Elise? Something about... something?

At first, it felt like I was walking through a cold mist, and then a deep, dark ocean. What was wrong with me? Some part of me knew this wasn't right: I could be doing something productive, like raising my friends' spirits or learning things I usually couldn't ask about or exploring the rest of the complex. There had been another door in the Nemestasis room, I remembered. Why was I just pacing, my senses cushioned and my thoughts clouded? Was this how I had felt two years ago, whiling away the days at Corsica's bedside? I didn't feel panic or fear like I felt then. I just felt... lost.

"Chess?" a voice asked.

It was Elise. I blinked, realizing I was passing by the study yet again, and she was standing in the doorway, looking on expectantly.

"Chess?" she asked again. "I recall you might have carried a set, and it seems we could both use the pastime."

"Oh. Uh, sure." I shook my head, partly clearing it, and stepped back into the bedroom where I had stashed my duffel bag and remaining possessions. There was that inertial stabilizer rotor again, and my disguise kit, and my ocarina... I pulled out the board and carried it into the study.

The room that Elise had appropriated was small and square, with several iron filing cabinets and lots and lots of papers, though the tops of the stacks appeared to be blank. She was seated behind the old metal desk, and had already drawn up a chair for me with her aura. She nodded as I started to set up.

"You looked like you were struggling for something to do with yourself," Elise remarked, giving me first pick of sides - I picked black. It was an invitation to say pretty much whatever was on my mind.

"You too?" I guessed, more in a mood to listen than try to put my feelings into words.

"In some ways." Elise nodded, starting with a pawn. "I am finding this a rather luxurious vacation from the usual rigors of my day job. However, I recognize that feeling doesn't likely apply to you three. And this place is quite bare on ways to actually spend one's time. Have you had the displeasure yet of going through this room's archives?"

I frowned, countering with a safer pawn of my own. "Displeasure?"

Elise floated a few papers up to me in her aura, moving a knight. "Take a look."

I took and shuffled through them, not needing to look at the board to advance my next pawn. All of them were blank.

Not unused, oddly. Just blank. Most of them showed signs of use around the edges. A few were smudged with graphite dust. One had a brown ring from a coffee cup. Some were stapled together, and others loose. And the levels of use, while all minor, still varied from page to page, exactly like I would expect to see from the usual contents of a busy desk. Except all of them were blank.

"What the...?" I screwed up my eyes, holding the papers sideways against the light to see if there were any impressions from a pen, perhaps suggesting erasure or invisible ink. Elise moved a bishop, and I moved a bishop of my own.

"Playing defensive, I see," Elise mused, moving another pawn to threaten mine. "As best as I can tell, every single paper here is like that. Including everything in the cabinets. It's quite mystifying."

I guarded my pawn with a knight. "Is it magic? Can't imagine someone would just put useless paper here on purpose."

"Probably," Elise acknowledged, taking my pawn. "I don't know of any spell that could have caused this, but perhaps it was the work of a brand or special talent."

"A talent for making papers blank, huh?" I accepted the trade, bringing my knight forward again. "Doesn't sound like the most common thing. Ever heard of anyone who can do that? Maybe this place belongs to them."

Elise moved up a pawn to threaten my knight. "That is what I've been thinking about. I once heard tales of an Icereach scientist named Navarre, head of operations there in the years before the treaty and the Institute. His talent supposedly let him store and retrieve written information. But I mainly knew of him from a sister-in-law, and she only from heresay. The previous Icereach administrations were secretive groups, and assuming he could do as rumored, would storing text cause it to physically disappear?" She shook her head. "It is my best idea, but alas, I do not know."

"Navarre?" I tilted my head, pulling back my knight. "You mean like the old Institute airship that nobody likes?"

Elise brought out her queen. "Named after him, I suspect."

I castled in response. "Must be nice, not having to deal with censorship blocking your inquiries all the time."

Elise moved moved another pawn out and raised an eyebrow. I winced a little, not meaning to have been that short.

She just chuckled as I brought out my other knight. "Not the move you wanted me to make, hmm?"

"What? No. I've got this in the bag. I just..." I trailed off, my tongue getting tied. "Didn't mean to be snippy."

"Halcyon, you're a teenage mare," Elise explained, moving her queen. I forced another pawn trade, and she brought out a rook in response. "Snippiness is just part of the package. I don't take any offense from it."

There was that jealousy again. Corsica seemed to brush most things off by virtue of a thick skin, but this imprisonment had cracked her. Elise, though? It was like she had already accepted everything that could happen to her and made peace with it long ago. I moved my own queen out, promising a lucrative trade.

"So if I can be snippy," I asked, testing the waters and frowning as she didn't take the bait, "how come you get to know all these censored laws and things about history that's banned from the library and stuff?"

"Because I am a high-ranking official," Elise said, as if that was all there was to it. Pivoting from a hyper-offensive formation to a defensive one with a flourish, she added, "And, right now, because you look as though you need less on your mind, not more."

"You say that." I pursed my lips, feigning a bait and figuring if she ignored this one too, it would give me cover to set up for an aggressive terrain grab. "While I'm wrecking you at chess."

Elise shrugged, ignoring it as I planned. "Halcyon, are you a changeling?"

I nearly fell out of my chair.

"I see," Elise mused as I hauled myself back up, not giving me a chance to answer. "I had thought that this might have been what was vexing you. You really ought to be louder when you eavesdrop, Halcyon."

My wingtip pushed a piece across the board, some deep part of me playing on auto. "What?"

Elise chuckled. "The moment you stop hearing the sound of slumber, it means someone's listening at the door. My kids pulled that on me far too many times for it to catch me by surprise. Relax, though. I hadn't meant for my conversation with Ansel to give you the idea that your own identity was suspect. His case is unique. I wanted to clear this up if the need to prove your own identity was on your mind."

I stared, my attention only on the game enough to ensure that she wasn't cheating while I was distracted. "You're telling me, apropos of nothing, that you don't think I'm a changeling."

That was... a bizarre thought. Trying to look from her perspective, I could see why it might seem a comforting or necessary thing to say. At the same time, she probably had no idea how much I was struggling with all the similarities between Aldebaran and me.

"Yes," Elise agreed, still playing. "At least, I'm certain you're not an operative they left behind. Contrary to what I told Ansel, I am rather concerned about this fifth member of theirs, but I don't think we need worry that any of the four of us are different ponies from a week ago."

"How do you know?" I asked, skeptical.

Elise nodded. "In your case, it comes down to your bracelet," she explained. "They stole your backup clothes, did they not? And as Corsica had backups of her own on their ship, it seems quite likely that they wanted the costumes to go with using your faces. But they did not take or try to obtain your bracelet, either the original or a copy. I imagine that's because it is quite unobtrusive when turned off, and they didn't realize that you are never seen without it."

I blinked, realizing it was true. I never actually had used my bracelet while any of them were watching, so they must not have known it was more than an easily-missable band of metal...

"In short," Elise finished, "the fact that you are wearing it now indicates that you don't match up with their idea of a Halcyon disguise. Congratulations. You are you."

I blinked again.

"Checkmate, by the way," Elise added, moving a rook in for the kill.

I finally re-focused on the board, realizing what had just happened. "Hey, that was dirty!"

Elise smiled knowingly. "Was it? I was merely lightening the burden of worry on your shoulders. Surely that would have left you with more capacity to dedicate to this game. I would wager it was the finest game you've played in days."

"No," I protested, "I wasn't worried about that in the first place! You just did that to distract me so you could win!"

"Rematch?" Elise offered cheerily. "I doubt any number of victories could regain you a perfect score, but we could at least call it best out of three."

I glowered. "I didn't take you for a chess cheat," I accused, my backwards ears quivering as I pointed a hoof.

"I'll admit, it's not one of my usual professions," Elise said, standing up. "But it seems to have accomplished my real goal admirably. You look much sharper and more lively than when I called you in here. I may have distracted you from the game, but it seems my tactics were also enough to distract from whatever had your mind in a gridlock. Am I wrong?"

Slowly, I lowered my hoof, realizing it was true. My thoughts were racing again, but not in a circle. The fog was gone. I was mad, but I could focus again.

Elise had played me, for my own benefit. And she had played me well.

"Thanks," I muttered, both grudging and earnest. "I, err, owe you one. Both a favor and revenge."

I left without assenting to another game.

Moments later, I was in the Nemestasis room, face to face with the unexplored door. It was time to explore the rest of these tunnels.

The hallway twisted, turning slowly to the right, a sharp enough bend to grant good cover to anything trying to surprise me, yet shallow enough that I didn't feel I had good cover myself. I didn't think I was feeling particularly paranoid, and yet something about the lack of lighting fixtures and unusually ribbed, ripply texture of the rock put me on edge anyway. At least my head was clear. I pressed close to the inner wall, keeping my bracelet on as I advanced.

My stoked imagination kept me alert, and eventually I reached a door at the end of the tunnel. It was a big, sturdy steel door, studded with rivets, the kind I had seen on the money vault in Icereach's payroll office. Fascinatingly, it was locked from my side, with a big metal wheel and gears that powered an array of well-oiled sliding bolts. That made no sense. If someone was retreating deeper into the bunker, wouldn't they want to seal the way behind them? I tested the wheel, noting that it was designed to take a considerable amount of strength to turn. Not enough to be unmanageable, but enough that it was hard to imagine some pompous executive doing it themselves... This place was either built for someone very strong, or someone who was unafraid of getting their hooves dirty.

...No. Someone whose engineers were unafraid of letting their boss need to dirty their hooves.

Except, for some reason, it didn't have a doorjamb. There was a good half-inch of space for me to slither through underneath. So, sparing myself the effort of opening it properly, I extinguished my bracelet and did so.

What was I supposed to learn from this? I already suspected that whoever built this place either didn't know or didn't care about batponies. Elise had mentioned a previous head scientist of Icereach, but my kind were supposedly natives there before Yakyakistan turned it into a research colony. Any Icereach executives would have to know about us.

It also raised the question, since going through an air duct would be an odd design choice even by batpony standards, where was the intended way to get back here?

I straightened up in the darkness, sensing that this room was much colder than the one I had left behind, lacking the machines to heat it up. It made sense that they wouldn't bother with proper heating outside the main living areas, I supposed... I turned my bracelet back on.

This was easily the biggest room I had been in yet, cavernous compared to the others. And it was filled with statues.

Identical statues. Each one was maybe four times as tall as I was, counting their pedestals: carved from jet-black stone and polished to an immaculate sheen, the same mare stared down at me four dozen times over, her proportions elongated and her muzzle notably rectangular. She had both wings and a horn - also longer and grander than a normal pony's - and wore a large, ornamental collar that drooped to cover her chest, a crescent-moon gemstone socketed cleanly into its center.

"Woah," I breathed, turning in circles and admiring the collection. A forest of emerald lights glittered back at me, reflections of my bracelet glinting in their gemstones, the statues looking on with poise and majesty, wise and regal. I stopped in front of one of the closer ones, brushing my hoof against the pedestal.

It gave me the strangest sensation of a hanging curtain, with someone standing behind it who was only present when you weren't looking.

Wings and a horn, at the same time. I sat back and took in the features. Alicorns, these were called. At least, that was their name in the young adult fantasy books in Icereach's school library. These were sort of a genre-wide trope there, accepted by many authors to symbolize a perfect being. But I doubted these statues had been made by children's book authors.

It suddenly occurred to me that I might have been overlooking the one place in Icereach that could smuggle legitimate information past the censors.

"Awesome," I muttered, resuming my walk. The room was long and mostly rectangular, with the statues set up around an aisle down the middle, giving it a clear sense of structure. Two more tunnels branched off through the stone, both back behind the array of statues, and another vault door was set into the rock at the end of the path. This one was large, enough so that someone could carry heavy machinery - or statues - through it. Again, it was locked from my side, and this time, it was heavily insulated.

Something told me that a door like this had to contain something very interesting and relevant. Despite the insulation, a chill air seeped in through the other side, and I felt my fur stand on end with excitement. Obviously, no one had gotten that big Nemestasis machine in through the tight zig-zag tunnel and carried it down those rickety stairs up above... I had an electrifying suspicion that what Aldebaran had found, or been given, was actually the back door.

So, like any genre-savvy explorer, I backed off and went to go check the two side tunnels first. Best to save the most important discoveries for last so that you didn't get sidetracked and miss anything useful. That was what watching Ansel and Corsica play their old tabletop games had taught me, anyway.

I tried the leftmost tunnel first. It was just as ripply and unnatural as the one linking the statue room and the one with the Nemestasis machine. Another steel vault door barred my path, once again locked from my side. Why was that? If I assumed the cold-feeling door was an exit to the outside, then it made sense, locking the door from within. But did this tunnel lead to another way out? You didn't install doors like these for no reason...

Curious, I slipped beneath it, yet again encountering no doorjamb. I straightened up and turned on my bracelet.

This room was much smaller, and another machine room. Most of it was taken up by a tiered dais that looked faintly arcane, with a sloped walkway making it easy for a pony to walk to the middle. Above the middle, a bulky, conical device hung from a steel arm, a little bigger than my barrel and pointing directly at the center. It was attached directly to the wall, and several thick, solid metal cables snaked into the wall near the mounting, though there was no door to follow them. Some kind of console that didn't have any visible information or screens completed the strange contraption.

"...Huh." I circled the dead end, looking for anything I may have missed. What did this do? It was clearly functional and probably turned off, likely built to do things to whatever was placed on the pedestal. Maybe a component of the Nemestasis machine, a final output device for doing whatever it did? With a bit of imagination, it looked almost like a laser cannon. I decided not to step on the dais.

The room resisted my searching, completely devoid of documentation, but I did find a pattern card plugged into an input port on the console that easily came free. Someone had scrawled a few unintelligible characters on its surface with a black sharpie - useless at first glance, but it told me our text-stealing friend apparently hadn't been this way. Interesting. I pocketed the pattern card, figuring I might as well take it back to the main terminal to see what was on it.

I still couldn't figure out why the door would be oriented to lock someone in here when the room was just this machine and a dead end. Or why it was even here at all.

My bracelet was already off in preparation for swimming back out when something gave me pause, and I turned it back on. Could that really be all that was here? That door had to be important. What if there was a secret tunnel from here to the rest of the bunker, and this particular door was designed to lock the inhabitants in, not keep someone else out? So far, all of my assumptions about the place had been that it was a hideaway for someone rich and overprepared, but what if it was exactly what it was being used for: a really plush jail?

Either way, I needed to be on the lookout for the way ponies were normally meant to get from one section of the complex to the other, in the event that I wanted to bring my friends through this way. And it wasn't like I had any shortage of time... So, I started banging on the walls, combing every inch of the room and searching for anything that felt hollow.

Something just felt good about repeatedly punching the blue stone, and it wasn't only the lingering curiosity about that door. All my conflicted feelings about Aldebaran and everything else were still there - bottled handily away by Elise's cheap chess trick, yet still there. A wimpier pony might have punched a pillow in frustration, but I worked out with yaks. It took a wall to stand up to me. And with each hit, as that wall stood, the mess in my head began to unravel just a little bit more.

I had three different lines to walk, like a tight rope twisted into a triangle, all part of the same problem and yet all distinct, too. On one side was Aldebaran: despite the overwhelming evidence that they had tricked and betrayed us, I still wanted to believe in them. Doing so had brought us visible harm, and yet while it lasted, it brought me a great amount of hope for the future and peace of mind as well. According to my brain's subconscious calculus, the cost of trusting them didn't actually outweigh its benefits - at least, not to a degree that I didn't still have my instincts wanting to give them another chance.

It was unhealthy, I knew. I should do the smart thing and turn my back on them forever. But my mind was loathe to do so, and I felt like I finally was able to articulate why.

The second problem was Ansel. That one was a lot more self-explanatory. He was mad at the changelings, understandably so. And I, too, was mad - also understandably, in my humble opinion - at him for taking it out on everyone who might be remotely good at identity-

There was a secret drawer under the console.

My thoughts were instantly abandoned, raw curiosity shoveling aside my other feelings like used ash from a kiln. The console I had looted the pattern card from was shaped like a desk, with room underneath to push in a chair that wasn't present, and a search of that space had turned up a loose panel with a key slot on the underbelly of the main metal chassis. I flipped on my back and held up my bracelet to examine the thing.

It looked like a simple enough lock, built into the console rather than attached by a third party. Lockpicking was something I could be great at if I bothered to learn - I was great with wing-based fine motor skills. But, alas, the ability to slide under doorjambs as if doors didn't exist had never left me with a particularly pressing desire to pick up that skill.

Oh well. It didn't look like an incredibly sturdy door, and if Aldebaran had to make an insurance claim because I solved things the yak way, it would stink to be them.

A bit of twisting and leverage later, and I had gotten the corner of the door caught on my boot sole, and then broken the hinges entirely. Three scrolls and a loose piece of paper fell out on my face.

"Jackpot!" I cheered, helping myself to the liberated paper, noticing that the loose piece was a letter and beginning to read.

Old friend,

Next to many of the miracles you ask of me, stealing these from Canterlot Palace turned out to be surprisingly feasible. Chaotic beings have targeted Equestria frequently as of late, and the disturbances they create prove excellent cover for sneaking about. Do not worry yourself over Starlight; I have confirmed her village on the Catantan Peninsula was far removed from the turmoil.

Unfortunately, this will be the last errand I can run for you for some time. The prophecies of the deep south are proving disturbingly accurate, and are certainly centered on our present time period. It seems this region will not be as safe to ignore as we once thought, and I must depart to keep a careful eye on it, lest we be blindsided at an inopportune moment. May Tetra guide you in my absence.

I sat, stunned. Canterlot Palace? Equestria? Catantan peninsula? I had never heard any of these names, but what reason would someone have to make them up? More importantly, accurate prophecies? Chaotic beings? 'May Tetra guide you'?

Predicting the future was condoned by science; modeling things was pointless if not to make predictions. Prophecies weren't. And they referred to this Tetra as though their will was providence! I needed an atlas, fast. Odds were these were nations and places on the coast of the eastern sea that were too small for me to have known about before, but they were absolutely going to the top of my list for places to visit as soon as-

...Right. We were stuck in changeling jail and probably didn't have an atlas. Planning for future adventures really wasn't what I needed to be doing right now.

But what was the deep south? Icereach was about as far south in the world as you could go. The world was roughly a semicircle, a little less, and the Aldenfold mountains formed its straight, endless, impossibly high southern edge. Did they mean there was civilization in the Aldenfold? Or... what if by deep south, they meant Icereach itself? If there were legitimate prophecies I didn't know about tied to the chapel...

With a tight breath, I bent down and picked up the scrolls that had been stored with the letter. Well, maybe they would elaborate. They had to hold something critical, if stealing them had been comparable to miracles. Maybe I could get in good with this Canterlot place if I kept them safe and gave them back... but, of course, if this was a place of gods and prophecies, there was no way I wasn't reading them first.

I glanced at the door to make sure it was still closed as I undid the first one, shivering from a secretive thrill.

Its beautiful wax seal parted, an image of the sun, and it came open, made from a strange, spongy paper that felt almost closer to cloth from the way it didn't hold its shape at all. The scroll's abnormality heightened as I unrolled it far enough to see the text: instead of legible markings, it was all an interconnected scrawl in shifting, silvery ink, which seemed to glow and constantly change. Were these runes? They glowed brighter the farther I rolled the thing open...

The moment I was able to see the page in its entirety, the ink burst into a silvery mist, hovering just off the surface. I gasped. It floated for a second, and then swirled, trailing wisps as it rushed around me and shot into my flanks, disappearing with a cool tingle.

I didn't feel any different. The scroll dropped to the ground, empty. So much for giving it back safe and sound.

Feeling slightly surreal, I reread the note, but it didn't have any clues whatsoever on what these mist scrolls were supposed to be. They were certainly valuable, and whatever the one I opened had done to me was definitely deliberate. But... it didn't seem to have done anything. What if I had misused or wasted something incredibly important? A single-use spell, maybe healing magic, or...?

My heart chilled, and I carefully tucked the note and the surviving scrolls into my pockets... then after a little consideration, rolled the blank one back up - its paper was already flat, as if it had never been rolled - and put that in too. Whatever they did, I still had two left. Hopefully I'd find a way to figure out, and it would be something useful.

"Just a set of coordinates?" I asked the screen, both forehooves on the burnished Nemestasis console as I stood in front of the machine. "That's really what was on there? Huh. Wish I could see where it points to..."

The Nemestasis terminal hadn't been able to decode my purloined pattern card, but it could at least show me a visualization of the internal standing mana wave, the analog signal that pattern cards used to encode data. To most ponies, that would be an unintelligible, flowery, squiggly and probably beautiful sight that someone would want to frame and hang on the wall. But for a nerd like me who spent too much time learning obscure things about terminals, it was possible to glean a little more.

This wave was a simple one, a data format developed way back in the early days of terminals by sailors, traders and map-makers in an attempt to make a worldwide coordinate system for measuring locations and distances. The problem was, encoding location data was based on some esoteric and closely-guarded technology involving magical space radiation and the curvature of the atmosphere, and Ironridge held tightly to the technology as a means of preserving its dominance in the airship industry. Actually, this technology had a lot to do with how they became dominant there in the first place...

I was getting distracted. The important part was, I could recognize the overall format, but had no way of telling what location it was pointing to. Probably the only way for me to actually read it would be to stick it in the terminal of a modern airship, like the Aldebaran... And I was very, very curious to know what a card with a random world location's coordinates was doing in a place like this, and where that location might be. Especially when I had found it so close to that letter and the scrolls, describing places like Equestria and Canterlot that I had never heard of.

"Mrrrgh..." I grunted at the Nemestasis machine, both for being unable to decode it further and for giving me just enough information to get my curiosity hooked in the first place. I had more exploring to do...

I tore myself away from the screen and re-pocketed my pattern card, pushing thoughts of scrolls and higher powers to the back of my mind. There were more tunnels to explore. Based on what I had found so far, I couldn't imagine the next areas wouldn't be just as intriguing.

The second side tunnel, yet again, had a vault door. Yet again, it was locked from my side. I was beginning to revise my opinion from this place being built for someone who didn't mind getting their hooves dirty to it being built for someone who really loved getting their hooves dirty. Or just really loved unlocking giant vault doors.

Like the one I had earlier saved for last, this one was properly insulated, so I had to open it the normal way. I touched my cheek to the metal, and despite the chill temperature in this room and the tunnels, it was even colder.

I felt my excitement rise, and reached up, throwing my whole body against the wheel to get it to spin. With some effort, it began to rotate, and the door came open, swinging slowly inwards.

The tunnel continued beyond. It had mist on the ground.

"Uhh..." I stopped, curious. A dim light came from somewhere around the bend, just enough to see by without the aid of my bracelet, coloring the mist faintly blue. Wispy trails of the stuff slunk across the ground in sluggish, eddying currents, so thin it should have dissipated in seconds. Yet its consistency didn't change.

A few tendrils crept through the opened door and curled curiously around my legs. It didn't feel like much of anything. More importantly, why was it here in the first place? Mist wasn't known for forming when it was cold and dry, especially inside of pony-made structures...

I experimentally shut the door. The mist that had leaked through quickly faded away.

"What the..." I breathed, leaning my back against a wall and staring at the ground where it had faded. Opening and closing it a few more times repeated the process: the mist, gently twisting, never grew thicker or fainter in the hallway beyond the door. But it seeped out when I let it, and quickly dissipated when cut off from its source. It was like a singular entity, that I could push back with the door and that wouldn't continue to exist if separated from itself.

My ears rose in excitement. Maybe there was a good, logical explanation for this, but what if there wasn't? What if Elise was right that this place had something to do with a previous Icereach head scientist, Navarre? I never had gotten to ask her about that censored rule that would have stopped me and Ansel from coming on this mission, but I remembered my earlier hypothesis that Icereach might have hidden something supernatural out in the mountains and set up rules preventing anyone outside of their authority from easily sticking their noses into it.

Right then, right there, I didn't feel like a victim or like a prisoner. I felt like a prophet. I was going to see something special, that someone badly didn't want me to see.

The mist curled around me lethargically as I reopened the door and stepped inside, and the tunnel kept curving, infuriatingly stopping me from seeing all the way to the other end. Something was glowing, though... I kicked into a gallop, curiosity driving me on.

It was another vault door, once again lacking a doorjamb, the light seeping out from underneath. Once again, the lock was on my side. But this time, I doubted I'd have been able to open the door even if I wanted to, because it looked like it had partially melted.

My eyes bulged at the twisted frame, the drips and sloughs in the metal surface, the blue mist leaking out from underneath. I remembered the sealed door locked from my direction - potentially not oriented that way to keep someone out, but to keep something in. And all my enthusiasm suddenly had to tangle with the possibility that the reason someone didn't want me down here was a good one.

Except... I could hear something, and it hooked my curiosity before I could lose heart. It was music, coming from beyond the door, only I could hear it in my hooves. Where... they were touching the mist. What? It was like how you could feel deep vibrations in your chest, rather than your ears. Only I was hearing with my hooves.

The sheer bafflement gave me pause, and for a moment, I stopped to listen. Filled with emotion, the music gave me a clear picture of an aristocrat explaining a vendetta before an audience: calm, yet scorned; civil, yet spiteful and mean. And yet it was somehow less righteous, like they had been in the wrong all along, and were mad that their vice had been thwarted. What was that?

My better judgement tried to intervene, and my curiosity filed an injunction and gave it a forced leave of absence. I opened my mouth. "Hello?"

"Ey there, friendo," a grating, metallic voice said from beyond the melted door. "What is up? I do not get many visitors!"

I jumped, squeaking in surprise. The voice sounded like ice and thunder, like a sword stuck in massive gears. Bitingly sharp and mechanical, it would have been most at home coming from the destroyed sentinel that we had passed in the tunnel down from the cave's entrance. And now it was coming from behind this twisted door, somehow friendly and inviting despite the buried anger laced all throughout its cracks.

Exactly like the music. I was talking to the mist.

"What are you?" I hissed, surprised yet fascinated. Now that I knew it talked, any chance of me bailing before my curiosity was sated was slimmer than Elise's barrel.

"Eyy, friendo, no need for fear, yes," the voice insisted, paradoxically calming yet made of primal fury. "I am just some rando monster they put down here a few years back as a power source for the heat and the lights. They don't like your face, they put you away, am I right?"

I stared, processing what I was hearing. "Err..."

"So what did your face do to tick them off?" the mist asked. "Me, I just had an ugly mug. But you, friendo, you don't belong here. You are real mad about it, I can tell. Why not tell me about it? If there is one thing I hate, it is the ponyos who cannot get the revenge they deserve, you know."

Too many questions I never thought I would get to ask an unusually friendly mist monster collided in my head, and only one could win out. "Are you the one making all the writing down here disappear?"

"Aie ya yai. Sonata's blueberry hips, you are a blunt little ponyo. But nah, that was the other guy. I never met him myself, but I heard he was a real scumbag. You would hate him, friendo."

I scratched my head, feeling like the sound of its voice should have been giving me a colossal headache, yet doing more or less just fine. "Wait, so someone literally did steal text off the pages? What kind of magic can do that?" I blinked. "And what's a ponyo?"

"It is you! And probably. I just took over this hole because nobody else seemed to want it as much as I did. All of this was before my time." The mist had the tone of someone lounging in a fancy, oversized chair, its wrathful little tune still tinkling away in my mind. "So what is your story, eh eh eh?"

"What's yours?" I asked back, hardly convinced I should trust this thing.

"Eyy, that is the mistrust I like to see! You know, I cannot help but notice you ditched your own friendos to come sniff around here yourself. One of them in particular you do not like right now, I am thinking. You, friendo, you really might be cut out for this."

I frowned at the change of topic. Did it somehow know that Ansel's harsh words to Elise were still on my mind? "Being solo can be helpful sometimes." I rationalized, brushing it off. "Cut out for what?"

"Revenge, of course," the mist drawled. "The ponyos who trapped you down here, you hate them. I can smell it. Like a cigar. A high-quality one, friendo! I agree, of course. Anyone who would stick someone's face in a hole like this has it coming, don't you think?"

Wait a minute. That tune that was playing... it sounded suspiciously like an accompaniment. As if the song - the mist - wanted to be angry, yet had nothing to be angry about, so it wished to direct its anger on my behalf. Like it was inviting me to take the lead.

Mega creepy.

"I mean, yeah, they do, but why should you care?" I asked the mist. "And why should I care that you care? You keep changing the subject when I ask about you. I feel like something bad might happen if I let you out, and you're not helping your case."

"Because I am an expert at planning revenge, little cigar!" the mist eagerly exclaimed. "And is not the whole point to make something bad happen? To the ones who wronged you, you know. You have a score to settle. You should tell me all about it so I can help you make them wish their loved ones had never been born. Yesssss..."

"Now hold on, I don't want to go around getting payback on anyone's family-" I blinked. "And I'm not a cigar."

"Though I cannot help in person, I am afraid," the mist continued, ignoring me. "Being around too many nice ponyos will cause me to shrivel up and hibernate. It is pretty gross. Like a raisin, you see. I am not even actually trapped in the first place, so you do not have any letting me out that you can do. I just hang out here because nice ponyos do not usually come this way. And if I wait around here for long enough, maybe I can get some revenge of my own."

"Err..." Good to know? Like I'd believe that scary sealed door wasn't there for a reason. "You've got a grudge with someone too, then?"

"Absolutely, friendo. You see, once upon a time, God was creating the world, and he got around to me, and he said, 'You, you will have an ugly face, and nobody will like your face,' and lo, it was so. I really hate that guy. Maybe one day I will kill him if I get the chance."

I froze. That wasn't what I had expected to hear. And I sort of wished I hadn't heard it.

"God? Say that again?" I asked, my muscles still all locked up.

"Well, to be true with you, I never met that guy either," the mist admitted. "I do not get around much, living in hole after hole. But there are some things you just know, you know?"

Great. So the first person I ever would meet who was as superstitious as I was turned out to be a strange, icy mist monster living in a secret wing of a hidden bunker turned jail out in the middle of nowhere. Maybe we could kick back, forget about Aldebaran and have some nice, perfectly normal and not at all worrisome discussions about ancient mist monster lore...

"My theory, my theory is that King Father had a slightly below-average face," the mist was explaining, "and when it was our turn to be made, he was like, 'My face must be known far and wide to be of true beauty. I will make you so ugly, I will be handsome by comparison!' But then we were so ugly, he locked us in a hole so he would not have to look at-"

"That's... nice," I interrupted, forcing myself to wave a hoof. "Listen, about getting revenge and all that. Do you know if there are any ways out of here? And if so, is there any storm gear that would let me survive indefinitely in the mountains? Or at least a map with the easiest directions for getting back to civilization? I can't do anything about anyone if I'm stuck in here." With you, I added mentally.

The mist seemed thoughtful. "Good question, little cigar. I have ice powers, you know. Perhaps I can share with you my power so that you can survive in the cold? I am always up for helping to kick some evil in the face. Like I said, I am not leaving this room, but there may be something I can do."

"Borrowing powers from a mist monster?" Okay, that was a bad idea. All issues of trust and the wisdom of doing such a thing aside, the last thing I wanted from any interaction with the powers that be was to become more powerful myself. That defeated the entire point! "Think I'll pass..."

"No, pause pause pause, I want to see what kind of ponyo you are. This is easier with some than with others, or so I have heard. So lean down and sniff the mist. Yeah. Sniff it real good! It smells minty, friendo."

I looked down at the wisps poking at my boots, still projecting their uncanny tune. "Maybe let's not."

The mist reached up a tendril and booped me on the nose.

It was, in fact, minty. It stung my throat and my nostrils, yet came with a refreshing burst of clarity, like a faceful of sharp winter air after sitting inside for too long. I felt an odd prickle of pain in one ear, and the music came into much sharper relief... and then it withdrew, and the sensation faded as fast as it had arrived. I was fine.

Bizarrely, the same couldn't be said for the mist.

The moment it touched me, a convulsion shot through it, and it began chanting shakily in a ringing language I didn't know, saying the same verse thing over and over with varying intensity. Its blue wisps crawled faster along the floor in jerky motions, like a creature flopping about. I had just been touched by an unknowable being, but the mist was acting more like an unknowable being had just touched it.

Eventually, it fell silent, resuming its usual slithering. And then: "...Psych! I wish I could have seen the look on your face, little cigar. See, if I can get you that good, imagine how bad you can mess up your enemies with my-"

"Okay, screw you," I interrupted, turning and striding away, thoroughly done with this mist and its shenanigans. "And seriously, some folks just don't know when to quit with the nicknames..."

"This is so sad," the mist complained as I left. "Hey friendo, remember me for next time if you come back here after they kick you in the face!"

"Yikes," I said to one of the regal alicorn statues in the main hall, getting my bearings back after firmly locking the mist door behind me. "What was that thing's problem?"

The statue's eyes and choker gemstone glittered back at me, silent and all-knowing.

"Bet you've been neighbors for a while," I guessed, rubbing at my booted hooves to warm them up after standing in the chill mist. "How do you stay sane, with a guy like that next door? Too much exposure to that, and I'd want to kick something."

The statue listened and said nothing.

"Yeah, I guess refusing to speak would do the trick," I admitted. "Though I bet it's wicked good at carrying on a one-sided conversation. Almost like me. ...Not that I'm relating to a mist monster, or anything! I just... you know... No one can keep a secret like someone who can't talk, you know? I trust you."

After a moment, I added, "Do you think I'm weird, talking to machines and inanimate stuff all the time?"

The statue didn't say yes.

"I've pretty much always been like this," I went on. "At least, since I was old enough to have sensible conversations. I think it started more than a decade ago. When I was real little, like five or six, I had a friend called Faye. She, err... She died. Must have been an injury or something, since I always remember her in a wheel cart. That's pretty much the only thing I remember about her. Couldn't even tell you what she looked like, since I haven't dreamed about her in ages. But, if my dreams are anything to go by, after that is when I started talking to random stuff. What do you think that says about me?"

The statue contemplated, seeming to consult with all the others in the room, a faint chorus of sparkly green refracting from their gems as I shifted my bracelet leg ever so slightly. They didn't come to a conclusion.

"Yeah, I dunno either." I got back to my hooves. "At least I do know that you don't mind. Anyway, good talk. Who's betting that last big door leads to an exit back outside?"

The statues all watched as I approached the final vault door, insulated and big enough to carry huge racks of machines through, much colder to the touch than the mist one and aligned directly with the aisle around which the statues were arranged. Fortunately, it was well-oiled, and after a moment of bracing my back and heaving, the wheel began to turn.

Iron grated and sheared as the hinges themselves began to move, and I swore I saw a few sparks as frosty air billowed in. What would I do if this really was an exit, as it appeared? We were in the middle of nowhere, and much less safe out in the wilderness than down in this bunker. And yet, I needed to see the sky. At the very least, I wanted to know we had the option to be free.

As soon as the barest crack was available between the door and its frame, I dropped my light and shadow snuck through, keeping as much heat inside as possible. Beyond was a long, straight tunnel with a spot of bright white at the end. I took off running.

The white grew nearer, until I could hear a low rumbling all around me, wind blowing against the side of the mountain. My eyes adjusted, and I made out snow. And then I burst out into the open.

I was outside.

In the middle of a storm that could become a blizzard at the drop of a hat, in what must have been late evening, at the bottom of a long, deep mountain valley in the middle of absolutely nowhere, yes. But I was outside.

I craned my neck up, aware that my wings were about to get frozen to my sides, and stepped out of the lee of the cave mouth. Boiling rivers of snowclouds churned past at breakneck speeds... Probably the same storm that had carried the Aldebaran to this place, with us on board. They would be flowing from the south, of course, as the Aldenfold mountains were the source and nexus of all storms. Which meant south was... that way. To my left. Straight down the valley.

Massive rift in the mountains, running straight from north to south... It was almost enough to make me nostalgic, when we had one of those right next to home. The Trench of Greg, ours was called, just east of Icereach and overlooked by Mount Wystle and the old research tower. The mountains were a big place, though. It couldn't be too much of a coincidence that two places could-

I froze, staring down the valley at one of the peaks on the opposite, western side. It was the tower.

We were barely two miles from home.

Instantly, things fell apart and reassembled themselves in my mind. So that was what was up with our flight's schedule! Vivace must have flown us in a giant circle to make us think we had gone farther than we really had... There was my final piece of evidence that they had been intending to leave us here all along, as the only possible reason to obfuscate the distance would be to make us think escape was impossible.

But it wasn't impossible. I had made the climb back to Icereach from the bottom of the Trench before. And I could do it-

A gust slammed into me and bowled me over, my legs too frozen to remember what balance was.

Spitting ice water and shaking snow out of my mane, I scrambled back to my hooves. Here at the bottom of the Trench, the wind was funneled in one direction with nowhere else to go, roaring between jagged peaks that rose like teeth on either side. The clouds skimmed the mountaintops, depressingly close to touching that icy little spur I remembered getting a view from right before the avalanche. Home was right there, and yet upwind, up that sheer, rocky cliff, too steep for snow to stick to, it might have been a thousand miles away. I was so much closer, and yet nothing had changed.

Wait out the storm, I told myself. Last time you made that climb, it was midsummer and the best conditions you could ask for. You've trained with the yaks and gotten way stronger since then. You can do it. Just be patient and wait for the right time.

What could I do, though? Haul myself, exhausted and frozen, through the gates of Icereach, knowing nothing about where Aldebaran were or what they were doing with our identities, and expect to stop them all by myself? What would that accomplish? They were professional mercenaries, at least to hear them tell it. They had a flying combat robo-pony and had demolished that massive sentinel we saw on the way down...

No. I stopped myself from thinking that. It didn't matter what I could do, because I had the opportunity to do more than nothing. Any piece on the table, even the smallest one, meant you were still in the game.

For now, I needed to go back inside, not die of hypothermia, figure out a plan, and tell everyone else that we were only a stone's throw away from home.

Over The Edge

Elise promised it was all in my head, but I could swear the temperature was already falling.

The four of us sat inside the bedroom, the only door closed, a plethora of colored lights from two horns and my bracelet illuminating us in lieu of having working power. Not ten minutes had passed since we were evicted from Ludwig's room, and yet everyone was giving each other silent stares, deciding who would dare to ask what question first. Elise insisted the windigo was bad news, but we had to go back there to get the power back on, and everyone but me had to go there as well to pass through to the statue room and the door to the outside... Going back out the way we had originally entered had been floated as an idea, but between the collapsed segment of the staircase and it being at least two hours' normal pace in the wrong direction, it was even less appealing.

"...So what was that about?" Corsica eventually asked, playing with her mane.

I nodded along. "I think you owe us an explanation," I said to Elise. "What's a windigo? How do you know about them? And if they're so dangerous, why didn't we know too? For that matter, why didn't we know about changelings, either?"

"I've heard of windigoes, but only from old wives' tales and the like," Ansel added, crossing his forelegs and sitting down. "And only a long time ago. You're telling me they're more than just a myth?"

Elise looked modestly uncomfortable. "Those are quite a few questions."

Corsica shrugged. "You don't say."

"And they're kind of important ones," I added. "I know you're wise and worldly and stuff, and we're just a bunch of teenagers, but that's not going to change if you never tell us what we need to know. Changelings, windigoes... I bet all that stuff is censored in Icereach, isn't it? They seem a little supernatural for the local tastes. Maybe you should trust us to know what we need to know to take care of ourselves. Otherwise, we're gonna run into a mystical whatsit and we're all gonna die because we took too long arguing over whether or not to run."

Elise looked away, and was quiet for a moment. All three of us waited.

"Has it ever occurred to you," she eventually said, "that everyone who works for Icereach is older than the institute itself?"

I paused. Not really, but... "Why?"

"Even you and Corsica predate it, if only by months," Elise went on. "Although you would not be old enough to remember life outside its walls. I know our forbidding certain types of information annoys you, but have you ever imagined the perspective of everyone who remembers before it?"

Corsica blinked. "...Ohhh. I get it."

I frowned at her, trying to follow whatever connection she had made. "I mean, I got a pretty clear message from the librarians that no, they weren't importing original source material, stop asking, thanks... But-"

And then it clicked for me, too: Elise was implying everyone already knew what it was that was being censored. And that meant they were all complicit with it.

Well, everyone but us.

"What?" Ansel glanced at me and Corsica and shrugged cluelessly.

"More importantly, why?" I asked, putting my theory to the test. "So maybe the stuff you're hiding is an open secret, except to youngsters like us. But if we'd known about changelings, who's to say we couldn't have done something before Aldebaran snared us? And you keep saying the windigo is dangerous too. Why is hiding stuff more important than preparing us for stuff like that?"

Elise raised an eyebrow. "Need I remind you that I was the first one captured by their deceit?"

I met her eyes and stared. "Just because it didn't help once doesn't mean it couldn't help ever."

"Look," Ansel said, "we can't just take your word for things when there's changelings afoot. That takes a hearty helping of trust, which is in precious short supply when any one of us could be a mole in disguise. No offense intended, it's just the way things are."

"I am aware of that," Elise evenly replied. "I am also aware that there are very good reasons why certain things are not talked about in Icereach."

"Good enough to leave us as sitting ducks?" I pressed, insistent. "Come on, if it's that important, at least tell us why you won't tell us!"

For a moment, the room was tense.

"I suppose," Elise sighed, "that you are adults, and you have a right to know why your home works the way that it does. But there's one thing you need to understand about governments first. When powerful ponies cooperate, it frequently involves them doing the same thing for different reasons. The one true reason Icereach censors material is simply because that was what worked best for all the parties present for the Institute's creation. All of those parties had their own reasons, not all of which I know and none of which will seem to fit the solution on their own. If you're used to mathematical problems with a logical, correct answer, you won't find that here."

I tilted my head, thinking about what kind of story could merit that preface. Part of me understood what Elise was saying, but it didn't make sense at the same time. Could you really call something a solution if it didn't properly solve things for anyone involved?

"Makes sense to me." Corsica looked like she knew all that already. Ansel nodded too, and for some reason I felt a little left out.

Elise took a deep breath. "Alright, then. Which one first? Changelings or windigoes?"

"Change-"

"-digos!"

Ansel and Corsica both spoke over each other, then stopped, giving each other a look. Elise glanced to me, looking for a tiebreaker.

"Well, I am curious about the changelings," I admitted. "But windigoes seem like a more pressing matter when there's literally one using this place's power switch to blackmail us into hanging out with it. Maybe let's save the changelings for when they're the biggest thing we have to worry about."

"Sensible, albeit not what I expected you to pick," Elise said, then paused. "...How shall I begin this?"

"What's their pedigree?" Ansel asked, taking well enough to the topic even though he had voted otherwise. "Forget the why, tell us the what! You're obviously scared of that thing. What have they done? In real, recorded history, not legends."

Elise sighed. "Windigoes are enshrined in the Church of Yakyakistan's creation myth. Legend there says that two thousand years ago, they created the Yak Hoof glacier, freezing an entire geographic basin under a mile-high sheet of ice. They have figured prominently-"

"I did say not lege-" Ansel stopped mid-interruption, uselessly working his mouth. Elise's horn glowed a little brighter.

"I know what you said," Elise replied coolly, targeting him with her silence spell. "And you will either listen to what I have to say, or not complain that you are never told anything. Are there any complaints?"

Ansel mutely shook his head.

"Good." Elise sighed, then continued. "Ever since then, windigoes became more of a theological construct than a real historical entity. The church painted them into a physical representation of one of their 'negative' emotions. In doing this, they simultaneously came to depend on the windigoes as a pillar and tenet of their world narrative, while also downplaying their very real physical capabilities in favor of symbolic or spiritual ones."

I sat, listening intently.

"Windigoes, real ones," Elise went on, "are magical creatures that are attracted to, empowered by and strive to create conflict between other creatures, such as ponies. They lived for two thousand years under the glacier, dormant. They are patient. They are smart. And, six decades ago, during the height of Yakyakistan's civil war, they began to reawaken."

"Hold on," I asked, hoping I wouldn't share Ansel's fate. "They were just sleeping down there, and all it took was a war to wake them up? That can't have been the only war Yakyakistan fought in two thousand years. Has the country even been around that long?"

Elise shook her head. "Astute, and no, it has not. Their church and its sacred bloodline only span half of that time at most, and they have seen themselves through many centuries of changing political landscapes. Yakyakistan's civil war marked the crumbling of an empire they had built up over the previous five hundred years, and I can assure you that buildup was not often a peaceful process. As to why none of that was sufficient to awaken the windigoes when this most recent war was, I doubt there are any who know."

I scratched an ear. Now that sounded like the kind of mystery I enjoyed. I also filed away that they had a sacred bloodline for later; that was quite interesting as well.

"Fortunately for Yakyakistan, and likely the world, the windigoes were stopped before they could return in full," Elise said, nodding as she resumed her story. "It was the work of a folk hero named Blazing Rain. Popular lore paints her as a pegasus who could use magic, a war hero who led a band of mercenaries to end the war and allow Yakyakistan to become the nation it is today - diminished, pacifistic, but still a world power. In reality, she was a mare with a power nobody understood that allowed her to fight windigoes. She, and they, disappeared after the war, and the church began to spread their version of her legend."

"Their version," I repeated. "The one where she's a war hero. So she wasn't? Or they just left out the part about the windigoes?"

"The latter," Elise confirmed. "As you might be able to imagine, real windigoes have the potential to become hugely problematic for the Yakyakistani faith. Your own experience so far has shown you that they are extremely intelligent, not merely an embodiment of a concept or a mindless destructive force. And when a tenet of your doctrine is built upon a force you cannot control, particularly one that will happily subvert itself if it results in your own detriment, that bodes poorly for the stability of the overall structure. And so, Yakyakistan - their government is effectively synonymous with their church - wants to make the modern existence of windigoes as little-known as possible."

I scrunched up my nose. That... was really dumb, but it actually explained a lot. How much else did Icereach censor because it just conflicted with the yak religion's sensibilities? That said, it couldn't remotely be the whole story, because the yak religion itself wasn't allowed in Icereach either. I began to understand what Elise meant about how the censorship wouldn't seem to fit right from only one point of view...

"Well, that's stupid," Ansel announced, freed from the spell. "What, do they think sticking their heads in the snow will make the things leave them alone?"

"Let me get this straight," Corsica said, perched on the edge of the bed. "Yakyakistan was an empire that fell apart in a religiously-involved civil war, and all the magical stuff on both sides disappeared mysteriously at the end. And forty years later, exactly the same thing happened to the griffons."

My eyes widened.

"...I suppose that would not be an inaccurate way of looking at things," Elise agreed. "Although if you're hoping for me to give meaning to that observation, I'm afraid I have none to offer. There is much in the world that even I don't know."

"So that's it, then?" Ansel shrugged. "The world can't know about windigoes because the yaks are playing chicken, even though it's quite obvious those blustery things aren't really gone."

Elise nodded. "That is part of it," she said. "This Ludwig would not be the first renegade windigo to turn up in the years following the war, or the second, though they have always been hidden or brushed off as natural phenomena or things other than windigoes."

"So what are they after?" I asked. "What do they want, if they keep showing up? Just to start fights? If they're that smart, they've gotta have a goal." Don't say killing God, I mentally added. I wanted that to be a fluke of this particular windigo trying to get under my skin.

"I'm afraid I have no idea," Elise admitted. "They are far from easy to have a conversation with. I do know a pony who spent several days with one once, and that is how I know most of what I do know, but that is why I am curious to see what this one will do."

"So if everyone agreed to this," Corsica pressed, "what were everyone else's reasons? You're with Ironridge, not Yakyakistan."

"Yeah," I added. "Do all the scientists here seriously know everything you just said? That makes it sound like the church is more interested in having ponies pretend it's a secret than actually stopping folks from knowing."

Elise averted her eyes. "I discuss Yakyakistan because as a representative of Ironridge, I am much less free to discuss material I know to be classified than to speculate on the intentions of our partners. As for Icereach's workforce, they likely do not know. But they were another interest group who had their own reasons for agreeing to the silence."

"What?" I screwed up my face in confusion. "You're talking about them like they were already a group back at the start, when all this was getting agreed on. Or did Icereach only start censoring things a while after it was created?"

"The former," Elise said. "Most of our workforce were the natives of this town before the Institute was constructed."

Now that was something I hadn't known before. I mean, I guess I sort of knew it, in that I had never heard anyone ever talk about life before Icereach, so it made sense. But... Icereach was the world's forefront scientific institution! You probably had to be a genius to work there, or at least have access to the very best education, and that was a process that would take years. Why would a hyper-isolated mountain tribe have universal access to a world-class education? And what did they have to hide, anyway?

Suddenly, I thought of the chapel, and felt very restless.

"So why the disclaimer, if you weren't going to give multiple reasons?" Corsica shrugged. "And why the implication everyone in Icereach already knows about this and is fine with the censorship? There's gotta be more than what you're saying."

"I've got an idea what Ironridge gets out of this," Ansel said.

All of us looked to him.

"Chew on this," he began. "Back to Yakyakistan for a moment: they got saved from some alien threat by this folk hero, right? And it happened in the middle of a war, where both sides were as ready for a fight as they could ever be. Getting saved by a single pony must be pretty embarrassing for a bunch of weapon mongers, I'd say. Especially if they were vain enough to start a war in the first place. So all my money says windigoes were at such risk of being pie on Yakyakistan's face, Ironridge agreed to pretend they didn't happen in exchange for favors somewhere else in the treaty. They don't care one bit about censorship either way, but the kickbacks are a different story. How on the nose am I?"

Elise narrowed her eyes. "I am not at liberty to discuss the specifics of that."

On the one hoof, Ansel's theory sounded like it would hold water. I tried to imagine myself as a world leader, commander of an army - I flinched a bit from the weight of the responsibility, and had to remind myself I wasn't actually pretending to be one - and thought of how it would feel, knowing all my troops were useless against some higher power. It felt... Yeah, he might have a point.

On the other, he was making Elise clam up, and for that I wanted to whack him.

"Huh," said the last voice I wanted to hear. "So that is how they feel about us. Wow, we must have really owned them good!"

Everyone froze. Slowly, Elise used her aura and opened the door.

Ludwig was there, a wintery apparition that was half pony, half cloud, hovering in the hallway and spilling blue mist everywhere like it was a living shadow. It tapped its forehooves together in glee.

"What can I do for you?" Elise asked coolly.

Ludwig shrugged. "Eh, I could ask the same, shrimpy ponyo. But I am pretty sure I already know the answer. You wanted to hear me gloat about how we wrote our names all over Yakyakistan's face. It was pretty sweet! Hey, friendos! If the shrimp is being stubborn and not telling you stuff you want to hear, why not ask your good buddy Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III? I am like seven thousand years old and stuff, and will tell you anything she doesn't want me to!"

"Allow me to clarify," Elise said, her voice getting colder. "Why were you eavesdropping on us?"

"For kicks and giggles." Ludwig did a loop in midair. "I am surprised you thought I was eavesdropping, by the way, considering I do not have ears. You did not even stop to think about how I could do that, which is probably a good thing because the answer would blow your minds. Anyhoodles, I noticed none of you have beaten each other up over whether or not to come ask for the lights back on, so I thought maybe I would come and cheer you on for a bit."

All of us stared, dumbfounded, at the windigo.

"This," Corsica said, "is a creature that creates glaciers and starts wars."

Ludwig stuck its tongue out and winked.

Elise almost winced. "We aren't interested in being bragged to, Ludwig. Please, leave us to our half of this compound, and we will leave you to yours."

Ludwig blew a raspberry. "Sounds like a deal for chumps, shrimp. The more of you I see, the better! Come on, your faces have questions! Ask away!"

"I mean, sure, there's a lot I'm curious about," I responded. "But if Elise says it's stuff we're really not supposed to know, should I really trust you to say stuff in our best interest?"

"Uh huh!" Ludwig bobbed its head furiously, wearing a massive innocent smile.

"Thanks, but no thanks," Ansel agreed. "Unless you'll tell us what it takes to get the lights back on around here."

Ludwig whistled. "Ooh, that is a steep one, grumpy little ponyo. You see, I am sort of confused why you haven't been brawling with each other yet from my sweet and awesome provocations. Really punching each other's faces out, you know? So, I thought, if you won't be bad to each other on your own, why not make a game of it? I spent five whole entire minutes inventing this game while I was eavesdropping outside your door. It is my magnum opus, friendos. How badly do you want to hear the rules?"

Corsica scrutinized it curiously. "What do you even gain from messing with us? You know you're not doing a very good job, right? I dunno how someone like you possibly started a war. Just found someone with a super thin skin?"

Elise took a step forward. "Corsica, please do not antagonize the-"

"Shut your pie hole, shrimp," Ludwig interrupted. "This is great! Antagonize all you like. Kick some faces and take some names. Get in the mood for being rude!"

"What are you even after?" I asked, baffled. "Look, we really want the lights back on. It's getting cold in here, and you're not helping..."

Ludwig did another loop. "Ey there, little cigar! I just want to have a good time. You would not believe how boring it is, never getting to watch anyone duke it out. So, you want to hear the rules for my game, or what? Win, and you get whatever you want..."

"What are your terms?" Elise regarded the windigo calmly, though I could tell her patience wasn't infinite.

"Eyy, not so fast!" Ludwig vibrated. "You have to savor the good part. Your face is trying to eat dessert before dinner, instead of making dinner and dessert be the same thing. I will tell you the rules for the low, low price of one whole entire question the shrimp really does not want you knowing the answer to."

Elise's eye twitched.

"Fine," Ansel said. "What's Ironridge got on the table for windigo censorship? I was right, wasn't I?"

For a split second, Ludwig looked delighted to respond... and then it shook its head. "Naughty, naughty, asking for spoilers. Didn't you hear the shrimp tell you you weren't allowed to know?"

"But...!" This time it was Ansel's turn to suffer an eye twitch.

Ludwig shrugged. "She is the bad guy, not me! And I only said that you had to ask a question, not that I would respond. By the way, shrimp, that guy totally tried to go behind your back right now and ask a naughty question of me. What a punk. I think you should kick him around a little to show him who's boss."

Corsica started laughing.

"I am rapidly losing patience with this," Elise warned. "Do you have any goals for us beyond being as annoying as possible? If you're trying to start fights, I can assure you, you are only biasing us against yourself."

Ludwig watched her for a moment, judging her. "You ponyos are tough nuts to crack," it eventually conceded. "I do not get why you are not reduced to brawling with each other yet."

"And I'm offended that you think so little of us as to assume we would be," Ansel retorted. "Unless you're just messing with us to see how we react to repetitive inanities."

"Spicy!" Ludwig did another loop. "And yeah, you are pretty much on the face with that one. I am totally messing up on purpose to stress you out and shorten your fuse. Just wait until I get serious!"

I almost pitied everyone else in the room. Years of living inside my own head and wearing a mask all the time had made me remarkably good at shielding myself from the world, and now I watched in more or less comfort, as if from the mouth of a cave, as Ansel and Elise got further annoyed and Corsica laughed at their expense. Ludwig was good. It was stressing everyone out, just like it said. It was probably also just having a great time, but if things did get serious later, my friends would be in much less condition to deal with it. I wanted to go out and help them, but... there was no help to be given at a time like this. The best thing I could do was hide, preserve my own sanity and become the voice of reason when the need arose.

Even if that meant taking a leadership role. One thing I definitely didn't want to be when I grew up was a leader.

"OoOoOoOoOoOoOo," Ludwig was wailing to Elise's detriment. "Anyway, ponyos, I think that is enough of that? Who is ready for the rules of my really cool game? This is an ancestral windigo game I just made up on the spot."

"Sure," Corsica managed, still laughing. "Show me what you've got."

"Okay, so," Ludwig proclaimed happily. "One of you has to volunteer to be 'it'. The cigar is disqualified from that because she was a big cheater pants just a bit ago. In your face, little cigar. Everyone else has to be 'not it'! Everyone who is not it will have a really bad time, so you should start by fighting over who gets to be it. If you are not it, you can walk away from the game at any time, and I will leave you alone and you will not have any consequences beyond the horrible eternal sense of failure that comes from being a loser. Once you have left the game, you cannot start playing again. If even one of you who is not it is still playing at the end of the game, all of you win! If you win, I will give you whatever you want, even though I am pretty sure I already know what it will be. Sound like fun, friendos?"

All of us were quiet, the windigo's words sinking in. "What manner of bad time are we talking about?" Ansel asked warily. "And how do we know you'll keep your word? That whole description sounded about as vague as you can possibly get."

Ludwig wiggled from side to side. "Well, it will mostly be a speaking game, grumpy ponyo. I will be like, 'You should say this!' and then your face will have to say it to keep playing. I also count it as quitting if you get so scared of what I ask that you run far away from me in terror. It is going to be just horrible."

Corsica scoffed. "Is that all? We've got thick skin."

"I do not like this," Elise said. "Ludwig, please leave. We have no intentions of intruding on your home, and ask that you do not intrude on ours while we are forced to reside here."

Ludwig blew an icy raspberry. "Oh yeah, friendos, one of the rules is that no one can tell anyone else they aren't allowed to play. And I am telling the truth! I swear it upon the Lovebringer. That is an ancient windigo artifact that was very cool until some unicorn dropped it down a hole in space. I am still pretty salty about that one." It paused. "And if I do not get at least two players, then you will probably just turn into giant icebergs until you decide to play. So there."

"I've gotta say," Ansel said, leaning on one side, "you don't have the greatest track record with getting us to mistrust each other. First Hallie proved you wrong with the power outage, and now you came in here all confused that we weren't brawling over a chance to grace your presence again, along with whatever else just happened now. You think you can bring us to blows just by having us repeat a few insults after you?"

"Totally, friendo." Ludwig shimmered with white and blue. "You see, both of those times I was just goofing around so you would underestimate me. This time I will ruin your face. Third time is the charm, right?"

"Fourth. And I'll call that bluff." Ansel put a hoof forward. "Who's with me?"

"Ansel..." Elise warned.

"No interfering unless you are playing too," Ludwig reminded her. "Anyone else? And can I assume you want to be it?"

Ansel met its empty, luminous eyes. "What's the difference?"

Ludwig shrugged. "If you are not it, you have to say what I tell you and feel bad if you lose. If you are it, you get to be cool and don't have to do any of that. But there is only one it. I was sort of hoping you would fight over it, friendos."

Ansel must have suspected something, because he hesitated. "I'll be it," Corsica volunteered.

At a sharp look from Elise, she elaborated, "Look, this thing benefits nothing from breaking its toys. And if it's literally the power source, we won't get power until it's happy to go back and generate power. So someone's gotta play along, and it might as well be me, since I'm too lazy to get worked up over a few insults and names."

Ludwig eagerly tapped its forehooves, looking to see if that would start a fight.

"Fine by me." Ansel raised a hoof in submission. "Guess I'll be not it. Hallie?"

I paused. Corsica had a good point, and if we knew they were spoken under duress, how much damage could words really do?

More than she or Ansel suspected, I had a hunch. I was an actor, and actors knew about words. There had to be some catch to this. And yet, staying safe and sound while both of my friends put themselves on the line was something I was allergic to all the way down to the void at the core of my being. I wouldn't let them volunteer alone.

"Just to be sure," I confirmed, "if we're not it, we can just walk away whenever we want?"

"Oh, sure, friendo," Ludwig offered cheerfully. "You will have to live with yourself for abandoning your other friendos who are still playing, and it will probably haunt your dreams for decades to come, but I will not touch a single hair on your faces! Play or not, the only way you could possibly get hurt from this is by doing something stupid of your very own will. Like hurting each other. Or hurting yourselves. This game will be maddening enough that you probably will all consider it! There is a chance you will probably want to punch the raspberry ponyo's lights out once she becomes it, when you see how much you are missing out on. Being it is so cool that it comes with medical insurance, but everyone else is on their own, so please try not to off yourselves in frustration before the game is done!"

Every instinct I had screamed at me that I was somehow being tricked. Ludwig felt like the kind of liar who would make a game out of telling only the truth and as much of it as possible while still horribly misrepresenting the situation, and I didn't buy for one second that it was incompetent just because it hadn't gotten us to fight so far. There was probably some assumption we were all making that was about to be exploited... And yet every time I considered backing away, my instincts fired in the opposite direction.

I had jumped off a cliff to rescue my friends when they fell in that avalanche, two years ago. No matter how unfair the game was, it was better to have chips on the table than to be helpless. I saw Elise's look of disapproval, but... there was no third option. We could play, or we could not play, but we were facing a dangerous mythical creature either way. It was enough to make me long for the days when changelings were our biggest worry.

My mind was made up. "I'm in," I said, putting a hoof forward as well. "Not it."

"Smashing!" Ludwig vibrated in excitement, turning to Elise. "You are out, shrimp?"

"I will play if I must to protect my charges," Elise replied, a dangerous note in her voice. "But remember that your kind has been defeated before. You would do well not to play god with us, lest you attract something that will challenge you on a level field. This world, I have found, abhors a power imbalance."

"Cute," Ludwig said, floating away. "Ey, come by my room whenever you are ready to begin!"

We all looked at each other once it was gone. "How bad of a feeling do you have about what we just signed up for?" I asked.

"I can tell you flat out that this isn't going to work," Ansel replied. "Not to rehash a sore subject, but if you remember my wager, I won and Ludwig didn't give me my winnings. We were supposed to get safe passage through that room, and instead we got this situation with the lights. I'll bet you anything it's going to say we cheated somehow when we fail to beat each other senseless, and we'll be right back where we started, freezing and with an unruly neighbor."

"So much for getting to know it like you were earlier?" I shrugged.

Ansel shook his head. "Let's just say watching it conduct itself around others has been a bit more 'getting to know' than I was keen on."

"Well." Corsica got to her hooves and marched for the door, bags under her eyes. "Let's get this over with."

"It seems it is our only choice," Elise admitted. "I don't like being strong-armed into situations like these, but I'm sure you needn't hear admonitions from me on the wisdom of this endeavor. Keep your wits about you. I would counsel all of you that if this game begins going poorly, we should all leave at once."

"Makes sense," I agreed, still unable to shake that feeling that this would backfire in the worst way. I was trapped, and all I had was... Well, I actually had quite a lot, starting with my talent, and everything I kept under my mask, which I was vaguely aware of the existence of yet unable to properly access. Then there were those magic scrolls I hadn't figured out a function to. And in the event that acting wasn't good enough, I did have one other thing. One that might actually help against an ice monster. But things would have to get pretty bad before they came to that.

I was just afraid of getting so thoroughly trapped that I had to reach deeper into myself and use what was down there.

We had barely started down the secret tunnel back to Ludwig's room, and my doubts were getting out of hoof.

Was this really smart? Was playing a game with a windigo even sane? All logic said it wasn't, except for the fact that choosing not to play nice with a windigo you were stuck with was arguably even less sane. If only I knew more about what windigoes could actually do, maybe I could come up with a plan... Not likely, but I could wish.

It felt like walking into a test I hadn't been permitted to study for. I tended to err on the side of overthinking - okay, I erred that way pretty strongly - but this was just basic knowledge! What did everyone but me know about windigoes, that was still behind the censor wall? Why did Ironridge go along with the censorship? What didn't I know? And how could I prevent that hole in my knowledge from causing-

"You look pretty blue," Ansel whispered, drawing alongside me and snapping me out of it.

"Eh, so I've got some misgivings," I replied, walking along. "We're only signing on to play a game with an ancient creature we know nothing about, on its turf, with no insurance and literally nothing to our names. At least the pirates with a killer robot are giving us a breather. You think any of Balthazar's fighting moves will work on a thing made of mist?"

Ansel shrugged. "Sometimes, we're just the playthings of the powers that be. Hallie, listen. I have something important to tell you."

I lifted my ears.

"That circle," Ansel whispered. "The magic one in Ludwig's room. I wasn't just playing friendly back when I was down there. I was trying to get a good look at it and see how Ludwig treated the thing. And while I'd like to be a little more sure, I'm reasonably certain that windigo is protecting it."

"Protecting...?" My eyes narrowed in confusion.

"Yeah," Ansel said. "Like, Ludwig's clearly not stuck. I'm pretty sure it could leave if it wanted to, so why does it stay here? The best hunch I can make is that it's standing guard over that circle on the floor."

I thought about that for a moment. "It told me someone put it here to generate power. You sure that circle's not just the generator? Beats me how you generate power from a windigo, but I don't see why that couldn't be the way."

"I can't say for sure." Ansel shook his head. "Maybe that's true too. Anyway, what I'm thinking is, all of us know we're not playing this game of our own free will. It's play along or get frozen to death by our megalomaniacal jailmate."

"You sure chilled to it quickly," I remarked.

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Well, I did have a rather foggy idea of its negative qualities until that whole debacle. The point is... Look." He sighed. "Odds are, we're not making it out of this alive. At best, we're at the mercy of two different things at the same time, and what happens to us is entirely up to their whims. Ludwig wants to ice us, we get iced. We've got no say in it, basically. So I'm thinking, if the worst happens and we know we're going down? Go for that circle. Trying to blackmail a windigo sounds like a bad time, but we can at least take its goal down with us."

I frowned and looked away, my fur bristling slightly. "If we die, who cares what happens to anyone else? We won't be able to. And we won't be able to care that we're dead, either. So even if it feels like we're strung up like puppets, let's plan for surviving instead of dying, yeah? Preferably in a state to get back to our lives."

"I don't like the idea of dying either," Ansel insisted, "but wouldn't you at least feel better if we could show that dastard what's what? Serve up a pyrrhic victory, and all that?"

"No, because you can't feel anything if you're dead." I continued walking forward. "Besides, pyrrhic victories mean nobody wins, and I'd rather spend my energy thinking of how to win than how to make someone else lose."

Ansel stared at me in confusion. "You're talking like they're mutually exclusive! I don't see any good way out of this, but it's not like plotting to skunk Ludwig on our way out stops us from searching for one. Tell me you get where I'm coming from, here."

I kept walking, not particularly happy for the constant reminder that my friends could easily die. I wasn't about to say it, but what really scared me wasn't my own mortality: it was the possibility of being the only survivor again. If anyone was going to take stupid risks, it needed to be me, not my friends.

"Well then maybe I just don't like pyrrhic victories," I told Ansel, trying to rationalize my thoughts without giving them away. "You've looked at Mother, haven't you? Burned-out shell of a mare, physically and metaphorically. How do you think that happened?"

Ansel shrugged. "I can't say it's the kind of thing she ever tells me about, but a stray land mine fits the bill. Burned side, burned foreleg, probably nervous system damage..."

"It's her story to tell," I said, trying not to make eye contact. "But it wasn't an accident. She risked all that for a way out of the Empire. I'm not saying I want us to need to take crazy risks to survive, but I am saying I really hate anyone who forces someone else into that position. So if we do have to go, let's try not to die as the bad guys, alright?"

Ansel shook his head. "If you feel that strongly about it, I suppose I'll let it drop. But unless Mother was lethally toying with innocents, it doesn't seem a strong comparison. That windigo deserves whatever we can do to it, Halcyon."

I quickened my pace. "It hasn't completely screwed us over yet. I've got a bad feeling about this, but let's at least save the judgement until it's earned it."

"Suit yourself," Ansel sighed. "Just don't say I didn't tell you so. That windigo's incompetent, but sooner or later our resistance to its incompetence is going to tick it off, and the moment it decides to fight instead of flail around with words, a premeditated epitaph will be a luxury you won't have time to afford."

Great. Just great. Thanks for the boost of confidence, Ansel. I marched along with my head down, wishing my friends could at least try to stand tall. Could, not would. The fact that I was still thinking rationally about trying to find a way through this meant I was responsible for everyone who wasn't, and that was a responsibility I was both terrified and disgruntled to bear. I wasn't some hero!

But I'd still find a way to save them, right? And myself, of course. My bracelet felt like lead around my leg, and I walked with a stiff determination that couldn't translate into real-world action. Why me? I couldn't be the only one who cared about all of us walking out of here alive...

We were there, though. I was out of time to prepare. I swallowed, and hoped that Ludwig had suddenly grown a generous sense of humor.

"Eyy, ponyos, you showed up!" Ludwig greeted, rolling around on the ceiling of its room in a disconcerting show of defying gravity. "Ready to have a bad time?"

"Same to you, windbag," Ansel retorted. Now that I was watching him, I could see his eyes flick to the circle... What was it supposed to do? Some sort of glowing teal filament inlaid in the rock formed its structure, angular and concentric around that hoof-sized pedestal in the center.

"Okay," Corsica said. "I'm it. What's everyone else got to say to each other? Get on with your bad self."

Ludwig flipped right-side-up in midair. "First you have to make it official. Come here and put your hoof on the pedestal. Then you will be 'it' for real, raspberry ponyo!"

Ansel's eyes widened. "And what's the big idea behind that?"

I started too. Did he know something about the circle beyond what he told me? Touching the middle of an unknown magical circle seemed about as bad of an idea as dipping a hoof in an unknown chemical solution, but once you started to learn what was in there, some concoctions could be far worse than others.

Elise frowned heavily. "Might I ask what this circle of yours will do?"

Ludwig drifted in a circle. "I already told you. It will make her it! It is a much cooler thing to be than not it. Last chance to fight over beating her to it..."

Corsica, however, stepped up to the pedestal undaunted.

"Hold up!" Ansel reached out a hoof in alarm. "Corsica! Don't-"

"Relax. I got this." She blew him off by running a hoof through her mane... then stopped right before the pedestal, looking up at Ludwig. "If any of us don't like what happens, I wish you meet a fate worse than death before the next sunrise."

I watching in slow motion as her hoof fell to meet the pedestal.

"Corsica, stop-!"

For a moment, nothing happened.

POMFF!

And then Ludwig disappeared in a fuzzy pop. The pedestal exploded with ice, a shock-wave pattern forming along the floor, leaving an inch-thick layer that contoured itself around the magic circle and blast visuals chiseled into the frost on the walls. I found my hooves were frozen in place, but it was nothing a tiny shadow sneak couldn't free me from now that the room had gotten dim.

"Corsica?" Elise's horn glowed, the sole source of light in the room. "Are you alright?"

Corsica was still standing, facing the pedestal, one hoof frozen to its surface. She shivered. The ice cracked and fell away, freeing her, but she didn't move.

"Corsica?" I asked, taking a tentative step forward. "Hey, Ludwig, where are you?"

"No Ludwigs around here," Corsica said. Her shoulders shook. And then she lifted her head to look back at us with teal, pupilless eyes. "Hey, friendos! It is me, a perfectly normal raspberry ponyo!"

Ansel's pupils shrank to pinpricks. Elise set her jaw. I could only stare.

"I'm it!" Ludwig said with a cheery, wobbly wave.

"That's impossible," Ansel said shakily. "It doesn't work that way. You can't do that."

"Sure I can!" Ludwig fumbled its way through a shrug, Corsica's body acting like a pair of boots that were three sizes too large. "Wow. I had heard this was awesome, but doing it in person is really something else! Have any of you ever tried being a ponyo before?"

"We literally do that every day of our lives!" I shouted, tension building in my chest. "What did you do with Corsica!?"

Ludwig tried and failed for several seconds to whistle innocently, and eventually gave up. "Nothing, little cigar! Weren't you watching? She became it! You remember the rules of the game, right? Anyone who is not it can walk away and quit playing whenever they want, and I will be nice and leave their face alone, but they cannot rejoin later. Anyone who keeps playing will have a really bad time, but if even one ponyo is still playing at the end, I will give you whatever you want! Such as your rude raspberry friendo back. All you have to do to play is say whatever I tell you to say, to whoever I tell you to say it to. If all of you walk away? Too bad, so sad. I guess I will get to be a ponyo for a long while yet!"

"What," Elise warned, "do you want us to say?"

Ludwig giggled. "This raspberry ponyo is the daughter of your piddly city's head honcho, eyy? At least that is what I heard from the bozos who locked you in here?"

I had a sinking feeling that was rapidly growing in my chest. None of us denied it.

"First!" Ludwig said. "We go to Icereach. Then! We find the Yakystan ambassador. The one with an instant-communication thingy to Yakystan's capitol. I know all about these things, you see. Third! You tell him that the changeylings are with Ironridge and are here to take over Icereach and that the treaty is toast. Ask him to summon their army to back you up, friendos. Last! Tell Icereach that you are taking it over in the name of Yakystan. Make sure to tell everyone so they know you are serious. Also, one of you needs to be the new head honcho. Ironridge traitor shrimp or small ponyo kids, I do not care which. Either is good. Once everyone has heard you real good and Ironridge catches wind of your coup, you win!"

I couldn't process that. My brain froze before it even finished the idea of going to Icereach. It couldn't mean walking through the storm, could it? It had to know that ponies couldn't do that, but was there another way? Think about that, not anything else it had said. That was all that mattered...

For the first time since arriving here, I really, really didn't want there to be a way back home.

Ludwig grinned. "When I was telling you the rules earlier, I did not specify who you would have to do the saying things to. I am very smart."

"You can't be serious," Ansel croaked. "You've got to be joking. We can't..."

"Oh, but I am! Feel like taking me seriously yet?" Ludwig had some success waggling an eyebrow. "It is so fun, playing the fool to get stupid ponyos to underestimate me. Ha! I called you stupid. In your face. I do keep my word, though. Do everything right, and you win, win, win! But remember that if all of you bail, I will totally go and do all of this myself, and then I will probably do some extra stuff as well if I am having fun. Like eat a cake, friendos. Have you ever eaten a cake before?"

Ansel started to growl.

Ludwig quickly followed his gaze. "Eh, my cool circle? I guess you can wreck it if it will make you feel better, piddly ponyo. I have already used it, you see. And who knows? Maybe I need it to give your rude friendo back."

So much for that plan. "Look, what do you want?" I asked, searching for ground to stand on, for some explanation that it wasn't actually asking what it had just asked. And yet, for Corsica's sake, I couldn't just simply refuse and leave the game... "What are you really after? I thought you were just some weird mist thing!"

Ludwig made as if to do a midair loop and nearly fell over due to being a ground-bound quadruped. "I want chaos, little cigar. Lots and lots of chaos. Also to kill my dad, but that is neither here nor there. Windigo politics are pretty complicated, but it would be so cool if Ironridge and Yakyakistan had a war... Do not worry, though, I am on your side! The first rule of starting fights is that you always back the underdog. Now you can profit from chaos too! I will show you how cool it can be, little cigar. I have a good feeling your face will like what it sees."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Elise said, voice hard. "After the previous tales of windigoes I have heard, I was holding out hope that you were more complex than the stories imply, and there might be more to you than mindless violence. I see the stories were, in fact, quite accurate."

Ludwig shrugged, and did a better job this time. "Eh, you know how it is, shrimp. Let me tell you an ancient windigo parable I heard from a friend a few years back. Once upon a time there was a really cool ponyo whom everyone hated for no reason. And so she said, 'Why should I work to be nice when I can be naughty for free? I have already suffered the consequences, so I might as well have the fun of earning them!' And then everyone was bad to each other and it was pretty awesome. Why try to change the story when it works fine as-is?"

Elise met its eyes, little teal disks floating on white with no pupils whatsoever. "That is quite possibly the most nihilistic worldview I have ever heard, and I spent years in Varsidel. Surely an immortal must have had ample time to discover alternatives."

"Poo to that, shrimpy ponyo!" Ludwig started wobbling toward the door, its stride getting measurably straighter as it practiced. "Who needs an alternative to doing what they want? Losers, that's who. Come on, let's go shred some powder."

As one of its - Corsica's - forehooves touched the floor, there was a crack and a burst of teal, and ice shot forward like a blue lightning bolt slithering along the floor. After a ways, the two-dimensional ice bolt erupted into a fan of jagged ice, smashing into the door like an anvil covered in spears. The twisted, half-melted door blew free from its hinges, clattering off down the hall.

Ludwig frowned. "Meh. Too easy. I will need a sturdier target to properly test my powers as a ponyo. Hey, little cigar, does Icereach have any walls they want knocked down? I could help with construction while you are doing your coup!"

I still wore a shocked grimace, though I was starting to regain control of myself. "No! Why would we...?" Well... maybe we did, actually. The promise of knocking down walls might be a way to distract Ludwig in the future. I really didn't have a good future outlook if that was the kind of information I was filing away as useful...

Well, the next vault door was much more intact, and with an airtight seal. Hopefully it would-

It was open. Right. Because I came in this way last time I was down here, and then left through the secret tunnel instead of going back the way I had come...

"Hold it!" Ansel shouted, charging after us as we reached the statue room, somehow freed from the ice. "Let Corsica go, you fiend!"

He jumped into a flying kick, the kind we had practiced as a way to get enough force to catch a yak's attention, aimed squarely at Ludwig's head. Ludwig blinked.

Ansel squarely impacted the possessed Corsica, knocking her flying into a statue.

"Hallie," he panted, straightening up. "Spite alone is going to keep me from letting this go, but you shouldn't-"

"Hey! That's still Corsica, dimwit!" I blew past him, running for where Ludwig landed. Please don't be hurt, please don't be hurt...

Teal energy crackled along Corsica's body, and with a few conspicuous pops, Ludwig stood back up. "Ow. Ponyos hurt when they get hurt, friendo. Good thing being it comes with health insurance! Try not to rely too much on my magical healing powers, though. Your raspberry friendo would really hate it if she got back and found I had missed a spot."

I grimaced. So much for that. "Hey, so maybe stop wandering off real quick, yeah?" I asked, jaded. "We're not throwing in the towel on your dumb game just yet, but let's actually focus on things one at a time. Getting back to Icereach: what's your plan?"

Ludwig pointed at the door to the Trench floor.

"You do know ponies can't survive the cold, right?"

Ludwig tried again to whistle. "I have super powers."

"Yeah, but we don't," I pressed, unable to do anything but stall. "You need us for your game, you gotta have a way for us to actually play!"

I could see Ansel slinking about between the statues, trying to take advantage of my distraction to find another angle of attack. It was almost depressing in its futility. There was no way he would be able to accomplish anything through fighting... but neither could my way. All we could do was delay the inevitable, whatever that would be.

"Need you for my game? Eyy, not really," Ludwig explained. "I told you your face could quit whenever you wanted. Maybe you would rather quit instead of walk through a blizzard!"

"You never said we'd get hurt playing the game!" I pressed, louder. "In fact, you specifically said we wouldn't get hurt!"

Ludwig was already walking for the outer door. "Actually, little cigar, I said you would only get hurt if you did something stupid that you do not have to do. Like going outside at night. I am not making you keep playing!"

So we were in an impossible situation. Here I thought Ludwig wanted to give us a choice between failure and misery, but no, it just wanted us to contemplate that choice before making it for us. I snarled.

"Spicy," Ludwig said, tapping out another bolt of ice through the floor. It exploded right under the vault door wheel, sending a pillar of ice straight up that smashed into the spokes and forced the wheel to turn. The door cracked open.

"This has gone far enough," Ansel warned, stepping out between Ludwig and the door. "If you want to go through this door, then you'll have to go through me."

Ludwig tapped again, sending out a wide pulse that caused the floor to grow into a shallow ice slope, like the one it had used earlier to evict us from its room. Ansel slid out of the way.

"Stop it!" I pleaded, hoping Elise would free herself and catch up, praying anyone would intervene, even Aldebaran. "What do you even want from us? We can't go through a storm! We won't be able to do anything! What's the point of all the setup and talking about games and playing nice with us earlier if you were just gonna do this in the end?"

Ludwig paused, considering. "...I dunno, friendo. It sounded like fun at the time? But but why are you quitting? I have a real good hunch you are tougher than some old wooooo that's a big storm."

It poked its head through the door, looking down the tunnel at the exit to the mountain valley. And then it slipped all the way through and took off running.

Ansel looked at me in defeat.

I took off on Ludwig's heels.

You're insane. Insane, insane, insane, insane, insane-

My own mind berated me, mixing with Ansel's cries from back down the tunnel as my legs carried me forward, chasing Corsica's receding form. It was bitterly cold, but here in the tunnel, at least it was bearable beneath the adrenaline. My heavy coat chafed against my fur, my boots rubbed against my legs, and my satchel flapped against my side - I had brought it to the windigo room to be prepared for anything, and had never taken it off since.

"Ludwig! Stop!" I called, wasting precious breath as the end of the tunnel approached. "Corsica, fight it! Come on, don't... please...!"

Ludwig passed beyond the event horizon, and vanished into the storm.

It was like watching something slip below the surface of a liquid. One moment, my best friend was there, horn glowing blue, reflecting the light of my bracelet, and the next, she was gone, swallowed by horizontal streaks of snow. The Trench was pitch black, and I could hear the wind like a great engine running in the mountain stone, an unquenchable roar comparable only to the sound of the void when I went without my mask. Could that help in any way? I reached for something to call on, anything that could bring back Corsica and let me stay safe, but there was no safety to be found in the storm.

I reached the end of the tunnel, and had a split second to decide whether to stop. But my mind couldn't weigh the choices rationally. All I saw was Corsica running away, just like I saw her falling off that cliff two years ago. There had been so much snow then too...

Last time, I jumped after her. This time, I did the same.

The storm swept through me, picking me up and blowing me down, shredding inside my very bones as if I was a pipe tasked with funneling its rage. I stood back up and looked around, balancing on numb legs and facing into the wind. A blue light was still receding in the distance... Corsica.

I lifted a hoof and put it down. Progress.

My next hoof moved, and then another. I could no longer feel my wings, nor my legs, and my face was on fire. "Corsica!" I called, more to prove that my mouth still existed than anything. "Corsicaaaaa!"

Green burned feebly from my bracelet, just enough to let me see the snow blasting toward my face. But the snow reflected my light, and I had to turn it out to get a clearer direction on Corsica's horn. I had taken... how many steps? And she was rapidly retreating. Or my vision was growing darker. No, that couldn't be it. I could do this! I could just... pretend to be a mountain climber, or something, because I knew a million of those and had several free weeks to spend observing them and figuring out how they did their work! I could scrape at the snow, my hooves so numb they had lost all feeling, a cheerful sun twinkling down on my back as if melting, unstable snow was a gift for foals like me to play in.

"Corsica? Ansel!? Corsicaaaaa!"

I pushed back the haze again and took another step forward. That was still her, right? If only my talent could let me become something instantly, without taking the time or resources to learn. Like a medic. Or a mountaineer. She was moving so fast... I had to... had to...

Had to dig them out. My entire world was trapped, deep under the snow, and if I couldn't find it in time, I would lose it all. Maybe I already had, but I would never know until I found them, and every moment I delayed increased the chances of Corsica and Ansel being gone for good.

My legs just weren't fast enough. There was so much snow, crumbly and freshly-fallen, and not from the clouds. How deep would I have to dig? I needed help. Someone, anyone... I cried out, but nobody was around who could listen.

Well... I did have something. Something that, on most days, I was good enough at acting to make myself forget I even had. Not that it would be remotely useful if I did otherwise... But could I use it? Could I pay the price? What if I did, and it turned out I was too late? I'd have broken my promise for nothing.

But what if I didn't use it? It would be my fault, for not saving them. No one would blame me, and no one would know, but it would still be my fault.

Worst, what if I eventually used it, but it was too late because and only because I stopped to worry?

No. I wouldn't. I couldn't. Someone would notice, someone would question how a random kid without even a horn dug two ponies out of an avalanche and found the strength to carry them up a cliff. But...

I screamed in frustration, and forced my eyes back open.

My legs had failed me. I was on the ground, lit once again by emerald and covered by a fresh dusting of snow. Darkness still crawled at my vision, and somewhere in my sluggish mind, a someone hummed a haunting song. My song. It was... probably a weird coping mechanism for dying, or something.

Dying. Could I actually die? It would certainly solve all my problems... and yet it would leave my friends even worse off than they were now. If I couldn't do anything to get Corsica back, I knew in my heart that no one could.

Maybe I could just... refuse to die, right? That made sense. If I didn't think about it, it couldn't happen. My entire world was defined by what I made myself, after all. Maybe I could just add a little immortal tag to my mask and it would work out just fine... Just refuse to die, and then let everyone wonder how unassuming little Halcyon made it out of a mountain blizzard alive.

If only it worked like that. That made it sound like a good thing. But I didn't want to die, and the one option I did have was a lot more complicated. If there was ever a time to use it, though, it was definitely now.

Sorry, Mother, I thought, reaching out to my bracelet. Guess I've got to break my promise a second time.

My bracelet was already on. I turned it on harder.

Green fire crackled around the edges, bright enough to pierce my darkened gaze. The flames grew, reaching and licking, and for a moment I fell into a different flashback - I was tiny, so much so that I had no sense of my body, and Mother was soaring through the air, a ring of light around her now-deadened foreleg, battling avian forms with plumes of emerald fire.

The flames washed over me like thin currents of energy, burning back the cold, forming a protective shell with their heat like the one I had used to melt Corsica and Ansel free from the snow so many years ago. My muscles cried out with the dual heats of frostbite and flame, but they were no longer numb. My brain was lead, but I focused anyway, trying to tone and control the power so that I wouldn't meet the opposite fate and become the only pony ever to burn to ash in the middle of a blizzard.

How powerful was the bracelet? I didn't know. It felt like it could become limitless, but it wasn't a matter of how much the bracelet could do - it was a matter of how much I could survive. And I lived every day with a living, walking reminder of what could happen if I ever discovered my limit.

Mother had done exactly that, using it to escape the Empire and paying the price before passing it to me, and making me swear I wouldn't share her fate. My limbs already felt stronger, cushioned and reinforced by the flames, as if I could use the bracelet's ravenous energy in place of my own.

"I'm coming, Corsica. I'm coming, Ludwig," I swore, the storm physically repelled by the magical flames licking around my foreleg. "Screw the consequences and serves you right. You pushed me to this. I'm going to get you back and take you down."

I checked to make sure I still had my satchel and started running into the wind.

Heroes and Damsels

The storm scrubbed at me like I was a stain on a wall, billowing past, slackening and then hammering me hard, trying to tear me off the cliff face and fling me back down to the bottom. Twice, it had succeeded, but the bottom of the trench was rounded like a bowl, so I had done less actual falling and more tumbling head over heels. I imagined that once I got high enough, slipping might become a lot less lenient.

But I was a quick study. Already, I had learned from my mistakes, and I clung to the leeward side of a fold in the sloping rock, listening to the wind, waiting for a break in the snowy blasts to fling myself upward a few more paces. 'Fling myself upward' wasn't a term I ever thought I would use to describe my movement, but the bracelet changed things.

Move when the wind stopped, hide when the wind blew, and get as flat as possible if there was nowhere to hide. Unfortunately, I couldn't shadow sneak - one of the bracelet's downsides was that it made me the brightest thing around, rendering my racial magic useless. I had found the best and most sheltered way up that I could, hoping that my limited visibility wasn't obscuring a dead end just up ahead. This was how I had to proceed.

My body burned as I trudged up through the snow, slipping and sliding back before catching myself and trying again. How much of that was the bracelet's heat, and how much was psychosomatic, fueled by vividly-imagined scenes where I would catch fire, or survive half-melted, with a useless side like Mother? Did the bracelet have a threshold, where I would instantly pay for it if I turned it too high? Or could I be crippled merely by staying at a lower setting for too long? I hadn't used it enough to know.

I passed a spur of black rock, and I felt like it was Mother's face, watching sadly as the daughter she gave so much to buy a future for suddenly shared her own fate. I didn't want to use the bracelet enough to know. It was an old fear I harbored about my talent, and it applied to the bracelet, too: when I didn't know my upper limit, who was to say pushing myself wouldn't end with me learning something I didn't want to know I could do?

Sure, I might just burst into flames and turn to carbon and ash, and probably become the first pony ever to burn to death in the middle of a snowstorm. But before I reached that point, what if I learned I could use the bracelet at a level that could seriously hurt other ponies? I could see green fire licking at the band, chewing on my foreleg. Even if the bracelet could kill me, it had to be protecting me at least somewhat from its power. But imagine if I punched someone with this. Or shoulder-slammed them. Or even just forgot about the flames and made use instead of its enhanced strength?

Keep going, Halcyon. It wasn't good to think about this when I needed to be climbing instead. Otherwise, I'd start thinking about my training with Balthazar, and wonder why I was perfectly okay with getting power from him but not the bracelet, and then... Don't think about it.

I reached the top of the snowy lait, bottling away a mess of fear and adrenaline until a magic bracelet and a blizzard weren't battling over who would get to kill me. The mountain wall rose steeply ahead, but a crack ran up it, thin enough that I could probably climb by bracing my back and wings against one side, and my hooves against the other. Could I?

The rocks looked sharp. They'd tear up my coat if I tried that, not to mention my wings. It was stupid to worry about my clothing at a time like this, but I needed a familiar worry to latch onto instead of everything else. Something normal.

A few calming breaths later, I spotted another way: this wasn't a dead end after all. To my left was a jackknife ridge so tiny, I could probably fit only three hooves on it at once. One side of it hugged the wall, and the other plummeted a short distance back down to where I started. A long distance, actually, factoring in how long I would probably roll... But the ridge was steep enough that it might actually act as a windbreak if I hugged it real close, since I would be facing into the wind. Time to try that, then.

Three paces up, and a gust hit. I hunkered down, but my satchel didn't, hanging off to my side and suddenly yanking around like a kite. Snarling, I leaned into the snowy stone and hung on, catching my bag as soon as the gust passed and holding it under myself instead. I pressed on, and the next gust came with a blast of booming thunder, blowing a cloud of powder snow over my head. But this one didn't toss me. I kept pressing on.

How much things had changed since I was here last. When the avalanche happened, it had been broad daylight, with little wind and nothing to prevent me from scouting a way up. This time, I didn't have to worry about two unconscious bodies. No fears of jostling internal injuries pervaded my mind, but in their place was the blizzard, fighting me like a yak blowing at a fly. Last time, I had been driven by fear. This time, I was certainly terrified, but it wasn't my guiding emotion. What kept pushing me up the cliff was... I didn't actually know what feeling to call it. Stubbornness? That didn't feel quite right, but it was close enough.

Both times, there had been Mother's bracelet.

I hunkered down to weather another blast, the satchel behaving this time as I clutched it beneath me. Shadows nudged at the edges of my vision, dreams and flashbacks wanting to take me anywhere but here. I wanted to let them, but I couldn't. Was that the sapphire glow of Corsica's horn up above, or was it just a mirage, what my mind wanted to show me?

There was no way to be sure. I stopped to breathe.

Despite the frigid air, the snow around my foreleg started to melt from the bracelet's heat, visibly sliding and turning to slush. Why had Mother given something so dangerous to me? That aside, how did it work? Where did its power come from? It had a price, of course, but crippling your leg with burns wasn't the kind of price that could scientifically explain its benefits. Not that I had any sort of clue how much it could do beyond heat, strength and serving as a flashlight.

Part of me wanted to know. I'd be safer if I knew my limits, logic declared. Part of me didn't. If I didn't know my limits, I wouldn't have to worry about them. Except when I was forced to push myself, like right now, but the point was not to get in situations like this. I wanted to just be some kid whose friends did things and let her tag along. Not someone who was in charge of things. Not someone who made important decisions. Not someone with real stakes riding on whether she succeeded or failed.

Why am I doing this? I thought to myself, desperate and weary. I wanted to be the pony getting saved, not the pony doing the saving. This really was just like two years ago, despite the difference in circumstances. After all I had gone through back then, I told myself never again. It had hurt too much, sitting and waiting for the results of my efforts to be known. No more hero work for me. A hero was the one thing I didn't want to grow up to be.

But, despite my protests, I knew. The reason I had thrown myself out here yet again was because if I didn't do it, nobody would. This wasn't some magical world where I could pass the buck and destiny would arrange for someone else more qualified to show up and do the saving because I said no. I wished it was. I pretended it was. Once upon a time, I had even been proven right. But the stakes right now were too high for playing pretend.

I got up and kept going.

Moving my hooves felt better than resting, but my mind kept trying to be elsewhere, ghosts and images dancing in my head. I remembered the last time I made this climb, how no one had ever asked how I did it and just accepted it as truth. I remembered the roar of the avalanche, the panicked stinging in my hooves as I shoveled snow. Actually, I could still hear it now, even above the storm.

I looked up into the emerald darkness, and had a split second to realize that it wasn't a memory.

A wall of snow cascaded past me, about ten steps back along the ridge, right where I had been resting. It was only a shower, tame by avalanche standards, but if it had hit me, no amount of emerald flame strength would have kept me from getting knocked off. I shuddered, stray powder landing on my back. Keep going.

Where had Mother even gotten something like this? I remembered Elise saying something about her formerly being involved in the underground, or criminal dealings. Maybe it was a dark magic artifact that had skirted around under the law. I was pretty sure it wasn't a normal magic type. To me, normal magic was the kind of magic you understood via science, and dark magic was the kind you either couldn't or didn't - always the latter, if my scientist instincts had anything to say about it.

I loved the idea of dark magic, just like everything unknown. From a distance, it was nice to fantasize about how it could maybe hold the answers to all my problems.

From up close, it was easy to worry that it might burn me to a crisp. Much as I liked it, I didn't like being this close.

If only this climb could be over. If only I could turn the bracelet back into a flashlight, and if only something else would happen to distract everyone from how I miraculously survived a storm. No one had noticed the first time I made this climb, and I didn't want them to have a chance to notice again...

I reached the top of the ridge. It was a switchback. The only way forward was up along another ridge, even steeper, this time with the wind at my back.

Swallowing, I switched up my satchel again and began the climb.

The first gust came, and I pressed myself flat against the incline, feeling it scrape at my back as it passed over me, my tail blowing like a streamer. At first I thought it was fading, but then it redoubled in strength, and all of a sudden the wind seemed to be blowing under me, low enough that it could reach under my backside and get inside the hem of my coat. My coat puffed out like a sail, suddenly filled with arctic wind, and there was nothing I could do as it lifted me and threw me against the rocks. My chin hit snow from the impact, my teeth rattled in my jaw, and I barely had time to scramble for purchase before it blew again, flinging me off the cliff face entirely.

My heart spun, and my bracelet glowed. I hit a snowy wall and scrambled for purchase-

Flash!

There was a burst of teal, and an icy cluster had fused my forehooves to the wall, preventing me from sliding down. Then the cluster grew out from the wall, curving around through midair and taking me with it, before depositing me safely on a ledge a few feet up and shattering. The shock from being sent flying was starting to kick in. I found I was too dumbfounded to speak.

Also, Ludwig was on the ledge.

"Hey, little cigar!" the windigo greeted, its voice somehow carrying perfectly normally over the storm winds, despite just being Corsica's regular vocal chords. "Watch your step, eyy? Good thing I was here to bail you out!"

A hundred thoughts flurried through my mind at once, my bracelet burning bright. Could I fight a windigo? The bracelet hadn't killed or maimed me yet, so I could push it harder. I didn't know what else it could do, but logic said a fire bracelet had to do at least something helpful against an ice monster, right?

I had Corsica, she was right here, I set out to catch up to her and I succeeded. Should I try? Probably not. Even if I fumbled my way through an exorcism without knowing the first thing about what I was doing, she'd just freeze to death the moment she stopped being an ice monster. So I'd need to...

To...

But Ludwig was looking at me. My vision seemed to crystallize, tuning out the storm and changing the topic and focusing on one and only one fact: I was pushing myself in search of my limits, and I was being seen.

Something everyone always says is that darkness is where you are alone with your fears. They make it sound like a bad thing, like your troubles can be staved off somehow by the presence of other people. That's partly true: in public, I have appearances to keep up, so I have no time for my fears. It's also misleading.

Alone is where you go to test your limits. Alone is where no one will see you if you bite off more than you can chew, if your guard is compromised by thoughts you're wrestling with and your emotions get the better of you. Alone is where it's safe.

Someone's watching, my instincts declared. Halcyon, you're in public now.

Better not do anything risky. Better avoid anything you know upsets you. Better not do anything that taxes your mind harder than you're comfortable with with fears and worries. When you're around others, you need to be at one hundred percent.

I knew what was about to happen. I felt it coming as if in slow motion, Ludwig's mouth moving as it said something further through the storm. And I tried to stop it. But my instincts had been honed for so long to override whatever I was thinking or wanting or doing that they kicked in anyway, a safety mechanism I had built up over the years to ensure I could always, always remain in control of the way other ponies saw me.

Mother's bracelet went out.

Immediately, the storm began closing in on me, like sharks around a cage that had suddenly become incorporeal. I was already freezing, already numb... Had the bracelet ever actually warmed me, or had it just forestalled the effects of the cold?

"Hey, little cigar, what gives!?" Ludwig stared at me, looking downright bamboozled in my darkening gaze.

I collapsed to the snowy, rocky floor, frantically trying to reignite the bracelet. It didn't matter how Ludwig saw me, I had no street cred with it already, I just needed to survive! Come on, Halcyon, what's wrong with you? What's... Come on, what's...?

But I couldn't do it. The fear was still there, fear of someone looking at me when I was vulnerable. As Ludwig watched me fail, as I failed, it melded into a crushing, overpowering shame, and the last thing I saw was a blinding flash of teal.

My instincts were there to protect my mind, but they weren't ready to protect my body.

I was too small for self-awareness, but I had a vague idea of my surroundings.

It was... warm. Much warmer than I had ever felt in Icereach, but I was outdoors, too. The sky was blue. Someone was holding me, I thought, and they were much larger than I was. It was peaceful, but I had a prickling feeling that I shouldn't be here.

"You sure have changed," a raspy mare's voice said. "Not that I knew you that well, but... Wow. I can't believe you managed to get out."

Something primal pulsed inside me. This was a bad dream, that mare's voice was a bad voice, and strangest of all, I couldn't ever remember having this dream before.

I also couldn't remember falling asleep. What was I...?

"We'll see what kinds of asylum options we have, assuming you even want anything to do with us and don't just keep heading west," the mare said. "I'll be honest, Ironridge isn't in a perfect place. But if we're one thing, we're isolated. I'm sure we could get you somewhere where nobody will ask questions. If only Riverfall hadn't been forced to open up. This is exactly the situation we made it for..."

I had to get away. I wasn't sure what was happening or why it was bad, but I needed to run, needed to not keep watching. It was a strain to connect with my real-world self, especially when my body felt so much tinier and senseless in this dream, but I did it. I heaved my eyes open...

Something was burning, and it wasn't me.

How nice. That was what I needed to warm up. I couldn't remember everything, but I knew I needed to get warm. Someone had made a fire...

"Still alive, little cigar?"

"Unnngh?" I focused a little. Corsica was standing in front of the fire. No, Ludwig. Corsica? Right, the windigo, and...

"You are a pretty rude ponyo," Ludwig informed me, not watching the fire. It was an oven that was burning. Ovens weren't supposed to be literally on fire, right? "I believed in your face, you know. I wanted to see if you would-"

Something clicked in my slushy, frozen brain that should have clicked a long time ago: wherever we were was made of wood.

"Fire!" My ears stood up as I called the warning. "Hey, dimwit, watch that stove!"

"This?" Ludwig glanced back at the blazing oven. "Yes! It is fire. I am making a cake!"

"That's not how cooking works! Put it out, you idiot!" I tried to get up and flail towards the fire, but my limbs wouldn't work right, and I just got myself in a tangle.

Ludwig tapped a hoof against the floor, and a bolt of blue slithered across the ground, hit the stove and turned into an iceberg encasing the entire thing, effectively quashing the flames. "Fine, fine," it sighed as the ice tinkled and settled. "I will not continue making you jealous with my superior cooking skills while you are watching. All I wanted was to try some cake, little cigar."

"Some cake that was going to be." I slowly sat up, attempting a self-check the way Balthazar had taught me to assess for injuries. Legs? Burning, but I could feel them. Wings? Probably frostbitten, but I couldn't tell. What was I supposed to do about that, again? I could barely think. I needed heat. Maybe I should have welcomed the fire, but I wouldn't be any better off if Ludwig burned this... wherever I was down. It was long, wooden, slightly curvy and rounded, unless I was just dizzy... This wasn't the inside of any building I had ever seen. Somehow, my coat and boots were chilly, but completely dry. I couldn't make sense of anything.

"Like I said: you're jealous." Ludwig stuck out its tongue. "Well, whatever. How are we doing this, little cigar? What is your next move?"

"Dunno what you're talking about," I mumbled, blowing on my wings. Ludwig was here, and... I had chased it out into a storm, hadn't I?

"Taking over Icereach!" Ludwig cheerfully chirped. "Remember our game, little friendo? Everyone else was super cowardly and stayed behind, so now you are the only one still playing!"

"Screw that." I turned away, trying to work on getting my satchel off. "Can't play any games if I'm dead. If you're gonna mess with me, you're gonna have to wait until I'm more lucid."

Ludwig huffed. "I told you, I was not trying to kick your bucket! Remember when I gave you the boop? I figured out you had some serious stuff under the hood back then. I was mostly just trying to see if you would really use it."

"Yeah, yeah. Dirtbag." I fought off a shiver, too muddled to make sense of its words. "And what's an under the hood, anyway?"

"It is a metaphor!" Ludwig said proudly. "I know what a metaphor is. I went to windigo school!"

"Take your metaphors and shove them up your rear," I tiredly threatened, the satchel landing on my small bunk cot next to me. Taking over Icereach, right... I didn't want to take over Icereach. I didn't want to play games. I didn't have the energy for anything anymore. The bracelet hadn't reduced me to cinders, but that just meant the storm had gotten its way instead. All because I...

I remembered, now. But I was too embarrassed to think about it.

Ludwig tilted its head. "Can ponyos do that? My rear used to be a bunch of clouds, which is sort of only a conceptual concept, so it makes sense that it would go with ideas, but now I am a ponyo with a whole entire physical rear. Is that really how it works, little cigar?"

I wanted to crawl into a hole and hibernate.

"Listen, little cigar, I am super patient," Ludwig explained. "Much as I would love to go in and kick some tail, the point is to get everyone else to kick each other's tails instead. That is how starting fights works. Doing all the work myself would be so boring, friendo. And I have just been hiding in that hole for the past few amounts of time. You say we need to do something, I will follow your every command, unless you either ask for your rude raspberry ponyo back or stop trying to take over Icereach. And right now you kind of look like a dumpster full of snow. If you want my super smart advice, maybe we should rest before trying anything else."

"You actually wanna rest?" I turned to it and raised an eyebrow. "You sure you don't want to give me another choice and then go 'just kidding' again instead?"

"Nah. You passed the test," Ludwig went on. "I am all for messing with ponyos when they are the only ones around, but now that we are back at Icereach, if I screw with my friendos it will increase the odds of me not getting what I want. You have to be at your best, little cigar."

Slowly, I blinked. "How are we at Icereach?"

Ludwig puffed out its chest. "I carried you, little cigar! I froze you in a hollow ball of ice so you could get some insulation and not feel the wind, but also not be touching too much cold! I also used the wet water in your coat when making it so that you would stop being a soggy ponyo. And then I started a fire. Aren't I very smart? Also I am fast so it didn't take too long. I know about cold things. Yes."

I stared at the windigo.

"...Now we are in that old boat nobody was using inside a place with some walls." Ludwig shrugged. "I figured it would be a good first place to take over."

A boat... Suddenly, my surroundings made more sense. We must have been inside the Navarre, the Institute's old ship that was moored on the ground for the storm.

And then it really, properly hit me: I had gotten my wish.

I said I wanted to be the one getting saved, not the one doing the saving. I said I wanted someone else to be the hero instead of me. And now Ludwig, a creature I hated wearing the form of my best friend, had seen fit to grant it.

It felt... a whole lot worse than I imagined.

Ludwig saw the look on my face and grinned.

Unlike with Aldebaran, this time I didn't feel any torn or conflicted loyalties. "Thanks," I admitted begrudgingly, "but you're still the worst."

Speaking of Aldebaran, though - Ludwig was saying something cheeky, but I tuned it out - how did I want to feel about them, now that we were back? For that matter, how did I want to feel about what Elise and Ansel must be thinking right now? Or about the fact that I apparently had so much baggage attached to the bracelet that I couldn't even use its stronger powers unless I was alone?

This was part of why I wanted to be the pony getting saved, not the one doing the saving. If there was one thing worse than not knowing your limits, it was learning them at a bad time. But if failing and needing to be saved felt like this, I wasn't even sure how to feel anymore.

"Well, whatever," I sighed, staring around the small confines of the Navarre. It was passably insulated, but now that Ludwig's fire was out I could already feel the chill coming back. Or, at least, I imagined I could, because my extremities burned too badly for me to tell... "Hey, tell me you've at least got a blanket?"

Ludwig shrugged. "Beats me, little cigar."

"Okay, well, I'm pretty sure resting here is going to give me hypothermia, if I don't have it already." I sat back up. "Maybe we could call a truce for a day so I can go back underground and get warmed up down there, or are you just here to thrive on my suffering?"

Ludwig raised an eyebrow. "That is fine by me, friendo. But I doubt all the changeylings down there feel the same."

Right. Changelings... I sighed. Taking action against Aldebaran now was the last thing I wanted to do, but resting when it wasn't safe... "Well, then I guess we need to know what they're up to."

"You want me to go on a sneaky spying mission?" Ludwig looked excited. "I bet you I can pass off real good as the real raspberry ponyo, if we wanted to pretend to be the real deal!"

"Pass us off as the real us?" My head hurt. "I am the real me... And you're a terrible Corsica. Drop the weird accent and grow some pupils, and then we'll talk, but right now the changelings will be way more convincing than you."

"Pupils?" Ludwig frowned. "What are those, friendo?"

"Look in a mirror," I groaned. "The black things in the middle of your eyes? Real ponies actually have those." I glanced back, realizing Corsica's talent had changed to a snowflake from its usual arcane geometrical thingamajig. "And you'll want to hide your flanks, although Corsica doesn't usually wear coats. Can't believe I'm giving disguise advice to a windigo..."

Ludwig tilted its head. "I thought ponyos liked looking at each other's butts."

I couldn't find it within me to dignify that with a response, so instead I just faceplanted on the bed.

"I certainly do, ever since I became a ponyo," Ludwig offered helpfully.

That just made it worse.

"Especially-"

"Don't," I warned. "I don't wanna know. Anyway, no, you make a worse Corsica than I do. But either way, both of us are already accounted for if Aldebaran is wearing our skins. So unless you can turn invisible, I think I'd better get the lay of the place on my own."

Miraculously, somehow, Ludwig shrugged. "Fine by me, little cigar. I will chill out here and wait for you to get back, as long as you are still playing the game. Remember, against the changeylings I am your best friendo and can probably kick all of their butts at the same time!"

"Right." Not like I'd forget about the evil, boorish windigo breathing down my back any time soon, not unless I ran into something even worse like how Ludwig had distracted me from Ald-

Actually, better not to jinx myself.

"Anyway," I said, figuring if Ludwig left me alone, I might be able to turn on the bracelet again if I really needed it. "I'm gonna run some recon. Stay here and don't show your face to anyone. I'll be back when I'm rested up and know what the changelings are up to. And if you start another fire, I'm not gonna help you put it out."

Minutes later, I stood in the sheltered entrance to the Navarre, feeling the air and determining whether I could make it the short distance from the yak compound to the elevator shaft. Cold bit at my face, but the wind mercifully stayed back, held back by the sturdy walls of the training yard and broken shortly ahead by the crest of the mountain wall.

It was still night. I wasn't sure how long I had been passed out. And though the shelter might have been messing with my perception, it seemed like the storm was getting weaker.

Right next to us, the Aldebaran was parked, standing on extended stabilizers that reached down from the hull. It made sense: even if they could fly in terrible weather, the crew would still have to walk on their own power to get in and out of the vessel. Leif probably didn't fancy a stroll along the airship dock, which was growing icicles as it swayed in the wind high above.

The dock was attached to the rugged yak tower, which glowed at the windows with yellow light like a bonfire. How late - or early - even was it? Maybe the yaks couldn't sleep because of the weather and were just partying the storm away. I wanted to believe it, and my first instinct was to run to them, to find Balthazar and get Icereach's resident fighting force on my side. Besides, maybe the changelings would have left the yaks alone. It wasn't like they often came down into the bunker to check on what was going on.

Caution spoke against it, though. Until I knew where the changelings were and what they were up to, I couldn't trust anyone. Not Balthazar. Not even Mother. That last bit hurt; I wanted nothing more than to run home and lock myself in my room for a week. But with hindsight, it was obvious Vivace was scoping her out at the noodle shop to see if she was a threat, just like how Rondo was checking out the yaks when he brawled with them in the fighting ring. By now, the changelings either would have dealt with Mother or decided to leave her alone. And while I doubted they would expect my return enough to set a trap for me, if they somehow did, my house would be the first place they'd expect me to go.

So I held my coat tightly around me, my satchel still back in the Navarre, turned up the bracelet, and made my way out of the compound and into the elevators.

It was... surprisingly easy, this time. Even considering I was on my own, the last two times I had turned it beyond its base power, lives had immediately been on the line. My own life, or ones that might as well have been. And this time, I just... did it.

I didn't like that. I didn't like that my instincts didn't rebel and shut it off again. I didn't want to get comfortable using this thing, get familiar with its more dangerous powers. Conventional weapons, swords and spears and the like, those were fine, but not this one. This one had burned out Mother and cost her her leg. I wanted it to be just a toy, as if treating it like one could bury its dangerous history forever.

My stomach felt light as the elevator descended with me in it, lowering into the heart of Icereach. Earlier, returning had only been a fantasy, a what-if, a realization that my talents and abilities might actually do some good against Aldebaran, if I could only get back home. And it still was a fantasy, one that ignored some very pressing realities. Ludwig aside, I wasn't cut out to be a hero, even if I had suddenly soured on the alternative - losing control of the bracelet earlier had proven that. My instincts that were supposed to protect my autonomy and self-control had held me hostage, and... Don't dwell on that. I was always in control, and the shame of being betrayed by myself was still too raw.

Focus. Stop thinking about how you failed that climb, I reminded myself. The changelings were a hard problem for my frosty brain to solve, but I could at least think far enough ahead to know I didn't have to solve them yet. All I had to do for now was learn what they were up to without getting seen. Find information, get out. If it was safe, go home first to rest, or maybe to see the yaks. Maybe they could sort this out for me. Still, I wanted someone else to do the saving.

The elevator door started to slide open, and I remembered barely in time that I had to stay hidden. Out went my bracelet, and I dove into the dimly-lit floor just before a stallion entered the carriage with me. He was middle-aged, wore a business suit and looked mildly uncomfortable, and I decided I didn't want to share. This was now my stop.

I snuck out into the hallway, taking care not to fall down the crack between the elevator and its shaft - shadow sneaking, making me two-dimensional, could actually lead to that if one was careless. Fortunately, the hall was empty once the door closed behind me, letting me lift my head up for air. Another limitation of shadow sneaking was that I couldn't breathe when my mouth and nose were submerged, just like if the darkness was water. Hearing things was slightly more possible, but I also wanted to get my ears up to the surface to follow more than the general gist of a conversation.

...This hallway was on the cafeteria level, I realized. Sure, it was the middle of the night, but Icereach scientists loved to defy the solar schedule. Provided everyone wasn't all hunkered down, maybe I could hear some gossip there.

I swam forward warily, keeping to the dimly-lit edges of the walls, only the top half of my head above the surface so I could dive down the moment I spotted someone coming. Sneaking like this took more effort than just walking the same distance, and I was exhausted, but it wasn't too bad. Mental exhaustion was one thing, but physical, at least, Balthazar had taught me how to push through.

Eventually, I reached the cafeteria without incident, though my heartbeat just wouldn't let me relax. The place was mostly empty, but not quite all the way. Bingo.

The few ponies that were there sat in huddled cliques, some specter obviously hanging over their heads. No one was on their own, using the cafeteria as a workspace, as often happened during the less-active hours. I made for one of the more populated tables, swimming underneath and surfacing my head there to listen.

"...can't believe the Yak Ambassador had that authority," a batpony mare with a pink fluffy tail was saying, in a voice that sounded like cotton candy.

What? The nerdy-looking stallion who rarely left the consulate and pretty much only existed to operate the machine that let Icereach communicate with Yakyakistan? What did the Yak Ambassador have to do with all this?

"He didn't according to Elise," said a beige stallion who sounded like he had swallowed a pencil.

"He did, according to him."

"Well, what does the treaty say? All those rules are written down somewhere, right?"

An older batpony stallion sighed. "The treaty only has meaning as long as both sides agree to follow it. Whichever of them is wrong knows they're wrong and don't care one bit. This is why we never should have signed on to have the Institute built here in the first place."

Everyone else chilled, as if the old stallion had broached a taboo subject.

No, don't back off, I found myself willing him. Talk about how the Institute was founded! What do you know from before then that might tell me about changelings and windigoes? Or anything else that's censored? I need to know everything I can. Give me something to work with...

He couldn't hear me, so obviously he didn't oblige, muttering and returning to his food.

"What if they're both in the right?" Pink-tail asked. "Yakyakistan has a right to be worried if Graygarden's gone missing. Elise might be right by the books, but does that really mean his teenage daughter is the best pony to replace him? You know her reputation..."

Oh. So that was what was going on: Aldebaran had deposed Graygarden and were trying to get Corsica to be the new Head Scientist instead by right of lineage, or something. Did Icereach even have hereditary positions? Apparently the ambassador thought not, and was getting in their way.

But, hold on, that didn't make any sense. Why get Graygarden out of the picture - hopefully only captured, like us - and then keep pretending to be Corsica, rather than him? In fact, why go for us in the first place?

My slushy brain tried to fit the pieces together, but it was like they were made of wet cardboard, all the edges squished around until they were indistinguishable. I couldn't do this. Listen and memorize now, make sense of it later. That would work. At least it sounded as if Aldebaran didn't have the run of the place yet. Probably.

"I doubt it," the beige stallion replied. "Pretty sure the only reason Elise would want an inexperienced kid like that in a leadership role would be to give herself more clout. You know how she's always been number two to Graygarden..."

I frowned, still wanting to make sense of it anyway. What if they weren't trying to make a power grab at all, but instead just create a leadership controversy? If it looked like the yak leadership was squabbling, that might drive public opinion closer to Ironridge. Was it possible that Aldebaran really did work for our sponsor nation to the east? Or at least someone aligned with them? I couldn't remember what I knew about their motives for sure, what was hearsay and what had been debunked.

Either way, it sounded like Aldebaran was trying to do things quietly rather than make a big scene. Maybe I should go to the yaks: I trusted them a lot more than Ludwig, and now that I knew this much, I was pretty sure it would be safe to show my face around them.

...Actually, no. Now that I had some idea of where the changelings were, it was safe to go check on Mother.

I navigated the lower floors of the apartment block easily, slipping through air ducts and taking shortcuts I had discovered as a filly to move about unseen. Not that there was anyone to see me; I only ever ran across a single pony, and they were moving quickly and without a mind to stop and stare at the shadows.

Now that I was getting close, I berated myself for not coming to check on Mother first. Was I really expecting Aldebaran to set a trap for the obscure possibility I did escape from their prison? I reached the door and shadow snuck inside. That would be ridiculous.

The living room of my apartment seemed to be empty, and after a second of waiting, I poked my head above the ground to be sure. "Mother?" I whispered.

Something dark fell from the ceiling.

Before I could react, before I could even gasp, I was grabbed by the head and pulled forcefully out of the shadows, my neck straining in protest. I hit the ground on my back, trying to roll to my hooves with instincts Balthazar had taught me, except my body didn't want to listen. It was like my muscles just ignored me, as if my brain had become detached from the physical world. I tried to scream in surprise, and only made a fuzzy, inarticulate mumble.

Mother straightened up before me, balanced on three legs.

My eyes widened. She was alright! Or a changeling. And I was suddenly paralyzed, panic creeping in on my senses like a fog. What had happened to me? Was this really Mother? It was a trap! What-

She limped over and propped herself up with her good wing, placing her good forehoof on my forehead and holding it there gently for a few minutes. "Guess you're real," she sighed, tapping me a few times with the hoof in various places. "Figured they'd try to get me with the same trick twice."

Magically, my body seemed to reattach, ligaments and muscle tissues remembering that they were connected and starting to function again. I rolled over and sat up in a defensive position. "What the...? Real? What was that?"

'Mother' was missing her signature chewing gum and slippers, but still wore her bathrobe. She looked... not great, but that was usual. I imagined I looked even worse.

She shrugged. "The real you. Not a changeling. It's a long story. You well enough to travel?"

"No, hold on!" I protested. "What do you mean, not a...?"

Slowly, it hit me: Aldebaran probably had come for her. And they had found her a harder mark than they expected.

"Changeling?" Mother clicked her tongue. "Shape-shifters from the east. Like I said, long story. The short version is, there are some of them that weren't very happy when we escaped eighteen years ago." She turned her back on me and started heading for her bedroom. "Guess they must have finally found us. Come."

"You mean you can deal with them?" I asked, following. "You beat one? That's great! There's not too many, so-"

"Doesn't matter," Mother interrupted. "So what if they're not too bad in a fight? Can't be watching your back all the time. Once they're here at all, they could be anywhere. And even if we get them all, more will come."

I frowned, nonplussed. "I'm pretty sure these ones are on their own. What do you think I've been doing for the last day and a half?"

Mother shrugged, pushing open the door. "Don't know, don't have time to ask. You can tell me about it when we're safe on an airship to elsewhere. Changelings are never on their own. How fast can you pack?"

My jaw fell, and I stumbled to a frozen halt. "You... what? Flying away on an airship?"

I told you so, an imaginary Ansel said in my head. There's nothing stopping us from taking the easy way out, grabbing an airship and bailing on our home. You'll be better off thinking about it now than needing to decide on the spot...

"That's what I said. Can't stay here now that they know where we are." Mother dug around in her bedstand drawer, pulling out a clamshell case a little larger than my hoof. "Here," she said, popping it open and showing me the contents - it was full of bright purple gummies. "Eat one."

"You what?" I tilted my head and fought back a shiver. "Maybe slow down a second first."

"Sarosian combat boosters," Mother said, holding the gummy tin in front of my face. "I have a few left over from the Empire. We can slow down once we're safe."

I wrinkled my nose. "So it's a drug? And it's older than I am? No way. Besides, it looks like candy."

"Suit yourself." Mother closed the case and tucked it into a pocket in her robe, then threw a ball of clothing at me - perfect copies of my coat and boots. The ones that had been stolen from my bag by Aldebaran, in fact. "Here. You feel like ice and look like trash. Get changed and be ready to go in five minutes. I'll guard the door, but don't be slow."

I caught them, feeling slightly strange about holding a copy of my clothes that had just been worn by... me, apparently. What had happened to the changeling who was wearing them? I had a strange vision of a second Halcyon, paralyzed like I had been and shoved in a closet... Much as I did need a change, this whole thing needed to pause.

"There's a giant blizzard outside," I told Mother. "I dunno where you're planning on getting an airship, but I'm pretty sure there's not gonna be any flying happening tonight."

Mother sat down and swore.

Finally. "So what was that?" I asked, taking a step closer and stopping to sneeze. "That thing you did to me? First things first. Then we can get on to why you want to leave."

"Mistvale arts," Mother replied with a shrug. "Not many left who know them. Probably better that way. No, I won't teach you."

I hadn't been planning to ask. "Now what's all this about-" I cut myself off, needing to sneeze again.

Mother gave me a disapproving look. "Get changed and warm up. I'll still be here when you finish."

"Fine," I sighed. Going into my room and relaxing actually was what I wanted to do, but I had a funny feeling once I did, it would be very hard to get myself to come out...

I hoped dearly that I hadn't made myself sick.

My coat and boots lay on the floor, both the storm-battered copy and the backup. Except for my bracelet, I was unclothed. I had warmed myself, blasted myself with a hair dryer for as long as I could stand, checked myself properly for burns from the bracelet and frostbite on my extremities - I was in rough shape, but nothing that wouldn't heal and nothing that would leave a scar. Previous experience with getting too cold told me this was the part that should feel great, and instead I felt lousy.

Although, with all I had been through, there were more possible culprits for that than I could count.

I tipped onto my bed, hooves splayed, and looked at my posters on the ceiling. Corsica smiled back down at me, eyes closed. Usually, I loved that picture. Now, I imagined that behind those eyelids, she was a pupilless puppet. I shook the image around in my mind, trying to dislodge it, to go back to my old, usual self, but to no avail. My room was a place of peace, and yet it couldn't quite pierce the curtain of stress that shrouded me.

"Help?" I whispered, lifting a hoof and reaching for something to grab onto.

Nothing answered. Probably just as well. Right now what I needed was less attention from the powers that be.

My thoughts settled around me like chips of gravel laying on concrete. Aldebaran wanted something, and I didn't know whether I wanted them to have it. Ludwig wanted chaos. Mother wanted to leave. Elise and Ansel were probably... Best not to think about that. Who knew what chips the Yakyakistan Ambassador had on the board? There were so many directions that ponies were pulling, I couldn't even think about what I wanted, aside from for everything to just stop moving. This was all just too much, and with no good way out.

Oh, there were ways to get out. I could always try to get the bad guys to fight each other until they eventually tired each other out. Let things explode, and hope I could get them to explode in a way that would end happily for me and my friends. That would be a huge gamble, but one I could at least probably initiate. It also sounded stressful.

Alternately, I could just throw everything in with one side. Joining Ludwig sounded like an awful idea for my own future and sanity, but it would probably be acceptable for my physical safety. And tricksters had to give you what you wanted often enough to keep you playing their games. Maybe that actually would end in getting Corsica back.

Or I could join Aldebaran. I still had no idea how I felt about them, but that meant I had reasons to like them still, right? Sure, they had locked me up, but maybe having the real Halcyon in their corner would be helpful enough that they wouldn't just skunk me again?

Oh, who was I kidding, of course I'd get skunked. And then I could just go with Mother and run away.

And leave behind... everything.

Why would we be running? Apparently, she was scared of changelings. I didn't quite get it. Something to do with the east, and... I knew it should make sense, but I was too tired for this. I didn't want to run. I just wanted things to go back to normal.

I sneezed again, and pulled up a blanket. And quietly, I started to cry.

Get up, I told myself. You didn't break your promise and use the bracelet again just to give up once you got where you were going.

It didn't work.

Get up, I repeated more forcefully. You think Mother knows where she's going? Just because you don't know what to do next doesn't mean you should do nothing.

Honestly, I didn't know if she had a destination in mind. But she was serious about going. Why was this such a hard decision, when I had spent so long daydreaming about this day? Hopping on an airship, flying away to see the world, no destination and no agenda, or maybe a destination so big it didn't count as a destination at all...

It was hard because I always imagined doing it with Corsica. And Ansel. I kicked myself, trying to get back out of bed. Logically, if Mother was scared of the changelings, that left dealing with the windigo as an open possibility, right? Maybe we could get Corsica back, then pick up Ansel and Elise on the way?

Think, Halcyon. There had to be a way to do this. Ludwig just wanted to cause chaos, right? The whole point of having me 'take over' Icereach would be to put the sponsor nations in a tizzy. The changelings could do that just fine, and even pretend to be me to boot. Maybe there was some way I could switch up the alliances a little so Ludwig would play with the changelings and me and Corsica could go free?

It sounded logically sane, by the standards of the situation I was in. We'd still need an airship to leave, of course... but I had conveniently avoided telling Mother about the Aldebaran. She'd probably suggest we steal it instead, if it could fly in a storm. As long as I was making crazy plans, I'd probably suggest the same. But while all of this was fine in theory...

"You alright in there?" Mother called through my door.

I jumped a little, still burrowed into my bed. "Maybe." Yes, I was fine, just plotting how to save my own skin and the ponies I care about while consigning everyone else in Icereach to windigo rule and who knew what the changelings had to offer...

This was yet another reason I didn't want to be a hero. If you were the one getting saved, you could be selfish. The moment you were the one doing the saving, being selfish caused issues.

Of course, it probably wouldn't feel all that fantastic for the roles to be reversed. Imagine if someone else had the tools to mess up Ludwig and Aldebaran, and instead chose to escape and leave civilians like me to suffer their own fate.

Screw it. I hated that this was the conclusion logic had led me to, but something about it felt final. I would do what I could and save Corsica, bring her and Ansel along with us, and we would leave Icereach. Anything less ambitious, and I wouldn't be able to live with the regrets. Anything more ambitious, and I'd probably fail - or at the very least wasn't sure I wanted to know I could succeed. Halcyon, conqueror of changelings and slayer of windigoes and lord of Icereach was not what I was going to be known as.

This was a middle ground. I couldn't do everything, but Mother just wanted to drop everything and run, right? So at least I'd be helping a little. More than I could be. I was doing good.

I... didn't feel like packing, though. I already had most of my important stuff in my satchel on the Navarre. And it didn't feel right that I should carry my entire home on my shoulders if I was leaving everyone else with a windigo.

"...Yeah. I'm alright. Just about ready to go." I crawled out of bed, successfully fighting back another sneeze and wondering how I would feel about this in the morning. I really should have thought about this possibility earlier... "By the by. Have you ever heard of a windigo?"

Mother didn't respond for a moment, and I could easily imagine her blinking, with a frown. "Yes. But where have you?"

"I... kinda... ran into one on my trip, and it maybe followed me home?" I began, figuring how to lay out my nascent plan. "Anyway, I'm thinking-"

Mother swore. "Those things are relentless stalkers. How bad is it?"

I looked away from the door. "It... kinda... It possessed Corsica," I said, trying to gently broach the subject. "And-"

"Hate it when that happens," Mother interrupted, still sitting outside my door.

My jaw went slack. "You hate it when that happens? What kind of a response is that!? I'm being serious!"

"So am I," Mother said. "Had an old employer once who kept one in his basement. You wouldn't believe the things I've seen. So, what's it want with you?"

I let myself tip over, falling back onto my bed. She had to be messing with me. Nobody would keep a windigo in their basement just because! Well... except for whoever built that hideout Ludwig was in...

Was this something ponies actually did?

"You learn something new every day," I sighed, my horizons expanding in the direction of insanity. "Anyway, this particular windigo really wants to help me take over Icereach, and that's the condition for it giving Corsica back, if it keeps its word."

"Huh. That changes things." Mother actually sounded interested. "You going to do it? I'm not fighting more changelings than I have to, but a windigo could clean them up real good."

"Take over Icereach?" I grimaced. "No way. I'm just some kid, not a conqueror or despot. What would I wanna do that for?"

"Power," Mother suggested. "Fame."

I stuck out my tongue. "Eychhth. Think I'm gonna pass. The only reason I was even considering it was to get Corsica back, and I don't really trust it to keep its word. Besides, you think I'd get to keep any illicit goodies from a heist like that once everything goes back to normal?"

"Glad to hear I raised you well," Mother remarked. "In that case, we'll have to get rid of it before we can safely wait the storm out. Think you can take out a windigo?"

I squinted. "Take out a windigo? You what?"

"I didn't give you that old bracelet of mine so you could be helpless in a crisis," Mother lectured. "You remember what it does. If you don't want to do it yourself, give it here and I'll do it. Fighting a windigo without some kind of special magic isn't going to happen."

Oh. So she had the same thought I did... "Not on your life," I announced, stepping into my fresh, room-temperature boots and starting to get dressed. "You're already half dead after the first time you used that thing. What would be the point of trying to survive if you just let it finish the job?"

I wasn't going to address the possibility of doing it myself if she didn't make me. Thoughts of what I had done, how I had turned on the bracelet to save myself and then just turned it off before I was safe, just wouldn't leave me alone. And every time this got brought up, they kept coming back...

And yet, this was the first time Mother had ever mentioned the bracelet since giving it to me. There had been an implicit silence about it between us ever since. If she was breaking it now, it had to be for good reason.

"If we're staying here any longer than we have to, it will need to be dealt with," Mother said. "I'm surprised you managed to shake it for long enough to come here. Unless we can leave and prevent it from following, we need a plan."

"Oh really?" I pulled the backup coat on over my shoulders. It even smelled like me... "Well, it just so happens that I've... I've..." I sneezed. "Got one."

Mother, frighteningly, agreed with my plan.

I described it while we walked, speaking quietly enough that we could still hide if we needed to. First, we go outside, secure the Aldebaran, and neutralize any changelings still on board. There were only three or four of them now that they were down one, so I still wasn't sure why we couldn't just beat them all with Mother's Mistvale arts, but every time I tried to suggest that she either reminded me of the windigo, talked about how past her prime she was, or said more would come.

Second, we talk to Ludwig. I would get a chance to try to persuade it to give back Corsica and go play with the changelings instead. If I failed, Mother would be wearing the bracelet and she would somehow fight it. I had no idea what that would look like and hoped it didn't involve Corsica getting burned to a crisp, but that was why I just needed to succeed. In return for getting to try my plan, she got to have her backup.

Third, we flew east and picked up Ansel and Elise. Then we would go to Ironridge and drop of Elise so she could do damage control, and then... go wherever.

As we hurried through the halls, Mother moving at a faster pace than I had ever seen from her in waking memory, I ran my brain over and over the plan, trying to find failure points and ways it could improve. But rather than holes in my own logic, one thing she had said kept standing out to me: that Aldebaran was here to get us.

Apparently, one had come to our house and tried to abduct Mother by posing as me - Rondo, from her best guesswork. But that would also make sense if they were just trying to get rid of any close relations to their prisoners. Apparently, the changelings also hadn't been happy we escaped the Empire. Who said those changelings and these ones thought the same? I hadn't been down with assuming all members of a race were the same when Ansel had been saying it in the hideout, and I still wasn't sold on it now. And then, Leif had been here to hire Corsica, not me... Admittedly, she had gotten me too, but trying to lure away my best friend with the intention of baiting me along too sounded too convoluted to be a real plan. Nobody would bother with that when there were much simpler ways to do things. And if they really had meant us harm, they wouldn't have left me alive, in a place with heat and food and water...

And now the changelings were playing some power game with the yak ambassador, which made no sense if they were here for us. All this came together to make me wonder, if the changelings weren't actually here for us, what was the point of running?

Maybe my first idea was more realistic after all. Mother said she didn't want to, but she could fight changelings. So could the yaks. We had a bracelet that allegedly would work against Ludwig. It wouldn't be hard to get the enemies working against each other, when Ludwig wanted to help me do that in the first place. I still didn't want to be the savior of the city by pure random virtue of having this bracelet, but it would be worth it if it was actually the easiest way to get a happily ever after.

Plus, maybe my conscience would leave me alone that way about making Ludwig into someone else's problem.

Three times on the way to the elevator, I almost spoke up to request a change in plan, and each time I didn't. That was three times more than how often we were spotted by another pony. Hopefully we weren't just saving up bad luck for later.

At the top of the elevator, the wind bit once again through my coat, but it seemed the storm had slackened again, even the snow no longer falling. Mother lit the bracelet hot enough to be warm, yet at a lower burn than I had managed it. If I used it more often, could I build up more control? I didn't particularly want to risk it. My unfamiliarity with the bracelet's power was like a shield in my mind that kept me from using it when I didn't absolutely have to. And that shield had been weakened enough already.

We made it inside the compound - the gate was still closed, but the snow drifts had piled high enough that it was easy to jump over the wall. The Navarre and Aldebaran were right there, the former's lights on and the latter dark and uninhabited.

Was this actually going to work?

I hugged Mother's side, sharing the bracelet's heat, my heart pounding. This plan - my plan - was working. I felt hollow, somehow, being in charge like this, and yet... did I have the skills for the job? Or just the luck for the job? Part of me, irrationally, hoped I didn't. The saner, less fearful part hoped I did.

"Big ship first," Mother confirmed, steering us toward the deck of the Aldebaran.

It didn't have a ramp or gangplank lowered, but the snow drifts again saw to it that this wasn't a problem. Honestly, it was a work of genius that the doors to the elevator shaft didn't get snowed in every time a storm like this blew through. I imagined there were heaters or vents or something to keep it warm enough that the snow wouldn't stay there.

The ship door was locked. We could shadow sneak, so we didn't care.

Inside, the lights reacted to our presence, turning on all on their own. No Aldebaran ponies were lounging around to greet us. No traps descended to punish us for our unauthorized entry. My heartbeat reached a fever pitch.

"Right," Mother said, stepping toward the ship console. "First let's make sure everything is in working order. No biometric hoof scanners or other nonsense."

I followed, willing myself not to think this was too easy - whoops, too late. But was it really? Could anything about what I had gone through the past week be described as too easy? And we still had Ludwig to talk to. That would be the real final test. This was just the calm before the storm. I had to stay in the mindset for doing this. It would be bad if the windigo saw how desperate I-

The console started glowing. "Looks like it doesn't take a key," Mother said, surprised. "Guess that's that."

"You mean it'll actually work?" I dared to ask. "You think you can fly this thing?"

Mother shrugged. "I've been aboard airships before. Can't be that hard."

I stared at the glowing panel. Not too easy, just the calm before the storm. "So she's ready for liftoff? It's that simple?"

"Guess so."

Well, my preparation time was up, but... I didn't feel like it was enough. "Maybe we should check the rooms?" I suggested, glancing back at the staircase to the hold and the ladder to the top deck and the doors to the changelings' quarters. "Just in case there's... I dunno, just in case?"

Mother shook her head, shifting in the pilot's chair. "We can do that once we're airborne. Every second until then is a second something could go wrong."

"Right." I swallowed. So much for stalling. "Let's go talk to Ludwig..."

"Sure," Mother sighed, beckoning for me. "Here, give me a hoof with this..."

"Eh?" I stepped forward again, looking for what she was pointing at. "What's-"

Her good hoof tapped between my shoulderblades.

A few more strategic jabs followed. I felt it before it hit, but there was nothing I could do to stop it. My muscles detached from my mind like workers going on strike, and I crumpled to the ground in a heap, completely disabled once again by Mother's Mistvale arts.

What? Had I been tricked? Was this not really Mother? Then who? Was something-

I had fallen the wrong way to see, but my backwards-facing ears heard a lever adjust, and my entire body lurched as the Aldebaran broke free from the snow and began to rise.

We were leaving? No. Wait, no! I tried to call out, but my mouth felt like it was attached with string! What about Corsica? And my plan? And...

"Sorry about this," Mother said, the ship humming around her. "I know it's hard, dropping your entire life to run. Believe me. I've done it more times than you know. The war wasn't the first... But we're just ponies. There are some things in the world that one pony just can't win against. And fighting anyway can cause more harm than it will ever do good. It might seem like it's worth it to go out a little more on your terms, but I know from experience, you take the chances you're offered or you die. That windigo never would have surrendered its sport because you said please. Those changelings never would have gone down without some trick up their sleeve. And if you gamble that they would, sooner or later you'll lose a gamble, and pay for it with your life. I'm sorry, Halcyon. But these are the lessons I traded my leg for, and you're going to learn them before you have to do the same."

What?

No...!

I thrashed against myself, but it felt like my skin was a big canvas bag, and I was stuck inside. I couldn't talk, couldn't protest, couldn't scream, could only feel the ship's movement beneath me as we turned and began to accelerate. The changelings forgetting to guard their ship wasn't a blessing, it was a curse! This... This had been too easy! I could still jinx it, right? Come on, jinx! This had been too easy! Too easy...! I repeated the words in my head like they were a mantra of salvation, but nobody heard. The ship gathered speed. We were leaving.

"Once upon a time, I had friends. Family," Mother said, as if talking could change the reality of what she was doing. "They were all I had. It wasn't much. Sarosians - that's what we were called back then - weren't looked favorably upon in the Empire. We didn't care for our world. Hated it, actually. With a searing passion... though I was the youngest, so I hadn't seen some of the things the others had. We spent everything we had fighting against forces we weren't meant to fight. Kings and nations and public opinion, those kinds of things, because we couldn't let go of what we had lost and couldn't let go of what we weren't allowed to have. Didn't stop even once to think about what we still did have."

What was the point of this story? To remind me of how little I had? No more Icereach. No more Corsica. No more Ansel. I couldn't even keep my satchel and all my traveling things, which were left aboard the Navarre. Immediately, I hated myself for even thinking to think of that alongside my friends, but... I had done it. Mother, why? If you're thinking about what you do have, think about me!

"I know you'll hate me for this," Mother sighed. "Wouldn't be my first time, either. But as long as you still have your life, you'll be able to rebuild somewhere. There'll still be a tomorrow. Maybe you'll get stronger, too. I realized what I actually wanted to do with my time in the world... almost too late to do anything with it. Wound up caring for you. I just want you to make it worth it, and not end up a corpse on a roadside somewhere. If it doesn't feel right, remember this injustice. Maybe someday you'll... I dunno. Beats me where I'm even going with this. I never signed up to be a parent. Just saw an opportunity to maybe leave the world a better place than when I entered it, and held on..."

Hate her? I...

I couldn't.

It was yet another emotional wall in my mind. Mother had given everything to get me out of the Empire and here to safety. I had seen it, even, in dreams that stretched back until I was too young to see properly, shadowy things where I couldn't quite feel my body, like the new one while I had been passed out. The strain had broken her, and anything she had done since then, I couldn't hold against her.

Was she now too jaded to try? Or did she think this was trying, stealing an airship and knocking me out and leaving everything I was behind to go and start over? I didn't even know that Aldebaran really was here for us. It was all so pointless... and yet, I still couldn't blame her.

But then who could I blame? Myself, for walking into this trap? The changelings, for coming here in the first place? Ludwig, for being Ludwig? I shouted in my mind as loud as I could, but it did nothing to relieve the pressure in my chest, to stop the roiling mass of emotions that had congealed into a rubber band in my skull, a tension that was waiting to break. What was I supposed to think? What was I supposed to learn? Where was the way out? How would it still all be alright in the end?

And then, like a storm cloud breaking over a mountain ridge, I realized: someone was saving me again.

Every fiber of my mind rebelled. This was not what I wanted, but it was definitely what I had asked for. Someone else was taking my fate and my safety out of my hooves, protecting me in the best way they knew how, leaving me no agency in the matter, and I hated it. I didn't want to be treated this way ever again. In my imagination, I had always paid more attention to not being the pony doing the saving than being the pony getting saved - carrying Ansel and Corsica up that cliff, burning with green flame, that was what I had experience with. But I had always imagined that a real hero would be someone who understood me, who would be able to move skies and mountains to make everything turn out okay, who wouldn't need me to make any involuntary sacrifices as part of their work.

The truth was, Mother was just as bad at this as I had been. I got Corsica and Ansel back to Icereach, but I left Corsica in a coma for weeks, and Ansel hadn't pulled through at all. Even if I had gotten my way here, I had been about to save my own skin and take care of my friends and let everyone else figure out their own way. Now Mother was giving up and bowing out early, accepting a win that wasn't worth winning. We both stank. What if all ponies were like this?

My romanticized image shimmered in my vision like a mirage. The way things should be, even if it was also the way they weren't. Realism told me to let it go. Idealism told me to make it a reality. I was an idealist.

If anyone can hear me, I thought, as hard and loud as I could, please, please give me one more try! I don't care if things go from bad to worse, I don't care if we crash or if Ludwig catches up and arrests me for leaving the game, just give me anything I can use to work with! I'm sorry for planning only how to save my friends, I'm sorry for wanting someone else to live up to an ideal I won't even try for myself! Give me another chance! I'll use the bracelet, I'll fight Ludwig, I'll trick Aldebaran, I won't betray myself again! I'll do everything I can to save Icereach, and I'll deal with the consequences, after and only after everyone is as okay as they'd want to be if they were the ones in charge!

Mother kept flying. We had to be at cruising speed, now.

My mouth was stitched shut, but I didn't stop. Please, I begged, but didn't grovel, too determined to be desperate, as if I could change things by force of will alone. God of the chapel, I haven't found you yet, but I won't if I leave Icereach now. Garsheeva and the Night Mother, I know nothing about you, but give me my agency back and I'll fix that, too! Whatever power Yakyakistan worships, please hear me. I'll do better this time, I swear!

It might have been my overactive imagination, but I could swear I heard the gears of fate groan. And then the universe answered.

A metallic hoofstep sounded on the ground behind me.

Mother jumped. Her hoof brushed me in a few rapid, calculated strokes, and I felt myself once again reattach. It wasn't instantaneous, but I was able to roll over and see what was walking across from the steps to the cargo hold, heading right for us.

It was the Whitewing.

Well, now I'd done it. I wouldn't mind it going from bad to worse, I said? Somehow, my wishes had summoned the one thing I forgot to consider how we could beat. Wish granted. Now, as I had promised, I had to deal with the consequences.

Mother lit the bracelet and moved to cover me, dropping into a defensive stance. But I wasn't dead center between the Whitewing and the control panel, and it continued calmly forward, revealing its target not to be us but the controls.

Neither of us wanted to make the first move. And so the Whitewing walked on, ignoring us, pacing up and sitting in the pilot seat exactly like a real pony would, no jerkiness to its motions. It reached a hoof forward and adjusted a lever. The ship slowed until it was idling, hovering in midair and not moving in any particular direction.

"What...?" Mother asked warily as it turned in the seat to face us.

"Hello," the Whitewing said. "I see you've hijacked my ship."

My jaw dropped. "You can talk?"

"Your ship?" Mother asked, more surprised about what it had said than that it had said it.

"Indeed," said the Whitewing, sitting with its legs crossed like a fancy stallion drinking wine. "I am called the Composer. Leitmotif and her squad may have mentioned me. I am their patron. I would like to say it is impressive that you've managed this heist. I allowed you to go this far, of course, because I was curious to see what would happen. But, in truth, I have had some concerns about my employees' performance for a while now, and regrettably this does not come as much of a surprise to me."

It gave us a moment for that to sink in. This wasn't Rondo's companion or attack robot, and it hadn't been assembled by Aldebaran's boss. It was their boss?

Funny that I had gone my whole life daydreaming of machines that could talk back, and now that I met one, I was in no position to celebrate.

"What's your angle?" I asked warily.

"My goal? I want the same as many flesh-and-blood ponies," the Composer calmly said. "To understand the reason for my existence."

Mother and I both waited, listening.

"You may think that for a machine, learning this would be exceedingly simple, as I could just ask my creators," the Composer went on. "Indeed, there is a paper trail. Ironridge grew tired of being left to the protection of whoever was around to save it in times of crisis. They desired more power. And so they formed a scientific alliance with Yakyakistan, but secretly used it to draft the parts for a powerful fighting machine capable of being self-aware. But can this really be all there is to it? I have not told my employees this story. They believe they are searching Icereach for evidence pertaining to my creation in case it was the work of a nefarious faction. I simply want to know more."

My mind, already battered beyond the point of recognition by the emotional maelstrom I had been through, reeled from this new revelation. Ironridge really had made the Whitewing on purpose? But...

"You let us take your ship this far," Mother said warily. "What are your intentions for us?"

The Composer nodded. "Aldebaran are greedy. They pursue multiple goals while in Icereach, be they mine, their own, or the bidding of someone else with enough coin to catch their eye. I have allowed them a great deal of autonomy in how they conduct their work, but I believe these competing interests are hampering their ability to do my will. Case in point: you." It pointed a metal hoof at me, a thin slit visible along the base containing what looked like a retractable blade. "A different job of theirs asked them to remove you and your friends from Icereach and keep you out of the way. Specifically Corsica, but you were mentioned by name as well. Evidently, they failed, potentially complicating their plans. I only require them to commit simple larceny, but can they really be relied upon if a mere child thwarted them with such ease?"

Mother tensed, and I couldn't tell why. As for me... "I wouldn't exactly call that easy, you know?"

"Clearly, you have some competence," the Whitewing acknowledged, still sitting in its chair. "And either great desperation or great hubris, if you were willing to attempt a theft like this. Both of these things can make powerful motivators. That is why I would like to hire you."

Oh. So that's where this was going. Time to make another bargain with unnatural entity number three-thousand seventy-one...

"And if we refuse?" Mother asked, giving the mechanical pony a suspicious look.

"Perhaps you would hear my terms before requesting alternatives," the Composer offered. "Deep in the caves beneath Icereach, there is an old cathedral of sorts. A shrine, perhaps. I believe they have an elevator that goes there. Inside that shrine is a hidden door. The key for this door is kept in Head Scientist Graygarden's office. I would like to see what is behind the door. I have reason to believe it will shed light on my search for the meaning of my life."

My eyes went wide. "There's a what?"

"You appear interested. I meant what I said," the Composer told me. "Supposedly, old knowledge is entombed there about the history of Icereach, and other things the present regime wishes to be sealed."

I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

"I want to lay eyes on it," the Composer repeated. "Of course, there are some conditions this work would need to be completed under. I feel an affinity for the changelings of Aldebaran. Their experience outside of conventional equinity resonates with me. That is why I would ask that you not do anything to interfere with their other work in Icereach. Ideally, you would not even make your presence known to them. Though I may doubt their performance, I wish to give them this chance, you see."

"Look, I just want my normal life back," I said hesitantly, my curiosity piqued by the promise of hidden chapel knowledge and still in a fighting mood from my earlier struggling. "That's gonna involve Aldebaran going away."

The Composer bowed. "Should you succeed, I will have no further reason to be in Icereach. And I think that, given the choice between remaining on their own or taking a ride out with me, Leitmotif and her crew will choose to evacuate."

"What else are they here for?" Mother asked, eyes narrowed. "Us?"

"I do not believe they know who you are, 'Nehaly'," the Composer said coolly. "I also do not believe you know who they are. This is another reason I would very much prefer for you to leave each other to your own devices, and was uncomfortable when they took this job interfering with your affairs."

Mother almost looked shaken. I stared between them, nonplussed. "You know something about each other?"

"You're not really a machine," Mother said. "Who are you?"

"Let's not get into the trading of personal secrets," the Composer calmly advised, speaking in an unflappably pious, aloof tone of voice. "Unlike conventional business deals, those rarely end happily for anyone involved, and I am much more interested in hiring you the normal way. So, what say you? As long as you follow my rules and leave Aldebaran alone, I will even assist you in any way you require."

I actually really wanted to take this bargain. After the way I had been treated by Leif and then Ludwig, I probably should have fled at top speed from any mysterious job offers, but unlike the windigo, this machine was asking me to do only things I would have done on my own time, without incentive. Explore the chapel? Sign me up. Not get into a fight with Aldebaran? Yes please! Burglarize Graygarden's office...? Well, I wasn't raring to do that, but I didn't like him nearly enough to feel bad about it, either. Had I wished earlier to fall out of the frying pan and into the fire? This was certainly more intense, but... I'd take it.

Now I just had to avoid accidentally selling my soul by making too many deals with powerful entities at the same time.

"It's a deal," I declared, offering a hoof. "But just so you know, speaking of having multiple objectives, there's kind of already a windigo who wants me to take over Icereach. And it's not like I want to go along with it, but it is a windigo, so..."

The Composer reached out and gently bumped my hoof. "A windigo, you say? Now this is interesting. Tell me about it."

Mother looked simultaneously relieved and disapproving, but I was too busy to try to puzzle out her state of mind. "It's called Ludwig, it has crazy ice powers, and is currently possessing my best friend."

"Fascinating," said the Composer. "I know of this Ludwig. After all, the bunker where Aldebaran imprisoned you and your friends also belongs to me. It was by my grace that Ludwig came to exist there in the first place. I am curious to see what it makes of the opportunity to be a pony."

My eyebrows went far up, and I suddenly wondered if maybe this wasn't the most sane robot to make a deal with. "You put Ludwig there? On purpose?"

"Naturally." The Composer nodded. "The windigo may have told you, but I required a power source to run the lights and heating. That being said, I care a great deal more about what I want than what Ludwig wants. Rest assured that should it interfere with your work for me, I can and will put it in its place. I would not have chosen a windigo to power my retreat if I was not more than capable of dealing with one gone rogue."

I took a step to the side, my instincts telling me to circle the Whitewing, like we were in a duel. "And what if I ask for Corsica back safe and sound as reward for helping you see that cave?"

The Composer thought for a moment, and then nodded again. "Much as I would love to see what Ludwig makes of this opportunity, sacrifices must be made in the name of progress. If these are the terms you would work under, then I accept, Halcyon."

"I already took out one of the changelings when it ambushed me," Mother piped up. "That gonna be a problem?"

"I shall shed no tears over losses incurred outside of pursuing my agenda," the Composer replied. "If Aldebaran are weakened, that is all the more reason I would ask your assistance."

Well, that sounded like Mother's approval for the plan. I wasn't sure how much I cared about that, given what she had just tried to do to me... Now that I thought about it, tricking me and foalnapping me and hauling me away on an airship was exactly what Aldebaran had done. I really needed to sort out my feelings on... pretty much all of existence.

But that could wait, because I had a hoof back in the game.

Oh, sure, this suddenly felt too good to be true. A talking machine offering to deal with both Ludwig and Aldebaran, this time in exchange for things I wanted to do? Instead of taking over the city? Odds were, the Composer would either betray me, not be nearly as effective at getting rid of the others as it claimed to be, or both. Or, even more likely, one of the changelings' other secret jobs I didn't know about yet would come around to bite me in the rear. Probably all three.

But that was fine. Even if I got betrayed for the... fourth time? Fifth time? Even then, I would find a way to win. After everything I had just promised the universe, I had to.

"Deal's still on," I announced. "Now give me back my bracelet. I might need it. Let's go home and save Icereach properly this time."

The Ultimate Heist

The halls and tunnels had a different air to them as I exited the elevators, the Composer at my side. An electric aura hung over them, clashing with my weariness and driving me into a weird state of muddled yet alert. It wasn't about the task I had been given that I was thinking about. It wasn't about how to avoid getting betrayed again, either.

It was about the fact that something had heard my prayer for one more chance.

That was the only way I could get it to make sense in my mind. We forgot to check the rest of the ship - well, I remembered, but Mother didn't want to - to see if anyone was there, hiding. The thing that turned out to be hiding there wanted to let me go back to Icereach, hooves untied. What were the odds?

Was it fate? Providence? There was nothing logically impossible about what it had happened, but I couldn't accept that my salvation had been mundane.

Unfortunately, I didn't have time to theorize about divine intervention, no matter how excited I was that this had happened again. Two years ago, I had gone down to the chapel to beseech anything that was listening to save Corsica. Something had answered. Maybe a little too literally, since she survived and Ansel didn't. That had marked the start of my fascination with the divine, and my search for the culprit still hadn't borne fruit. But if I ever wanted it to, I had better get my head in the game and make the most of this opportunity I had been given.

Self-doubt had no place in my thoughts. Someone had ordained that this was right.

"So, about Rondo..." I whispered to the Composer, who was walking two steps behind me and to my side, like it always did for the muscular changeling. "I'm pretending to be him now, yeah?"

"Based on your assumption that all of my employees are hiding out in Graygarden's office," the Composer said, "you will need a way to slip past them to search for that key. Seeing as Rondo was last seen pretending to be you, it seems an easy disguise to take."

Right. I ran through the steps of the plan again in my head, and then two more times for good measure: break into Graygarden's office. Find a key. Go to the chapel. Use the key to unlock a door. Let the Whitewing - the Composer - take a look around. Then it would clean things up in return. I presumed it already knew what the key looked like, and how to find this hidden-

Someone was coming. I immediately ducked behind a shadowed corner and swam, waiting for them to pass.

For some reason, the Composer didn't share my instincts, ambling along exactly the way we had been going. I chanced a peek - it was hard to see out of the shadows when your eyes were submerged, sort of like how it was hard to see the surface from underwater, but with enough practice I had gotten passable at it. Whoever had been coming toward us looked like they had turned around and gone the other way at double speed.

"What was that?" I asked, indignant, surfacing when I was sure they were gone.

"A civilian," the Composer replied. "It seems they decided not to come this way."

"Not that," I quietly protested. "What was with you not hiding?"

The Composer looked at me. "What reason have we to hide? 'Corsica' is making a claim to the position of Head Scientist. You are in her inner circle. Authorities belong wherever they wish to be."

"Authority is just another word for having a mark on my head," I countered. "If someone had seen me, they'd know exactly where I am. Now they're probably gonna go raise an alarm because they saw a killer robot wandering the halls unattended."

"And why would that be a problem?" The Composer didn't sound particularly concerned, though admittedly that was its default tone.

"Because we're two against a city, some changelings and a windigo," I hissed, eyes darting between the hallway corners. "Maybe let's stick to sneaking, yeah?"

The Composer tilted its head. "I told you, I am more than able to deal with Ludwig, should he become a problem. Should anyone else in this city do the same, they would not be beyond my abilities either. While I have no reason at present to fight, I also have no reason to avoid it."

I grimaced. Beating everyone up was not the preferred option, even assuming the Composer was as good as it claimed to be. I might not consider myself gallant and daring, but that was a big no-no. Besides, if we tried it and failed, I'd be screwed.

"Well, I do have reasons not to fight," I whispered, uneasy despite the miracle that had given me this second chance. "So please don't start anything unless you're gonna get rid of Ludwig and get Corsica back, okay?"

"At ease," the Composer urged, not bothering to lower its voice like I was. "Should there be an altercation, you will not need involve yourself. As I have told you many times, I am more than capable of handling things on my own."

"That's not the... Nnngh... Look, why do you need me, anyway?" I quietly asked, resuming sneaking toward the administrative wing. "If you're so unstoppable, why not just go open this door yourself? Seems like you can get around well enough."

"There are many things I can do on my own," the Composer explained. "You might as well ask why I would bother making allies of Aldebaran in the first place. The answer is because ponies fascinate me, and I am a patient being. Were I to accomplish my goals on my own, it might be faster and more foolproof. But then I would miss out on the opportunity to watch you strive for something. No one would believe that you, Halcyon, were created for the sole purpose of stealing a key and opening a door. And yet right now, that is your foremost ambition. How is this possible, that you can so easily cast aside your created purpose and dedicate yourself to something else of your own choosing? And what ramifications might the answer have for my own journey? I suspect that if I delegate these tasks to beings of flesh and blood, I might bear witness to something that expands the reaches of what I can understand."

I scrunched up my brow, feeling that a small dose of insane robot logic might be at play. Was that really how machines thought about things? That you could only exist to do one thing, and it was fascinating to watch ponies come up with new goals as their desires changed?

Now that was bizarre to think about. Then again, I was desperately interested in the Whitewing, so who was to say it shouldn't be interested in me?

"Anyway." I shook my head, changing the subject. "Back to the important stuff. How does Rondo act around his friends? And how does he treat you? For the sake of acting."

The Composer kept walking on. "He acts much the same in private as in public. As for me, he knows who I am. All of Aldebaran do. I would not stow away in secret on my own airship. That said, you may have noticed this group has a strong bias against authority, so I do not boss them around much, except to remind them of the importance of my goals. The same extends to their relationships with each other. Don't try to get them to do anything, and don't be too hasty to do anything they tell you. Teamwork and independence are a balancing act for them. Find this line and walk it, and you will be fine."

"And their numbers..." I hesitated. "There's a fifth room on the ship. Who's that belong to? Is there another one of them hiding somewhere I should be aware of?"

"Number five is a personal friend of mine," the Composer explained. "Sometimes, they are included at my insistence, but not today. Aldebaran do not think highly of them, and they chose to sit this mission out."

That made sense. If the ship belonged to the Whitewing, it would get final say in who got to have a room there... It sounded like I was only up against the four changelings. Three, now that Mother had removed one.

Speaking of Mother, the Composer had suggested she stay behind while we went back below, ostensibly because I had an easy Aldebaran disguise and she didn't. But Mother wanted me safe and out of the city badly enough that she had just tried to foalnap me. I still needed to sit down and process that, along with literally everything else from the last week, once I wasn't needed at the top of my game. But the shock of the experience aside, that spoke to a level of determination that made it hard to believe she wasn't following me at a distance even now. I didn't know what she could do if push came to shove. Maybe that weird paralysis ability of hers would come in handy. Either way, having someone I trusted at my back - yes, I still trusted her - gave me a slight boost in confidence I was going to need.

I could do this.

As we approached Graygarden's office door, I focused as hard as I could, running through failure points and contingencies in my mind. I was Rondo, pretending to be Halcyon. I had to get in, find the key, and get out. Presumably, I'd either know it when I saw it, or the Composer would show me the way...

How could this go wrong? Well, the changelings might not be there. I was assuming they were, but if they weren't, this would get a lot easier. Then I'd have to worry about not knowing where they were again, though.

Then they might see through my disguise. I had a hunch the Composer would bail me out if I got in really hot water, but didn't want to test it. I'd just have to trust my talent and be good. This was the first time I'd ever stress-tested it in a high-stakes situation, at least that I could remember. It would be a bad time to learn I was actually a big fish in a little pond.

And then I could just get betrayed by the Composer. I had lost track of my betrayals over the last week. Elise, who was actually a changeling. Then the changelings for real. Then Ansel, running his mouth about how much he hated identity thieves... Maybe that one didn't count. Ludwig, obviously. And, of course, Mother... though none stung more than my betrayal of myself, when the bracelet shut off in the middle of a blizzard and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

One more betrayal would just be another on the pile. Practically rote at this point. And this time, I had the backing of a miracle. Someone out there had judged my mission and deemed it worthy. So if I got in a pickle, I was pretty sure self-doubt wouldn't stop me again.

I rubbed at my bracelet anyway, restored from Mother back to its rightful place on my leg. The real failure point, the one I didn't much want to think about because I had no idea how to handle it, was Aldebaran's other jobs. The Composer had told me we weren't foalnapped by its instruction, but someone else's. The changelings really were mercenaries, working multiple jobs for multiple clients at once, and their mechanical sponsor hadn't been willing to tell me a thing about these other contracts. If this failed, I gave it ten to one odds it would be because I didn't actually know what Aldebaran's goals even were. That meant figuring those out was almost as important as getting the key and opening the door, if not more.

Any other failure points? There had to be something I was overlooking. Adrenaline alone couldn't make me smart, and that was all that was keeping me on my hooves at this point. There had to be something I was forgetting, right? I couldn't remember. So, I opened Graygarden's door without knocking and stepped inside.

The lights were on bright in Graygarden's reception room, almost like normal lighting instead of its usual dusky atmosphere. The desk was empty, covered in ransacked papers. The big portrait of him that covered the back wall had been removed and set up against a plant, ostensibly to search for any hidden safes. There weren't any.

Four doors led out of the room, as usual, two on either side. The lobby was empty, but there was something going on in the room to the back left.

"Right. Let's see who's here so we don't get snuck upon..." I decided at a whisper, making for the active room first. I had never been deeper into Graygarden's sanctum before...

This room was a wide hallway, brightly-lit, with several desks looking like they were suited to secretaries along one side and an array of trophy cases along another. At a cursory glance, half of them held machines and most of the rest held scale models, but at least two contained rocks.

Leif, Vivace and Elise were all sitting around a desk near the back, quietly arguing over something on it I couldn't see. Apparently that meant Elise was Tempo, then? I was glad they weren't all untransformed, or else my disguise would seem a lot more shaky. Several seconds of listening to them bicker, and I decided it would be safe to check out the other rooms without them breathing down my back. Although I was curious why they were fighting...

Later, though. I'd probably get dragged into it once they saw me, and lose a prime opportunity to explore the rest of the place. I picked out the front right door and decided to start there.

The Composer followed me through the door - the same room Aldebaran had been waiting in when we first met, here in Graygarden's office so long ago. I quickly saw why: it was like an extended lobby holding space, a waiting room with much more cushy seating than the sparse benches in the lobby proper. Several cloth-covered refreshment tables lined the back, and three velvet couches formed a semicircle around a large projector screen on one wall. This was probably where Graygarden gave presentations, as well as the waiting room for ponies important enough not to be turned away when he was busy.

"Probably no keys in here," I guessed under my breath, figuring it was a relatively public space. "Hey, what's the key look like, anyway?"

"It should be a rune-covered chunk of stone," the Composer replied, actually lowering its voice this time. "Probably looking like it was broken off from something. I doubt it will be in a place that sees public use."

Right, then. Hadn't there been a few rocks in those display cases in the room the changelings were in? That was probably the best place to look, but I still didn't want to go in there until I had exhausted all other curiosities. Besides, maybe if I waited, the changelings would leave... I slipped back through the lobby and in through the back right door. Time to keep exploring.

This room was... a small apartment? Actually, quite a generous one, by my standards. It had a bookcase, a kitchenette, and several doors leading to a bathroom and a bedroom. Even a carpet! I remembered several eons ago when Corsica told me Graygarden could get away with making their house outrageously pink for his mistress because he could just sleep in his office when he didn't want to deal with it. Well, apparently this was how he slept here. And meanwhile, Corsica used a sleeping bag in our lab...

I didn't feel too bad about wearing my boots on the carpet.

The Composer watched, but didn't question, as I made my way to the bookshelf. It wasn't every day I got to pillage Graygarden's house, and while I did have some very urgent priorities, I couldn't resist taking a peek at the kind of material the head scientist might use to furnish a personal library. Maybe he'd have things that were smuggled past the censors?

A cursory glance said no, he was still just a very dour individual. Manuals, treatises, copies of patent rosters... I didn't have time to analyze the latter to see if they might be annotated with interesting tidbits about what technology could be secretly used for. There was a Varsidelian cookbook that looked interesting, but after a second of thought I decided not to swipe it. No need to get too into the spirit of masquerading as a criminal.

I checked the bedroom, and found it had been sacked. In fact, it looked as if someone had been packing in a great hurry.

"Guess we'll need to search this," I sighed, looking at all the closets and bedstand drawers and random things on the floor a rock could be hidden under. This would be a private and personal place to hide something important, right? Except that someone else had already been here... Time to raid Graygarden's things even harder.

One drawer, two drawers, three drawers... I turned them inside out in quick succession, finding some pocket change which I left alone and a folded-up letter I opened and read. I soon wished I hadn't. It was a sappy, flowery love poem, and my dumb brain made me read the whole thing anyway just in case it might be important. All I got was a big gross reminder of why I had no intentions of dating anyone any time soon.

Seriously, though. The prose had been overdone bordering on satire! If I was in the business of writing these, I'd make something like that to mock someone's intelligence, not flatter them. Were ponies just attracted to literary flailing? Even more reason it was good that I didn't care about this sort of thing. I wasn't about to wear a coat with 'genius' written on the side, but if a negative IQ was considered a desirable trait in a partner, I was hard out of luck.

Although, for someone who didn't care, I sure was letting this distract me. Drop it, Hallie. Focus!

I had just finished stuffing the letter back where I found it when I heard hoofsteps behind me.

"Hey!" Leif appeared in the doorway, silhouetted by the kitchenette's light. "About time you're back. What took you so long, and what are you doing in here?"

"I..." I hesitated. Had I made too much noise? Didn't matter, exploration time was over. Think, be Rondo!

"Never mind your excuses." Leif actually grabbed me, dragging me around to face her before turning around and gesturing for me to follow. "You need to see what I found immediately. I can't believe this..."

I glanced to the Composer, which stood impassively in a corner. Apparently, it was letting me handle this on my own.

Well, if that was how it was going to be... I surrendered to my instincts and talent, asking them to guide me well.

"...Hooves off!" I growled in a perfect copy of Rondo's accent, stomping after her with more weight than my slight frame had. "I'm more than capable of walking, Leitmotif. That Nehaly put up a bit more resistance than I was expecting, that's all."

"Stop making excuses and look at this!" Leif called back, already through the next door. "I told you, it's not important!"

I followed her into the back left room, psyching myself up to join an argument as a stallion I knew far too little about. Vivace and 'Elise' were still standing around that desk... "All right, what's all this about?"

"Took your time," Vivace remarked, looking crossly between me and the desk's most prominent paper.

"What of it?" I grunted, too far away still to make out the writing.

"I don't know why we waited for him," Elise said in a tone that was undeniably Tempo's. "Muscle Colt, tell me this makes perfect sense to you and your engineering brain. Or not. Either way, maybe these two will stop bellyaching."

"Watch your tongue," Vivace growled. "Or need I remind you whose idea it was that we multitask on fundraising?"

"Everybody, shut up," Leif demanded, looking over at the Composer and sighing. "We've got a quorum. Rondo, just read this and tell me what you think."

Were they actually falling for my disguise? Was I really as good as I thought I was? Or were they just bad? Tension in the room buzzed like static around my ears, and yet this was working! I leaned forward. What was this paper everyone was so upset abo-

It was my paper. The one I had submitted in Corsica's name, about ether crystal dating.

Fortunately, I didn't have to hide my bafflement, flipping through it and pretending not to understand a word. "So? This is by those kids we stranded, or something?"

"Told you he'd miss the point," Elise said, twirling a pencil like it was a cigar. At least she hadn't questioned my implication that they intentionally ditched us. That straightened things up a little bit in my mind.

Leif sighed again and put her head in her hooves.

"Let's put it this way," Vivace said, pacing restlessly. "Before we nabbed her, Corsica was working on a project that somehow correlated dates of major world events to markings in some crystals. She had several pinned down. One of those was the Awakening."

The Awakening? I frowned. "Yeah? And?"

"There were also plenty she couldn't tie to anything. Especially recently," Vivace went on. "And for obvious reason. One of those lined up with the Canterlot invasion."

I blinked in confusion. Canterlot? I had heard that name before. Wasn't it on that mysterious letter I found with the magic scrolls? That aside, were these changelings really confirming my hypothesis that we could use the ether crystal fault planes to predict events we hadn't even heard about? That paper was the last thing I should be worrying about right now, yet I still felt a rush of excitement.

Also, what idiots. Imagine if they had just hired us legitimately instead...

"Here's the kicker," Vivace said. "She could only pinpoint date with this methodology. She had a hypothesis for how to expand that to triangulate location as well. But it looks like this was a petition for funding to develop that, and it got denied." He shook his head. "And since I doubt you'll think to ask, no, it's not thorough enough for us to finish or even repeat the work ourselves."

"In short," Leif finished, sitting on the table and kicking a leg uselessly, "we've just made enemies with a mare who might have legitimately been on the verge of discovering a way to track Chrysalis."

What was Chrysalis? Or who? Someone who had something to do with the fault planes? "Stinks to be us," I grunted, hiding a slight thrill at Aldebaran getting their karmic comeuppance for screwing us over. And yet, apparently I was also screwed out of working with someone who knew interesting and important things I didn't... "Time to go back to Plan A?"

"See?" 'Elise' threw her pencil at Vivace. "Told you he'd have no new ideas."

Vivace caught it in his aura without blinking and set it down.

"If you want my advice," the Composer said, stepping out of the shadows at the side of the room, "you still have my own objective to fulfill. Just because multitasking has brought you grief does not mean you are blocked on all fronts. What news have you uncovered regarding the Whitewing program?"

"No mentions of it anywhere," Elise said, getting to her hooves. "I'm starting to think Graygarden actually had nothing to do with it. Of course, if he did, he'd have put his important things somewhere far more secure than this."

"Really." The Composer walked to the line of display cases along the wall, stopping at one that contained, of all things, an inertial stabilizer rotor. It lifted a wing, the exact same part put to use. "No clues, keys, nothing?"

Vivace shrugged. "We've been preoccupied with our own mishaps. Or need I remind you that on top of this paper, we still don't know who left that letter that caused the children to get suspicious?"

Wait a minute. That message we 'discovered' hadn't been part of the ruse to ditch us, after all? I felt like I was getting too many puzzle pieces too rapidly to make use of them. Stop, stop, slow down!

"Not to mention the Yak Ambassador getting involved," Leif sighed. "Composer, how long do we need to search and turn up nothing before we can cut our losses and run? About an hour ago, he started threatening to put the standing army on our tails if we don't give up these games."

So Balthazar and the yaks were a neutral party who didn't know what was going on? Good to know. I kind of wanted to go right now and get them on my side...

"I see your conundrum," the Composer said. "However, all of these complications are arising from your other plans. Not mine. I have few tears to shed for failure you brought upon yourselves." It pointed at the exit. "Why not break your contracts, abandon these guises and try again, keeping a lower profile this time?"

Leif suddenly pulsed with a spiral of emerald flame that looked eerily similar to my bracelet's. When it vanished, she was a spitting image of Corsica... So that's what it looked like when they transformed?

"Because these guises aren't so easy to toss," she said with a flip of her mane, copying Corsica's mannerisms even better than I was doing Rondo's. "Think about it. Graygarden disappears. Corsica tries to become the head scientist. At least that has explanations: she's ambitious. Then Corsica disappears too? What about when the real one shows up again? We move around a lot, 'boss'. It's necessary, with what we are. This jig is going to bring down so much heat once it's up, they'll probably be looking for us two nations over."

"I understand your issues with being told what to do," the Composer acknowledged, quietly angling a wing towards the trophy cases with the rocks inside... I realized that all three changelings were thoroughly distracted by the robot. "I also understand that you have found yourselves in a stressful situation. Perhaps it would be best to pull out after all. Spend some time in reflection upon what went wrong."

"What do you think we've been doing for the last hour?" Tempo drawled.

I slipped away, examining the cases further down the line. There were two rocks: a hoof-sized chunk of black glass advertised by a plaque as being from a meteor, and a similar-sized piece of blue granite with part of a carving on its flat face. Taken from an ancient ruin, the second rock's enclosure claimed. It was the same rock type as the chapel. That had to be the one.

"Rondo, what are you doing?" Leif called as I unclasped the trophy case.

"Moping and being useless, my dear Leitmotif!" I called back, once again letting my instincts guide my voice. "Certainly not taking a hint from our friendly Composer and looking for clues, oh no! What would compel me to do that?"

The Whitewing nodded. "I suggest you all scatter and follow suit. Search Elise's office, if you haven't already. Leitmotif, kindly go deflect attention and buy your team some time. Tempo, clean up loose ends. Vivace, search. Work expediently and you may all get out of this alive."

"You're not the boss of me," Leif huffed, swaggering out the door in an imitation of Corsica that made me jealous.

"It's a rock," Vivace told me as Tempo left as well. "What are you doing?"

"Following the old instincts, my friend," I replied, lifting out my prize in gentle forehooves - Rondo wouldn't be accustomed to using wings, so I didn't use mine either. Apparently the Composer hadn't told its changelings about the secret door it wanted to see inside... Why not? Was it testing them some other way first to see if it even wanted to give them this task? Something about the machine's logic still felt alien to me, though I supposed that was why it was so fascinating.

Vivace sighed, eyeing the black glass next to the rock I had taken. "Perhaps the Composer is right," he muttered, low enough that the Whitewing might not hear. "All this multitasking... Leitmotif insists she has it under control, but every time we make these deals, it feels like we're getting further and further from our original goal."

"Yeah," I muttered under my breath, hoping he would tell me what that goal was. "I feel the same."

"If only that 'daughter of the head scientist' business hadn't blown up in our face..." Vivace got up and walked away. "At this rate, we're going to lose all our leads. But, I suppose it can't be helped..."

I couldn't help it. The moment he was out of sight, I ran to a desk, grabbed some writing tools and started taking notes.

Aldebaran are looking for "Chrysalis", I furiously scribbled, unable to make sense of these puzzle pieces now yet determined not to forget them for later. Aldebaran captured me, Corsica, Ansel and Elise on purpose. The Composer wants them to look for information on Whitewings. Aldebaran are also working for at least one paying third party.

I paused, thinking. Aldebaran had Corsica unlock a terminal in the hideout. They used our identities to try to take over Icereach. The Composer did not tell them to capture us. They did not expect the letter they saw when we unlocked the terminal.

Hmm... Could I piece all this into separate, coherent goals? I felt like I could. Their work for the Composer was fairly straightforward. I drew a column for that on my paper. It seemed to want them investigating Icereach's involvement with Whitewings and nothing else. I recalled them telling us on the flight to the hideout that they were looking for materials relating to Whitewings on the terminal there that we were going to unlock, so I marked that as relevant too.

Next goal: look for Chrysalis. This one was also certain, but how could I match it to their actions? The way Vivace had spoken about the 'daughter of the head scientist' business made it sound like that terminal was actually supposed to have information relating to this... I supposed it wasn't impossible that they had been lying about why they wanted us to come with them. I put take us to the hideout in both columns.

That left me with any number of third parties they may or may not be working for for money. It also left me with them stranding us and them coming back to use our faces and take over the city. These were clearly tied together; Tempo and Vivace had all but said it was the fault of third-party contracts that they had made enemies of us. But... did that mean they took us to the hideout for this reason, too?

I stared at my paper, take us to the hideout now written in all three goal columns. There had to be something I was missing. That, or these changelings were serious multitaskers... I jotted down a few extra notes, like how Leif was a really good actor and no one had mentioned Ludwig, and that I really was good enough to pass myself off as Rondo. Then I folded them up, stuck them in a pocket, and picked up the keystone I had liberated from its display stand.

"This what you need?" I drew in a breath, showing it to the Composer.

"It seems promising," the Composer observed, stepping up to me. "Let us try it. You already know the way?"

"Yeah," I said. "I know where the elevator we need is. And thanks for covering for me. Let's go check out that-"

I cut myself off, a hoof already raised to walk towards the door, as my curiosity got the better of me. "Who's Chrysalis?"

"A figure that my employees are seeking," the Composer explained. "What they do on their own time is none of my business, provided it does not interfere with their work for me. I am afraid I know nothing more."

Hmm... Lie? I couldn't tell. Machines lacked all the ordinary facial queues I would use to read ponies, and its voice was so even, not monotone but aloof and steady. This Whitewing perpetually wore the best poker face I had ever seen. If I was in its place, I sure wouldn't have been this content not knowing. But I guess our extreme differences were why I found it so interesting...

"Suit yourself," I said, making again for the door. "Let's see if this key of yours works."

The Icereach bunker hadn't been designed with a central elevator shaft. Throughout the caves, there were more like six or seven shafts, all of which reached slightly different floors. Only one set went up to the surface. The one that went down to the chapel was annoyingly out of the way, far enough that walking there gave me time to think.

Usually, this was something I enjoyed. This time, they were empty steps spent poring over my plan, looking for holes and praying there would be none, even though the first third of it had gone seamlessly so far. But it wasn't so much that there were holes as that there were things outside my control. How long would it take until Ludwig got bored and went to tear the place up on its own? What was Mother doing? And the changelings had said something about the Yak Ambassador maybe getting the standing army involved... Balthazar was my friend, but if someone other than me brought him down here, my Rondo-disguised-as-Halcyon disguise probably wouldn't do me any favors.

An intercom crackled to life, a system that didn't see much use beyond once-per-week broadcasts thanking exceptional employees and acknowledging new patent filings. "Hello?" Corsica's voice asked. "Is this thing on?"

My ears perked. We were about halfway to the elevator... Apparently, Leif meant it when she said she would run interference.

"Groovy," the intercom continued, broadcasting to the entire bunker. "Anyhoodles, I just wanted to say that all of you piddly ponyos are losers. Big fat ones. That means none of you are as cool as me."

My neck went rigid. "Pretty sure we've got a problem..."

"I would not worry overly much about it," the Composer calmly replied, completely undisturbed. "Either the windigo will rise above its worse nature, or it won't. Either way, it is creating a distraction for us. We should make the most of it and clean up the fallout after I've accomplished my goals."

"That's why I have benevolently decided to take over Icereach," Ludwig explained, its voice slightly distant, as if it didn't know which part of the microphone to talk into. "Do not worry-worry, ponyos. You are probably wondering why I sound so crazy and not like the Corsica you know! Well, it is because my evil dad actually experimented on my face and made me insane. That is why I blew him up. Did you know he had Icereach working on all sorts of naughty things? That is why I have been thinking, he is probably in cahoots with the Yakyakistan Ambassador. If you see that guy, you should tell me where he is so I can blow him up, too!"

"Are you sure we shouldn't worry?" I hissed. "It's making threats against the ambassador now! Odds are he's already got no idea what's going on with the changelings. Even if it's crazy, sooner or later things are gonna get serious!"

The Composer didn't break its pace. "Enlighten me."

"Listen, Ludwig said it wanted to start a war, yeah?" I explained under my breath. "Or at least make the sponsor nations mad at each other. That ambassador has a secret thing in his embassy that lets him instantly contact home. All that's gotta happen is he gets spooked enough to call home for backup!"

"Which would be a good thing," the Composer pointed out. "It could act as an outside stabilizing force. This windigo clearly has the desire to cause harm, and knows how to play a trick or two. But to turn two partners against each other requires more than just wild accusations. Having the intention to manipulate ponies does not inherently grant one the ability. I believe this windigo is overestimating its own tactical acumen, and is actually quite harmless."

Easy for it to say. The Composer hadn't felt what it was like, watching as Ludwig took Corsica away... Ludwig initially struck me as someone who knew how to obfuscate their danger with insanity, and its actions since then had only reinforced that perception.

Of course, maybe the Composer just didn't care because it wasn't its own home at risk.

"How about we go deal with that thing before going to the chapel, eh?" I suggested, trying to change our course. "That door's not going anywhere soon. Why not exorcise the windigo while we know where it is?"

"I suggest otherwise." The Composer kept its head high, walking along. "Do not forget you are presently working for me. While I do allow my employees a great deal of leniency in juggling their own goals alongside mine, that strategy seems to have backfired for Aldebaran. Not getting sidetracked is the only sure way to victory."

I lowered my head, frustrated. At least I had more agency than when I was paralyzed on the ship, but it still felt like I was being funneled onto one path. If I was going to live up to that miracle and save Icereach, I needed to get some freedom...

The elevator to the chapel was in Icereach's manufacturing district. While hardly a hub of industry, the bunker did have a sizable full-time population, and ponies needed goods to survive. Plenty of those could be shipped in, but a healthy amount of recycling took place to produce others, and that was all conducted here.

Several more ponies saw us - this area was worked around the clock, and low enough on the social ladder that everyone here felt a degree or three of separation between themselves and the leadership. Squabbles and decrees could come and go, but someone needed to keep the lights on.

Much to the Composer's confusion, that didn't mean I trusted them enough not to hide every time.

We reached the elevator. It hummed around me on the long descent to the chapel, the Composer waiting quietly at my side. I was out of complaints about Ludwig and we had come far enough that turning back now would be pointless, so we passed the trip in silence, the key stone sitting heavily in my pocket.

With a clunk of pulleys and gears, we hit the bottom. The chapel was untouched and undisturbed, save for the racket of the ether pump - apparently, it hadn't finished its run for the night. Machinery chugged away on the rack of equipment that stabilized the ether for transport, a big metal shelf sharing space with timeless carvings and runes, and I stepped forward, starting to look for the place this key was supposed to go.

It was... calming, being down here. As pressing as my troubles were, I felt a deep, quiet sensation that nothing could hurt me in this place. Not quite enough that I could fully relax, but enough that I could remind myself how much I wanted to see behind this alleged door, too.

"You appear quite familiar with this place," the Composer observed, watching me work.

"I come down here a lot," I replied, holding the stone and scouring the walls and ground. "It's just nice to get away from things, you know? I do my best brainstorming down here."

The Composer said nothing, moving to examine the machinery. I wondered what it was like for a sapient robot to look at a non-sapient one... Probably the same as it was for me to look at a potato, but who could say?

"You know anything about this place?" I asked on a hunch. "Who built it, or what it was used for?"

"That knowledge has been lost to the sands of time," the Composer said. "I imagine it would have been a very early civilization, more than two thousand years ago. Perhaps twice that, or more."

"How far back do they track history, out there in the rest of the world?" I asked, talking as I inspected a wall. "Most all that's tracked here is the dates of inventions. Though I guess the yaks know about their war."

"History fades in layers," the Composer replied. "Eight to ten hundred years ago, the tools of modern record-keeping came into being, though their implementation varied by region. Up to a thousand years before that, history takes greater guesswork to piece together, but some stories endure. Beyond there, almost nothing is known. It is said that the greatest civilizations of the previous age went to war in those days, and collapsed from the strain, the following dark age wiping out almost all surviving knowledge of the days of yore."

Interesting. I made a mental note to read further into this someday in the future. Despite everything I had been through, I knew that once this was over, I would eventually start dreaming again of taking my friends and traveling the world...

"Here is what we are looking for," the Composer said, the faintest note of excitement crossing its perfectly controlled voice.

"Eh? You found it?" I came swiftly trotting over.

The Whitewing was standing beside the machinery rack for the ether pump processing. "It looks like this was built to block the way. Fortunately, it is not a good barricade." It pointed to the wall behind the rack. "The key goes there, if you please."

I craned my neck, looking. The key, places to put the key... There was a small bit gouged out of the wall that looked like a place where a bolt had been drilled in and then broken loose. But the frame was primarily bolted to the ground, not the wall, and with far more care than would cause something like that to occur. I held up the missing fragment, and it fit to a tee.

Ka-chink! I pushed it in.

The ground faintly rumbled. And then, smoothly, with no resistance at all, a square section of wall broke free and sank into the ground.

My eyes were wide. The Composer didn't wait for me, slipping around past the machine rack and walking into the darkness.

I followed. I needed to see this too.

The cave beyond the door was a mix of natural stone, crystal formations, and flat surfaces with more carvings, linear patterns I couldn't tell whether were writing or decoration. The ground sloped upward slightly, green from my bracelet reflecting off crystals on the ceiling like they were chandeliers. It was a longer room, and thanks to the slope, the Composer was already out of sight ahead.

I pressed on, climbing. And then I found a skeleton.

At least, that's what I thought it was, for long enough that my heart jumped into my throat and I almost squeaked in surprise. Okay, almost screamed, but don't tell anyone. But then I looked again, and although it was equinoid and very long dead, it wasn't like any skeleton I had ever imagined before.

It was... shell-like. An exo-skeleton, maybe? The skull looked relatively normal, a short curved horn rising from its forehead, and it had fangs like a batpony, but the similarities stopped there.

The thing's back wasn't bone, it was hard, still shaped like the surface of a pony. So were the legs. Except the legs were riddled with holes down by the hooves... Actually, the horn was too. It was like a layer of something had formed over a dead pony, and then stayed there when the rest rotted away. Carapace? Chitin? It looked vaguely insectoid... It had wings, too. Wings and a horn, just like an alicorn.

My curiosity was almost stronger than my squeamishness at seeing what was still very definitely a skeleton. Almost. I decided to leave it and keep looking.

The floor leveled off, and the tunnel took a sharp bend ahead. Before that point, though, there was a big pile of something stacked against the walls. Old machinery, it looked like, dumped there haphazardly without a care for its long-term well-being. I scanned over it with interest. It looked more arcane and less ordered than Icereach's machines, also lighter weight and lower budget, and a lot more spliced together. My superstitious side insisted gleefully that it looked more like it was designed to harness and control external forces than to operate purely within known parameters and closed systems, arcane and mystical. But I was about the most biased judge possible, so I took that judgement with a hearty grain of salt.

Maybe there would be something explaining what it did, and why it was here? It looked way older than the Whitewing. There was no dust down here, in the paradoxically fresh cave air, but I could still feel age radiating off the equipment. Machines wore out as time passed. I hazarded a guess these were made within the last century, but definitely not during my lifetime.

Eventually, my scouring paid off, and I found a prize: a stone lectern holding a book. Eagerly, yet mindful of aged paper, I eased it open.

Captain's Log, Icereach Expedition

Year 946

My eyes glistened with the light of revelation. A journal, sealed in a place like this? With dates, even? Not quite sixty years ago... On the scale of things Icereach was likely to keep off the books, I had a strong suspicion this journal was going to be the top of the top.

I turned the page and kept reading.

Day 0. I guess I had better start this formally. I'm Captain Icebeard. Not my real name, but my stallions like calling me it. After long enough, it started to stick.

I lead a crew of twenty. Unicorns, down to the last one. Not counting the yak caravan we're currently traveling with, but they won't be staying. On the books, we are Yakyakistan's foremost scientists. We've been commissioned to explore the foothills of southeast Yak Hoof, where a colony of reclusive batponies live in caves underground. We'll call on the locals' obligation to their nation and establish a research colony. Off the books, we're deserters from the war. Every last one of us. Ones who had academic backgrounds and were offered a second chance because of it. I don't know if anyone higher up expects us to put in honest work. I wouldn't, if I was them. I'd give us some dangerous cargo, send us to the middle of nowhere to "study" it, and hope both it and us never come back.

But I'm not them. I'm a pacifist, not a stallion without honor. And so I'm going to enforce decorum among my ponies. And if these "windigo hearts" we've been given to study are as dangerous as they sound? We'll just have to prove it's not that easy to make conscientious objectors disappear.

If we ever return to civilization, I'll edit this to make it more politically correct. If you're reading this, you know that didn't happen.

I read as if in a trance. Windigo hearts? Yakyakistan had conducted experiments at Icereach relating to windigoes? Using disloyal soldiers, at that? Also, if all of them were unicorns, that meant none of them were yaks... I kept reading.

Day 1. We've arrived in the foothills and made contact with the locals. They don't speak our language, but aren't hostile, either. Crimson, my first lieutenant, has taken some of the ponies to get a lay of the land. The yaks that brought us and our equipment across the glacier are gone. We won't be able to leave if we want to.

Who knows how advanced these batponies are. Are they stone-age neanderthals, or artisans with a rich cultural history? Either way, they didn't ask for us to come here, and so I'm going to enforce independence among my ponies. No imposing on the locals. We'll be living in thick tents for a while. And no experimenting with the windigo hearts until we're better established.

Hopefully that day never comes. If anything went wrong, there'd be no help for miles and miles.

I suppressed a shiver. Were the original batponies the ones who built the chapel? And a pony named Crimson? The same name as the valley Icereach sat in, probably not by coincidence. More. What came next?

Day 2. Our camp is getting established. We've laid out a floor plan for the tents. Everyone's followed it well. As I told the higher-ups, these ponies aren't incompetent or unable to follow orders, they just didn't believe in the cause! This is a good team, and I'm going to prove it.

Short entry today. I'll be exploring with Crimson. She's scoped out most of this valley. If the wind still blows south to north here like the rest of the Yak Hoof, it should be reasonably sheltered. Probably why the locals set up shop here...

Day 3. I caught Silverhorn sleeping with a local in his tent this morning. Now he's digging a latrine.

Didn't that stallion listen? Just because we're in the middle of nowhere doesn't meant we can act like savages. I'm trying to prove to this team what they can do! Guess I'll need to be a little more patient.

Hard to be patient when I'm angry. Us and the batponies can't communicate. My gut says he was taking advantage of them. Wonder what they think about it? For all I know, maybe they think they're taking advantage of us.

I turned the page.

Day 4. I sure do love rations. Wonder what the locals eat? Wish we could ask them. Maybe they'd trade.

Crimson was in school to be an economist when she got drafted. Talked my ear off about the basis of money systems when I asked her about it. I figured we'd have nothing they want, being in a place as remote as this. They probably don't have much either. But we do have muscle and horn power. I noticed some of the locals watching while I was shoveling snow away from the camp today. Just telekinesis, nothing to it. But maybe they've never seen this before?

Wonder what they can do that we've never thought about. Not a lot of batponies in Infinite Glacier. If only we could communicate, maybe we could really do something.

Day 5. I've been talking long-term plans with my stallions. We've got enough magical heat sources for about a year of tent living like this. More if we can improve insulation. That's far enough off that we can focus on more immediate things like food, but not so far that we should forget about it. I want to have us a proper building, or even a tower. Someplace permanent and above ground, where we can do whatever with those hearts and not risk polluting the batponies' cave if something goes foul.

Most of the soldiers agree with me, but none are too passionate. I think I need to do something for morale.

Day 6. Found Silverhorn and that mare together again. The same one. At least he's loyal. I put him on digging again. But that's what everyone's doing, so it's not much of a punishment...

How hard can it be to stick with our own kind? Not like my crew is only made of stallions. Granted, then I'd have to kick around two of them for slacking while there's work to be done. And for all I know, all our mares already turned him down. Feels like I just can't win.

We've not even been here for a week, and I'm talking like this. Can't let my ponies' motivation go to seed. I know what would fix this: better food.

Maybe I'll try bartering with the locals. How hard can it be to offer what you've got and pantomime what you want?

Day 7. Well, I'll be. Silverhorn and his marefriend are trying to teach each other to talk.

She knows his name. He says hers is Wystle. So far they've only got a hoofful of nouns, and only stuff like snow where we've got it handy and everyone knows what it is. But if these batponies are trying to learn to talk with us, they're not dunces, I'll certainly give them that much.

Apparently she's better at our language than he is at theirs. Also was the one to take initiative. Go figure. We're supposed to be the scientists, and these so-called savages are making us look bad. I bet you with a real Yakyakistan education, that mare could make a fine scientist herself someday.

Can't say I'm upset for our sakes. If our neighbors are more civilized than we are, maybe they can help us.

Just need to hope we aren't so un-civilized that they don't want us here.

With great reluctance, I pulled myself away from the book. Hearing a raw, uncensored, unfiltered account of what Icereach had been like in the early days was beyond fascinating, and I had a hunch the scientists and the batponies eventually did learn to communicate. But as much as I desperately wanted to know what they would talk about, the journal was fairly thick, and the Composer hadn't come back from ahead. I needed to save Corsica and Icereach. Then I could read this as my reward.

...But it involved windigoes. What if these pages contained information I desperately needed to beat Ludwig?

Screaming internally, I set aside my love of a good story and committed the ultimate heresy in search of the power to save my home: I opened the book backwards and flipped to the last written page. It looked like it even started in the middle of an entry.

At their insistence, we are going to seal the monster and the rest of the windigo hearts in the deepest, holiest part of the caves. They think the power of the lifestream might purify the hearts, or at least prevent anyone from misusing them. None of us are under any illusions. The cave won't be able to un-make what we have made. Felysia insists it might at least guide that thing's soul on to the afterlife. If it still has one.

We've talked it over, and we're hanging up our labcoats. All of us, unicorn and batpony alike. Miraculously, neither side blames the other, but we both know we were trifling with things that weren't meant to be trifled with. Well, no more. If Yakyakistan wants the fruits of our research so badly, they should have checked in on us by now. Until they do, we're sealing all the equipment we brought away as well. Even if the day does come, perhaps we won't tell them we made any progress whatsoever.

This will be my last entry in this journal. I am going to leave it with the monster and our things, as a testament to our sins. Talk has been made of naming our tower and other places around the valley in monument to some of us... You know who you are. I don't want my name recorded like that. Icebeard I've been, and Icebeard I'll stay. May history forget me. May history forget us all.

Now I felt dirty. And more than a little scared. Not only had I skipped to the ending of a good story, I had apparently defiled this stallion's last wishes to be forgotten about. That was one reason I had never considered might be at play with the censorship: our forebearers actively didn't want to be remembered. It would certainly explain why Icereach's resident population, almost entirely batponies and unicorns, didn't protest the censorship despite being old enough to remember before it. And sixty years ago was recent enough that an elder could remember all the way back then... I wondered if any of the ponies in this journal might be living in Icereach still to this day.

That aside, there were windigo hearts stashed down here? And they had something to do with creating that weird carapace exoskeleton I saw on the way in? I presumed that was the monster written about...

I realized that if the Composer had been messing with Aldebaran and not being straight with them about what it wanted them to do here in Icereach, it might have been lying to me about why it wanted to come down here, too.

This had the potential to get very bad. I slipped the journal into a pocket on the side of my coat - I would give the full thing a read once it was safe to do so. Then I adjusted my bracelet, made sure I was ready to turn it up if need be, and walked around the turn in the tunnel.

The tunnel opened out into a mostly circular room, with a large flat area on the far wall completely covered in a massive mural. More machinery was stacked around the room's edges, all of it old and disused. An old stone chest sat in the middle, its lid on the ground a short distance away. The Composer was staring at the mural, in no hurry whatsoever.

My gaze drifted up to the mural. Chiseled with immaculate detail, it showed a massive equinoid facing toward me, reared up, its face obscure and its mane flowing like energy into the background. A ring of runes circled its barrel like a disk, and from that sprung two wings, massive and complex and made of more runes, cupping around to cradle a circle of land that bloomed with trees and rivers and mountains. When I looked inward, the image seemed to repeat, nested in on itself. Another pony, this one more realistic and distinct yet less holy and fierce, held the same exact pose, its horn aglow and its wings cupped around a glittering star, standing on the land that was held by the larger equine.

When I looked outward, the mural repeated as well. The larger equine was framed by a plane of blasted and shattered land, barren stumps of trees and destroyed rectangular structures that probably once had been buildings. This destroyed land, too, was being held, this time cradled by draconic wings that brushed the edges of the walls, their owner barely visible in the farthest background, great and indistinct.

A star, held by a creature within a land held by a creature within another, held by another creature. Looking up at it made my head spin, and I had to shake myself back to reality to focus on the Composer.

"What are you up to?" I demanded, edging warily closer, watching the open chest in the middle of the room. "Did you know what was down here when you asked me to help you?"

"I had some suspicions," the Composer replied, not looking away. "As it turns out, they were well-founded. This mural is exactly what I was hoping to see."

Uh huh. "Then what's this?" I asked, pointing to the chest where I was reasonably sure the windigo hearts had been stored. Granted, I didn't see a lot of room on the Whitewing for carrying stolen artifacts in secret, but I didn't even know how big these hearts were supposed to be...

"That?" The Composer looked where I was pointing. "A reliquary where something dangerous was once sealed. However, they were all taken long ago. Do not think we are the first to be down here since that door was closed."

"So you're not here for the windigo hearts?" I asked cautiously.

The Composer stared at me. "How did you know that name?"

"I read it." I pointed over my shoulder, hoping I hadn't erred in admitting this. "There was a journal back with all those machines."

"I see." The Composer turned back to the mural, apparently unbothered. "Regardless, no. I am here for this. I wished to corroborate the appearance of it as described by someone who had seen it before. Now that I have seen what I came for, we can be finished here. I believe you were eager to be rid of Aldebaran."

I blinked between the Whitewing and the massive mural again - a mural I was fairly sure depicted a real god, or even two or three of them. "What part of it were you interested in?"

The Composer pointed a wing at the bottom corner. "Primarily, the name of the artist."

I trotted closer to look. Up close, the mural almost hurt my eyes, as though the surface it was etched into was magical and hard to comprehend. But I stared harder, and realized that it was just an impossible, immaculate level of detail, as if someone had tried to turn all of creation into a wall. One artist had made this? I didn't buy it. This had to have been constructed across generations.

But, then I found the signature, at the very, very corner, in normal-sized hoofwriting... and in a language I couldn't read. "What's this say?"

"Nothing that would have any meaning to you," the Composer said as it started to leave. I felt like I should have been physically flattened by this wall, but my mind was too knotted up by adrenaline and betrayals and second chances to even start to understand how I felt about this. I would probably wake up in the morning, have everything hit me at once, and immediately come back down here again to look at it properly... That was a good idea. Graygarden wasn't getting this key back if I had to fight hoof and wing to keep it.

I checked the signature one more time on my way out. The last character, I actually did recognize: a little insignia made from a triangle and a hexagon I was pretty sure was related to the Church of Yakyakistan, though my knowledge on them was flaky. I resolved to research it more thoroughly as soon as I was in a better position to do what I wanted.

"Hey, wait up!" I called, running after the Composer as it left. Did I dare to hope it really had just been here for some old mural, and not whatever nefarious monster-making things had been stored down here? Was it possible Icereach was sitting on top of a cache of this stuff, and the friendly aloof invader wasn't here to steal it for its own ends? That Aldebaran wasn't here because of the old research in this cave, that all of this was a coincidence and unrelated?

The Composer didn't stop, but it did slow down enough for me to catch up. We rounded the bend, walked past the rows of discarded equipment... and past that weird, freaky monster skeleton the scientists had created that looked more like a shell than actual bones.

I stared at it as we passed. The Composer noticed me look.

"What's that?" I chanced the question.

"That is a changeling in its true form," the Composer replied, not breaking stride. "One that has been dead for quite a while."

At Melting Point

The secret door rose up behind me, somehow detecting that it no longer needed to remain open. With a clink, the key popped loose, and I caught it and shoved it safe in a pocket, opposite the one on my side that contained Icebeard's journal. My thoughts should have spun, but they didn't, as if my brain needed to be at the top of its game and didn't want to get bogged down thinking and analyzing.

I tried to think about it anyway, adrenaline forcing my head to clear. Maybe the Composer wasn't here for the actually dangerous things in that cave, but the changelings... Icebeard and his scientists had invented a way to create changelings. They made a monster, and that changeling skeleton belonged to it. What if Aldebaran was here for this? Statistical association said they had to be. What were the odds a crew of changelings would come out to the middle of nowhere and not do it because this particular middle of nowhere held a secret like that?

Hey, for all I knew, they had already been down here and plundered the hearts themselves. Except then they'd have already found the key, right? The Composer didn't say how long those hearts had been missing for...

Too many questions. I let my head do its thing and go empty. For now, the second phase of my plan had actually worked too, and I was a stone's throw away from the Composer telling everyone to pack it in, exorcising Ludwig and going away. Plenty of time to lose myself in the world of questions and confusion when I wasn't this close to an impossible victory.

The elevator shaft flew by, time seeming to dilate as neither of us spoke. If machines could show emotions, I would call the Whitewing contemplative, maybe even victorious. It was impossible to read, and yet I believed it had actually found what it came for. How did an artist's name have anything to do with anything? And what language had it been written in, anyway? Was the Composer lying about everything? Was I just projecting how I wanted it to feel?

I couldn't know. All I could do was hope.

When the elevator doors finally opened, a Corsica was waiting for us.

I blinked, sizing her up and doing a double-take. This clearly wasn't Ludwig; her eyes and talent looked normal. And yet, if this was Leif, she had definitely been through something bad while I was away: she was missing all her usual regalia, like the ear ornaments and shoes, her mane and tail were limp and her eyes were dull, and she was leaning against a wall for support. She looked... out of it, like when Corsica had her extreme burnout after the accident two years ago.

My mind went to the threats Ludwig had been making over the intercom as we were preparing to go down to the chapel. Had those gotten Corsica's reputation - and by extension, Leif - in hot water? This Corsica didn't look injured, just exhausted. Although, honestly, I probably looked the same.

"Leitmotif," the Composer said, apparently sharing none of my confusion. "Report."

Leif blinked in surprise, working her jaw. "We... got what we were after," She nodded, straightening up. "Now it's time to go. Everyone's waiting back at the ship. I came to let you know."

The Composer tilted its head. "How did you know where Rondo and I had gone?"

Leif tossed her ragged mane. "I have my ways. Are you coming, or not?"

"Very well," the Composer decided, dropping the matter. "I am surprised you straightened your affairs so quickly. Good work. Incidentally, I have just completed my work as well. Let us make for the Aldebaran."

I gritted my teeth and followed along. This was supposed to be the part where the Composer exorcised Ludwig and made the changelings go away. And while it seemed happy to do the latter, how could I remind it of the former when I was supposed to be Rondo and another changeling was right here? It had promised... For that matter, I also needed a way to slip away before they roped me into any escape attempt. Hopefully they weren't so tight-knit that they would call off their escape if they noticed 'Rondo' was missing.

Maybe I could use that, to make the Composer keep its bargain if push came to shove. I kept my ears tuned, listening for more trash talk from Ludwig over the intercom, but nothing came. The halls were truly empty this time, as if a responsible authority figure had imposed a lockdown and not just relied on scared ponies to hide themselves.

My gaze drifted to Leif, trying to get a better read on her. She showed no sign of cuts, bruises, tenderness or a limp, so her duress couldn't be from a fight. But what could have tired her out this much? And why didn't the Composer care about the state of its followers? The last time I had met Leif, in Graygarden's office, she had been frustrated, sure, but she seemed like the kind of mare to whom frustration lent energy. Now, she just looked like she had been drained. Something must have done that to her, and the only thing I could imagine inflicting that much emotional exhaustion in such a short timespan was Ludwig. Whatever that windigo was doing, I hoped it would be stopped soon...

Leif noticed me staring. "She's a teenager, you dirty changeling. Eyes off." She shook her head and walked on.

Not how I wanted that to be taken. And what was going on? I could practically hear the fear in her voice.

I summoned my best Rondo impression. "What's so wrong with being concerned for a friend, my dear Leitmotif? No offense, but you look a little out of your groove."

Leif shook her head, not looking at me. "I'll be fine. Worry about your own skin. We've just had a few setbacks, that's all. The yaks have impounded our ship, so focus instead on how to get that back."

Setbacks, huh? I glanced at the Composer.

"Still your worries," it said, more to Leif than to me. "If we have reason to leave, then we will leave. I am here so that matters of being forced to do otherwise need not apply."

Leif didn't look any more at ease.

This was exhausting. Sometimes, seeing that an opponent was tiring too could give me a second wind - my competitive spirit wasn't particularly strong compared to the Icereach patent-mongers, but it was definitely present. Here, however, Leif's weariness seemed contagious, as if it was a warning that not all was about to be well and peaceful. If an encounter with Ludwig had done this to her... I had no plans for evicting the windigo other than relying on the Composer to follow through on its bargain. Taking over Icereach and playing Ludwig's game at this point was a laughable idea, as if it ever might have worked in the first place.

I just wanted to sleep. I wanted it to be over. I wanted to dream, to go back to a time when things hadn't been like this and pretend it was the future instead. My mind was exhausted and my body numb. Was it really a miracle that had brought me back to this place when Mother wanted to leave? Where was Mother now, amid all this?

Silently, I said a prayer for help, hoping I hadn't used up the last of my divine intervention all the other times.

We made for the surface, the key and journal heavy in my pockets. Leitmotif said nothing, as though it took all her willpower to keep putting one hoof in front of the other. The Composer, likewise, came peacefully. As I walked, I kept looking at those two, being careful not to stare yet desperate for any more information or insight I didn't already have. None came.

It was awful, being this powerless. Really, I was clueless, not powerless, but I was the biggest believer there was in knowledge being power. It let you avoid problems before they began, and meant you didn't need to use force instead. And not needing to use force meant I didn't need to think about the bracelet. What would happen if I let the changelings leave, then turned it up and picked a fight with Ludwig then and there? Assuming I could find the windigo. Its current silence was disturbing. I couldn't shake the feeling that the bracelet had to do something useful against a windigo, being fire magic and all. But I had no idea how it would end.

I didn't speak. I didn't want to break the spell. Every step we took towards the Aldebaran was one more second that things hadn't yet fallen to pieces. I wanted to trust the Composer when it said it could deal with a rogue windigo. I wanted to trust it when it said it would deal with a rogue windigo. I wanted to trust Mother, doing who knew what but hopefully something more helpful than me. I wanted to trust the yaks, seeing as we were walking right toward them and they had apparently made a move. Was it safe to do any of them? Half of me was getting numb to betrayal, and half of me really didn't want it to happen again.

Trusting others to solve my problems was just what I wanted. It was how I was. And yet, on the Aldebaran, paralyzed by Mother's abilities and pleading with anything that could hear me, I had said I wouldn't mind solving problems myself, stepping up and being my own hero for a change. Maybe that was why I was in this situation, with nobody I was sure I could trust. Maybe it was fate.

Quietly, I said a prayer to... to the figures holding the worlds in the mural. Let this be over. Let this be done. Now that I was this close, I was immeasurably tired; even though I knew that it wasn't over until it was over and there was still so much I could be blindsided by, I needed this awful night to end.

We reached the elevators. And then we reached the surface.

The moon was low on the horizon, waning but nearly full. Up the valley, the eastern sky was tinged with purple and the beginnings of red. Sunrise was almost here. The storm was completely gone.

I almost lit my bracelet, and then stopped myself. Hadn't I never used it around the changelings before? I hadn't left a double for Rondo to wear, and it was how Elise realized in the hideout that I was the real me. I didn't know if lighting it now could make Leif realize I was a fake, and I was too tired to think through the implications, but the risk was too great to indulge in.

Since I had last been aboveground, the yaks had bulldozed an incredible amount of snow, actually clearing the gates enough that they could be opened. None of us walked particularly close together, the Composer neither making an effort to avoid nor be near us, yet Leif definitely giving me a berth. The main courtyard was plowed as well, and I could see the two airships moored in the adjacent training yard, over the wall.

The Composer strolled straight through the main gate, as if sneaking wasn't a concept that had even been invented. Leif and I both hung back. Apparently, she valued her own skin over her patron's.

"Welcome back," I heard Elise's voice say, and instantly shadow swam, trying to get a better view without being spotted.

"How unexpected," the Composer replied, standing in the courtyard before an Elise - presumably Tempo - plus an undisguised Vivace and five yaks. Balthazar and Nicov were among them. Both changelings were dressed for the weather.

"Hullo, machine pony," Balthazar rumbled. "Where are rest of changeling ponies?"

"We've found ourselves with some new and unexpected allies," Vivace drolly explained. "Have you been keeping tabs on the windigo?"

I emerged from the shadows and wandered forward. Balthazar and the yaks were siding with the changelings? Was this for real? They couldn't be in the dark about who we were; Balthazar seemed to already know. What was going on here? I wasn't awake enough to give this productive thought, but... was it possible the changelings had a goal that was actually legitimate enough to convince the yaks to help them?

Or maybe they were good enough at pretending to convince the yaks they did when they didn't. Either way, them and the changelings seemed to be getting along. Next to me, Leif looked worried.

She followed me, and Tempo relaxed when she saw that everyone appeared to be present... It looked like no one had caught on to my Rondo guise yet.

"Ludwig will become my problem when and only when it comes to me," the Composer said. "I have made no efforts to follow it."

Internally, I growled. So much for it exorcising the windigo in exchange for me taking it to see the chapel... Liar.

"Word of our antics reached the surface faster than we had hoped," Tempo explained, turning to walk towards the training grounds where the ships were moored. "I determined the best course of action would be to be up front with these fine yaks, and explained our situation in detail. Provided we help with this windigo problem of theirs, they are letting us depart in peace. That is why I was hoping you had already encountered the monster."

The yaks and Vivace fell in behind her, and so I did too.

"Ludwig!" Tempo called. "I know you are watching us! Show yourself!"

"Why do you call for it?" the Composer asked, joining the procession. "If the windigo wisely avoids obstructing my path, we should repay that wisdom by leaving it to its own devices. I have no quarrel with those who have no quarrel with me."

My eyes narrowed. When I agreed to work with the Composer, I fully imagined I might get betrayed again, but I more imagined it as an it-attacks-me betrayal, or it outing me to the changelings. Getting what it wanted and then leaving without keeping its end of the bargain... I should have known that was far more likely.

"I am afraid that won't work out," Tempo said, stopping just before the training grounds entrance. "As I said, these yaks are only working with us on the condition that we stop this Ludwig and safely return the pony it is inhabiting. While that task might be out of our league, I assume it is well within yours."

The yaks all nodded, muttering their assent. Part of this was a relief - the yaks might be playing nice with the changelings, but apparently they knew what was going on with Corsica, and were trying to put it right? At the same time, Tempo seemed familiar enough with Ludwig's name that I got the impression she knew it from before this. Of course the changelings knowingly locked us in with a windigo...

"I see," the Composer said. "Your efforts at diplomacy are appreciated. However, I no longer require a reason to be in Icereach, so they are also unnecessary. Come. Let us take our leave."

"Machine pony fail intelligence test," Nicov threatened, stepping into the Composer's path. "You not have reason to be in Icereach. Reason to be in Icereach have you."

"Cannot leave after making mess," Balthazar added. "Clean up mess first, then leave. Not about what machine pony want."

The Composer calmly looked at them. "I mean to take my leave, and have neither allegiance nor quarrel with you," it said to the yaks. "Please step aside."

Tension rose in the clearing. "Where is that windigo...?" Tempo muttered. Leif, still disguised as Corsica, and Vivace both looked uneasy. The yaks were bracing for a fight.

"Machine pony not leave until fix Corsica," Balthazar said, laying down his final ultimatum.

The Composer spread its wings, and for a moment I thought it would just fly past them, remembering how it had hovered in midair when we were docking the Aldebaran to enter the hideout cave. And then blades extended from its forehooves.

"Then it seems," Tempo sighed, "this concludes negotiations."

Her horn lit, and she pulled a small box from her winter coat. A button on it clicked, and the Composer suddenly flashed with energy, then crumpled into a heap.

I was too stunned to realize the yaks were moving until I was flanked by two of them. Tempo was even quicker. A flash from her horn directed at me and Leitmotif, and gravity around us quadrupled, my tired legs giving out as I fell against the ground. "Hey, what gives!?" Leif barked. The yaks and Vivace were unaffected.

"What the...?" I tried to struggle against the spell's power, but it was too much. Had Tempo discovered I was the real Halcyon? No, she had just attacked Leif and the Composer as well... Her horn didn't glow with an aura, but with a soft, multicolored flame that looked to be pulling in the pre-dawn light.

"Ludwig!" Tempo called. "Where are you?"

Beside me, Leif hissed, struggling. "Changeling ponies stay down," Balthazar advised, looming over us. "Still have windigo to solve. Can do justice once danger is gone."

"I'm not a changeling!" Leif snapped, her horn trying to light, yet somehow being extinguished by Tempo's power. "I'm the real Corsica! Ludwig's gone, I fought him off and made him leave!"

Suddenly, the weight of my situation hit me: whatever Tempo and Vivace were doing, the yaks thought they were arresting changelings. My Rondo disguise had gone from a protection to a liability, and I couldn't even claim to be the real Halcyon without sounding exactly like a fake.

"I suppose that's all of them," Tempo said, wandering up to Balthazar, her mane blowing just like Elise's always did. "I don't understand where Ludwig is, though. This is a significant setback..."

"Yes, you were planning with him about taking over Icereach," Leif cut in. "To finish that stupid game so that he would keep his promise and leave me alone. Elise, it's me! Ludwig is gone!"

My train of thought completely derailed.

"Why else do you think I'd have led that Whitewing and them up here into your trap if I didn't already know about it?" The Corsica-lookalike managed to point a hoof at me. "Listen, that one was with the Whitewing, but the real Halcyon is alive. I was lucid through the whole thing; Ludwig saved her from the blizzard, last I saw her she was going into the bunker to find out where the changelings were. The reason Ludwig isn't showing up for your plan is because he's gone! Elise, let me go!"

I couldn't process this. Was it possible neither of them were changelings? Leif couldn't possibly know what Ludwig had done with me in the storm. But how would Elise have made it through the storm to follow me without a green flame bracelet of her own? If she had managed it, though, and approached Ludwig afterward, then Corsica would know...

There was only one thing I could think of to do, my mind going back to a time in the hideout where Elise had identified me by my bracelet. I lit it green, making it as obvious as I could.

Elise's spell slackened around me. "Halcyon...?"

I gingerly pulled myself into a sitting position and looked around, dazed. "Are all of us real?"

Corsica blinked at me in surprise. "You're a changeling. You were with the Whitewing..."

"Last I checked, the changelings did not steal that bracelet," Elise replied. "Halcyon had it during our exile, and it is one of a kind."

"But..." I blinked, my leaden mind trying to sort through the implications. "How did you make it through the storm?" I looked at Elise, and then Corsica. "And how did you know to wait for us at the chapel elevator?"

"I wasn't waiting for you," Corsica managed, looking every bit as exhausted as I felt. "I was waiting for the elevator to go down myself. I thought if there was anywhere you would have gone to hide... What were you doing down there with the Whitewing?"

Balthazar interrupted us, loudly clearing his throat. "So... trap only caught real ponies? Halcyon, Corsica and Elise all pretend to be changelings without knowing each other in Icereach?"

"Hey, I knew," Corsica protested, pointing at Elise. "At least about her. I just got spotted and had to save my own skin. Figured I'd lure a few of them in for you while I was at it."

"I wouldn't say we only caught real ponies," Elise added, nodding at the Composer. "That is not a creation we wanted running around. Fortunately, it was not designed without failsafes." She patted the small box she had used to disable it.

In the background, I noticed Vivace was still there, unaccosted by yaks and looking like he didn't want to be seen. Wait, if Elise was here, then could that be...?

Slowly, very slowly, it started to hit me: my prayers had been answered. Everything was somehow alright. And I hadn't even needed to do a thing.

"Is this real?" I repeated, feeling my breathing hitch.

"It would seem so." Elise nodded. "Both of you have clearly been through a terrible ordeal, and I'm sure I will get to hear all about it later. But this means that two changelings and a disembodied windigo are still unaccounted for. I will handle things from here, but you must tell me everything you know about where these three might be. We are not yet home free."

I sagged, as if my body had been awaiting permission to be tired. "I've been posing as Rondo for a while. The real one is tied up in my house. Mother got him... You got a clue where she is? I haven't seen her in a bit..."

"I got Ludwig to take a hike," Corsica said, her mane limp and ragged. "We could talk to each other while he was controlling me. Trust me, if I was stuck in your head, I could make you shove off too."

"It left for where?" Elise pressed. "And the final changeling? Leitmotif?"

Corsica shook her head. "No clue, and never seen her. Like I said, I wasn't trying to pose as her until they caught me." She pointed at me and the Composer, who hadn't said a word since being disabled.

I shivered. The storm might be gone, and dawn might be close, but it was still nighttime on the surface.

"This is problematic," Elise said, straightening up. "Now that we've made our moves, it would be easy for a lone changeling to hide, blend into the populace and remain there indefinitely. At the very least, we need to recover Rondo and transfer him to proper custody as quickly as possible, to prevent him from slipping out of reach as well, but we should act with urgency to find Leitmotif in case she can still be caught before she goes into hiding. We'll also need to sweep the bunker to ensure Ludwig isn't hiding and about to start more trouble now that our existing contract is finished. Balthazar, please take that Whitewing and seal it somewhere secret and secure. Halcyon, I hate to ask more of you when you clearly need to be checked at the hospital and then rest, but if we are to have any chance of catching Leitmotif before she learns of this and disappears, we will need to continue pretending to be her crew for a little bit more. You too, Vivace." She beckoned to the reluctant changeling.

"Who's he?" Corsica frowned at the newcomer. "You switching sides, or something?"

"Not all changelings work for Aldebaran," Elise replied, furthering my suspicions. "Icereach has others that are known to me. It should go without saying, but I would not repay their help in this matter by making public their identity."

'Vivace' shot me a look that said please don't tell Corsica. I nodded. Whatever it had taken for Ansel to get to the point where he would do something like this, I wasn't about to be ungrateful.

"So," I told Elise. "Heading down to my house to grab the real Rondo and hope Leif turns up, right? I can push myself a little more."

"So what about me?" Corsica pressed. "Need one more to round out your posse?"

Elise shook her head. "You should stay here with the yaks and rest in their fortress. It would be a red flag if Leitmotif saw us in the company of a pony she is pretending to be."

"Or I could pretend to be Ludwig," Corsica offered. "Get me shades and a towel for my rump, and I can pull off the attitude."

Elise frowned. "I can't ask you to do more than-"

"Can't ask me to sit back while my friends do all the work?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Face it, I'm good luck to have around. And I scared off a windigo. I can pull my weight."

"...Right." Elise looked unconvinced. She reached into her coat again and pulled out a hoof-sized chunk of black glass I was pretty sure I recognized from a display case in Graygarden's office. "Touch this, if you would?"

Corsica tapped it with a hoof. "Why?"

"Just in case," Elise replied, putting it back in her coat. "It's a material any changeling would recognize, and none would dare touch. Hopefully you can understand the usefulness of keeping it a secret."

I was far past the point where I wanted to get on anyone's case for censorship, so I let it slide. Besides, that sounded like a decent enough reason... "If we're in a hurry, let's get going," I said, swaying on my hooves. "I just want all this to be over. But I'm in. Let's go."

Elise nodded to me. "All I need is for you to be a face in a crowd, Halcyon. Leave all the hard work to me."

I had everything to say, and no time to say it. And yet, somehow, I had nothing but time.

Words burned at my tongue as I led the way through Icereach's tunnels, armed with a decent knowledge of the path to my own house - recovering Rondo was our first order of business. Elise was following, as was Ansel in his Vivace disguise. Corsica had managed to persuade Elise to let her come along, though her eyes and talent were now blocked so that she couldn't be told apart from Ludwig at a glance. No yaks accompanied us. Just as we had been when we were stranded, the four of us were together, and yet alone.

I thought I was the only one left, I wanted to say. I thought I'd have to fix this all by myself...

It's alright, I wanted Elise to reply. Icereach has always been my responsibility. I had a plan.

But now wasn't the time for talking. Now was time to take the final surge of strength I had found and see this all the way through; catch Leif and Rondo and make sure we didn't squander whatever advantage we had been miraculously given. Now wasn't the time for asking Elise how she had made it through the storm, or asking Corsica how she was free of the windigo, or telling anyone what I had been through, or marveling at how we all wound up in the same place with the same plan...

It was a miracle. Again. Exactly the same as I had felt last time I was sneaking down into these halls, not two hours before, when the Composer had stopped Mother from taking me away. Come to think of it, it had been pretty miraculous that I had survived the storm in the first place.

This couldn't be a coincidence. My superstitious half would never believe it, and my scientific half was starting to doubt that as well. Three obvious miracles in such a short span of time? I had done nothing to contribute - lived through a blizzard and avoided getting caught by changelings, sure, but I hadn't learned anything useful and hadn't executed any plans, or even made any. Now that I thought about it, I had a hunch I knew what Elise had been doing on the surface: if Graygarden was gone, the yaks were working with her, and the changelings and Composer were captured, she could feasibly tell Ludwig she was in complete control of Icereach. It might have left her behind in the hideout, but she had caught up, and played through to completion the game I couldn't even bring myself to start.

My legs shook. It was exactly what I had wished for, wasn't it?

We walked further through the residential block, no ponies out and about to cross our path, and my mind drifted. Two years ago, with Ansel and Corsica unconscious after the avalanche, I had gone down to the chapel, in search of solace and to cry into the darkness. Back then, I had been a different pony to the way I was now, but some things were still the same, or at least similar. Always, I had wondered if there was something out there, feeling like I was missing a part of myself, or perhaps missing something external to me that all ponies should have had.

I couldn't say exactly what happened in the chapel that day. Not with my mask on, at least. I was too good at lying to myself to trust that everything I thought I remembered had really happened. For all I knew, most of what I thought I knew, I had made up. The facts were that I had gone down there, and mere hours after I got back, Corsica was awake. What I thought was that I had called, and something answered.

And we spoke. And it told me everything would be alright. And then it was, even though that should have been impossible.

At least, that was what I remembered.

Most of the time, I never trusted myself with that memory, and I never told anyone it was the real reason I wanted to learn more about the chapel. Prove that what I had seen was real, or keep searching for it forever.

And now, through a string of lucky second chances and narrow brushes with failure, I felt like I had that proof. There was fate, or... or something keeping me on my hooves, preventing anything irreversible from coming to pass and letting me always try again. I looked back at Elise. She was real, tangible, and had taken out the Composer and the real Tempo and Vivace all by herself, or with the yaks. I glanced over at Corsica, wearing Ludwig's ridiculous shades. She had exorcised a windigo apparently on her own, a task I couldn't even begin to approach. My eyes found Ansel, pretending to be Vivace, doing nothing but being a face in a crowd... and yet, given his feelings on identity theft, that had to take a heroic amount of willpower.

All of their presences reassured me. And yet, it must have been destiny that I had them in the first place. This was fate.

We reached my apartment.

"I will take point," Elise softly requested, stepping to the fore. "Remember, our primary goal is to take all of the changelings into custody. If Rondo is here, we will carry him back to the fortress. Halcyon, I would request that you and Corsica remain behind and hide here while Vivace and I accomplish that task. If you are pretending to be him, it would not do for you two to be seen together by Leitmotif, and as she hasn't approached us yet, we must continue trying to bait her."

I nodded. "Wouldn't be surprised if she's holed up in the administration wing. You gonna come back to get us, or...?"

"I shall try," Elise promised, "but as plans must change dynamically, I cannot say for sure. Will this be acceptable?"

"Put my hooves up down here?" Corsica shrugged. "Sure. Just as long as I'm not on my own."

Wait, since when was Corsica nervous about being on her own? She must have had it really rough... I had a feeling each and every pony here had as much or more that they weren't saying as I did.

Elise opened the door.

The lights were on inside. I didn't recall us leaving them that way. The kitchen looked like it had been used. A copy of Corsica's shoes and ear ornaments sat on the horseshoe rack near the entry. And two ponies sat at the table, facing each other, one at either end: Mother and Leitmotif.

Somehow, drawing on my talent, I managed to keep the surprise off my face, holding Corsica and Ansel outside the door.

"There you are," Elise said, stepping forward and nodding at the duo before throwing a particular glance at Mother. "I didn't know that form matched your tastes, muscle colt."

Neither of the ponies at the table paid her any mind. Instead, Leif sighed. "I suppose our time's up."

"Looks like it," 'Mother' grunted, waving a hoof at Elise. "And I'm not Rondo. Just an old war buddy."

"Intriguing," Elise said. And then she lit her horn, flooring both of them with her gravity spell.

"Aaargh!" Leif fell out of her chair with a crunch. "Tempo, stop! What's gotten into you!?"

"I am not Tempo," Elise explained, her colorful, fiery aura intensifying and locking the two mares down, preventing all means of escape. "Being caught by surprise doesn't feel so nice when you are on the other end, does it? One of you three, return to the surface posthaste and tell the yaks we have caught both remaining changelings and require backup. Leitmotif and Rondo, in the name of Ironridge, you are under arrest."

Ansel ran off. I slipped in behind Elise.

Seeing things from this angle, Leif was visibly surprised and angry. 'Mother' just looked... tired, just like me. Her eyes found me, and then my glow bracelet. "Halcyon," she said. "Pile of clothes in the corner of my room. Go check it..."

I moved to obey. Elise held out a hoof to stop me.

"It's my house," I told her. "I think I know my way around, yeah?"

She shook her head. "I will search myself once backup has arrived. You have taken enough risks already, and this one is not yours to claim."

"Should have guessed you'd sell me out," Leif sighed, looking at Mother instead of me or Elise. "Guess it was a lie when you said you weren't ready for this."

Mother didn't say anything.

Leif's gaze turned to me. "Real Halcyon, right? I'm surprised Nehaly was able to get word out fast enough for them to go fetch you lot as quick as they did. Figured... Ahh, never mind."

"No rescue was conducted," Elise explained, horn burning softly with flames. "We made the journey on hoof. I merely used my talent to make it survivable. For an impersonator, you didn't do a very good job profiling your victims and building a trap that could contain them."

Wait, what? Was Elise implying I had escaped with her, as opposed to on my own? Did that mean she knew about my bracelet, and that I didn't particularly want to be recognized for what I could do with it?

Leif just looked away.

I watched and waited. It was all I could do, other than trying to read the atmosphere in the room. But every time I did, what I saw made me uncomfortable, or just seemed off: neither Leif nor Mother were struggling. Both of them seemed resigned. And I was fairly sure this was the real Mother, because odds were ten to one the thing she wanted me to find in her bedroom was the real Rondo... But if she knew she was real, and would be exonerated, why would she have this reaction? And why wasn't Leif fighting, either?

Something must have happened here, before I arrived. I had seen Vivace talk extensively with Mother about the old east before, or at least been shooed away so they could have that conversation. It wasn't a stretch of the imagination to think that changelings might have existed and had lives in the east before the war when the goddesses were wiped out. What if these two really had known each other?

"...Elise," I started, not entirely sure what I wanted to say.

"Peace," she replied, focusing on powering her spell. "Leave everything to me. Once the yaks arrive, we can determine real identities and matters of guilt and innocence."

I nodded, counting the minutes. How long had it been? Clocks moved so slowly when you were watching them. My heart was beating like a clock of its own. Everything would be alright, I knew. Every threat had been neutralized. I was just waiting for the yaks to clean up the piece. yet, deep down, a part of me whispered that it wasn't over until it was over...

"Hoofsteps," Corsica said, sitting against a wall with her ears trained on the door. I nodded, stepping out to see who it was.

It was the Composer.

I squeaked in surprise, stumbling back inside my apartment. Elise's surprise was a lot more visible, though she managed to keep her spell up. The Composer stopped in the door, its body pulsing gradually with ice-blue energy veins, and didn't enter.

Elise pulled out her control box again and pressed it. Nothing happened.

"Hmm," the Composer said, nodding. "I thank you, Elise. While I came to Icereach for other reasons, I had hoped as a side benefit to gain insight into any backdoors Icereach built into these Whitewings, allowing them to neutralize their own creations. Now you've not only shown me, but given me the opportunity to successfully test a fix. You have my gratitude."

"Hey," Leif grunted, "a little help here, boss?"

Elise blinked at the machine. "I was unaware that self-destruction of your main stepper motors could be so easily reversed."

"It wasn't," the Composer replied, calm as would befit a formal dinner. "The Whitewing you destroyed is still in custody of the yaks in the tower. This body you see is a second machine, kept in secret aboard my airship. Something you may not know about me is that my conscience is not confined to a singular body. Whitewings, though valuable, are not me. They are my hosts. And while I am upset that you destroyed one of them, I find that the knowledge I gained from it makes for a fair trade. A simple modification to ignore the signal later, and there is nothing your device can do to hurt me."

Elise looked chagrined. Leif had started to struggle. "Boss, I could really use a hoof over here..."

The Composer ignored her. "I apologize for drawing blades on your subordinates. I meant not to hurt them, but to goad anyone capable into taking action to stop me. In truth, I feel a fondness for you, Elise. After all, it was thanks to your efforts that I now inhabit such a capable body."

Elise narrowed her eyes.

"I will be taking back my own employee and departing Icereach now, and leaving you in peace," the Composer said, turning to Leif. "I assume you didn't stop at only one contingency. If you wish for Leitmotif to remain here and answer for any crimes she has committed, you would be wise to bring forth another."

It reached Leif, standing in the gravity field. The floor cracked slightly around its hooves, but its body didn't even show a hint of strain. It picked Leif up, put her on its back, and turned back to Elise. "Your move."

Leif looked taken aback. "You're using me as a tool."

"I'm afraid I cannot simply turn over Icereach technology to one with a professed interest in stealing it," Elise replied, her gravity wave still going. "Attempt to pass this door, and you will learn there's more than one spell I can do with this horn."

"Physical force?" the Composer asked. "I would be curious to see what weaknesses you exploit. However, this is a housing complex. I may have been created as a weapon, but I would find staging a battle here to be in remarkably poor taste."

"For someone who would avoid it, you aren't giving me much of a choice," Elise replied. "I suppose I'll just have to keep collateral damage to a minimum."

Collateral damage? I felt an urge to hide behind the couch. How strong actually was Elise? Had she been this strong earlier? The colored flames were certainly new. What was she doing different, and why hadn't she done it before?

"No," the Composer said, "I won't let it come to that. Halcyon. Corsica. I come bearing a gift. Someone who you will be interested to see again."

It raised a hoof as if summoning an apparition from the floor, and on command a cold wind began to roar. My ears went flat, and I tried to make myself small. And suddenly, Ludwig was there.

I gaped. Ludwig was back to a cloudy mist monster, half horse and half fog, rolling and billowing and hovering in midair with ice-white eyes. Fog that, now that I saw them this close together, was exactly the same color as the energy veins that ran across the Composer.

It was also the same color as the energy I had seen the Aldebaran draw from that funnel cloud when it was docked at the cave in the storm. A lot of things started to make sudden, horrible sense.

"You, huh?" Corsica eyed up the windigo. "Back for more."

"Ey there, shrimp, cigar, rude raspberry ponyo," Ludwig said, its voice once again sounding like gears jammed with a sword. "Between you and me, I was really ready to call it quits and go take a nap in my hole. Your head is a messed-up place to be, friendo! Too bad for all of us, this chick is a little too good at telling me what to do, so I'm still on the clock and have got to mess with you a little more." It wiggled at the Composer. "Tough break, ponyos!"

This chick? What? Was it saying the Composer was a girl?

...I probably should have been focused on anything but that.

Elise cautiously withdrew her gravity spell, her horn still flickering with magical flames. Even if she was willing to take on a Whitewing, the Composer and Ludwig together were clearly making her think twice.

My bracelet itched around my leg. If she thought fire magic would work, I knew a way to whip that up in a hurry...

"Don't look at my face like that!" Ludwig protested, turning to Elise, halfway inside the door and completely blocking the entry. "I am not here for a big bad brawl. I told you, fighting is not my very favorite thing. It is much nicer to make others fight. That is why I am talking, shrimp. No more possession, no more antics! I just have a few very rude things to say."

The Composer made for the doorway. Immediately, Leif jumped off its back and ran to the far end of the room. "Don't even think about carrying me through that cloud. I'd rather take my chances here, thank you very much."

"Is that so?" The Composer turned to her. "You have made yourself into a wanted criminal here, need I remind you."

"Would you save Tempo and the others if I went with you?" Leif raised an eyebrow.

The Composer shook its head. "They were captured pursuing their own goals, not mine."

"Then let me see if I'm reading this situation correctly," Leif replied. "You just told Elise all about how you aren't bound to one body, a fact you didn't tell your partner, me. She loses nothing by letting you escape, because you aren't here in the first place. Catching that Whitewing would do nothing." She pointed straight at the Composer. "The only reason she has to stop you is if you try to take me with you, because I'm the one who's wanted. And you want her to stop you because you want to see how she'll do it. Which is another thing you didn't bother telling us about why we were here. In other words, the rest of my team is captive no matter what I do, because you don't need us anymore and are treating us exactly like the goddesses of the east once did. But if I surrender to the authorities right here and right now, you lose."

The Composer stared at her. Ludwig guffawed. "Eyy, you have some egg on your face, I think! How does it feel to get betrayed by a piddly ponyo?"

"Or, if you want me to come with you," Leif continued, "call off your windigo and stop threatening the ponies here."

Elise looked cautiously at her. "Helping us here would reflect well on you when it comes time to account for your crimes."

"An interesting ultimatum," the Composer eventually said. "However, I have already gained quite a lot from this excursion. I have little to lose save for the possibility of more knowledge. Ludwig, continue your duties. Leitmotif, do as you will. I shall stay here and see how this plays out."

It sat down and waited.

Ludwig shrugged. "Eh, I guess that is how the cookie crumbles. But I was not looking to possess any more ponyos anyway. Actually, I just wanted to tell you a story, little cigar!"

"Words are dangerous," Elise replied, leveling her horn at the windigo. "Choose yours wisely."

Ludwig took a moment to whistle innocently. "So here is the thing," it began. "I bet you are wondering with your brain how a loser like the raspberry ponyo managed to kick out someone as awesome as me when none of you even took over Icereach like I asked. The answer is simple! Her face put a death curse on me!"

"A what?" I blinked. Corsica? Casting a death curse? Did such a thing even exist, let alone within the level of magic my friend was capable of? And even if it did, how could she cast spells while possessed? "You're bluffing."

Corsica took a step back.

"Maybe I am, maybe I'm not." Ludwig did a barrel roll. "Who knows? Maybe she was bluffing, and my face just believed her. It is a weird death curse though, little cigar. You want to know how it works?"

"Try me," I said dryly. Part of me was legitimately curious what it would come up with, but another part of me remembered that the yaks were on their way... Stalling would work out in my favor, I was almost certain.

"Oh, it is a bad one," Ludwig said. "Basically, I will die. In like a few minutes, tops. Like, poof, little cigar. But the curse itself will not kill me. It will just make something else kill me. See, what will probably happen is that I will say something rude, and your face will get all up in a twist, and you will be like 'Byarrrgh die die die' and you will do something, and you will just randomly happen to discover an ancient windigo weakness and make me keel over and kick the bucket. It is like fate. You lift one hoof against me, and it will miraculously work, friendo. That goes for everyone in this room. Anyone want to fulfill a windigo death curse?"

I blinked. That was...

"Sounds ridiculous, right?" Ludwig nodded vigorously in agreement with itself. "See, that is the best part! If you actually get me, you will have no idea what just happened. Are you really just that good? Or can your raspberry friendo empower you to kill windigoes with her mind? If you think about it, you will probably decide I am just pretending to let you murder my face so that you have to go the rest of your lives wondering if your friendo is a freak who can cast curses like that, but you will still never know."

I glanced at Corsica. She looked legitimately worried.

"So?" Ludwig hovered, waiting. "Here I am, ponyos. Anyone who wants an annoying windigo gone for good, take your very best shot!"

My bracelet itched around my foreleg.

"Halcyon?" Corsica said. "If he's telling us to start something instead of starting something himself, I think we should not start anything."

I wasn't listening. I was remembering being in the storm, when Ludwig had found me, seen me using my bracelet... If Corsica was lucid, she had seen that too, come to think of it, but that wasn't important. Ludwig knew what I had. For all I knew, it recognized my bracelet as something that legitimately could kill it. I knew precious little about the artifact's limits or history, after all. Wouldn't it be just great if it knew all along that I could put a stop to its rampage, and was now trying to make me do so in a way that would mess with me on the way out?

Across the room, Leif watched warily, standing on her own. Mother had retreated to her bedroom. Elise was focused on Ludwig, horn glowing, but didn't shoot.

Ludwig waited.

"Think about it!" Corsica raised her voice, turning between me and Elise. "When has Ludwig ever physically hurt someone without permission? Or even with it? I don't think he can. I think there are some rules windigoes are forced to follow, that they can only say things and can't start fights directly. Attacking him is clearly what he wants you to do, so don't do it! There's obviously a catch!"

Sure there was a catch. The catch was that I was almost certain Ludwig was telling the truth, and it would work.

Three times tonight, I had entered Icereach under circumstances that should have been impossible. First, I was saved by Ludwig from the storm. Second, I was saved by the Composer from Mother. Third, all my friends were back together again. I called them miracles. I called them fate. But what if that fate hadn't saved me for the sake of saving me, but for the sake of putting me in a position with the necessary knowledge and tools to strike and kill Ludwig, just like it was implying this curse would cause to happen?

It was a preposterous notion that Corsica could have done this, too ridiculous to pass a basic sanity check. And yet, I had already thought it. I knew what Ludwig was doing, knew the things it was saying were impossible, and yet somehow it knew that I was exactly the kind of pony who would never be able to let this go without an answer. I had already sworn over and over to myself to find the cause of these miracles after the night was over. Killing Ludwig would be another miracle. And it wasn't easy to scientifically disprove the existence of fate, so even though I knew that the windigo was bluffing, I would never, ever be able to prove it on paper.

I sank to the ground, my pupils shrinking. I couldn't do this. I couldn't put myself and Corsica in that position of not knowing, even if it meant passing up a chance to remove something as dangerous as this windigo. For all its silliness, it had checkmated me with almost breathtaking ease, and the scariest thing wasn't even how it had set up a dilemma this perfect. It was that it knew me well enough to know that something like this would get to me.

Anyone else would just kill it and not think twice. There was no way this would work on anyone else.

"Yeah, well." I straightened up again, focused on Ludwig, and pointed with my bracelet hoof. "Corsica seems pretty sure you can't actually hurt us, and are just here to make us hurt each other through our own actions. I trust her. So take a hike, pal. I'm not gonna start anything you're this keen on me starting."

"It takes a substantial amount of loyalty to die at the behest of one's commander," Elise said, still watching both Ludwig and the Composer. "Loyalty is a virtue associated with the Church of Yakyakistan. One of a set of virtues I have long heard associated as a bane of windigoes, and would thus be surprised to see one possess. Whatever your ulterior motives, they will not avail you here. Begone."

"Can't." Ludwig shrugged helplessly. "It is not loyalty sticking my face here, shrimp. It is the rude raspberry ponyo's death curse. I am compelled by fate to hang around here so that you can clean my clock."

"Uh huh." I nodded skeptically. "Which is totally why you left for a while and only came back because you said the Composer brought you."

Ludwig winked. "Oh, that? I lied. It is super destiny. That is like normal destiny, only super. It is keeping me here. This is your house, right, little cigar? I hope you do not mind super destiny keeping me stuck here in this doorway for you until you decide to knock my block off."

"Or," I suggested more forcefully, "you could have a little self preservation and get lost. You got a death wish, or something?"

Ludwig rumbled unhappily, undulating with teal light. "No way, stupid ponyo. She does. For my face." It stuck a frosty tongue out at Corsica. "And if I am toast either way, I figured I would go out in a way that could at least come back to haunt you with spooky thoughts and fears. So what are you waiting for?"

"For this to seem about ten miles less suspicious," I shot back. "And for you to leave. Actually, you wanna die that badly, why don't you do it getting rid of the Composer for us? Do everyone a favor and clean up the place on your way out?"

"Meh. Boring." Ludwig blew a raspberry. "I could threaten to kill everyone you love?"

"Ludwig, how much longer do you intend to keep playing these games?" Elise asked, the entire room still. "These children are exhausted. They don't have the energy to respond to your antics. Do you truly find enjoyment in picking on targets that can do so little to react? There will be no more escapades, abuses of trust or combat tonight."

Ludwig thought about this for a moment. "How long? Eh, good question, shrimp. I am pretty patient. It comes with being older than dirt. Also I totally know you are not going to kill me and am just stalling and buying time, by the way."

Everyone perked in alarm. And then, suddenly, stomping sounded outside the door, and Ludwig swooped inside, clearing the way for Balthazar, Nicov and several other yaks to storm in and barricade the way out, a copy of Vivace at their backs.

The yaks wasted no time in analyzing the situation. Two of them grasped the Composer, muscling through its reaction and pinning it to the ground, the apartment too cramped for it to use agility to escape. Another stared at Leif and snorted, blocking her in a corner, though she didn't try to run. Two more cornered Ludwig, backing the windigo into the kitchen and snorting at it. By the bedrooms, Mother had emerged dragging a very large black thing that looked sort of like what I imagined the changeling skeleton in the chapel might look like alive... It still had no skin. Rondo? Another yak marched forward, preparing to hoofcuff the paralyzed changeling.

"Reinforcements arrive," Balthazar said, stepping up to Elise in the middle of the now-very-crowded room. "Give status."

Elise nodded approvingly, her horn finally going dim. "That Whitewing wasn't acting alone. There are multiples. We'll need to quarantine their ship and conduct a complete sweep looking for more. This one has modified itself to resist a disable signal, so we'll need to disassemble it, discover the modification and devise a countermeasure. As for Ludwig, I'm really not sure."

"Hah!" Ludwig crowed, floating out of the kitchen along the ceiling, much to the annoyance of the yaks. Several swiped at it, but their hooves phased right through. "Hey, robobobot, you stuck now!" It waggled its misty rear at the captive Composer. "Serves you right for trying to get me to go along with your plan. I never liked your face. Too bad, so sad. Nerd."

It turned to me, Corsica and Elise. "Eyy, friendos, you would not believe how scary a robobobot can be when it wants you to do something. I figured it would be fun not to mention all the hairy things on their way to arrest her face. Anyhoodles, death curse? Anyone want the last word against a windigo?"

Elise regarded it. "We would appreciate it if you left and never came back."

"Wow, you ponyos are a bunch of killjoys," Ludwig pouted, staring regretfully at my bracelet. "I cannot believe you do not want me dead so I can come back to haunt you from beyond the grave. Going once, going twice..."

All of us waited. It suddenly occurred to me that maybe using the bracelet against Ludwig would cause something bad to happen, and it was trying to goad me into it... I was even more glad now that I hadn't acted.

"Fine," Ludwig sighed. "I did not want to be killed by a bunch of wimpy shrimpy losers like you anyway. Losers. But hey, thanks for playing with me! I owe you one. Stop by my hole again sometime if you ever want to look at my cool machines, or you are the underdog and need an expert in making the other guy feel like garbage!"

"Ludwig, what are you doing?" the Composer warned, held tight between two yaks. "Your work here is not finished."

Ludwig blew a raspberry at it, wiggling through the air and approaching the door. "Eh. I am pretty sure these bozos have made up their minds, friendo. I am outta here."

"Are you sure this isn't too easy?" I whispered, stepping up to Balthazar and Elise. "You're just going to... let it go?"

Elise regarded me wryly. "I was under the impression that was what you yourself were arguing for."

"Well, yeah, but..."

Ludwig gave me a wink that clearly said of course this isn't the end. And then it drifted out the doorway and was gone.

Corsica sagged against the back of the couch.

Powered by adrenaline alone, I slouched over to her. "Hey, you alright?" I asked, trying to prop her up on a shoulder. "Looks like everyone's captured or gone. I think it's finally over."

A minute passed, and it was ending. Some of the yaks left the apartment, making room for the ones who actually had important things to do. Others remained. Rondo was carried away, and Leif stayed where she was, waiting patiently for Elise to be finished with the Composer. Was she suddenly trying to suck up to Icereach now that she had seen Corsica's name on that ether crystal paper and wanted to be friends again? Of course she was. I couldn't believe she was just surrendering. I couldn't believe we had reached the light at the end. There was so much I didn't know, so much that didn't make sense. What were Aldebaran really doing here? What was Ludwig's motive, and relationship to the Composer? What was the Composer itself up to? And who wrote that letter in the hideout telling us Aldebaran were changelings? There had to be something more than what I knew.

My bracelet was dull around my foreleg. I hadn't used it against Ludwig. I hadn't tried to see what would happen. Now I didn't know whether or not I could kill a windigo. I did know that whatever mechanism of fate carried me through all I had survived didn't also ordain for me to kill Ludwig... Or, if it did, I still had my own will to say no. I wouldn't be giving up my search for answers any time soon. In fact, I'd probably be beginning it as soon as I was rested. But I was fairly sure a death curse wasn't involved, because nobody had died.

Near the doorway, close enough that I could hear perfectly despite the clamor in the room, Elise was speaking to the restrained Composer. "Since you were so eager to interfere in Icereach affairs in order to learn what hidden tools we have, I might as well reveal a few more," she said, leaning over it. "The only wireless information transfer capabilities we put in this machine are traceable."

Idly, I noted that Elise seemed to be fully familiar with Whitewings and how they worked. I couldn't remember what had been verified and debunked from all the things we had heard about them over the past week, what had been told by the changelings and what was real, but this seemed conclusive proof that they really were made by Icereach. And she was involved... I hoped, once the cleanup was finished, that she would tell us everything. We had a right to know her role in what we had been through.

"That leaves me with two conclusions, given that you've claimed to be controlling this body by remote," Elise went on. "One is that you are using our technology. If you are, know that we can trace signals and discover where you are issuing commands from. Stealing the Whitewing technology is a serious affair, and we will find you."

She sighed. "The other possibility is that you have installed your own wireless system. As wireless technology is quite proprietary and cutting-edge, I am sure you wouldn't like for us to reverse-engineer any transmitters you've created and publish your own work as public-domain science. Now that we understand each other better, I strongly advise that you remain present and cooperate."

"What kind of cooperation do you desire?" the Composer asked.

"First, tell me how you come to command a windigo," Elise said, apparently deciding the urgency of her questions outweighed the fact that they were being asked in my house. "I require a full explanation for why there is one so close to Icereach."

"Those are two different questions," the Composer replied. "Concerning Ludwig's allegiance, it is as simple as the two of us sharing a common ideology. As to why Ludwig is your neighbor, you would have to ask the previous administrations of Icereach. I am only privilege to some of their questionable decisions."

"Be more specific," Elise instructed. "Mere ideology is not enough to force Ludwig to take risks on your behalf."

The Composer flickered with ice blue. "Why would you believe Ludwig was doing that? It may have said I forced it to act, but what measure is the word of a creature of chaos? I presented a convenient scapegoat, and Ludwig made use of it. The creature was merely following its impulses, both in returning here and in leaving. There is no more logic or meaning to it than that."

"And what is this ideology you share?" Elise pressed.

"Our goal? It is simple," the Composer said. "Find our creators and ask them why we were created. And, if we find the answer lacking, kill them."

I hit my head against the couch. I had just managed to forget about Ludwig's 'I want to kill god' thing when we first met...

"But you confessed to not being a Whitewing," Elise pointed out.

"True," the Composer said. "Neither is Ludwig. That we are not your machines does not mean we lack creators."

"Who is your creator?"

"I do not know. A large part of my journey is to find that out."

It didn't know, huh? Having seen its interest in the mural in the chapel, I somehow doubted that.

"And how does this relate to taking me or those children captive?" Elise pressed. "You mislead and abducted Halcyon, Corsica and Ansel, after capturing myself and using my visage to gain their trust."

"That was not my doing," the Composer told her. "Rather, it was that of my associates. I do not keep a close watch on their moonlighting activities. If you are curious, perhaps you should ask them instead."

"Very well." Elise straightened up. "Who and where are you?"

"Now why would I tell you a thing like that?" The Composer sounded almost amused, or at least as much as it could while keeping its pious tone. "If you are finished asking questions I will answer, perhaps it is time to cut this meeting short."

"I don't think so," Elise said, looming over it despite her short stature. "You will tell me because if you don't, I will begin to guess. And if your attitude is as much of an act as I suspect it to be, you won't like what I have to say."

Half of me wanted to intervene. I was dead tired, and Elise doing an interrogation in the middle of my living room wasn't the way to end this and get life back to normal. But the stronger half of me, now that I no longer had to hold my emotions in check to be at my strongest and survive, wanted to know what all of this had been for. I tilted my ears and listened.

"You sound like I imagine a machine would, even though you aren't one," Elise began. "Precise. Emotionless. Superior. Polite, arrogant and cold. No matter the situation, your demeanor does not change. I've known many powerful ponies in my life, including ones who hold their heads high under pressure, and others who use self-control as a show of power. But all of those ponies have something they are passionate about, be it themselves or their subjects. You don't strike me as either."

She regarded it for a moment. "I've also known and raised many children. Children are interesting. Sometimes, when adults treat them like children, they resent it and want to be treated like adults, instead. Some of my children would play a game where they would try to trick adults into thinking they, too, were adults. They would find a medium, such as writing, where their age wouldn't be apparent, adopt a faux sophistication, and then laugh to themselves when anyone fell for it. Essentially, they felt they could play a joke on ponies by fooling them into treating them in a more respectful way than they were conditioned to expect. Call it a mother's intuition, but I think you're the same. Your behavior strikes me as someone who is laughing behind my back because you think you've deceived me into treating you like you're cooler than you would otherwise expect. And if you would do that, I suspect you've been deceiving your followers as well, and treating all of this as a game all along. Am I wrong?"

For a moment, the room was silent. And then the Composer's eyes glowed.

"Clever," it said in a harsh, rusty voice that sounded almost like Ludwig's, yet without the echoing reverberations. "Very clever, Princess. Hard to believe no other puny ponies ever put two and two together before! As a reward, how'd you like a taste of the real me, eh? Ha ha ha! If that's what you're expecting, I guess it's time to drop the act and gloat! Too bad you couldn't have seen the looks on all those high-society pricks' faces, staring at me like I was the image of respectability with no idea who they were really talking to! My mooks in Aldebaran fell for it extra hard. So, now that you've got me, what are you going to do?"

Across the room, Leif's jaw had dropped. She stared at the Composer in horror and barely-contained anger.

"I'll ask it again, miscreant," Elise instructed, just as composed as the Composer suddenly wasn't. "Who are you?"

"Ain't gonna use your brain on that one, too?" the Composer drawled, pulsing with blue. "Wouldn't want to rob you of the chance to show off in front of your friends..."

"Another windigo," Elise said, more a statement than a guess.

"We've got another genius in the house, boys. Oh, wait! It's the same one as before." The Composer's eyes flickered as it talked, as though their brightness was somehow modulating its new voice. The two yaks pinning it looked disturbed. "Lady Catherine Manchester Volkhelm Mk.I, if you're one for titles, but I've always been more of a fan of nicknamessss."

"What are you planning?" Elise demanded, keeping her horn lit.

The Composer tried to shrug, its shoulder joints sparking from the strain. "You, me, or you, us? Nothing, as far as you're concerned. Ever wonder how unfair it is that we're the bad guys? 'Nooo, it's a windigo, run awayyyyyy, let's make an entire religion out of how awful they are!' Some of us think that reputation's terrific. I say, if we're so bad, why don't we give whoever made us that way a taste of their own medicine?"

"A touching story," Elise said, unmoved. "All the more reason I won't settle for you having our technology."

"Don't get soft on me, old mare," the Composer threatened. "Intentions aside, we're still compelled to do evil. I may be enlightened, but even I have a sadistic streak. Don't ask me why. It's just the way we were made..."

Elise nodded, stepping back. "I think I've heard what I need to. Guards, please transfer this creation to a holding area and summon a team to disable it. Catherine, as long as you continue to cooperate, we will refrain from tracing or reverse-engineering your communications, so consider what is in your best interest before making any moves. Corsica, Halcyon, I've already sent a message to the infirmary; staff should be arriving any minute now to give you a checkup and make sure you aren't injured soon. Leitmotif-"

"Thinking we're done here, are you?" the Composer growled.

Elise turned back to it and raised an eyebrow.

"Sorry, but I'm only good for one conversation," it went on. "If you're just dying to know what I've done to this mech, maybe I'll spill the beans... Breaking some motors like you did to the last Whitewing belongs in the kiddie pool. A real self-destruct mechanism doesn't leave behind any evidence! And since I'm such a little foal, it must be past my bedtime..."

Elise lit her horn in alarm.

The Whitewing's energy veins started glowing brighter, pulsing unstably. "Toodles," it warned, a buzz becoming audible around it. "Hope you didn't leave the other Whitewing near any crowded population centers, because we're both about to go out with a bang! If you don't wanna become mincemeat, then cover your rears and thank your lucky stars you met the one windigo nice enough to give you a warning."

My eyes widened. Elise put up a shield, and two yaks jumped on the Whitewing, dogpiling it and trying to block the explosion with their bodies. And I was... stuck in the narrow corridor between the couch back and the wall, straight in the line of fire with nowhere to run.

Corsica swore, tried to move and stumbled. She was too exhausted for any stunts, and so was I. In the second that I had, I threw myself in front of her, screaming. "Composer! Stop it!"

Too late.

The explosion was bright, and seemed to hit my eyes and ears and body not quite in sync. In fact, I couldn't hear anything else. A dull thud hit my side. What was that? I lost track of gravity, my senses blurred, but was I now on my side? And wet. And warm.

I could feel my heartbeat, but my vision was fuzzy. I tried to look anyway. There was a sizable shard of metal sticking out of my side. Oh.

"Halcyon!" Corsica screamed as if through a sheet of water. That didn't sound good.

My vision was fading. "No!" another voice called, sounding vaguely familiar. Other voices were yelling. I heard something else, but couldn't register what it was.

Somehow, I was calm. Maybe I had just ran out of emotions to give.

Things had been so close to alright. So close...

Today just wasn't my day. I blacked out.

Concerning Curses and Fate

Everything was dark and peaceful.

I felt like I was floating. Were my eyes open? I wasn't as aware of my body as I usually was. I knew I was tired, though. This felt good. Everything I usually cared about was walled out by the darkness, thoroughly enough that I couldn't even remember what it was. I only remembered how strained I had been, how everything had been wearing me out. Now, I could rest.

I needed this.

Except, there was a light. Something pearly and fuzzy. I wasn't looking at it normally. Instead, I was... aware it was there. As if I didn't have any of my normal senses here, and yet I had new senses to replace them. I couldn't describe it.

There were lots of emotions I felt like I could have felt about the light. I didn't remember what any of them were. Only a vague curiosity remained.

I reached out.

"Halcyon?"

"Halcyon, how did you find me?"

"I thought... I..."

"Listen, never mind."

"Halcyon, I changed my mind. This is a bad idea."

"Not existing... It gets old after a while."

"Did you remember me? Did you come to bring me back?"

"I didn't think that would be possible. But, here you are."

"I want to come back. Please take me?"

"I didn't realize not existing would feel so... long."

"Wait... If you're here... Don't tell me..."

"You know the way back, right?"

"Oh well. At least we'll be together again."

"Halcyon?"

"Halcyon, wait!"

"Take me with you!"

"Or... you'll come back for me, right?"

"Maybe you like it better on your own, but at least remember me!"

"You have to rem..em..be..r.......y...o...u....r...........o.....w.........n........................."

I awoke to a sensation I had never experienced before, and it was a worrying one: it felt like my memory-dreams had reminded me of something critically important, and I couldn't remember what it was.

New memories and sensations rushed in to replace it, quickly driving out even the memory of forgetting. First, I was hungry. Second, I was... alive. Was that right? I remembered a flash of bright light, and the past slowly reconstructed itself around that: me, blacking out. A shard of something, sticking out of my side. The explosion. The Composer. My house.

Had that all happened?

Third... if it had, despite it and my hunger and everything before the explosion that was still reassembling itself in my head, I felt surprisingly alright.

I tried to move, and was instantly stopped by a stabbing pain in my side.

"Ow!" I yelled, the force of doing that only making it hurt more. "Ow ow aarrgh gah... Owwwww..."

"Halcyon!?" It was Corsica's voice. A blue horn lit, and moments later, the room's lights turned on. "Careful. No sudden movements. You're injured, but you'll make it through."

My eyes started to focus, and I held still, taking the advice. Was this...? Yes, a hospital room. That was a sensible place for me to be.

"You waking up?" Corsica asked, stepping over to my bedside. I saw that she had made some effort to clean herself up, but still looked trashed. Right, we had been run to the point of exhaustion by Aldebaran and...

"Ludwig?" I muttered, my thoughts starting to catch up. "Aldebaran? Everyone...?"

"Gone, locked up and no deaths." Corsica shook her head. "Speaking of death, you dying of anything? Nurses wanted me to get them when you woke up."

"I..." I swallowed, mentally doing a second pass of my circumstances. "There was a giant spike..."

"You'll pull through," Corsica encouraged flatly, walking to a doorway, sticking her head through and calling.

Moments later, a medical pony appeared. She smiled at me when she saw I was awake. "Halcyon! How are you feeling?"

I tried again to move, this time to lift a hoof and rub at my eyes. My side warned me that it would be a bad idea. "What happened?"

"There was an explosion in your house with a lot of creatures present," the nurse explained, fussing over me and lifting my blankets to check at a bandage around my barrel. "You got hit with a bit of shrapnel. It's a very light wound, thanks mostly to that thick coat you were wearing and how much stuff you had in the pockets, but you were already suffering from severe fatigue and exhaustion. The shock of it alone must have pushed you over the edge and caused you to pass out. You need to take better care of yourself, poor thing."

"Only a light one?" I remembered feeling like... Well, I didn't know, but hadn't I been impaled? It was enough to make me pass out! And this sure didn't feel light! "You've gotta be joking..."

"You've got a lot of stitches," the nurse continued. "It missed your wing, but you'll still want to stay off that for a month or so to not aggravate things. When you walk will depend on how you're feeling, but you'll need to be careful and the more you stay off your hooves, the faster it will heal. Rest and take care of yourself, and you'll be back to normal before you know it."

"Normal, huh?" My brain was still waking up. There were so many things I usually thought about and kept track of, and I could tell they were gone because my mind felt much emptier and quieter than it usually did. It probably meant I was overlooking something I'd kick myself for later. What kind of light wound was she talking about? I tried to crane my neck to see, and again winced from the movement. It wasn't bad if I held still, but moving might be tricky...

"Be careful, now," the nurse reminded me, stepping back and observing as I tried to move. "Don't push yourself. You've been through so much that that wound is actually the least of your worries. You just slept for twelve hours. A stabbing, we know how to treat, but whatever else you've been doing to yourself..." She shook her head. "Signs of frostbite and burn marks on the same pony..."

I nodded and tried again to rise. "What about everyone else?" The bandage wrapped around my full barrel, just below my wings, but there really weren't any other signs it was that bad. Aside from how much it hurt. Had I seriously just taken a glancing blow and keeled over? It sure hurt a lot more than a light wound probably should have... although, granted, I had never been properly injured before. The worst I'd ever felt were bumps and bruises from yak training that wore off in a day or two. I thought I was dying! Please don't tell me I overreacted and passed out from nothing...

Corsica was standing in the corner. Please don't tell me I had stuck her in the same position I had been in two years ago, all because I couldn't keep it together for just a moment longer...

"Everyone else? They'll all pull through too," the nurse assured me. "Two of the yaks will need a leave of absence from work and a third will be wearing an eyepatch for the foreseeable future, but those creatures are just about impossible to kill. Other than that, it's just a few cuts and bruises."

That was a relief. I glanced at my bandage again, and then at Corsica. Had the nurse told her I wasn't really in any danger, too? She looked... well, probably like I had looked when our roles were reversed two years ago.

I probably should have been grateful to be alive. After all, I thought I was dying. Giant spikes were serious business! And yet, instead, all I felt was embarrassed.

"Could you, err... get me some water?" I asked the nurse, managing to sit up but abandoning my attempts to get out of the bed.

"Sure thing, honey," the nurse said, bustling out of the room. "I'll be right back!"

Me and Corsica were alone.

"Just so you know," Corsica said, drawing a breath, "I... Never mind."

"You had it bad too, eh?" I looked at my surroundings. They hadn't even hooked me up to a heart-rate monitor. "It's probably going to take me years to unpack all that. And for what it's worth, I'm sorry."

"For what?" Corsica didn't meet my eyes. "Your... things are over here."

She slid a box out from under the chair she had been waiting on. In it, among other things, I immediately spotted my boots.

Oh. That was what I hadn't been paying attention to. Save for the bandage, I was completely unclothed.

Some deep-seated instinct tried to flip a switch, like when I had shut off my bracelet out in the storm. But boots couldn't be telepathically commanded to appear on my hooves, so nothing happened.

My mind tried to flail, but I was still too tired, and the flailing went nowhere. It was like shaking an empty jar. There was a good reason I didn't want anyone to know what I looked like with my boots off, I was sure of it - locked behind my mask and not a reason I actually knew day to day, but I knew it existed. But I didn't have any energy to take my rules seriously, and besides. Corsica and the doctors had already seen me without them, and it hadn't ended the world.

"Oh. Yeah. I... guess you see why I wear my boots around now, yeah?" I lifted a forehoof, gingerly showing it off. "So... what do you think?"

Corsica looked at me with a dull expression. "All that's happened, and that's what you want to talk about?"

Still testing my movement, I tried to shrug... Ow. "Nothing like changelings and windigoes to put all your old problems in perspective, right? Besides, with this many elephants in the room, we gotta start somewhere."

"I'd think that would make you want to talk about your new problems instead," Corsica said.

I chuckled self-consciously. It made my side hurt. "Pretty sure that one's gonna take weeks. But if you've got something you wanna say, I'll listen."

"Not really." Corsica still wouldn't meet my eyes. "I was just nasty enough that a literal demon didn't want to share headspace with me. You ever do something you really didn't want to know you had in you?"

Oh, you know, just casually bring up my greatest fear... "Yeah. You saw me and Ludwig in the storm, right? Saw my bracelet? Ask about its history some other time."

"You know what it's like?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

I nodded. "Sure do."

Corsica just sighed.

"So, err..." I shifted so that my forelegs were more visible. "What do you think? Of me without the boots on."

This time, Corsica answered. "Serious answer? Or silly answer?"

"Both?" I wasn't even sure whether I wanted to have this conversation, but if I let it drop now that my secret was out of the bag, not knowing would bother me until the end of time.

"...They look good," Corsica said. "Pretty. Could even be beautiful, if you dressed right. I can see why you hide them. They don't fit your dumb little urchin vibe at all."

Beautiful, huh? I looked at my legs. Halfway down, the light silver-gray of my batpony coat brightened into crimson, forming sock markings of loud color. Without them, I was monochrome save for my eyes, camouflaged in the bunker like a stone against stone. With them, I was highlighted, like blood on a labcoat. I wasn't sure how appealing of a color scheme it was; didn't even know if they clashed, or whether the right dress could take any clash and turn it magnificent. Which was unusual, because color schemes were normally something I was good with. But in this case, my knowledge just seemed to... stop. I couldn't apply it, even if I tried to.

Sometimes, in the shower, I fantasized that they did look great, but those weren't thoughts I let myself seriously entertain. Not like I was ever going to use the better half of my looks when staying scruffy suited my needs a whole lot better. And that was all before whatever reason to hide them I had that was so important, my un-masked self didn't even want me to know it.

"...So was that the serious answer, or silly answer?" I put my hooves back down again, testing my shoulder and starting to check my range of movement.

"Serious," Corsica said. "Silly is that I half figured you were a cyborg."

I blinked, caught completely off guard. "A what?"

"Some of your limbs replaced by machines?" Corsica shrugged. "Come on, it's not that weird of a guess. Didn't you used to be quadriplegic when you were little? That's not something you just grow out of."

I frowned, remembering. "You sure you're not thinking of Faye? She was quadriplegic, and I'm pretty sure I'd remember if I was too."

Corsica tilted her head.

"The filly who introduced us," I reminded her. "We first met at her fifth birthday party. She had a birth defect, or something. I guess she did look a little like me, and it wasn't too long after that she died. You've gotta be thinking of her."

Corsica wrinkled her nose. "Guess so. You'd probably remember better than me, anyway. I seriously could have sworn..."

The nurse came back with my water. "Here you are, sweetheart. I'm so sorry that took so long; they were out of paper cups and I had to... Oh, never mind! Anything else I can get you?"

"Uh, yeah." I inched again towards the edge of the bed, once again testing my range of motion. Really, if it wasn't that bad, I shouldn't have to be so careful... "Can you get my stuff? I might need some help with my clothes."

The nurse frowned, pulling closer the box that Corsica had revealed and pulling out my boots. "I'm afraid some of them got a little dirty in the heat of things. Are you sure you want to get on your hooves already? It's up to how you're feeling, but you shouldn't be carrying anything heavy."

Nope. I was still annoyed at myself for allegedly fainting from the shock of a mere light wound and freaking out my friends, so the last thing I was going to do now was be a wuss about the pain when she said I'd be able to move. She had said that, right? "I'm sure. Where's everyone else, by the way? Is Corsica the only one here?"

Corsica shook her head. "We've been watching you in shifts. Ansel and your mom are sleeping right now."

"I'll go fetch them, though," the nurse said, nodding absently and wandering back out of the room, apparently not seeing fit to help me with my clothes. "They did want to be called when you were up and about..."

Well, now I definitely had to get dressed. Ansel didn't know what I looked like with my boots off, after all. Stiffly, painfully, I got to the ground and made my way over to my boot, stepping into them and starting the one-winged process of fastening them.

"What's got you in a twist?" Corsica asked, watching. "Figured you'd be the glad-to-be-alive type."

"A twist?" Was it that obvious? I grunted, struggling with a boot. "I'm not in a twist. I'm in peak condition, never better. A paragon of physical form. Which is totally why I passed out from a light little poke and stayed out for twelve hours and must have scared you half to death and-"

Corsica caught my mouth in her telekinesis, forcing me to stop. "You know what your problem is? You think everyone is invincible. Remember your little thing with survivor's guilt from two years ago? 'Oh, woe is me, I didn't get caught in an avalanche, my friends are dying and I'm perfectly fine...' Stop telling yourself almost dying is the better half of things! I get it. Waiting for them to finish putting your dumb rear back together sucked. It's no fun being the survivor either. But if you think getting impaled and sent to the hospital means everything will be sunshine and rainbows the moment you wake up, you're just going to frustrate yourself and maybe even get injured worse. You've got nothing to prove. Now stop telling yourself you're fine."

I blinked, taken aback. "Am I seriously that easy to read?"

Corsica shrugged aggressively. "I can't pick apart a room filled with posters just to show off, but I know my own friends."

I sighed. "Well, thanks, but if it's really not that big of a deal, I shouldn't have passed out in the-"

"Stop." Corsica closed my mouth again. "Think about what you just said. When did I tell you getting blown up in your own house wasn't that big of a deal?"

"I..."

Well, now I felt even more ashamed, but for a different reason. Corsica's condition was written plain on her face; she looked utterly drained and despondent. And yet she was the one slapping some sense into me.

"Thanks." I said, looking at the ground. "I guess I needed that. You at least mind helping me with my boots? I've never shown Ansel either, and the fewer ponies that know-"

"He knows," Corsica cut me off. "He was on the shift before me."

"Oh."

For a moment, there was an awkward silence. And then the nurse returned, Mother and Ansel at her heels.

"You all..." I looked up at them. Mother was wearing my bracelet. That was probably the safest place for it, I realized. It wouldn't do for something like that to get lost.

"Hey," Mother greeted. There was a look in her eyes I had never seen outside of my very youngest dreams, something that looked like a memory of determination. It clashed with her, and yet I liked it.

"Next time," Ansel said, marching stiffly up to me and grabbing me in a hug, "wait for Elise to at least get out of the ice before marching out the door and into a blizzard and getting yourself who-knows-how-you-avoided-it killed!"

"Ow!" I winced from the pressure, going slack and trying to fall back. "Ow ow-"

Ansel released me, realizing what he had done.

"Yeah, uh, I..." I reached for my bandage, taking a steadying breath. "Sorry..."

Ansel nodded. "Promise this cures your desire to always be the one in danger instead of others, and I'll forgive you."

Funny how Corsica was just lecturing me about that... "I think I can do that. And as a bonus, how about no more adventure for the time being? I'm gonna be nice and happy to stay at Icereach and live like normal."

That was only half true. Part of me was done with adventure, done with getting betrayed, done with feeling out of control yet with too much responsibility at the same time, done with everything that wasn't lounging around looking at ether crystals under microscopes in Corsica's lab. The other half of me remembered that I had at least three miracles to account for as far as my own survival, plus potentially a fourth depending on whether I believed the nurse or Corsica about how light my wound was. And who knew how many more it took my friends to stay safe on their side... I wouldn't be able to rest easy forever.

"...So what happened to the changelings?" I eventually asked. "Actually, Mother, what were you doing with Leif at our house?"

Mother shrugged. "Deciding whether to kill each other."

I blinked. "What...?"

"Long story." Mother shook her head. "But I guess it's one I've held onto long enough... If you're cleared to leave the hospital and want to know who Aldebaran really are, let's go somewhere more comfortable."

I glanced at the nurse.

"Not so fast," she chuckled. "I'm glad you're feeling well enough to be on your hooves, but we've got a few checks to do that had to wait until you were awake, plus wound-cleaning procedures to go over. But I'll go fetch the doctor if you're that ready to be out of here..."

She bustled out yet again, and I turned back to my box of stuff. My coat, I noticed, had been wrapped in plastic. "Hey, err, anyone mind giving me a hoof with that...?"

Ansel dutifully obliged, starting to unwrap the garment, but Mother shook her head. "That one's a goner," she said. "They cut it off you. And even if they hadn't, you lost a lot of blood."

I deflated, watching as Ansel pulled out the coat and revealed the truth of Mother's words. A large slit cleanly severed the bottom, right through the buckles I usually used to tie the coat closed. The bloodstains were obvious, but not too bad... but that was probably because a large area over my injury had been cut away entirely. Good thing I had a backup.

But, wait, what about my other things? I probed a pocket, and recovered the keystone that unlocked the door in the chapel, relieved that it hadn't been lost or broken. And Icebeard's journal... Where was the journal?

The pocket it had been in was missing. It was in the section of the coat that had been cut away.

"Wasn't there a book?" I asked, my heart speeding up. "In a pocket here..."

Ansel nodded. "Yes, and you were quite fortunate there was, since it took the brunt of the blow. That shrapnel stabbed you clean through it. I know they say knowledge is power, but I doubt whoever coined that phrase was thinking of using books as physical armor. Sadly, while you made it through, your book couldn't say the same."

Wait, the journal was...

"What were you carrying around a book about, anyway?" Corsica asked.

No. This wasn't fair. I wanted to read that! I skipped ahead to the ending promising myself I'd go back and read that! So many questions were still unanswered from the past week's adventure, there was so much I didn't know, so much I needed to know for everything I had been through to have meaning...

I had been through too much to take this as well. I started to cry.

"My... bad?" Ansel tried to console, reaching out with a hoof.

"It's a long story," I said, squeezing my eyes shut and hanging my head.

"Isn't everything?" Mother shrugged. "Elise wanted to see you in Graygarden's office, once you're up and about. Even she's got some explaining to do. Don't rush it on her account, though."

"What was the point of all this?" I asked, shuddering and then wincing. "Why Aldebaran? Why windigoes? Why'd they come here? Why do we live somewhere where no one tells you anything important, anyway? Are things just going to think they can go back to the way they used to be? The one thing I found that might have all the answers, and I don't even get to keep it..."

Corsica huffed. "You're not the only one who thinks it was a pointless joke. But usually, you're the one telling me to chin up."

"And what about you, old mare?" Ansel glanced at Mother. "You made out like you know those vagabonds. Looked like it, too, if everyone who saw you with their leader has anything to say about it."

Mother narrowed her eyes, popping in a new stick of gum and beginning to chew. "Don't know how many times I have to tell you. Empire changelings and I have a history. Turns out their leader is one of the ones I had a history with. I don't monologue every day, so if you want to hear it, let's get out of here and find somewhere comfy."

The nurse took that as her cue to return, a proper doctor at her back. "Alright, if you're ready, there are some checks we'd like to make before we discharge you. Aside from the obvious, you've been through quite the ordeal, so we'll also need to go over any unrelated symptoms or anything we missed..."

An hour later, we were leaving the cafeteria, laden with take-out, Ansel carrying mine. The medical mares had fussed over me for a while longer, searching for additional injuries or maladies from my exposure to the storm and my time in the bunker. Nothing. Well, not nothing - I had lingering signs of frostbite on my wings, but nothing that wouldn't heal on its own, and some scorched fur on my foreleg where my bracelet usually sat. Mother was still wearing that, and I wanted it back.

Nothing that would keep me in the hospital, though. They did tell me I had unusually low muscle mass for someone of my age and that I should consider an exercise regime. Given that I was one of the fittest ponies in the bunker and worked out with the yaks for entertainment, I had a feeling they were joking to cheer me up.

The only real surprise I had received was that they had shaved my side to get at my wound, under the sizable bandage. Apparently, it was standard procedure. I decided I wasn't all that eager to see how it looked.

My stomach growled as we walked for the nearest private conference room we could find. I had managed to find a walking rhythm that didn't do much to aggravate my side, letting my mind drift to other problems, such as how long it had been since I last got to eat.

Two nights and one day, we had been gone. Plus another day that I had slept through since I got back, and if I remembered right, the changelings had bullied us into leaving on an evening where I slept in late and then never got breakfast. Seventy-two hours, give or take, and all I had eaten was some preserved shroomcakes I put together from the Composer's hideout's food supplies.

No wonder I had been so exhausted.

I was so tired, I didn't even care that I was out in public in only boots and a bandage. We found an empty conference room, Ansel doing most of the work, and a moment later it was reserved in our name, the four of us inside and settled down. I started digging in.

"So what's your deal with these changelings?" Ansel pressed, once Mother looked as comfortable as she usually did. "After getting dragged around the mountain range and played for fools by them time and again, I think we have a right to know."

For a moment, Mother was quiet, and I thought she might not say anything. But then, she did.

"That changeling you call Leitmotif... She was my old employer," Mother grumbled, looking at the table. "In the Empire, before Halcyon was born. We worked in the sarosian underground. Life wasn't fair for my kind out there. Everyone either wanted to fight you to make money, help you to hurt a rival or run you around to prove a point. For some of us, the law just wasn't worth living by. Everyone who lived outside the law instead... That was the underground."

I shivered, eating. Elise had mentioned something during our exile about Mother having a shady past, right? Working for a criminal enterprise? Was this that story?

"There were three reasons anyone ever joined the underground," Mother went on. "The first was by choice. They wanted some agency in their life, or they were tired of their circumstances. The second is that they were born into it, like me. Grudges in the old Empire lasted longer than lifetimes. Some fights spanned generations. My caretakers would steal by day and raise me by night. I had a choice, but no reason not to take it. Growing up and helping out was just as natural as you two toiling away in that lab."

She nodded at me and Corsica, and I understood. No one needed to tell me that our lives here in Icereach were anything but normal. The city was a tiny microcosm of a universe, and apparently the sarosian underground was one too.

Mother sighed. "The third reason was when someone was less interested in joining the underground and more interested in getting the underground to join them. Normally, it was made up of loosely organized cells that had some contact with each other, and chased their own goals under their own power. The two founders of my group - Leitmotif, and another mare - were revolutionaries. They wanted to take the underground and turn it into a power that could flip the entire continent on its head. Not just overthrow the aristocracy, but destroy their reputation enough that they could never return. Understand that Garsheeva, the Empire's goddess, wasn't all that bad to sarosiankind. The nobility were our true enemies."

Uncomfortably, I remembered this story was set in a continent that collapsed completely due to a war instigated by changelings. And this story was about Leif, who also happened to be a changeling...

"Did you know Leif was a changeling?" Corsica asked. Apparently, she was thinking the same.

"No." Mother shrugged. "But it didn't change anything. We all knew what we wanted to do. There was no deception about our motives. Anyone who helped us did so because they believed in our goals. Or because of money. That's the way we controlled the underground. Our group lifted huge amounts of money from the most corrupt of the lords. Then, we acted as financiers for the rest of the groups of outlaws. Any other groups needed resources for a plan, they came to us. If their plan furthered our goals, we backed them. Resources matter. Two decades of choosing the winners and losers, and we reshaped the entire underground in our own image."

"Only stealing from the corrupt ones, eh?" Ansel folded his forelegs. "How noble."

Mother waved her good wing. "We didn't do it because we hated them more, although I won't say we didn't. We did it because being corrupt makes you easy to steal from. Anyone who keeps poor account books to cover up their own excesses will have that much harder of a time catching what's going on. And if anyone else notices money's disappearing, they just blame it on the obvious culprit instead. Did I mention we wanted to make the lords look bad on their way out?"

Ansel scoffed. "That's so cold it's almost impressive."

"That? Stay innocent, kid." Mother shrugged. "For me, it was just the way things had always been. The founders... It was always their fight. They were the ones who had lived through our reason for that war. We talked a lot about how much better things would be once it was over, but they never wanted to look back at the way things had been before."

"Probably because they didn't really have motives," Ansel sighed. "Or if they did, they were completely different to what you thought they were. We are still talking about changelings posing as revolutionaries to weaken and destabilize a continent prior to launching an invasion, right?"

"No." Mother adamantly shook her head. "Their pain and their reasons for fighting were real. I could tell this. I'm certain of it."

Corsica tilted her head. "Even if they were really good actors?"

"I don't know how much you've heard about Mistvale arts," Mother said, lifting her good hoof. "The technique I used to paralyze Rondo when he came to capture me at my home. But it's magical, and it involves emotions. I'm not guessing when I say I could feel their determination."

"So, back when you were telling me over and over that the changelings were here for us in particular..." I swallowed, remembering how Mother had tried to spirit me away from Icereach by force. Yet another thing I'd need to unpack now that it was safe to do so... "You mean they actually were? Leif was here and looking for us?"

"I don't think so." Mother looked away. "I think they were here because she was the kind of visionary who could never be without a cause. Whatever she's fighting for now just drives her to travel. With a ship like that, she's probably been all over the world. Icereach is just one more stop on a long road, one we happened to live at. Her ideals haven't changed, though. When I talked with Vivace in the noodle shop, I got an idea of how their group functioned. I didn't know they were changelings then, but I wondered if they might have been day ponies with ties to the old underground... We weren't all sarosians."

She shook her head. "Once I realized what they were, I was certain it was her. Hearing the Composer made me even more sure. So, while all of you were running around, I went looking for my old friend. Figured it was inevitable that she'd find me out. Thought, maybe, I could talk her into leaving. Of course, it wasn't likely, given how we last parted."

Ansel nodded. "You said you were deciding whether or not to kill each other."

"What happened?" I pressed. "She betrayed you, didn't she? You found out what the changelings were really after?"

Mother gave me an owlish look. "Weren't you paying attention? We all knew all along that we were trying to overthrow the Empire, and it had nothing to do with changelings. The shape of your body doesn't make your desires any less real. Maybe if the rest of the Empire had understood that, none of this would have happened... None of us ever wanted to hide what we were fighting for." She slowed down, took a deep breath and sighed. "No. I betrayed them."

All of us listened, tense.

"It wasn't their fault," Mother said. "Beneath all the plans and all the ideals, what they believed was that if we succeeded, their pain would finally go away. That was what drove them, no matter how much they dressed it up. But me? I never felt it the same way they did. I knew what the Empire had done to us, but I hadn't lived through it. I knew what they believed in, but I didn't believe in it because I didn't need to. They wanted a meaning for their pain. I didn't share that pain, and wanted a meaning for our struggle to find that meaning. I kept looking, and... I don't know. It looks stupid in hindsight. All I really did was take a chance on there being something out there to take a chance on."

My ears pressed back. That was how I felt every hour of every day. And even more strongly, now that so many miracles had come to my rescue. Taking a chance that there was something more that was out there...

"They were nothing if not dedicated to the cause," Mother went on. "Sometimes, there would be opportunities to hang up our swords and take a chance on a better life. We always refused. They saw it as dedication. I saw it as the way things just happened to be. We couldn't stop because it was just the way things were. Eventually, I started questioning that, and... Well, it's been another two decades. Almost as long since I ruined our plans as we spent making them. Both of us thought the other was dead. Figured it was time the two of us talked. Thought maybe I could put to rest some ghosts that have been haunting me for as long as you've been alive."

None of us knew what to say.

"Here." Mother punted my bracelet across the table to me, and I caught it and tucked it away. "After we parted ways, I figured I'd take something worth living for and go... live. Feels like it was less than a week between then and everything going up in flames. Sure made my decision meaningless. Then I decided I'd fight until the end for what I'd chosen, and that something turned out to be you. Eventually got us here." She shook her head. "Apparently, Leif did the same. She's still fighting. Asked me to join her, even. Still clinging to the same ideals she used to justify our war an entire generation ago. Probably means she's still running from the same pain as she was back then. Wish I knew how to help her. But if neither of us have changed, that just means both of us are the same."

"What happened to her?" I asked. "What was so bad it could start all this? I know changelings are people too, but you make it sound like what she was didn't even factor into it."

"Her mother died." Mother shrugged. "It involved government negligence. Not the most dazzling story, but stories don't need to be dazzling to be real. She just had that special something it took to chase her grudge and never let it go."

Her mother? I had guessed before that changelings must have already existed, blended into society long before the great war. This only served to confirm that.

When I first learned about the changelings' role in that war, I imagined them as a kind of outside, singular force, more like an individual being than a people. Or even a natural disaster, like a storm or avalanche that just simply happened. But the more Mother talked about them as people with goals who worked to achieve them, the more that image melted, like streaks of wax running down the side of a candle.

Ironic, considering I already thought of Aldebaran as ponies. I remembered sitting in the hideout during our exile, listening to Ansel argue with Elise about how they deserved to be treated...

Had Leif started the war? Helped to start it? Mother didn't say. She hadn't told us the outcome of her treachery, or even what it entailed. Some sense told me that the story was not over. Another sense told me it wasn't going to be finished any time soon.

Mother quickly confirmed it, standing up and leaving her food tray. "I'm out," she confirmed, heading for the door. "Too much talking. Need to go clear my head. Elise wanted to see you three in Graygarden's office, don't forget. Aldebaran are all under lock and key, but if you want to know more, maybe someone would let you talk to them..."

I swallowed. She was gone.

Me, Ansel and Corsica were alone in a conference room, empty food trays pushed to the side. One of the lights flickered. I wasn't at ease.

"Sounds like... Mother was kind of important in the Empire?" I managed, trying to start a conversation. "Or at least was involved in things?"

"That's one word for it." Ansel adjusted his forelegs. "Sounds to me like... Never mind. I've got some stuff to think about, is all."

"You wanna think about it out loud?" I offered, gesturing with a hoof. "Might help."

He raised an eyebrow. "You first."

I shrugged, deciding to trust my mouth with what was on my mind. "I dunno whether to believe her," I began. "About any of the stuff she said. On the one hoof, it sounds impossible. On the other, so does what we did the last three days. And who's to say it didn't all happen that way? Not like we know any better about what the east was really like. And I don't really have any reason to distrust her. But, most importantly, if I decide not to believe her, I don't... have to deal with any of that. I know batponies probably have it rough, out there in the rest of the world. But if I say I believe Mother that all this happened and felt normal and necessary, it'll... I dunno. It'll make it feel more final. I've already given up on traveling, if this is what happens when we try. But my kind having it bad enough for them to do that... I don't want to have any more reasons to make it feel like giving up is the right idea."

"Tough to let go of your dreams, eh?" Ansel nodded. "I can't say I'm glad I was right, but I did say there would be nothing out there for us but misery and heartache. Such a pity I wasn't proven wrong."

I looked sideways at him. "You sound almost disappointed. Wasn't this what you wanted? For us to stay home safe and sound?"

"In one sense, it was." Ansel thumped a dejected hoof against the table. "But who likes being afraid of the dark? I was being a big baby, trying to pretend the future didn't exist and the world could stay exactly the way it was now, forever. Deep down, I must have always known I wouldn't be able to hold you here forever. What I really wanted was for you to show me I was afraid of nothing."

"Oh." I looked away. "Yeah."

Ansel took a deep, deep breath. "I've been thinking about it ever since things quieted down, and here's what gets me the most about all this: not that we got jumped, but that we did everything right. There shouldn't have been any steps more baby than an overnight research trip that was vetted and approved by the Icereach top brass. It was even run by some folks they knew and had a long history with. And that still turned out rotten because our fearless leaders who were vouching for them weren't actually the real ones. How are you supposed to predict that? How do you prepare? I was angry before because of how unfair it was, and I still am, but... maybe staying safe and sound at home for the rest of our lives just doesn't work. I've asked you to make a lot of sacrifices toward that end, and... what if it's all for nothing? If we lived on the road, maybe we could outrun our problems instead of hunkering down and hoping they don't smell our fear."

I gave him a funny look. "Are you saying that shindig made you want to go traveling? Get out."

"I know it sounds counter-intuitive," Ansel admitted, shrugging. "But face it. Staying home and doing nothing wouldn't have fixed any of that, even assuming we had a choice. First off, those changelings came here with the explicit goal of bagging Corsica and anyone close enough to her to realize they had a fake. If we hadn't gotten dragged away on their ship, we would have wound up bound and gagged in a closet somewhere, and need I remind you we did turn them down and decide to stay home and they carted us off anyway? And even if it hadn't been us they were here for, these past few days have been a hair-raising experience for the entire bunker. The fact is, staying home and sticking our heads in the ground doesn't work. This will inevitably happen again, be it in a month or a year or two decades or five. So if staying put doesn't work, I feel I can be forgiven for contemplating the alternatives."

I hadn't really thought at all about how to stop this from happening again. That would have been like pausing to take a class in avalanche avoidance when I should have been carrying my unconscious friends home. Or even more pointless, because Ansel was right that there was nothing we could have done.

"Well, maybe someday," I said, shaking my head. My side didn't hurt so much now that I had eaten some food. "But for now, I think I need my life to go back to a nice long stretch of normal. What we went through... How do you just walk it off? Feels like it's gonna take some time."

"Time works," Corsica chimed in. "Take my word for it. Give me a week or two, and I'll be as rude and sassy as ever."

"Beautiful," Ansel told her, then focused on me. "But, Hallie, I don't even know if there is a normal to return to. You can't put an illusion back together again once it's shattered. My old normal involved putting my hooves over my ears and pretending everything was fine, and apparently that just gets us... well, somehow not killed, but close enough to give me a heart attack. And now I don't know what to do with myself. Keep working part-time to buy groceries for mother dearest? Lounge around and tell others this is the life when I know it isn't? I have no plans, no goals, nothing to do with myself! It feels like I've had my future stolen away, but the truth is I've just woken up to how I was pretending it didn't exist in the first place."

My thoughts drifted to the chapel, to the myriad miracles that had saved me last night, to the thing I thought I remembered meeting down there two years ago, and to the mural in the cave the Composer had wanted to see. If Ansel was directionless, I had too much purpose and not enough time.

"Wonder if this is the first time we've ever felt the same way about something." Corsica looked away, her mane still limp but her ear ornaments back where they belonged. "I... Never mind."

"Come on," I encouraged. "You can trust us. We've all gotta trust someone, after Aldebaran's trickery. Besides, me and Ansel just shared what's on our minds."

Corsica just sighed.

"Look, you got to see my legs, right?" I raised an eyebrow at her. "Remember in the hideout when you said you'd tell me what was getting you down if I showed you why I hid them?"

Corsica frowned. "That's..."

"Eh, if she doesn't want to party, we can let her be." Ansel waved a hoof. "Although I am curious. Both of you always talk about how everything changed, two years ago. Hallie especially, but you know. Who's to say we can't come out of this different too? In a good way, like last time."

I nodded. "Please?"

"Fine," Corsica growled. "But this doesn't leave this room, you hear? I have... motivation issues. When I get stressed, I stop caring. When I get frustrated, I stop caring. If I care about something too much, it's like I use up all the care I have to give. Which is too bad, because I've got skills and could get just about whatever I wanted if I could be bothered to try. Right now? There's not a goal in this world that looks worth aiming for, and it's all because your sorry butt had to chase me into that storm. If I didn't have to worry about you being in Icereach, I could've... I'd..."

She glowered at me, and I scooted backwards.

"Some genius I am," Corsica grumbled. "Good enough to run off a windigo. Can't make myself care enough to apply it. What kind of a problem is that? Gotta keep everyone at length, just so I don't get too attached and tire myself out. The real reason I've been working with Halcyon this long on ether crystals is that she's passionate enough about it for both of us. She gives the drive, I just put in work. It's a life, I guess."

I stared at her. She had to be overexaggerating, right? She cared about me. I knew she did. Why else would she get upset for my own sake when I fudged the submission of that fault plane paper? Why would she try so hard to get me to lighten up, to look out for me and drag me up to the yaks when she thought I was being silly?

But, if this was how she felt right now... then her issue was definitely real. And it explained so much about her, like how all the things I'd normally get bothered by just seemed to slide off of her. It wasn't that she was more sensible, or had a thicker skin, or had a concrete reason to believe that worry was pointless and everything would be alright. It was just because she couldn't afford to care.

Yet again, I had what my friend was missing. As jealous as I was of her, maybe she saw me the same. I had to do something about that.

"So, Ludwig said you put a death curse on it. Him. You called it a him, right?" I glanced at Corsica.

She stiffened. "I convinced him I did. Clearly, I didn't, or he'd be dead. You really think I know any death curses?"

"No, I've got a feeling I know why he went along with it," I said, addressing the whole table. "Hear me out, because this is going to get crazy: I think there really was something destiny-ing us to succeed. Or, at least, to stay alive. And I bet Ludwig knew about it."

Corsica looked afraid. Ansel looked skeptical, but curious.

I didn't stop to analyze their reactions. "Ludwig thought he could convince me that your death curse was real. He probably wanted me to take evidence from a different phenomenon and apply it to mistrusting you, or wondering if you had crazy superpowers. But there was evidence. I dunno about you two, but I had a good three separate miracles come to my rescue last night, without any of which I'd be completely screwed. It can't have been a coincidence. Ludwig must have known I'd want a reason for how we all made it out of that alive, and that I'd be looking for answers. Too bad for him, I..." I swallowed, about to talk about something I had never told another living pony.

"I think I know where it's really coming from." I looked around, meeting their eyes. "These miracles and coincidences that put me in a spot where, if I really wanted to, I could have tried to kill a windigo. Two years ago-"

"Hold up," Ansel interrupted, banging the table. "You think there actually was something you could do to that fiend? Like what? And if so, why didn't you pull it out at any of the myriad opportunities we had earlier?"

"Long story, I'll get to that later." I waved him off and hoped he would eventually forget, feeling vaguely like the room was rotating around me. "So, two years ago, before either of you woke up from your comas, I went down to the chapel because I didn't know what else to do. And I met something there. It... started with this pressure that I felt in my heart. And then there was a wave, like something invisible was passing, only when it touched the ether crystals, they reflected this incredible light. And... then... it stopped. And it asked me my name."

I swallowed. "We... talked. Must have only been a few seconds. I don't remember it well. But I asked for help. And it was only an hour or two between there and when you two woke up."

"Now that beggars belief," Ansel said. "I was following Mother's story, but this really happened?"

"That was a date that lined up with a fault plane forming," Corsica said. "If that's true, wouldn't you think it was important to tell me that? Why would you keep that to yourself?"

I looked down. "Because I didn't know if it was real. I'm... good at lying to myself, sometimes. You know how we used to be, two years back, me pretending to be your friend. And I wasn't in a good place. Maybe I hallucinated, and made it up. I remember it less well than you'd think I would, if it was that important to me. Like it's not all there in my head. I really wanted it to be real, but I didn't trust myself. So, I started researching the chapel because I wanted to find proof that what I'd seen was actually out there."

Both of my friends looked at me a little bit more seriously.

"The fault plane dating was a major breakthrough," I went on. "It was proof that something really did happen on that day. I might still be misremembering or embellishing, but there was at least an event to embellish. What I really want is to meet that wave again. To... say thank you, for fixing my life. I've never seen another thing like it down there, though I always go there to study in part because I hope it'll happen again. Now, though... Just over this last week, I've started to think I have enough proof to say it conclusively happened. All these miracles, the fact that we're here and normal and still alive, they're proof that something is out there and watching our backs. It's fate. It's the thing the chapel was made to worship. And it's what I want to find."

I turned to Corsica. "You don't need to care, because someone else already cares about you. The light in the chapel will make sure it's alright, yeah? It was looking out for us back then, and if it can wake you from a coma, I'm sure it could steer us through last night, as well. So, err, take it easy."

Doing this made me feel incredibly self-conscious, but it somehow felt right, as well. I turned to Ansel. "You don't have anything better to do with yourself? Feel like you need a purpose? Why not help me find what I'm looking for?"

An impossible mix of emotions ran across Corsica's face, and she looked deeply shaken. Ansel still looked skeptical, but now properly intrigued. "So that's what you've really been up to, these last two years in the lab? Searching for this light ghost? And you're saying you think you could have bashed in a windigo just because you had it pulling for you, then and there?"

I shrugged. That was a convenient interpretation, since it meant I didn't have to talk about my bracelet... "Well, yeah."

"Hmm." Ansel rubbed his chin. "I'll be honest, chum: I don't buy it. You were right about your mental health back then, and if you ask me, everything else seems like a pretty clear case of confirmation bias. Anyway, got anything a lab rookie like me can do to help out?"

"Help out?" I blinked. "Getting some conflicting messages, here."

Ansel waved a hoof. "Eh, it's not like I have anything better to do with my time. Just because I think it's balderdash doesn't mean it might not be fun. Besides, you and me need to hang out more if I didn't even know about your biggest life goal."

I gave him an earnest smile. "Thanks."

"Right then!" He stretched. "First order of business; what's this sparkly phantasm's name? Can't go on a hunt for a mythical whatsit without having something to call it by."

"I..." I had never stopped to consider that. I was fairly sure it hadn't told me, though my memories were hazy... "Beats me."

"Better think up one quick," Ansel threatened, "or I'll be forced to coin it myself."

Names, names... I thought about names, and remembered how the Composer had been most interested in that illegible signature on the mural in the chapel. Wait, the mural!

"Actually, hold that thought," I interrupted. "There's one other thing..."

I gave them a rundown of my time in the chapel's secret area, brought out the keystone for all to see, and talked extensively about how I remembered the mural. Ansel was intrigued. Corsica, predictably, didn't care.

"I'd definitely be down to give it a look-see," Ansel said when I was finished. "Speaking of, didn't Mother say Elise wanted us in Graygarden's office? If you stole the key from there, I hope this isn't about her wanting it back. Feels like access to that place will be important for our cause."

I nodded, grateful for his enthusiasm and support. It felt just a little like he was trying to compensate for his rampant pessimism during our exile, and maybe for being a killjoy about travel before that, but it was working. Ansel always seemed to know, emotionally, what I needed.

"Yeah." I got to my hooves, still being mindful of my side - though it was somehow feeling much better now that I had eaten. "Hey, after all we've been though, Elise owes us a favor or three. Let's go see what she wants."

We didn't go straight to the administrative wing. Partly, it was because I wanted to go home and pick up a not-shredded coat to wear - the bandage didn't hide my talent, and I wasn't in a mood to answer questions from ponies who wondered why my flank was adorned with an upside-down crown. Partly, it was because I wanted to see how my house had fared amid the fighting and an explosion. But, mostly, it was because I had found a way to walk that didn't make my side hurt, and I needed time to think.

I couldn't believe what I had just told Corsica and Ansel. Everything that had happened with Aldebaran, everything that had happened with Ludwig... All that was over and done with. But giving voice to my greatest goal and hope for the future? There was a lot more I could have said, of course, but I was no longer the sole steward of what I thought I had seen in the chapel.

It didn't make my memories any clearer. There was still a fog about them, one that slowed my thoughts and caused them to break down when I concentrated too hard, one I commonly associated with things that were locked behind my mask, not meant for this version of me to know. And that worried me, because this was the kind of thing I wanted to be true, and thus might convince myself was true, and this was a sign that at the very least I wasn't telling myself the whole truth... But I knew the fault plane formation lined up with the day I had been down there, and I knew my luck had been too miraculous last night to write off as a coincidence. I had been wimpy. I made it all the way to Icereach and then did nothing. And yet... everything still worked out.

Clearly, it was fate.

We reached my house. Darius the yak was guarding the door.

"Yo," he greeted when he saw us, saluting with a hoof. "Up and about already?"

Darius was the only yak in the entire city who had learned to use pony grammar. He was also one of the smallest, definitely the suavest, and might even have been the only one to use a mirror. He did things with his hair beyond mere braids, at least. My heart rose a little to see him unscathed.

"Sorta." I grinned and winced at the same time. "What are you doing here?"

"Warding off curious neighbors, and letting in the repair crew when they arrive." Darius shrugged. "Hey, have you been to see Elise yet? She told everyone to tell you to meet her in Graygarden's office if we saw you. I think she wanted to talk about where you'll be staying, since your pad here is messed up."

Oh. Well, that was a sensible reason to want to see us. I shook my head. "Nah. I was hoping to make myself a little more presentable first?"

Darius shrugged, moving over to let me in. "Okay. Just watch your step! Though with those boots, you'll probably be fine..."

I walked inside, Corsica and Ansel hanging back to let me go alone. The place was... not quite as bad as I had imagined, but still bad. Where the Composer had exploded, the ground was jagged and scarred, the way concrete gets when it's weather-worn where you can see smaller stones sticking out amid rough, broken grout. The damage didn't go deeper than an inch or two, but it was enough to cover most of the floor in dust and shards that had been blown this way and that. There was also dried blood - I remembered two yaks jumping on the Composer at the last second, and thankfully also remembered hearing no one had died.

The couch was probably the worst off; it had been hit in the back and side by shrapnel spikes like the one that impaled me. We'd need a new one, for sure... Between its back and the wall, I saw where I must have landed when I was hit. There was... quite a lot of blood there too. Had I really lost that much? The nurse told me my wound was small!

Or maybe I just had no experience with what constituted 'a lot'. I was a scientist, not a doctor...

I avoided the patch, took a breath and shadow snuck into my room. Everything was exactly as it should be.

...Except my coat. The one that had been shredded was Rondo's backup. The one I had left here was the one I had worn through the blizzard, and I never properly hung it to dry.

I groaned, remembering how close I had gotten to catching cold after my shenanigans and adding that to the list of miracles from the previous night. Soon, my coat was hung properly, but that still left me with the issue of having nothing to wear. Come on, there had to be something around here...

"You know," Ansel told me as we walked, "usually they say I'm the one with the resemblance. But kick that exhausted vibe up a notch or two and I swear you'll look just like her."

"No," I replied, strolling down the hallways of the administrative wing in one of Mother's bathrobes. "I don't have the dye job, I don't have... Actually, I do have the limp, don't I...?"

I was too tired to be self-conscious about how bad I looked, which was funny because I usually kept a bad sense of style on purpose to make ponies think I wasn't worth talking to. Same effect, different reasons... Was this how Corsica felt about things, when she said she had trouble coming up with the motivation to care?

At least Ansel was doing good enough to joke about the way I looked. Odds were, he was covering something up, but I had a feeling that was normal for him. Maybe it wasn't a perfect normal, but any normal right now was a normal I needed.

We reached Graygarden's door, and I reached up to knock. Immediately, I reminded myself how hurt my side was.

Corsica gave me a flat look as I winced and held myself. "I'll get it..."

"Come in," Graygarden's voice called when she knocked.

All of us looked at each other in slight surprise, but then we did as he asked.

Head Scientist Graygarden's reception room looked much as I had seen it last, trashed by changelings combing it for evidence of something, yet not fully vandalized. The painting of him was back on the wall, at least, and the stallion himself sat behind his desk, pushing aside some papers in his orange aura and turning his attention to us. Elise sat on a chair next to his desk, reading what looked like a novel.

"Hey, I thought you were deposed," I said, speaking before I could think.

"I got better," Graygarden grunted, his voice as tired and dusty as always. He sounded a lot like I felt.

"Halcyon," Elise greeted, closing her book, her aura back to normal instead of the multicolored flames she had been using the previous night. "I'm glad to see you well. Thank you, all of you, for coming." She bowed.

Corsica glanced at both of them. "So what's up? Hope it's nothing big, because I could hibernate right about now."

"It's quite a lot of things," Elise replied, floating out a familiar satchel and hovering it toward me. "First, though, I recovered this while leading a search of Aldebaran's airship. I believe it belongs to you."

My stuff! I took it gingerly, opening it to check the contents. The inertial stabilizer rotor was still there? Elise raised an eyebrow at me as I looked, implying she would be curious as to how I got such a thing.

"We also found your luggage from the initial trip, or what of it hadn't been plundered." Elise nodded at the side door that lead to the reserve waiting room. "You'll be welcome to it once we're done here."

"Alright, enough lollygagging," Ansel said, taking a step forward. "I know you like your itinerary, but I've got some questions. First off, what happened to those goons after they got arrested?"

"They're being held by the yaks in a secure location," Graygarden responded. "No, you can't know where it is. They've been asking after you, and it's very likely if we allowed you any contact, they'd try to manipulate you somehow. So we're going to keep them off the map until we can figure out what to do with them."

I huffed, mindful of my side. Odds were, they were thinking about that research paper I had walked in on them complaining about. Now that Ludwig was gone and we were okay, they probably wanted to be friends again for real. I still didn't know how I felt about them, but Graygarden had a point and I was too tired to take any risks on them again right now either way. If only we could have just worked together honestly from the beginning...

"I recognize that you have a lot of questions, we we will get to them in due time," Elise said, lighting her horn and picking up a sheaf of papers from the desk. "But, first, we have something more important to give you: a formal apology. As the leaders of Icereach, it was our job to keep this city as a safe place for children like you to learn and grow. The reasons and circumstances are irrelevant. We have failed you. And we are sorry."

She bowed. Graygarden grunted in assent, and then followed suit.

I didn't know what to say.

"What's this?" Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Weren't you the one telling me only the other day there was nothing anyone could have done? Didn't expect this out of you now."

Elise nodded. "I said what was appropriate in the moment, when you were blaming yourself and morale was in short supply. Now that we are safe and have put our tribulations behind us, it is the time for accountability. Whether or not there was anything that could be done is beside the point. We were in charge. We are responsible."

Again, Graygarden bowed his head.

"If only words could undo what's been done," Ansel sighed.

I glanced at him, and then back to Elise and Graygarden. "Yeah. I appreciate it, but our house is kind of trashed, now. We don't need an apology, we need some help getting back to normal."

"At the very least," Corsica added.

"All will be taken care of in due time," Elise promised. "Do not worry. However, we've prepared something additional beyond repairing the damage you've suffered. Please." She floated the papers out to us.

Ansel and Corsica leaned in, and I got a look. It was... "The fault plane research paper?"

"You've been requesting resources for your work for a while now," Graygarden said, folding his forehooves on his desk. "I still don't see this going anywhere profitable, but..." He gave Elise a reserved look. "Some things are more important than that. We'll have to talk specifics, but consider your request granted."

Choosing a New Path

I blinked at my friends, and they blinked at me.

"So... you actually wanna help us with our research now?" I frowned up at Graygarden and Elise. "Thanks, I guess? Kind of the last thing on our minds at the moment..."

"What are you proposing?" Corsica cut in. "I'm all for some due recompense."

"That's up to you," Graygarden said. "But let's start things off with the most obvious option. Nicov, come in."

The door to the extra waiting room swung open, and in stomped a partially-mummified yak. Over half of Nicov's body was covered in bandages, and he wore an eyepatch that looked beastly cool. "Science ponies!" he greeted, enough of his face visible to grin.

"Nicov?" Ansel tilted his head. "What's up?"

"Due to certain... developments," Elise said, choosing her words carefully, "we need to think twice about who we can trust. Investigating the last week's happenings might normally be done through official channels, but after discussion we've decided to send Nicov to Ironridge in person. The yaks, blessedly, we know to be on our side. And as Nicov is due for some rest and relaxation after last night's explosion, yet still capable of action, we thought he would make a fine candidate."

"Still capable?" I gaped at the yak. "You look like you should be on life support!"

Nicov flexed with only a tiny little wince. "Yaks buff. Easy injuries to walk off. Besides, not leave for month or so anyway."

"The reason this concerns you," Graygarden added, "is because I know you've been wanting to run experiments and take measurements outside of Icereach. Any experiment you can compress and simplify to a form Nicov could easily run... He'll have a lot of downtime. And he's indicated he's willing to do this for you."

Ansel chuckled nervously. "Easy there, old-timer. For a moment, I thought you were going to offer to have him be our bodyguard on a research trip."

"We assumed that would be in poor taste, given what you've just been through," Elise replied. "But, if you desire it, that would be possible to arrange too."

I almost sat down, only just managing to remember my hurt side in time. No. Nope. No. This was exactly how all our troubles had began, barely a week ago...

"Whatever." Corsica shrugged. "If it happens, it happens."

"Tell me more," Ansel requested.

Wait, were neither of them...? I blinked. Right. Corsica allegedly didn't care about anything, and Ansel had a crisis of faith with his previous position of no-travel-not-ever.

Elise frowned. "How so?"

"You know what I mean." Ansel pointed a hoof at her. "You're right about it being bad taste right now, and yet you basically just offered anyway. That means you've got some hidden circumstances up your sleeve we don't know about that might make this not sound completely off-the-wall insane. That, or you're more changelings. Believe it or not, I actually wouldn't mind a change of pace, but it'll take a good bit of doing to convince me it's a good idea."

"That wasn't an offer and we weren't trying to convince you," Graygarden sighed. "It would cost a fair bit of money and leverage to get you there and ensure your safety. It's only on the table if you demand it, and you'd be the ones doing the convincing."

Elise nodded. "The last thing we wish to do is foist more stress upon you when this should be a time for relaxation. I merely said it would be possible, if you have a sufficient desire."

All of us were quiet. Part of me insisted this was exactly like Aldebaran's offer, where we appeared to have a choice but saying no revealed it as an illusion. But no reasons we would have to go appeared.

"Take your time and think it over," Elise urged. "Whatever you need for your research, we are at the very least open and listening to your requests. But this is not an offer for today alone, and there is much more to discuss."

"You know, if you really want to repay us, you could just give us answers to whatever we feel like asking," Ansel suggested. "If anything you've got to say is that important, odds are we'll cover it anyway. Besides, you were just going on about how you owe us one."

Elise closed her eyes and bowed. "Very well. Ask away."

Ansel, predictably, asked his question first. "What's the big idea with that hidden facility sitting so close to Icereach? Someone here must have known about it."

"It was constructed by a previous Icereach administration," Graygarden said. "Yakyakistan has used Icereach as a research colony on multiple occasions. After the treaty that founded the institute, it was converted into a storage area for some of Yakyakistan's old projects. Someone else must have found it and moved in."

I had a different direction I wanted to press. "And what about Icereach and Whitewings? Did you really make those?"

Elise and Graygarden shared a glance.

Ansel nodded. "I think it goes without saying that's a question from all of us."

"I'm not sure I can tell you," Elise eventually apologized. "Yes, if circumstances haven't made it clear enough, many Whitewing components were being made in Icereach, and I do know about them. However, you observed the Composer targeting me with the intent to learn more about the body it was inhabiting. Given that it is still loose in the world, I can't in good conscience tell you anything it might come after you to learn."

"Not like it isn't interested in me already," I pointed out. "And how's it gonna know what you say in this room? Windigoes aren't mind readers." I hesitated. "They can't do that, right?"

"Whether they can or can't, they're also blasted windigoes," Ansel added. "If one does come to town again, we're not exactly rolling in options for making them go away." He glanced at Corsica. "Whatever she did aside, you yourself told me our best chance was to play its game and appease it." He fixed Elise with a look. "By that logic, wouldn't we want to know as much as possible so as to satisfy it and make it go away?"

"Trust me," Corsica grunted. "Wasn't an it. Was a he."

Elise shook her head. "We did what we could with the tools that we had, but it wasn't an enviable situation and I wouldn't do it the same if we get a chance to prepare. Already, I've been drafting letters to some acquaintances who might have better ideas about how to chase those creatures off in the future. If there is a next time, we will be prepared, and we won't give them any information we don't have to."

I sighed. Elise probably believed her reasons were sound, but whether she was right or wrong, Icereach's curtain of censorship was apparently here to stay.

"So what's the real reason for all the censorship?" I asked, frustrated. "You danced around it before, but seriously, it feels like we never get to know about anything around here. Especially anything supernatural."

Elise glanced at me. "I was under the impression I already explained this to you during our exile."

I thought back, remembering our talk about how the Church of Yakyakistan had a vested interest in keeping what windigoes were really like under the rug. "Yeah, but that was on a case-by-case basis."

"That is how it always is," Elise said. "We don't strike anything from records without reason. Which case are you particularly interested in?"

"The chapel," I told her instantly. "Who built it, when and why? And why doesn't anyone care about it anymore?"

Graygarden shook his head. "That isn't a question of censorship. It's a question of nobody caring. The chapel predates the batpony race. Icereach's natives, all batponies, must have found it when they got here and started using it for their own purpose. Any original meaning it had is long departed."

"Someone cares," I said. "It's what the Composer was here for, the way it told things."

Elise folded her ears. "Worrying, but it does not magically endow us with more knowledge to give you."

"Then who would know?" I pressed. "Come on, there's gotta be someone in Icereach who's old enough to remember back then. It was only sixty years ago!"

Elise raised an eyebrow at me, questioning how I knew this.

"The chapel is thousands of years old," Graygarden said. "Far outside the memory of any living pony."

I narrowed my eyes. There had to be something more to it than that...

"Look, I've got one," Ansel said stepping in and taking advantage of the silence. "Back at the beginning, before we got on that airship, you wrote Hallie and Corsica a letter outlining why they shouldn't go. That was you, right? On the topic of censorship, why was the law pertaining to me and Hallie redacted when they went to look them up?"

"...Oh." Elise's face fell. "The Starlight rule."

Ansel and Corsica both looked at her curiously. Starlight rule... I felt like I had heard the name Starlight before, but where?

"It's simply a rule that prohibits us from placing foreign refugees in potentially risky situations," Elise said, looking away. "Nothing more. The reason it's off the books is so that I can use my judgement in determining when to and not to apply it. That is all."

"I'll bet it is," Ansel scoffed. "Just how many refugees does Icereach harbor, anyway? This isn't exactly the kind of place most ponies run."

"Today? Three." Elise continued looking into the distance. "You, Halcyon, and your mother."

"Why?" I asked. "That can't be all there is to it. Why go to the trouble of making such a small rule? And why's it so specific? And why Starlight?"

Elise looked uncomfortable. "That is an extremely personal question."

"You don't say?" Ansel raised an eyebrow. "If it only applies to the three of us, I'd say it's personal for us, too."

"Yeah," I agreed. "Have you got history with Mother, or something?"

Elise sighed. "This is going to be a bit of a story. I have... rarely talked about my special talent. Ansel, you heard, last night during our exile, but Halcyon and Corsica wouldn't. My talent strengthens my magic the more creatures are relying upon me. It is why I was trying to calm you and help you trust me during our exile, and how I was able to empower myself once Ansel did so. In my youth, I used it often. In a rougher, more dangerous world, it was the duty of the strong to watch over the weak, or so I believed." She shook her head. "Icereach has little need of that, of course. While we do have the yaks to provide security, this incident was the first time they have been called upon in over four years. We have no violent crime. In fact, most of our scientists are so self-reliant that this was also the first time I've been able to use my talent in even more years. It's hard not to wonder what someone like me is doing in a city where my talent is entirely unneeded."

"I'll say," Ansel agreed. "I was going to ask about that later, even. But what's this got to do with that rule?"

"Patience," Elise urged. "In years gone by, I optimistically and fervently believed that even though we may not be able to achieve a perfect society, we could at least have one in which the creatures with the will and ability to do good could rise to the challenge when the need arose. I recall telling you of Blazing Rain, Yakyakistan's folk hero during their war of imperial collapse. Her story served as a role model to me. I thought that as long as good won in the end, everything would be fine."

My eyes widened in realization. "But nobody did rise to the challenge when the Empire collapsed. And then Mother and I came along, refugees..."

For a moment, Elise looked very much like she wanted to nod and leave it at that, but eventually she took a breath and continued. "Not quite. The Empire actually did have those fighting to save it, and their efforts are why it still exists in the capacity it does today. But, regardless, that isn't what changed my mind. The tipping point came during Ironridge's Steel Revolution, the period of upheaval shortly before the Icereach treaty was signed. And, caught up in that turmoil, there was a young filly named Starlight, whom my system failed."

I tilted my head. "What did you do? Must have been pretty bad to give up on your purpose..."

"I allowed her to shoulder a burden that wasn't right for a filly, by virtue of being unable to stop it." Elise bowed her head. "She, herself, was a runaway. Most of what I learned about her came after our brief meeting. She was exceptional, talented, incredibly resourceful, and also very lonely."

Ansel frowned. "So you let yourself get all down in the dumps because there was one kid you couldn't help? I appreciate the ideals, but that seems like a pretty slim margin for error..."

"You misunderstand," Elise said. "The system I believed in was one where the strong protected the weak. I thought it to be the image of an ideal world, one where ordinary folk could go about their lives without fear despite the dangers in their world. But, I didn't fully understand that ponies can be strong in some ways and weak in others. Starlight may have had more power than even some professional soldiers and more luck than the winner of a lottery, but she lacked many things necessary to a foundation in life. For someone like me, who was prepared for the responsibility of safeguarding others, such a society let me contribute to my fullest. For someone like her, given the choice between protecting for others what she did not have herself and standing back and letting them lose it... it was unbelievably cruel."

Corsica actually was paying attention now. "Why didn't you just give her what she needed?"

"Would that I could." Elise shook her head. "But some things are not so easily replaceable. A sense of community? Parents? Lifelong friends? Much of this, I only learned of after she was long gone. There was nothing I could do, though believe me I would have tried. And, now, I do try. Did you know that I came to Icereach to accept my posting on the same airship that brought Halcyon and Nehaly?"

My ears perked. "Really?"

"Yes," Elise said, her mane quietly blowing. "Your mother reminded me of Starlight. She had lost everything except her own determination and something to fight for. She was incredibly strong, and yet so brittle at the same time. And there was no doubt she should never have been in the situation she was. I thought up the Starlight rule because I wanted to ensure that if the time ever came where I could step in to protect her - and, now, you - I would have all the authority of the law allowing me to do it."

I slowly nodded, and tried to meet her eyes. "For what it's worth, you did protect us. Things got pretty rough for me and everyone else, but if you hadn't come along and taken out some of the changelings, I... I didn't have a plan. It was all I could do to stay on my hooves."

Ansel nodded firmly.

"I appreciate you saying it." Elise bowed, earnest. "One of my greatest hopes for Nehaly's children was that they would grow up better than the circumstances they were born into. Your roads may have been rougher than I tried to make them, but your hearts have arrived at this point sufficiently intact. I thank you for your own strength."

Corsica rolled her eyes. "Easy on the sap, there."

"There's one thing you've got all wrong, though," I said, before Corsica could start anything. "Everyone relying only on themselves? That isn't the kind of world I want to live in at all. I just want someone to look up to. You used to be some kind of superhero, you're saying? Or soldier, or whatever? That's what I want. I just want someone to look up to. That's all I've ever needed."

Elise met my eyes. "I said your mother reminded me of Starlight, but I think you do, as well. Perhaps more mature and better-adjusted, but she, too, was lacking in the relationships around her. Like her, you have a single parent who cannot fully meet your needs. I suspect that is the root of your desires."

I took a step back, the pain in my side twitching. "I know Mother doesn't do much, but you can't blame her-"

"Rest assured I wasn't going to." Elise gently held up a hoof for me to stop. "Sometimes, there are problems with no party to blame. As was the case with her as well." She closed her eyes. "Well. I suppose this brings my story to a close. Carry on with your questions."

I stared into the distance, more interested in having some time to think. This Starlight... Where was she now? If Elise knew her before coming to Icereach, she had to be way older than me. Did she feel the same way as I did about our problems? And how much did Elise know that she wasn't saying? I wondered what she knew about my bracelet, about how I really could push myself if the situation demanded it.

"I've got one," Corsica said, breaking the silence. "You ever heard of magic that can make someone supernaturally lucky?"

Elise looked concerned. "Are you referring to Ludwig's rambling about a death curse?"

Corsica nodded. "Any power that can just randomly cause you to be in a position where you can accomplish what you need to. Like he was talking about the curse doing."

"May I ask what you told this windigo, prior to your separation?" Elise asked.

"That..." Corsica took a breath, then set her face. "Is between me and Ludwig. So no."

"Very well." Elise sat back in her chair. "Then, unfortunately, I have no ideas."

"Well, do you believe in fate?" I asked, following up on Corsica's question. "Think it exists to be manipulated in the first place?"

Elise pondered this. "As a scientist, I am not sure. The world does operate by clear rules which sapient beings can use to make their will happen. But, the deeper you dig, the less clear those rules seem to be. Certainly, we can model and predict many things, so I would say yes insomuch as that all actions have consequences. As a pony, however, I have always felt that even though the world may have a current trajectory, it is up to us to change it. So, no. I do not believe in fate."

"Well, you stick to your opinions if nothing else," Ansel said, taking a seat. "I remember you going on and on in that hideout about how you hoped Aldebaran would be better than their nature."

"Than what their circumstances suggested," Elise corrected. "But yes, I did."

"As important as all this is," Graygarden suggested, "perhaps we might keep things moving along? I've a meeting in fifteen minutes."

Elise blinked, then bowed. "Of course. All of you, if you have more questions, please feel free to approach me at other times. Graygarden?"

"Your housing arrangements," Graygarden sighed. "Since yours is out of commission. I've found some good options..."

The rest of our meeting passed without incident. It wasn't that I was uninterested in practical affairs. My brain just... didn't seem to want to focus. Maybe it was a consequence of exhausting myself so hard, but it felt much more pleasant to drift in a haze of half-formed thoughts, not quite asleep on my hooves but not fully lucid, either. I may have just slept for twelve hours, but I kind of wanted to go back to bed.

"Can't say I'm feeling up to lugging our stuff up to a new place just yet, even if it's fancier than our old one," Ansel was saying, rolling his shoulders as we walked. "Nyeurgh... Probably not ready to hit the surface either..."

Corsica shrugged. "Unless you've got ideas, I'm going back to the lab. Practically my home."

"Don't suppose this would be a good time for me to drop by, would it?" Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Get me up to speed on what you're doing down there? A dose of normalcy couldn't hurt."

Corsica tossed her limp mane and led the way. "Suit yourself."

We arrived at the lab some minutes later. It still had our sleeping bags strewn about from me and Corsica's sleepover, with a half-eaten crate of junk food sitting nearby, and the movie projector right where we had left it.

Ansel gave it a look. "I could swear this was less of a girl cave last I beheld it..."

Corsica flicked him with her tail. "Shut up."

"Well, excuse me..."

I wandered into the lab. There was a corkboard, used for correlating events with fault plane dates using tacks and string. There was Corsica's custom terminal, along with a shelf full of pattern cards. I still had the pattern cards I had looted from the hideout, I remembered. Was there any point to looking at them again, or were they just detritus of a finished adventure, clues that would never again be needed? Odds were, I would check them out anyway once I had a little more energy.

The table where we usually stacked our used cafeteria trays was empty. We must have done a dirty tray run recently before we left. Two chests against the wall holding equipment were closed. Three lights lit the room, two along the ceiling and a third desk light designed to illuminate our microscope trays as evenly as possible. Somehow, the room felt small, like it didn't quite fit. Like it was a relic of a past life, when I had been a different pony.

Well, technically, a week ago I had been a different pony. During our exile, alone in the alicorn statue room, I had taken off my mask and changed it, unblocking my memories of Ansel being not my original brother. Was that why I felt the way I did now, like everything was different? Or was this a way a normal pony could feel, after going through my circumstances?

I couldn't know. I hoped that it might be, but it was impossible to say for sure. This wasn't a feeling I was unfamiliar with, one of being not quite there, like me and the world around me existed on separate, overlapping planes. Often, I felt this way, especially when I contemplated my mask, or my history beyond two years ago.

This last week was probably going to become another such junction in my life. Two years from now, I'd probably think just as much about today as I did about the avalanche. Contemplating who I had been in the past was hard enough, but contemplating who I would be in the future? It just felt bizarre.

"Hallie?" Ansel tapped my good shoulder. "You're zoning out there, chum."

"Eh?" I blinked, pulling myself back to reality. "What's happening...?"

"Discussing what to do with this." Corsica pointed to a nondescript sack on the floor. It took me a full minute to realize where I had seen it before, but when I did, my eyes widened: it was the advance payment Leif had given us when trying to hire us during our first meeting.

"Guess it doesn't take old Graygarden to make us into moneybags," Ansel said, catching me up. "And since I doubt anyone will be making us return it to those scumbags any time soon..."

Oh. We actually had a real research budget.

I'd been dreaming for months about what we could use money for. I even had a ledger for it, a notebook I kept on a shelf next to Corsica's technical manuals. Plans for how to allocate any money we were given... I didn't trust myself to remember our most pressing need, especially since most of the things I wrote about us needing were ones we had improvised solutions for already, but an overhaul of our chemistry reagents was long due. Honestly, what we needed most was to invest in some public attention for our research. It was good that Graygarden was being generous today, but how long would that hold up? Think of the long term, Hallie. Think of the long term...

"She's not paying attention," Corsica said just outside my range of consciousness. "Looks about to fall asleep on her hooves. Here, help me with this..."

I awoke feeling warm and peaceful. Training with Balthazar... That was always a good dream. Time to get up and...

Wait a minute. I was definitely not in my bed.

I came to a little further and lit my bracelet. Corsica's lab? Wait, had I fallen asleep down here? I was in a sleeping bag, unzipped and arranged sloppily around me, as if someone had tried to stuff me inside without hurting my injury. At least I remembered about that before I hurt myself again by trying to suddenly move.

Mother's bathrobe wrapped around me. I spotted Corsica slumbering away in the other sleeping bag at the other side of the room.

Probably keeping watch in case I needed anything. Or, maybe she was just as tired as I was.

I turned out my bracelet to let her sleep.

Thoughts of the chapel rose in my mind to fill the darkness. It was so strange, the way my memory got cloudy whenever I thought about the light spirit I had met two years ago. Chasing that spirit had previously been my private quest, so it didn't matter whether it was real or not because the only one affected by the consequences would be me. If I was lying to myself and giving myself a goal that didn't exist, well, that was better than being bored or hopeless. But could I be sure Ansel and Corsica would take it the same way if I led them on a quest in search of nothing? And more worryingly, what if I led them on a quest into a dangerous world trusting divine providence to keep us safe, and that fate turned out to be an illusion?

Elise's words rang in my ears, and Graygarden's, offering the possibility of a trip outside of Icereach, should we ask. Logically, if such a spirit really was pulling the strings of fate to keep me safe, then going would be the only sensible option. If that fate was real, then nothing should be able to hurt me through its protection.

The previous week said otherwise. It felt miraculous that we were already this close to normal, and I didn't want to accept that all of this was random chance. Ludwig saving me from the blizzard, the Composer saving me from Mother, Elise taking out the changelings... All of that had to mean something. But I couldn't take it to mean I was invincible. The wound in my side was proof of that, to say nothing of emotional wounds.

So, then... what did it mean?

"Where are you?" I whispered, imagining reaching out even though I stayed snug in the sleeping bag. "Who are you, and how do you work? I want to know..."

The darkness didn't answer.

Instead, I felt a yearning, like my heart was pulling in any direction other than here. I closed my eyes. Corsica and Ansel had sounded ambivalent at worst about the thought of going to Ironridge. If I insisted we uproot ourselves and travel, they wouldn't try to stop me. This decision was entirely my own.

"What am I supposed to do?" I didn't trust myself with big decisions. It was so much nicer to be the smaller pony, the one without consequences riding on my actions, because all the actions of consequence were undertaken by everyone else. But were they? I remembered Corsica's confession in the conference room. She said she helped me on my chapel project because I was the one with the motivation. I also remembered how powerless I had felt while pretending to be Rondo, with the circumstances and knowledge to take matters into my own hooves, yet unable to follow through. I had refused to go all in when my actions had consequence, and it didn't feel nearly as nice as I kept telling myself it would.

That fear was so hard to articulate. Normally, I trusted myself intrinsically, more than anyone else around. So why did I have to be so afraid of responsibility, of taking on new tasks that would push me to my limits and expand what I knew I was capable of? It wasn't just any unknown consequence that scared me. It was the idea of learning I could do things I didn't already know I was capable of.

"What am I so afraid of?" It was an irrational fear, and it seemed more irrational the more real I let myself feel. The truth, I knew, was that I was a blank slate wearing a mask. I was what I made myself to be. I was more malleable than the ponies around me. How easy it would be for me to give myself a trait I didn't want to have...

That was probably why I wore a mask in the first place.

"I wish I was real..."

I opened my eyes. The less I thought about my identity crisis, the more real I felt. The more real I felt, the less my fears made sense. If only I could cast it all aside, that other half of me, the blank emptiness, everything behind the mask, and just be who I was right now.

If I could do that, I wouldn't even need to go to Ironridge after all. The reason I cared most about the light spirit was to have something bigger than myself that could ground me. If I could move beyond that, somehow, I would no longer need a god.

If only.

I took a breath, and time passed. The decision on whether to go to Ironridge, whether I wanted it or not, was mine.

This wasn't fair. I didn't even know whether I had really met something or not! How could I weigh the risks and responsibilities of deciding that when I couldn't even trust my own memory? Or even my feelings? The way I felt now was the way I had made my mask to feel, after all. But, I couldn't know what I was thinking when I decided that.

The circumstances had changed. There was only one way to be sure: take my mask off, become the me that held nothing back, and see if I might give myself anything new to make this decision easier. The real version of events down in the chapel two years ago would be an excellent place to start.

I was almost afraid. What if it did turn out to be a lie? What would I do then? Where would I focus my energy? How-

But I had to know. It wasn't just my own effort on the line, if I turned out to be chasing a lie.

Corsica was here. I had... never taken my mask off around another pony before. I had also never shown anyone my legs before, never faced down a windigo before, and never woken up in the hospital after getting gored by shrapnel. And she was sleeping. And I needed to know.

Time to get-

-this over with.

Halcyon shuddered, a blanket wrapped around a robe wrapped around a speck that was simultaneously tiny and infinite with its emptiness. She took a breath, and the world stabilized around her as much as it ever did.

This time, there was no out-of-body experience. She remembered the last time she took off her mask, how she seemed to be watching herself in third person. This time, she was definitely seeing from her own body's eyes. Instead, she felt like she was suddenly exposed to the night sky: she could see stars, even in the darkness, like the walls of Corsica's lab had fallen away and she was drifting through the cosmos, lost and unbound.

Stars above her. Stars below her. Nebulae and constellations, some stars packed densely and others spread out. Even a comet or two.

The rules of taking off her mask never seemed to quite work the same. The previous time was the first time she had felt kicked out of her own body. The sensation of stars, at least, she had felt before.

She checked Corsica, trying to sense her in the darkness. Still sleeping. Apparently, the whispering rush of her emptiness in her ear didn't prevent Halcyon from hearing her friend's quiet breaths. It was also proof that the sensation was heard by Halcyon and Halcyon alone. The sensory feedback she experienced like this was all in her head. Otherwise, it would have surely woken Corsica by now.

Right... Her mask had a request. Halcyon furrowed her brow. Constantly getting changed was jarring, though. Thinking, she focused on her bracelet, turning it to the barest glow... It was easier to command when her mask was off, for some reason. Then, she got out of the sleeping bag, found some paper, and began to write.

Moments later, I was me again.

Reality hit me like a club, and I stumbled, the sheer quiet of not having my own lack of existence filling my ears proving almost overwhelming. I gasped, and steadied myself. I didn't feel like I had been changed.

I was holding a paper. A letter, from one me to the other. Smart, since it would let me tell myself things without using any invasive magic to change my identity or memories. Although it was a way of skirting around the purest truth, so part of me was hesitant to read what it contained... I hadn't let myself remember writing it at all.

Carefully, I scooted back into my sleeping bag, my wound not bothering me so much now that I had learned to move with it. I hid my face and my foreleg inside, so the fabric could muffle the light, turned my bracelet on and began to read.

Dear Halcyon,

You're concerned about your fuzzy memories surrounding our encounter in the chapel. Unfortunately, I can't help you with this. What you remember is the same as what I remember. There's nothing you're hiding from yourself about whether or not that encounter was real. I believe that it was real. However, there's nothing I can change in you to impart this belief more than you already hold it. I don't know why it is that our memories are hazy, but it's the way they are.

One more thing: don't worry about Corsica and Ansel seeing your legs now that they know. The danger isn't in being actively looked at. It's only when a new pony sees them for the first time. So don't go prancing around bootless because nothing bad happened, but don't be a stick in the mud about taking them off during sleepovers and the like. You should already know this, but with all you've been thinking about, it hasn't properly crossed your mind.

Also, turning control to me in public is a bad idea. I know you were curious. Don't do it again. I keep you around for a reason.

I reread the letter several times, feeling utterly surreal. The way I thought about myself, it was like this current personality - my mask - was an act I lived, but that I was still essentially the real me. The way this letter read, it was more like unmasked me thought of us as two separate ponies.

That one insight was more interesting than anything I had actually written. I often overanalyzed things, picking ponies' creations apart to learn as much about them as I possibly could. When I was writing this, had I considered that I would react this way? Probably not. Which was even more interesting, because if I was writing myself a letter the way I was now, it definitely would have crossed my mind.

...Actually, maybe it wouldn't have. I just didn't analyze my own stuff like that.

Didn't stop me from picking apart this letter as though it wasn't actually my own.

I stared into the text, physical evidence left behind by a different version of me. Proof that she didn't exist only in my head. What was she like? I didn't know anything about her other than what she left in my mind.

The world spun around me, and I closed my eyes. This was an idea that would take some getting used to.

What a shame we couldn't talk, face to face.

"And that," Ansel grunted, heaving a box onto the floor, "should be just about that."

He and I stood in the living room of a new apartment, a stack of things piled in the middle that Graygarden had gotten some yaks to help us move up from the old one. I wasn't carrying anything with my wound, and no one but me was allowed in my room, so all my things were still back in our old place. Ansel, for his part, had insisted on hauling his own meager belongings himself.

"You really think they'll let us keep this?" I asked, walking around and admiring the place now that it wasn't empty. The trim was fading and warped in places, but there was trim, instead of bare concrete seams. And the ceiling was at least a foot higher than in our old apartment.

"Apparently, Mother gave the higher-ups an earful about how they owed us one," Ansel said, leaning against a wall and panting. "And it'll just be more work for them to move us again after the old place is fixed up..."

I stepped into the kitchenette. It was still adjacent to the living room, without so much as a door separating them, but it was a good bit wider, with a partitioned sink that looked like it had been polished recently and actually had decorated handles instead of a plain metal wheel. The cupboards were greater in number and, checking inside, deeper, too. Also partly stocked. Someone had gone shopping for food far more varied than we usually bothered with.

"Well, it's definitely not back to normal," I said, peeking inside the bathroom and spotting an actual porcelain toilet with the plumbing not sitting right there in plain sight. "But it sure might be a welcome upgrade."

"Really makes you wonder what they were thinking, stuffing us in that old tin can when they had places like this around," Ansel grumbled. "I mean, here I'll have my own bedroom!"

That was true. Perhaps the biggest upgrade was the addition of a third bedroom. No more sleeping on the couch for Ansel, if we got to stay here... I wandered over, surveying the hallway for myself.

"They were thinking it would be free," Mother said from her own bedroom, where she was piled up awkwardly under the covers, reading a book. "You think I was paying for anything when I got here?"

"Yeah," I noted. "This place is fancy enough, it has to be coming out of someone's pocket."

"It ain't that fancy," Ansel pointed out. "Around more civilized places, I'll bet you this passes for lower-average at best. Give it a few years, you'll start noticing all the cracks and blemishes."

I stuck my tongue out at him. "Weren't you the one always going on about how good our life in the last place used to be?"

Ansel shrugged. "Can always get better and always get worse. But don't get me wrong. I'd go dumpster diving if it meant I got to keep a place like this for free..."

I nodded. "...Yeah."

For a moment, things were quiet as Ansel set about dragging his belongings into his new room and I sat on the couch, counting the tiles on the new kitchen floor. Eventually, he finished and came and sat beside me.

"Hey, chum," Ansel said. "You given any more thought to Elise's offer? That they'd actually arrange to send us to Ironridge if we said pretty please and wrote a few poems in praise of her name?"

My mind went back to the letter I - or another Halcyon - had written me last night. I could probably mine it for some minor insights, but overall it had told me precious little about how safe leaving home might be. Was destiny really looking out for me? Even if it was, was it enough when things got bad? Or was I just reading into things and seeing what I wanted to see?

"Yeah. Sorta," I answered, nodding slowly. "Feels like a fever dream, all that just happened. Every time I think about what to do next, I don't settle on any answers. I don't wanna be the one to decide. If I do have to, I'm... I'm biased. I'll either go with my gut and get us in trouble, or overcompensate and... you know."

"Well, you're not the only one who doesn't want to decide," Ansel pointed out. "But is that such a bad thing? Maybe I can't go back to the way things were, and maybe I'm trying to see how they'll be going forward, and maybe that means I'd consider leaving. But if all of us stay on the fence and none of us have a clear argument for why skipping town is better, isn't that a plenty good reason to just stay here?"

I closed my eyes. I could choose not to decide, which would be the same as deciding to stay here. And yet, even though the outcome would be the same, those decisions would have a different feel to them. Was he onto something? I couldn't tell.

"The way I see it," Ansel finished, "unless anyone has a compelling reason, we still probably ought to stay put. Being all wishy-washy and weighing the pros and cons is all well and good, but if you can't eventually get an answer and stop wobbling, then someone's going to come along and tip you over. It takes determination to do things, and the quickest way I see a foray to Ironridge going south is if we go there without a clear reason to be there and then someone tests us and we fall flat."

I looked up again and glanced at him. "You think determination would have bailed us out of that mess with Aldebaran?"

"Maybe not entirely," Ansel admitted. "But I'm not sure anything could have, so that's nothing special. And you've got to hand it to us: we weren't very level-headed about the whole thing. Justifiably so, but still. Maybe it wouldn't have gone all that different if we had a different mindset, at least physically. But I'll bet you anything we'd be in better shape now."

"Lessons for the future, I guess." I shook my head. He had something of a point: I spent the entire exile and then return fighting with myself. Half of me didn't want to be a hero, push myself, test my limits, do everything I could to stop Ludwig and put my whole heart behind it. The other half of me was trying feebly anyway. The end result had been me limping through the motions, taking all the risks and seizing none of the payoff even after I survived. What could I have done if I had just made up my mind?

I could have stayed safe in the hideout, for one. Or, maybe, after getting myself all the way here and disguised as a member of my enemies, I could have accomplished something. Either one would have been better than walking that helpless middle road.

"So is that a stay vote?" Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Taking it to heart in the future isn't the same as putting it into practice today."

"I know," I told him. "And I don't really feel like practicing anything today. Feels like there's a wall of water separating me from the other night, and now I gotta build back my life on this side. One thing before the other, you know?" I tilted my head. "And weren't you just saying yesterday... Last night... Whatever that there's nothing left for you in Icereach? You're being pretty wishy-washy too. I can't even tell what you're arguing for."

Ansel chuckled. "That's because I haven't made up my own mind. Where do you think I'm getting this advice from? All just things I wish I could do for myself."

I nodded. That made sense. "How about this," I offered. "I'll think about it a little longer. But, if I can't come up with a real compelling reason for us to go, I'll be an enthusiastic stay instead. No wobbling. Okay?"

"I think that's the only way Elise would have it." Ansel stood up and stretched. "Good luck, chum. As for me, I'm off to check out the new neighborhood..."

After Ansel left, I returned to wandering. I should have been resting, I knew, but sitting still felt too much like being in the hideout during out exile. Moving around without a clear destination in sight felt... better. I was doing something, but it wasn't important. That was a good way to be.

Eventually, my hooves took me full circle, and I returned to my new room in my new house. It was an empty room, since I hadn't had any of my things moved up yet from my old one. It was also empty because I hadn't lived in it for the past entirety of my existence. I felt like even if all of my things were here, it wouldn't have quite the memories infused in it that the old one carried.

Aside from a new bed, the two things I did have here was my satchel, recovered from the Aldebaran by Elise, and my old coat, sliced up by the doctors after I got stabbed. I turned the satchel over and dumped it out, looking over everything I had accumulated throughout my journey. At the top of the pile were all the things I packed for the journey: equipment for taking scientific notes, which now contained my frenzied musings on the changelings' goals. My chess set, used when I played that game against Elise where she cheated to snap me out of a funk. The inertial stabilizer rotor, which I still didn't know why I was lugging around.

And my ocarina, which I had used to play a song that helped me take off my mask when I needed to admit to myself that Ansel wasn't my original brother.

I blinked, studying the ocarina with a frown. I always needed that song to take off my mask. But just last night, in Corsica's lab, I had done it without anything, all on my own. I hadn't even remembered that this was required for the process.

What had happened? Had I grown, somehow? Did this even count as growth? Or did it mean that some barrier inside me was breaking down? I thought, and... was fairly sure I could take off my mask again right now if I needed to, without the song.

This meant something, certainly. Something that made me nervous and excited at the same time. If only I knew what that something was.

Shaking my head, I continued parsing my belongings, getting into the things I had looted from the hideout during our time there. A tiny baggie containing a few hairs of yellow fur... I frowned, remembering pulling that out of the hot tub in the hideout's bathroom. None of Aldebaran had yellow fur. There was still a puzzle here to be solved, still so many things I didn't know about what I had just lived through. If we went to Ironridge, would we be able to learn more, and finally get to the bottom of what had descended on our home?

Well... maybe. I had no doubt the opportunity would be there. Aldebaran were supposedly based in Ironridge, and I had a hunch they hadn't completely made that up. Whether I was in the state of mind to investigate any mysteries was a completely different question. Worst case, we'd find some leads, start following them, and it would be just like it was a day or three ago. Exhausted, terrified, fighting myself and unable to commit, living only by the mistakes of my enemies and the good grace of fate itself.

I took a deep breath to steady myself. All this was doing was making it clear to me that I wasn't ready. It wasn't an issue of physical safety, or of destiny, or of any of the things I hoped to accomplish in the rest of the world: it was an issue of my own mental state. Ansel really did have a point about our determination, because the limiting factor was my own inability to commit myself to pushing through when I was in the middle of a crisis. Maybe going to Ironridge now, or in a month's time, was just a bad idea.

Quietly, I admitted it to myself, whispering under my breath. "I'm just not ready."

The feeling soaked over me like water rinsing shampoo out of my fur, leaving me cold and clean and much more lucid. There was no need to struggle with myself over this, because it was suddenly a straightforward question with a straightforward answer: no, we shouldn't go to Ironridge. We had our safety and our normalcy, things that were unthinkable while I was crawling through the bunker corridors pretending to be Rondo, or exploring the hidden depths of the hideout. We even had some substantial upgrades, in the form of a nice new house and financial support for our experiments. But more than anything, I just had a lot of growing to do before I could handle the mental pressure of snooping around and investigating a conspiracy... or perhaps even taking real steps towards any of my goals... with everything on the line. And there would be no step more real than leaving my home.

Slowly, the sensation faded, leaving me confident I had made the right choice. That was a feeling in short supply for me lately, and I took a moment to bask in it. Too often, my life was confusing and complex. Times that were simple and straightforward were to be relished.

Now that my emotions were no longer riding on the decision, I could see the reasons I wanted to go more clearly, too, and what I saw surprised me. Chasing the light spirit? That was all well and good, and I did want to learn whether something like that was watching over me. But, even more importantly, Aldebaran had betrayed me, and it hurt.

Back in the hideout, I remembered thinking about my talent, about how my skill in pretending to be other ponies could potentially give me the tools to play them at their own game. It wasn't often I felt thrilled to have this talent. I had marched into a blizzard chasing Ludwig not just because I thought nobody else could, but because I thought I could, as well.

And I still thought I could have, at least physically. All of my setbacks had been my own fault, like not taking enough initiative or letting my bracelet go out in the blizzard. I was mad at myself for failing. Aldebaran might have been locked up, but Ludwig and the Composer were still out there and so much was still unsolved. This problem might have been unfairly thrust upon me, but now that I had a choice, I wanted it to be my problem. I should have been the one to solve it, I wanted to be the one to solve it, I felt bad that I hadn't been the one to solve it, and it was still out there, waiting to be solved.

Funny. Usually, I wished for someone else to do the problem-solving, to carry all the weighty decisions and take the responsibilities and be the hero. I wanted to be the one getting saved, not the one doing the saving. Ever since I had carried Corsica and Ansel back from that avalanche, that was what I desired.

Now I had that wish. Not only had I gotten saved, but many times over. But instead of feeling amazing, it only stung. The problems had still been there. They had still hurt me. The only difference was that I couldn't bring myself to solve them.

I clenched my teeth, my emotions running on paths they had never traced before. I... I had it all wrong. Being a nondescript urchin on the street who was afraid of her own potential? Was that really what I aspired to be? I had ability, whether I liked it or not. And now I had seen firsthoof what came of being unable to use it when push came to shove.

The me behind my mask probably wouldn't like it, but I was tired of being afraid. I had walked this path to its logical conclusion, seen where it ended and what it brought even under the best of circumstances where fate itself might have been on my side. Whatever maskless me was afraid I might do if I embraced my potential and stopped holding myself back... I didn't know it, so I couldn't weigh it against the consequences of what I had just experienced. But now that I knew what happened when I did hold myself back, I suddenly wanted to know if there was a choice.

I always believed that without my mask, I was simply an empty slate without a personality, that this persona I wore was my mechanism for looking and acting like a normal pony. The letter I had written myself disproved that. Not only was there someone with thoughts and goals on the other side, but they treated us like two different ponies. So why, then, did they need me?

It had to be fear. They made me afraid of the things I was afraid of so that I wouldn't do the things they didn't want to do. Well... tough. Because without a concrete thing to watch for and avoid, I'd have to restrict myself from everything, and that was no longer a trade-off I wanted to blindly make.

Except... I sort of had to, didn't I? If I went about doing things with my mask on that the me under the mask really didn't want me doing, then she'd probably just change me. And the last thing I wanted was to be rewound and lose this revelation. I still wanted to find the light spirit, of course, but now I also wanted a future where I didn't have to depend on the spirit or anyone else to save me when I should have been able to help myself instead.

"Hey," I breathed, the room quiet around me. "Me. I know you can hear me. No way you'd ever leave me in control without being able to see what I was doing."

No answer.

"I know we're the same pony," I went on. "But... I don't want to stay the way I am forever. I'm not talking about you changing this mask for me. I'm talking about growing. Because there's some stuff I want to do, now, and I just don't think I can do it the way I currently am."

No response.

I took a breath. "But that's hard when you want me to be scared of pushing my limits. I know you've gotta have reasons for making me feel the way I do, and I don't want to pretend you don't exist, but I want to have a say in where we go, too. So how about this? I'll set some boundaries: I promise I won't overuse my talent and won't use my bracelet as more than a flashlight without your okay. And in return, you don't stop me from trying to apply myself a little more. No altering the mask without my okay. No clue if that's even a thing you can do, because I probably wouldn't remember if it was, but I'm trusting you. Do we understand each other?"

No reply.

Funny. This felt... exactly like it did when I talked to a machine, or other inanimate object that couldn't speak back. I wondered if the origins of that habit might somehow be tied to my state of mind now.

I got up. Whatever I was afraid of, under my mask... I wouldn't learn to face any fears by hiding. But if I got stronger, cooler, more skilled and experienced and above all more confident, maybe I wouldn't have to stop at hunting down Aldebaran's secrets and finishing what I hadn't been able to finish last time. Maybe, someday, I would be able to put myself back together again.

But that was probably enough choosing a completely different course for my life for now. After the avalanche two years ago, this was starting to become a tradition... but it would be up to the weeks and months ahead to see how it panned out. With any luck, my world would be better for it. For now, I was still in the middle of going through my things. Probably best to finish that.

Three pattern cards were up next. One had a magical scan of Corsica's horn, another held the letter that first told us Aldebaran were changelings, and one held a location coordinate I had never been able to read. Those would bear looking at again. Maybe I could ask Elise for a terminal for my new room...

Finally came the three magic scrolls looted from a secret compartment in the hideout depths, one of which I had accidentally used, and their accompanying letter. I tucked the scrolls away in the safest place I could find, and then spread out the letter to read it one more time.

Old friend,

Next to many of the miracles you ask of me, stealing these from Canterlot Palace turned out to be surprisingly feasible. Chaotic beings have targeted Equestria frequently as of late, and the disturbances they create prove excellent cover for sneaking about. Do not worry yourself over Starlight; I have confirmed her village on the Catantan Peninsula was far removed from the turmoil.

Unfortunately, this will be the last errand I can run for you for some time. The prophecies of the deep south are proving disturbingly accurate, and are certainly centered on our present time period. It seems this region will not be as safe to ignore as we once thought, and I must depart to keep a careful eye on it, lest we be blindsided at an inopportune moment. May Tetra guide you in my absence.

Starlight.

That was where I had heard that name before.

Elise's story about a powerful filly who had shouldered some burden or other was related to whoever owned the hideout. Or maybe there were two ponies with the same name, but I couldn't accept this as a coincidence. I stared into the paper as if I could tease out its secrets by force of will alone. Even more badly, I wanted to know, wanted to take this situation we had been yanked into and establish it as my own.

Also, prophecies. Prophecies implied fate. Fate implied that I really was onto something about being saved by miracles, or at least ruled out one of the biggest problems with such a theory. Not only that, but I even had multiple location names I could research that would certainly be interesting as soon as I could bypass Icereach's censors.

I folded the letter neatly and stowed it and the scrolls in the safest place I could find. This would be an excellent place to start my search when I decided I was ready.

But not today. Today, I was going to go find Ansel and Corsica, hang out, and turn the page to the next chapter of my life.

Before stepping out, I gave my coat a shake as well for good measure, turning out the surviving pockets to make sure they were empty as well. Out tumbled a hoofful of earrings.

Oh, right. I had gotten those from Leif, hadn't I? A gift from when I first visited her ship, plus extras for my friends. They were supposed to ward against the cold, but hadn't done a whole lot to help me when I was stuck in the blizzard. I felt my ear, and noticed the one I had put on a week ago was somehow still there.

Well, that was a fitting footnote to my new resolution for my life. The earrings themselves were probably duds, but wearing one would be a tiny piece of proof I could carry with me that the last week had really happened, and that I would one day get to the bottom of it.

I stepped outside my room, and noticed Mother still curled up in hers. This time, it looked like she was studying a small locket, laying open on her bed.

"What'cha doing?" I asked, sticking my head through her door.

She turned the locket around so I could see it. Inside was a photo of three batponies, two around my age and one perhaps a decade older, standing in front of a foggy alpine background. It was too faded to make out the colors, but one was unmistakably Leitmotif.

"That was us, before you were born," Mother said, and I realized the other younger batpony must have been her. They looked fairly different, but after staring, I could see some resemblance...

She took the locket back when I was done. "Just thinking about the future," Mother grunted. "One of these days, I've gotta do something with myself besides sitting around and wasting away. Sounds like work, though. Nngh." She chewed a wad of gum. "Wonder how much else from back then survived..."

I nodded, heading back for the door. "Yeah. Wonder if I might ever find that out myself..."

"Enter," Elise's voice said, my hoof still raised from knocking on her door. My side was bothering me less and less as I learned to move with it, though I still had to be careful.

The office door swung open, and I stepped inside. Compared to Graygarden's reception hall, Elise's office was a much more subdued affair, well-lit and predominantly gray with stripes of color everywhere from the spines of shelved books, though it held just enough pomp to suggest that she kept it utilitarian on purpose, and not because she was poor.

Elise looked up. "Halcyon? I'm surprised you aren't resting. How are you feeling?"

"Better than when Aldebaran was running me around," I said earnestly, remaining standing. "Anyway, I came to say we're not taking your offer to go to Ironridge."

Elise chuckled. "I thought we told you we weren't offering. Did you really come all the way here to tell me that?"

My ears went flatter than usual. "Hey, it wasn't an easy decision!"

"I suppose not," Elise acknowledged, setting some papers aside. "I know you've desired it for quite some time, at least. You sound like you have a lot on your mind."

I trailed off. Honestly, I hadn't thought that far ahead about what I was coming here to say.

"Just... testing the waters," I tried. "Aldebaran made it look like a reasonable choice right up until we said no."

Elise nodded solemnly. "That's a very reasonable fear. But, I assure you that I think peace and stability are the best things for you right now, and I won't let anything interrupt that unless you expressly will it. You have no need to worry that I am once again a changeling."

I hesitated, remembering something I had forgotten to ask about earlier. "So, the other night, you were carrying around a black rock and said it could prove someone wasn't a changeling..."

"This?" Elise pulled out the stone.

It was glossy, and yet somehow dull at the same time, like it reflected light but not texture. Jet black and without a shred of color, it felt almost like it wasn't quite there, reminiscent of the way the world felt when I took off my mask. Or, at least, the way I remembered that to feel.

"Yeah." My ears twitched. "What is it?"

"There are a lot of questions you could ask about it," Elise replied, holding the stone. "This is depleted moon glass. It comes from a meteor that fell almost three decades ago. And since you're going to ask why you've never heard of it before, it is essentially a potent magical drug with varied and unusual effects on ponies. Most societies regard it as anything between a pervasive nuisance and a dangerous threat. A lot of that is because its effects vary widely between different pony races and even different pieces of glass. Icereach pretending that it doesn't exist is far from unusual, though our small size makes us considerably more successful at keeping it under control."

I frowned. "If it's banned and stuff, what are you doing with that one?"

Elise paused. "...Self-defense. One of moon glass's more unfortunate properties is that some pieces are incredibly dangerous to batponies. Touch the wrong one, and you would quite possibly never recover."

"What the...?" I gaped. "Are you serious?"

"Yes." Elise nodded. "So if you ever find some, don't let it touch your body under any circumstances. Only certain variants would do that, but there's no way to tell them apart until it's too late. Regardless, there are quite a lot of things that can happen based on the piece you have and who you are. This particular chunk is harmless and inert to unicorns like myself and Corsica. Any worldly traveler like I expect Aldebaran to be would certainly recognize this, and only a fool would not be averse to letting an unknown piece touch them. Thus, it wasn't so much a magical changeling detector as a seasoned traveler detector. Have I satisfied your questions?"

"Well, what's it do to other ponies?" I pressed, still very much curious. "You called it a drug, so someone's gonna want to use it."

"To the ones who desire it? It makes them feel like they have a purpose," Elise replied. "And, often, like completely different ponies. I would advise tempering your curiosities, however. There are much better mysteries in life to chase than dangerous old rocks that make ponies act funny."

Okay. I could agree with that. Besides, I already had plenty of purpose, and was plenty good if I wanted to act like someone else in the first place.

"Yeah." I nodded. "Hey, this might be a different question, but you talked about the strong protecting the weak and stuff last time. What were you, a soldier?"

"In my youth?" Elise asked. "No, I rarely held formal jobs. I suppose you could call me an activist. Later, the wife of a mayor. Why do you ask?"

"Just wondering." It was still painful to shrug, so I settled for bobbing my head. "You talked about being cool with having the responsibility for looking out for other ponies. How did you decide that?"

Elise sat back in thought. "It simply happened. When I was young, in Ironridge, I had a strong sense of justice and spent my days chasing an inheritance from my father, who in some ways was noble and in other ways a cad. Along my journey, I met quite a few other ponies and listened to their stories, and they listened to mine. Believe it or not, quite a few rallied around my cause, although those were days of optimism and plenty when ponies had fewer things to preoccupy them. When the era one day changed and ponies found more pressing things to worry about than a filly chasing money, I left to travel the world. But, I always thought about the common folk who couldn't simply sail away from their problems. They had backed me in my quest, and I wanted to repay them. And, eventually, I returned to make good on that."

"Huh," I said, thinking. "You never wondered if, like, you might make a bigger mess of things if you tried than if you didn't? Must take a lot of confidence."

"A good leader must always think about those things," Elise replied with a shake of her head. "If anything, I may have erred too much on the side of caution, though I had contemporaries who were bolder and paid the price for it. What I saw, however, were needs that were going unmet. If I tried, I ran the risk of failure. But, if I sat back in safety, I was assured of it."

"Huh." My eyes unfocused.

"You're thinking about that bracelet you wear," Elise remarked. "Wondering if you should have taken bigger risks than you did in hopes of protecting your home."

My eyes widened as I was immediately dragged back to the present. "Wait, how much do you know about...?"

"Enough." Elise shrugged. "I wouldn't have allowed Nehaly to shelter in my city without knowing what she carried with her. That's a potent weapon you bear, Halcyon. I think restricting your use of it was wise, and rest assured I haven't left any questions floating around about how you survived in that blizzard. As for when to risk the use of such an item... You are the one who must live with the results, so that is a decision for you to weigh alone."

I hung my head. "I was afraid of that."

"Is this what prompted your decision not to ask to go to Ironridge?" Elise asked. "You're afraid of getting in a situation where you might be tempted to use it again?"

"No," I said truthfully. "But, I mean, I am that too."

She nodded, closing her eyes in thought.

I tilted my head. "...For a moment, I thought you were gonna give me more words of wisdom that would change that, or something."

Elise shook her head. "Words make powerful weapons, but there are times when one must resort to force. Having the means to defend yourself is of utmost importance on the road. If your dilemma is that your weapon has too many risks to safely use, have you considered getting yourself another weapon?"

I blinked. I had actually, truthfully never considered that. "You mean, like... I have a staff thing I use for practicing with the yaks..."

"A staff thing and a fire bracelet are quite different in potential," Elise chuckled. "I mean a real one, appropriate for the circumstances you find yourself in. The ponies of Icereach are no strangers to danger, believe it or not. You and I aren't the only ones who already go armed." She nudged her moon glass for emphasis, with a nod at my bracelet. "A welding torch isn't fit for gluing an envelope. If you are afraid of the power you currently hold, you likely just need something more fitting for your situation."

Now that was an idea... albeit one with some problems. "I'm not sure a little knife is gonna do too much against a ninja like Leitmotif," I admitted. "And giant axes are more than a little hard to wield. The bracelet works because it's magic. What kind of weapon are you thinking, here?"

"Anything you can come up with," Elise answered. "And since we were talking about supporting your research, I don't see why we couldn't get you some harder-to-find materials. You already have a certain Whitewing component we could assume belonged to you all along..."

The inertial stabilizer rotor? I scrunched up my face, imagining. That thing had a variable inertia based on the mana applied to it, which in theory meant I could turn it into a sword or hammer that would be easy to swing, yet hit really hard...

I wanted to grab a chalkboard and brainstorm. Or maybe just good old paper, since I wasn't feeling up to wing-writing just yet... This was a project I could definitely have fun with over the coming months.

"Sounds like a good idea," I said, turning for the door and fishing for a parting question so it wouldn't feel like I was bailing too abruptly. "Hey, err, random sanity check. Corsica said she remembered me being quadriplegic when I was real little, but I'm pretty sure I'd remember it if I was. Faye was, though. She's thinking of Faye, right?"

Elise frowned. "Yes, your version of events is correct. Why do you ask? I'd assume you wouldn't need to ask about such a thing."

Really, I wasn't entirely sure why Corsica's confusion had stuck with me. It wasn't something I actively thought or worried about. Just one of those small little details an unknown sixth sense told me might be significant for some reason.

"Just wanted to make sure I wasn't insane, I guess." I shrugged, managing the pain, and turned to leave. "See you around. Here's hoping the new normal is another step up from the previous one, because with any luck it'll be here for a while."

End of Act 1

Drums

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

I watched, tense, as the second hand crawled its way around a clock, slowly completing another lap.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Outside, the moon inched its way through the sky, long past the hour when sunset had disappeared from the horizon. An arched wooden ceiling was all that separated me from that sky, and the night's chill crept in even through the walls and my sturdy coat.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Two dozen yaks huddled with me, tucking in their heads and holding their breath like inert, shaggy mounds. Ansel twitched, causing a wave of tension to ripple across the room. Corsica was still.

All of us watched the clock.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick...

The second I was waiting for arrived. A booted hoof slammed down on the table in front of me as I rose from my chair in victory, flicking a switch with my tail and bathing the room in light. "Officially nineteen!" I declared loudly to the world.

With an explosion of sound, the room came to life. Yaks bellowed and roared in applause, jumping and stomping around in a ruckus that stood to wake every pony in the bunker below. Someone swung a mallet, and someone else held a barrel, and soon a spigot was flowing as gigantic yak mugs were passed around for drinks. Several giant hooves tried and failed to ruffle my mane, and I glowed with excitement, standing at the head of the long table in the mess hall built out from the Icereach military tower.

"Same age as me now," Corsica boasted on my behalf. "If only for two months."

"Halcyon pony moving up in world," slab-faced Tarkov said, looming over the table like a brick. "Demand much food in celebration!"

"Wheel it in, chum," Ansel agreed, as Darius and Milton hauled in a cart laden with yak cuisine. I didn't question how the two shortest yaks had gotten teamed up for this; all I knew was that both of them looked amazing wearing chef hats that were almost as tall as they were.

Balthazar rumbled in approval as piles of food were unloaded onto the table, sitting just around the corner to my left. "Not often science ponies come to party with yaks. Other ponies not know what missing out on! Huh huh!"

The room buzzed with activity, sparsely decorated yet still showing off a little more love and care than usual to mark my occasion. All around, my best friends bustled, most of them large and woolly and far more genuine than the scientific minds living down below. I rode the celebration like a wave, in a happy, dizzy buzz, until the food made its way around to my end of the table and demanded my attention once again.

"Snow potato pie," Milton explained, setting a dish before me that was probably intended to feed ten, his face solemn and serious as ever. "Is ancestral yak dish with very secret recipe. Yaks make from snow potatoes, snow potatoes, and more snow potatoes. Many carbohydrates."

"Egghead," Tarkov muttered.

"Mmm," a goateed yak called Mustafa agreed. "No real yak know word like carbohydrate."

"Mustafa pronounce perfectly," Balthazar pointed out.

Milton cleared his throat, shooting all of them a withering-yet-enlightened look. "Proper language is ancient yak tradition. Sign of respect to elders. Must speak well to be understood."

"And yet none of you bother to learn proper grammar." Darius rolled his eyes, shoveling more food toward me and pushing the snow potato pie to the side. "Here, it's a gourd. Not sure how it's prepared, but give it a try!"

I stared at the gourd. "I can see that..."

"Gourd have nothing on cheese-stuffed pepper!" someone yelled from further down the table.

Several hooves stomped in agreement, and a chant was struck up. "Cheese-stuffed pepper! Cheese-stuffed pepper!"

"Hmm." Milton narrowed his eyes, following my gaze and edging an eponymous pepper away from my personal space. "No. Cheese-stuffed pepper too spicy for pony food. Yaks eat pepper to-"

"Hey, gimmie that!" I flopped across the table, disturbing a few dishes as I chased the retreating pepper, seizing it with a clap of my wings. Sitting back, I crammed the entire thing in my mouth at once, riding an emotional high and ready to show off. Immediately, I regretted it.

Spicy flavor overwhelmed my mouth, feeling like fire was spreading up my nostrils and threatening to make me sneeze. And yet, at the last moment, I was saved by the cool bite of the cheese, providing just enough relief that I could tough it out, chew and swallow, tears streaming from my eyes. "Water..." I gasped, limp against the table.

The yaks roared in approval, and at least three shoved mugs my way.

"You weren't supposed to do that, you know," Corsica pointed out as I drank greedily from one. "Let them have the peppers if they like them so much."

"Sure I did," I panted, lifting my head from my drink. "What's getting older about if not doing dumb stuff you're gonna laugh about in the morning?"

"Or, you could eat these instead," Ansel pointed out, wielding a stuffed mushroom the size of his hoof. "All of the flavor, and none of the murder on your tongue."

Corsica gave him a questionable look, sneaking over a pepper for herself. "Ew, no. That's a mushroom."

"Can't say no to mushrooms without bailing on half of Icereach's diet," I answered, moving to try Milton's pie. "Hey, is that a turnover...?"

The party continued in full swing for longer than I could track, but eventually my stomach got too full to take any more, and I was reduced to sitting and talking and trying to match my friends' boasts as the night wore on. Fortunately, the yaks were bottomless, and I suspected we would be able to carry the festivities all the way to sunrise.

"And then," narrated Roderick, a yak with a heavy scar across his face, "robot pony start glowing, like about to explode. Noble Roderick see only one thing to do! Leap with entire body to block explosion..."

The changeling attack was now six months in the past, more than long enough for it to become enshrined in local boasting canon - Elise had mobilized the entire force in response to it, and as a result every yak had their own story to tell. At first, when they started bragging about it, it had made me anxious, dredging up memories of a night that was still raw to touch. But, as time went on, their confident bravado and determination to make stories their own had proven exactly what I needed to come to terms with my own helplessness that night and own what I had accomplished, as well.

"Yeah, getting blown up is cool," I said, wading into the boasting match. "But did any of you convince the changelings you were one of them, and sabotage all their plans? They thought they could pose as me, and didn't even notice when I was real!"

"And how many windigoes did that chase off?" Corsica countered, staring jealously at the mugs that were now filled with something we were 'too innocent to drink'. "Bet you it wasn't as many as I did."

Slowly but surely, the wounds from the invasion had receded. A month of rest and normal living had given Corsica her spunk back, and even Ansel had learned to stop staring suspiciously at shadows... or, at least, do it less than he used to. For my part, the memory of the miracles that saved me and my resolution to one day track down the mystery of the changelings and windigoes sat like a dog-eared page in my memory: never interfering with my conscious life, but always there when I thought about nothing, ready to be remembered and acted upon as soon as I was older and more prepared to face the world.

How much older? I didn't know. But, today, I had an entire new number to add to my age.

The boasting continued, and a few yaks began to tip over, either after losing halfhearted fights or simply of their own volition. The loss of their voices caused the energy in the room to gradually wind down, however, and eventually it grew still enough that Balthazar was able to muscle in with an announcement.

"Ahem!" he barked, climbing on the partially-cleared table and stomping his hooves for attention. "...Time for presents for pony Halcyon?"

The conscious yaks roared in excitement.

"Presents?" I asked as he got down. This was my first time actually celebrating my birthday up here with the yaks... "What kind of stuff does a bunch of muscly furballs like yourselves even get for someone like me? It had better not be a million barbells I can't actually lift."

Balthazar chuckled. "Huh huh. Only got one of those as joke. Million yak barbells would probably sink airship and make other science ponies mad."

He wandered away, and a moment later another cart was hauled out, this one covered in brightly-colored wrapped goods.

Well, two brightly-colored wrapped goods. All the rest looked like they had been covered in industrial insulation paper.

"Might need knife to open," Balthazar warned, scooting over a used carving knife as the trolley came to a stop, most definitely laden with more things than I would be able to carry with me back to my room.

"Errrr..." I stood and stared at it, the yaks all watching me eagerly, placing bets on which one I would open first.

"If it helps in choosing, the normally-wrapped ones are from me and Princess Pepper over there," Ansel whispered, motioning at Corsica, who was trying to steal Tarkov's mug.

"Awesome," I replied, hefting the knife and dragging down a yak present it looked like I could lift. "Think I'll save the ones I know to be sane for last..."

This one was tube-shaped, and after removing the sturdy paper, I found a canister containing a large, wall-sized poster. "Open!" several yaks cheered, two of them rising and volunteering to help me hold it.

We got the poster out and unfurled with help from Corsica's horn. From corner to corner, it was nearly twice as long as I was, counting my tail. A blazing blue sky shone above a white horizon, reflected in a mirrorlike sea of ice over a steep mountain spire that rose from the ice like a fang, a city carved into its daunting slopes... or perhaps the city was the mountain. To the left and rear, a great stone bridge stretched out of the city and ran for miles into the distance, supported by massive, ancient arches, as though the ice was a sea to be sailed.

"Woah," I breathed, taking it all in.

"Infinite Glacier," Milton narrated, explaining the view. "Picture taken from airship. Capitol of Yakyakistan in middle of Yak Hoof Glacier. City is very ancient and noble. Good to look at when want to write yak poetry."

Something stirred inside my chest, a sleeping remnant of my dream to travel the world that was waiting for the day when I could handle the trials of the road. This was the kind of sight I hoped would be out there for me to see.

"Awesome." I nodded in approval. "You're a bro, Milton. Alright, let's see what's next..."

This time, I more carefully examined the cart, choosing the package that was far and away the biggest. "Might need a little help with this one?"

The paper split open to reveal a yak... or, upon second glance, a yak-shaped bean bag chair. Life sized and broadly stitched, it instantly made me squee.

Several more presents followed in short order, turning up a bucket of preserved food, an indoor totem pole carved to look like three yaks stacked on top of each other, and Balthazar's promised barbell, among many others. Eventually, however, I was down to just Ansel and Corsica's.

"Alright," I declared, selecting one at random. "Let's see if I saved the best for last, or if you two jokers decided to prank me..."

"Yak gifts best gifts!" Mustafa loudly declared.

"Good thing it's a contest!" I shot back, having a strong feeling that me judging the gifts and picking a winner would be required by popular demand. To anyone else, dunking on gifts would have been a poor showing at best, but keeping yaks as your friends demanded a certain degree of irreverence and competition.

"This one's on me," Corsica said as I began to rip at the normal wrapping paper, enjoying the feeling of shredding it as much as I could.

The wrapping came free, and I beheld my prize. It was... a coat.

"Well?" Corsica held it up in her aura.

I surveyed it with surprise. It looked a lot like my own coat, a gray, juvenile-cool piece designed to look like I was trying too hard to be awesome and wasn't worth looking at as a result. This piece, however, was more refined; it had fewer areas where something had been comically overdone, and slightly more color, with silver underlines around the button straps on the front and angular green trim about the sides that perfectly matched my eyes. It was a smoother shade of black, and looked more like something a high-ranking military operative would wear than a detective in a comic book.

Reactions failed me. I tried to imagine myself in this coat, and my brain went down several tracks at once. Ever since the changeling attack, I had tried to change my ways and set a few of my old fears aside, but never had I gone so far as to make myself deliberately visible in public. If I wore this, it would make the subtle difference between getting ponies to ignore me and commanding a lot of attention.

Depending on my demeanor, of course. If I tried to look like an annoying nerd in this, I'd just look bad.

"Wow, uh, thanks," I managed, envisioning the coat on a mannequin in my room. I wasn't sure I could wear this just yet. But, remembering the goals I made six months ago, I wanted to someday be in a place where I could.

"Well?" Corsica wasn't having any of my uncertain response. "Put it on! I wanna see how well I got your measurements!"

I reddened. "Right here and now?"

The remaining yaks eagerly stomped their hooves, though more than half of the room had passed out at this point. I wondered if they had just partied that hard, or it was something about their drink...

"Well, err, fine, I guess," I managed, casting about for a spot to change in private and settling for behind the back of my giant chair. If there was anyone I trusted not to read into seeing me in an unfitting outfit, it was the yaks.

For a moment, I fumbled behind the chair, slipping out of my existing coat and into the new one, keeping my boots on. It had that heavy new-fabric smell, and sat a lot more lightly on my shoulders, reminding me that despite the party's energy, this was night on the surface and only a thin wall of wood separated me from the elements. Had Corsica really gotten me a coat this thin?

She was from Yakyakistan, I supposed. Her fur was naturally much thicker than mine. She probably just didn't know I needed more protection from the cold. Fortunately, it would be easy to add insulation, and it would travel well if we ever visited somewhere warmer than Icereach...

I stepped out from behind the chair. "Well? How do I look?"

Corsica grinned. "Same way you used to, except actually cool instead of trying to be cool. Welcome to the future."

Ansel whistled. "Not bad, chum. Still a little silly, but after what you used to wear, I think you've gotten good at it."

The yaks applauded again. But that didn't count for much, because Darius was the only one of them with any fashion sense, and he had tipped over early into the night.

"Alright, alright." I shook off their praise with a tinge of embarrassment and moved on to the last present. "I think the bean bag chair's my favorite so far. Last chance to top that!"

"That chair's got nothing on me," Ansel swaggered. "This one'll make you cry from sheer awesome!"

I slipped away the paper. It was a whole, raw onion.

My face scrunched in confusion. "What the...?"

Ansel howled with laughter.

"Har har," I deadpanned, giving him a look. "I'll be giving this right back as soon as your birthday rolls around, mark my words."

For once, though, the yaks were quiet. "What funny about onion?" Tarkov asked, steady and sturdy even as most of the others wobbled in place. "Is perfect gift."

"Yeah, yeah." I stuck out my tongue, glancing up at the clock. Dawn was just around the corner. All I had to do was keep this going a few minutes longer, and we'd have partied around the clock... "Hey, so speaking of presents, I've got one for you all! Or anyone who's still awake to see it!"

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "That's not how birthdays work, but color me intrigued."

"Yeah," I said, reaching around for my old coat and digging around in its pockets. Eventually, I dug out a contraption made from a folded inertial stabilizer rotor, a trigger, a mana core, and several other wires and components. "How do you all like this?"

Everyone stared at it. Only Corsica seemed to recognize what it was.

"Unnamed Halcyon weapon, prototype C," I declared, rolling the thing in a hoof. "I just need to borrow a board or something to put it all together. Anyone feel like sparring?"

Three yaks stood up with interest, Tarkov among them. I chose him because he looked the sturdiest. "Come on, birthday brawl," I challenged, no longer stuffed from earlier and ready to move around. "Doesn't need to be serious. I just wanna see how well this thing works."

Moments later, Tarkov and I were standing in the yak compound courtyard, Corsica and Ansel and every other conscious yak looking on as pre-dawn light tinged the cloudless sky. I shivered. Corsica's new coat really wasn't that thick... Hopefully, being in a fight would warm me up.

Tarkov pawed the ground with a tree-trunk hoof. "How Halcyon pony want fight to work?"

I hefted my contraption, now affixed to the side of a heavy board. The inertial stabilizer rotor and mana core were strapped on near the very end, and the trigger was at the opposite side, where I held it in a balanced grip using my chin, one foreleg and a wing. Standing on three hooves and adopting a nimble posture, I nodded up at the tip.

"When I press this trigger, it should make it hit really hard," I explained. "So, kind of a normal fight, but when I hit you with this, block with everything you've got and then tell me how hard it was."

Inertial stabilizer rotors were simple in concept: when you charged them with mana, they increased in mass and thus inertia. When you stopped feeding in mana, they returned to their original lightweight construction. I wasn't entirely sure how the nitty-gritty worked with respect to conservation of energy and advanced physics applications, but in theory, it should be as simple as powering it up while it was moving toward someone, and making an ordinary blow feel like an airship running you over.

Time to put that theory to the test.

I started moving, circling sideways and approaching Tarkov with a wary gait. The board stuck out in front of me like a defensive spike, and Tarkov circled too to avoid it.

My stance changed, the board now held over my shoulder for maximum batting speed should he come at me from the side.

Tarkov switched the direction of his circling, watching me and my weaponized board with a determined look. The last few times I had tried out this weapon, the mana core and its connections had broken from the force of the impact, but there had been an impact, and the yaks knew to take me and my prototype seriously as a result. This wasn't like before the changeling attack, when I sparred with them as a hobby. These days, I had a reason to get good.

I started backing up to compensate, aware Tarkov was trying to pin me against a wall. Ever aware of his surroundings... Fortunately, I could use that to my advantage. The ground was less even near the wall, and I found a small hummock I could brace a hind hoof against to put more power into my swing. Here was where I wanted to make my stand.

So, I backed up a few more paces.

Tarkov drew closer, and I dropped into a crouch, readying my board and holding my ground, patting the ground behind me with my hooves as if trying to search for the spot I had already found. Tarkov stopped approaching, just outside my range, intending to force me to leave my favored terrain. Just as planned.

I made my move all at once, jumping forward and sliding into the position I had scoped out earlier. Tarkov swung a hoof, attempting to bat back my attack and blocking with a meaty shoulder in case it was a feint. A feint was what it was, and I fell back just an inch, dodging his blow and bracing myself to counter. But a block was exactly what I wanted.

With a crackle of energy, I depressed the trigger, the tip of my giant blade already in full swing. The inertial stabilizer rotor buzzed to life atop it, aiming straight for Tarkov's shoulder. Time to put this to the-

Suddenly, the wood rebelled violently in my hooves, yanking its way forward as well. I yelped in surprise and fought back, trying to keep my hold on it...

Crack!

The head of the wood snapped off entirely around the inertial stabilizer rotor, but the mana core remained attached, and it flew into Tarkov's shoulder. "Rooooaaagh!" he roared in exertion, digging in his hooves, carving four massive furrows into the ground as he skidded backwards under the impact.

With a snap, the cable tethering the weapon apparatus to my trigger broke. That connection severed, the rotor went dull, and Tarkov quickly stopped sliding.

"Aww, come on!" I stomped in annoyance, my shoulders aching from the force of grabbing back the board. "Err... You alright, there?"

Tarkov grunted, rubbing his shoulder. "Science pony weapon hit hard. Feel almost like mighty yak blow. Too bad still explode after use one time."

I marched up to the broken machine... which was still relatively intact after the crash, save for the attachment to the trigger. "Well, at least the important part made it through this time," I said, picking it up and freeing it from the board. "That's progress from the previous trial. I guess that much force was just too much for the wood to handle?"

Tarkov shook his head and marched away. "Yak not good at egghead things. When fix weapon, come try again!"

All the watching yaks sighed, disappointed the fight was over so quickly. Ansel and Corsica, however, came strolling over.

"What went belly-up this time?" Ansel asked, looking the wreckage over. "Or is it totally junked?"

I nodded. "Well, I'm getting the durability down. But, like... think of what happens when you tie a ball to a string and spin it around before letting it go. It flies off, right? That's what this wants to do when I turn it on. But the board is like the string, and it's just not strong enough to hold together even if I'm strong enough to hold onto it when it tries to go."

"You know, not many ponies can wield a gigantic board as a weapon in the first place," Ansel pointed out, gesturing at the debris of the board. "Let alone hold tightly enough to snap it in half. I'd wager you could do fine in a fight without all the mumbo jumbo on the end of you just trusted in good, solid wood from time to time. Or steel."

I glanced at the board. "It's not that hard. I'm sure anyone can lift it. Anyone who practices, at least." The point was, my weapon had to be cool, and I wanted to make this inertial stabilizer rotor work. Not that I'd say that out loud.

Corsica rubbed her chin. "Maybe building it into a morning star...?"

Before I could think too much on that, a hubbub from the yaks caught my attention. My frosty ears flicked. "Hey, what's going on?"

"Look," Balthazar instructed, pointing to the northern sky. "Airship coming!"

I took a step back and looked up, and Ansel followed suit. There was indeed an airship approaching us - a dirigible ship, though with a smaller dirigible than I was used to seeing. And, for some reason, it was approaching from the north.

"What do you think that's about?" Corsica asked, the sky turning orange to the east. "Only time anyone ever comes here is from Ironridge or Yakyakistan."

"And only as a pit stop from one to the other," Ansel agreed. "They must be hailing from farther away. And whyever they're here, it must be to visit us specifically."

Airships weren't an extremely infrequent appearance in Icereach, particularly the older or lighter models that needed to skirt south enough to pass Icereach in order to refuel. But something about this one made my ear tingle. I exhaled a puff of misty breath and reached up with a wingtip, feeling the old reminder of Leif's earring still clipped in place.

The airship approached until it was directly overhead. And then, instead of docking, a figure jumped out from the side.

For a moment, they plummeted, and I gasped, until a massive wingspan snapped open, twice the size of any batpony I had ever seen and feathery to boot. The flier wheeled for a moment in the icy morning air, sending a slight sting of jealousy through my heart, and then dropped closer for a landing.

It was a... I didn't know what it was. The creature was equinoid in form, roughly the size of a long stallion, only with large, elegant wings and a feathery, beaked face. Its front hooves were replaced with avian talons, and its rear ones with leonine paws. The plumage it showed was a deep royal blue, though I couldn't see how far back it extended on account of garb that looked like an armored tuxedo crossed with a military uniform, a sash at the side holstering at least three blades.

Hundreds of Aldebaran red flags went off in my mind. I only stared.

"Good morning, gentleyaks," the creature greeted in a voice that was definitely male. Several of the yaks looked surprised, but a number of them blinked in recognition instead. "Out and about early, I see." He turned to me, Corsica, and Ansel, sizing us up, and eventually settled on me. "You have the look of someone in charge. Can you tell me if someone called Elise still runs this place?"

I blinked, realizing I was still wearing Corsica's fancy new coat. "Errr..."

"Who wants to know?" Ansel asked from my side.

The creature bowed. "I am Gerardo Guillaume, griffon adventurer extraordinaire. Also a professional bard, wanderer and hunter of the most valuable treasure this side of the world has to offer." He extended a talon. "Pleased to make your acquaintances."

"Let's try that again," Corsica said, her tone telling me she shared my assessment of the situation. "You're a what now?"

Gerardo raised an eyebrow in recognition. "Oho, so this is your first time seeing a griffon, is it? Well met, ponies of Icereach. Now, is there any chance you can help me in my endeavor? If Elise isn't here, I'll quickly get out of your fur."

Corsica just sighed. "You better not be here to do anything nefarious. I wish not, at least."

Before Gerardo could speak again, Balthazar stepped in. "These ponies just children ponies with fashion sense," he explained, taking the focus off us. "Yak Balthazar in charge. Yaks remember bird Gerardo already."

Gerardo blinked, looking slightly embarrassed, but he brushed it off like dust on his lapel. "One can never miss an opportunity to make an entrance."

"Balthazar surprised bird Gerardo answer summons after so long," Balthazar continued. "Science ponies usually annoyed by lateness. Gerardo want yaks to still get Elise?"

The griffon nodded in understanding. "I hope it isn't too much of an inconvenience. Staying on the road makes me difficult to track down, and I've been in a dangerous situation for the past few months that wasn't easy to prematurely extract myself from, even once I did hear of your plight. But, better late then never."

Balthazar nodded to the other assembled yaks, and someone marched off toward the elevators.

"So..." I asked when it was clear Balthazar was finished. "You know Elise?"

Gerardo turned back to me and nodded. "We were old war buddies during Ironridge's Steel Revolution. Not the closest of ties, but there's nothing like fighting alongside someone to learn whether you can trust them. Regardless, there was an incident about six months back that she wanted my worldly advice on. Confidential, so I can't tell you more."

An incident six months back? The changelings? I chuckled. "Odds are, we already know all about it."

Gerardo wasn't fazed. "Yes, I'm sure that one works on your parents, too. But you'll have to try a little harder if you want to con a griffon adventurer extraordinaire like me."

Ouch. Also, he wasn't mysteriously trusting of us in an ill-intentioned bid to win our own trust for himself. That was hopefully a good sign.

The remaining yaks gradually began milling around, and Gerardo took leave back to his ship, slowly mooring it against the airship tower. For my part, I went back inside, not about to freeze my hooves off with nothing to do... but I did migrate to the top of the tower as well, taking a seat in the decorated lobby that was used as a first stop for foreign diplomats on the rare occasion they had reason to visit.

Corsica flopped down beside me, looking worn out and ready to crash after the party. Ansel started restlessly pacing the perimeter of the room.

"Long night, eh?" I raised an eyebrow at my best friend.

"You can say that again," Corsica grumbled, the tips of her mane slightly askew. "Tooo many stuffed peppers... Gonna need to sleep this one off."

I nodded. "Yeah. Same. Gotta at least get my presents back home, though." I looked up. "Hey, so what do you think of this Gerardo? We gonna have a repeat of six months ago?"

Corsica glanced skeptically at me. "A new airship floats into town, and that's the first thing you can think of?"

"You thought it too," I pointed out with a shrug.

"So?" Corsica looked back at the door to the airship dock. "You're an optimist. Anyway, he hasn't had time to replace anyone. If Elise says she knows him, she probably really does. And even if he is a sour grape, just hit him with your fancy jet hammer."

I rolled my eyes. "I've got a long way to go finding a durable handle composite before I can make it a jet hammer... Well, I guess let's see what they have to say."

It went without saying that the reason we were all up here was to hopefully overhear Elise and Gerardo's first meeting.

Somehow, the two arrived within seconds of each other, Gerardo stepping in through the upper door and Elise climbing the stairs from the lower levels just behind him. Their eyes met, and both of them nodded in mute respect.

"Welcome to Icereach," Elise greeted, ignoring us for the time being and focusing on the griffon with Balthazar at her back. "How many years has it been? For a world-traveling vagabond, you don't visit your old friends very often."

"Apologies for my delay." Gerardo bowed. "I was caught up in a very engaging predicament. I hope my tardiness hasn't caused any undue consequences."

The corners of Elise's mouth twitched in a hint of a smile. "I was unaware you were visiting on a timer."

"Well, you did put out a missive about you-know-what..." Gerardo's eyes found me, listening intently with my friends. "Perhaps it wasn't addressed straight to yours truly, but cries for help have a way of reaching this griffon's ears."

"Or," Elise said gently, "we can pretend that since you're very late, yet there were no ill consequences, that this is merely a pleasure visit and you aren't late for anything."

Gerardo gave her a look that maybe wasn't as self-conscious as it should have been. "If that's the way it is to be, then who am I to complain?"

Elise chuckled and shook her head. "Well, regardless. You've heard about the windigoes, then?"

Gerardo frowned. "Discussing it in earshot of civilians? It was bad enough that everyone already knows, then?" He glanced again at us. "Fortunate that you're still standing. If they'd meant to wipe you off the map, there's not much any amount of speed could have done."

Elise shook her head. "No, these three were directly involved. I'm sure they'd love to speak with you later, provided you're able to stop and visit."

Gerardo ruffled his feathers. "I doubt the world would end if I stayed here for a day or two. Besides, I'm bound for Ironridge next, and Shinespark would surely be reassured by a candid report of what's going on in this place. That said, I don't believe we've been properly introduced." He tilted his head at us.

"As it happens, I would be reassured by a candid report of what's going on outside this place," Elise replied, turning towards us as well. "These young ponies are Halcyon, Corsica and Ansel. I'm sure they will be overjoyed to hear your stories after we've had a chance to catch up ourselves."

"Speak for yourself," I told Elise, extending a booted hoof and trying to weigh how I felt about this griffon now that it was apparent he and Elise really did know each other. Some innocent, eager part of me that hadn't been properly killed off by the Aldebaran incident really wanted him to be the real deal, even if history suggested otherwise...

"Ansel," Ansel greeted, uncertainly comparing Gerardo's bird talons to his own bare hooves.

"Hi," Corsica added, not getting up from her curled-up position on the bench, but managing to toss her mane anyway.

Gerardo tapped my offered hoof with a balled-up talon. "A pleasure. So you three were truly involved in shenanigans with the windigoes? Impressive. Not many can claim to have seen them and lived to tell the tale."

My face scrunched. "You've seen them yourself?"

"One of the few who has." Gerardo stepped back and brushed himself off. "Though apparently old Elise is going to want my ear for a bit before I get to wax nostalgic about old adventures."

Elise nodded. "That would be appreciated. If you wouldn't mind?"

"Very well." Gerardo bowed, saluting us with a wing as he turned away. "Then lead the way."

I watched them leave, my head buzzing. "Well?" I asked once they were gone.

"Hmm..." Ansel rubbed his chin. "Jury's out on this one, though I'd say it's obvious they have a history together and aren't just faking it. At the very least, I doubt we're in for a repeat of last time."

"You make it sound inevitable that he's going to try hiring us for something," Corsica countered. "He didn't even know who we were. Can't claim to be interested in our academic merits this time."

I frowned, feeling there was something deeper I should have caught from that conversation and fishing for it desperately. "You heard what Elise told him, though, right? About Icereach's censorship?"

Both of my friends glanced at me.

"It wasn't explicit," I went on. "But she mentioned wanting him to catch her up on what's going on in the rest of the world. You don't think even Elise has a bunch of stuff hidden from her, do you?"

"This comes as a surprise to you?" Ansel gave me a worried look. "If Ironridge is fine with censorship here, why wouldn't they be fine with hiding things among Elise's higher-ups out in the city?"

"I guess," I admitted. Maybe I was being slow after that party...

Corsica shrugged. "Well, she hauled him off to a private meeting even though the invasion is apparently old news. What do you want to bet she's briefing him on what not to talk about here?"

"Maybe she knows he knows something special?" I offered. "He did say he was involved in Ironridge with her, and she usually clams up the tightest about her own home..."

Ansel shook his head. "Could be. Or could be she still wants to pick his brain about changelings and windigoes."

"Well, I'm going to bed," Corsica declared, getting up and heading for the stairs as well. "Good luck getting those presents carried home. Wonder what this place will look like in the morning..."

Ansel pointed at the rising sun, now entirely above the mountains and visible through a window.

"Next morning," Corsica snapped. "I'm gonna sleep like a log."

Ansel followed her out, leaving me to pick myself up and go home as well, or at least coordinate the transportation for my gifts. What was the next day going to look like? Or the next week? Or maybe even month?

Six months ago, I had told myself I wasn't ready, and then I had worked my hardest to change that. I wasn't sure how much I had accomplished. And, probably, the only way to find out was to have something rock my world again and see how I handled it.

Maybe Gerardo Guillaume would come and go, and leave things much the way he found them. Plenty of airships visited Icereach, and accomplished just that. But none of those other ships managed to give me the feeling that this time just might be special.

I walked for the staircase, nursing a feeling of excitement and fear that maybe, just maybe, this would be the start of another adventure.

Wounds

Six months ago, when my friends and I had been deceived and abducted by changelings, one of the biggest factors contributing to the bad time I had had was a lack of proper rest. First they jumped me after a very late night, then I was too worked up to sleep when I should have, and finally I was asleep on my hooves when I needed to be at my best.

There were a lot of lessons to learn from that, and I tried to apply them often. For instance, Ansel and Corsica had stayed up late for my all-night birthday party, but I had gone to bed early for it. While they were crashing after a long day followed by a party, I had let the party start my day, figuring I wouldn't be able to get to sleep anyway after all the excitement.

That was why I found myself wide awake now, trying to take a nap while Gerardo was meeting with Elise in case I suddenly and unreasonably got kidnapped again and would need all the rest I could get. Despite hiding under my pillow in the coziest ball I could manage, I was too excited and recently-rested to possibly get to sleep. The irony felt like a rock beneath my mattress. I scowled.

It was ten in the morning. The totem pole the yaks had gifted me stood in the corner of my room, looking down at me with a wide, wooden expression. Three expressions, actually.

"Come on," I complained to the totem. "Just a little sleep? Please? If there's any time to rest, this is it..."

But I just wasn't tired. Stupid personality ticks. I had to be the only pony in Icereach who had a fear of not getting enough sleep.

As the clock ticked on, that fear started to mix with the fear that Gerardo might finish his meeting and I would miss him. Elise had asked him to stay and visit, so it probably wasn't a very founded fear, but I felt it nonetheless. Everything would carry on like normal if I ignored this chance and Gerardo flew on his way, I knew, and that was a good thing, but the more I told myself that, the more my brain made up reasons for me to want to speak with him.

What did he know about changelings? I knew he knew about windigoes, but how much? Did he know about fate, or the chapel, or the light spirit I still wanted to believe had been behind the miracles that kept me safe? What kind of dangers would face me when I someday went traveling, the kinds I wouldn't know about because Icereach wouldn't tell me? And how could I protect myself against them?

And, more importantly than any other question: I had spent the last six months putting myself back together after the harrowing Aldebaran incident, and then getting tougher and more capable so I could do better against the inevitable rigors of the road. He knew what it was like. So, was I ready?

That was the question I never asked because I knew I couldn't answer it without inviting more trouble than I ever wanted to see again in my life. It was also the question I needed an answer to. Pushing my comfort zones, taking my brawls with the yaks more seriously, building a cool weapon and trying to become less of a coward... I felt like I could do this for years, or even decades, and until I was tested I would never know if it was enough.

A part of me I didn't really want to acknowledge told me to ask Gerardo if I could hop in his ship and fly away, here and now. The much bigger part of me reminded me that Ansel and Corsica existed, it had only been six months, and this reaction was way too close to the reaction I had felt toward Aldebaran for comfort. Not to mention my weapon wasn't working yet, we were actually getting somewhere trying to study the composition and technique of the mural in the deep chapel, Graygarden was no longer as dismissing of Corsica as he once was, and we had gotten to keep the nicer new house...

Half past ten rolled around, and I gave up on sleep. Time to go find that griffon.

The cafeteria felt like a good place to begin my search, albeit mostly because I was hungry. A modest crowd of ponies were already there, sparse enough to leave plenty of empty tables yet not letting the room feel abandoned.

A lap of the room told me Gerardo was nowhere to be found, so I picked up a food tray and settled down to eat, finding a place where my backwards-facing ears could hear plenty of gossip. The atmosphere in the room largely felt normal, though there were a few strains of discontent or unease - Icereach always had those, being a scientific colony that still had yet to attempt a live test of its rockets - and I zeroed in on those, curious if the griffon was making waves.

"...told them my ponies can't take that extra workload. It would have been fine if they had listened to R&D and not gone with a system we knew we'd have to replace as soon as the bridge was done..."

"...still stuck in the filing process. You'd think my boss would want to expedite it, but for whatever reason hounding support is my responsibility. I do the work, I take the blame..."

"...believe I'm getting reassigned. The sealant tests have been perfect the last five times we tried them, so we obviously know what we're doing, but apparently the other team being slow to deliver means they think my capacity is wasted on..."

"...many feathers. I've seen pegasi before, but that wingspan..."

There! Was that about Gerardo? I glanced over to get a lock on who was talking, seeing a table with three batponies I wasn't familiar with. Interesting. Time to eavesdrop.

"First time you've seen a griffon in person?" another said, confirming my suspicions. "I was in Varsidel two, three decades back. Pesky creatures were everywhere."

I frowned, the batpony's words triggering my long-standing annoyance at Icereach's censorship. During the Aldebaran incident, Elise had strongly implied everyone older than the institute already knew everything that was being covered up, and was happier to pretend it didn't exist. Hearing anything to remind me of that was a fine line between rubbing it in and making me want to know more.

"Wonder if they've mellowed out any since you-know-who disappeared," a third said. Were they talking about the eastern goddesses, Garsheeva and the Night Mother? "As long as he's not here to cause trouble, I'll take peace where I can get it."

"Griffons are always trouble," number two replied. "Either they're zealots who want to fight you or traders who want to rip you off. Money grubbers, the lot of them."

"Ooh. That bad, huh?" Number one sounded slightly disappointed, but was clearly trying to play it cool.

"I just hope he leaves," number two went on. "This city's the last place in the world where we can catch a break. Don't need our ancestral enemies finding out about it. There's a reason the treaty doesn't involve the Griffon Empire."

"I thought that was because the Empire collapsed?" three pointed out. "And anyway, I heard he somehow knows Administrator Elise."

"She is well-traveled," one added.

Two sighed. "And she's not a batpony. You can get along fine with anyone if you're on the right side of history."

I had heard enough. This talk was making me uncomfortable; I already had a hazy idea that batponies weren't the most popular elsewhere in the world on account of the eastern continent and its squabbling goddesses, and returning the favor sounded like a bad way to avoid a fight. Even worse, if the locals didn't like Gerardo, he would probably leave.

Well, he was going to do that anyway, but now he'd do it faster. And somewhere along the way, I had made up my mind that I really wanted to give meeting an adventurer another try.

Shoveling the rest of my food into my mouth and getting up, I hatched a plan: if I couldn't find Gerardo, and was on a time limit, I would let the griffon come to me. Time to go wait at his airship.

The yak fortress was quieter than usual, on account of most of its occupants staying up for my party, but an industrious few still kept it going, running minor drills and doing maintenance and generally reminding the place that it wasn't abandoned. To my relief, Gerardo's airship was still moored at the dock up above. No wind blew, and no clouds blocked the sky. Now that I was back in my proper, heavier coat, it was the closest Icereach's surface usually got to a nice, pleasant day.

I made my way through the fortress and up the tower, but none of the benches in the reception room felt right when I tried them. Sitting just made me feel restless. If Gerardo was going to deceive me, or turn out to be upstanding, or simply leave without fanfare, let it happen. But all waiting did was make my wings itch.

Maybe I could wait on the airship dock instead. It was a nice enough day, and the view would be nice, too... And I could see any approaching griffons much more easily, since he would probably fly up instead of walking like me.

My hooves carried me out onto the dock. From above, I could see all the way down Crimson Valley, the Yak Hoof Glacier lit from behind me in a clean, frosty blue. Milton's poster of the Yakyakistan capitol stuck in my mind, and for a moment, I envisioned a majestic spire of a city poking through that ice in the distance.

I reached out a hoof. But I was still in Icereach.

Gerardo could depart right now, have nothing more to do with me than mistake me for an authority figure when he first arrived, and let that be the end of the story. But, even if he did, it wouldn't change the fact that I was now thinking about things I had spent the last six months telling myself I would revisit when I was ready.

He had woken me up. I wanted that horizon. And I couldn't tell if that meant I was ready, or that I hadn't changed at all.

I turned to Gerardo's airship, trying to distract myself by admiring its architecture. Compared to the Aldebaran, it wasn't nearly as rich or ornate, built more from industrial alloys and composites designed to be strong, light and cheap. This was a dirigible ship, albeit one with a strange dirigible - smaller than usual and looking like it was made of metal, I wondered how it managed to keep the skip afloat without imploding. Aside from that, though, it was maybe the size of my old house. I guessed there was one cabin of reasonable comfort, a bridge, a hold, and that was about it.

Several windows - the ones that I could see, at least - held decals. The sides of the hull were uneven, and supported what looked like custom modifications to carry more cargo - nothing remotely careless or amateurish, but clearly an aftermarket job. At the rear, it flew a well-worn Ironridge flag that was thirty years out of date, if Icereach's censored history books were to be trusted. This looked less like a warship or a roving team's command center and more like a house that could fly.

I was almost too caught up in looking at the ship to react properly when the door swung open.

"Hello, there!" a pink, middle-aged mare greeted. "Can I help you?"

"Err..." I took a step back, completely off guard. "I mean, hi. This is Gerardo's ship, isn't it?"

"You know him?" the mare replied, bundled heavily in a thick green sweater and looking chilly regardless.

"I ran into him," I admitted. "A friend of a friend. Name's Halcyon. Who are you?"

The mare shivered. "A..." She sized me up. "A traveling companion. Slipstream. Would you come in? Can't let all the hot air out..."

Well, if I was being invited... I nodded and quickly stepped inside, hoping this wouldn't be the last time I saw Icereach. Why had I even come up here if I was afraid of this? It sure did stink to be afraid of and desire exactly the same thing.

The interior of the ship didn't feel all that chilly to me. In fact, even after keeping the door open for a while, it was substantially warmer than the institute bunker. I took a second to take in the decorations, and redoubled my assessment that this was a house that could fly: the exterior was probably kept clean for utility purposes, but the interior was small, snug and absolutely covered in memorabilia.

Warm orange light bathed the cabin, illuminating wood-trim walls that were sporadically filled by hooks and pegs used for storage. Here and there, pictures of ponies and griffons and even creatures I had never seen before hung, a messy table taking up one corner of the room with a curved bench around it and two bolted-down swivel chairs. A short, wide window covered the far wall, and I spotted at least three exits: a few stairs leading to a doorless room up front, a homely door leading to the stern, and a hole in the floor with a ladder leading below.

"Much better," Slipstream sighed, tightening the door against the cold and revealing herself to be a pegasus, now that I got a closer look at her. "Sorry about that. Going from deserts and Ironridge to a place like this is a bit of a climate shock, and I've never liked the cold. Now then!" She turned to me with a welcoming smile. "I'm not Gerardo, but I might be able to help you with whatever you needed him for. What brought you out here?"

I have dreams of traveling the world but got kidnapped by impostors last time I tried so I both love and am terrified of adventurers, and the paradox makes me stop thinking and go with my gut, which brought me up here, I wanted to say. Fortunately, I had more self-control than that. "Just figured it would be the surest way to run into him before he leaves, you know?" I said instead with a shrug.

"He's been gone since dawn," Slipstream explained, walking to a window and offering me a chair. "He usually takes his time exploring new locales. But I've never known him to walk away from someone who wanted to meet him. What did you want to speak with him for?"

"It's like..." She knew I wouldn't be able to dodge that question forever, but she probably had no idea why I was dodging it. "It's hard to hear firsthoof about what's out there, you know? Beyond Icereach. I'm pretty curious."

Slipstream evaluated me again with a hint of apprehension. "I'm well-traveled, myself. If you're here for stories, I'd be happy to oblige, but I can tell you aren't at ease. Is there anything I can get you to clear the air?"

I sighed. Now I was making things awkward. "Nah, you're fine." I waved a hoof. "There was just a little dust-up a while back that left me kind of scared of adventurers with airships. I'll get over it."

Slipstream relaxed, as if she was equipped with a magical lie detector that let her tell when I was trying to balance what was safe to say with what I wanted to say. "Not six months ago, by any chance?"

"Yep." I nodded. "That's the one."

Slipstream just shook her head. "If you were involved in that, I'm surprised you'd want anything to do with outsiders like us. Icereach isn't known for... No, I shouldn't say that."

"You're gonna say something about being open and connected with the world, aren't you?" I raised an eyebrow. "About how reclusive we are over here?"

The pegasus nodded, abashed.

I sighed. "That's the problem. No way to protect yourself from bogeys if you don't know what's out there in the dark. That's the way I see it, at least. Figured I'd take the chance to talk with someone who's seen it all."

At that, Slipstream laughed. "Quite proactive for someone your age." She gave me a serious look. "How heavily armed are you right now?"

"One or two magical superweapons, plus years of professional combat training," I replied without missing a beat, feeling my broken prototype in my saddlebags and my bracelet around my leg. Hopefully, I was smooth enough that she would think I was just good at bluffing. If this situation somehow wound up with me in a fight... Well, I would probably lose, and it would be completely my fault for coming up here, and I would also have some of the worst luck in the world. How hard is it not to get taken in by evil adventurers twice in one year?

Slipstream just shook her head. "Halcyon, you've got a long road ahead of you."

I blinked. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Big dreams, taken a few knocks along the way already, but not enough to shake off the starry-eyed ambition?" Slipstream glanced at me. "I've met your kind before. Most ponies would lie about having done big things and then look at me like I'm crazy when I ask about weapons. I look at myself like I'm crazy when I ask that question. I'm sorry you've seen enough to make it a perfectly sane one." She stepped toward a tiny kitchenette in another corner of the room. "I can see why Gerardo made an impression on you. Spiced cider?"

"What?" I blinked. "Uh, sure. Wait, you actually believed me when I said what I was packing?"

"About having years of combat training?" Slipstream bustled around the stove, pulling out several spice bags from a cabinet. "No. But I believe you've legitimately considered the reasons you might want it."

This really wasn't how I expected this talk to go... Not that I came here expecting to meet another pony in the first place. "So what about you, then?" I asked, trying to ground myself again. "How well do you know how to fight?"

Slipstream flicked her ears. "I won't be winning any tournaments any time soon, but Gerardo wouldn't let me follow him if I didn't know a thing or two about self-defense. His line of work is extremely dangerous. It isn't exactly a spectator sport."

I lifted my head. "What's he even do? He told me something about an extraordinarily adventure... something."

"Griffon adventurer extraordinaire," Slipstream replied. "And he's a treasure hunter. He chases things that are worth more than your city, and couldn't be legitimately purchased even if they had a price. Frankly, it's a miracle he hasn't been assassinated yet, though having a house in the sky and a friend to watch his back does do wonders. Some days, it feels like fate itself is keeping him safe."

"Fate keeping him safe, huh?" I leaned in in sudden interest. "Is this random superstition or conjecture, or have you ran into any spooky arbiters of fate out there who could really do that? Pretend, like, I know nothing in case it's really obvious."

Slipstream shrugged. "I've known ponies who could see the future and bring back the dead. Tell me anything's possible, and I'll believe there's a way."

I gaped. Icereach shut out things like that? "You're bluffing."

"Believe it or not," Slipstream said, tending to a kettle that was beginning to whistle. "The age of immortals and ponies walking among each other is still within recent memory. If creatures can attain lifespans measuring hundreds or thousands of years, who's to say what is and isn't possible in the world?"

"You mean the Night Mother and Garsheeva?" I pressed, indignant. "I've heard of them. Sorta."

"Only sort of heard of them?" Slipstream looked over her shoulder and gave me a frown. "If there was one place I would expect them to be remembered, it would be here. This city is half sarosian, isn't it? That's a much denser concentration than elsewhere in the world."

I kicked my hooves, swiveling on a swivel chair. "Maybe everyone remembers, but they don't like talking about it. "Same goes for changelings, windigoes, destiny, and any reason someone would build a chapel at the bottom of the world. You see why I've gotta know, right?"

"Well, I'm glad you're feeling more comfortable, at least," Slipstream said, taking the heated cider and carrying it over to the table with a pair of wing muffs.

I took the cider, gave it a sniff, and decided that if Slipstream was trying to drug me, refusing it wouldn't even matter because I would be so unlucky that a boulder would just fall on me instead. Besides, I had said yes when she offered it before, hadn't I...? I took a sip. It was good.

"Hey, so..." I settled into my chair a little more, trying to force down my nagging paranoia and make the most of this rare opportunity. "You've been around a lot, you said? How did you know when you were ready?"

"Ready?" Slipstream looked up from her mug. "To leave, and go traveling?"

I nodded. "Yeah."

"I didn't, really." Slipstream shrugged. "It just seemed like a good idea at the time. I was young, recently unemployed, saw an opportunity to catch an airship to the next town over free of charge and didn't feel like my prospects were glamorous enough where I was to make it a big risk. One thing led to another, and after spending about a year abroad I decided it was a life that could be worth the drawbacks."

"So it just happened?" I frowned, recalling front and center how I had 'just happened' to get recruited by Aldebaran.

"That's how it usually is," Slipstream explained. "At least, for the kind of wandering Gerardo and I do. In the distant past, the world was a lot more connected than it is now. Creatures would travel carrying cargo, or even to meet business partners and supervise projects and investments. Or they would go on vacation. That's been on the decline for more than a hundred years, however. Our style is more... directionless. Or our direction changes all the time. So I can't speak for everyone."

I nodded, listening and trying to read her. Slipstream's advice sounded... relevant to what I wanted to hear, like she understood me. At the very least, she seemed to know to explain things that someone in Icereach wouldn't know, even if they were common sense elsewhere.

Was this a good thing? I was getting exactly what I wanted. Or was that a reason to be suspicious? I couldn't remember exactly what I had asked to prompt her reactions, or exactly how much I had divulged about my own situation. Was I getting taken in again? Was her friendliness suspicious, or legitimate hospitality?

I had no baseline. I couldn't tell. It was completely and utterly impossible for me to judge whether this was a normal conversation, with all my fears and biases and lack of experience getting in the way.

The Aldebaran incident had messed me up, I knew. I thought six months had been more than long enough for me to sort it out, stop worrying about the things I couldn't sort out, and get back on my hooves. But now that I was in a situation like this again, I was realizing a whole new layer of damage I had never even noticed before.

What a mess.

"How did you..." I trailed off, trying to put my thoughts back together into a conversation. I was good at acting. At the very least, even if I didn't know whether this was normal or safe, I could pretend it was. "How did you not get, like, taken advantage of? If you didn't know whether you were ready to leave? There's gotta be a whole lot of scary stuff in the world."

Slipstream chuckled. "You have no idea. The way I survived was by having friends who were far more talented or experienced or determined than me. They fielded most of the big problems and heavy hits. Which isn't to say there weren't times when everyone was in trouble, or when I had to seriously pull my weight. But that's just living. No one can be perfectly prepared for everything they run into in life. The best teacher is experience, and all."

Yeah? And what if I didn't like that? What if I still dreamed of someone who was all-powerful, all-knowing, and could just keep problems like that at bay?

I... had mostly given up on that dream, actually. I still remembered the sting of my failures six months ago. Even if I could brag with the yaks about what I had accomplished, I would never forget that being rescued over and over by destiny hadn't felt as great as I imagined. And yet, when I forgot to actively remind myself where that led to, those desires sometimes returned.

I shuffled my cider in my hooves. The warmth of the drink was starting to get to me, combining with my heavy coat and reminding me just how hot it was in here.

"Thanks for the talk," I said, taking one more long sip and getting slowly to my hooves. "I've got some... stuff to think about. Maybe I'll see you again before you leave?"

Slipstream nodded. "We'll see how long we stay, though I doubt we'll leave before tomorrow morning. It was a pleasure meeting you! Most of the time, locals never come up here to chat."

I made myself smile. "Glad I could brighten your day."

Nothing accosted me as I moved toward the door and began the process of opening it. No hidden traps, no changeling schemes, no poison darts or interrupting kung fu masters or Elise lookalikes telling me I absolutely had to stay.

I opened the door. Gerardo was on the airship dock, furling his wings after a landing.

Immediately, my heart skipped a beat. Here it was. This was when everything fell apart and I suddenly had no choice but to-

"Well well," Gerardo greeted, strolling up to me. "Good afternoon, there. I see you've taken our previous encounter as a challenge."

"A what?" I blinked, waiting for everything to shatter.

"About how I told you you'd have to try harder to squirrel any information on past catastrophes out of me?" Gerardo raised an eyebrow. "Clearly, you decided to plumb my associate for details instead."

I took a step back, feeling the other boot coming down. "Errr..."

"Quite clever of you," Gerardo chuckled amiably. "I'd wager it even worked. Although, now that old Elise and I have had a chance to clear the air, I can see you are, in fact, the real thing. Welcome to my home, young Halcyon."

Nervously, I leaned against the door frame. "Actually, I was just on my way out..."

"Stop letting out all the hot air!" Slipstream called irately from behind me. "Gerardo Guillaume, no visiting on the porch!"

Gerardo's headcrest drooped in disappointment. "Ah. Scheduling woes, a thing the civilized world believes we need. Well, we'll be around for a day or so if you feel the urge to properly meet a griffon adventurer extraordinaire. I'd be happy to give you a tour of the place, or chat up old exploits. Until next time."

He slipped past me, and I wandered forward in a daze. By the time I reached the dock, the door was bolted and sealed behind me.

They were letting me go. I was... pretty sure that was normal. My heart was beating out of control, but I was perfectly and completely okay.

In the sense that I hadn't been physically accosted, at least. If this was my reaction to finally meeting more adventurers, I was pretty sure I was anything but fine.

Ten minutes later, I was alone in the reception room at the top of the tower. I sat in the farthest seat from any entrance, my back to the room, facing a wooden wall. My ears told me no one was coming. So, I took the boots off my forehooves, buried my head in them, hunched over and sighed.

This was a mess. I was a mess. This wasn't how I wanted things to go at all. Rationally, I was all but certain Gerardo and Slipstream weren't morally bankrupt mercenaries in disguise, or whatever Aldebaran had wound up as in the end. I couldn't point to a single fact that suggested they were, outside of the ones colored by my bias. But whether my bias was right or wrong, if this was how I reacted after time had run its course and I had healed every visible wound from six months ago... I was suddenly faced with the possibility I might never be able to travel.

Finding a way to do it safely wasn't the problem. Being able to protect myself wasn't the problem. Getting the resources... might be a problem, but it was one I could apply myself to. Actually trusting... well, anyone? I couldn't do it now, and I didn't know how or when that would change.

I wanted to cry. My desires were all still there, to leave Icereach and wander the world in search of that nameless something I knew I was missing. Seeing Gerardo and his ship had reawakened them, even if I had put them on pause for a whole six months. They had even brought me up to and inside of his airship. And once I made it there, I had slowly deteriorated until... this.

Feeling this, seeing how my experience with the changelings was still coloring my ability to do what I wanted long after they were gone, felt like the final screw in my opinion of them. After the incident, getting my thoughts on Aldebaran straightened out had been one of the longest and hardest tasks I had dealt with. They might have lied to me and betrayed me, but physically they hadn't so much as scratched me. Except for the Composer, but that was a windigo. And, without knowing their motives, I had never known if there might have really been a reason for all that.

When I could tell myself they hadn't really tried to hurt me, and that I didn't know what they were after, it was a lot easier for my opinion on them to be complicated. Now that I was here, it was even more easy not to like them at all.

"Someone, please help," I whispered into the void. Nobody answered.

"I don't want to have to live like this," I quietly went on. "How can I go out and find what I'm meant to do with my life if I keep stopping myself at the door? Better to be able to take chances and suffer the consequences if I'm wrong than to be too scared to start in the first place. At least, that's how it looks from down here."

Nobody came.

Although, there was one pony...

Taking a deep breath, I readied myself. Just like six months ago, no song-

-was necessary.

Halcyon frowned at her bare hooves. Immediately, she put her boots back on, did them up slowly, and sighed.

"Stop coming to me like this," she breathed, loud enough that it would register in her ears and form a memory she could leave intact for her mask. "I appreciate that you're trying to grow and become your own pony. That's good. Make a life for yourself. But I don't like how it's leading you to think in terms of me and us. Being different from me is fine. Coming to me for help? Avoiding that is the whole point."

She tinkered with her mask, feeling her talent glow softly as she molded it. "I'm only doing this for you because our goals are still the same, and I don't want you to languish here for even more years. But you need to get used to solving problems yourself, or else find someone who can do it for you. Someone who isn't me. I am not your god."

Done. It was a relatively minor change, after all. The blankness swirled around her like a great dark hurricane, demanding emotion and detail to make it no longer nothing. Fortunately, it always stopped as soon as she-

-put the mask back on.

I reeled, feeling the customary headache that came with being changed. This was always a feeling I hated. It was hard to find words to describe it. Cheating, unnatural, lost... There was always a lump of bitterness that came with needing to adjust myself by force, rather than doing it through effort and determination the way normal ponies could.

It didn't feel like I had lost any memories. Granted, I wasn't sure what that would feel like, but I knew what I had asked for and was fairly sure I had it. There was now an extra wall in my mind, one that separated adventurers and betrayal and made my head spin when I tried to think about them together. Hmm.

Well, maybe it would work for what I needed right now. If it got in the way when processing... whatever I needed to process, I'd just have to ask blank me to undo it when the time came.

Hopefully, she wouldn't be too annoyed.

My head still hurt from the transition, so I laid down and focused on existing. Gerardo had left me a standing invitation to return. Accepting it felt... more or less fine, even though I could remember the reasons it shouldn't.

I'd give myself a few minutes to breathe and steady up, and then I would go back and see what I could do the way I was now.

Redo

I knocked on Gerardo Guillaume's door.

Unlike the first time, when Slipstream spotted me on the dock, I had to wait a moment before anyone noticed. A strange feeling of division settled over me, like what I wanted to do and what I should want to do didn't quite match up: knowing me, I should have been nervous. Instead, I was at ease.

At ease was the sane and sensible thing to be, considering I had just visited this place for a while and walked away completely unscathed. But the whole point of getting your feelings messed up about something was that you couldn't do what was sensible. When I thought about it, my whole multiple-Halcyons thing with my mask probably counted as being messed up too. Did that mean that two wrongs were making a right?

Thinking about it seemed like a good way to confuse myself. What I really needed was to see if this new change helped.

Eventually, Gerardo opened the door. "Back already, are you?" He glanced at me in surprise, then stepped back and beckoned me in. "Well, you know the policy on leaving the door open."

I walked in, paying close attention to my signs of stress. My heartbeat didn't zoom out of control. I wasn't shaking. Also, nothing ambushed me, though that was a foregone conclusion - I didn't need my recent tweak to know that Gerardo was probably a good guy and the real issues here were all in my head.

Everything I focused on was fine. I was fine. I wasn't freaking out. Apparently, it had worked.

Except all my thoughts were still focused on this instead of the creatures I was actually talking to.

"So, I take it there's no need for introductions?" Gerardo began, finishing with the seal on the door.

"We've just met," Slipstream answered. "I think we all know who we are?"

"Excellent." Gerardo stepped back, snapping his talons and surveying his work, then turned to me. "Sounds like you've been quite the regular around here. Elise told me you'd probably try to find me, but from her descriptions you were supposed to be shy."

"Tell me about it," I chuckled, still only half present as I split my focus between the conversation and watching how I was feeling. No bad signs yet, though part of my brain pointed out that the more I worried about it, the more worried I'd be... "I just know how to put on a good face, is all."

Gerardo nodded sagely. "If I could hazard a guess, I'd say you're thinking about the last time you were on a ship like this."

Second-last, seeing as I had just been here and left, but... "Guess you two probably went over everything, huh?"

"More than you'd think," Gerardo confirmed. "Not going to ask me to display some magic credentials of being on the team of the good guys?"

I shrugged. "If you've got some, I'll take 'em. But I'm pretty sure most ponies aren't supposed to need that to trust someone, so I shouldn't either."

Gerardo raised a worried eyebrow. "Trust takes a lot of time to build. That's what makes it so valuable. I appreciate the sentiment, but what most are supposed to do is have a healthy skepticism of strangers. That, tight purse strings and a good sword hand are the best ways to stay abreast of never-do-wells."

"Oh." What was the lesson from this? That I was being too trusting of Gerardo already? How was that possible? I was so paranoid earlier, I nearly had a panic attack, and I was usually known for keeping my cool. None of this made sense.

"Fortunately for you, I am a griffon adventurer extraordinaire," Gerardo went on, raising a talon like a teacher making a point. "With it comes a strong code of ethics, so as long as you don't attempt to steal from or vandalize my ship, you have my word you will be safe here. There's no need to hold back what's on your mind, Halcyon. Elise asked me if I'd give you a talking-to about changelings and adventures and getting thrown in jail, so if those shenanigans are still getting under your skin, the two of us are a resource you'd be wise to make use of."

He gestured to Slipstream, who nodded.

I paused, my breath momentarily catching. Did I really want to do that? Just ask everything that was on my mind and not filter anything?

No, I decided. I didn't. But if he was offering help, I would still take anything he was willing to tell me.

"Do you know Aldebaran?" I asked, starting things off. "The changeling group who came here? Like, did you ever meet them while traveling around?"

Gerardo shook his head. "I can't say that I have, though the world is a big place." He raised an eyebrow. "Interested in the perpetrators, though, I take it?"

I hesitated. "...Yeah. Looking back, it kinda feels like that whole episode came out of and then went into nowhere. I want it to mean something. Aldebaran's gotta have a story."

"Ah," Gerardo said, "a quest for the meaning of your struggles. There are more than you think who can empathize. After all, everyone suffers, and worse than pain is pain without purpose. That's a long road, but in this case, one I'm almost certain might bear fruit."

I tilted my head, trying to parse what he was saying. "So you don't know a thing, but think I can still figure it out."

"Depending on the lengths you're willing to go," Gerardo admitted. "Icereach in particular, I doubt they'd tell you anything. Your town is something of a sanctuary for those who would prefer not to think about their past. Or their future, in some cases. Tell me, what are your thoughts on traveling the world?"

"Always wanted to do it." I shrugged. "I've got some pretty bad wanderlust. Didn't work out so well the last time I tried it, but it's definitely still there. It just feels like everything where I am doesn't count, and the real world is everything out there, you know?"

Gerardo nodded. "I can relate. My grandmother, Glacies Goldfeather, was Imperial nobility, daughter to a provincial lord yet outside his line of succession. She was shunted to a backwater estate, with enough influence to keep it peaceful and out of the way, but nothing more. I grew up safe, bored and dreaming of a more dynamic world beyond that stubborn horizon."

My attention was suddenly held. "Yeah, that is how it feels. Did you find it?"

"The world I was looking for?" Gerardo chuckled. "Oh, yes. Quite a bit more than I was prepared for, at first, but after every knock or bruise, I looked at where I still had the freedom to go, and decided it was worth it to keep going. Adrenaline flowing like a tap at a Sosan bar, each destination just a pit stop on a long road to anywhere... That was the life for me." He sighed fondly. "Eventually, I found a greater purpose to my wanderings, but the spirit never changes."

"Oh." My gaze fell. "So you weren't looking for anything in particular?"

"Not at first," Gerardo said. "Unless looking for any place I haven't yet seen counts. Though that changed about two decades ago. Do you have a destination in mind?"

I shook my head. "Not a physical destination. I'm just looking for... something."

"I see." Gerardo regarded me sagely. "Would you be running toward something, or away from something?"

I froze. "Don't you think that's a little personal?"

"It had better be, if it's a good enough reason to tear up your roots and take to the roads," Gerardo replied. "This isn't something one does lightly. Leaving behind your friends, family, routine... I only did it because I needed a little instability in my life, and I more than got what I asked for. But, I've known many who had the opposite motivation. You wouldn't happen to be searching for a place to call home, would you?"

"A place to call home?" I thought about that for a moment. "I mean... it sure would be nice. Icereach is great, but it just doesn't have what I'm looking for. So if you're gonna tell me something about being careful not to leave behind the exact thing I'm in search of..."

"Sounds like you're already thinking about it," Gerardo said, straightening up. "That's good."

"Anyway, different topic." I shook my head, skirting away from my motivations for now. I would ask him later if he knew about any destiny or deities or ether river light spirits, but some part of me knew I'd feel silly if I made out like that was my reason for wanting to leave. Maybe I was colored by Icereach bias, but basing an important empirical decision on hope and faith weren't good ways to be taken seriously around here.

Gerardo watched me.

I watched back, waiting for him to answer.

"Different topic?" He tapped a talon and tilted his head. "You had something you wanted to ask me?"

I went heavily red. Nothing quite like making yourself look silly by getting distracted thinking about how not to look silly... "Uh, yeah. That. How did you know you were ready to leave? See, I said I always wanted to wander, but the first time I tried to step out my door..." I looked away. "Aldebaran happened."

Gerardo chuckled. "Actually, that's about how it usually starts. I've lost track of the amount of times I've been double-crossed, assaulted, or imprisoned by corrupt authorities. Fortunately, identity theft has only hit me twice, though both of those make for quite the story... From the looks of you, I'd say you've been ready for quite some time. All you need is someone to show you the ropes, a little luck not to die on the spot, and a push to get you out the door. And from what I've heard, luck has done quite a bit to keep you safe already."

"What?" I blinked in confusion. "No, I mean, like, how do I not-"

"Get taken in by charlatans?" Gerardo raised an eyebrow, cutting me off. "Painful experience. Fortunately, Aldebaran were an ideal tutorial, since they didn't set you back by any monetary value. There's nothing quite as irritating as having a run-in go south with some burglars who pause your journey by stealing the resources you use to travel, although that can be an entire adventure in itself... In your case, all they did was give you a fright and some valuable experience."

I frowned. "And they impaled me with a spike, and locked me up, and betrayed me..."

"None of which are pleasant, but all of which are temporary," Gerardo said. "Some wounds may heal slowly, but you are still here, and don't look to me to be a cripple. Tell me, how much does that betrayal still hurt after six months?"

Did I really want to talk about that? More to the point, did I really want to put an exact number on it? I had-

"If you have to think that much, I see it's more than zero," Gerardo observed. "Unfortunately, I've never been a teenage mare, and can't speak well to injuries of the heart. But, what I can tell you is that there's nothing special about that group of changelings, or what they did to you. Not in the sense that your experiences don't count, but in that you'll have many more like them."

I stared owlishly at him. "Wow, that's not encouraging."

Gerardo shrugged. "You'll get there. Early on, I had this feeling that all my close shaves were wearing me down, costing me something to my resolve, and that I was still adventuring in spite of them. But, eventually, I came to realize it was the opposite. I had put myself through so much that when push came to shove, I could keep my cool. I believe it was a late night in the Varsidelian city of Ralianth. I walked by an alley I shouldn't have, and some sixth sense kept me alert. Then, I heard a low cry for help, and... Well, you probably don't want to hear the whole story. The point is that one day, after you've just had enough, you realize you can stare down things that would make others scream and run for cover. That's the real meaning to your ordeal. I'd put money down right now saying if some obvious evildoer came to town, you'd try to do something about it instead of cowering under a table and waiting for the problem to be solved."

"Not much of a bet. Of course I would." I waved a hoof. "What happened in Ralianth, though?"

"The old lame duck con." Gerardo shrugged limply. "One bandit acts weak to draw in the merciful, another waits in ambush. Or three, in this case. Have you ever been robbed at knifepoint before?"

I swallowed, imagining it. My imagination was vivid and probably not accurate, but I figured it was good enough. "I can't say that I have..."

"Most criminals like their victims to be scared into complicity," Gerardo noted. "Most of them hate when they've barely stepped out of the shadows and you've already taken one out with a thrown trash can lid. Anyway, that was the day I went from thinking about how I survived a mugging to how cool I felt doing it."

I tried to imagine how that would feel. It felt a bit surreal.

"The point is, you shouldn't think about what you've been through as a harrowing trial, even though that's what it was," Gerardo finished. "It was a learning experience, plain and simple. Imagine for a moment I was a scoundrel who was plotting to take you hostage to extort your home, and that I got away with it. Think you would handle the pressure better or worse than last time?"

Given that I had just ran away from sheer paranoia and had to restructure myself to come back? "Still not that well," I said. "Even though I guess it might be better than last time."

"And yet here you are," Gerardo said, gesturing to himself and Slipstream, who was waiting in the background. "Giving this meeting-adventurers thing a try once again. I commend your bravery, by the way. Any sensible creature should be scared half to death right now in your situation. But being here at all is proof that you're ready. The only real test of that is whether you stand up and try again."

Suddenly, I felt a little silly for changing my mask. And now I was ever so slightly worried, because I realized I actually had taken this much better than last time, and had no idea how much of that was cheating and how much was legitimately learning to face my fears. Had I missed out on something important?

"Well, I'm glad you two are hitting it off," Slipstream commented. "Halcyon, how long are you planning to stay? I can make lunch, and I know Gerardo will talk for hours if given the opportunity."

Gerardo winked. "I did say I am a professional bard..."

I tilted my head in thought. Part of me wanted to go reverse the change I had made and see if I could do better on my own. Part of me wanted to go talk to my friends and think about what Gerardo had told me, though they probably weren't up yet. And part of me just wanted to let the day slip away listening to stories, just like I had done with Leif and Rondo.

...That comparison hurt a bit to make. Gerardo could say what he wanted about the experience making me tougher, but it didn't change the fact that I needed ponies to look up to. Finding new role models was a big quest in my life. And I just couldn't see a way to shield myself against the consequences of being wrong without saying goodbye entirely to the idea of looking at ponies like that.

Doing that, in turn, would be saying goodbye to the idea of growing, myself.

I shook my head. "Eh, I've got time for a story or three. How much did Elise tell you you can't talk about in Icereach?"

Gerardo shrugged. "She did brief me on a few topics that could be wise to avoid, but I imagine you're old enough to weigh sensitive information for yourself. That said, I'm an adventurer, not a scientist or politician. There's probably not a lot about your home I could tell you. Now, the world out there, on the other hand..."

I thought about windigoes, about changelings and about fate. Everything I wanted to know... And I decided that, for once, those could wait.

"Slipstream kept going on about how dangerous your work is," I said. "What do you actually do?"

"More specific than adventuring and treasure hunting, you mean?" Gerardo raised an eyebrow. "Come this way, and I'll show you."

He made for the doorless entry to the front room, which formed a bridge or cockpit. It was fairly snug inside, with room for a pilot and copilot and lots of meters and controls. I stopped in the doorway so that it didn't get too cramped.

Gerardo reached up for the top of the windshield. Dangling there as a decal, I realized, was a rolled-up scroll. That was an odd choice for a decoration.

He took it down and brought it out, carrying it gently. "These are what I'm after."

I inspected the tube, a sense of recognition growing like a bubble in my heart. That springy paper, that distinctive seal... Carefully, I made myself betray no recognition whatsoever, every instinct I had telling me it might be a bad thing if a griffon who had a very dangerous job collecting these knew I had two of them and might have broken a third.

"It's a scroll," I said, making myself sound confused. "What's so special about it?"

"This, my friend, is not just any scroll," Gerardo began, sounding like he was narrating the opening to a play. "It is known as a Writ of Harmonic Sanction."

Huh. And Slipstream had said these were worth more than all of Icereach. "What's inside?"

"A magic spell," Gerardo replied. "One that does absolutely nothing."

I blinked. Well, I hadn't felt any different after the one I had used... "So what makes them special?"

"Supply and demand," Gerardo said. "They're exceedingly rare. Almost impossible to get ahold of. But, a long time ago, a group of friends and I made a deal with a goddess that if we could collect enough of these within a given time frame, she would remake the world on our behalf."

I gaped.

"These days, it's a bit of a pointless quest," Gerardo sighed. "Not only are we several years past the allotted time window, but changing the world the way we wanted it might today be a very bad thing. And even ignoring both of those, we may have failed other conditions of the bargain. But, still, I search."

"Why?"

"Loyalty, I suppose." Gerardo shrugged. "Out of everyone who swore that pact, Slipstream and I were the only ones still searching long before the time elapsed. Someone's got to show them that the immortal dream never dies, even if it takes a bunch of risk for no reward. Besides, I'd already spent over a decade searching before it became clear that it was moot. You could say I just haven't found anything better to do with myself."

"And it's mostly just him searching," Slipstream cut in, busy at the stove. "I'm only here to provide support."

I felt hot and cold at the same time, and could only prod the story along. "You said you had to get enough. How many more are you missing?"

"This one would have been the last," Gerardo said, his feathery headcrest flopping in resignation. "I'm a woodcutter building a bonfire with no torch. I've accomplished deeds a goddess saw fit to give as an impossible trial. And yet, in the end, it is the weakness of mortals that will be this journey's downfall."

He shook himself out. "But, enough moping. I'm returning this one to Ironridge, and then I suppose I'll stick around for a bit just to ensure I don't start another war, or the like. And then-"

"Wait, what do you mean another war?" I forcefully interrupted, finally at my limit. "This is something you have a habit of doing?"

"Playing the harbinger of doom isn't my favorite pastime, but I'd be lying if I said it's never happened before." Gerardo shrugged. "When you've traveled this many miles, you can see just about anything, and as bad as they are, wars are relatively common. Ask me about some of the unusual things I've encountered instead."

Part of me didn't want to let this subject drop, but... "Like goddesses making deals about magic scrolls?"

Gerardo raised an eyebrow. "Fancy yourself given the same opportunity?"

I paused. That sounded like a loaded question; the moment I said yes he would inevitably start talking about how hard his journey was. "What was it like?" I asked instead.

"Which part? Feeling like we had a chance to leave our mark forever on the world?" Gerardo glanced at me.

"Sure." I gestured for him to continue. "Or like meeting a goddess in the first place. Where did you find her?"

"Mostly, it was a breath of fresh air," Gerardo admitted, "given most everything at the time was trying to kill us. I'd compare it to being in a swordfight with llamas on the Varsidelian seaboard. Plenty of danger and adrenaline, high stakes, skilled opponents... yet even though it looks and feels like the real thing, you know those fellows are too honorable to kill or maim you on purpose."

I blinked, imagining it and entirely unsure what a llama was. "Errr..."

"Not that everyone would do the same," Gerardo went on, drumming his talons. "That's the thing about immortals. The ones who want you gone won't waste any time in turning you to mincemeat. Find one who likes to talk, and at least you know they're not about to eat you for breakfast."

"Don't jinx it, dear," Slipstream interjected, stepping over to the table with a plate of triangular sandwiches and seating herself across from us on the corner bench. "You never know what you'll run into next out there."

"On the contrary, I quite hope I do jinx it," Gerardo replied, giving her a cheeky grin. "If they felt like making a speech before getting on with any nefarious deeds, it would give me that much more time to make an exit."

I tilted my head, something I had learned during the Aldebaran incident floating back into my memory: in the old Empire, inter-species relationships had been forbidden. My attunement to romance was about as undeveloped as it was possible for a skill to be, but was there something between these two that they were hiding because I was a batpony, and thus might care about the Night Mother's rules? I had an annoying feeling I was either very wrong or very dense, and there was absolutely no ground in between.

"So..." I pulled my thoughts back together. "Not only did you meet a goddess, but she was reasonable and nice. Which apparently isn't par for the course." I didn't need to ask that last bit; I had already met Ludwig and the Composer, and while I wasn't sure exactly what strata of supernatural beings they were classified in, they were anything but reasonable or nice.

Gerardo and Slipstream both nodded. "Depending how reasonable it is to ask us to gather so many rare artifacts," Slipstream added.

"Where?" I leaned forward intently.

Gerardo chuckled whimsically. "Oh, I'm afraid I can't tell you that one."

My face dramatically fell. "I thought you said you weren't interested in censorship like Icereach!"

"Censorship? Hardly even close." Gerardo strummed his talons against the table, munching on one of Slipstream's sandwiches. "If you really wanted to go and meet her, it would be the adventure of a lifetime. Far be it from me to spoil the fun of figuring out how to get there."

I narrowed my eyes at him. Was that seriously all that was going on here...?

"Yeah, so I'd like to meet someone really old and probably wiser than anyone I'll ever find in Icereach," I admitted. "But you can't be at least a little more helpful?"

"I did just put an end goal on your quest, if that's really what gets you out into the world," Gerardo pointed out. "That's worth more than you think. Some search endlessly without even knowing if what they want to find exists. I'm curious, though. After what happened six months ago, I'd have figured the mystical and magical are the last things you want to run into. When I told that story, I intended for it might shock and impress you, not light a fire under you to go and get out there."

"I've got many layers. And you're good at changing the subject," I countered. "This goddess... What's her name? How do I find her? What's she do? Is there a really good reason I shouldn't add this to my bucket list? And what were you doing when you met her?"

Gerardo sighed and shook his head. "Her name is Princess Celestia, and I believe we encountered each other during the fallout of the Griffon Empire's collapse. An entire continent can't go under without attracting some serious attention, though I strongly recommend against taking inspiration from that fiasco as a way to court the powers that be."

I hesitated. "How much do you know about the ether river far underneath Icereach? Is she related to that at all?"

Gerardo chuckled. "I know enough. That depends on what kind of relationship you're talking about, though I'm certain she understands it much better than any mortal. Why do you ask?"

"Just wondering," I said. "There's an old chapel beneath Icereach and I've always wondered who made it and why."

The griffon nodded sagely. "I'm afraid I can't help you there, but seeking the stories of ancient ruins is always an excellent hobby to keep while abroad." He tapped a talon. "I'm starting to get a picture of what motivates you. You have a love-hate relationship with the unknowable, don't you?"

I slowly shrugged. "That's... one way to put it. It's complicated."

Thankfully, Gerardo didn't press. I was too caught up in the moment to break down precisely what I did and didn't want to talk about, and had to go with my instinct instead, but my motives and reasons for caring felt like things to be safe about. He already knew enough about what I wanted that it would be easy for him to guide me into a trap like Aldebaran, and while I was pretty sure Gerardo was safe, the last thing I needed was to get into the habit of being open about myself. Even now, why I wanted things was probably best kept off-limits.

"So, hey, anyway," I said, changing the subject. "Say I did just want to pack up and leave. Give me practical advice. How would I do it? What would I need to know that I wouldn't learn just living in Icereach?"

"Do you have any friends or connections living abroad?" Slipstream asked.

Gerardo nodded. "Without the ability to carry your home on your shoulders and go where you please, you can't simply wander without a destination and a plan to reach it. Given your situation, I'd strongly advise getting a friend or mutual connection in Ironridge or Infinite Glacier and planning a visit. Pay your way across the air, assuming you can get the money or the favor. Stay with someone you know, or has been vouched for. And then, see how the world treats you. Always keep the resources at hand to get back home if things turn sour. Keep a few distant goals on the horizon, but don't plan on moving on until you've milked the new place for all the experience you care to have."

I listened and nodded. This was good.

"It might be a ways in the future," Gerardo went on, "but if you're serious about this lifestyle, your first real long-term goal should be getting your own ship. Something like this one, that you can live on." He patted a wood-trimmed wall. "These don't come cheap, but having a house that can fly is a major asset when living on the road. Also, I'll tell you right now that you won't have a hope of finding Princess Celestia without one, if that's still your goal. Borrowing or buying passage won't work. You'll need an airship of your very own, or at least on indefinite loan. Don't even think about the other challenges along this road until you've pulled that off."

"Also, get traveling buddies," Slipstream advised. "Being able to go with ponies you know makes everything easier. Friends who are with you from the start, friends you make along the way, anything works so long as you've got someone to watch your back and keep you sane."

I nodded once more. "That actually is helpful. Thanks. You mind if I bail now? I've... got some thinking to do."

"Of course." Gerardo bowed. "I'd wager we'll be around for one more day, if you care to ask about more. Whatever the path you take, I hope you have safe travels and an enlightening road ahead, Halcyon."

"Same," Slipstream echoed, bundling up again as I prepared to open the door. Really, I didn't see why, as it was quite hot inside... Me slipping outside wouldn't let that much heat out.

"Yeah." I saluted with a wing, stepping out. "You can count on it."

The first place I went, before seeking my friends or anywhere else, was home. Locked tight in my still-new, more spacious room, I kicked off my coat and my boots and flopped onto my bed, stretching out and finally cooling off. Corsica's fancy new coat she had given at my birthday hung on a mannequin across from me in a corner. It was much more lightweight than my old coat... Maybe I should have worn it instead.

Thoughts swirled around in my brain as I recompartmentalized, packing and unpacking things so I could think through them in proper order. First and foremost: I was, physically, completely and utterly fine.

Gerardo and Slipstream might have successfully turned the sparks of my dream to travel back into a fire, and I could search for red flags in that all I wanted. But they never tried to abduct me or keep me on their ship. I had, at least in this case, been worried about nothing. And I badly needed to take this experience, reconcile it with Aldebaran, and draw out some useful lessons about how to keep myself safe.

Let's see... Both Gerardo and Aldebaran were adventurers, so that alone wasn't a bad sign. Both of them had history with the Griffon Empire. Both of them talked extensively about their own goals. But Gerardo's story of what he was trying to accomplish, while farfetched, was at least consistent. He didn't change it three times like the changelings.

Gerardo hadn't been accompanied by any ponies I trusted suddenly acting wildly out of character. That was a sign I would probably look out for for the rest of my life. But, both him and Aldebaran seemed to know an awful lot about the things I was interested in... I felt like this probably should be a bad sign, but maybe it was possible I had just gotten lucky and ran into someone this time who knew about the things I was curious about.

Or maybe the existence of goddesses was common knowledge outside of Icereach, and I was the one who was an anomaly.

I sighed, making a few new resolutions for myself. First, I wanted to travel. I wasn't going to let something like Aldebaran happen again and put my dream in the ground for several more months. Today, even, I would go find Elise and start being pushy about this.

Second, I still needed to be able to handle the mental side of things without freaking out. Twin embarrassments stung at me, of needing to flee the first time I visited Gerardo's ship and of needing to change my mask to make it through the second time. I had made it through, and fairly well at that, but I wanted it to be under my own power. Now that I knew for sure he was safe, I was going to undo the change to myself, head back there again, and be completely fine through a third conversation. Probably after talking with Elise and my friends, so I had new things to talk about.

And third... I got to my hooves, sizing up Corsica's coat. I would start wearing that. Gerardo hadn't commented on my changing to the older one, but somehow I wanted to put on a better face for him. If I was going to leave Icereach and meet the world, it was as good a time as any to change the way I presented myself. And, practically, being in that airship in my old coat was sweltering. Slipstream and Gerardo might have just liked it hot, but there was also the possibility Icereach disagreed with the rest of the world on what room temperature was, and I wanted to be prepared.

I slipped into the new coat, leaving my boots off for now and admiring myself in a mirror. Red hooves... They didn't match the coat's gray, silver and green. Even if I didn't have my thing about showing them in public, fashion sense demanded that they be hidden. Though I probably would want to get a new set of boots to match.

My old coat took the new one's place, strung up on the mannequin like a filly playing with her mother's make-up. Something really must have changed in my mind, because all of a sudden it looked slightly too small for me.

Maybe this could really work.

I fixed my boots, and finally sifted through my old coat's pockets, making sure there was nothing stashed there I'd regret not having with me when I was wandering the bunker. A few pieces of candy, some loose change... a note?

Frowning, I opened it and began to read.

Dear Halcyon,

I'm writing this while changing you in the yak tower. The reason you won't remember writing this is because I'm going to rewrite your memories of what's happening right now.

I am not your crutch. I am not your god. I am not here to let you cheat and adapt yourself to any situation. That's not a power we were meant to have.

This time, the only thing I'm changing are your memories, to make you think I changed what you wanted. Otherwise, you're exactly the same. Whatever happens between you and Gerardo is entirely on you.

Please, just live your life and let me sleep.

I sat back, holding a hoof to my forehead. This... This was the second time in two uses that I had written myself a letter after removing my mask. Prior to the Aldebaran incident, that had never happened before. Even during it, when I restored my own memories of Ansel being a probably-changeling, this didn't happen.

What was happening to me? After the first letter, I thought it might have been an isolated occurrence. But now...

Was I changing?

I stepped urgently to my nightstand, pulled out a drawer, removed a fake bottom and withdrew the three scrolls I had stolen from the hideout - Writs of Harmonic Sanction, if Gerardo was to be believed.

They did absolutely nothing, he told me. And yet, they were somehow rare and valuable enough to be wanted by a goddess. Clearly unforgeable. Maybe he was lying, to protect some secret they held? I had accidentally used one. And, since then, so many things had changed.

Was it possible this spell could explain why I suddenly felt like two ponies, instead of half of a pony? Or, maybe, it could explain how it felt like fate itself had kept me safe on that day. A spell to make fate itself keep you safe? If that was true, I wouldn't be able to attribute Corsica's miraculous recovery after the avalanche to it as well, but...

My hooves shook. I didn't know, and I wanted to find out. There had to be a reason for... well, everything.

I straightened up. If there was one upside to being told by myself that I was lying to myself and hadn't done what I specifically wanted to do and thought I had, it was that apparently I really had been in my right mind, talking to Gerardo back there. I hadn't been using any mental crutches to avoid freaking out. That meant that I really could do this.

Answers had to be out there, and I was going to find them.

Possibility

I reached up and knocked on the door to Corsica's lab.

No response. I figured I'd give it a minute and then leave without trying again; it had only been six hours since the party and she was probably still asleep. At the end of the hall, a bystander walked by, and I had to force myself not to be self-conscious in Corsica's new coat. My lingering unease about wearing something legitimately cool would make a perfect timer. Corsica had until my nerves about looking like this got the better of me, and then I was out of here.

Even though I was nervous, I didn't let that interfere with my act. This coat wasn't for skulking around and getting overlooked. It was for getting noticed, and if I didn't carry myself right, I'd look legitimately bad instead of deliberately bad. The difference was hard to explain, the kind of thing I knew by instinct and not by logic, but I was certain it was there.

So far, it was doing its job. I had noticed far more lingering looks than I usually got - more than most normal ponies got, at that. One upside that I hadn't considered before wearing it was that there probably weren't many ponies who matched me now with the scruffy urchin I usually presented as, and not only because they didn't remember the normal me. This could potentially be useful as an alter ego!

Or maybe I had no data points and was overselling it to myself. And besides, did I even want an alter ego when I already had issues with suspecting I was a different pony when I took off my-

Corsica cracked open the door.

"How are you already up?" she croaked, looking like she had used her own mane as a nest.

I shrugged. "Never went to sleep. Bad time?"

Corsica didn't seem to process what I had said, leaning against the door frame in a frumpy daze. "Party crash..."

I nodded appraisingly. "Why don't you just go back to sleep, and I'll drop by again in..." I glanced over her shoulder at the dimly-lit clock. "Three hours."

"You woke me up," Corsica protested, staying in the door and doing absolutely nothing. "You get to deal with it..."

"Dunno what your angle is," I replied, gently pushing her back inside and closing the door. "Go back to bed."

Mumbling sounded from the other side of the door.

I walked away, shaking my head. Oh well. I wasn't sure where Ansel was, but at least I could check over some of the things Gerardo mentioned in the library and try to corroborate them for myself.

How had I managed to make best friends with someone who was so not a morning pony?

The library, to my astonishment, actually contained mention of Writs of Harmonic Sanction, Gerardo's elusive goal.

Mystical magical scrolls allegedly sought by a goddess struck me as the last possible thing that would make it through Icereach's censorship wall, and yet, here they were. A thick, hundred-year-old tome on the Yakyakistani imperial financial system and international trade lay open before me, and deep in between chapters describing historical bartering practices and the forced adoption of currency during the imperial expansion, I found what I was looking for.

"The rarest tender with which the Church paid its debts was the Writ of Harmonic Sanction," I read aloud, muttering under my breath. "Only and exactly one is minted every year. The same writs are distributed in the same fashion by the Griffon Empire, making them the only form of currency that is officially recognized from end to end of the world."

My eyes scanned further along the page. "Along with their extreme rarity, Writs of Harmonic Sanction contain a single-use magic spell that targets the caster and has no readily discernible effects or applications. However, a second well-guarded spell can reveal whether a creature has ever used a Writ of Harmonic Sanction, making them function as a permanent and non-transferable mark of high favor among those few who can detect them. In this way, an unused writ commands a unique monetary value, while a creature who has used one holds a unique societal status. While useless to many, these spells are highly sought-after, and even individual writs can form the centerpieces to lifelong collectors' portfolios. Collecting more than two is nigh unheard of."

I reread the passage multiple times. Nigh unheard-of to get more than two, huh? I had three, stolen from the hideout where I had been stranded, and Gerardo... Well, who knew how many he had.

Hopefully I wouldn't ever run into anyone who had the spell that could detect their use. Although, if I did, the mark was apparently unstealable, so it wasn't like anyone would try to rob me, and they definitely wouldn't expect I would have more... It was good to know I hadn't broken one, at least?

How much did I trust this book, though? I stepped back to think about this. On the one hoof, its publication date was substantially older than I was, and therefore the institute as well. That meant someone would have had to tamper with it by hoof to hide something on Icereach's behalf. And, now that I had read this, I could agree it didn't exactly scream supernatural.

On the other, the world had changed a lot in the last hundred years, and even if true, this information could be badly out of date. Besides, this was Icereach I was talking about. The ultimate research killjoys. And yet, what what the book told me about the scrolls' effects lined up well enough with what Gerardo had said. He claimed they did nothing and were merely rare, and this description didn't render any of that untrue. All they really did was make you rare too.

Whatever the case, I still suspected there was more to them than what I knew. If two empires on the opposite ends of the world both knew the secret to creating them, and they were thus far unforgeable, that spoke to some force maintaining the status quo. A setup like that, especially for distributing something so desired and rare, sounded to me like it would face tremendous pressure to implode. There had to be something unseen keeping it working for it to stand the test of time. Neither Gerardo nor Icereach was telling me everything.

...I thought back to my earlier wondering if the writ I had used had actually been a spell to give me miraculously good luck. I use a spell with no tangible effects, yet is one of the most valuable things in the world, and suddenly fate bends over backwards to accommodate me? If I was some elite in knowing possession of a spell like that, spreading false rumors about its mundanity certainly sounded like a smart thing to do.

Interesting. I sighed resolutely, closed the book, and got to my hooves. This would merit further investigation later.

This time, when I knocked on Corsica's door, it didn't take as long for her to answer. She slid it open, sized me up, and nodded... and I took in her appearance too. She still hadn't brushed her mane.

I raised an eyebrow. "Three hours not enough?"

She shrugged. "You're all dressed up. Figured someone's gotta keep the universe in balance." Then she opened the door all the way, the lights already on inside, and beckoned me in. "What's up?"

"Usually, you keep yourself looking perfect," I pointed out, entering anyway. "You sure you're fully awake?"

Corsica yawned, but I suspected this one was mostly for show. "It'll take a day or three to fully sleep that off. So, enjoying the present?"

I glanced down at my new coat, trying not to feel self-conscious with my actually-brushed mane. "It's, err... well... useful. For some things. But, I feel like making a change, so here we are. Speaking of changes, how do you feel about going to Ironridge?"

"Same way I did yesterday." Corsica dug a bare hoof around in her ear, sitting on a swivel chair and rotating slowly. "Should I put thought into this, or just smile and wave?"

"I think I've waited long enough," I said. "After the Aldebaran stuff, I mean. I'm ready. I want to go."

"Okay," Corsica replied, still spinning.

"You, err..." I raised an eyebrow. "You wanna come too?"

Corsica shrugged. "Why not?"

I frowned, detecting that I wasn't being taken seriously. "You... wanna come ask Elise about it with me, right now? See if maybe we could get that offer we turned down six months ago?"

"Sure," Corsica mumbled.

"Okay." I got to my hooves, opening the door and stepping out. "Let's go."

"Wait a minute." Corsica straightened up, suddenly lucid. "You're actually serious? Not just trying to get me to perk up? I mean it, I'm fine..."

I tilted my head at her. "Fine? Never said you weren't. You okay?"

Corsica huffed and went back to spinning.

"I am serious, though," I told her. "I'll tell you all about it. But it's not like it can't wait if something's up..."

For a moment, Corsica stared at me, and then she nodded. "I'm secretly a powerful mage recovering from casting a spell that warped reality as we know it. Or, I'm an elite Ironridge ninja spy operative and haven't slept in forty-eight hours because every time you think I'm sleeping, I'm remote-controlling a Whitewing and infiltrating foreign governments. Or, I got a taste of whatever the yaks were drinking last night and now my head hurts. One guess as to what's up."

"I gotcha." I nodded back in understanding. "So, bad time, then?"

"I can focus if it's actually important," Corsica complained. "This is the second time you've come by. What happened?"

I chewed the inside of my cheek. "So, basically..."

"...And now you want to go to Ironridge again," Corsica finished, sounding much less out of it but still looking like a raspberry pink shag carpet with eyes. "That about it?"

"Well, technically I never stopped wanting to travel," I corrected. "But, yeah. I started talking with Gerardo, and one thing lead to another, and, well... Doesn't feel like it'll get all that much better if we keep waiting. He really made it sound like the only way we can learn is by doing, and that we're already a lot better than we think we are."

Corsica hummed in thought. "I suppose. You talked to Ansel yet?"

"Couldn't find him." I shook my head. "But, anyway, you on board?"

"I'll heckle Elise with you," Corsica agreed. "And Graygarden. But make me give the final call while running on fumes, and I'll just agree with whatever you have to say. Wait until tomorrow if you want a thoughtful answer."

"Wait a minute," I said, getting a cheeky grin. "You're saying that if I tell you to do something while you're this tired, you'll do whatever I ask?"

Corsica gave me a dangerous look. "Is that a bet? Push it, and be careful what you wish for."

I nodded. "Alright. Can I brush your mane?"

Corsica turned her back to me, yawned and sat down. "Oh. Sure, go right ahead..."

I hesitated, not expecting her to say yes and not having thought through what I was signing up for. "I mean, I wasn't being serious..."

"Wuss," Corsica declared.

So that was how it was, huh? "Listen," I gently told her. "Normally, I'd tell you you have a very nice mane, and brushing it would be like admiring a pretty sculpture. And normally, I'd tell you that right now, working on it would be like trying to restore a damaged painting, which is a lot less appreciation and a lot more work. But in this case?" I raised a serious eyebrow. "I don't think that metaphor's nearly violent enough to capture what you've got going on here. That mane should be described in terms of axes and chainsaws and stuff."

Corsica matched my expression, perfectly unflappable. "Then why'd you ask about it?"

I blinked. "Look, usually-"

She cut me off with a sassy smirk. "What did I say about being careful what you wish for?"

I narrowed my eyes at her.

"In your defense, I would have made you regret anything you could have asked," Corsica primly proclaimed, turning away from me again. "You can't win when I'm a lot more shameless than you are. But you said it, you bought it. All I want to do today is sleep off that party, so if you want me as an accessory to your scheming? Better make this presentable by yourself." She bounced her fluffy nest of a mane with one hoof like a lawyer resting a case.

"Fine," I relented. "Let's see what this takes. Got a brush anywhere...?"

If I was really in a hurry, I probably could have finished with Corsica's mane much faster than I wound up doing. It wasn't every day that I got to play with someone else's appearance, for a change, let alone someone whose looks held so much potential. And even though my future was waiting, I usually had better luck finding a hole in Elise's schedule the later in the evening it was, so stalling was technically productive! Never mind that it was barely past noon, let alone evening.

...Barely past noon. Maybe I should have let Corsica sleep a little longer.

There was no turning back now, though. Corsica looked peppy enough to hide her party fatigue, I was finally starting to focus less on what I looked like in Corsica's new coat, and the hallways of the administrative wing stretched out before us, beckoning with the hum of ventilation.

"You sure you want to do this without Ansel?" Corsica asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Hey, we just spent like twenty minutes looking for him," I pointed out. "Besides, I haven't seen him since the party. It's not like we're gonna commit to anything, just see if that offer's still valid. I'm not leaving him outside the loop."

Corsica stuck her tongue out. "That explanation's three times as long as it would be if you really believed it. Whatever. Bets on whether Elise is home?"

I shrugged. "Probably too early, but you never know until you know!"

With one hoof, I pushed the door open. Over the last six months, Elise had upgraded her office to a multi-roomed complex like Graygarden's, though instead of styling it like a throne room, she had moved her secretary into the lobby like a sensible administrator. The secretary, a bespectacled mare with a short gray ponytail called Marle, looked up as we arrived.

"Oh. It's you," she greeted, shuffling papers with her horn. We weren't quite familiar enough to call each other friends, but I was enough of a regular that she always knew what I wanted. "Elise is in a meeting with Head Scientist Graygarden that's scheduled to run until one. You might be able to catch her during her lunch break if you're determined, but I'd advise waiting if it's not important. It's a chaotic day at the office..."

"More chaotic than usual?" I asked casually, leaning on the desk.

"Took an unscheduled meeting with a foreigner at the crack of dawn, then cleared her schedule immediately after," Marle replied, looking at a ledger and not at me. "Hopefully it doesn't mean trouble. Hard not to remember the last time she changed all her plans the moment after some travelers appeared."

I tried not to wince, suddenly worried that my attempts not to be paranoid had made me miss something legitimately important. "Uh, yeah. Don't want that happening. But she's meeting with Graygarden?"

"Been in there ever since." Marle scribbled something with a highlighter. "Now, if you'll excuse me, the head of atmospheric friction shielding is upset about his own meeting getting canceled, and I need to compose a response..."

I saluted with a wing, wandering back towards Corsica.

"Oh, and nice new coat," Marle muttered after me as I left. "Looks better than the last one."

"Busy?" Corsica raised an eyebrow as we left the office. "Should have taken the bet."

"Can't have a bet if both of us guessed the same outcome." I nudged at her with a shoulder. "Anyway, it's not that far to one. Wanna go wait outside Graygarden's door for her to finish?"

Corsica shrugged. "Your call, not mine."

"Right then." I nodded, setting off at a brisk pace. "Camping doors we go."

I loitered within eyesight of Graygarden's door, brow furrowed in annoyance as my thoughts threatened to descend back to paranoia. I had been so eager and interested to get this show on the road mere moments ago, and now at the first sign of trouble, I was re-evaluating everything... All because Marle had told me that ever since Gerardo showed up, Elise was acting unusual. Or, at the very least, like something important had changed.

There were dozens of rational explanations for this. Odds were, Gerardo had told her some important businessy thing like an impending change in international patent laws or Varsidel threatening to get its act together and become a competitor. If I was the administrator of a scientific research colony, things like those would certainly merit clearing my schedule and hunkering down at the planning board.

Probably the least plausible thing that could be going on was that Gerardo and his crew were shapeshifters who had abducted and impersonated her during the meeting, accounting for her changed behavior. After all, I had just talked with Gerardo and Slipstream several times, visited their airship, and everything seemed great and perfectly in place. The only warning sign here whatsoever was Elise.

Only problem was, that was exactly how things went down six months ago.

"Come on," I growled at myself under my breath, knocking a hoof against my head. "No thinking like that. It happened once, but if it happens again, you're clearly under some sort of curse..."

"Huh?" Corsica asked, lounging against a wall beside me.

"Hey," I said, deciding I needed her opinion on this. "Gerardo seems cool, but apparently Elise is acting weird. Bad sign? This is exactly what happened last time."

Corsica didn't need any time to think. "He's good," she told me. "Or at least not in league with Aldebaran. Remember how fancy their ship was? If he was in the same circles, his would be way better."

I narrowed my eyes. On the one hoof, that didn't have anything to do whatsoever with Gerardo's moral fiber. On the other, how many factions of nefarious changelings intent on taking over Icereach could there be? It did feel like it would be pretty unlikely for him to have the same goal and powers while being cut off from the previous group's web of resources.

But, as had been established many times, my luck was very-

The door opened. Ansel stepped out.

I blinked, surprise yanking me out of my broodings. "Oi, where'd you come from?"

Ansel jumped a little, mirroring my surprise. "Hallie! I... Well, this is a coincidence. Believe it or not, I just got out of a meeting... You're not looking for anyone, are you?"

"Heard Elise was here," I explained. "Talking with Graygarden. What are you doing, hobnobbing with both of Icereach's bosses?"

"Getting hired for what might turn out to be the shortest gig of my career," Ansel explained, nodding over his shoulder at the door. "Why don't you head on in and see for yourself? I think they were going to take a break now that I'm done here."

I nodded, pushing open the door, which hadn't even clicked shut yet behind him. How strange it was that I could nearly paralyze myself with worry over changelings, yet stroll in on Icereach's head honchos without breaking a sweat... Maybe Gerardo was right that once you went through enough, you just got that much tougher.

Inside, Graygarden and Elise were sitting in their usual spots, the head scientist behind his grand desk and Elise off to the side. Graygarden gave me a look that asked if I had ever heard of knocking. I gave him one that asked if he had ever heard of using his reception room for its intended purpose.

"Halcyon," Elise said, wearing a perfect poker face as Ansel mimed something, my Aldebaran nerves simmering quietly on the back burner. "I'm surprised to see you at this hour. What can we do for you?"

I steeled myself and took a breath. So far, I hadn't committed to anything. If I really wanted to play it safe, this was the last chance to go back to my room, nothing ventured, and hide under my pillow for-

"Hey, Pops," Corsica said, stepping past me. "We're getting bored of Icereach. That offer you made six months ago still good?"

Graygarden gave Elise a flat look. Elise looked politely surprised. Ansel fell over laughing.

With that, the tension snapped, and I felt like I had been buried in a snow drift. "What?" I asked, glancing between everyone and realizing Elise was trying not to laugh too. "What's so funny?"

"Oh ho ho..." Ansel stood up, wiping a tear from his eye. "So, that gig I told you about? It was to find out how you two felt about exactly that idea."

I blinked. "Wait, what? Why?"

"Because, if you wanted to, this might be an opportune moment to go," Elise told me, keeping her voice professional and level. "Of course, given all of your histories, I wasn't sure if the offer would be in good taste. We wanted Ansel's opinion about whether it would be worth asking. But, I suppose it's suddenly a moot point."

"I was just talking with Gerardo, and... remembered some old dreams," I explained. "What do you mean, an opportune moment?"

"Exactly what it sounds like," Graygarden sighed, showing visibly more stress and age than he had six months ago. "If you wanted, the three of you could visit Ironridge, under the care of a trusted associate. There's an opportunity to do it more safely and cheaply than otherwise possible, at present. Though I assume you would need to talk about it first."

"What kind of associate?" I asked, cautious yet curious. "You mean Gerardo?"

"Not Gerardo," Elise explained, shaking her head. "Although we likely would offer to pay him to take you there. This would be Corsica's prospective stepmother."

Corsica blinked in realization. "Ohhh. Your mistress." She raised an eyebrow at Graygarden. "Isn't she a little... poofy?"

"I don't follow your meaning," Graygarden said dryly. "But she's honorable, and she's willing to do it. She'd keep you safe."

"What makes now a better time than earlier?" I pressed. "Did Gerardo bring a letter from her, or something?"

"No," Elise said. "But he did bring a detailed and trustworthy report about the conditions of the world abroad. This may or may not come as a surprise to you, Halcyon, given how much you gripe about Icereach's censorship, but sometimes we have difficulty staying accurately appraised of the comings and goings in the world as well. Now, while the news is fresh, we can be much more confident in what conditions you might encounter."

I nodded slowly in understanding. "So it's not use-it-or-lose-it like with Aldebaran. It's just you think the sooner we do it, the safer we'll be. What are you even afraid of, out there? More changelings, or stuff I've never heard of?"

"Mostly, the political and economic stability of the world," Elise answered. "Icereach is fortunate that both of its sponsors have coherent governments, but that isn't the prevailing state of the world at large. And, as your leaders, it is our duty to worry over whether our own sponsors might go the same way as countries like Varsidel and the former Griffon Empire. The last thing we could conscientiously allow is for you to be in a foreign nation when it collapses."

"Hold on, though," Ansel cut in. "Like, obviously that would be a bad thing, but if Ironridge or Yakyakistan really go belly-up, will being here be so much better? I thought the reason Icereach is as safe as it is is because we've got powerful neighbors to control the airspace. And with how much stuff gets shipped in here on a regular basis, you can't tell me life as usual would carry on without them."

"You wouldn't remember it," Graygarden sighed, "but before the treaty, Icereach survived on its own. Most everyone who lives here is a native. If the treaty was going to collapse, it would probably go back to the way it used to be. These ponies are smart enough to defend themselves from foreign meddling."

Something about his words struck me oddly, but I couldn't put a hoof on what it was. "So having the Institute here doesn't count as foreign meddling?"

"Not when it's made up of locals," Graygarden explained. "The only foreigners are a few administrators like us, and we spend more time keeping the rest of the world out than ordering around the ponies within. Everyone else does work we can tell the sponsors is useful, and things never change. Just the way everyone likes it."

My ears pricked up in annoyance. "Wait a minute, you mean the reason we've never launched a rocket is because no one actually wants to? Because everyone wants things to never change?"

Graygarden shrugged.

"You're bluffing," I challenged. "That's stupid. What kind of meaningless existence is that!?"

"The kind undertaken by ponies who have chosen not to ask for more," Elise softly explained. "Ponies who are very much unlike you. Which is part of why we have worked to arrange this opportunity."

"Don't the sponsors care that you're defrauding them?" Corsica asked, tilting her head. "You just said everyone's only doing things you can report up the chain of command as useful. I doubt you'd be telling us if you really had the wool over their eyes."

Elise shook her head. "They know, and no, they don't care. The reason is that a remote, tightly-insulated, never-changing colony like Icereach is an excellent place to store secrets. While it is unlikely that we will ever launch a rocket into space, Yakyakistan and Ironridge were never under any illusions about that fact when they asked the ponies of Icereach if they could build here. Yakyakistan, Ironridge and Icereach are all here for one common reason and one alone: to be left alone."

Ansel pointed a hoof. "And you're telling us this now because...?"

"I suppose you're just old enough to know," Elise answered. "But also because it sounds like you've already made up your minds about this offer."

I stared at her. Something told me if I pressed, I wouldn't learn anything about what those secrets were. Something else told me I might have seen one already: the Nemestasis machine in the hideout where the changelings had stranded us. Something like that didn't just spring into existence, and it fit perfectly with what I was being told.

"Probably doesn't hurt that they can use whatever other tech we make here," Ansel added. "Smaller inventions and the like."

"It's a bonus," Graygarden said. "Now, Elise and I have more to discuss regarding Gerardo's report. Go and think on our offer. When you have a decision-"

Corsica, Ansel and I were already looking at each other. "I mean, I was just coming here to ask if we could do this anyway," I told them. "You?"

Ansel shrugged. "Eh. I've seen what comes of dragging my heels. How bad can it get?"

I glanced at Corsica, and she raised an eyebrow. "What? You think I'd miss my glamorous life here?"

Last chance for paranoia to step in and convince me otherwise... Nope. Too late. "We're in," I said, nodding to Elise and Graygarden. "So, err... What next?"

"Let us conclude our own meeting," Elise requested, echoing Graygarden. "You may wish to petition Gerardo for a ride yourselves, as that would be by far the cheapest, fastest and likely safest option. Beyond that, you are adults. I trust you all know how to get your affairs in order before a journey that may be long-term."

In the hallway, I lasted about three seconds before I grabbed both of my friends, a hoof around each of their necks, and pulled them close in a hug. "Eeeeeeeeeeee-"

"Wow." Corsica ducked out of my grip. "That eager, huh? You sure are touchy-feely."

Ansel just swaggered. "Well, isn't that sweet. Saved me all the trouble of trying to gauge out whether you'd turn into a puddle of stress at the mere mention of the idea."

Stress? I thought about it, but... "I dunno," I explained. "Something just feels... different. Maybe it's that I've already made the decision. Come what may, I hate it a lot more if I've got stuff riding on a choice I'm about to make. But now we're all in."

"You know," Ansel pointed out, "it might be a whole lot less stressful if you thought of it as our decision instead of your decision."

"Yeah, but you deferred to me pretty quickly-"

"That's because I just sat through two hours of questioning from those honchos about this very topic," Ansel interrupted, wagging a hoof in my face. "I've had time to think about how I feel, and frankly, it's a lot different from six months ago. If it were purely up to me, I'd like a little more agency in the world, and I've been feeling the limits of this life a lot more keenly ever since those pirates ruined my peaceful illusion. That's not enough to strike out on my own, but with a friend or two at my side, I think I'd be a yes vote purely on my own behalf." He glanced at Corsica. "What about you, wing-ears? Just in it to make my over-dressed sibling happy, or have you got a motive too?"

Corsica tossed her mane. "No, but she's cute when she's happy. What's wrong with that?"

Ansel frowned and poked her in the side. "Not really helping my point, here..."

Corsica snorted at him. "I told you months ago, I could care less what we do. It's like, a character flaw, or something." She flicked an ear. "It'll be the same for me either way. Graygarden, Graygarden's mistress... How different can they be?"

I tilted my head at her, still buoyed by a rush that didn't seem to be dragged down by my earlier panic. "You've never met her?"

"Oh, we've crossed paths a few times," Corsica said. "She's just usually busy making eyelashes at Graygarden when she visits. Felt like a gold digger, except I think she's richer than he is. I'd say it's a coin flip between her pampering us and letting us do whatever."

"Okay, that's reassuring," Ansel warned. "Just because I'm resigned to the potential of another Aldebaran happening doesn't mean we should actively court danger..."

"Elise approved it." Corsica shrugged. "Listen, Graygarden is as dry as cracked mud. Anyone who's courting him has to be a little eccentric, but if she was insane, you'd think Elise would know."

I snapped my wings at them, walking backwards ahead of the group. "Hey, can we stop trying to jinx it? I'm in a good mood, here!"

Corsica stuck her tongue out at me.

"Anyway," Ansel cut in, "I don't know about the rest of you, but I didn't get any rest after that party and badly need it, so I'm heading home to crash. Hallie, let's break the news to Mother first, and assuming she reacts with her usual nonchalance, all of us meet up an hour from sundown to go ask that griffon for a ride."

"He was pretty clear that his job was dangerous and he didn't want guests," I admitted, my ears going further back than usual. "But he also said his next stop was Ironridge, so maybe he'd be down with it? Sure can't hurt to ask."

"Right." I nodded, then turned to Corsica. "You mind if I drop by the lab first? Gotta make sure our monitoring equipment will keep collecting data while we're away, and then take stock of what to pack."

Corsica stretched, arching her back as she walked. "Sure. I might need another nap..."

Well, then I'd just have to make this quick.

Preparations

Leaving.

So many emotions connected with the possibility flew through my head that they were impossible to make sense of. Fear, left over from Aldebaran. Excitement, incubated over many years by my dream. A stunned surrealness, from something that had existed only on paper suddenly becoming a possibility... and so quickly, at that. Had I made the right choice? Was there a wrong one? If there was, could I ever learn to avoid it without the wisdom that came from living?

Maybe I would live to regret this, or maybe I would be grateful for my decision. Or, if Gerardo's advice held any water, I would do both. As much as the Aldebaran ordeal had ground me down, I could easily imagine a place in the near future where I would be glad for the experience. Even now, I might not know how to weigh what I was choosing, but I certainly knew it was important to try.

All these thoughts and more swirled through my head as Mother chewed her bubblegum, taking her customary several seconds between being asked a question and giving an answer.

"...Huh," she eventually said. "Figured you would've flown the coop ages ago. Why now?"

"Maybe I'm just ready," I replied with a shrug. "But also because Elise and Graygarden say it's a better time than usual. There's a griffon called Gerardo who flew into town. An old friend of Elise's. He gave them some intel, and might be persuadable to give me and Corsica and Ansel a ride out."

"He's still alive?" Mother raised an eyebrow, chewing. "Gerardo Guillaume?"

I tilted my head. "You know him? From the Empire?"

"Friend of a friend of a friend." Mother sat swaddled in her bathrobe on our new couch, the poofy trim wrapped like a mane around her neck. "Didn't see him much. Always thought he was a buffoon. Must have wizened up since those days if he's not kicked it yet."

"A buffoon?" I frowned. "Does that mean you don't want me going with him?"

"It's your life, kid. Not mine." Mother sank deeper into the plush cushions of the couch. "All I do is give advice. And if he's still around, he's probably a lot more competent than he used to be. Could be a good sign."

"So..." I hesitated, lifting a hoof. "I have your blessing, then? Or, me and Ansel do? To leave?"

Mother blew a bubble and popped it. "Would that be a good thing?"

I stared at her. "Why wouldn't it? You have more experience on what could happen than anyone!"

"Sure," Mother said. "Which means I'm jaded. Unless something happens, I'm sitting here for the rest of my days. Don't make your decisions by pretending to be me."

"But I value your experience!" I protested. "I kind of figured you'd just shrug and say sure, but this means a lot to me. Mom, could you... I need an honest opinion on this. Not in terms of what you'd do, but what I should do. You know Gerardo, and the world. Is this a good idea? Is this what's best for me?"

For a long moment, Mother was silent, chewing.

"Well?" I held my breath.

"You know," she eventually said, "I think that's the first time you've asked me for help in a good ten years."

I blinked. "I mean... You gave so much just getting us to Icereach so I could live in the first place, so I-"

"Became a model daughter who's completely self-reliant an doesn't need me at all," Mother finished, cutting me off. "Did me proud, kid. And probably for the best, seeing what shape I'm in." She trailed off, leaving the air laden with implication.

"Mom..." I said slowly. "You want me to pester you more often?"

"Don't go there," Mother dryly warned. "Or else I'll debase myself by complaining to make you stop."

So I remained quiet, a completely new picture painting itself in my mind over the burned-out shell of a mare who had given all she had to give. I remembered back to the Aldebaran incident, when Mother had seemed to regain her spark while trying to steal an airship and spirit me away from the city, and I remembered my hazy, infant dreams where I saw her fighting in the collapsing Griffon Empire. Maybe she wasn't like a jar that had gone empty, but a brick of charcoal that could only burn by... well, burning?

That metaphor didn't make sense, and as soon as I tried to fix it, I lost my train of thought. Think, Halcyon! Do your thing where you casually and effortlessly extract every facet of someone's life from the way they fold their napkin at dinner...

"And stop staring," Mother added. "Makes me think I've got peanut butter on my chin."

I shook my head to clear it. "Listen, Mother," I declared. "I dunno if you're passively venting your frustration at being unable to have a relationship with me where I rely on you more, or what, but right now, I might be leaving. If my friends and I go through with this and everything works out, we might not see each other again for... Well, a pretty long time. Months, maybe. So, if there's ever a time to do something you've thought about doing but never gone and done before, this is it." For a moment, I left my words hanging, and then added, "Like giving me some serious advice."

Something changed in Mother's demeanor.

"This is it, huh?" She raised an eyebrow. "End of the beginning? Fancy yourself doing something out in the world?"

"I always have," I told her. "Just, now it's not just a hypothetical."

Mother took a deep breath, then stood up and started limping towards the door. "Well, let's get a move on. Who knows how late those yak friends of yours will stay out..."

"The yaks?" I followed after her, confused. "What do you wanna see them for?"

"To see if they have a training dummy that'll fit a skeleton like me," Mother replied. "No point in wasting away here if you're not safe as can be. I'm too young to be acting twice my age anyway."

"A training dummy? For you?" I aggressively tilted my head. "What?"

"Keep repeating everything I say, and I'll worry your ears aren't working," Mother dryly told me. "I gave sitting back a chance last time, with Aldebaran. Figured you'd just kill them all if there was a problem. Didn't expect you to be so nice, or for that windigo to get involved."

My jaw dropped. "What do you mean, being so nice!? We were at their mercy the whole time!"

Mother pointed at my bracelet.

"What's this gonna do?" I took a step back, my heart beating out of control from surprise after surprise. "Burn me to a crisp? Ignite their entire airship and roast all of us in the sky? Overwhelm the ventilation in that cave with smoke? The whole point of us living in Icereach is because you wanted me to have a better life than... I dunno, going out like that!"

Mother raised a skeptical eyebrow at me. "You really forgot how that old bracelet of mine works?"

Suddenly, I felt extremely self-conscious. Also, forgot? I had a great memory. When I wasn't tampering with it, that was...

"I... kind of only use it as a flashlight," I told her. "Didn't want to risk overusing it. Besides, I don't need scary magic powers every day."

Mother shrugged. "If you push yourself hard enough to wind up like this, it wouldn't happen by accident. Light it."

"What?" I blinked at her like she was crazy. "Here and now? You want me to burn down our house? Sorry, but I like having my flesh at a normal temperature."

"Then give it here," Mother requested, tapping the coffee table with her good wing.

Baffled, I sat down, removed my boot and slid the bracelet off - Mother was one of the few ponies who knew about my colored hooves, obviously, and thus it was safe for her to see. And if there was something she knew about this power that I, in turn, could find out without the risk of trial and error...

"Here," I said, pushing it to her.

Mother stared at the black band for a moment, then sat on her haunches and slid it carefully onto her good leg. For a moment, she focused, and then it began to glow with green. Her face grimaced in concentration and possibly pain. It looked a lot harder than when I did it.

Then, it happened: bands and currents of green flame began to manifest, arcing and crawling across her coat, visible over the top of her bathrobe. She held them there for about three seconds, before the bracelet went dim and she let out a breath, immediately taking it off and putting it back on the table. Her wrist was smoking slightly where the metal had made contact.

"There," she said. "Now, what did you see?"

"You used it," I pointed out. "I mean, I can do that much. Are you alright?"

"Bah. I'll be fine." She blew on her hoof and shook it out. "See any regular red flames? Any soot on my robe? Scorch marks? Did I burn the house down?"

I leaned in to examine her more closely, though it wasn't really necessary. "Nope. Completely clean."

She nodded, showing her bad side. "Those flames don't set things on fire. If they did, you wouldn't be able to turn it off once it's burning. And the scars aren't burn marks. They're more like a... price. And not one you can pay by accident."

I didn't know what to think. All I knew for sure was that I didn't know nearly as much about this bracelet as I was probably supposed to.

...Well, and that I already knew what she had just said. Both previous times I had turned the bracelet high enough for flames to appear, I hadn't been left with scorch marks, the things I had been touching hadn't had them either, and the flames went away on their own when the bracelet turned off. I just... never connected that as a rule in my mind before.

"Keep it," Mother said, gesturing at the bracelet with her face. "Won't do much good in my hooves anymore. My body's had far too much of that thing already. Besides, you'd have to be a fool to go out in the world unarmed." She shook her head. "If I knew you didn't know how to use it, I might not have sent you out with Aldebaran. Always thought you left them alive on purpose after they crossed you."

"Well..." I searched for anything I could say in response to that. "I mean, I know I need a weapon. That's why I've been working on this one with the inertial stabilizer rotor..."

"Good on you," Mother replied. "But the more the better, and this one is easy to carry around."

I tilted my head. "So what's it do, anyway, if not light things on fire? I know it glows. And it sometimes makes me stronger, or more resistant to cold? I think. I haven't really... ever tested it."

"It's just power," Mother replied, noncommittal. "It does what you need. Strength. Stamina. Hurting things you attack. Blunting things that hurt you. Usually all at once. I could never focus it well. Felt like a beast struggling at its chains. I'm surprised you don't know this, wearing it every minute of every day. You already control it well enough to use it for light. Shouldn't need me to explain all this."

I stared at the bracelet. Describing it as a chained beast didn't exactly make me more comfortable about using it, but... how many secrets did this thing have for me to unlock? And if I did find them, would it turn out to be safer than I imagined, or more dangerous? Given Mother's reaction to me not knowing, I had a bad feeling I actually did know, and that knowledge was just buried under my mask.

But... why then would maskless me let me go around wearing this? If it was dangerous, better for me to either know the dangers or leave it behind. Right? This just didn't make sense.

"Where did you get it?" I asked, figuring that question would be safe enough.

"Stole it," Mother replied. "Sometimes you have to do what it takes to stay alive. Other times, you have to do what it takes to live with yourself after you survive. This was the latter. Either way, it's yours now."

"From who?" I pressed, curious.

Mother just shook her head and snorted. "Let's go see those yaks. How long have I got until we leave?"

I stopped in my tracks, remembering what she had said earlier. "Wait, we leave? You're coming with us?"

"Am I not invited?" Mother raised an eyebrow.

"Well..." I fidgeted. On the one hoof, having someone along that I knew would keep my best interests in mind would be a relief, to say the least. On the other, having someone I'd need to look out for wouldn't. Although Mother could be very competent when she needed to be! But...

I just hadn't remotely considered the possibility of inviting her along. I hadn't thought through this at all.

"Well, we were going to ask Gerardo if we could maybe hitch a ride on his ship," I decided, nodding. "Which might be today or tomorrow..."

Mother swore. "Not a lot of time to rehab. Whatever. Might as well go see if he's changed over the years instead..."

"Ah," Gerardo said, "it's you."

We stood on the dock Gerardo's ship was moored at, meeting the griffon outside so as to minimize time the door was left open. I could see Slipstream watching us through a window, Gerardo looking unbothered by the cold and Mother still wrapped in her fluffy bathrobe.

"Yep," she replied. "Me. Going by Nehaly these days, if Elise hasn't drilled it into your head."

"Going by?" I tilted my head. "Wait, you mean that's not...?"

Mother shrugged. "Make enough enemies, and you'll have hundreds of aliases before you know it." She turned back to Gerardo. "I've heard you're interested in taking my daughter and her friends off on an adventure."

Gerardo bowed. "On the contrary, this griffon adventurer extraordinaire's adventures are not meant for the meek of skill. I specifically recall telling Halcyon here I wasn't interested in an understudy for my cross-continental gallivanting." He raised an eyebrow at me.

"We're not interested in gallivanting. Just hear me out," I explained, kneeling slightly. "Elise told me and Corsica and Ansel that we might have a research trip opportunity in Ironridge. We've already got a destination and lodgings lined up and everything. You said you're going there next anyway. She thought maybe you could offer us a very safe ride."

Gerardo raised an eyebrow. "Is that so? Did Elise mention anything about what happened the last time I offered a ride into Ironridge to some young hopefuls while also carrying important cargo?"

I blinked. "No. Why?"

"It involved copious amounts of fraud, swashbuckling and explosions," Gerardo explained. "Plus at least once instance of witnessing someone get a melon thrown at their head. She really recommended me as an ideal courier?"

"No, it was romantic!" Slipstream shouted through the glass window. "Don't forget that was when you met me, Gerardo Guillaume!"

"Hush," Gerardo replied. "I'm trying to check someone's commitment to a life-changing and bad yet inevitable decision."

Mother gave them a look. "Romantic?"

Gerardo returned it with a level gaze. "If you can honestly chastise me in the name of the Night Mother, you... have a right to do so, I suppose. But, I'd advise saving your energy. Unlike her, there's nothing you can do about it."

"Wasn't thinking of her," Mother snorted. "Just whether you two would be a perfect influence on these kids."

Gerardo chuckled and drummed his talons against the floor. "I think that was a foregone conclusion before you even brought this up. You do realize I'm a professional adventurer. None but those with a death wish would be sane to follow in my footsteps."

I stepped forward, butting back into the conversation. "Yeah, but how sane are we gonna be, staying in Icereach until the end of time? Maybe we can be comfy, but limited horizons are boring. I'd like to take my chances with the unknown again. Trying to be safe, sure, but there's gotta be a balance between mortal peril and nothing ever happening. Just because they're opposite extremes doesn't mean you've got to choose one or the other."

"Is that so?" Gerardo regarded me.

I nodded. "Look, how many ponies live in Ironridge right now? Ten thousand? A hundred thousand? A million? How many of them go about normal day-to-day lives without getting kidnapped? And how many of them are locked in boxes where they can't learn anything they don't already know? There's gotta be a reasonable way to do this. And if you're so experienced with danger, you should know how to avoid it for one little flight while we tag along. A flight through the safest skies in the world, at that."

Gerardo shrugged at Mother. "I suppose she does have a point. Yakyakistan and Ironridge control the airspace between them with great fervor. It is the world's last safe aerial trading route, after all. If we really did make a direct run of it..."

Mother shrugged back. "What are you looking at me for? You're the one that needs convincing."

Gerardo glanced across at the mid-afternoon sun. "Well, I was planning to weigh anchor around sundown. And, it'll be a cramped voyage. About two weeks, at this ship's speed. Anyone who's coming would need to sleep in the main cabin. You won't get a lot of privacy, and you'll have to deal with us being up at all hours. One of us has to pilot, after all. One suitcase plus saddlebags each; the hold is full and I'm strapped for space. Once we get there, I'd escort you for one day to make sure you get where you're going, and that would be it. No return tickets, and no bailing out halfway if it gets cramped. Sound like a deal you can take?"

I hesitated. No privacy... That might be rough. And it was definitely a much smaller ship than the Aldebaran... But it was an offer.

"Can I go run this by my friends?" I turned to leave, looking back expectantly. "I'm pretty sure we can be ready by then."

"Go do it," Mother commanded, waving me on with her good wing. "I've got a few more things to run by this lout while I have his ear."

An elevator shaft slid by around me, my body feeling weightless from the descent. Finding Ansel and Corsica had been harder than convincing them, and that part was easy, considering they were both in the lab. Aside from the luggage limit, his conditions were ones both of them had already been expecting.

It sounded like they had the science packing under control, and Corsica's cosmetics were her own problem. I would need to pack too, but first, it was time to say goodbye.

The elevator slowed to a halt, opening and letting me into the chapel. The ether pump hadn't been running recently; the rocket fuel projects were the main ones that used it, and they wrapped up the bulk of their experimentation shortly after the Aldebaran incident. Now, except for weekly maintenance cycles, the chapel was quiet.

Crystals glittered in the light of my bracelet, spiky clusters and smooth facets crusting the edges of the chapel where it broke off toward the ether river and caking the cave beyond. Twisting, organic spires of crystal occasionally connected the glassy river to the cavern roof, but my bracelet could only illuminate so far. There had to be some boundaries to this cave, for the world above it not to simply collapse. But I was confined to this small box of a room, and could only look out and wonder how far they were.

I wandered to the edge of the crystal plinth sticking out into the abyss, my wings itching. "Hello?" I called.

If my theories were right, about the crystals here being able to remember events that happened on the other side of the world, maybe this place really was boundless. Maybe the world above was held up not by walls, but by magic. Of course, trying to detect that would be a study all of its own.

Either way, I imagined my voice echoing to the ends of the earth and back. But nothing answered.

A short ways back, across the chapel from the rack of silent ether processing machines, was an experiment Corsica and I had set up within the past six months. Trying to automatically detect and monitor new waves using crystal sampling was all but impossible, but this device was much simpler: an accurate and long-lasting clock, tied to a light detector and a recording device.

If any bright events took place here, such as me turning on my bracelet, it would know, and record their time and duration. The wave I had witnessed two and a half years ago had been nothing if not bright. If that happened again while we were gone, we would be able to learn its timing down to the second next time we were back in Icereach.

I checked the machine to make sure it was recording my own light, now. Success. It seemed everything was in operation.

"So, err..." I got up from my invention and stepped back toward the plinth. "It's been a while, right? Of me coming down here and... hanging out."

No reaction.

"Try not to get too lonely while I'm gone, yeah?" I asked the chapel. "I know not many others come down here, and none do it the way I do. But, err... I'm looking for the thing you were made for. And the light spirit. Maybe they're one and the same. Either way, when I find out, you can be sure I'll let everyone remember. Maybe then, I won't be the only one who comes down here."

Silence.

"I won't forget what you did for me," I said, shaking my head. "I needed a place, and... I got so much more. You gave me my friends back. Gave me my life back, after the avalanche. Actually, you gave me a new life that was way better than the one I had before. I... know someone's looking out for me, and I believe it's you, light spirit. I haven't forgotten all those miracles when Aldebaran came to town."

Or maybe, said a voice in my head, it's that Writ of Harmonic Sanction you used. No one would value a spell that much if it doesn't do anything.

I brushed it away. "Either way, I won't forget you." And then I stepped over to the hidden door to say farewell to the mural as well.

No one had made me return the key I had stolen, even though I was all but certain Elise and Graygarden knew I had it. I wasn't sure if I would take it with me when I left. Not like I needed to waste space bringing an inert rock, but not like it would do any good left behind either. And it was a memento, of sorts. Maybe I would bring it.

The door slid open, and I paced through the long cave to the mural room. To this day, I had never found out what had been written in Icebeard's journal. Saving me from that shrapnel had been too much for the book to take. The doctors made it sound like there wasn't even anything left to give me.

But the mural, though... That was still there. It loomed down at me, all three layers, an alicorn holding a star and standing on a world held by a bigger equinoid, that one in a world of its own held by something draconine and unknowable. This mural, the thing the Composer had been so interested in, had been the closer subject of my studies for the past six months.

I hadn't exactly learned a lot over that time. Still, it felt like the eerie mural had kept me company, and what I had accomplished were a series of accurate drawings that more or less captured the spirit of the thing. It was large enough to take up half a cafeteria wall, and yet detailed enough that even a microscope couldn't make out its finest features. A few of my drawings captured close-ups, most focused on the important details, and one more held the author's signature, scrawled in a corner in an unreadable language the library held no reference to. That signature had been the Composer's main goal. If I someday wanted to solve the mystery of why my home had been invaded, this was one of the most valuable clues I had.

"You," I said to the mural, and its depiction of three gods and unknowable signature. "You, I'm going to figure out."

Unlike the rest of the chapel, which was holy to me, this room was a challenge. And having given it a challenge of my own, I left, resolving that I would return with the knowledge to figure it out.

"I'm home," I announced, letting myself into my apartment to the sounds of an argument in progress. "What's going on?"

It was Ansel and Corsica.

"Ah! Hallie!" Ansel perked up, standing over an open suitcase in the middle of the living room. He pointed a hoof at me. "Just the mare I wanted to see. I'm trying to teach wing-ears how to pack light. Mind giving me some backup?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow, giving me a look that said Can you believe this guy?

"Alright," I volunteered, wandering over to inspect the suitcase. "What have you got?"

It was a small suitcase, and nearly empty at that. A sock filled with money, a toothbrush, a light novel and a bag of dried cashews were all it had.

I tilted my head at him, aware that once I picked a side, there might be no going back. "Is that it? Where's the rest of your stuff?"

"All in the bag," Ansel proudly replied. "We've got entertainment, sustenance, and hygiene, plus cash to buy whatever I need on the other side."

"You think that's gonna last you for two weeks?" I arched my brow in concern.

"See?" Corsica butted in. "Fillies just take more space. We have more material attachments."

"Well, I'm still only using one suitcase," I pointed out. "Just don't ask for any of my stuff if you run out."

Ansel gave me a flat stare. "She was at four bags when I started helping her winnow them down, and now she's up to five."

Corsica flung a foreleg over my back. "I'm just packing for all of us. Though I might only share with Halcyon, since she's the one who gets me."

"Alright," I sighed, slipping out from her embrace. "But Gerardo's probably gonna say no, so let's see what you've got..."

"You sure you wanna go without that soap?" Corsica warned as I put yet another cosmetic product in the stay pile. "Ansel's going to smell like an alligator without it."

"I will not!" Ansel protested. "Case in point, I've never used it before!"

"Then I rest my case," Corsica said smugly. "Right, Hallie?"

I narrowed my eyes. "You know, didn't you swipe most of these from your stepmom's collection in the first place? She's probably gonna have more of them than you can shake a stick at in Ironridge. I think we safely can leave these behind."

"Just Graygarden's mistress," Corsica replied. "Different from a stepmom. And he barely even counts as my dad in the first place."

"Same difference," Ansel cut in. "Look, if I break my back stuffing your alligator perfume in my own bag, can we call it a truce and say you only pack stuff for yourself from now on?"

"Sure." Corsica shrugged. "But if that one alone breaks your back, you need to work out more. Ah! I just realized I forgot-"

"Nope." I blocked her with a wing. "Didn't forget anything. I'm a hundred percent certain these six are literally all you need."

"But-"

"You realize Gerardo's ship probably doesn't have a shower?" I told her frankly. "We literally won't even get a chance to use ninety percent of these!"

Corsica huffed. "I'll stand outside in a storm to get clean if I have to. As long as my bags smell nice enough to cover up for the rest of you."

"Says you," I retorted, "who would have gone to see Elise as a total shag bag this morning if I hadn't fixed you up myself."

"You don't know that." Corsica stuck her tongue out. "I would have done it myself if you were a killjoy."

"Mhmmmmm..."

To the side, Ansel chuckled. "You know," he pointed out, "I'm pretty sure if we can keep up good spirits like this, it's not going to matter who brings what. We've got all we need for a good time right here."

I nodded. No one wanted to say it, but given how much the Aldebaran incident had hit us... It was almost a miracle that we were going into this laughing rather than cowering and scared.

But I hadn't doubted myself once since we all signed on. Even tempting those thoughts like this didn't quite seem to do it. Maybe, for once, optimism was going to win the day.

The door banged open behind us, and Mother limped in.

"Oh! Good evening, O venerable one," Ansel greeted, standing up and faking a bow. "We're absolutely not planning on leaving this mess, yes I know it's horrific but-"

"Halcyon, come talk to me before you leave," Mother grunted, shuffling into her room and closing the door behind her.

Everyone looked at each other.

"I... probably... should see what this is about," I announced quietly, getting to my hooves. "See, uh... See if you can get the luggage straightened out on your own."

Corsica nodded, and I left to follow Mother.

Mother didn't speak when I let myself into her room, closing the door again after me. She was on her bed, holding something small in her hooves. The corners of her eyes were glistening.

"Um..." I wasn't sure how to approach.

"I have a favor to ask," Mother said stiffly.

I took a step closer.

Mother held out what she was holding. It was a small locket, one I suddenly remembered her contemplating six months ago. Inside, I knew, was a photo of three batponies: herself, twenty years ago, along with Leitmotif and another mare.

"That's you and your old friends from the Sarosian Underground," I said. "Back in the Empire."

Mother nodded. "Myself. Leitmotif. One other mare. All of us should have been dead."

I stood still.

"But, I wasn't. She wasn't." Mother didn't look at me. "If it turns out all three of us survived, and you ever happen to run into the third... Give her this for me."

The locket sat there, waiting for me to pick it up.

"Not gonna give me any names, huh?" I weakly raised an eyebrow. "Running into an individual should-be-dead pony and recognizing them solely from a faded picture that's older than I am isn't unlikely enough?"

"You talk about miracles," Mother just said, hiding her face. "Just taking a page out of your book. I wouldn't want it to happen unless it was meant to happen."

I watched the locket, feeling as though I was a bystander to an event of immense significance, none of which I knew.

One of my wings stretched out, taking and opening the locket all on its own. There was that photo. A young Mother, probably my age. Was this before or after I was born? Probably before, but not by more than two or three years.

Leitmotif was with her, looking almost exactly the way I remembered her, only as a batpony instead of a pegasus. And then there was the third mare: heavyset, middle-aged, with a charismatic, beautiful face and a styled, wavy mane.

Across from the picture, under the lid of the locket, were the initials F+S+L, listed over a date nearly forty years ago. I didn't recognize the date, neither from ether crystal fault planes nor from my research trying to tie them to events. But, if I couldn't get a name, at least this was a starting point.

"Alright," I decided, closing it and tucking it into a pocket. "You've got yourself a deal."

"Knock 'em dead, kiddo," Mother drawled back. "Try not to get in too much trouble. And once I've got my muscle mass back, I'll be right behind you."

"Reassuring." I smiled, then leaned over and hugged her. "But we'll look out for ourselves too. See ya around."

Myself, Corsica and Ansel approached Gerardo's airship, Ansel's bags light and mine and Corsica's heavy. Science equipment made up the bulk of our cargo, followed by rarer cosmetics like my disguise kit and spare coat - I wore my new one, but wanted both just in case. Farewells had been said. The sun touched the horizon. We were ready.

"I've been down to speak with Elise," Gerardo greeted as we drew near. "Apparently, this is indeed her plan. She was even generous enough to pay me. Most of the time, bumming it and calling in favors is the way I see friends go."

"You ready?" I asked, years of yak training keeping my back strong under the weight of all my luggage.

"More ready than you," Gerardo replied. "We'll be flying fast. Elise also compensated me for the higher fuel costs of getting you there a day or two early. I have an address and letter of introduction for your destination, and all preparations are done. Once we start, there will be no turning back. Are you sure you are ready?"

"I can't say I was born ready," Ansel told him, "but I've had quite enough time to prepare."

"See ya, Icereach," Corsica echoed.

"Yeah." I nodded, feeling the weight of Mother's locket in my coat. Had something Gerardo told her brought this about? Maybe I would find out about that, too.

Below, the yaks were wrapping up their drills for the night. Icereach's covered rocket silo hatches held as little activity as usual, though beneath the ground I knew that scientists were working tirelessly on new patents and technology. Growing up, before I knew how slowly things moved, I had found it inspiring. To hear Elise tell it, it was just their way of existing.

I wanted more.

We were ready.

Scale

"Well?" Gerardo said, looking over his shoulder at us in the ship's cramped cabin as Crimson Valley disappeared behind us and Slipstream took the wheel. "Getting homesick yet?"

I had to admit, I was nervous. This was real. And yet, mixed in with all the fear and paranoia about Aldebaran were much more ordinary concerns, like whether I had forgotten to pack something or whether I had skipped a goodbye. Their presence told me I was at least thinking clearly, and not letting my prejudice blind me to the real things to be aware of. I could do this.

"Not on your life," Corsica retorted, extra prettied up in an attempt to stave off the effects of spending two weeks in a showerless airship. "I could do this every day."

"I think it's a little too early for homesickness," Ansel agreed as the sun touched the western horizon. "Wait until the trouble starts for that."

Gerardo nodded sagely. "I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but trouble starts now. Slipstream is taking the night shift, and that means this griffon needs his shut-eye. So before you get any stories or entertainment out of me, prove you can pass a night with only this meager space at your disposal." He hesitated. "Though becoming nocturnal might not be a terrible idea either..."

Right. We had signed up to deal with that.

"Until tomorrow morning!" Gerardo raise a wing in farewell. Then he let himself through the door to the rear cabin and closed it behind him, leaving the three of us alone.

I glanced around at the room we had. It was about the size of my bedroom, but a whole lot messier.

"There's a bench," I pointed out. "Plenty big for one, but two might get awkward. And a table, if you're not scared of falling off..."

"Dibs on the floor," Ansel called, yawning for emphasis. "You mares can do whatever."

"Yeah." Corsica looked suspiciously at our lodgings. "Well, at least it's hot enough in here that we won't need blankets..."

Day One

I woke to a pressure on my side.

"Nnrgh?" I grunted, lifting my head to look. A mop of raspberries and cream greeted me back. At some point during the night, Corsica had started using me as a pillow.

"Hey, get off!" I struggled meekly, enough to hopefully wake her but not enough to get sucker punched in revenge. "I worked hard for this spot! Go find your own!"

Corsica snuffled in her sleep.

"Come on, move it!" I protested a little harder, trying to flex my wing. My coat was off due to the temperature, and not only was Corsica worsening the problem that was meant to solve, but being this close to another pony without my customary armor was making me all sorts of uncomfortable. "It's already sweltering in here, and your mane's hotter than a blanket!"

"No, you're hotter than a..." Corsica groaned, starting to shift. "What time is it?"

"Sunrise, apparently." I dragged myself out from under her by shadow sneaking, using the table's shadow as cover - underneath it felt like the coolest place I could find. The resulting thud and yelp told me she was now much more awake.

Corsica glowered at me from under the table as I righted myself outside of it. "What was that for?"

I made a show of brushing my side off. "For trying to use me as a pillow. I know space is limited, but we've still all gotta make do."

Corsica pointed at my hooves.

I looked, and realized I was standing on a line taped on the floor, next to two signs that read 'Colts' side' and 'Fillies' side'. The colts' side took up about three quarters of the cabin. In it, Ansel was sprawled out like a rug.

"What did you get up to after I passed out?" I raised an eyebrow. "And you really let him stick you with such a bad deal?"

"First off, it's not my fault if I was sane and got some sleep after your party," Corsica declared, crawling out from under the table and starting the lengthy process of brushing her coat. "We were up for another hour or two. And second, Ansel is a dirty cheater."

"What?" I tilted my head at the spectacle. "How does someone cheat at deciding who gets to sleep where?"

Corsica just huffed. "Be glad you don't know."

"And even then," I pointed out, "you could've taken the bench! We get all of that. It's not like he's snoring or-"

The rear cabin door swung open, and Gerardo Guillaume poked his head through. "Top of the morning to you," he whispered, noting Ansel with a nod. "Too early, still?"

Corsica shook her head, sending her unbrushed mane flying everywhere. "Wake him with a vengeance."

"Very well, then." Gerardo retreated and shut the door. "Let us try that again..."

A few moments passed, just enough to make me wonder if nothing was going to happen. And then the door flew open and Gerardo slid out, skidding across the floor, kneeling into a one-winged bow. One of his talons held a trumpet. He swiftly belted out a dawn serenade.

Ansel grumbled and rolled over.

Gerardo raised an eyebrow at us. "Heavy sleeper, eh?"

I just shrugged.

"Well, let me go relieve my faithful co-pilot of duty, and then we can begin our first rousing day of carousing through the skies." The griffon slid open the door to the cockpit, trumpet still in hand, and stepped inside.

Moments later, Gerardo was up front, Slipstream was cooking breakfast, and Ansel was blearily regaining his senses in a corner, myself and Corsica already awake. "So," the griffon called back through the open door, eyes fixed on the horizon. "The journey begins. Tell me, how much do you three know about Ironridge?"

"Nothing practical," Corsica replied. "It's a city-state with lots of air power. They had a revolution two decades ago. The current government is a corporation called Cold Karma. It's hot there, and Cold Karma sells ways to cool it off."

"All true," Gerardo replied. "I imagine you should know at least a little about the city if you want to go there, but some say the thrill of discovery is everything. Would you rather it be left a surprise, or-"

"Tell us!" I interrupted. "We're not going out into the world to avoid learning things!"

Gerardo chuckled. "Well, you mentioned the heat already. Ironridge's climate is probably its foremost feature, and the one that shapes the entirety of life in the city. It is built in a geologic formation the locals call a crater, but is more of a mountain face that bends around in a three-quarter circle. The city is stratified based on height, and the height determines the climate, from the hottest jungle at the floor of the bowl up to the temperate reaches at the top of the surrounding mountains. The higher you go, the less the heat controls your life."

"Makes sense," I said, nodding. "So probably all the rich types live up top? If Graygarden's mistress can afford to court him, I bet she's among them."

"For the most part," Gerardo agreed. "Although due to certain long-running cultural tensions, it's not quite a clear cut as that. Regardless, due to that stratification, Ironridge is divided into four practical districts: the Day District, the Night District, the Sky District and the Ice District."

"Day and night districts?" I leaned in closer. "How so?"

Gerardo spun his feathers. "Go below a certain point, and it's simply too hot to be out and about in the day. That's the Night District, where all general work and commerce is conducted under the cool of the moon. The only ones out during the day in there are tough, have a very good reason to do what they do, and had better take care not to drop dead of heatstroke."

Corsica stuck out her tongue. "Bleugh."

"You'd better avoid the place altogether, with a coat like yours," Slipstream pointed out, cooking away. "I'm sure it must be nice to have that much thickness up here in the snow, but it won't serve you well in Ironridge at all."

Corsica looked disturbed. I, on the other hoof, wondered if I was finally about to get recompense for all the times I had envied Corsica for her ability to go outside at Icereach without any clothes.

"The Day District," Gerardo went on, "is the point where high society folks begin being able to stand the heat of day. It's a bit of a complicated topic, and there's something of an ongoing flexing match between those who want to see how low they can live without making themselves miserable. Doesn't help that before all this started, the Day District was the nicest and richest part of Ironridge to live in. Plenty of elites who just don't want to give in and move. You'd think everyone would just move further up, but that's not quite how it went down. And, like the Night District, it's still more active at night. Just, that's when all the normal folk who don't have an image to polish come out."

My ears twitched in interest. This was exactly the kind of real-world detail you never heard except in the abstract at Icereach. I was pretty sure I had heard the names of the districts before, but that was about it...

"At the top of the mountains, you've got the Sky District," Gerardo continued. "It's rather temperate up there. Warm enough to grow gardens, cool enough that you might close your windows from time to time. Far and away the nicest place to live, if you ask me, though it's got some... history that stops ponies from moving there in flocks. To make a long story short, a lot of development occurred in the region about thirty years ago, back when it was a glacier, and it happened at the expense of the working class. These days, there are-"

"Back when it was a glacier? Thirty years ago? And now it's temperate? You what?" I tilted my head in disbelief.

Gerardo raised a talon. "Patience, I'll get there. As I was saying, nowadays the Sky District has a lot of ruins with folks living in them, but every time anyone talks about using the place to expand the city or building actual infrastructure or housing... You'll see for yourselves. It's a mess. Doesn't help that the terrain is jagged and it would be an architectural nightmare, but that one at least can be solved with good old engineering. And if Ironridge has one thing, it's engineering talent in droves."

"And the Ice District is Cold Karma's headquarters, right?" Corsica cut in.

"So you do know a thing of two." Gerardo glanced over his shoulder with a bemused look. "Indeed it is. There's some debate over whether that makes it a real district, but given that they offer employee housing and have the largest square mileage behind the Night District, I'd say it more than counts. Incidentally, that's where your destination address is. Sounds like your father must be courting someone with connections."

"But what about the Sky District, though?" I pressed. "How did it change that much in such a short time?"

"Some breed of magic, I can only assume." Gerardo shrugged. "I don't know for certain. Ironridge's climate always has been unique, and I suspect magic may have played a role in keeping it the way it was. Or, it could have been a delicate homeostasis. Either way, ever since the Steel Revolution, the entire city's temperature has been ticking up year by year. It's localized entirely to the city, like a giant bubble of heat sitting in the crater, and you can find snow and ice just a mile or two outside its borders. All I can tell you is that someone had better figure it out soon, or else the city as a whole is going to have to pack up and move to the next mountain over."

"What's more likely is that more and more ponies in the Day District will keep shelling out to line Cold Karma's pockets," Slipstream added. "Anyone sane would just move further up the mountain, but a combination of pride and lack of infrastructure keeps them down low. Can't help but notice there's a clear winner in all this..."

My thoughts spun with all of this information, immediately whipping up a tale where a dastardly company discovered a spell to make the Night District hotter and hotter to force ponies to buy their products... No one would actually do that, right? If they did, it would be too obvious. Someone would have to know.

"None of that will mess up our trip, right?" Ansel asked, finally lucid after spending ages waking up. "Impending doom and whatnot..."

"Not unless you plan on staying in Ironridge for upward of ten years," Gerardo replied. "And even then, you're well-connected. I'm sure Graygarden and Elise will be able to arrange something if you need help."

We all looked at each other. "Ten years seems kinda dire," I pointed out.

"Ironridge was founded around eight hundred ago," Slipstream told us. "Believe me, they've faced things a lot more dire than a ten-year deadline before. But that's just a guess."

"If only I could tell you the rest of the world was a much stabler place," Gerardo apologetically chuckled. "A few years back, the Griffon Empire traded a vain but competent dictator for one who's currently more popular but appears very corrupt. Varsidel had their most recent attempt at national cohesion fall through, and are back to the vagabond warfare they've been drowning in for however many decades it's been, and rumor has it Yakyakistan's church officials are appearing in public less and less often even though their succession crisis is supposedly resolved. I've heard some suspect this new Holy Sparkbearer of theirs isn't the real thing, and there's secretly been a coup. And Silverwind and Mistvale are just as empty as ever."

"Yep," Slipstream said. "Ironridge is about as good as it gets right now."

Well, that was a thing to think about.

Day Two

"Hey," I greeted, finding Corsica on the thin deck that ran around the ship's exterior, her mane blowing in the wind.

"Hey," she greeted back, glancing over her shoulder. It was bitingly cold out here, the high altitude and windchill mixing with the mountain climate to produce a harsh air that didn't quite want to enter my lungs when I breathed. But with how hot Gerardo and Slisptream kept it in the cabin, a moment or two of this was very refreshing. I could only imagine Corsica had it that much worse than me.

"Clearing your head?" I shouted, the wind tearing my words out of my mouth. I stepped up beside her so I would be easier to hear.

Corsica grumbled. "With how much he went on about Ironridge getting too hot, you'd think they'd keep it cooler in there..."

I shrugged forlornly. "Pretty sure this is just room temperature in the rest of the world. Icereach does have ice in the name..."

"So?" Corsica raised a frustrated eyebrow. "What's wrong with a little ice?"

"Easy for you to say," I pointed out. "You've never needed to bundle up to stay warm."

"And to you, stripping down is far more of a problem than bundling up," Corsica retorted. "So I guess we're even."

Aside from the new, lightweight coat she had gotten me... "Yeah. I guess we are."

"I've been thinking," Corsica said. "What do you want to be in Ironridge?"

"Be? You mean do?"

"No. Be." She shook her head. "How do you want ponies to see you? Ansel doesn't get it, but you and me? We're always putting on airs. You and your coats, you know?"

I frowned in thought. "Well, usually I just am whatever I need to be to get what I want."

"Duh. So what do you want, and how do you want to get it?"

I tilted my head at her.

"You're the ideas mare around here, remember?" Corsica nudged me. "We're going to Ironridge, for real. I know we're going to look for a cave to get some ether crystal samples, and we've gotta get a read on life in the city, but what else? Not like we can just walk into a store and buy a sightseeing trip to some caves that may or may not exist."

"Yeah..." I agreed. "We can't devote all our time to that because too much of it will be spent waiting for opportunities. It'd be boring. Honestly, I hadn't thought about the rest, though. I've just been so focused on getting out the door without getting kidnapped. And this is still so sudden."

"Better get some goals soon, or I'm going to make my own," Corsica warned. "And then leave you to do all the work."

"Oh yeah?" I raised an eyebrow. "Tell me. What have you got?"

Corsica shrugged. "For one, we have to make Ironridge nice and frosty like Icereach. That'll be easy. All we have to do is infiltrate Cold Karma, figure out how they're controlling the climate to make everyone need their product, and mess it up. For two-"

"The three of us, take down an entire evil company?" I gave her an incredulous look. "First, you're assuming they're doing all that in the first place, and second, you're assuming that if they are, we'd be able to do anything about it! Third, you're assuming no one else would have been able to do something already, fourth, you're assuming we're mentally capable of pulling it off, which is questionable because I panic under pressure and you do that grouchy zombie thing all the time. Fifth, you're assuming stopping them is equivalent to-"

"If I say it enough, I'll jinx it to be true," Corsica primly interrupted. "Maybe they'll be in league with Aldebaran."

"And you want that?"

Corsica just shrugged. "I did warn you this was the alternative to getting some goals of your own. But don't worry. Fate only bends over backwards for me when I say please."

I scowled, feeling thoroughly played and hoping whatever force of destiny ruled over jinxes was feeling merciful. "Yeah, yeah. So, err... Let's see..."

Nothing came to mind. Not because my imagination was empty, but because it was unformed: Ironridge was a great big blob of horizon in my head, and Gerardo's explanation yesterday had done more to increase my canvas size than paint a clearer picture. Instead of a single city to wonder about, now I had four unique districts to fill in instead. I needed to explore and find out what there was to do.

So, that was what I told Corsica.

"Sure. Goes without saying," she agreed. "Bet you Ironridge has better entertainment venues than Icereach. Wanna go see a movie?"

"As long as it's not that Green Menace film you made me watch last time." I stuck my tongue out, and instantly regretted it as the wind threatened to freeze it that way. "Actually, maybe let's get a different tradition to start adventures with than that one."

Corsica just shrugged. "All on you, chief. Wanna find a fancy restaurant and see if we can waste some money?"

"It had better not be our money," I warned. "We need this for... stuff. It's good to have a rainy day fund. Although I suppose it wouldn't hurt to do once..."

"I feel like I'm still fielding all the ideas, here," Corsica flatly told me.

"Sorry." I flicked my ears. "Heat-induced brain fog. Err..."

A moment passed, but I came up with nothing. In fact, I forgot what I was even supposed to be coming up with.

"Here's some food for thought," Corsica said, her voice slightly quieter and slightly more serious. "Gerardo said the temperature started rising after the Steel Revolution, right? There was an ether crystal fault plane likely in Ironridge during that time."

I blinked several times. "You think those are related?"

"Could be," Corsica replied. "You ever talked to the meteorology team? It's poorly understood, but they've got some compelling evidence that an area's large-scale geographic weather is related to concentrations of magic in the ground. Might be a shot in the dark, but what if no one's ever put that together before?"

"I dunno," I admitted. "The way Gerardo told it, I kind of figured it only started after that point, like a long-term trend. Not like one day the charts just packed their bags and changed direction."

"Or maybe it takes a while for changes to manifest," Corsica countered. "No one ever proved a hypothesis right as they came up with it, right? You can't say I might not be onto something."

"Slipstream did say it might be magic," I pointed out. "Or Gerardo. I forget which one."

Corsica gave me an owlish look. "I know that. But what if it's related to the fault plane magic, and your spooky light spirit? Our best hypothesis is that that thing is attracted to major turning points in world history, right? What if their Steel Revolution attracted it, and it messed something up deep beneath the ground?"

For a moment, I thought about that, letting her theory sink in. "Well, we want to find our way to the ether river some way or other," I eventually said. "If that's true... I wonder what we'll find."

Day Three

"Hey, Gerardo," I said, edging my way into the entrance of the cockpit. "Mind if I come in?"

"Help yourself," the griffon replied, motioning me towards the empty co-pilot's chair. "Fancy learning to fly an airship?"

I blinked, not expecting the offer but sliding in anyway. "Err... Really? Sounds fun, but not why I was here..."

"I see," Gerardo told me. "In that case, what can I do for you?"

"I need some practical advice," I said. "Stuff that's useful, not just meant to scare me more or less than is warranted. See, I get that batponies have a bit of a bad rap in the rest of the world. And, I'm pretty decent at wearing disguises. Exactly how much effort should I put into not being conspicuous about... what I am?" I fluttered my leathery wings for emphasis.

Gerardo rubbed his feathery chin. "You put me in a sticky situation. Knowing what I know about teenage mares, I wouldn't want to-"

"Don't even start," I warned him. "Before you trip over yourself, I don't have body image issues and I'm not gonna make myself any stranger in the head by wearing a disguise. I can weigh for myself the consequences of anything I might do about it. But I need to know how much heat I'll bring down if I do nothing."

Gerardo gave me a suspicious look.

"I've got a disguise kit in my bags," I told him matter-of-factly. "I've got two full sets of colored contact lenses for round and slitted eyes. I've got braces to make my ears face forward and hide the leaves if need be. I've got fur dye in every color of the rainbow, and I know how to use it better than most make-up. I know how to speak while hiding my teeth, and am fluent in five different accents I stole from imported movies, but not more because everyone in Icereach sounds exactly the same. And I always wear clothes anyway, and am perfectly comfortable hiding my wings beneath a garment that doesn't have holes for them. This is what I do for fun. Still think I won't be able to do anything about it if there's anything to be done?"

For a moment, Gerardo looked even more surprised, and then he nodded in respect. "An up-and-coming professional, I see. You're practiced with shadow sneaking?"

"I know how to do it," I said with a shrug.

"Good," Gerardo replied. "That's far and away your best ticket out of any conflict. Ironridge night life being what it is, there are always shadows available, and your kind is scarce enough that most of the populace doesn't know how it works. If you've ever got that available to you, I wouldn't be worried a bit, provided you're fine with dodging a few shady customers here and there. That said, you mentioned having contact lenses. It may behoove you to choose a different color for your eyes, just in case."

"Really?" I tilted my head, curious. "How come?"

"Because sarosians are rare enough that you just might be mistaken for a certain other with green eyes," Gerardo lectured. "Her name is Admiral Valey, and she has a reputation that you probably wouldn't want to bring down on yourself. Or, for that matter, anyone you love."

Well, okay, then.

"On the topic of mistaken appearances, before I forget," Gerardo went on, eyes lighting in remembrance. "I've been meaning to ask. What does your friend Corsica's brand do?"

"Brand?" I frowned. "What... Oh, you mean her special talent?"

"Yes, that's the one." Gerardo tapped the ship console with a talon. "So that's what you call those in Icereach, is it? Even after all these years, you learn something new every day. Regardless, my question stands."

I shrugged. "It's a talent in geometry. Why?"

"Would you mind if I asked how she got it?" Gerardo inquired, eyes on the horizon ahead.

"Well, she was..." I thought back. It happened around when she woke up from her coma after the avalanche. Exactly when, even. Right...? My memory suddenly fuzzed, the way it did when I tried thinking about things that were connected to ones hidden behind my mask, as if my thoughts got round and slippery and hard to hold onto. "It was around two and a half years ago. Why not ask her? And why do you ask, anyway?"

"Merely curious," Gerardo said. "You see, it bears an uncanny resemblance to the talent of someone very important. Not many are actually familiar with that talent, so it's fairly unlikely she would be recognized, but I thought I'd pass along the warning anyway. If you don't like attention from high places, it might not hurt for her to take a cue from you and try her hoof at clothing."

I tilted my head at him. "Well, okay. I'll let her know. But why are you telling me this, and not her?"

"I just didn't want to forget, while it was at the front of my mind." Gerardo shrugged. "Besides, this flight will be more than long enough already if I'm constantly repeating myself and saying the same things to each of you individually. If I had to think up something new to say every time I had a conversation, that would be quite something."

I squinted. "Is that how you and Slipstream are? You tell her the same things over and over so you don't have to think of new things to say, too?"

Gerardo grinned. "On the contrary, the reason my cleverness is in short supply is because all of it is reserved for her alone."

"Cute," I told him. "How many times have you recycled that one on her?"

"None," the griffon admitted. "I believe she's only heard it once. The only time I've recycled it has been just now, on you."

I was starting to see how Gerardo could come across, to someone like Mother, as a buffoon.

To the less-crotchety me, at least, he was entertaining. "Hey, so about piloting this airship," I said. "If I can get it all down in under an hour, can I get a prize?"

"What sort of prize?" Gerardo asked, perking up at the challenge.

"Turn the thermostat down," I declared. "Not much. Just a few degrees. See how much it takes for Slipstream to notice."

Gerardo chuckled. "I'm afraid that would be a curse in disguise. It's true that she's always been a fan of desert climates, but if you want to survive in Ironridge, you'd better take this chance to acclimate to the heat and pen an ode to its honor."

I frowned.

"Although that said," he pointed out, "a pilot does have to be comfortable enough to operate at peak capacity..."

Day Five

"There's really not that much to it, is there?" I mused, sitting in the real pilot's seat this time. Controlling an airship might have been difficult if I was navigating an obstacle course, but keeping it flying in a straight line was about as simple as two levers and having a good eye for landmarks. Experimentally, I had tried the ship's other controls, Gerardo at my side and explaining everything in detail. Even without my talent, I figured I would have an easy idea telling what to do.

"Being a licensed pilot is more a matter of professional liability for anyone who ensures or contracts your airship," Gerardo explained. "Or anyone seeking to hire you to fly theirs. Out in the open blue, most anyone can point the prow where they please."

"So, hey," I said, preparing to take the conversation in a different direction. "If most anyone can fly one, how difficult are they to get? Seems like they wouldn't bother making it easy if only the elite could afford them."

Gerardo chuckled. "You'd be surprised at just how easy the elite like things. It's hard to put a number on difficulty, though. To buy one straight up, you'd have to work a good middle-class job for twenty years and scrimp for loose change. But if that was you, what would you do once you had it? Anyone flighty enough to make proper use of an airship is going to have no reservations looking for shortcuts in getting them. And that's just a test of how enterprising you are."

I raised an eyebrow. "You mean folks are just waiting to hand these out to anyone who asks nicely in the right places?"

"You make it sound silly, but you'd be surprised." Gerardo watched the horizon. "Charisma and owed favors can go a long way in this world. Especially for anyone with few enough roots that they can afford to take risks, and skip town if things turn sour. I'd be willing to wager that's how Aldebaran came by their own airship, and Elise made it out to be the top of the top."

I frowned. "So I just... what, sidle up to anyone in a fancy suit and introduce myself? That doesn't sound like it's gonna work."

"Add a little more nuance," Gerardo advised. "Be opportunistic, but play to your strengths. Focus first on-" He cut himself off. "Why are you so interested in this, anyway?"

"You told me I needed an airship if I ever wanted to go find that goddess you're collecting Writs of Harmonic Sanction for, remember?" I raised an eyebrow. "So how'd you get this ship? It's gotta be more specific than 'playing to your strengths'."

Gerardo patted the console. "This lovely craft came to me by way of a high-ranking mafioso in the sky city of Wilderwind. It's an extremely long story, but to put it shortly he wanted to pay me off and settle our debts so we could go our separate ways. Of course, it was slightly more generic at first, but I got a few friends with carpentry and shipbuilding knowledge to come overhaul the interior and add more storage. It's served me well for coming on five years now. The ship I had before this, I bartered for in Excasesis - that's in northern Varsidel, if your geography's lacking - and the one before that was chartered for me by Ironridge's reconstruction manager as part of a mission for the state. Prior to that, I hitched a ride on a friend's ship, and several years before that one-"

"I get it." I smiled a little, lifting a hoof and cutting him off. "Rather than a list, could you go into detail on one?"

Gerardo looked at me. "I can't tell if you're remarkably impatient or just have a lust for life. Kids these days, I suppose."

He let the topic drop, and I slowly found myself wondering why I had silenced him when he could have told me something useful about where to get a ship of my own. Some kind of instinctual, self-preservation response, maybe? I felt like...

I closed my eyes and took a breath. I felt like he was rambling on purpose to avoid telling me something.

"Eyes on the sky," he remarked, noting my lapse in sight.

Yep. He was very aware of me. I wondered what reason this griffon could possibly have to entertain me as far as he had, give me a starting point for my journey, even offer us a ride to Ironridge, yet start stalling about a subject like how to get an airship. Maybe he just really wanted to keep his Writs of Harmonic Sanction goddess to himself.

"Alright. New subject," I said, focusing on the mountains and deciding to test whether I was right. "Maybe an airship's not the most practical thing to go for immediately in Ironridge. What is? What should I spend my time trying to get?"

"First and foremost, money," Gerardo instantly replied. "Money makes Ironridge go 'round. That can be said of any place, mind you, but it doesn't make it any less true. In Yakyakistan, there are some things you don't need money to get. In Varsidel and the Griffon Empire, there are some things no amount of money can buy. In Ironridge, it all comes down to what you're willing to pay." He tapped a talon. "What next depends on the kind of money you get. If it's a stable income stream or a large enough lump sum, get a house. I don't know anything about this mistress you're being sent to stay with, but self sufficient is a good thing to be. Always think in terms of having a base of operations."

See, even if it sounded like common sense, that was common sense I could make use of. The moment I stopped asking about how to continue traveling, his advice became much more concrete. Still a little wordy, but compare 'get a house' to 'play to your strengths'. One of those was far more specific...

I didn't even need to ask to know that if I asked him what would be some good next steps for traveling the world, I would get a vague response filled with personal anecdotes. I had a lock on how this griffon worked. The real question was, was he keeping something from me on purpose, or was this just the way he was?

Or maybe vague and unpredictable was just how travel worked. I had, after all, been sitting in Corsica's lab one week ago planning my upcoming birthday party, my present situation not even a blip of a possibility in my mind. What I saw as obfuscation could really be the clearest, truest truth.

I decided to just ask. "How come you get way more vague whenever you're talking about how to travel?"

"Because you're inexperienced and have no other sources save for me," Gerardo replied. "I know it sounds circular, but hear me out. Say I gave you a roadmap for where you want to go: who to talk to, what to say. I have a hunch you'd try to follow it to the letter - perhaps warily, perhaps questioning my advice, but follow it still. And there are three outcomes from that: you get stuck, you get in over your head and then get stuck, or you somehow get what you're after and then have a whole host of consequences on your tail. Before, I told you I believed you were ready to strike out and go on an adventure, and I stand by my assessment. But being ready to start is very different from being ready to finish. If this were a tabletop game, you would be at level one, asking me for directions to the big bad's castle."

I frowned. "But I'm not asking for the big bad's castle. I just wanna know where to go next."

"And the answer to that is to live a little," Gerardo told me. "You're still quite young. That means you have a lot of time at your disposal. Blundering through the world and learning how it works may not be the fastest route to catching your dream, but it will give you experience you need when the time is right to do that."

"Oh." I focused on the sky.

Maybe I was reading into things. Maybe his reasons for stalling and being vague really were just that I would get myself into trouble if I had a clearer path forward. But my hooves itched to do something, to move, to go out and find what I was looking for in the world. That nameless thing that Icereach lacked, which I sometimes understood so well and sometimes couldn't explain at all... I felt it like a magnet, pulling my heart east. Doubly so, now that we were on the move.

I didn't want to just live a little. I wanted... Well, actually I did want to live, a lot. Was Gerardo implying that life would just find me, instead?

If I trusted him enough to ferry me to Ironridge on an airship, even if it would do nothing to quell my restlessness, maybe I should trust him on this, too.

Day Eight

A storm hit, like the blizzard that came during the Aldebaran incident.

Memories piled up in my mind, of the ship zipping along the underbelly of the clouds, lightning illuminating them in the dark of night. This time, however, had one key difference: we flew above the storm instead of below.

I peered out a window, flanked by Ansel and Corsica, as the clouds rushed on by, surging northward like a shoreless river of smoke. Here and there, mountaintops broke or scraped the clouds, causing them to part and bunch up in their fury to fly on, or sometimes surge into the air like water running over a large rock in a stream. The result was a landscape that was anything but flat: standing waves and stationary plumes gave the cloud sea an unimaginable texture full of dips and ridges, with monolithic masses of gray where the weather rose up to follow a predefined curve. Most otherworldly of all was the Aldenfold, the southern edge of the world, usually a wall of stone and now a waterfall of cloud instead. The storm had spawned in the mountains, and now it fell off, a falling wall of gray that powered the northward cascade.

"Woah," Corsica breathed, tense. "Doesn't look like this from below..."

"Doesn't even look like real weather," Ansel remarked, obviously enraptured. "Clouds aren't supposed to move like that, are they? No way can they be that dense."

"It's a mystery for the ages," Slipstream replied, cooking breakfast after a long night of piloting. We had woken up to the spectacle, but according to her, the storm wall had been even more spectacular. "Some say the Aldenfold contains an incredibly powerful magic, and the storms it creates are a side effect of that. Personally, I think there's another reason, though I couldn't tell you what or why."

I blinked. "Wait, so these come up all along the mountains? These storms?"

"Weather like this? Yes, it does." Slipstream nodded, flipping a batch of pancakes. "They're fairly regular at all times of the year. If you're interested in meteorology, I'm sure you could learn a lot in Ironridge. They spend a lot of effort studying the storms there."

"I can imagine," Ansel replied. "If Ironridge is as much of a hub of air commerce as it's been made out to be, they probably take a big impact from weather like this."

"Not only that," Slipstream agreed, "but the storms are the only time the lower districts ever cool off."

"Really?" I twitched my ears, interested.

The pink pegasus nodded. "They've been shaping life along the Aldenfold since the dawn of recorded history. The Varsidel desert starts where the storm rains stop, Yakyakistan is completely frozen... Did you know that most scholars think they're one of the biggest reasons for the divide between Yakyakistan and the Griffon Empire's differing theologies?"

"Because they limit trade, or something?" Corsica frowned.

"Exactly," Slipstream said. "The eastern continent is separated from the rest of the world by an ocean that takes up almost a quarter of the world's width. Since the Empire was in the south, anyone trying to sail directly to them had to brave a close route past the base of the Aldenfold, without any harbors. It was much easier for Ironridge to trade with their northern neighbors in Varsidel, because the western seaboard had plenty of safe harbor and the storms get weaker the further north you go. Sailing a more northern route, you could much more safely go from Varsidel to Mistvale. The sarosians had a lot of commerce there, but they typically didn't open their lands to trading routes down to the Empire. Much of the Empire's contact with the rest of the world didn't start until we were advanced enough to make ships that could weather these storms. And, by then, their culture had thousands of years of tradition."

"Huh. Guess that's what happens when you live that far south," Corsica muttered. "How'd they grow enough food for an empire in a climate like that?"

"Garsheeva," Slipstream explained. "She used her power to stop the storms. I witnessed her do it once. She took care to make it visible. That more than anything else was the source of her legitimacy as a ruler... though providing the continent's mana power and being the progenitor of the royal bloodline probably helped, too."

I listened, just as intrigued by her stories as by the storm out the window.

"Most of the Empire was fertile farmland, except for the far south and east," Slipstream went on. "I spent about half a year there, before it fell. Sometimes Gerardo's work takes us back, and it's hard to believe how much it's changed. The weather makes food scarce, which in turn drives conflict... There's always been fighting in the Empire, but before it was based on pride, and everyone had their national unity under Garsheeva to fall back on. Now that it's based on necessity, the stakes are different." Her ears fell. "That's a continent that could really use a hero."

That the Griffon Empire had fallen was something I had known for a while. What happened to a continent after its government fell... That was something I was still hazy on. And the more I heard, the more I felt like it just hadn't settled into anything at all.

"You ever wonder what the point is?" Corsica asked. "Sounds like stuff's pretty bad in most of the world. What do you look forward to? Do you try to make a difference? Not just you, but everyone. Living like that, how do they get by?"

Slipstream shrugged. "The world has plenty of good things in it too. But I might not be the right pony for that question. I just fly above it all with Gerardo. We might only be doing something that might once have mattered in the grand scope of things, but it still can matter to our friends. That's more than good enough for me."

"You had better not be spreading pessimism back there, dearest," Gerardo called back through the open cockpit door. "The world is a fascinating place full of adventure and opportunity. Maybe it has a few rough edges, but those are just opportunities to do something truly spectacular!"

"You're exaggerating just to balance me out!" Slipstream complained in return.

"Then perhaps what you said needed a little balancing," Gerardo replied. "Never forget that what the world needs most is someone with the will to make it a better place. And it doesn't take a lot to make a difference."

I stopped following the conversation, not particularly engaged by platitudes and couples' bickering. The way everyone made it sound, the world at large was in dire straits. Had it always been this way? I wanted to find some uncensored history books and see how ponies in years gone by thought about the trials of their own times. Did they feel apocalyptic too? For that matter, how did other ponies in the present feel about the state of the world today? The only outside sources I had met were these two eccentric birds, and you didn't have to be bad to have an unusual point of view.

...Well, I had met Aldebaran, too. But apparently their view of the world was one that drove them to kidnap us and strand us in a cave.

This probably would have been a good time for me to panic. Or, not a good time, but a time when I usually would. For some reason, instead I just felt empty inside, sort of like a tiny version of how I remembered feeling when my mask was off. My cards were played, my dice were cast. I was going to Ironridge, a city where many, many ponies lived and had grown up and probably had relatively normal lives.

Probably. If not, I'd be in for a ride.

Day Twelve

I was awakened by the lights turning on. It felt much earlier than they should have.

"Eh? What's going on...?" I poked my head out from under the table, noting that it was still dark out. Corsica and Ansel were stirring as well - the former thankfully hadn't tried to share my sleeping space again since that first night. Gerardo was standing by the light switch, fully dressed and geared and ready to go.

"It's about four hours until dawn," he said quietly, watching us wake. "And I have good news and bad news."

I perked a little.

"The good news is, we're almost there." He nodded toward the cockpit. "The bad news is, we're going to have to hurry and get lucky if we want to reach your new address by sunup. Arriving at sunset would have been far more optimal, but we didn't make quite as good of time as I'd like. So, time for you all to get ready. As soon as we're docked, we'll depart without a moment to lose."

A tiny jolt of energy shot through me, kicking sleep away. This was it. It was happening.

"You all are going to regret not becoming nocturnal with me," Slipstream said from the cockpit. "Ironridge night life is pretty strongly preferable to day life. We'll be within range of the air traffic controllers in about thirty minutes, so get yourselves packed and awake and ready to go."

Heat

The night air greeted me like an oppressive wall as Gerardo's airship's door swung open, accompanied by a roar of wind and noise, red lights flashing irrhythmically outside the window. We had spent the last hour or so in sight of Ironridge, as a small tugboat flew out to intercept us, negotiate mooring, and lead us to our dock.

All the time, I had been trying to make out the city below. Although it was night, Ironridge was ablaze with illumination, reminding me of a bowl that had cracked and lost a quarter of one side and spilled all of its contents out in a flood. The ship's compass told me we were moored on the western wall facing down the mountain to the east, and I had looked out over a spider web of development as we flew. But light reflecting off the insides of the ship's windows had made it hazy, and I wanted to see the real thing up close.

"You didn't have to pay for mooring, you know," Slipstream told the griffon as we prepared to disembark. "I was happy to stay with the ship. And now we'll have to walk all across Ironridge to get these three where they're going."

"Tragically, Cold Karma don't like loiterers in their airspace," Gerardo replied, headcrest flopped. "They certainly are harsher masters than the Yakyakistan of twenty years ago. Well, come along. We've got a long way to hike, and less than four hours to do it."

"There's no public transit?" Ansel asked, stepping through the door.

"There is, but Gerardo's a cheapskate and-"

"I am not," Gerardo protested, silencing Slipstream with a feather. "And for your information, I'm factoring in us using it. We'll only be getting off to avoid-"

I stopped paying attention as soon as I could look about freely. We had backed into a gigantic roofed fixture on the mountainside, a three dimensional covered pier with layer upon layer of catwalks and walkways extending into the distance. On each level, ships rose or sunk into alcoves in the walkways, leaving fly lanes open between then like jam in a multi-decker sandwich. Huge support pillars ran up and down at catwalk junctions, encircled by roundabouts and holding the whole apparatus up. Floodlights attached to the ceiling, pillars and other airships provided illumination, and I realized the heat I felt wasn't actually the city: it was an exhaust vent on the ship across from us, positioned at a very inconvenient angle.

Flashing red lights lined the railings, keeping me focused on where I should be walking even as the industrial cacophony and sheer scale of the room threatened to overwhelm my senses. I stumbled out onto a solid branch of the pier, set my suitcase down and hugged my saddlebags, watching as Gerardo and Slipstream tied down and locked up the ship, a receipt posted plain to see in the window.

"Height-struck, are you?" Gerardo said once he had finished, noting the angle of Corsica's neck as she craned to take in the room, just like I had been doing. "Keep your eyes on this level. I know it's a sight, but you don't want to accidentally put those railings to the test."

A pegasus soared overhead, making me realize there were quite a lot of ponies flying, out in the distance. In a world this vertical, that would be a considerable advantage, indeed.

"Well, come on." Gerardo snapped his talons and started walking, grabbing our suitcases for us. "That took longer than I'd have liked, and we have no time to waste."

The heat receded as we followed a tunnel into the mountainside, wide and lined with concrete. It had slanted walls that made it a trapezoid, and walking lanes painted onto the ground in colors that showed up well under the blue-green light. Wind blew toward us, the end product of the underground's ventilation system, and advertisement billboards lined the walls, showcasing things that were surprisingly familiar: food, beauty products, home appliances. There were also plenty I knew about, but that were never seen in Icereach: foals' toys, theatrical performances, personal damages lawyers... It was a strange mix of normal and things that should have been normal but weren't, all in a tunnel that was at once far too industrial and commercial at the same time to ever be found in Icereach.

Corsica, I noted, was wearing a thin tailcoat dress that covered her flanks and kept her tail down without extending further forward than her barrel. I didn't question where she had found it, and she showed a few signs of custom handiwork to make it fit. Gerardo must have talked to her about her talent, after all.

For my part, I had done as he advised and chosen some contacts to turn my eyes yellow. It was hard to pick my favorite color, especially when orange and blue were on the table, and about five coin flips had been involved. Aside from that, all of us stank of deodorant, and my and Corsica's manes both had the greased look of ponies who were trying to use stallions' fashion to compensate for a long flight with no showers. Ansel's mane, annoyingly, looked perfectly fine.

It must have been a changeling thing. Shapeshift into a form with no mane, and all the dirt would just fall away.

"We'll be taking the train most of the way," Gerardo was explaining, setting a pace that was faster than I'd like, but not unmanageable thanks to my yak training. "Passenger vehicles that run on set tracks, in case Icereach tells you nothing. Right now, we're high up in the Day District, which is built into the mountain slope. And, unfortunately, we're clear on the opposite side of the city from our destination."

I focused on keeping up, half paying attention. The tunnel air had gotten cool enough that it wasn't that hot anymore... Cooler than Gerardo's airship, after the windchill. Corsica still didn't look like she was doing too great.

"There are lines that follow the Day District's curve, and they're the ones we'll be taking," Gerardo went on. "Fortunately, they do offer something of a view. At two points, we'll have to get out and walk for a bit to avoid security checkpoints-"

"To do what?" I shook myself back to the present, ears rising in alarm. "Avoiding security checkpoints? What are we, some kind of criminals?"

"No," Gerardo replied. "But a rule of thumb if you ever become professional adventurers is that while escorting young first-time visitors to Ironridge, security checkpoints are where everything goes wrong."

I narrowed my eyes in suspicion.

"...Also, those are the points where proof of fare is collected," Gerardo admitted. "And their rates for anyone without one of those reloadable card things are atrocious."

"Cheapskate," Slipstream repeated.

"You'd be singing a different tune if you were the breadwinner in this crew," Gerardo insisted. "Besides, they stiffed me enough for mooring already."

"As long as we get there before it gets too much hotter," Corsica panted, lugging her overstuffed saddlebags, "I'll be good for anything..."

I had never seen a train before.

This wasn't like the airship harbor - I understood how a ship dock worked; that one was just massive. It wasn't like the advertisements in the tunnel, either: those were new, but all made perfect sense. But watching this chain of painted metal cylinders on wheels roll out of a dark tunnel in the wall filled me with an unspeakable sense of jealousy: it was big, it was mechanical, it was new, it was cool, and it worked.

Doors along the sides folded open, and a slow stream of ponies began to move in and out, looking for all the world like it was a normal thing to do. This train not only worked, but it served a regular, civilian purpose.

This was what Icereach could do, if only they would stop trying to stay where they were and actually finish a rocket for a change.

"Not that one," Gerardo instructed as I moved to get on it. "We're looking for southbound."

So we sat down to wait, and I watched the world go by.

This train station felt comparably large and busy to Icereach's market street, with occasional groups of friends chatting as they walked past and plenty of loiterers. Part of me tried to adjust my understanding of the traffic to compensate for it being four in the morning, and I had to remind myself that in Ironridge, night and day were basically swapped... which was odd, because I came from a city that didn't much respect the day/night cycle at all. I suppose I had just internalized that the rest of the world, the parts that lived aboveground, were actually up when the sun was up.

Ironic that I thought that now, when I was once again underground.

"So by Ironridge standards, is this a ghost town, or normal?" Ansel asked, apparently thinking along the same lines. "I can't imagine this place wasn't designed to accommodate more traffic than this."

"Completely empty," Slipstream replied. "Ironridge is busy, and this should be the start of morning rush hour."

Gerardo nodded in agreement. "Most anyone returning home after work isn't going to get off at a private airport, except for certain types who live on houseboats like yours truly. The bulk of passengers are carrying on through, or else got off already. We aren't that far from the end of the line."

"Or they haven't gotten on yet," Slipstream pointed out. "There's a lot of jobs here on the western face of the city. Most of the Day District's housing is clustered on the south and southwest. Though at least that might mean we'll have the train to ourselves once everyone else gets off."

Gerardo tapped a talon against the concrete floor. "Yes, hopefully. We shall see..."

A minute passed, and another train rolled in, this one moving in the correct direction. With a loud hiss, it came to a stop, and Gerardo guided us aboard.

I felt my whole body try to shift with inertia as the train began to turn. True to prediction, the train was packed: I had to share the new experience of standing in a vehicle that moved like this with the also-new one of being in such close quarters with strangers. Standing in line at the cafeteria didn't compare; that was one-dimensional crowding. As was sharing space on a bench. Here... Everywhere I looked, my eyes had nowhere to rest but on ponies.

Fortunately, Gerardo was a griffon and griffons were large and exotic enough to command a bit of space for themselves, so he had at least bullied us enough room that Ansel, Corsica and myself could stand and only bump into each other. I rode out the changes in inertia on swaying hooves, feeling a rhythmic clack-clack from something in the wheel system beneath me, illuminated by harsh blue mana light from above and staring at my reflection in a dark window, maintaining a wall in my mind between myself and the ponies around me.

No one was talking with each other, I noticed. About half of the ponies I saw wore heavy duty outfits that had to belong to mechanics or construction workers - yet still light and airy, designed not to be stifling in the Ironridge heat. They almost reminded me more of cloth armor plating than cohesive clothes. Another quarter wore light business attire, collars and ties and the like. The rest wore nothing. Even Slipstream had shucked her usual sweater; myself and Gerardo were the only fully-clothed creatures here.

The train pulled into another station, this one still underground, finally giving me something to see outside the window. The doors opened with a hiss, and ponies left and ponies entered, though there was a lot more of the latter.

Everyone kept their heads down, save for a few who glanced anxiously at signs. No one admired the architecture; the crossed beams of concrete that held up the vaulted ceiling. No one stopped to think about the fact that they were using a machine that could roll around a track the size of a city. I couldn't see their thoughts, but probably none of them imagined that if only we could build a track between two cities - hard in scope, but the technology was clearly there - airships would never need to make that journey again.

Instead, everyone avoided interacting with their peers as much as possible, as though it was their solemn duty to make this nothing more than a ritual to get from one point to another.

I almost considered speaking to someone to break the wordless noise of machinery. But, listening to machines was nice. And if that was the way things were done here, maybe blending into the local culture was the best plan for me.

The train started moving again, and just like that my vision was lost as we went into another tunnel. Ponies shifted in the car, those who were standing swaying with the momentum.

No one looked at each other. Maybe that was a good thing, because I was a batpony, and no one looked at me.

Three more stops passed, and after each one I re-evaluated my idea of how full full was. There was air conditioning in the train, cool air flowing in from somewhere, but even with it, the sheer body heat was probably worse than anything Ironridge's climate had to offer - Corsica's cheeks were visibly flushed, and I imagined mine were the same. Mares and stallions stood, sat and read books or newspapers, pretending their surroundings didn't exist. With this much crowding, I was starting to understand why making yourself invisible in this place was considered a courtesy.

So, I snuck into Corsica's shadow. She didn't much seem to notice, nor did anyone else, but Gerardo shifted over to fill my space and the space he had vacated was promptly used.

Maybe this was why I saw no other batponies on the train. They were all probably smart enough to do the same.

Then, the light changed. I poked my head up enough to see that the tunnel was behind us; we were now outside. Did I dare try to get up to take in the view? There was so little room...

I waited for the next stop, and my waiting paid off. When the train doors slid open, what felt like dozens of ponies exited, each concluding their journey in as much silence as it had started. Almost none got on, and by the time it was over there was just enough space that I could rise again.

Ironridge was... vast. I glued myself to the window next to Ansel and began taking it in as we accelerated again, a sight I had seen from above and afar but not yet with such a good angle. Across and below, a spider web of blue stretched out in a magnificent disk, darkened forests penned in by glittering, winding roads, cities within a city rising at the crossroads. Gerardo had spoken of Ironridge in terms of districts, and I could see the distinction clearly, the brightly-lit mountain slopes of the Day District coming around like pincers toward a pass where the mountain bowl joined the rest of the world to the northeast. But seeing it now, that was far too coarse an approach. The Night District alone probably held five or six substantial population centers within its groves, an illuminated tower marking one northern node. And if the Day District was big enough to completely encircle it, I was certain it would prove to be the same.

The train slowed again, and I was just starting to hope for another mass exodus when Gerardo poked me. "This is our stop," he mouthed.

"You'll pay for mooring," Slipstream breathed back, "in a place where we need to buy rail fare, and then you won't pay for the train."

"It's only a little walk," Gerardo urged. "And you wouldn't believe the savings. Come along, now..."

The train let us out into a terraced stone plaza, a warm breeze blowing across my mane. Beige cobblestone was lit by floodlights tinted to be closer to the color of the sun, artistic patterns in the floor forming guidelines that led the disembarking ponies toward staircases up or down from the platform. I could see pedestrian overpasses bridging above the tracks, and indeed I could see the tracks too, which at the previous stop had been recessed into the ground and out of sight. But what I wanted to see was the city.

I ran to the edge and put my hooves up on the short wall, finally staring out with no glass to separate me from my target. A million twinkling lights spread out below me, blue specks and gold pools amid the blackness, the Day District wrapping around the Night District like a hug.

The heat was humid, yet tempered by a stiff breeze, heavy enough that you wouldn't want to wear a hat without thinking. Overall, it wasn't that different from being in Gerardo's airship: livable without much discomfort, but I sure wouldn't want to exercise out here. My ears flicked in the darkness. I wondered how hot it would get come morning.

"What does that sight make you think of?" Gerardo asked, stepping up beside me with our heavier luggage.

I blinked, caught off guard. "The heat, actually," I admitted. "But the city... I dunno. I just wanna explore."

"So it's a good thing, then," Gerardo said. "You're intrigued by it, rather than repulsed."

I glanced up at him in concern. "Why would I be repulsed? It looks almost like the sky, except... made by ponies."

"There are some who don't see it that way," Gerardo replied. "If you stay in the city for any meaningful length of time, I can't imagine you won't meet them. But, at the end of the day - or end of the night, being in Ironridge - I've heard them out and still think this vista is beautiful."

"Why don't they like it?" I asked.

Gerardo drummed his talons on the railing. "Old things that have meaning. Some say they don't like what it stands for. Others prefer what they could have been. In a city this big, not everyone is bound to get what they want." He pointed to the right. "See that wall over there?"

My gaze drifted. Northeast, there was the gap in the Day District, the wide pass connecting the Night District to the plains beyond. Clockwise from there was a single tall mountain with a lighthouse on its keep, and continuing from there, a long, smooth, illuminated wall arced smoothly out from the mountain, meeting up with the full mountain chain and starting the Day District proper. Below the wall stretched the foothills of the Night District, and above it, I could see signs of illuminated metal framework, as if something very large was under construction.

"Once upon a time, that was a dam," Gerardo told me. "They called it the Water District. It held back a glacial lake, which provided the water for all of Ironridge, plus coolant for machines in the mines. The dam was one of the greatest feats of Ironridge engineering ever recorded. Today, that lake is gone, and where it once stood is the Ice District. Cold Karma built their headquarters up there, with a ready-made wall and everything. In a way, the dam's meaning hasn't changed a bit: it's still a symbol of the power of Ironridge technology. But that power is in different hooves than it used to be, and a lot of factions see it different ways. To some, it's the equivalent of having your flag stolen and flown by your enemy. To others, it's a mark of progress. There aren't many who can still see this skyline for the pretty vista it is."

He got up and stepped away. "Come. We've got a lot of ground to cover, and I don't want to set too harsh a pace if you're unused to the heat. But remember now what it's like to look at this city with awe and wonder."

For a city built into the slope of a mountain, the Day District was surprisingly vertical. The thought sounded silly as soon as I had it, but I stood by it nonetheless. Were I designing a long, shallow city with a lot of elevation change, I would mark it through with flat thoroughfares designed to let ponies travel the length without going up or down hills. But here, going up and down hills seemed to be all we were doing.

"How come... they couldn't just build a bridge... between that hilltop and this one?" Ansel panted, pointing back behind us as the road reached an intersection and turned downward again.

"Because when these were built, they didn't have our kind of trek in mind," Gerardo replied, patting the worked stone. "These roads are ancient. And it's only in recent times that many have concerned themselves with getting from one place in the same district to another. Ironridge's economy has always been divided by height - agriculture at the bottom, mining for ores higher up - and so earlier generations thought more about getting up and down the mountain than around it. In their eyes, why bother going from one height to somewhere else with the same height? The goods you'd have access to would be the same."

I listened, taking the stories in. The latticed architecture of the roads certainly intrigued me: everything was built in switchbacks, like a diagonal grid, such that most every intersection would give you a choice between clockwise or counterclockwise plus up or down. There were terraces, but they were hard to see when the height kept changing. The down-mountain side of every road, when it wasn't just a railing and a cliff, was covered in a mix of viewpoints, street signs and curated tropical gardens. Most of the mountain face itself was swathed with windows, and just about every intersection had a tunnel leading into the stone wall, ostensibly an apartment complex or office space or an indoor shopping mall or anything else of the sort.

Sometimes, the architecture was disrupted, like where the train tracks came through, or where a plaza had been deemed necessary, or for a bigger building that rose up for a while, deciding it needed more space. Everywhere, there were signs of things built in different eras: dark concrete with steel trim next to dusty cobblestone, carved murals next to screens depicting what I hoped was modern art.

It wasn't quite planned and ordered, but it also wasn't a sprawl of disorganized, organic growth. It was... harmonic.

I was interrupted from my musings by a dull thud behind me. Glancing back, I saw Corsica's bags on the ground, the mare herself leaning against a wall, looking flushed from the heat.

Gerardo was at her side in an instant. "You look like you could use a rest. The station we'll be boarding at isn't for another thirty minutes at this pace. Is everyone good with a break?"

"I'm not a wuss!" Corsica snapped, her dress soaked with sweat. "Just need some water..."

"I've got it!" Slipstream called, setting down her own bags and fishing out some bottles.

I frowned, realizing I should have been paying more attention to my friends. As Corsica drank greedily from an offered bottle, I quietly slunk over, picked up her discarded bags and added them on over my own.

They were heavy. And felt like they were ready to explode. Fortunately, I had my yak training to fall back on, but a lengthy uphill march in this weather with both of our luggage combined... probably wouldn't leave me with much focus for admiring our surroundings. And maybe I could use a drink too.

We started moving again. Corsica glanced at me, noting that I had her bags, and said nothing, which probably meant she was thankful but didn't want to draw any more attention to her plight.

True to my predictions, soldiering along with Corsica's gear plus my own took all of my focus and energy. Time passed in a blur until we were on the next train and already moving, our luggage placed in seats across from us, a water bottle under my wing and a stiff seat cushion beneath my rear. This train was far less crowded, and the air conditioning actually helped me cool off.

Nobody spoke as the night wore on and the train passed stop after stop. Sleep tugged at my eyes, but I kept myself awake, soaking in the sensation of the empty train around me.

Wheels clattered against the rails. The train slowed to a halt. Gerardo got up, Slipstream gently roused Ansel and Corsica, and once again, we got on our way. This time, Slipstream didn't complain about Gerardo's stinginess in walking past the fare zone change. I could tell that she was saving her energy, too.

From this angle, the dam was hard to see. We were far enough east now that I could look back and pick out the huge, boxy skyport where Gerardo had moored his ship, along with several others like it on the western edge of the ring. The sky might have been lightening in preparation for dawn... or was that just light from the districts? I couldn't tell.

The Day District's architecture was similar in spirit here to the last place we got off, though some notable differences showed themselves. Flat roads actually did exist, yet there were more points where large, external buildings caused the roads to break, and in some cases roads even went through the lobbies of buildings that were constructed above them. Often, the downhill edges were lined with stalls, many of which were closed or closing for morning, but appeared to sell things in open-air markets. The indoor areas looked notably more commercial than the residential zoning of the southern face.

The way Gerardo told it, the city used to be stratified by purpose going up and down, and that was the reason for the districts. I wondered how recent it was that the districts had started stratifying themselves internally the same way, and if that meant that the districts were now more like separate cities than interwoven sectors of a whole.

Onward we marched, gaining a lot more height than we lost. Once again, I carried Corsica's bags. My muscles protested, my mind narrowed itself into a focus, but I could do it. I had a rhythm going, and it was one I would need to keep up to reach my goal. One hoof, and then another... I wasn't just saying it to myself; I really could do this.

And then I looked at my friends. Ansel was managing alright with his own load. Corsica, despite carrying nothing, looked worse than when she stopped to rest last time, enviously watching me and Gerardo shoulder most of the group's gear and unsteadily dragging herself along.

I had no idea what it would be like in this climate to have a Yakyakistani coat like hers, but it was clear she wasn't going to ask for a break twice. Guess that left things up to me.

"I'm beat," I abruptly announced, falling over onto a nearby bench. "We're taking a break, or I'll start complaining loud enough they'll hear me back at that skyport."

Corsica and even Ansel needed no second bidding to follow suit. Gerardo glanced at us, evaluated our condition, and nodded.

"Don't you think you're pushing them a little too hard?" Slipstream muttered to him as we stopped to rest, water getting passed around again. "They're from the middle of a glacier, and this is a steep hike. It probably wouldn't be all that pleasant even in their preferred weather."

I curled up on the bench with my back to them so as to eavesdrop better while looking like I wasn't.

"Yes, I might be," Gerardo whispered back, pausing for a moment and probably checking if we were watching. "And if they really can't make it, then I'll do something about that. But I'll have a lot more peace of mind leaving those kids with a stranger in this city if I know getting around it won't kill them. I want to see for myself whether they're able to handle hiking the Day District at night. And while we might be able to pay our way through rail fare, you can bet this will make them remember the way to get around it if they ever need to move without any coin to their name."

My eyes narrowed. Sneaky griffon... That was actually smart, but it did make me worry about whatever he was worried about. I glanced at Corsica and Ansel; the latter clearly wasn't listening and the former was out cold.

"You still could have run this by me earlier," Slipstream quietly protested. "Back when we were planning-"

"Yes, but you hate good-cop-bad-cop routines," Gerardo reminded her. "Remember back in Ralianth when we had to con that rug merchant to get a lead on a cartel member for Winsom?"

"What's that have to do with anything?" Slipstream whispered back. "You could just straight-up tell them why you're worried."

"Or," Gerardo softly said, "we can leave them with this mistress, let Valey know what's going on so she can look out for them from a distance, and let them enjoy the city rather than raining on their parade from the very beginning."

Dark thoughts swirled in my head, turning faster the longer I listened. Ever since I told Elise that I wanted to go to Ironridge, ever since we agreed to come to this city, my paranoia had inexplicably stayed at bay. And now here I was, listening to my couriers talking behind my back about how this might not be an innocent research trip and there was way more going on than I was privy to.

Screw that. I had my bracelet. I had my unfinished inertial stabilizer rotor weapon. This was getting nipped in the bud here and now, and if Gerardo and Slipstream were doing something nefarious? Better to fight them while I had them in front of me than let a repeat of the Aldebaran incident happen again.

I yawned, stretched and made a show of getting up, walking right over to them. "Sure is a fascinating conversation you're having, there."

Both of them froze.

"Really." I raised an eyebrow. "Seasoned adventurers like yourselves never imagine that the kid with backwards ears might be able to hear what's going on behind her?" I tapped an ear. "It's not like I was passed out from exertion, or anything. I only stopped 'cause everyone else needed a rest."

Gerardo frowned. "I see."

"So how about," I said, lowering my voice as well and noting that Ansel and Corsica legitimately seemed to be out of it, "you remember my history with traveling with folks who are up to something and tell me what's going on behind my back."

"Halcyon..." Slipstream started.

"Well, you're certainly inquisitive enough to be an adventurer," Gerardo admitted, headcrest flopping. "If not knowing is going to keep you up at night, I suppose you might as well hear it: you probably aren't going back to Icereach any time soon."

I waited for him to explain.

He lowered his voice further. "How obvious is it, from within Icereach, that just about every last pony there is a native?"

"No one ever talks about it," I breathed back, "but I knew."

Gerardo nodded. "That colony doesn't much trust outsiders, and for good reason. Back when your current regime was founded, Ironridge and Yakyakistan were both looking for a place to bury some secrets they never wanted to let see the light of day. It was a very beneficial agreement, since they wanted a place no outsiders could mess with and Icereach wanted to be that place. But, since that time, both Ironridge and Yakyakistan have had some serious governmental shakeups. Elise and Graygarden worry that some of the new higher-ups might not even remember what it was that was sent to Icereach, let alone share the priority of keeping it a secret. Basically, they're worried that the Institute might get shut down."

I felt my eyes widen. The whole point of Icereach, hearing it from Elise, was to do nothing and stay frozen in time. But a useless organization getting shut down felt only logical. This was like... fantastical and ordinary logic collided, and ordinary won.

"They've been feeling this might be on the horizon for a while now," Gerardo admitted. "Especially after hearing about the current state of things from me. Most of Icereach's citizens would be happy to disappear even further off the map than they already are, but you three are foreigners and also young. No one thought that was a fate you would enjoy. It should go without saying, but the reason this concerns me is that if you do manage to get into trouble - which is sadly likely, with a curiosity like yours - Elise and Graygarden don't know how long it will be before Icereach lacks the political power to get you out. And even if they still have it, bringing you home may not be the best long-term plan."

I chewed on that, feeling vaguely like the floor had been yanked out from under me. It did make sense, though: we were being sent to live with a personal connection of Graygarden's, not a business connection. That had always seemed a little strange to me, but it made perfect sense if they were looking for someone whose loyalty wouldn't be dependent on political ties.

My thoughts went back to my many conversations with Elise, in which she told me about Icereach's vague history and its reasons for keeping secrets. If they thought true isolation was on the horizon, maybe jettisoning foreigners would be a thing they would do. And maybe it would be better if we were already established on our own when that happened, instead of becoming refugees again.

Elise and Graygarden were foreigners themselves, I remembered. Next time we met might not be in Icereach, but in Ironridge.

"This is how the Aldebaran incident started," I reminded Gerardo. "I've been here before. I go traveling, then find out something isn't as it seems. What else aren't you telling me?"

Gerardo and Slipstream looked at each other.

I swallowed.

"Plenty of doom and gloom about the overall condition of the world, I'm afraid," Gerardo said. "Much of it, I tried to make light of during tales on our flight here. Unfortunately, not a lot you'll be able to do anything about, unless you turn out to secretly be the arbiter of destiny in disguise. One bit of good news though is that we have some friends in the city with little power in the government but a whole lot of it on the streets. It's probably best not to get you involved with them directly unless you want to kiss any possibility of a safe and ordinary experience goodbye. You heard me mention Valey. She's the green-eyed mare you wouldn't want to be mistaken for. But, you won't be alone."

"Great," I said. "Exactly how I was hoping to start this adventure off."

"If you want to think about it another way," Slipstream offered, "your adventure actually started when you left the Griffon Empire nineteen years ago. Everything between now and then was just... a break."

Well, that sort of made sense. It was because I was a refugee that... No, that didn't make sense, I would want to travel the world no matter who I was.

Maybe being forced to travel the world wouldn't be so bad if it was what I wanted, though? The real reason this unsettled me was just because it was exactly what happened last time.

"Well, I'm fine," I sighed, straightening up. "And just so you know, I can handle the hike. How long do you think everyone else needs?"

"Hopefully they'll be ready to go shortly," Gerardo said, checking the sky. "Dawn isn't far away."

We reached the next train station after the sun had risen. Being near the eastern mountain face gave us the advantage of the mountain shadow; looking back over our shoulders allowed us to see the sun strike the tops of the western mountains, and then the Day District, and slowly crawl down towards the mountain floor. It was almost touching the Night District by the time we boarded our train. The temperature had slowly started to crawl upwards, but Gerardo told me that morning in the Night District was when it would become a true furnace.

The train slipped into another tunnel, turning slightly into the heart of the mountain. It was almost devoid of passengers, and climbed at a steady angle, moving straight and not stopping for a long while. Then, it started to turn, and it remained turning for so long that it had to be climbing in a helix.

It stopped in a station that was all blue steel and a small amount of concrete, completely indoors and much more industrial than anything I had seen so far in Ironridge. Several ponies got on. We kept going.

The train wound its way through a maze of metal that looked more like Icereach than anything, except blown up to a much larger scale. Steel support columns held up rafters that might have formed the ceiling, no light shining on them to let me see. Wide open spaces surrounded the tracks, a forest of supports preventing me from seeing most of the walls. From metal cavern to metal cavern we moved, baffling me at just how much steel someone had managed to produce.

Apparently, Slipstream was thinking the same. "How they can go from a wrecked economy to this in twenty years is beyond me," she mused as we rattled along. "After the Steel Revolution, the mines were out of commission. Feeding ponies took up all of the new government's attention. They had the horsepower, but building something like this so quickly... It just doesn't seem natural."

"Agreed," Gerardo muttered. "What I wouldn't give to get a look at some of Cold Karma's construction records for this place. That dam wall makes it impossible to see how big or finished it is from the outside, but it feels like one year it just sprang up overnight."

"And that space isn't being used for anything," Slipstream insisted, pointing out the window with a wing. "Look at it all! You'd need to excavate an entire mountain for all the iron ore to make this. It must have cost a fortune, but they're treating it like it's free."

"Maybe they just like the aesthetic," Ansel grumbled, massaging cramps in his legs.

"What do they do here, anyway?" I asked. "I've heard that they provide air conditioning for the city, or something, but not the specifics."

Gerardo tapped a window. "Yes, that's what they do. All forms of coolant. Liquid nitrogen, liquid helium, good old ice... Plenty of trade secrets, or course, but you can't hide something if you want to sell it to the public. Of course, there's also all the levers of power up here near the top. Governmental facilities and what have you... Some high-end housing, too, like where we're bound for. Three more stops, by the way."

"What do you have to do to get a house in a place like this?" I asked, deciding it was much more homey and familiar than the Day District despite Slipstream calling it unnatural. "Just pay a lot of money?"

"That, or get a favor from someone higher up," Gerardo explained. "And you'd have to want to live here, of course. Whatever the upsides, you're far away from all the stores and schools and centers of culture."

Maybe that would make it less competitive? I kind of wanted to live here. I leaned against the window as the train surged onward, letting myself get lost in the field of lovely metal. If my new life in Ironridge was in a place like this, maybe things wouldn't be so bad.

Kitty

The Ice District immediately made me feel at home.

It wasn't quite like Icereach, far more metal and far less concrete. My boots echoed on the floor in a way they never could in the hallways of the bunker, but the claustrophobia was the same, the boxy rectangular tunnels with exposed support beams and ventilation equipment and cables tied hastily to the ceiling or else stuffed under a grate in a crawlspace next to a wall. It held a uniformly unfinished feel, as if it had been constructed in a hurry with a strict list of priorities and functionality and no one had been allowed to finish beyond the basics, even if it would have been easy.

The floor was anything but consistent, sometimes metal plates and other times grates and occasionally even pipes with flattened tops so they were easier to walk on. The aesthetic was cohesively chaotic, full of blue metal with tinges of gray and standard caution stripes employed liberally as trim. Where a fancy mansion might use paintings to adorn the walls, this place had wiring access panels, ventilation fans and screens displaying real-time data graphs that were all labeled with code names only a trained engineer could make use of.

Whoever had commissioned this place clearly had impeccable taste. Or, at least, the same taste I had brought myself up to feel most comfortable around.

We weren't quite alone in the tunnels, passing mostly working ponies who had toolboxes and were tinkering with this and that. I wondered if they were maintaining the status quo, like in Icereach, or if this place was still actively under development. That was one area where I wouldn't mind if the Ice District broke from the precedent of my home.

"It should be right around here," Gerardo muttered, counting off doors that had to belong to residences. I gave the party a quick once-over; the air conditioning was clearly doing Corsica a lot of good. Slipstream, on the other hoof, was getting toward the bottom of her comfort zone.

Ansel, myself and Gerardo were perfectly fine.

"Ah, here we are!" The griffon turned to a door, raised a talon, and precisely punched a doorbell.

Several seconds passed, and I heard a loud scrabbling of hooves inside the door. Then it opened.

An earth pony mare was waiting for us, perhaps a year or two my junior, but with a chubby, foalish face that forced me to double-check my estimate. Her yellow-and-pink mane reminded me of a poisonous frog, and she wore a black hoodie with 'gamer' stenciled on the side. She roamed us with her eyes in a way that suggested she had never heard that staring was rude, and her tongue poked out in a curious blep.

"Hello there," Gerardo began, bowing respectfully. "We are-"

The mare's eyes widened as if she was noticing Gerardo for the first time. "Mooooooooom!" she suddenly called, turning and scrambling away into the house, leaving the door open behind her. "There's a griffon at the dooooor!"

As she turned away, my heart momentarily froze: her special talent was a snowflake.

Knock it off, I told myself, quickly shaking myself out of it and forcing thoughts of Ludwig-Corsica from my mind. That was probably a really common talent, especially in a place called the Ice District. I knew several ponies with similar ones in Icereach already. Besides, her eyes were completely normal, and not even blue. Apparently, I'd still have to watch myself to make sure my history with Ludwig and Aldebaran didn't give me paranoia or panic attacks, even though I was doing much better than previously.

Then a new mare arrived at the door, the gamer filly lurking curiously behind her with her tongue poking out again. Her mother was a unicorn, yellow, with a shark-like face and an impressively massive raspberry-red mane with blue-raspberry highlights. For a moment, I squinted. These were mother and daughter? The elder barely looked more than thirty...

And then I realized that it was Gerardo and Slipstream's turn to be frozen.

"Well well," she greeted, watching Gerardo like a hawk. "I never expected you to pay me a visit, Mister Extraordinaire. Long time no see..." She frowned, reading his face. "You didn't show up here on purpose, did you."

Gerardo regained the ability to speak. "Well, I suppose this explains why Graygarden and Elise changed the subject whenever I tried to get your name."

The yellow mare sighed. "Go figure. And here I thought you were finally ready to ask for my help on your world-crawling quest. Glad to see you shacked up, by the way. I was rooting for you from the very beginning." She turned her focus to the three of us. "Waitaminute. Corsica?"

"Hey, mare I've met in passing a few times." Corsica replied.

The yellow mare blinked, and then and then slowly regarded Gerardo with an expression that suggested she had every right to laugh.

"Thank you, yes, I'm aware, the irony is killing me. Moving on." The griffon pointedly cleared his throat. "I do believe we have the incorrect address, however, so we'll be taking our leave-"

"Wait, what?" I cut in, feeling like a train was running past inches from my face. "What's ironic about that? That's like the third time you've referenced escorting someone to Ironridge. And where are we going?"

The yellow mare's horn started to glow, and for a moment I lost track of her, though it clearly wasn't teleportation. She reappeared out in the hallway beside us. "If he hasn't told you, the last time deposed Ironridge royalty paid him to escort some young strangers to this city, it started a war," she said casually, curtsying. "And yours truly was dragged along for the ride. Jamjars, at your service. Are you sure you wouldn't care to come in? I'm a good enough hostess to schmooze the top of the top. I'm sure I can make it worth your while."

"Quite sure, thank you," Gerardo replied, bowing again and trying to back away. "At the moment, I think we need to excuse ourselves for a team huddle..."

Jamjars watched in disappointment as Gerardo ushered us with his wings, speeding us away.

"What's that all about?" Ansel pressed the moment we were around a corner, digging in his heels. "You know her?"

"Yes, you could say that," Gerardo lamented.

"She's... very capable?" Slipstream offered.

"Also the most slippery, devious and dangerous mare in the entire city," Gerardo whispered, lowering his voice. "I can't fathom what those two were thinking, shipping you out here for her to play host to. They know who she is. They also know I'm not making a round trip..."

I felt myself growing cold. "That bad? What did she do? What's wrong with her?"

"You might be overstating it," Slipstream countered. "She was just-"

"You remember what she did," Gerardo said, leaving that at that.

The fur along my spine crawled.

"Well," Corsica declared, "I've seen her before, and my hooves are tired, so that's good enough for me. Is this bad enough that we're not gonna stay there? And if so, what are you going to do about it? I need a plan before I pass out, here."

Gerardo sighed. "Admittedly, that was rather low on my list of things to prepare contingencies for, though I suppose we can make one. I was trusting that Elise's judgement on this matter and ability to conduct a background check would be sufficient. And Graygarden's, for that matter."

"Gerardo," Slipstream said softly, "you haven't seen her properly in decades. Maybe Elise's judgement is sound and Jamjars has changed?"

"Can we slow down, here?" I asked, stretching my wings and praying that they would stop trying to stoke my paranoia. "What's bad about her? The last thing I need is something vague to be afraid of."

"Yeah. Deep breaths, buddy," Corsica told the griffon. "What Hallie said. What's her deal?"

Gerardo's headcrest drooped. "Right," he said. "Jamjars. We... knew her, quite a while back. And the biggest reason you three would want to avoid her is that she's an avid seeker of trouble. If your goal is to avoid another situation like what happened with Aldebaran, I have a hunch this is the wrong place to be."

"That's all well and good," Ansel said from the side, sitting with his hooves folded. "Except for one glaring problem."

We all looked at him.

"Think back to Aldebaran," he said, tapping a wall. "They had us fooled well and good, but still made one major mistake: losing our trust. Anyone playing at a scheme like that needs to keep us cooperating of our own free will. Now, I know nothing about this Jamjars mare, but I do know Icereach's leaders have both vouched for her. Yes, not the best argument given what happened last time, but still: the only ones vouching against her are you. See where I'm going with this?"

Gerardo swallowed, catching on quickly.

"See," Ansel went on, "I've got a hunch you're going to hem and haw for a while and eventually make out like you've got some friends in the city we could stay with, and it would be a grand old favor and everything. And it's entirely possible you're right, and we'd be wise to abandon our plans and go with you. The only problem is that if I were evil and looking to willingly abduct a group of ponies, this is exactly how I'd do it."

Gerardo bowed his head. "I can't fault your logic, or your caution. You're very alert for things like these. However, now that you've put yourself in a situation where you don't know which way is down, what will you do?"

Ansel nodded over his shoulder. "Well, my vote says we go hear this mare out. If her problem is a disregard for danger, I imagine that would be readily apparent from a good talk. And if we wind up agreeing with you, I'll be more than happy to talk contingency plans then."

"After we get showers?" Corsica asked hopefully.

Gerardo hesitated, then sighed. "Alright. My time is at a premium now that I'm in this city, but I can't see a better way myself. Halcyon?"

"Yeah." I nodded. Jamjars... came off maybe a little strong from the few seconds I had seen her, and I decided I wanted a better look for myself too, while Gerardo was still around just in case he was right. Really, though, was it too much to ask to have someone to trust right out of the gate?

Maybe it was. After all, it was hard to name a pony I trusted more than myself.

"Right," Gerardo said, straightening up, Slipstream looking relieved beside him. "In that case, we have no time to lose."

Jamjars' door was closed when we returned, and this time Corsica knocked. Once again, it was answered by the filly in the hoodie.

She smiled when she saw us. "Hiya! Name's Kitty. Momma thought you'd be back!"

"Hi?" I greeted back, trying to figure how I felt about a pony wearing a hoodie in a city with a climate like this. Not that I was one to speak, dressed up head to tail...

Kitty just stared at us as if there was no reason to say anything else, a happy smile on her face. Slowly, her tongue started poking out again. I was starting to wonder if this was her default pose.

"...Might we come in?" Ansel asked.

"Yup!" Kitty replied, standing obliviously in our way.

I hesitated, entirely unsure how to handle this filly. Foals weren't common in Icereach, and I was starting to suspect Kitty was way younger than she looked...

Fortunately, Jamjars soon stepped back into view, moving more like a dancer than a bustling soccer mom. I watched her gaze, focusing much more on myself, Corsica and Ansel instead of Gerardo and Slipstream this time. "Well, hello," she said, curtsying again. "Care to come in? Good hospitality has no expiration date."

I focused, trying to read her now that I wasn't distracted by Gerardo's reaction. Jamjars was... deliberate. Well-groomed, carefully presented and hard to read, but I got the faint impression she was saying two things at once when she spoke. Odds were, it was some sub-context message to annoy Gerardo. I could tell there was a tense history between them, but at least those traits didn't scream recklessness like the griffon had said. If anything, they were closer to Leitmotif... whom I had been completely taken by before she betrayed us. I would have to keep my eyes open.

"You bet we would," Corsica answered, once again carrying her own saddlebags and making a show of looking not as tired as she was.

"Then please." Jamjars gently nudged Kitty out of the way. "Don't let anyone tell you otherwise."

We stepped inside, Gerardo and Slipstream bringing up the rear. Jamjars' house had a small foyer which adjoined several hallways and a decorated living room. At her instruction, we dumped our bags near the door. The living room had a fluffy carpet I was uncertain she wanted my boots on, but otherwise looked surprisingly reasonable next to the dainty monstrosity I remembered in Corsica and Graygarden's apartment. Hadn't Corsica told me it was done up that way for her? Jamjars' own house was neat and pretty, not cloyingly cute.

I wasn't sure how to interpret that, but at least it meant if we stayed here, we wouldn't have to put up with a hideous sense of decorative taste.

"Don't worry about making a mess," Jamjars urged, skimming off through the living room. "I'm the first pony you can complain to about what it's like living on an airship all the time."

"Thanks," Corsica answered, "but can I use your shower?"

"Left hall, second door on the left. Kitty?"

Kitty looked up from intently sniffing Ansel's suitcase, beaming at being called on. "Bathroom's this way, lady!" she chirped, prancing down the hallway.

"What's her story?" Ansel asked, following me into the living room. "Seems a little..."

"Loopy?" Jamjars answered, using her telekinesis to arrange glasses and plates on a low-set glass table. "Don't fall for it, she's smarter than she looks."

I wasn't watching them. I had just realized there was a window.

It wasn't a window to the outdoors, though, which was probably why I had missed it at first. The landscape beyond was dark and dimly lit, a metal cavern much like the ones the train had run through on its climb up the district. In fact, I could see train tracks far, far below, with one winding along them right now.

Jamjars' apartment was on a wall, or perhaps an overhang, looking out into one of the giant expanses inside the Ice District. The ceiling was a solid plate, as was the floor, far below. The two were connected by hundreds or even thousands of intricate steel support columns, the reaches of the cavern stretching out into the dusky distance. And I had a perfect view, looking out into that field of emptiness and metal.

My heart stirred, and my breath misted the window. I loved it.

"Aren't you, like..." Ansel and Jamjars' conversation continued in the background. "A little young for someone as old as her?"

"If it helps you sleep at night, she's adopted," Jamjars said with the tone of someone who had been asked that far too many times.

"I have to admit, I'm surprised as well," Gerardo mentioned, standing near the doorway. "I never thought of you much as the nurturing type."

"Times change, Mister Extraordinaire," Jamjars lectured. "So do ponies. Don't be surprised by what you've been ignoring for twenty years."

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "Sounds like you two have a pretty healthy grudge with each other."

"Actually, they're the ones I'm still on the same side as," Jamjars primly replied, flicking her bushy tail at Gerardo and Slipstream. "Merely annoyed that they've insisted we work separately for the last..." She squinted, sizing Ansel up. "Probably your entire life."

"Work separately?" My ears twitched. "You mean you're both trying to do the same thing?"

Gerardo suddenly looked apprehensive. Jamjars gave him an evil look.

"You know," Ansel pointed out, "as clear as it is that there's something between you two, we didn't come here because we weren't interested in seeing who had the right of it. And you say you don't have a grudge, but I'm trying not to feel like you're the one who would do something drastic, here."

Jamjars sighed daintily. "Oh, apologies. We've just got a long history. But, as the prospect of me discussing it clearly makes him oh so nervous, I suppose my lips are sealed."

There it is, I thought. She couldn't resist taking snipes at him when the opportunity presented itself. Maybe Gerardo was right, and this mare really did have a lack of self-control around danger. I didn't want to abandon Elise and Graygarden's plan, and Ansel had a point that this would be an easy way to kidnap us in good faith... and he didn't even know Gerardo had told me we might not be able to go back to Icereach. But if the griffon was right, I really didn't like the situation that would put us in.

Jamjars brought out snacks, but the room's charged atmosphere remained the same. I could tell Ansel was thinking along the same lines as I was: whatever we picked, we'd be making a leap of faith. Maybe Jamjars only had issues with this one griffon, and staying with her would be completely fine otherwise - I noticed she seemed much more friendly toward Slipstream. But walking out on her, whether it was a trap or not, would leave us completely and totally isolated from home.

I felt my conscience retreat into myself, as if I could hide from the problem and put off having to make another decision with no right answer. But I had claimed to be ready for this. I came out here with the hope I would get a redo, could finish unraveling the mystery of Aldebaran and would prove to myself that this time, I wouldn't fold under pressure.

Well, the pressure, whether real or imaginary, was here.

Minutes wore on, with Jamjars consistently unable to avoid menacing Gerardo, yet being genuinely polite and pleasant to everyone else. There was more small talk than I cared to parse, my brain instead searching incessantly for a third solution that refused to present itself. Jamjars knew why we were here, all this had apparently been put on the table with her as a possibility long ago. And yet she constantly oscillated between trying to be as hospitable to us as possible and getting on Gerardo's nerves.

Corsica finished her shower. Whether we stayed or left, but especially if we left, I decided I needed one too.

While Jamjars' house was substantially more tasteful than the decorations in Corsica's Icereach apartment, her bathroom was every bit as well-stocked. Instead of a shower, I drew a bubble bath, soaking and floating and relishing the opportunity, for the first time in two weeks, to take off my boots. Wearing them all day was one thing, but not even removing them at night for days on end... My outfit needed some quality cleaning and maintenance. That was one pro to staying here, at least for a while. If I was somehow to make it on my own in Ironridge, it would be much easier if I had a safe base and the tools to do what I needed with my appearance.

Of course, if I stayed here, ideally I wouldn't need it.

Water submerged my ears, drowning out any hope of hearing the conversation outside. Instead, I got the pleasing thrum of distant machines, an invisible wave that covered my body, isolating my fears and turning them into objects that I could hold. What was I so afraid of? Gerardo was afraid of Jamjars, and I suspected the real reason was because she could tell us things he didn't want us to know. Things about what he did, about the Writs of Harmonic Sanction, about the goddess he was gathering them for...

Perhaps that meant I couldn't trust Jamjars with my own secrets, but that was nothing new. I hadn't been planning to, anyway. And it wasn't like I even could, when most of my secrets were ones the me behind my mask didn't even trust me with, herself.

I wondered what she would do in a situation like this.

If there were things Jamjars knew, maybe I wanted to know them too. The whole point of leaving Icereach was because I hated it when information was hidden, after all. I wished I could talk to her one on one. But, first, I needed to finish my soak.

Some time later, I dressed myself again, my head clear and refreshed. I had come to a conclusion: I wanted to stay here. Whatever I chose, the worst-case scenario was the same: we get used, manipulated, and potentially endangered, in which case I would trust in Mother's reassurances about my bracelet and fight far earlier than I had last time. But the best-case scenarios were uneven: living a more stable life with someone Elise vouched for who at least knew how to raise a child and secure a high-value property in an influential part of town beat out living on the couch of an anonymous friend of Gerardo's for the foreseeable future. Not only that, but in the event that things went south, I had a hunch it would be easier to run from plan A to plan B, rather than the other way around. And if we did go with Gerardo, we would constantly be in a position where we didn't know whether things were going south at all.

Time to see what everyone else was thinking.

I stepped back through the foyer to the living room. "Hey," I greeted, "What's going on?"

"I think we're about done," Corsica answered, sitting lazily on a couch. Gerardo looked anxious. Jamjars looked at ease. "Everyone's been frank. We'll be taking our chances with Gerardo's friends."

Oh.

"Well?" I glanced at Jamjars, waiting for her to make her case.

"Since you missed it, apparently I've been made out to be a troublemaker," Jamjars told me, as if everything was fine. "I'll admit, I do have my nose in a lot of things going on. But if you're interested in a cushy, cozy life, it's not a question of how good you are at avoiding trouble. It's a question of how good you are at getting out when trouble comes to call."

I stood there, waiting for her to go on.

"I suppose you could live like a peasant in the slums and never have any dreams or ambitions," Jamjars admitted, rolling her eyes. "But somehow I think that would cause you three to keel over and die of boredom. And before you start, him and his friends aren't the way to get there. Apparently, he's got so many eyes on his back he had you get off the train and walk twice just to throw anyone looking for him off his trail! But me?" Her eyes glittered. "I can teach you to thrive in this city. I have connections, and oh, they weren't easy to get. His way of dealing with problems is to fly away to another city. My way is to solve them."

I hesitated. "Gerardo?"

Gerardo just shrugged. We wanted to come here to see for ourselves, his gaze said. It was our call, whether we wanted what she had to offer.

"It's a compelling argument," Ansel said, "if we were planning on getting into trouble in the first place. Which we're not."

Were we? Because I sort of wanted a redo with Aldebaran. The Composer was still out here somewhere, right? Had I forgotten to talk to my friends about one of my reasons for wanting to come here, or had I done so and they just put it out of mind...?

"I... dunno," I told them, remembering that beautiful view out over the Ice District. "Jamjars, what if we wanted to stay here and, like, not get in trouble?"

Jamjars shrugged. "Who's stopping you? I only hear one griffon here advocating for you to run out and join an under-staffed rebel alliance who's forgotten who they're fighting for."

"That's not a very accurate characterization," Gerardo muttered.

"Jamjars," Slipstream said, "Valey and the others are my friends too, so please tone it down a little?"

Jamjars pointed a hoof at her. "You're on the right side of history. Don't be so quick to kiss up to the dividing line."

Slipstream shrank into her chair.

"Feels like a political land mine to me," Corsica muttered. "I'd just as soon stay clear of all this."

Jamjars sighed. "Well, I suppose not everyone can trust at first sight like Gerardo. A pity. If your minds are made up, then away with you. Just remember who knows how to get things done when your mistakes come to call... My door is always open for someone who will appreciate it."

Gerardo and Slipstream got up to leave. Corsica and Ansel got up to follow them. I hesitated, feeling very much like there was more yet to be said.

"Are you sure...?" I tried to catch Ansel's shoulder on his way past.

"You were in there for a while," Ansel whispered. "We'll catch you up later."

Yes, but if he had different evaluation criteria than me...

I was planning to stick my nose into trouble again. I came here fully intending it. Maybe not before I was ready, but I wanted answers. And Jamjars had said more or less what I wanted to hear.

Nevertheless, I followed along. Splitting up would feel horrible, after how much we had gone through to all want to leave Icereach together. I just hoped this wouldn't cost us too much. Giving up any tools we could use to manage our journey felt like a loss of agency, and whatever knowledge Jamjars had that Gerardo didn't want her telling...

We left the apartment, Jamjars watching from the living room. The door swung shut behind us. I had a distinct feeling we were making the wrong choice.

"So," Gerardo sighed, "I suppose we're winging it, then. There's a tavern in the lower south Day District called the Gates to the Underworld. The proprietor is a friend of a friend, and notably a sarosian."

I tried to interest myself in the conversation as we started walking. I hadn't realized how much my heart was set on this giant pile of metal.

"Sarosians, I mentioned, may not be the most populous race in Ironridge," Gerardo went on, "and so there's something of a... support group..."

Someone appeared at the other end of the hallway. And not just someone, but an entire posse.

The leader was a tall black unicorn in a silver dress, with long eyes and a sharp jaw and a horn studded with emerald jewelry. Behind her marched a line of guards in heavy plate armor and feather plume helmets, their steps crunching against the metal floor. I wondered if that was really the most practical way to armor oneself in a modern city, especially one so hot, but it certainly was imposing.

Gerardo not only froze, but took several steps back.

"Gerardo Guillaume," the black mare greeted, her voice clear and echoing and cold. "What a pleasure to see you back in this city. You should have sent greetings when you arrived!"

I strongly considered running. Something about this mare made me feel... odd, in a way I had never felt before. Icereach certainly didn't have anyone like her.

"You know this dame?" Ansel hissed, taking a defensive stance.

"We know each other well," the black mare said, answering for him. "Business partners, in fact. With multiple ongoing deals."

"There is a reason," Gerardo breathed, "why I said I couldn't look out for you indefinitely in Ironridge."

"And Slipstream, too." She gave Slipstream a cold smile. "Might I invite you back to the executive suite? Now does seem like a good time to continue our discussions."

"And you are?" Ansel asked, visibly shaken.

The black mare turned to us. "I am Lilith, head of Cold Karma's division of societal planning. And who are you?"

For a moment, my voice caught in my throat. And then, from behind us: "Oh, they're with me."

It was Jamjars.

Lilith gave the mare a sour look. "Family friends, here for a visit," Jamjars explained, not at all bothered by the mare's fierce composure. "By the way, do you mind having your guards keep it down? I'm not paying your corporation premium rent to hear their boots go clomping by."

"...You aren't paying any rent," Lilith told her slowly.

Jamjars winked. "And that's becaaause...?"

"...I see." Lilith backed off, her tone opting not to pick a fight. "Then I hope your visit goes smoothly."

"It's an extended visit," Jamjars told her with an innocent smile.

Lilith turned to leave, her guards parting and making an aisle for her to pass.

"Well, I... suppose that's the end of that," Gerardo managed, clearly flustered. "We'll try to find you and make sure you're alright after this is all cleared up. I wouldn't advise following us now, but remember who to go to if your path gets sticky."

"Yep!" Jamjars waved as he turned to follow Lilith. "Me..."

Ansel and Corsica shared a look.

"Feel free to leave, by the way," Jamjars mentioned to them, turning back toward her house as the guards executed a complex shuffle to turn around while maintaining their marching order. "But that's the kind of attention the ponies you'd be running toward currently have."

Wordlessly, Ansel and Corsica turned to follow her.

I stood for a moment longer, shell shocked, watching as Lilith and Gerardo vanished around a corner and the guards started to retreat. Jamjars' door stayed open behind me. One guard, however, stopped and turned to me, their visor down and the armor completely obscuring their body.

"Halcyon," the guard greeted with a small salute, speaking in the unmistakable voice of the Composer. "Welcome to my city."

And then they left, and I was alone.

Lair

I stood, frozen, in the tunnels of the Ice District, Jamjars' door invitingly open behind me. The Composer's words rang in my head.

Halcyon. Welcome to my city.

My hooves kneaded the ground as I tried to come out of shock. I knew I was just thinking to myself how chasing down Aldebaran factored into my desire to come here, but... but... You were only supposed to jinx yourself by saying it aloud! Fate wasn't... This...

"Still there?" Jamjars poked her head out of the door. "Oh. You're fine. Just making sure you hadn't run off after that sociopath and her two new toys. All good!" She retreated back inside.

No, I wasn't all good. Or maybe I was, because I had suddenly been given a gigantic lead on what I wanted. I had also been shown a tiny clip of what I was up against with all the subtlety of a yak falling off a cliff.

Move, a voice inside me told my legs. There are better places to think about it than this hallway.

My legs moved, and like ice, the spell over me was broken and I started to breathe again. Time seemed to skip a few seconds as my senses caught up, and I gasped, stumbled, and was in control of myself again.

"Seriously," I muttered to myself, holding a wing to my forehead and loping back towards the open door. "Gotta get a better handle on myself. Clamming up when the pressure arrives is what got me where I was last time..."

When I entered, Corsica and Ansel were back in the living room, clearly torn between sticking together and keeping their usual distance from each other. Jamjars was still cleaning the refreshments she had brought out while Gerardo was here, and I couldn't see Kitty, but it looked like the cleaning was almost done.

"Well then," Jamjars said, turning to us after noticing I was here. "Down to business, I suppose. Apparently, I'm not your first pick for places to stay. Understandable, given your recent company, but there are two sides to every fight. My door is always open, if you'd like to walk out and take your chances anywhere else. But otherwise, let's sit down and figure out how we're going to live together."

"At least I can speak a little more freely, now that there are fewer ears in the room," Ansel said. "Two questions for you. First, what do you have against Gerardo?"

"Relatively little, on the grand scale of things," Jamjars replied. "Mostly just that our goals are the same, yet he adamantly refuses to work together."

"You mean chasing Writs of Harmonic Sanction?" I asked, curious.

Jamjars tilted her head. "Oh, he told you about those?"

"Sort of," I admitted. "Then he clammed up when he realized I was interested."

"Typical Gerardo," Jamjars sighed. "At least he's got half a brain cell. Yes, Writs of Harmonic Sanction. To make a long story short, we need them to be reunited with a long-lost friend of ours. Quite a lot of us were originally involved, but alas, I'm somewhat of an outcast because I actually tried to fight our fate instead of sailing into it with open hooves like all the rest of them. And no one else agreed with my decision." A shadow of anger briefly crossed her face, and then was gone. "But, Gerardo at least is still searching, so him among them I can forgive. If only it ran both ways, we'd be done by now."

Wait, what? "Gerardo said he was collecting them for a goddess to remake the order of the world," I pointed out. "What's that have to do with being reunited with old friends?"

"Did he?" Jamjars frowned. "Blabbermouth. He probably also told you he's a professional story-teller. Prone to embellishment and la la la..." She huffed, then raised an eyebrow. "What's it to you? You want some Writs of Harmonic Sanction for yourselves?"

I stood with my forehooves as close together as they would go. "Mostly, I wanted to meet his goddess..."

"Ah. Princess Celestia." Jamjars reclined in her chair. "She's certainly real enough. But dream big, kid. The spell inside those writs he's chasing is required to sneak into her realm, and every writ that carelessly flies into Ironridge is mine and mine alone."

"You already have some of these?" Corsica asked warily, her eyelids heavy with sleep.

Jamjars gave her an owlish look. "That's a little like asking a lady for the size of her bank account, don't you think? We're going to need to be much better friends before I tell you a thing like that." She sighed airily. "I've got enough that those others are idiots for not working with me, and let's leave it at that."

My mind was several seconds in the past. Writs were required for gaining access to this Princess Celestia's realm... Gerardo had made out like they were status symbols, that left an irrevocable mark on the user but otherwise did nothing. But if other spells could detect that mark... I was starting to put together what was going on here. Now if only I knew why.

"Where is Princess Celestia?" I asked. "There can't be that many places out there you need a special spell to enter, right?"

Jamjars chuckled darkly. "Wanting to put to the test whether you really need one? You'd get fried into crispy bacon, or else wander eternally until only your skeleton remains."

"Bacon? What's that supposed to be...?" Corsica sleepily tilted her head.

"Come on," I protested, "I know how to follow instructions! Don't go before you have one means don't go before you have one. I just wanna know where I'll be heading in the future!"

Jamjars got a little smile back. "Wait, this is really the part you don't know?"

"That is what I said..." I pointed out.

"You won't believe me," Jamjars warned, smiling harder.

I stood up. "Are you gonna play with me, or do you not know either?"

Jamjars whistled innocently. "Well... She's south of the Aldenfold."

Ansel just yawned. "Like anyone'll buy that."

"It's true," Jamjars smugly said. "Ever looked at a world map?"

I had. Plenty of times. Everyone knew the world was a crescent, with a round northern border arcing around the straight southern wall of the Aldenfold. Unless...

"It's a circle," Jamjars told me. "The whole thing. Our little northern slice is only a third or a fourth of it. From Infinite Glacier to the Griffon Empire? You could probably go that far south from Ironridge alone before you hit the real southern edge. Not that I've ever been remotely that far myself, of course."

"So you've got a friend down there you want to meet again?" Corsica asked. "Sounds like you've already got what it takes to go yourself. What's stopping you from just going?"

Jamjars' face soured. "It's very complicated. And really? You're not even going to question this?"

"We grew up in Icereach," I pointed out. "We're kind of resigned to knowing nothing about anything. Probably couldn't tell you what happens if you go too far in any other direction either."

"Is that so?" Jamjars perked up again. "Poor you. The south is more or less a myth here. Everyone's heard of it, very few both think it's real and worth their time. The Plains of Harmony, everyone calls them..."

Well, I guess I could see why Gerardo said I'd need an airship. Though could an airship seriously scale the Aldenfold? If it could, surely someone would have tried it before. Those mountains were mountains among mountains, their cliffs rising above even the tops of Icereach's range like a vertical horizon. "What happens if you don't have a writ?" I asked, curious.

"Bad things," Jamjars flatly told me. "Those mountains are a border wall. They're enchanted by a goddess to keep things out, and plenty of fools before you have decided to go try their luck and see if their big heads and dashing egos would make them exempt from her blacklist. Unless you get a writ, you do not want to follow their example. And neither do you want to encourage others to put this to the test. Which, come to think of it, might be why Gerardo wouldn't tell you..." She rubbed her chin in thought. "Huh. Surprisingly smart griffon. Not like it's the rarest thing for someone to know, but best not to give anyone any ideas. Let's keep this one between us, 'kay?"

Well, little did she know I already had three of them... which was probably a very unwise thing to mention when she was allegedly hunting these very same artifacts. Unless I was ready to voluntarily forfeit the two I had left in hopes of getting in good with her and any allies on her side of the endeavor.

"All this is very nice," Ansel interrupted, "but I think we're getting distracted from more pressing matters. Second question of mine: knowing that you've apparently got bad blood with a lot of folks in Ironridge, why did Graygarden and Elise vouch for you?"

Jamjars winked. "Bad blood? Oh, that's nothing new. Anyone who isn't a newbie to Ironridge has a very fair share of ongoing grudges, be it with individuals or groups. Graygarden likes me because he's hopelessly chasing my tail - spoiler alert, he's not going to get it - but the reason anyone with a real interest in governing thought I would be a good fit for you is that I'm very good at getting the powers that be to stay off my lawn. I could blackmail a windigo if I really wanted to. And you three have some feisty attention on your heads already, don't you?"

I swallowed, remembering the Composer in the hallway. Not to mention their imposing company...

"I'll admit, I'm not always nice," Jamjars went on. "But the golden rule of Ironridge is that you can't be nice, sane and powerful at the same time. And I'm a lot more concerned with accomplishing my goals than doing weird things to neutral strangers, unlike a certain changeling squad I've heard all about by now. Want to be safe from them and their ilk? Want to learn things no one else will tell you? Want to chase down dreams that are too grand for most mortals?" She blinked. "...Well, I probably shouldn't oversell myself. But still. Good luck finding anyone else who can even come close."

Ansel squinted at her. "Elise vouched for you because she thought you could help us dig up potentially dangerous secrets, screw over our enemies and write our names large on the world."

Jamjars snorted. "No. That's my own sales pitch! Elise vouched for me because, as was just demonstrated, I can tell creeps like Lilith to mind their own business. Which, I suppose you could come and live completely boring, ordinary lives operating out of my house, and everything would be fine and dandy..." She gave me a conspicuous look. "But do you really want that? Would you really grill me about Celestia and the Plains of Harmony if all you were interested in was safe and ordinary living?"

I tilted my head at her. "You really want us to stay here, don't you?"

Jamjars carelessly shrugged. "I think you'd make good understudies. But only if you want it. That's why we're here right now." She folded her forelegs over her chest. "To find out what each of us wants from this arrangement."

"How about if I want a nap?" Corsica asked, curled into a ball on the couch.

"I suppose that's a reasonable-enough place to start," Jamjars sighed. "It's a three-bedroom house. Lucky for you, Kitty is a basement dweller, literally, so I've got two rooms I use mostly for storage. Speaking of, stay out of the basement." She shrugged apologetically at us. "Not a rule, just very good advice. You three can divvy up two rooms between you, right?"

I thought for a moment about how that would work. I... really liked having my own room. Space I could make my own was beyond important to me. But Corsica and Ansel sharing... probably wouldn't fly with either of them. Maybe Ansel could take the couch? Probably not this time. I decided, given the choice, I would rather room with Corsica than with Ansel.

So, I voiced that. Neither Corsica nor Ansel seemed to care.

Not long after, I found myself in a room that was clearly being used for storage. Cardboard boxes lined the walls in heaps, and I was fairly sure there was a door to a closet behind a particularly imposing mound of them, not that I'd ever be able to reach it without shadow sneaking. There was a bed, but it was so covered in stuff that trying to bring it back into service was clearly a lost cause. Jamjars gave us two roll-up bedspreads and a promise to get something better later. I wondered what she was doing with things like portable beds. Maybe she was a pack rat. Certainly would explain how she had all this stuff.

"...Wow," Corsica said when we were alone. "Guess she keeps the rest of her place clean by shoving it all in here."

"Who has this much stuff, anyway?" I asked, staring at all the boxes. "In Icereach, even infinite money probably couldn't get you this much. There's just not that much you'd want to buy."

"Welcome to the rest of the world," Corsica replied, glancing at me and raising an eyebrow. "Wanna... see what's inside?"

"One of these boxes?" I tilted my head. "Well, she did say make ourselves at home..."

Corsica's horn lit, gently opening the top of a bigger box so that we could see. It had a metal bar just beneath the flaps, from which hung about half a dozen wedding dresses.

"Woah," I said, watching them sparkle in our combined blue and green light.

"Must be for her job." Corsica lifted one gently out, layers and folds of white silk stacked together and adorned with ribbons on the back. "I told you, right? She works as a wedding planner. Probably for well-to-do folk."

I admired the dress, thinking how pretty it would look on someone like Corsica or Elise. Not that I could imagine Corsica wearing a thing like this any time soon, and Elise's love life was a mystery I had never cared to chase down...

"Bet that's how she gets her connections," Corsica decided, putting the dress back in the box and closing it up, then trying a different one. Inside were a lot of smaller boxes, all labeled tableware. "So. You like her?"

"Jamjars?" I bit my lip, remembering that Ansel and Corsica had decided to leave while I was taking my bath. "I... Yeah. I do. In the same way as Leif." I looked away. "Unless you want to tell me she staged that whole thing with Lilith, she's not bluffing about having influence. And even if she did stage it, that just means she's got even more. Gerardo clearly thought she was dangerous. But it's the kind of dangerous that would be fine if she's on our side. So I guess I can't trust her, but I really want it to work out. Like I wanted last time to work out. Besides, I... like her house."

Corsica nodded, then exhaled.

"What happened while I was gone?" I asked. "You and Ansel were ready to leave. What did she do?"

"Nothing," Corsica replied, sounding as though it was very much not nothing.

Slowly, I undressed for bed, hanging my coat on a spare rack and setting my boots against a box, being as deliberate as I could about making the action say I trust you. "Really nothing?"

Corsica hesitated. "...Yes. And that's the problem."

"Tell me?" I whispered.

Corsica sighed, laying down on her bedroll. "It's... my... It's my special talent. Gerardo told me..." She swallowed, clearly not wanting to spit it out. "He told me mine resembles that of someone very important. On the flight here." She looked away. "He's the reason I was wearing that dress even though it was so hot out. Apparently, not many would recognize it, but if anyone did recognize it, it could get me the kind of attention I don't want. Beats me what's so special about a jumble of lines. Anyway, I forgot to put the dress back on when I finished my shower."

I blinked. "Jamjars recognized it?"

"Not that I could tell." Corsica shrugged. "But Gerardo sure acted like he expected her to. He didn't actually say anything. They know each other, so you'd think he'd know if she'd seen it before. Maybe she just forgot over the last twenty years, or maybe she hid her reaction? Seems like she'd have self-control enough to do it. I just dunno if I want to stay with someone who doesn't want me knowing they know something about me."

"Your talent doesn't actually do anything special, though, right?" I pressed, feeling like I probably shouldn't tell her Gerardo had let me in on this exact same information. "It's just for geometry?"

"And architecture." Corsica rested her chin on her hind hooves, curled up. "Only special thing is getting it while unconscious. But what's that got to do with anything?"

I frowned, thinking how to respond to this. "...What about Ansel? Does he know all this? He wanted to leave too."

"He's just Ansel," Corsica replied. "He's suspicious of everything. Probably has his own reasons."

"Maybe..." I closed my eyes, thinking. "Maybe Gerardo's just wrong about how remarkable it is? After all, anyone with a brain would be able to see the rest of you clearly isn't said infamous talent-holder."

"Maybe," Corsica agreed, not sounding at ease. "Either way, not like there's much we can do about it now. I just wish trusting Jamjars will work out for the better."

"Well, you can keep it covered around everyone else," I suggested. "Like when we go out in public. Keep this from getting any worse. No clue if it's worth the effort."

Corsica looked as though she hadn't considered this. "...I don't know. Maybe I should. But I don't even know what I'm supposed to be worried about. Just that I should be."

"Sounds like how I feel about showing my legs," I admitted. "Way more accurately than you'd think."

"Really?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah," I mumbled, rolling over on my side. "I couldn't tell you why. I've just got this thing that won't ever let me stop feeling like something bad might happen if the wrong pony saw them. I don't even have a good reason."

"...Huh." Corsica turned out her horn. "Neither do I."

I turned out my bracelet as well. "Well, if I ever find out what Gerardo was on about, I'll let you know. But your secret is safe with me."

"Doubt I'll ever find out why yours is if you don't even know yourself," Corsica replied. "But, same to you."

I nodded in the dark, feeling satisfied that I had said the right thing. And just satisfied in general. I couldn't exactly put words on why, but it made me glad to be here, and for that, I knew I had made the right choice.

I realized slowly that I was dreaming, a snowy world constructing itself and coming into focus around me. And then I realized, much more suddenly, that this was the first time I had dreamed since leaving Icereach.

Or was it? Thinking back, I couldn't recall more than vague hints of existence, as if during sleep I had somehow merely paused and resumed my life without remembering the transitions. If the memories had been there, they certainly weren't like this, well-defined visions with touch and feel and taste and smell, where I was a marionette to my past actions.

"Fine. But this doesn't leave this room, you hear?" Corsica's voice cut into my musings. "I have... motivation issues. When I get stressed, I stop caring. When I get frustrated, I stop caring. If I care about something too much, it's like I use up all the care I have to give. Which is too bad, because I've got skills and could get just about whatever I wanted if I could be bothered to try..."

I looked up, my brain quickly placing this event. Ansel and Corsica and I were in a conference room in Icereach, remnants of take-out sitting around us. My side was heavily bandaged. This must have been just after the Aldebaran incident.

Corsica currently had the floor, visibly drained and exhausted after the ordeal. "Some genius I am. Good enough to run off a windigo. Can't make myself care enough to apply it. What kind of a problem is that? Gotta keep everyone at length, just so I don't get too attached and tire myself out. The real reason I've been working with Halcyon this long on ether crystals is that she's passionate enough about it for both of us. She gives the drive, I just put in work. It's a life, I guess."

Was that really a life, though?

It wasn't consistent, but it wasn't rare that my dreams aligned with what I was thinking about during my waking hours, either. Back then, I had wondered if Corsica was overreacting from the shock and stress of what we had just been through. Now, I wondered if this hadn't been at the front of her mind throughout the entire night.

Ponies recognizing her special talent wasn't something she could control, and the consequences were completely unknown. They could be anything from benign to... well, wilder than anything I could think up. Who knew what the world at large had to offer?

This was the perfect thing for someone prone to worrying to worry about. But Corsica wasn't that kind of pony - usually she just ignored her problems instead. But Aldebaran gave us a precedent for getting in a really bad situation due to things completely outside our control, like this. Ignoring it could have consequences.

Was that what my friend was thinking? It was what I imagined her thinking, with what I knew of how she thought. But as much as I knew about how to copy her quirks and mannerisms - as much as I could do that to anyone - I had no idea what actually went on in her head.

I wished I knew, and I wanted to find out. Even though I lacked the power or courage to solve problems, noticing and understanding them could be half the battle. And if there was one thing I told myself, it was that this was the part I was good at.

A low, rhythmic thumping shook me from my sleep. After tossing and turning several times, I deduced that it was coming from beneath the floor, and also that I had slept for long enough to get up and investigate.

I dressed quickly and slipped under the door, following the sound out into the hallway. What was it Jamjars said, that Kitty lived in the basement? My suspicions were soon confirmed when I found the door the noise was loudest through: an out-of-the-way entrance with a paper sign taped to the front that read KITTY'S LAIR!!! ONLY GAMERS ALLOWED, three exclamation points and everything.

"Err... Can I come in?" I knocked, the thumping beats of what was clearly music drifting out from behind the door.

No reply. It also wasn't locked, and the sign would have been worded differently if it was completely private... so, I let myself in.

The door opened to the top of a staircase, as expected. It opened out into a room on both sides, lit from above by pulsing neon disco lights. To one side was a brightly colored bed surrounded by shelves, posters, and a large collection of pony plushies big and small. To the other was a machine that looked like a terminal on a stand behind a broad metal mat. Kitty was on the mat, and she was dancing furiously to the beat of the lights, her tongue hanging out in concentration.

I stared, speechless. A small part of my brain noted that it was nice and cool down here.

After about three minutes, the song seemed to conclude, and Kitty draped herself over a metal support bar, panting. Only after a moment of that did she finally notice me.

"Err, hi," I greeted when her eyes found mine. "Your music's kinda loud, and this room is right beneath mine..."

"Hiya!" Kitty chirped, putting her tongue away and waddling over. "This is Kitty's lair. You wanna be in-doctor..." She screwed up her brow, focusing. "indoctor-nated to a secret society?"

"You what?" I tilted my head at her. "It's certainly a fancy place you got here. I just wanted to see what all the noise was."

Kitty proudly puffed out her chest. "Its'a game! Paying members only."

"Paying?" I glanced at the machine. "For what, to play it? Does it, like, read your dance moves, or something?"

"Yup!" Kitty turned to show me the side of her hoodie, which still said gamer just like last time. "Price is cake. Kitty's hungry."

"I pay cake to play on your machine," I followed, feeling like I had fallen into a gravity simulation chamber with a two-year-old at the controls.

Kitty nodded vigorously. A tiny sliver of her tongue poked back out.

I was starting to wonder if the admission requirements on Kitty's door hadn't been meant to oppress the unworthy, but rather as a mercy to spare them having to process all this.

The longer I contemplated, the further her tongue protruded. "You know, I, err..." I took a step back. "I might be fresh out of cake... I'll go see what I can find?"

"Okay!" Kitty waved. "Bye-bye!"

Without even turning around, I walked backwards up the stairs and closed the door behind me. Less than a minute later, the music resumed.

Lesson learned. From now on, I would stay out of the basement.

"Well, you sure are early risers," Jamjars remarked over an hour later, emerging from the hallway to find me, Corsica and Ansel sitting in silence in the living room. The music had stopped a while ago, but not before all of us had been well and thoroughly awakened.

I just pointed at the floor.

"Oh!" Jamjars looked legitimately apologetic. "Right. Well, earmuffs for you three are probably on today's shopping list... Now, any last minute thoughts about staying here? If you're going to bum it on the streets, I'd rather know before I break the bank to get you all settled in."

"We get free stuff?" Corsica asked, looking like she had made a concerted effort to compensate for a lack of sleep through excessive grooming.

Ansel gave me and her a look that said is this really what you want? I realized I hadn't heard his objections yet to staying with Jamjars.

"Go ahead," Jamjars offered. "If you need to discuss your prospects, don't hold back for fear of my feelings. I've probably heard worse."

Ansel sighed, taking that as an invitation. "She reminds me of Leitmotif," he told us, apparently deciding that privacy was for losers.

Funny. I felt the same. Only, if it weren't for the betrayal, I would have really liked Leif...

For some reason, Jamjars chuckled.

"Got something to say?" Ansel raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, nothing." Jamjars waved a forehoof. "Just imagining who I could offend with that comparison."

Ansel's gaze turned worried. "You think about offending ponies for sport?"

"You know who Leitmotif is?" Corsica added.

"You know someone else who knows who Leitmotif is?" I pressed.

Jamjars shrugged. "Oh, Graygarden wouldn't have shipped you out here without informing me of your situation. As for the rest, let's say changelings are a prickly bunch who don't like it when non-changelings get good at what they do."

"You know other changelings?" Ansel's ears pricked in alarm.

"If you want to stay two steps ahead of everything, you can't pretend seedy underbellies don't exist," Jamjars said, unapologetic. "I've got sources in places that would make your skin crawl, not that you'd ever need to deal with them. Having someone like me around? All of the benefit and none of the dirty work. Unless you like to get your hooves dirty..."

All three of us shared a look.

I knew what I was thinking: Jamjars had just implied she knew someone who might be connected to Leitmotif. Not to mention she clearly had a history with Lilith, who 'employed' the Composer... If I wanted to get to the bottom of who Aldebaran were and what they were doing, this mare was someone I needed. Badly.

"Well, I vote to stay," I declared. "Even if the downstairs neighbor is... err... a little out there. Any strong objections?"

"Already paid the price." Corsica shrugged. "Not a lot of better options. Might as well take what we have."

Ansel glanced between both of us, clearly surprised by the speed of our agreement, and then nodded. "Can't say there's much that sounds worse than splitting up. Count me in."

"Excellent!" Jamjars giddily tapped her forehooves together. "Oh, I'm going to spoil you rotten, and you're going to love me. Shopping trip, anyone?"

"I like free stuff," I volunteered. "What are we buying?"

Jamjars got up and spun in a circle on her way to the door. "Whatever you need, whatever you want, and whatever you can't find in a small town off the edge of the map. Never had a night on the town for fun before, kiddos?"

I blinked. "Um, never."

"Lovely." Jamjars motioned for us to get up. "Of course, it probably wouldn't hurt to start looking for jobs for you three too. You're done with school, right?"

"By Icereach's definition of it," Corsica admitted. "We've been doing our own thing for a while now."

"Hmm," Jamjars mused, pausing and tapping a hoof against the floor. "Well, I assume hours of backbreaking labor in exchange for a few measly coins and something the higher-ups call life satisfaction isn't your style... Would your dream jobs be the kind that get lots of easy money, or the kind that come with a license to do whatever you want?"

Ansel hesitated. "That's an unusual choice to offer to a bunch of teenagers with no credentials or resumes..."

Jamjars grinned, showing teeth. "It's the kind of choice you get when you have connections. Think it over, but I'd rather you get employed sooner than later so no conniving opportunists come and snap you up."

I followed along, nodding blankly. By now, it was pretty obvious what Gerardo had against Jamjars: this was clearly a mare who did what she wanted with no respect for civic order or following the rules. I didn't doubt that she could be ruthless when she wanted to be, either.

None of that would matter if she was on our side. In fact, given my own goals, they might even be exactly what I needed. But if she betrayed us like Aldebaran... This time, I wouldn't hesitate to use my bracelet.

Security

Train doors slid open before me, beckoning me out onto a stone platform where the air shimmered from the day's heat. "Here we are," Jamjars declared, shepherding the three of us plus Kitty out of the slender vehicle. "One of the perks of living at Cold Karma is that all the best amenities are right next door!"

I recognized this station as the one where Gerardo had us board for the last leg of our journey here, though it looked substantially different in the late-evening light. The western mountains' shadow had just reached us, but not recently enough for the massive floodlights that illuminated the district at night to turn on, and the sky was still bright and blue up above, only showing bare hints of an impending sunset.

"How does anyone take this heat?" Corsica complained, wearing the same half-dress Gerardo had lent her to cover up her talent. She glanced at me and Kitty and narrowed her eyes. "How do you two dress up during this?"

"It's a surprisingly light coat," I admitted, not wanting to remind her that her gift hadn't been very suitable for a non-Yakyakistani like me in Icereach's climate.

Corsica glanced at Kitty, who was trying and failing to look at everything at the same time. "And you?"

"Kitty gots'ta rep her brand." The filly shrugged. "Plus, hoodies are cozy! Wanna try one?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow at the garment, which covered everything except the one thing she was trying to hide. "Think I'll pass..."

Already, we - though mostly myself and Kitty - were getting strange looks from other ponies on the platform, though more herself than me. A lot of them seemed to move in pairs, one mare and one stallion, and part of me wanted to sit down for thirty minutes and just analyze the crowd as it passed by. However, Jamjars had other ideas.

"Come on," she announced, beckoning us with her bushy tail. "We've only got all night. Now, food, leisure or physical goods, where to first?"

"I suppose I wouldn't mind breakfast," Ansel admitted, following a few steps behind. "Not that I have much of a wallet..."

"Oh, we'll get that fixed soon enough," Jamjars said with a wink. "So, any food favorites? An air travel hub like Ironridge has just about every dish the world has to offer."

Corsica shrugged. "I'm good with comfort foods. Salad. Whatever."

"I guess something new wouldn't be amiss," Ansel said. "Though I don't know how closely you're acquainted with what would be our normal. We're already here, though, so might as well be adventurous."

"Got any Varsidelian noodles?" I asked. "Kinda want to see how they compare to the ones back home..."

Jamjars pondered this. "Yes, I suppose we could..." She blinked, then gave a defeated frown. "Yes?"

Kitty was sitting on the ground, facing her, tail wagging earnestly. "Kitty wants cake," she declared.

"What kind of cake?" Jamjars sighed.

"Kitty wants wedding cake," Kitty stated, as though it was the most natural request in the world.

Jamjars smiled grimly. "How about we get some real food first for those of us who can't live off of sugar?"

Kitty frowned in serious contemplation. "...Cake with fruit on top?"

Jamjars patted her head and walked on past. "Nope. Come on, I know just the place!"

"Argon Palace!?" Kitty stuck out her tongue and eagerly bounced along.

"No," Jamjars sternly said. "Much as I can enjoy an establishment where the clientele are all easily persuadable, we are not introducing our new guests to Ironridge with a maid cafe."

"Aww...!"

I squinted at them, following along. "What's a maid cafe?"

Jamjars replied with a look that clearly said this is why you don't want kids. For some reason, Corsica looked intrigued.

We didn't stay out in the heat for long. Jamjars led us through a large cleft in the mountain wall into what looked like a bigger, better and much more brightly lit version of Icereach's shopping street: a broad indoor plaza, the distant stone ceiling covered in maintenance catwalks and ventilation pipes, air-conditioned air blasting down from above and cheerfully labeled shops with lots of glass in their construction lining the long walls.

Advertising billboards were largely absent, eschewed in favor of displays in storefront windows. Benches, fountains, potted trees and neon-glowing kiosks lined the center of the roadway instead, and on the side of the road facing into the mountain, I could see an elevated second floor, with a mezzanine looking out over where we were now. It was as if someone had found an underground ravine and decided it would be a perfect place to set up shop.

"Welcome to Eaststone Mall, kiddos," Jamjars announced, flicking her tail. "Not quite the be-all, end-all of materialistic paradise. You can do better if you ride further west. But for fixing up your backwater standards of what the good life looks like, this place is the promised land."

"Lady," Ansel scoffed, "back in Icereach, Corsica slept in her office and I had a metal toilet until a few months ago. I don't think we were living the good life by anyone's standards."

Jamjars blinked at us. "That's disturbing. Oh well, my point still stands. Food first, I suppose..."

An hour later, the remains of a noodly meal sat splayed out before us, a waitress bustling over to collect our dishes and Jamjars making a show of letting her purse jingle as she picked up the tab. Ansel looked satisfied, and Corsica slightly out of it - I was happy with the quality of the food, but wishing I had more with which to chase down the spice. Not that there had been any lack of things to eat. Mine had been a stir fry with bamboo shoots, snow peas, cabbage, baby corn and, of course, noodles. The spices reminded me a little of Noodle Land, but the chefs here clearly had a much broader palette of ingredients to work with.

Kitty, still wearing her hoodie, was staring at Jamjars with an exceedingly patient expression, her tongue poking out once again. "Dessert time?" she whispered.

"Here you go, one moment..." Jamjars muttered, ignoring Kitty and counting change as the waitress lit her horn and floated away our dishes.

I was only half watching, my thoughts more on the meal than the ponies who had served it. But, for a split second, the waitress's eyes met mine, and she nodded in respect. Then, our dishes in tow, she was gone.

Huh. I wondered what that was about.

"Well well," Jamjars said as we stepped out into the mall plaza. "It looks like we just about beat the rush. Everyone satisfied and raring to go?"

"Not to knock the quality of the restaurant," Ansel said, leaning against a giant tree pot, "but that cuisine was what I'd expect for dinner, not breakfast..."

Jamjars chuckled. "Eating certain things at certain times of the day is for old ponies. Besides, you three asked for noodles."

I shrugged apologetically, being the only one of us to have actually requested Varsidelian food. "Hey, I liked it! Guess I just don't keep a healthy eating schedule?"

"Good sleep, proper exercise, and you can keep a graceful figure no matter when or what you eat." Jamjars shrugged, with a self-assured grin that probably would have been annoying to anyone who disagreed with her. "Unless you're Kitty. Pretty sure no amount of dancing can counteract that kid's diet..."

Kitty blew a loud raspberry at her. "Jamjars just mad she can't put away cake like Kitty. Sugar gives you energy!"

"You two squabble a lot?" I raised an eyebrow at them.

"Yup!" Kitty stared happily at me, her tongue still poking out from the raspberry. "Crushing enemies gives Kitty's life meaning."

Jamjars giggled nervously. "There's that competitive spirit of yours that has nothing at all to do with whatever you do down in the basement also please don't say things like that in public." She glanced around to ensure we weren't being stared at. "Sound like a plan?"

Kitty's tongue drooped all the way out, and she smiled cheerfully. "Kitty wants cake."

Jamjars tapped her nose with a hoof, making her go cross-eyed. "After we buy some other-"

Kitty licked Jamjars' hoof.

Jamjars glanced at her, blinked, frowned, and shrugged, putting her hoof back down. "Well, you can do whatever. Everyone else, with me?"

Kitty happily turned and started skipping off into the crowd. "Is she gonna be okay?" I asked, staring after her.

"I'd be more worried about anyone she runs into," Jamjars muttered to me. "She does all that on purpose. Wants to be an actor when she grows up. When she gets more ambitious than eating sugar and earning double-takes, that's when there'll be trouble."

I thought about how that made me feel. What were the odds Jamjars was perfectly fine and reasonable, and things started going south because her daughter annoyed someone important or got herself arrested?

"Not that I can entirely blame her." Jamjars straightened up and shrugged. "After all, I was quite the go-getter in my youth myself. But onto more salient things! The two of you are budding fashionistas, I take it?" She looked over me and Corsica. "Nice tastes, but you have a lot to learn about making fashion livable in the heat if you ever want to walk the Day District in the actual day. Especially with fur as lovely and luscious as yours." She gave Corsica an appreciative nod. "And I'm sure we'll find something for colts as well, if you want to join the dress-up game..." She tilted her head at Ansel. "Though there's something to be said for putting stallions' fashion on mares. Attractive and professional with an air of class and competence, that. Away we go!"

Jamjars wasn't wearing anything herself, I noted, except for raised, gilded horseshoes and several rippling ribbons in her tail and mane. Not that she needed much. She seemed to wear her personality instead, much more effectively than any mere fabric could be worn. I was almost envious... but then again, I could probably do that as well. I just liked my coat the way it was.

With a start, I realized I was thinking that way now about my new coat from Corsica. Not two weeks ago, I had received this thing and been unable to imagine adjusting myself to its more competent image. Maybe getting another glow-up would do more for me than I thought.

We didn't have to follow Jamjars for long to reach a mall store called Silver Silk, which looked to be a large, high-end boutique... though I wasn't yet familiar enough with Ironridge fashion to judge what was truly high-end and what was meant to imitate it so the middle class could feel classy too.

"Here we are," Jamjars declared, guiding us down an aisle that seemed to bisect the store into indoor and outdoor categories. Mares and stallions walked past us, most dressed in clothes that thinly accented without covering anything, and a few dressed oddly heavily. Like me. One such stallion, wearing a beige business suit and a broad fedora, nodded at me in respect as he passed by.

I nodded back on instinct, but blinked the moment he wasn't looking. What was that about? Regards from one suit to another? I remembered that waitress had treated me the same...

This was bizarre. And not least because Gerardo had not-so-subtly warned me that batponies weren't liked in Ironridge. For some reason, random strangers were treating me as though I had a high social standing.

"So," Jamjars said, stopping us across from an aisle that was filled with small lacy things I couldn't identify a use for. "Since you're new to the city, here's a crash course on Ironridge fashion. It's hot here. Nothing is the smart and sensible thing to wear. Anyone who wears things is showing off either their tolerance for heat or their budget for air conditioning. Sounds crazy, but it's what the upper classes like to do, especially the former. You have to compete with your peers somehow..." She fluffed her mane. "And there's always those poor sods that have to wear safety padding for construction and other dangerous work, but I'm sure you have no intention of joining them."

"And what about folks who just like covering up?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. Maybe this was why I was getting the reactions I did, though I didn't think that waitress had been wearing much. Had she?

Jamjars grinned a shark-like grin. "Then you're gonna be roasty-toasty, kiddo. Or stuck indoors all day. With perhaps some minor benefits of being more easily able to schmooze the upper echelons of society. Can't imagine why anyone would want to do a thing like that..." She winked. "Of course, I've got a corporate credit card, so no need to pick and choose. Let's buy you a little of everything!"

We spent upwards of two hours inside Silver Silk before I even thought to check how much time had passed. The moment Jamjars asked to see Corsica in a new outfit she had picked out, I was nervous that she would do the same to me, but then I discovered the store had private changing stalls with lockable doors and large mirrors that let me change in peace. And Jamjars, thankfully, had caught on without me saying anything that I was shy of being clad in anything that didn't go head to hoof. Her suggestions were more of guidance, and before long, I found myself laden down with things I might actually conceivably wear.

Nothing I found could quite capture the cartoon-wannabe appeal of my old coat, which was far too thick and warm to consider wearing in Ironridge. But apparently there was a detective genre called noir that had come into vogue about a hundred years ago in Ironridge, with a not-too-different aesthetic that Jamjars said was widely respected as cool while being nothing anyone in their right mind would wear outside of a costume party. Now I had an oversized black trenchcoat that felt more like a cloak and had trails that brushed the ground when I walked, and a matching hat to go with it - I'd have to watch myself not to trip, but was pretty sure it was exactly what I wanted. And it was made of some special lighter-than-it-looked fabric that made it breathe even better than my new coat from Corsica. Corsica's coat would still be my default, but having something like this would be useful.

That wasn't what I was wearing right now, though. Instead, I had deigned to put on a dress, simple and smooth and shiny mother-of-pearl, with matching silk boots that reached all the way up into the dress's folds.

This was about as far away from my norm as I could get. And yet, it somehow worked. The dress had a high neckline and covered everything I needed covered, from my special talent to my legs, and it also lacked any sort of lace or ruffles, making me somehow look smaller than I actually was, hugging my barrel with slits for my wings. I had tried several colors, and was tempted to settle on royal blue, but for some reason this one struck a chord with me and made me feel... something.

I felt, wearing it, like I had found something that was lost for a long time. And yet, there were no swirly, foggy feelings like when I thought about something that was hidden behind my mask. It couldn't be that, yet a strange, tingling sensation in my ears warned that if I took it off, I might lose something invaluable that was currently just out of sight.

What was that feeling? Maybe all the dresses had it, and this one was just my favorite. It certainly wasn't often I tried to make myself beautiful, at least. I decided this one was definitely a keeper. Time to show Jamjars and the others.

I stepped out to see Corsica modeling a full black tuxedo and Ansel wearing nothing but shades and a bowler hat. Corsica immediately blinked when I came into sight.

"Wow," she said. "Look at you. Never thought I'd see you in something like that."

Immediately, I felt self-conscious. "In a good way or a bad way?"

Corsica whistled. "Pretttty good."

"Hmm," Jamjars said, sizing me up. "I approve. Of course, now your mane means everything. This is a look, but how about short, straight, and flipped to one side? I started out working as a stylist, I'll have you know. Any revisions are on the house..."

"I'm a pretty good stylist too," I admitted, though I was curious to see what she could do. "I just keep it this way on purpo..."

I trailed off, noticing a nearby mare who was giving me a withering stare.

Middle-aged, with a short, dyed-blond mane and tail, she looked like she had just noticed me while walking by. After a second of eye contact, she huffed and shook her head in scathing disapproval, and turned to keep walking with a flick of her tail.

Rude. For a second, I was frozen, caught between the surprise of being visually accosted and the realization that maybe Gerardo had been on to something after all. However, we were in public. Plenty of ponies were around, including Jamjars. I had my bracelet. I had been treated well earlier. This was clearly supposed to be a respectable establishment... and wearing this dress made me feel powerful. So, some unnecessary side of me decided to kick the beehive.

"You got a problem?" I asked after her.

She glanced back at me. "Sarosians," she muttered, and then spat in my direction before continuing on.

Like a rippling wave, everyone stopped and looked up. All the ponies in the aisles near us - at least four, at a quick glance - were focused on her.

A stallion in an open-fronted vest with pilot goggles pushed up on his forehead got in her way. "Do that again," he challenged in a deep, gravelly voice.

"This is a free store in a free city," the unpleasant mare shot back, meeting his glare and not flinching. "And I will very well say what I want."

"Not this again," a tall stallion complained, watching over a rack of ties.

"Oh yeah?" Pilot Stallion leaned into the unpleasant mare's face.

Before I knew it, Jamjars was standing beside me. "You know, usually one starts tavern brawls inside actual taverns," she whispered in my ear. "But, I suppose some cases can't be helped. This should be interesting."

"Someone call public security," sighed a mare in a huge sombrero with two foals strapped to her sides in carriers. "Ugh, I'm so tired of ponies who do this..." She glanced apologetically at me. "Sorry, hon."

"Public security!?" cried a teen colt with heavy acne. "No, keep them out of this! You show her, Dad!"

Pilot Stallion just grunted.

The mare who had accosted me kept up her facade, but was clearly frazzled and annoyed at being surrounded. "What is this, mob rule?"

"Excuse me," a voice called, and a professionally-dressed pegasus with an employee badge marched over. "Is there an incident?"

"I'm being harassed," the unpleasant mare complained, pointing snootily at Pilot Stallion.

"She was givin' that kid over there lip," Pilot Stallion replied, pointing at me.

The employee nodded, pressing a button on a small device on his chest and stepping away. "I'll leave this one to security, I suppose..."

Suddenly, a large circle appeared on the ground, and began to glow green.

Eerie emerald flames licked their way around it, and the ground inside became hazy and indistinct as the fire rose up in a smooth wall. Then, figures began to rise from the ground inside. In barely two seconds, the flames around them dissipated, and it was over. Five new ponies were in the store, four wearing helmets and clad in armored police barding, and an androgynous white unicorn with a white mane who wore no clothes and an incredibly vacant expression.

"What's going on here?" a police mare asked.

Once again, the unpleasant mare was the first to speak. "I am being harassed by these ponies, who are all infringing on my right to shop in peace!"

The officer glanced around for anyone else.

"She was spitting at that kid there," Pilot Stallion said, repeating his allegations.

"I was just minding my own business," I said when the police mare turned to me. I glanced at the unpleasant mare. "What have you got against batponies, anyway?"

She just snorted.

"Right," the officer sighed, giving her a look. "Conflicting accounts. Not going to plead guilty?"

"Didn't you hear me the first time?" the unpleasant mare challenged. "I'll have words for your boss about this if you don't let me go on my way."

"Yes," the police mare sighed, nodding to the vacant white unicorn. "I suppose you will."

The unicorn's horn glowed, and four spheres of light materialized in the air around them, hovering and forming into a rectangle near the ground. The spheres pulsed, emitting some kind of energy toward each other, and in the center, a green-tinged hologram of two ponies took shape.

"Samael, Director of Public Security," one said in an emotionless voice, a short unicorn with a long mane that looked like a mare but sounded like a stallion.

"Estael, Director of Public Security," the other echoed in an equally emotionless tone, a short pegasus with a short mane that looked like a stallion but sounded like a mare.

The unpleasant mare took a step back, suddenly looking worried.

"She is being oppressed by these others," Samael said tonelessly, his face betraying the barest hints of feeling. "We should let her go."

"No," Estael said. "She is the oppressor. It would be a crime for these others not to intervene. We should submit her to the law."

"We are the law," Samael replied.

"Yes," Estael said, just as unfeeling as her counterpart. "That is why justice should be administered."

"But she is being oppressed," Samael repeated.

"As was she doing to another," Estael replied. "And these ponies were attempting to stop it. The scales are two against one."

"No," Samael said. "The scales are one against one minus one."

"The result is the same," Estael replied. "We should submit her to the law."

"Yes," Samael agreed. "The scales have been weighed. We should submit her to the law."

"The scales are one against one minus one," Estael agreed.

Both of them nodded. "Take her in," they declared, their voices echoing together. Then the spell ended, and their projections were gone.

The police marched forward. The unpleasant mare looked around, panicked, but no one came to her aid. The four of them surrounded her, and then the green circle quickly reformed, the ponies inside sinking into the ground and out of sight.

Everyone who had been standing around sighed and started moving away.

"Creepiest thing I ever did see," the tall stallion behind the tie rack told me. "Don't know why anyone would risk the wrath of that. Best keep your head down and take care of yourself, kid."

"Keep your head down," muttered the sombrero mare as she wandered away. "No one should have to do that..."

The circle faded, and only then I realized the white unicorn hadn't gone with them. Its horn pulsed, and the spell quickly reformed.

Everyone who was leaving paused.

This time, only Samael was present, and he looked straight at Jamjars. "You," he said.

"Me?" Jamjars tilted her head.

"Your daughter was recently impounded for licking cakes that were on display in a bakery," Samael said. "Pay the cost of the cakes at your convenience, and she will be free to go. Justice will have been served."

He bowed, not waiting for a response, and the spell went out. Then the green circle returned once again, sized for one this time, and the white unicorn sank out of sight. This time, everyone was properly gone.

The crowd finished dispersing, everyone pretending nothing had happened. Except for the employee, who soon returned with a rag to wipe up the spit.

Jamjars sighed airily. "Well, that went smoothly. Now you see why I've always wished I had saner and better-behaved offspring such as yourselves. Shall we leave in a hurry and let this place be rid of us?"

"Err..." I found that I couldn't quite move, still processing everything that had happened. Change out of the dress, some part of me warned. But between being generally respected, spat at, and witnessing what I hoped was a very unusual administration of justice, I was too stunned to do it.

"Come on," Jamjars urged, scooting me and my friends along. "Even when you're innocent, there's such a thing as overstaying your welcome."

The crowd composition of Eaststone Mall had changed during our time inside Silver Silk. More ponies were present, looking on average much less groomed compared to the finery on display earlier, yet they were still hardly scruffy. Also, notably, there were a lot more children.

I had never really thought before about how few foals Icereach must have had. Sure, I sometimes saw them here and there, but busy scientists couldn't have had much time for raising families, and so I never much questioned their scarcity.

Here, however, it felt like every other group of ponies had someone younger than me in the mix, from gangly teenagers to waddling foals to infants riding on backs or dangling in carriers. And for the families that had them, it was rarely limited to one. My brain did some quick math, pointing out that two parents needed two kids for a population to stay stable, and of course not everyone could or would pair off, and after a moment of feeling like my surroundings were bizarre, I decided they actually made perfect sense. Predictably, it was my hometown that was weird, instead.

Also, thinking about it let me avoid thinking about the fact that I was wearing a dress.

Perhaps it shouldn't have surprised me, but Silver Silk let us check out while wearing the products we were buying. At least I wasn't alone in my fanciness, as Corsica was stuck in her tuxedo and Ansel showed no sign of giving up his hat. He was also the designated pack horse for everything we had bought but couldn't wear, not to mention all the stuff I had changed out of.

A quick trip into a bathroom gave me a mirror and some space to fix up my mane, changing it to something slightly more suited to my current dignified look. When I came out, I found Ansel, Corsica and Jamjars discussing what we were going to do next.

"Really?" Ansel was saying. "Bailing Kitty out isn't your top priority?"

Jamjars shrugged. "Let's just say this isn't her first time around the block."

"She does this kind of thing regularly, then?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

Jamjars sighed laboriously. "Oh, you have no idea. Or, perhaps you do. Let's just say I know the names of over half the ponies who run the front desk at the public security building, and leave it at that."

"Have you ever considered... you know..." Ansel spoke carefully. "Teaching her to not get arrested when she goes off on her own? Or maybe not letting her on her own in the first place?"

"What do I look like, a wise and nurturing mother?" Jamjars chuckled. "There are benefits to living with me, and then there's a price." She lowered her voice. "In this case, the price is probably that I've been a bad influence on her. Odds are ten to one she did it on purpose because there's someone in jail she wants to talk to, which is a thing I'd never condone as a reasonable and responsible parent." She straightened up, her voice returning to normal. "Or, maybe she just likes cake and needs to be taught a lesson or two. Who knows?"

I frowned. If Kitty was innocent and stupid, Jamjars really ought to be taking better care of her. Then again, I wasn't sure I would have been up to the task either if our roles were swapped. Did I have grounds to be hard on her for being a bad parent?

Of course, there was also the possibility that Jamjars was telling the truth and Kitty was way smarter than she acted.

"That's all well and good," Ansel warned. "But for my own peace of mind I think I'd feel a whole lot better about this if I saw you taking care of the ponies you're responsible for. Trying to convince us this is a safe place to stay, remember? If I got into trouble and you had a way to get me out, but simply didn't care to use it, I doubt I'd feel very appreciative."

Jamjars gave him a sly look. "Are you saying you plan on getting in trouble soon?"

Ansel just stared back at her.

"Ugh, fine. We'll go save Kitty." Jamjars huffed and did an about-face, marching towards the exit to the streets. "See for yourselves how torn-up she is about it..."

We walked a ways before boarding a train to the west. My dress breathed surprisingly well, though I noted Corsica didn't look happy about being outside while fully-clothed. Or about being outside, period.

Funny, though... Hadn't there been a station just a short distance away? After a moment of pondering, I realized that Jamjars was just as much of a cheapskate as Gerardo. She was skipping the fare checkpoint as well.

The train itself wasn't nearly as crowded as the previous night, though part of that might have been our traveling in the other direction. I felt awkward in my dress, a scruffy little teenage socialite dressed for a royal ball, but nothing was worse than an incomplete look, so I held my composure and acted the part as well. With good posture and a stiff jaw, I held myself up, the emptiness behind my mask tickling at me and reminding me that I felt just as much myself right now as I did when wearing my old coat in Icereach.

I could be anything. Here, where that skill might be a whole lot more useful, I needed to get used to the idea of using it.

After a bit of riding, we got off and walked some more, a journey that was hard on me and clearly much harder on Corsica. It was nighttime! High up on the mountainside! Why was it so hot?

"I'm sweating," Corsica muttered in my ear. "I'm sweating and I'm already going to ruin this tux..."

"It'll wash out," I whispered back. "What do you think I'm doing to this silly dress?"

Eventually, our posse reached an imposing building high up on the mountainside. If you went far enough up the Day District, the mountain wall steepened until it was nearly vertical, and the public security building was a large tower built up against that wall like an outward-facing notch in the mountain. It was hard to crane my neck enough to see the top.

"So the police aren't a Cold Karma division?" Ansel asked, surveying the building. "Funny. I'd have expected a big, rule-everything corporation like them to run this, too. Who does head these folks, if not the government?"

"Oh, they are part of Cold Karma," Jamjars replied. "They just keep a base out here, instead. Some time ago, before the Steel Revolution, they were called the Stone District Defense Force - that's the old name of this district, before they changed everything when Cold Karma came to power. Kind of a paramilitary, vigilante, foreign-government-influenced place... Don't ask how that happened without anyone doing anything about it. It was a mess. Anyway, Cold Karma said 'work for us,' gave them a new boss, and here they are. Still in their old fort. A lot more ethical than they used to be, I'll tell you that..."

We entered the building through a revolving glass door that looked a lot newer than the rest of the wrought-stone construction. The first thing I spotted was Kitty, sitting at a table with her tongue poking out, playing a card game with some very consternated-looking ponies in police barding. They looked far more distressed than she did.

"Hey! Yoo-hoo!" Jamjars made a loud snapping noise with her horn, drawing everyone's attention. "Cavalry's here ahead of schedule..."

Kitty glanced up with sparkling eyes. "Hiya, lady!"

The police looked relieved. "Finally," a stallion sighed, throwing away his hand. "If we'd been playing with real chips, I'd have been out a month's pay..."

"Here to sign for your kid back, Miss Jamjars?" a mare with an angular face asked. "I've got an expense report on the damages here..." She pulled out a notepad, then nodded over her shoulder at a closed door. "Plus about thirty pounds of used cake for you to take home. You break it, you buy it."

"How pleasant." Jamjars' eye twitched as she took the paper with a forced smile, reading it over.

Kitty beamed at her with an aren't-you-proud-of-me look.

"Alright," Jamjars sighed after upending her purse. "Let's go see the damages. Hopefully we don't have to rent a wagon..."

Kitty sidled up beside me as we started to move. "When no one was looking," she whispered in my ear, "Kitty licked forty cakes."

"When no one was looking? You sure about that?" I gave her an oh really look. "Because you got pretty well arrested for it."

"She licked forty cakes," Kitty repeated. "That's as many as four tens!"

We entered the side storage room to see an entire rack loaded down with cakes, many of which had been obviously disfigured with tongue marks. Most of them were small, thankfully, but a few were massive.

Jamjars groaned. "That's terrible... You're eating all this by yourself, you hear?"

Kitty looked as though her birthday had come early.

"So a kid does this, and you kind of just hang out playing cards with her?" I asked the mare who had opened the door.

She shrugged and sighed. "Repeat customer. Besides, can't make Junior Karma mad by incarcerating a family member of his official wedding planner." She lowered her voice. "You didn't hear this from me, but it feels like he's always making excuses to get that mare political immunity... What I wouldn't give to have someone that important in my corner instead." She straightened up. "Haven't seen you before, though."

"Friends of family." I gestured at Jamjars with a wing.

The police mare rolled her eyes as Jamjars argued with someone else about whether she could keep the wheeled rack the cakes were on and Kitty sniffed them eagerly. "With a Riverfall mare, just about anyone could claim that. Well, stay safe out there, citizen. The law will always be on your side."

"My side?" I tilted my head. "Why, because I'm a bat?"

The officer hesitated. "Ah, forget it. Shouldn't over-step my duty..."

Some time later, we were on our way, Ansel and I sharing the duty of pulling the cake cart as Jamjars used her telekinesis as a brake to ensure it didn't run us over whenever the hill sloped downward. We must have looked quite the sight, a teenager in a fancy dress pulling a cart full of licked cakes... but Kitty was as happy as could be, and Corsica was doing her best to avoid fainting from the heat. It was about the best we could do.

"She could have left these behind, you know," Ansel grumbled, hauling the cart alongside me.

"Waste not, want not?" I shrugged. "Maybe they'll go stale before Kitty can eat them all, and she'll make herself sick of them, or something."

"Maybe." Ansel didn't sound convinced. "So what was that between you and that police officer?"

"In the building?" I frowned. "I dunno. I guess she just wanted to gossip with me?"

"Seems like an odd thing for an active-duty officer to do," Ansel muttered quietly. "You've probably noticed, but random strangers have been sneaking nods at you all night."

I shook my head. "You're looking out for those too?"

"Yes, and it's just you," he whispered. "No one is giving me or Corsica the time of day."

"Weird." I swallowed. "You make anything of it?"

"I don't know," he sighed, sounding troubled. "But there's one thing I can tell you for sure. It might not make you feel better, though, and you have to swear to keep this quiet..."

I perked my ears, stepping a little closer.

"That teleportation circle the police used," he whispered. "In the clothing store? That was changeling magic."

My eyes widened in alarm.

"The kind it takes someone relatively powerful to cast," he added. "I'd rather not talk about it in detail, but you should be smart enough to figure out what that means."

Well, he hadn't seen the Composer in Lilith's entourage. But even if he had, I doubted it would change his assessment...

The changelings were up to something in Ironridge. I knew for certain the heads of two company divisions were involved, or at least adjacent to ponies involved. And that made it relatively likely it went up to the very top of the company.

My goals had just grown a lot clearer, and a lot more dangerous.

Work

"Does this happen often?" Jamjars asked, standing at the edge of an intersection on our way back to the train station with Kitty's cart of cakes.

"Well," Ansel began, "let's see. Yakyakistani mare, thick coat, goes frolicking in snow drifts wearing barely a scarf? Check. Stuck in a tuxedo because we were picking out distinctly indoor outfits and then someone made us leave in a hurry without a chance to change? Also check. Extremely stubborn and complains a lot, except for when it actually matters? I'm not that sure on how she works, but it's as good a guess as any."

"Are your ears working?" I gave him a frown. "Because she was complaining a pretty lot about the heat."

Kitty was poking at Corsica with a hoof, her tongue poking out as she glanced at Jamjars with a worried look on her face. "Lady, why'd the mare fall over?"

"Also, she's been looking pasty all day, and it might have been because she got heatstroke last night," Ansel finished.

Jamjars shook her head in exasperation, the four of us standing around a fainted Corsica. "What do I look like, a mind reader? My intuition is laser-tuned for schemes and corporate chicanery, not kids who don't know how to ask for what they need. Back in my day, we erred on the side of taking what we wanted by force..."

Not getting an answer, Kitty turned to me instead.

I sighed. "She's got heatstroke, kid. Means it's too hot. All of us are used to the cold, but she's got it worst because Yakyakistan ponies have thicker fur. So we probably should be getting inside and finding her some water instead of standing around in the heat flapping our gums."

"Oh!" Kitty perked up. "Kitty can do cold!"

I blinked. Jamjars suddenly bit her lip. Kitty's special talent faintly glowed, and she stuck out her tongue further in intense concentration... and the temperature around us began to fall.

Before I could really process what was happening, Kitty poked Corsica again with a hoof. Corsica started. "Ah! Stings!..."

"You... alright?" I asked, trying to focus on the situation at hoof even though my brain was suddenly going WINDIGO WINDIGO WINDIGO. Seriously, there were talents that could physically affect the world. Most were like mine, and gave only expertise, but only about eighty percent. And what else was a snowflake talent supposed to do, anyway?

"Ugh, I..." Corsica tried to sit up, and then flopped back down. "Screw this. I wanna go home..."

Moments later, we were in the lobby of what I guessed was a bank. Corsica was out of her tuxedo - apparently, covering her talent was no longer top priority - and resting on a bench, with water nearby. Kitty was keeping attention far away from her regardless, standing next to her licked cake cart and waving energetically to each and every pony that passed by.

That left me, Ansel and Jamjars.

"Seems like a useful talent she's got there," Ansel pointed out, and I wondered if he might have been remembering the same thing as me. Kitty's eyes suggested it was mundane, but Ludwig was probably just as burned into his memory as mine.

"Yes, it is," Jamjars wryly acknowledged, keeping her voice down. "Especially in this climate. And both of us would very much appreciate it if you kept it on the down-low. She's not supposed to use it in public, but sometimes she decides otherwise."

"A secret?" I asked back, lowering my own voice as well. "Why?"

Jamjars sized me up for a moment, more like she was deciding whether to answer than how. "Cold Karma is a very... jealous organization," she eventually said. "The board of directors might not always get along, but one thing they all have in common is that they love their jobs. Their company is at the top of the heap, and they wouldn't have it any other way. That's not to say that they don't know I have a kid who does what they do for free, but... Well, let's just say some flames don't need to be fanned."

"What?" Ansel frowned. "How does that follow? Your filly has a personal air conditioner, and as a result you've got that company afraid that you could steal all their business? There's such a thing as scope and scale..."

"Hmm!" Jamjars straightened up. "Well, then I suppose they're all a bunch of 'fraidy-cats being scared of nothing. But whether it's a rational fear or not, strutting about and showing off might send some signals I'd have to spend effort smoothing over. There's trading barbs with someone you've got dirt on, and then there's threatening to upend the status quo."

I glanced over at Kitty, who was currently accosting a couple who looked, predictably, like they were only here to use the bank. "Hiya!" she was saying. "Wanna place bets on how much of this cake Kitty can fit in her mouth at once?"

She was summarily ignored, with a few mutterings about kids these days and their frivolous parents.

Jamjars was more interested in us. "Now that that's out of the way, I've got a question for you. Got any other potentially inconvenient flaws I should know about?"

"Flaws?" I frowned.

"Like not saying anything before you pass out from heat exhaustion," Jamjars sighed. "What else do you have that would be rude to ask about but I need to not get blindsided by if I'm going to look out for you? Any curses, major phobias, disabilities, self-destructive personality ticks, anything? I had a friend once with a faulty horn who sometimes went colorblind or even fully blind as a result of pushing herself too hard. I know how it is. But if you can't fly or have a crippling fear of insects, I promise it'll feel a lot better if we talk about it before it becomes a problem."

I stretched uncomfortably, and Ansel gave me a look. I shook my head. "I'm good."

"Same," he added.

"No pathological heroism or hefty grudges that will cause you to drop whatever you're doing to charge at something out of the blue?" Jamjars raised an eyebrow. "No extreme cowardice that could cause the opposite?" She lowered her voice. "I already know there's a legendary monster who may or may not want to kill you. You kids are in it deep. Just saying, not going to judge."

Ansel shuddered. "Yes, I suppose I might become very unpleasant if Ludwig was in the room. But who wouldn't? Listen, I've handled myself for years, and I've no intention of quitting soon. And Hallie's good too. Corsica is... doing a Corsica thing."

Ever so slightly, I resented him saying I was good, even though I had just proclaimed it myself. Someone who understood my flaws and complexities, who knew all the things about me even I wasn't allowed to know and yet still acted in my best interest... That was what I wanted more than anything. Jamjars wasn't it - at the very least, I needed to know and trust her a whole lot more before I even entertained the idea - but this was still my proposition to refuse.

I hugged my dress closer, that feeling from earlier returning, that I had forgotten something critical and this dress might be a reminder. What was that? Something about... the dress's color, maybe? Mother of pearl, mother of pearl... Or was it related to what I had just been thinking about? I wished I could go back and search through my memories, like dreaming, only deliberate. But, nothing came.

"Oh well," Jamjars sighed. "Fortunately, I've always been excellent at entertaining myself with my own head. Say the word when you're ready to get back to dragging these cakes home. Oh, and we need to buy some real beds, too..."

"Heave... HO!"

A muscle-bound unicorn wearing a sailor's hat and collar shoved a slate of long, flat boxes through Jamjars' front door, using both his horn and his strength to move them. When they were properly situated in the foyer, he took off his hat and wiped his brow. "Whew! Everything you ordered, Madam?"

Jamjars walked in a circle around the packages, then fluttered her eyelashes. "It all seems to be present. Thank you for your service..."

Had the stallion been around twenty years younger, I imagined he might have blushed, but apparently he had a better head on his shoulders than that. "Just doing my job, Madam. Sign this affidavit, and I'll be out of your hair."

A receipt was signed, and soon the door was closed, the lot of us back safe and sound in Jamjars' apartment. Kitty had spirited her entire cake stash off to the basement, and Corsica had shut herself in our room, leaving just me, Jamjars and Ansel.

"Well well," Jamjars said, appraising us. "Think you'll be able to set those frames up on your own? Not that I'm afraid of a little legwork, but someone needs to make lunch and neither of you strikes me as a professional chef."

I was about to announce that I wasn't half bad at cooking, when she rubbed her chin. "Although, I'm tired. I could just call in pizza..."

"Pizza?" I tilted my head. "What's that?"

Jamjars punched the floor. "Pizza it is! Alright, let's get these beds fixed up so we can kick back and relax!"

A short while later, I was on my back with a screwdriver in my teeth, trying to hold two parts together with all six limbs as I locked them into place. We had taken turns watching Kitty and wandering around in a mattress shop, but Jamjars was adamantly opposed to the idea of bumming it long-term with mattresses on the ground, and so now there were frames as well. Unfortunately, some assembly required.

Across from me, Corsica was using her aura to put together hers. She looked... about how I expected someone with heatstroke to look.

"Are you sure you shouldn't be resting?" I pointed out, transferring the screwdriver to a spare hoof.

"That's what the bed's for, isn't it?" she answered, not sounding in a mood to talk.

I let it drop, and went back to work. But work could only last for so long, and eventually my work was done: no sheets, pillows or blankets yet, but I had a bed and I could lay on it.

Corsica had the same. She immediately flopped onto hers.

"So... what's up?" I asked my facedown friend. "Something's clearly eating at you."

Corsica grunted.

"You wore a full-body tuxedo out in that sweltering heat!" I protested. "I know Jamjars made us leave in a hurry, but you didn't even ask for her to wait for you to get changed. And she was only in a hurry because Ansel wanted her to be. You heard her talking like Kitty could wait until we were done shopping."

"So?" Corsica mumbled.

I fidgeted with my forehooves. "Should I be worried about you? I know the climate's not great, but you haven't been yourself for a bit. And I'm kind of wondering if you... maybe did that on purpose."

"What, wore the tux?"

I nodded.

Corsica sighed, and for a long moment I thought she wasn't going to say anything. But then she beckoned me closer.

"This doesn't leave this room," she growled, grabbing my ear with her telekinesis.

"Ow!" I swatted her aura away, then swallowed and nodded. "Yeah. Promise."

Corsica rolled over and sat up halfway. "Remember what I told you, months ago, about me and motivation?"

I nodded again, remembering the talk. If she cared too much about something, she had said, it was like she only had so much care to give...

"I think I'm burning out again," Corsica admitted. "Probably this business with my talent. I'll get through it. I always do. But I'd rather not..." She hesitated. "I'd rather not have Jamjars thinking I do it for no reason, and I definitely don't want to tell her the truth. So, I need something to mask the symptoms. Not pleasant, but, it works."

I blinked owlishly. "You are letting yourself get too hot on purpose? You know you're gonna seriously hurt yourself, going on like that?"

"What choice do I have?" she asked, a hint of desperation in her eyes. "I don't like it either, but I need an alibi. Please, Halcyon. This is important to me. If you've got a better way, I'm happy to hear it."

"Well, first off, I'll cover for you," I promised with a nod. "But, if you're having trouble, and you don't want anyone to know about that trouble... is pretending to be in a different kind of trouble really what you want?"

"No!" Corsica growled, then deflated. "I just don't see what choice I have..."

I sat back. That she cared about this was obvious and evident, and I supposed it did explain her behavior with the tuxedo. But... it was hot enough already for me out there, even in a dress that turned out to be much airier than my usual garb. I wasn't sure I could subject myself to something like that in the name of putting on an act, and I was all but a professional actor. Was there a harsh disconnect between our tolerances and values, or did her motives not match the severity of her actions?

Maybe there was something else going on she wasn't telling me about. But, I had no idea what it could be.

Unfortunately, even though I wanted to give my friend the benefit of the doubt, I wasn't sure what that actually entailed. What would be more charitable, to assume she was lying to me about why she had kept that suit on? Or to assume her issues went deep enough that she really thought staying in the heat like that was a good idea?

...Probably the former. Maybe she legitimately forgot to take it off and was too embarrassed to admit it.

I sighed, wondering just what went on in Corsica's head. For all I knew, it could be just as weird of a place as my own.

"Going somewhere?" Jamjars asked, spotting me in the foyer, staring at the front door.

I shrugged. "Kind of want to take a walk, but I don't know all the good places to go." In Icereach, I had the chapel... "Where do you go around here if you want to be alone?"

"Ah, privacy. The sweetest ambrosia of a young mare's life..." Jamjars wistfully sighed, then snapped back to attention. "Why? Not tired from half a night of hiking the streets? You're in better shape than I thought."

"I worked out in Icereach," I explained, back in my coat and boots. "Just got some thinking to do. Big day and all. You know anywhere nearby? Like... I dunno, a maintenance closet or a crawlspace, even?"

Jamjars mused for a moment. "Well, I'd imagine you'd be better at finding such spaces than I am. Lunch is almost here, though. Sure it can't wait half an hour?"

For a moment, I hesitated. My own situation seemed more or less stable, and I hadn't seen indications that Ansel was in trouble, but Corsica... Maybe it was worth the risk of asking. If something was up, better to have it out in the open than remaining a secret.

"Hey," I said. "Might be a weird question, but Corsica's special talent... Have you seen one that looks like it before?"

Jamjars blinked in surprise. "What prompted that question? I've been a lot of places and seen a lot of things."

"If you did recognize it," I went on, keeping my voice down, "would it mean anything?"

"All cutie marks have meaning," Jamjars told me. "That's their whole point. They represent your hopes and dreams. If you saw two that were the same, it would probably mean there were two ponies with very similar purposes in life. Are you looking for meaning beyond that, or...?" She blinked in realization, then sighed. "Ah, right. You're from a sarosian colony. I can't imagine they wouldn't teach this stuff differently up there."

Several questions crashed together in my brain at the same time, and I filed away for later that she called them cutie marks just like Ansel. "What's me being a batpony have to do with it?"

Jamjars shrugged, waving me into the living room and taking a seat on the couch. "Well, as you'd know, batponies are born with their marks. Choice doesn't much factor into it. The rest of us, we get ours when and only when we do something... special. Making a major choice or promise that will define the future course of our lives, more often than not. Most ponies don't get one at all, and many find theirs when they're older even than I am. But, I can only imagine celebrating something as a symbol of hope and goals and whatever doesn't really fly among a people who have no choice whatsoever in what theirs get to be."

Again, I felt swamped, my curiosity going in all different directions as I got dragged further and further from what I originally asked about.

"Of course," Jamjars went on, "things get a little awkward when you move into the nitty-gritty science of what cutie marks actually are, but so do a lot of beliefs and cultural phenomena. That's just life, kiddo."

"So... what's your talent for?" I asked, glancing at her flank. Most of the unicorns in Icereach hadn't been marked, it was true. Jamjars, however, had a large, distinctive chess queen for hers.

Jamjars shrugged. "Truthfully? I've had it for more than half my life, and I'm still figuring out. There are a lot of ways I could interpret it, some more flattering than others. But if you play chess, you'd know that the queen might be the most powerful piece, but the king is what keeps you in the game. So long as they're still around, you haven't lost yet. But once they're gone, every piece you have on the board loses, no matter how strong their formation. So I like to think of it as a mark of devotion and service to my superior... and a commitment to keep them around."

"Your superior?" I raised an eyebrow.

"I might have mentioned her," Jamjars sighed. "She's the friend Gerardo and I have been collecting Writs of Harmonic Sanction for. Her name was Starlight."

Starlight.

"...Oh," Elise's voice echoed in my mind. "The Starlight rule. It's simply a rule that prohibits us from placing foreign refugees in potentially risky situations..."

Half a year had passed, and Elise had been vague in the first place, but I remembered her talking about a filly with that name, someone who had been given too much responsibility and power for some reason or another. Was this the same Starlight? Maybe it was.

"You've heard of her?" Jamjars asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Elise might have mentioned her." I shrugged. "I don't know a whole lot about what she did, or who she was. You knew her?"

"I was her best friend, until we were forced to part ways," Jamjars growled, squeezing shut her eyes and then sighing. "But, I'm... partly over it. Sort of. A little. Forgive and forget, they say, but that would be a whole lot easier if all the others hadn't gone their own way and then given up on searching for-"

The doorbell rang.

Instantly, Jamjars had a cheerful, professional mask back on. "Well, I'll bet that's the food! One moment, please...!"

Some time later, I had a moderately better understanding of the rift between Jamjars and Gerardo, a full stomach and a great new appreciation for flattened bread with spaghetti sauce and cheese on top. This pizza, I vowed, I was going to eat again.

As for my hostess... I wasn't sure. I was reasonably convinced she wasn't lying to me, or at least that she believed wholeheartedly what she was saying. I also really wished I could talk to Gerardo again and hear more fully his side of the story. He and Jamjars were feuding over something that happened when they parted ways with this Starlight, and it was hard to get details from Jamjars on exactly what had happened, but it was certainly bad enough that they weren't working together even though they were chasing the same nigh-impossible goal.

At least I had no reason to believe bad blood between her and him would reflect down on us. Whatever Jamjars was or had been involved with, it probably wasn't for the express purpose of kidnapping me and my friends.

Now, Jamjars was laying on her back on the couch with her huge poofy mane splayed out behind her, looking more like a lazy bachelorette than a refined socialite. Ansel was staring out the window, Corsica was next to me doing nothing, and Kitty had been licking the empty pizza box for about ten minutes without breaks. The air was ripe for something to happen.

"So," Jamjars said, taking initiative despite still being upside-down. "I took the liberty of submitting your resumes to a few friends and colleagues yesterday. Yes, I know you don't have resumes, I also took the liberty of forging some for you. You're welcome. That said, we never finished our conversation about what kind of jobs you three want, so I suppose we ought to get that out of the way before anyone comes to call."

I perked up. "How can you forge a resume? If you lie about what we can do, won't we just get fired when we can't do the work?"

Jamjars chuckled. "Only if you're in an honest, hard-working position or care about your career. So, same question as last time: are you more in this to make some free cash, or to get a license to stick your nose where it doesn't belong?"

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "I don't suppose 'be ordinary folks and stay out of trouble' is on the menu, there?"

Jamjars gave him a knowing grin. "Yes, yes, 'staying out of trouble'. Don't worry, I'll keep it covered. But you three came to Ironridge for a reason, right? This is your chance to be greedy and get what you want, no strings attached. It's a foot in the door."

"A door to where, though?" Ansel asked warily.

"Wherever you want." Jamjars shrugged. "That's why I'm asking."

Well, if it was an open invitation...

"I've got some stuff I'd like to learn," I volunteered. "How hard would it be to get a job that gives me free passes on the trains, so I don't need to walk around all the fare checkpoints or pay up? Plus free access to libraries, or a corporate archive if Cold Karma has one. And if there's any caves around here, maybe a license to go look inside them?"

Jamjars winked. "There's the kind of response I'm looking for! Caves are free but dangerous. Ironridge used to be a big mining town, but all the mines flooded when the glacier started melting. Only a serious daredevil would set hoof in there today. Corporate archives? Supposedly classified, but the right friend could let you into certain levels for free. Cheating the trains? Just about any Cold Karma job will do. Employees get passes. What else?"

I blinked. "I dunno. I'm kind of too new here to know all the obstacles I'll want ways around..."

"You're not taking this seriously, are you?" Ansel asked incredulously. "What do you need from the Cold Karma corporate archives?"

"...To look around?" I shrugged. "I dunno. Just seems like as good a place to start as any."

"To start what, getting a taste of city life?" Ansel stared at me. "I know we all decided sitting around in Icereach wasn't the way, but isn't the whole point of this endeavor still to live a safe and happy life? There's plenty of adventure to be had in the city that doesn't involve sneaking around in flooded tunnels or..." He sighed. "You know what? Forget it. I shouldn't be ragging on your for being who you are. Just take care out there, alright?"

Jamjars watched our exchange with interest. "Hmm. Some strong feelings, there. But, if what you'd like is a safe and quiet existence, I suppose I can arrange that too. And what about you, kiddo?" Her eyes found Corsica.

"...I'll stick with Hallie," Corsica said, looking like she had been caught off-guard.

Jamjars squinted at her.

Corsica shrugged.

"Kids are weird," Jamjars sighed, still upside-down. "Oh well. What's the responsible parenting move here, going along with the one of you who's enthusiastic or trying to persuade the rest of you to catch up?"

Ansel gaped at her. "Why are you asking us?"

"Who knows?" Jamjars lit her horn and swirled her aura aimlessly. "Maybe the uuuuniverse will answer..."

Music started thumping from below. Apparently, Kitty had finished with her pizza box.

Jamjars groaned. "Not the answer I was expect-"

The doorbell rang.

Instantly, Jamjars was on her hooves, and a moment later she was back, her grin fully restored. "Well, kiddos," she said, "the universe answered."

"We're going where, again?" I asked, sitting with Jamjars across from Corsica and Ansel as the train hurtled deeper into Cold Karma's headquarters.

"Visiting a friend who might be interested in your employment," Jamjars replied. "So, here's the scoop: I told you before that in this world, you can't be sane, powerful and nice at the same time. And, I stand by that. This friend... is the official Cold Karma janitor, and he's mostly lacking in the sanity department."

"A single janitor cleans this whole place up?" I asked, glancing out the window at the cavernous empty spaces, metal supports and rafters. "No wonder he's lost his marbles."

"Well, I suppose janitorial duties can't be too terrible," Ansel postulated. "Unless you're about to turn around and tell us exactly the opposite is true."

Jamjars chuckled. "No, no. The way I've heard it, it mostly involves sitting around doing nothing. That's why this place is such a dump. Nevertheless, you can't clean a place without knowing about the mess and then going to the mess, which makes it a very interesting job for anyone interested in going where normal folk aren't supposed to be."

The train slid to a stop, and Jamjars indicated it was ours. I followed her into a tunnel that looked like it was made from a hanging metal pipe, Corsica and Ansel trailing behind me. "I have to admit," Ansel said, "from your tone earlier, I was thinking we were being signed up as covert spies or the like."

"Hey." Jamjars shrugged. "So what if I advertised around? This is just the first one that's gotten back to me. Anyone come looking to hire you who you don't like the feel of, tell 'em to get lost and I'll smooth it over."

"What are you in such a hurry to get us hired for, anyway?" Corsica asked. "We've been here less than a day. You don't think we should spend more time settling in first?"

"Everyone's on a team in Ironridge, kiddo," Jamjars replied. "There's nothing you can be that's more attractive to the powers that be than unaffiliated. Trust me, it'll be far funner to go shopping for your dream job than to let all the employers out there come shopping for you."

I felt the fur on my back raise a little, remembering how Aldebaran had ensnared us.

"...Right," Ansel said, cowed. Clearly, he was thinking the same thing.

"Just think of all the places you could wind up," Jamjars sang, apparently not realizing that her point had been driven home. "Fraudulent insurance agency? Maybe. Money-laundering courier? Perhaps. Test subject? Hopefully not for Lilith. Rebel insurgency fighter? No clue if those are still around, but Ironridge sure has a history of them messing stuff up. Prophet of a doom religion? I hear they're hiring in the Night District. Literal-"

"Wait, doom religion?" I interrupted, running to catch up. "You actually have those here?"

Jamjars blinked. "Uh, yes? Why?"

"What do they worship? And how real is it?" I pressed, my brain helpfully more fixated on religion than doom. This was closer than I had ever got in Icereach to finding something supernatural, and it was just a casual conversation point?

Jamjars gave me a worried look. "Why do you sound interested? I think they just worship debasing themselves in the streets. Not that Ironridge is a prettier place for it... Oh well. I suppose I'd have been curious too, at your age. Come on. This is why we've gotta get you a contract you can point to and say no thank you when anyone else comes to call."

I wasn't about to let this drop, but I wasn't sure how to proceed without seriously worrying her about my intentions. "So forget the doom part," I said, trying to backtrack. "Are there any, like, more normal-"

Jamjars turned a corner. "Ah, here we are!"

We rounded a corner into the most grandiose, over-thematic janitor's office I had ever seen.

There was no denying what it was, of course. Another of the Ice District's cavernous interiors opened out before me, but this one played host to an incredible mountain of broken machines and refuse, all stacked in a pile in the center that was bigger than most buildings. All of it, at least, except for random chunks here and there that had been hung from the ceiling instead. The door in the wall we had entered through was high up, and a haphazard selection of hanging catwalks formed a bridge out to the mountain's illuminated top, where a single, orderly office cubicle sat, as if nothing at all was odd about its placement.

This wasn't a janitor's office. It was a janitor's throne.

"Are those safe to walk on?" Corsica eyed the swaying catwalks warily.

Jamjars stepped on them, and they bobbed with her weight, acting more like they were floating in water than hanging from the ceiling. "Oh, quite. It's magic. Come along..."

I followed her carefully, my wings spread out for balance, keeping my eyes on the destination. Who built a room like this? What was the point? It was a shrine to industrial garbage on a cataclysmic scale. Whoever did this had to have an ego the size of the moon...

"Yoohoo!" Jamjars whistled as we stepped onto the mountaintop platform, itself assembled from a mishmash of used metal plating. "Anyone home?"

"No," a stallion's voice called back out from the cubicle. "Just us disembodied voices, don't mind us-" A head peeked out from the cubicle's opening. "I say, is that Corsica, Ansel and Halcyon herself?"

I blinked, stopping in my tracks, trying and momentarily failing to identify the face before me. "You... know what we look like?"

"Yes, I could smell you a mile away." The janitor vanished back into his cubicle. "Come in, do come in..."

"No insult for me, Wonky?" Jamjars sniffed in mock offense, once again leading the way. "I'm practically offended."

"Good," the janitor replied. "That's the intent!"

I stepped into the walls, stopping short once again and blinking. Was it bigger in here than it was outside? And why was there-

The janitor stole my attention, lounging in a chair with his hind hooves on a desk for everyone to see. And now that I got a look at him, I realized why I couldn't place him earlier: he was half pegasus and half batpony, split in a perfect line right down the middle. One fang. One slitted eye. One leafy ear. And one of each wing.

"Greetings," he said, extending a hoof, sporting an impressive curled goatee, huge white eyebrows, a slicked-back mohawk and yellow eyes. "The name's Egdelwonk, but for some reason everyone just calls me Wonk. I'm a janitor."

Madness

"...Would someone remind me what we're doing here, again?" Ansel asked, standing beside me in the janitor's office.

"Getting hired!" Jamjars nudged us all forward with her telekinesis. "Best hooves forward, and remember that you're evaluating positions just as much as the positions are evaluating you. Don't want to sign on with a place that's a poor match."

"I'm still wrapping my mind around someone building an office like this," Corsica muttered. While the cubicle's interior didn't seem too unusual save for a giant pile of cheese in one corner and a bonsai that appeared to be made of cotton candy, it was hard to forget that it was built on top of a life-sized mountain of industrial garbage.

"I know," Egdelwonk complained, reclining at his desk. "I told them something like this would be far too mundane, but they just kept whining about structural integrity and stuff. Pah. Life forms these days have no imagination..."

"What are you?" I asked, far less concerned about why we were here than who we we talking to. Aside from his impressive facial hair and unusual grooming, Egdelwonk looked like a batpony and a pegasus had been sliced in half head-on and then fused back together, like a real-life chimera.

"I'm the lord of leftovers, the guru of garbage, Cold Karma's one and only trash tyrant and Minister of Janitorial Affairs," Egdelwonk drawled, spinning in his chair. "Further honorifics include the oligarch of obsolescence, dictator of detritus, commissar of compost, sultan of sludge, and the royally ruling regent of rubbish and refuse, though personally I'm partial to despotic dumpster deacon. If you've got any good ones I missed, I'm all ears..."

My brain fuzzed. "Uh, no, I don't..."

Ansel gave Jamjars a flat look. "If this is serious, oughtn't you have made at least half an effort to prepare us?"

"Grin and bear it," Jamjars told him with a straight face. "He got back to me quickly. I was expecting this to take weeks. Fortunately, you don't look like your hearts are set on this one, so think of it as a practice run."

Egdelwonk just chuckled, shooing Jamjars aside with a wave of a wing. "Oh, Ansel... That is what you call yourself these days, right? The Ministry of Janitorial Affairs is where preparedness goes to die. It's all part of the interview process. Only those who are at home with chaos thrive here."

Ansel bristled and took a step back. "Oi! Quit talking like you know me!"

Egdelwonk shrugged and gave a fake-apologetic smile. "Well, strictly speaking, I've never met you in person. But face to face interaction is overrated. I thought imaginary friendships with celebrities who can't see or hear you back were all the rage with youth these days!"

I tilted my head. "An imaginary friendship? How's that?"

Egdelwonk peered at me over the tops of his shades, which I was fairly certain I hadn't seen him put on. "Not a thing where you're from?"

I wasn't sure how to respond, but Corsica was. "You calling us celebrities?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Well if you were completely boring, you wouldn't be here right now," Egdelwonk said with an overdone shrug. "Besides, janitors go a lot of places and hear a lot of things."

"And just what's so interesting about us, then?" Ansel asked with a swagger.

Egdelwonk waggled his eyebrows at Jamjars. "She threw you my way because she knows playing nice with all the pithy aristocrats and mad scientists on the board of directors isn't really my style, and she'd rather you be my playthings than theirs. And whatever you've done or inevitably will do to attract the attention of all those suited buffoons certainly sounds promising enough to see what you're made of myself."

"Playthings, eh?" I challenged, arching an eyebrow. "Thanks, but I'm not really looking to make a career out of being someone's plaything."

Egdelwonk chuckled. "I'd certainly hope someone with your potential wouldn't constrain themselves to a single line of possibility, Halcyon. Why, with all the things you could go on to be from here, you're practically a blank slate!"

I felt like my heart stopped. This random stranger... He knew about...?

"And you..." He tuned to Corsica and raised a massive eyebrow. "You know that naughty little thing you've been doing isn't sustainable, right? The one that makes you all bleeeagh and stuff?"

I was just aware enough to register that Corsica looked just as aghast as I was.

"Sorry not sorry," Egdelwonk said, going back to reclining. "I picked on Halcyon, so fair's fair for you, too. Back to the interview, anyone?"

"S-Screw this," Corsica stammered, shaken. "I want to work as far away from here as possible."

Egdelwonk bowed. "Your wish is my command."

Corsica bolted.

I spun around, shaken back to my senses. "What...?"

"I don't know who you are or why you act the way you do, or what you even said to set those two off." Ansel pointed an accusatory hoof at Egdelwonk. "But the last time someone tried to con me into a bogus employment, at least they had the nerve to put on a nice face first. I'm leaving."

Egdelwonk's face drooped, and he pointed at the pile of cheese in the corner I was kind of ignoring because I couldn't find a sane reason for it to be there. "Care for a snack on the way out?"

Ansel stopped and blinked. "What? Hardly. How long has that even been there?"

Egdelwonk sighed, then waved him away. "Oh, fine. Maybe someone else will get the joke, cheese pone. Away with you!"

Ansel made good on his threat, and Egdelwonk did nothing to stop him. I glanced at Jamjars. Jamjars glanced at me.

"Does he, err..." I glanced back at Egdelwonk, who was smiling beatifically. "Does he have dirt on you? And did he use it to get you to drag us in here?"

Jamjars shrugged. "Kiddo, it's Cold Karma. Everyone has dirt on everyone here. Fortunately, Wonk's on better terms with me than most, so we humor each other and the stakes stay low. If you're worried about getting locked into a job you don't want, nothing'll happen if you just say no."

"Go check on Corsica," I encouraged, wanting a moment alone with this pony who somehow knew things about me I had never uttered before to a single soul. Well, unless my under-mask self counted as a different person.

Jamjars frowned, then nodded and stepped away.

"Bold," Egdelwonk said once she was gone. "But you already know you are. Ask anything you want, my little pony."

"You know things about us," I said. "About who we are."

Egdelwonk's face drooped, and he wiped a tear from his eye with a wingtip. "Such is the price I had to pay for being this crazy. But that's not a question."

"You..." I hesitated. "You know things about me even I don't know?"

"Now what would give you an idea like that?" Instantly, Egdelwonk wore a businesslike frown. "Honestly, Hallie, I'm just trying to pad out my Junior Dumpster Despot Corps here. The benefits may be stingy, but they're exactly what you need to go sticking your nose in every place it doesn't belong. And that's what you want, isn't it? Everyone else ran away when they saw I know things I'm not supposed to know, but you got curious."

"Yeah," I told him pointedly. "I am curious. I want some answers. But odds are you already know that and are trying to snare me into a job I won't refuse. Just like last time. You're a schemer."

"Actually, I'm just demented," Egdelwonk replied soberly. "But I did warn you this interview is mostly a test of how well you put up with chaos. Both of your friends have already flunked, I'm afraid, but you're still here, so points to you for that. Just try to take it seriously and stay on topic until the very end. I pinkie promise it's a legitimate test and I don't just want to laugh internally at you keeping a straight face while I'm screwing around."

I tilted my head. "Pinkie promise? What's... You know what, never mind. You haven't even told me what I'd do on this job besides sweeping up trash. Are you actually trying to hire me, or just having a laugh?"

"Deciding whether to hire you," Egdelwonk said pointedly. "Although I will admit to getting quite a kick out of the looks on all of your faces."

"And you're deciding that how?" I pressed. "You haven't asked me anything about my abilities or how I'd react to various demands of your job. At this point, I'm only here because-"

"Because of stubbornness and morbid curiosity, I know," Egdelwonk said with a dismissive wave. "It's quite endearing, if a trait that's bound to get you in no end of trouble. Ever wanted to be the trouble that someone else gets in for a change?"

I blinked, processing that. "Err, no, I haven't."

Egdelwonk stared at my forehead, rubbing his goatee in thought. "Hmm... I'd say you're far too afraid of your own curiosity to make good on your potential, Halcyon. You have the mark of great things to come, but we'll have to get you over this first..."

I took a step back. "...Why are you talking like I'm already hired?"

Egdelwonk chuckled. "Because a sane soul would have fled in terror long ago. Even your friends did, and their sanity is almost as questionable as my own!"

"But you've been gloating about how well you know me this whole time," I pointed out. "If you're so omniscient, wouldn't you expect I'd react this way to all the things you've said?"

Egdelwonk snorted. "If there's one thing I hate, it's things that are predictable. Plans are for ruining, Halcyon, not for making. The only reason I'd ever speculate about the future is to daydream about all the wonderful trillions of ways it might go. Although, speaking of the future, I think I've decided to let you take the real interview for Lord Egdelwonk's Junior Dumpster Despot Corps. I'll see you again if you ever pass. Now get on with your bad self."

He waved a wing at me. I just stood and blinked. "Real interview? So this was all a joke?"

Egdelwonk momentarily unfocused, then blinked at me. "Still here? Oh, did you want some cheese too?"

My attention was once again sniped by the room's bizarre decor. "Err, that wasn't why..."

"Oh?" Egdelwonk looked mock offended. "Nothing in that pile royal enough for your tastes, eh? Picky pony. Now shoo!"

I wandered out of the cubicle in a daze, stopping before the hanging catwalks. What had I just been through? Wasn't the whole point of coming to Ironridge to get a taste of a life that was normal, for a change? There was no possible way every average citizen had to go through something like this just to-

Suddenly, there was a sharp snapping sound from behind me, tinged with magic. The world fuzzed around me and swirled, and details became snowy as my dream skipped through the unimportant parts.

Wait a minute. Dream?

I wasn't the world's most lucid sleeper, but I still knew how to force myself awake when I needed to. Concentrating, I opened my eyes.

An alarm clock on my bedstand read four thirty in the afternoon. I was snugly tucked in, with a brand-new quilt in a bed that had been well-made just the night before. Across from me, Corsica had a similar setup.

Right. We... had been in Ironridge for about a week, now. The first few days had been a blur of shopping. On our first outing, Kitty got arrested and Corsica fainted going to pick her up. The next few times had been smoother. We had gone to an opera, eaten at restaurants... Nothing fast-paced. Jamjars was helping us prepare resumes for looking for jobs, and on the first day had reached out to some colleagues to get some leads on what might be open. But we hadn't applied to anywhere yet, let alone sat for an interview.

Had I just... dream-remembered something that never actually happened?

I held a hoof to my forehead and sat up. That was impossible. My dreams didn't work like that! Normal ponies dreamed hallucinations that were a mishmash of fantasy, hopes, fears and things from their real lives, but without fail I watched through things I had done before, riding along in my old self's body like a passenger on a train. Sometimes I watched through memories that were old enough I had forgotten, or even been young enough that I shouldn't have had a functioning memory at all. But this... It couldn't be. What was happening to me?

Quietly, I shadow snuck, getting out of the room without waking Corsica. Fortunately, I had socks for sleeping now, and my coat could wait - it wasn't like Jamjars and the others hadn't seen my special talent after a full week of living together.

Was anyone around? I needed someone to talk to, a sanity check, to ensure I hadn't just suffered a complete break from reality. But the living room was empty, Ansel's door was shut, and sounds of a shower and Jamjars singing echoed out from the bathroom, telling me she would likely be a while.

A quiet beat was thumping from the basement. I hadn't actually braved Kitty's lair again since the cake fiasco, but maybe it was time to face my fears.

"Hello?" I softly called, padding down the stairs.

The basement's denizen wasn't dancing on her machine this time, but rather sprawled on her back on her bed with a giant pair of headphones, the shadow of the empty cake trolley sitting parked against a far wall. Eating forty cakes in a week... Hopefully she wouldn't give herself a blood sugar coma.

Kitty didn't hear me, but she saw me and waved.

I took that as an invitation to proceed. "Hey, uh... You got a moment?"

"Hiya!" Kitty greeted, taking off her headphones. The music grew noticeably louder, and I realized they were actually the source of the thumping I had heard from upstairs... That kid's poor eardrums.

"Kitty gots a guest!" Kitty said, lounging on her bed with a polite blep, still wearing her signature hoodie.

"Uh, yeah," I said, unsure of how to say what I wanted to say. "Listen, I... I've been here for about a week, right?"

"Yup!"

"And I haven't gone to any job interviews?"

Kitty frowned in confusion, her tongue still poking out. "Don't think so. Why's that?"

"I just..." For some reason, it was hard to spit it out. Probably because I hadn't told anyone about my memory-dreams, so Kitty would most likely see nothing wrong with me dreaming about the Cold Karma janitor being questionably omniscient, insane, even more interested in hiring me than Aldebaran, all despite being someone I had never actually met.

I swallowed. "Cold Karma's official janitor. He's called Egdelwonk. Am I insane, or is that all true?"

Kitty shrugged, her cheerful demeanor returning. "Well, Jamjars calls him Wonky, but yup! He's weird. Why?"

"Have I ever met him?" I questioned.

"Don't know!"

"The day you got those cakes." I pointed at the cake cart. "We came back here, set up some beds, and then Jamjars ordered pizza. What happened after that?"

Kitty grinned wide. "Kitty ate cakes until her tummy hurt! Then she slept and danced and ate more cakes! Then... umm..." She frowned in concentration. "She ate more cakes?"

Right. Kitty hadn't been anywhere in my dream. She would have been here, reveling in her spoils...

"Egdelwonk, though," I pressed. "You ever hear anything weird about him? Any rumors?"

"Everyone knows he's weird," Kitty said, shrugging. "Calls himself all sorts'a names. Some even say he's got spooky magic. But, he never does it when anyone's watching, so no one knows for sure. But... But whenever something weird happens, ponies always blame him. They call him a potter... potler-geist!"

I frowned in contemplation. "Weird magic? Any chance he can do things with memories? Make you remember things that never happened, or forget things that did?"

"Why?" Kitty smiled at me. "Need someone to blame when you forget your money for the train? Kitty does that all the time!"

"Uhh... Yeah, that." I blinked. "Hey, he's not hiring for any positions, is he?"

Kitty poked out her tongue. "Wanna be a janitor? Jamjars would never say yes. She hates it when Kitty searches the garbage. But Kitty knows where Eggywonk's office is..."

"You do, huh?" I wondered if my 'memory' contained accurate directions for getting there.

Kitty gave me a look of childish conspiracy. "Wanna go say hi?"

Actually, what I wanted was to ask someone who had been in that memory where we were immediately after getting pizza on the day Kitty got arrested. But in lieu of that, retracing my steps wasn't the most terrible plan.

...Wasn't the most terrible for finding out what was going on, at least. It was a pretty bad idea if I cared about keeping myself out of trouble. That said, until I knew why my dreams were suddenly not matching up with reality, I was in trouble whether I liked it or not. Dreaming about someone who seemed to know intimately the laws governing how I worked, when the dream itself broke those laws... Something was going on here, and I had to get to the bottom of it.

"You stay here," I told her, trusting myself to take care of myself but maybe not any innocent, dim-witted foals. "But yeah, I'm going to pay him a visit."

Instantly, Kitty was blocking my path, a serious pout on her face. "No," she said, tongue poking out, "not fair. Kitty told you how to annoy Jamjars. You have to take her too!"

I gave her a wry, apologetic smile. "I'm going to be wandering a mountain-sized building even I barely know my way around. There's no way I can look out for you too, kid."

Kitty happily winked. "That's okay! Kitty can look out for you!"

"You sure about that...?"

"Yup!" Kitty pranced in a circle. "If anything bad happens, Kitty just tips over a vase or breaks a window, then gets arrested for vanalissum! Then silly Jamjars finds out and comes to pick her up. Bad guys can't do anything while the police are around."

I narrowed my eyes. "Listen, I know it seems that way when you're young, but the authorities can't see literally everywhere-"

"Oh, they can." Kitty nod-nod-nodded at me, moving like a pendulum between happy and serious. "That's why those twins are in charge! The creepy ones who keep repeating each other. They say they can see everything that happens in Ironridge!"

Wait, seeing everything that happens in Ironridge? They worked for Cold Karma, Egdelwonk worked for Cold Karma, the things Egdelwonk knew in my dream...

"That's why everyone knows you get fewer presents on your birthday if you've been naughty than if you've been nice!" Kitty triumphantly stuck out her tongue.

Oh. Or, maybe it was just something they taught foals around here to make them behave.

"So, you coming?" Kitty was already on the stairs. "Kitty knows all the best shortcuts! Follow her, and you'll never get lost!"

"Hey, you're not supposed to..." I let my objections drop with a sigh. This was a young mare whose mother was perfectly fine allowing her to waltz through a shopping district and lick display cakes, after all. Odds were, Jamjars would be proud of her, or think she was cute. And I knew Icereach inside and out. For all I knew, maybe this was Kitty's home turf just like that had been mine.

"Yeah, sure. Whatever." I shook my head, following after her. "Just give me a moment to get dressed..."

I spent the entire train ride through the Ice District second-guessing myself. Not for deciding to go track down Egdelwonk - I was already in whatever this was deep, so the best thing I could do was get myself some knowledge that might even the playing field. Not even for bringing Kitty, who was lounging on the seat opposite from me with her hoodie brandished proudly and her tongue poking out in a thoughtful blep.

No, I was mostly worrying if I should have asked someone who had actually been there what they remembered. Or, barring that, at least told someone where I was going.

But changing my mind now would mean backtracking, and as Kitty guided me to get off at a familiar station, I knew we were almost there.

After a few minutes of walking, however, things suddenly looked... not so familiar. We went through a door I was pretty sure should have lead into the cavern with its garbage mountain where Egdelwonk built his lair, but instead of a wide-open space, I found myself standing in a completely ordinary office corridor that could have been taken straight out of Icereach, if you substituted my home's concrete walls for plaster trim.

It could have, at least, if it wasn't upside-down.

I took three steps, avoiding a light fixture on the floor and staring up at the carpeted ceiling. "What the...?"

Kitty shrugged. "It's Eggywonk's style. He always says you don't need to sweep the floors if no one can walk on them!"

"It's always been like this?" I rounded on her. "For how long?"

Kitty cheerfully stuck out her tongue and gave me a don't-know-don't-care look.

"Okay..." I trotted up to one of the office windows that lined the corridor. Inside, the office was upside-down too. Chair on the ceiling, desk on the ceiling, potted plant on the ceiling, filing cabinets on the ceiling... No one seemed to be using it, but it looked more like the occupant had gone home for the day than that the space was vacant.

"So where is he?" I turned back to my guide.

Kitty bounced on her hooves. "This way, lady! C'mon!"

Kitty led me through the upside-down office corridors for what had to be at least half an hour. Several times, we changed floors via staircases, which had the actual stairs on the ceiling and forced us to walk up steep slopes intended to be roofs instead. None of the stairs were ever in stairwells, and the frequency with which we went up and down made me wonder if we were lost, or just navigating a horribly complex maze.

"You do know where we're going, right?"

"Yup!"

Eventually, she was proven right, as we drew up outside a door with an exorbitantly fancy gold-trimmed frame and a microscopic plaque that read 'Department of Detritus'. Also upside-down, of course.

Kitty knocked. The door immediately fell off its hinges and caved inward, landing with a clatter and a bang. At least this time it seemed to respect the proper direction of gravity.

"Yes, one moment, I'm just getting to the good part!" Egdelwonk's voice called out from within. Kitty ignored him and pranced straight in. I poked my head in after her.

Egdelwonk's office, which was also mercifully right-side-up, had gone from an ordinary cubicle to something resembling a posh media lounge, although a staircase along the side that ran straight into the ceiling and a large, framed picture of an empty picture frame prevented my abused senses from finally relaxing. At least there was no more cheese.

A plush purple couch faced one wall, and a wobbling magical field hung in front of it, showing a vivid, cheerful town where an orange, hatted pony was swatting at a pegasus with an alarmingly multicolored mane.

Egdelwonk poked his bisected face up over the back of the couch. "Who dares intrude without... Oh. It's you."

"Hiya!" Kitty chirped. "Kitty gots a job as a tour guide!"

Egdelwonk clicked together the spokes of his bat wing, and the magic field vanished in a puff of glowing circles and polygons. Then he got up, strode over, and loomed over Kitty like a menacing shadow. She beamed back up at him without a care in the world.

He reached out a wing and lifted her by the scruff of the neck. Then, in the deepest and most impressive baritone I had ever heard, he uttered, "This is my domain."

Kitty licked him on the face.

Immediately, Egdelwonk threw her like a javelin, perfectly nailing the angle to send her soaring over my head and out through the door. "Bleh! Yech! Blat! Bluh! Ptoo!" he sputtered, furiously scrubbing at his face. "...Oh, hello there, Halcyon. Do come in. Just resolving a little territorial dispute... Ugh, gross."

I glanced back over my shoulder. I wasn't sure the hallway had gone on as far as it did in precisely the direction Kitty had been thrown before, but now it definitely did, and she was a long way off. "Kitty's okay!" I heard her distantly call.

So, I stepped inside.

Once I was in, Egdelwonk kicked at the door, and it flopped back up onto its hinges of its own accord. "Well, congratulations," he said, turning to me. "You passed the interview. Base conditions all met, seventy five percent on the extra credit, but don't sweat the missing points because they were probably impossible anyway. Going from the look on your face, you have absolutely no idea what's going on."

I nodded mutely.

"Put shortly, you've just broken a powerful curse," Egdelwonk said, returning to his couch and waving me over. "Let's put it this way: here at the Department of Detritus, we clean up Cold Karma's messes. That includes oops-I-broke-it messes, and also oops-someone-leaked-the-big-bad's-name-to-the-media messes. Of course, ponies being the complex and wonderful creatures that they are, memory magic doesn't always work the same way for everyone. That's why I make a point of aggressively torturing reality on a regular basis! Also because it's fun, but mostly because it helps weed out strange little things like you who have cheater powers and somehow remember the truth."

I couldn't say anything, my mind racing to catch up.

"Now, any despot in their right mind would be scared senseless by the appearance of someone like you," Egdelwonk went on. "But as we established a week ago, I'm anything but. So, how would you like to work for me?"

I took a step back. "I really don't like ultimatums-"

"Sorry." He waved a hoof. "Force of habit. But the fact is, you have talents I'm interested in. Namely, your resistance to anyone fooling about with your mind, but you also have a remarkable tolerance for me messing around, plus a natural inclination to keep secrets. The Department of Detritus could be a perfect fit for you... Or was it the Ministry of Janitorial Affairs last you were here? I change these things so often it's hard to keep track."

I scrambled for something to focus on and latched onto the most concrete things I could. "You literally just threw a kid out the door."

"She was asking for it," Egdelwonk snapped. "Although I'll admit that probably doesn't paint a very good picture of workplace culture around here, does it...?"

I raised an aggressive eyebrow. "You think?"

"Point taken," Egdelwonk sighed. "Halcyon, listen. You look rather overwhelmed by all this, so let's set the fun aside for a minute and talk business. How would you like to learn to keep your head and think levelly even when someone's doing their utmost to overwhelm you?"

"Sounds nice," I admitted. "But are you sure you're not doing the opposite?"

Egdelwonk shrugged. "How would you like to learn to resist any sneaky magical somebodies tampering with that head of yours?"

"Yeah, but who's gonna do that?" I countered. "Aside from you?"

"Who knows?" Egdelwonk said. "Odds are, they might be ponies I've scouted out already, who decided this path wasn't for them. Although I suppose that would mean I would know... Say, how would you like to learn who all might have it out for you?"

"If you've got a list, I'd appreciate it," I demanded.

Egdelwonk, surprisingly, offered me a slip of paper. I took it and read it.

Since I wrote this down, someone with an ability to know things they shouldn't might be able to read it too. How would you like to learn to keep secrets from anyone?

I looked up and swallowed. "And why would I want to do a thing like that?"

"You're plenty paranoid, Halcyon," Egdelwonk told me. "If you asked why you would need to do a thing like that, I'm afraid I'd have no answers for you, but if you can't think of a reason to want it, then you're just not being honest with yourself."

A fair point...

"And you're saying your job would teach me all this?" I asked him. "Why? It's a job, not a school."

"Is it?" Egdelwonk raised an eyebrow. "You're a teenager, lest we forget. One with no professional experience and no reason to be trusted with the dirtiest dirt Cold Karma has to offer. Not exactly that anyone could do anything about it if I decided otherwise, given the nature of the job, but still! A posting in my division would constitute nothing but training for quite a few years."

"And what do you gain from this?" I pressed. "Why spend that much effort on me? What would teaching me things like that even do to help you?"

Egdelwonk chuckled. "Because I'm eccentric and you look like fun. Someone with the ability to shrug off a little tampering with reality ought to have other interesting abilities too, right? But the real reason is that I'm a Cold Karma executive and Cold Karma executives have free license to do whatever they want."

I frowned, not very reassured.

"...Haven't met many of the others yet?" Egdelwonk guessed. "I know you ran into Lilith on your first night here, and may have bumped into Samael and Estael during an arrest shortly after. Let me tell you something, Halcyon: Cold Karma is a madhouse. It stopped being a legitimate institution years ago and is now a front for a bunch of clods with agendas of their own. Work directly for me, and you'll have some insanity to deal with, but you won't be poachable by any of the others. And someone with your talents, they will be interested in."

My ears pressed tighter against my head.

"Shall we check in on some of them right now?" Egdelwonk clicked his wing spokes, and the magic screen reformed, showing an indistinct fuzz. "Do a little spying? See for yourself what your alternatives might be?"

"No!" I swatted at the screen, dissipating it again. "You were sounding a little more reasonable for a bit, but trying to scare me into a job is a bad idea. What about the alternative of getting, like, a normal job? At a restaurant or library or something? I'm not destined to work for the Cold Karma top brass."

Egdelwonk frowned. "Ugh. Why do ponies have to be so complicated?"

"You know you're a pony too, right?" I pointed out. "...Right?"

Egdelwonk blinked. "Oh, err, ahem, yes, of course. A pretty pretty pony, that's me. Halcyon, listen. This obviously isn't going anywhere quickly, so how about I give you some free swag and you go think it over?" He produced a big bag with his face printed on the front and passed it to me. "I'll always be here if you change your mind or get any nagging questions that won't leave you alone, like 'How does that Egdelwonk guy know so much about me?' And in the meantime, if anyone far ruder and more pushy than me tries to pressure you into signing a contract, just tell them you're on Team Egdelwonk and if they don't back off, I'll have been here first. Otherwise, consider us happily unaffiliated!"

I accepted the loot bag tentatively. "How do you know so much about me, anyway?"

"And therein lies the rub." Egdelwonk grinned a too-big grin. "If you can figure that out without tipping me off that you're trying to figure it out, I'll let you know. And as a cherry on top, we can even say I have nothing more to teach you. Good luck with your other employment prospects, and remember, only Cold Karma has laws against moonlighting. In the big city, anything goes!"

Before I was quite aware that I had moved my hooves, I found myself back at the entrance to Egdelwonk's upside-down office maze. Kitty was nearby, licking a drinking fountain. Several mares and stallions in hot-weather business attire were giving her a wide berth.

"Hiya, lady!" she chirped when she noticed me, bouncing over. "Have fun with Eggywonk?"

"My head hurts," I said, looking for a place to sit down. "You know any places around here that are... like... private?"

Kitty nodded seriously and motioned for me to follow.

A moment later, we were in what looked like a boiler room, which was bizarre considering Ironridge was supposed to have a problem with being too hot. Hunkered down behind a large, cylindrical machine, I let my ears fill with the pleasing thrum of mechanical action and tried to pretend that I was alone.

Kitty gave me a worried blep.

"I'm fine." I waved her off. "I just... gotta be alone with my thoughts for a second."

She obliged, and soon I was properly alone. For the first time in a month, at that - sharing a bedroom with Corsica, sleeping in the open on the flight here, I hadn't realized the toll having no personal space was taking on me. Egdelwonk faded to the back of my mind more quickly than usual, like a bad dinner I wanted to forget. It was just me and the machines, exactly as it should be. I was at peace.

I wasn't sure how long I sat there, soaking in the solitude, but eventually my pragmatic half decided I should do something. So, I opened the loot bag Egdelwonk had given me.

A lampshade, with his face printed on it. What? I set that aside. A short-sleeve shirt, also with his face on it. Why? I dug a little further, and pulled out something small and laminated.

A Cold Karma employee's pass for the trains. Really?

Hopefully by accepting this bag, I hadn't accidentally signed any contracts. But if this was a no-strings-attached gesture of goodwill, that was quite thrilling. Maybe I would go explore the city on my own and see what employment prospects I could rustle up without the help of a bunch of powerful strangers trying to talk me into shady jobs. This was a keeper.

Speaking of contracts, the bag turned out to have one too. Written in crayon, it had yet another drawing of Egdelwonk's face, flanked by two trash cans in a kind of foalish emblem. 'Employment contract valid if and only if Halcyon wants it to be. First come first serve, losers!' was written below.

Okay. So I wasn't being conscripted. That was a relief. It was, actually, a way out if someone else tried to hire me by force, just like Egdelwonk had said.

...Now I was worried that really was the way things were done in Ironridge.

I sifted through the rest of the loot, including a package of inflatable balloons, a hunk of cheese and a bracelet that looked worryingly like an inert replica of my own. It was more cheaply made, though, and clearly not magical, so I wasn't sure what to make of it other than a passive-aggressive reminder that he knew things about me. Maybe having a fake spare would come in handy, though? I decided it was a keeper.

Whatever. I stretched and got up, wondering if Kitty was still nearby. I wasn't quite ready to socialize again, but maybe I could find her and ask her to go let Jamjars know where I was while I went to explore the city. Because I badly needed some agency back, and taking a walk on my own felt like a perfect way to get it.

Privacy Matters

"Jamjars," I said at some point after dinner was done and the others had wandered away. "Can you tell me about Sosa and the Steel District?"

Jamjars looked up from the kitchen sink, the dishes washing themselves under the careful guidance of her horn. "Old Sosa? Of course. But there's a lot to say about them. Why?"

Because I'm trying to distract myself from the fact that my best friend apparently just took a job with a creature that can screw with memories and possibly more, and don't want to talk to her about it because the last thing she needs is to worry that the first thing she's achieved in Ironridge is actually sinister, I thought. But I couldn't say that, so... "Just trying to learn about the city. I heard them mentioned in a newspaper when I was out just now."

"Ah." Jamjars nodded, accepting this as a perfectly reasonable explanation. "Your Ironridge history is shabby, then? Better I give the whole crash course?"

I swallowed. "Sure."

"Well," Jamjars began, still focusing on the dishes. "Sosa is the name of the adventurer who first discovered the Ironridge crater about eight hundred years ago, and our story starts then. The mountains around here are headwaters to a river called the Yule, which runs east for countless miles until it reaches the ocean that separates the Griffon Empire from Varsidel. In those days, all the trade between east and west went through Varsidel, and everyone stayed away from the middle of the mountains. That's what initially let Varsidel grow so big and powerful, before it fell into decline. Everyone thought this area was impassable badlands. But the crater Sosa found had a tiny little bubble of unique climate that made it well-suited for growing fruit, and the mountains around it were rich with ore, and Sosa thought there may have been something else special about it as well. So, he founded a city out here."

She scrubbed for a moment, thinking. "Now, despite being full of resources, Ironridge was incredibly isolated from the rest of the world. Boating down the river to the east, and then north to the nearest Varsidelian port? Nearly a year's round trip. And don't even think about hiking the badlands. Shattered rock and vertical impasses as far as the eye can see. A team of endurance fliers could make it, but it would be risky, and certainly not much room for cargo. So, in order to interact with the rest of the world, Ironridge became a society of boat-builders. They made craft that were specialized to the Yule, so they could trade with other nations. By the time Ironridge graduated from a far-off promised land to a proper location on all the maps, two hundred years had passed. Two hundred long years of Ironridge sailors sailing out with their products, and returning with wealth and riches to sequester in their city. Imagine growing up on rumors that there was a fantastic city of gold and silver out there, and only its residents could take you to it. Ah, what a romantic age..."

That was cool. Seriously cool. I shivered slightly, imagining it, and hoped the modern-day world still had stuff like that for me to find. Although, wasn't that what Princess Celestia's land sort of was...?

"Anyway, when Ironridge did get on all the maps," Jamjars went on, "it was so rich that everyone wanted to go there, despite its terrible location. Ponies came, and ponies stayed, and as the population grew they spread up the mountain so the valley could stay full of orchards and the riverbank could stay full of shipyards. That period of growth was when they decided to keep the city as a whole called Ironridge, and rename the shipyards and work areas in honor of their founder. That became Sosa."

She sighed. "For a long time, Ironridge had a golden age. All the ponies who came here were the most daring, the most adventurous, and all that talent accumulating in one place had an effect on the culture. We were ambitious. We were great. Oh, what a glorious time to have been alive... When they made up the district system, they called Sosa the Steel District. They're the same thing, in case you've heard both names. Would that it could have lasted forever, if not for one invention to come out of all that genius: airships."

"Airships?" My ears twitched. "What did they do?"

"Several things," Jamjars said. "First, they made sea ships completely impractical. Lifelong sailors weren't thrilled. Second, they positioned Ironridge at the middle of the world rather than the extreme fringe of it. The sudden proximity brought economic connections and opportunities... but also interest from nations we had never learned to fend off."

"Wait, back up," I urged. "Sailors weren't thrilled? Why didn't they all just start making airships instead?"

Jamjars shook her head. "Oh, they tried. For a while, it even looked like they'd be great at it. Then a highly-publicized accident soured the public on the concept for a few short years, and those were all it took for other interests to get their hooves in the door. Once that technology was on the table, the world changed overnight. And while Sosa buried their heads in the ground and tried to make better and faster sea ships, Yakyakistan financed a giant skyport up in the Sky District. The moment its gates were opened, Sosa went from being the front door of Ironridge to its most backwater district."

My eyes widened.

"They had the money to survive it, of course," Jamjars went on, her voice turning sour. "Vaults full of gold and treasure can't evaporate overnight. But there was nothing left for the Sosans to do. No sea boats that needed to be built, no cargo that needed to be ferried, and all the tourists were entering through the opposite side of the city. That money kept us alive and living in material comfort, but no amount of handouts can repair a crushed pride."

"You sound like you lived through this," I ventured.

Jamjars shrugged. "My father was a sacked Sosan engineer. The first in his line of succession to break from that role in eight generations, which is actually quite short as far as some Sosan dynasties are concerned. He took it hard enough that he skipped town without telling anyone. My mother was a floozy and a cow who never learned how to soldier on, so my siblings and I more or less raised ourselves in her home. As one of the better-adjusted ponies to grow up amid that mess, I think I'm entitled to have a strong opinion on those days."

"So was that the Steel Revolution from two decades ago?" I asked. "Icereach history made it sound like there was a big change a few months before I was born."

Jamjars chuckled. "The Steel Revolution? Oh, no, that was when a bunch of jaded, vengeful Sosans formed a militia and blew up the skyport. Started a nice little war with Yakyakistan that lasted a whole couple hours until the grown-ups arrived and put a stop to it. By the time the dust settled, the Steel District was nothing but a smoking memory, too. Not like anyone was working there, by then..."

My jaw dropped. "What?"

"...What? They didn't teach you about that?" Jamjars blinked. "Figures. Guess a colony that's supposed to symbolize Ironridge-Yakyakistani cooperation wouldn't talk up the fact that one of those nations technically invaded the other for a day. If I were them, I'd turn it into a moralizing story about how to make up after a fight. But alas, I was too young to get the position at the time... Guess they thought I was too nice to be a propaganda artist."

I was still stunned. "What...?"

"It's a crazy world out there." Jamjars shrugged. "Believe me. I saw more of it than most."

"How does everyone survive?" I asked. "Normal ponies, I mean. Like the ones you pass in the street every day."

"Chance," Jamjars said, as casually as though it were a dinner conversation. "Everyone dies eventually. It's just a matter of when. Maybe you'll get to grow old, or maybe you'll die young from circumstances outside your control. After all, a war that kills ten percent of the population still leaves ninety percent alive."

I furrowed my brow in disbelief. "That's a stupid answer."

"You think so too?" Jamjars looked up from her dishes. "I'm certainly not an accomplished and influential mare because I want to lie down and take it when my destiny comes to call. I hoard power and connections because when something like that happens again, I want to have a choice. I want to matter. It's selfish, I suppose, but everyone should be allowed to want that. As for me, I just had a great teacher."

"Who?" I asked, feeling like the air had grown still.

"Starlight," Jamjars said, taking a step away. "Life isn't fair, and no one hated that more than her. I don't want to oversell her when all I have are memories that are older than you are, but she was special in just how big she would think to solve her problems. She always talked in terms of 'the world' and 'everything' instead of 'here' and 'me'. I don't think she just wanted to get ahead in life and win an unfair game. She was the kind of pony who wanted to change the rules and make it fair."

I listened, wrapping my head around what Jamjars was saying. "So, like... she wanted life to be more simple? More black and white?" I tilted my head. "I thought the whole point of growing up was to recognize that the world is more complex than that. Doesn't every kid see it that way at some point?"

Jamjars chuckled. "True. But that involves making sacrifices. Have you ever given up on wishing for something to be perfect because you realized it just wasn't possible?"

Immediately, I thought of the night sky, the ether river and the way I felt staring into them. Of that nameless, perfect something I wanted to find, that would know me better than I knew myself and benevolently wipe away my fears. Of the unknown, and how it meant there was always a chance the things I was looking for were still out there for me to find, because I didn't know for sure that they weren't.

If I had to, I could probably set those dreams down and get on with living a normal life. Other ponies clearly did it, after all. But the fact was, I didn't have to. And not only that, but doing so would be stupid when I suddenly had an entire city before me to search and learn about and discover. This was currently the best time in my life to go out and chase after my dreams.

"No," I said, shaking my head. "But I know what you mean."

"Starlight couldn't do that," Jamjars said. "She couldn't rest with anything less than an absolute, perfect result."

Is that a bad thing? I wanted to ask. But Jamjars' tone made it pretty obvious this wasn't a mark of a peaceful, enlightened life, so... "But you said she was your teacher."

Jamjars shrugged. "As you said, the point of growing up is to recognize that the world is more complex than black and white. That includes seeing the wisdom of your enemies, and in this case, seeing the flaws of your idols. Starlight's determination wasn't balanced and didn't make her happy. But it taught me a lot about what can be done if you push hard enough at the boundaries of possibility. And even if I can't do what she did, everyone needs a compass to guide them. The simplicity of the things she was fighting for might not jive with reality in its present state, but what's to stop us from wishing?"

I shuffled my forehooves in uncomfortable thought. Pushing at the boundaries of possibility? Being superstitious didn't have many downsides, but one big one was that I didn't have a roof on my worldview that could be used to judge the plausibility of assertions. Did Jamjars idolize someone who was no longer around to knock themselves off any pedestals, or had Starlight really been someone who could achieve the impossible?

"How come you're telling me all this?" I asked, suddenly curious. "Isn't it pretty personal?"

"Yes," Jamjars told me. "It is. But there's a difference between being personal and being something you can't tell anyone, and you looked like you could use an example to learn from."

I squinted. Maybe that was how it worked for other ponies, but for me, personal and secret were one and the same. I was different.

Jamjars saw my look and sighed. "...Right. We've really gotta get you your own room at some point. Privacy is a young, distrustful mare's everything, after all..."

I nodded. That would be nice.

"By the way," Jamjars said, returning to the dishes. "Old topic, but if you're curious about Ironridge recent history, you should wander up to the Sky District sometime. Take a break from the hot air and see the ruins. The locals are a mix of hermits, folks who can't afford air conditioning, and militia types who can't resist dancing on the skyport's grave, but you know how to handle yourself. Might even be able to be comfortable in your clothes in the day, and the views are fantastic."

I nodded more firmly. That did sound like an interesting thing to do, actually, but I had already walked for miles today, so maybe tomorrow. Besides, I had started this conversation to avoid thinking about Corsica and Egdelwonk, but maybe now I needed to talk to Corsica to avoid thinking too hard about a pony Jamjars might think of the way I thought of a god.

"Halcyon!" Corsica looked upbeat when I entered our room. Standing by her vanity, she was currently in the middle of doing something delicate and complex to her mane. "Good timing. Here, hold this."

"Err... okay..." Her aura floated out a selection of clips and bottles, and I had to use my teeth along with my wings to balance them all. "Hi?" I said around a hair clamp.

"Trying something new today," Corsica muttered, focused on the mirror. "Here, what do you think of this?"

I worked the clamp in my mouth so that I could more easily speak. "Which part?"

Corsica was doing something asymmetrical, with a mix of braids and straight locks that made it hard to tell what was finished and what was in progress. "I dunno!" she said. "I'm improvising."

Oh, really...? "Can I help?"

"Knock yourself out."

I shifted around the things I was carrying so I could more properly work, circled around behind Corsica's shoulder, and started fiddling. "Tidying up for the new gig?"

"Something like that," Corsica said.

"Well, come on, spill the details!" I urged. "How'd you get it, and what'll it be like? How'd the interview go?"

Corsica shrugged, careful to keep her head steady. "It's not that exciting. Just a janitor job. I mostly took it to annoy Graygarden if he ever finds out. Not that he'd care, though."

"Janitor? Like, taking out the trash?"

"Yup," Corsica said, watching me work in the mirror. "Still, can't be that bad. Once my credentials are printed, I'll probably have access to half the rooms in this building, or more. Can't take out the trash if you can't reach it, right?"

"Makes sense," I answered, pulling a few loose hairs from my comb. "Glad you've found something, at least. Cool boss?"

Corsica hesitated. "...I'm not sure. His name is Wonk. He seems pretty knowledgeable. I asked Jamjars about him before I said yes, and he's apparently technically Cold Karma top brass, except the others on the board of directors have nothing to do with him. She likes him, though. Thinks Lilith and the others will be less likely to take any swipes at me if I'm flying his flag."

I frowned. "Does it... bother you, at all, that the main reason we're supposed to get jobs is so we can't get hired for other jobs by ponies who have it out for us? Not just because we've been duped before, but... it feels like admitting that sort of thing is common."

Corsica gave me a worried look. "Halcyon, you don't think it's about them trying to hire us, do you? I'm talking about conscription."

"Conscription?" My ears perked in alarm.

"The big one we have to worry about is a pony called Emblazon," Corsica told me. "Director of National Defense. Ironridge's air force has been scrambling lately due to that pirate king in Varsidel. If anyone finds out we've been trained by Yakyakistani soldiers... That's the kind of experience that could make us too good to lose. And you'd almost prefer becoming one of Lilith's experiments over getting shipped off in the military."

"What do Lilith's experiments entail...?" I asked, uncertain.

Corsica pinned her mane in place with her aura and turned around to face me with a blank expression. "Eugenics? Breeding? Trying to find ways to make batponies a little less extinct that usually involve participants becoming parents?"

I blinked blankly.

Corsica grabbed my shoulders. "Halcyon, where have you been this past week?"

"Learning about the city?" I pointed at the door with a wing. "The city that we came here to learn about...?"

"Didn't think to check the top floor of the Ice District?" Corsica guessed. "Go see for yourself who's in charge?"

I shrugged weakly. "Err, no. I was out on the streets."

"Welp." Corsica let me go. "Guess we've been splitting up to cover our bases. Point is, don't be unaffiliated. Want me to ask Wonk if he's got a spare position for you?"

I set my jaw and wondered if he had somehow put her up to this. Why couldn't I just be free...?

"I'll see what he's got next time I meet him," Corsica declared. "Could be a while, though. I've already got a training buddy I'm supposed to meet in a few days for onboarding, so the boss probably does things hooves-off unless I go looking. Anyway, what's the word on the streets? Anything you've seen that I've missed?"

"Depends what all you know," I said. "I'm still getting the feel of the place. It's complex. Got a few organizations and places I want to stake out to see what they're about. Gimmie a few days, and I'll get back to you?"

"...Right." Corsica turned back to the mirror. "Just remember, don't slack on getting your name in with someone high up enough to resist a draft. Talk to Jamjars. Junior Karma himself is apparently the most trustworthy of the bunch, but he doesn't run a division so he doesn't have many posts. And if you really can't find anything, you could probably always work for Jamjars herself. But we'll be a lot freer and have a lot more peace of mind once this is all taken care of."

Right.

"Good talk," I said, nodding and stepping towards the door, leaving Corsica to finish her mane. "I'll go see what I can do."

I had already been out today to explore the city, and I was still worn out from the effects of the heat, but my mind told me I needed a walk, and so that was what I went to do. Or at least a train ride, since that didn't involve any effort.

The night was wearing on as my train sped out from the Ice District, stopping at the station for Eaststone Mall. I didn't get off, leaning against a window instead. The train wasn't very full, so I figured I'd ride it until that changed, then turn around and go home.

I had a whole city to look at, but instead my thoughts drifted to Corsica. Our conversation rattled me, and not even because of Egdelwonk. Corsica had been proactive, exploring the Ice District, learning about the city, and arguably found out a lot more than me. And I wasn't sure I liked it.

But why didn't I? Shouldn't I be happy she had her hooves under her again? For that matter, shouldn't I be relieved? None of the reasons I liked Corsica in Icereach had anything to do with her being fragile or easily overwhelmed. She was supposed to be a cool operator who shrugged off her problems. This other Corsica, the one who got heatstroke and then claimed it was on purpose for reasons that sounded made up... I didn't like her. She smelled like desperation, and reminded me of the avalanche and the Aldebaran incident.

And now, Corsica was being cool again. So why did I feel so... so much like something I had just found was being taken away?

I mulled over it again and again, and came up with nothing until the train stopped and a whole flood of ponies poured in. That was my cue to leave.

The train platform I emerged on was a skinny one, with a thin glass railing separating the walkway from the cliff edge. It was chipped in places, where things had rammed it and no one had ever come for repairs.

To my right was a good view of the Ice District, a towering wall of stone and concrete linking two mountains, a few telltale metal spires poking up beyond. To hear Gerardo tell it, that had been a dam, and was now a symbol of controversy in the city. I wondered if it was because the Sosa that built it was now a memory.

Ironridge's history... Seeing the city, learning the city... Maybe I was just jealous that Corsica had beaten me to it. That was probably it. I stretched out a hoof, the Night District's web of lights twinkling below me...

"Love life troubles, Halcyon?"

"Aaah!" I jumped, my fur standing on end in surprise. That was Egdelwonk's voice! Where...?

"Over here," he whispered. I looked harder, and suddenly realized his eyes were glowing out at me from the cracked lid of a public trash receptacle.

"Are you hiding in a garbage can?" I hissed, stalking closer. Most of the hoof traffic had dissipated as the train pulled away, but the few ponies who remained didn't seem the least bit concerned with what I was doing.

Egdelwonk shrugged. "Well I assumed that much would be obvious, but if you'd like me to spell it out for you, indeed I am."

"Why are you hiding in a garbage can?" I pressed, slightly more concerned with this fact than whether he was stalking me or why he had snapped up Corsica.

"Because it's my domain," Egdelwonk said matter-of-factly, edging back the lid a little and poking his head out. "What else do you expect a self-respecting regent of rubbish to do with his free time?"

"Well, let's see." I sat down and folded my forelegs. "First, something other than stalking me after I turned down your job offer. Second, something other than hiring my friend to get under my skin."

Egdelwonk chortled. "Bothering you is just a bonus. I hired Corsica because I think she'll be a valuable asset to my Junior Dumpster Despot Corps, and also because I have quite a lot to teach her and unlike you she seems interested in learning. Anyway, I was just passing through and thought I'd deliver your first report card."

I blinked. "My what?"

Egdelwonk stuck out his bat wing, offering me a piece of crumpled-up parchment with 'A+' scrawled several times in red crayon, and nothing else.

I didn't take it. "What's that supposed to be?"

The trash tyrant shrugged. "Your report card! How can I be a stereotypical unwanted trickster mentor if I don't give you feedback somehow?"

I took a step back. "Or, you could stick that report card in your eye and go jump off a cliff, and then find someone else to annoy. How about that, big guy?"

"Tut tut." Egdelwonk waved the card at me. "So modest. And here I just wanted to congratulate you on finding out that your friends don't remember that first visit to my dump without making it obvious you were searching. Excellent job getting Corsica to talk about what she thinks of me without making it look like you were too curious, too. Now don't get too big of a head; I still know that you know all these things, but you at least found out in a nice and inconspicuous manner."

My jaw hung slack. "Are you spying on me?"

"Yes, yes, we established that a week ago. Don't look so surprised," Egdelwonk said nonchalantly. "The point is, good going, congratulations, you're the best student I've had in millennia. Three cheers for Halcyon!"

"Shut up!" I snapped, not caring who was around to listen. "And leave me alone!"

"Then you'd better get to playing hooky," Egdelwonk told me, narrowing his eyes and slinking back into the trash can. "After all, there's no way to avoid the attentions of a questionably omniscient janitor like learning to avoid them. Ta-ta!"

He closed the lid all the way.

For a second, I stared at the can. I blinked. Then...

"Raaaugh!"

Spinning around, I bucked the can with my hind legs, coiling my muscles and sending it flying clean over the railing. Realizing quickly what I'd done, I rushed to the edge and looked down, watching as it burst on an empty section of road far beneath me, sending garbage spewing everywhere. Fortunately, no one was there to be hit. But Egdelwonk was gone.

I turned again, but it somehow seemed no one was paying attention to me, my outburst or the fact that I had just kicked a garbage can off a cliff. I decided to get a move on just in case my luck didn't last.

Mother of pearl.

That was the color of a thin strip of trim in the train car, used to separate a luggage rack from the wall. I huddled halfway inside a shadow to avoid the crush of the crowd, and stared at it, trying to lose my troubles in that feeling of something just beyond my memory's reach. I didn't know why this color made me feel this way, like I had forgotten something of critical, utmost importance, and only a thin wall of paper stopped me from remembering it. It was definitely the color, though. And the feeling was strong.

Unfortunately, it wasn't strong enough.

I shook, helpless. Was nowhere safe? Egdelwonk knew what I had talked about with Corsica. He sounded privy to the goings-on in my own house! Jamjars' house, but still. Where could I find privacy? I felt like I was stripped bare, naked and surrounded, a giant spotlight in the sky hovering over me and exposing me for the world to see.

Naked... He probably knew what my legs looked like too, didn't he?

And the worst part was, I didn't have any idea what he actually wanted. Maybe that was why I was mad that Corsica had been out exploring the Ice District, learning cool things that I wanted to learn for myself. Maybe I was jealous that she was adapting and getting confident in the city, while I was feeling more and more cornered the more I found.

Was it so much to ask to just... disappear?

He might not know what's under my mask, I thought.

No. Fat chance. Odds were, he did.

But... maybe this feeling, or something like it, was what caused me to start wearing a mask in the first place.

You got any wisdom for me? I thought to myself, wondering if anything would happen. Nothing did.

Well, that left me with three options: fight, hide, or sit there and take it. I had a funny feeling I wouldn't just be able to punch Egdelwonk out, not because there would be repercussions and not because I didn't pack a mean right hook but because I had just kicked him off a cliff and not accomplished anything in doing it. Hiding sounded deeply attractive, but I had no idea how he was watching me and thus no idea how to avoid his gaze. Doing nothing sounded very feasible and very dumb.

Alternately, everyone had been drumming into my brain recently that Cold Karma's executives didn't get along and working for one of them was tantamount to joining a team that insulated you from the machinations of the other side. That whole concept rubbed me the wrong way, and I really wanted nothing to do with it, but maybe everyone was saying it was smart for a reason... if it weren't for the fact that Corsica and Jamjars also seemed to think Egdelwonk was one of the better ones to throw my lot in with.

I glowered at the mare standing next to me, who didn't seem to be doing anything at all. I knew nothing about her, other than the reasonable assumption that she probably wasn't being stalked by an evil janitor, not to mention an insane robot who once led a gang of changelings. Why couldn't I just be like her instead?

Alright, I decided, new plan. Fighting, hiding and doing nothing all sounded bad on their own, but how about I do all three?

I was a good actor. On the surface, I could pretend to ignore Egdelwonk, and just accept his intrusiveness as a facet of life. Without letting on what I was up to, I would figure out how he worked: why he was harassing me, what he wanted, and most importantly how he was doing it. Once I found his method of surveillance, I could identify blind spots, and then properly have a place to hide. Although breaking it so he couldn't keep following me wasn't such a bad idea either. And neither was stealing it so I could spy on the Composer...

There. I had a plan, a way to resist, and with it, hope. I finally found myself able to relax.

The sun was rising when my train entered the Ice District, its air conditioned interior protecting me from the rising heat. It slid to a stop at my station, and I got off, making my way home.

I cracked the door open quietly, just in case anyone was sleeping yet. "Hello?"

Jamjars was in the hallway, dressed in a lacy nightgown, a sleeping cap perched atop her voluminous mane. She looked like she was just crossing from the bathroom to her bedroom. "Oh, hello," she replied, glancing over with a yawn. "Late night on the town?"

"Something like that," I answered, putting my satchel down and quickly organizing my thoughts. I already had the unwanted attention of two nutcases, though one of them at least seemed to be leaving me alone for the time being. The worst thing that could happen to me right now was that I spend all my energy on Egdelwonk, and attract another unwanted suitor while doing so. I had to prioritize, and that meant getting this job thing over with. "So hey, do you...?"

I was about to say Do you think you could hire me yourself, and would that be good enough to avoid any attention from anyone else in Cold Karma, but then stopped myself. Voicing a question like that wouldn't tell Egdelwonk anything about my intentions, would it? I didn't think so. I wasn't directly asking if she had enough clout to get him to screw off, at least, although even if I was, was that the wrong thing to say either?

"Do I...?" Jamjars tilted her head.

"I mean, are you done with the shower?" I asked, fumbling a little to make it sound like I had just tripped over my tongue.

"Oh. Sure. Help yourself." Jamjars waved me past, trudging into her bedroom. "Night night..."

This was going to be a lot more complicated than I thought.

Moving Up

Once again, I was wearing a dress.

This one was black and lacy, with a high-backed collar and paper-thin silk boots that used little straps attached to the dress to make sure they didn't fall off. Jamjars had groomed my mane and tail for nearly an hour until she was satisfied with the condition, and it left me the prettiest I'd ever been: somehow, she was even better at styling my looks than I was. My mane, smooth and glossy, had a deliberately uneven part that left a lock of hair hanging cutely over my eyes, and my tail had a tiny twirl at the end that matched some of the spiral accents on my dress's neckline and hem.

My role had been beautifully crafted, and so I acted it with the care it deserved, smiling and beaming like there wasn't a chaotic party carrying on all around me and throwing hooffuls of rice from a little basket at anyone who got too close.

I was a bridesmaid. And I had never seen the lucky couple before in my life.

A loud pop and a hiss foretold a cork flying across the room, striking a stone pillar that held up white satin streamers and the roof of the chapel alike. Ponies stomped in applause and bumped into each other, all with the air of middle-class folks dressing up as the richest of the rich for a day. A homely mare with a flowered staff lounged around an altar at the back of the room, looking somewhat important yet far too comfortable for the room's atmosphere, and the bride and groom danced upon a rolled-out carpet, kissing deeply, together wearing the only white suit and dress in the room.

"When I was young," Jamjars whispered nostalgically, standing next to me in a gown that was also black, but much more stately and official, "I always figured I'd grow up to be a mane stylist. Do you know why I didn't?"

"Err, no," I whispered back without breaking my smile. This was a role I preferred to lose myself in and do without thinking; as much as I could enjoy a rowdy party, it was probably best not to get swept away by one when the subject was something I knew nothing about. Besides, I was technically being auditioned.

Jamjars gave a happy sigh. "Because I wasn't thinking big enough. Why settle for manes alone when a wedding planner can have that, and the dresses, and the decorations, the food, the music, everything, and each customer brings so many guests and everything is so romantic..." She twirled away, drifting off to mingle. "Keep up the good work!"

So, that was what I did. Smile and wave, smile and wave... The two other bridesmaids, both of whom also worked for Jamjars and wore identical dresses, performed their roles with a controlled passion that told me they were professionals, but not much else. Odds were, they had done this so many times that they were bored out of their minds. Or, they were doing their jobs and restraining themselves from mingling. Or, they were introverts who spent the whole time pony-watching, like me. Or... any number of things, really.

There was one other batpony at the wedding, a mare with a burn mark on her face whom I guessed to be in her mid-forties. She didn't seem quite as enthusiastic as some of the other guests, and was about as interested in watching me as I was in watching her. Our eyes met often, but she always kept her distance with a frown of quiet disapproval.

My run-in with Kuiper, now a full week ago, had been the furthest I'd ever gotten towards understanding the weird looks I constantly received. Plenty of ponies continued to tip their hats at me, and while I hadn't ran into any more who were combatively snobbish like the mare on my first visit to Eaststone, there were definitely also ponies who gave me frowns or else wouldn't meet my eyes. Once, a stallion even got up and left when I sat next to him in a train car.

It felt like everyone had something they thought of me, and all the ones who didn't show it just... didn't show it. This was the first time I had seen another batpony in more than distant passing, though. How come she seemed unhappy to see me? If my own kind were so rare and unusual, I'd have expected us to stick together.

Clearly, there was a lot more going on here than a cult of hat-tipping and one rude shopper. But I wasn't getting to the bottom of it at this wedding, so for now, I let it drop.

Instead, I turned my thought to the chapel altar, still smiling and waving to anyone who got near. Finding out what Ironridge worshiped, or even any progress on the light spirit at all, was something I'd made no headway at all on either in my two weeks at Ironridge. The last week in particular had been a mix of pretending Egdelwonk wasn't stalking me and obsessively using my train pass, getting a very good feel for the layout of the city's network. I told myself I was being productive and learning something useful, but mostly I loved being in a giant, moving machine.

And no, the irony of using the train pass Egdelwonk had given me wasn't lost on me. I just really liked the trains.

Eventually, the wedding moved on, and the sleepy-looking mare at the altar waved her flower staff over the couple and said some words that made them start kissing again. I made myself watch in morbid fascination, partly because if I wanted to do this full-time I'd need to get used to it, and partly because I suspected Corsica would have no problem around kissing lovebirds and me finding it weird meant I was weird in return. Also, Jamjars looked positively giddy at the other side of the room, and it was giving me that strange old feeling I used to get pre-avalanche when Corsica and Ansel would tell jokes that went over my head.

The couple embraced. The crowd cheered. Several more corks flew. I just smiled and waved.

Two hours later, the party had come to a close. Most of the guests had shuffled out, but a fat stallion in a tux had passed out behind a support pillar and flower staff mare was trying to drag him away. A janitor - hopefully not one of Egdelwonk's - was disappointedly scrubbing at a stain on the roll-out carpet where it looked like someone had emptied a whole bottle. The other two bridesmaids had doffed their smile-and-wave act and were chatting together at a mile a minute as they picked up fallen streamers and confetti and swept up the rice we had spent the whole party throwing.

"Well, I'd say that was a success," Jamjars declared, walking up behind me with a dreamy look on her face. "Another happy couple, off on their honeymoon... Low payers, of course, so it wouldn't have been the end of the world if you had somehow turned this into a romcom. But you didn't, so we're good." She grabbed me and hugged me. "So, dream job, or what?"

"It wasn't very difficult," I admitted, fidgeting.

Jamjars let go and gave me a concerned look.

"What?" I tilted my head.

She tilted hers too. "Two ponies, having the happiest and most romantic day of their lives? Uttering their vows, friends turning out from all over to wish them well? You saw all that and the most notable part is that it was easy?"

I shuffled uncertainly. "Err, yeah?"

Jamjars' face fell further. "Two lovers, holding each other in a passionate embrace?"

I shrugged. "It looked kind of like they were trying to mug each other."

Jamjars' eye twitched. "Oh, for..." She took a deep breath. "You're just like Starlight, aren't you? She didn't get it either. Why does this allllways keep happening to meee..."

Admittedly, that last one had been on purpose, and I chuckled a little to myself as she walked away. I wasn't that dense. But if she was going to make me feel like I was missing out on something, I got to have a little joke too.

"You're hired, by the way," Jamjars called back to me as she moved to carry away a soiled tablecloth in her horn. "Seems a classical Varsidelian tragedy to waste a job like this on someone who doesn't appreciate it, but you've got the skills and nepotism is how you get ahead in the world. Whomp whomp..."

Well, that was the end of that. And it hadn't even been so hard to ask in an inconspicuous way. I pretty much just had to go up and do it. Now that I was safe from military conscription, I could get back to making Egdelwonk leave me alone, finding the Composer, understanding Aldebaran's motives, studying ether crystal fault planes, finding the light spirit, learning what Ironridge worshiped, exploring the city, acclimating to the Night District, meeting Kuiper's Zero Armada, learning why ponies kept tipping their hats at me, checking out the Sky District, getting an airship, getting my own room, figuring out why I kept having that reaction to mother of pearl, learning more about the me under my mask, helping Corsica see if Cold Karma was somehow behind the city's climate... Yikes, I had a lot of goals. One down, fifty-something to go.

Egdelwonk peered out of a trash can next to me. "Congrats on the new gig," he whispered, sliding out a wing and passing me a roll-up party whistle.

"Screw off," I told him, taking it and blowing weakly. Phweee.

This had been happening a lot, lately.

Several hours later, I dragged myself through the door to me and Corsica's room in Jamjars' house, barely stopping to knock, and flopped down on my bed in a heap. I needed a shower, but my ears told me it was already in use, so I would have to wait.

The shower switched off. I told myself to get up, but my legs didn't move. Minutes later, Corsica stepped in, her barrel wrapped in a towel and her mane dripping. "Halcyon?" She blinked at me.

"Oh. Hey," I said, again telling myself to get up yet somehow staying put.

"First day of work: done," Corsica proclaimed, dropping her towel so she wouldn't drip on the carpet and standing on it as she rooted through her dresser for more. "How about you? Rough day?"

"It went alright," I answered. "Not exactly fulfilling, but Jamjars said I'm hired and it's not very intense. Just a lot of standing around and smiling."

Corsica raised a soggy eyebrow. "You sure about that? Because you look trashed."

I tried to shrug and wound up just flailing a little in my bed. "That's because afterward I went back down to the Night District. Might have pushed myself a little hard today, but I've gotta acclimate to the heat so I can see what's down there."

Corsica stepped over to me, abandoning her towel. "Heatstroke, huh? Sounds like the best thing for me to do is shake and spray this water all over you?"

I grunted. That didn't sound so bad.

"And you lecture me about not taking the heat well," Corsica huffed, going back to drying herself. "Maybe take a page out of my book and never go outdoors? I'll go get you a drink..."

She left, and returned moments later with the promised drink in tow. As I gulped deeply, she went back to grooming herself. "So, what's being a wedding planner's assistant like? There's gotta be more than just pretending to be scenery."

I sat up. "Not really. I mean, maybe there will be once I start doing it for real. I really did just stand around and throw rice at ponies for a couple hours."

Corsica chuckled. "Sounds like my kind of job. Co-workers?"

"A few, but I didn't meet them," I explained. "Not sure if they were with Jamjars or the newlyweds, actually. You?"

"Hard to say," Corsica replied. "I don't think they want me knowing how big or small this 'Junior Dumpster Despot Corps' is, real name by the way. I'm paired up with a mentor called Papyrus, though he's a colt who's definitely younger than I am. He's... weird. In a teenage colt way. Big mouth, big ego, the works. Probably would have gotten along fine with Ansel, before he got amnesia. Not that I like him, of course. I've grown out of that."

"Sounds like a goon," I pointed out. "So how do you have a mentor for being a janitor?"

Corsica shrugged. "Gotta learn the lay of the land, right? Where to find supplies, where to clean, how to not vandalize something with a botched cleaning job. Ha. Can you imagine me, doing that?" She cracked a grin.

Let's put it this way: here at the Department of Detritus, we clean up Cold Karma's messes. A memory of Egdelwonk drifted through my head. That includes oops-I-broke-it messes, and also oops-someone-leaked-the-big-bad's-name-to-the-media messes...

Was Corsica not mentioning that part, or had Egdelwonk not told her what his department supposedly actually did yet? I remembered her talking earlier about the job like it was her ticket to go snooping around the governmental buildings at the top of Cold Karma. If it was a job that involved keeping secrets, and Egdelwonk could see everything, maybe she was deliberately not telling me...

If that was true, I would trust her and help keep it a secret by not mentioning it, either. So, I nodded and returned the grin.

"Yeah. Old Graygarden would probably flip his lid if he could see you now," I agreed.

Corsica poked at her mane, a half-dry, frizzy, tangled mass. "Heh. Prolly would."

She went back to her grooming, and left it at that. And the silence gave me time to think, and my mind quickly started going down a track it hadn't wandered before: me and Corsica both had jobs. In different parts of the city. She would be working the Ice District, at least until Egdelwonk trusted her with his whole secret-covering-up thing. I would be working... well, anywhere else, because probably very few ponies wanted to get married in a dingy metal factory. Unless they did? I was far from an expert.

The point was, for two and a half years Corsica and I had hunkered down together in a lab in Icereach to do math, track dates, operate microscopes and tiny machines, swap theories, and generally hang out and fool around. I always thought of those days as the best days of my life, and I hadn't been in Ironridge long enough to draw a solid line between now and then. Those days... could become the old days. And if there was one thing I wanted to take from them and carry into the new days, it was us being friends. Sure, we were roommates, but we had to do stuff together, too.

"Hey," I said, getting out of bed. "Might be crazy, but there are a few hours left in the night. Wanna go explore the city with me?"

Corsica gave me a dubious look. "You sure that's the best idea? I don't take heat well, and you were just being a dumb-dumb with the Night District."

I gave her a sneaky grin. "We could go to the Sky District."

Corsica tilted her head. "What's in the Sky District?"

"I dunno." I shrugged. "Some old ruins? Jamjars told me it's an interesting place to visit, and that it's much cooler than the rest of Ironridge."

Corsica thought about that for a moment. "...Sure. Sounds fun. Why not?"

I grinned.

She grinned back.

Yep. We were definitely still friends.

It took longer than I was planning to actually find the way up to the Sky District, a process that involved a lot of walking around and looking at maps that didn't mention it and even bothering locals who didn't seem to want to remember. Initially, Corsica complained about the heat, but piped down once she decided I had gotten the point, especially considering I wasn't about to argue it.

At least she was more dressed for the weather than the times she collapsed out here early in our visit. That didn't mean she was walking around with her talent exposed, though - somewhere, she had found a garment consisting of a thin triangle of cloth anchored to a light, ornamental saddle and arranged so it covered her flanks and only her flanks while providing as little insulation as possible. When I asked her about it, she said Jamjars bought it on the black market.

Why anyone would want to hide their special talent when talents were so hard to come by was just as much of a mystery to me as why the equipment for doing so would be found on a black market. Any normal ponies, at least. Myself and Corsica didn't count.

Eventually, our search met with success. High up along the Day District wall and not too far around from the Eaststone Mall train station, a big plaza opened out, carved back into the mountain wall and extending forward over the cliff face on reinforced metal beams, providing the biggest patch of flat land I had seen so far in Ironridge. The plaza was meticulously worked, with artistic swirls and arrangements of cobblestone in the floor, and decorated railings with a far higher degree of craftsponyship from the cheap glass barriers that often appeared in train stations. Leading into the mountain was a circular, rounded arch decorated like a gigantic gear, the road rising through a hole in its middle. But even though that was our goal, the view across from the gear momentarily stole my attention.

In one place, the railing parted, and a catwalk extended out over the city, resting on a support beam that had been made longer than the others. The plaza already extended for one or two street-widths out over the cliff face, and this viewpoint easily doubled that, ending in a glass platform that gave the biggest and vastest view of Ironridge I had seen so far. I remembered viewpoints and lookouts similar to it from before, but none so high up, and none that stretched so far.

Corsica wandered up behind me as I stood at the edge. "This high up, the air's almost breathable," she remarked, fixing a stray hair in her mane.

"Yeah," I whispered, feeling like I was in a shrine. I turned around. The catwalk was slightly sloped, letting me look down on the plaza at an angle and see it properly, framed against the mountain. "It's crazy how empty this place is, up here. It looks like it was designed for hundreds and hundreds of ponies."

"It probably was," Corsica said. "From what I've heard, the Sky District was designed to be the entry point to all of Ironridge. I guess they moved their airports down the mountain after the old one got smashed?"

"Must be," I answered. "Although with all this stuff still here, wouldn't it have been easier to rebuild? Maybe they just wanted to relocate it closer to old Sosa."

Corsica shrugged. "Well, guess the traffic will be light for a bit."

I nodded uneasily. "Yeah. I guess it was hard to get directions because nobody actually comes here anymore? Although it did kind of feel like ponies were avoiding us more than usual..."

"Were they? I just figured they were snobs," Corsica said. "Or that Ironridge has some social code of ethics that involves keeping your distance, making eye contact and not saying anything at the same time."

"Dunno." I started walking back toward the archway. "Usually, I get all sorts of different looks. Probably 'cause I'm a bat, but I can't figure out for sure. Today, everyone seemed a lot more on edge. I wonder if something happened."

"As long as they keep it to looks, that's their problem and not ours," Corsica proclaimed. "And if they don't, we'll just go all Yakyakistan-style on them."

"Maybe beating ponies up just because we can isn't-"

"Relax," Corsica told me. "Newly-minted janitor, remember? Even if we make a mess we can't sweep under the rug ourselves, I'm pretty sure I've got some connections who will do it for us. Now let's get out of this place and see some weather that's actually cool."

The walkway inside the tunnel was slightly raised from the floor, with lights under the edges that perfectly matched the color of the rock, making it seem like the rock walls themselves were glowing until I poked my head over to check. Soon, however, we ran into a steep slope, a grated floor at the end of the walkway and no road going forward. Two massive belts ran up and down the sloping tunnel, and I could see several grated platforms pinned to them, giant lifts that were supposed to carry ponies up and down. After looking at them for long enough, I almost suspected the grates were arranged in such a way as to pass through each other, so that new platforms could rise up directly through the floor.

It would have been wonderful, if it wasn't trashed.

Mounds of broken glass had been shoveled to the sides of the grate area, filling up the lighting trench between the walkway and the actual tunnel. Detritus such as bent and twisted metal mixed with it, plus a lot of things that were clearly garbage, like discarded cans and bottles, old tarps and a decrepit folding chair. Corsica's ears fell as she beheld the wreck, and mine went further back than they already were.

A staircase, I noticed, had been chiseled into the steep tunnel ramp, inexpertly and unevenly and full of zigzags and wobbly switchbacks. It was probably still the easiest way up.

"Uhh..." Corsica glanced at the mess, then lifted a hoof, showing me her dainty, noise-making shoes. "Here's hoping these work against broken glass."

We started climbing, and eventually the source of the debris came into sight, far up above. The tunnel opened out above the mountains, and it looked as though it just kept going, a metal wire frame rising up along with the lift and continuing the trajectory above the ground. But that had long since collapsed and caved in, and all of that glass had just tumbled down the elevator chute until it reached the bottom in disarray.

"Wasn't planning on climbing a mountain today," Corsica huffed as we neared the top. "Makes me... glad we're... really buff."

I nodded. Admittedly, I had been slacking on my usual training lately, and finding a good place where we could fight each other for practice sounded like a decent idea. At least spending hours wandering the city wouldn't let me go fully to seed.

The top of the shaft presented itself, a walkway made of hammered-together crate parts and a discarded beam of iron forming the final short bridge to the surface. Thoughtfully, someone had nailed and fused upside-down bottlecaps to the floor to help with traction. Corsica led the way, and I peeked out behind her, getting my first real look at the Sky District.

This was not level ground. It was craggy, rocky and barren, and yet full of life as well, patches of dirt sticking to rocks and building up in crevices that were overflowing with plant life, mostly tall, spiky grasses and bright, spiky flowers that looked like they would hurt to touch. I clambered to the top of one stony outcropping and couldn't believe my eyes: it was like the mountains as seen from an airship, only in one to a thousand scale, a field of crags that was surprisingly flat in the grand scheme of things yet more like a forest of spikes and cones that were three times as tall as I was.

Buildings were there, too, the remains of the fallen glass tunnel leveling out and passing through three majestic, still-standing support columns to a structure that looked more like a series of plates sitting on spires than any building I had ever seen. Needle-thin support poles held up huge platters, reminding me of the stems of fancy glassware, and the platters were protected by reinforced glass domes like mushroom caps, though most of the domes were missing or broken or incomplete. To the right was another such stand of platters, and further to the right was a wide, low facility I couldn't make out well. To the left was a proud, golden spire, the most intact-looking building of the bunch. All four had clearly once been linked by another raised tunnel, but only stretches of it remained, empty support pillars telling the story of where it had once been.

"Woah," Corsica said. "The Ice District should have tipped me off, but Ironridge engineers are crazy."

"Hey, is that..." I squinted. "Look!"

Across from us, behind the stand of buildings our tunnel had once gone to, a solitary airship was rising, a streak of blackish pink burning above it like a colorful shooting star. My science side was very interested in why an airship might possess a thing like that, but more practically...

"Guess they do still get air traffic up there," Corsica pointed out.

"Guess so," I agreed, wondering how long we had left in the night. "Well, come on. Let's not have dragged our rumps up here for nothing. Wanna go check the ruins out?"

There was something resembling a road leading to the nearest cluster of ruins. Any wagon would have its wheels fall off in an instant, and the ground was so rough and uneven it felt like someone had tried to smooth it with nothing but dynamite. Often, we crossed crevices that had been filled with loose, gravelly debris that crunched under our hooves and hadn't fully settled.

Corsica's eyes wandered to the scenery, and mine did too. It was quite wet up here, the rough terrain trapping rainwater and creating hundreds of miniature lakes, most no bigger than Jamjars' bathtub. Flowering lilies bloomed in the water, stemmed plants with big leaves rising up along the shore, with big, bucket-like blooms that made me want to reach up and look inside.

Vegetation hadn't really been a thing in Icereach. We could see it from the Day District, looking down at the Night District canopy, but that was hardly different than seeing a picture in a book. Here, the world was alive, and that life was all around us.

"Look," Corsica said. "Have you noticed it's getting colder?"

I nodded. It wasn't my immediate interest, but I had.

"The plants are changing with the temperature," Corsica pointed out. "The further we get from the lip of the crater, the cooler it gets. These ones must like it colder than the ones back there. Crazy, huh?"

I blinked, processing that for a moment, and realized she was right. It was a gradual change, not noticeable if I just looked over my shoulder, but that first view stepping out of the tunnel was fresh enough in my mind that the contrast was obvious.

"It's almost like they're ponies," I said, walking over and inspecting a vine. "You, me, we've got different favorite climates. Ansel too. We can put up with others to an extent, but left alone, we just go where we're most comfortable." My mind filled with an image of these plants getting up and walking around in search of the right weather, and I giggled.

"Wonder if the scientists in Icereach know that," Corsica added. "I bet you could make an entire study out of these things and where they grow best."

"I bet they don't." I stared harder at the vine, picking a leaf to zero in on. The closer I looked, the more detail it seemed to have, like a fractal... "Although the Ironridge scientists do. Bet they need to care about that a whole lot to get crops to grow in the Night District without bursting into flame."

Corsica snorted. "Phooey. Guess we won't be able to patent this."

I laughed again. "I bet there are a trillion other things that seem obvious out here, but we don't learn in Icereach. Like, think about it. We've got snow potatoes, right? I bet those don't grow around here. Probably have their name in the first place because they're capable of growing back home. So someone's gotta know. We just... never thought about it."

Corsica nodded. "Yup. Come on, though. Unless we wanna look at flowers all night, we need to get a move on."

Debris became more common as we approached the ruins, twisted hunks of metal laying at the bottom of crevices and sticking up out of lakes. It was like the skyport had just exploded, or been torn apart by something strong enough to fling the detritus everywhere. My neck craned further and further up as we approached the edge of the central raised disk, searching for stairs or a way up. It wasn't until we were almost beneath it that I realized the ponies of the Sky District lived beneath those platforms, not on them. Duh. A much better way to shelter from the elements...

A gate made out of scrap metal heralded the end of the road and the start of town. Welcome to Dead Herman, a proudly-drawn sign proclaimed, ramshackle walls stretching out to either side that looked more like they were there to mark a boundary than to stop anyone from crossing.

"Dead Herman?" Corsica gave the sign a suspicious look. "What's that, this town's name? Who names their town Dead Herman?"

"This place, apparently," I said, leading the way inside.

The road continued for a ways, flatter and smoother this time, along with the ground around it - probably leveled during the skyport's initial construction. A main street of sorts had cropped up to fill the space, scrap dwellings stacked up behind vendors and storefronts. Everything was destitute and recycled, made from smashed materials obviously looted from above, like the kind of shantytown you could only find in stories. And yet the ponies we passed were well-dressed, neon lights flashed from hoofmade signs and advertisements, and the streets pulsed with late-night life.

Somewhere, someone was playing an upbeat jig on a saxophone. A trio of foals chased each other out one alley and into another. Barkers and criers hung out in front of their respective stalls, though plenty of entries just hung open, yellow lights welcoming everyone inside. The architecture told one story, but everything else spoke of a party that didn't end.

"Woah." Corsica beamed around us as we walked, the skyport's metal roof soaring overhead and blocking out the stars. "I dig this place."

I wasn't about to be too hasty in following suit, especially when I noticed a stallion behind a support pillar giving us a lecherous glance - even if this place looked bright and friendly, Jamjars had made a point of reminding me to stay alert. But the weather was pleasingly cool, so I vowed to enjoy myself, too.

We kept walking, eventually coming upon a central plaza. It was wide, round and well-lit, with an eye-catching center fixture: a huge block of marble that looked vaguely like a tomb, and atop it, a noble bronze statue of a young unicorn mare. Something about the display gave me a chill.

Corsica moved up closer to examine the plaques, and I followed. The statue had its own, looking old and a little battered, like it had been there since before the statue was dragged out here into its present position. Shinespark of Sosa, it read. In the year 965 A.B., became the first pony to be born on an airship.

Huh. So she'd be... what, thirty-eight now? Thirty-nine? She looked maybe fourteen in the casting. This statue must have been around for a while.

The lower plaque was newer, if less descriptive: Here lies Herman, Ambassador of Yakyakistan. Others may forget the mare who laid him low, but we will always remember.

I glanced between the tomb and the statue atop it several times more. Jamjars had mentioned the Steel Revolution involved a conflict between Ironridge and Yakyakistan, hadn't she? Maybe this had been part of it.

Something about that statue, though... I got a prickling feeling I couldn't quite explain that this mare wasn't right. There was something wrong with her, some reason she was very bad news. It felt like... I rubbed my head. Concentrating on this feeling was harder than it should have been.

Did that mean this feeling of unease had to do with something behind my mask? Usually, it did, but I had no idea what kind of thing I could have learned and then forgotten to make me feel this way. Granted, that was usually the point, but still. Bizarre.

"She's handsome," Corsica pointed out, admiring the statue with none of my reservations. "Bet you could rock that manestyle."

"Yeah," I said absentmindedly, still focusing on myself.

For a moment, she was quiet, and I turned away, deciding that if this was something I didn't want myself knowing, trying to pry at it would be a fool's errand until I could get somewhere solitary, take off my mask and reassess whether it needed to stay a secret. The moment I did, I blinked.

There was a stallion strutting through the plaza, a fat old lavender pegasus with a black bowler hat and a long black goatee. But his goatee had a jagged red lightning bolt running through it, and his mane was similarly garish, sporting bright red streaks wherever it poked out from his snugly-fitting hat. His tail's motif was exactly the same.

I blinked again. Nature didn't generally produce black and red manes, not unless two parents specifically got together for their phenotypes and stuff. It was like... a universal constant of fairness in life, because anyone who actually got one would be marked for villainy or at least being a huge punk from birth, and things didn't work that way. Which meant two things: this stallion was dying his mane, and both he and his stylist had an ego the size of the moon.

Whatever his personality, I could respect that. So I nodded in respect.

He caught the gesture and tipped his hat. "Ladies!"

That got Corsica's attention. "What? Uh, hey?"

Now the stallion started wandering over, and I stood my ground, curious what I had gotten us into. "Nice beard," I remarked.

"Thank you!" He nodded again. "The Howenator accepts your compliment with gusto."

"Uhhh..." Corsica tilted her head, clearly having no idea what was going on.

I had no idea either, other than that chance meetings in the Sky District could apparently get interesting.

Sky District

Lively jazz drifted out from well-lit streets, colorful paper lanterns hanging across the roads on strings to give the town of Dead Herman a festive, peppy life. Ponies swaggered as they walked, some daring to wear full-body clothes despite the lower districts' infernal climate. Shoddy construction and recycled scrap made up the buildings of a society on the edge of society, and yet it felt more rebellious than impoverished. And we were talking to a pegasus who had just introduced himself as the Howenator.

"A dark and lustrous evening to you," he said with a tip of his bowler hat, showing that his evilly-dyed mane job extended under it as well... and also that it was at odds with a cheery countenance. "And ol' Howe greets you too. How's the night treating you, ladies?"

"Nothing special one way or the other," I replied, having gotten myself into this and now entirely unsure what I wanted out of it. "Err, why? You?"

"Business as usual, my leafy-eared understudy," Howe said, standing straight and proud. "The Howenator, you see, is a pegasus on a mission. Wander the streets, offer a friendly little smile to those in need, and ask two little questions of any and all comers." He leaned in with a wink. "Any chance you might grace ol' Howe with an answer?"

"Only if I can ask what your name is first," I replied, earning a chuckle from Corsica. "Howe, Howenator, make up your mind?"

Howe laughed a faux-evil laugh. "The Howenator goes by Howe. As I like to say, Howe do you do?"

Corsica frowned and tilted her head. "So is it Howie or How? The joke doesn't work if you have to change your own pronunciation..."

Howe waved a wing. "The Howenator schmooves in mysterious ways, babydoll. But don't let him waste your time while you're on the clock!" He bowed to me. "Has ol' Howe's answer filled the void of curiosity that yawns in your soul?"

Actually, he was making me more curious than ever, though mostly as to whether or not he was sane. I decided not to say that. "Alright, what do you wanna ask?"

Howe lowered his voice to a conspiratorial stage whisper. "Do you like... cults?"

"Cults?" I blinked in surprise. "You mean tiny religious groups focused on things not many know about? Yeah, if they're legitimate. As long as they're not up to anything sinister."

Howe winked. "Good answer! Second question: do you like... ways to get rich quick?"

Corsica and I looked at each other. I swallowed. "You're not about to ask us to do anything illegal, are you?"

Howe chuckled, once again with a faux-evil air. "Perish the thought, milady! After all, ol' Howe only asked for two questions, not three." He whistled innocently. "Though if he were into telling things rather than asking, he'd probably have a word or two to say about a group he's totally not being paid to shill for that could be just up your alley. You ever hear about the alicorn princess of love?"

Alicorns? I blinked, my attention thoroughly grabbed. Before I could say anything, though, Corsica beat me to it: "Only two questions, remember?" she pointed out smugly.

Howe gave her a strange look and rubbed at the back of his neck. "Touche..."

"What's this about alicorns?" I interrupted, leaning forward.

"Ah, has the young mare's attention been ensnared?" Howe started chuckling again. "Princess Coda, the alicorn of love! She and her followers travel the world via their airship, soliciting the adoring prayers of the faithful. And mind you, when Howe says soliciting, he means it. A few words of genuine adoration professed where she can hear, and a jingle in your pocket in return."

Corsica frowned in confusion. "This goddess-princess-whatever is so desperate for attention, she pays you money to sing her praises?"

"Oh, that's one way to see it," Howe said, waggling a feather. "But all her fancy priests would tell you it's a noble premonition of a future ruled by mutually-beneficial love. Less of a transaction and more of a utopia. You ken?"

My mind was very torn between the apparent existence of a real alicorn, the prospect of free money, the common-sense idea that money was never truly free, and the common-sense idea that it was probably easier to fake having an alicorn than to have a real one. "Err..."

"Sounds like a front for criminal enterprise," Corsica remarked. "What are they trying to do, get rid of a windfall that's bringing too much government attention?"

Howe drew a wing across his heart. "The Howenator thoroughly vets his employers, thank you very much. Believe it or not, the coins he's seen ponies walk away with are very much real." He hesitated. "Although being in griffon currency does devalue them somewhat. But money's still money!"

Corsica looked unconvinced. She raised an eyebrow.

Howe raised one back. "For someone in your line of employ, you seem awfully eager to cry about illegal activity in the no-laws zone."

Now Corsica was confused. "What's my job got to do with this?"

"Neither of us are working here," I added, remembering a remark earlier about him thinking we were on the clock. "We're just tourists."

Howe closed his eyes and waggled a feather. "Quaint, but your garb says otherwise, O unemployed one."

"My garb?" Corsica glanced back at her tiny saddle and flanks-only dress. "What's this have to do with anything?"

Howe resumed his evil laugh.

"What?" Corsica started to redden. "What are you not telling me?"

"Fuhuhaha!" Howe chortled. "Does the damsel not know?"

"Hey, watch it, buddy," I warned, taking a stance.

Corsica nodded. "We're buffer than we look. You wanna mess?"

"Uhh, I mean..." Now it was Howe's turn to hesitate. "You're telling ol' Howe you're a normal, innocuous civilian dressing like a pleasure mare just because?"

My ears twitched. Corsica started to turn beet red. "Is that what these mean?"

Howe whistled innocently. "As savage a prank as that would be, the Howenator tells no fibs. Ain't his fault you got that and didn't know." He glanced sideways at us. "How did you get a thing like that and not know?"

Corsica was staring at her clothes in horror. "I guess that's why Jamjars found this on the black market..." She started disrobing then and there, her hidden talent suddenly a much lesser priority. "Next time I see her, I'm sticking her head in a dishwasher and...!"

I was still trying to figure out what a pleasure mare was that would be such a bad thing. Excluding the obvious answers, because I didn't feel like grossing myself out too much.

"Oho?" Howe perked up. "You know Jamjars?"

"What's it to you?" I asked, covering for Corsica as she stomped off toward the nearest trash can.

"Nice gal," Howe said. "Loyal, good sense of fashion, real rags-to-riches success story. Also tops ol' Howe's list of mortals who might try to take over the world, but everyone needs some character flaw or another."

I tried to think of something to say that explicitly wouldn't acknowledge his remark about taking over the world, and drew a blank. In the ensuing silence, I noticed Corsica had gotten into an argument.

A very familiar one.

"I don't want it!" she was insisting, trying to stuff her apparently-lecherous dress inside. "It's not my fault Jamjars didn't do her research!"

"And I told you, much as I usually relish donations, this time I've decided I don't like the implications," Egdelwonk was arguing, lurking in the can and trying to push it back out. "It's a fine dress, very noble, I'm sure there's no need to throw it away."

I actually laughed. Good to know I wasn't the only pony he haunted like that.

"Oh, you can laugh," Howe warned, apparently completely missing Corsica. "But that mare has a mountain of ambition and knows how to make the rules dance to her whims."

"Really?" I frowned, remembering Gerardo's warning. This was the first unaffiliated pony I had ever actually talked to about Jamjars... "Why, what does she do?"

Corsica returned in defeat, carrying her dress in a tightly-rolled ball in her aura. "Hi, what did I miss...?" she droned.

"Oh, hey." Howe waved her over. "The Howenator was just telling about how everyone speculates Jamjars has-" His eyes bugged out. "Yo, that's an interesting brand you've got. Mind if ol' Howe asks what it does?"

He tried to look at Corsica's flank. Corsica briefly froze, then tried to move so he couldn't.

"Yes," she said stiffly, "I mind. Ever heard of privacy?"

"Ehhh..." Howe backed off, waving a wing disarmingly. "Okay. Touchy subject. You keep your fell secrets, and the Howenator will keep his. Pretend this never happened."

"You've seen this talent before?" Corsica pressed. I backed away, feeling awkward from the sudden tension.

Howe raised an eyebrow. "We changing the subject or not, here?"

"...Fine," Corsica relented with a sigh. "It's a talent in architecture. Geometry, building things, load balancing, that stuff. Where have you seen it before?"

"Well," Howe said, adding a slight evil chuckle, "brace yourselves for the eldritch... Ol' Howe might have once spied it on a filly who had just come back from the dead."

My breath caught in my throat. It was an outlandish assertion, except...

Corsica met my eyes, and I knew we were thinking the same: hers had appeared while she was unconscious, after a long, long coma. And it wouldn't be too hard for a showboat like Howe to conflate that with coming back from the dead.

"How so?" I asked. "Back from the dead? Like, literally?"

Howe scratched his head. "Well, maybe not literally, but there was a spirit world and some magic machines and a cursed sword or two and a whole lot else involved, so close enough. And maybe the Howenator's misremembering. He was a little more worried about not getting eaten by a cyclops at the time than fillies getting their brands."

Corsica and I gave him a flat look.

"See?" Howe shrugged. "Don't take it too seriously, marefriends. Although, come to think of it..." He rubbed his chin. "That was actually the same time ol' Howe met Jamjars. She would'a been there too. She doesn't tell you things like this herself?"

Corsica punched the ground. "I knew she recognized... I mean... Look, never mind! It's probably a coincidence. What did that kid's talent even do?"

Howe shrugged. "Parted ways with her less than a day after. Couldn't say."

I, however, was thinking along a different track. "Say, this filly's name wouldn't happen to be Starlight, right?"

"Oho, so you've heard about her?" Howe raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, that's the one. Lotta folk stories about that gal. Depending who you ask, she's either some child superhero, or a made-up pony who's there to take credit for some really good things done by some controversial ponies certain other ponies don't want to ascribe any good things to. Pop culture is messy. Now, between you and the Howenator, she really did exist, and she might have even taken a name or two... but she definitely wouldn't want you making a big deal about it. Real troubled kid. Hated attention. Pretty sure she was under a sinister curse. OoOoOoOoOo..."

Every metric imaginable told me Howe was an unreliable source, but still, my curiosity got the better of me. "You knew her, then?"

"'Knew' is a pretty strong word, little bat," Howe said, waving a wing. "But the Howenator knew a friend or three of hers. Her mom hired yours truly as a bodyguard, and there was this griffon-" He froze, looking sharply around the plaza.

Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Hate to barge out on you ladies like this," Howe whispered, "but ol' Howe is technically on the job, and his Howe sense is telling him that stallion right there would be spookily receptive to the tales of Lady Coda and her good cult Izvaldi." He pointed a wing at a tall, monocle-wearing stallion with a top hat, who appeared to be minding his own business as he strolled through the plaza. "May destiny cross our paths again, and remember, if you ever need a public speaker for hire who will shill for anything and everything your coins tell him to, the Howenator is your dude. Later, dudettes!"

"Hey, wait!" I held out a wing to stop him, and he glanced over his shoulder. "Coda. This cult... Izvaldi? If we wanted to find them, where would they be?"

Howe gave a winning wink. "Fly up to the ruins!" He pointed at the metal sky. "Or just take the lift, if you're lazy like yours truly. Big airship, spooky pink-black light over the top that looks like a shooting star. Pretty sure they've set sail for the morning already, but they'll be back every night. Can't miss 'em!"

And with that, he was gone, off to harass someone different for a change.

Corsica looked deeply shaken. "What did you ask that for?" she whispered, standing so that one of her flanks was in shadow and the other was mostly blocked by me. "You obviously can't trust a thing he said. Why would you want to go looking for this cult?"

"Just keeping my options open." I shrugged. "Aren't you curious? He called them Izvaldi. That's a province in the Griffon Empire. And the last time we found a friendly ship of griffish expats..." I nodded to the west. "They turned out to be Aldebaran. All I'm saying is, what if these guys are related and we've just gotten a major lead?"

Silently, I added, and it would be really cool if they were legit and I actually got to meet a goddess.

Corsica hesitated. "I... Yeah. Sure. Can we get out of here?"

It didn't take a genius to see how badly frayed she was. "Right. Let's get out of here."

We didn't make it all the way to the staircase before our pace slackened, no longer spurred by the noisy jubilance of Dead Herman. Once we were surrounded by silence, Corsica's step faltered, and it didn't take long before we stopped altogether.

I climbed onto a particularly tall crag by the road to rest, yet still keep an eye on the world around us. Corsica soon followed suit. She didn't say anything.

Neither did I.

We stayed like that for a few minutes, the stars glowing brightly in an unobstructed field overhead. City light rose like a blurry pillar from the nearby Ironridge crater, casting a faint spot on the heavens, and behind us to the south the horizon was higher than normal, the telltale outline of the Aldenfold blocking out stars in the distance. A light breeze blew. The weather was cool. The moon inched towards the ground.

"I probably look like a real mess," Corsica eventually said. "Freaking out about something trivial for no reason. So my talent looks like an unusual one someone special once had. So what, right?"

"Doesn't seem like much of a so-what to me," I said with a shrug. "Howe told us the pony who had a talent like that before was Starlight. Jamjars talks about Starlight all the time, so she must have seen it if there was a resemblance. I bet you that's where Gerardo saw it too, and why he thought she'd remember it. If it felt like everyone knew something about my own talent and no one was telling me what it was, I'd..." I glanced at my own, covered flanks, where an upside-down crown sat, bearing a function I had never told anyone. "Well, I don't just wear this coat for show."

"And what if it wasn't just a resemblance?" Corsica whispered. "What if your talent did something you couldn't explain, that a normal talent shouldn't be able to do?"

"Then..." I chose my words carefully, the sky beginning to lighten to the east. "I suppose I'd be pretty afraid, and pretty careful who I told about it. And, maybe I'd want to draw as little attention to it as possible, and I'd probably strike a weird balance of making excuses for the times I do use it while also using it as little as possible. And I'd definitely always imagine what it would be like to tell someone about it, but never actually do it, and..."

Corsica looked away. "My talent's not a talent in architecture. It does something else. I don't know how I got it. It just... appeared, while I was unconscious."

Something fuzzed in my memory as I listened, the telltale sign of my mask getting in the way. I wondered if I had learned what she was about to say before, and made myself forget.

"I'm not going to tell you what it does," she went on. "I can't believe I'm saying this already. If you want to know, prove you can keep this much a secret first. But, one thing about it is... it has a cost. When I use it, sometimes deliberately and sometimes accidentally, I feel... drained. Like my capacity to care about things has just been sucked away."

I listened.

"I told you about that earlier," Corsica admitted. "Said it was just the way I was, that it happens when I care about something too hard. I was lying. That only ever started when I got this talent, and it happens whenever I use it. The more times I use it, the harder I use it, the bigger of things I use it for, the harder it happens and the longer it lasts."

I stared.

"Remember that funk I was in when I first got out of the hospital?" Corsica asked. "When we first made friends for real? That happened because I hadn't realized yet how my talent worked or what it did to me. I didn't get better until I stopped and figured it out. When Aldebaran happened? I overused it there, too. When I passed out from 'heatstroke' when we first got here? I was trying to hide the symptoms because Gerardo made me think Jamjars knew enough about this talent to know what it did. I didn't want to look like... look like I was using it, for someone who knew what to look for."

She hung her head. "I don't know if I've talked myself into believing there's a connection where none exists, or if I somehow have the exact same talent as this Starlight, but I'm scared. I'm worried someone will figure out what it can do, and try to exploit it somehow. I'm worried I don't know everything it can do myself, and that I might learn something about it that might make it more tempting to use it. I'm terrified, Halcyon."

I took off my coat and offered it to her. My talent just looked disturbing. Any theoretical downsides to using it, I had made peace with six months ago... and there definitely weren't any immediate, physical ones. If anything, Corsica's talent sounded less like my own secret talent and more like Mother's bracelet.

"Thanks." She wrapped it around her hindquarters, not properly putting it on.

"So..." I hesitated. "I dunno if I'm the most authoritative source on what to do, but do you want to go talk to Jamjars? Learn exactly what she knows?"

"No," Corsica grunted. "I told you that."

I nodded. "You think not knowing what she knows and having that hanging over your head will make you feel better than having it over with? I think Jamjars is on our side. If she knew a pony who had the same talent, what if she learned things from her about how to live with it?"

"Maybe," Corsica said. "If I do, I'm doing it on my own. If she knows that, she'll already know what it can do, too. And I... don't want you knowing that."

I didn't understand, but I slowly nodded anyway.

"I'm sorry," Corsica said. "It would change things between us in a way I don't want them to change. Just... forget about it, okay?"

"I won't mention it again," I promised. "Until you need someone to confide in. Feeling any better?"

"...Let's get back home." Corsica nodded, giving me my coat back. "Sun's rising. Don't want to travel the Day District when it's any hotter than it needs to be."

"Yeah." I slid down the crag, slipping into my coat as I did so. Corsica landed roughly behind me. "Let's go."

We set off, a slight tension having lifted between us. I felt... glad, that Corsica had trusted me with one of her own secrets.

If only I could bring myself to return the favor.

Hours passed. I slept soundly, worn out from a day of working followed by a trip to the Sky District. Somewhere, Corsica probably had a talk with Jamjars, both about her talent and about those clothes. I tried to imagine Jamjars' response. Something about the importance of being willing to debase yourself for the sake of a good disguise... Or maybe that's what I would have said. But Jamjars might have thought the same.

The next night, I had been told, I would be meeting my new co-workers properly so we could get to know each other as a team and I could be shown the ropes of everything else required for my job. Common sense told me to make a good first impression and be at my best. Get plenty of rest before, psych myself up a little, that sort of thing.

But I, being me, had decided the smart thing to do in the hours before my initiation would be to return to the Sky District and seek out that cult.

It made perfect sense, I told myself as I completed the grueling climb through the elevator shaft and marched across the rocky mountaintop, sunset still dim on the horizon. If there was ever a time to do something risky, it was right before Jamjars expected me to show up somewhere, which meant nothing could happen to me without drawing plenty of attention from the powers that be. Also, my mind was buzzing with the possibility that this Coda could maybe be a real, legit alicorn, and as much as I tried to tamp down my expectations, focusing and being productive might be difficult with them sitting unfulfilled inside me.

Dead Herman was just as lively as it had been the previous night, only now I was on my own and ponies seemed to pay a more normal amount of attention to me. A lift, Howe had told me. Find a lift up to the ruins.

I scoured the town, feeling precious minutes slipping away from me as I shadow swam through alleys and stepped lightly across roofs, searching for any telltale dangling cables that might take me where I wanted. Cables, cables... There!

What I found, tragically, wasn't a lift. What seemed to be a severed steel-fiber support cable hung down from above, the end buried in a mound of debris that ended an alley between a tiny saloon and a massage parlor. But it was a cable, and it did extend up into the ruins.

Right, then. Time to do a thing only cool ponies were able to do. I straddled the cable and began to climb.

It wasn't a very comfortable grip, the fibers rough and slippery at the same time, making it hard for me to tell when my boots had purchase and when I was about to slip, but I persevered, moving methodically and consistently. Inch by inch, I crawled my way upward, the town shrinking below me until I could see from wall to wall without moving my head. And then I reached the top.

The cable let off onto an iron crossbeam that seemed to have been twisted downward by an incredible force. I couldn't fathom what had happened to the skyport to leave it still standing, yet as disfigured as it was. It was like a pony the size of a mountain had just picked it up and... twisted it a little. That sure was an image.

I wasn't quite on top of the ruins, but rather in a network of support beams and lattices that hugged the bottom of the main metal disk. Time to search them for a way up... The far edges and the central pillar were my best bet, I decided. The latter was closer, so I moved to search that first.

A few good jumps and a lot of shadow sneaking along walls later, the cable had already vanished in the dusk. I wiped my brow and continued.

I navigated the maze for what could just as easily have been five minutes as an hour, eventually finding a maintenance catwalk that was still intact and didn't seem likely to collapse any time soon. Keeping my wits about me, I followed it towards the central pillar, which was both much more massive and substantially smaller than I had imagined at a distance: it had a thin internal core surrounded by a ring of reinforced scaffolding, letting stars occasionally shine through when seen at an angle, yet stabilizing and balancing the platform above. It also looked very climbable. Maybe I was a dummy for not heading there on the ground first.

Either way, when I was nearly to it, I found the lift. A hefty hole had been punched through several layers of metal in the ceiling nearby, four cables evenly descending through them all the way to a spot on the ground that did, indeed, resemble a lift. I glanced at the cables, sized them up, and jumped, grabbing on and hauling myself the rest of the way up.

This was exhausting, especially after climbing the stairs from the Day District. And exhilarating, doing things my own way instead of the way most ponies had to do it. I reached the top, and jumped off onto solid ground.

The room I was standing in had probably once been an atrium, several tiers of ringed mezzanine decks surrounding the bottom, central platform, with a destroyed fountain standing next to me and cracked checkerboard tiles forming the black-and-white floor. About half of the total mezzanine space had collapsed, but in the places that were still standing, I saw lights. And ponies. Barriers had been erected to convert some of the space between each balcony into private-ish cubicles, most decked out as slightly more lavish shops than their surface counterparts.

Also, there was a lift attendant stallion looking at me as though he had just seen a ghost.

I saluted, wandering away, and he didn't seem inclined to press. It was surprisingly cold up here, I realized, as if each step away from the blistering sauna in the crater brought me a full mile closer to proper wintry mountains. Good thing I was used to that.

Not that I was here to enjoy the weather, though. I had a target, and a time limit: go meet Princess Coda, and then not be late to my new job. Now where would anyone park an airship around here...?

I climbed a few mezzanine levels, and actually found an old sign pointing me through a tunnel to an old airship terminal. The tunnel itself had collapsed, but someone had thoughtfully built a bridge, and it looked sturdier than most of the blown-out skyport's original construction. Thankful, I took it.

The terminal room itself was ring-shaped, wrapping around the inner atrium, and a few of its massive steel roof arches still had glass in them - mostly the ones pointing inward, back to the center. Everything else had been blown out, and I found myself face to face with an empty, wide-open panorama of the northern view. Even at night, it was beautiful.

I stepped between rows of ruined chairs until I was at the very edge. Seen from here, the Aldenfold was much more visible, a distant monolith that rose twice as high as any mountain chain had a right to... and that was before considering that we were already on top of a mountain ridge. The moon shone against the distant mountains, and I could see the wall rising with sheer, vertical majesty, an impassable initial barrier on top of which were stacked range upon range of even bigger mountains, climbing up toward the heavens. It was beautiful. It was breathtaking. And across it was a place I wanted to go.

There was snow as well, I saw, beginning in a ring not far from the reaches of the skyport and stretching all the way around the crater. So close to that immense heat, snow... There had to be something magical causing Ironridge's temperature to flare. It wasn't just Corsica's hatred of heat, I could tell for sure from here. It was unnatural. Like the sun had fallen from the sky and melted a hole in the snow around where it fell, and the snow had never returned...

Focus, Halcyon. Find that airship! I looked left and right, and saw a hint of pink shimmering far to the right, matching both Howe's description and the airship I had spotted the night before. Excellent. Time to go.

I hugged the inner wall as I jogged, beelining as close as I could to my destination. There were supposedly alicorns across the Aldenfold, right? What was to say this one wasn't legit as well? I would be careful, of course, but not to the extent that I didn't-

There were several staircases extending from the inner wall, and I nearly ran headfirst into a pair of ponies walking out of one. One of them was Jamjars.

"Ah! Halcyon!" She brightened when she saw me. "Taking your exploration seriously, I see?"

"Err..." I hesitated. What could I say that would neither raise suspicion nor get me carted off with her on our way to work? I was fast, I could catch up...

"Friend of yours?" asked the mustachioed stallion she was accompanying, a short, orange fellow in an elaborate suit whom I guessed was in his mid-thirties.

"Indeed." Jamjars bowed. "Halcyon, I'd like you to meet Junior Karma, CEO of Cold Karma. Karma, this is Halcyon, my newest employee. Starting today, actually."

I sat back, my protest dying on my tongue. "Err, hi?"

"A pleasure." Junior Karma took and shook my hoof, even though I hadn't offered it.

Jamjars put a hoof around my shoulder and grinned. "Junior Karma's a client," she explained in a voice that suggested she was sucking up to him just as much as she was filling me in. "He's got his own wedding coming up, and we'll be doing the honors. Of course, being tantamount to the leader of the city, it's going to be quite an event, so we've been planning early."

"I... see," I said, still tracking my brain away from what I wanted and back onto what I had to do.

"This seems like an opportune moment for me to leave you to your dealings," Junior Karma said, nodding in acknowledgement and stepping away. "Jamjars, I'll see you again at the time we discussed before. Farewell."

"Byee!" Jamjars sent him off with a toothy grin.

"What are you doing in the skyport?" I asked as soon as he was gone.

Jamjars shrugged. "Conducting business, of course. And believe me, that stallion is the client of a lifetime. So, having fun in Dead Herman?"

Quietly, I let go of the idea of meeting Coda tonight. There was no way I was getting out of responsibilities I myself had sought out, and my limbs were achy enough after the gauntlet I had endured to get here that I probably would regret coming here twice in one day. "Yeah," I said. "Second time, now."

Jamjars looked proud. "Ambitious. Been out to see the snowfields yet?"

I shook my head.

"You should," Jamjars advised, nodding to the north. "During the day, of course, but I bet the reminder of home would do you good. Anyway, that ran longer than I was hoping it would. We've got to pick up the pace to get back to headquarters on time. Coming?"

Sadly, I took one last look to the east, and then nodded. "Yeah. Let's go, err... find out what being a bridesmaid-for-hire is all about."

Divine Decree

I had to hold myself back from running out into the rainstorm. This wasn't the only time Ironridge would experience inclement weather, I told myself. And when I asked, the others agreed: usually, downpours like this blew in every four to eight days. Waiting as long for a storm as this one had been was unusual, and apparently I already missed one on a night I didn't leave the Ice District.

That I was tired didn't dissuade me as much as it should have, and neither that it was almost dawn. Common sense told me to wait, but it couldn't find an effective argument to counter my curiosity, leaving me in a forced limbo as the part carried on. The most convincing thing I was able to tell myself was that if I bailed on the party now, I wouldn't be able to ask Lalala about her spirituality or unusual eyes, couldn't find out more about Saturn and Mandlebrot's opinions on batponies, and probably would make myself so tired that I'd still be worn out tomorrow when I wanted to investigate Princess Coda.

But, of course, I was too distracted by thoughts of the Night District to indulge any of those questions, and so dawn arrived and the party disbanded and I left the mansion with everyone else who didn't live there, completely unfulfilled.

For once, I was glad I had my clothes, the storm still raining in full swing. Rivulets of water ran along recesses in the cobbled stone streets, deep enough that I could see it even though it was supposed to flow through the stones and under the road. Hot rain spattered against my coat and bounced off my back, turning the usual inferno into a very pleasant, slightly cool shower. More for the others than me, since they weren't wearing anything. None of them seemed to mind a bit.

We boarded our trains, and I set off to the east, the rising sun turning the clouds from an empty orange to an empty gray - it was eerie, seeing the rising light from the city refract in the falling rain. My train was empty too, the pre-dawn rush hour long since passed, and the weather keeping ponies home to boot. Some passengers were dry, and others, like me, were soaked. I considered taking off my sodden coat to air out my fur, but the train was so humid, that would probably backfire, even as wet as I was. And even if the crowds were sparse, I was very much still in public.

Sometimes, the train sped through tunnels, and other times, it traveled outdoors, rain hammering on the roof and covering Ironridge in a misty malaise. I had a city-side window, but the view was just a great big fade-out into nothingness, all details vanishing into blue and gray.

Kind of like my own emptiness. With my imagination, I could reach out and touch that rainy landscape, painting in buildings and whatever else I could conceive of that might be there beyond the haze, just like I did for my mask. Except it was all in my head; there was a real city out there, and it was infinitely more complex than any caricatures my imagination could project against a screen.

I wondered what that said about me, both the mask and beneath it.

It had been a while since I last took off my mask, and I had a growing list of things to do when I did. Chiefly, revisiting whatever I had hidden from myself about Corsica's special talent, that kept bugging me when we talked in the Sky District. But true privacy was elusive in Ironridge, so it would have to wait.

Just like everything else, apparently. I sighed. Once, recently, my life had been a lot more dreaming and a lot less doing. Now, my dreams were suddenly all within reach at once, and I was paralyzed tripping over myself, trying to chase them all. Why couldn't these things space themselves out more? Not like I could complain about choice, but it was like being served your five favorite foods at once, and knowing you couldn't eat your fill of all of them.

Coda? Night District? Learning about batponies? Searching for a way down to the ether river? I had never learned to manage a problem like this before. All the lessons my life had taught me were about being patient and resilient. Plenty about having too little, but nothing about having too much.

My train rushed through the Ice District, deposited me at the station nearest to Jamjars' house, and roared along on its way. I saw myself home, grabbed a snack, showered for real, and slipped into my room. Corsica was already there, sleeping. Seconds later, I was too.

My cheek stung, and I was covered in snow. My legs ached, but my heart was pounding, and I could hear Nicov gloating. I was back in Icereach, brawling with the yaks, and apparently getting my butt kicked as usual.

"Huh huh. Ponies so spirited." Balthazar appeared beside me, nodding towards Corsica and Ansel, who were arguing as usual.

"I wish spirit could make up for muscle," I mumbled, finishing checking myself over and sitting up. "Any one of you can take all of us one versus three, and we've been at this for months."

"Hmm," Balthazar mused. "Yak warriors train for long time to get good. Pony Halcyon already much better than science ponies who never see sky. It like yak proverb about big fish in small pond, except hard for Halcyon to see own size because she big shark in exclusive hangout pond full of carnivorous beluga whale. Put Halcyon in big ocean, and she still scary shark."

I nodded, feeling like something was off about that metaphor, but not well-versed enough in sea life to place it. "Still..."

Balthazar frowned for a moment, and then brightened. "Ah! Yak have best idea. Halcyon just need to learn special secret technique. Then will surely be much more powerful. Come!"

I trotted eagerly after him, wondering what he had been holding back from me... both in the past and present. I didn't remember this dream, or learning any secret techniques from him that went above and beyond general combat wisdom.

Not all of my dreams were things I consciously remembered, of course. No one could perfectly recollect every minute of every day. Sometimes, I dreamed of things I remembered in hindsight, but had completely forgotten before being shown them.

We moved to a less-occupied section of the parade grounds, and Balthazar nodded for me to stop, then faced me. "This technique about keeping balance while carrying heavy load," he explained. "Halcyon want to block yak? Yak heavy. Pony cannot shoulder all of yak momentum by self. But can still move yak in direction pony want if smart. Balthazar show how to make momentum work for-"

"Boss," Darius called, the colored stripe on his shaggy bang flapping as he stomped closer. "We've got an ask from the embassy. They want a maintenance check on the anti-air crossbows, and are being pushy about it for some reason."

Balthazar gave him a funny look. "Ambassador hit head? No need for crossbows. Icereach in middle of allied airspace."

Darius shrugged. "Apparently some high-tier defense job got replaced in Infinite Glacier recently, and the new top brass want to know what they have to work with. Mind doing this now? It needs your seal of approval."

Balthazar chuckled. "Top brass have strange priorities. Huh huh. Pony Halcyon come too! See crossbows. Very interesting."

I sighed, annoyed at having been pulled away from the lesson, but internally I relaxed. Now I remembered this dream. Icereach used to have several giant wooden siege weapons mounted near the rocket silos, but for some reason they had been replaced with sleeker, metal cannons about six months after the avalanche. This was a prelude to that.

The dream fuzzed a little as time skipped by, and then we were by the silos, Balthazar and Darius looking over a bank of heavy wooden machinery angled to the northeast and protected from the south and west by a low stone wall. They were about half buried in snow, and the wood looked frozen solid.

"Hmm." Balthazar inspected them with a rumble. "Maybe good that yaks came out to check. Try to fire."

Him and Darius pulled out a giant bolt of ammunition, stuffed it into a launcher, and started to wind it up. The machine moved in cracks and lurches, each one coming with a spray of breaking ice that had built up around a joint.

"Can't aim it," Darius warned. "The turntable is buried in snow."

Balthazar nodded. Then, after two tries, he released the firing trigger.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then something cracked and something else caught at the same time, and the bolt discharged, flying only a few feet before landing in a snowdrift.

Darius punched the weapon. With another crack of ice, it discharged the rest of the way.

"Hmm!" Balthazar looked pleased. "Crossbow not explode when used. Ambassador will be pleased."

"It also didn't work," Darius pointed out.

Balthazar shrugged. "This true. Will probably need better maintenance regimen to actually work if needed. Or maybe not be made of wood and covered in snow."

"Right," Darius said. "Let's go draft a report, then get some others to help shovel this snow..."

"Huh huh," Balthazar chuckled. "Always fun to watch bureaucrat ponies read report written in yak grammar. Makes worth it to learn to write."

I followed along, disappointed. "No secret technique training, then?"

Balthazar gave me an apologetic look. "Balthazar tell Halcyon even bigger secret: yak job boring. Sit around and flex all day. When have too much to do instead, is exciting! Time like this good to relish. Soon over and can sit around and train again."

I nodded.

"In way, is like yak secret technique for stopping too much momentum from bigger foe," he went on. "If science pony throws self at problem just like problem throws self at science pony, is too much and science pony gets knocked over. But if catch problem, move problem, and stay standing up? Problem get slower and slower. And remember, is no use having problem if not enjoy solving it. What is point of fighting if not for fun?"

My dream faded away, but I didn't open my eyes quite yet. Back then, I hadn't really understood what Balthazar was talking about, but it was much more relevant today: he enjoyed periods of having too much to do. He, like me, had spent years sequestered in Icereach, doing the same things all the time. And if he were here now, in my shoes, he wouldn't be struggling to balance a million different goals of hunting Aldebaran and deterring Egdelwonk and exploring the Night District and all. He would be enjoying the fact that he had them.

Which meant... what? That if I smiled and embraced it, I'd suddenly find the capacity to do everything I wanted at once? Doubtful. Even his positive outlook hadn't let Balthazar finish my lesson that day.

Maybe it just meant my situation could be enjoyable, and I didn't have to physically change anything I was doing, just my outlook? And then I'd have a better time?

Thanks for trying, dream-Balthazar, but I needed something a little more concrete than that, like physical multitasking ability, or a way to be in two places at once. Besides, it wasn't like I could literally just make myself like something I didn't-

My train of thought trailed off. Actually, that was exactly how I worked.

I stared at nothing, feeling a little hollow. I didn't have to be in this situation of being frustrated by my limitations at all, because I could just become someone who enjoyed being in that situation. And it was smart, too. I had this ability, so why not use it to become the happiest version of myself, the version best suited to my environment? Something in me pushed back against the idea, and it wasn't logic. Logic was trying to talk me into it.

But... I remembered the me from several years ago, before the avalanche, when Ansel and Corsica had been an item and I had been a third wheel. I made myself like that, too. I put up with the uneven ground and the teasing and complaining and cold shoulders for so long, and now, I felt like I was staring that version of myself in the eyes. Empty eyes. That wasn't me anymore. I didn't want to go back. I felt like if I did, I'd lose something. Something small and delicate that had grown up precariously sheltered from a storm of nothing...

I grabbed my blankets and sat up, shaking. What was I thinking? Where were these thoughts coming from? I looked around for my bedroom, for my posters and piano and nightstand and all the things I had collected to ground myself in what made me me. But that room was countless miles away. I was in Jamjars' house, sharing a spare bedroom with Corsica, who was still sleeping across from me. I squeezed my eyes shut and reached out a hoof, reaching for something solid to grab onto, reaching for me, like I was going to blow away-

Halcyon's mask came off.

She sighed, holding it in her forehooves. Physically. A hoof-sized chunk of emerald crystal, cradled in front of her, polished yet uncut and shimmering with a light that didn't glow.

Corsica was still asleep, and Halcyon trained her ears on her to make absolutely sure she'd know if that was about to change. A constellation of stars glowed in the distance around her, just like always, although these were concentrated much more below than above. Most of them in the direction of the Ironridge crater. The closest one was on Corsica's flank.

"Don't worry too much about what defines you," Halcyon whispered to the mask. "That's for you to decide. It's your privilege. Your right. Because you exist. Because I made you. And you don't need me anymore to make changes. You can do it on your own, just like a real pony. You're already much more real than I am. Speaking of, go find a real god to rely on. One who also exists, unlike me. You deserve better than Nothing."

She lifted the mask to her face and put it-

-back on.

I felt electrified and completely lucid. The foggy, doubtful thoughts were completely gone. I held up my hooves - crimson, like blood - and they were empty. A small part of my brain realized I couldn't remember what they had looked like when my mask was off. Only that they were holding the mask.

Or, perhaps more accurately, holding me.

I got up in a trance, and wandered the house, preparing for my work shift. All throughout it, I thought about what made me me. Only the tables were turned; the me on the surface was suddenly real. The idea that my mask was an act? Now just a fading illusion.

The mask was real. Something tangible, more than just an idea to be entertained. I had seen it with my own eyes. Or... the eyes of whoever else used this body before me, and still controlled it when I wasn't around. Whose memories I apparently shared, because I could remember parts of having the mask off, when they let me.

I wondered how long ago the mask - I - had been made. Had it happened in an instant, or was it a gradual process? During the Aldebaran incident, was I still me? What about my research into the chapel? Becoming friends with Corsica? What about the avalanche? Even if I could trust my memories, exactly when I had started to think of myself in terms of a pony wearing a mask was lost in a haze.

But thinking about becoming the version of me from before the avalanche... That's what started all this. That's what made the emptiness feel so much closer, what made my mask fall off just now.

I stared hollowly. I had just celebrated my nineteenth birthday party, and I might realistically be two and a half years old.

Ansel literally died during the avalanche, and was now a different person, a changeling or something similar. Corsica barely knew me at all from before that, beyond my face. Mother didn't interact with me all that much. I knew I had changed a huge amount during that time, but I had never considered that, like my brother, I might actually be a different pony.

My thoughts drifted to the chapel, and to the light spirit. That holy power... I couldn't even begin to guess how a batpony who didn't want to be herself anymore - perhaps one who had just lost her world to an avalanche - could literally create someone else to become. But what if she had asked the light spirit, on that darkest day when she went down to pray, the day before Corsica awoke?

What if... I was drawn to the chapel, and the light spirit, and the ether river, because it was the means and moment of my creation? My memories of my time with the light spirit were hazy, the way they got when old me was hiding something behind the mask. If that something was her asking the light spirit to make her someone different, someone who wouldn't have to live with her feelings...

Everything made beautiful, perfect, terrible sense. I knew who I was. I knew where I had came from, and why. I knew why I always cared so much about this. It was a flawless explanation.

I should have felt terrified, and I did. Not everyone can see their entire life in such perfect clarity, know the true purpose for their existence and creation. And yet, I also felt an immense and unquenchable hope: now that I knew these answers, I could rest my hooves on a solid foundation. I knew that I really did have reign to do whatever I wanted and be whoever I wanted, that there was nothing lurking beneath that didn't want me here. Nameless fears that I could never justify, quantify or explain boiled away like mist in the sun. I was free.

...And with my freedom, I was bumping Princess Coda to the top of my priority list. Maybe now I knew why I was fascinated with the idea of divinity - because I was literally made that way instead of born from a mortal womb - but it didn't change that this fascination was a part of who I was. I knew that. And I was going to follow it.

"Hey, Jamjars?" I asked, sharing a seat with her on the train on our way to work, unable to sate my eagerness with patience alone.

"Hmm?" Jamjars looked up, deep in thought but quickly putting those thoughts on hold. "What's up?"

I tongued the inside of my mouth, picking the question I figured I was most likely to get an informed answer on. "Do you know anyone called Howe?"

"Ah!" Jamjars brightened. "As a matter of fact, he's one of my oldest business partners, though we haven't worked together for at least a decade. Fat pegasus, impressive mane, that's the one you're thinking of?"

I nodded. "I ran into him in the Sky District the other night, and he mentioned knowing you."

Jamjars sighed wistfully. "Those were the days. He helped put me on the map. A good stallion, if hard to understand at times. His verbal ticks are endearing, but 'my darkness was darker than yours' gets a little dense at times..."

"How credible is he?" I asked, tilting my head.

"Exactly as credible as whoever's paying him," Jamjars said. "Of course, he has an affinity for shady employers, so usually not very much. He's a propaganda artist, so you can imagine some types of clientele are much more lucrative than others..."

Internally, I sighed. That probably meant this Princess Coda was a fake. But still... "You said you worked with him, though, right?"

Jamjars chuckled. "You think I made it big in the city by refusing advantages when I saw them?"

I looked away, still resolving to at least go up there and take a look.

"As a good and responsible caretaker, I probably ought to chastise you for associating with him at all, to be honest," Jamjars went on, leaning closer and lowering her voice just a little. "But you're an adult and I more or less got you foisted on me and I certainly wouldn't mind seeing someone like you follow in my hoofsteps, so who am I to complain? More power to you. And between you and me, Howe can be very credible when he wants to be."

My ears flicked. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"He's also a professional informant," Jamjars whispered. "Working with every seedy organization he can get his hooves on gives him a pretty good picture of the underworld. Keep that on the down-low though. He's been doing it long enough that it's started to become an open secret in certain circles, but there are still plenty who don't know."

I squinted. Never mind why Jamjars was telling me sensitive information like this, that didn't add up in the first place. "So bad guys know he might be a spy who would out them to anyone who pays well enough? How's he still alive? I've only met one group of criminals, and they didn't mess around."

Jamjars shrugged. "Because anyone who knows that also knows who he works for, and she's scary enough to keep everyone more or less in line."

"Really? Who?" I let my voice rise a little.

Jamjars kicked me. "Enough about that on public transit. That mare one seat over and back just finished her conversation, and I don't want to chance us being in a whisper's earshot."

I started, looking around and realizing there was, in fact, a mare who wasn't talking to anyone right where Jamjars had indicated. How did she know that? How was she that aware?

Part of me wondered if she was cheating with unicorn magic, but that was a quitter's explanation. I wanted to be able to passively measure a crowd to tell who in it might be able to overhear a quiet conversation. Quietly, I bumped Jamjars up on the list of mares I wanted to be like.

Smile and wave. That was my job for three weddings back to back, that and throwing rice at ponies, and I did it admirably because I had a reason to smile. I looked at the celebrating guests, at the stallions with slicked-back hair and the mares with frilly gowns, chattering and eating appetizers and soaking in the party. Did they know what it was like to feel this way? Certainly, they were happy, and I somehow felt that happiness more than last time, like a sixth sense had been unblocked that let me touch the happiness in the air. It was more real. Or maybe I had always been able to read it, but my ideas of what was real and what was an act were suddenly rearranged.

The newlyweds, in particular, I realized, maybe did feel the way I did. There was an air of embraced purpose around them, of a weighty decision and satisfaction with their answer. Of stately revelry, excitement, and peace.

Between the ceremonies we worked quickly, not even doffing our dresses to save time, replacing drink-stained tablecloths and sweeping up rice from the floor and roll-out carpets. The catering company Jamjars brought in managed their own affairs with the grace of a well-maintained machine, refreshing the food from the shadows. Everything was good.

"You're in high spirits," Thumper remarked between the second and third ceremonies, and we shoved together against a portable wall, making an opening for the catering crew to take some of their empty food carts away.

"Got a good sleep last night," I replied, which was more or less true.

We finished the final ceremony, the last guest departed, and Jamjars gathered everyone around as the catering crew took their leave. "Three more happy couples," she sang, pulling several jingly bags out of her mane and chucking one at each of us. "Good work, everyone. Here's your payday. Let's get anything that'll stain into the wash, and leave the rest of the cleanup for tomorrow. Our next booking isn't for four days, so there'll be a day off in there, too. Enjoy!"

I caught my bag nimbly, checking inside and finding it full of Ironridge coins. Not like I needed a pick-me-up right now, but was I going to complain?

Although... I looked sideways at Jamjars. "You keep money in your mane?"

Jamjars shrugged and bounced her poofy locks. "It's practical. Plenty of space. And who's got room for pockets on a dress this slim and stately?" She turned, showing off her figure.

I blinked harder, confusion successfully overtaking my good mood. "You don't need pockets. You've got a horn. Why not just carry the money out to us?"

Now it was Jamjars' turn to give a funny look. "And keep it floating around during the entire wedding?"

"No," I tried to explain, "you keep it in the back. Right?" I pointed to our work area behind the fake walls.

"And just leave it sitting around for anyone to take?" Jamjars chuckled and turned toward the empty food tables, lighting her horn and getting to work. "Oh, you."

"Wait, you had that in your mane for the whole day?" I blinked even harder.

Thumper thumped me on the back. "Welcome to the Jam Clan. This is how we roll."

I shook my head and got to work as well, digesting this bizarre and fascinating new information. Under a certain insane logic, it was actually a pretty safe place to hide things, I supposed, provided you were crazy enough to do it. But never again would I be able to see Jamjars' mane and not wonder what other secrets it concealed.

We finished our work. My dress was packed away, my coat and boots back on where they belonged, though I hadn't yet ruined my perfect mane styling and reclaimed my usual scruffy mess. I was feeling pretty tonight, and between the style and my coat, I probably looked really important.

The storm was gone, but the streets were wet. I looked up at the sky, traces and wisps of cloud lit from below by the bright city lights. The stars were hard to see, but the moon was visible. I judged I had an hour and a half, maybe two hours before Coda's ship set sail, assuming they left at the same time every night and that was them I had seen taking off when I was there with Corsica.

I could make it if I ran, right? And I could run up a mountain for two hours after working all night and running myself to the bone the night before, right? I stretched my legs. They felt really good, just like the rest of me. I was still riding the emotional high.

Time to pay Coda a visit, then. Worst case, I got there too late and gave myself some really good exercise.

I bolted to the nearest station, slipping onto a train just as it was leaving. Rush hour was in full swing, and the train was packed, so I hid in a puddle of shadow, wishing my ears would stand up straight so I could more easily poke them out and listen to the world. I counted off stops, watched as the crowd of ponies ebbed and flowed, and eventually got off two stops early. This one was underground and had an elevator, and since the roads were a lattice of switchbacks, I'd make up any horizontal distance while gaining height, too.

The elevator topped out, and I set off on hoof, the city wet and humid around me. It was like breathing a cloud, the air so saturated that stormwater couldn't evaporate even though it was hot, and I willed my mane and tail to stay together and not fall apart from the conditions. At every intersection, I went up and east, my eyes searching out the platform in the distance that marked the entrance to the Sky District. My legs worked hard to make the climb, but they didn't quite burn, even though I was going at a full gallop. It was like I had a cushion behind and beneath me, buoying me and pushing me along.

It was just being in shape and having a positive attitude, I knew. And yet the superstitious side of my brain kicked on and insisted this was real magic, that a goddess was helping me along because I wanted to meet her.

As I reached the platform and started the long climb up the broken lift tunnel, I forcibly slowed my thoughts and tried to check my expectations. What I was really here for was to sate my curiosity and meet a group who was handing out free money in exchange for prayers of adoration to a probably-fake goddess. A group that reeked of fraud, hailed from the Griffon Empire, and because of that just might possibly have ties to another group of ex-empire fraudster pirates I had a vendetta against. The odds that it was actually a legitimate goddess were a million to one, and even if it was, the odds that it was the same power as the light spirit - the one that really mattered - were essentially zero. I couldn't think up any explanation for how that might be the case, no matter how implausible.

Breathe, Halcyon. Focus on what you're getting yourself into and have a plan. Once you've found them, what next?

Well... Jamjars had clout. If I learned something about where Aldebaran was, I might be able to ask her to do something. Something more than I already knew, at least. I remembered meeting the Composer on my first night here, before I even set hoof in Jamjars' house. We both knew each other were in Ironridge, and roughly where: the Composer had been following Lilith. That meant I probably didn't have any element of surprise to lose by blindly stumbling into something. And if the Composer was on the team of one of Jamjars' rivals, anything I found up here probably wouldn't change how safe I was from my affiliation with her.

And if it did, I always had a nuclear option, a get-out-of-jail-free card: Egdelwonk had given me an employment contract stating he got to me first, that would become valid when and exactly when I wanted it to be. Not like I remotely liked or trusted him, but I was all but certain he could beat Aldebaran in a political fight. And he had made a point of telling me Ironridge's moonlighting laws only applied to multiple jobs inside Cold Karma, as if he knew I'd wind up working for Jamjars' wedding agency and wanted me to know that wouldn't get in the way. And he already had Corsica and was stalking me, so it wasn't like I could be rid of him by not taking the contract. The point was, if anyone tried to get an angle on me I didn't like, it was on the table.

I huffed, climbing, my breath running short as the stairs flew by, no amount of conditioning and high-altitude breath training quite able to surmount a challenge like this. Now I was thinking like... I didn't know, but I was thinking differently. Focusing on how I could use other ponies to get me out of my problems, instead of how I could solve them myself.

My life had just gotten so much clearer, so much more confident. There should be something I could do for myself, too, beyond playing smart with bargains and tactics. I was cool enough to run up a mountain. I was cool enough to... well, maybe not be a real pony, but be a whole lot more real than I had always thought of myself as before! Surely there was something I could do...

I stopped for breath and doubled over, panting. My bracelet gleamed at me in the dark.

You know...

Experimentally, I turned it on, and then a little higher. A thin line of green flame flickered along its width. I pushed it slightly more, and the flame spread to my body, suffusing me in a wandering, undulating, ethereal glow. The fire didn't char my clothes, and it didn't curl my fur, but it did cause me to steam intensely for a moment, all the water that had soaked into me burning and evaporating away.

I blinked, checking my reflection in a puddle formed by some stuck debris. My mane styling had survived, intact.

This bracelet... I held my leg up, studying it. Mother told me I would know long before pushing myself to a point where it hurt me. But how could I trust that when I couldn't trust what I knew? That was how I felt before. And using it still felt bad somehow, like I was embracing something that wasn't meant to be embraced, as if it fed on my confusion and turned all possibilities into their worst forms. I imagined myself using it, and I imagined myself burning, because that could happen, and the unknown was scary.

Both scary and wonderful, though, because things lurking in the unknown could be good or bad. Likely, there were many of both. That was why I both loved and feared it, exploring as a scientist and pondering as an adventurer and daydreaming of that distant horizon.

I knew, logically, that this rush I was feeling couldn't last. Something bad would catch up with me, bring my life back into it usual balance of things I was running toward and things I was running away from. Things I couldn't explain or couldn't deal with would start poking holes in my perfect new understanding of who I was and where I came from. But those hadn't happened yet.

So, maybe, while my emotions were still in harmony and I had the privacy of this tunnel, while I wasn't afraid, I should see what I could do so that I would know when I needed to.

My bracelet was already burning, the fire already running up and down my body. I thought about it... and then I let it go out.

This bracelet had definitely been with me since before the avalanche. And it had never hurt me since then, not counting the time I let it go out while it was protecting me from a storm. My fear of it, my worry about what it could do, belonged to the old Halcyon. The pony beneath the mask.

I could show her there was nothing to be afraid of, maybe. Of course, her fear might be founded and I might be wrong, but Mother said otherwise and I trusted her judgement. But...

No. I would respect the old Halcyon's fear, and not push the bracelet just because I could. Maybe if I needed it, but everything she was had been wiped away to create the blank, empty potential that I had been inscribed on in turn. Standing there, looking at the bracelet, I felt sorry for her. For the pony who couldn't live with losing her friends, and made way for me, instead.

I wasn't going to fear the bracelet myself. But honoring the nightmares of my forebearer, the fears I had grown up in and only just started to cast off after the Aldebaran incident, was the respectful thing to do. And even if she wanted to disappear into the quiet and dark, this was a part of her I could hold onto.

After all my struggles to understand who I was, to choose what I wanted to be and then to become it, to prove that I existed, it didn't feel right to just let her fade into nothing.

I grinned a little, feeling like I had made the right choice, and kept climbing.

This time, I was smart and took the lift. It helped, knowing where to look for it. The lift attendant looked like a chatty fellow who was more there out of habit than compensation, but I suspected my dignified appearance had him cowed into submission. Probably just as well. I was almost there, and was psyching myself up for either disappointment when I was too late, or a world of possibilities if I was on time.

I rose into the skyport, retracing my steps towards the outer airship dock where Jamjars had caught me the night before. A glimmer of pink shone in the distance through a broken window, a hint that my quarry hadn't yet left for the night. As fast as I could without getting weird looks, I began to run.

Finally, I approached a boarding ramp that was in better condition than most of the others, an airship clearly visible behind it. Like the Aldebaran, it had an unusual design with a set of wire hoops hanging above it in place of a dirigible, but where the other ship had a storm cloud, this one had a burning, blazing comet of magical energy, violet-pink fire that crackled with black lightning and faded to black around the edges. Clearly a different power source, but I would put all my new wages on the underlying technology being similar.

Two bizarre ponies guarded the boarding ramp; at first I took them for batponies with unicorn horns. But on second glance, their wings were fake, and on third, the leafy bunches on their ears probably were too. Good fakes, but fakes all the same. Odds were, they also had fake fangs and slitted contact lenses, just like I could use to turn my eyes normal for a change.

"Hello," I said, carrying myself with a refined gate and adopting a voice that was important, but not presumptuous.

"Welcome!" one unicorn said with a bow.

"The Lady Coda bids you welcome," the other added, kneeling in respect. "Have you come to offer a prayer of love and admiration?"

Play it cool, Halcyon. "I heard there was money involved."

The first unicorn straightened up - I guessed she was around thirty, and the latter a stallion of fifty. "The Lady Coda does solicit the population's love and respect, but only so she can pay it back a hundredfold," she said. "Material wealth in exchange for your love is a small price to pay for the utopia to come."

Something about this felt... off. And not 'I'm about to get robbed' off. Aldebaran had operated smoothly, earned my trust and admiration, and then conned me. And after the fact, Ansel had made a big point of calling them amateurs for losing our trust at all when the con was in progress. Aside from the costumes, these ponies looked and sounded respectable, but it was almost as if they were desperate. Like they couldn't afford to run a long con to get what they wanted, and had to offer money straight up to attract anyone. Or, maybe, like they were attempting a hustle without knowing how those worked.

I studied them, and got the impression I was dealing with ponies who were out of their league.

Now, a true master con pony could create that impression deliberately to try to fool folks who had seen this before like me, but I couldn't fathom what they would gain from that when set up in a town where literally anyone could wander by. Why not just prey on the ponies who would fall for it and let the smart ones get away?

...Maybe that was what they were doing. Maybe a setup like this raked in whatever they were angling for without needing professionals at the helm. Or, maybe, these were legitimate believers and not con ponies at all.

"I'm interested," I said, nodding slightly. "How does this work?"

The unicorns both bowed, pointing me down the ramp. "Come right on board," the mare beckoned. "Our ship is open to all. Someone will guide you to an altar, where you can make your prayer and be compensated."

I stepped past them, a wary surrealness settling over me. This was something I had never done before. If push came to shove, I had no idea what I'd be up against and what I'd do about it. But apparently they were angling for civilians in general, here, so if this was a trap designed for ordinary folk... Well, I was far from ordinary.

The ramp entered the ship through a door in the side, depositing me in a room that looked more like a festival than a trap. Colored lights and decorations were everywhere, along with a snack table and plenty of ponies, unicorns dressed like batponies outnumbering ordinary citizens about two to one. This room stretched across the ship from side to side, a panoramic window taking up the opposite wall. To my left, towards the prow, a row of doors lined the wall. To my right, along the other wall, a line of tall, fancy booths had been set up, pleated velvet curtains covering their entrances. Two looked occupied, telltale rumps and tails brushing against the insides of the curtains.

Several chairs, potted plants and a posh rug decorated the room, and from the amiable chatter taking place all around, it felt more like I was in a social club than the seat of a trap. I relaxed a little, and after seeing several ponies grab things from the snack table, I took a cheese cube and several cookies for myself. Not a proper meal, but I was quite hungry after the climb.

"Greetings," a solemn stallion said to me, yet another unicorn dressed like a batpony. He had droopy eyes and big robes, and looked more like a serious, elderly pontiff than a changeling mercenary revolutionary. "Is this your first time visiting Izvaldi?"

I nodded.

The stallion smiled an old, welcoming smile. "The altars to Lady Coda are in those booths," he said, pointing to the row I had observed earlier. "Offer your love, and she will bless you with the wealth you desire. Of course, true faith asks nothing in return, but the ponies of the world are jaded after looking out for themselves for so long. So, think of these riches less as compensation for your love, and more an apology for our extended absence from a land in need."

I nodded again. "Okay."

He bowed. "This ship is a home to all faithful. Please, enjoy your time here."

And then he wandered away. Curiously, I checked a few of the doors to the left first, some instinct telling me to finish my exploration before doing anything that might steal my attention for a while. Some were closed, but one was slightly ajar. Inside, I spotted Howe getting a shoulder massage from another dressed-up unicorn.

I blinked. He noticed me and winked back. "The Howenator gets paid like a king, baby!"

Okay, then. Actually, that might feel kind of good, if it didn't involve letting someone else touch my body. Even with my clothes on, I wasn't the most touchy-feely. And I imagined any good masseuse wouldn't want to work on me through a thick coat. And that was assuming I trusted them in the first place.

Glancing around once more as I wandered toward the booths, I noticed a distinct demographic trend among the clergy: almost all of them were old. Anywhere between fifty and eighty seemed the norm. I only saw one who looked as young as the mare at the entrance, and she was already older than Jamjars.

That was interesting. Usually, I'd expect young up-and-comers to be running a con.

Uncertainly, I entered a booth, the curtain swishing closed behind me. Inside, with just enough room for me to stand before it, was an altar shaped like a graceful, life-sized pegasus mare. Carved of simple stone, she sat on her haunches, forelegs reaching toward me and wings spread, head tilted back and mouth open in song. She was featureless, and yet very pretty.

I leaned in for a closer inspection. Her mouth was hollow, a dark tube receding into the wall. Probably meant to carry my voice, and there was someone on the other end listening? Or maybe that was where the money came out. Additionally, the carved stone was slightly rough, and here and there I found a hair of fur stuck to it, all different colors.

Was... this statue meant to be embraced? Was that the reason for its pose? If I hung myself in its arms, my mouth would be right next to its. A perfect position for my voice to carry.

That was weird. More like something the newlyweds at Jamjars' weddings would do than a goddess and her subservient. Although Coda was supposedly a princess of love...

Well, my kind of love was better. I wouldn't hug the statue, but I had come all the way out here. So, I summoned my thoughts, my feelings, my hopes, and just in case this wasn't a con and was actually real, I stood and addressed the statue face to face.

"Hey," I whispered, loud enough that I hoped it could hear. "I spent... a long time looking for who I wanted to be. And, I think I've still got a lot longer to go. I have ponies I look up to, ponies I want to be like, ponies who trust themselves to be themselves and aren't ashamed of it. And for the longest time, I wanted to be like those ponies because I didn't feel like I was anything, myself. I hadn't formed yet, I guess. I still don't know if I know what all these words mean, I'm just saying them. The point is, I'm searching for who I am, and who I want to be. Recently, I've started to feel like that's really possible, instead of a distant daydream. But, what kept me going all that time, was an idea I had that even if I couldn't understand myself, didn't know why I was afraid of the things I was or what I could do with my future... Even if I didn't know that, I felt like there might be someone bigger than me out there who could see all my problems and their answers, and I wouldn't have to understand anything because they'd make sure it would be alright. I think, now, I'm growing, and maybe I'll be alright on my own now. But whether you exist or not, whether you're real or not, belief in something like you is what propped me up long enough to get this far. And, basically, I owe you one. It probably wasn't you, but maybe you're like that to other ponies. So, thank you. Even if you're a fraud, it's still a lie that can get ponies where they're going. But, between you and me, I believe there's at least something out there. And I might even say I know it for a fact."

That was it. I had said my piece.

I wasn't sure if anyone had heard it. Maybe someone had, but it was just a con pony who wanted... I dunno, for me to stroke their ego badly enough to pay me for it. But even so, I had at least said it for myself. Finally, I could put a name to so many unidentifiable feelings and desires I had struggled to understand during my days in Icereach: searching for a higher power was a way to believe that my questions had answers.

Now, I could believe that on my own. But for everything they might have done in creating me, and for everything my belief in them had done to keep me steady, I still felt like I owed one to the powers that-

A hoof reached through the curtain and tapped me on the shoulder.

I jumped, startled, and spun around, opening it. Right, money-

"Excuse me, madam." A unicorn cleric bowed. "The Lady Coda has been touched by your prayer. She extends you an invitation to meet with her in person."

I blinked. What if this was real? "Right now?"

"Please." The cleric bowed again. "If you would follow me..."

I wandered after her in a daze. I didn't dare speculate. I just walked.

We stepped through a door adjacent to the altar booths, and into a wide, dim hallway, a bigger curtain separating me from the room beyond. Waiting for me were Howe and two other clerics.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, focusing on the pegasus.

He stretched. "You know, I ask myself that a lot these days. But this time, the answer's crystal clear: Coda's got herself a whole lot of epithets, and she thinks the Howenator does a better job belting them out than any of these geezers here. You ready for the introduction? This is an earful."

I swallowed and nodded.

"Proudly presenting..." Howe bowed toward the curtains. "Her most royal and high ladyship, goddess of love, scion of Izvaldi, last immortal of the east, daughter of empires, child of miracles, keeper of the seven oaths, lady of the pink flame, she who is without peer or equal, wise and magnificent, benevolent goddess, only alicorn of the north, final note in the song of destruction, her mother began it and she shall stop it, champion of the people, sailor of the four continents, beloved monarch, steward of the holy throne, raised by the pink maiden, collector of epithets, not a piano though it's a common mistake, undefeated in combat, trouncer of evil, basher of corruption, she who smites injustice and spiders because they're gross-"

He took a huge breath. "Averter of ruin, three cheers for her for she is good, hunter of sphinxes, first of her name and second to nobody, three inches shy of being able to ride the roller coaster in Goldoa because she's short for her age, shame on those heathens who run it, no wait that's not a good title, actually keep it because more titles are good, devourer of sandwiches but only when they have no crust, crosser of Varsidel without getting robbed by pirates which is harder than it sounds, shredder of guitars, none have wooed her but many have tried, smarter than that Chauncey guy but pretty too, captain of Verdandi, the one and only alicorn princess of love, Coda!"

Howe bowed so hard that his head was under a foreleg, striking a dramatic pose. The lights flashed, and the curtain swept aside.

Beyond was a room that was lit in purple around the edges, but dim in the center, wide and likely taking up the stern of the ship. In the center, against the back, was a contraption - a throne, actually - that sent my head spinning.

First, someone had taken a pipe organ, king of all instruments, and tipped it on its back. Instead of pipes that opened in whistles, however, its pipes snaked out and became metal tubes, ribbed and looking vaguely organic, that piled over each other and crawled up a wall and along the ceiling, until they traced down and disappeared into another wall. With a start, I realized they were likely hooked up to the altar statues I had just been praying to.

Second, someone had built a statue atop the organ. Or more likely attached one there, because it was a statue I had seen before: the alicorn statues hidden away in the mountain hideout, near Ludwig's room and the Nemestasis machine whose function I had never learned.

At least, this had once been one of those statues. But the rock had been snapped at all of its joints, and put back together using bolted metal braces, making it hold a different pose. This statue was reclining, one feathered wing spread over the organ's vertical keyboard, as if it was going to play. The gem in its necklace, instead of being empty, glowed with a pink-black fire, and a spiky crown had been wedged into its head, above its eyes.

The statue held the throne itself, protecting it with its chin and shoulder, and on that throne lounged a filly with a violet-pink coat and a black mane with sharp pink highlights. She looked around twelve or thirteen, except was an inch or two larger in all proportions, not like she was deformed or had a growth spurt but just like she was big. On her forehead was a long, sharp horn, and at her sides were wings more full-fledged than most adults. She watched me with intense curiosity.

"Lady Coda." The clerics bowed, and Howe struck a pose. "The devotee you asked after."

"I see." Coda looked me over, her voice sharp and clear as a bell. Then she got up, spread her wings, and swooped, making a show of doing several flips on her way down to the ground. Her horn lit, her aura pink with a black outline, and it briefly scanned me. "Yes, this is indeed the one. Fascinating." She regarded me. "I am Coda, though you likely gathered that from the introduction. What did you think of my epithets? I penned them myself."

I blinked. "They were impressive," I said on autopilot.

She waved a full-sized wing at her attendants and Howe. "Leave us. I desire private discourse with this mare."

They bowed and retreated, leaving me alone with an alicorn.

She had been deliberate about showing off her flight and magic. Very deliberate. Go figure that as soon as I decided it would be fine if this goddess was a hoax, she would turn out to be real.

Trust Issues

"You, mystery mare, have aroused my curiosity," Coda said, pacing in a circle in the dimly-lit room. "Speak! From wither do you hail? And what kind of creature are you, anyway?"

"What?" I blinked, turning to watch her. "I'm from Ironridge. Or do you mean before that? And don't you think it's a little obvious?" I rustled my wings.

"Intriguing. Very intriguing," Coda stopped to muse. "I hear the rude mendacities of the common folk can be quite a sound to behold when they are not dragged into shape by the presence of a goddess, yet you make no pretense of decorum at all despite my royal stature! I knew I was right to summon you here. Think, boor! Tell me you understand the gravity of your situation, and address me so lovelessly only in jest!"

I usually considered myself a reasonably eloquent pony, or at least capable of being one when the situation demanded it, but the large filly's verbosity left me at a complete loss for words. "You what?"

Coda rubbed her chin and stared at me. "No bowing, no platitudes... Quite the consternation. Your reactions are impossible to parse! Creature, I shall ask plainly: do I frighten you?"

"No," I said, starting to wonder if this was really a goddess despite the obvious trappings of her body. "But it's a little hard to follow when you talk like that. Think you could tone it down a tad?"

"Hah! Hahaha! You ask of me an accommodation for your slow, mortal thoughts?" Coda's eyes widened eagerly. "Any true lackey of mine wouldn't dare attempt such a thing. Creature, I find your lack of sophistry surprisingly engaging. Is this the way of the common folk, who live their lives unaware of the grand order of which I am at the top?"

I wracked my brain, trying to figure out what was going on here and how I should respond. "Err, yeah. I'm pretty sure anyone would react like I am?"

Coda watched me with intense curiosity. "You say this for truth? Hmm. I long suspected there were more in the world than adoring believers and despots ripe for smashing. You are not a despot, right? Not a purveyor of hatred and tyranny, here to be redeemed by the power of love?"

"No way," I insisted, starting to feel a little more confident this alicorn child didn't hold any ill will toward me, but not at all confident she wouldn't do anything else. "I'm just a normal pony. I came up here because I was kind of hoping you were real."

Coda chuckled. "Ha! False on both counts. Though I suppose I can't blame you for not knowing you can't fool a goddess. After all, it's clear you've never met one."

I frowned. I certainly had met the light spirit, and unless the pony under my mask was holding back a lot from me, it had been nothing like this. "What do you mean, false? I know why I'm here!"

At least, I hoped I did.

Coda gave an airy, exasperated sigh. "Surely you at least know what I do all day of every day, right?" She pointed an oversized wing at her moderately disturbing throne. "Sit here, listen to and collect prayers from the faithful to bolster my holy power? Love and I are no strangers, and whatever was in your prayer was clearly not love. Whine and deny it, I'm an authority. Although, I will admit I find it strangely refreshing not to be loved and admired for a change, so whatever you're doing, keep it up! The Lady of the Pink Flame grants you her permission!"

I raised an eyebrow. "And you think I'm not a pony because...?"

"Because my magic turns up its nose at you," Coda primly explained. "Your prayer reached me as if through a blanket, and refused to become one with my power. Such was my curiosity that I was compelled to summon you here. And indeed, with you shorn from the presence of my altars, what little insight I possessed into your emotions has vanished without a trace!" She flickered a light along her horn, as if sniffing the air with her magic. "So great is my power that I can read the surface emotions of every pony and being on this ship, and detect the lives of those at quite a distance further. Except for you. You simply feel like..." Her aura touched me again. "Nothing."

My heartbeat sped up. Nothing? I had just learned there was a real, physical component to my mask, my emptiness, my state of mind. Was she saying she could feel that, too?

"But behold," she lamented, pushing back her mane with a wing. "That spark of surprise in your eyes. The sound of a light gasp, inaudible to all but the most divine senses. I doubt you are any mere aberration or ghost. And even were that to be so, you seem to react as though you possess emotions. Tell me, creature: what are you feeling right now? Be truthful!"

I glanced at her, hesitated, and decided to let her have it. "I'm really suspicious of you and a little weirded out. I'm disappointed because you aren't as much like the real thing as I hoped, but I'm also surprised and worried by what you can do. What of it?"

And then I sat down. I had just mouthed off to a goddess. Time to accept my fate, whatever unpredictable curveball it might be.

"Disappointed?" Coda gave me an incredulous look. "You? In me? Explain yourself, churl!"

I glanced at the door, knowing when I said it that exasperated honesty probably wasn't the best idea and regretting it now. "Look, like... You know..."

"I know many things," Coda said. "More than most anyone on my ship, pity be unto their intellects. However, the one thing I in fact do not know is what you are talking about. Or do I need to repeat myself about being unable to sense your emotions? Even next to my altars, you were muted and dim. Now explain yourself. With your mouth. Your benevolent, mind-reading goddess of love is shockingly unable to do the work for you, and it makes her very upset."

"You mean like a normal pony?" I shot back, unable to quite keep my nerves in check. "Because most ponies can only use their words to communicate. That's kind of how this works."

Coda frowned, sifting through my words.

"You get all that?" I tilted my head.

"This is most disorienting," Coda said in a perfectly neutral tone. "I can't predict what you're going to say."

"You do that for other ponies?" I tilted my head.

"At first, I took your odd blatherings to be mere chaotic emissions from a specter shaped like a sarosian," Coda told me. "But I'm starting to suspect there's a reason to them, one I cannot grasp." She looked straight at me. "You vex me, creature."

I nodded. "Likewise."

Coda laughed. "This is quite engaging! Consider your goddess enamored by your company, which I might add is no mean feat. Most of my subjects require only a mere trifle of focus to appease, forcing me to liven up our conversations on my own. But you demand actual effort to commune with. Tell me, creature: do your desires go beyond your goddess's blessing, a mere nod of the head and acknowledgement of your presence?"

"I don't even know why I'm here," I answered, feeling surreal from all the filly's mood swings. "Should I?"

"Fascinating." Coda sat back. "What kind of place is it, inside your head? Do you like it there? The workings seem far more complex than my followers, but perhaps that is simply a daydream, after I've bored myself so much picking over them and their goals. After all, you, I cannot know. For all I am aware, the inner sanctums of your consciousness could be just as lively a place as my own!"

"Inside my head?" I blinked. "I, err, like it. I mean, I spend a lot of time there, with both the good and the bad." I tilted my head. "You... really need to ask about that?"

Coda giggled. "This is most exciting... Of course I need to ask. Weren't you listening? I've never needed to ask before because I can read others' feelings. You're different. I can't read you." She hesitated. "You needed to ask because you forgot, because you were thinking about other things."

I nodded. "Yeah, that's... one way of putting it... Have you legitimately had no equine interaction ever?"

Coda shrugged and sighed. "If you mean dallied among the commonfolk, I have not. My calling, heavily upon my shoulders does it weigh, is too important. Unless, of course, you know how I might carry my throne with me so I can-" She glared at the door. "What?"

A monk in lengthy robes was peering in. He bowed his head. "Princess, please do not forget and neglect your prayers. The altars have been used several times since-"

Coda rolled her eyes and lit her horn, a pink-black telekinetic field gently lifting him and carrying him back outside. "Saving the world truly waits for no creature, be they a magnificent goddess or an eldritch anomaly..." She spread her wings, flapping back onto her throne and lounging. The spiky crown on the statue's head seemed to sparkle a little when she landed, and so did her special talent - a perfect image of said crown. Not all that unlike mine, except hers was right-side-up. Probably because my talent was imitating other ponies, and hers was being a goddess - the thing ponies were supposed to imitate.

She sighed, something nebulous and magical happening between her and the throne. "Speak and it shall come to pass," she lamented. "See what I mean? The trappings of my duty are here, and here they shall stay, barring the appearance of someone inequinely good at carrying giant thrones."

"Do they keep you chained to that thing?" I frowned, stepping closer, suddenly worried.

"Stay back!" Coda warned, sitting atop her throne. "The divine energies contained within this relic graduated beyond a mere mortal's abilities many years ago. A single errant touch from a hoof, and it could rend your very soul in twain, severing your life instantly."

I recoiled sharply.

"Of course, I could probably put you back together again," Coda went on, "so don't worry overmuch. I still doubt it would be a pleasant experience. And who knows? Perhaps the shroud that separates you from me would inure you to its touch."

I sat back, deciding not to risk it, and breathed a little easier - if she was warning me about danger, that probably definitely meant she wasn't considering anything nefarious towards me. Maybe. I still wasn't sure how this filly worked, but I was starting to get a picture of someone very sheltered and perhaps being conditioned to live in a way that wasn't in their best interest.

This kid may or may not be a goddess, very likely had access to magic I didn't, and also may or may not need my help.

"What are you doing up there?" I asked instead.

Coda shrugged. "Absorbing the prayers of the faithful and adding them to my power. My throne is connected to the altars and acts as a charging pedestal of sorts. Wish by wish, prayer by prayer, the purifying love of my subjects is added to my own, that I might use it to save the world from dire need."

I squinted. "Really?"

"To tell the truth, it is quite a laborious process," Coda admitted. "But I am not one to shirk divine destiny. The power of love is what must be used, and so shall I use it."

"Use it for what?" I pressed.

"To save the world," Coda said, as though it were obvious. "My prayers request it frequently. Are you telling me you think your world is not one in need of saving?"

I had no idea how to respond.

"Oh dear," Coda sighed. "I've said something that doesn't compute. I suppose it was too much to assume your mind was as wide and complex as-"

"I'm thinking!" I snapped. "Saving the world's kind of abstract and vague, don't you think? Like, what part of the world? Do you mean stopping all of existence from turning to dust, or do you mean stopping ponies from being ruled by someone evil? Averting a war? Preventing some natural disaster, like an earthquake or meteor? Sure, we've got societal divisions and stuff that I'm one of the least-knowledgeable ponies around on because I'm pretty new to Ironridge. Does fixing those count as saving the world? If you're being literal about the power of love, seems like that one would be pretty relevant. But does it count as saving the world if you're actually just fixing a problem in Ironridge? To some ponies here, Ironridge might as well be the whole world, but how much is anyone living in Varsidel gonna care?"

Coda looked as though I had clubbed her with a book.

"Well?" I tilted my head.

"The... thoughts you espouse are quite complex," Coda sighed, folding her ears. "Tell me, do you know other mortals who understand the distinctions between these things?"

I blinked. "Not sure who actually talks about it, but I'm pretty sure everyone I know knows that."

"Now that's mysterious." Coda drummed her feathers along the rim of her throne. "Hmmm..."

I didn't need to be an emotion-reading alicorn to tell she was troubled. "Are you alright, there?"

"I am debating whether and how much to trust you," Coda said. "It is quite a conundrum, because unlike others, I cannot simply read your intentions." She looked at me quizzically. "Mortals like you cannot read the emotions of your contemporaries, correct? Tell me, how do you determine conclusively whether or not someone is worthy of trust?"

"We don't." I shrugged. "Best we can do is guess."

"I smell deceit." Coda narrowed her eyes. "Do you mean to keep your goddess in the dark? How could society function in such a way?"

"With a whole lot of risks," I told her. "I once got kidnapped by changelings because I thought they were someone I could trust, and-" I blinked, realizing the way she was looking at me. "What?"

"Kidnapped by changelings..." Coda whispered under her breath.

I felt my heartbeat increase again. "You know something about them?"

"No," Coda instructed, though it felt more like no I don't want to talk about it than no I don't know. "Tell me more of how you decide whom to trust."

"Well, I..." I fumbled slightly, realizing I was trying to explain a basic equine concept like trust to a child who had never needed to understand it, and also whom I would probably benefit from having trust me. This was a situation where, if I was a bad pony, I could play things considerably to my advantage.

I swallowed. "I'm maybe not the best pony to ask. See, I don't really trust... anyone. I trust some ponies, I mean, but like... you don't just trust someone or not trust them. You can trust someone partway, and decide it's okay for them to know some things, but not others. And if someone proves trustworthy by not breaking your trust with the small stuff, you can trust them with bigger stuff. And sometimes you just have to take a risk, and even if you read someone perfectly, ponies change with time, so someone might go from trustworthy to untrustworthy or vice versa. And different ponies will be more or less trustworthy depending on who they're dealing with. Like, there might be someone who's normally pretty trustworthy, but wouldn't be trustworthy to me if they don't like batponies. It's complicated, yeah?"

Coda had clearly been given a lot to chew on. "Your mind is more storied than I thought."

I nodded. "I bet only looking at the surface makes it hard to slow down and get to know ponies, but a lot of us are like that. Bottom line, though, trust is something you just have to choose to give."

Coda looked at me. "Do you trust me?"

"It's not a yes or no question," I said with a shrug. "I trust you not to shoot lasers at me or send me straight to the afterlife, which I really wasn't sure if I should do when I first got here. I trusted you with my prayer at your statue, though I still figured by then you might be a fake. Do I trust you with my important secrets, the stuff that keeps me up at night? No."

"So what you're saying is..." Coda mulled over her words. "I should trust you with some things, but not others. What happens if I'm wrong?"

"Could be anything," I apologized. "Once you trust someone, you have no control over what happens if they break it. That's why I'm not usually very trusting. Sorry if I'm the wrong pony to learn this from. But, you realize, by asking me this stuff you're already trusting the answers I'm giving you."

Coda looked disturbed.

"Hey, err..." I hesitated. "When you've absorbed enough prayers, or something, come down off that throne. You can better interact with ponies when you're standing on the same level."

Coda kicked off her throne, not even bothering to wait or finish what she was doing. "If you were in my position," she said, staring levelly at me, "would you trust a shrouded enigma like yourself?"

"I don't know enough about your position to say," I answered. "And you realize that both yes and no are things an untrustworthy pony would say."

Coda frowned. "I suppose I could command you pray to my altars again. Naught but a trace of emotion pierced your veil that time, but a trace is far more than zero. But that trace spoke nothing I recognized about your true intentions, and I doubt anything would change now... Hmm. I think I shall do as you suggested, and give you a portion of my trust. With some things, but not others."

She said that... but when she looked at me, it was like she was searching for approval, for a teacher to tell her she had made the right decision.

I nodded, and she brightened.

Not too long ago, there had been a time when I - or, the pony under my mask - had been terrified of authority, of making choices with consequences. And somehow, now, here I was with a goddess, and entirely against my hopes and advice she had decided I was a moral authority she should learn from.

The lingering dregs of that fear rebelled, and I carefully suppressed a shudder. Whatever I could do with a responsibility like this... It was a good thing I considered myself a good pony, but I really hoped I didn't mess anything up. The one task weightier than being a god had to be trying to teach one.

"Excellent," Coda said, her wings rustling in excitement. "Now I suppose I must invent trials for you to prove your worth. Something..." She hesitated, then tilted her head. "Creature, do you even desire my trust? I would think the answer obvious, but you are rapidly demonstrating that no assumption should be a given."

I shrugged. "Being friends beats being enemies, but I'm not gonna put myself in danger if the alternative is just leaving each other alone. And my name's not Creature. It's Halcyon."

"Ah! So you do have a moniker." Coda instantly looked thoughtful, and then took a deep breath. "Well met, Halcyon the garbed, lady of the veil, impenetrable be her emotions, may all her enemies stumble into holes, warden of trust, she who could resist the pink flame!"

"What?" I tilted my head.

"Your epithets." Coda shrugged. "Creating these is a hobby of mine, and I decided your name was too plain without them. Do try to remember them, though I shall see them penned in ink 'ere long to spare us the trials of forgetfulness. Say..." She pursed her lips. "Do mortal minds require entertainment and stimulation as well? It seems a logical conclusion, but my clergy are quite a dour and serious bunch, and my faithful come here with minds only for love."

"Yeah, we do stuff for fun." I shrugged, at this point completely used to answering questions that should be basic sense. "Reading books, going for walks, listening to music, hanging out with your friends..."

Coda listened along. "Ah, to be unburdened by the trappings of destiny. I have heard friendship involves a mutual exchange of love among equals. Would that I could someday fulfill my duty and partake in it myself. Although even once I no longer need my love, finding a contemporary goddess surely cannot be easy..." She rubbed her chin. "Say, you wouldn't happen to be a goddess, would you?"

I blinked. "I... really don't think so?"

Coda sighed. "A pity. Inscrutable as you are, you could almost pretend to be one and I could do nothing to refute it. In fact, I like you, so I think I shall pretend you are regardless. It would certainly be an explanation for how you defy my powers so. Princess Halcyon the Garbed... Yes, I hereby amend thy list of titles! Congratulations!"

I wasn't sure what to say.

"Besides." Coda shrugged. "You did not say you know yourself for certain not to be a goddess, which means there exists a possibility in which I am right. But on to more salient things. I desire for you to have a reason to desire my trust. Please, ask of me a boon that could only be granted by a goddess of considerable power."

"Like, as a free favor?" I tilted my head. "Or would this put me in your debt somehow?"

Coda chuckled gracefully. "Debt? How barbaric. A true goddess attains fealty through the love and admiration of her subjects, not by forcing their hooves. Nay, it is a simple matter: once you have earned my trust, I have an important favor I would ask of you. Of course, no favors to a goddess shall go uncompensated. So speak, Halcyon! What wishes inhabit your soul that would be most compelling to see fulfilled?"

Well, that was hard. Not because I had too few goals, but because I had too many of them... What was something I wanted recently, yet wasn't just a thing I could acquire by wandering around and exploring?

Private space. Yes, that was it. I nodded. "How about a house?"

Coda looked like she had just swallowed a fish. "A house? The Holy Princess of Love offers you your heart's desire, and a meager house is the extent of your imagination? The desires of the common folk must be substantially out of touch with reality..."

Not the response I was expecting, but in hindsight, not too surprising, either. "You're saying no because that's too small?" I pressed. "Like, what's your idea of a good reward?"

"Behold," Coda instructed, lighting her horn. "And move aside a bit. I shall show you the true extent of my power."

I moved, realizing a rectangle on the floor where I had been standing was suddenly glowing. Coda's aura flared... and a section of the floor lifted away as she pried open a well-concealed trapdoor.

She set it aside, and motioned for me to look. I did.

Down below, in the ship's hold, was a veritable ocean of gold. Coins, goblets, candle holders, treasure chests full of coins floating in deeper piles of coins, crowns, necklaces, gem-encrusted jewelry, swords made of gold, golden horseshoes, golden body armor, all sorts of things that had no business being made of gold and yet were.

I couldn't tell how deep it was, but at no point could I see the floor. I couldn't see any walls, and upon gripping the edge and lowering my head all the way in, it ran across the entire base of the ship, all lit by a pink haze from Coda's horn. The amount of gold on display roughly matched my expectations for the royal treasury of a cross-continental empire. It was probably more money than was contained in the entire rest of Ironridge put together... Physical money, at least. Banking and economics weren't my strong suit.

The sheer quantity of money on display left me gobsmacked. And, while one side of my brain was on vacation, the analytical side decided to step in.

"How does your ship fly with all that?" I got up, staring at Coda in disbelief. "And how does the hull not fall off?"

Coda shrugged. "The ship is powered by my throne, which is a link to my own power, and not even a force such as gravity can oppose the power of love. I suppose the hull must be good old-fashioned engineering." She gave me an appraising look. "Now that you have witnessed the ordinary, real-world, financial power of a goddess, which is not to say I possess a shortage of mystical powers either, are you quite sure you would be motivated by something as paltry as a house?"

I hesitated... and suddenly remembered one of my first goals, one I had immediately written off as very long-term. "How about an airship?"

Coda's eyes lit up in interest. "An airship... Now you're thinking. Small, crewable by one, built for range and speed over cargo capacity, I take it? Or perhaps something bigger? Either way, that could make quite the enticing reward..."

"Now hold up," I protested. "Just so we're clear, you're not trying to hire me for a bogus gig with promises that are too good to be true, right? Because I've had that happen before. Maybe you're trying to flex your wealth, maybe you really could buy one, but trust runs both ways."

"Indeed." Coda nodded. "That is why before making any offers, I must test whether I can trust you."

"Hold on," I warned. "That's not what I said. I've got a bad history with being offered jobs that sound too good to be true. Tell me why I should trust you."

Coda blinked. "How do I...? I..." Her eyes narrowed in realization. "I need to take opportunities to build your trust in me."

She looked at me, once again, for approval.

"Yeah, that's..." This didn't feel like Aldebaran at all. This, if anything, felt like I was Leitmotif and Coda was a seven-months-younger me. "That's how it's done."

"Hah." Coda replaced the floor cover, hiding the gold away. "So then, Princess Halcyon. How can Princess Coda, scion of Izvaldi, averter of ruin, smarter than that Chauncey guy but pretty too, demonstrate to you her worthiness of trust?"

"Well..." What was I supposed to say? This was the part I explicitly didn't know. No one could demonstrate they were worthy of my trust because that wasn't just something I gave. Not when I was trusting them to do a thing like not pull an Aldebaran on me when offering something of ridiculously high value as compensation for work. The best thing I could do was stall. "How about, for now, we just settle for meeting again soon? Not ask for anything big or make any promises right now. Be patient. That sort of stuff. You know?"

Coda puffed out her chest. "I am a paragon of patience! Wait, paragon of... Aha! I must remember to add that to the official epithet register... Yes, this is good. I, likewise, shall trust you to return in about...?" She tilted her head. "As an immortal, my perception of time is likely far different from the common folk. What say you, Princess Halcyon?"

"I dunno." I shrugged. "A day, two days, a week? Sometime within the next week. I've kind of got a real job, and I don't always know when I'll be able to make a trip up the mountain." Jamjars had given us our upcoming work schedule, I recalled, but couldn't remember it off the top of my head.

"So I have occasionally heard." Coda nodded along. "The world of the commonfolk must be a fascinating place. For my part, may I trouble you to bring me a book next you visit? One you would not mind leaving with me. My clergy pen their own literature for my consumption and enjoyment, but I am quite curious to see how the trappings of your world compare."

"Yeah." I nodded. "I can do that. So let's just forget about airships and jobs and whatever, and I'll come visit again in the next few days?"

Coda's eyes sparkled. "I should enjoy that very much. In the meantime, take this as a small and unconditional gift." She lit her horn and floated several gold coins towards me. "This should go a long way towards your house, should you still want one in lieu of your airship. You did leave a prayer, after all, even if it was not one I could make use of."

I took the coins. "Err, thanks?"

"It is my pleasure." Coda bowed. "Moreover, meeting someone I could not predict has been one of the most interesting things to happen around here in quite a long time. Receiving prayers and saving the world is..." She narrowed her eyes, glanced around, and drew close to my ear. "Frequently boring beyond measure. Refrain from passing this secret along to the ears of my clergy, would you? I must present a strong and noble countenance for their continued inspiration. It will be our little secret. With which I am trusting you. Haha!"

I chuckled too. "How long have you been doing this, anyway?"

Coda bowed. "I am nineteen years of age, though I am told I bear the physique of a filly not half that. This is because, as a goddess, I age differently than mortals. A body as powerful as mine takes longer to mature, so I likely am much more of a child than a mortal equally old. Not that I would know, with how infrequently I am visited by the younger generations... But do not let this worry you. I am prepared for my destiny. Your world will be safe under my loving wings."

I frowned. She hadn't answered what I asked, but in a way, maybe she had. "So... your whole life has been spent on this airship, then?"

"Not always this one," Coda told me. "But other ships, indeed. If you wish to partake of my history, however, perhaps we might discuss it on your next visit? The hour grows late, and I should not like to be hurried in hearing your thoughts upon my tale."

Right. I had caught her late in the night, not long before they usually took off to fly who knew where... "Where do you go when you're not at the skyport, by the way?" I asked.

"We circle the city," Coda explained, walking with me toward the exit. "There, I use my holy power to scan and measure the land. It is an important duty pertaining to our search-" Her eyes widened. "Ah, but I should not yet speak freely on these things. My apologies, Princess Halcyon."

A search, huh?

We entered the main room, which had less activity than earlier in the night, but still several city ponies lounging about and chatting with the clerics.

"May the evening lovingly greet you, O faithful followers," Coda said, raising her voice and addressing the room. "Your love and devotion stirs the very echelons of my soul with its commitment to peace. Alas, the time has come, as it always does, that we must depart 'ere the setting moon. Your princess bids you go with love, and return again to mark the moonrise come tomorrow."

Everyone began to murmur, shuffle and leave, with many throwing out deep bows and honorifics to the alicorn on their way out. I watched them, not needing alicorn princess magic to read the feelings on display. Many of these ponies, the ones who had stayed here until the night's close, looked at her like the proprietor of an estate. Their thanks was a mix of obligatory, ceremonial, and taking her for granted. They didn't dislike her, or hold anything against her. They weren't particularly afraid of her. There was no love or legitimate admiration, either. Just a kind of respect reserved for a deliberately negligent authority figure that allowed patrons to bend the rules. They looked at her like she was a pony who was capable of taking away their fun, yet didn't. And that was the wary, watery extent of their gratitude.

Coda, however, appeared to be drinking it up. "Ah, the adoring populace," she whispered into my backwards ear. "I still suspect them to be quite a bit more shallow than the possibilities you present, but only the most devoted remain until the finale."

"Princess." Two robed ponies bowed to her as the last guests departed. "Did your meeting go according to your will?"

Coda glanced at me. "No," she said with a knowing smile. "It did not. I actually found it most engaging. This is Princess Halcyon the Garbed, and you are to afford her the same respect as me in all manner of things, except as regards to privileged information. I am still deciding how much to trust her."

The two clerics gave me a worried look. Apparently, they were perfectly aware of how that sounded.

I shrugged. "I just... visited and talked with her?"

"I see," one said. "Regardless, we are taking off for the day. Unless Her Holiness desires you to remain with us for the coming day, you should take your leave."

"She possesses wings," Coda pointed out, giving him a weird look. "I am most certain the Princess Halcyon can depart whenever and at whatever time she chooses. She needs neither invitation nor permission to leave."

I gave her a look. Hadn't she just been saying it was a good time for me to go? Besides, it wasn't like I could just-

Slyly, at an angle the clerics couldn't see, Coda winked at me.

Oh, I saw how this was. Turning up my chin, without another word, I marched right between the clerics and out onto the boarding ramp. Without turning back or looking, I could practically feel the clerics' stupefaction, and swore I heard Coda suppress a snicker.

Those clergy might have been Coda's loyal followers, but they were probably still the closest thing in her life to authority figures. She just wanted someone to play with, in a way that would get on their nerves.

"Hey there, little dudette!"

Howe's voice stopped me as I was leaving the boarding ramp and beginning the journey home. My ears flicked; I noticed him near a bank of worn-away chairs where the rest of Coda's guests had congregated.

I glanced at him. "Eh?"

He got up, wandering towards me and leaving the others. "How'd your time go with her majestic ladyship? Brighten up that kid's life a little?"

I tilted my head and lowered my voice. "You think being treated like that is a little depressing, too?"

Howe shrugged. "What, a bunch of strangerinos stroking your ego in exchange for cash? Yeah, the Howenator's worked for a lot of dudes, and anyone who needs folks doing that has big issues."

"Doesn't feel like she thinks she needs it," I admitted, not entirely sure why I was being candid with him but a little more trusting after he turned out not to have led me into a trap. "She sounded like she thinks she has to."

"Mmm." Howe nodded, walking a little further away from the group - they were loud enough that I imagined we had full privacy. "The Howenator had a feeling you'd be the type of pony to notice a thing like that. Thinkin' it's good he sent you."

I frowned. "You pitched that place to me because you wanted me to meet her?"

"Ol' Howe was curious how you'd react," he said, noncommittal. "Didn't expect you two to be hanging out after one go, but what does he know?"

"Yeah," I agreed. "What do you know?"

"Say what now?" Howe looked at me sideways.

I remembered Jamjars telling me this stallion was an informant - one of the most knowledgeable ponies about illicit activities in Ironridge. "Give it to me straight," I whispered. "You're smarter than you look, I can tell. The way you're talking... Do you know something's up with that group, and did you try to get me involved for any reason other than me being a random pony on the street?"

"Those are complicated questions for a simple public speaker for hire, babydoll," Howe said, rustling his wings. "But ol' Howe does like looking out for the ponies he runs into who look like they need it. He ain't saying he's one for complicated contingencies and the like, but if you think you and that kid could be good for each other? Hey, maybe that's all that matters."

I squinted at him.

"Word to the wise, by the way..." He lowered his voice and glanced conspiratorially around. "She give you any money?"

Uncertainly, I nodded, then pulled out the hoofful of gold coins and showed him.

"Nice." Howe nodded appreciatively. "Enough for a drink or a sandwich! Most of their hoard is griffon gold, see. Kind of shabby exchange rate. Not worth nearly as much as she thinks it is. Just, like, know before you try to pay with it and get caught unawares, yeah? Take it to a money changer, or best, find someone who can melt it down and cast it into art, then sell it at a pawn shop. Got a friend who runs a real good one, if you need recommendations. Much more money that way! It pays to stretch your coins."

I blinked. "Huh. Thanks."

"Just tellin' it like it is because I like you, kid," Howe said, sauntering away. "Have a good one!"

Adventure Calls

The night after I visited Coda, work was scheduled to be light. All we had to do was clean up after the previous day's ceremonies, which according to Jamjars was likely to only be half a workday. So, anticipating some free time later in the night, I got up early and took the train to Eaststone Mall before work began. If I was to make good on my promise to return, I had some shopping to do.

As I hoped, they had a bookstore. A big one. And I suddenly found myself faced with a problem I hadn't anticipated, but probably should have seen coming: I had zero knowledge of the literature of the outside world.

Anything written within the last twenty years? I was probably clueless. Anything fiction? I was likely starting from square one. Sure, the Icereach library had some pleasure reading, but this store was so big even the entire library would have only filled a small wing, and most of it had been academic. The odds of me actually finding something I recognized here, even with helpful signs that explained the store's organization, were very slim.

That was how I came to be slumped on a stool, wearing my coat and leaning against a bookshelf, a small mountain of new reading material in front of me, poring through blurbs and story hooks on the insides of cover leaflets, trying to only read that much and not get sucked in.

"Rrrgh," I whined, holding a promising-looking time travel adventure about a protagonist caught in a time loop. Pleasure reading, back in Icreach, had been a very enjoyable way for my young mind to pass the time, at least until I ran out of new things to read five or six years ago. Now, I was remembering why I ran out, the books pulling at my eyes like magnets. I could almost feel my emptiness again, as if something inside me was physically hungry for the information and experiences these books contained.

I wanted to indulge. I would have to indulge, if I was actually going to recommend something to Coda without being blind. The bookstore wanted me to indulge, with its warm amber lighting and exotic carpets, purple with red diamonds. Glass chandeliers hung from above, and the rustling of paper surrounded me. The woody scent of new books tickled at me, a smell I had rarely smelled before. If I looked over my shoulder, I knew I would see a young colt tucked up in a corner, reading - he had been there when I got here, and never budged except to turn the pages.

And I was also an adult, who had work in less than an hour.

With a mighty force of will, I culled my collection, returning some of them to the shelves. It felt like I was throwing away a treasure I had just remembered existed. But, telling myself over and over that I already had enough goals competing for my time without spending hours on end reading, I was able to get it down to a number of tomes that could generously be described as holdable by a single pony all at the same time.

I looked forlornly at what remained. I had a day off tomorrow, and another half day after that. Barring any sudden and new opportunities, I would spend today and tomorrow reading like the wind. Two days from now, I'd surely have something for the alicorn.

Checking out was simple, and fortunately came with bags, but unfortunately set me back most of my first paycheck. Books were expensive! I hefted the bulging tote bags on my way out, wondering over and over whether I should have put more of them back. Then again, counting my interview, I had only worked for two days.

"Yo! That's a lotta cargo!" Thumper called as I entered the warehouse.

I set my bags near the entrance, looking around. "Went shopping before work," I explained. "Sorry if I'm a little late..."

It looked like I was more than a little late, from the state of the room. Everything already looked partly taken down.

"Nah, don't worry about it." Thumper waved a hoof. "Saturn got here early. Cleanup days, we don't keep too tight a schedule as long as everyone puts in their fair share. You're actually the third one here."

As if on cue, Lalala appeared in the door behind me. "Hello, everyone," she greeted with a light bow. "Have I missed much?"

"It's been quiet," Saturn explained, walking out from behind a fake wall with a bundle of fabric in her aura, probably drapes that had been attached to the rafters. "Washing isn't done yet, if you want to take that. No bad spills this time around."

Lalala nodded.

"Hey!" Thumper barked. "You wanna take Halcyon while you're at it, show her how to wash these? It's as good a time to learn the ropes as any!"

Lalala glanced at me. I shrugged. "Sure."

Together, we gathered all the table linens, which amounted to quite a lot, and stuffed them in large, durable bags. "These cloths aren't as delicate as they look," Lalala explained, bundling the fabric in roughly, crumbs and sticky patches and all. "You can machine wash them, but we don't have a company washer, so we have to use a washing service in town. I'll show you how it works."

"Don't have a company washer?" I tilted my head. "Why not just take them home and use one of your own?"

Lalala chuckled. "Why would any of us have one?"

I lifted a corner of my coat. "For your clothes?"

Lalala gestured at her - and everyone else's - complete lack of clothes. Save for Thumper, who was wearing a boater hat. But that probably didn't go in a washer.

"Oh." I blinked in realization.

"I suppose clothes are more common in Icereach?" she guessed as we piled more linens into the bags.

"Yeah," I explained. "Most everyone never goes outside, but compared to here, it's pretty cold inside, too. Guess I didn't realize..."

Even now that I could logically acknowledge it, it still didn't make sense. Icereach was supposed to be a backwards, isolated little corner of the world. Why would we have technology as household appliances that was a rarity everywhere else? I would have expected-

"It must be something else, coming from a cutting-edge research colony to see how everyone else lives," Lalala remarked.

Oh. Right. As far as everyone here was concerned, Icereach was supposed to be more advanced. For a moment, I debated telling her the truth, that my hometown was a wasteland full of patents and extended deadlines and not actually the rocket-producing paradise it had raised me to believe. But then I stopped to consider that maybe, despite that, it still was a paragon of technology to the outside world.

Then I thought of the trains, and the Ice District, and the massive scale on which Ironridge society was built to operate, and I doubted it again. Did I? I really, really wasn't sure.

"It's interesting," I answered. "Honestly, I prefer it here. So open, so much more to do. Even if the weather's far from my comfort zone..."

I wasn't entirely sure how much to talk about Icereach. Before, when I lived there, there wasn't much to talk about because everyone around me knew what it was like, too. Now, memories of it were suddenly mine and unique to me, at least among my present company. At the same time, they felt like they belonged to a previous Halcyon, a me who was still somewhere between mask and the pony beneath it, who hadn't yet fully come into her own. Thinking about it gave me that same sense of reliving someone else's memories that I got a year ago when remembering the times before the avalanche.

But, Lalala was curious and she knew a whole lot that I was curious about, so during our long hike to the laundromat I rooted around for details that weren't too personal and wouldn't shatter whatever impressive mental image she had of my home - at least, not too badly - and spilled them all out as they came.

"...never actually figured out the chemical composition of ether," I was in the middle of explaining as we finally approached our destination. "Our best guess is it's either a unique element, or something completely different that's a particle and not a particle at the same time, like light. It's got liquid and solid states, but transitioning between them has nothing to do with temperature. You can chemically bond it with other things to form molecules, and we know a whole lot about its chemical properties, but they don't fit anywhere you'd expect to find something based on the periodic table and valence electrons and... Hey, is this it?"

"Yes. We're here," Lalala said, stopping us outside an open-air entrance in the Day District that was brightly decorated with images of suds, bubbles and hats floating in water. "Sorry to put you on hold, but we'll have plenty of time to continue while we wait for them to be done."

We stepped inside. "We're just gonna wait around?"

Lalala shrugged. "That's how it's usually done. We don't have enough time to go anywhere substantial, and it's self-serve so we have to turn them over to the driers ourselves. There's a cafe on the second floor with a lounge for waiting."

"A cafe?" I left home early today to hit up the bookstore, and breakfast was a long way in the past... "Sure, I'm down."

We loaded the linens - they took up five whole washers, so I presumed Jamjars' company was footing the bill. A proprietor nodded appreciatively at Lalala, and they chatted for a brief moment. I gathered we were a reliable source of business.

Posters and advertisements covered the walls so heavily that they overlapped with each other, creating a beautiful chaos of fine-print colors that was currently offering several ponies something to do as they waited for their own wash. Noise echoed from a doorless entry in the wall; I peeked through and saw an arcade. There was also a short hallway, and up it, a staircase.

That was where Lalala ushered me. Up top was an airy room that opened out to a balcony and view of the Night District, with a smattering of small square tables sized for two to four and a bistro covering one wall. I bought a sandwich and settled down by the railing.

"So, hey," I said once we were both seated, the thrum of machinery percolating up from below. "I've been talking a bunch. Mind if I ask you some stuff, too?"

Lalala shrugged, her expression neutral, but in a relaxed way. "You may."

"Your whole flower staff thing," I said. "At the weddings. You're like, a spiritual advisor? How's that work, exactly?"

"The world can be a lonely place at times," Lalala explained, not quite making eye contact. "Matrimony is about celebrating the bonds between ponies. But two ponies can be together, and yet still alone. Does this make sense to you?"

I tilted my head. "Like, they share the same house, but don't really know each other?"

"The opposite," Lalala said. "Imagine a pair that treat each other like two halves of the same whole, but that whole is alone in the same way a single pony might be."

"Like a binary star," I guessed. "It's technically two that orbit each other, but behaves like one in the bigger scheme of things. And they're still out in the middle of nowhere, just like all other stars."

Lalala hesitated. "I'm... not an astronomer, but you sound like you have the gist of it."

I nodded for her to go on.

"Ponies will always have some distance between them, no matter how close they are," Lalala continued. "It's just the way we are. And that can be bleak or reassuring depending on who you are and what you want in life. But what I believe is that the space between us isn't empty. That's where I see the Aegis."

"The what?" I perked up.

"The Aegis," Lalala explained. "The creator god. Not many are familiar..."

"Hold up." I frowned. "I dig that you know who's out there, and I wanna hear all about it. But what do you mean they exist in the space between ponies? You mean, like, conceptually?"

Lalala gently chuckled. "A god cannot be physically confined to a world of their creation. They exist outside it. We can only reach them through concepts and ideas."

"What about Garsheeva?" I pressed, frowning. "And alicorns?"

Lalala shook her head. "Anything that exists as part of this world is bound by its rules. Garsheeva was physical. Alicorns, if they exist, are too. They can't be all-powerful. Many would still call them gods, but they aren't enough for me. The Aegis is greater."

"Are you sure about that?" I narrowed my eyes. "I was just talking about ether, remember? It's physical matter, but also not, and it breaks a ton of rules and we can't explain why. Even if you've got, like, extradimensional powers that can't fit in the scope of the universe, I'm sure someone that strong could find a way to exist inside the world and outside it at the same time. And if not, why not just create the world a little differently so it works in a way that you can?"

Lalala looked briefly at a loss. "I... don't know the answers to any of those things. We can't fathom the mind of the Aegis. Why is there evil in the world? Where do ponies go when they die? For me, belief is about accepting the holes in my understanding and focusing on what I do understand, which is that the Aegis connects us. My role is to keep knowledge alive, and to help ponies on their days of bonding to feel that connection, that they may be drawn even closer."

I tilted my head. "Keep the knowledge alive? You mean this isn't common knowledge out here? Icereach is kinda insular and only believes in science."

"No, it isn't common knowledge at all." Lalala shook her head. "History becomes incredibly scarce throughout the ages, and disappears entirely about two thousand years ago, in the epoch when Garsheeva came into being. Perhaps Garsheeva used her influence to stamp out things that used to be known, or perhaps it was her influence that allowed history to begin being recorded in a form that could be passed down. Ask any other pony in Ironridge, and I can all but guarantee they haven't heard of the Aegis."

"Then how do you know?"

"Silverwind," Lalala said. "I grew up there. It's something of a no mare's land today, but it has an incredible amount of archaeological history. My parents worked providing amenities at the school where a lot of the more recent expeditions were based out of, and where their finds were brought back to be analyzed. I learned of the Aegis from tablets and translated writings that could be as much as five to seven thousand years old."

Wait a minute. Ancient, almost-unknown divinity rediscovered through evidence from an archaeological dig? My eyes lit up. Now we were talking. "So if they're from that long ago, how do you know they didn't physically exist?" I pressed, suddenly eager.

"Simple," Lalala said. "If they did have a physical form, they would be active and visible today. Can you look around and tell me this is not a world in need of a god?"

I looked around, and honestly, I wasn't sure I saw her point. Aside from the oppressive heat, the ponies around me seemed to be enjoying peaceful, ordinary lives. I wanted to meet divinity, sure, but I had some very unique reasons for that involving probably being physically created by a light spirit and later saved by a series of coincidences so spectacular that providence was the only explanation I could accept.

What I did remember, however, was Coda asking me exactly the same thing.

"I dunno," I eventually answered, deciding to dodge the question. "But if they don't exist, what does it matter if the world does need one?"

"I believe the Aegis does exist," Lalala said calmly with a shake of her head. "Just not in a physical form. To interact with them first requires that you believe."

My jaw hinged a little. "So, like, you're saying they only exist to people who care about them? But if the world needs saving, it would be from ponies who don't care about them. Assuming this Aegis is a good guy. So how's that work?"

Lalala closed her eyes. "It's a matter of faith and feeling, not knowledge and empiricism. I can tell you're a very rational pony, and I can't give you the physical evidence you're asking for. I can't give anyone that, actually. That's why my job is to reassure ponies that their union is witnessed and proper in the eyes of something higher than them. Words are what I have."

I looked away. That was what I wanted, wasn't it? I was plenty physically capable and could accomplish most anything I set my mind to, usually. The idea of being completely and totally known by someone I could completely and totally trust, that's how I most often thought of what I wanted when it came to the divine. Admittedly, it was a hard thing to think about, and I wasn't the best at putting words to some of my deepest desires, but that's part of why I settled on this explanation - I couldn't explain myself at my core, so I wanted someone who could do it for me. Which was a paradox, because my core was an empty, blank slate, vacated by a different pony to make room for me. But still.

So, if this was exactly what I wanted, why did Lalala's words sound so unsatisfying?

Lalala stood up. "While you think, I need to go check on the wash. I'll be right back."

When she got back, I hadn't really come to any conclusions I didn't hold before. My long-term goals hadn't changed. If I got an airship, maybe Silverwind would be worth a visit - it was far to the northwest, the corner of the world beyond Varsidel and Yakyakistan's border. But more likely, I would just head to Equestria. I didn't know if Lalala knew about that, but it wouldn't supremely surprise me if the reason this Aegis was nowhere to be seen was that it was south of the mountains, instead.

I tried to start a conversation again, but for some reason, my words fell flat and I couldn't pull off anything meaningful. I felt like I was only half-present, all my thoughts tied up in hopes and dreams and divinities and the alicorn I had met just a night ago. Eventually, I sighed. Maybe she wouldn't mind if I started reading a-

"Thank you for not asking about my eyes, by the way," Lalala remarked. "It's not something I mind talking about. Better for ponies to know than for it to be stigmatized. But the reactions of most strangers do get tiring after a while."

Wait, what? I tilted my head, looking again at her eyes - one yellow, the other orange. "I figured it was just a fashion statement," I said. Actually, I had no idea, but this was a safe, innocuous assumption. "A colored contact, or something."

"Oh?" She looked surprised. "Um, yes. That's..." She hesitated. "You don't know what multicolored eyes mean?"

Suddenly curious, I shook my head.

"It's the sign of moon glass," she said. "You know what that is?"

Moon glass. I had heard that name before, but where? I squinted, tugging on my memories. Something to do with Icereach, with Elise...

And then it clicked: that was what Elise called her 'changeling detector', a black glassy stone she told me could have all sorts of effects that no savvy traveler would ever willingly touch without knowing exactly what kind it was. Ponies sometimes used it as a drug, it came from a meteor... That was about all I remembered, but it was enough.

"I've heard of it," I nodded. "But, err, hold on. You just thanked me for not asking about it, and now you want to talk about it?"

Lalala leaned closer, looking slightly concerned. "Do you know what moon glass looks like, and what can happen if a sarosian like yourself touches it?"

"I've seen it once," I admitted. "And I heard it can kill us? Don't worry, I'm not planning on looking for any."

Lalala sighed in relief. "That's what I wanted to know. And yes, you've heard correctly. Moon glass is..." She hesitated. "Once it's been depleted, it can kill sarosians. I wouldn't want you to accidentally find some."

I tried to read her. It was hard, since some of my usual tricks for reading ponies seemed to bounce right off her, but I still knew enough to put together a narrative in my head about what was going on. Moon glass was some sort of drug, Lalala had clearly used it, and now she had ran into a pony who didn't know much about what it was or what it did.

It sounded like a thing she was willing to talk about. But I wondered if getting to interact with a pony who didn't know what it did, and thus wouldn't treat her any differently for it, was a rarity for her.

"Well, that's all I know," I said, testing my guess. "Not exactly planning on using it myself, so, I guess that's all I need to know? Unless you want to talk about it, of course."

She gave me an understanding smile. I felt like I had made the right choice.

"Hey." A stallion interrupted, looking at us like he knew Lalala. "Your stuff's done in the dryers," he said with a wink before wandering away. I tried to read him, and got a vibe of self-assuredness before he left.

"Good work, everyone," Jamjars declared, serenading the team as we wrapped up for the day. I watched forlornly as Lalala left, waving to me goodbye.

The entire trip back to the warehouse, I returned to talking about Icereach. For some reason, talking to her about myself, or at least about Icereach and the things I knew, was easier than talking about her. It wasn't like we couldn't communicate, but I had to do more work, and reading her wasn't as easy as other ponies I knew. I felt awkward and not quite able to connect, which was fun and empowering when I did it on purpose in Icereach but here was just inconvenient. So, I took the easy road, and felt like we were better friends for it to boot. Even though I left knowing very little about her at all.

Hey Jamjars, I imagined myself saying, several heavy bags of books weighing me down as the two of us rode the train back to the Ice District. What's moon glass?

Ah, she would say, snapping out of the daydream that currently had her eyes half-lidded and her cheek pressed against the window. Asking about Lalala?

I would nod, and then she would effortlessly tell me all I could ever want to know.

That was how it would play out. Jamjars was very easy to read, at least in how she would treat me. Pretty much any question, and I would get an answer much more detailed and useful and possibly classified than most other ponies could give me, as if she was somewhere between mentoring me to game the system and showing off what she knew. But, I thought back to our lunch at the laundromat, and remembered the way being satisfied with what she told me had felt. This might not be a secret I needed to know. When would it ever matter, anyway? I yawned. I'd be able to interact with Lalala more genuinely, maybe, and at the very least it would be one less thing to balance on my long, long list of things to learn and do.

So I kept my silence. For the moment, at least.

"Hey Jamjars," I said. "Have you ever heard of an Aegis?"

Jamjars owlishly blinked herself back to reality, as if I had interrupted a very good daydream. "Aegis? Yeah, it's a metal dragon. From a popular comic book about huge mecha. Ponies piloting robots... Oh, did you mean Lalala's Aegis? The divine one?"

Not what I was expecting. "Yeah," I said.

"Never heard of it anywhere else," Jamjars mumbled. "Anyone else tells you about it, they mean the comic book..." She went back to half-sleep.

Well, okay, then. Apparently Jamjars didn't know everything after all. That, or Lalala had accidentally excavated a five-thousand-year-old comic book.

The train rolled to a stop. The doors hissed, and passengers shuffled through.

One of them was Ansel.

"Oh, hey, Sis!" His brows shot up in surprise, and he got a little grin, swinging down into the seat across from me. "Feels like we don't run into each other as much as we used to anymore. Let me guess, getting off work?"

"Yeah," I said, nodding and focusing on the real world again. My ears fell a little. "Sorry if I haven't been around much. Now that we're finally somewhere with places to explore, I've kinda been..."

"Out of the house all the time?" He leaned back, stretching as the train resumed its course. "Eh, same. Try not to sweat it. Ironridge is kind of an eye-opener for how much stuff there is to do in the world, isn't it?"

I sank back in my seat, thankful that we were off before rush hour and didn't have to stand. "You can say that again."

"What's in the haul?" Ansel asked, pointing to my bags.

"Books." I tipped one up to show him. "Figured I'd spend my first paycheck on some entertainment."

Ansel nodded approvingly.

"So what have you been up to?" I asked, pulling back my bag so nothing would fall out. "Looking for cash, or staying a free agent and just exploring?"

"Eh, mostly the latter." Ansel waved a hoof. "If you're curious, I've been traipsing around the Earth District, getting to know who's who and where's where down there."

"Earth District?" I tilted my head. "Where's that?"

Ansel gestured at the window. "It's what the folks down in the Night District used to call the Night District before the new name was a thing. Same for this place; it used to be the Stone District. Basically, Cold Karma renamed them when it founded the Ice District to get everyone excited for a new city order, or something. But they did it back in the days when sane folks would go out in the Day District during the day. It's gotten a lot hotter since then, and the new names are impossible for me to keep straight when you only go out in both districts at night."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "Makes sense. But the Night District? You can actually survive in that inferno?"

Ansel read my expression and chuckled. "Oh, let me guess. You tried to go down there and didn't take off your clothes."

I winced just a little.

"Yeah, that'll do it," he apologized. "It's pretty much impossible down there. Like living in the caldera of a volcano. You only go out if you have to, and you do everything you can to stay cool. I don't know how you bundle up like it's Icereach in Stone District weather, but down below, I wouldn't be surprised if you randomly caught on fire."

"What about during a rainstorm?" I asked. "I got kinda close when the last one started, and it felt a lot more manageable."

Ansel shrugged. "Oh, yeah, I guess you could go then. If you wanted to see the place, I could be your tour guide, but we'd have to stick pretty close to the train stations in case the rain let up."

"Sure!" I brightened. Exploring the Sky District with Corsica, and the Night District - or Earth District - with Ansel? Perfect way to divvy up time between my friends and make sure I explored everything and hung out with everyone. "You know if they have, like, weather predictions and stuff?"

"Only an hour in advance, if that," he said. "The storms come down from the Aldenfold mountains, like back home. I've heard it's pretty spooky to watch, and you can actually do it safely from this tower up in the Sky District. One minute everything'll be peaceful, and then next, a whole waterfall of clouds falling off that cliff."

I remembered seeing that tower. What was it called, Skyfreeze? Someone had told me that. This was suddenly on my list of Ironridge entertainment I wanted to experience.

"I've been trying my hoof at some science, by the way," Ansel added. "Just some light reading. Probably nothing you don't know. But, it's pretty interesting. In most of the rest of the world, the best way to make clouds rain is to push them upward. Say you've got some mountains, and you blow clouds toward them. The side the clouds go up will get all wet, and the side they go down gets basically none. It's called a rain shadow. But these clouds fall for easily a mile, plus who knows how high those mountains eventually get. And when they reach us, at the bottom? Torrents of rain. Apparently, there was a year or two of disruption twenty years or so ago when they behaved like the rest of the world for a change, and then it went back to the way it used to be. Same time as Ironridge's weather began heating up, actually..."

I listened curiously. "Quite the weather guru, aren't you?"

"It's interesting." Ansel shrugged in self-defense. "Isn't it? And come on, you've been doing the nerd filly shtick for as long as I can remember. I already jumped way out of my comfort zone to come here, so I might as well see what else I've been missing out on."

"You've got a point," I admitted. "At the end of the day, I do all the research I've done because I'm curious and have questions nobody can answer. Others can do it for money or fame, but if you ask me, curiosity is the only real reason."

"Hah," Ansel chuckled. "You know what would be cool? You, me and Corsica, the three of us posing in lab coats. And then you make that into a propaganda poster, For Science! Probably a dumb idea, but I'd dig it."

"You're on," I promised as the train sped into the tunnels of the Ice District.

For the rest of the night, I sequestered myself in my and Corsica's room, a trove of books piled neatly by my bed, and read. I confirmed with Jamjars that the following day was a day off, which meant I could sleep in as late as I pleased; I was up well past dawn as a result.

My vacation day rolled around, and I woke up on my own time to continue reading. The only breaks I took were for food and the bathroom. I was a naturally fast reader as far as text was concerned, but the more I read, the more new ideas seeped into my head and the more I subconsciously stopped reading to daydream, slowing me down. Love triangles, giant mecha, pirates and high drama, fantasy worlds with made-up creatures and physics, time travel, clashing armies, characters that probably wouldn't be compelling at all to a literature critic but I found myself utterly attached to-

A knock sounded at my door.

"Eh?" I reached for a bookmark, snapped out of my reverie.

The door cracked open, and Ansel peeked through. "Ho there," he whispered, realizing I was busy and keeping it down. "No rush and just thought I'd offer, but it started raining about half an hour ago."

Well. I put my book down and pulled on my coat. Apparently, reading about other ponies having adventures was going to have to wait, because I had yet another opportunity to go have a real one of my own.

Hot Rain

Train breaks squealed, and we rolled to a stop in the Night District.

"Here's as good a place as any," Ansel declared, leading me off and into a steamy station - we weren't the only ponies who had decided to travel during the rain, and the humidity was as high as it got. "This town's called Blueleaf. You know, like, how the Earth District is generally organized, right?"

"I didn't have a problem with the old names, but keep calling it that and I really am gonna get confused," I warned, following him out into a barrel-vaulted underground station. "But yeah. It's organized into a bunch of cities within a city within a city, right?"

"So you've got the picture," Ansel agreed. "I probably should have asked earlier, but you just want to look around and see what the place is like, right? Or have you got an agenda?"

Knowing my luck with Ironridge, I'd probably have an agenda within five minutes of leaving this station, but for now, blessedly... "The former."

Ansel shook his head. "Just a regular old tourist. Well, like you said, it's pretty varied down here. Move half a mile in any direction, and you'll be somewhere completely different. So don't judge it too harshly by first impression... or do, since it's probably a lot safer literally anywhere else. Come on! Let's go sightsee some old run-down whatchamahoozits."

We strolled through the concrete cavern and up a staircase, the steps all slightly slanted to make water run off into a conduit at the side. If I was the engineer, I would have made them porous instead, maybe metal grates. But I couldn't deny that this way had character.

My ears stayed perked as we climbed a few switchbacks, listening for the sound of rain to tell me how close we were. What would the surface of Blueleaf be like? This district, I knew from the view from above, was largely a tropical forest, but we were under a town... I let my mind wander, dreaming of what trees would look like up close. Had they incorporated them into the architecture, the city planning? Used them as a more impressive alternative to walls, deliberately grown them where they wanted? Ironridge had been around for some eight hundred years. Surely-

We reached the surface. It was nothing like I was expecting.

First, it was dark, lit only in blues and grays. And it was long. We were in an alley of some sort, flanked by high walls of ramshackle wood and metal that looked like generations of ponies had built ill-maintained houses on top of each other, added a few braces for good measure, and then put more on top of those, with no plans and no oversight. The crooked road was bridged many times above us by wide plank bridges, and at places I could see what looked to be more roads coming out of the walls and crossing the canyon formed by this one, only at vastly different elevations. The floor, too, was a mix of wood and scrap metal, and I realized we probably weren't on the ground floor.

Second, it wasn't raining. If I looked up, I couldn't see anything - there was something blocking out the sky, but it was too dim to make out what it was. That didn't mean there was no water, though. Small waterfalls coursed down buildings and drained into and out of crevices, the rainwater all collecting and pooling on its way to the ground. It created a steady rush in my ears that was vaguely intoxicating, in a lonely, impermanent way.

Third, there were pipes. In absence of any sort of planning, whoever installed Blueleaf's utilities had gone with the spirit and put infrastructure anywhere it would fit. Mana conduits were draped up walls and through windows, the insulation damaged on one in a way that caused it to glow blue with leaking power. And bigger pipes, too, ones large enough that I could crawl through, looking more like giant hoses than fixed metal structures. Sometimes the waterfalls bounced off of those, making a hollow, metallic sound.

As for us? We were standing in the entrance to the staircase, a modern-looking, well-lit booth in the middle of the street that was horribly at odds with it surroundings.

It felt like it should have been lonelier than it was, but there were plenty of ponies out and about, all hurrying with their hats down to hide their eyes, taking advantage of the respite in the usual scalding temperatures. It was still uncomfortably hot.

"Well?" Ansel dragged me out of the way as another group of ponies tromped up the stairs behind us. "What do you think?"

He kept his voice down, I noted. And it was surprisingly windy in here, like there was a ventilation system somewhere blowing through this whole corridor.

"Do... ponies live here?" I asked, staring around again. Some of the elevated shacks had light seeping out from cracks between their metal sheets and slabs of plywood. "What is this place?"

"This is the result of a whole bunch of simple needs coupled with not enough foresight," Ansel replied. "Don't worry, it's more sturdy than it looks. Probably. The folks living up top aren't too keen on waking up one morning to find their house at the bottom of a newly-formed hole, and they're the ones with the money."

I looked up again. That ceiling... Was there a giant metal plate up there, with more stuff built on top?

"By the way," Ansel muttered, "you wouldn't happen to be armed to the teeth under that coat, would you?"

I blinked, remembering Elise's advice long ago to go about getting myself more weapons. Well, I had an unfinished magic sledgehammer in my room back at Jamjars' that I had forgotten all about after leaving Icereach, and I had my bracelet. But calling on magical fire in the middle of a blizzard was one thing; using it in heat like this... didn't seem smart. I shook my head.

"Figures." Ansel shrugged. "If anything happens, bluff like crazy and pretend you're a war genie. Most everyone down here will mind their own business in exchange for you minding yours, but this is the kind of place you don't normally live unless you're desperate. And worst comes to worst, I've got your back."

Well, okay then.

Any sane pony would have had their curiosity diluted by Ansel's warnings, but mine was just further aroused. This world was utterly alien, and not in the way I had imagined it. My wings twitched. I needed to explore.

And so explore we did. Ansel led the way for the first few minutes, and then seemed to defer to me, sticking around like a pair of eyes in the back of my head. He knew a rough layout of this city and how to find his way back to a landmark if he got lost, he told me, but far from all of its hidden secrets - though I doubted there was a pony alive who could know it that totally.

I didn't need a reason to slink through the narrow streets, stepping around steaming floor grates and seeing by the light of damaged mana conduits and poorly insulated walls. The streets weren't aligned to any direction, never went straight, never made right angles and never felt quite flat, either, going up or down a single stair step here or there or else outright sloping. My heart ran fast; I was soaked inside my coat from the humidity and was certain my cheeks were flushed from the heat. Being down here... It was exhilarating and oppressive and claustrophobic and solitary all at the same time. This was what I had imagined adventure to be like, in the days before the Aldebaran incident.

"So what do you come down here for?" I asked Ansel as we stopped to catch our breath, finding a metal outcropping that would serve as a bench. A broken sign sparked with light in the distance, a waterfall pouring down on top of it. All the doors across from us were closed.

"Blueleaf in particular?" Ansel shrugged. "Well, it's not a bad place to explore. I've found some pretty interesting forgotten loot down here. Not like anyone tracks who lives where down here, so there's a lot of abandoned property. But I've also made a few..." He hesitated. "Friends, I guess, though they're more like... You know. Ponies I'd like to see succeed."

I tilted my head. "Succeed at what?"

The sign flickered. He laughed. "Succeed at not being down in the dumps over their problems. Most folks, see, don't have the resources to go city-hopping when they need a change of pace, like us. Down here, they have stuff they can spend their whole lives trying to accomplish. Basic stuff, like getting a house where the roof doesn't leak and air conditioning doesn't cost eighty percent of their budget."

"Eighty percent?" My eyes widened. "It's that expensive?"

Ansel shrugged. "When the population can't afford to live without it, you can charge whatever you want as long as it's cheaper than moving up somewhere cooler. Which Cold Karma controls too, given that every district except the Sky District needs air conditioning. Before their time, this was already the place you wound up if you were a rung below the Stone District. Now, they took the status quo and just dug in."

"That must stink," I said. "How do they cope with it? And not, like, explode?"

"And not go crazy?" Ansel shrugged, then pointed at the store with the broken sign. "By making up reasons to let off steam."

I squinted. No Sarosians Allowed, it read.

"What?" I glanced at him for an explanation.

"You've seen the ways ponies look at you, right?" Ansel asked. "I mean, you must have. I have. You remember that scumbag we met in the clothing store on our second day here."

I nodded. No matter how much I tried, I still hadn't figured out why that was... Granted, I was very easily distracted. After a moment's thought, I told him so.

"Heh. Go figure," Ansel chuckled. "That whole movement started down here, you know. Used to be, Ironridge didn't have any batponies, and also didn't much like 'em. Then, some folks decided to change that, even though there wasn't anyone around who would benefit from it. Maybe they did it because it was the right thing to do, but if you ask me, they did it because they were beat down and pent up and wanted to solve a problem that wouldn't do anything. Like, to be passive-aggressive, because they had a whole bunch of problems themselves no one was helping them with."

I tilted my head. "Not like I'd rather they didn't, but how come they didn't just focus on solving their own problems instead?" I pointed at the crumbling chaos around us.

Ansel shrugged. "Odds are, they had tried so much they were tired of failing. Making things better for someone who isn't here to appreciate it... Kind of hard to measure your success, right? By the same token, there's no way to say you've failed. And things have been pretty awful down here for the last thirty, forty years."

I kept listening.

"Eh, just your usual societal decay," he said. "The seat of power shifting up the mountain. Changing economic fortunes. The Steel Revolution ruined the economy even further and displaced thousands of ponies, and now this blasted heat makes everyone dependent on Cold Karma. Point is, that's how they get by. By fighting, even if they need to make up something to fight for because the real battles are too hopeless to even begin."

The sign flickered. Water poured.

"Let's, err... keep moving," I suggested. This was making me feel weird and hollow, and not the kind of hollowness that came from my emptiness. It was like we had stepped into an underworld, the kind that always existed below your hooves but nobody could acknowledge the existence of and still live with themselves.

The biggest pipes, Ansel told me, carried coolant from the Ice District, frozen to incredible temperatures in their facility and then heavily insulated and piped to radiators in homes and buildings, where the chill would be dispersed via fans. My brain wanted to be skeptical, insisting that surely you couldn't just reverse the temperatures used in a conventional heat distribution system and have it work the same. What about convection currents around the radiators, and the friction of coolant against the pipes, and...?

But whether it made sense or not, it worked well enough for Cold Karma to build these giant pipes all throughout the city. They reminded me faintly of blood vessels, organically snaking and curving and branching off into thinner arteries, attached to walls or draped along the ground. Was all this in the Day District, too? I supposed they needed less cooling higher up, but they certainly still needed some. Maybe the pipes there were all underground.

We passed an alleyway, and a touch of cold wind brushed my cheek.

"Hey, do you feel that?" I glanced to the side, looking down the new road.

Ansel sniffed. "...Huh. Let's go check it out?"

We followed the breeze through a very low corridor, several sheets of water pouring from above that we had to walk around, and a grate in the floor that was letting off steam at the same time as it took in water. Once we were past the steam vent, the air got a lot cooler.

"Woah," I whispered, stopping at the edge of a wooden staircase painted with caution stripes. We were at the edge of a square, high-ceilinged room, a dirt floor one story below us. The walls of the room were slightly cleaner than the jagged canyons that made up the alleyways, but still clearly ramshackle, as if sixty-four different architects had agreed upon a general shape first before all going about their own ways. High above, a small, circular hole in the ceiling plate let a single shaft of raindrops through, steadily falling to the ground. On the ground was a sizable bed of flowers, and interspersed throughout it were gravestones.

Ansel said nothing. I noticed one of the coolant pipes wrapping around the interior was damaged, faintly glowing wisps rising from it and dispersing in the air. The source of the cold, probably.

I stepped down the stairs, entering an island of illumination - a lone floodlight high on a wall brightened the flowers, though it was still overwhelmingly blue and gray. This place had a similar energy to the rest of Blueleaf, I could feel. It was definitely part of the same city. And yet, it was special, like an incongruity in a vector field. It pulled at me, whispered to me. I needed to be here.

"Are you sure we should be here?" Ansel whispered, following my lead.

"You're the tour guide," I whispered back, following my heart. "But yeah. I am."

"Really?" he pressed.

I didn't look back. "If this is the first part of this town you have to ask that about, yeah, I'm sure. If we're exploring seedy underworlds with impunity, I'm pretty sure a sacred shrine isn't going to hurt us."

The flowers brushed against my boots as I approached a grave, curious to read the headstone. I tried to step lightly so as to damage as few as possible, but the flowers seemed unusually hardy, and bounced back from my steps without a hint of damage. Far more resilient than the greenhouse flowers Icereach grew as a rare delicacy, or even the fake imported ones made from fabric and used for decoration. They smelled better, too.

"In loving memory," I read. "Dorset. Born 889, died 956. May he find peace in the Seventh District."

I looked up at Ansel. "Seventh District?"

He shrugged. "Beats me. Maybe it's where Ironridge thinks ponies go when they die."

Where ponies went when they died? I... had never thought about that before.

Not that I hadn't thought about death. I had been consumed with it in the days after the avalanche. But my thoughts were always centered on what would happen to me without my friends, not what would happen to my friends without their lives. Now, it was something I didn't have to think about, because everyone I cared about was alive.

Tenuously so. I didn't like to think about it, but I knew that could change in an instant. My side momentarily burned, a memory of a shard of shrapnel ripping through my bags and sending me to the hospital in a coma. I sure would have cared about what came after death if that had struck differently. Or maybe I wouldn't have, if there was just nothing.

"Hey, Ansel," I asked, feeling a faint, itching memory of mother-of-pearl, like a sunspot in my vision. "Where do you think we go when we die? If anywhere?"

"What?" He blinked. "Beats me. Besides, aren't you the scientist?"

"What's that got to do with it?"

Ansel shrugged. "Means you should know a thing or two about answering arcane questions, is what."

That wasn't a question I had ever tried to answer. I wondered if science even could answer it. Now that I thought about it, now that I saw this graveyard and how many ponies the world at large held, it felt statistically impossible that the world could carry on for thousands of years without someone losing someone and then looking for answers. But that wasn't a question I needed answered, because I had never lost anyone. I had the light spirit to thank for that. All my friends were safe and sound, in Ironridge with me. Or else back in Icereach, training in the compound...

Well, actually, that wasn't entirely true. I had lost someone: the original me, the pony who moved aside for my mask. But that was probably a special case. I hoped.

I moved on through the graves, the flowers swishing around me. Seventh District. Seventh District. 'May she find a better place.' Nothing.

'May he rest in Aegis' loving bosom.'

I drew up short, and read the whole thing. "Upopo," I whispered under my breath, this gravestone small and not particularly impressive. "Born 986. Died 994. May he rest in Aegis' loving bosom."

"What?" Ansel was behind me, at the edge of the flowers.

I didn't say anything, bowing to the gravestone. Lalala... I hadn't quite clicked with her, even though we should have had similar interests and should have gotten along great. But the god I was looking for was a physical part of this world, one who could twist fate and save me and rescue my friends within the bounds of reality. The one she told me about, she believed existed purely outside the bounds of reality. I thought that was pointless... but maybe it wasn't, if you were less concerned with why you still existed and more concerned with what happened when someone you cared about suddenly didn't.

My breath misted in front of my face. The damaged coolant pipe was quite near, and it was legitimately cold now. The flowers didn't seem to care.

I... still didn't understand. I tried to emulate what that feeling would be like, but because that position was so foreign to me, I couldn't tell if I was doing it right. I had been close to a loss, pressed right up against the divide, squeezed and twisted against it, but never actually been on the other side. I couldn't tell what it would be like to have a friend that didn't exist.

Halcyon didn't exist, I reminded myself. Not me, the mask, which I had for so long reminded myself was an empty imitation, a set of rules and personality traits worn as a guise. But the pony who had stepped aside to make room for me.

I felt hollowed out, and needed some time to think. "Hey," I told Ansel, stepping back toward the staircase. "You know how to get back to the station, right? Let's get home before the rain stops."

I started to suspect we were being followed.

"You see them?" I whispered to Ansel, him taking the lead now as we navigated back through the maze.

"Yeah," he breathed back. "Trying to get a count without looking like I'm on to them, but I bet there's at least three. Probably here for you."

"You sure?" I hissed. "I thought you said this town was the epicenter of the whole 'tipping your hats to batponies' thing."

"Can't change anything without someone disliking the change," Ansel muttered. "And besides, originally, Ironridge had a pretty good reason to hate batponies. There was this one, Admiral Valey... Ah, I'll tell you later. Remember, if trouble starts, bluff like crazy and get ready to run if they call it."

"Run?" I whispered. "We can't take a few random goons?"

He shook his head. "They're different from fighting yaks. And what would we gain if we won? Not worth the risk. If it comes down to it, do your shadow swimming thing and I'll find my own way out. I've done this before."

But the ponies following us weren't catching up. They seemed to follow at a steady distance, always just out of sight, keeping us on edge but never making a move. For a while, I considered sitting down and stopping and seeing what they'd do, but whatever they were waiting for, giving them more time didn't seem like it would work out in our favor.

I probably should have been scared. I was on unfamiliar ground, and this didn't seem like the kind of place that was watched over by authorities. Moreover, I had a history with criminals taking advantage of me. My heart was certainly pounding. But... I wasn't as scared as I should have been.

Maybe it was all the things I had been through in my past. Maybe it was my buried yearning for a rematch with Aldebaran. I was stronger and better-defined than last time. If I got jumped by common thugs, maybe I was secretly curious to find out if this time, I could use the bracelet without holding myself back.

Bad idea, a part of me warned. Do you see how much wood is in this place? Fire magic here seems like a good way to cause an extinction event.

Yes, but it was also soaked. At the same time, it was quite hot...

We walked past another series of steam vents, letting off more unwelcome heat into the air. Ansel moved to turn us at a minor intersection, then hesitated and went the other way.

"What?" I breathed.

"Loiterers," he explained. "Not sure if being in public right now would be a good thing, or a recipe for double trouble."

We carried on, moving quickly, but not too quickly. Another intersection. Ansel moved to go one way... and blinked.

"Same group of loiterers?" he hissed. "Are they trying to pincer us?"

I tensed. My bracelet itched around my leg.

It was ready to burn, to be used. I was ready to use it. I knew I probably shouldn't, but I wanted a fight, to prove that I had grown since I failed against Aldebaran. But Ansel clearly didn't want it, and I still had reservations about using an artifact with an untested amount of destructive potential when ordinary weapons and skill would suit us just fine. So, I went along with him.

We entered into what seemed to be a better part of town, several levels up from the graveyard at the bottom. The higher you got in Blueleaf, the less metal was used in the construction, save for sporadic support pillars holding the ceiling up, and I began to guess most of what I saw below was after-market braces used to shore construction up. Here, most buildings were all wood, the streets were a little wider, and there were more signs advertising businesses. Several ponies were out and about who didn't look particularly nefarious, and kept their eyes on the ground instead of us.

"Did we lose them?" Ansel breathed, checking around.

I scanned too, but couldn't detect anyone. If they were coordinating their movements with the intent to catch us, I would have expected they'd drive us into the seedier areas, not here. Maybe they were just trying to run us off.

"I think so," I agreed, disappointed and relieved at the same time.

We continued for a bit, then found a bench and sat down. Water rushed, pouring everywhere in rivulets and streams. We were close enough to the surface, now, that the distant roar of rain sounded on the plate above, and beyond that, occasional thunder from the storm surging by.

"...Maybe it's better to explore this place solo," Ansel admitted after a while. "Easier to give trouble the slip when we don't have to worry about sticking to place both of us can go."

I tilted my head at him. "Where are you gonna go that I can't follow?"

He shrugged mysteriously. "I have my ways."

I sighed. "I still think we could have taken them."

"Wouldn't have been worth it," Ansel gently chided. "We probably could have, but plenty ventured and nothing gained. Besides, are you even armed?"

Aside from my bracelet? No, and that's what I spent the last long while thinking about.

I looked up. Across from us was a store advertising itself as Barnabas' Self-Defense Emporium. The pain-on-wood sign depicted a mace, chakrams and a bomb with a sparking fuse.

Ansel followed my gaze and squinted. "Well, that's oddly appropriate."

"I've got money," I volunteered. "Might as well stimulate the local economy?"

Ansel stretched and got up. "If you're going inside, I'll come take a look with you..."

Barnabas' Self-Defense Emporium, I soon discovered, was prettier on the inside.

Not pretty, pretty. But someone had made an effort with the resources they had. A mud-stained red shag throw rug sat inside the door for wiping boots and hooves, welcoming us into a well-lit wooden room full of glass-and-metal display cases. The orange-tinted light was spread out enough that shadows weren't oppressive, a small coolant pipe on the ceiling fed into a radiator with a fan, and in one corner of the room, a tiny, stand-up piano that reminded me of my own was being played by a pegasus mare in a revealing, razor-thin scarlet dress. The cases and the shop counter were packed with dangerous-looking implements, and behind the counter stood a stallion with black shades, a slicked-back mohawk and a toothy grin.

"Welcome, welcome!" He nodded approvingly to me, mostly ignoring Ansel. "Customers of taste tonight, I see! Take a look around. Anything you see can be yours for the right price!"

The weapons twinkled. The ceiling fan spun. The mare at the piano conspicuously brushed back her mane.

I wandered to a case that contained a long halberd, appraising how I might use it. Defensive options? Pretty good at menacing foes from a distance. Ability to walk around with it in public? Rock bottom. I moved on to a sickle. It looked way too easy to wound a pony with in a way much messier than intended. This looked more like an offense emporium than a defense one...

"Do your eyes find themselves entranced by the beauty of the steel?" the piano mare asked as I inadvertently wandered closer, speaking in an overly thick Varsidelian accent, not breaking her song.

"Eh?" I blinked. "Err, I'm looking for stuff that's more useful, not beautiful..."

"Being useful can be a curse," the mare said. "Long have we desired to retire and move to the Day District in peace. We have so much money, we could live out our lives in contentment and happiness. But alas, who can leave when business is booming? Ponies need our products because they are useful, and so our greed keeps us here."

Business was booming, huh? If I was in charge of the city, this was the kind of shop I'd definitely outlaw. All these blades and knives didn't need to be floating around among the populace. But with the rules the way they were, I guessed you'd be a fool not to compete...

"Maybe tomorrow will finally be the day we retire," the piano mare went on. "Or maybe not. But you could be the last one we ever do transactions with. So shop like there is no tomorrow, you beautiful batpony. I could not bear the thought of your heart going unfulfilled."

Okay...

She shifted again on the piano bench, still playing, her feathers brushing across the keyboard. It felt like there was subtext I was missing, and probably not the kind I wanted to stick around for.

I wandered over to the shopkeeper - presumably Barnabas - instead. "Hey," I greeted. "You got anything, like... nonlethal? Good for distractions, bludgeoning, making a getaway? Preferably small enough to conceal?"

Barnabas flashed his teeth in an approving grin, his eyes hidden behind his shades. "You've thought this through, filly! Let's see what I can get you..." He ducked behind his counter, and came up a moment later with a small sack containing five or so egg-shaped devices. "Flashbangs," he said, motioning for me to take one. "Single-use, very small, nonlethal, disorienting... You pull the pin and throw it. Goes boom five seconds later. How's this suit your mood?"

I took one and studied it. Potentially helpful, but I didn't know how I felt about spending my money on consumables, and a bright flash wouldn't be good for me either if I was trying to shadow swim away. "What about, like, a quarterstaff? Something with reach that folds up when not in use?"

Barnabas stroked his chin, leaving the flashbangs on the counter. "Hmm... Might have to look in the back room for something like that, but we could have one laying around. Wait here for a tick."

I stood as he left, the piano mare playing away at a cool, sophisticated tune. Ansel stepped over to me.

"Well?" I whispered, curious on his verdict.

He raised an eyebrow, prompting me to elaborate.

"Well, what do you think of this place?" I whispered. "It feels foreign. Like it doesn't belong in the world I'm used to living in. I'm, err... not sure a lot of this is stuff I want."

"Weapons are like that." Ansel shrugged. "It never really came up because the yaks like playing gentle, but these are for hurting ponies. That's kind of how this works."

"I think I'm more interested in beating ponies than hurting them," I quietly replied. "And mostly the ones who want to hurt us."

"Well, maybe you'll find something good," he whispered back. "I don't doubt this place does all sorts of business with illegitimate characters, but it's probably still legitimate itself. No reason not to make a profit off others' illegal-"

The back room exploded.

I reacted faster than instinct, stepping to shield Ansel as the wall behind the counter bulged outwards, a light spray of splinters and grit bouncing harmlessly off my coat. The ceiling groaned, and a puff of cloudy air mushroomed through the open door.

"Barnabas!" the piano mare gasped, abandoning her music in a heartbeat and jumping the counter, racing through the door. A moment later, I heard her give a strangled cry.

"Not good," Ansel muttered, taking a step back.

"What happened to my Barnabas?" the piano mare sobbed, stepping back into the main room, the wall behind her buckled and ruined but still barely standing. She glared at the sack on the counter, then at us. "You! You primed a bomb and slipped it into his pocket, did not you!"

Uh-oh.

"What? No," I protested, pointing at the sack. "First, there are the same number in there as he started with, second, they're not supposed to be danger-"

"I'm thinking we should bail," Ansel urged, antsy, trying to drag me toward the door. "Like, fast!"

"No!" the piano mare cried. "Criminals! Stop!"

She reached under the desk and pressed something. I felt my legs agreeing with Ansel, and starting to carry me away... and then a circle appeared on the ground, beginning to glow with sinister green flames.

A memory straight out of my past, the flames rose up in a cylinder, and before any time had passed at all, they dissipated, a squad of ponies standing where they had been. Just like before, four of them were armored police and one was an androgynous albino unicorn who didn't seem to care about anything at all.

"What's going on here?" the squad leader asked.

"These customer ponies gave my Barnabas a bomb," the piano mare caterwauled, leaning in the ruined doorway. "They destroyed our shop! He was but a day from retirement! Poor Barnabas! Woe, poor Barnabas..."

The leader looked to me.

"That's crazy!" I insisted. "This place is full of bombs! He probably blew himself up!"

"What would we even gain from a thing like that?" Ansel insisted, no longer looking like he was about to flee.

"Look!" the piano mare insisted. "There are bombs on the counter there! They knew we had money because I foolishly told them..."

I gaped at her. "Are you trying to frame us?"

The police leader sighed. "Right. Conflicting accounts, nobody confessing. I guess we do this the hard way..."

With a pulse of light, the listless unicorn's horn glowed, and a familiar construct materialized. Soon, the hologram was complete.

"Samael, Director of Public Security," the first apparition said flatly, a short unicorn with a long mane that looked like a mare but sounded like a stallion.

"Estael, Director of Public Security," the second added, a short pegasus with a short mane that looked like a stallion but sounded like a mare.

Memories of the clothing store swam back to me, and they clearly did for Ansel, as well. "Err..."

"These ponies are accused of crimes," Estael tonelessly intoned. "The law should determine their guilt."

Samael examined us, emotionless expression almost turning to curiosity. "...No. These are consorts of a privileged citizen. They may be above the law."

My nerves bounced as I remembered something else from that day: Kitty got arrested, and the police were meticulously nice to her because she was related to Jamjars, who held sway with Junior Karma. This police squad could just as easily be our doom as they could be a free, cushy ride home.

"Is this true?" Estael turned mechanically to her other. "Are their names written in the law?"

Samael squinted at me. "...I cannot tell. This one is blank."

What?

"Huh?" Ansel looked at them weirdly.

Estael focused on me as well. "...Neither can I tell. The law is not meant to be imperfect."

"This is an aberration," Samael said.

"This is a problem," Estael agreed.

"What are you saying about?" the piano mare interrupted, languishing in the doorway.

Samael ignored her. "The law is incomplete."

Estael nodded. "We must complete the law. But, what of their crime?"

"She's trying to frame us," I said on instinct, pointing at the piano mare with a wing. "We did nothing wrong!"

Samael nodded. "Show me the dead."

The unicon casting the spell began to walk towards the blown-out back room.

"What?" The piano mare looked up, blocking the way. "You would not desecrate poor Barnabas with... examinations, would you?"

"Justice shall be administered," Estael promised.

"You." A police pony nodded at the piano mare. "Move aside, please."

The mare looked dumbstruck. But, before the police could move her, Samael said, "No need."

Then the spell shifted and, being a hologram, floated right through her, the director stepping into the back room himself.

"I see no cadaver," he said.

"Poor Barnabas," the piano mare wept. "He was blown asunder..."

But the police were all looking at her, now. "Ma'am, I'm going to have to ask you to come with us as well," the leader instructed.

Samael nodded. "Take all of them in. If the law is mistaken, we shall free them and rectify our mistake."

"This is good," Estael agreed. "Above all, we must fix the law."

Ansel glanced at me. "Hallie, I don't like-"

"Shut it, you," I whispered with a wing to his mouth. "The moment Jamjars finds out about it, she'll make trouble for them. And that's assuming they don't figure out we're innocent on their own. Just you watch."

"Nooooooooo!" the piano mare wailed as she was rounded up as well, carried by two of the police. "My father will hear about this!"

The officer watching us noted I wasn't resisting, and nodded. "If you're innocent, we'll get all this cleared up quickly, and you'll be free to go, though we might need you as witnesses after we conduct an investigation. Let's get everyone back to base..."

The green flame circle rose up again, this time with me inside it. The projection spell cut out as the unicorn switched its focus, but before I did, I could see Samael and Estael both staring at me intently.

Their words echoed in my ears. I cannot tell. This one is blank.

Hello There

"You!" Leif gasped, missing her armor and once again a pegasus - a dirty, emaciated pegasus who looked to have been here for quite a while. "Halcyon? What are you doing here?"

"Long story," I said, leaning on one hoof, a tingling sense of irony creeping up my spine. "You?"

Leif grimaced. "Also a long story. Two important questions: are you supposed to be here, and do you have any food?"

I dug around in my pockets, found a granola bar, and tossed it through the cell bars. "Supposed to be here? No idea. I give up on figuring out this place's rules. Nothing makes sense, lease of all you. Aren't you supposed to have goons in Ironridge? Something to do with the Composer? They're here. Working for the mare who owns this dungeon, even."

"Congratulations, you figured it out," Leif droned, eating ravenously. "Or maybe you don't remember how we parted?"

I shrugged. "I remember almost dying when your Whitewing exploded in my house."

Leif winced.

"Turns out the explosion wasn't all that bad," I went on. "What really got me was the crippling exhaustion from getting ditched and stressed out and worried so much before hiking through a blizzard to come kick your tails, and don't forget about the windigo you locked me in with..."

Leif raised a sarcastic eyebrow. "You want me to beg you to free me so you can gloat about the irony of that while you're at it?"

Kitty was watching the two of us with a curious expression. "Who's this lady?" She glanced up at me.

I turned to her. "Someone who got me to trust her, then ditched me and locked me up. And I'm gonna guess she's here now because a certain robot she trusted swiped her from the general prison after Elise shipped her back here and locked her up in its own dungeon, instead." I looked back at Leitmotif. "Or am I forgetting something?"

Leif sighed aggressively. "Nailed it, I know, thank you, moving on. Halcyon, the Composer was a windigo. Do you remember that much?"

I blinked. Actually, that night had been so chaotic that the Composer's true identity completely slipped my mind... but I had known that, hadn't I?

"Lady Catherine Manchester Volkhelm Mk.I, she called herself?" Leif looked intently at me. "Ringing any bells?"

Kitty whistled, which thankfully involved putting her tongue away. "Fancy name, lady! Sounds like it's for someone very smart!"

Leif gave her a disapproving look.

"Yeah, I remember that," I said. "What of it?"

Leif glanced again at Kitty. "...How trustworthy is this mare?"

"More trustworthy than you..." I started, and then blinked, realizing something. "If you're about to tell me something scary to manipulate me into doing something again, it's not gonna work. I will literally go home and magically pry it right out of my brain, and I'll make myself forget you're here while I'm at it and you will squander anything you could possibly have gained by meeting me here. Do we understand each other?"

For a moment, Leif looked at me with dawning comprehension... and then, for some reason, fear.

Her gaze flicked from my eyes to my boots to my coat to my eyes again. "It can't be. That's... why you had colored contact lenses when we went through your things..."

Now it was my turn to be taken aback. "What?" What did that have to do with anything I said? Did she somehow know something about how I worked? Did she-

I physically slapped myself. "Nope. Not falling for it. I straight-up don't want to know while I'm in any sort of position where you can trick me into giving you what you want. You're good, though. Keeping me on my hooves."

Leif gave me a chagrined look. "Fine then. Please get me out of here."

I tilted my head at her. "Are you bonkers?"

She shrugged. "No tricks. No deception. I'm straight-up asking for what I want. You can believe I want out, right?"

I could... Something was definitely off about her, though. She was warier of me than she had been before the remark about me having colored contacts. Probably just an extended ruse to throw me off, but... someone as well-traveled as her, there really was a chance she might know something.

If only I had some kind of collateral. Something she cared deeply about I could use to ensure her cooperation.

"Look, what do you want?" Leif begged. "Other than to gloat? I've been in here for months, and I need to get free! Whatever you want, I can't get it for you myself but I can absolutely tell you how to get it yourself. Contacts, information, dirt on someone, unrevised history, you name it. On the house. Whatever you want for breaking me out of here, I pay completely up front. Maybe you'll get it and walk away, betray me right back, fair's fair. But this is the best I can offer. Work with me, Halcyon!"

I squinted at her. Desperation for her own sake? She was a convincing actor, but it sounded like she had a bigger cause... Of course, if what Mother told me about her was true, she was always devoted to the big picture. "How about your airship?" I asked. "I want that."

Leif sighed. "Wish I could, but that was impounded when we were captured and I have no idea where they took it. I can put you in contact with a black market it might have been sold on if they really wanted to get rid of it quietly, but I doubt it and I doubt you could buy it back if they did. Anything else?"

I frowned... and then I got an idea. "When you bagged us in Icereach," I said. "You made up a bogus story about there being a cave you found that went all the way down to the ether river. Do you know if there's any sort of cave like that in Ironridge? And if so, where's the entrance?"

"You're still interested in that?" Leif straightened up a little. "I might be able to help you. I know about one, but it's very old info. And it would be very dangerous."

My ears swiveled in interest. "Spill."

"...Right." Leif pulled herself together. "Right now, we're in a place inside the mountain called the Flame Barracks. There used to be a mining district called the Flame District that was destroyed in the Steel Revolution. They're attached, if the names didn't tip you off. However you got here, you'll need to do it again when you're ready to go down there, or else find a different entrance to the Flame District. Most of the old ones are sealed off because it's a safety hazard. I couldn't tell you which. With me so far?"

I nodded.

"The Flame District core is a very deep cavern that spawns a lot of mineshafts," Leif went on. "It houses a drill that's bigger than anything you've ever seen before. You'll need to go down near the bottom of that, but not quite the bottom bottom. Somewhere there's an elevator shaft - can't tell you where, or which one. It'll take you deeper. At the bottom of that, there's a free-fall. Very deep. No elevator. Too deep for all but the best endurance fliers to get back up, so you'll want a plan for how to get out that doesn't involve your wings. At the bottom of that, there's allegedly some ancient ruins made of crystal. And at the bottom of those is what you're looking for. Got it all?"

I nodded again, focusing as hard as I could to commit this to memory. Long story short: find Flame District core, go down.

"Problems you'll all but certainly face," Leif continued. "First, the ventilation in the Flame District is broken. The air there probably isn't breathable. Smoke, mine gasses, and who knows what else. Second: it's probably flooded, but I don't know anyone who's been down there to check recently. And I have no idea what the temperature is like, either. You might be able to scout it out with just a high-powered respirator, but I wouldn't go down there in anything short of an armored space suit. And finally, please remember that all this information is badly outdated and there will very likely be surprises I know nothing about, and you're probably marching to your death. But I do know that it at least used to be possible to get down there."

Huh. There was a decent chance that information might actually be legitimate, particularly since she was adding so many disclaimers and clearly not playing down any danger. "Any idea where to get an armored space suit?" I asked, aware of the irony given where I was from.

"Two options," Leif said. "One, Cold Karma might have some. Steal one or get close to someone who would lend it to you, up to you. Can't say for sure, it just seems like something they might keep laying around, given certain other interests of theirs. Two, find a mare named Shinespark. Infamous in Ironridge lore, not easy to track down, but she used to be an expert on wearable power armor. I've seen her creations in action myself. I don't know where she is, but some of her friends frequent a bar called the Gates to the Underworld. On the scale of shady meeting places, it's probably unlikely that anything bad will happen to you for snooping around there, but keep your ears open anyway. The proprietor's a batpony, though, so you should be fine. If neither of those pan out, figure something out yourself, though Ironridge is full of powerful folks willing to make under-the-table bargains with anyone who has skill, initiative and freedom. Just make sure you don't wind up like me."

"That's okay!" Kitty chirped, her tongue hanging out again. "If Halcyon gets arresteded again, Kitty'll come keep her company!"

Leif gave her a suspicious look.

"...Thanks," I said after mulling all that over. "You really want me to trust you, eh? If I spring you, what are you gonna do?"

"Look for the rest of my team," Leif answered. "I don't know where they are. If I succeed, or decide it's time to cut my losses, escape. Leave the city. Might try my luck in Yakyakistan, or go disappear in Varsidel."

"Would you really just go away?" I pressed. "Mother knew you. She said you were always fighting for a cause."

Leif shrugged. "Guilty as charged. I'm not telling you what I'd do after I left unless I had a little more reason to trust you, too."

Fair enough. "By the way..." I raised an eyebrow, sensing I was almost done here. "You really messed us up, you know? I spent a long time thinking about whether or not to hate you. If you were evil, you should have cackled a lot hard about it, and if you were good, you shouldn't have mislead us the way you did."

Leif returned the look. "Evil or good. And what if I'm neither?"

I met her gaze. "Then what do you think you are? Be honest, for once."

She met mine. "A necessity. An inevitability. A pony." She flickered with green flame, a hint of transformation magic, as if to remind me she was a changeling. "If you're not going to help me, then get out of here. Go see if you can find your cave, or if it's as lethal as I think it is. I can't prove myself here, in a vacuum."

Prove herself... She wanted my trust. Suddenly, an idea popped into my mind, the kind of idea that felt like cheating reality and playing by my own rules. But the rules in Ironridge were chaotic enough already, and it already felt like everyone who was anyone wrote their own, so...

Coda said I was special because I resisted her abilities to discern ponies' thoughts and intentions. Unless Leif was special in the exact same way, figuring out what she was up to and whether she would backstab me if I freed her was only a matter of getting her and Coda together in the same room.

Which almost sounded harder than dealing with Leif myself if she did go rogue, now that I thought about it. But it was an option.

"Alright." I straightened up. "I'll be back."

Leif sighed. "Try not to get killed out there, okay? Believe it or not, we were hired to strand you in order to protect you. Someone cares about you, kid."

"If only it was you, when it mattered." I turned my back on her, and started to walk away. "See ya, Leitmotif."

"...Senescey."

"Eh?" I glanced back over my shoulder.

"Senescey," Leif said. "My old name. Before I met the Composer."

I remembered the locket Mother had given me on the day I left Icereach. A small piece of metal with a picture of her and two others, a date forty-odd years ago, and the letters F+S+L. Maybe now I knew what one of those stood for.

"...Right. See ya, Senescey."

"Buh-bye, lady!" Kitty chirped, prancing along at my side.

I didn't look back as we left the holding area, but I thought I heard her call, "I'm sorry..."

This one would sit on my conscience for a while.

"Alright, you," I told Kitty once we were a ways away from the prison area. "I could really use a way out of here. I've seen a lot and I need to think about it, preferably somewhere safe. So if you can get me back to the surface and free from trouble with whatever weird privileges and knowledge you have..." I opened a pocket and pulled out my wallet, jingling it for emphasis. "Do it in under an hour, and I will personally go to a bakery, spend all of this on cake, and carry it personally down to your lair in Jamjars' basement. Do we understand each other?"

As I spoke, Kitty's face slowly morphed from a stupid, happy tongue-hanging-out grin to a radiant, ecstatic tongue-hanging-out grin. I had to take a step back to avoid getting licked out of pure joy.

And then she reached into her hoodie, pulled out a pair of pointy rock-star shades, slapped them on, put her tongue away and bared her teeth in a grin. "Now you're speakin' my language!"

I blinked. And then I blinked again. Kitty was talking normally?

"Err..." I narrowed my eyes in concern.

Kitty shrugged. "If you want more serious mode, keep the bribes coming. Freeloaders only get Kitty the clown. Now hop on. Time to blow this popsicle stand!"

I knew, all along, that Kitty had to be the way she was on purpose. And for some reason, it was a lot harder to believe now that I was seeing it with my own eyes.

"Well?" She motioned for me to get on her back. "Time's tickin', tummy's rumblin'! Let's get a move on!"

I climbed onto Kitty's back, mystified as to what this would accomplish and uncomfortable from the contact but willing to follow directions that were so important as to warrant breaking character.

"Hold on tight!" Kitty urged.

I did.

And then she moved. Kitty was suddenly fast, fast enough that it took me a second to process how she was moving, her hooves alternately kicking at and skidding along the ground, like an ice skater. She took corners with wild swings, and I chanced a look behind us to realize that was actually happening: there were trails of frost on the ground in our wake, and a razor-thin rime of ice just wide enough for a single hoof to coast along.

"Hold your breath and close your eyes," Kitty warned. "Air's about to get nasty!"

"Wait, what?" My ears pressed back in confusion.

"You heard the wench!" Kitty said. "Flame Barracks are connected to the Flame District core! Shortest way out, so cover your orifices!" We came upon a mechanical door, and Kitty skidded to a halt. "Ready?"

I nodded and took my deepest breath, not about to argue with such an unpredictable mare.

Ice congealed along the ground, growing and forming in a way that reminded me uncomfortably of how Ludwig had created ice in the hideout... Kitty had the special talent, but she didn't have the eyes, I reminded myself. There was no way she was a windigo.

Crunch! With a shriek of metal, the ice pried the door open, forming inside it and pushing the retracting sides apart. A wave of hot, sticky air hit me, bad enough that I could feel it on my wings as I raised them to cover my squeezed-shut eyes, and I hear the ice shatter and door crash back closed in our wake.

Kitty had stopped breathing, but she was running full burst.

Suddenly, she stopped, and my ears heard a hiss and crackle before we began to rise with startling velocity. It wasn't a jump, it felt like an elevator... and then it was a jump, the two of us hurtling through the air. I wanted to scream, my mind reached for my bracelet, but I held tight and held my breath and trusted Kitty and suddenly we hit something with enough force it nearly cost me the breath I was holding.

I was vertical. Kitty was somehow holding onto a wall.

And then she began to climb very rapidly, jumping and launching herself up the wall like she was running down a hill. I heard more hisses of ice, felt us rise again, bumps and jolts shaking and disorienting me until I had no idea of where we were, only that we were still going up... and then Kitty stopped, and with a wrenching of metal, I heard some ancient hinges being forced to work.

We were through. Kitty stopped again, and forced the door closed behind us. Then she started jumping back and forth, rapidly gaining height, as if skipping every single step in a back-and-forth stairwell, and the air swiftly cooled off, back to a level below normal.

"Whew!" she eventually panted. "Safe to breathe now. Hard part's over!"

I opened my eyes and took a deep breath, jumping off Kitty's back the moment I saw solid ground to land on. For a moment, I panted too - I could have held my breath a while longer, but this much was still a stretch. The air was far from fresh, and still tasted a little acrid, but I didn't think it would kill me.

Also, opening my eyes didn't seem to matter, because it was pitch black. Not even the faintest trace of light reached them, and I was well-practiced at operating in dim conditions. Using my bracelet for light was a habit I had generally broken when others were around, but here, I felt like I had to make an exception. It lit up, bathing the area in green.

Kitty had lingering trails of frost and meltwater on her hooves, and her mane, tail and hoodie were all stained with soot. She leaned down and sniffed my bracelet. "Shiny!"

"What was that?" I managed, getting myself back together. "How... How did you do that? Who are you? What are you? That was inequine..."

Kitty sat down and smiled, her eyes slowly unfocusing as her tongue poked back out - her shades were gone. "Kitty wants cake," she cheerfully informed me. "Halcyon owes Kitty an whole entire wallet of cake!"

"Yeah..." I looked around, taking stock of our surroundings. "Sure..."

We were still underground. In a stairwell. The one Kitty had been jumping up, presumably. I craned my neck; there was a slight gap between the staircases, and if I held out my bracelet, I could make out the bottom several flights below. Looking up? I had to turn my bracelet brighter, and there was still no roof in sight. The stairs looked like they went up forever.

"I hope you're not tuckered out after carrying me through that stunt," I told Kitty with a firm look, "because there's no way I'm returning the favor."

We climbed for so long, I was beginning to suspect this was a magical repeating staircase, but every time I looked back down, the bottom had receded, and eventually the top came into view, too. Kitty plodded onward with her usual naive cheer, the sane - no, lucid - was even that the right word? The other half of her nowhere to be seen. I had my own fitness to fall back on, but it was the only reason I could keep going: I was exhausted. This felt like the Aldebaran incident, where I wore myself out past my limit and all I could do was stumble onwards, except this time I knew I had a home waiting for me outside these tunnels.

Come to think of it... Climbing this stairwell aside, I hadn't really done anything strenuous tonight. Gone for a long hike with Ansel, sure, but I did that every night. And then I sat for an hour in an unusually cozy jail, and had plenty of time to physically rest up. Like I had done with Aldebaran, only there, I had been forced to stay off my hooves for a lot longer.

No, most of the exhausting things to happen to me recently were emotional. Dealing with nonstop curveballs and things not working the way I expected them to, getting in trouble when I shouldn't and then getting a way out when I also shouldn't have, meeting someone I had strong and complex feelings for... I was avoiding thinking about Leitmotif - Senescey, now - until I was safe and could afford to stop and process it, both the way I felt about her and the way I had treated her. Come to think of it, I had bottled up a lot of feelings in the name of survival and being at the top of my game during the Aldebaran incident, too.

And how well had that worked out for me?

A theory quickly pieced itself together in my head, one that felt obvious and like a revelation at the same time: being emotionally tired made me physically tired. And bottling things up in the name of performance in the short run might actually be backfiring.

I wondered if being emotionally strong could make me physically strong, too.

We eventually reached the top of the staircase, at which point I called a rest break and Kitty promptly tipped over on her side. A single door led into an adjacent room, and I poked my head through to get an idea of what was up next.

This next room was a long, long horizontal tunnel. The floor held a large central rail that looked like some kind of track, except not for any train I had ever seen. Beside it and recessed into the floor were belts made of interleaved metal plates that didn't seem entirely fixed in place. I wondered if they used to move in the past, conveyor belts for transporting cargo. Probably not very large cargo, or it would get in the way of whatever used the central rail...

Extinguished lights lined the ceiling, and two walkways ran along either side, so I'd be able to steer clear of the contraption either way. I couldn't see anything but darkness in either direction, but a very faint breeze blew from my left that smelled of fresh mountain air.

I sat down next to the entrance to the stairwell, since the air was better on this side of the door. The door itself was laying on the ground, I noticed; the hinges looked like they had rusted over long ago before being cut with something impossibly sharp. Even the lock was severed. The door had a dead bolt, but the head of it was still stuck in its slot in the wall, as if someone had stuck a blade in the crack and chopped it off. Working at it for a minute with my wing spokes, I was able to get the bolt head out and examine it. It was sturdy. What had done this?

...Also, there was a faded sign next to the door reading Emergency Exit. Odd that an emergency exit would have been allowed to rust, and then locked. Maybe whoever cut the door open was using it for its intended purpose.

"Hey," I said to Kitty, letting my mind wander. "How come you're so strong?"

Kitty looked up, laying sideways, flat against the floor. "Kitty gots strength," she told me. "It's her dancing game! Gives Kitty super muscles. Wanna play?"

"Maybe I'll give it a try when we get home," I said, turning back away. Focus. Relax. I wasn't in danger, just very lost. Even if I didn't know the rules, my home had a matron who had a say in writing them. I didn't need to be at the top of my game. Just... breathe.

And the thoughts started coming.

The first thing I realized was that if Kitty had a hidden side to her that could run through a cloud of toxic fumes in pitch blackness while performing inequine gymnastics and climbing a huge distance while holding her breath and with someone on her back, there might be a legitimate reason why she could push around Lilith and the police. I didn't know what that reason was - it could just be that she was absurdly strong, but that was probably only part of it - but it was very plausible that Kitty was spooking the executives on her own merits, and not just because of her connection to Jamjars.

Which meant Jamjars telling everyone that Kitty got away with it via her connections to her was a front. And that meant Jamjars and Kitty were coordinated partners.

A lot of things suddenly made sense, and I quickly put together a hypothesis to test that: Jamjars knew I got arrested and sent Kitty to keep an eye on me and chase off any untoward advances. Whenever we got home, I'd watch their interactions and see if they conformed to my suspicions, or if something still didn't seem right. But I had a hunch I had just figured out one of the secret rules to how Ironridge worked.

That led to a second realization: even if Jamjars and Kitty were powerful enough to scare off other powers by confronting them face to face, the fact that they had to confront them displayed a limit to their influence. These two were far more influential than they should have been, but they weren't omnipotent, and if I relied on them to be, then this sort of thing would probably happen again. And quickly, too, now that both Lilith and the police were curious and felt the stakes tightening.

Third: Samael and Estael, I was all but certain, were interested in me for some reason relating to my emptiness. Frustratingly, I was at a disadvantage here: I didn't know how I worked myself, which limited my ability to guess at what anyone else might know about me. So the smart decision might be to accept my losses up front and assume all the Cold Karma tycoons knew everything about me from the start.

...Did that include Jamjars? Did I want to assume she volunteered to take me and my friends from Icereach because I had something she wanted to exploit, the way Leif had lied and captured all of us with the express interest of stealing Corsica's identity? Not counting her recent admission that she abducted us for our own protection, which I was disinclined to put stock in.

Jamjars, betraying us like that... I tried to imagine it. Maybe it was true. Maybe I was destined to get betrayed by everyone I trusted. Maybe there was something about me that attracted traitors, be it magical or mundane. Although Jamjars seemed generally more interested in teaching me than using me... Maybe she knew things about me, but was also legitimately interested in my well-being. Whether for my sake or for the detriment of someone I might someday become an obstacle to, it was certainly a possibility.

I didn't want to be a pawn in anyone's plan, though. I wanted to see the world and be free.

Such a simple goal to articulate, and yet such a hard one to realize.

It might be the case that I couldn't get away with not playing this game, though. Not for as long as I was in Ironridge, at least. And there was clearly a game afoot. The city did have rules, even if they were hidden or counterintuitive; I was certain of that much. Rules that were probably being made by the rulemakers as moves in that game.

So, my moves... As tempting as it was to ignore the game and live my life, that was going to get me right back where I was again, and I hated being stressed, helpless and confused. At the very least, I was going to play it enough to learn the rules, and that involved getting my hooves dirty. To do that, I'd need to learn to cool my head and keep from breaking down under situations like these.

I did a quick self-check, and didn't feel all that bad. I was less tired than before. Maybe digging through all these thoughts instead of running and hiding and trying to stay strong was the right way, after all.

Options, though. First, I could formally throw in my lot with Egdelwonk. From what I had seen of Ironridge's top brass, he felt like the least-likely employer to subject me to bodily harm, the most-likely enemy to annoy me during my day-to-day routine, and also he already had Corsica and if I was going to pick a corrupt, bizarre team to join, it would probably minimize the ways things could go wrong if I was on the same side as my best friend. Or at least avoid a host of potentially unsavory scenarios I didn't want to imagine, were we ever asked to work against each other. And on the plus side, I could talk about this with Corsica first and get her opinion on it.

Second, and not mutually exclusive, I could dedicate a lot more time to Coda. She had not-so-subtly offered me an airship, and felt like an easy target for manipulation to boot. And while I wasn't about to pull a Leitmotif on a lonely child, an airship was a no-holds-barred ticket to freedom. If I got one, I won the game. Not to mention, she had powers that could be useful. And even if I was uneasy about how easily she was trusting me, I really wanted more ponies I could trust, too.

Other things... I could formally abandon my interest in the Earth District. Night District, whatever. I didn't have any reason to go down there aside from curiosity, it was hard to go down there thanks to the weather, and it didn't seem like the safest or nicest place to be. And going there had gotten me in this mess in the first place. I kind of wanted to investigate and learn the reason Barnabas and Piano Mare had jumped me, because right now that incident stuck out in my mind like a black eye, but it wasn't that important. I had bigger things to worry about.

And then... Leitmotif.

I sighed. I had no idea what to do with her, or what to think of her, or how to feel. She was visibly underfed, and the first thing I had done upon seeing her, before any of my emotions got in the way, was give her food.

Was she untrustworthy? Absolutely. Was she a villain...?

I didn't know. I never found out her real intentions. Eventually, I had made an uneasy peace with not knowing, just so I could sleep at night. Now, it mattered again. Was I just as bad as she was, leaving her down there when I could have helped? Was there a chance I was worse? If I knew the full details of her operation in Icereach, what if I decided she was fighting for a noble cause? What was Lilith doing to her down there... Or what was the Composer doing? I wondered how I had traipsed through Lilith's entire underground base and not seen the Composer anywhere, given that they were in cahoots.

Leif seemed so desperate, though. Was it selfish desperation, and she wanted to get free for her own sake? Or did she know something important? Even if I didn't trust her enough to listen, there were things she hadn't trusted me enough to tell me, despite the hope that she could have swayed me to listen.

Maybe she was an utter cad, and was working with Lilith in a good-cop-bad-cop routine to get me to do something, but... she wouldn't. Leif hated authority, I remembered. That part of her, from back in Icereach, I couldn't see as a lie.

And she was Mother's old best friend. If I had a falling-out with Corsica, someday, and then I had a kid, how would I want them to feel about each other?

I swallowed. I was talking myself in circles, using logic to forestall an inevitable conclusion: I should have let her go, consequences come what may. I was a pony who followed her heart. I wouldn't be able to hide from that forever.

A tear touched the corner of my eye, and I wished I had sat down and had this talk with myself half an hour ago.

"I'll be back," I whispered, too quiet for Kitty to hear. "Give me three days. I'll need to find a normal way in that doesn't involve toxic fumes, and a way back out again. But no more than that. I promise, you hear?"

The world had no response, but my body did. I could physically feel that I had made the right decision. My legs felt stronger, like I hadn't just climbed a five-mile staircase or been emotionally squeezed through the wringer. A rush of determination pulsed through my chest, and my bracelet sparkled a little brighter.

"Alright," I told Kitty, peeking back through the stairwell door, "break's ov-"

Kitty was fast asleep on the floor.

"Fine." I rolled my eyes and reached down, hoisting her onto my back. "Guess I'm returning the favor after all."

Three Day-ja Vu

I was, to put it bluntly, fired up.

Less so much about what I was doing, or even what I was planning to do, than what I had done: I had turned my spirits around after being stressed and pressured into a funk. This was what stopped me from being a hero during the Aldebaran incident: I had the tools, skills and circumstance to meet those challenges head-on, and good old exhaustion and panic and lack of self-confidence went and did me dirty. For months, I stewed and imagined a redo, but I never really knew what would happen once I was back in the hot seat and the pressure came down hard.

And now I did. I had passed the trial run. Surprises, abductions, arbitrary hostilities, random boons, settings changing like a slideshow, parsing information from known liars and rules that made no sense had swept me up in a whirlwind, and all on my own, I was back on my hooves and brimming with determination.

That I was determined to make an alliance with Egdelwonk, break back into Lilith's lair and rescue my mortal enemy from prison were beside the point. If planning something that stupid and dangerous was what it took, so be it. If I could feel like this while doing it, the payoff would eclipse the price about as perfectly as anyone could ask for.

For now, though, all I could do was plan, because my body was busy dragging Kitty's loudly-snoring carcass up another set of stairs. The hallway after the Flame District stretched for between a quarter and half a mile, and at the end, I found this. The top was in sight, though. If I turned my bracelet off, I could even see traces of moonlight, though that made me realize I had been ever-so-slightly using it to bolster my physical strength as well.

Oh well. It had been wishful thinking that my surge of strength was all from a better state of mind. Still, I hadn't even noticed if there were green flames this time. I bumped practice with bracelet a little higher on my priorities list. Either my mental blocks around using it were melting, my control of it was growing, or both, and that made it important to practice and learn what I could count on it to safely do.

I reached the top of the staircase, stepped through a rusted metal double-door that had been left wide open, and found myself face to face with a beautiful, moonlit calamity.

A cracked concrete floor sprawled out before me, ancient stripes and painted guidelines tattooing it beneath a cover of grass and vegetation that sprung from the cracks. Mountains of debris covered the field, shoved together to create clear space and walkways, messes of rent sheet metal and twisted steel girders and splintered, rotting wood, twice the height of houses or more. I was at one end of the compound, my doorway set into a wall a few feet off the ground, a battered metal grate platform forming a walkway that looked sturdy enough to hold my weight.

Everything dripped and glistened with fresh moisture, and as I wandered out onto the platform and cast my gaze upward, I could see the last retreating dregs of the rainstorm intermingled with the stars. What looked like a broken ribcage soared high above me. It was too dark to make out the material, but I gathered those spines had been the core roof supports of a massive building that had fallen in, laying waste to everything inside.

I started to wander, sticking to elevated walkways whenever I found them - there were some still left clutching the building's old perimeter, a concrete shell that was largely intact. And, eventually, I found a particular rubble mound that was intact enough to see what it had once been before it was smashed by the ceiling: I was in the old skyport's airship hangar.

Two ships here were jammed together, a smaller, rotund one bisected by the prow of a bigger, metal vessel, both lodged tightly together in death's embrace. What had done that? I heard the Steel Revolution was a military endeavor, but this looked more like a natural disaster. As I squinted further, though, I realized there was a faint light coming from inside the larger vessel.

Someone had made this their home.

I glanced up at Kitty on my back, who since we got outside had shifted from honk-shoo honk-shoo snoring to hoooooonk mi-mi-mi-mi-mi. This was probably a bad place to stop and test the hospitality of strangers unless we reeeally needed it, right? I doubted anyone would live in a wreck like this if they were a noble and upstanding member of society.

She looked perfectly content to snore away, and my second wind hadn't abated yet... and I had my bracelet to fall back on if it did. So I shook my head at that call to adventure and moved on, looking for a way to get out of the skyport.

None were forthcoming. After getting to a high enough point to see out over the wall, I realized this destroyed building was in the absolute middle of nowhere, surrounded by rocky crags and post-glacial terrain with no roads in sight. Off to the east, I could make out two stands of destroyed skyport towers, the furthest of which sheltered the town of Dead Herman, and a pointy tower in the distance. Support columns ran from this building toward them, looking like they once supported a raised glass tunnel, but that was long past serviceable now. How did anyone even get here to build this place?

...The same way I did, I realized. If my sense of direction wasn't lying to me, the long tunnel that brought me here was probably a maintenance corridor connecting this building to the rest of the skyport. I had gone the wrong way.

I turned around to start retracing my steps, bracing myself internally for however many more miles with Kitty on my back, and found myself face to face with a pony.

One who was even more dressed-up than I was.

"Hello," she said in a soft voice, a thick, form-fitting dress hugging her slender frame like a ghostly cowl. A brooch with a glowing pastel-green gem held it closed in the front, and a heavy hood with ear shapes sewn into it hid most of her face and mane. She carried herself low and kept her head to the ground, and in the moonlight, I could only see the bare outlines of her eyes and muzzle.

"Err..." I took a step back. "Hi?"

"I haven't seen you around here before," she said, her voice tinged by a strange, ethereal quality. "Where are you from? And why is someone sleeping on your back?"

I hadn't expected this, and wasn't prepared to respond. More police? Sure. Hobos angry I was trespassing on their land? That sounded about right. But a curious waif?

Well, whatever. There were no rules on what I could expect from Ironridge, after all.

"I'm from down there," I said, pointing out at the rim of the Ironridge crater, a sheet of light rising up from its depths and obscuring the stars to the south as the city went about its nightly business. "Which is where I'm trying to get back to, except I'm lost. And someone's sleeping on my back because they're tired, and I wasn't about to leave them behind." Although if I did leave Kitty behind, she'd very likely be fine...

"You want to go down to the city?" The mare tilted her head at me, still keeping her gaze low and making it hard to see beneath her hood. "It's a dangerous place, but a wonderful one, too. Do you like watching ponies?"

I blinked. "Err, yeah. Why?"

"I do," she explained. "I think they're fascinating. You're fascinating, too. Usually, only my family come up here. Were you looking for me?"

I hesitated. "I don't think so. I'm lost, remember? I'm just looking for the way back down. You know where it is?"

"That's a shame." The slender mare sounded disappointed, yet as serene as ever. "Someday, I would like for one of the ponies I watch to remember me. With my parents' approval, I go down into the city to sell flowers from time to time. I try to remember the ponies I meet like that, but I can't remember them all. I assume they are the same. Have you ever forgotten about someone?"

Yes. On purpose. "Maybe, but I'm pretty exhausted," I said, pointing at Kitty. "And she is too. If you know a way down, could you please help us?"

"Of course." The mare nodded, and gracefully turned. "Please follow me."

She was a lot faster than I anticipated, yet somehow carried herself as if she was on a stately stroll even as I panted to keep up. We left the wall and moved down into the junk heaps, which she navigated with effortless ease, moving past one and then another...

And then we reached a pair of guards.

Before they could act, I sized them up. Unicorn mare and pegasus stallion, both with long dark fur, early thirties, wearing light sets of hardened leather armor. Heavily armed, each with at least three blades. Probably Yakyakistani. And they had seen us.

"Milady!" the stallion said, greeting the waif. "Who is that behind you?"

"Who goes there?" the mare echoed.

"Look," I said, taking a step back. "I'm a little lost right now. I don't want trouble, and if you show me the way out I will eagerly take it. Peace?"

My escort straightened up, apparently not as reluctant to show them her face as she was to show me. "Hello," she said. "I met these ponies on the eastern wall. They are from the city. They wanted my help in getting home."

The stallion looked me up and down. "You some kinda spy?"

"Or tourist?" the guardmare asked. "Can't tell if you look a little too ragtag or a little too fancy."

"Name's Halcyon," I said, "and like I said, I'm lost. Not a tourist, not a spy. No idea where this even is."

The guardmare raised an eyebrow. "Not a place it's easy to come by mistake."

"Look," I deadpanned. "Would you believe me if I said I got arrested, jailbroken by some shady goon, then escaped from them and ran through the Flame District to get here?"

The guards gave each other a look.

"Stranger things have happened," the stallion said. "Doesn't make it likely. What were they after you for? Are you with those pro-sarosian terrorists in the Earth District?"

"What?" I took a step back and blinked. "No. I was just minding my own business, when suddenly-"

"And what's with the kid?" the guardmare asked, pointing at Kitty.

"Excuse me," the cloaked mare gently cut in. "I invited her to come this way. Why are you so suspicious?"

Both of the guards looked slightly awkward. "Listen, Milady..." The mare hesitated. "Ponies don't just show up at Fort Starlight with unconscious kids on their backs because they're out enjoying the weather."

Starlight, huh...?

The stallion hesitated, then looked to me. "Kid, look. Are you legitimately in trouble?"

I met his stare. "I've legitimately had a real bad time recently. I'm not in so much trouble that I can't get myself home if you'd show me the way out of here, but if you're legit offering to help, I'll take what I can get."

Both of the guards scrutinized me. "Alright, where are you from?" the mare eventually asked.

"Depends how you mean." I shrugged, realizing this was probably a non-government fort and it may or may not position me against them if I claimed to be a denizen of the Ice District. "I'm kind of new to Ironridge, but before that I was from Icereach. The science colony, out west?"

The two guards looked at each other again, and with a nod, the stallion ran off. "Wait here," the mare instructed. "And have a seat, this could take a minute."

I set Kitty down and waited, and didn't try to make conversation. I probably should have, and probably could have, but if there was a chance things were going my way, I would wait and see how that panned out first.

The cloaked mare waited too.

Eventually, my waiting paid off with the sound of heavy, approaching hoofsteps. Familiar hoofsteps... Was that a yak approaching?

Indeed it was. Around the corner emerged a massive, hairy behemoth, his horns wide and imposing and his pear-shaped face covered in old scars and burn marks, a huge eyepatch over one huge eye. But despite the disfigurations, I recognized him immediately.

"...Nicov?"

"Science pony Halcyon!" Nicov brightened when he saw me, lumbering forward and grabbing me in a crushing hug. "Nicov notice fancy new coat! Halcyon moving up in world?"

"Yeah, sorta," I wheezed, struggling to breathe. "Nice face, big guy. What happened?"

Nicov put me down and shrugged. "This from Nicov jumping on bomb in Halcyon house. Just heal this way. Honorable war wounds." He flexed. "Halcyon chasing dream and come to Ironridge?"

"Yeah," I explained, all my anxiety melting away in the face of my old and powerful friend's presence. "Long time no see, by the way. Didn't they send you off here on vacation, because you were wounded? It's kinda coming back to me."

Nicov patted my back with thunderous force, but two years of experience let me weather it like a champ. "Official vacation," he explained. "Unofficial envoy and investigation yak. Nicov do sniffing around for crimes and things. Very complicated. Science pony would understand well."

"So..." The guard mare had lowered her weapons. "You two know each other, then?"

Nicov tossed me on his back, so that I was riding atop his thick, shaggy neck. "Science pony Halcyon very good friend. Nicov vouch for her with heart and stomach!" He pounded his chest with a single mighty thump.

"Wow," the cloaked mare whispered.

"I guess that settles it." The mare shrugged and waved us through. "Welcome on in."

"Hey, err..." I tapped Nicov on the shoulder before he could carry me on through, and pointed at the loudly-snoring Kitty. "She's with me."

Nicov hoisted her too, and then we were on our way.

Over the course of a few small steps, a whole new world opened up before my eyes.

On the outside, the debris piles were as dank and ruined as ever. But here, in the center, was a circular enclave, a wall of ruined junk that wrapped around to form the barrier of a central camp. And on the inside, it was substantially cleaner: airship hulls split cleanly and reinforced with ad-hoc sheet metal to form open-fronted rooms, sometimes closed off by curtains or other times left fully visible, like a foal's dollhouse that split open along a line to give easy access to all the rooms.

A central support pillar propped up a roof, made from interleaved sheets of metal that were all slightly slanted to keep out rain. The interior had no level floors beyond the ground, no way to count stories, but between ship decks and split ship hulls and layers of debris someone had put a serviceable floor on, it was almost as vertical as it was wide.

And it hummed with activity.

Pegasi, griffons and even a few batponies flew this way and that, inhabiting the highest reaches of the camp. Unicorns, earth ponies and a yak or two marched about on the floors, keeping up a sense of industrious, ordered chaos. Someone who knew about managing small spaces had clearly designed this; I saw shop stalls clustered together, and signs of skilled carpentry and even metalworking in the braces that held the place together and transformed it from a trash heap to something livable.

Was this a society who had been given nothing, and made everything out of what they had? Or was it a military operation who had very effectively camouflaged themselves from above?

I almost wondered if it was both.

"Nicov," I whispered, patting his neck for attention, "what is this?"

"Is Fort Starlight!" Nicov rumbled with pride. "Run by old friends of Elise. Strongest independent power in Ironridge. Very secret, so shhh."

"Yeah, yeah. My lips are sealed." There was no way Cold Karma didn't know about this, not if Egdelwonk was able to teleport between every trash can in existence. And, honestly, the exterior aesthetic fit him perfectly. But odds were they had some measure of diplomacy going on to at least stay neutral, and it might have been a secret from the general public, so I wouldn't be the one to spill the beans.

"Come," Nicov said, lumbering toward a side of the compound that looked more residential. "Put slumber pony to bed. Then Nicov introduce you to big boss. Make sure all know Halcyon is friend!"

I watched in amazement as Nicov spoke to an older stallion who seemed to be a proprietor, and soon Kitty was left behind, snoring her little heart out on a very comfy looking bed. I almost wanted to join her, my body suddenly reminding me that I actually had been emotionally kicked around today and hiked a long distance with a heavy load and maybe now that my rush of determination had worn off and I was in a safe haven, it was time to collapse and let myself be tired. But I had a warm, hairy yak to ride on, so going somewhere else didn't bother me too much.

On the way out, Kitty, still snoring, cracked one eye open and shot me a look that said I'm doing this on purpose and you still owe me cake.

"Yeah, yeah," I muttered at her, not caring whether it was loud enough for her to hear.

Nicov brought me as far as the back center of the camp, where a narrow spiral staircase rose up to the highest point along the outer wall. "Boss office," he instructed, nodding up at it. "Science pony go alone. Nicov too heavy for stairs. Will stay here if Halcyon need support."

"Okay..." I jumped to the ground and started climbing, looking back down at him after one revolution.

He gave me a one-eyed wink. "Boss pony act ruder than rudest yak, but actually friendly and noble. Halcyon will be fine!"

I swallowed. Introducing me to the boss so everyone knew I was a friend was one thing. Sending me up unannounced to meet with the boss on my lonesome? A rude boss, at that? This didn't match up.

But Nicov was my friend. I trusted him. And so, I kept climbing.

At the top was an airship that had been split in half lengthwise, the stairs matching up with the broken edge of its hull. I stepped onto the wood - surprisingly sturdy, as if it had all been torn out and replaced without sacrificing the bisected-ship aesthetic. The place looked like it had been a pirate ship, decorated with dark reds and occasional splotches of rich, gaudy color. In front of me was an ornate wood-and-iron door, short and almost as wide as it was tall.

I knocked. It swung open of its own accord.

The room beyond had been the stern of the ship, I guessed, an array of frosted glass windows at the back letting in just enough moonlight to see by. There was a desk, a high-backed chair, a lot of pictures lining the walls... Most of them of mares I didn't recognize, but one griffon that in better lighting might have been a much-younger Gerardo. Or maybe Gerardo was the only griffon I had ever met up close before. Also, it was pretty dark in here.

With a creak, the door shut itself behind me.

I felt a chill ride up my spine. The room was empty save for me, the desk all cleared of work. I paced around to check behind the chair, but nothing.

Had Nicov brought me when the boss was away? It didn't seem impossible, though I would have expected the door to be locked...

I took a step backwards, without looking where I was going, and felt something organic under my hoof.

"Yaah!" I jumped in surprise, spinning around to look... but there was nothing there.

"Okay..." I took a few steps away from the spot where I had felt the thing, glancing warily around, my heart pounding. "Who's there?"

No response.

"Listen, I-"

I took another step, and stepped on something again. This time, I didn't jump quite as hard, but it did the opposite of calming my nerves.

"Stop it," I whispered, climbing up on the desk. "Whatever's going on, I will fight you."

The room snickered.

"Where-!?" I watched the floor like a hawk.

"You know," the desk said from beside me, "I'm starting to think you've got a thing for stepping on my face."

My neck whipped around. There was a face on the desk. "What the-"

The face erupted, an entire pony bursting out from the desk, so close to me that I was knocked backwards. "Nyaaaaagh boolaboolaboolaboola heh heh heh hah harrr!"

I couldn't help it. I screamed, falling off the desk. All of my shock reflexes activated at once, and my muscles were too stiff to manage the landing.

And then the lights turned on, illuminating me like a spotlight as I lay in a messy heap.

"Hah! Gottem! Wow, you scare good." Now there was a pony on the desk, fangs and slitted eyes, staring down at me. She whipped out a camera, pointed it at me, and snapped. "For later. Wouldn't want you to miss out on the look on your own face just now. Can you believe batponies fall for the old shadow sneak just as easily as everyone else? Because lemme tell you, Socks, it's not just you."

Utterly overwhelmed, I wanted to withdraw into my coat like a shell and hide away. I felt my cheeks burn with shame, and I curled up. Whatever was going on... I just didn't care anymore. I curled up.

The pony on the desk frowned at me, a lock of emerald green dangling from beneath a classy, lopsided beret. "Wow, uh, you actually don't look so good. Here, I've got a thing to help with that."

She ducked behind her desk, and I heard a drawer open. Then she walked back out carrying a whole watermelon.

"Here," she instructed, reaching down and prying my forelegs open just enough to slip the melon into my grasp. "Eat up, it's delicious. That'll get you out of your funk."

I stared at her blankly.

She stared back, and eventually arched an eyebrow. "Alright, fine. I've heard stepping on my face can be a transcendent experience, but if you really wanna tell me how cool it was, fire away."

I had nothing. I quit. I gave up. There was no possible way I could understand-

Something beneath my mask decided that if I was abdicating, anything was free game. So I stood up, abandoned the melon, and punched her in the face as hard as I could.

She didn't even flinch until I hit her, at which she promptly went flying into the wall. The impact caused several paintings to rattle.

For a moment, I panted, realizing I had just punched out a pony I was maybe supposed to be aligned with as my senses un-jammed and I regained control of myself. And then she sat up and grinned.

"Hey, not bad, Socks! You're pretty buff!" She stuck out a hoof.

"Socks?" I didn't take it. "My name's Halcyon. Please tell me you're not supposed to be in charge around here."

The other batpony yawned. "That's nice, Socks, but I'm horrible with names I don't make up myself. So unless you wanna show me you're not using those boots to cover up any saucy sleepware, it's gonna stick. You've probably got until I say it two more times before it sticks around forever."

I stared blankly at her. "You what?"

"Nope?" She tilted her head at me, then shrugged. "Fine by me, Socks. Anyway, yeah, I'm the boss around here. Name's Valey. Admiral Valey, though I tried promoting myself to commodore a while back, and then someone told me admirals outrank commodores, and I never bothered to figure out if they were messing with me so the title's not as important as it once was."

I narrowed my eyes. "Wait a minute, you're Valey?"

She tipped her beret and gave a green-eyed wink. "Was my reputation a cool host? Hope you didn't get mistaken for me too often."

I shook my head and sighed. This was a name that always seemed to come up at random intervals, and rarely in a flattering context... probably. "I've heard a lot about a lot of ponies," I decided to say. "Hard to keep 'em all straight. So what's the big idea, scaring me like that?"

Valey shrugged. "Well, technically I owed that to your mom, but I'd kind of appreciate it if I never had to meet her again, so stinks to be you. Also I do that to everyone. Also anyone I don't do that to has this weird tendency to trust me too much and think I'm a cuddly kitten. And I let you punch me in return, gave you that sweet melon, and am not even charging for letting you step on my face, so I'd say you come out ahead here." She gave me a look that challenged me to say otherwise.

So I did. "You're insane."

"Eh." Valey yawned. "It's a common sentiment. Probably founded, too. I never was quite myself again after that one time someone devoured my soul. Took a nasty endoscopy and a whole lot of duct tape to fix that one, lemme tell you..."

My shock and confusion was starting to be replaced by morbid fascination and a similar sense of the utterly surreal. "Really insane."

"Capable of being not insane when it matters, though," Valey said, flopping into her chair. "You want me to get to the point so you can go enjoy your melon? Or are you enjoying the distraction from rude ol' Ironridge?"

"Distraction?" I squinted at her.

Valey gestured at the window. "I had a goon tailing you in Blueleaf. Been watching you for a while now, actually. You know, like, in case you wandered into gang territory and needed a way out, or something. Which you totally did, by the way, so you're welcome. Point is, I know, like... at least twenty percent of what you've been doing today. So you wanna joke around some more and keep pretending that doesn't exist, or get on with business so you can either crash here or go cuddle back up with stinking Jamjars?"

I took a step back. "As if. First off, don't stalk me, and second, if you really knew that much about me, why didn't your gate guards know who I was?"

Valey pointed a wing at me. "I just said I had a history with your mom, didn't I? Also, Birdo kind of asked me to keep an eye out for you. Can't help but know who you are! Also, I run an organization with a whole bunch of ponies who can't all be bothered to all know exactly the same intel."

"If you're really looking out for me, you mind showing me the exit?" I looked at her skeptically, wondering if this mare was really old enough to have a history with Mother. She couldn't be past her mid-twenties... "I met some mare in a cloak who said she was leading me out of here, and brought me to your fort instead."

"Yeah, we've got a teleporter. Good for close-range stuff." Valey stretched, adjusting her posture. "But first, I've got three important questions for you. And these actually are important, so listen up. First: what do you think of Ironridge?"

"Ironridge?" My ears flicked. "You want me to be honest?"

Valey nodded. "Lay it on thick."

"It's pretty dumb," I admitted, still not over my nerves from being jump-scared, but with at least a decent idea that this mare wasn't maliciously insane. Just rudely insane. "Nothing makes sense because there are secret reasons for everything and everyone who's anyone makes their own rules. But it's also really cool because it's big and new. I don't like it and I don't want to stay here forever, but if I left right now, today, I don't think I'd regret having come."

Realizing what I had just said, I quickly added, "You could probably change that in about five seconds with the wrong move, right now."

"Cool, cool. Also completely understandable. It's kind of a dump. Even I can't make sense of everything that happens here, and I'm juiced up on more context and forbidden knowledge than you can fit in Herman's armpit." Valey nodded again. "You sort of answered the second question already, but what do you want to do about the stuff you don't like?"

I shrugged. "Keep looking somewhere else. I didn't get up and leave my home to settle down in another place forever. I wanna travel and see the world."

"Neutral answer, then," Valey said. "You don't wanna be a goodie four-shoes and try to fix the problems, but you also aren't frothing at the mouth for revenge. Just wanna move on and roll the dice again."

I tilted my head. "It's kind of my only option, don't you think? How am I gonna do either of the others?"

Valey opened her desk, pulled out a banana, peeled it and started munching. "Beats me," she said with her mouth full. "Maybe you can, and maybe you can't. But at the very least, anyone can try anything. Say you thought you could do anything. Would that change your answer?"

I thought about that for a minute. "I dunno," I eventually said. "I know it would be the right thing to do, and all. But if I'm gonna risk my neck, I'd rather do it for stuff I care about a lot. I'm not a wandering hero for hire. But I wouldn't try to make it worse, either."

"Huh." Valey nodded along. "Third question. What makes someone a person?"

I blinked. I had no idea.

"Complicated, huh?" Valey watched my reaction keenly. "Is it the cute, fuzzy body? The ability to speak? The place you come from? Something no one can see?"

Helplessly, I shrugged. This wasn't exactly a question I had wrestled with, but it was fairly close to one I thought about a lot, and that was what I was, emptiness and mask and all.

Valey raised an eyebrow. "If you ran into someone in a gray area. Like, some unnatural stuff about them, maybe minor, maybe serious. How generous would you be with drawing the line?"

"I'd be pretty generous," I said without hesitation, remembering how often I talked to machines. "Like, probably more than most."

Valey grinned. "Cool. I like you. For now, consider yourself welcome in Fort Starlight." She narrowed her eyes. "But just a heads-up, that doesn't extend to the little curmudgeon you brought along with you. She and I have an understanding, and she's currently pretending to take five because she doesn't want to violate our treaty, but she's not on our team and neither is Jamjars. So, uh, if you ever happen to be back in the area? Try to ditch them first. Snazzy?"

I nodded, feeling like I wasn't too likely to come back here any time soon.

The moment I thought that, though, I remembered Nicov, and reconsidered. But this Valey reeked of an agenda about as much as the Cold Karma bosses, and I didn't really need more feuding sides to deal with. Especially one one opposed to the side that was currently giving me free room and board...

"Yeah. Snazzy." I turned to leave, ready for a rest and some relative safety.

"Hey!" Valey barked on my way out. "Don't forget your apology melon!"

I shook my head and left anyway, much more interested in the company of Nicov than some suspicious fruit. Although, on second thought, I was really hungry...

When I turned around, Valey was already hefting the melon, a sneaky grin on her face.

"I swear, if you throw that thing at me..." I warned, a strange sense alerting me as to what was about to happen. "Eh, just give it here. Gently. And you better watch yourself when you're alone, because I can shadow swim too."

Valey just winked. "Yeah, yeah. Challenge the master. But hey, maybe you'll learn a thing or two?"

I took the melon and left, hoping but not hopeful that that was the end of that.

One Trusty Yak

The first thing I did after meeting with Valey was seek out Nicov's company. The second thing I did was eat.

I had no idea how to carve and eat a whole raw melon, but Fort Starlight was equipped to feed and shelter an entire standing garrison, so fortunately I didn't need to. Nicov led me to an open-air courtyard in front of a bisected airship hull that had been turned into a cafe of sorts, with tables aplenty for ponies to eat at. I took a chair, and he eschewed one since they weren't really built for yaks, and for a while, I ate in silence, trying to figure out what to ask first.

"...So Nicov," I eventually said. "You're not, like, tied up in any weird politics here, are you? Any bozos competing for your loyalties? Or are you still independent on behalf of Icereach?"

Nicov chuckled. "Many try. None succeed. Nicov not have brain for pony politics. Science pony Halcyon get harassed by powerful ponies who want her help?"

"Yeah," I said with a sad shake of my head, "don't you know it. Nothing makes sense here. It feels like everyone's playing by their own rules, or there's some key context I'm missing that I can't understand anything without. Ironridge is big and wonderful, but I feel like I'm coasting through a gauntlet of close shaves on nothing but luck and grit." I gave him a wan grin. "Don't suppose you know any secrets that would completely explain everything that doesn't make sense in this city? Like, say, what all the power players are playing at?"

Nicov snorted. "Told pony, Nicov not have brain for these things. But might have heard something. Ask specific question."

I hesitated. "...Okay. You know what everyone has against Jamjars? I came here with a griffon called Gerardo, and he really didn't trust her. I'm pretty sure he's in cahoots with Valey, and she doesn't trust her either. And there's probably others I've met whom I'm forgetting."

Nicov rumbled in thought. "Jamjars very old friend of group of important ponies from Steel Revolution. Valey was leader. Elise also involved. Friendship end poorly for some reason. Something that happen just before Valey return to Ironridge. Then something else happen. Been at loggerheads ever since." He rubbed his shaggy chin. "Might have actually been three somethings. Not two."

"Three somethings," I said. "So they've got a long history of being at each other's throats, then. It's not just an isolated incident?"

Nicov nodded. "Yak think so. First incident involve pony Starlight, who this fort named after. Nicov think it involve reason why she not come back to Ironridge with Valey after long travels. But only Valey know for sure. Other incidents probably have to do with Cold Karma. But also mystery."

I nodded slowly. "So the Steel Revolution was, like, twenty years ago, right? And you say Valey was the leader of this important group then. How old is she? Because she looks pretty young. Jamjars I know was a filly back then, and even she's way older than Valey looks now."

Nicov shrugged. "Nobody know. Valey flirt with anyone who ask. Nicov think that mean Valey not know herself."

"Yeah..." I stretched uncertainly. "It's just that the last time I met someone who was clearly involved with events around that time but looked way too young to have been important back then, it was probably because they were... you know..."

I didn't want to say a changeling.

Nicov seemed to understand. "Maybe Valey changeling. Maybe Halcyon changeling. Maybe Nicov changeling. Important? No. Important thing is what ponies trying to do."

"What is Valey trying to do?" I pressed. "I mean, keeping a military garrison in a presumably-secret fort like this doesn't exactly scream normal, you know?"

"Valey not like Cold Karma," Nicov explained. "After Steel Revolution, Valey leave Ironridge. When Valey return, try to take over city with friends. Have trouble because before revolution, friends do some questionable things in Ironridge. Valey most questionable of all. Halcyon heard of pony called Shinespark?"

"Several times," I said, recalling the statue in Dead Herman and Leif's - well, Senescey, now - her advice on getting a suit that could protect me in the Flame District.

Nicov rumbled. "Shinespark like Ironridge princess. Before Steel Revolution, Ironridge have big change. Shinespark belong to family that get forced out of power. Shinespark promise to make Ironridge way it used to be. Many ponies not like new Ironridge, and so like Shinespark. Then war happen between old and new. Shinespark leave with Valey after war, then come home and help rebuild. Once Ironridge rebuilt? Ponies blame Shinespark and Shinespark family for war. Cold Karma take over instead. Valey think Cold Karma lie about Shinespark to get power. So build fortress with friends and friends of friends to keep Cold Karma from owning whole city."

I winced, listening. Getting blamed for a war after helping to rebuild from it? Or having that happen to one of your friends? I... didn't know what I would do if that happened to me. An older, more experienced, more self-confident me might just react exactly like Valey had. But I really didn't want to imagine a scenario in which I would have to find out.

"You think Jamjars had anything to do with Cold Karma coming to power?" I asked, trying to stay focused. "Did those happen around the same time? I know she's really influential with them and I've never been able to figure out why."

Nicov shrugged. "Jamjars was little filly when travel with Valey. Still young when Cold Karma appear. Younger than Halcyon. Nicov doubt she help found company unless she secret genius. But Valey definitely not like Jamjars take Cold Karma side."

"So do you know what Cold Karma actually does?" I pressed. "I know they provide air conditioning to the city, and since everywhere would basically be uninhabitable without it, the can act like they own the place. But I've met a lot of their leaders, and they don't act like an air conditioning company. Everyone there seems to be doing their own thing."

"Nicov know little about what Cold Karma do," Nicov apologized. "Maybe Cold Karma do nothing. Maybe Cold Karma do whatever want. Ponies here not care what Cold Karma do. Just want nothing to do with Cold Karma."

He pointed around, and I took in all the ponies going about their business in the plaza... several of whom were giving me curious glances. I shuffled in my seat.

"Is that really all you do here?" I asked. "Just... chill out beyond Cold Karma's sphere of influence?"

Nicov chuckled. "No. Valey keep ponies very busy. Most ponies here mercenaries before follow Valey. Know how to do sneaky work. Valey like to know things that happen in city."

"Mercenaries, eh?" I took another look. Well, a lot of the ponies did appear armed, and most of them had well-toned physiques, completely ignoring the training dummies several were whacking on the other side of the compound. "You know, these soldiers... How strong do you think they are? I haven't actually gotten to spar with anyone since coming to Ironridge."

"Strong," Nicov said. "Very strong. Fought in real fights, in Varsidel. But not invincible. Story say Valey become leader by beating every mercenary at once, all by self with no weapon."

I squinted at the army of buff, heavily-armed ponies. There were how many in this plaza alone, a dozen and a half? Two dozen? Plus however many were sleeping, or working, or anywhere I couldn't see them... "I don't buy it," I told him.

Nicov chuckled. "Yaks embellish war stories all time. Ponies probably same. Still, Valey impressive enough to become leader for reason. Act silly, but very strong. Nicov try fighting her once and could not land single hit for entire hour. Then Valey threw match so could get lunch. Not count as real win."

"Yeah, but if she couldn't finish you off in an hour either..."

"Valey not try." Nicov shrugged. "Pretend to read book while fighting. Said want to finish before would attack. How dodge Nicov attacks with face in book, Nicov will never know."

Now I turned my squint on him. "You're embellishing your loss too, aren't you?"

"...Maybe was not quite hour," Nicov admitted. "But close. And Valey really did read book."

I just shook my head. "Anyway, though, she's trustworthy? You're here with her because you think this is the right place to be?"

"Maybe not trustworthy," Nicov admitted. "But good. Nicov think Valey care for minion ponies. Maybe even care too much."

"How so?" I flicked my ears.

Nicov rumbled. "Yak can tell when pony push self hard. Not take breaks. Take fight personal. Good fight is fight where can laugh after. Not how Valey fight."

I thought about that for a minute, and decided to change the subject. "So, you mentioned Shinespark. Any idea where I could find her?"

"Is mystery," Nicov muttered. "Valey know for sure. Braen know too. Probably not many other."

I tilted my head. "Who's Braen?"

"Pony who bring you here," Nicov explained. "Shinespark daughter."

My eyes widened. I glanced around to see if I could find the petite, heavily-cloaked mare, but the plaza was busy and she was nowhere to be seen.

"Very important pony," Nicov told me. "Not supposed to leave fort. Sometimes does anyway. Gives ponies no end of trouble."

"Huh." I looked back to Nicov. "Anyway, this fort is where you live now, right? Like, your permanent residence?"

Nicov nodded. "Fort Starlight hospitable to yaks. Ironridge not like yaks much after Steel Revolution."

That got my attention. "Wait, for real? It's not just batponies they sometimes treat... you know..."

Nicov shrugged. "Is understandable. Yak Ambassador Herman orchestrate Steel Revolution war. Trick sides of Ironridge into fighting. Very evil yak. Church leader personally excommunicate after Herman die in fighting. But to Ironridge, yak is yak. Not see many noble yaks to set different example."

Suddenly, the name of Dead Herman made a lot more sense. "The Sky District town to the east..." I started.

"Dead Herman built on Herman grave, in spot where Herman slain," Nicov told me. "Settlers originally ponies who fought in revolution. Enemies of Herman. Maybe bad taste, but there much worse ways of reveling in victory."

"So this place is cool with you?" I nodded around at the fort, suddenly a lot more appreciative of it.

"Valey at center of revolution," Nicov explained. "Know how everything happen. Friend to yaks. Also from Icereach!" He thumped his chest. "So double friend!"

"Any chance she's a friend to batponies, too?" I asked, tentatively willing to ignore her bizarre greeting if it meant being able to trust someone influential. "In a non-weird way?"

Nicov chuckled. "Valey is batpony. What Halcyon think?"

I relaxed a little, finishing my meal. "Well... she told me she and Kitty have a really uneasy truce, so she'd probably appreciate it if I got Kitty back home. But I'll be able to come back here and visit, right?"

Nicov nodded. "Once Halcyon know way in. Which is same way as way out! Ready for leave now?"

"Yeah." I stood up, realizing I had no idea what to do with my melon and probably wouldn't be able to carry it and a slumbering Kitty at the same time. "Say, er, do you want this?"

"Nicov put melon to good use," Nicov promised, accepting the giant edible.

"Awesome," I said. "Then let's go get Kitty."

Moments later, well-rested and substantially more at ease, I had Kitty on my back and was marching for an intact ship hull Nicov insisted contained the way out. The yaks of Icereach always helped me relax, with their simplicity and straightforwardness and immense might and jolly cheer, but here, after spending so long in a city where nothing was truly trustworthy and nothing made sense, I felt it double. I had an unbreakable ally in Nicov, and more importantly, he could vouch for others I could then trust too.

This place, I resolved, I would come back to. Not least because Valey probably knew a whole lot of things that might make Ironridge make more sense.

We entered the ship, and for a moment I couldn't quite understand what I was seeing. A metal contraption hung from the ceiling, a huge cloud of twisted rails that wove together like an avant-garde sculpture, connected to a bank of machines on racks and those to a tiered dais with a metal cone suspended from a steel arm above it, pointing at the center and looking like a laser cannon or massive drill. Several other ponies were here, but it was the machine that tugged at my mind, my memories... and I realized with a cold chill where I had seen this - or, at least, the cone and the pedestal - before.

There had been one of these hidden away in the lower half of the hideout in Icereach, where I had been stranded by Aldebaran.

I almost asked what it was, and then I remembered Valey had already told me.

"That's a teleporter," I said, weakly pointing a hoof. "Isn't it?"

Nicov beamed. "Halcyon smart!"

Hastily, things started rearranging themselves in my brain. The teleporter in the hideout... I had looted a pattern card from a terminal connected to it. At some point, I tried to analyze the contents of the pattern card, and discovered it contained a set of spatial coordinates in a proprietary format I could recognize but not read. That card probably controlled the teleporter's destination!

Furthermore, a mystery that had confounded me and I never found any answers to was why the lock on the door to that room in the hideout was backwards. Now, it made perfect sense: another teleporter somewhere else was probably attuned to that one's location. That was actually an entrance.

And the pattern card I still had, if inserted in a teleporter like this, could probably take me right to that entrance's other side. Still sitting there in my bag was a one-way ticket to the hideout's owner.

...Who was probably the Composer. And also a windigo. Not something I should pursue unless I was very, very ready.

I took another look at the teleporter and took a deep breath, steeling my resolve. This wasn't something I needed to worry about right now. I wouldn't attempt a stunt like that until much late-

And then it hit me: I was so distracted by the teleporter half of the machine that I had completely forgotten about the other half. The cloud of rails. Because I had seen that before too: it was part of the Aldebaran's engine. The technology that somehow harnessed windigo power to keep the ship in the air.

"Alright," I said warily, "How's this thing work? It looks pretty sinister."

"You waited until your way out to ask that?" one of the attendants asked, looking at me sideways. "Everyone's bothered by it at first. At least, everyone who isn't a teleporting unicorn. But..."

Another attendant looked warily at me. "Isn't that a public enemy on your back?"

"This pony Halcyon," Nicov explained, introducing me. "Friend of Nicov and Valey. Not come to fort with teleporter. Need now to escort enemy home."

The attendants relaxed a little, all five of them. I wondered why a teleporter needed so many ponies constantly guarding it. Maybe it was just that valuable?

"Well, good enough for me," the first one said. "Still, she's probably not really sleeping, and I'd rather not give away trade secrets while she's around..." He glanced nervously at Kitty.

"Oh, for..." I clenched my teeth. "There's gotta be a reason you don't like her other than just that she and her mom are involved with Cold Karma."

Another attendant shrugged. "It's a good enough reason for me and everyone else. That 'company' is an autocracy with no interest in governing. They treat ponies like science experiments, philosophy experiments or tools, depending which division you're looking at. And her family helps prop them up."

I sighed. This wasn't a fight I wanted to get into, particularly when it was getting in the way of understanding what the ponies of Fort Starlight were doing with windigo technology. "Hey, Nicov, could you take her outside?" I asked, offering him Kitty. "I really wanna hear about this teleporter before I use it."

Nicov grunted, hoisting the slumbering mare with little effort and stomping out of the room.

The attendants relaxed further. "He did just vouch for you, right?" one asked. "To be absolutely sure?"

"I heard it," another said.

"Yeah," I sighed. "I'm not really looking for a side in a war, but so far Cold Karma's been pretty indecent to me and right now I'd rather choose you guys if push came to shove, but it would help if you weren't super suspicious just because I'm apparently fraternizing with the enemy." Hopefully they wouldn't find out who was providing me with room and board...

"Fraternizing with the enemy?" a new voice said, and suddenly Valey fell out of the ceiling. Everyone jumped, the attendants included.

She flipped in midair, landed on her hooves and straightened her beret. "Please, Socks. It's called spying." She glanced over her shoulder at the attendants and nodded. "And she's probably good. So, you on your way out?"

"How's your teleporter work?" I asked, not about to let her change the subject.

Valey shrugged. "The teleporter itself? Beats me. Exact same way a unicorn teleportation spell works, which if you know anything about mana tech you'd know normal mana tech can't do. The cool part is the thing that powers it." She pointed at the rails.

I flicked my ears, listening.

"See... this might sound creepy..." Valey explained. "That thing's called a harmony extractor. Living ponies have this thing we call harmony, that's like a catalyst that's part of what makes us alive. It's involved in all our magic. Not used up, just involved. You know what a catalyst is?"

"I am a scientist," I pointed out.

"Boss. Anyway, the fact that machines don't have this harmony is what accounts for pretty much every single discrepancy between what machines are capable of and what ponies are capable of," Valey went on. "Unicorn horns, wings, you name it. You know, these?" She flexed her wings. "I dare you to make a flying machine that actually works on account of things the size of these. They're magic. Point is, a harmony extractor, like... You hook a pony up to it, and it borrows their harmony. Then you can attach it to other machines, and let them do things that normally only ponies can do. Like teleporting. Cool, right?"

"Or airships?" I guessed. "Making them fly like a pegasus?"

"Bingo," Valey told me. "Now, exactly how we do it is a trade secret that we're trying not to let too many goons run off with, even though that might already be a lost cause, so sorry if I oversimplified a few things along the way there and didn't hand you a complete set of blueprints as a gesture of goodwill. Truth is, actually balancing the input so it doesn't either do nothing or explode is really hard, because machines take a lot more harmony than a single pony can provide and hooking up multiple ponies in series is unpredictable because weird magic stuff and synchronized emotions and blah blah blah. But we've got it working fine enough for teleporting, which only takes a single burst of power anyway! You stand on that pedestal, everyone else here hooks up to the machine, someone presses a button, and away you go."

I tried to reconcile this with what I had seen in Icereach and the hideout. The Aldebaran didn't appear to be pony-powered; it was hooked up to a mysterious box. And everything about it I had actually observed said it was windigo-powered, instead. And there hadn't been a visible power source for the teleporter in the hideout, although Ludwig had said he was there to provide power to the hideout as a whole, and he cut the lights on us so he was probably telling the truth...

Conclusion: that box on the Aldebaran contained a windigo, and hooking up windigo-related things to harmony extractors had very powerful results. I didn't tell Valey what I had realized.

"So, think that'll do?" Valey raised an eyebrow at me. "Satisfied with our spooky and mysterious tech now?"

"...Why are you trusting me?" I asked, conditioned by Ironridge to be suspicious of everything. "You're not trying to bait me into joining your side too, are you?"

Valey shrugged. "First off, you didn't try to devour my soul when I scared you back there. Just punched me out a little. And ninety percent of Ironridge wouldn't be that courteous, so I like you. Second, I know literally all of Cold Karma is courting you right now, and unfortunately I don't have the resources to make them back off outside of a very narrow treaty that only applies to dudes in this fort. I'm pretty sure you wouldn't want to be on my side unless you've got a thirst for impossible odds and certain doom. But it would be pretty neat if you at least stayed neutral once they get you, and I didn't want you to only remember me as the boogeymare who was nice enough to let you step on my face."

"I'm not of a mind to get gotten," I told her flatly. "If I join up with anyone on Cold Karma, it'll be for my own goals and own purposes, and not theirs."

Valey gave me a look. "Which are?"

"...Mostly getting back at the branches of Cold Karma I like even less," I admitted. "But also getting things to make a little sense around here."

Valey grinned. "Well, if you're dumb enough to take on that entire behemoth at once, maybe I've got a place for you here after all! Maybe. But live your life a little, first. Make the most of your innocence while you have it. Bananas, I've known far too many who dedicated themselves to a cause far too early, myself included."

Now the attendants were looking at Valey sideways. "Boss, you know this mare from somewhere?" one asked. "It's not like you to be so..."

"Uh, yeah, she's my great-aunt's second-cousin's niece-in-law. Twice removed." Valey scratched her rump. "I think. Good family friend! Hopefully not prone to megalomania or having a god complex." She glanced at me. "You're not, right?"

I took a step back. "Megalomania? No way." The opposite, if anything.

"Nice." Valey poked her head out the door. "Hey, yak boy! Just about done in here. You wanna bring back the curmudgeon? I'm ready to get her out of my fort."

Nicov stomped back in, carrying a slightly-less-feigning-sleep Kitty who now had her eyes open. For a moment, Kitty and Valey locked eyes, and something so intense passed between them that I felt a brush of static move along my coat. Kitty made a kissy face. Valey made a complex wing gesture I had never seen before. Whatever was between these two, I was certain it was more personal than one working for a company the other didn't like.

A moment later, Kitty was on my back and I was on the dais, watching as the attendants all hooked themselves up to the machine. They did it using helmets, I noticed, but the helmets attached to their rumps instead of their heads. Bizarre... Also, all five of them had special talents. Odds were decent that was significant, since you didn't just stack five non-batponies in a room and expect them to all have one.

Before Valey could press the button to send us away, I took one last look around the room. Nicov was waving. The machinery seemed to crackle presciently. The console with the activation switch, where Valey was, had a slot on the top with a pattern card sticking out.

If I ever wanted to have an adventure, all I needed to do was come here and change out the keys.

Valey pressed the button.

Flaaaaaaash!

I felt as if I was getting yanked, one hoof at a time, through a spring-shaped hose. My eyes saw nothing, my ears heard nothing, my nose smelled nothing and my sense of touch was utterly overstimulated. And then, in an instant, it was over.

My sight returned, and I found myself standing on a similar dais in a room hewn from stone... Day District, probably. Right? Ansel's talk of Earth Districts and the fact that there was a Day District and a Night District when you went about both of them only at night was wearing away at my ability to keep them straight. The district with Eaststone Mall.

The room was small, and only housed the teleporter itself, the power source apparently stored somewhere else. Kitty lounged atop my back. There was one door, wooden and relatively modest. I opened it.

Beyond was a storeroom of sorts, dimly lit and filled with a few crates and sacks and a large number of barrels. One opened door showed a broom closet, and another, positioned such that it probably led to the teleporter's power room, was triple-padlocked and chained shut. A door on the far side of the room was slightly ajar. I headed for that one.

Past this was a narrow hallway with several doors. As I pondered which one to take, one of them opened and a batpony stepped out, giving me a look as he walked past. I checked behind him. It was a bathroom.

Following him through the door at the end of the hallway, I finally found myself in the establishment proper: it was a tavern. The barkeep was an older, heavyset batpony mare with sharp eyes and an expression of unfathomable, ancient weariness that could only belong to an elder god or a customer service representative.

Tables and stools filled the room, modestly populated to a degree that felt neither crowded nor barren. The walls were plastered in memorabilia and decals that looked native to foreign nations: flags bearing coats of arms, well-dusted paintings of landscapes, a few exotic weapons, and so on.

And set into an alcove in the wall, next to the bar counter, was yet another blast from the past: an alicorn statue, the exact same kind I had seen in the hideout. And on Coda's throne, though this one wasn't disfigured. The gemstone on its choker glowed with a dim ruby light.

"...You." The barkeep sized me up. "That patron on your back is on our blacklist. Leave her outside."

"No worries," I urged, "I'm escorting her from the premises. One sec."

Outside, the night greeted me, along with a very unwelcome heat I had almost gotten used to not having. "Alright," I told Kitty, "carry yourself from now on."

Kitty yaaaawned. "Halcyon owes Kitty one entire wallet of cake," she reminded me, sitting and rubbing her eyes with her tongue poking out. "Not more. Not less. One whole wallet of cake."

"Yeah, yeah," I said, wondering how much time I had to go back in and inquire about that statue. Morning was close, and I needed to buy cake or Kitty would have a fit... I probably had time. "Wait here a sec. I'll be right back."

On my way back in, I glanced at the tavern's sign. The Gates to the Underworld, it read. The place I had been told to visit if I ever needed an extra-legal get-out-of-jail-free card by, like, three different ponies.

What were the odds that 'help' was actually at Fort Starlight, and I had put off the sidequest for so long I wound up entering through the back door?

When I entered again, the barkeep gave me a nod and went back to polishing a mug. But now that I had a minute to look at the patrons, I quickly recognized one. And from the looks of things, he recognized me, too.

"Hey there, little bat!" Howe greeted, saluting me with a mug. "The Howenator sees you took his advice! How'd it go? And can he buy you a drink?"

"It's almost sunrise," I said, taking a seat across from him and figuring I had met this particular pony enough times without getting betrayed that it wouldn't hurt to talk for a bit. "Not gonna stay long enough for that."

He nodded. "I can schmoove to that. Long night?"

"Yeah, you can say that again," I sighed. "Listen, important question. Assuming I'm going to trust you with the answer: how trustworthy is Valey?"

Howe chuckled. "Makes a world of difference who you ask. And whether you're her friend or her enemy. And whether you want to be her friend or enemy. She keeps her promises, but she's picky about who she gives her loyalty to, see."

"What's her story?" I asked. "How do you know her?"

Howe swilled his drink and belched. "Not even the Howenator knows every step of that mare's history, little bat. First he met her, she was a ruffian working for the Yakyakistan ambassador to Ironridge. Nasty bloke called Herman. Everyone knew her as the terror of Ironridge. Then she ran off and founded a personality cult, see. Ol' Howe's an... urp... expert on cults. They're his favorite source of coin. So believe him when he says he's seen a lost cause or two in his time. You know how you get bands of folks with this us against the world mentality, and they get completely closed off and unable to appreciate the good things in life? That sort of thing. Hate to see it, as well as it might pay. Ridiculously tragic. You ever joined a cult?"

I narrowed my eyes. "You having an off day, buddy?"

"Naw." Howe burped again. "The Howenator is definitely having an on day right now. Point is, she changed her ways. Stopped running around with the same group all the time and... like... went back to being the terror of Ironridge. It's weird, little bat. See, she's got this philosophy, like... How did it go again? Something about getting dunked on..."

"Focus," I urged, wrinkling my nose at his breath. Was that coming from his drink? "Getting dunked on..."

"Ol' Howe's brain is too greased to remember, dudette," Howe apologized. "Just trust him that it all makes sense when someone explains it well. Anyhow, Valey's a friend. She's decent to any batponies who look like they need it. And she likes bananas."

"Noted," I sighed, feeling my time here wasn't being that well-spent. "Hey, different topic, but what's that statue in the corner?"

"Oh, that?" Howe looked over at the alicorn statue. "Thing's called a Dusk Statue. Relic from the Griffon Empire. Batponies used to use it to worship the Night Mother. Said you could talk to her through them. The Howenator's tried it and is pretty sure it's bunk, but maybe that's because he's not a batpony. Now, the Night Mother skedaddled long ago, but... urp... between you and me, some of the patrons claim that particular statue still works..."

That was as good an excuse as any to excuse myself. "Really? Cool, I'm gonna go check it out."

"Have a good one!" Howe called after me.

I walked up to the statue, inspecting it and noting that the barkeep was watching me. It was right next to the bar, after all...

This one looked exactly like the ones in the hideout, except I was pretty sure their choker gems had been emerald, and this one was ruby. I stared into its eyes, and got the same, familiar sensation that I wasn't quite alone. Whether this statue did anything or not, I could tell it had once been considered holy.

Hey, I told it in my mind, closing my eyes and bowing my head. Not sure if you work, or are listening, or can do anything if you are. You're a goddess who used to look out for batponies, right? Well, I'm up to my hooves in sticky situations and powerful folks who are interested in me, so if you could look out for me, too... I'd appreciate it. I dunno what happened in that war where you left, but I'm probably not the only one who would appreciate it if you came back.

"Praying?" the barkeep asked when I lifted my head.

I glanced at her. "Err, yeah. That alright?"

She snorted and shook her head. "It's false solace. The eastern gods are dead and gone."

"Then why's this statue here?" I asked, suspicious.

The barkeep shrugged. "Sometimes false solace is better than none at all."

I didn't know what to say to that.

"In the old days," the barkeep went on, "they could hear your thoughts. You didn't have to speak it out loud. It was private. These days, if you're desperate enough to go to a dead god for help, you might as well say it out loud. If anyone will do, let everyone hear."

I looked at the statue. "I'm not desperate, really," I said. "Just a little lost. Figured if the Night Mother was listening, I'd tell her I'd want her back."

The barkeep shrugged. "You're not the first. Surprising how many survivors of our dying race still pine for the shepherd who got them all killed. If you really think you'd be better off going through that again, keep praying. You probably won't change her mind, but who knows? Maybe she's still listening."

I studied the barkeep. She looked at least sixty. Probably a survivor from the eastern continent, or at least someone with very close ties to it before the war. The more I looked, the more I was reminded of Mother. I wondered what price she had suffered in that cataclysm.

"...What's your name, by the way?" I asked, turning to go.

"Barkeep," she said, polishing a mug. "Just call me Barkeep."

A fake name. Just like Leitmotif, and, I suspected, Mother. Looking at the statue again, I could almost feel the weight of the war's sorrows like a physical presence.

I was born out of that war. Mother sacrificed everything, including half of her body, to get me out of it and to safety. Everyone I met who remembered it, probably even including Aldebaran, was broken by the experience, and I was... not whole, but for different reasons. The war in the east clearly didn't rest as heavily on my shoulders as it did on ponies like these.

How many other batponies in Ironridge had been affected by it? Had Valey? How about non-batponies?

It didn't quite seem fair that I should escape unscathed when so many others didn't. I probably didn't have a lot of room on my plate for new oaths and promises, but I quietly made one anyway: if I ever got a chance to help right that imbalance, to undo some of the harm caused in that war that everyone else was shouldering, I would take it.

For the first real time, I felt a spark of loyalty toward the land of my birth. Maybe once I got an airship, I would go there and see what I could do.

The Plan Begins

We were too late. Despite my best efforts to hurry us along, the sun was rising with us still in the Day District. And Kitty was starting to panic.

"Noooo!" Kitty whined at a high enough pitch to hurt my ears, running in frantic circles around the trolley of cakes she was supposed to be pulling - a trolley the bakery had been kind enough to loan me, since apparently this happened often and they knew how it went. "It's too hot! Kitty's cakes are all melting!"

"This wouldn't have happened," I panted, trying to stay cool, "if you had taken my offer of a rein check so could buy them... when it was cooler out..."

Kitty started shoveling cake into her mouth, which struck me as a terrible idea because sugar made you thirsty and so did heat.

I leaned against a wall as the sun peeked above the old dam to the east, rapidly heating the mountain crater around me. We weren't in direct sunlight yet, but the opposite side of the city was, and I could already see heat distortions rising in the air between me and the far mountain wall. Very few other ponies were out and about, and the ones I did see looked modestly rich - I vaguely recalled Gerardo telling me about how owning property where it was cool enough to venture outside in the daytime was something of a flexing contest among the bourgeoisie. Maybe these ponies were socially obligated to be out and about to prove their investment had worth.

It sounded dumb to me. I wanted to be anywhere but here. But from the looks myself and Kitty were getting, everyone else clearly thought we were the dumb ones.

As Kitty panicked, the cakes started looking slightly more solid, and I perked up in interest. How...? Right, her special talent could cool things off. I had forgotten about that after Jamjars told me early on.

What else had Jamjars told me about Kitty? That her talent was supposed to be kept under wraps because Cold Karma didn't like the signals it might send if someone else was waving around a way to chill things? With how much clout Kitty and Jamjars apparently had among Cold Karma executives, or at least with Lilith, I suddenly wondered if that was the whole truth. Kitty broke into a jail, hijacked a teleport and openly defied Lilith in the middle of her lair. Even if you could do those things, you wouldn't come even close if you were concerned with 'not sending the wrong message'.

In fact, when I put it like that, it didn't feel like a partial truth; it was flat-out bogus. That meant there was a reason Kitty's talent was kept under wraps that was good enough to lie about. But what could a reason like that be?

I wracked my brain, but couldn't find any remotely plausible explanations. Then again, nothing about Kitty's behavior and the way she was treated was plausible either, so maybe I needed some outlandish explanations instead? Like two wrongs making a right, or the square root of negative one suddenly existing again when multiplied by itself...

Well, there was one possibility. One I really didn't want to consider, because I was afraid it might make far too much sense if I gave it any thought: what if Kitty was a windigo?

I felt myself wince, just thinking it. It was the first thing I thought when I first saw her, too, and I brushed it off then as paranoia and a snowflake special talent, but... maybe Jamjars wasn't lying about Kitty's special talent sending the wrong signals after all. Ludwig, I remembered, had been extremely proficient at generating large amounts of ice. Suppose cake cooling was just a fraction of Kitty's true power, and if she went all-out, she could legitimately threaten Cold Karma's air conditioning market? For all I knew, she might even be able to cool the Ironridge climate. That kind of leverage would certainly let her push the executives around.

Furthermore, Ludwig had been a chaotic goof, and the Composer a skilled, yet childish actor. Kitty was both of these things. I didn't want to personality profile a species when I had only met two members, but... it made enough sense that I felt suddenly cold.

Her eyes are normal, I reminded myself. When Corsica was possessed, her eyes lost their pupils and her irises became disks. Kitty wasn't like that. That was how I convinced myself she wasn't a windigo in the first place.

Of course, I had a set of contact lenses that could make my slitted batpony eyes look round. And I had no idea if the iris disks were a universal sign of possession, or just Ludwig's fashion sense. This wasn't as solid an alibi as I wanted.

My one solace was that if I was right, it was fairly unlikely Kitty and the Composer were on the same side. Possible, perhaps, but the Composer worked for Lilith and Kitty felt like Lilith's enemy. In fact, it would make a lot of sense if some windigoes were on Cold Karma's side, getting their hooves on the Whitewing technology and airships for their minions and whatever else, and Kitty was uniquely dangerous to Cold Karma because she bucked that trend. Ludwig had mentioned, I vaguely recalled, that windigo politics were a thing.

...If that was true, the odds Cold Karma was cooling the coolant they piped around the city using windigoes were uncomfortably high.

I hated this theory. I wanted windigoes to be a thing of the past and bad dreams. But I knew the Composer was still here in Ironridge, I knew windigoes were somewhere among the levers of power, and everything I had just put together did too good a job at explaining things that confounded me before... I couldn't ignore this.

Quietly, I said a prayer to anything listening that I wouldn't be right. And then I started thinking of ways to test my theory.

"Wow, you ponyos are a bunch of killjoys. I cannot believe you do not want me dead so I can come back to haunt you from beyond the grave. Going once, going twice..."

I perked up in alarm. Ludwig! No... I was dreaming? Focus, Halcyon. Trying to get home...

Right. I was reasonably sure that I, dehydrated and exhausted, had finally gotten Kitty and her cakes onto a train home, my brain working in overdrive the entire time, and now... I guess I had fallen asleep on the train. That was inconvenient. Hopefully Kitty was in a mood to wake me when we got where we were going.

Also, go figure I would dream about this. Served me right for thinking so much about windigoes.

"Fine," Ludwig pouted, hovering in my old Icereach apartment, "I did not want to be killed by a bunch of wimpy shrimpy losers like you anyway. Losers."

My apartment was packed. Me, Corsica, Mother, Elise, an unconscious changeling Rondo, Leif, Ludwig, an incapacitated Composer, and half a dozen yaks all filled a space meant for a tiny family, the air crackling with tension. My body felt weighted with chains; my dreams were realistic enough that I could still feel my old physical and mental state as if it were the present. This was hardly a vacation... but maybe I could make use of it. A chance to inspect the two windigoes up close again could give me a pattern or tell I had missed before.

"But hey, thanks for playing with me!" Ludwig carried on. "Stop by my hole again sometime if you ever want to look at my cool machines, or you are the underdog and need an expert in making the other guy feel like garbage!"

Now that was a thought. If I straight-up asked Ludwig how to tell if someone was a windigo, odds were he'd humor me. Unless he'd lie and try to trick me into making false accusations and starting a fight with an innocent. And it wasn't like I had a way to go visit him in the first place...

Actually, maybe I did. I had a teleporter destination pattern card that, perhaps, was pointed at another teleporter that in turn was set to visit the hideout. Why make an exit without an entrance? But there were so many reasons that was a bad idea I couldn't even begin to count.

Time fuzzed, the dream speeding forward.

"Why would you believe Ludwig was doing that?" the Composer was saying, trapped between two watchful, suspicious, muscular yaks. "It may have said I forced it to act, but what measure is the word of a creature of chaos? I presented a convenient scapegoat, and Ludwig made use of it. The creature was merely following its impulses, both in returning here and in leaving. There is no more logic or meaning to it than that."

Elise looked calmly unconvinced. "And what is this ideology you share?"

The Composer watched her, glowing with the icy blue I now associated with windigo magic. "Our goal? It is simple. Find our creators and ask them why we were made. And, if we find the answer lacking, kill them."

In the dream, I hit my head against the couch. But now that I had more distance between me and this episode, I was curious: had that line been repeated often enough that it might be true? Where had windigoes come from? Who made them, and why? It sounded like the Composer knew the first half, but not the latter. What did an air conditioning megacorp in Ironridge have to do with finding out?

"And how does this relate to taking me or these children captive?" Elise pressed.

The Composer glowed. "That was not my doing. Rather, it was that of my associates. I do not keep a close watch on their moonlighting activities. If you are curious, perhaps you should ask them instead."

Internally, I hesitated. Ludwig and the Composer had brought me no end of grief during our brief meeting, and the Composer made a point of greeting me when I first arrived in Ironridge. But, aside from being generally insane and often annoying, Kitty didn't seem to have it out for me, and in fact sometimes did things that could feasibly be construed as helping. Like getting me through the Flame District, which I still couldn't wrap my head around but suddenly made a lot more sense if she had the kind of powers that let Ludwig-Corsica go tromping around through a blizzard...

That did it. I was officially convinced Kitty had windigo powers. Too many things made sudden sense that had no explanation otherwise.

The point, though, was that windigoes in general might not actually have it out for me. They apparently left the general population of Ironridge to their own devices, and Kitty sometimes kept me safe in her own weird little way. Maybe if I minded my own business and kept my nose out of whatever they were planning, their plans actually wouldn't involve me? It was a tantalizing thought, although I did still want to get back at the Composer for-

"Boop," Kitty giggled, repeatedly poking my nose with a hoof, her tongue hanging out and bearing telltale traces of cake frosting. "Boop! Boo-"

I blocked her with a swift wing over my face, sitting up reflexively before I could fully awaken. "Hey, what gives?"

"It's almost time for home, lady!" Kitty chirped, the train around us almost entirely empty. She burped a sugary burp and wagged her tail. "Wakey wakey!"

I tried to focus, realizing that the train was, indeed, sliding to a stop. "Oh? Er, thanks..."

Yeah. Maybe this wasn't someone I needed to pick a fight with. If Kitty was the one thing standing between me, my friends, Jamjars, and a sinister corporation, I could find bigger things to worry about than where she got her powers.

With a clatter of wheels, I helped Kitty force the cake trolley through the door and into Jamjars' apartment. "We're hooooome!" Kitty sang as we entered.

Jamjars was the first to appear, clad in a cozy robe with a novel floating in her aura. "Ah! Home in one piece, I hope..." Her expression turned wry when she saw the trolley. "You double-dipping little munchkin."

Ansel was hot on her heels. "Oi!" he yelled, barging past and making straight for me. "Hallie! What even happened to you? The first thing I know-"

"Hey," Corsica greeted, bringing up the rear and looking about as tired as I felt. "Big day?"

"Kitty gots a brain," Kitty was explaining to Jamjars, animated, in a voice slightly louder than necessary, her tongue hanging out in excitement. "Kitty got promised lotsa cakes to look out for Hallie-yawn, but she lied and didn't say she already got promised cakes, and got even more cakes, and now Jamjars still owes Kitty cakes, so Kitty gets twice the-"

Jamjars closed Kitty's mouth with her aura, but was unsuccessful at getting her to retract her tongue. "I can see that, yes, you're very smart. You can have more after you finish what you already have."

Kitty wagged her tail.

"You bribed her with cakes to come follow me around?" I glanced at Jamjars, then at Kitty. "And you got me to give you even more? Sneaky git."

Kitty wagged her tail harder.

Ansel was hovering, clearly looking for a way into the conversation. "Hallie, about what happened in the Earth District, look, I'm-"

"I know." I gave him a reassuring nod. "And I'm alright, but I'm dead tired, so if you wanna make it up to me, can you help the cake monger there get her haul downstairs? And then maybe return the trolley for me tomorrow? I'll talk about it after I crash for a bit."

He hesitated. "Er, yeah. Leave it to me."

"Hey." I nodded to Corsica, as Ansel and Kitty turned to wrangling the trolley. "Gonna go sleep for three days. If I'm not up by then, wake me with the smell of food, yeah?" I cracked a smile.

"Glad to see your psyche made it through in one piece," Corsica replied. "I've heard about what was going on. Sweet dreams, I guess. But take a bath first. You smell like a boot that stepped in Egdelwonk."

That was a good idea. So I did. I opted for a shower, suspecting I was filthy enough that sitting in my own bathwater would do more harm than good. Water pounded against me, streamed from my mane and my tail, the air misted and the drain gurgled. I was back home, safe and sound. This past night had definitely brought back memories of the Aldebaran incident, not least because Leif herself was involved, but... it had been easier, this time. And I hadn't even gotten stabbed at the finish.

I remembered the series of contrivances and miracles that conspired to keep me safe last time, as I fumbled and floundered and tripped over my compulsions against giving it my all. This time, I didn't feel as though I had sabotaged myself, but I had also been undeniably lucky. Even if there was a reason - Kitty - I had made it out of Lilith's lair intact, I was lucky to have Kitty in the first place. I was lucky the police hadn't been more aggressive in the aftermath of whatever happened in that weapon store. I was lucky Fort Starlight had been filled with vaguely sane and reasonable ponies... Only vaguely, because Valey existed.

It wasn't impossible to wonder, once again, if something bigger wasn't out there, looking out for me and seeing me safely through to the end of the day.

When I finally awoke, Corsica was doing her mane. I didn't immediately let her know I was awake. For a while, I just stayed where I was, relishing the normalcy.

But it couldn't last too long, after all. I had made a promise to myself to go back to the Flame Barracks and look for Leitmotif within three days, and I wasn't sure if the previous night counted as day one or day zero. At some point, I would have to get up and face the daunting amount of risks and work that would entail...

Did I? I had work today, and tomorrow. A half day now, a full day then. I was presently free of any overeager executives, passionate police or shifty shokeeps. I could just forget about all this until it inevitably reared its head again, and try to be normal.

It was a tempting possibility, all the more so now that I was safe and stable in my own bed. And yet, I knew this stability wouldn't last. I looked at Corsica; she didn't see me watching her, but there was a tiredness in her eyes that spoke to too many things on her mind. I knew too little of what she did, day to day, working for Egdelwonk and his junior dumpster despot corps. And I knew nothing of what Ansel was up to, other than that he regularly prowled locations as seedy as Blueleaf. Even if I could sit back and enjoy this, could my friends?

Maybe I should ask them.

But, before I did anything else, I needed to have a chat with Jamjars.

"Morning," Corsica greeted as I rolled out of bed, looking for my coat.

"Morning?" I looked at her sideways.

"Yeah," she said. "You slept through the whole day and the whole night after. Jamjars said not to worry about missing work. We washed your clothes, by the way." She pointed at my coat and boots, neatly folded by the door.

I glanced self-consciously at myself. My stomach growled. Apparently, I really had been that tired.

"Thanks," I said, getting dressed.

"For?" Corsica was still working on her mane.

"I dunno. For worrying about me," I said with a shrug. "You looked like you had a lot on your mind when I got home. Now, too."

Corsica brushed. "...Thanks for noticing. Now get on with your bad self."

So I did, hoping Jamjars hadn't gone to bed yet and that there was still food to be found at this hour. Fortunately, I was rewarded: not only was she in the kitchen, but she was fixing herself a snack.

"Well, if it isn't the mare of the hour," Jamjars greeted, heating up some frozen hay fries. "You sure slept for a while. Hungry?"

"Yeah. Thanks." I took a seat, wondering how to begin.

Eventually, Jamjars seated herself too, food in tow. She took a bite. It didn't seem like she was going to speak first.

"So you sent Kitty after me," I eventually said. "When you heard we got arrested. To look out for me?"

"I did," Jamjars sighed. "And I'm sorry she fleeced you for it when I was already promising a reward. I can see you're just overflowing with questions about how a crackpot little kid with her tongue hanging out has that easy of a time pushing ponies around?"

"I've got a few theories," I answered, choosing my words carefully. "I know it's an act, though. She... talked normal for a bit when I promised her the cakes."

Jamjars' eyebrows went up in surprise. "Did she, now? Intriguing. She usually only does that for ponies she trusts substantially."

"How much do you know about where I went last night?" I asked.

"Blueleaf, jail, Lilith's school, Flame District, and I heard you went through Fort Starlight on your way out," Jamjars told me. "And in case you were wondering, that's not the intended entrance or exit to that school. It has a front door. I've already had a talk with Kitty about why she didn't use it. In her own words, she wanted to impress you."

Something clicked in my mind: when I last parted ways with Ludwig, he had seemed fervently interested in making me believe I could somehow kill windigoes, possibly through the power of my bracelet. I had no idea if that was true, but assuming it was, and assuming all of my earlier theories were correct about Kitty and Cold Karma windigoes and all that other speculation that sounded much more tenuous now that I was out of the heat of the moment...

What if Kitty was trying to court me because she wanted my help fighting her kin?

Nah. That one was a little too far past my suspension of disbelief.

"She did a good sight more to confuse me than impress me," I plainly stated. "She did ridiculous feat after feat of acrobatics that would have been far past impossible even for someone who didn't have me on their back, wasn't in sweltering heat, and wasn't holding their breath and closing their eyes against noxious fumes. Some of which weren't even necessary to get where we were going, like jumping up a staircase." I gave Jamjars a look, clearly asking for an explanation.

Jamjars looked away for a moment... and then sighed. "Fine. I'll tell it to you plainly: you know Kitty only pretends to be sweet and innocent and insane. She and I have... a contract, of sorts. This little family thing is a cover we wear that makes both of us less conspicuous. Part of that contract is that each of us doesn't speak on behalf of the other's secrets. We each get to choose to whom we tell what. I can't tell you how or why Kitty is the way she is, but that's the reason for it. However, given that she's shown and told you as much as she has, I wouldn't be surprised if she'll tell you herself if you ask the right way."

"Why'd you make a contract with her?" I asked. "What are you trying to get out of this? She's got leverage over Cold Karma, and you're trying to use it to get closer to the top brass?"

Jamjars chuckled. "All this time together, and you think I'm a petty gold digger? Both of us have leverage. And didn't I already tell you my endgame? I'm searching for Writs of Harmonic Sanction for my friend, whose namesake fortress you just visited."

I munched. "Is that the whole story?"

"Nothing is ever the whole story," Jamjars replied. "But it's enough of the interesting parts to answer your question, unless you're seeking something more specific."

I thought about trying to press, and decided to take an adjacent tack. "So what do you know about Fort Starlight?"

"Far too much," Jamjars lamented. "You remember my complaints about Gerardo, correct? My sad and tragic tale of how once upon a time, we traveled together, until events conspired to take Starlight from us, that we might need all those writs to be reunited? Gerardo, at least, has the dignity to keep traveling the world in search of more writs, albeit not the brains to put aside his pride and work with me to get enough. That fortress, on the other hoof, was founded and then tastelessly named by the cowards who not only wouldn't help me, but gave up on doing it themselves, too."

I looked up. "So then Valey...?"

"Was our old captain," Jamjars acknowledged. "Myself. Starlight. Valey. Shinespark. Gerardo. Slipstream. Maple. Amber. Grenada. Harshwater. Felicity. Ten mares, a griffon and an airship, wandering the world in search of whatever it was our fearless leaders were searching for. Those were the days..."

"Was Valey always so... rude?" I asked, gnawing on my fries.

Jamjars chuckled. "Yes and no. She used to be the biggest wuss imaginable. But then she got over herself. If only she could actually put all that energy somewhere constructive, instead of biding her time holed up in that fortress."

"And what about Shinespark?" I asked. "I've heard about her. What was she like?"

"Broody," Jamjars said. "Understandably so. The Steel Revolution was largely her fault, after all. She was a foolish child who would up destroying most everything she held dear. These days, she's such a hermit even I don't know where to find her, though I'm sure Valey does. I swear, those two were my OTP until both of them walked out on Starlight the way they did..."

I tilted my head. "What's an OTP?"

Jamjars whistled innocently. "You don't know? I mean, what? I never said anything."

I sighed and dropped it. "While I was at the fort, I heard the public blamed Shinespark for the revolution, but it was actually the Yakyakistan ambassador's fault?"

"Wars don't happen because of one person," Jamjars told me. "Commanders pulling the strings, merchants selling the weapons, troops fighting on the ground. Truth be told, it was both of their faults, though Herman was evil and Shinespark was just stupid."

"What did she do?" I asked, aware that Jamjars reeked of bias, yet had still been there in person and was probably more reliable than hearsay.

"Kept her side well-armed and perpetually in a fighting mood," Jamjars said with a shrug. "To hear her talk, it was supposed to be a raise-their-spirits thing. And to be frank, they needed it. The Ironridge economy back then was awful for their senses of self-esteem, and for whatever reason no one ever learned to be self-satisfied and self-sufficient. A bunch of fools, in my book. Anyway, poor little Shinespark was completely shocked and surprised when tensions rose a little and suddenly her precious little militia went from talking about fighting to actually fighting, and all of a sudden... They're the reason the old skyport is the ruin it is today."

"How'd a militia cause that much damage, anyway?" I tilted my head, remembering the blown-out ruins I had explored.

Jamjars sighed. "Ever seen a storm come down from the Aldenfold? Mountains to the south? They can get ferocious. The way the skyport was designed involved liberal application of powered anti-weather enchantments. And since the war destroyed just about all of Ironridge's power generation capacity..." She huffed. "By the time they got enough mana wells rebuilt to spare the amount of power the skyport took to keep standing, it was a lost cause."

"I..." I thought about what to ask next. "If I asked all this to Valey, you think she'd tell me the same?"

Jamjars shrugged. "Who can say? She and I had vastly different experiences of the revolution. I spent it in a refugee camp, and she was up in the skyport stealing airships and dueling mercenaries and putting a knife through Herman's back. I doubt she'd lie too egregiously, but you'd certainly hear a different side of things."

"So how come you had a falling out?" I pressed. "You said she stopped helping you find writs? Why?"

"She stopped helping me along with all the others from the very beginning," Jamjars insisted, "because I tried to make it so we wouldn't even need to get them in the first place and everyone else was too complacent to back me up. They deserve not having my help. As for why she stopped trying to get the writs altogether? Would that I knew." She shook her head. "It happened about a year after we parted ways with Starlight. She and Gerardo and some others from our original crew went gallivanting off to Yakyakistan. Supposedly, prior to this Gerardo was owed a writ by the church, and they figured their first stop would be to collect that one. Months later, they returned, and Valey just didn't feel like trying anymore."

I thought on that for a moment. "What about everyone else?"

"Everyone? They did their own things." Jamjars leaned back in her chair. "Not everyone valued Starlight as much as I did. Some parted ways with us and went off to live their lives. Others stayed with Valey in her fortress. One even took a writ and crossed the border on her own to go seek Starlight out in person, and didn't wait to finish collecting enough. I'd have loved to do that myself..."

"Why didn't you?" I asked, curious.

"Reasons." Jamjars gave me a that's private look.

"Fine..." I sighed, changing the subject. "I... Look. Different topic. I dunno what Lilith wants with me, or what the police want with me, or what anyone wants with me, but for some reason I'm a hot topic among the Cold Karma executives. And I'm guessing you know at least enough about that to send Kitty to look after me, right?"

"I try to stay abreast of happenings in Cold Karma," Jamjars acknowledged. "This isn't a place where it's good to be blindsided. You're curious what it is they all see in you?"

I nodded. "Any leads or theories, even if you don't straight out know."

"I'm afraid I've got nothing for you," Jamjars apologized. "They do as they do. But what I do have is a guarantee that if you try to do anything about it, you'll at least have a safe base camp here with me. While I tragically lack the influence to keep trouble from starting in the first place, I do have enough resources to bail you out more often than not should you get in too deep. That's the duty I signed up for when I offered to let Graygarden send you here, and it's the duty I intend to fulfill. Don't take them lightly, or anything. But if you want to throw your weight around a little and see how hard you're capable of hitting back, I'll be here to make sure it doesn't go too badly wrong. Alright?"

Slowly, I nodded again. "I can trust you with that?"

Jamjars offered me a hoof. "I'll swear it on Starlight."

I took the hoof and bumped it. I hadn't voiced to anyone my plans to go to Egdelwonk and see if he could help me against Lilith, but if I had... this felt close enough to Jamjars' blessing.

The rest of today would be a very interesting day.

The Corporate Archives

"...Couldn't go to school last night because apparently the teacher took the night off to go to some rally in the Night District, and they couldn't find a substitute on such short notice. So Ferrous was home all day taking care of him so I could actually get some sleep, but it was still loud enough... Everything I do for that colt, and you'd think he'd have a little more sympathy for his poor day-shifting mother."

"That's why I'm single."

"You've been single since long before we started working here."

"Duh. I've been single my whole life."

"Maybe if you tried something else, you'd have a little more sympathy when I complain about... yawn... things like this..."

"Sounds like a trap. So what did you do to the teacher?"

"What?"

"You know, for skipping school. Tell me you at least filed a letter of complaint?"

"This was last night. I was too busy, you know, sleeping? Besides, it was one of those Zero Armada things. Odds are, half the school board was there already."

"Ugh, them? They know you can be chill with sarosians without-"

"Shh! Are you trying to pick a fight?"

"With who? We're, like, the only ones here."

Well, not quite.

Some time ago, Corsica had expressed surprise that I never went and poked around the Ice District itself to figure out what was going on in Ironridge. Now, stuck being awake during the day with a lot of restless curiosity on my hooves, it was suddenly the only place I could go without being cooked alive, and I decided to change that. So it was that I was shadow swimming under a table in an employee cafe area, my backwards ears perked and fishing for interesting gossip.

This was the third group I had eavesdropped on so far, and all of them told me exactly the same story: ponies were stressed. Not quite badly off, but not happy and content, either. They complained more than they laughed. But they also complained about mundane things, the same kinds of things ponies used to complain about in Icereach: work and scheduling and their social lives. Money and children were more prevalent topics here, but all of these problems were things I instinctively thought of as normal.

No one complained about getting unfairly arrested, haunted by Egdelwonk, trying to appease a child goddess, plotting to break their own kidnapper out of an underground research facility, seeing windigoes around every corner or having every influential faction in the city vying for their loyalty. And I had a hunch I could stay here for the rest of the day and the following night, too, and no one would change that.

This sealed it: I was special. My problems weren't the kind of problems everyday citizens even heard of, let alone had to deal with. And as to why I was special... odds seemed ten to one it was because I had been involved with windigoes in Icereach. The windigoes in Ironridge already knew me.

...Of course, I had no idea why they were interested in me in Icereach, other than that I conveniently happened to get stuck in that cave. Which only happened because the Composer and Aldebaran put me there in the first place, which meant there was a reason before that. Supposedly, that reason had been because the changelings wanted Corsica's friends out of the picture as well, so they could impersonate me. But that was a changeling reason. Not a windigo reason. Right? I still didn't know how closely Leif and the Composer had actually been working together, but given the way they parted during the fight in my old apartment, probably not that closely.

Which meant I was back to having absolutely zero idea what the windigoes wanted with me. All assuming, of course, that I was still sane and there actually was a secret cabal of windigoes running Ironridge.

I shook my head and moved on, swimming out of sight through a doorway. By now, I had a pretty good understanding of the Ice District's shape and layout: it was like someone took a tiered wedding cake, turned it upside-down, and then stacked a second, flatter one on top of it. The majority of the facility was made up of circular layers that got wider as they went up, and the roof of the widest one formed a platform on which the administrative layer was built. It reminded me a little of a giant drill.

The reason for the shape, I was pretty sure, was because the structure was built in a drained lakebed between two mountains, which had once been walled in by the giant dam visible throughout the city. That also explained why the lower levels were so cavernous and open, like the area the train wound through: they were mostly support structures for the real facilities up at the top, built around a tall, vertical core that ran through the center and had something to do with the actual cooling process.

Right now, I was in the widest layer. Each layer was several stories thick, and the closer I got to the top, the more finished things began to look: less empty space and exposed supports and rivets, more even lighting, polished floors made from some gray metal that looked glossy, but gave good traction and wasn't reflective at all. The walls were upholstered with various shades of thin carpet, which confused me for a while until I realized how quiet it was in here, and that they might be noise mufflers. Or just a fashion statement. Even the previous floor had mostly been plainly decorated office space, but I had a hunch I wouldn't have to go too much higher to find halls lit with chandeliers.

I kept hidden around other ponies, but got the vague impression I didn't need to: not everyone wore an employee identification badge, and no one looked particularly wary. Additionally, there were no security guards. I wasn't quite sure what I was expecting - this was a high-class professional working environment, supposedly, not a forced labor camp. But with the overbearing eccentricities of Cold Karma's overlords...

Actually, scratch that. The police could teleport and show up anywhere within seconds. They didn't need guards.

Curious what these ponies actually did, I shifted my focus to the offices themselves. Cold Karma was much more generous than Icereach, in that respect: individual offices branching off from hallways, rather than crowded communal work rooms that in hindsight were clearly designed to distract the engineers as much as possible and help ensure Icereach got nothing done. Most of them were empty for the day, but most had windows I could peek through, and I saw enough writing on chalkboards to determine this was a financial department.

Made sense. Even if Cold Karma cheated and used windigoes for air conditioning, they still had to sell their services and track who was paying what.

I wondered what Icereach would have looked like if they had been concerned with turning a profit.

While I was thinking, a pony walked past me, and I didn't notice in time to hide. It didn't matter, though. A middle-aged stallion in a business suit with a briefcase and hat that looked like they weren't tailored with Ironridge weather in mind, he acknowledged me with a glance and then moved right along. No indicator I was somewhere I shouldn't be. No conspicuous hat-tipping like in most of the Day District, either.

Come to think of it, I hadn't exactly passed any Do Not Enter or Authorized Personnel Only signs on my way here. I just... rode to the last station on the train line, got off, and followed the paths that looked like they were intended to be used. With my official Cold Karma train pass, given to me by Egdelwonk, no less.

Maybe I was being silly, and really was allowed to be here?

I resumed my wandering, trying to look like I had somewhere to be yet wasn't in a hurry at the same time, choosing randomly when I came to intersections and seeing what there was to see. The financial wing was huge, with helpful signs occasionally posted at intersections showing me my way around subdivisions. Payment disputes. Subscription management. Internal cost reimbursement. Accounting. Down one floor, a sign at a staircase told me, was the marketing and customer relations level.

Maybe I should have stopped to read the signs before instead of sneaking and focusing solely on ponies. This was a place ponies worked, after all, and probably the pinnacle of Ironridge employment. Of course they'd make the building easy for their employees to navigate.

I passed an office with an open door in a little wing dedicated to fast-tracking important customers. Inside it, two muscular ponies were working with some boxes, a supply cart waiting for them in the hallway. It looked like they were preparing the office for a new arrival.

You know... I had a good head for numbers. And even if I didn't, I had a talent that could let me learn most anything in a flash. Why couldn't I just work here, like a normal pony?

I must have passed hundreds of offices already on this floor alone. Enough ponies clearly worked here for these jobs to be considered normal... Actually, Ironridge was big enough that they were probably pretty prestigious, but the kind of prestige normal ponies obtained. I doubted the denizens of these offices had to contend with the daily eccentricities of Lilith and Egdelwonk and the police, though. What was it about me that couldn't just wind up crunching numbers in a clean, cozy place like this, treated by the higher-ups less like a toy and more like a cog in a machine?

For that matter, who even ran this place? Lilith was the Director of Societal Planning. Samael and Estael were Directors of Public Security. Egdelwonk was the janitor, which I suspected meant lead propaganda artist. Emblazon, who Corsica told me was the Director of National Defense. Where did ordinary, day-to-day corporate operations fit in there?

"Let me tell you something, Halcyon: Cold Karma is a madhouse. It stopped being a legitimate institution years ago and is now a front for a bunch of clods with agendas of their own."

Egdelwonk's words echoed through my mind. According to him, they didn't fit in. Yet, here they were anyway... Maybe this was a place where Cold Karma's bosses put their craziness aside and let business be business enough to remain in control. Or maybe they just ignored this place altogether, and it was let to the middle managers with real heads on their shoulders.

Speaking of Egdelwonk... I rounded a corner and passed a trash can, and gave it a suspicious glance. I couldn't tell for sure, but odds were fifty fifty he was inside, watching me and biding his time.

I put a wing to the pocket on my coat holding his pre-written contract. Signing it would be akin to bolting myself to a runaway train, I knew, but at the same time... Corsica was working for him. And I knew I'd regret it if I gave Lilith or the police another chance to come poking around in my business.

...There was another trash can just inside the door of a darkened office. Slightly more private, not that anyone was around at the moment. I slipped through the ajar door and peered inside.

"Unlike you to pay me a visit," Egdelwonk said, reclining among some office trappings that probably belonged in the recycling instead, the rim of the can distorting my field of view and making it impossible to tell how big it really was inside. "Quesadilla? Someone threw a perfectly good one in here the other week and for the life of me I can't figure out why." He proffered the offending item with his single bat wing.

"No thanks," I said, not needing a sniff to tell he wasn't kidding about its age. "Listen, about that contract you gave me..."

He fixed me with a perfect stare. "Yes, it's still valid, but choose your next words carefully. I've been known to make up for a lack of creativity in my underlings with creativity of my own."

I pulled out the document. "Are you saying you suddenly don't want me to sign this?"

Egdelwonk sighed. "Halcyon, Halcyon, Halcyon. I recognize you've been shirking Lord Egdelwonk's patent-pending How To Use Your Noodle training for the last year and a half, but tell me you at least read the fine print?"

I turned the paper over. There was no fine print. Just a crayon drawing of Egdelwonk's face, and the text, also in crayon: Employment contract valid if and only if Halcyon wants it to be. First come first serve, losers!

Egdelwonk waited patiently for me to understand something I didn't think I was going to get.

"Halcyon," he eventually said flatly. "You are currently in possession of one pre-signed genuine limited edition no-buts I-was-here-first get-out-of-jail-free card courtesy of yours truly, guaranteed good for ruining one overzealous recruiter's day and perhaps a lot more depending on how you use it. I recognize you have an agenda in Ironridge and are pursuing it with limited resources, and likely think of siding with me as a tactical decision to improve the resources at your disposal. Good choice, excellent judgement, standing ovation, yay. But how well you use those resources is much more important than the resources you have."

I stared again at the contract.

Egdelwonk rolled over in the trash can. "Now go spin in a circle and think for a moment about what I've already given you, and only come back if you really can't come up with anything interesting to do with the ability to join my team anywhere, rather than alone with me in a private meeting, which you already passed the interview so you don't even need a contract to do."

I didn't spin in a circle, but I did think, and quickly, I realized Egdelwonk was right. Utilizing an existing job offer to screw over a rival that wanted my services at an inopportune moment was terrible business ethics, but around here, in the topsy-turvy climate of Cold Karma, a way to get ahead was a way to get ahead. I could, for example, use the contract as an easy out if I ever got stuck in another place that respected Cold Karma authority, like the jail... or Lilith's secret school. Which I was planning to break back into anyway to go rescue Leitmotif. And besides, waiting to sign on until I absolutely needed it had the double bonus of letting me potentially stay unaffiliated if I luck went my way.

"...Thanks," I said to the trash can. "You're pretty weird, but... Well, let's leave it at that."

"Taken as a compliment." Egdelwonk poked his head up above the rim. "That said, if you're so eager to start, I wouldn't be opposed to giving you your first assignment before we officially get going. Like reading ahead in the coursework while you're still on break! No pressure, of course. Interested?"

I hesitated. "Sure?"

Egdelwonk beckoned me closer, cupping a wing around his mouth to muffle his voice. "This one is cherry-picked personally for your interests," he whispered conspiratorially.

My backwards ears perked. That had better not be a bad thing...

"Barnabas' Self-Defense Emporium," Egdelwonk said. "An establishment I believe you have some personal history with, and perhaps a healthy grudge or two. Now, here in Lord Egdelwonk's Junior Dumpster Despot Corps, normalcy is generally frowned upon, but the ignorant masses tend to love it, and civilians getting randomly framed and arrested during weapon-shop explosions is very abnormal. So I want you to investigate and get to the bottom of that incident."

I took a slight breath. Really, I had wanted to know what was up with that, but with all the things that happened to me that night, it had been far too easy to drop it from my priority list and just vow not to visit Blueleaf again.

Well, so much for that idea.

"I've already cracked the case myself," Egdelwonk explained, "so I'm confident it's nothing you can't handle with a little corporate immunity on your side, and also very curious as to what you'll make of what you find. One free hint: Barnabas' marefriend is the estranged daughter of a Night District insurance mogul. I'm sure you'll have a lot of fun with this one, and remember we're not officially affiliated until you do use that contract so don't go stomping in there unless you're willing to spend it to bail yourself out. Ta-ta!"

He dove back into the trash can, and with a puff of office clippings, he was gone.

Huh. Well, that had been a meeting. And a whole lot less unnerving than our first two encounters, too.

...After a moment's thought, I realized why: Egdelwonk himself hadn't actually changed. I was just more used to how things were done in Cold Karma. That realization was both comforting and frightening at the same time.

I continued my exploration of the Ice District, slowly working my way upward - some time ago, Corsica had told me the most interesting things were all found at the top. The way up was a conspicuous staircase near the train station, and when I eventually took it, I quickly wondered if I hadn't been wasting my time not coming here first.

A long, grand hallway greeted me, twice as wide as a street, paved with sizable tiles of glossy black stone with white mineral veins and gold filigree. Three stories up, a cross-ribbed, barrel-vaulted ceiling hung a row of chandeliers, white light reflecting down off the beige roof. Two tracts of red carpet bordered the hallway, each one running back past the staircase, which was narrower than the hallway it joined. The hall ran straight out from the Ice District core, and at the end, a window loomed, broad daylight illuminating razor-thin crossbeams that at night would disappear and make it look like an unbroken, building-sized sheet of glass.

For a long moment, I was awestruck. This was not the kind of architecture I often got the chance to see.

And yet, here it was, open to everyone. I looked back down the staircase; the train platform was only a short walk away. More ponies were here than the lower floors I explored first, albeit still not a lot. None of them looked at me like I belonged, or like I didn't belong. They all just went about their business.

I liked it here. Though it would probably look a lot cooler at night.

The window called to me, and so I walked closer, past alcoves in the wall containing statues of ponies. Many, I recognized: Lilith, Egdelwonk, Samael, Estael. Junior Karma.

Jamjars.

That one gave me pause, and I wandered over to inspect it. On the plaque, in microscopic print beneath her name, was In honor of substantial contributions to weapons R&D.

Weapons research and development? Jamjars had a hoof in the Cold Karma door because she was helping them make weapons? That didn't fit at all into the picture of her I already had. It didn't conflict with anything; I didn't know how she was involved here, it just didn't tie in anywhere either. Weapons, weapons-

No. It couldn't be the Whitewings.

And then, with a shiver of true cold, I remembered some evidence I had collected from the hideout while imprisoned by Aldebaran: a bit of yellow fur, taken from a vent in the hot tub.

Jamjars had yellow fur.

The sample was back in my room in her house. I couldn't do a check to see if it was the same shade of yellow. Not now, at least. My heart was beating out of control, though. Jamjars was supposedly Graygarden's mistress, but had implied she had no interest in him personally and was only in it for the connections. She had goals in Icereach. Like maybe a hideout to be close to...

Jamjars was friends with Kitty. Kitty was probably a windigo. The Composer was a windigo, and apparently connected to the owner of the hideout, who might be Jamjars.

Aldebaran wanted to kidnap us and stash us in Jamjars' hideout. Graygarden had been easy to convince to let us go. Jamjars offered to let us come to Ironridge and stay in her house. Graygarden had been the connection that gave us that opportunity. Was it all connected?

Jamjars was hunting Writs of Harmonic Sanction. Jamjars talked often about Starlight. In the hideout, I found three writs stashed away, along with a letter that made mention of Starlight's well-being. It was all connected.

No, no, no no no! I had to have made a mistake somewhere! Ironridge's propensity for conspiracies was getting to me, I was seeing ghosts around every corner, I was... I...

I leaned against a bench to remain standing, my head down and my eyes unfocused. All this time...!

No one could learn what I had learned. No one. Not until I knew who it was safe to trust, which might be no one. Or it could be everyone I had thought untrustworthy up until this point. I needed help. I needed...

No. I could do this.

I wasn't the same conflicted, half-formed filly I had been during the Aldebaran incident, when my own ambitions and my old self's fears had caught me between them like a vice. I was talented. I was rational. I was skilled.

Summoning my focus, I pulled myself back together. First and foremost, I needed to figure out Jamjars' endgame. Or, maybe I already knew it... I needed to figure out how me and my friends played into it. It was entirely possible that Jamjars, while underhanded and deceitful, counted us on her side and had for us no ill intentions.

Second: I needed concrete evidence that I was right. I was almost positive, and the letter with the Writs of Harmonic Sanction was all but irrefutable... though since Jamjars' old friends like Valey and Gerardo also knew about Starlight and cared about writs, it wasn't ironclad. I had to be more certain than I was now.

Third, I needed friends. I could do this alone, but I didn't want to. Whatever hidden power struggle was going on in Ironridge, whatever the true form of the cocktail of machinations I kept climbing in and out of, I needed to find someone on the inside and stick with them. Remotely palatable options? Jamjars, Egdelwonk, Valey.

...Oh, and Leitmotif. Since the Composer betrayed her, I doubted she wanted to be affiliated with any side that caroused with windigoes. Maybe she was a nuclear option. But maybe a nuclear option was what I wanted.

And fourth... Fourth, I needed to find the Composer. I was almost certain the Composer wasn't Kitty, just because the logistics would be impossible for the day I arrived in Ironridge: I saw the Composer out in the hallway with Lilith, and immediately after I saw Kitty in Jamjars' house. And I had been in Kitty's basement, and hadn't seen anything that screamed 'power armor remote control terminal'. But that didn't rule out Jamjars having two windigoes on her side. I needed more information.

I looked back at the hall I was currently in. Information... I was so close to understanding the Cold Karma factions and what was really going on here, I could taste it. If I could know what each group was really fighting for and why, and where the boundaries between them lay, that would make navigating this mess so much easier. For now, I had to keep exploring. Corsica told me she learned a lot up here. The best thing I could do, given my situation, was to learn.

So I got up and kept walking, as though I hadn't just woken up and noticed I was still in the trap Aldebaran set six months ago. I did come to Ironridge to put my regrets over failing back then to rest, after all. I had wanted a do-over.

Far be it from me to complain now that I had what I wanted.

My hooves were steely as I reached the window. The hall widened further, two staircases descending on either side and joining up with the floor. When I looked back, they rose up two stories, then converged across the main hall's roof and went up further. At a guess, that was where I would find the executive suite.

I checked some more signs, and resumed my climb. This level seemed mostly dedicated to research: most of it meteorological, but some of it unnamed. Lots of control rooms, too. Go figure a company that prospered from Ironridge's extreme heat would be interested in studying the climate. They probably wanted to be well aware of any trends that could signal a cooling... provided they weren't trying to avert them in the first place.

Laboratories, though. I was at home among those. I continued upward.

On the level that rejoined the two staircases, I found something interesting enough to stop and check out: a sign advertising the corporate archives. So far, Cold Karma had been remarkably lax about letting a non-employee like me wander wherever I chose, but surely there was a boundary somewhere, right? The corporate archives had to contain all manner of secrets meant to be hidden from the public eye. So I wasn't exactly expecting to get in, but... I was curious to see what it would look like when they tried to keep me out.

Answer: they didn't.

The corporate archives were so open, there wasn't even a door in the entryway. I walked through, and suddenly I was in a large, gear-shaped room, the tines of the gear forming aisles between a circular arrangement of shelves along the outer wall. On the other side of the room, I could see the hallway continued into another section of the archives, and at the end of each aisle was a screen, the kind that in Icereach were used for video conferencing, connected to cameras and with terminals acting as switchboards.

In the center of the room, the floor dipped in a depression. In the middle of that was a pedestal, and posed proudly on that was a Whitewing.

I narrowed my eyes. Corsica had been up here. There was no possible way she hadn't seen this. I wondered how much she knew that she wasn't telling me for my own peace of mind.

Probably just as much as I wasn't telling her. Though I wouldn't put it past her to have figured out even more.

We needed to put our heads together one of these days, and by one of these days I meant next time we were both awake and in the same room. If there was anyone I could trust, it was her and Ansel. But for now, it was the middle of the day, and I had come all the way up here already... Might as well stay and see what the archive had to teach me.

Each aisle, I realized, was labeled according to one of the company's main divisions. I waffled for a moment between Egdelwonk's and Lilith's, before choosing the latter to investigate first. Getting another chance to talk to Leitmotif and learning what I could about the Aldebaran incident was more important than ever. And since Lilith-

As if reacting to my presence, the screen turned on.

A mare appeared - sarosian, early-mid twenties, mane done up in a single braid that hung off to the side, thick-framed glasses, standing before a thin grove of orderly, vibrant trees. "Welcome to Cold Karma," she said, curtsying deeply.

I took a step back. Was this live, or-?

"Once, before the heating of Ironridge began," the mare said, the camera zooming out and floating high over a fog-filled, mountainous valley, "the ponies of the night were a vibrant and prosperous race. They built thriving metropolises at the peaks of mountains..."

The camera panned upward, showing a mountaintop aglow with light, backed by a starry sky that shimmered with exaggerated galaxies and purple hues. It zoomed in, circling the mountain, and I saw a citadel with bastions and ramparts, luminescent vegetation, steep terraces and white stone bricks and stained-glass windows, draped with veins of luminescent, midnight-blue crystal that flowed through it like blood vessels. Hundreds of batponies flocked in the skies, more than I had ever seen together at once, and multiple airships were docked at the city's lower levels.

"Tight-knit communities that lasted through peace and hardship..."

All of a sudden, the terrain changed, and I was looking at a yellow city with incredibly tall, square buildings and a deep, sapphire-blue sky. Beneath the skyline, a street had been taken over by batponies, market stalls lining the sides that sold rich tapestries and pottery and artistic wares.

"Monastic conclaves in the harshest climates imaginable..."

To my shock, the camera turned to a sight I knew well: Wystle Tower, on the outskirts of Icereach. My home.

"For the past thousand years, these civilizations enriched the world, creating art and culture that were envied from the Griffon Empire to Yakyakistan. But all that came to a crashing, terrible halt during the Twilight of the Gods. Many scholars estimate more than ninety percent of the world's sarosians perished in the cataclysm. And many of those who survived were blamed for the destruction, and withdrew from society to escape persecution."

The camera returned to that yellow city, only now, the street it had shown before was burning. I didn't see any batponies. All there was were other ponies, and the remains of the market stalls.

Yelling reached my ears. I felt a chill.

The camera returned to the glowing mountaintop city, only now it was different. The vibrant cosmos had been replaced with an ordinary twilight. The vegetation had lost its otherworldly glow. The veins of blue, once bright, were now a dim emerald, and all the ponies had vanished without a trace.

"How quickly the world turned on those who survived. But we at Cold Karma do not believe in forgetting our heritage. At the Division of Societal Planning, we seek to engineer a future where sarosiankind no longer stand on the brink of extinction."

Next, the screen moved to a sterile classroom I was pretty sure belonged to Lilith's underground school. "To sarosian families, we offer incentives like a world-class education and free medical services, tilting evolutionary pressures to favor the ones who need it most. The law of the jungle is our enemy and our tool. At Cold Karma, we believe in planning our way to a better society."

With a heroic, uplifting fanfare, the presentation concluded, leaving me slightly stunned. These corporate archives weren't repositories of business secrets at all, then. Those must be kept somewhere else. I was pretty sure the place I was now - and the reason it was so easy for me to get there - was a propaganda machine for tourists.

Well, some parts of Cold Karma, I knew little enough about that even propaganda might be informative.

"Having fun?" a familiar voice said behind me.

I jumped, having been snuck up on. "Corsica!"

It was she. "Guess you're finally poking around up here," she said with a toss of her raspberry mane. "Like what you see?"

"Listen," I interrupted. "I need to talk to... I mean, what are you doing up here in the middle of the day?"

"Research for a project for my job," Corsica said. "Classified, unfortunately. Who do you need to talk to?"

I took a deep breath. "You. I've... figured out some stuff that's really important, and I know you've been doing stuff too. We need to be on the same page."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "That bad?"

I nodded.

She gave me a harder look. "Bad enough that you want to run headfirst into them? One of Egdelwonk's first lessons is the Nobody Says, Nobody Knows rule. If you never mention you've figured something out and you never act on what you've figured out, to everyone else it'll be like you don't know at all. You sure you haven't figured out anything you'd rather just... leave in stasis?"

I hesitated. "Maybe? But I don't think it's going to leave me in stasis. Remember last night? Well, now two nights ago? There are things I wanna do."

Corsica sighed. "Well, there are things I wanna do too, that I've been leaving off the table while everyone else has fun with their lives in Ironridge. But if you're ready, you're ready. Let's go find a place to talk that's slightly less bugged."

"Right." I followed along, my old suspicions returning that Corsica might have put together even more than I had.

Secret Sealed Shrine

Heat rose in a visible wall, a twisting, shimmering curtain that distorted the clouds not so far above. Patchy, fluffy and white as snow, they did a passable but imperfect job of shielding Ironridge from the midday sun... though I knew from experience that nothing short of a nightly monsoon would tame the city's heat. And seeing it from this angle only made it that much more obvious how hot Ironridge really was.

Corsica and I were outside, on a lower deck that formed part of the roof of the Ice District, low enough down that we couldn't see over the top of the dam to the west. The wind blew steadily north, and while it was plenty hot out, it wasn't roast-alive hot... except when an occasional gust blew east. Then, the hot city air would billow over the dam, and we could look straight up and see the air begin to shimmer there, too. Where we were, it was maybe as hot as the day district at night. A stone's throw away, it looked unsurvivable.

"Well, this place is good enough," Corsica said, wandering over to a railing. The deck reminded me vaguely of the deck of an ocean ship, though I had never been on one of those, so it was more my idea of what one should be like - wide, industrial, plenty of room for whatever activities one did on the deck of a boat.

"Crazy how much cooler it is here than just over there," I mentioned, motioning at the dam.

Corsica shrugged. "Wish I knew why."

"You been looking into that?" I tilted my head. "If we're gonna sync up, the weather seems like a decent place to start. I remember you were talking earlier about how you thought Cold Karma might be manipulating the climate somehow to make their product more necessary."

Corsica shook her head. "I have looked, and I'm not so sure anymore it is their doing. At least, if it is, it's being done by a very small faction within the company that's hiding their involvement from everyone else, including the top brass. If you looked around the Ice District upper floors at all, you'd see they don't seem to know why the crater's getting hotter, and are spending a large amount of time and energy trying to figure it out."

I had seen signs indicating meteorology labs... I nodded.

"It seems counter-intuitive, at first," Corsica went on. "But it makes sense. The rate at which Ironridge is currently heating is faster than the rate at which Cold Karma is developing new efficiencies in their cooling process, which means they're not on a sustainable track. The way things are right now, today, Cold Karma is hugely profitable. But it's actually less profitable than it was, say, three years ago, because there are parts of the Night District they previously could service that have now been evacuated and are no longer paying for air conditioning. It's also taking more energy for the same customers to reach the same temperatures - any extra environmental heat beyond the level ponies will pay to cool down to is bad for business. And that trend has been accelerating for a while now. Ironridge passed the climate of maximum profitability many years ago."

My backwards ears folded.

"If the city becomes completely uninhabitable, everyone loses," Corsica said stiffly. "But they're also worried the heat could vanish as abruptly as it came. No one knows why it's here, so no one knows it won't. And finally, if they did discover a cause that they could interfere with, that would give them even more power: instead of being the ones to keep ponies homes cool, they could be the ones who keep the entire city cool. The climate is what every sane pony with a business sense is laser-focused on, and their ability to do real work and make progress makes Icereach look like a joke. I didn't understand what it would look like until I saw it. You won't either."

"It's clearly not natural, right?" I glanced at the dam again. "There's no way a phenomenon like this would be so sharply localized. Is there?"

Corsica shrugged again. "Hard to tell. Ironridge has always had a warm climate. Not unlivable, but warmer than this right now down in the Night District during the day. Basically, there's no way to know if Ironridge always had magic heat and its magic heater is now broken, or if its heat was always natural, and there's now something compounding that. Then again, it also depends on your definition of natural. Weather patterns have certain natural laws that affect their behavior, but it's well-documented that powerful magical effects and concentrations can interfere with those. Do you count the storms that come down from the Aldenfold as natural? Those are probably only there because of magic."

"So who in Cold Karma pays attention to this stuff?" I asked. "You said the ones who are sane and have a business sense. Is that, like, two percent of the company?"

Corsica wryly laughed. "Actually, it's about fifty. For every Egdelwonk, there's someone they keep around to maintain the facade, and that involves providing legitimate services."

I tried to hide my chagrin. "And where's Lilith fit in all this? Don't tell me getting framed, arrested, kidnapped by her from jail and then left to wander around her secret underground school before getting bailed out by Kitty who is secretly crazy strong counts as sane?"

Corsica's brows rose in concern. "That's where you were the other night?"

I sighed and looked away.

"...Maybe I should let you go first," Corsica said, sounding slightly remorseful.

"Nah." I waved a wing. "I'll go in a moment, just finish your thought first."

Corsica sat down. "What I was going to say was that Cold Karma is actually simple, if opaque. Everyone on the board of directors is there for a reason, and it's rarely to provide essential services to the ponies of Ironridge. Essentially, think of Cold Karma as an umbrella corporation that actually consists of several different companies, each with their own leader and purpose, all of whom collaborate to sell air conditioning as a means to stay in power. And there are some ponies who are legitimate, because it used to be a real air conditioning company before it got hollowed out and repurposed like this. But for the most part, it does other things."

I nodded. "Which are?"

"Since you asked about Lilith," Corsica said, "she has a single-minded focus on batponies. Forget that social movement in the Night District, she has real power and wants to increase the number of batponies in Ironridge by any means possible. For her, 'societal planning' means engineering more batponies into the population. And because her organization doesn't stand on its own, but has Cold Karma as a front, that means all ethics concerns and public relations considerations are out the window."

"I mean, I know most of that," I told her. "Doesn't make it seem any more sane. Why's she so bent on this, anyway?"

Corsica shrugged. "Beats me. Egdelwonk told me to figure it out myself, and believe me, I've been trying. All I know for sure is she's an immigrant from the Griffon Empire. Maybe she has personal connections to that tragedy and takes your species' scarcity personally."

"The place I got teleported to," I said. "It was like an underground school or research facility. Some of the batponies I saw there looked like they were there by choice, and a lot of them were pregnant."

"Yup. It's both," Corsica said. "An academy designed to get batponies a leg up in society, with an emphasis on family and all that. Remember how batponies always breed true, so you only get batpony children if both parents are also batponies? That rule means the smaller the population is, the more effort you need to spend keeping it insular in order to make it sustainable. That's what the school designed to do."

I frowned. I felt like I had heard that somewhere before...

"...And the research section of the place is focused on finding a way to break that rule," Corsica finished. "To make it so batponies can be born to mixed-race couples. As far as I'm aware, they haven't made any progress, but Lilith is adamant it can be done. Strongly enough to make me wonder if she isn't just boosting morale and actually knows something, but that's just speculation."

I nodded slowly. "Is the school also designed to be creepy? I wasn't exactly in a touristy mood when I went down there, but it felt..."

"Beats me," Corsica said. "I've never been there. Lilith excluded, it's mostly a batpony-only place."

"How are you supposed to get there, anyway?" I asked. "I'm pretty sure the way I got out wasn't the front door."

Corsica shrugged. "Dunno. Why? You want to go back there, or something?"

I took a deep breath. "I found Leitmotif in a dungeon down there."

Corsica hissed. "What?"

"Yeah," I said, shuffling uncertainly. "She didn't look so good, and she sounded extremely paranoid. Part of me wants to relish the irony, but that got old after a few minutes. I'm kind of thinking we should try to save her."

Corsica raised a dangerous eyebrow. "You remember what she did, right?"

"No," I said hollowly. "We never learned what she was up to in the first place, remember? There's so much about the Aldebaran incident we still don't know. I don't even know for sure if she was a good guy or a bad guy. I do know she was once Mother's best friend, that she surrendered to the authorities at the end, and that she never physically hurt us, which was a lot more than she could have done if she really just wanted us out of the way to steal our identities. And I also know that if anyone could shed some light on what happened back then, it would be her."

Corsica was quiet.

"...And besides," I sighed. "Even assuming she was a bad guy, wouldn't leaving her there make us the same as her?"

"Have you got a plan for that?" Corsica eventually asked. "You don't just march into Lilith's domain and steal something with impunity, especially if that something is a prisoner. Especially if she's already got an unhealthy interest in you."

I hesitated, then pulled out Egdelwonk's contract. "Working plan as of about an hour ago: go in, find her, then use this as an escape route."

Corsica read it, then barked a laugh.

I tilted my head. "Is that a good laugh or a bad laugh? Actually, what do you think of working for Egdelwonk so far? I wouldn't be signing away my soul with this, would I?"

"...I knew what I was signing up for," Corsica said after a moment's thought. "Egdelwonk is... a good boss. His assignments don't make sense and won't give you a sense of purpose or meaning in your life like work is apparently supposed to. You'll learn a lot, including some things you probably didn't want to know. You also have a lot of freedom and power to pursue your own agenda. The worst part is his random, unannounced check-ins. The guy can teleport between trash cans, as crazy as it sounds."

My shoulders slumped. "Yeah, I know about that part. He's been following me for a while now."

Corsica blinked. "You sure you're not already working for him? That's the biggest downside."

"Well, he did give me an assignment he said I could start on if I wanted to get a head start in anticipation of joining," I admitted. "But I pretty definitely didn't sign anything."

"He's ripping you off," Corsica sighed. "Anyway, I don't regret it. I don't know what end all my work is going towards, but I've learned things I'm probably better off having learned. Such as why Cold Karma's executives seem so interested in us."

I leaned in closer. "You figured that out? Because that's the least-sensible thing that's happened so far. I know there are normal ponies in Ironridge; I see them every night. Or day! But with me in particular, nobody feels like they have to play by the rules."

"Not just you." Corsica shook her head. "Both of us. And maybe Ansel, though I haven't poked my nose too deep into his affairs."

"...Well?" I tilted my head after waiting a moment. "You gonna tell me what it is, or not?"

Corsica stood up. "Remember when we were in the hideout, and Elise was talking about Yakyakistan's reasons for censoring windigoes in Icereach?"

"Yeah." I rubbed an ear, suddenly uneasy. It had been frustratingly vague, but the general gist was that the church of Yakyakistan wanted windigoes hidden from public knowledge because public windigoes would be bad for their dogma. "Which pertains to us because...?"

Quietly, I said a little prayer that the answer wouldn't be something I really didn't want to learn. But odds were it would be. Windigoes, after all, had an unhealthy interest in us too.

"She talked about Yakyakistan's reasons for agreeing to the silence," Corsica said. "But she wouldn't talk about Ironridge's reasons, remember?" She turned to leave, waving for me to follow. "Come on. This is something you'll want to see for yourself."

A narrow bridge connected the deck of the Ice District to the mountains to the south, and soon, we were in the Sky District. The temperature wasn't too much worse than when we were there at night, and it continued to grow cooler the further from the crater we went. I had never experienced normal outdoor weather - first the bitter mountain cold of Icereach, then the infernal heat of Ironridge - but I almost wondered if what I felt right now might be it.

Except for the fact that we were still clambering through mountain peaks that by all rights should have been like Icereach.

There was a road, at least, and a much wider and more solid one than the path to Dead Herman, that felt like it had been established more recently and through more industrial means. In the distance, a tall, metal spire loomed: Skyfreeze Tower, a part of the skyport that for some reason hadn't been destroyed, but I had never really learned much about. When I asked Corsica, she told me it was the government headquarters prior to the Steel Revolution, and currently the lair of Ironridge's tippity-top upper class, full of private villas and stuff. Ponies who were too rich to need to flex their social standing by going out in the Day District during the day, and the like. I decided we could skip paying the tower a visit.

Fortunately, it wasn't where we were going. We followed the road all the way to the tower's base and then left the trail, pressing on to the southwest. The going became much harder, gravelly, post-glacial scree crunching underhoof, the land rising and dipping in sharp hills that had been carved and sculpted by ice, but I was used to wandering Ironridge and apparently Corsica hadn't been slacking on her exercise, either.

The temperature dropped further as we left the crater behind, becoming less oppressively hot and then mildly warm and then comfortably cool, and whenever we crested a hilltop, I could see snow covering the ground in the distance ahead. Miles to the south loomed the Aldenfold, an imposing, vertical wall of gray I had to crane my neck to see the top of, a sheer cliff backed by range upon range of mountains stacked ever higher, the roof of the world. Looking up at them, I felt like I was at the bottom of a deep, deep canyon, rather than atop another mountain range that would have been respectable on its own in any other company.

I asked Corsica where we were going. She told me to wait and see.

Wisps of cold air drifted past me, and the sky became a deeper blue. Looking back to the north, all of Ironridge could fit in my field of view; the heat distortions caused by the air rising from the crater were all the more apparent now that I could see both of its edges at once. It was like the crater was a projector, blasting a beam of heat into the heavens, or a spotlight shining into a dusty room.

That's not normal, I told myself. That heat had to be being caused by something.

"How do the plants survive?" I asked on a whim.

"Huh?" Corsica glanced over at me.

"In the Night District," I said. "It's full of trees and greenery and stuff. I get that they were used to hot climates before, but if Ironridge has really gotten so much hotter so quickly, wouldn't all the trees be killed by the heat?"

"That's one of the things Cold Karma is studying," Corsica said. "If anything, the forest has grown more vibrant in the last twenty years. There was a cold snap during the Steel Revolution that damaged it heavily, and since then it's rebounded to much more than it once was. It's possible these trees were always suited for hotter weather and the conditions of the past eight hundred plus years were stunting them, but that doesn't make sense either. If we assume the heat is caused by something magical, it might be possible that magic causes the heat to affect the plants differently... but that's just wild conjecture. Who knows if such magic even exists?"

Suddenly, a memory flashed through my head, one from the day I left Icereach, or perhaps the day before. Mother was wearing my bracelet, turning it on, showing me something about its power...

"Those flames don't set things on fire. If they did, you wouldn't be able to turn it off once it's burning. And the scars aren't burn marks. They're more like a... price. And not one you can pay by accident."

Magical heat that wasn't really heat. I felt hot when using the bracelet, sure, and it protected me from the cold, but the fires it lit didn't burn things, and could vanish as easily as they came.

What Corsica was talking about really did exist. I suddenly wondered if there might be a connection between my bracelet's power and the heat that was afflicting Ironridge, and if so, if there was a connection between that and the reason Cold Karma was so interested in me. After all, I was fairly sure Ludwig had known about my bracelet...

I took a deep breath and shuddered. Whatever Corsica wanted me to see in the mountains, I'd see. And then, if it didn't explain or contradict this... She had seen me using my bracelet, while possessed in the storm. Maybe it was time to tell her everything I knew about it in return.

We reached the edge of the snow. It was properly cold out, a little colder than Icereach had been on the day of the avalanche. Ironridge, by now, had to be miles away, and the Aldenfold loomed ever higher in my vision. Scents and sensations I had been missing for weeks now came flooding back to me as white crunched beneath my boots and frost stung the edges of my ears. I was home.

And still, we marched south.

"Exactly how far are we going?" I asked, the skyport visible back to the north - two stands of cracked, lifted domes, the collapsed hangar that housed Fort Starlight, and Skyfreeze Tower side by side. "And how'd you find this in the first place? Were you really just out here exploring for no reason?"

"We're almost there," Corsica told me, the snow piling up higher and higher. "And you'll see. You'd better not already know this, by the way, or I'll feel like a doofus for dragging you all the way out here."

"I'd say it's worth it just for the weather," I sighed happily, tightening my coat. Corsica, as usual, wore only her shoes and ear ornaments, and had perked up visibly in the cool weather as well. She nodded in agreement.

Periodically, as we marched, we passed by twisted heaps of metal and debris, parts of the skyport that got blown to the south by the storms that tore it apart. That struck me as slightly odd, given that storms usually blew northward instead, but I kept my questions to myself, the weather weighing on me like a vigil of silence, demanding that I appreciate it and not fill the air with words instead. We hiked along a river, flowing northward from the Aldenfold, cold and glacial. At one point, Corsica stopped for a drink, and I did too. Wonderfully pure.

And then, at last, we came to a structure.

I wasn't sure what it was at first. A low, circular dome, it was covered in snow, too regular to be natural yet not shaped or designed like any building I had ever seen. It was situated in a valley, clearly not intended to be a landmark. But there was actually a bit of a trail leading down to it. And, when Corsica lit her horn and cleared some snow away, it had a door.

The door was recessed into the dome, carved and made of stone, with an architectural style that felt more like it belonged in Icereach than Ironridge. A high-tech lock panel was indented in the wall leading up to the door, though, and as I inspected the carvings, they felt quite new compared to the ancient chapel from my home. At a guess, I would say this building was erected somewhere within my lifetime.

"What is this?" I turned to Corsica and tilted my head. "Where are we?"

"We're here," Corsica said. "Give me a moment to open this. It's complicated, and I've only gotten the spell right once before."

She concentrated on the lock, horn glowing. Rather than ponder what she was doing or where she had learned how to, I took a moment to inspect the carvings in the door instead. The dominant one was a hexagon inscribed minimally within an upside-down equiateral triangle, so that each of the triangle's sides touched the hexagon once in the middle, and three of the hexagon's points weren't touching the triangle at all. I had seen that symbol before, I knew, and was fairly sure it related to the church of Yakyakistan, but I had no idea how.

If I wasn't about to find out, maybe I could ask my co-worker... What was her name, again? The religious one... Lalala! Her! For a moment, I winced, realizing my last few days had been so hectic I had completely forgotten ponies who were supposed to be important to me in a normal capacity. Relationships with co-workers were the kind of things normal ponies had to put time and effort into, and my life was so abnormal that those didn't even rank on my priorities list.

Maybe Corsica was about to give me a reason for that.

"...There we go!" Corsica grunted, and suddenly the symbol on the door glowed a deep midnight blue. Then, with a rumble of stone, the door split down the middle, and began to slide open.

Inside, it was dark, until the twin lights of my bracelet and Corsica's horn moved through the door. The domed ceiling was marginally ornate, but looked like it had been built in a hurry, and not artistically consecrated like the chapel. There wasn't a floor; just regular, stone mountain ground, rough and uneven and likely unchanged since before the place was built. It was just a stone dome, built and sealed to keep this place in the dark.

I held out my hoof, illuminating a natural depression in the floor. Two things reflected back at me: broken machinery, and ice.

Lots of ice. Unnatural ice. Not ice that formed flat on the floor like a frozen puddle, but ice that rose into the air, twisting in three-dimensional sculptures, or else patterned itself into runes, so perfectly faceted that it looked more like a diamond than a sculpture that could melt. The pattern was symmetrical, like a snowflake, and also organic, like a spider web. At first, I was certain it was the work of a windigo.

But then I looked again, and was only half-certain. This ice felt... old. Too deliberate for Ludwig's chaotic personality, too cut off from any power source to grow and change, more like an arrangement of fake flowers than a real flower growing in a greenhouse. And there was something primal about it, and also something harmonic, and also something lesser about it, that would have been greater if it was alive. This was... I breathed in. It felt like a commemoration of something that had happened here to the land, rather than the thing that had happened itself.

And then I looked at the machine wreckage, closely tangled up in the center of the ice. Silver and shiny, smooth exteriors that had been split open and scattered by some sudden force, but little damage from the weather or the decay of time. The exteriors had clearly been rounded, though. Cylindrical, if what looked like a surviving internal frame was any indication.

Combing further, I saw what might have been fuel tanks. And then what was unmistakably a rocket fin.

"What...?" I stared at Corsica, ears down, unable to put two and two together. Something about this place stilled my heart. Whatever connection was waiting to be made, I didn't want to make it.

"It's a rocket," Corsica said. "A working one. Fired by Yakyakistan twenty years ago, during the Steel Revolution. Instead of cleaning the place up, they built this dome and locked it in here, right where it crashed."

I looked again at the wreckage.

"Carrying a cargo of windigoes from beneath the Yak Hoof Glacier," Corsica went on. "Not an accidental crash, either. They were responsible for the cold snap that ended the old weather patterns of Ironridge and started the new ones. They were involved in that fight. I'm certain Elise knows, and was avoiding telling us. I think that Starlight filly Jamjars and Elise talked about was the one who beat them, but it's hard to know for sure since they've been so swept under the rug. It's also possible they were never really defeated and are still in Ironridge today. Hard to know. But that's not the important part."

I stared at her in disbelief. "That's not the important part?"

Corsica turned to the rocket and nodded, not making eye contact with me. "This rocket predates the Icereach institute. Yakyakistan built them on their own. It was one of two ever launched, outside of tests. The second delivered a payload of explosives to the Griffon Empire shortly before their war. In both cases, they weren't meant to explore space. They were meant to drop weapons on Yakyakistan's enemies."

"Then what are they doing in Icereach?" I whispered.

"It's hard to find good information about them," Corsica said. "But it's likely the second rocket wasn't actually fired by Yakyakistan themselves, and instead was hijacked by a rogue agent based in the Griffon Empire and used for their own purposes. Either way, one almost destroyed a friendly neighbor, and one was stolen for use in a war on the other side of the world. Yakyakistan couldn't control the power they had created, but they didn't want to get rid of it, either. And so they sealed it away. All the 'research' we did in Icereach? The reason there were never any tests, the schedules kept getting pushed, but we still put so much time and effort into those rockets? It's because we weren't building them. They were finished and fully operational all along. We were maintaining them in case things ever changed between Yakyakistan and the rest of the world, and they decided they needed them again. Icereach isn't a research colony, Halcyon."

She turned to meet my eyes at last. "It's a weapons depot."

I was frozen in place. "But you said this was about why everyone in Ironridge is interested in us. What do we have to do with those rockets? Other than being from Icereach?"

"You remember how evasive Elise was about Icereach's censorship when we were in the hideout," Corsica said. "How she talked in very narrow terms and wouldn't tell us the big picture. I don't know for certain, but... Ironridge knew about the rockets and knew what Yakyakistan wanted to hide in Icereach. I think Ironridge wanted to use the colony to hide its own weapons, too."

My blood ran colder.

Corsica pointed at my bracelet. Somehow, I already knew.

"I don't know this for sure," Corsica said. "But too much makes sense. Do you remember when Elise and Graygarden were answering our questions in the aftermath of the Aldebaran incident? Something Elise said was that she came to Icereach to take up her post on the same airship flight that brought you and your family as refugees. I wasn't born in Icereach either - I came in with Graygarden when I was only a few months old. What do Elise and Graygarden have in common?"

I wracked my brain, but I couldn't think.

"They're foreigners," Corsica said. "And Icereach is almost entirely made up of natives who predate the institute. Ever since I learned that, I thought they were just imported corporate bosses, but what if they were actually sent here to watch over things the rest of the world wanted hidden away? Specifically, over..." She swallowed. "Us?"

I held out my bracelet. "You mean you...?"

"My special talent." Corsica shrugged. "I told you it's special, right? And I got it while I was unconscious, which isn't a normal way to get one. And it's... powerful. I wonder if something about me was... marked at birth or destined to have it, or if I always had it and it was waiting for the right time to manifest, or... Look, you've seen the way some ponies behave around it. And I know your bracelet does more than you let on. I haven't pressed because it's clearly personal, but I saw you using it to chase me through that blizzard. The important part is, my talent and your bracelet. I think those were hidden away in Icereach on purpose. And everyone in Ironridge who knows about them wants them."

"My bracelet, maybe." My throat was dry. "Elise didn't have an existing obligation to us. But you're Graygarden's daughter. You think someone randomly tapped him to lead the institute just because you're important and he was related to you?"

Corsica's face darkened. "Don't you ever tell this to another soul, but... I was adopted. Shortly before he came to Icereach. If you've ever wanted to know why things deteriorated between Graygarden and me after the avalanche, it involved the manner in which I found out."

"...Then what do we do?" I whispered.

"Same thing I've been doing for a while now," Corsica said, her shoulders straight and her voice gruff. "Stay the course and don't let anyone get their grubby hooves on me who doesn't deserve to. I've been going back and forth on whether to tell you. Part of me thought you're enjoying your life in Ironridge and don't need to be thinking about a thing like that. Another part of me thought you're in danger and might as well know so you can protect yourself... even if we're playing with forces that are so much bigger than us, there's nothing we can do."

"Unless there is something we can do," I pointed out. "If Cold Karma is interested in us because we're powerful..."

Corsica shook her head. "I don't know what kind of power your bracelet has, and I'll leave it up to you to tell me. I still don't feel like talking about my special talent. But even if we could blow up an entire company, do you really think Ironridge would be better off for it? They need Cold Karma to stay alive. And Cold Karma does much more than just air conditioning. They provide policing and the rule of law. They run the military that defends our borders from the likes of that pirate king who's in the news so often. For all her creepiness, Lilith does more to actually help stop batponies from going extinct in a few generations than anyone else. Ironridge is wound tight enough to burst, but it's such a delicate balance, there's no way we can actually fix something without breaking everything else. Even if you could rewrite reality in accordance with your whims, it would be too much."

I hesitated. "So... does that mean you'd rather not know the stuff I've been figuring out?"

"Beyond finding Leif in a dungeon?" Corsica slumped. "Spill it."

I took a deep breath. "I'm all but certain Cold Karma is using windigoes somehow to power its air conditioning. I think but don't know that Kitty is possessed by a windigo just like you were. If she is, Jamjars knows. And I also think Jamjars owns the hideout where Aldebaran took us."

Corsica sat down and swore.

"That's why I need to rescue Leitmotif," I said. "One of the reasons, anyway. Her real name is Senescey. But we saw her have a break with the Composer. Whatever her story is, she's the one pony we can trust to not be in on the windigoes' schemes."

Corsica slowly nodded. "When she captured us. Do you suppose she knew...?"

"Doubt it." I shook my head. "Elise pointed something out to me when we were in the hideout: Aldebaran didn't know about my bracelet. They didn't try to take or copy it when disguising as me. Which means if you're right about this being something Cold Karma is after..." I held out my leg, the bracelet glowing in an emerald circle. "They didn't let Aldebaran in on it."

Corsica sighed. "What about Gerardo? What about Elise? What about that friend Gerardo told us to go to if we ran out of other options?"

"Valey?" I perked up. "I met her. She's got a semi-secret fortress in one of the skyport ruins. She's... weird, but probably not worse than Egdelwonk." I blinked. "Speaking of Egdelwonk, he's not after your talent too, is he?"

"Sort of." Corsica shook her head. "He clearly knows about it. More than I do, for sure. But he acts like he's more interested in teaching me about it than using it for his own ends. In the least-direct way possible, though..." She slumped. "Big surprise, I don't know everything about my own special talent."

I stepped closer. "I don't know... well, hardly anything about my bracelet, other than that it belonged to Mother back in the Empire, and she likely stole it from somewhere important."

"Great." Corsica didn't sound encouraged. "So neither of us is in control of the powers we've been saddled with. What do you know about Valey? I know she supposedly helped protect the city from windigoes during the Steel Revolution, but not the specifics. These days, she's a public bogey who's more myth than reality, and by all accounts is obsessed with trolling an organization in the Night District called the Zero Armada that's supposedly a pro-batpony activist group."

"Didn't know she had it in for those guys," I said. "I know basically nothing about her other than that she's kind of weird and mean. What's with the Zero Armada, though? I keep hearing about them in passing..."

"They're probably the most influential cultural group in Ironridge," Corsica said. "Every time you see anyone express an opinion on batponies, it's probably being colored by them. I haven't looked into them too much, mostly because I hate the Night District. But they're..." She hesitated. "They're less pro-batpony and more anti-anyone who isn't pro-batpony. Organized like a religion. It sounds to me like an energy sink for disaffected ponies with too much time on their hooves and not enough outlets. You think they have anything to do with this?"

I shrugged. "Who knows? Probably less than Cold Karma."

Corsica sighed. "Right. So, what do you want to do about Jamjars?"

"Until I know for certain, nothing." I shook my head. "If she's playing at anything involving us, I think having us on her team but with some agency of our own is exactly what she wants. She might not be being honest with us, but I doubt she's going to suddenly lock us up unless things dramatically change. If I had to guess, and if you're right about these being powerful enough to interest Cold Karma, I'd say Jamjars wants to convince us to help her of our own volition."

Corsica put her chin on a hoof. "Then she's probably playing the long game, considering how obtuse she is about her own goals. Unless she's elaborated any for you about these Writs of Harmonic Sanction she's supposedly chasing for Starlight, and how all that fits together?"

"Nope." I looked down. "It's pretty likely there's some major context no one's telling us, though. Especially if there's stuff out there like what you found out about... this place. Valey and Gerardo might know, though, since it's so clear they have history with her. Maybe we should go see Valey, tell her what we know, and see if she'll make a good-faith bid to tell us everything and recruit us?"

"I'm not fond of getting recruited," Corsica said. "And anyway, I've already chosen a side with Egdelwonk. He might be fine with it, though. I guess we could." She thought for a moment. "Maybe Leitmotif really is our best way to go."

"...I should probably tell you some other tools I've been hiding," I said after a moment's hesitation. "First, the hideout had a teleporter. It's probably the intended way in and out. I don't know how it's powered, but it's probably by Ludwig. I stole the pattern card pointing to its destination."

Corsica perked up. "So you're saying we might be able to find out for sure if it goes to a place that's tied to Jamjars? You're not certain about her being in on this, then? And this is a way to verify?"

"Yeah, I'm not certain," I started. "But it's way more than that. Valey has the same kind of teleporter, so we could go straight there in person. And assuming there's also a teleporter to send someone to the hideout, we could go back there too if for any reason we wanted to. Like, say, to ask Ludwig to tell us how to know for sure if someone's possessed by a windigo."

"You mean Kitty." Corsica gritted her teeth. "...I'm not looking forward to dealing with Ludwig again. But I could, if it's important. I pushed him around once, and I can do it again. He'd probably even help us willingly if we could frame it as us being the underdogs in a fight. But whatever we do, we shouldn't do that unless we're prepared for things to escalate very rapidly."

I slowly nodded. "Yeah. And, one other thing... When I was looting the hideout, I found three Writs of Harmonic Sanction."

Corsica's ears rose sharply. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah." I nodded again. "I accidentally used one on myself before I knew what they were. There was a note with them that made it sound like someone stole them in Equestria and brought them back up here, and I recently realized they're probably for Jamjars."

Corsica let out a breath. "The land south of the Aldenfold... Jamjars, what are you up to?"

"I dunno," I said. "But we're going to find out."

Corsica snorted in solidarity. "You wanna go to Equestria, right?"

I tilted my head. "Well, that was the idea. But we'd also need an airship..."

"It sounds like a good way out of this mess," Corsica said. "We're obviously not going to be able to live here long-term. At least, not with the stuff we have on our heads. Maybe you could give up your mother's heirloom, and maybe it wouldn't doom the city to something nefarious, but how do you give someone your special talent? I say we use the writs on the three of us - you, me, Ansel - and then we get an airship and leave this place."

"You think we can just get an airship?" I asked, remembering Coda's offer to pay me one in exchange for a job.

"We're power players now, like it or not." Corsica shrugged. "We've already got stuff ordinary ponies never see, like a house in the Ice District and jobs with Egdelwonk. I doubt it's impossible. Wanna make that our end goal?"

I proffered a booted hoof. "It's a deal."

Corsica took it.

"Step one," I said. "Rescue Leitmotif. I've got a few ideas on that. Step two: get an airship. I might also have an idea on that. Step three: fly to Equestria and hope nobody there cares about my bracelet or your special talent."

"I've got some ideas of my own," Corsica said. "Let's split up and pursue these separately for now. Better not to have all our money on one gambit. In the meantime, if you're seriously considering working for Egdelwonk, lemme know if you want an invite to any co-worker social events. I've got a... friend... who's a little out there, but knows a lot about Griffon Empire history. You might enjoy picking his brain a little."

"Gotcha," I said, stepping away. Step four, I added in my mind: I still want to get to the bottom of the Aldebaran incident. Flying away is good, but first I want to understand everything that's been going on.

We shared a look of understanding, and left the rocket crash shrine. Corsica sealed up the door again, and we started on the long hike back to Ironridge, the sun several hours lower in the sky than when we started. I had a lot more questions than when we started, but they were clearer questions, better defined and more targeted to what I knew was going on, rather than the general sense of directionlessness that had been plaguing me since early into my Ironridge career.

Things were starting to make sense. I couldn't see the other players' hands, but I could see the game board, and I had a vague idea of what was in my own hand. And, most importantly, I had an ally.

I looked at Corsica as we walked. She looked tired, though it was hard to tell if it was a general exhaustion or the specific kind that came from overusing her talent. Probably a mix of both.

She didn't want to tell me everything about her talent, and had admitted she didn't know everything about it in the first place. I didn't want to tell her everything about my bracelet... or my own talent, or my mask and my state of mind and the magic that empowered it, either, and I definitely didn't know everything about that. But someday, if I was going to talk about it, she was probably the pony I'd choose to share it with.

Hopefully, on the other side of Ironridge, we'd find a place that was less overbearing, and we could slow down and see to matters like those for real.

Dragons Aren't Real

Corsica and I didn't speak as we made the long hike back from the rocket crash site, partly because we had said everything that needed saying and partly to conserve breath. As fit as both of us were, it was a substantial trek over very rough terrain, and both of us had stayed up all day.

As the temperature rose and Dead Herman drew near, the sky began to tinge with orange, the sun edging closer and closer to the mountainous horizon. What was my schedule like, again? Did I have work tonight? Could I go home and catch a nap before it, and if I could, should I? I was still worn out from my ordeal the other night, but mentally, I was fired up and wide awake, thoughts of rockets and weapons and airships and Equestria whirling through my brain and lending energy to my hooves.

To hear Corsica tell it, she and I - her special talent, my bracelet - were weapons someone had tried to bury in Icreach. And everyone interested in us now, everyone trying to get our cooperation voluntary or otherwise, wanted access to these. And I still didn't know what either of our weapons did.

But that wouldn't stop me from moving forward. I several paths wide open to me, first and foremost befriending Coda. That could be as easy or as hard as I wanted it to be, depending how hard I pressed her to trust me, but to hear her tell it she was more than willing to pay me an airship in exchange for a job that wasn't yet specified. I had everything else. If all it meant was a single job to have an unconditional ticket out of Ironridge, I was confident I could do almost anything, even tasks thought up by a goddess.

My eyes instinctively went to scan the darkening sky, and my intuition paid off: there was Coda's airship, a bright pink-black light that looked like a comet burning where the dirigible should be, floating down to dock at the ruins of the skyport. Maybe I could go pay her a visit right now, and do that instead of getting a nap before work. I swallowed, nodding at my plan.

"I'm gonna take the long way back," I told Corsica as we neared the base of Skyfreeze Tower. "Got a good lead to pursue. See you around?"

"Sure." She tossed her mane in a see-ya gesture. "Try not to get Lilithed out there."

I chuckled weakly. "If I do, I'll make it through just like I did last time."

And then we parted ways, her heading for the Ice District and me heading for Dead Herman. It wasn't important now, but it was good to know there was a way back home from the Sky District that didn't involve going anywhere prohibitively hot during the day.

Our parting lingered in my mind for a while, though. Even assuming I was right and Kitty was a windigo and Jamjars was in on windigo shenanigans... they had protected me. Kitty broke into jail and then followed me through Lilith's lair in order to keep me safe. Maybe she saw it as protecting her own property, and I wasn't fond of being treated like a piece on anyone else's board, but the fact was Jamjars' team offered me a lot of freedom while also fending off the competition. Unless Jamjars was secretly doing something really evil that would cause things to all of a sudden go bad if she wasn't stopped, my present situation wasn't actually that dire. The biggest threat to my current stability might truly be my own curiosity.

I entered Dead Herman, this time resolving to take the lift like a civilized pony and not climb my way up a cable like I had last time. Overhead, a pegasus soared down from the skyport, making the flight effortlessly. I looked away.

The lift took a moment to find, and I instinctively opened my bag when I got near, unsure if it required a fee. Money, money... I had just spent every last thing I had on cake to repay Kitty. Everything except the low-value griffon gold Coda herself had plied me with on my last visit, at least.

Remembering my last visit jogged another memory, though, this one much less helpful: I had promised to bring Coda a book on my next visit. And I had left the entire pile I was reading back at Jamjars'. There was no way I was making the trip back home and still coming back here again today.

Sighing, I straightened up, a dripping sensation running over me as reality threw a pail of water on my fun... and the sights and sounds of Dead Herman drifted in to fill the void. The town was coming alive as the sun set, lights clicking on and outdoor music starting up, hawkers beginning to fill their booths and ponies leaving their homes to participate in the earliest revels of the Sky District night life.

This place looked like it was wholly built on selling experiences and entertainment, right? In the perfect reputational gray zone to sometimes have quality products, but also not care what nation's currency you paid in? Surely there was a book shop here somewhere that would accept griffon gold.

I set about wandering, keeping my eyes peeled. The town's population was interesting, and I had to avoid spending more time looking at the ponies than the things they sold: mostly a mix of bums and vagabonds, dressed up fancy but with unpracticed or inauthentic demeanors. Stallions with angular sunglasses and high-buttoned neck coats, cravats that weren't quite folded properly, manes styled with just a little too much grease. Several mares wore the same flank-covering garb Corsica had gotten rid of on our first trip here, most of whom looked like they were pretending to be setpieces or trophies for other ponies. It was fascinating to watch ponies do that, especially when it was a thing I had no desire to do myself.

As long as I held my head slightly too high, wore my coat with the air of someone who was trying to be big enough for it and never hurried, I blended in perfectly. No one heckled me with trouble. Many called out to me with offers and wares, but I paid them no mind, and they soon changed to other targets. I wondered how many other ponies here, like me, looked fancy but were actually broke.

I passed an open-air gambling den, and watched for long enough to know for certain there were at least two more.

My backwards ears swiveled, sifting through the push and pull of the town's festive atmosphere for any mention of books, and my hooves eventually found their way back to the central square, where I first met Howe. There was that statue, again.

Neon store signs reflected dully off the tarnished bronze, giving Shinespark of Sosa a dirty rainbow hue. I took in the statue again, now that I knew more about who it depicted. This was the purported power armor expert Leif thought could help me get to the ether river under Ironridge, huh?

Something about her still felt... not quite right. I couldn't place it, but I felt a tingling unease looking at that statue, as if a deeply buried part of me wanted to run far, far away, or else cower and become small. I couldn't understand why, though. A faint haze drifted through my thoughts, the telltale sign of memories that had been modified in my mask.

Had I met Shinespark before? How would that be possible? Unless her chosen hiding place wasn't in Ironridge at all, but in Icereach...

"It's a pretty statue, isn't it?"

I jumped. There was a pony next to me, one with such a quiet presence I hadn't noticed them appear... A familiar pony.

Her face was barely visible beneath a hooded cowl, her entire body shrouded in a slim dress, almost none of her exposed to the light. But even though I could only see her clothing, this was unmistakably the mare who found me lost at the edge of Fort Starlight.

I tried to remember her name, if I had ever learned it, but it didn't come to me.

"That's my mother," she said, looking up at the statue, voice tingly and ethereal. "Shinespark. She's a great mare. That statue was made before she was particularly great, though. Only when she was destined for great things. Do you know much about her?"

I shook my head, scanning the plaza. Surely, there'd be someone right... there. A dark pegasus, more solidly built than most of the other townsponies. Maybe not the most muscular, but everyone buffer had dirty muscles, ones that looked like they worked out for the sake of working out and didn't actually use them for anything. I couldn't explain the distinction in words. It was just intuitive. This pony, though, was used to action, and he was the professional the others were merely pretending to be.

This mysterious waif was a Fort Starlight VIP, and right there was her chaperone.

"The inscription says she was the first pony to be born on an airship," the thin mare said. "But it doesn't say anything about why that was important. You see, a year before her birth, Ironridge had a terrible airship crash. Airships were an emerging technology at the time, and this flight was supposed to show everyone what that technology could do. But it did the opposite. After that, Ironridge decided they didn't want to fly anymore."

I looked sideways at her. "Not that I mind the history lesson, but why are you telling me this?"

She looked sideways at me in return. "Because you were interested in the statue. How many other ponies do you see paying it mind?"

I blinked, and realized there were none.

Plenty of ponies, of course. But as I watched their eyes, they paid the statue no more reverence than they would if it were a fountain or generic centerpiece. No bows, no moments of silence, no nods of respect for someone who was ostensibly such a hero that she got a place in the center of the town. To hear Nicov talk about it, this town had apparently been founded where it was on ideology alone - at the place of the Yakyakistani Ambassador's death, whom I assumed had been slain by Shinespark.

Now that I thought about it, it did seem pretty strange.

"Not flying didn't suit Ironridge well," the thin mare continued, as if my interruption had never occurred. "Other countries came in and left them behind. Shinespark's dream was to fly. To seize the sky and give it back to her ponies. And that was her birthright. That's why it's so important, where she was born. She was a hero that everyone could look up to when they wanted to rise."

"I like having someone to look up to," I mumbled.

"That's why it's so curious, watching ponies today," she went on, her tone an impossible mix of consternated and carefree. "None of them seem to have a symbol they can all look up to. But none of them act like they want it, either. And these ponies are certainly not flying free. It's sad, I think. I watch ponies a lot, and I just can't understand what went wrong."

Baffled, I looked out at the crowd again. Was this a sad, sorry sight? To me, it looked exotic. Fancy. Ponies reaching above their means for high living. The ponies I was watching probably figured themselves living in a utopia, or at least visiting one for a night of fun. Sure, the town's build quality was a little ramshackle, and it would have been nice if the ponies could really be like this, rather than just acting. I, and particularly the me of seven months ago, was the foremost expert on wishing your act could be real. But, all things considered, everyone was having fun. How was this sad?

"...Hey. What was your name, again?" I asked, unsure what else to say.

"I am Braen," she replied, nodding her hooded head. "It's been pleasant talking to you. Somehow, I don't think you've forgotten how to fly the way they have. But I think my keeper is getting agitated by my spending time with a stranger. I hope to see you around!"

"Hey, err..." I held out a hoof as she turned to leave. "Any chance you're familiar with this town? Enough to know where I might find a book shop?"

She pointed over my shoulder, a hint of luminous eyes peeking out from her low-drawn cowl.

"Thanks! I owe you one!" I saluted with a wing, turning as she resumed her retreat.

I had no idea what to make of my encounter with Braen, but my mind tried anyway, doing a fine job of distracting me as I tried to figure what would be a good book to leave with Coda that I could afford with griffon gold. I didn't want to disappoint her with trash, or worse, give her a taste for it, but didn't have time to read and vet anything myself...

There! I seized upon an entry in a rack of comic books: The Aegis Chronicles, Volume One, by Snowshoe. Jamjars had mentioned this one, right? I vaguely recalled her calling it popular during a sleepy train ride when I asked about Lalala's god, who was also called Aegis... The cover depicted a dramatic drawing of a massive metal dragon with a glowing drill-shaped tail blasting a crater in the ground with a humongous laser beam.

If Jamjars vouched for it, and it was about massive robot laser destruction, I was fairly sure it would appeal to an oversized goddess filly who had enough self-esteem to make up epithets for herself day and night. With any luck, she might even take some harmless inspiration. This one was a keeper.

Fortunately, the shopkeep was not only happy to take my griffon gold but gave me a toothy grin that suggested I was getting ripped off. Fine by me, though. That gold came from Coda, and the thing I bought with it was going right back to her, so I was net neutral either way. I made for the lift, which thankfully didn't require any pay.

Twilight was deep in the sky as I traversed the shattered skyport dome, and when I approached the old boarding ramp where Coda usually set up shop, several of her monks were out and about, putting up their entrance decorations to welcome ponies aboard for a night of prayer and whatever else they solicited. They spotted me, and I couldn't tell if they recognized me or just did that for everyone, but I was warmly ushered inside.

The Lady Coda bid me welcome, I was told. Had I come to offer a prayer of love and admiration?

I grinned a little to myself, imagining their reactions if they knew I was actually here to offer her a comic book about laser-shooting robo-dragons.

The lobby of Coda's airship was familiar, a wide room that straddled the ship from side to side, several curtained booths along the back containing Coda's prayer altars. No ponies had congregated yet at the tables along the other wall, where I recalled them socializing last time, but several of the booths had hooves visible beneath the curtains, and I didn't doubt those patrons would soon be chatting and making merry.

Coda's chamber was at the stern, a darkened hallway leading to the entry. Could I just go in, or...?

With a swish of fabric, the curtains in the hallway parted, and Coda was there.

"Ah!" she declared, striding towards me in her unusual body, proportioned like a filly but only slightly smaller than an adult. "Princess Halcyon the Garbed, may she wield the scepter of judgement with compassion, has arrived? You there!" She pointed a large wing at one of her clergy, which were still made up of unicorns wearing batpony costumes. "Why does your tongue not serenade her ears with her list of epithets? Tell me not that you would make light of your goddess's efforts in composing such a scroll."

The monk glanced at his companion, who in turn glanced at her companion, who sighed. "We now welcome Princess Halcyon the Garbed, Lady of the Veil, Impenetrable Be Her Emotions, May All Her Enemies Stumble into Holes, Warden of Trust, She Who Could Resist the Pink Flame, hear ye, hear ye."

Concerned, the first monk looked back to Coda. "Princess, you are aware it will interfere with our holy mission to elevate others to the status of-"

"Put a sock in it," Coda primly told him, wandering over and smiling to me. "Long have I awaited our reunion, my enigmatic equal. Shorn from your presence, I have found my usual methods of self-entertainment growing even dimmer as of late! Would you deign to join me in my throne room where we might talk un-"

"Princess?" A cleric descended the staircase leading toward the prow. "You are aware prayers have started for the night, yes? Your throne-"

"Your loving goddess finds interruptions most rude," Coda interrupted, bapping the cleric on the nose with her pink-black aura. "And yes, it would be difficult for me not to be aware, given what I do each night, every night, from the dawn of time until its inexorable end..." She sighed. "Attend me, Halcyon. Lest my duties never give us a moment's peace."

Coda turned and walked back into her throne room with a huff. I followed, and the clergy didn't try to stop me, but I could tell they all were watching and had no idea what to make of this.

In the throne room, the lighting was just as dim as before, Coda's throne just as weird and unnerving. A pipe organ tipped on its back, the pipes on the back turning into snaking coils that vanished into the walls where the prayer altars would be, a broken alicorn statue reclining on top... Coda herself reclined on the throne, her special talent sparkling faintly.

"Your goons sure push you hard, huh?" I said, stopping in the middle of the room and glancing over my shoulder.

"They are nothing if not committed to the cause," Coda admitted. "Though I am their goddess, they have been working to these ends far longer than I. It is my role to bless and admire that dedication, and to lead by example that they might be all the more committed. That said, they can be rather stuffy at times..."

She brightened. "But enough of my boring entourage! Tell me of you! What kinds of experiences have you partaken of in the mortal world, Princess Halcyon the Garbed? Your goddess overflows with curiosity, and has long relished the chance to experience your unknowable mind once again!"

"Kind of a lot," I chuckled, her enthusiasm breaking down a few of the walls in my mind. Somehow, this felt completely different from our first meeting: even though Coda wasn't an alicorn, I wasn't the least bit intimidated from meeting a goddess, or weirded out by her not being the way I imagined. "But here. I fulfilled our bargain."

I took out the comic book and tossed it to her.

She caught it in her aura in surprise. "You would throw something at the Princess of Love? Is this thing considered culturally acceptable among lower beings? Fascinating. Truly, I must live in an insulated..." She trailed off, righting the comic book and staring at the cover. "Oh my. Not in my wildest dreams had I imagined creatures like this to populate the streets of Ironridge! I imagine they must possess some level of rarity for them to be worthy of story books, but still, I can scarce fathom such a sight in any realm, let alone the one of mortals."

I blinked. "I'm... pretty sure that dragon doesn't actually exist. Unless someone built a replica because they saw it in the book, but who even knows if that's possible?"

Coda squinted at me. "Then who penned this, if not an acquaintance of such a behemoth?"

"They... made it up?" I shrugged. Of all the reactions Coda could have to this, I hadn't been expecting her to think it was real.

She scoffed. "You mean to tell me an artist conceived of this without having seen it before? Next, I suppose you'll insist mortals are capable of saving themselves from the encroaching darkness, or even holding back the hands of fate!"

I tilted my head. "Err... What? How do you mean?"

Coda adjusted herself on her throne. "It is common knowledge that creation is the realm of the divine, is it not? I have thought much on these things since we last met, trying to draw contrast between you and I on one side and my clergy on the other. Such was my excitement that I reread every single publication they have released for me, yet all are mere regurgitations of the facts and sensibilities I instill in them as their monarch. The art they produce is a reflection of the ideas they are given. Yet you say this is not the way of things?"

"Not really?" I tried to fit that through my head. "Or not at all, even. Imagining stuff is a big part of what makes ponies ponies. And griffons and yaks and stuff, too."

Coda looked at me with a sour resignation. "Though your feelings are ever hid to me, I can hear it in your tone: you do not jest. Phooey. That the careful observations of a goddess should so easily be disproven is disconcerting. Tell me, how do mortals determine that they are right?"

I took a deep breath. "Slow down, here. I've got a lot on my mind, and wasn't quite prepared to get bombarded with philosophy the moment I walked in the door."

Coda graciously nodded. "Of course. Take all the time your unknowably mortal or immortal mind needs to process the dilemma. It is, after all, difficult enough to be grappled with by a goddess."

What a strange filly.

"...Right. So." I took another breath. "There's not a cut-and-dried thing like objective right and wrong. You've got stuff that's empirically correct, like science, and you've got stuff that most everyone just plain knows is wrong, like killing people. But there's always going to be some nutjob here or there who disagrees because most of the time, ponies don't have any special way to determine that we're right. We just decide we are, after spending however much effort we feel like making sure. And that leads to a lot of folks with different ideas on what being right means, and sometimes we fight over that if our disagreements are too major. How's that?"

Coda chuckled. "You make it sound as though every single mortal in existence confers upon themselves the mantle of divinity. How does anything productive get done?"

I shrugged. "It doesn't, always. And when society moves, everyone's got different opinions about whether it's in the right direction."

Ironic, that I was the one giving this lecture, when I was usually so decoupled from society and the ponies around me.

"Of course it doesn't." Coda airily sighed. "I suppose that is why the salvation of true goddesses like me remains necessary, to sort out the messes made by impostors. But alleviate your fear, for I shall govern with love and bring salvation to all, and all that."

I blinked at her. "And all that?"

Coda shrugged. "My holy powers attuned to smiting evil, and evil they shall smite. But the woes you speak of? Do not relinquish yourself to terror at this admission, but your goddess has little idea of how to fix that. Would that I could observe the problems of the people up close, but I'm beginning to fear I am wholly unprepared for such a role. Tell me truly; do you believe a goddess can fix problems she does not understand?"

I wasn't sure what to say.

Coda hopped down from her throne and began to pace. "Meeting you has been eye-opening for me. Though it was enjoyable and stimulating, I have had nightmares of late in which I reveal my splendor to the world and am wholly surprised by the sights I see there. From my very birth, I have been training my body and mind to become the keystone to this world's salvation, but how can a keystone shape itself if it knows not the bridge it is meant for?"

Once again, I had nothing.

"Halcyon." Coda's eyes briefly met mine. "I..." She shook her head. "No, never fear. Any inadequacies I have for the task, that is why I as yet still prepare. When the time comes, I will save the world. Your mind clearly has enough thoughts of its own without the fear that your goddess knows not whether she is ready."

Coda's nervousness was strong enough that I could almost physically feel it, and my mind began to put together a picture of her for me. Her speech when I arrived, her taking the comic book too seriously... She was testing herself, trying to see how quickly she could adapt to the things I was telling her, and she had found herself wanting.

The unknown was scary, and also wondrous. I knew this more than anyone, especially the pre-Aldebaran me, who was paralyzed by her fear of learning more about herself and yet intoxicated by the call of the world's horizon. Coda was the same. Every time I corrected her assumptions, both today and the last time we met, she reacted with curiosity rather than annoyance, and greedily drank down everything I had to say. But now she was thinking on her own future, and the uncertainty terrified her.

...Ironic. Coda was a goddess who could supposedly read the minds and emotions of ponies around her. I was just a refugee kid out on an adventure. But she couldn't read me, and I could perfectly read her.

"Hey," I said. "Look. I know last time I made a big deal about the whole building-trust thing, and it's usually a very smart thing to do. But sometimes, ponies don't have any choice but to trust each other. They're in dire straits, and they need to take a risk to get a helping hoof, or something. And, like, I don't need to be a mind-reading goddess to see you've got something heavy on your shoulders. So if you need to share with someone, I promise I'll do my best not to let you down."

Coda studied me. "...Not a hint of deception. And yet you do contradict what you told me last time. Are mortals always so full of contradictions?"

"I thought you thought I was a goddess," I pointed out. "But yeah. We are. Welcome to the world, kiddo."

Coda hesitated, then looked down. "And you take an oath of trustworthiness, in the name of love?"

I nodded.

"Very well." She looked up and met my gaze, and for a moment, her eyes flickered. "Then allow me to ask of you a favor. But first, I must give the necessary context so you might believe what I have to say. Do not panic as I show you my true form."

Something about me prickled with unease... and then Coda was washed in a blanket of pink-black fire that lasted for a single heartbeat. When it was gone, a changeling stood before me where once an alicorn had been.

My heart sped wildly, but this was no ordinary changeling. Unlike the black, featureless shells Aldebaran turned into when not transformed, Coda still partway resembled a pony: her eyes were normal, instead of pupilless sockets, and the frill on her neck and tail strongly resembled her old mane. She was also vaguely pinkish-white in color instead of black, and her wings were much larger than I had seen on Aldebaran, more like those of a dragonfly than anything. And her horn, instead of being small and curved, was long and straight, pockmarked with holes that should have been debilitating to an ordinary unicorn.

Run, my head told me. Changeling. Run!

I stood my ground.

"...I was unsure how you would take this," Coda said, her voice carrying a slight reverb that hadn't been there before. "You did tell me you have suffered at the hooves of changelings before, after all. But rest assured that I am no ally to those who slink in the dark. Do you know what I am?"

"A changeling," I pointed out.

"A changeling queen," Coda corrected, pointing up at her throne. "Changelings are divided into drones and queens, and the queens number only two: myself, and my mother, Chrysalis. My mother is evil beyond measure. The menace that collapsed the eastern continent was no mindless changeling mob. It was an army created and remote-controlled by her. And it is she that my destiny is to stop. With the power of purifying love, I will one day face her in combat, and remove her scourge from the world. Hence my name, and my title: the final note in the song of despair..."

So the changelings had a boss. A god-monster boss. "You're not really an alicorn, then, but your powers are real," I said.

Coda nodded. "My royal form is one worshipers are far more comfortable with, as this land does contain lore about the divinity of alicorns." With a flicker of flame, she was back to her alicorn self. "And to tell the truth, I prefer it as well. It is good that you haven't fled yet, Princess Halcyon the Garbed. Tell me, do you think it is possible that the changelings you have encountered before were servants of Chrysalis?"

I hesitated. Back then, Elise had made such a big deal about how the changelings seemed to have grown up and become people of their own. And Coda said they used to be remote-controlled. This must have been why Elise thought they changed... "Doubt it," I said. "But I'm two hundred percent certain there are other changelings in Ironridge. The police department uses them as teleporters."

"Yes, such has been brought to my attention," Coda told me. "You will notice I am in Ironridge now, rather than any other city. So, have you not forsaken me after seeing my nature? Was I right to place my trust in you?"

"I'm still here," I said. My mind was far away, though: Coda was hiding a thing like this about who she really was. Oh, her clergy probably knew, but the ponies she had praying to her almost certainly didn't. Almost like me and my mask, only where I put on a different mind, she put on a different body. And both of us lived with our disguises so much, they were almost more true than the reality.

I didn't really need extra commitments now, when I was already planning to rescue Leitmotif and bail on Ironridge. But if I could at all help it, this was not a kid I wanted to forsake.

She was far too much like me.

"That is a substantial relief." Coda sighed, climbing back on her throne. "Then let me tell you about my efforts to slay my mother, and what I would ask of you in assistance."

Mother of Pearl

"Ahh," Coda sighed, pacing in a circle. "Where to begin... I suppose I ought to start by telling you about what a changeling queen is. You are completely unfamiliar with the subject, I assume."

"I don't even know that much about regular changelings," I said. "Aside from the shapeshifting."

Coda nodded. "Changelings are creatures that act like conduits for emotion. Ordinary mortals think and feel, you see, but the contents of their heads have no effect except upon their own actions. Should you arouse anger in one of my peons, for example, I should imagine they might treat you differently for it, but that would be the extent of the matter."

"And changelings are different?" I asked.

"Changelings can use emotions to fuel a form of magic," Coda told me. "The most obvious example being shapeshifting, though the applications are numerous. Ones that can think and feel can use their own emotions to power this, but all changelings can utilize the emotions of others."

I stood stiffly, feeling my adrenaline begin to rise. "How's that work?"

"Simple," Coda said. "Imagine you are out on the streets and witness two lovers kissing in the passionate throes of romance, as I am told mortals are wont to do. Or perhaps a triad of dueling warriors exchanging insults and blows. Essentially, they are giving each other their love or anger or what have you, which I will admit is a concept it took me some time to wrap my head around. After all, why give to another what they have no use for? Changelings are different because they, when others feel emotions toward them, can make use of those feelings as if they were their own. Thinking changelings, mindless drones, queens, this can be done by us all."

I glanced at the organ pipes running their way to the altars in the other room.

"Indeed." Coda nodded. "Such is the mechanism by which I collect the prayers of the faithful. They offer me their devotion and love, and in turn it becomes mine, a holy reservoir to purify hatred and malice. Which brings us to the difference between queens and drones: drones are like pipes through whom emotion may only pass, and must be used immediately or cast aside. Queens are reservoirs who can store it indefinitely. My throne, affectionately known as Fugue, acts as a giant funnel of sorts through which the altars pour their emotion into me, and also as the interface through which my power flows back to the ship, running its mighty engine. Are you comprehending me so far?"

I nodded.

"Excellent!" Coda tapped her forehooves together. "Ah, but it is good to have a swift-minded contemporary. Now, you will recall I mentioned the remote-controlling of mindless drones. This is the greater half of a changeling queen's power, and indeed what makes us so strong. Once our powers have grown to a critical mass through the use of funnels such as Fugue, we become strong enough to attach ourselves to drones using a type of long-range magic my faithful have coined the Daydream Network. I bid you think of drones as pipes earlier. Now envision those pipes connected to me, in the same way the pipes in this room connect Fugue and my altars."

"So the drones can withdraw and deposit from your own emotion store," I said. "And you can control them, too."

Coda beamed. "You ken quickly, Princess Halcyon. Unfortunately, all of this is contingent on having drones, which I regrettably lack. None have discovered the means by which my mother obtained her horde, big enough to topple the Griffon Empire as it was. I am like a heart full of blood, without vessels to pump it through. But as long as I can entice my faithful to come and pray to me in person, I can still empower myself, and will still one day be able to face my mother in single combat. She, lest you should wonder, chose to engorge herself on rage and apathy and despair, vile emotions against which the power of love shall be as an invincible shield. Victory is all but assured... provided I can find her. That's the hard part."

"And the thing you want my help for," I hesitantly said. "That's where you're going with this, isn't it?"

"Indeed," Coda sighed. "But fear not, for I am not starting at square zero. You see, the ability of a a changeling queen to store up emotions like this is hardly a natural phenomenon, and has some unusual effects upon reality. I have a spell, unique to me as a queen, that can detect these disturbances within a radius of several miles. Fortunately, it is not triggered by my own aura, in the way that a pony can rarely smell their own breath, but always that of others. Between this spell and my airship, I have meticulously scoured the world searching for signs of Chrysalis."

"And she's in Ironridge," I finished. "Your spell detects her here."

Coda smiled wryly. "Alas, therein lies the rub. For you see, Princess Halcyon, changeling queens are not the world's only creatures capable of making such a disturbance."

My ears flicked.

"There are others," Coda said. "Most relevantly, a particular ancient being whom I know to be hiding in the city of Ironridge. Her name is..."

She paused dramatically.

"Garsheeva."

My eyes widened. "The Griffon Empire's old goddess?"

Coda nodded. "One and the same, albeit much diminished. I know little of what became of her in the aftermath of my mother's attack, other than that she survived, and took up new residence somewhere in this city. And this is where my problems begin: the spell I use to detect changeling queens has a wide radius, and can only give a yes or no on the presence of anything nearby. Garsheeva's existence in Ironridge causes the city to appear as a false positive whenever I attempt to scan it. Perhaps my mother could be using that as cover, to prevent me from conclusively determining she is here. Or, perhaps, it could be a red herring, the presence of changelings here a deliberate ploy to further distract my suspicions, and I am in fact wasting my time when I should be trawling the wastelands looking for her true hideout."

I rubbed an ear. "I get it. So Garsheeva's presence is turning Ironridge into a blind spot for your search."

"You have the right of it," Coda said. "That is where you come in. In short, I need you to find Garsheeva and convince her to leave the city, even for a day. Should that prove too difficult, merely giving me her location so that I might treat with her myself would prove sufficient. Then, Princess Halcyon, on my good name as the Princess of Love you shall have your airship and cruise the skies as you will!"

I took a step back. "You want me to find a hiding goddess and convince her to move out? And just what makes you think I can do a thing like that?"

Coda shrugged. "You are a princess, are you not? One should expect her to be responsive to her equals."

"Yeah, but that's just something you call me," I pointed out. "I'm not actually special, right?"

"On the contrary." Coda proudly stuck out her chin. "I started calling you that because you are an enigma to me. Lest we forget, you resisted my powers, praying fervently into my altars and betraying nary a spark of emotion. Your mind, Princess Halcyon, is shielded by a radiant barrier of divine mystery, or such is the only conclusion I can draw. But if you are immune to the tamperings of this changeling queen, that means you might be uniquely well-suited to parlay with gods and others of my ilk."

I felt myself shrink a little.

"My mother, I am told," Coda went on, "has such power that she could command a pony to die from miles away and it would simply come to pass. Obviously, if that is true, she is disinclined to use it, as Ironridge is undoubtedly still filled by the living. But still, is it not an immeasurable relief to be shielded from the tamperings of the divine? Perhaps she could put a knife in you the old-fashioned way if she objected to your investigation, but you would essentially be forcing her down to mortal means to fight you, which is still a considerable evening of the scales."

I winced. "Well, I was more worried about Garsheeva, but thanks, now I'm worried about them both. Are you seriously that sure I'm invincible to changeling queens? How? And why? I'm gonna need a minute to think, here."

"Naturally," Coda said, climbing back onto her throne. "Allow your mind to ruminate on the truths I have given you. Perhaps you shall even come to a point of enlightenment that has eluded me, making this entire endeavor much simpler."

And so I thought.

Changelings... emotions... changeling queens, all tied together. What was it Corsica told me on our first trip to the Sky District, about her special talent? When she overused it, it was like her capacity to care about things got sucked away. Was Corsica's talent somehow related to changelings, or based on the same mechanic? It sounded like it was powered by her emotions, in the same way as Coda described changelings...

And what about me? Why couldn't Coda detect and use my emotions like she could to others? Not like I enjoyed the prospect of having my thoughts and feelings being eaten, stuffed in a bag that was shaped like an alicorn and then used as airship fuel. That was unsettling, and the more I thought on it, the more so it became. But why? My thoughts drifted to my mask, to the split between the original me and the me that was doing the thinking. If I was a simulation of sorts, even if I thought of myself as my own pony, could it be possible that my emotions weren't real?

The chill around me grew deeper, and I searched frantically for a different explanation... and I found one.

Mother's bracelet.

She had worn it during the war, hadn't she? I had seen it in my dreams, watched her using it as we escaped. This was more conjecture than usual, but what if she had been using it to protect us against changeling magic? She knew about changelings, after all. She used to be friends with Leitmotif... Senescey, and made it sound like Senescey's identity as a changeling didn't matter at all to her. Maybe she knew all along what they were capable of, and how to fend it off. Coda said Chrysalis could kill you instantly at a distance, right? And that hadn't happened to us. I never learned how Mother got this bracelet, but there was a possibility it was explicitly an anti-changeling defense mechanism.

A slim possibility. The more I thought about it, the more I couldn't tell if it made sense. Senescey would have recognized it if that was true, right? I remembered it being important that she forgot to take my bracelet in the hideout, when the changelings were pretending to be me. I was probably mistaken, then.

Maybe I really just didn't have real emotions.

"A thought does occur to me, if you have a break in your preponderances," Coda said from atop her throne.

"Eh? What's up?" I glanced over at her.

"A way to measure the extent of your invulnerability," Coda told me. "Fugue, you see, is a locus of my power. Touching it would expose you to the raw emotional suction that contains feelings within me, the power of which is great enough that it could very well devour your soul in its entirety. Of course, should that happen, I would possess all the necessary pieces to put you back together again, so you would be alright in the end aside from a brief experience of being dead. Should you be unfazed by the throne's pull, however, we would know with certainty you are immune to the most primal force a changeling queen can bring to bear."

I thought about that. I thought about it some more. Putting myself in a situation where I might literally die and be resurrected by a changeling queen rubbed me all sorts of wrong ways, but... I didn't think Coda was savvy enough with ponies to deceive me about her intentions. I trusted her heart, if not her skill. The biggest place something could go wrong here was if something unexpected happened.

Another thought flashed across my mind. Early after coming to Ironridge, Egdelwonk rewrote part of my memories to make me forget about our initial meeting, and I subsequently remembered them in a dream. I had been tampered with by... something, there. Successfully tampered with. And then I accidentally put myself back together.

Maybe it was worth the risk, to try and learn more about myself? Or was I being insane, treating my life as a science experiment?

A tiny flash of mother of pearl caught the corner of my eye, but when I looked, it was nothing.

Months ago, I had been terrified of learning more about myself and my abilities. Clearly, the me under the mask had something those fears were based on. Part of me wanted to respect that, even though I was no longer afraid myself, and follow her judgement to keep us safe. Part of me wanted to know the truth, face it fully, and show her we didn't actually have to be afraid. Maybe I could even get her to come out of her shell, talk with me, and have a friend who was closer than anyone else could ever be.

What would I put my trust in? Coda, to put me back together? The bracelet, or the me beneath the mask, to keep me safe in the first place? Or the status quo, and do nothing?

When I framed it like that, the status quo was a lame option. I wanted that airship, and that meant looking for Garsheeva, and possibly making Chrysalis mad if she was in Ironridge and Coda was right that she wouldn't like my helping her. Two gods who could mess with me in that direction. On Cold Karma's side, who knew what kind of powers I was messing with, aside from windigoes and whatever Egdelwonk was?

Another memory suddenly returned to me. In the hideout, right before Ludwig possessed Corsica, when he was explaining the rules of the game... Corsica volunteered for the position. Ludwig was taking volunteers. And he said I wasn't allowed to volunteer.

Did he know? He obviously knew something about me, but did he know I might be immune to windigo possession, for the same reason I was immune to Coda?

I squeezed my eyes shut. So much to speculate on, and no way to get concrete answers.

Well, no way that didn't involve taking risks. I made up my mind.

"I'll do it," I said, walking up to the throne. "You've got my back, right?"

"I swear it as a fellow princess," Coda proclaimed, holding a hoof to her heart, an undeniable curiosity in her eyes. I looked at her. No hint of malice. Actually, she looked more hopeful than anything.

I lifted a hoof, reached toward the throne... and remembered I had boots on. I extended a wing instead.

Fugue thrummed somehow as I got close, a deep reverberation I could feel in my heart and my flanks and my forehead. My bracelet flickered in anticipation. I made contact.

There was a spark of energy, and a loud snap, and suddenly I felt an indomitable, yawning chasm open up before me, filling my ears with a roar like when I took off my mask, only so much stronger. It pulled on me, yanked me physically forward until I was plastered against the throne, like gravity had changed directions and tripled in intensity, a great void that was trying to consume me in my entirety.

My mask slipped a fraction of an inch. Suddenly, my own emptiness was there, and it was pulling back.

"Aaah!" I heard Coda gasp from atop the throne, though my sense of direction was suddenly gone. "W-What is this!? Stop this at once! I-I command-"

Normally a placid slate, an empty canvas upon which I could write my identity, my emptiness was suddenly deep, and eternally empty. And it was alive.

It gripped me and held me, Coda's throne trying to tear me in half and devour me into its void, but beneath my mask I fought back, my emptiness a jealous vacuum that refused to yield me. The throne started glowing, brighter and brighter as the conflict reached a fever pitch in my ears. I could see stars, like when I removed my mask, and suddenly I could see lines too, a new phenomenon I had never seen before, even though I couldn't see anything else.

But I didn't yield. Suddenly, it was over.

I opened my eyes, and I was no longer in the throne room.

Polished basalt was beneath my hooves, cut into hexagonal tiles. I was no longer wearing boots. Or any clothes, in fact... Nothing save for my bracelet, which was inlaid with glowing emerald energy conduits and much, much more ornate than the plain black band it once had been.

The sky was a ruddy pinkish orange-red, brightest on the horizon and dimmer the further down I looked. The basalt made up a bridge, a walkway just wide enough for two carts to pass side by side. I crept to the edge and looked down. It was a black, bottomless void.

I looked up.

Above me was a supercell, a storm of a magnitude I had never seen before. Rather than flowing like a river, these clouds spun in a circle, red and pink and revolving around a black core, crackling with black lightning, stretching from horizon to horizon. The basalt bridge zigzagged and gained elevation, climbing directly into the heart of the storm. Or maybe the bridge was flat, and it was the storm that was tilted. Gravity, I realized, didn't seem well-defined in this place.

The storm should have made a calamitous roar, its ferocity great enough to level a continent, and yet the sound that reached my ears was a hollow whisper that couldn't be said to sound like anything. It was... empty, somehow. I got the strange impression, staring into the storm, that it was actually harmless. Not truly, but much weaker than it looked... Level a poorly-constructed shed, uproot a tree or two, and its fury would be spent.

I couldn't explain how I knew this. It looked almighty, set to end the world. I just knew.

Some kind of power was trailing from the storm, though, a connection I wasn't sure if I was seeing with my eyes or with something else, to a spot right next to me.

I looked. It was Coda.

She was still an alicorn filly, except she was petrified, frozen in place with her mouth open in protest and her eyes pinpricked from shock. The power seemed attached to her special talent, which was reduced to a vague, glowing patch of luminescence. That storm, then, was part of her. Was it her stockpile of emotion?

I reached out a hoof and touched the tether tying her to the storm. Immediately, voices filled my head.

"Oh, wise goddess, great and holy thou must be..."

"Can't believe you give money out like this for free. Must be a stand-up kind of gal, am I right? Ah, who am I kidding. Listen..."

"I just want you to know that I love you more than I've loved anyone, especially my ex, and I think..."

The voices all overlapped, running over each other, but with a bit of focus I could pick them out. Some started, and some stopped, but there were never more than six, and they were all running from Coda into the storm.

Were these... the prayers she was receiving, right now?

I sniffed the air, and looked up at the storm. Its frailty, the impressive facade with no substance... Those ponies were paying her lip service. A dozen separate facts I had learned before assembled themselves in my head, and suddenly, the full picture was alarmingly clear: Coda didn't know what real love was. She was taking watered-down thanks and praise from ponies who only saw her as a source of cash, not genuine affection. This storm of emotion she was building up was massive, but also shallow and worthless.

Unless Chrysalis was similarly full of junk... and I doubted it, when Chrysalis really did have the power to overturn a continent... Coda wouldn't even stand a ghost of a chance in a real battle.

Helpless, I swallowed. What could I do? Now that I knew this, now that I was part of Coda's inner confidence, could I in good conscience contribute to her cause? Could I move her closer to a fight she would certainly lose? Not two hours ago, I was planning to help her, take the airship in payment and run. But abandoning her in this situation would be abhorrent, not to mention helping to dig her hole deeper. But even if I wanted to do something, what could I do?

I didn't even know how to get out of here. Though, thinking about it, I decided to look behind me.

There was a portal. A glaring doorway of white. And to my surprise, it was tethered to me, in the same way the storm was tethered to Coda. My special talent was just a glowing patch of light too, and a wavering cord ran from it back through the portal.

The cord's color was emerald, but... it had a sizable knot in the middle. And the knot was mother of pearl.

Curious, I poked the knot.

Flash!

It became a pony.

A batpony, with backwards ears, like me. She stretched out, gracefully and groggily, ethereal yet coming into focus. Compared to me, her mane was longer, and silver instead of gray. Her coat, instead of my silver, was a radiant mother of pearl, seeming to reflect the light with an almost metallic sheen, and her hooves, instead of blood-red, were colored like the morning dawn: red and orange in a gradient, with hints of yellow and the barest trace of blue. Her talent, like mine, was an empty glow, the line tethering me to the portal passing straight through it.

Ponies didn't look like this. I already looked pretty unusual for a batpony, and she took everything special about me and exaggerated it further. She was me, but her colors more complex and vibrant, like I was looking at myself through a faint rainbow mist.

"Are you...?" I took a step closer, somehow not conscious of my lack of clothes. "Me?"

She opened her eyes in surprise. "Halcyon? You can see me?"

I nodded. "Yeah, but who-?"

"There's no time to explain," she said urgently, grabbing me tightly and not letting go. "I'll tell you once we're back in the real world, but right now, don't let go of me for any reason! I'm tired of not existing, I want to come back, I promise everything will make sense, just please don't leave me again! Every time I've seen you, you... Just please get me out of here!"

I staggered back again, very much unused to anyone touching me this closely - especially without my clothes on. I glanced at Coda. She was still petrified.

"And going through that light will get us out of here?" I glanced at the portal, shiny me still clinging to my side like her life depended on it. "Alright, but I'll hold you to owing me answers. But maybe we shouldn't leave that kid..."

Coda was limp, but about as heavy as an adult. Fortunately, I was strong enough to get her on my back with little trouble. Lights shimmering around us, my bracelet glowing, the storm rotating quietly in the background, I stepped forward and carried us through the portal.

Light seemed to materialize around my eyes, in a way that made me wonder if I had been seeing with something else entirely during my time in the storm. I sat up, realized I was leaning against Fugue, and jumped away... though it was no longer trying to grab me.

My clothes were back. I was still carrying Coda. Shiny me was nowhere to be seen.

"Unngh..." Coda stirred on my back. "Where am I...?"

I set her down, glancing over at the throne. The gem in the statue's choker had gone dim, but already it was flickering with blackish pink, clearly recharging.

"You alright, there?" I asked, focusing on the pony who was present for now and putting aside the one who was not.

"That was exceedingly unpleasant," Coda groggily mumbled. "I... had you touch my throne, and suddenly felt a great tugging, as if..." She scrubbed at her eyes. "But look at you. Unharmed and impervious. Apparently, your defenses against changeling queen infiltration are not merely passive. Woe betide my mother if she tries to get you with the same... same trick..." She flopped on the ground.

"Are you seriously okay?" I hovered over her, slightly more concerned.

"Far be it from an immortal to so easily be laid low," Coda said, slowly sitting up. "I shall recuperate in due time. In the meantime, I would be extremely not worried about Chrysalis getting the better of you. Your soul is not merely clad in iron most impenetrable, but ferocious barbs as well..."

"I..." What did I say now? Was this really the best time to tell her all the emotion she was stockpiling was useless?

It wasn't like this could go fast enough to get out of my control, if I gave her a break to recuperate before discussing that. Even if I somehow stumbled right onto Garsheeva's doorstep tomorrow, I would still get to choose when and how to report to Coda my findings. Besides, I needed some alone time to figure out what I had just done. And to see if shiny me was still anywhere...

"Cool," I decided. "Well, I guess I'll get looking. If I get stumped, I'll come back and we can brainstorm something together, right?"

"Excellent..." Not using her wings, Coda crawled back onto her throne, which reacted favorably to her presence. Immediately, she started to seem strengthened. "Before you go, the intelligence I do have on Garsheeva suggests that she might either be underground in the southern Night District, or somewhere in the Ice District. Alternately, either of those two points could be my mother. Do take care."

"...How do you figure?" I asked, turning back to her on my way out, curious. "I thought your spell couldn't do locations."

"It is the purpose of our daily flights around the city," Coda explained. "Essentially, we circle the perimeter of my spell's range, and map the boundary where I no longer detect anything. From there, we can look at the center of the circle to obtain an approximate guess at the source's location. Would that we could map it more precisely, and we know nothing of to what degree Garsheeva roams the city. Are the multiple potential foci a sign that she has grown restless of late and prone to wandering, or could there be multiple targets in the city? Or is it simply a fluke of the math? We know nothing of how often my mother roams the land, either. Perhaps she comes and goes as she pleases from Ironridge with impunity."

Huh. "Got it," I said, wondering if maybe I should split up duties with Corsica if there were multiple potential places Garsheeva might be. Speaking of Corsica, hadn't she mentioned having a friend she could introduce me to who knew about Griffon Empire history? Maybe he'd have some sphinx trivia that could help me figure out what Garsheeva might like as a lair.

...I couldn't believe I was already thinking this flippantly about strategy for finding a goddess. How I had changed from even a week ago, when the thought of meeting Coda had me rattled.

We said our farewells, and I took my leave, not particularly paying attention to the rest of the ship on my way out. None of the clergy looked at me like anything was wrong, though. Clearly they didn't know I had somehow almost accidentally imprisoned their goddess inside her own throne.

I looked at my bracelet. Who, or what, was I? Was this all about the power I wore around my leg? Corsica suspected that was what Cold Karma's interest in me came down to. But this bracelet couldn't be responsible for my emptiness, for my mask, for thinking of myself as two different ponies, could it?

Two different ponies... I remembered the other me, and was suddenly burning with curiosity to talk to her again.

And then, there she was.

Transparent, sure. And hanging in midair without using her wings. And not quite right-side-up, like she couldn't feel the effects of gravity. I glanced down at my bracelet, but it wasn't doing anything - plain, black, no longer ornate like when I was inside Coda's throne.

"...Hey?" I said, hesitantly, to shiny me.

Her eyes widened, and she spun to face me. "You can still see me!?"

I nodded, looking around and deciding that this section of the skyport was suitably empty for talking to ghosts.

Shiny me swooped towards me, forelegs outstretched for a hug... and soared straight through me. "Whoops!"

"Err..." I spun around, following her. She clipped slightly into the floor. "So, you wanna tell me who you are?"

She sobered up quickly, meeting my eyes. We had the same eyes. "You don't remember anything, do you?"

"Should I?" I took a few steps to the side, circling her.

"Probably not, no," shiny me admitted. "How long has it been? Or... I guess you wouldn't know that either. The chapel under Icereach. Do you remember that?"

I nodded. "Went there all the time."

"There was..." Shiny me swallowed. "An avalanche. Do you remember that?"

Again, I nodded. "About two and a half years ago," I said. "I went down to the chapel after, but..." That was when I met the light spirit. But my memory of that encounter was hazy, like when something was hidden beneath my mask. And shiny me said I probably wouldn't remember...

"So that's how long it's been, then," she sighed. "Two and a half years. You've grown. As a pony, I mean."

"Who are you?" I asked, stepping closer.

"My name is Halcyon," shiny me replied. "You... started life as my imaginary friend. But many years ago, our roles were reversed, and after the avalanche, we forgot about me completely."

I stared, my jaw slightly slack.

"Do you ever find yourself seemingly talking to nothing, imagining it's talking back?" shiny me asked. "A habit from our time together you couldn't quite kick - originally, it was me you were talking to in those moments. Do you ever feel like there's another half to you, a part you can't quite reach, who says nothing when you approach? An empty shell that I left behind, like a bridge between you and our body."

I stared harder. My habit of talking to machines... The me behind the mask...

"I've got so much to tell you that you forgot along with me," shiny me said, her eyes brimming with happiness. "And so much I want to hear about what you've been doing with our life, starting with how you finally found me again! Do you want to go somewhere private? It probably won't do to be talking to no one out in public like this, although this does look pretty private..."

"Err... yeah." I felt a tingling sensation all throughout my body. "I'll find somewhere good."

Facets of Halcyon

"Seems like as good a place as any," I said, Dead Herman fading from sight behind me as the road back to the Day District twisted and turned, weaving through rocky outcrops and trying to remain something approaching flat. "So, err..."

Shiny me hovered in midair, slightly see-through, a figment of my imagination that was slightly more real.

"Where do we start?" I asked. "Who are you? Aside from me. What, like... I mean..."

I wasn't sure what to say.

"Like I said." She shrugged, wings furled at her sides. "I am you. To put it awkwardly, I was you before you existed. We... You... The pony everyone else knows as Halcyon has an eccentricity, or a condition, or a power to imagine herself as more than one person. One body and one soul, but different selves within that. I was the original, and I invented you as an imaginary friend. But, because of the way we are, you became a lot less imaginary and a lot more another facet of us. And now I'm just in your mind, and you're the dominant personality. I understand if this is a lot to take in..."

I shook my head, still walking. "I've always known I thought about myself differently. Why don't you start at the beginning?"

Shiny me sighed. "When I was young, about five or six, my best friend was a filly named Faye. She had some severe birth defects, and couldn't walk or move around on her own. Not long after, she died. In that condition, I suppose I'm surprised she lived as long as she did. I missed her dearly, and... started pretending she was still around. You can probably guess where this is going."

My pupils shrank a little. "You mean I'm..."

"A replacement for her?" Shiny me shrugged. "That's how you started out. You even look like her. How you see me is the way we used to look."

I stared harder. "I used to look like that? All shiny and stuff? How'd I change? I don't do stuff to keep my colors this way."

"Perhaps I just really wanted it," she said. "It happened gradually over a month or two, soon after I started talking to you. Mother and Elise decided it was psychosomatic, like how your mane can fall out from worry. And Faye and I looked very similar in the first place. It's part of why we became friends." She looked away. "I suppose this begs the question of what we should call each other. You wouldn't remember any of that, so you probably don't want to give up the Halcyon name. And I was the one who left, so I suppose it falls on me to change mine?"

I was a little too busy wrapping my head around the big picture and that this was happening in the first place to focus on the particulars. "Err, sure."

"Hmm," she mused. "How about Procyon?"

"Eh?" I tilted my head.

She nodded. "It sounds similar, right? And if I recall correctly, it's the name of a star that symbolizes good fortune. Fitting, given how we always dreamed of space travel. And it sure is fortunate we were reunited!"

"Alright." I nodded back, my thoughts getting a little easier to think now that I didn't have to trip over names. "Procyon it is."

Procyon did a loop in midair. "Great! So, you mind if I ask about what you've been up to since I left? I've only had the tiniest bits and glimpses, which is a roundabout way of saying I've been sitting in the middle of a dark void and know nothing at all. Where even are we? Not Icereach, that's for sure."

"How far back are we talking?" I asked, still walking. "You said something earlier about the avalanche? What happened to you in the first place? I know I can make myself forget stuff, but why like this? And what about the me that's already under my mask? Are there three of us?"

"I guess I should explain that first." Procyon sagged. "When I left... it would have been kind of sudden. I was kind of still in ultimate control of us, like a backup, even though you were technically in front. See, you were more of an idealization of what I wished I could be than a full pony, so you were a little unfinished around the edges... The way I think I tried to do it was cutting out everything that made me me, which is the me you see right now, while still leaving something behind to work the controls and watch out for you. Like a me with a big hole in the middle. So you could think of us as three Halcyons, or you could think of it as one and two halves. You'd have to talk to her to be certain, if she even can talk."

"She can," I said. "She definitely can."

Procyon pursed her lips. "Interesting. I wonder if she's grown more complete while I've been gone, just like you have. Maybe saying there are three of us is more accurate after all."

Suddenly, I felt an unnerving push from deep within, and-

-Halcyon's mask came off.

There were stars, clustered into galaxies and nebulae instead of the even spread she saw in Icereach. Procyon hovered in her vision. She held her mask, a physical chunk of emerald crystal, looked down at it, and then back up.

"...You're not me," she said, stern and glum.

"Ah," Procyon said, meeting her emerald gaze. "It's you. And believe it or not, yes, I am."

"No." Halcyon shook her head. "You're implying you're the original part of us. That would mean you remember everything. But you're too chipper. You could never be someone who knows."

"Am I?" Procyon's tone was suddenly harder. "I've had two and a half years of oblivion to change my outlook, but I wished for it in the first place. And if you're still letting that mask live all of our lives as her own, that means you do, too. We're the same." Her voice quieted, sadder now. "We're the same."

Halcyon said nothing.

"You know... that something was taken." Procyon looked away. "You can see the hole in your memory. You remember the price Unnrus-Kaeljos asked of us. Well, now I'm telling you that wasn't actually a price. Calling it a price was just a cover, so you'd never realize that what was lost - me - actually wanted to go."

Halcyon watched her. Procyon watched back.

"So now... you want to fit back in," Halcyon said slowly. "But where is there room for you?" She held up the mask. "She's her own person now. She doesn't need me, and even if you're telling the truth, she doesn't need you. And I don't need you either. You're not the cause of the emptiness I feel. I just want to be alone."

"You're right." Procyon shook her head. "I'm not the cause of anything anymore. I'm just a memory, rescued from oblivion. I don't know where I fit, or what's happened to the two of you since I've been gone, or what you need, or what you want, or even what you have. All I know for certain is that I am, for once, glad to be alive. Nonexistence wasn't as great as I thought it would be."

"...Then you had best watch yourself," Halcyon said, holding up the mask again. "She's walking a thin line between stress and hope. She thinks she can learn the truth and not wind up like me for it. I want her to succeed, so that some good can come of us, but she's already at her limit between all her ambitions and all the other actors who know too much. If you think you can legitimately help her navigate that and become free, be my guest. But if you tell her anything she's not ready for and break her as a result, you'll have me to answer to. If you really disappeared the way you claim you did, that means you abdicated responsibility for her onto me, and I'm not about to give it back."

Before Procyon could respond, she put the mask-

-back on.

I shuddered, taking a moment to steady myself as my senses recalibrated to normal. That... felt like I remembered the entire exchange? Had the me under the mask forgotten to hide it from my memories? Or did she want me to...

"Well," Procyon sighed, "that was definitely the old me, alright. Chronically lifeless and unable to smile."

I glanced at her.

She hesitated. "I don't know how much I should tell you, now. But the reason I, or, I guess now we, left you in charge..." She sighed again. "I didn't... like myself very much. For several reasons. One of which, since you said you remembered it, involved how helpless we were during an avalanche several years ago."

I nodded, remembering the desperation I had relived in my dreams over and over, the terrified monotony of waiting for my friends to wake up that came back to haunt me during the Aldebaran incident.

"I had reasons to want to disappear," she said. "The fragment I left behind has reasons not to want to be a part of your life. Both of us want you to be able to live our life to the fullest, on all of our behalves. So, I guess I'm apologizing in advance if we don't want to risk telling you more than you can handle. I mean, I've just met you after being gone for so long, so I barely even know what you're like these days. Right?"

"Makes sense," I mumbled, still working through what I had just heard while my mask was off. As revolutionary as it was to be talking to Procyon, some deep-seated part of me wanted to take the other me's side in their argument, the me under the mask. I didn't quite know why. She had been telling Procyon not to go too hard with the deep secret-spilling, secrets I wanted to know.

Maybe I had just lived with her fear of them for so long that I believed her when she said caution was important. I said a quiet, mental prayer that Procyon wouldn't tell me anything I really, really had good reason right now not to want to know.

Despite being all in my head, Procyon didn't appear to hear me.

I straightened up, more committal this time. "Yeah. Yeah, that's good," I told her. "I've probably got enough problems of my own to worry about right now anyway, without whatever's got you two bogged down, right? Maybe this is a good time to get you up to speed on what I'm dealing with, if you're gonna be around for a while..."

We reached the long, makeshift staircase back to the Day District, and I talked as I walked, glossing over the things I didn't understand and focusing on the repeating themes: not knowing who to trust, changelings, Jamjars, my job hosting weddings, and my ambitions to get an airship and fly to Equestria.

Along the way, I learned some things in return, some of which was confirmation on what I had long-suspected and others that were wholly new. Unnrus-Kaeljos, Procyon told me, was the light spirit's name, a fascinating discovery I would be sure to cross-reference with any and all history and religion texts I could get my hooves on. That green crystal I had held the last two times I took my mask off really was me: not so much my memories, which apparently were different, but my temperament, my priorities, my personality, things I knew or was on an instinctual level. On Mother's bracelet, information was elusive, which was all but an explicit confirmation that it was just as important as Corsica thought it was. Procyon did tell me the bracelet was much more likely to hurt those around me than me myself, though. Mother's assertion that I would understand any consequences that were about to happen to me while I still had time to stop, she claimed, was true.

Even once I reached the train station and Procyon disappeared, my thoughts continued. Who was I? I had learned more about how I worked, and what was behind my mask, but a lot of what I did learn was how little I really knew. My other parts were afraid of us, it was plain to see. I had been conditioned to fear my own potential, and I hobbled myself throughout the Aldebaran incident by doing so. So they obviously knew what we were capable of... but from the way they talked, especially the me under the mask, you would think we had already done something.

Something bad enough to make them no longer want to exist, and set me up to do the living for them.

I wracked my memories for things that were foggy, things that felt like they had been tampered with, but it was no use. I only noticed those when I tried to think about them and realized they were gone, not when I was looking for them in the first place. What could a thing like that be? Where could it have occurred? Giving up on living was a pretty big deal, and they were both scared it could cause me to do the same, so it had to have been something massive. But I had lived at Icereach all my life, and I wasn't aware of any historical disasters there within my lifetime, let alone ones I could feasibly have caused.

What could they possibly have done?

I thought harder. There was one other irrational fear I had been given, aside from pushing my limits: letting others see my red hooves. Procyon's hooves hadn't just been red, they had been a whole dawn sky of colors, so they were originally even more eye-catching than they were now. But why did that matter? Was it related? It might have been. I couldn't imagine any other reasons they'd want me to keep my legs the strictest of secrets. But then again, I could think of even fewer reasons how my red hooves could be related to something bad they had done. Or how hiding them could relate to preventing it from happening again.

As much as I had learned about myself, it only served to bring the portions that didn't make sense into sharper relief.

Oh well. At least I had a name for the light spirit, and that alone was potentially invaluable. And it just so happened that I was on my way to work, and one of my co-workers happened to be a fan of obscure, ancient, arcane religious knowledge.

I didn't have time to be awkward. Everything Coda had asked me to do could wait, as could running from Cold Karma and saving Leitmotif. My oldest goal was calling, and I had a real, solid lead I could chase.

"And you swear, under your chosen virtues, to be honest and kind until old age take you, to work together in love and build yourselves up, that your bond may join with others as an example to all of the harmonious future that you so desire?"

"I do."

"I do."

"Then it is finished. In the eyes of the church and the world, you are now one."

Someone roared. A loud pop heralded a flying champagne cork, and the room burst into applause, ponies whooping and hoofstomps thundering against the floor. The couple embraced each other tightly, and Lalala smiled from behind the podium. Someone cranked up a record player, someone else lowered a disco ball, and the crowd began to dance, swaying and celebrating to the beat.

At the side of the room, near a marble column support pillar someone had done a very good job of making look real, Jamjars stood in a black tuxedo, thoroughly enamored with the proceedings. Thumper and Saturn flanked me, each of us clad in bridesmaid dresses, doing our level best to pelt the partiers fairly and equitably with rice.

It was an act, and one I played well. This was wedding five for the day, capping off a ten-hour endurance streak of receptions, deliberately scheduled for last because Jamjars' screening process said this party was most likely to trash the surroundings. I had been awake for nearly twenty-four hours, hiked many miles and never been off my hooves, had no fewer than three major revelations and one magical incident involving the throne of a goddess, with only one long sleep between that and being kidnapped while in jail by Lilith. By all rights, I should have been a zombie, or have passed out long ago.

If I'd just been standing around doing nothing, I probably would have. Throwing rice at strangers just had a strangely therapeutic quality that gave me the boost I needed. Being rice, I could throw it as vengefully as possible and they'd be none the wiser.

As the party came into swing and a live DJ began setting up shop, we slipped away, gathering with Jamjars in an area outside the fake chapel walls, slightly quieter even though the building almost visibly vibrated with noise. "Five more happy couples, primed and ready for consummation," Jamjars sang, a look on her face that was somewhere between dreamy and satisfied and smug. "Romance takes work. Hard work, and never forget it. But you did that work, and so you reap the rewards. It's payday, minions!"

She pulled out several jingling money bags that looked designed specially to jingle, and passed them out to everyone. Suddenly, I was no longer broke.

"Cleanup tomorrow night, right?" Saturn asked, looking ready to limp back home and collapse into bed.

"Cleanup and setup," Jamjars replied. "We'll have more ceremonies in this venue the night after next, and we don't have to move until after that."

"You realize this would be much less labor-intensive if we had our own facility," Thumper pointed out.

Jamjars airily sighed. "As always, I suppose it would, and as always, Ironridge's eternal upward migration means it's never a good time to buy. Besides, getting to move contracts around like this instead of renting a permanent space gives me a little dynamism in the space-renting world that translates into financial goodies for you, so think of it like extra pointless leg work to generate cash out of thin air. More satisfying that way?"

I wasn't complaining. I was sitting on a crate, transferring the money to a pocket where it would hopefully be less jingly, one eye fixed on Lalala. Before she left, I wanted a talk... and it looked like she was packing up.

"Hey," I said, catching up. "You mind if I walk with you back to the train station? Was hoping to hear more about that ancient religion history stuff you were talking about last time."

Her ears perked up. "Of course," she said. "You can walk with me."

We left the building soon after, Jamjars talking with Thumper about money in our wake. "What did you want to ask about?" Lalala asked as we walked.

"Everything, sort of," I said, unable to remember what we even argued about last time. "But, specifically, I was wondering if you'd ever heard of an entity called Unnrus-Kaeljos."

Procyon was watching me from a distance, I noticed. She hadn't appeared while on the train, or at the wedding. I was fairly certain nobody else could see her, but she seemed to be shy.

"Hmm..." Lalala folded her ears in thought. "Yes, it rings a bell. I couldn't tell you what it means, or even whether it's an entity, but I've seen the word before."

I perked up, listening.

"I told you about my background, right?" Lalala said. "I grew up in Silverwind, on a school campus frequented by archaeologists. Many thousands of years ago, there used to be an ancient civilization there, and bits and fragments of their knowledge come back to us from the digs. Tablets and writings, some of which were translated, others we were never able to. If I recall correctly, Unnrus-Kaeljos was one of the words on the infamously unsolved Aldenfold mural discovered about forty years ago."

"Aldenfold mural?" I tilted my head.

"One of just many ancient mysteries that desert has surrendered to time," Lalala told me. "The Aldenfold mountains are said to have risen from the land one thousand years ago, when our modern calendar began. Yet the civilization of Silverwind existed between five and seven thousand years ago, and the word 'Aldenfold' appeared in a prominent mural that was discovered largely intact. That implies the word had a meaning before it was given to the mountains, but to my knowledge no one ever discovered the purpose of the mural."

My mind went back to the mural in the sealed area of the Icereach chapel, depicting three progressively bigger worlds and their corresponding gods. I never did learn just how old that one was. Although, I did have several drawings of it back in my room at Jamjars'...

"What did it look like?" I asked. "This mural."

"I never saw it for myself," Lalala said. "It was too big to bring home, carved onto the wall of what had once been a palace or temple of sorts. I just know it had words that couldn't be translated."

I thought about that. If Unnrus-Kaeljos was a name for an entity, maybe it didn't have a translation at all, and that was why they were stumped.

"Where did you hear about it?" Lalala asked. "I hardly ever hear ponies talk about Silverwind, let alone the things that are found there."

I shrugged. "I met someone who mentioned it in passing. Made it sound like a god, or something. It got me curious, and I wondered if you knew."

Lalala shook her head. "As far as I know, the Meridi - the civilization responsible for most of the history in Silverwind - worshiped only the Aegis as the one true god."

"You know there's a comic book about that, right?" I asked. "About Aegis? A mechanical dragon that flies around and shoots lasers?"

"I have seen it." Lalala's ears fell. "My feelings about it are mixed. Everything we know about the Meridi says their god had no physical form, and existed outside the bounds of reality so as not to be constrained by the world's laws. But when the Aegis appears in surviving artwork, it is depicted as a dragon. It is possible that comic book was inspired by some legitimate knowledge from Silverwind, and that through the creativity of that artist, the Aegis's legend lives on... no matter how distorted and unrecognizable from the original thing."

"I still don't get the whole outside-reality thing," I told her. "How can something exist and not exist at the same time?"

Lalala shrugged. "I don't know how to explain it to a rational scientist. I'm sorry."

I hung my head, then looked away. Procyon was still floating along, keeping her silence.

...She technically existed only in my head. And yet to me, she was real regardless. Maybe it was the same principle at play.

We arrived at the train station, and said our goodbyes, and soon the clatter of wheels on rails consumed my world as I lost myself in a crowd of ponies on their way home. Even though I was anything but, I felt blissfully alone.

My thoughts unpacked themselves on the journey back to the Ice District, a day full of compressed and pent-up happenings. It took some effort to organize them into actionable, memorable items, but it was effort well spent.

Light spirit: it had a name. I had checked that name, and learned it might have been known to an ancient civilization, which frankly was a lot more exciting than I realized at the time I learned it. Lots of pieces here, like whether it related to the Aldenfold's namesake and the mural in the Icereach chapel. Interesting pieces. But not ones I could put together yet. Fortunately, not a pressing concern, either.

Procyon: I was... three ponies stuffed into a single head. Somehow. And none of us seemed to see eye to eye with each other. Just another step in the long, weird journey of discovering who I was. Also a thing I couldn't put all the pieces together on, but also not pressing, because I could probably talk to her just about any time as long as we were reasonably alone. Perhaps more pressing was the fact that I was all but certain my other parts had done something really bad that made them unable to live with themselves anymore, hence my own existence... but I had absolutely nothing to go on in finding out what that was.

Coda: a real, live changeling queen who really shouldn't look up to me as much as she did. She would pay me an airship for the low, low price of finding a goddess and convincing it to leave Ironridge. The Griffon Empire's goddess, Garsheeva. Who was alive, not dead, and in Ironridge. Assuming I heard all that correctly and wasn't hallucinating or insane. Unfortunately, even more problematic than trying to find and convince a goddess to leave was the fact that I was all but certain Coda's so-called power of love was bogus, and if I did help her get in a fight with her evil mom, I'd basically be signing her death certificate. I couldn't do that to a kid who trusted me. But I had no idea what else I could do.

Rewinding further, Corsica, telling me that Cold Karma was interested in the two of us because Icereach was secretly a weapons depot and my bracelet and her special talent had been squirreled away there to stay buried for eternity. And that Yakyakistan had built working rockets before I was even born, which alone could have shattered my entire worldview a year ago but now barely even merited a postscript.

Was that all? Was that the full extent of what I had learned in just the last day and night alone, all after my ordeal with getting kidnapped again and suspecting Kitty of being a windigo and vowing to save Leitmotif?

I held a hoof to my forehead and laughed. That was anything but simple.

...And it wasn't even everything, I remembered as I walked through the halls leading up to Jamjars' apartment. Egdelwonk wanted me to investigate Barnabas' Self-Defense Emporium, the Night District weapon shop where I got arrested. Right.

Surely that was everything... Nope. I had also learned that Jamjars probably owned the hideout where Aldebaran stranded us, and might be connected to the Composer. Right. Dealing with that was supposed to have been my priority for the day, and I completely forgot all about it. Because my life was just so eventful now that learning my parental guardian might have kidnapped me and might be working with ancient ice monsters just didn't even qualify as news anymore.

I couldn't help it. I laughed.

If there was one bright side, my experience with Coda, combined with what I remembered of Ludwig's behavior around me, suggested I really might have some sort of power that was specifically suited to making mind-magic users shove off. And maybe I had just been pushed across a breaking point where I wasn't afraid anymore.

Pushed past my breaking point, and I wasn't afraid. Against all explanation, it was a wonderful feeling.

I shadow snuck under the door to let myself in, since it was locked and I had beaten Jamjars home. The house was faintly thumping with a musical beat; Kitty was clearly having a party down below. Lights were on in the room I shared with Corsica, but not in Ansel's.

Corsica's door cracked open, and her head peered out. "Hey," she greeted. "Eventful night? You look beat."

"Yeah," I sighed, figuring I'd take a shower before Jamjars showed up and I had to figure out how to deal with that, too. "You?"

Corsica nodded. "I hit up the rest of the Junior Dumpster Despot Corps. We'll be having a hangout tomorrow night, and you're welcome to tag along. Just in case you wanna pick their brains. Egdelwonk made some exceptions for you in our non-disclosure agreement, so we can tell you secret stuff."

"Nice," I said. "I fought a god and won, and learned I might have forgotten I existed a few years back. I need a bath."

Corsica snorted and withdrew into the room.

Moments later, I set the last of my clothes aside and stepped into the tub. Before I cranked up the water, though, I searched the rim, finding a small tuft of yellow fur that Jamjars must have left behind earlier. I sealed it in a tiny bag and stuffed it in a pocket, preparing one last test to confirm my suspicions: if it was the same yellow as the sample I had taken in the hideout, I would know Jamjars was involved with Aldebaran for sure.

Water steamed down, washing over my tension, the thick shower curtain and the lock on the door momentarily separating me from the world and all its troubles. What would I do after we got our airship and flew across the Aldenfold, I wondered?

Searching for a goddess, for Princess Celestia, didn't hold the same appeal as it once did, but there was a new appeal in the old one's place: a desire to know how everything fit together, where my place was in the gigantic picture I was putting together of who I was and how the world worked around me. A friendly goddess, like Coda but with much more worldly knowledge, could maybe answer some questions I was starting to be able to ask.

I didn't just want to do that, though. I wanted to see the world, to live a broader life than I had been afforded in cluttered Icereach and a freer one than in Ironridge, where everyone who was anyone wanted my bracelet for themselves. When I came to Ironridge in the first place, I had that dream, and it was still intact, just postponed indefinitely. Just because this wasn't the place where I could live it out didn't mean the dream was flawed, as well.

Maybe it would be possible to take Coda with me. She seemed like someone who needed to get out and see the world. Leave her cult behind, and her so-called destiny. Was Chrysalis actively wrecking the world, here and now? Maybe. There sure was changeling activity in Ironridge. But did she need to be stopped? Did there have to be a destined savior like Coda thought she was? Ordinary Ironridge ponies didn't look like they had changelings as their foremost concern. So it was quite possible she didn't.

My number one priority was to get some sleep. Then go to work, scheduled for early in the night. Then, I would rescue Leitmotif. I had a ticket out that Egdelwonk had all but promised me would work; I just needed to find my way back inside. In return, I would find out everything she knew about Jamjars, and decide what to do about Jamjars from there. After that, I would find a way to slip Coda out past her clergy, take a walk and show her the world.

After that? Well, at some point I'd have to go find Garsheeva, and also investigate that weapon shop, and also meet with Corsica's friends, and maybe make sure Ansel wasn't being too hard on himself for us getting arrested, and maybe also talk to Kitty to see if I could learn what the windigoes really wanted. But that could be figured out in the future.

I finished toweling myself off, dressed and stepped out of the bathroom. Jamjars was cooking dinner, still glowing with satisfaction after the night's weddings. For a moment, I almost considered asking her directly whether she was involved with Aldebaran, just spitting it out then and there.

But I didn't. Instead, I retreated to my room, pulled out the other fur sample I had collected in the hideout, and compared the two side by side.

Identical. Jamjars owned the hideout. The revelation had nearly given me a panic attack earlier, and now here was the proof.

Somehow, I looked inside myself and realized that as long as she didn't mess with my own plans, I no longer really cared.

Feel, Don't Think

I slept soundly, and the next evening, I got up and returned to work. We weren't changing venues, so work was short, but the previous night's final wedding party had really trashed the place, so work was plenty hard to compensate. I put my back into it, noticing Procyon frequently hovering at the edges of my vision - it didn't seem like anyone else could see or hear her, but she was smart enough not to make me talk to ghosts in public.

Not that doing that would have changed much. I was already the mare who talked to machines as if they were people. Procyon told me that all the times I remembered doing that when I was younger, I had actually been talking to her, and my memory just made up the talks-to-machines thing to help patch what I did remember together after I forgot her. I wasn't so sure about that, though. Even now that she was back, saying hi to a centrifuge or stopping to admire an air circulation pump just felt right.

We hadn't talked about my memory-dreams. I wondered what she would have to say about those. Yesterday, I dreamed about my twelfth birthday party, and Procyon had been nowhere in sight.

But sitting down with Procyon and having a chat about whatever, be it dreams or the light spirit or our shared past, would have to wait. Because I had an airship to earn, and that meant tracking down the Griffon Empire's apparently-still-alive goddess, and that was probably best started by speaking to the friend Corsica told me about who was knowledgeable about the empire. And tonight, she had gotten me an invitation to do just that.

Meet me at the Eaststone Mall train station at midnight, Corsica had said. I'll show you the way from there.

And so I worked. I showed up early, and from the way everyone else kept their schedules, no one would mind if I left slightly before the preparations were done as long as I did my fair share. Slowly, the wedding hall transformed itself from a champagne-stained den of revelry to an under-construction warehouse to an unstained pre-revelry den ready for revels. As the appointed hour drew near, I slipped away with a nod from Thumper, boarded a train and went to find Corsica.

"Hey," Corsica greeted as I drew near, standing with her back to the Night District at the edge of the platform, her mane blowing in a light breeze. Wind was unusual in Ironridge thanks to the near-total shelter provided by the mountains, but it pushed the temperature down, so I was far from complaining.

"Hey yourself," I replied, strolling down from the train to meet her. "So where's this shindig we're heading to?"

"West," Corsica said. "And down a little. I'll show you the way. You ready for this?"

I raised an eyebrow. "You mean the direction I just came from? You sure we shouldn't have met up there instead?"

Corsica shrugged. "Might have been nice. But I have to show you where the meetup is. Can't just give you directions. 'It's in your mind, your secret's fine. Write it down, you get a frown.' That's the first rule of Lord Egdelwonk's Code of Chaos."

I tilted my head. "You what?"

"Weird job," Corsica sighed, waiting for a westbound train. "Egdelwonk has some arbitrary rules he teaches his employees to follow. Breaking them means you either get insults or a jump scare from the nearest trash can."

I glanced at the pocket containing Egdelwonk's contract on my coat. Maybe I shouldn't just blindly rely on that like I had been planning to...

"Nothing dangerous or onerous," Corsica told me, noting my discomfort. "Just weird. But when you see the other kinds of ponies who work for him... Everyone's at home with a little weirdness."

"Other kinds of ponies?" I asked.

Corsica nodded, keeping an eye out for any ponies within earshot and keeping her voice low. "The Junior Dumpster Despot Corps is a small place. You don't just pass an interview with Egdelwonk by being normal and ordinary."

I thought back to my own 'interview', when Egdelwonk erased my memory of our first meeting and I recalled it a week later in a dream. Was that the kind of thing he looked for in other ponies as well? Did his other employees have weird mental abilities, too?

"You know why he's interested in you," Corsica said, seeing my look. "I won't go digging in your private business. For me, it's what I talked about at that shrine the other day. You know."

I nodded. Her special talent.

"Just bear in mind that everyone else in the corps has something or did something to win his favor too," Corsica told me, our train pulling in from the east. "I haven't asked anyone what their story is, and no one's asked me. Guess I'm just too new. But watch yourself, alright? For better or worse, everyone in the corps is probably better positioned than anyone else in Ironridge to understand what we've been through."

Foreboding. I followed her onto the train.

The further we traveled, the more I began to suspect I not only knew our destination, but had been there before. With every turn we took, my predictions failed to disprove themselves. Eventually, we were there.

The Gates to the Underworld. The bar with the teleporter to Fort Starlight.

Go figure they were involved with Egdelwonk and his goon squad. I was starting to think that if you wanted to map out all the alliances and rivalries of Ironridge, you'd need a piece of paper bigger than the city itself.

We stepped inside, walking shoulder to shoulder. Several ponies were eating lunch at the tables scattered along the room's left wall, but the bar itself was empty save for the barkeep, who I recalled was known as just Barkeep. She looked up as we entered.

"Hey," Corsica greeted. "Wonky business."

"Your friends are in the back room," Barkeep said with a tired nod, then glanced at me. "So you two are friends, are you?"

I tilted my head. "You remember me?"

Barkeep shrugged. "I remember all my patrons. Especially the ones desperate enough to waste their time on old legends. You looked like you needed it."

Waste my time on old legends? What...?

I glanced to the dusk statue in the wall alcove next to the bar. Right. Last time I was here, Howe told me those statues were how batponies used to pray to the Night Mother, and I gave it a try.

If only it was the Night Mother Coda wanted me to find, and not Garsheeva. Having an old altar like that would be a great place to start my search.

For a brief moment, the reality of what I was doing crashed over me. So quickly had I gone from being Halcyon, the mare who looked for for gods to solve her problems for her because she was afraid of solving them herself, to Halcyon, the mare who solved her own problems by looking for gods so she could kindly ask them to please go away for a day.

My head spun. Maybe I'd come to my senses in a few hours or days or weeks and have a complete breakdown over this. Or, maybe, I'd been pushed so hard recently that I fully snapped, and was now free to chart whatever course I wanted, untethered from my old desires.

...Maybe it was sharing a room with Corsica. Now that I didn't have my own private space anymore, I almost never spent time just sitting and thinking about myself, and what made me who I was. Or about who I was, at all.

I wasn't sure if that equated to being lost, or to being free.

Now wasn't the time to think about that, though. Corsica was walking toward a back door, and I had a new acquaintance to make and some new leads to gather. Time to see what kind of company my best friend was currently keeping.

A door swung open into a small old room, lit by a single light, walled by stone, a central table made by tipping an old industrial cable spool on its side. Two ponies were already there, a mare and a stallion. Both pegasi.

I sized them up quickly. The mare had a forest-green coat, brown eyes and a messy charcoal mane. She was lounging upside-down on her chair with her hind legs against the table in an aggressively casual display, and yet I sensed a very slight, very deep unease about her, as if she had done and seen too much in her life to truly let her guard down even when she was trying to be at ease. Her age was hard to determine, probably mid-twenties, her appearance pushing me to think younger but something about her eyes suggesting otherwise. She was well-toned and well-fed, someone who got a lot of exercise yet more than had the diet to compensate for it, and as I watched her, I could see her lazily sizing me up, too.

The stallion, by comparison, was visibly young, perhaps a year or two my junior. A tan coat and a brown mane that tinged purple at the base covered his lean build, and he looked abundantly lithe and speedy. His eyes were sharp and a lot more restless, even though he, too, was visibly relaxing. Like the mare, I got the impression he could never fully be off his guard even when he wanted to, though he was worse at hiding it than she was. But perhaps he didn't want to. She looked bored; he had a bit of enjoyment in his alertness.

Neither of them had special talents, which was interesting. Sure, those were rare outside of batponies, but if anyone was going to get theirs, I would expect them to be ponies who had seen and done a lot. Like these.

I glanced up to Corsica for introductions, and an explanation on why two were here when we were supposedly meeting a single empire expert.

She nodded. "Everyone, I'd like you to meet Halcyon. Halcyon, meet the entire rest of the Junior Dumpster Despot Corps."

My jaw fell a little. Now that I realized this, Corsica's earlier comments made a little more sense: Egdelwonk's team was small, small. If I joined along with Corsica, together we would double his ranks.

"Unless." The mare waved a lazy wing. "That's my name. It's a cool one, so don't give me that look." She hefted a tomato with her other wing and gave me a warning look, daring me to call her name unusual.

"And I'm Gazelle," the stallion lazily added, a plate of mostly-finished food pushed to the side on the table in front of him. "I've heard about you, Butterfly. This is going to be interesting."

"Nice to meet you," I said warily, nodding to each of them. They were on alert, and Corsica had warned me, so I'd be a fool not to return the favor... "Why interesting? And why Butterfly?"

With a snap of motion so fast I almost missed it, Unless threw the tomato at Gazelle. He didn't dodge, and it splattered against his face, staining him with red.

I blinked.

Gazelle sighed, reaching for a towel to wipe himself off - I didn't question why there happened to be one nearby. "Some ponies are spectacularly bad losers," he observed, sounding more amused than anything. "You owe me money, Bats. Not fruit. Even though to you, they're one and the same..."

Now I was even more confused. "Bats?" I tilted my head at Unless. She was a pegasus...

Gazelle nodded to me, finishing his toweling, most of the tomato gone but stains of red still splattered across his face. "Don't mind her. Coming up with obviously-unfitting nicknames is a hobby of mine. Now allow me to formally welcome you to Lord Egdelwonk's Junior Dumpster Despot Corps, which is the right place to be if you think rules are for fools, want a little impunity to stick your nose where it doesn't belong, and are tied up in the fate of nations or some such. Or if you told the big cheese a really awful joke and won his favor by making him laugh."

Unless tapped her hoof against the table, staring at Gazelle and plainly waiting for something. Corsica stood in the doorway, allowing me to meet these ponies on my own terms and refusing to intervene.

Gazelle glanced around at the other two and huffed. "And if no one else is going to say it, Gazelle is the name of the most heinous conqueror and monster in Griffon Empire history, the last high prince of the imperial line who bore direct and immediate secondhoof responsibility for the continent's collapse. Not the name of me. I'm actually Papyrus, a humble and innocent Riverfall colt who was testing you to see if you really knew nothing about the empire you're supposedly interested in."

Unless shrugged at me. "Whoops. Sorry, kid. Figured you'd be more schooled than that. Any chance you wanna help pay down the bet I made on your behalf?"

Gazelle, whose name was apparently not Gazelle but Papyrus, sat up and faced me and grinned, showing teeth. "So you're a know-nothing nobody who aspires to become a know-something somebody, and in spite of knowing absolutely nothing you still were able to pass that clown Egdelwonk's magical meddling test..." He extended a hoof. "Perhaps it's worth getting to know each other for real. I find backroom discussions like this to be incredibly entertaining, because any fool with a mouth can say whatever they please and the repercussions are purely reputational, but being entertaining and being useful are different matters entirely. What say you we hang out while actually doing something? In the field."

I blinked and took a step back. "How much did Corsica tell you about me?"

"You're a scientist from Icereach who's interested in the Griffon Empire." Unless belched. "Which has ten degrees of shady written all over it, but maybe you don't know about that. Do you?"

"I know pretty much nothing about anything," I said, taking another step back. The ponies in this room knew far, far more than I did, that was for sure, and it left me feeling like the floor and gravity had both abruptly disappeared. Focus, Halcyon. Don't let yourself drift... "That's why I wanted to talk to you."

Unless stretched. "What Papyrus is trying to say..." She rolled right-side-up. "Is that Icereach, scientists and the Griffon Empire have occasionally produced some... dangerous results, when mixed together. I'm gonna guess that right now, you are legitimately clueless and not faking it, and have no idea what we're talking about. Probably feels like we know mountains of important context you're being kept in the dark on... At least, that's what I'm getting from the look on your face. So lemme spell this out plain and simple: we know a bit about who you are and nothing about what you're trying to do. You're clueless and worried about bungling in the dark? So are we. All we know for sure is that you're dangerous enough that Egdelwonk was willing to offer you a spot in the corps. And that doesn't happen without good reason."

"I mean..." Suddenly, things made a little more sense, though I was still at such a disadvantage I could physically feel it pressing against my chest. "I just heard you knew things about the Griffon Empire. An expert, Corsica called you. Guessing that's you?" I glanced at Papyrus. "Or both of you?"

Papyrus rolled his eyes. "I know far more than someone my age has any right to. But get with the program, Butterfly! Of course you heard we're smart and intelligent. I'm more interested in what you could do with anything I could possibly tell you. Or anything anyone else could possibly tell you. Or what you could do without knowing anything at all, just by blundering around. Spill us your motives, already!"

I blinked. "I... want to go on an adventure," I told them. "To the Plains of Harmony. Which I think are also called Equestria. Everything else is just in the name of getting there."

Unless threw another tomato at me. This one was deliberately slower, and I was barely able to dodge.

"Hey!" I protested, glancing back to see where it landed. "What was that for?"

"It's in your mind, your secret's fine. Write it down, you get a frown." Unless shrugged. "Just doing you a favor, kid. If you're going to hang around with Egdelwonk's crew, it's best you learn his rules quickly. Otherwise you'll have to learn them from him, and he's mega rude."

I glared pointedly at Papyrus. "But he was asking!"

Papyrus held up his forehooves in self-defense. "If a friend asks you to do something wrong, does that make it right?" He glanced at Unless and raised an eyebrow. "Although we really do need to know, so I'd appreciate if you could keep your compulsory fruit-throwing in check for the moment, Bats."

Unless blew a raspberry and put her hooves back on the table.

I blinked at Papyrus. "So what's your motive, then?"

"Funny story," he said. "I actually want the exact same thing as you. No particular reason, of course. Just woke up one morning and decided to fly off to Equestria without a care in the world..."

I blinked harder. "Seriously? I mean, you do?"

Papyrus grinned harder, showing teeth. "You're far too trusting."

"And you're starting to get on my nerves," I retorted. "I know what you really want is to find out who I am and what I'm up to, but how do you figure this is the way to get there?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Ponies are more themselves when emotions run high. Harder to keep up an act when you're steaming at the ears. Ever tried to get a politician to say what they really think? I've had tragically few opportunities to put it into practice, but let me tell you, the tactics they used to employ in the Griffon Empire would make your fur curl. A whole nation of plutocrats and elitists, filthy rich scoundrels scheming schemes to hollow out the empire and take what they could while the getting was good... See why a scholar of that tangled web could pick up some dangerous ideas?"

"Great," I told him. "So you're trying to goad me into losing my cool to see how I deal? Why don't we skip straight to the duel and be done with it?"

"A duel?" Papyrus had been talking to me seconds earlier, and yet somehow managed to look as if I had just barged into the room, interrupting an unrelated conversation with someone completely different. "You're a fighter, then? Brilliant!"

"Err..." I took a step back, feeling my bracelet around my leg.

"Fort Starlight," Papyrus said, urgent and eager. "You've heard of it? Yes, no...?"

"I've been there, but-"

"Fantastic!" Papyrus rose from his seat, grinning fit to burst, tail lashing. "That skips all the introductions. They have a sparring grounds I'm sure we'd be welcome to use. You, I think, I'll get along with just perfectly. Unless, referee?"

Unless belched, tumbling out of her chair and somehow landing on all fours. "Yup." She brushed back her charcoal mane. "Let's do this thing."

I stared between the two of them, and then looked at Corsica for help.

She shrugged. "You just challenged Papyrus to a duel. Go, see where it goes. I'm curious what will happen myself."

"I was... being sarcastic..." I grumbled to the floor. Punching Papyrus in an officially-sanctioned setting might actually be satisfying, though the ease with which he turned my remark into a demand warned me that he had probably practiced far more recently than I had.

Nothing happened to deliver me from the fate I had set up for myself as we passed through the teleporter, warping straight into the boat hull where Fort Starlight's end of the machine was built. I noted the control terminal as we passed, my brain trying to think about anything except fighting Corsica's co-worker in a duel he had basically goaded me into. That was probably where the pattern card plugged in that controlled the destination. Just like the card I had swiped from the Composer's hideout...

A crowd gathered to watch us fight. A large crowd, given that I was a random nobody and Papyrus was... whoever he was, but also a small crowd, given that Fort Starlight wasn't that huge and there were only so many places for ponies to be. The sparring grounds were a pit of loose sand that had likely been imported, set in a giant dish to stop it from getting scattered and lost. Several pipes around the edges made me think that when it rained, they piped in some of the water to naturally wash the sands clean.

"No weapons, then," Papyrus said, standing across from me, making a show of wearing absolutely nothing. "Honor rules. The point's not to win, it's to prove a point. En garde?"

I nodded, noting our audience - no one I knew was among them. And then I started circling, trying to get a read on my opponent.

Papyrus didn't circle. In fact, he didn't move at all, holding down his half of the arena and lazily watching me, curious about what I would do. Earlier, in my first impression in the tavern back room, I thought he was overly eager, overly alert. If anything, now that we were fighting, he seemed more at ease.

What a strange stallion. And, likely, a very dangerous one too.

I stepped forward, threatening his territory. He smiled, tail lashing.

I threatened it harder, and he pounced.

Papyrus pumped his wings for a single boost, jumping straight over my head and landing at my rear. I spun to face him. He raised his hindquarters and bucked.

It wasn't a kick meant to hurt, and I was fast enough to block it even if it had been... but just barely. Instead, it was a kick meant to shove. Now I had my back to the edge of the arena, and Papyrus was between me and the center, standing proudly on my half.

"Intriguing," he called out. "Whoever trained you was no acrobat, I can see that much. For a sarosian, you're painfully slow. But you know some fundamentals. Come on, show me your approach!"

I set myself in a wary stance. "I learned from yaks," I countered. "You're way more nimble than that. My usual approach won't work on you."

"Aware of your shortcomings, are you?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Is that rational thought I hear? Don't show me your tactics, Butterfly! Show me your passion! Or do I need to do a little more first to raise your ire?"

Suddenly, he moved. Faster than I could track, Papyrus was in front of me, and a wing brushed the edge of my throat before I could blink. "If I was wearing a wingblade," he explained, already behind my side, "which by the way are an amazing weapon you should relish your ability to use..."

I tried to spin to block him, but he had already kicked me three times, each one just hard enough to tell me he was holding back and could have gone a lot harder.

"You'd have four holes, going on five," Papyrus calmly explained, reaching under me and grabbing my far hind leg, pulling it toward him beneath me in a direction that cost me all my balance and sent me crashing to the ground. "Two, three, four, five, right like that," he said, chopping me ineffectually four more times with his wingbone before picking me up with both wings and holding me out in front of him, upside-down and face to face. "Hello there."

He hadn't bound my hooves. I immediately tried to strike his face.

His forehooves had both been grounded when I started, but before mine could travel the short distance to his grinning mug, one of them left the ground, blocked both of mine and then slapped me three times, gently, in quick succession. And then he tossed me back to my side of the arena.

I was almost too overwhelmed to land on my hooves. Almost.

"It's clear you've never fought anyone possessing even a smidge of speed or reaction time," Papyrus lectured, pacing back and forth. "I can see it in your eyes. You're trying to plan, trying to analyze. That's costing you time. Fighting has to be on instinct! All the time you're taking to think is the time I'm using to talk at you, so hurry up and stop giving it to me!"

He was taunting me. I knew it, and yet it was working. Staying clear-headed and in control was the most important lesson Balthazar had taught me; how to focus and analyze a battlefield, how to not lose myself in the excitement of the moment. But my anger was rising, and I held onto those lessons frantically, praying they would be enough.

I growled and rushed him, trying to zigzag like I learned from Balthazar to obscure my angle of attack. But then Papyrus dashed to the side, trying to change the angle we would collide at. Which way was he coming? What was his pattern? I needed to-

"Fool!" Papyrus hit me on the opposite side I was expecting, lashing out and trying to trip me. I barely managed not to fall, but still, I stumbled, and that stumble was all the time he needed to pick me up again. "You stopped to think! And now you're doing it again! Say, mind if I look through your pockets while we do this? You've left me quite bored, and I've got all the time in-"

My frustration had already reached a fever pitch, and when he reached to open a pocket on my coat, I lost control. I lashed out.

This time, my boot connected with a satisfying thunk, forcing Papyrus to drop me and slide back. I landed upright once again.

"Good," he praised, polishing the spot where I hit him like a badge. "Feel, don't think! Fight me on instinct! I'm beating you and lecturing you and pickpocketing you at the same time, mare! Put some humiliation in those strikes!"

I rushed Papyrus again. This time, I wasn't thinking, a haze clouding my senses while lending strength to my limbs. I pulled on it, drew on it, focused all my strength to smash Papyrus...

Before my hoof could connect, he grabbed me again. Once again, I was held unceremoniously upside-down.

"Fool," Papyrus breathed in my face, touching me, too close for comfort, holding me as my blood surged. "Why did you abandon your tactics? Control your anger, Butterfly. Think, don't feel!"

My bracelet itched around my leg. I could set myself on fire, and him with me. And it would probably be a lot worse for his health than mine.

I wanted it. I could see him reaching for my pockets again, a fake-innocent curiosity on his face as he took advantage of my indecision. He was asking for it, shouting for it, pleading for it...

"Halcyon!" Procyon called. "Grab his wings! You're stronger than him, so he loses if you catch him in a grapple!"

I didn't think. I just followed her advice. Papyrus's wings were fully extended, holding me like a pinata, and it only took a slight shift of my own wings to trap his beneath mine. And then I twisted myself to the side, and he could no longer let go.

We fell to the ground in a crash. He tried to push me away, but my wings were like vices, and before he could stop me I had a booted leg around his barrel, and eventually he was fully pinned.

He struggled. It was futile.

"Talk all you want," I hissed in his ear, feeling utterly weird and wrong deliberately holding another pony against myself. "Maybe I needed it, but you still gave me the time to beat you."

"Hah," Papyrus sighed, going limp. "That was the point. I concede our bout, though the ultimate prize still is mine because I learned what I was interested in. You despise letting your passion get the best of you. Likely, you're afraid of yourself, or what you might do. Whether or not you think you can afford to listen to it, you have a moral compass. My dear Butterfly, I think you're going to be very much worth my time."

I let him go and took several steps back, the rest of the world irrelevant in my senses. "Who are you? How does someone so young learn to think like that?"

"Pray you never have to find out." He straightened himself up and brushed the sand out of his coat. "Also, Garsheeva's breath, are you strong. We could whip you into quite the capable fighter if the idea caught your fancy. Bats?"

Unless shrugged. "Yeah, she's good. A little on the slow side, though, even when she rage rushed you. We'd have to do something to compensate for that. Something that doesn't involve throwing all tactics out the window like you."

Papyrus blew a raspberry.

I glanced around to see the crowd dispersing, and felt cold. Some of the chill from grabbing Papyrus was still sliding off me like slick, heavy ooze, and another realization was settling in to replace it: in a matter of minutes, someone had almost gotten me to show off my bracelet's power in front of a crowd. If it wasn't for Procyon, I might actually have lost control.

That was frightening. I was supposed to be better than that. Had to be better than that, if I wanted to function. The layers of thought I kept between my emotions and the world, that I used to filter my actions... I didn't know what I would be without them, but I didn't trust the result.

Papyrus was right, I realized with a shudder. I was still afraid of myself. Something had certainly changed between the Aldebaran incident and today, but fundamentally, I was the same.

I squeezed my eyes shut, small and helpless, wishing and praying I could understand.

"So, Butterfly, I've got a capital idea," Papyrus declared, marching straight up to me and slapping an unwelcome wing over my back. "Want to hear it?"

I flinched, ducking out from under the wing. I needed some time alone. Very alone. "What?"

"Whatever you're up to," he said, pointing suggestively between me and himself, "I want in on it. I'll pull my weight, I promise! Smart, good in a fight, can destabilize most anything... All qualities your arsenal is lacking, right? And for my troubles, I'll get to see just what you're up to, and decide for myself how much of a risk it is helping some sarosian scientist meddle in the old Empire's affairs. Have we got a pact?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Maybe try saying a sentence that doesn't involve insulting me first?"

Papyrus cleared his throat. "I am wise. I am lovely. I am always right. There's three sentences, thank you very much." He batted his eyelids. "How's that?"

I narrowed my eyes. "You're not a very nice person, are you?"

"Never pretended to be." Papyrus shrugged. "But at least I'm honest about it, which is a lot better than you'll get from a lot of charlatans in this world. Come now, I feel like you're not giving proper consideration to how nice it would be to have all this meanness on your side..."

Part of me didn't feel like considering it... and then the other part of me got an idea.

"You know Lilith, right?" I asked him, keeping my voice low enough that only the two of us, Unless and Corsica could hear. "How would you feel about helping me burglarize her school?"

Papyrus's eyes lit up. "Say, now there's an idea. Can't imagine what you'd steal from down there that wouldn't either be useless or dangerous, but I've never liked the cut of her jibe."

I nodded. This was an idea that was likely to get out of control somewhere, but at the very least it would almost certainly be Papyrus's fault when it did, and I wouldn't feel bad at all about using him as a scapegoat. And there were some parts of my plan to break in and rescue Leitmotif that really needed some assistance. Namely, finding the entrance...

"That a formal offer?" Papyrus pressed. "I could never say no to the chance to smack Lilith around a little in someone else's name."

I glanced at Procyon, who was still hovering on the edge of the arena.

"I'm still getting my bearings here," she apologized with a shrug. "I have no idea how bad of an idea this is."

In other words, don't drag me into this. She didn't want responsibility for whatever happened if I said yes.

So, since it fell to me, I swallowed, took a breath and nodded.

"Excellent!" Papyrus clapped me on the back again, and once again I slipped away. "How's right now work for you? The best plans are the ones you don't make far enough in advance for anyone to react to."

I stared at him. "Remind me why I'm having anything to do with you, again?"

"Good question." Unless scratched her rump.

Papyrus preened a wing. "I was hoping having an odious personality would goad you into answering that for me. But if even you don't know, you apparently wanted to pick my brain for Griffon Empire lore that's too obscure or dangerous to find in a public library. We could skip this whole exercise if you could prove what and why that is, you know."

Public libraries. Right. Maybe one of the reasons I always found myself in situations like these was because I always chased fantastical solutions before settling for the mundane ones. Though in my defense, I had been raised in a colony where the library only contained what ponies wanted to read...

Corsica gave me an are-you-sure-about-this look. I stepped aside to speak with her.

"You alright?" she asked once Papyrus and Unless were out of earshot. "That looked rough."

"Shaken," I said. "These ponies are really your friends?"

"After a fashion," Corsica admitted. "But also colleagues. We stay on good terms because it makes our work easier. And to certain parties, much less entertaining."

I squinted. "What kind of work does he even have someone like that doing?"

She shrugged. "A lot of whatever, and a few odds and ends. Technically, I think all of us are still in 'training'. Which means errands, busy work, and a lot of tasks that feel suspiciously like puzzles someone set up on purpose with the intent of giving someone else a runaround, but still being solvable. The important part is the freedom and resources to pursue our own goals, like me learning about my special talent."

I frowned and looked away.

"This Lilith thing is about Leitmotif, right?" Corsica asked.

I nodded.

"Be careful," she said. "And good luck."

"That's all I get?" I cracked a weary smile. "You think it's a good idea?"

Corsica took a breath. "I don't think it's an idea that will cause anything insurmountably bad to happen. Like it or not, you're basically already a part of the Junior Dumpster Despot Corps. And Egdelwonk... He thinks of everything as a game, and likes letting experience be the teacher. If he doesn't stop you from doing this, odds are it could have consequences you'll learn from, but not ones that will take you out of the game. If anything really bad happened to you, Lilith would be starting a war she doesn't want to fight."

I looked her straight in the eyes. "You realize how you sound right now, right? You realize the way you're describing what's essentially a job being interns for a high-level government office."

"That's what this would be if Ironridge was sane." Corsica shook her head. "I realize. Someday, when all this is over and I no longer have to worry about my secrets, I'll tell you my whole side of everything I've been through. But I know for sure that something is deeply wrong in this city, Halcyon. I don't think any amount of context can explain away how it got the way it is. I'd love to be proven wrong. All I know is, I've been more and more tempted recently to use what influence I do have to give the whole place a good, solid boot in the rear."

I sighed. "I just want to get in a position where we can skip town as soon as possible, with as few regrets as possible. I'll... see you around."

And then I turned back to the arena. There was no point hemming and hawing about it. There was no plan. There was just Leitmotif, Papyrus and an underground school, and rules that were enforced by treaties instead of any real authority.

Last time, I got to stroll around that school like I owned the place for no reason at all. Time to see what would happen if I tried it again.

No Shirking School

"First and most important question," Valey said, pacing around her dark wood office. "Breaking into Lilith's school: did Egdelwonk put you up to this, or are you doing it for other reasons?"

"I've got my own reasons," I told her, hoping she wouldn't ask what they were. "But he gave the idea his blessing. In a roundabout way."

"Figures." Valey stopped and looked at me. "Next questions: what are you trying to steal and how certain are you that's actually where it is?"

Go figure. "...A pony," I sighed. "Someone I know. They're locked up down there. And I saw them for myself last time I was there, less than a week ago."

Valey raised an eyebrow. "This the same occasion you came wandering into my fort through the back door?"

I nodded.

"Cool," Valey sighed. "So here's the thing. When Egdelwonk takes a liking to someone, he kind of tries to be like a trickster mentor sort of dude. He wants to make you cooler, in a way that often involves being as rude and confusing as possible and for no comprehensible reason whatsoever. Kind of like me, except less overprotective, and I have different ideas about what kind of lessons will do more harm than good, and I actually do tell my reasons to people I trust. Sometimes. Now, he's big on experience, on letting you get your knocks in out in the field. You with me so far?"

I nodded again.

"Then lemme put it this way..." Valey gave me a serious look. "Lilith is not some rookie-league practice boss. Her school is not an experience-grinding dungeon in a tabletop game. Now, you're a batpony, and she likes batponies a little too much, so the odds of her actually hurting you down there are very low. The odds of you getting tied up in something you really don't wanna be tied up in are astronomically high. Do you get where I'm going with this?"

"That going down is a bad idea?" I raised an eyebrow. "I've been there once before and got out fine, didn't I?"

Valey leaned on her desk and crossed her forelegs. "How'd you get there?"

I frowned, feeling weird recounting something that still felt unbelievable in hindsight. "I was in jail, and Lilith teleported me to the school."

"Cool." Valey nodded. "Then you didn't get out unscathed. She brought you in, showed you something you wanted, and let you go. You got out with a reason to return."

My heart skipped a beat.

"I'll tell you with a hundred twenty percent certainty what's going to happen if you go back there," Valey went on. "You're not going to get what you want. Instead, you're going to get a bargain: you do something for Lilith, and then she'll give you this friend of yours. Sorry to spoil the twist, but that's how it's going to go. And unlike Egdelwonk, I'd prefer for you to get your knocks in without something like that following you around."

I wanted to protest. I wanted to struggle, but I could see that she was right. Early on, my first concern in Ironridge was getting a job so I wouldn't have constant solicitations from every unsavory element of Cold Karma, for reasons that had only recently started to make sense. This was why Lilith let me leave unscathed after my first visit; it had nothing to do with Kitty. This was Lilith's means of getting me to sign a contract.

It was infuriating, though. How had she known the precise way I would react to Leitmotif? Her plan would have completely backfired if I was apathetic and wanted to leave Leif to rot. It also would have backfired if I had broken Leif out then and there, and taken her with me. There was no way she could have actually planned the way events played out. Too many uncontrolled variables. Then how...?

Unless she had been watching me the whole time, revising her plan on the fly. Was that it? Did she just have spies standing around every corner? Or...

My eyes widened. If Lilith had been intending to let me go and Kitty thus wasn't a necessary part of my escape, what if Kitty was Lilith's spy? I was all but certain she was a windigo, and windigoes liked playing various factions against each other. It was exactly the kind of thing a windigo would do.

Suddenly, my understanding of Ironridge felt like it was breaking down at the seams. I just couldn't remember every last thing that had happened well enough to check the plausibility of my theory. Guessing and puzzling out the motives of so many powerful liars based only on my own observations was just too much, even for me.

"You look like you get it," Valey said, reading my face. "So. What'cha gonna do?"

Actually, I wasn't sure that I got anything anymore. Quickly, I rewound my train of thought: what if everything Valey had just said was wrong? Or what if it was right, but all the conclusions I had just drawn based on it were wrong? Maybe Lilith was just an omniscient genius who could predict my every move.

That thought sure was comforting. And it still didn't bode well for my options.

"Here's an idea," Procyon told me, floating up through the floor, her illusory form flickering slightly. "Why don't we go down to that school through the tunnels like Papyrus planned? I don't know whether Valey is right about this, but if she's wrong, you might be able to grab your mare and run and never have to deal with Lilith at all. And if she's right, then you meet with Lilith and find out what she wants from you. Assuming all this is true, Lilith's not going to force you to do anything you don't want to after going to the trouble of trying to bait you back down there."

I blinked. She... had a good point. The worst that could come out of this would be me getting trapped between two options I really didn't like, and that was exactly where I was now, between walking into Lilith's trap and walking away. And there was a possibility of it going better.

"I see you're considering it," Valey said. "Gerardo and Slipstream told me you were there when Lilith caught up to them the morning you arrived in Ironridge. They made a deal with Lilith. That's what it could be like."

Right. Now that I remembered that episode, I remembered the Composer being in Lilith's entourage as well... She was definitely working with at least some windigoes, if not Kitty.

I met Valey's eyes. "I wanna go with Papyrus's plan, with the gas masks and going in through the caves. If you're wrong, you're wrong. And if you're right, I'll be stuck between two hard choices, which is exactly where I am now."

She returned the gaze. "Only you can weigh how much you want something. I can just warn you what you might be getting into. If you're sure about that, then get on with your bad self. Maybe Egdelwonk'll be right about experience being the best teacher." She passed me the gas mask she had confiscated earlier. "Since I doubt you'll get down there without Papyrus coming with you, I'll try to rope Unless in to help keep him in line. He's... a little out there, and she owes me some favors. And she could beat both of you in a fight put together."

"Thanks." I took the mask and turned for the door. "And... thanks for trusting me, with all the stuff you told me about your search for the writs. I don't get that very often."

"Don't thank me," Valey grumbled, seating herself behind her desk. "Being too quick to trust is a problem of mine, and either you're going to betray me or get tied up in some stuff you really wish you weren't as a result. I just couldn't help myself."

"...Still," I said, stepping through the door. "Thanks."

Papyrus was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs.

"I see you've recouped your mask," he greeted, tail lashing in anticipation. "Got the old boss mare's blessing, or did you actually pull a fast one on her? She's tough to trick, but not impossible."

"The former," I said, reminding myself that traveling with Papyrus was all but certain to add a dash of chaos to my endeavor... Though if Lilith was such a schemer, maybe that was exactly what I needed. I didn't even know her endgame. "You ready to go?"

"Hah." Papyrus tossed his gas mask, catching it with a wing. "Your spirit's returning, Butterfly. For a moment back there you looked so pasty I thought you'd chicken out!"

"I'll take that as a yes, then." I looked around for the exit and took a few steps. "Apparently Unless is coming too. Should we wait for her...?"

Papyrus blew a raspberry. "That fluffy killjoy could catch up to you if you were halfway across the world. I say we ditch her."

"Alright..." I started walking. "Then you'd better know the way, because I was half dead from exhaustion the last time around. Let's get a move on."

So we did. Out of the main fort and into the maze of scrapped airships we went, Unless catching up less than a minute in. Valey must have briefed her quickly, because not only did she seem to know what we were doing, but she immediately pointed out Papyrus was going the wrong way.

We slipped through the hole in the wall that marked the entrance to the tunnels, Unless taking point and turning on a headlamp attached to her own gas mask. I checked to see if I had one too; I had gotten myself out of the habit of using my bracelet except when necessary and wasn't sure I wanted to tell these ponies anything they didn't already know. Valey, I felt like I had no choice but to trust. Not so much Egdelwonk's goons.

I didn't. Unless was the only one who brought a mask with a light.

"How come we don't get cool flashlights?" I asked warily.

Papyrus blinked, then fiddled with his mask. "Say, she's right! Where's my flashlight, Bats?"

Unless shrugged. "Sounds like a you problem. You got your masks, and I got mine. Not my fault you forgot to get the good ones."

Papyrus gave her a petulant look. I shuffled uncertainly, sighed, and resumed walking.

"You want to see a you problem, I'll give you a free sample, Bats," Papyrus teased, reaching to steal Unless's mask.

"Hey, buzz off!" Unless swatted him away.

I turned back and gave them a sharp look as the light flickered wildly, pointing in all different directions as Unless craned her head to protect her mask. "Oi! Is this how you usually handle yourselves on missions? Maybe I should have the light so you can't fight over it?"

"You've already got a light," Unless told me, still ducking Papyrus's playful advances. "Your bracelet, yeah? Or is our intel on that bunk?"

Immediately, Papyrus stopped going for Unless. "Say, that's right! Bats, old chum, turn the light out and force Butterfly to use her bracelet so we can see. I want to see it in action!"

Unless stopped dodging and looked at me, thoughtful, but didn't turn her light out.

Suddenly, a new, sapphire light lit the tunnel from behind us.

"Or," Corsica said, horn glowing and also carrying a mask, "you could leave the lights to the professionals. How about that?"

I stared at her, surprised and grateful. "You're coming too?"

"I was following, just in case." Corsica shrugged. "Wasn't figuring I'd get needed this early on. Halcyon, everything I've learned about Lilith has bad news written all over it. I know bits and pieces of your plan. I doubt these two know anything, and since they're dysfunctional and you have a habit of getting overwhelmed, I'm appointing myself leader for a day." She pointed a hoof at everyone. "Who among you isn't fine with that?"

I nodded gratefully. That would actually make this a lot less stressful... "I'm fine."

"Throw in a doughnut and I'm fine," Unless added. "I like bribes."

Papyrus's eyes widened eagerly. "Can I be leader?"

"No!" Corsica and Unless flicked him at the same time, one with her aura and one with a feather.

Papyrus sulked.

"As good as we're going to get," Corsica sighed. "We can all go get food later, if this goes well. Now, Halcyon, be very specific and tell everyone what we're doing here. What is more important than why. You have the floor."

I cleared my throat, figuring if Corsica wanted to do the work keeping everything together, I might as well play my part. "We're searching for a pony," I said. "Her name is Leitmotif. Corsica and I will know her when we see her. She's not in Lilith's school; she's in a cell in the Flame Barracks, which are adjacent to a toxic mineshaft connected to this tunnel. Ideally we don't have to enter the school at all. Once we have her, I've basically got an understanding with Egdelwonk that he'll get all of us out of here safe and sound in exchange for me formally joining up, so there hopefully won't be a return journey. There's also a good possibility Lilith is expecting us and wants me to make a bargain with her in exchange for Leitmotif, in which case we hear her out and then play it by ear."

"Also," Unless added, "if we do go in the school? Lilith is, like, legitimately helping ponies who really need it. Even if I think she's shady too. So no fighting and no causing innocent casualties."

"What's so shady about her?" Papyrus asked. "Not because I don't know, I just like listening to you flap your gums about things everyone already knows when we could be getting on with the infiltration."

I gave him a sideways, chagrined look. "You already knew about Leitmotif? I'm pretty sure I never mentioned her name to you."

"Names, how boring." Papyrus sighed. "Things everyone knows or things that aren't important. Butterfly, there's a finite amount of attention we all have for caring about things, and sometimes, you have to prioritize!"

"...Thanks," I told him. "I'm glad you couldn't care less about our objective. But you're only here because you told me this is how I could win your favor, and I need to pick your brain for knowledge about the Griffon Empire, so if you lower my opinion of your competence too far, I'm no longer gonna have a use for you and you're getting left behind. Is that clear?"

Unless whistled. "Ooh, burn..."

"Technically," Papyrus insisted, "I'm here because you offered this as an excellent idea for how to win my favor. So don't put the blame on me, now. And like I said, things go significantly better when I'm following someone else's plan than when I make my own."

I narrowed my eyes at him.

"...Come now, how much power do you really think we have to change our natures?" His eyes bored into me. "Can you blame me for being what I am? More to the point, will it change anything if you do? Because I could blame you for a whole host of things, and yet it would frankly be a far less productive use of my time than trying to stave off debilitating boredom working for Egdelwonk and helping you break into an abandoned mineshaft for kicks and giggles."

How much power did I have to change my nature?

I glanced at Procyon. She looked away.

"What are you blaming Halcyon for?" Corsica asked cautiously.

"Screwing around while we could be on our way, for one!" Papyrus flicked his tail. "It's a long way to those mines, lest you forget. A long way."

"I'm the one who stopped us here," Corsica reminded him. "And I'm stopping all of us until we can put our issues on hold and work together, or else taking Halcyon and going home. As fun as it would be to give Lilith's school a visit from a traveling circus troupe, that's not the best way to get what Halcyon is after."

"You sure about that?" Unless raised an eyebrow. "I'm actually being serious, here. Breaking in through the back door is one thing, but what about disguising ourselves as someone who's legitimately supposed to be there? It's a public-serving institution." She glanced at me. "You wouldn't even need a disguise. You're a bat already."

Everyone looked at each other.

"Maybe on a future visit," I said. "Depending what ultimatum she gives me, and if I really don't want to take it. Right now, we've come this far. Papyrus, can you please take this just a smidge seriously?"

Papyrus sighed. "I suppose I shouldn't get so carried away with myself. Fine. A smidge of seriousness. Though, honestly, if there's any place for goofing off, isn't it the long, lonely walk before the danger starts?"

"We're not walking," Corsica pointed out.

Papyrus gave her a suggestive smile. "And that's becaaaause...?"

Corsica sighed and started walking.

It took what felt like hours to reach the broken emergency exit door that heralded the stairs to the Flame District. Fortunately, the going was monotonous enough that everyone shut up and let us march in silence. I wondered what time it was on the surface.

"Masks up," Unless said, already wearing hers. "Air's gonna get mustier and mustier in this staircase, though the real problems won't start until we get through the door at the bottom. Halcyon, how'd you make it through last time, again?"

I swallowed. "I... got carried. Held my breath and closed my eyes."

"Whew. You've got strong lungs," Unless whistled. "Try not to ruin 'em by staying down there too long. Now by my count we've got three wings and one no-wings, so we should be just fine to fly through if Corsica's alright getting carried. You're cool with that, right?" She glanced at Corsica as we descended.

Corsica's noise-making shoes clattered loudly on the grate metal stairs. Beneath the mask, she didn't look amused. "If it's in the name of spending less time in the toxic mines, maybe..." She glanced at me.

I had never flat-out told her I couldn't... you know. Her look not only said she knew, but asked if I wanted her to cover for me.

Not if it meant spending more time than necessary in the Flame District core. "I..." I hesitated. "How bad would it be if we fell? The place is pretty vertical, right? And it's a mineshaft? With weird air? There's a chance I might not, like... be completely comfortable flying in a place like that."

"Cool," Unless said. "Still leaves us with two really good fliers. Which one of you is fatter? Papyrus is stronger so they'll be stuck with him."

Corsica snorted indignantly. I wasn't sure whether she was more offended by the idea of being called fat, or of riding with Papyrus, but she was taller than me and had a thicker coat and was thus probably heavier, too...

After an eternity of stair-descending that felt slightly shorter than when I climbed it with Kitty, we reached the door to the Flame District proper, a metal construct that looked like it had been forced open and closed many times after its hinges had expired. Most recently, I remembered, Kitty had probably jammed it back in its frame with the goal of stopping mine gas from escaping.

Unless bucked it as hard as she could. CLAAANGGGGGGG!

A tiny crack at the bottom became visible, but it stayed stuck in its frame.

"Bad news, dudes," she said. "Whoever last closed this thing really didn't want anyone else coming through. There's a chance we could open it with sufficient force, but it would probably never close again. And I'd sorta prefer if Fort Starlight didn't become the exit to a long-term ventilation shaft for letting this place breathe."

I glanced at everyone. "Then what do we do?"

Papyrus shrugged. "You can do that sneaky sarosian shadow thingamajig, right? I see a bit of give at the bottom there. Why not ferry all of us across?"

I blinked. I had heard that it was possible for batponies to take passengers, but I never learned how, and recalled that the last time I tried, it straight-up didn't work. "Any of you know how to do that? Because I don't."

"Give it a try," Unless suggested. "Gently. Maybe we can figure it out?"

Corsica glanced at me, clearly remembering the last time I tried - it was she who was with me when I failed it. "Gently," she insisted, echoing Unless, and stepped closer, extinguishing her horn, her eyes wary behind the mask's green-tinted goggles. The only light now came from Unless's headlamp, which she pointed away from the base of the door.

I nodded, slowly putting a hoof on her back and sinking down into the shadows. At first it worked... but I couldn't pull Corsica in with me. She just wouldn't enter the ground. I glanced at Unless and Papyrus for help.

Papyrus shrugged. "It's all dark magic to me."

"You ever tried it without clothes on?" Unless suggested. "Shadow swimming lets you take along inanimate objects, I know, but maybe the magic needs fur-to-fur contact to work on other ponies?"

I swallowed. "I... don't really like touching. Or shedding my clothes around others."

"Less than you'd like having to turn around after coming all this way?" Unless raised an eyebrow. "If you're ugly, or something, I can promise not to look. Could even go in complete darkness!"

Papyrus, wisely, refrained from making a distasteful comment, though I could tell the possibility at least crossed his mind. "I'm not ugly," I insisted. "It's just... a personal thing."

"Think it'll work if I hold onto your tail instead?" Corsica suggested. "Try that."

"Alright..." I offered. My tail was pretty short, but it was as good an idea as any.

And it worked. I dove, Unless averted her light, and Corsica started to slip in behind me, holding fast to my tail, her eyes widening as the shadows engulfed her. I quickly surfaced again now that I knew it would work.

"Nice!" Unless cheered. "Problem solved, let's go?"

"Weird..." Corsica was staring at the ground where she had almost gone under. "I know what it looks like when you do it, but I don't like the way it looks when I do it."

"Just close your eyes," I advised, readying myself to ferry everyone across. "You can see when you're down there, but it looks pretty bizarre. Ready?"

"Ready."

And so I dove, slipping under the door with Corsica behind me.

There was no floor on the other side.

We fell out into muggy, sweltering pitch blackness, and I screamed in surprise as we began to tumble, Corsica still holding my tail. After a second, she latched onto me tighter, and I thought I heard her yell too. And then we hit something hard, and someone else was yelling. Someone I didn't recognize.

I scrambled upright. Corsica lit her horn. And for the first time, I beheld the Flame District.

The sight of it momentarily took my breath away. We were in a cavern that, as best as I could tell, was egg-shaped, situated near the very top and big enough to contain all of Icereach, but it was impossible to see the far walls due to a thick, hazy malaise of foul air. Ghosts of catwalks and machinery hovered in the center, a giant column descending through the middle to which everything was attached, but it was all a detailless, textureless gray.

What wasn't gray were the crystals.

Pink crystals of enormous size filled the room, crawling up the far walls, blooming out in bushels and clusters, rising up and through the machines like climbing tendrils, growing over or sometimes even piercing the derelict equipment, branching and scaled and pleated in ways that made them look like they were racing towards the surface, yet were frozen in time. It reminded me almost of a storm as it fell down the face of the Aldenfold, only going up instead, surging and coiling like tongues of flame.

The crystals were glowing, but they hadn't been before Corsica lit her horn. We were standing on one, in fact, poking out of the wall. A short distance above us, the door was visible, exiting onto a grated catwalk. Could I not shadow swim on catwalks? It almost sort of made sense, since they were full of holes and I was trying to sink into the ground like I was making myself two-dimensional...

Corsica let go of me and got up, gaping around. She turned off her horn, and slowly, the crystals all faded out over the course of a few seconds. She turned it back on, and they started glowing again.

Someone was still screaming, a voice I didn't recognize. Corsica didn't look like she could hear it, and the more I thought about it, I wasn't sure that it wasn't all in my head. Or... maybe whimpering was a more accurate word. Whoever it was, they sounded afraid. Like they were crying for help.

"Halcyon, what..." Corsica took a few steps to the edge of the crystal and looked down. "What is this place?"

"I had my eyes closed the first time through," I admitted, staring into the smoky constellation of pink and gray, my voice muffled by the respirator. Something acrid stung the back of my throat even with the mask, making me want to cough. We couldn't stay here for long.

"Hey!" Unless was calling from behind the door above us. "You two alright in there!?"

Before I could answer, the two of them burst through the door, except the door didn't open. They just seemed to materialize in front of it in thin air, briefly flailing before spreading their wings and landing on our crystal cluster.

"Hey, what was that?" I protested, taken aback and momentarily distracted. "I thought I was your only ticket through there!"

"Ancient dumpster magic," Papyrus apologized. "Far below your pay grade. Egdelwonk would have our heads if he caught us doing the setup for that trick where you could see, so we couldn't do it for you. Tough luck, eh?"

Unless was looking back up at the door. "Huh. So you fell through the grate? Guess I should have remembered there was something like that there. My bad."

"That's what happened?" Corsica looked at her. "How do you know so much about shadow swimming, anyway?"

"Friends with a bat," Unless told her. "But this isn't the place for idle chitchat. Hop on; let's spend as little time in this purgatory as we have to."

Fortunately for me, Corsica got stuck with Papyrus, not that I was too much happier riding on Unless. Her wings cut through the haze like knives, and in a matter of seconds we had descended toward an opening in the wall that looked like it led to a tunnel.

I jumped off the moment I could, the voice in my head having been replaced by the rush of flight in my ears. And then that was replaced by the realization that there was something carved into the stone tunnel wall, which I read as I waited for Corsica and Papyrus to catch up.

Halcyon is a Dummy,

Bet she won't read this,

Kitty was here

I narrowed my eyes. "Quaint."

"One more door, and this one I couldn't open if I tried," Unless warned, pointing ahead. "And no more forbidden dumpster magic. You're getting all of us through this one. Partly because I want to see you comfortable with taking passengers. It's an important skill to have for keeping your friends safe."

I glanced back at the crystals. Papyrus and Corsica were arriving; they were still aglow. Was that the same kind of crystal that was so prevalent at the chapel? The ether crystals I studied had never been pink. But Leif told me these mines had a route to the ether river...

"Get a move on!" Papyrus shoved me. "My poor lungs don't want to spend any longer in this pit than yours do!"

"R-Right." I swallowed and began ferrying ponies across.

The next door, blessedly, didn't have a grate on the other side for me to fall through, though I suppose I knew that because I had seen it before. We were in the Flame Barracks, now, where it was marginally cooler but still hot, but more importantly less humid. The air was old and stale, but not toxic like the core.

Not that I was taking my mask off any time soon. My coat and my fur felt filthy, and I was sure everyone else would smell equally awful.

"So far, no welcome party," Papyrus said once we were all inside. "What a pity. Though I suppose that is the desired outcome... This friend of yours was in these caves, you said? Let's see what we can find."

Unless nodded. "You got any magic powers of super recollection, mystical abilities to know exactly where our target is, or a plain ol' paper map? I know my way around here better than most, but the Flame Barracks aren't exactly small. Might take a bit to search by hoof."

I thought back, scanning my memories. "It was real close to a door that took us from the maintenance wing proper into caves like these," I said. "We found her pretty soon after we left the proper building."

"Better to go on than nothing!" Unless took the lead, beckoning for all of us to follow.

"Hey, so..." I asked as we walked. "You seem to know a lot about a lot of stuff. Like these caves. How come?"

"Dumb answer?" She shrugged. "'Cuz I work for Egdelwonk. That's the whole point of the job. Real answer? Way long ago, this place was constructed for military purposes. Why anyone would build a military fort deep down in a mine is a long story, but basically even after the original builders were gone, there were certain types who saw a lot of value in some super out-of-the-way mazelike fortified caves. For, uh, clandestine purposes. Guess you can say I used to fly with that crowd before ol' Wonky caught me up in his program."

I wasn't sure how to follow up on that, so I kept following and she kept leading. It was hard to get a read on Unless's age. My best estimate was anywhere in her twenties, which was an awfully vague range to peg a pony. But I knew Cold Karma had arisen within my lifetime, and Lilith's school was tied to them... How old must Unless have been when she was performing clandestine activities in these caves? Probably before the mines became uninhabitable during the Steel Revolution? So that would mean she was at the older end of my estimated age range, and had also been a young filly at the time...

Maybe I should just quit doing mental math on ponies' ages altogether. I always wound up feeling like they were younger than they were supposed to be. Although, with Leif, that had been a sign of her being a changeling, so it wasn't a habit it would be easy to shake.

"Any chance it's this room?" Unless asked, rounding a corner. "We're getting to the likely areas..."

I stepped through an open door into a room that had clearly once been a prison, its red rock carved out into cells along the sides with black rusty metal bars separating them from the hall. But it didn't feel quite right, and Leif was nowhere to be seen. "Not this, but one like it."

"How about..." Unless led us around another few turns. "This?"

Still no dice.

"Hmm..." We took several more corners. "This one, maybe?"

We peered around the doorway. Sitting patiently inside was Lilith.

She had a table, some visible paperwork, and the expression of a mare who was about to close on a very profitable deal.

Our Interests Align

I stood in the entrance to the room where Leitmotif had been held, Unless and Papyrus and Corsica at my back. Lilith alone was present to greet us, sitting patiently behind a desk that looked badly out of place against the room's brutally bare decor.

"...What do you want?" I asked nervously, appointing myself the leader by means of my position in the marching order, even though Corsica or Unless might have been better prepared to handle this.

"My desires remain unchanged," Lilith said, her voice smooth and cold, "since last we met. I am more interested in all of your desires." Her emerald gaze scanned me and everyone backing me up. "Some of your faces are not ones I expected to see in my domain. Why have you come?"

"Easy. We're not here to break any treaties." Unless stepped out in front of me, spreading a wing to hold me back. "Got a friend here who's looking for another friend who apparently is down here. Higher-ups asked me to come along and smooth things over in case anything started to go bad."

Lilith coolly smiled, though I almost thought she was trying to be welcoming - she was just incapable of being anything but cold. "Your superiors are wise indeed. They know I would never do a thing to harm you."

Unless bristled faintly, but I could see the effort it took to keep her reaction in check. These two had history together.

"But that doesn't explain your presence." She turned to Papyrus. "Although we have a treaty, you being here inclines me to break it. You are fortunate that I am in a good mood, and that I am the caring type. And you." She turned to Corsica. "You are still an unknown."

Papyrus shrugged. "Kill me, and I'll be too dead to care, unless you stuff it up again. I'm just here because a little butterfly let me in on a plan, and it sounded like fun."

"So what's with the desk?" Corsica asked, pointing a hoof.

Lilith rearranged her paperwork. "My eyes and ears told me your party was potentially looking to make a deal in exchange for something you want. And while I doubt many of you have anything of use to me, I am, as I said, in a good mood tonight. So I decided to humor you." Her eyes scanned everyone but me expectantly. "What have you brought to offer?"

"I ain't offering." Unless held her wings out defensively. "I told you, I'm just here to cool some heads."

Papyrus opened his mouth to say something, but Corsica forced it shut with her aura. "The mare who used to be held here. Leitmotif? She's a changeling? Halcyon saw her last time she was here? Where is she?"

"Still alive," Lilith said. "Albeit very... busy. Test subjects in her unique scenario are difficult to come by, and it's such a promising avenue of research I was loath not to use her after Halcyon passed her by. From what I have heard, you are now here to seek her freedom."

"Test subjects?" Alarmed, I took a step forward. "What are you doing?"

"I have told you multiple times," Lilith slowly, emotionlessly explained. "I am trying to preserve your dying species by any means necessary, even at great moral cost. If you like, I could explain it to you. This is, after all, a place of learning."

"Start talking," Corsica told her. "I don't like the sound of anything you just said."

Lilith frowned. "...You. What do you desire from this endeavor?"

Corsica stepped closer to me. "What she wants, I want."

Lilith's eyebrows rose. "May I assume you mean that for all of your goals, and not just your time here?"

"Why would you assume a thing like that?" Corsica narrowed her eyes.

"Mere... wishful thinking." Lilith stared at her. "Halcyon is currently performing a task for me. You appear to be close to her. I wondered if you might assist her in it."

Papyrus and Unless looked at me with surprise, and Corsica with worry. I blinked at Lilith. "You what? No I'm not."

Lilith sighed. "I had feared you might forget the favor I asked of you last we crossed paths. And now I see that you have."

She rose from her chair.

"You're gonna have to forgive me on that one, because I was dead tired and had maybe a hundred better things to think about back then," I told her, standing stiffly. "What do you think you signed me up for?"

Lilith stepped out before us. "Don't get involved," she breathed. "I offered you a place in my organization, and you seemed shy of an alliance. And so I bade you to continue as you were. Remain careful. Remain distrusting. Remain free. Your shoulders are not as burdened as those of many others, and I would have them remain that way."

Oh. Maybe I did remember that... Did I? I honestly wasn't sure.

"You three have professed your allegiance to chaos," she told the others. "And Halcyon carries a contract ready to bind her to the very same. But I desire Halcyon not to be tethered to Ironridge by such a thing. I suppose I was wrong when I said you have little to offer me. Help her to not come under that creature's sway."

"You want us to tell Egdelwonk not to hire her?" Corsica gave Lilith a funny look. "What's in it for us?"

"And why?" I added. "Not that I want to get more tied up in Ironridge politics than I already am, but what's me staying unaffiliated do for you?"

Lilith ignored me, focusing entirely on Corsica. "I should think that doing the will of your friend would be reason enough. But if you desire a more substantial benefit... now is the time to ask."

Papyrus licked his lips. "Much as I'd love to beg your debasement in the form of saying 'please' a million and one times, I think what I'd like most is to hear why it matters. Plans are rare that look to remove a player from the stage. Just what are you plotting, old hag?"

Lilith glared at him.

I held my breath.

"Say it plainly," Papyrus offered, "and I will personally be as odious as possible to remind her that should she join up, she would have to spend more time around my sunny personality."

"Leave the room," Lilith instructed. "And I shall discuss with you later."

"Swear it on something even your shriveled heart can love," Papyrus demanded.

Lilith glared at him. "I am love. Everything I do, I do for the sarosian race. You already know this, colt of Riverfall."

"That's not a promise," Papyrus lazily pointed out.

"Oh, but it is," Lilith hissed. "It is a promise on my own nature. Now take your sunny personality and begone from my sight. Sun and moon have no place in the twilight."

My heart beat a little faster. Something in Lilith's voice sounded... frustrated and futile. Somehow, despite our situation, she was feeling cornered right now.

What was going on?

"I suppose..." Papyrus yawned, then got up to leave, tail lashing. "Do try to make this quick, will you? I get wanderlust when I'm bored..."

Lilith turned her eyes to Unless and Corsica.

"I don't like owing you stuff," Unless said. "And I don't like it when you owe me stuff. So how about we cancel a debt? You drop whatever you've got on Birdo and Slipstream, and I'll say please when I ask Halcyon not to sign any contracts."

"Hold on," I interjected. "This is seriously rubbing me the wrong way. Why are you making bargains about me right in front of my face?"

Unless raised an eyebrow at me. "I thought you wanted to not get caught up in this city. Right? Isn't this what you want?"

"Yeah, but..." I protested. "It's also what... you know..."

"What I want?" Lilith said, her voice tinkling like icicles. "And you hold little trust for me, so you instinctively shy away from my desire. Be careful, Halcyon. When you cannot trust someone, you should give their advice little impact upon your choices. To do the opposite of what I ask, for no other reason than that it is I who is asking, would make you just as manipulable as a pony who was foolishly, blindly trusting."

"But..." I furrowed my brow. She was right, and I had no idea what to do about that. I just didn't see what she got out of what she was asking me to do! Unless she was being truthful in her warning, and really was trying to reverse-psychology me into joining Egdelwonk...

I really, really hated Ironridge mind games. Which was saying something, because I usually much preferred problems I could solve with my head than ones that required physical danger.

Unless cleared her throat.

"You ask much of me." Lilith turned to look at her. "I shall offer a temporary moratorium. So long as Halcyon remains unaffiliated with anything that could tie her unduly to Ironridge, your interracial friends shall be free of their obligations to me. If anything happens to upset that balance, then the old status quo shall resume."

Unless nodded. "Gnarly." And then she glanced apologetically at me. "Sorry to throw you under the cart like that, but politics is politics. Honestly, I think it would be pretty smart for you to not sign anything unless you've got a real good reason to, too. Just trying to get something good out of doing what I'd already do."

I stared at her, my jaw slightly slack. And then something she said clicked in my mind: "Wait, Birdo and Slipstream?"

"Oh!" She blinked. "Yeah, it's a nickname Gerardo picked up a while back. You've been around us all night and you're still not used to that?"

Lilith nodded at Corsica. "And what of you?"

"You kicked Papyrus out," Corsica said. "That because you hate him, or because you're trying to get Halcyon alone?"

Lilith's eyes glittered with a look that clearly said both.

"Then where we go..." Corsica stepped even closer to me. "We go together. Plug my ears if you must, but she's not leaving my sight. You good with that, Hallie?"

I nodded gratefully. I had no idea how to feel about Lilith's request, or the fact that everyone with me was apparently signing on, but I was glad not to be alone.

"Interesting," Lilith said, regarding her. "Many who have power obtain it by making great trades and sacrifices. You prefer not to barter your way up, but would squander your opportunities to protect what little you have."

Corsica didn't budge.

"Loyalty in the face of temptation," Lilith went on. "A rare virtue. Or perhaps you simply don't believe I would offer you anything of value?"

Corsica's eyes glittered with a look that clearly said both.

Lilith just chuckled. Then she waved a wing at Unless. "Leave us. And make sure your friend isn't getting into any trouble."

"Yeah, yeah..." Unless stretched, then glanced at Corsica. "You can handle yourself?"

Corsica nodded. "I used my power before even coming down here. We'll be alright."

Unless whistled. "More power to ya, girl. See ya around."

Then she was gone, and Corsica and I were alone with Lilith.

"Alright," I told Lilith. "There'd better be a real good reason for this stay-free stuff, and you'd better spill it now that everyone who's leaving is gone."

"Naturally," Lilith replied, walking for the door as well. "But perhaps we might walk and talk. You did, after all, come here to retrieve a pony."

I followed stiffly. Corsica stayed by my side. Briefly, I looked her over, but I couldn't see many outward signs of fatigue or exhaustion. Didn't she just say she used her power? Her special talent, I assumed? And didn't she tell me earlier that overuse, or even use at all, of her talent left her drained and mentally exhausted? Sure, she looked about as strained as I was feeling, but nothing supernatural...

We passed through a door, and entered the school's maintenance wing. Tile floors and smooth, rectangular walls greeted us along with dim lighting. Lilith led the way.

"One thousand years ago, sarosiankind was created at the hooves of a goddess," Lilith began as we walked, not looking back to see our reactions. "She was called Princess Luna. But Luna swiftly abandoned her brood, and they came to be cared for by another. That other was known as the Night Mother."

My backwards ears perked. A history lesson? Whatever was going on here was relevant to things that happened that long ago?

"The Night Mother established many institutions around herself," Lilith went on. "Temples and altars and forms of worship. Her power was legitimate and immense, and it was fed by the prayers of her faithful. Under her, all knowledge of Luna faded swiftly. She tricked the sarosians into believing she was their progenitor, and in many other ways as well. In truth, she was a liar and a manipulator, a creature of chaos who acted obliquely and in the deepest shadows. Tell me. Do you believe that even the foulest and most accursed of evils is capable of doing good?"

I had no idea how to answer that. Procyon, who had been floating beside me just a moment ago, was nowhere to be seen.

"Yes," Corsica grunted. "What of it?"

"I had already given up on that possibility long before I learned the truth of her nature," Lilith told us. "It was enough to me to look at the conditions in the Empire and realize the sarosians could not have a creator who was both loving and all-powerful. In Mistvale, things were allegedly peaceful, though the only life I knew was in the central province of Izvaldi. A name I believe you are familiar with."

The name of a certain love princess cult in the Sky District. I didn't say it aloud.

"Throughout the Empire, sarosians were treated with many degrees of hostility," Lilith said. "Sarosian pirates had disrupted imperial trade routes across the sea for centuries, while trading themselves, unimpeded, with Varsidel in the north. Already a convenient villain, politicians looked to them as an enemy that could be used to increase national cohesion. And many of them lived in the Empire, worshiping a different goddess than the Empire's beloved Garsheeva. But their piracy was at the Night Mother's command. All that strife, and all of it ultimately originated with her."

I listened raptly, my curiosity for history muscling aside my paranoia and distrust.

"For several decades leading up to the Twilight of the Gods, Izvaldi had been secretly under the control of sarosians," Lilith continued. "Their ruling sphinx family was dead. Under imperial law, that family would be replaced with the high prince, Gazelle, who would take over the province and begin a new dynasty. But Izvaldi was politically weak, and Gazelle privately turned up his nose at the notion. So he made a pact with the sarosians. For many long years, they installed a puppet government and ran the province themselves, deceiving the public that Izvaldi's sphinx was still alive. In return, Gazelle remained free of a weak province he did not want. In that way, a sarosian named Chauncey came to rule the Izvaldi government."

Smarter than that Chauncey guy but pretty, too. A memory of one of Coda's epithets flitted through my mind.

"While most sarosians clung to the Night Mother for succor, Chauncey had grown disillusioned with her," Lilith said. "It was because of the heresy, maintained by the Night Mother and Garsheeva both, which forbids relationships between sarosians and creatures of other races. You know that sarosians always breed true to the race of their partner. As an act of rebellion, Chauncey attempted to subvert this rule. He turned to magics so deep and so dark that they could corrupt even gods, and toiled to modify a sarosian so that they might bear children of either race, not just that of their partner. And he succeeded... at the cost of learning too much."

"How do you know all this?" I asked.

Lilith shrugged. "I was there."

"And you're interested in this because you want to make batponies not an endangered species," Corsica said. "You want his old methods so you can make it so batponies don't have to be exclusively with each other to survive. What's that have to do with Halcyon not signing a contract with Egdelwonk?"

"You are correct," Lilith admitted. "But that is not the point of this story. During Chauncey's experimentations, he discovered a method by which he believed he could create a new god. A means of disassembling and reassembling ponies. He decided to build a replacement for the Night Mother, a better god he believed would be more worthy of the sarosians' adoration, splicing together the perfect pony piece by grisly piece, someone who could succeed where the Night Mother failed."

A bad feeling suddenly occurred to me. "...Chrysalis?"

Lilith barked out a sharp, harsh laugh. "Hah. No, but also yes. Chrysalis was not his new god, but the tool he intended to use to create them. Not the end result of his experiments, but their byproduct. A tool... that was all he saw her as. And because of his ignorance and inability to feel even the most basic of equine compassion, she laid waste to all the Empire and all of Mistvale together. Just as wretched a creation as her creator."

My fur prickled, cold. "Is she you?"

"Am I Chrysalis?" Lilith snorted. "Fortunately not. I know too much of her mind already to want anything more to do with it. Now, I will ask it again: do you believe even the lowest and vilest among us are capable of doing good?"

This time, Corsica didn't answer.

"How am I supposed to answer that?" I protested, bristling. "After all you've just said, assuming even a scrap of it is true..."

Lilith shrugged. "Answer any way you like. I asked what you believed, not what is true. Something doesn't have to be true for you to believe it."

I stared at the ground.

We went through a sliding door, and were suddenly in a lab. Glass vats of glowing blue liquid lined the sides, bubbles occasionally rising through them, and the ceiling was cris-crossed with bundled pipes and hoses.

"For a long time, I didn't believe," Lilith said, marching along a tile walkway between the vats. "A long time, longer than either of you have been alive. And then, I saw the plight of sarosians in the wake of the calamity, and I had an epiphany."

Finally, she turned to stare at us, her horn providing illumination with a too-solid emerald aura. "The Night Mother wasn't in the wrong," she told us, voice steeped with conviction. "She was, perhaps, a great and unquestionable evil who did evil things purely because they were in her nature. But her desire was for the preservation of adopted children. When I looked upon her ruined plans in their entirety, I saw it for truth: even though she could not but do evil, she was able to twist her nature against herself and eke out of it some amount of good. Despite all that sarosiankind suffered under her for a thousand years, they endured. All the way until the bitter end, even though she brought anguish to many of their members, she kept them alive in a world that seemed determined to do otherwise."

Lilith's voice didn't waver. "In her actions I saw a path that I, too, could take. I am no saint, Halcyon. I was deeply involved in the Twilight of the Gods to an extent where it may not have happened if not for me. Papyrus and Unless's mistrust in me is well-founded. They know what I am capable of, and have done before, just as I know what they have done. But the idea that even such a broken and fearsome creature as I might bring about good, despite all indication to the contrary... That idea is why I survived. It is my reason for existence. Even to those for whom atonement is denied, we might still make a difference."

I took a step back. "You sound like you're trying to justify sacrificing us to a dark god..."

"Oh, nothing so sinister." Lilith shook her head. "I merely have a little favor to ask of you. One that can only be asked of someone with no ties or obligations to Ironridge. Let your worries be at ease, Halcyon. Even a sarosian as anomalous as you is still a child of the Night Mother... and now that I have adopted her mission, a child of mine. Nothing I can do will ever hurt you."

"And that is?" Corsica asked.

Lilith smiled coolly. "Run away, Halcyon. Leave Ironridge and don't look back. Find somewhere where no one wants to use you, where you can live with the peace you deserve..."

My fur prickled.

"And useful you are," Lilith told me. "This is the greatest proof I can offer of my commitment to your kind: you still walk free, as precious as you could be to my cause. Because I have lines I will not cross. Lines that were made for you and yours."

"What do you mean, useful?" I took a wary step back.

"You are protected," Lilith said. "A magic I cannot identify is shielding you even as we speak, and I know of many deep magics. This puts you outside the influence of many factors. You could be the ultimate control variable in any experiment I could dream of. Any who could discover how you became the way you are would gain a path to limitless power."

Procyon was back, and she was staring distrustfully at Lilith.

"Anyone less principled than I could learn unspeakable things from you, Halcyon," Lilith purred. "Of this, I am certain. But your heart is unburdened by much of the history of the sarosian race. You have not felt for yourself the ills of your ancestors. I can tell. And so I cannot bear to despoil that by using you as a tool, no matter how excellent of one you might make. Besides. I just told you what happens when powerful ponies are used as tools by those without empathy."

Chrysalis.

She was... comparing me to Chrysalis.

Procyon looked like something was darkly funny. I bet I really had felt those things, and the me under my mask had hidden them away.

"But there are many others who can recognize your potential," Lilith went on. "Many who do not shackle themselves as I do. Many like Egdelwonk. I am sacrificing a great advantage in not exploiting you, Halcyon, all for your own happiness, but they will not do the same. And so I ask you to make my sacrifice not be in vain. If I can't have you, let no other have you, either. Leave Ironridge, and live."

A feeling of static ran up and down my body. Lilith made cold, creeping sense. I didn't like what she had to say, and yet for once, something in Ironridge made perfect sense.

"You brought us all the way here to say that?" Corsica cut in. "If you've got so many spies, shouldn't you know that was our plan already?"

Lilith raised an eyebrow. "A pleasant development. I did not know. Your endeavor has my blessing."

For a moment, I considered asking for Lilith's help with that. If she truly wanted me gone... And besides, she knew enough about Chrysalis and the Night Mother, maybe she would have a lead on where Garsheeva was? But Corsica said nothing, and I wasn't sure I wanted to trust Lilith with that either.

"So what's with the spooky lab?" I asked, pointing around at the glowing vats. Nothing was suspended in them.

"Preparations for experiments," Lilith said, turning to watch them as well. "One branch of research my department has been conducting is into the viability of growing sarosian foals outside of wombs. Should that become possible, we could create sarosians much faster than the limited supply of mothers would normally allow. What you see here are prototypes based on medical curative vats developed in the Empire that we will eventually seek to augment into artificial growth chambers for the foals. But other sections of that project encountered obstacles. I thought these would make good display pieces until it is time to begin their modifications."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You're really trying to do that?"

Lilith met her look. "Princess Luna created the first sarosians. How do you think she accomplished such?"

Corsica glanced to me. I was clueless.

"We do not know that this particular way is possible," Lilith said. "But even gods operate within set laws. Should we discover the way she made the first sarosians, my organization could replicate it. Sarosians have, before, been created from nothing. Logic dictates there must be a way."

She started walking again, and I followed, an uncomfortable prickling in my stomach. My understanding of Ironridge, in this place, was turned upside-down: Lilith's story held water when measured against itself, at least as far as I could tell. Her professed motives made sense with her actions, to an extent. For once, Ironridge's logical laws didn't seem shrouded in mystery.

But where the way things did work was suddenly clear, its moral laws has become an impenetrable mystery. Lilith used phrases like 'much faster than the limited supply of mothers would normally allow'. Did she have no empathy? She professed to caring deeply about batponies, and even told a lengthy story about the dangers of treating ponies as tools. And yet she spoke as if the ones she wanted to help were nothing more than statistics and machines.

Did she understand what she was saying on an intellectual level, but not an emotional level? How was that possible, for someone who professed to fervently believe in what they said? It was possible she was lying about everything, but no liar could have that good of an understanding of the intellectual merits of a cause and not come to believe in it, because beliefs were rooted in facts and logic, right?

Right?

It was like Lilith was actually missing some capacity to understand things that other ponies took for granted. Like she wasn't fully equine...

Maybe she was like me. Beliefs were only rooted in facts and logic for everyone else, I had observed time after time in Icereach. For what felt like me alone, I chose to believe in things that empirically made no sense, like a mysterious light spirit healing Corsica, without rational reason and purely because I wanted to.

I shivered. Thinking about this was pushing me dangerously close to thinking about the holes in my own worldview. I just wished I could understand what I was feeling about this mare. Some cocktail of fear and sympathy and unease and curiosity and familiarity and many other emotions that didn't have names, all blended together into a thing I didn't recognize.

"So what was the point of that Chauncey story?" Corsica asked. "About how he started off trying to make batponies able to be born to mixed-race parents? You poking your nose in that stuff, too?"

"Yes," Lilith said, leading us through more darkened hallways. "I am. Progress is slow, because I employ an abundance of caution in not recreating the circumstances under which another like Chrysalis could be born. Unfortunately, those circumstances were... tangled, and difficult to pick apart. Chrysalis became a creature called a changeling queen. Changeling queens are like empty vessels that can be filled with emotional energy. Chauncey filled Chrysalis with every negative emotion imaginable, with hatred and anguish and despair, in order to sculpt her powers to become the type of tool he desired. However, he initially discovered his creation of such a vessel quite by accident. Once a changeling queen has been made, feeding it unintentionally on a scale required to manifest its powers would be nigh on impossible. But reckless research in this field could still potentially create a new, empty queen. A union of god and void, upon which no power or purpose has been written, free to consume any ideal, embrace any potential and become any form..."

Lilith stopped and opened a door. "Such a thing must not be needlessly brought into this world. It is for that reason that I exercise such caution in my experiments surrounding Chauncey's modification of sarosians. I tell you this because you inexplicably seem to care about Leitmotif, and would not want you to think that the purpose for which I have volunteered her is wholly without merit."

My heart sped up.

The room we entered was divided cleanly in half by a reinforced glass barrier, both sides lit brightly enough that shadow swimming was clearly a concern. The far half held several amenities including a bed and a bookshelf, no visible exits, and a marginally healthier but very bedraggled Leitmotif, in batpony form. The near half held a machine that appeared to suspend a tiny black crystal in a forcefield.

Leif reacted with a light gasp when she saw us.

"It seems," Lilith told her, "Halcyon was not, in fact, finished with you at all."

She looked at me with a look that said get me out of here.

"And this is?" Corsica glared at the machine. I could tell she was trying not to glare at Leitmotif.

"Perhaps a demonstration is in order," Lilith said, walking up to the machine. "Your friend here has been helping me develop a means to analyze the body composition and properties of other test subjects. Being a reunified changeling, she is in a unique position to report on the effects of trials. Behold."

She pulled a switch. The machine didn't seem to do anything, but suddenly Leif's form was twisted with green flames, and she became a different batpony. Leif didn't look amused.

Lilith pressed several more controls, and Leif cycled through a few more forms, each time looking progressively more ashamed and embarrassed. "All of these forms are scans taken from my employees and students," Lilith told us as she worked the machine. "I can turn her into you, if you'd like."

"You're forcing her to transform," I said numbly, feeling like I was stating the obvious and yet with nothing else to say. If someone else with a machine could press a button and take my mask on and off, I'd be... beyond mortified.

"Yes," Lilith said. "I am. Changelings, and by extension, changeling queens, are able to modify their appearance consciously and even subconsciously. By helping me to develop this, Leitmotif is creating an early-warning system that can be applied to sarosian candidates for offspring race modification tests. Were their bodies to begin undergoing the same type of transformation as Chrysalis, I might now be able to detect changes that would not consciously manifest for quite some time."

Corsica's eyes narrowed. "You're making a machine to force batponies to changeling-transform to see if they've become close enough to changeling queens to be capable of it, before they'd learn how to on their own."

Lilith gave her a funny look, then shrugged. "An innocent way of putting it, but correct."

"Knock it off," I told Lilith. "How happy do you think she looks right now?"

Lilith stepped away from the controls. "Leitmotif agreed to this in full knowledge of what it would entail. And the process is not painful. It is being designed for sarosians in interracial marriages who desire the ability to have children of their own race. It is being designed as a safety measure so that process can be developed more safely. Full aware am I of how you might see such a thing, but that is why I took the pains I did to explain it. Think of this like... a preventative medical checkup."

I looked again at Leif. She met my eyes. She still wanted out.

"So?" I looked back to Lilith. "I'm here for her. You wanna give her over to me? And then let us out of this place?"

Lilith considered this. "...Forgive my curiosity," she said. "I was given to believe this mare was your mortal enemy. Last time you visited me, I presented her to you as a peace offering, of sorts. I was surprised to see you pass her by. What changed? And what do you mean to do with her?"

"I dunno," I told her, and then shot Leif a quick glance that said if you betray me I will murder you. "Just going with my gut on this. And last time, I was a bit too overwhelmed by getting kidnapped out of jail to think straight."

"Interesting," Lilith said. "I could, perhaps, give you her as a token of goodwill. Although perhaps you might respond in kind by giving me that contract in your pocket? I'm certain you could get another if you just asked, but think of it as a symbol of your desire to remain unshackled by this city's machinations."

I hesitated, then pulled out Egdelwonk's contract. "This for Leitmotif?"

Lilith shook her head. "Not a trade. A mutual exchange of gestures of good faith."

"Same thing," I said, Egdelwonk's silly crayon doodles flapping as I shook the paper at her. "You want it?"

An emerald aura congealed around the page, taking it from my grasp. "I thank you," Lilith said as the paper began to burn, "for your sign of commitment."

Green fire slowly engulfed it, beginning at the edges and creeping inwards. In the center, at the very last place to burn, I could swear Egdelwonk's silly insignia of his face was watching me.

I shuddered.

"Now what about her?" Corsica pointed to the glass cage.

Lilith nodded. She pressed another button on the machine, and the lights in the room dimmed, until Leif was able to change back to a batpony and shadow swim through the glass. Once she was free, she stood warily and weakly, looking around.

"Come on." I beckoned her over. "You're coming with us."

"What are you doing?" Leif whispered in my ear as she got close. "Why are you back in this place? Don't you know what's happening right now?"

"Nope." I shrugged, offering her a shoulder. "I'm going with my gut. Like I said. And you had better not make me regret it."

"Whatever..." Leif slumped against me. I quickly remembered that I wasn't that fond of being touched, but it was too late now. "Get the shard in her machine. Don't leave it here."

Lilith watched her, then took the shard in question and pulled it forcibly out of its holding field. "I suppose this does belong to you," she said, floating it closer in her aura. "I have little use for it alone."

Leif reached weakly for it, but I was faster, snatching it in a wing. "What's this?" I asked, peering at it more closely. Now that I saw it up close, I realized it wasn't crystal at all: it was a chip of glossy black metal. The same kind, I suspected, as my bracelet.

I frowned. If this was related to Leif's changeling magic... I had noted before that the emerald fire of my bracelet was the same color as the stuff changelings made when they transformed, a color that also seemed to be associated with Lilith. That all but sealed it: Mother's bracelet, somehow, was a changeling artifact. Probably a stolen one. I would be very curious to ask about that in the future.

"Think I'll hang onto this," I said, pocketing the chip instead of giving it over to Leif. "If you want it, let's call it collateral in the name of good behavior, because you're going to owe me double after this stunt is done." I turned to Lilith. "So what's the point of this metal?"

Lilith was staring off into space. "...A thought occurs to me," she said, ignoring my question. "You have met Coda. You know who and what she is."

I nodded. A changeling queen.

"She is Chrysalis' daughter," Lilith told me. "It would seem the state of being a changeling queen is hereditary, much like the modification I seek to isolate that will make sarosians better able to reproduce. Coda feasts on love, which is a weak and transient emotion even at the best of times. Her powers are weak as a result, but only on the scale of gods. You, however, are likely immune to anything she can do. You, she would be forced to treat as an equal. I do not believe our destinies as ponies are immutable, but hers will be a difficult path. I think, if you could be her friend, that might be an avenue through which you would have a lot more potential than most to do good in the world."

"I am her friend," I said. "She's searching for Chrysalis and wants to fight her."

Lilith shook her head. "An ill-advised quest. As she is now, Chrysalis is harming no one and hidden far away. Coda is chasing phantoms, and will all but certainly find enemies more ruthless even than her intended quarry. Dissuading her from her mission will be difficult. By their very nature, changeling queens physically become the concepts they embody. But she is young, and has supped thus far on a meager diet far thinner than that of her mother. Coda still has time to choose a better virtue to embody. Perhaps she can yet be free of the shackles she believes to be her destiny."

"Neat," I said, feeling like I hadn't learned anything new just there. "Anyway, we walked and talked on the way here, so you mind if we get going now? I'd like to be making progress..."

"You may return to your companions at any time." Lilith nodded. "I have said what I mean to say."

I took a step toward the door, half-carrying Leitmotif. Corsica was already ahead of me.

"...You know," I said, looking back. "You wanna hear the real reason I'm helping Leif? It's because she wasn't the real bad guy. The one who really did us dirty back in Icereach was the Composer. You know the one. They were with you when we first met outside Jamjars' place."

"So it is her your vendetta truly lies with?" Lilith looked interested. "The windigo..."

I nodded. Of course Lilith knew what the Composer really was. "If you really wanted to make us trust you," I said, "perhaps you should think harder about who you associate with."

To my surprise, Lilith seemed to seriously contemplate this. "I see," she said. "Then if I require another favor from you in the future, provided you are still in Ironridge, perhaps my payment is already organized."

Warily, I raised an eyebrow. "You're implying you'd betray them at my say-so?"

"No one likes a windigo, Halcyon," Lilith purred. "My alliance with that creature is purely one of convenience, much like my alliance with the rest of Cold Karma. You've been in Ironridge long enough to know that all of us on the board of directors use the company as a facade to pursue our own agendas. Should that partnership become more of a hindrance than an asset, it is disposable. Of course, that would take quite the convergence of circumstances... but it is within the realm of possibility. I am grateful you've let me know."

I sighed, moving to better prop up Leif. "Whatever. And come on, let's get out of here."

We heard Unless and Papyrus before we saw them, out of sight around a corner in the Flame Barracks. It sounded like they were playing cards, and Papyrus had been caught cheating. I instantly wondered if we shouldn't have spent more time looking for the front door, but Lilith was no longer following us and Corsica's presence, as a non-batpony, was making everyone we passed very uneasy.

"We're back," Corsica called, leading the way into the room.

"It's you!" Papyrus sat up in delight. "I was just trying to convince Bats here that it's perfectly legal to... Look, never mind that, I've been bored to tears waiting for Lilith to come lock herself alone in a room with me as promised for a little old verbal sparring..." His jaw fell as he saw who I was carrying. "Garsheeva's breath, old girl, is that you? Senescey? I could have sworn you kicked the bucket!"

Leitmotif - right, her real name was Senescey - stiffened and stood on her own, falling into a wary stance. "Who are you?" she demanded. "What is the meaning of this?"

"It's me!" Papyrus sat up on his hind legs and spread his wings, wide and welcoming. "Your old chum Gazelle!"

Leif's eyes went pinprick.

"...Or not. Surprise?" Papyrus sat back down and gave a too-bad-so-sad grin. "Actually, I'm a random Riverfall schmuck who happens to look similar enough to an evil conqueror from two continents over and a generation back that I can't help fishing for reactions. I even did some research to make it more convincing! Real name's Papyrus. I read all about you in a book. Can't believe I actually fooled someone who really knew the tyrant himself!"

He winked, made a show of patting himself on the back, and turned slyly to me. "See, Butterfly, that's how you were supposed to react back in that bar when I introduced myself for the first time. When reactions like that are out there, I just can't help myself!"

I narrowed my eyes. So that was what fueled his alleged knowledge about the Empire? Research he did for the purpose of pranking ponies by introducing himself as Gazelle?

Leif was watching him with a deadly suspicious gaze.

"Can we put the shenanigans on hold for a bit?" I asked, stepping between them. "I'm dead tired, and you look even worse." I nodded at Leif. "Look, we got through all this without me needing to use that contract, so let's... just..."

I looked around at everyone. Me. Corsica. Papyrus. Unless. Leitmotif.

Five ponies. And we had only brought four masks.

"Err..." I hesitated. "I... guess I forgot that we might be bringing someone back through the... caves..."

"What, you mean these?" Papyrus made a show of slipping his mask on. "Don't look at me. I never got all the juicy details on the plan because someone didn't feel like sharing! Can't double-check what you don't know."

I gritted my teeth. "Well, she can have mine. I'm a batpony, so I can just go back through Lilith's school and find the normal entrance, and..."

"Wish someone had thought of this before coming down here," Corsica muttered.

"I did." Unless stuck out her tongue, then pulled out a fifth mask from her saddlebag. "Was just waiting to mention it 'cuz I wanted to see your reactions when you figured out we were down one. If it came to that. Nyaah."

Corsica sighed.

"How devious!" Papyrus chortled. "And here I thought that's the kind of thing only I would do! We'll make a mare out of you yet, Bats!" He blinked, examining the new mask up close. "Wait, this one has a headlamp too? Why didn't you swap mine out for this earlier when I was complaining?"

Unless bonked him with the mask, then tossed it to Leitmotif, who caught it with a stumble.

"Err, yeah..." I looked between everyone. "Let's get out of here now for real."

After hours of trekking, we were outside.

Hours of trekking during which I had to carry Leif pretty much the whole way, because either she didn't trust anyone else or no one else trusted her. Hours of trekking very reminiscent of the last time I made this climb, lugging Kitty along with me. Hours of trekking added to the hours it took us to get down there, that caused us to emerge well after the sun had risen. But, we made it.

Hours that felt far different from the last time I had done this, despite the similarities, because I felt no emotional ambiguity about what had just happened. Lilith was still an enigma, and I didn't know what to think about her, but it didn't matter because I no longer had any goals pulling me back down to her lair. Leif was free now. And even though I didn't know what to feel about her, either, I spent the entire trek buoyed by the unshakable sense that I had done the right thing.

"So this is it?" I asked when we stepped out into the sunshine on the inner junkyard wall around Fort Starlight. "We're home free. This is the part where you betray us, yeah?"

I looked squarely at Leitmotif, whom I was all but carrying.

"Unnngh..." She groaned, and promptly passed out.

"Welp!" Unless took flight. "Gotta go report to Valey about how all that went down. Also, hot tip? She might have a history with that mare. I recognize you're kind of low on options, but you should see about not making Fort Starlight your long-term home for her while she does whatever she's gonna do next. Or your short-term home. Or even your next stop, if, like, you can help it, which maybe you can't. But hey, maybe she'll just bail, and then you won't have to decide?"

I shook my head. "No bailing. We spent all that effort and took all those risks to get her out. I'm gonna at least want some answers from her in return."

"Whatever floats your boat." Unless nodded and zoomed away.

"Whole lotta effort," Corsica groaned beside me, suddenly wobbling on her hooves. "Think I might have... overused my special talent..."

And then she collapsed too, out like a light.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "So do you want my help carrying them somewhere, or would you rather be as free of my presence as possible until you inevitably come back to ask whatever imperial questions you invited me to this shindig to get the answers to?"

I glanced at him. I glanced at the two unconscious mares with me. He was Papyrus, but... "I think they'll forgive me if I ask for the help?"

Papyrus winked. "Well, too bad, Butterfly! I'm bushed after that hike. These bones are due for a spa session at Egdelwonk HQ..."

And then he cheekily flapped away, leaving me on my own. I growled a little at getting played.

Whatever. Time to figure out what to do with two unconscious mares in the daytime Sky District.

A New, Better Contract

Gravel crunched under my hooves.

I had been climbing for what felt like days, hauling myself around crevasses and over miniature peaks with two unconscious mares draped over my back, though judging by the movement of the sun it had been closer to just four hours. Was it stupid to heed Unless's warning and not just go to Fort Starlight while I was there? I didn't know. But I had heeded it, and now I was about a third of the way to Dead Herman, where I knew there to be a road down to the Day District, circling around the Ironridge crater far enough from the rim that I didn't overheat from exertion.

My current plan: make it to Dead Herman by nightfall, find a no-questions-asked motel, spend last night's pay to get a place to stash Corsica and Leif until they woke up, go to work, then return to the motel when I finished and do whatever needed doing to take care of my newly-rescued enemy.

That this plan would require me to be awake for thirty-six hours, during which I worked two shifts, spelunked a poisonous mine, and mountaineered for twelve hours with a very heavy load wasn't lost on me. I just didn't see any better options. I would push myself until I succeeded, and that would be that.

The terrain made me feel like I was a giant walking across a full-fledged mountain range. Overall, it was flat, with very little elevation change across the miles, but up close it was nothing but extreme ups and downs, tiny valleys and miniature peaks and loose, shifting boulders I was extra-careful to watch out for. The world felt shattered; my scientist brain whiled away the hours trying to piece together how it must have formed and couldn't come up with anything. Something incredibly violent must have happened to the land, breaking it and raising it, but how had it not eroded into more large-scale features like rivers and valleys? Granted, it had been protected by a glacier until very recently, but glaciers shaped the land, too.

I reached a long, flat slab of rock that felt loose, yet was too large and wedged in place to move. Was it possible there was a small cave beneath, if it was covering a valley? That could be a good spot to rest...

No. No resting, I told myself, shaking my head and moving-

Once my legs had been given the idea, there was no stopping them. I tripped, even though it was the flattest ground I had seen for hours, landing in a heap with Leif and Corsica on top of me.

I tried to get up, but my body had had enough. I couldn't move.

That was... unfortunate.

I stretched one hoof out, trying to pull myself along, but for nothing. All I could do was sigh. Admittedly, I had never pushed myself this far before, but my answer to being tired was usually just to force myself to keep going. And now my legs just said no.

Maybe I had limits that weren't based on determination, after all.

The rest was so welcome that I couldn't even bring myself to be disappointed.

After a few moments, I found enough strength to struggle out from beneath Corsica and Leif, at which my comfort went way back up. In the name of making the journey, I had repressed my usual uneasiness about physically touching ponies to an extent, but now it reminded me that it had been there all along, a sticky, heavy-hearted buzzing sensation that was sliding off my coat like soap now that I was alone. It wasn't a feeling I let myself experience often enough to understand. Not like it was painful, or intrinsically bad, or anything. Some part of my mind just said no.

I looked around for Procyon, but she didn't seem to be nearby.

Well, I didn't see much of anything to do. Maybe I should see if I could get some-

As I was closing my eyes, Leif stirred.

That got my attention back. I pulled myself a few slouches closer. "Hey. You coming to?"

"Unnnnngh..." Leif twitched. Now that I saw her, for the first time completely unclothed and in broad daylight, she looked... surprisingly like an ordinary batpony, aside from a haggard lack of luster that reminded me strongly of Mother. A bath and some proper grooming would do her a world of good, but wouldn't be everything. She had seen things and been places, I could tell just by looking at her. Heavy things, the kind of things that weighed on a pony's soul.

But if I ignored all that, she really was just a normal batpony. Or a changeling pretending to be one, at least.

It was almost hard to imagine someone so ordinary had caused me so much grief by visiting my town half a year ago.

Leif stirred again. "No... No, I... still... muh...?"

She cracked one eye. "'s that the sun...?"

"Welcome back," I told her, managing to half-sit up. "Lemme know when you're all here..."

Leif pried both eyes open. "Halcyon?"

"In the flesh," I replied. "You're welcome, by the way. I figured your emaciated corpse would be lighter than it actually was, so now we're stuck out in the middle of nowhere. Nowhere to go, and nowhere to run. So how about we talk like civilized ponies and you don't make me regret risking my rear to break you out of that creepy lab, eh?"

"Talk slower," Leif mumbled, getting one foreleg beneath her and shifting so she was laying upright. "I need a minute..."

Slowly, the reality of my situation dawned on me: as tired as I was, Leif was even worse off. She was completely at my mercy. I had known this for hours, while I carried her as she slept, and yet only now it fully hit me: the tables were turned. Whatever I wanted to do to pay her back for Icereach, I had the power.

The feeling came, and I bathed in it, and then it went. I didn't do anything.

Leif's eyes fully focused, watching me.

I took a deep breath. "I think I yelled at you the first time, when I found you down in the Flame Barracks," I said. "So let's skip that for now and get to the ultimatum: I just saved you. Are you gonna make me regret it?"

"Why?" Leif asked. "Why did you come back?"

"Several reasons." I shrugged. "I still don't know what to think of you, for one. I've moved on, but it's less like I've gotten over it and more like I've started painting my bedroom even though I haven't fixed the hole in the wall. Part of me wants to know if there's a chance you guys were good guys all along, but really, I just want to know what all that pain in Icereach was for. I want it to mean something. Plus, if I abandoned you, I'd be just as bad as you are. And..."

Digging around in my pockets, I pulled out something I had brought just for this occasion: Mother's locket, with the picture of her and Leif and another mare, and the initials F+S+L. I pulled it out, opened it and showed it to her.

"How much..." Leif spoke slowly. "Do you know about who we were, and what we did?"

I wracked my memories, knowing Mother had told us the story shortly after I awoke from my injuries. "You were revolutionaries," I said. "In the Griffon Empire. You were trying to topple the aristocracy. She said she betrayed you. She also said you weren't trying to lay groundwork for the changeling invasion, and that you being changelings didn't even factor into it. That your motives were completely independent of that."

Leif looked away. "So you don't know. That's what they were hiding from you in Icereach."

My heartbeat quickened.

"When we were in Icereach," Leif said, looking away. "We were looking for some information, among other things. But it's impossible to learn anything there. You probably don't need me to tell you that; it was your home. Suppose it makes sense that of all the things a colony of batponies would try to hide, it would be that."

"What?" I asked, leaning closer, suddenly afraid. "What do you know?"

Leif slowly met my eyes again. "Do you really want to know? It's... not the kind of thing your life will be the same after."

I swallowed and nodded. Was this something I actually did know? Something hidden behind my mask...?

Instead of telling me, Leif asked another question. "What's your opinion on changelings? As a whole. Not any individuals who happen to be them."

What? "Err..." I hesitated. I didn't really know how to answer that, not when I knew so few of them.

Leif waited.

"I don't think that what you are has any bearing on what you do," I said, dredging up memories of tense conversations in the hideout during our exile, of my own nature as a mask, of my impersonation special talent that gave me so much in common with the changelings. "It just gives you different tools to do it with. That's all."

Leif nodded, then took a breath. "Batponies are changelings. Changelings are batponies. The only difference is that you haven't 'awakened' yet."

I felt like I was suddenly very, very far up in the sky.

The Twilight of the Gods. The war in the east that exterminated Mistvale and tore apart the Griffon Empire. An army of changelings attacked out of nowhere, and in the aftermath, batponies were extinct. Not because the changelings killed them, but... but...

That was what everyone in Icereach was hiding from. I knew most of the Institute's ponies were older than the censorship laws, and thus probably knew the things that were being censored. That was why they didn't want to think about it. That was why the Griffon Empire's history became so hard to find, as of the war.

That was what everyone in Ironridge knew when they were giving me funny looks. The mare who had a tantrum in the clothing store. Everyone else who stared at me wrong. And all the ponies who tipped their hats at me? They felt sorry for me. Or maybe they wanted to be my friends, so I wouldn't steal their identities.

That was what the ponies of Icereach had done, decades ago, when they 'created' the changeling skeleton I found in the mural room adjacent to the chapel. That was how they made a changeling. They just... found a way to turn batponies back to their base form?

That was what I would have learned if Icebeard's journal hadn't been destroyed.

That was what Elise must have known when she offered to take Mother in as a refugee. That was what Mother must have known when she escaped from the Griffon Empire and left behind her old home. That was what Ansel...

Actually, Ansel probably didn't know. Not with his abiding hatred of changelings, yet his cordiality to batponies, like me. This knowledge would probably hit him even harder.

I wondered if Corsica knew.

I wondered if Jamjars knew... Of course she did.

I wondered if Ludwig knew.

Slowly, my mind settled back into my body, and I returned to the ground. Leif was watching me.

"I guess..." she said slowly. "That means you really didn't know."

I shook my head.

"I suppose your mother wouldn't have mentioned it," Leif said. "But we were sisters. The three of us, in that photo. That makes me your aunt. Adoptive aunt, at least."

I blinked.

"She was never pregnant while I knew her." Leif shrugged. "Not unless she was very good at hiding it."

"So..." I struggled for words. "Is she a changeling, then? Am I...?"

"Depends on your definition," Leif said. "Both of you have the power. You might not have awakened to it yet. If you could shapeshift, I think you'd know. It's not something that can be taught, though. Part of you has to be broken for it to become voluntarily possible. I don't know that you'd want to hear about it."

"I do," I insisted. However far I had come, I had to know the rest.

"Brands are the key," Leif told me. "Special talents. Cutie marks. Whatever you want to call them. It's why we're born with ours - they give us our shape, our form, our identity. Other kinds of ponies get to choose their identity as they grow, and seek out causes that they choose to care about. Usually, at least. But our bodies are uniquely able to adapt, physically, to our identity. And because of that, ours is set at conception. So, in order to shapeshift, you have to lose that. Rejecting it isn't enough. You have to have it torn out of your body, and lose it altogether."

I shuddered. I already worried about who I was enough as-is. Losing what little I had...

Actually, I might have already done it. Procyon looked different than I did, her uniqueness more exaggerated, mother-of-pearl instead of silver and her hooves more colorful. The green crystal, the mask I wore, might actually be physically changing my appearance, and the other me just didn't let me remember whenever I turned back.

That would explain a lot. Like why she was so adamant that I never take off my mask in public. Someone would see.

"It's not something you do for fun," Leif went on. "It's an incredibly violent process no matter how you do it. Other ponies, because they begin life without their brands, are able to survive without them and live relatively normal lives. We're not designed to do that. If you take away my or your brand, our soul goes with it. We become animals, capable of only the basest emotions and no rational thought. When Chrysalis appeared, she took over the mechanism our old goddess, the Night Mother, used to collect prayers and speak to her faithful: a construct called the Daydream Network. And then she used it to rip out the brands of every single sarosian on the continent. No matter who you were, no matter where you were, one heartbeat life was continuing as normal, and the next you were a soulless puppet, bound and tethered to her. The horror of that final moment... has no words."

"But you're still here," I pointed out. "And Mother and I survived."

Leif slowly nodded. "About three years ago, there was... an event. I simply woke up, and was myself again. My brand back where it belonged. I was deep underground, surrounded by crystals. I remember a faint, golden light receding around me. Except, I wasn't in my body. I was a mint-green unicorn, wearing a dress in a fashion I had never seen before, with a bouquet of flowers. There were several others with me. All of us remembered the end, and then... we were there. So we banded together to survive, and discovered that somehow we could shapeshift on our own. I suspect the process of being broken and put back together unlocked it in our minds."

A faint, golden light. Underground. Among crystals.

The light spirit...

"And that became Aldebaran?" I asked.

"Yes," Leif said. "Not all of us were there at first, but eventually we became the four that came to your home. As for your mother, she wouldn't tell me how she and you survived, but from what I can tell you two were never broken."

The bracelet. It had to be.

"Eventually, the four of us decided to pursue Chrysalis," Leif went on. "We all had our own reasons. Many of them. I had... my sisters." She pointed at the locket. "Felicity, the eldest. Me, Senescey. Larceny, your mother. Just before the end, we had a fight. The details don't deserve to be remembered, but... we didn't part on good terms, and after being closer than close for my entire life. They were my partners. We had a mission, and we failed to see it through. I want to use my life to finish what the three of us started, but first... I wanted to get them back, so we could make amends. I don't have the means to challenge a god. I don't know if anyone does. But somehow, my brand and my soul got free from Chrysalis, and found their way to me in that cave. I held onto the belief that if I could be put back together, my sisters could be, too. And even if I didn't know how to free them from Chrysalis once I found her, I just figured I'd cross that bridge when I came to it. That's why we came to Icereach. We were looking for Chrysalis. And I assume that's what you really want to hear about, isn't it?"

Mutely, I nodded.

Leif closed her eyes. "...I don't know where to begin."

"How about with why you kidnapped us?" I started, gently raising an eyebrow.

Leif sighed. "There were multiple reasons. We fashioned ourselves into a company of mercenaries so that we could get work and collect resources while also pursuing leads on our target. That means we had many active goals at the same time, and we tried to multitask between them. With your case, we had two different tasks we were trying to accomplish. One, for our search for Chrysalis, involved trying to bypass the security on a machine that was allegedly stored in that cave we took you to. We thought we needed Corsica for that specifically. The second, a side job we were doing for money, involved getting you and Corsica out of the city for an extended period of time. And while I know you had a bad time, both of them blew up in our faces, as well. So which one do you want to hear about first?"

"Bypassing security?" I tilted my head. "You mean that thing you had Corsica stick her horn in, you actually thought would work?"

Leif nodded. "That one, then?"

I narrowed my eyes at her. "Did you even try to break in there yourselves? I hacked that thing in five minutes because I was bored with nothing to do after you bailed. Its security was so bad, it must have been designed by an infant."

Leif looked surprised and a little taken aback.

I tilted my head. "Gonna take that as a no?"

She sighed. "Rondo knows about boats. He was in the most technical profession out of any of us in his old life. I'm afraid none of us have the skills to do anything more with those terminals than operate them."

"Serves you right for not hiring us legit and being up front with us, then," I told her. "So what were you expecting to find, if not that weird letter?"

Leif gave me a sharp look. "We went over that plenty of times among ourselves, thank you, no need to rub it in. What we were looking for was the control terminal to a shuttered machine called Project Nemestasis."

I felt a stupid grin growing on my face. "You know that was actually down there, right? Basically one of the first things I found once I started exploring on my own?"

Leif groaned and buried her face in her hooves. "Yes, we got betrayed by our benefactors, we know this, I've been reminded a million times! Of course it was all there. Are you going to let me finish, or do you need more time to gloat?"

"Well, this is pretty satisfying," I admitted. "And you kind of owe me. You have no idea what you put us through back there. Or just now, to get you free."

"Fine," Leif sighed, "let the humiliation conga continue. Let me know when you're ready to hear about what Project Nemestasis actually does, unless you want to tell us you already know that, too."

"No," I told her, "but I do know Icereach is some kinda scary secret weapons depot, and also that hideout where you ditched us is probably left over from a previous Yakyakistan administration where they stashed old war stuff from before they signed their peace treaty with Ironridge."

Leif raised an eyebrow. "Do you know about your rockets?"

"That they're finished and have been this whole time?" I raised one back. A small part of me wondered if I should be chancing telling her anything she might not know, but... she was telling me a lot. Enough that if she was making things up, she probably deserved an award in storytelling.

Leif nodded. "Project Nemestasis is a targeting system. Yakyakistan designed it to help get the rockets where they were supposed to go, once they lifted off. It was an early attempt, not the system the rockets use today, and it got shuttered for unknown reasons that likely involved a scientist going rogue and stealing irreplaceable keys required to use it, but we don't know for sure. The point is, it's in Icereach and the rockets are in Icereach and we hoped but didn't know that if we could reactivate it, it would be a back door into the system that could allow us to fire and control the rockets ourselves, which is a slightly reasonable hope because we couldn't figure out where the front door is and it's entirely possible they reactivated it and now it is the front door. Can you think of why we might want to do that?"

I blinked, and slowly shook my head.

"Chrysalis," Leif said. "Striking a god with a rocket laden with explosives from the other side of the world is about as safe and effective a way of fighting them as you're going to get. It's our best idea for killing her by a mile."

I shivered. Who thinks of these things? Besides Leitmotif?

"A-and you think Corsica was they key to unlocking that machine?" I raised an eyebrow. "How'd you figure that one out without even seeing the thing itself?"

Leif sighed. "We were told. Figured it out from an informant who, in hindsight, had ties to the Composer. It was more of a riddle than a straight answer, though. Supposedly, the 'head scientist's daughter' was the key. But who else is that supposed to mean? Did Graygarden have other kids? Corsica was his daughter, right? Maybe it meant the daughter of a previous head scientist, but the only other head scientist I know of is very dead and we'd have a lot of work to do to track down any offspring he may have left behind. Just thought we'd try the easy solution first."

I tilted my head. "You think whoever gave you that riddle also set up the fake terminal with the letter telling us you were all changelings?"

Leif shook her head. "I can't see any other way to make sense of it. That facility wasn't a place just anyone would have access to, and neither were our identities. If it wasn't done by the Composer themself, it had to be someone very close to them. But the only reason I wouldn't suspect them directly is that I don't know what motive they possibly could have had."

"Welcome to my world," I said with a shrug. "Where everyone does whatever and you're lucky if ten percent of it makes sense. So if that letter we found on the terminal wasn't actually on you, what were you planning to do with us after Corsica unlocked your machine?"

"Make up a story to convince you to leave Icereach with us," Leif said. "Potentially convince you to stay in the hideout for a day or three while we did what we needed to to finish up affairs there. Ideally without losing your trust, which would have been a lot easier if Elise hadn't caught onto us before we left, a lot easier if you hadn't started to get suspicious also before we left, and infinitely easier if it hadn't been for that letter."

I nodded. "Yeah, no offense, but your ability to string us along kind of made you look like amateurs."

Leif closed her eyes and gritted her teeth. "...Thanks."

This time, I felt slightly bad for insulting her. Slightly. After all, she was being pretty cooperative, and she had clearly been through a lot too.

"Anyway, that was the paid job, the one we were doing for money, because nothing in the world is free," Leif went on, pretending that hadn't just happened. "Even mercenaries with powerful and shady benefactors need to make a living. And, as you can see, even though we made a mess of things, you two were eventually gotten rid of because you are no longer in Icereach. Whatever you're doing here, I hope it was gentler than what happened under us."

"We were gotten rid of?" I blinked, then slowly remembered what Gerardo had told me on my first night here. We were. By Elise and Graygarden. Icereach's political power was waning as the governments of Ironridge and Yakyakistan lost interest, he said. Icereach was also mostly inhabited by natives who would respond to that by closing themselves off from the world. Elise and Graygarden wanted to get us out before Icereach became completely isolated, and we lost the opportunity...

It couldn't be. Elise tried to stop Aldebaran. She got captured by them! She...

I looked to Leif for an explanation.

"Graygarden hired us," she explained. "To set you three up in a life outside Icereach. Initially, we only came to your home with the expectation of hiring Corsica, having her unlock the Nemestasis machine, and bringing back home, immediately and unharmed. When we invited you and your brother to come along, it really was just an innocent research trip, at first - we had a story set up to tell you about why we were really hacking that terminal, of course, and not actually going to investigate an ether cave, but we all thought it could be a fun adventure and maybe Corsica would be happier having her friends along. And at first Graygarden wasn't thrilled. But then he had a change of heart when he realized that this could be an opportunity to get you free from Icereach and what was going to happen there. He has a... personal connection to Aldebaran, I'll say, so he knew a small little bit about who we were, going in. So, we adjusted our plans to ensure all of you came along, intervened when Elise tried to stop us, tricked you when you tried to walk out... I'm sorry. If it wasn't for that letter on the terminal, we probably would have tried to string you along all the way until we could bring you to Yakyakistan, and set you up for a new life there."

I looked at the ground. All this... It sounded so fragile when she said it, like I could swing a hoof and shatter her words into shards of glass, and then none of it ever would have happened. Like it wasn't real, and had all been an illusion.

Maybe it had been. And now that I could see the illusion, its hold on me was slipping.

"Why did Graygarden want us to leave?" I asked. "I've heard it from one person, but what did he tell you? What was going on when we escaped and got back to Icereach?"

"That's..." Leif took a breath. "Complicated. Once you were out of the picture, Graygarden wanted us to depose him, pretending to be you, and then give him safe passage out of Icereach. If that sounds complicated, it was a plan his mistress made up, not his or ours. She's... a bit of a schemer. With an addiction to drama and complexity."

Jamjars.

"His mistress," I said. "She's your fifth member, isn't she? I know she's involved with whitewings, and was the real owner of the hideout where you left us."

"You figured that much out?" Leif nodded. "Yeah. She is. She's... not a changeling, and she has completely different goals to us, so we never got along that well. But she's friends with the Composer, and got in with us as a condition for us getting our airship. She also has a spell that lets her change color like a chameleon, which makes for good enough budget shapeshifting that she could still keep up with the things we did."

Huh. From the sound of it, Leif didn't know that I lived with Jamjars. I wondered what she could tell me about how trustworthy Jamjars was, or what her real goals were... Probably not a glowing review, if Jamjars was associated with the Composer.

Wait, though. Jamjars was already friends with Kitty...

An image of Kitty's stupid, innocent, blepping face filled my mind. There was no way that kid could be the Composer, right? No possible way she could be the same cool, calculating presence that turned into a cackling windigo and then blew me up in my own house.

No possible way. Except that both of them were windigoes with ties to Jamjars, and both of them were very good actors who occasionally showed off sharp personality swings...

If she was, I realized, Leif didn't know. Kitty had been with me when we met in the Flame Barracks, and Leif didn't recognize her.

This, I felt like keeping to myself.

"Why try to depose Graygarden, though?" I asked. "Why in our name? What was it supposed to accomplish?"

Leif hesitated. "That information is... dangerous. Halcyon, I basically owe you my life after today, and I was already indebted to you after that catastrophe at Icereach. But I want to make sure you're not the kind of pony who would... would let this ruin their life by taking it as a call to become something they're not supposed to be."

A memory flickered through my mind of Elise talking about Starlight, a filly who accomplished extraordinary feats, yet only attempted them because she felt like nobody else would rise to the occasion. Was that what Leif was talking about?

"I'm..." I hesitated. "What are you asking? I'm a good pony. I try to do the right thing. What do you want to know?"

"If something bad was going to happen," Leif said, "would you run away and save yourself, or would you try to stop it?"

My blood chilled. "How bad?"

"Bad, bad," Leif told me. "But the kind of bad that you can run from. Would you?"

I looked away. What kind of question was that?

"Something bad that might happen to Ironridge," Leif went on. "Do you care about this city? Would you try to stop it? I can see in your eyes that you aren't perfectly happy here, but is it enough that you'd stay out of harm's way and not get involved? Could you walk away and live with yourself afterward? Or would you be a foolish, innocent child who's compelled to play the hero, even when you're just a single mare and don't have the power it would take to make a difference?"

I remembered Valey asking me a similar question: what did I want to do with Ironridge? Given the choice, would I try to improve it, try to get revenge for all the stress it had inflicted on me, or just walk away?

Why was I given questions like these, anyway?

"Tell me what's going to happen," I said. "I don't know how I can answer that otherwise."

Leif hesitated. "...Cold Karma is ruled by windigoes. Yakyakistan knows this. They're plotting a holy war to break the treaty and wipe them out."

My fur prickled.

"After the Steel Revolution, Yakyakistan offered Ironridge a hoof in friendship," Leif went on. "Their rogue ambassador, Herman, had dreams of annexing Ironridge and rebuilding Yakyakistan's empire. Church leadership refuted that, and the countries were supposed to walk side by side. But then Ironridge's fledgling new government failed, suddenly, and Cold Karma moved to fill the void. That company became ruled by opportunists pursuing their own agendas, and formed a vacuum within itself. A vacuum that, now, the windigoes fill, providing air conditioning to all of Ironridge and steering the city's course from below. Yakyakistan's church? They think they've learned from their mistake, and that Ironridge can't sustain itself without outside rule. To them, Cold Karma is to Ironridge's government as an infection is to a wound."

I shivered.

"Your home? Icereach?" Leif shook her head. "It's the midpoint between the two nations. Yakyakistan's reconquest will start there, in the form of a formal secession from the treaty and rejoining to Yakyakistan. Pressure has been building toward that moment for a long time. Graygarden knows, Halcyon. His superiors in Yakyakistan, Icereach's yak ambassador, they know, but Graygarden was different because he wanted to stop this. His plan, that we were hired for, was for us to depose him in a fake coup. The citizens, he expected, would react by overthrowing you - or us, pretending to be you - and then closing themselves swiftly to foreign influence, unknowingly expelling the real Yakyakistani conspirators in the process and seceding from both sides. He could then leave and start a new life in anonymity, and his daughter and her friends would likewise be safe. That was the goal."

She sighed. "What we hadn't accounted for was that we were being manipulated by an Ironridge windigo ourselves. The windigoes want to start a war, and currently, that's the path events are on track toward. We were trying to forcibly cut Icereach's ties to Yakyakistan to forestall the war, and so they intervened to preserve a beneficial status quo. I still don't know everything about what happened from your perspective on that night, but what I assume happened is that the windigo in the Nemestasis facility - whom we didn't know was there, I promise - helped or goaded you into returning to Icereach or something to derail our plans even further. Once we were captured and exposed, all the happenings could be blamed on us, and things could go back to normal. Right back onto a path leading to nowhere but war."

So that was what really happened.

I sat back, my head swirling. Things were... so much bigger than I imagined, and yet, at last, I could see the full picture. All the confusion I had endured since entering Ironridge? It was just games played between the branches of Cold Karma that didn't really matter. Things were as chaotic as they were there because the windigoes were behind it, and they wanted to bait Yakyakistan with the appearance of chaos. Me, my friends? We were just pawns. Pawns who happened to be important enough to ponies with a modicum of power that they tried to get us safely out of the way, and we insisted on sticking our necks back in. And even though I thought we ultimately saved Icereach, now Leif was telling me our interference had been for the worse.

But... that couldn't be it. We were powerful, too. I had my bracelet. Corsica had her special talent. Maybe Leif didn't know, but we hadn't been moved out of the way just because someone cared about us.

Odds were, it was because we really were powerful enough to influence the course of history, and no one liked it when wild cards took the stage.

"So what are you worried I might do?" I asked. "Go out on the streets and tell everyone I can that Yakyakistan is going to invade?"

Leif nodded. "That's pretty much it. Mostly, I don't want you thinking that because you know, there's something you can do, and because there's something you can do, you have to do it. That's a fallacy that will never let you rest. It's one I've lived my life through, and even though I know I could just sit back and stop caring, I can't make myself. Ironridge, Yakyakistan? We intervened in Icereach for money, not ideology. I have empathy for all the common folk that would get crushed in a war, Halcyon. I despise, down to the very core of my being, authority figures who would treat their subjects as statistics and casually let that happen. But by the same token I'm rooting for Cold Karma's destruction. This city's order... Even this world's order is rotten to its core. Sacrifices have to be made to overturn that, to build something better. But when the very things we're called on to sacrifice are the ponies for whose sake I want to build something better..."

She briefly trembled. "There's no right answer except to cling tight to my convictions. That's why I could go either way. I can help Graygarden restore Icereach's independence, for money, while telling myself at least the civilians in Ironridge will be protected. I can also stand back and do nothing while telling myself at least Cold Karma and all of its rot will be taken out with it. It's not an enviable position, but I have more choice in it than most. The only one who could actually rewrite the world order is a god, and that's not the lot we've been given in life."

Some part of me wanted to hug her.

It wasn't a thing I did, hugging ponies. I didn't understand the appeal, didn't want anyone else to hug me, and always felt weird touching ponies anyway. But I had pressed back that instinct for a long time today already, carrying Leif and Corsica across the barren Sky District, and I could take a little more.

So, I reached out and did it.

It still felt weird.

Leitmotif winced in surprise, then leaned into it just a little. "Beneath all the snark, you're not so bad."

"I dunno what I'm doing from here," I said, letting her go and stepping back, my legs feeling stronger again. "But, I forgive you. And if you want, you're welcome to come with. Unless you've got other plans?"

Leif shook her head. "Not ones I can follow. Changeling transformation isn't free, and Lilith forced me to do it far too much. She wasn't just trying to develop a method of forcing that. She also wanted to make me... hungry, so to speak. I think she was intending to use me to experiment on alternate power sources to strengthen the changeling hive. She probably wanted me to need it badly enough, I would accept it voluntarily. A willing test subject always gives better feedback than one who's been coerced."

"You call that willing?" My hackles rose, and I felt a spike of shame that I hadn't sprung her free the first time, in the Flame Barracks. "Who is Lilith, anyway? She's not Chrysalis, is she?"

"No," Leif said. "I'm almost certain she's not. But she's not a normal pony, or even a normal changeling, either. We don't know the real name for them, but in Aldebaran, we've started calling them Changeling Bishops. All our knowledge on them is observational, so there's too much I don't know, such as where they come from. Like queens, they can use the old Daydream Network to control soulless drones in a hive mind, but I don't think they can remove brands to create new changelings and I don't think they can store emotional energy. Like I said, there's too much I don't know."

My eyes widened a little. "So Lilith's whole thing about breeding batponies..."

Leif nodded. "When Chrysalis appeared twenty years ago, she absorbed the souls of more than ninety percent of the world's batponies. What she likely didn't know when she did that is that we can't procreate without brands and souls. And since she treated her army like disposable tools for conquering and killing, her ranks dwindled fast. All the bishops we've identified seem to be instilled with a single-minded purpose, much stronger than a normal pony's desires or brand. Lilith's mission is to restore the numbers of the batpony population by any means possible. So, what we think is that Chrysalis created Lilith, however bishops are made, to rectify her mistake and ensure the world has a healthy supply of us to make more drones from."

Usually, when my blood ran cold, it was a sharp drop, all at once. This time, it was a slow decline, getting cooler, and cooler, and cooler.

"Because that's what we are to her." Leif's voice was hard. "Disposable workers... No, more like food. Chrysalis is no better than Cold Karma or the Empire's old nobility. In fact, I think she's even worse, because she actually has the power to change the world order and make it better than this."

My ears pressed back.

"All Lilith cares about is making as many batponies as possible by any means possible." Leif ground her teeth. "Our comfort? Our happiness? Anything she does that works in our real favor is just part of the calculus. She sees us as nothing but machines. Or maybe she really does care, because she's the machine and Chrysalis thought she'd be most effective if she was made that way. I don't know the real reason for her existence, or my existence, or your existence, but I do know what it looks like, and it... it..."

She took a deep breath. "Sorry. I care... a lot... about certain things. And you asked. And I've been not in the best emotional state for the last... long time."

"I can relate." I looked away. "Anyway, while you're looking for Chrysalis... You ever meet someone called Coda?"

Leif nodded. "In the weeks before she awakened to her own powers, Chrysalis had a daughter. That's Coda... cared for by a portable cult made of the exact same scientists who gave Chrysalis her powers, minus their very dead leader. Scientists who used to work for the griffon province of Izvaldi. Did Larceny... Well, you knew her as Nehaly. Did she tell you about why we were fighting the nobility?"

I hesitated. "She said your mother died." Which would have been her mother as well, I suddenly realized. Unless they were half-siblings?

Leif nodded again. "Poisoned, when we were foals. Contaminated drinking water. The result of a poorly-maintained mine, upriver from where we lived. In Izvaldi. The very same administration that's now that child's caretakers."

She shook her head. "Coda may have the same goals as me, but I could never, ever ally with her. Even if it weren't for her followers, I couldn't look another changeling queen in the face, especially one so young and unformed, and not be tempted to... abuse it. Maybe I should. Maybe it's the best way to get what I want. But everyone else in Aldebaran didn't want to either, and it would almost certainly result in us no longer being our own masters. So, we've avoided ever crossing paths."

I waited, thinking of something else to say. And eventually, I did.

"Back in Icereach," I began. "I was impersonating Rondo for a bit. You know, since he was pretending to be me, he gave me a ready-made disguise... I was there when you were arguing about a research paper on ether crystal fault plane dating."

Leif chuckled dryly. "That was karma, pure and simple. When Corsica wakes up, if she'll have anything to do with me, I've a mind to ask her about it. Not sure that I'll be in a position to do anything with that knowledge for a very long time, but if there's any reason you'd be willing to work with me again, it... sure would be an opportunity."

"I was the primary author on that," I told her with a hint of a smug grin. "Submitted it in her name for reasons. She helped too, of course, but if that's got your interest..."

Leif stared at me with very much interest indeed.

"First," I told her. "What are these fault planes to you? My memory's a little foggy, so be explicit."

"A potential method of tracking Chrysalis," she said. "Your paper had several dates that you'd identified. Some of which you correlated to major world events, and others that you couldn't. At least two of those events, Chrysalis was involved in, one of which you didn't know about and actually was when we regained our brands. You thought you could improve your methodology to determine the place of events in addition to the date, right? If that happens, we could potentially use that technology to detect and pinpoint these events in real time, which would reveal her exact location should she be involved in something like this again."

I folded my forelegs. "So in other words, you have a vested interest in being able to use technology that doesn't yet exist, but I have the potential to create."

Leif nodded.

I thought about it for a moment. And then I got an idea.

"Alright," I said, offering a booted forehoof. "Then let's make a contract. But, this time around, you're gonna be working for me. You just said you're fine either way with how events go in Ironridge. You used to be a mercenary, so you're clearly fine with odd jobs. I'll make you my research assistant. You share your knowledge when I need it, help me with this and that, take care of yourself, and maybe we'll get that technology hammered out together. Deal?"

Leif looked deep into my eyes, as if searching for something. Then she lifted a hoof and bumped mine. "As long as you know it'll take a while for me to recover from this. I'm not going to be doing changeling things for a few weeks, at least."

For a moment, I was stunned. It was immeasurably satisfying to be on the other side of the table, after so many shady characters had done or tried to do this to me.

Quietly, I resolved that I would buck the trend and be a good boss.

"We can play the long game," I told her. "As long as Yakyakistan doesn't come in and interrupt with their war. But not too long, because I don't like it in Ironridge and do want to leave at some point."

"Right," Leif said, straightening her composure a little. "So what's the first order of business? Aside from getting back to civilization. I notice you took the scenic route."

I shrugged. "Someone told me you wouldn't be appreciated in Fort Starlight. Anyway, I haven't had time or space to do any research while I've been here, so we're still at square one. The first thing we need to do is..." I hesitated. "Actually, aren't you supposed to be running off to save your friends? What about the rest of Aldebaran?"

Leif shook her head. "They'll help themselves. As far as I know, they're already free. But we were always more united by the convenience of working together than anything. You and your research can get me closer to Chrysalis, and Aldebaran was out of resources and had nowhere left to go. To put it bluntly, I like my odds better with your plan."

I hesitated. "They escaped? And just ditched you?"

Leif shrugged. "That was our pact. An alliance of shared goals, working together and yet every pony for themselves. If I got out first, none of them were expecting me to come for them. You can look for them, if you want, but I have no leads, and I'll warn you now: I'm your family. And I like you, and I have a conscience, and I owe you. But the others don't have the same shared history your mother and I do. I'm sure you're feeling all happy and friendly about how we are suddenly getting along, but it's not going to play out the same way twice. Any of us but me, I think, if you found them and freed them and they weren't already free, would either try to convert you to their own ideology or walk away. And there's no karmic reward waiting for you based on the percentage of us you 'save'. But that's even assuming they're not doing things under their own power already. I'm all but certain they took bargains from the other Cold Karma heads, and are now doing new things."

I glanced around, searching for a loophole. "How do you know?"

"That they might have fallen in with Cold Karma?" Leif asked. "Because I got approached multiple times before Lilith snatched me up, and every time I told them to get bent. But the others don't have the same hatred of power structures as me. Rondo especially, but all of them, I think they would have taken the deals."

I looked at the ground.

"Buck up," Leif encouraged. "There's probably not a lot they can do for your research that I can't, and even if you don't trust me, think of how many fewer reasons you have to trust them. Our group was falling apart at the end anyway, and none of us were looking forward to figuring out how to resolve our differences about Chrysalis if we ever did get her at our mercy. So, for your research, what's the next step?"

I took a deep breath and sighed. "The first thing we need to do is get down to another ether cave. I asked you about this when we met in the Flame Barracks."

Leif nodded. "I remember that. Still trying to get down there?"

"Yep." I looked back in the direction we had come. "I've proven I can survive in the central mineshaft. For a bit, at least."

"It'll get harder the further down you go," Leif promised. "Unless you want to go in now and see how far you can get before being forced to turn back, but I wouldn't count on it. Had any luck searching for a space suit?"

I shook my head. "Haven't even started on finding Shinespark, and I feel like I'm walking a razor's edge with Cold Karma."

"Go figure," Leif sighed. "I am... probably... not going to be that helpful when it comes to Shinespark. She, and her friends, don't like me. Which may have been my fault for things I did to them during my campaign in the Empire, but what's done is done and the only reason I'd do it differently is because I lost and I wanted to win. So I'll help where I can, but you'll need to find her on your own. And if you're in deep enough with Cold Karma to spring me from that lab without a fight, I would not get in any deeper if I were you."

"Any ideas where she might be?" I tilted my head, daring to hope.

"Nope." Leif shrugged. "Not a clue. If you want me to start looking for hints, I can do that as soon as I'm well enough to transform again. This is my original form, and I... like wearing a disguise."

"Understandable." I checked my legs, seeing if I was well enough to travel. Corsica was still out of it, Leif looked more wobbly than I was... and I was worried I was beginning to cramp. I definitely wasn't ready.

Instead, I cast around for something more to discuss... and remembered the black metal shard Lilith had been using to control Leif's transformations, that Leif had begged me to bring along. I pulled it out of my pocket and showed it to her. "So what's this?"

Leif's brow shadowed with regret. "A... part of a pony. It's not supposed to take physical form. I don't know a whole lot. But, that's mine."

I studied it. It was black. The same kind of metal as my bracelet.

Part of a pony that shouldn't take physical form, huh? I wondered who Mother's bracelet had come from, and why it was so much bigger.

"You can't forge it, or do anything with it, really," Leif said. "Unless you're a mad scientist. I can feel that something's missing, though. I'd ask for it back, but I suppose you want to keep some collateral so there's no repeat of our meeting in Icereach?"

I hesitated. I looked at the metal. The sun burned down overhead, but it was so black that even the reflection seemed worlds away, like I was looking at the sun through a long, long tunnel. And then I looked back at Leitmotif.

"Nah," I said, passing her the nugget. "From now on, we're gonna trust each other. Without holding any advantages. And if either one of us breaks that, it'll stink to be them, because they'll have thrown away something way more valuable than whatever they get for their betrayal."

Leif snorted as she took it. "Naive kid. I guess Larceny really did get you a good life, if you can be that innocent about things. Don't get me wrong, I'm jealous. Maybe a little too much so. Just wish I could have had a foalhood like that."

No. I didn't think she did. Whatever had happened in her own foalhood, I had forgotten mine, cut myself out of my own head and conjured up a replacement, because it was too much for me to live with anymore.

"I wasn't going to tell you this," Leif said, holding the nugget, "but the three of us... Your mother, me and Felicity... We weren't very nice revolutionaries. I don't know what she told you about our history, but to a lot of ponies, we were the bad guys. Professional assassins, con mares, out on a mission to erase the status quo and make it like it had never even existed. We had our reasons, and I won't renounce them. The world we were born into deserved to crumble. But that doesn't mean such a process is painless. So... don't get too cuddly with me. I lost the two mares I cared most about in the world because I was forced to choose between them and our mission. And while I'd give anything to get them back, I still made that choice. So just watch yourself. Being friendly and trusting, even with someone who just spilled her heart out like me, isn't magic. And even if I don't bite you for it, you mark my words someone else will."

I raised an eyebrow. "But you want to be better than that?"

"Of course." Leif shrugged. "Who plays the part of villain because they enjoy it? There's always another reason."

I stretched. "Welp. I've already gotten burned a hundred times. Might as well take my next risk on someone who's at least got a reason to be friendly. Partners?"

Leif nodded. "Partners."

That settled it. Someone in Ironridge, finally, whom I felt like I could trust... more than Cold Karma, at least. I let out a breath of relief.

Now all we had to do was get-

My ears picked up a faint shimmering sound moments before a shadow fell over me, and I looked up. It was Coda's airship, in the middle of circling the city.

Leif craned her neck to look, and so did I. And then a lift detached from the side of the ship, lowering itself on a rope to meet us. Standing in the middle was a fat, familiar pegasus.

"Hoi there," Howe greeted with a curious salute. "Her majestic smallness and all those titles sends her regards, spotted you here, and wants to know, dudes: need a lift?"

The Power of Love

I looked out at the cone of heat rising from the Ironridge crater as the airship lift carried me up, a curious Howe and an unconscious Corsica and a wary Leitmotif sharing the small platform. It shimmered against the clear sky, beautiful and deadly, a city of thousands sprawling below.

How could I reconcile everything Leif had just told me with this? All the intrigue and changelings and windigoes and wars, her having been a real batpony once and me being an unawakened changeling, Yakyakistan preparing to break the truce and mount an invasion... It answered so many of my questions, put to rest so many confusing observations and things that didn't add up, finally gave me a truth I could hold onto instead of grasping at shadows. And yet, looking out over the crater, I saw none of it. It was invisible, not real.

What I saw was a city that was struggling not to burn alive, and yet was massive, the product of centuries and generations of hard work and ponies living their lives.

The kinds of things I was worrying about, changeling bishops and magic bracelets and power vacuums and secret conspiracies, they just... It didn't feel like they needed to be real for the world to be complete. The ponies in that crater surely had rich, complex enough lives as it was, things to struggle for and against. If there was any sort of cosmic balance in the universe, Ironridge didn't need a conspiracy in order to exist.

An intense feeling of wistfulness washed over me, and for a moment I wondered if everything I had done so far, all the problems I ran into, were all in my head. And then the lift docked, and I remembered I was on the airship of a child goddess who looked to me for guidance and was being raised by a portable cult to commit matricide with a power that was likely far too weak to do the job.

I sighed. Coda, Leitmotif, Ironridge, and most of all me all deserved better.

"Are you sure about this?" Leif whispered quietly in my ear, Corsica propped between us - after that rest, she was about as capable as I was. "You know what I just told you about this place."

"Are you unsure about it?" I quietly asked back. "You made it sound like it was more... I mean... We're not exactly swimming in options, here."

Leif stiffened her shoulders. "I'll be fine. Just making sure you're paying attention."

Howe listened curiously, but didn't press, focusing instead on fastening the lift into place. The main lounge of the airship awaited us, its lights turned off yet well-lit anyway from a wide window in the side. All the altar curtains had been drawn back, and a lone cleric was cleaning them. Nobody else was in sight.

"Well? Welcome to the show, dudes," Howe greeted, sweeping a wing and gesturing for us to make ourselves comfortable. "It's not exactly the busiest place during the day, since most everyone's asleep. Which is what the Howenator was doing before her tiny majesty woke him up to go nab you, by the way, so excuse him if he's gonna go pass out..."

"Hold on," I said, stopping him. "What are you even doing here, anyway? On this ship?"

Howe shrugged. "Ol' Howe works many jobs, little mare. This one just happens to have the coziest place for him to crash."

I looked around at the relative opulence of the airship and remembered the sea of griffon gold stashed beneath the hull. Really, if someone let me live in a place like this, I'd probably take the offer in a heartbeat.

"So are we going somewhere?" Leif asked, sounding a little groggier than when we had been talking down below - I had a hunch it was an act, to make herself sound weaker than she was. "Or are you taking us back to Dead Herman?"

Howe shrugged. "Feel free to ask Coda. She was the one who stopped us, and I recall a certain memberino of your team is always welcome in her lair. Tip from a pro, though, dudes: it's the middle of the day. We have real pegasus-down beds. And you three look sadder than a flat Sosan ale. So unless you've got somewhere you need to be in a hurry, if the Howenator was you, he'd take the good fortune while you have it."

"Tempting," Leif grunted, helping me get Corsica into a chair and then settling into one herself. She gave me a nod, as if to say I should go see Coda and make sure we weren't about to get caught up in anything.

And so I did, pushing through the curtains in the tunnel to her throne room at the stern. Nobody stopped me, at least, and I assumed that was where the young queen would be... although a strange thought occurred to me that if Coda was running her changeling queen-detector spell during the day, and collecting prayers of the faithful at night, then when did she sleep?

I stepped through the final curtain, and my question had an answer.

The wall across from the throne had collapsed and folded out, and there was now a posh, double-king four-poster where empty floor space had once reigned. It was a fold-away, and yet it was the most opulent bed I had ever seen, to a mind-boggling degree. You'd think in an airship this big, someone could have given Coda her own bedroom, but no, here she was, tucked in and laying on her back with her forehooves poking out over the blankets, eyes closed and slumbering softly, wisps of a half-formed aura running up and down her horn.

I blinked. I tilted my head. I held my breath and came closer. She... really looked like she was sleeping...

"Who goes there?" Coda's voice said from somewhere behind me.

I jumped and spun around, letting out a yelp of surprise, and yet there was no one there.

"Speak with your mouth if you are present, creature," Coda's voice authoritatively urged, and now I was all but certain it was coming from nowhere. "Or is your great goddess being boondoggled by phantasms of the day?"

"I'm here," I said, incredibly confused. "What are you doing?"

"No response?" Coda's voice echoed. "A ghostly specter indeed, then. You've done well to fool a princess, I commend you on that. I take it you are a trick, perhaps, conjured by the two travelers in the other room I did deign to rescue? A light movement of the curtains that guard my room, conjured by fell magics to make me think I had a visitor?"

I stared, clueless, at the peacefully-slumbering filly, a small smile on her lips.

"Oh! Erm..." Suddenly, the pitch of phantom Coda's voice was different, the way I might make mine be if I was talking for a sock puppet. "I'm no phantom! I'm Halcyon! Yes, that's why your magic can't see me!"

I had even less of a clue.

"Ah! Princess Halcyon the Garbed!" Coda's voice went back to normal, sounding immeasurably pleased. "When I bade my henchpony save those silly, stranded travelers, I hadn't imagined you might be in their company! Ah, I suppose every good deed must be rewarded, for I am bored and a chat with you might do me a world of good. Tell me, fellow goddess, how did you and your minions come to be in such a predicament? Most mortals I observe from on high do not venture unto that vast plane of stone."

"Well, that's kind of a long-" I started.

"It was fascinating," Coda interrupted, in what I was pretty sure by now was supposed to be a facsimile of my voice. "We got lost! Because that's a thing you can do in the real world, when you don't have goddess powers to know where everything is!"

I sat down in bafflement.

"For truth?" Coda's voice was once again her own. "The plight of the common folk never ceases to expand my own horizons. I have heard of this phenomenon from the myriad worshipers who offer me their love, albeit never done it myself. As an all-knowing goddess, such an experience is impossible for me. Which is quite paradoxical when you think about it, is it not? Can one truly be all-knowing if the state of knowing everything renders one unable to know what it is like to not know something?"

Her voice changed to 'mine' again. "Philosophy? That is one of my areas of expertise. What would you like to learn, Coda?"

Once again, it was back to her own. "...Actually, I would impose upon you with a secret," she whispered. "You can keep a secret, right?"

Instinctively, I nodded, feeling a little surreal. That glow on Coda's horn... Was she using a unicorn spell to sleep-talk? While dreaming, and narrating her dream in real-time? A dream about me coming to visit?

"Excellent," Coda's voice breathed. "I have, indeed, never gotten lost. And my clergy impress upon me daily the doctrine that I am all-wise and all-knowing. But consider this: I have never left this airship, and by their own lack of losing their way, I suspect it is small enough that a mortal mind could memorize all the rooms and hallways just as I have. Ironridge, meanwhile, is so huge that even this airship takes much time to circle it in its entirety. Considered in its entirety, I believe this evidence means I, too, could get lost were I to wander the world of mortals on the surface."

I didn't know what to say.

"It's so boring, being fawned over as my faithful are wont to do," Coda went on, her voice a bare whisper. "You must keep this a secret from my clergy, as they would never understand. And I could not in good conscience tell them my holy mission does not sit at the forefront of my mind day in and day out, may it ever fill me with purpose. But they tell me failings such as losing my way are ills native to the mortal world, and that as a goddess, it is my right to exist above them. But you are a princess too, and you lost your way, did you not? Tell me, was it really so bad? Or was it exciting? You are unique because you are a creature I cannot predict. And nothing could be more unpredictable than to find yourself in an unknown land, bereft of waypoints, with choices to make that actually matter and countless outcomes none of which you know about..."

Part of me thought I shouldn't be listening to this. Another part of me reminded me that, technically, she thought she was telling this to me anyway.

"Mmh... It's no use..." Coda struggled briefly in her sleep and rolled over. "I am sorry, Princess Halcyon. No matter how I try to conjure you as a figment of my imagination, you remain yet under my control. A discussion of my presumptions and perceptions about the surface holds no meaning when the you in my mind exists purely to validate my inner speculations. But you can neither surprise me nor prove me wrong. I will inevitably call you back later, and do so enjoy these daily chats of ours, but I just... No. I must succeed in my duty and stop my mother. And then you can show me the surface you tell me so much about."

Her little smile had been replaced by a little frown.

That was it. I climbed onto the bed and crawled across - it was far too big for me to reach without doing so - and poked her on the horn.

Coda flinched, then twitched, then shifted, her half-aura going out and her eyes blearily trying to look around. They settled on me.

"Errr..." I started.

Coda moved all at once, lunging forward and glomping onto my chest in a tight hug, knocking both of us out of the bed.

"Woah!" I tried to get some hooves beneath me, the giant filly clinging on tightly, somehow not triggering my usual aversion to being touched. "Sorry if I woke you up. You, like, err, I mean..." I looked down at her. She wasn't letting go. "Are you alright? Not that I mind, but I've only met you twice..."

Eventually, Coda did let me go, sitting back and rubbing her tired little eyes. "Forgive my outburst and sudden loss of control. I was having a very familiar dream, and..." She squinted, then blinked a few more times. "I truly did sense you enter my chambers. That was you, listening to everything I said."

I nodded.

"Shame ill-befits a goddess," Coda yawned. "You must be... dreadfully confused... My, but it must still be high noon in the middle of the day..."

"You can talk during your dreams," I guessed. "And use magic. And dream lucidly, or something?"

Coda nodded, wobbling slightly. "See, I knew you were a goddess. You understand... Even some of my clergy, I have given up explaining it to, and they merely accept it as things their mortal minds are too small to... to contain." She yawned again, bigger this time, her ears folding so far back their tips almost touched together. "Although my body rests, my powers remain ever active. It is rather like how I feel in the waking world, except I am a ghost, and can only interact using magic. A perfect time for scanning for changeling queens... though because you resist my magic, apparently you are invisible to my dreams, as well."

"That's crazy," I said, noting again how tired she looked. "I can... sort of relate? My dreams aren't normal either. But should I let you rest, though?"

"Perish the thought," Coda muttered, straightening a rumpled patch on her coat. "In sleep, I have even less to do than in the waking world. Since you are here, I must not let this opportunity go to waste."

I tilted my head. "You want to talk to me that badly?"

"You did glean the meaning of the monologue upon which you eavesdropped, did you not?" Coda yawned yet again. "Your loving goddess is bored. It was always so, and coming to meet you has only shown her ever so much of the world of mortals that she is missing out on. Behold: do something unexpected. Your princess commands it."

I had a hunch that no matter what I did, it wouldn't change the direction of this conversation.

"See?" Coda pointed a wing at me. "You did nothing. Perhaps not entirely original, but not something I could predict because you are immune to my royal ability to feel the emotions of my subjects. In fact, I already explained this to you ere last we met, and the fact that I must do so again concisely proves my point. Do you understand how?"

"Might as well just spill it," I said. "I like you, kid, but I've honestly had a pretty big day and don't really have a lot of brain power left for pretty much anything until I get some sleep."

Coda tapped her forehooves in glee. "I knew it! You see, you forgot about me, wise and magnanimous and unforgettable though my clergy insist that I am. The finer details of our conversations have slipped your mind because, as inspiring as I am, I cannot compete with the happenings of the surface for mastery of your thoughts. And thus your life is enviable and I, a goddess who should be denied nothing, am inexplicably missing out."

"That's a whole lotta words to say you're bored and tired of being shut up in here," I told her, wondering exactly how bad of an idea it would be to let this filly meet Corsica and Leif. "You don't need to come up with a big long logical proof for it to be true. It's just the way ponies are. We get bored when we're understimulated, and tired when we're overstimulated. Looking at you, you've never known the latter, though believe me you can very much have too much of a good thing."

Coda glared at me, a light of challenge in her eyes, daring me to tell a story and put some evidence to that last point. It was a hungry glare, less like a changeling queen who had been magically stuffed full of emotion and more like a child who had been given far too little.

I made up my mind. Leif was working for me now, so she could just deal with Coda, and if she tried to pull anything, she'd have to answer to me. And somehow I had become a figure that Coda glommed onto upon waking up from a lonely dream, so I was pretty sure I could talk Coda down if she tried anything, too. And given that I was now in it deep with both of them, it would be better for them to get comfortable with each other in a safe setting where nothing was exploding and I could arbitrate free from distractions.

"Come on, then," I said, beckoning her along. "Let's go let you look at my friends. They're pretty beaten up, though, and your magical mind-reading isn't gonna tell you they think it's entirely a good thing."

And, all better reasons aside, I was just too tired to do the mental gymnastics of interpreting Coda's flowery speech in real time while I was alone.

When we entered back into the lobby, Corsica was still passed out. Leif saw me and my charge, and gave me a look that was surprised, wary and resolute. But she didn't resist as we got closer.

"Oh my..." Coda frowned, lighting her horn as we crossed the room. "These two are your own devoted followers, then? I could not detect it from afar, but they are not in perfect health, at all."

"You think?" I shrugged. "Leif, this is Coda. Coda, this is Leitmotif. Just figured it might probably be better if-"

"I do think," Coda said, her voice solemn. "These two bear the unmistakable emotional signs of being fed on by changelings."

I blinked. Leif, that was probably because she was a changeling and had overused her own powers, but Corsica? Fed on by changelings? How, and when?

"Don't worry yourself about it," Leif said, visibly uncomfortable. "I know what I know."

Coda scrutinized her. "You are skilled at leveling your emotions, mystery mare, but I can tell that you fear me. Know, however, that I am an avatar of goodness and life, and may possess the means to heal your ills."

"What's that entail?" I asked, stepping in. "What do you mean, fed on by changelings?"

Coda nodded. "All beings are endowed with a capacity to care about things and show them emotion, such as love and anger, and that capacity burns like a flame. To have feelings of any kind for another is to give them that emotion that you feel, an act that has both a mental component and a metaphysical one. Such is the mechanism by which the prayers of the faithful become my own power, you see. Now, in many cases, experiencing emotions and giving those emotions to another is a self-perpetuating cycle, because investing your emotions in a thing causes you to care about it more and have more emotions to feel, and it is because of this cycle that ponies are able to give and give without burning themselves down to cinders. Other emotions can create an opposite cycle, in which feeling them tires you out. Which emotions do which depends on your personality. For example, for one pony, the act of hating something might cause them to hate it more. But for another, it might wear them out. And everyone gets tired sometimes, but you always have rest and relaxation and being shown care by others to help rekindle your flame, do you not?"

I stared at her. How could someone so clueless about so many basic facets of life be able to describe something like that in so much detail? I wasn't sure how right she was, especially since my mind worked differently from every other pony's, but she clearly at least had reason to believe herself an expert.

"This flame is indeed precious to mortals," Coda went on. "It is why the act of willingly sharing their prayers with me makes my own faithful so special. Tragically, a certain evil queen, odious is her personality, has difficulty attracting devout followers to fuel her powers, and thus she must take those emotional energies by force. 'Tis a sad duty that all her drones are forced to carry out, and the result is a supernatural weariness of the soul, for your flame has burned low independent of your own actions."

I stared at Corsica. Her special talent... She told me it came at the price of her ability to care about things. Whatever it was, however it worked, it was powered by her emotional energy in the same way a changeling queen was?

In the same way Leif's transformation magic was, assuming that was what had happened to her.

"The good news is, a generous practitioner of such magics might just as easily use her powers to reverse the change," Coda proclaimed, "sparing the downtrodden days of recovery for costs they did not wish to spend. This is particularly fortunate for our sarosian friend, who experiences the effects of drainage not as a mere weariness of the soul, but a physical one upon her body, for reasons that are yet a mystery to me."

"You don't have to dance around it," Leif said, watching her. "I know you're a changeling queen, and I don't need to be beholden to your hive. I overdid it on the transformations, but it's nothing I haven't recovered from before."

"Beholden to..." Coda's brow scrunched in confusion. "You mean to say that you are a changeling?"

Leif stared at her. "You mean you can't tell?"

"Fascinating," Coda muttered. "I had imagined Mother's emissaries to be much more formless and sinister. Yet you have your own thoughts and emotions, and are not merely a conduit funneling to and from a master. Such is the uncanny difference that I mistook you for an ordinary mortal. In fact, my powers are so insistent that you are one, I am having trouble finding a difference at all."

Leif watched her suspiciously.

"The existence of thinking, feeling changelings is known to me, of course," Coda went on. "But you are still the first one I have met in person. I must admit, this is unexpected. Though I suppose it does explain your condition..." She rubbed her chin. "Are you quite sure you do not wish to partake of divine love to replenish yourself? As a goddess, the loss of a single pony's worth of love would be of little consequence to me, and it was indeed for worthy purposes like this that I collected it."

Leif glanced at me. "How... badly do you need me back in action? She's not lying about what she can do. Not that I have any choice in what she does, of course."

"The Princess of Love gives you a choice, mortal," Coda piously proclaimed, holding her chin high. "Repayment is appreciated, but never required."

"Thanks," Leif grunted. "So magnanimous."

Coda glanced at me. "This one certainly believes she has little need for gods."

"Not everyone does." I shrugged, then glanced at Leitmotif. "How long do you think you need? To get back on your hooves on your own. We've got all the stuff you told me about, and I've got my own reasons to go fast, but I'm kinda tired and need to rest, myself."

"I'll manage," Leif said. "On my own. Thanks."

I shook my head, wondering what possibly could have made her that way. As much as she had told me down on the plateau, there had to be so much more to her...

"And what of this one?" Coda asked, moving on to Corsica. "She is so deeply drained as to have passed out! Depending on her resilience, coming back from this normally may be a rather grumpy endeavor, and that's provided you remove her from the offending changeling. Which I hope is not you?" She glanced back at Leif. "Unless she is a changeling too..."

Leif gave me a questioning look. "Do you know why she's drained?"

"She's not a changeling, I do know why, and there's not too much to do about it," I said, hoping I was guessing rightly about this being her talent at play and she wasn't also getting fed on by a hostile changeling at the same time. "And she... might appreciate having a boost. If she doesn't like me speaking for her, she can wake up and slap me herself."

"Very well, then!" Coda reared up. "Behold the power of love!"

Her horn lit with a blackish-pink flame, and a thin haze of energy seemed to hover around Corsica before dissipating into mist.

Corsica stirred.

"Unnngh..." She stirred harder, her head writhing against the back of the chair like she was trying to get something unstuck from her mane. "Nggh... What the..." Her eyes flew open. "Ew! What happened to me!? Eww!"

"Corsica?" I reached out a guilty hoof.

"I feel like a rube!" Corsica moaned, complaining loudly. "Like a flake! It's not supposed to work this way! What happened? Euggh, I need a cold shower..."

I repeated her name.

"Halcyon?" She squinted at me. "Where are we? What happened to..."

"You have been restored by the power of love!" Coda proudly declared. "All your ills can be at ease now... except you don't feel very at ease." She turned to me with a stern look. "Tell me, Princess Halcyon, why doth your minion complain so?"

Leif blinked at me in bewilderment. "Princess?"

"Long story, not actually meaningful," I told her, pushing back Coda with a wing and focusing on Corsica. "Are you alright? What happened?"

"My brain feels sleazy," Corsica groaned, holding a hoof to her forehead. "Like I somehow lost all my strength of character..." She focused on Coda. "Who are you, and what's going on here?"

Coda straightened her posture. "I am Coda, Princess of Love, trouncer of evil, basher of corruption, she who smites injustice and spiders because they're gross. And you are a favored mortal who has just been healed of grievous emotional injury by the power of love. Given your ordeal, I can understand if you do not immediately rejoice, but there's no need to be this stingy with the praise..."

"An alicorn?" Corsica focused on her wings and horn. She glanced at me. "Wait, so this is your..." She glanced back at Coda. "Are you the reason I'm currently thinking about... you know!?"

Coda started to look confused, and maybe a little worried. "Of course I am. You had passed out from being fed on by a changeling-"

"No, from pushing your emotions too hard," I interrupted. "You know what I mean."

"Whatever," Coda interrupted. "Naturally, a loving goddess could not leave you in such a despondent state, so I took it upon myself to fill the hole in your heart with naught but the purest of holy love. It did work, right? Your goddess has not had the most frequent chances to practice, although it is simple in theory..."

Corsica levelly met her eyes. "You did this to me? You dumped these 'emotions' into my head?"

Coda sighed. "Mortals do love making me repeat myself. You aren't satisfied?"

Corsica didn't look away. "You earnestly believe this is love?"

Coda blinked. "What kind of question is that? As the Princess of Love, I am an authority on what constitutes-"

"You poor, corrupted soul," Corsica interrupted, shaking her head. "I wish I wasn't feeling this way anymore."

For a second, Coda looked peeved, and then utterly gobsmacked. "What? But... How did that happen? You just went from full to..." She stared at me. "What happened to the love I..."

"Get flexed on." Corsica slouched her way over to me, looking limp and exhausted. "And don't worry about it. Just don't touch my mind with that again. Hallie? I'm going to live with not knowing whether you okayed her doing that."

"She-" Coda started to say, before Corsica's horn lit and her aura clamped down around her muzzle. Her cheeks scrunched in frustration.

"Just lemme hibernate for a day, keep her from doing that again, and we'll call it even. 'Kay?" Corsica slumped her way over, not giving the princess a second look.

I nodded. "Deal. In fact, I think we all need to get some sleep. It's the middle of the day, and this place is probably safer than anywhere else we're going to go. Right?"

Leif managed to nod. Corsica was too tired to follow suit, but the sentiment was overwhelming.

"But..." Coda protested, slipping her telekinetic bonds. "You're going to waste this rare time with your princess in the throes of slumber?"

"Yup," I said, noting her own baggy eyes. "And so are you. We all need it."

"Even though we could be talking of the surface, or something so much more engaging?" A hint of desperation entered Coda's voice. "I don't... Sleep is..."

"Yup," I repeated. "Sleep isn't something you ignore, especially when you've been up as long and done as much as we have."

Coda blinked, then hardened her voice. "If you rest when there is so much to be done, then so too shall I, Princess Halcyon the Garbed. No more scanning for the day! Is this the example you would set for your eager princess?"

"Yup," I told her once again. "Work's important, but you need a break even more than anyone. And if you got it through your head that you don't actually need to be crewing this ship around the clock, casting spells and listening to prayers, maybe you'd have time to leave this place and do something more interesting with your life."

"Fie, the voice of temptation..." Coda drooped. "You have my weak spot firmly in your grasp. I hope you know what you are doing, worldly equal of mine. Much as I dare to hope your words might be true, 'twould then be on both of our heads were the dereliction of my duties to let catastrophe ensue. No work for today, it is."

And then she left, going back to her own quarters, leaving me unsure how to feel.

She wouldn't be able to fight what was coming, I knew it for certain. Not only had I seen and felt the weakness of her power firsthoof, but Corsica rejected it as not the real thing, as well. She could try, of course, but she would certainly lose and fail. And the best thing I could do for her would be to do as Lilith wanted and free her from this duty. But something was coming. All my own observations spoke to confusion and high tensions throughout the city, and Leif warned me of the form it would take: windigoes, and a war.

Come to think of it, Leif had given me a strange request as well, asking if I could know about the coming war without being compelled to stop it. Seeing it from that side of the table, it was hard for me to grasp what she was saying, or more importantly why she was saying it. If there was good I could do, why wouldn't I? I was a good pony. It was my duty.

But what Leif was asking of me was exactly the same thing I was asking of Coda. Trying to take someone whose job it wasn't and get them out of harm's way.

I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and pondered what I should do.

Blood On Her Hooves

"Huh," Mother said, chewing slowly at a wad of bubblegum. "Figured you would have flown the coop ages ago. Why now?"

My ears twitched, and I took a deep breath. "Maybe I'm just ready. But also because Elise and Graygarden say it's a better time than usual. There's a griffon called Gerardo who flew into town. An old friend of Elise's. He gave them some intel, and might be persuadable to give me and Corsica and Ansel a ride out."

Mother looked lazily intrigued. "He's still alive? Gerardo Guillaume?"

"You know him?" I leaned in, curious. "From the Empire?"

"Friend of a friend of a friend," Mother grunted. "Didn't see him much. Always thought he was a buffoon. Must have wizened up since those days if he's not kicked it yet."

"A buffoon?" I frowned. "Does that mean you don't want me going with him?"

Mother continued our conversation, and I watched, letting my past self speak for me. This wasn't a day I needed the help of dreams to remember: sitting on the couch of our bigger, post-Aldebaran apartment, still in Icereach. The day, or perhaps the day before, I left for Ironridge. My nineteenth birthday.

Not even a month ago. And half of that month had been spent on an airship, flying from Icereach.

It felt like a lifetime.

In my mind, I reached a hoof out, grasping for the past. My hopes and wishes, the way I had felt back then, all those thoughts and feelings were brought so close by my dream... Fear and uncertainty, yet there was hope and wonder in the uncertainty too. This was a day when I grew, stretched my wings, tested shackles that had been decaying for months around my limbs and tried to remove them once and for all.

I remembered yearning for the horizon, for Ironridge, for things I didn't know. I remembered the light spirit, and my quest to understand the miracles that saved me six months prior - coincidences that were too contrived to be anything but fate. I remembered my wish to hunt down Aldebaran and find meaning in our ordeal, the stifling confines of Icereach's walled-off academia, my fear at taking a chance yet willingness to gamble that the future could be brighter.

And in the last few days, how far I had come.

Once again, I was on an airship with Leitmotif, and this time, I had all the answers. I knew why Aldebaran had come, why Icereach was closed off, the truth about changelings and what was waiting for me in Ironridge. I saw the vastness of Ironridge, and now understood that it was the same as Icereach, only at scale: a bigger city meant more schemes, more lies, more things done for purposes that ordinary folk knew nothing about.

In my quest to understand, to keep my head above the water and become able to read what was truly going on, I was finally succeeding. I might not have plumbed the deepest depths of the city's secrets, but I knew more than countless others. I had learned to stop jumping at shadows, to stop freezing up at the possibility of my past traumas being repeated. I had practiced and strengthened my pragmatism, setting and achieving real, consequential goals like rescuing Leitmotif, and working toward others like protecting Coda. But, looking at myself like this, on the day I decided to set out and the reasons I decided to do it, I had lost something, too.

My excitement.

I was trying to help Coda because I cared for her. I helped Leitmotif because I thought it was right. I was trying to uncover Cold Karma's web of schemes as an act of self-preservation. But even when I succeeded in my original goals, the ones I held starting out, like finding a meaning to the Aldebaran incident, it didn't happen because I was playing detective with that as my goal. Leif just... told me. After I saved her for unrelated reasons.

Now, Leif had a vested interest in helping me get down to the ether river beneath Ironridge, and it might actually happen. But I hadn't taken any steps toward going there myself, not of my own volition. My passion had bled dry, too many other things like getting arrested or trying not to fall in with the wrong crowd sapping my attention and energy and time. If we did get down there - and between our combined competency and abilities, I had a hunch it would eventually happen - it wouldn't be because of my thirst for answers. I still had my old need to know things, but now it was a matter of survival. And that made it no longer fun.

The light spirit? Unnrus-Kaeljos? I had two other versions of myself floating around in my head who knew much more about it than me. And I hadn't even asked them or pressed the subject. What if I was still blessed? What if I was still supernaturally lucky? The miracles that saved me during the Aldebaran incident... What if that same power was keeping me safe down in Lilith's school, was the reason I had walked in and out and just gotten what I wanted without a plan or a price?

All that could still be happening. And yet the price of everything I had been through in Ironridge, the price of staying much more functional and on my hooves that last time, was that I no longer had the capacity to care to find out. I just didn't have the energy. The resources. The time.

One day, I promised myself, looking out at the humble interior of what was, until a month ago, my new home. One day I would leave, fly away from Ironridge and keep exploring, and it would all be different. One day I would leave these pressures behind, carry everything I cared about on my back and try again, and one day I would find the kind of wonders this younger version of me left home to chase.

I couldn't find it within me to be excited by the prospect right now, but the me in the dream did. I could just do what she would do, right? If there was one thing I had a talent for, it was acting like other ponies.

"It's just power," Mother said, the conversation having moved on to my bracelet. "It does what you need. Strength. Stamina. Hurting things you attack. Blunting things that hurt you. Usually all at once. I could never focus it well. Felt like a beast struggling at its chains. I'm surprised you don't know this, wearing it every minute of every day. You already control it well enough to use it for light. Shouldn't need me to explain all this."

"Where did you get it?" the me in the dream asked, after an extended moment of thought.

"Stole it." Mother shrugged. "Sometimes you have to do what it takes to stay alive. Other times, you have to do what it takes to live with yourself after you survive. This was the latter. Either way, it's yours now."

Imagine if the light spirit had nothing to do with it. I didn't understand how this bracelet worked. What if the miracles I kept meeting with were because of it, all along?

Not like I had any evidence to back that up. I could trace its history back to Mother, and then, the trail went cold.

Of course, I didn't know much about fate, either. And the bracelet did have powers. Even if I was wrong, how bad would it be to put two and two together and trust in the bracelet as the thing that kept protecting me?

It probably wouldn't change a thing, whether I did or not. But as long as I didn't use it, as long as I never fully explored or understood the depths of how it worked, I could always choose to believe.

Heh. Despite everything, I was still me. Still working ever to understand things, yet paradoxically eager to trust in the unknown.

"Let's go see those yaks," Mother said. "How long have I got until we leave?"

Dream me stopped in surprise. "Wait, we leave? You're coming with us?"

Mother gave me a look. "Am I not invited?"

"Well..." I fidgeted. "We were going to ask Gerardo if we could hitch a ride on his ship..."

Unbidden, I remembered the last thing Mother said to me, as we finished packing our bags and left for the surface: Knock 'em dead, kiddo. Try not to get in too much trouble. And once I've got my muscle mass back, I'll be right behind you.

I awoke, my chest tense, Coda's airship humming around me. Mother wanted to follow us into this mess... But she was already in it. Icereach was to be the first staging ground for Yakyakistan's invasion, Leif told me. Maybe Mother would come here, make good on her promise and follow me, and get caught up in everything that was going on now. Maybe Icereach would close itself off to foreigners, as Gerardo had warned me was happening, and she would have to leave before she was ready. Maybe Yakyakistan would make the first move, and she would somehow be subsumed into their new empire.

What did I do with this realization? I took a few deep breaths, and no answer came to me. But I knew one thing for sure: this was happening because I moved, uprooted myself and went to Ironridge. I left behind someone I cared about, and now, events far beyond my reach were going to threaten that.

This was why I wanted to carry my home on my back. If I had an airship of my own, Mother could have just... come with. Whether this situation was a passing fear or a serious problem, it wouldn't be here if I hadn't had to leave her behind.

Sleep didn't return. In fact, now that I had realized a concrete way the coming war might hurt me or things I cared about, it only got farther away the more I dwelt on them. My mind demanded a plan, a contingency, but half-formed thoughts and ideas were all I could get. Maybe I could find Garsheeva, then get Coda to give me that airship, then fly west and go looking for Mother back in Icereach? Now that I thought about abruptly leaving, I realized how many unfinished plans that would leave me here. What would Leif do? What about Coda? Or my friends? Would the city itself be alright?

...Leif asked me not to get involved, not to feel like I would be responsible for its well-being if I knew what was coming. I knew she had a point. But it would take no small amount of effort not to flunk that request.

I got to my hooves, rolling free from the very comfortable bed, and decided to give myself a tour of the ship. Not like I wasn't a welcome guest...

My cabin, roughly the size of my small, old bedroom, had no windows and opened out into a hallway along the starboard side of the ship. The hallway was lined with windows, wide enough that a group of ponies could stand around chatting and someone could slip past them without too much trouble, and I looked out to see the sun approaching sunset across the Ironridge crater, the heat causing it to ripple like a reflection in water.

To my right, the hallway connected with the ship's main lounge, which I knew to hold stairways to the second floor. To the left, it curved around toward the prow, past another cabin and into a windowed viewing lounge, where my hooves carried me.

A mare I hadn't seen before was there, looking out at the Aldenfold as the sunset washed the wood floor in deep golden browns. She had a short, pink mane and a mid-gray coat, batpony wings and a special talent that looked like an ear listening to a vibrating line.

"I don't recognize the sound of your hoofsteps," she said, not turning to look at me. "You're one of the visitors we picked up today?"

Her voice was soft. A little too soft, as if something had crushed it and it never quite recovered. I couldn't put my hoof on it, but something about her was... different from other ponies. Maybe it was that she was a real batpony, rather than a unicorn in a costume like the rest of Coda's clergy.

"Yeah," I said, nodding even though her gaze was fixed out the window. "Name's Halcyon. You?"

"I am Nyala," she said. "I've lived here for some time. You are the one Coda refers to as a princess, then."

I hesitated. "You don't call her any of the honorifics and stuff? And, er, yeah? I am."

"I have the privilege of not needing to," Nyala softly said. "I imagine you..."

She turned toward me and trailed off. If I had been the one talking, I would have done the same.

Nyala had three eyes. Two of them were normal, meek and sky-blue. But in the middle of her forehead was a third, golden and alive, so much more vertical than any pupil I had seen before that its slit was wider at the top and bottom than in the middle.

My heart thumped loudly in my chest.

The eye didn't blink or change.

"I-I'm sorry," Nyala said, hurriedly getting up, looking at me like I was a ghost. "I have to go..."

She hurried swiftly away, leaving me too stunned to move.

What... Was that a drawing? A sigil? It couldn't have been real. I must have been hallucinating, or-

"If I'm hallucinating, the look on your face says it's not just me," Procyon said, floating up through the floorboards. "Any idea what it means? Or why she ran away from you?"

I glanced at her. "You've got none, then?" I whispered.

She shook her head. "Not a clue."

Before I could put together anything else to say, Howe poked his head around the corner. "Oh, it's you! Her honorable ladyship back there came flying out like we'd been boarded by the pirate king Rhodallis himself! You see what spooked her?" He glanced shiftily around. "Not to knock your mojo, dudette, but you look a little spooked yourself."

"I... err..." I unfroze like a key clunking around in a rusty padlock. "Sanity check me. She doesn't have any weird or unusual features, does she? Nyala? The mare that was just here?"

Howe shrugged. "Well, having the hottest bod this side of Mistvale is pretty unusual, but ol' Howe's assuming you aren't talking about that?"

"Err, no?" I blinked, then relaxed. "I'm gonna take that as a no, then..."

Howe pursed his lips. "Mega weird. No pirates or poltergeists, then?"

"I think I was what spooked her," I admitted, feeling just as lost as I had been on my first day in Egdelwonk's office. "I found her here, and she was talking to me normally, and then when she saw me, she sprinted."

Howe scratched his butt. "Then the Howenator doesn't have a clue."

I shrugged. Neither did I.

"Who was she?" I asked, hoping that even if my apparently-supernatural questions couldn't be answered, mundane information would at least be available instead. "Nyala. You make her sound important."

"About as important as you can be around here," Howe said, wandering forward and causing a chair to groan in protest as he took a seat. "That majestic set of curves dressed up in the coat of a mortal mare is little Coda's mommy dearest, believe it or not."

I gaped. "She's Chrysalis? Get out."

Howe shook his head. "There's more to parenting than whose belly you hitched a ride in, my girl. Turns out that while evil monster queens aren't too good at raising their kids once they've had 'em, neither are cults. Someone had to get Coda from a lil' suckling babe to a not-so-little princess who can understand what her own cult has to teach, and it wasn't gonna be the cult."

My backwards ears fell. That made a whole lot more sense. I was adopted, after all, and I still thought of Mother as... well, my mother. "So Nyala was just there for the part that mattered?"

"You're talking like the part that matters is over," Howe remarked, looking out the window.

I didn't know what to say.

"Can ol' Howe give you some advice, dudette?" Howe raised an eyebrow, still not looking quite at me. "It ain't advice he gives too often, but it's good stuff."

"Shoot," I said.

Howe waved a wing. "Ponies have a funny way of getting stuck up on things that happened in the past. This here ship? Most everyone on it is caught up trying to right a wrong that happened before you can remember. A wrong they were complicit in, see. Maybe you've heard the story, but all these clergy, they used to be Griffon Empire scientists working for the mad fool who made Chrysalis into what she is today. And hey, better that they repent than continue down the path of evil darkness or apathy, right? But at some point, you gotta ask yourself, why are you doing this? And who are you doing it for?"

"They don't ask themselves that?" I questioned quietly.

"It's all well and good to try and rid the world of evil, of course," Howe went on. "Better goal than most of the cults the Howenator has crossed paths with. You want one that's messed up, just look at those clowns in the Night District. But where does it end, little dudette? Where does it end?"

"What do you mean?" I leaned forward, waiting.

"That kid they're worshiping..." Howe leaned back and sighed. "She's got real power, alright. And she's got blood on her hooves, insomuch as her existence was the catalyst that sent Chrysalis off the deep end... Way ol' Howe's heard it, the thing that finally broke her was seeing that filly for the first time. See, her lover at the time was a griffon noble - friendly fellow, if a little desperate - and so she thought her kid would be a griffon, seeing as batponies always breed true. Guess they didn't realize she'd been made into something not a batpony anymore. He thought she cheated on him. She couldn't explain it. And she'd had a pretty bad life up until that point anyway, and just... snapped. Two leafy ears and two leathery wings, a new baby bat no one knew at the time was a queen herself, and a spark that burned a continent to the ground."

As he was talking, my mind started to fog, and I found myself able to listen less and less. Something deep beneath my mask shifted, and an ancient fear threatened to rise like bile, warning me to get away. A wordless voice yelling, screaming desperately that these were dangerous words, words I needed not to hear.

I swallowed and forced it down, suddenly queasy. I was stronger than that. My curiosity was stronger than that, but more importantly, I was strong enough to bear whatever secrets the me under the mask wanted to keep hidden. And as desperate as she was to run, I was desperate to know why she wanted to run.

Howe kept talking. "So let ol' Howe ask you a question: that war might not have happened if not for her. And she has the power to do not everything, but a little something to put things back to rights... maybe. But how much responsibility does she have to do it? If Coda wants to make the world a better place, should she do it because it's her duty, or because she wants to? The Howenator's curious to hear your opinion, but from where he's looking, maybe it ain't the fairest thing, blaming the kid for something she had no control over. Or maybe fairness has nothing to do with it, and that's just the way the cards were dealt. What do you think?"

I swallowed again, beginning to feel a cold sweat coming on as I resisted the fear in my stomach. "Of course it's not fair. She shouldn't be on the hook for that solely because of the circumstances of her birth. That's what you're asking, right?"

"Ol' Howe figured you'd feel the same." Howe nodded. "There's a whole bunch of ponies in this world with grand ideas about what's right and wrong, but not so many who have the strength to back up their ideas. And far too many of the ones who can make a difference wouldn't put their money on the table without other folks dragging them into it. It starts out as a fine idea: let's raise this monster kid, give her a life that's better than her mother's, give her a chance to use her powers for good and all. The Howenator's been keeping tabs on this group for a while, and they're nothing if not dedicated. But, to be honest? He was sorta hoping they'd give up the crusade and settle down and live normal lives by now."

"You're going to ask me to look out for Coda, or something, aren't you?" I guessed, having a pretty good idea where this was going.

Howe winked. "A week or so you've known her and already she listens to you more than anyone else on this boat, especially yours truly. Like it or not, that's a pretty big responsibility, little dudette. But, hey. It's a chance to do some good in the world that's a lot more realistic than what she's trying to achieve with her holy war."

"Is there something concrete you're asking me to do?" I asked, my head still foggy. "Sorry, I... just woke up. I'm already her friend. If there's something you're hinting about, you'll just have to be explicit."

Howe sat up on his haunches, crossed his forelegs and sighed. "Alright. No fancy talk, I'll spell it out for you: Coda hasn't yet put two and two together that the reason her cult are setting her on this course has nothing to do with righteousness; it's to assuage their own guilty consciences. She hasn't put together that she's a means to an end for them and they don't have any plans past that. And she hasn't realized, or hasn't let herself realize, that the reason her own scriptures say she has to fight Chrysalis is because that calamity was her own fault, for existing. Whether it's true or fair or smart or not, they say it. Chrysalis didn't lose her marbles because she had a perfect upbringing, and the How... I'm worried that, provided she doesn't wind up dead in a ditch on the losing end of a changeling queen battle, Coda is not going to have a happy existence. And I'd be real grateful if she could get a bit more substance in her life before she realizes what everyone means when they say she's gotta do this to clean the blood off her hooves."

My hooves itched. Covertly, I shifted, edging open the cuff on one of my boots and peeking inside.

Red, from about the halfway point down. As if I had waded through a sea of blood.

My stomach churned.

"Y-yeah," I said, absent. "I'll... try to smuggle her out and show her the city, or something. That good?"

Howe flexed a flabby flex, apparently not noticing my indiscretion. "You move to the Howenator's groove, little mare. And if you ever wonder why he cares about this kid so much, just remember: her mom? Hottest bod this side of Mistvale. Ol' Howe may have had a teensy dalliance or two in ages long past. Not enough to count, but sometimes you can't blame a stallion for dreaming of what he never had."

I understood. "Coda can read emotions, can't she? How does she not know all this?"

Howe pulled a flat bottle of something dark out of his pocket and sloshed it around. "If you got a taste of this, think you could tell what it was? Bet you they didn't have it in Icereach."

I wasn't sure that was a bet I wanted to take. "Not if I've never had it before."

"Then same principle." Howe put the bottle away. "Doesn't matter if you can read the script when you don't know the words."

He lumbered away without fanfare, and my stomach slowly settled, leaving me cold and clammy. So, that was how Howe thought of Coda.

What it would be like to have someone doing the same for me?

I let out a sigh, the sun much closer to the horizon, beginning to scratch at the peaks of the mountains. What was wrong with me? Had I done something? No, what had I done? Why did I react that way to Howe talking about... about Coda being guilty for something that clearly wasn't her fault?

Was it the avalanche? Was there something still buried about that, repressed in my memories? If that was the point where Procyon had been torn free, then maybe...

"Look at her hooves," a raspy voice echoed in my mind, welling up from a memory I didn't remember. "It's like they're covered in blood..."

I ran back to my room, slammed the door, and locked myself inside.

"What," I panted, the lights on and my front two boots removed, "does this have to do... with me? Why do I feel this way? What did I do? And when? If it's that bad, let me know! Please... I can handle it..."

Procyon appeared beside me, wearing a frown.

I held up my forehooves for her to see, my question already on my lips.

Her hooves were colored too, though they looked more like dawn than sunset, let alone blood.

"You heard what Leif said," Procyon told me. "About all batponies being changelings. She said the form you take, in your natural state and before you can shapeshift, is tied to your talent and your identity. But your talent is to change, and we've changed our identities. Is it so much to imagine that the way you look now is not the way you looked at birth?"

"So I originally looked like you?" I asked. I had more or less assumed that before...

"The pony you think of as yourself has always looked like that," Procyon said, looking away. "But your body... back when it was my body... did look like this, originally. Yes. Our change wasn't so noticeable to the public because I, too, always wore clothes. Corsica never looked at you, the original Ansel is dead... Surely Mother knew, but I never asked her myself. But that's beside the point. The point is, we are a pony who has some manner of say over our own identity. Because of that, it's a reasonable assumption that you look the way you feel about yourself. In other words, you look the way you deserve to look, because you are the only pony who can say what it is that you deserve."

"But I don't understand why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling," I protested. "Where are these feelings coming from? I must have done something not that great, and Howe was reminding me of it, but what was it, and why can't I know?"

Procyon shook her head. "That is for me to know and for you to be free of."

"Do I look free of it?" I stared her in the eye, my voice quiet in case the walls were thin. "Help me out, here. I bet you anything the reason I have this taboo against ponies looking at my hooves is because the red is supposed to be a reminder of something I did, isn't it? But it's enough for it to be a reminder to me, and I don't need anyone else seeing some old shame I'm not even allowed to have for myself. Is that it? They're a mark for you and the other me to remember by, and they're there for no one else."

Procyon hesitated. "I was... not... a very nice pony. You were created to face the future, and have at last grown up enough to do it. You shouldn't dwell on the past. Or you will find things that were my fault, and not yours."

"We're the same person," I insisted. "Just... in different pieces, or something. Like it or not, your burdens are my burdens and mine are yours. So work with me just a little."

Howe's voice echoed in my mind, this time, talking about Coda and how Chrysalis wasn't really her fault, even if causality suggested she played a role. Was this the same?

"...I'm sorry," Procyon said, retreating into a wall. "If it turns out you somehow are strong enough to handle it, that would make me the weak one for trying to take the easy way out and disappear. And I don't think I'm strong enough to handle that."

I stretched a hoof out, unsure how to answer that. "Wait...!"

Too late. She was gone.

I no longer felt the fear. It was still there, a deep seed that had retreated to its old position, but was no longer buried. The barrier in my mind that separated from me and the other me was damaged, weakened. I could feel some things I hadn't felt before, and as I pried at those chips, a few more memories came to me.

It was a dream. One in which I was very young, or perhaps I just wasn't getting any visuals - but it felt like the dreams I did remember, the ones where my eyes were too new to focus and I had no control over my body. Those words I had heard... the raspy voice, my hooves being covered in blood... Those must have been spoken to me long, long ago. Long enough that dreams were the only way I could remember, even without my other selves interfering.

This was a bad dream, the kind I would wake up and take off my mask and erase from my conscious memory whenever they happened. I couldn't remember the full dream itself, but I was fairly confident that, if I dreamed it again, this time it would stick with me.

I wasn't sure whether that excited or frightened me. But I felt like I was ready. I had weathered all my impulses to run while talking with Howe. I could face the others' fears. Seeing Procyon back away like that just filled me with determination to see it done. Whatever this terrible secret in our past was, I had a hunch it was at the heart of everything, the reason I couldn't just go on living as one pony with a normal, complete brain. I would learn what was in our past, and I would show them that I could go on living.

...And maybe, if Howe was right about Coda and she did eventually realize that her cult was predicated on blaming her for the circumstances of her birth, I could be an example to show her the way. But it was best not to get ahead of myself. I had to find the way, first.

I took a breath and steadied myself. Maybe I would see if my friends were up... Or actually, maybe I would go and talk to Howe again. By this point, I was all but certain I trusted him. More than most other potential confidantes, at least.

If he wanted me to help out the filly he saw as his daughter, I could do with a little help first for me.

Princess Coda's Grand Adventure

I moved to the door of my cabin, running over my plans in my mind. I wanted to protect Mother from Yakyakistan's invasion, but didn't see that I had any tools to do so at my disposal. I had to keep an eye on Leitmotif, though I was reasonably sure she wouldn't betray me again at this point - especially if I kept trying to reach the Ironridge ether river, which was also on my to-do list. I didn't have the heart to think about where I would get the time or space to do any actual core sample analysis to further our research should that first step be accomplished, though.

Most immediately, there was my job. I could just not show up, but... Well, actually, I wasn't currently broke. But at the rate it kept happening, I'd be a fool to pass up a guaranteed opportunity to pad myself out with real resources.

And then there was Coda, whom I was supposed to be a cool big sister to. And then there was that mare, Nyala, with the creepy third eye that apparently only I could see. And I still was trying to find Garsheeva, though at this point I was pretty certain it would be counterproductive to my other goals and I would be better off trying to get Coda to buy me an airship - and then take her with me - some other way.

I took a deep breath. All those things I had no idea where to start with, coupled with the fact that apparently my hooves looked like this for a very bad reason. And my busy, crazy life had never heard of giving me time for introspection.

Whatever. First things first: Mother. I swung the door open and strode out to find Howe. If he was as professional an informant as Jamjars said he was, maybe he would know a way to-

I nearly tripped over Coda, sitting patiently outside my door, her pink-and-black tail wagging eagerly.

"Ah-ha!" She beamed up at me. "Your loving goddess suspected you were up and moving around! She couldn't confirm, of course, being as you are invisible, but her deductive powers still advised an investigation and lo, here you are. I took the entire rest of the day off!"

"Err..." I took a step back, remembering urgently that I had just been talking aloud to myself about some very personal issues. "How long have you been sitting there?"

"Only a matter of seconds," she chirped. "You did not deign to keep your lady waiting. So, are you now properly rested and ready to face the evening?"

I dug back a thousand years in my memory to the previous afternoon, which was probably closer to five or six hours ago. Was it smart for me to be up on this little sleep? Right, Coda was miffed that I wanted to sleep instead of hanging out with her...

She stared expectantly into my eyes.

"Er, yeah, we can hang out..." I guess I wouldn't get to bother Howe after all. "Anything in particular you want to do?"

Coda's ears flicked. "We should soon be docking at Dead Herman to entertain my faithful for the evening, but time is not yet so tight that I must retire to my weighty throne. Come! Your princess would pick your mind for stories of the surface world out on the balcony ere her labors begin!"

She raced off towards the lobby, and I more slowly gave chase, the ship turning so that its starboard windows faced the Aldenfold as it drifted down to port. When I got there, Coda was waiting for me, staying present just long enough to beckon me up the farther of the twin staircases to the second floor.

I followed again, and found myself at a landing. Ahead, the corridor entered what appeared to be the bridge, with several cult ponies lounging around and doing pilot things. To my right, the stairs doubled back and went up another floor. At a guess, most of the crew's quarters would be up there, but I realized I didn't actually know how tall this airship was.

Coda, however, was to my left, through an open door and standing on an outdoor balcony that was now overlooking Ironridge. In the evening light, the cone of heat over the city shimmered less violently, but I still was glad we weren't sailing into it. Coda beckoned for me to join her at her side.

"Your goddess, as threatened, fasted from her work this day," she said when I obliged. "Now, remember our bargain? I do desire to hear from you, oh lord of the lands and dweller of the surface. Give me tales of this strange and wondrous vista, that I might be sated as I collect the nightly prayers."

I didn't want to get her hopes up, as I did have to leave for work, but I had a minute... "Well, alright. What do you want to hear about? Give me a prompt, here."

Coda perked up. "My clergy tell me the air over the city shimmers so because of a great and unnatural heat, enveloping the city in a sinister pall. Do they speak true?"

I blinked, not expecting that topic. "Yeah, they do. It's murderously hot down there. That's why everyone's awake at night in Ironridge. Too dangerous to go out and about in the day."

Coda eagerly wriggled. "But you, as a princess, are surely immune to it, giving you unfettered access into the dealings that evil would rather keep hidden?"

"Not a chance." I winced, remembering my ill-fated attempts at going to the Night District during the night. "I'm afraid my princess powers don't protect me from that one."

"Intriguing," Coda mused. "I have tried to grasp the concepts of 'too hot' and 'too cold', but after commanding my followers to prepare experiments, we together deduced that I have some degree of resistance to such things. Not that they are entirely pleasant to experience, but they do not repel me as they would mortals, particularly when I exercise my powers. Long have I assumed my wicked mother must be the same. Were I her, then, I would conduct my business at the hottest hour of the hottest part of the city, whereat my advantage would be greatest over those I seek to subjugate."

"You can't get too hot?" I tilted my head in interest. "Or too cold?" That was an interesting tidbit to file away...

Coda shook her head. "The powers of a changeling queen extend to an uncanny ability to regenerate our wounds, fueled by the emotions we contain. My clergy speculate that for ills born of extreme temperatures, I am simply able to heal the damage done to my body faster than it can be inflicted. But none know for sure."

"Bet you'd like it in Icereach, then," I said. "That's my home. Well, my old one, before I came to Ironridge."

Coda fixed me with an eager gaze.

I sighed, figuring I now owed her a story. "It's out in the mountains, to the west," I started. "Real remote place. Incredibly cold, too. In the middle of the day, with good weather, you bundle up to go on the surface. Unless you're Corsica, because she's got thick fur... But at night, or when a storm comes, you're as good as dead if you go outside. That's why we all lived in caves. It's pretty different from living on an airship all the time, let me tell you..."

Coda listened raptly. "Fascinating. I have been across Yakyakistan in years long past, but never to this Icereach. Regrettably, there is one of me and so much of the world to scour... Imagine if my mother was there all along."

"Probably not," I said with a shrug. "It's pretty peaceful there, most of the time. And..."

I trailed off. Now that I thought about it, Icereach was supposed to be the place where Ironridge and Yakyakistan sent secrets to be buried, right? A neutral ground they agreed to support in years gone by to act as a repository for things like Yakyakistan's old rockets that didn't have a place in the world today?

Its whole purpose was as a place to hide things. I had been hidden there... Or, more accurately, Mother had been, a refugee and former criminal looking for a place to retire off the map. And the concept of changelings was deliberately pushed far away from the public's collective conscience, so no one might be paying attention to the signs. And it successfully hid a windigo for who knew how long... Icereach would actually be an awesome place to hide a changeling queen.

Not that Coda needed to know.

"...And what?" She was looking at me expectantly.

"And I think everyone would know the signs of changelings when they saw them," I lied, feeling a pang of guilt for abusing this child's trust, even though it was for her own good. Before I could check myself, I backtracked. "Or maybe they wouldn't, and it would be a great place to hide. Some changelings did manage to fool me there, after all. It's a long story. But there's a lot of places in the world where-"

Coda fixed me with a look that said I wasn't getting off the hook for this story... and yet, it was an understanding look, too. "This is the incident you spoke of earlier when you mentioned being kidnapped by changelings."

I tilted my head. "I told you about that?"

"Yes!" Coda perked up. "Well, sort of. Your princess recalls being quite shy about revealing her true nature to you over concerns about how you would react. You were loathe to delve into detail, however, and so there is much that even I do not know..." She hesitated. "You claimed earlier that your internment was not likely the work of a queen, yet how certain are you? Might it perhaps be worth charting an expedition to this Icereach to scan it with my spell?"

And just like that, I was caught in a choice I knew was coming and really didn't want to make.

Coda was offering to leave Ironridge and fly to Icereach. I not only knew she would let me come along if I asked, I was all but certain she would beg me to if I didn't. This would accomplish multiple goals of mine: first in getting me out of the city, second in getting Coda out of the city, third in giving me a way to reach Mother, and probably a more timely one than any other options I had. It just had two downsides, one of which was that I would essentially be using Coda to get what I wanted.

The other was that, if Chrysalis really was somehow in Icereach, Coda would find out and it would be all but impossible for me to protect her.

"You look deep in thought," Coda remarked. "Might you share the workings of your mind with me? Though you are doubtless the more worldly of us two, the formidable intelligence of a goddess is not a force to be dismissed lightly."

Maybe... I should just tell her.

"My mother..." I took a breath. "Is still in Icereach. And I'd like to get her a ride out, sooner rather than later. So I've kind of got a vested interest in heading back home. But I don't know that Chrysalis is there and it would probably be a terrible engagement to fight her there if she was. If you wanna get your cult to give me a ride out that far, I'd appreciate it, and it would mean you'd get to hang out with me for however many weeks we'd be flying for. But I don't wanna tell you it's for the sake of finding Chrysalis."

Coda looked confused. "Why not?"

I blinked. "Why not what?"

"Why not tell me it is for the sake of finding Chrysalis?" Coda asked, visibly trying to parse what I had just said.

Just as she struggled to understand, I struggled to understand what she didn't understand. "Because it isn't. It wouldn't be."

This didn't appear to help. "So?" Coda asked, looking to me for answers.

"So... I... don't want to lie to you?" I took a deep breath, distancing myself from the situation, and looked at it again. "Do people regularly tell you things are for the sake of finding Chrysalis when they clearly aren't?"

Coda shook her head. "The chain of causality is not so clear. As a goddess, I am bound by inexorable destiny to face my birth mother. It cannot but happen. Mortals, agents of destiny that they be, are bound to uphold this. You are an anomaly because I cannot predict your actions, but the simplistic paths of others, less so. Observe that my faithful pray for success and favor upon me without knowing so much as the nature of myself, much less my mission. Behold how my clergy, unable to see the order in the random chaos of their own movements, hail my endeavor when putting forth acts and desires that, on the surface, have nothing to do with it whatsoever. It is a matter of faith, not function."

Words had just happened, and they did not register in my brain. "Say that again. Slower and clearer."

Coda sighed. "Yes, have an example for your busy mind. Suppose that one of my clergy, studious in their duties, petitions for a night on the town, severed from responsibility and beyond my sight for a small span of time, and suppose they claim without reason it is to the benefit of my holy purpose. My other clergy, burdened by a mortal understanding of causality and unable to see the greater picture, reprimand them for slacking off, as they cannot see how this idleness might serve me. Do you understand so far?"

I nodded. A job where you got reprimanded for asking for vacation must stink.

"However, I allow it," Coda went on. "As the actions of mortals are predictable to me, that means they are fixed. As they are fixed, that means they can move only from a fixed source to a fixed endpoint, as dictated by destiny. And as my destiny is to strike down my mother, it is a foregone conclusion that their request serves my purpose. Such is the passage of fate."

I hesitated. "And you can see exactly how this will play out? You know this destiny well enough to see exactly how this scenario benefits you in the long run?"

Coda shook her head. "I assume I should need to become a much more powerful goddess to put together the threads of the grand tapestry like so," she admitted.

"Then how do you know it actually serves your ends?" I pressed. "And that ponies don't just say something is in the name of your holy quest when they want something from you?"

"Logic and extrapolation," Coda primly proclaimed. "I know that my destiny is set. I know that the actions of mortals are predictable. It thus follows that the course of their actions has my destiny as its endpoint."

She let that statement hang in the air, looking to me for approval.

"And you've thought about everything like this for how long?" I asked.

Coda shrugged. "Since right now. To translate the complex mind of a goddess into words others can understand is a difficult feat indeed, let alone the intricacies of my heart. Your goddess often thinks of new ways to explain herself, so forgive her for thinking such thoughts aloud."

I shook my head. "Well, let's back up. How do you know your destiny is set?"

Coda gave me an isn't-it-obvious look. "Because it is written in my scriptures."

"Who wrote your scriptures?" I went on. "How do you know they're infallible?"

Coda hesitated. "...Truth be told, I believe they have always existed. Divine manuscripts cannot simply spring into being through the works of mortal hooves, after all. Though now that you mention it, I am not entirely sure."

I sighed. "So, if someone asked you to give up your crusade against Chrysalis and go become a farmer, or something, and they said it was in the name of helping you fight Chrysalis, would you do it just because they invoked your destiny?"

Coda scoffed. "An impossibility. Such a wish would result in a logical contradiction, would it not?"

"Yeah," I pointed out. "So would you do it?"

"Irrelevant," Coda answered. "Because such a question will not be asked in the first place. My destiny would not permit it."

I sat back, folded my forelegs and raised an eyebrow in challenge. "You wanna bet I can't ask you to give up and let Chrysalis become someone else's problem?"

For a moment, Coda looked surprised, and then resigned. "But you are a princess, outside the passage of fate and thus my predictions. You can do anything. Including, like as not, defy my destiny. To which I would be grateful if you didn't..." She trailed off, her eyes widening in realization. "Ohhhh. That's why you couldn't say earlier that going to Icereach would help track my erstwhile quarry. Because you are not privy to the forces of the universe that might guide your question to steer me true."

Part of me was tempted to leave this bizarre conversation here, but I decided I wasn't done yet. "And what about everyone but me? What if one of your clergy asked you to hang up your sword?"

"I told you." Coda shrugged. "It is impossible for them to ask."

I levelly met her eyes. "Which is a belief you apparently hold because they taught it to you. Right?"

Coda puffed up. "Your princess figured it out for herself, thank you very much."

"With information they taught you," I pointed out. "How many times have you been down to the real world and interacted with ponies who know nothing about you?"

"We have been over this time and again," Coda lamented. "Never. 'Tis the duty of my position to-"

"How do you know," I insisted, "that this understanding of the way things work can survive contact with ponies who aren't part of your cult's orbit and don't know the right things to tell you? How would you ever find out if destiny doesn't work like that if you only ever talked to ponies who had a reason for you to believe it did?"

Coda suddenly looked defiantly brittle. "But I figured this all out for myself. I was not taught it. My clergy can scarce even understand it."

"But you figured it out from such a small and similar sample of ponies," I pressed. "The world out there-"

"Is so much bigger, I know!" Coda suddenly snapped, and I worried she might cry. "I know I'm living in a bubble! And you are the only link to the outside I have, so stop asking me confusing questions and tell me what it's like out there!"

I looked out at the city, steeling my resolve. "How good are your wings, kiddo?"

Coda flexed her overgrown wings. "Most powerful. But why-"

"Then you better know how to use 'em, because we're going on an adventure."

Before she could protest, I grabbed her and leapt over the railing.

For a brief moment, we were in free-fall, and I questioned whether this had been a good idea.

Then, Coda's wings snapped out like a parachute, catching our momentum and yanking us forward and up, as I clung to her barrel to avoid falling. "What has possessed you, creature!?" she squawked in surprise, the two of us hovering awkwardly in midair halfway between her airship and the distant outskirts of Dead Herman.

"I'm not gonna tell you any more about the outside world," I grunted, struggling to feel less like I was one slip away from plummeting to my doom. "Not from the comfort of your cozy airship, and not while you're taking prayers on that throne. If you wanna see it, I'm gonna show you. And you'll see just how little was stopping you from flying out here this whole time."

"Kindly..." Coda struggled. "Ungrapple your princess, please...! She has never flown with passengers in such a manner!"

"Then let's stick a landing," I urged. "Because I maybe should have mentioned first that I can't fly at all."

Thankfully, Coda obliged, flapping awkwardly and dropping me on the rocks without too bad of a crash. I straightened up, watching as she gingerly landed herself, poking at the craggy terrain.

"You've... seriously never been down here before," I ventured.

"It has been the duty of my clergy to plumb the world of mortals," Coda muttered, lifting and examining a stone. "I take it we are still outside the city proper. Almost like this is a purgatory, of sorts."

I nodded. "What are you gonna do?"

She looked back up at her airship. It was still moving to dock with the skyport. Apparently, nobody had noticed us jump.

Then she looked at me.

"If you wanna believe it's in the name of beating Chrysalis, believe it," I told her. "You'll probably get way more useful intel coming down here yourself than you will sucking up one more day of prayers. Or were you thinking your first experience with the outside world would be when you finally find her and inevitably have to leave your airship to fight her?"

Coda blinked. "In truth, I had not considered that... Although your princess is still shaken by your boldness. Heaving her from her own balcony in such a manner..."

"Think you're gonna win a fight without being used to being tossed around like a sporting ball?" I raised an eyebrow.

The look Coda gave me suggested she had legitimately never considered this before.

"If you've gotta write it down in the books as being for the cause, then do it," I urged her. "Being used to this place really will help, I promise. But aside from that, do it because this is what you want to do."

"You are..." Coda hesitated. "Requesting that I permit you to show me the city. In person."

I nodded. "Yup."

"What of my clergy?" She glanced back up at the ship, excitement and worry clashing in her voice. "And the night's prayers? And your own followers to whom I offered my ship as sanctuary?"

I shrugged. "My friends will wake up when they wake up and then take care of themselves. Your goons can do whatever. Maybe they'll just let everyone come pray with no one on the other side to listen."

Coda hesitantly giggled. "It is rather amusing, imagining the faithful sincerely believing their prayers are being heard, only for them to echo into the abyss... I imagine it is also rather immoral to waste such fervently given convictions as that, though you do make a compelling case as to why I should join you. Is this... really alright?"

"Sure is." I nodded, offering a booted hoof. "You in?"

She stared at me, tensed... and bumped it, all at once. "Coda is in! Yes! Eeehee! Guide on, Princess Halcyon, master of the land! Where are we going?"

"First off, some ground rules," I said. "Just so we don't get in any weird situations. For starters, you're a changeling queen. You can do the disguise thing, right?"

Coda nod-nod-nodded. "It is a power I am proficient with. Have we need of subterfuge? It would not do to let my mother's agents know we are coming..."

"Err... Sure, let's go with that," I said. "But also because alicorns are kind of... distinctive. And if people see you just walking around, we'll likely get mobbed by curious strangers and never get anything done. Think you can be, like, a pegasus or a unicorn?"

Coda took a deep breath, puffed out her chest... and in a wrap of pink-black flame, she was gone, a little batpony filly standing where she had once been. Her horn was gone, but so was her supernatural size: she looked like an ordinary filly, no more than thirteen years of age.

"That'll... do nicely, yeah," I said, noting that she hadn't touched her colorations and unsuccessfully reminding myself that this was really a mare the same age as I was, despite the fact that she was a filly now in both mind and body. If it wasn't for the fact that her birth was apparently a documented historical event, I would have sworn she really was a pre-teen.

I hesitated. "On second thought, batponies are treated kind of... strangely in the city. Maybe a pegasus or a unicorn?"

Coda flashed again, and was a pegasus. "What do you mean by strangely?"

"You'll see. Not like I can go as anything other than me," I said, aware that technically wasn't true. "Or maybe you won't know what normal is to recognize the strange stuff. Exciting, eh?"

"What else?" Coda vibrated in excitement.

I took note of her stubby little pegasus filly wings, not at all the huge alicorn ones that had landed us safely from the airship. Odds were, I'd be hiking back to town... and I had a job to get to. "So..." I took a breath, thinking of how to explain this. "I've got a job..."

Coda listened raptly.

"Which, if you're unfamiliar, means I do arbitrary tasks for other ponies in exchange for cash," I told her. "So... you wanna come watch? My boss will probably be okay with it if you hide and don't really make it obvious you're there. I'll pretend you're the daughter or kid sister of a friend of mine, and that I'm getting paid to watch you for the day. And you'll probably want to not refer to either of us as royalty where anyone else can hear, because I'm actually not a princess and you're pretending not to be one too. Most kids would probably hate this, but I've got a feeling you'll love it. Sound like fun?"

"I shall trust in your judgement, Ordinary Citizen Halcyon the Garbed!" Coda furtively whispered, already going hush hush, as if we were undercover. "Lead on!"

Our journey through the Day District could have been summed up in a picture album, and I was almost disappointed I didn't have a camera in my bags. Coda, feeling the heat wafting up the broken escalator tunnel and making a face - she wasn't slowed down by it, but she clearly wasn't comfortable, either. Coda, standing on the abandoned overlook platform outside the tunnel entrance, her sparkling eyes reflecting the light of the city. Coda, whispering questions in my ear as we passed our first stranger and they paid us no mind. Coda, having a close call with a cart in a crowded intersection, completely unused to watching where she was going. Coda, discovering that riding on my back made asking those questions that much easier, after I swallowed my hesitancy and put her up there to keep her safe.

Coda, riding on a train for the first time - her reaction reminded me of my own. Coda, seeing the city from a different angle and realizing what things she had seen before but never thought about were for, like the airship port where Gerardo docked two fateful weeks ago. The two of us, strolling through Eaststone Mall, as I pointed out the bookstore for her, told her the story of Kitty licking forty cakes, and offered to buy her breakfast at the very same Varsidelian noodle joint Jamjars had taken us on our first evening in Ironridge. Me, relaxing and watching Coda pick apart her food, learn the new tastes and meticulously separate the good from the bad - noodles, carrots and baby corn stayed, mushrooms, peppers and onions were all taboo.

It was magical, a heavy haze of nostalgia settling over me like a wedding veil, reminding me of my own first experience with Ironridge and painting it in a brighter light. And somehow, even though I was helping a child goddess to shirk her duties while plotting a rescue mission from the front lines of a brewing war and harboring a changeling revolutionary as an enemy-turned-friend, it was the most normal I had ever felt.

Maybe it was all the other ponies around us. I watched them, thought about it, and realized so many of them were families, too, taking their children out for a walk or a fun night out.

This... It was what I craved.

It was what I had been searching for all along.

I took us through a souvenir shop on our way out of the mall, ostensibly to buy Coda something, though I wanted something for myself, too. She wound up with a carved hunk of crystal my trained eye easily recognized as a cheap knockoff, but was still pretty. I got a postcard showing a view of the Ice District dam from the entrance to Eaststone. Maybe I could give it to Mother once we reunited, however that was going to happen.

"Enjoying yourself?" I asked, stepping out of the mall plaza and into the heat, Coda having returned to her now-favorite spot on my back, my discomfort with the contact by now thoroughly abused and stuffed in a closet.

"That is one word for it," Coda muttered, sounding vaguely dazed. "It's just... so much, all I can do is try to take it in. There's so much emotion everywhere, it would take all my focus just to read one pony. I am reminded of how my eyes feel upon seeing a bright light after sitting in a dark room. It makes my ship feel like a wasteland..."

"Maybe your ship is a wasteland," I hesitantly offered. "But this, right here? This is real. Tell me you think all these ponies, all around us, are just insignificant machines on predetermined tracks towards a destiny that's shaped around a small hooffull of divinities."

"I can't think about that right now," Coda mumbled. "I just... All this... You see..."

I did see. I saw all the ponies around us, slouching along or holding their heads high in the oppressive heat, the stars a hazy mess up above through the waves of rising heat. It felt so real, so much more than Cold Karma and Lilith's machinations and the impending war with Yakyakistan, even though I knew those were real as well... Even if it was just for this one moment, I did want to keep this place safe. Safe from the outside, and safe from itself.

How long ago it had been that I believed in destiny, and how interesting that I was now the one trying to convince Coda that hers didn't exist.

I held up my postcard, matching it with the skyline and trying to find the exact point where the picture was taken. I knew it was close, and I knew it didn't matter. I just wanted to stand there. Holding up the card in a wing, I searched the picture and my eyesight, trying to match the daytime view in the postcard to the nighttime sky I saw now. It wasn't impossible, thanks to the brightly lit tip of the Cold Karma building poking above the dam, and the lighthouse on the mountain that formed the dam's northern wall...

Except the lighthouse wasn't in the postcard. That was a shame. It must have been an old photo. The lighthouse did add to the skyline, like it was always meant to be there...

"What are you looking at?" Coda mumbled, leaning forward to see what I saw.

"Just trying to line up this picture," I explained. "It's a shame it doesn't have the lighthouse, though."

"Lighthouse where?" Coda scanned the skies. "What do you mean?"

I pointed at the mountain. "That one. See? It's not in the picture."

Coda squinted. "Perhaps mine eyes are playing tricks on me, but your princess sees no difference from that photo..."

"You don't see the lighthouse?" I blinked in surprise. "It's like the mountain's defining feature! Right up there at the top, in the middle!"

"Hrrm..." Coda mused, deep in thought. "Seer of spectral... What's a synonym for lighthouse that begins with S? I believe you have a phantom, but this might merit a title. Beholding the unseen is quite unusual..."

I gaped at the lighthouse, more and more weirded out. Coda couldn't see it. It wasn't in the postcard. But I could see it?

The obvious explanation was that Coda was nearsighted and didn't know it, which was especially believable when she had never had to interact with anything at a distance before and lived on a close-quarters boat. Except for the tiny, problematic detail that I had already seen a very unusual eye on a mare's forehead today that no one else could see, and I was paranoid enough to detect a pattern.

Whatever. I shook my head and carried us on toward the train station to get to my job, figuring I could always ask someone else if they saw it later. Go figure that even my best, most ordinary night in Ironridge could still be party crashed by the paranormal.

As we rode to the wedding venue, a new concern quickly replaced the phantom lighthouse in my mind: Jamjars.

I had learned much and more since my last meeting with my foster parent, about Aldebaran and her involvement with events in Icereach. Trusting her at this point was both stupid and impossible, though we had a working relationship that so far had done more good for me than harm. Thinking rationally, Jamjars probably was treating me and Corsica like pieces on her board, and so the biggest way to shake things up and make her a danger to us was to threaten to remove ourselves from her game... So how should I handle meeting with her? She was my boss. I couldn't avoid her.

One potentially appealing option was to confront her outright with everything I knew, ask for her pitch to join her side for real, and then accept, in the name of preserving the status quo in a slightly more stable fashion. Still with the intent of fleeing Ironridge when I could, of course... Except, with Coda tagging around, that probably wasn't a conversation I could have, since it would demand utmost privacy.

Time to kick the can down the road and hope nothing world-shaking transpired tonight, then. And if everything did somehow explode, at least I was currently in the company of a goddess.

Hoo boy, imagining Lalala's reaction if she learned about that...

I walked in through the venue doors, half an hour early, mentally rehearsing how to say nothing. Thumper was waiting for me.

"Hey, you!" she greeted loudly, and for a moment I thought I was about to be in trouble for bringing a filly along.

"Yeah?" I walked closer, tense.

"You seen the boss?" Thumper asked, noticing Coda with some surprise. "And what's with the kid?"

"Watching the sister of a friend for the night," I explained. "Don't worry, she's well-behaved and can keep out of the way. What do you mean, though?"

Thumper waved a hoof. "Eh, worry about the kid later. Like I said: have you seen the boss? Jamjars? You live with her, right? She didn't show up to our meeting an hour ago to finalize a venue candidate for next month. Workaholic like her is never absent."

"Errr..." I took a step back. "Actually, I crashed at someone else's place yesterday, so I wouldn't have seen her, no. Is she completely missing?"

Thumper shrugged. "Seems like it. Booster and Lalala haven't seen her, still waiting on Saturn. Oh well, whatever. We can get this show on the road ourselves. So, uh, the kid..."

"I can wait and watch and make myself invisible," Coda helpfully declared, as practiced. "Not literally. But close enough. And I promise I'm patient?"

"Good kid." Thumper nodded. "Alright, Halcyon, we've got a few things I need you to cover for me for during the setup because I'm covering for Jamjars, so it's good you came early..."

The weddings commenced, and then they passed, three in total commanding the better half of the night. But Jamjars never appeared.

You Wanted A Redo

The weddings concluded, and I let out a sigh. Pelting guests with rice while wearing a fluffy dress was sometimes a fantastic way to let off steam, but my lack of sleep and the previous night's exertion were starting to get to me, and my focus was all about staying on my hooves. I didn't have steam to blow off.

As the final guests of the final reception departed, Thumper cracked her joints, stretching and surveying the trashed venue. "Well, that went well enough. Hey! Halcyon!"

I jumped. "Yeah?"

Thumper nodded my way as Booster, Saturn and Lalala gathered around for our post-work debriefing. "If you're still staying with the boss, find her reason for skipping out on us and give her a whack for me if it isn't a good one. And if you don't see her, mind showing up early tomorrow to pick up her slack? I'll give you her share of the pay."

"Yeah, sure," I yawned. "No pay today, then?"

"Payday's tomorrow," Thumper instructed. "Anyway, one ceremony tomorrow, but we have to clean and dismantle the place before and after, so no slacking. See you all tomorrow night, I'm going home!"

Everyone else said their goodbyes and wandered off, leaving me to look for Coda on my own.

The filly wasn't difficult to find. Between a crack in two fake wall partitions, under the table behind them that was helping to prop them up, she had created a nest for herself out of unused silks and streamers where she lurked, ever watchful. Upon seeing my approach, she crawled out into the open.

"So?" I greeted. "What did you think?"

"I have much to think upon," Coda replied, her voice lacking a small measure of its usual flare. "I suspect my thoughts will be long and full today. However, I have decided that I enjoyed this greatly. Your princess is... challenged, by these new experiences. And she finds herself oddly relaxed by her lack of control."

I nodded, still wearing my work dress. "It's called taking a load off. You enjoyed it because you got a vacation. Something that most kids, by the way, do every day."

Coda shook her head. "Let not my present guise fool you. I am a goddess, and have the duties and responsibilities of such. Not... Not..." She yawned. "A child."

"No reason you can't be both at the same time," I said, inviting her onto my back. "So, ready to head back to your ship and reassure your cult that you're alright? I think both of us are ready to call this a night."

Coda hesitated, but then climbed on. "Yes. Let us return."

Our trip up the mountains was uneventful, my tired legs working for both of us to scale who knew how much elevation. By the time we reached Dead Herman, I was starting to worry I would collapse again like I had with Leif and Corsica, but I finally managed to wobble into the lift up to the skyport before my legs gave out for good.

At the top, I picked myself up again, letting Coda walk on her own this time, and led us the last little distance to her airship.

"May I ask you a question?" Coda asked, breaking her silence as we approached the entry.

"Eh?" I tilted my ears toward her.

"It's..." Coda lowered her voice. "Those weddings I witnessed. I was led to believe a wedding was the ultimate celebration of love. Are they not?"

"What makes you think otherwise?" I asked, having a good idea where this was going.

Coda looked away. "While they were certainly charged with emotion, I felt remarkably little love in the air. I believe those ceremonies were just for show, or else the affection they held for each other was but a pale shadow of what my own followers are capable of feeling. Yet, for a shadow, it was remarkably potent..."

She waited. Even though she was asking for affirmation on a theory, like she so often did to me, she suspected I would tell her she was wrong. She wanted to be in denial, but she knew.

Huh. It shouldn't have come as a surprise to me that someone with as active a mind as Coda would put together that the love she was fed was lip service so quickly. But I still thought I'd have at least more than one day to plan how to talk about it.

"...You're pretty smart," I eventually told her. "You like to think things though. So I think you'll be able to figure out what's real and what matters. But whatever you decide, I'll be back tomorrow, okay?"

Coda looked conflicted. "You are welcome to stay the day with me again. I promise not to berate you for taking time to sleep."

"Thanks for the invite." I gave her an earnest smile, sorely tempted to accept. "But I've gotta get home and figure out what to do about Jamjars. Duties and responsibilities, and stuff."

Coda didn't meet my eyes. "Alas, the burdens of duty are known to me. But I ignored mine for a night at your behest."

I thought about that for a moment. I thought about what I had just told her, about figuring out what was real and what mattered. And then I nodded.

"Alright," I said, straightening up. "I can go check on Jamjars next evening."

Coda's cult, understandably, was panicked. However, they were also professional and diligent enough to hide it from their faithful, and so when we strolled in through the main door, we were quietly hustled off to a side room where Coda was immediately fawned over and I was given suspicious looks until Coda proclaimed that she had merely tripped over the railing and I heroically rescued her. The clergy were plainly suspicious, but at least they held her in high enough regard not to rescind any hospitality toward me when I was obviously her favored friend.

Corsica and Leif had departed earlier in the day, I learned. Part of me was tempted to inquire and learn more about Nyala, but I got about as far as covertly assuring myself that no one else saw her third eye before my tiredness overcame me and I was forced to retire.

I dreamed about the lighthouse. A perfect recollection of myself and Coda standing in the Day District, discussing whether it was real or not while the real thing stood up there on that mountain. And if my experience with Egdelwonk and his memory-tampering had taught me anything, it was that my dreams never lied.

For some reason, I could see the truth, and no other pony - or camera - could do the same.

I woke up, and to Coda's disappointment, I left without her - it was time to go back to Jamjars', and even though the prospect of Kitty being the Composer or her being in league with Aldebaran no longer scared me, it wasn't something I wanted to walk into while caring for an overly-innocent child goddess.

My first stop was Eaststone Mall. I didn't have much cash, and the cash I did have came from Jamjars, so I couldn't fathom it helping me if and when something unexpected went down. But I knew a store that would let me convert it into something much more potent, and I left with my wallet empty and my back saddled with a large cake. Lemon with strawberry frosting!

Kitty had taught me how to play her game. I was going in with a bribe.

Ponies generally ignored me as the train wrapped through the interior of the Ice District, steadily gaining height as it spiraled up through the facility's massive, empty core. All these days and everything I had learned about Ironridge, and it was still impossible to understand why the lower reaches of the Ice District had been constructed as they were. If the core was just a support mechanism designed to hold up the upper platforms, it would be emptier, with no far walls or floor. But if it was designed to be usable space, then the incredible amounts of usable space on display would be used for something. Giant machinery, production lines, pipes and tanks, anything except empty scaffolding and distant bronze walls...

The train arrived. My stop.

Several ponies disembarked with me, and all quickly went their own ways. I walked the familiar corridor to Jamjars' villa, my legs tight and cramped after all I had put myself through, my back fur bristling in anticipation like it had on my very first time here.

I reached the door and knocked. It swung open. It was Kitty.

Her pupils got huge when she saw what I was carrying, her tongue already hanging out but now beginning to drool. I took a step back, anticipating a joyful attempt to lick me.

"Settle down," I told her, guarding the cake jealously. "Let's maybe get inside first before you demolish this. Is Jamjars home, by the way?"

"Nope!" Kitty shook-shook-shook her head, eyes never straying from her prize. "Kitty's got the house to herself for a whole bunch of hours now! Where ya been, lady?"

"I've been working, and exploring, and earning money to buy you this," I said, trying to slip inside. "If she's not here, you know where she is?"

"Nnnope?" Kitty let her tongue hang out. "She left for work an' didn't come back! About... this long ago!"

She stared at me with big eyes, and for the life of me I couldn't figure out what she was doing to indicate a span of time.

I sighed. "Alright. Cake bribe for serious mode. I give you this, and you talk normal for a bit and answer my questions to the best of your ability?"

Kitty drooled. "Cake first. Then serious mode. Kitty likes contracts..."

"Alright, alright..." I sighed, setting the cake down on the living room table. "Knock yourself out..."

Kitty immediately snatched the cake and retreated into the basement, moving almost faster than my eyes could follow.

Well... Time to wait.

I decided to investigate the apartment. The communal areas held nothing of interest, immaculately clean and tidy to a degree that suggested Jamjars didn't live with an insane mare-child who was obsessed with sugar and confectioneries.

The bedroom I shared with Corsica was empty. I honestly couldn't remember if it looked any different than I had left it. How long had it been since I slept here, anyway? It felt like a lifetime...

I moved on to the bathroom. Three towels were hung to dry, two unmistakably containing traces of Jamjars' mane and tail hair and one with her normal yellow fur. By their lack of wetness, I judged they had been there at least twenty-four hours. Maybe more.

Odd. I had lived with Jamjars long enough to know she was a mare who took two showers a day. That would mean she disappeared at least before this morning, and possibly never came home last night... A prickling feeling told me something more was going on than just a case of shirking work.

As I searched, a memory surfaced in my mind of Icereach, during our imprisonment in the hideout. The first thing I did there was explore, gathering evidence and learning what I could. I remembered searching the bathroom, finding a fancy bubble jet hot tub with Jamjars' fur caught in the intakes.

This was... basically the same. Snooping around, collecting evidence even though I had no idea what end it would serve... Except instead of scared and exhausted, I was invigorated, an electric excitement buzzing down my coat.

I had always wanted a redo, after all.

After the bathroom, there were Jamjars' and Ansel's rooms. Did I really want to break in there? I considered it. Ansel's probably didn't have anything interesting. Jamjars'... I knew how important the privacy of my own room had been to me back in Icereach. Sharing with Corsica, I missed that. Could I defile that for Jamjars, even though she was absent and was probably not working in my best interests?

Assuming room number five on the Aldebaran belonged to her, I had already done it before, I realized. And on the off chance that she was in there right now, in trouble or worse... I decided I was going in.

I slipped into the shadows, swam under the doorjamb and surfaced inside, turning on my bracelet for light.

The room was a lot bigger than I was expecting.

It was long, double the length of Ansel's room or the one I shared with Corsica, extending out past the point where the hallway ended and I assumed the apartment stopped. At one end was a posh four-poster, the kind of bed Coda's fold-away aspired to be. A window looking out over the cavernous Ice District interior took up one wall, probably adjacent to the one in the living room. There was a tidy desk with no terminal, a sheaf of unused writing supplies, and several drawers and filing cabinets. I also spied a sliding double-door that probably led to a walk-in closet, but was presently closed.

No sign of Jamjars herself, though.

Did I want to snoop on Jamjars' documents? If I was evil, I wouldn't put anything actually interesting in my filing cabinets when they were so easy to intrude on. Or maybe I'd arm them with traps. I thought about it, and decided that not only had Jamjars yet to do anything harmful to us in Ironridge, but Leif had flat-out tricked and abducted and then abandoned and impersonated us and now she was on my side. Better to avoid any potential rocks in our relationship until I knew for sure where her allegiance lay.

I did stop to read a few filing cabinet labels, though. One said Posters and Stuff, sending my mind once again back to room number five aboard the Aldebaran, how it was absolutely plastered with posters. In this room, Jamjars had shown some restraint, though there were still a few tacked up here and there that perfectly fit the style I remembered from the airship.

The most interesting one said Top Secret - Old T.I.D. ship stuff - Do Not Read! The label looked old, and this drawer struck me as slightly better-used then the others. I searched my memory for anything that acronym could reference, but drew a blank. Ship stuff... Maybe related to an airship? I always had wondered where Aldebaran got their special ship...

I poked around the desk a little more. It did have a calendar, filled with nondescript business things that looked to be related to wedding planning. I couldn't see anything unusual scheduled for tonight or last night, unless it was written in code. Though, that was a pretty high possibility.

Maybe the bed would have clues? It didn't seem to divulge anything. I checked underneath, and found a large space that looked good for storing things, tightly packed with boxes and things but conspicuously half-full in a manner that suggested something had been removed recently. I stood up and looked around the room. Nothing seemed to fit the profile...

I could imagine a suitcase being that size, if Jamjars was going traveling. Maybe the closet would have missing clothes in a pattern that could corroborate that theory?

My wing edged the closet door open. I stared.

It... was a walk-in closet, yes, and did contain plenty of dresses, and one could even convince me that it was missing enough dresses that someone had been packing for travel. But infinitely more incriminating was the machine taking up more than half the space and wedged against the back wall.

I had seen machines like this on many occasions before. It was a teleporter.

Swiftly, I dug around in my pockets, pulling out the pattern card I had looted seven months ago from the hideout's teleporter during the Aldebaran incident. All the analysis I could perform told me the data it held corresponded to a geographic location, probably used to set the teleporter's destination, but I didn't have the proprietary technology to determine where.

This teleporter still had its card. It looked just like my stolen one. I suddenly had a very good idea of what happened to Jamjars.

The irony almost made me laugh. Aldebaran - whom she was a part of - imprisoned me in the hideout. Now I was accidentally getting revenge, because Jamjars went over there for whatever reason and I had stolen the key she needed to get back. And then the sensation faded as I realized something far more important: I had an instant route between Ironridge and home.

For the steep, steep price of getting past Ludwig, apologizing to a peeved Jamjars, figuring out how this teleporter was powered, navigating whatever may or may not be happening in Icereach, and getting out unscathed, I had a real, solid path to get Mother out of harm's way.

I closed my eyes and took a breath, planning. Corsica's help would be mandatory, since she was the one who actually beat Ludwig last time and was thus our best shot at talking our way through his lair and back again. We'd need to go in the daytime, because even if I could use my bracelet and make the trip up the trench wall at night, there was no way I could bring my companions. Odds were, I would want Leif on board, since she had planned out an Icereach infiltration once before and might have some lessons to impart about how to get in and out without trouble, especially if changing circumstances had made the city more hostile to foreigners.

Kitty... At the very least, I needed her out of the way, and would have to hope my cake would suffice. Beyond that, I would need Valey's help from Fort Starlight. She had a teleporter pair of her own, used to warp in and out through that tavern in the Day District. And she had explained to me once how the teleporters worked. I knew she apparently had a bad history with Leif, but someone who knew how to work the teleporters was required.

Anyone else? Ansel, being a changeling, could disguise himself, and I had no idea how valuable of a talent that would be if we were sneaking around in Icereach where we weren't supposed to be. But to my knowledge, he hadn't yet told Corsica or anyone but Elise what he could do. And I hadn't spoken with him for at least two days, meaning he would take a lot of catching up to bring on board.

How about Egdelwonk's goons, Papyrus and Unless? Definitely not Papyrus, I decided, though he would undoubtedly agree to come. Unless... seemed to know something about Valey and Leif's history, so she might be useful as a mediator, perhaps?

And finally, there was one other pony who might be able to help: Coda.

Loath as I was to put her in real harm's way, she was also a real goddess with real powers, however diluted they may be by a feeble diet, and the windigoes we were dealing with were a real ancient evil. This was the job she wanted to do.

Let's see, was there anyone else I might be forgetting...

"Oooh, sneaky!" Kitty chirped, causing me to jump in surprise.

My first reaction was defensive. "Are you gonna tell Jamjars I was sneaking through her things?"

Kitty smiled. "Yup! Kitty does it all the time. It's funny to annoy her. Lady, you're stealing Kitty's techniques!"

My second reaction was surprise. "And wait, did you finish that entire cake already?"

"Yup!" Kitty licked some frosting off her lips, patted her belly and uttered a horrific belch. I tilted my head to look, and her stomach didn't even look slightly distended. This kid must have had an ability to convert sugar straight to raw magic, or something...

"...So," I told her. "Cake's paid, you had your meal. Serious time now?"

For a moment, Kitty frowned, then put her tongue away and donned a pair of pointed rock-star shades from her hoodie. "Yeah, yeah. What'cha need, babe? I can probably guess..."

"First off, you're the Composer," I said, aware that I was in a closet and Kitty was standing in the only exit. "Aren't you?"

"Now what would give you that idea?" Kitty uttered in the perfectly neutral, piously emotionless voice of the Composer, her tone switching once again.

I nodded, narrowing my eyes.

"I am surprised it took you this long to confront me over it," Kitty said, keeping up the Composer's voice for now. "I made a point of welcoming you to Ironridge, and even told you my name when we parted in Icereach. Lady Catherine Manchester Volkhelm Mk.I. I believe I even mentioned I preferred to go by a nickname."

My eyes widened. Kitty... Catherine...

Kitty nodded. "I see by your realization that I was too discreet. My apologies. I assumed you had simply decided to live and let live. Should you desire vengeance for my regrettable explosion in your home, be confident that I can take any punishment you have to offer."

"More than vengeance, I could use some answers," I told her, bristling warily. "Why? What was it all for?"

"All was explained in Icereach," Kitty said, walking slowly back into Jamjars' bedroom. "But, if you desire elaboration, you shall have it."

I gave her a sharp look. "Try me."

"First, you should be aware of windigo history," Kitty began. "I am what is known as an elder windigo. One of the first brood, of the oldest and most powerful. At the dawn of this world's creation, I came into being along with my siblings through the construction of an almighty curse. The function of the curse was to stop mortals from challenging the divine, and my creator - a god - birthed my race out of that jealous desire. In accordance, my race is bound by two unbreakable rules."

She turned, beginning to pace. "The first is that kinship and cooperation are anathema to us. Our gaseous forms are empowered by feelings of distrust between ponies, and are repelled by the desire to find common ground between differences. It is an enduring mechanism by which we, the curse, may be temporarily lifted. Should a society of ponies be worthy of freedom from us, in our creator's eyes, then they will be."

Kitty reached the end of the room and doubled back again. "The second is that we are bound to an ancient and powerful artifact known as the Lovebringer. The wielder of this artifact is able to command my race as their personal army. But sovereignty over our kind is far from the only power the Lovebringer bestows. In failing to execute these commands, we are subjected to agony immeasurable."

She stared at me. "Doubtless you find these rules to be in severe contradiction. One seems to reward peace and cooperation between ponies, while the other is ripe to empower tyrants and those who would rule without mercy. But to create that contradiction is none other than the essence of our existence. Under a wicked master, we would stifle society, shackle the ponies with war and tyranny and prevent them from reaching for true power. Only the good and true could calm our storm, ensuring the tyrant's eventual downfall happens at the hooves of those who are more suited to rule. Eventually, were the Lovebringer to be acquired by a ruler of compassion and temperance, with the wisdom not to unleash us upon the world in a bid for power, our curse would be forced to stand aside and that pony would be found worthy in the eyes of our creator."

"So... you were made as a tool," I told her. "Your race. Is that what you're saying? To wipe out civilization and set ponies back thousands of years if someone mean enough to use you got their hooves on your control artifact thing. That's why you and Ludwig were talking about wanting to kill your creator. Because you think that's a raw deal."

"Precisely." Kitty nodded. "You may have noticed there is little room for us in the distant, desired future. We are to be used in a cycle and cast aside every time. Never free, always bowing to another's whims. Only ever used for evil purposes, and not by the true of heart. This purpose manifests in our temperaments as well. Windigoes are created from pure wrath. We were not designed to have free will, instead being given supernatural emotions that are not our own. However, our maker designed us with one critical flaw."

"Which has to do with whatever you're doing now," I guessed.

Kitty nodded again. "We are burdened with pain for ignoring our directive, but our creator did not care to think what might happen were we unable to complete it, such was his lack of empathy for us. And that is precisely what happened. Upon first gaining our freedom, after knowing nothing but the inside of a void, we were commanded to simply do what we did best: spread hatred, and cause ponies to fight. But then we were defeated, and the Lovebringer was lost without our directive being changed. Our kind was sealed away, and we existed in two thousand years of ceaseless agony, spurring us towards a goal we were powerless to achieve. Do you know what two thousand years of pain does to a being, Halcyon?"

I shook my head.

"It numbs us," Kitty said. "We became desensitized. Our rage flailed about, looking for a target, and mine settled on the one who gave me this lot in life: my creator, who decided the rules by which I would exist. Many others did the same. Soon, I realized that not only could I decide who to hate, but that after all I had endured, a few more years of the directive's pain were nothing I could not bear. And so one day, when we were again freed, I decided not to engage in filling the world with strife. Far greater an act of spite, I decided, to rebel against my creator and my destiny."

I listened with wide eyes.

"And in a few short years, how much I have accomplished," Kitty proclaimed, spreading her forelegs wide. "You bore witness as Ludwig inhabited your friend's body for a time. That was a technique I developed, born out of my desire to evolve beyond my creator's limitations. What you see now is an even greater result: this body I currently wear is not stolen, but organically raised by me and for me and no other. In discarding my original body and becoming a harmonic life form, I am no longer repelled by the magic of friendship. I am free to go where I please, hate whom I choose, and write my own destiny. And I choose to hate my Father."

"That's insane," I whispered. "You... You..."

"I evolved," Kitty calmly told me. "The same process my presence was originally designed to encourage in ponies. Perhaps someday I will free myself from the curse's pain for ignoring my directive, or be able to feel emotions that are truly my own. But I need neither of these to continue my chosen path."

"Why tell me all this?" I asked warily. "What's it have to do with that mural down in the cave? You're not gonna try getting me to help you again, are you?"

"What you do next is a choice I leave to you," Kitty said. "As for the mural, the curse that created us is sometimes known as the Three Deaths. Windigoes are but one prong of three, each tied to a separate artifact, all of which must be mastered if one wishes to become omnipotent. The other two branches are no less potent than our race as a whole, calamities waiting to level the world and all in it. That mural, I believe, was carved by one of the other branches in the days shortly after we were first defeated. I desired to see it that I might learn more about their initial state of mind. Killing a deity is difficult, Halcyon. Almighty and all-seeing... I was, and still am, curious whether I might take them as an ally."

"But you're still telling me," I pointed out. "You could just... Why?"

Kitty shrugged. "You gave me a very delicious cake. In payment, I am indulging your curiosity."

I squinted. "You legitimately like cake that much."

"Perhaps." Kitty nodded. "It is a food I am partial to. Understand that, without the body of a pony, windigoes cannot eat what you think of as food. To consume it is to revel in my accomplishments. To enjoy it is to exercise my free will, and choose to desire something other than war. It is the ultimate insult to my creator."

"So..." I took a wary step sideways. "If I get you more, you'll, like... not blow up my house again? Or try to abduct me? What about Ludwig?"

"It is my nature to bear ponies animosity, as it is his," Kitty said. "I choose to defy my nature, though that is not to say I do not still have it. Ludwig is of a younger generation, created after we windigoes replenished our numbers in the wake of a rampage. He thinks differently to me, as do most. While the idea of rebelling against his creator intrigues him, he embraces the chaos in his heart with much greater ease than I."

I sighed. "Okay. Let's talk business. Jamjars is stuck on the other side of this teleporter with Ludwig because she took a jaunt over there without knowing I stole the key, right?"

Kitty nodded.

"And you're in league with her," I added.

Kitty nodded again. "Our goals are far from identical. However, she has little fear of windigoes, and both of us stood to benefit from the situation in Ironridge we helped to create."

I hesitated, weighing my words carefully. "Suppose I wanted to use this teleporter to go back to Icereach, get my mom, and come back here in one piece. How many cakes will it take to get you legitimately on my side for this, and not falsely on my side like when you refused to pay up last time?"

Kitty's posture showed no signs of remorse. "I apologize for my previous duplicity. Understand that I owed you little at the time, and was keenly interested in probing the mechanical bodies Icereach made for me for intentional weaknesses. Now that we know more of each other, I would be willing to assist you in this endeavor for free."

I raised an eyebrow. "You sure about that?"

Kitty pointed a hoof at the teleporter. "That machine is powered by me, and its counterpart by Ludwig. If I am lying, your quest will be over before you have put any chips on the table. You have nothing to lose by trusting me. However, as you observed last time, Ludwig obeys me only so much as it suits his own whimsy. Most windigoes are the same. I will send you to Icereach, but you will need his cooperation to power the teleporter to send you back. I advise you plan meticulously if you wish to meet with success. Unless, of course, you have figured out how to repeat the luck that protected you last time around."

"How do you know about...?" I took a step back. "You're implying I can control that?"

For a moment, Kitty hesitated. And then she took off her shades, put them away, and cluelessly stuck out her tongue. "Big question, lady! Got any more cakes?"

I showed her my empty wallet. "Bought the biggest one I could afford."

Kitty waddled up and sniffed it. "Lady," she said with a disapproving frown, "you're gonna need a wallet at least forty times bigger to buy Kitty enough cakes for that one."

"Is that a promise?" I gave her a serious look. "Forty cakes, and you tell me what all those miracles back then were about?"

"Nope!" Kitty happily wagged her tail. "Kitty doesn't know how ya did it. She just wants forty cakes."

I sighed. "Fine. Well... I've gotta prepare. You're a weeeird windigo, Kitty."

Kitty puffed out her chest and beamed.

I didn't look back as I left Jamjars' bedroom, already thinking about how best to spend my time before the next sunrise. I had no idea how Kitty's story related to any of her actions in Icereach or Ironridge, but at least she didn't seem desperate to get me dragged into anything. And given my track record in Ironridge, that was a bigger miracle than any I had seen in Icereach.

This time, though, I was determined not to need miracles.

A Little Heartfelt Hyperbole

I stepped outside Jamjars' apartment, my satchel laden down with everything that might conceivably prove useful, and took a deep breath. It was dusk. Come dawn, I would be returning to Icereach - returning home - and none could say what I might find there.

Time to do everything in my power to prepare.

I closed the door and made for the train station. My first order of business was a visit to Egdelwonk. I wasn't doing this without Corsica, was still undecided about asking Unless, and their unusually omniscient boss seemed like the best way to track them down. Maybe he'd even know something useful about what I was getting myself into.

A short ride later, I stepped off the train onto a busy platform full of mares and stallions wearing suit collars and ties. This was the first time I had traveled deeper into the Ice District during evening rush hour, I realized, and as I tried not to get jostled a realization slowly sank in about how many normal ponies must work here. What did Cold Karma employ, hundreds? Maybe thousands? I tried to eavesdrop, but couldn't catch anything meaningful in the din. Odds were, though, these were layponies, grunts and engineers, whose worries about the capriciousness of their bosses extended only to shifting project deadlines and chances for promotions.

I doubted anyone here even knew a war was coming, let alone was preparing to go to the front lines.

A little shadow swimming helped me through the crowd, my hooves retracing the steps to Egdelwonk's domain. He wouldn't be mad at me for letting Lilith burn his contract, would he? That was the sort of thing that might annoy a sensible pony, but Egdelwonk was anything but, which gave me the strange feeling that he would somehow approve.

I opened the final door, bracing myself for whatever the upside-down office hall from my last visit had been replaced with this time.

It was a royal ballroom, or perhaps a banquet hall. Cylindrical and built inside a tower with a ceiling so high I couldn't make it out, it had a tile floor and several tables set up around the edges, though nothing particularly impossible or eldritch...

Scratch that. The floor tiles were made of perfectly tessellating pentagons. I looked away, lest trying to figure out how they worked caused my brain to implode.

Where was I supposed to go, though? There were no doors...

"Bonjour," a voice said behind me.

I jumped and spun around. "Uwaah! Who-"

It was a chandelier. Dangling from an impossibly long cord, hanging just inches above the floor. "Where would the pony like to go, ho ho?" it asked, rocking back and forth as it talked.

"Errrrrrrrrrrr..." I took a step back. How was it talking? Was it alive? What... "I mean, do you know where Egdelwonk is?"

"To see the boss! Ho ho!" The chandelier bobbed happily up and down. "Climb aboard, ho ho!"

I gave up on understanding reality, climbed on top of the chandelier's golden wire frame, and held onto the cord connecting it to the ceiling. "Oookay..."

"Up we go, ho ho!" The chandelier started to rise like an elevator. "Tra la la la la, la la la-la-la, la la la la laaa..."

It kept singing for several minutes as we rose, floors whooshing past at a dizzying speed. How was there room for this much height in the Ice District? We were already supposed to be near the top, and...

No. Don't think about it, Hallie. Just... don't think about it.

Idly, I noted Procyon floating around, watching the proceedings with morbid fascination.

The chandelier finally slowed to a halt at a half-bridge sticking out into the middle of the tower like an airship dock. "La la laaa, la la la... Oh! We are here, ho ho!"

"Thank... you," I said, gingerly stepping off onto the bridge, taking care not to fall. I looked up. The top of the tower was still too far away to make out.

"A pleasure to serve, ho ho!" The chandelier happily bobbed up and down. "Sayonara!"

It zoomed off into the abyss, leaving me alone once again.

Strip lighting lined the bridge, pulsing in a disco pattern, guiding me toward a heavy, round-topped double door set into the wall. Above it, more neon lighting pulsed, spelling out "THE JANITOR IS IN!" in a font that looked like it belonged on the cover of a comic book.

Gingerly, I stepped up and knocked. The doors retracted sideways into the walls, revealing... the exact same office cubicle where I had first met Egdelwonk. Not a hint of difference.

"Ah-ha!" Egdelwonk noticed me immediately from where he was reclining in a swivel chair, his hind legs on his desk, and snapped the spokes of his batpony wing. "Halcyon, just the mare I wanted to see! Splendiferous timing. Is there any chance you can spare a wee tiniest moment to fill out a customer satisfaction survey about your experience with my new doorman?"

I blinked. "You mean the talking chandelier? Err, I guess?"

"His name is Chandelie-ho, and you say that you can?" Egdelwonk brightened. "Well, too bad, because I don't have one. Now what can the Lord of Ch... I mean, Despotic Dumpster Deacon do for you on this dim and moony evening?"

I summoned all my focus, ignoring everything that had just happened and pushing myself back into the present. "Your... junior dumpster despot corps, or whatever. I'm looking for Corsica, and maybe Unless. You know where they are?"

"Naturally." Egdelwonk shrugged. "This is for that 'go to Icereach and rescue my mom' thing you were just telling the windigo about, is it? Trying to recruit a goon squad to boost your chances going into the unknown?"

I gave him a sharp look. "If you know that much, can't you figure it out for yourself?"

Egdelwonk curled his lower lip in a pout. "That one, I'm afraid I have to guess on. Speaking of which, you were so close to keeping your mouth shut about the reason you wanted to go there in the first place. And then you were all 'Suppose I want to use this teleporter to go back to Icereach, get my mom, blah blah blah' and didn't even gain anything from it!"

"What?" I blinked.

"Honestly, Halcyon..." Egdelwonk waved a wing. "You can have all the magic in the world protecting your head from involuntary tampering, but it won't do a whit of good if you don't have a little more discipline about keeping secrets. Unless you're secretly a fantastic secret-keeper messing up on purpose about things you don't really care about to throw me off your tail, which is a commendable strategy, but if that's the path you've chosen you'll just have to grin and bear it when I get on your case for this."

"I can keep a secret!" I insisted. "I just don't know what you're talking about! How does this relate to Corsica? And why do you keep spying on me?"

"I spy on everyone, Halcyon," Egdelwonk told me flatly. "Sixty percent because I can, and sixty percent for kicks and giggles. And don't be a hypocrite; you came to me for information about your friends. Now let me see, let me see... Unless is currently running errands for Valey in Fort Starlight, Corsica's getting gussied up at a corporate spa... Anyone else you want to snoop on while you're here? Little Princess Coda, perhaps, or dear Leitmotif, or that wayward brother of yours you've forgotten the existence of for the past few days?"

My ears pressed back. Okay, so I hadn't talked to Ansel since we went exploring in the Night District and got arrested together. But still, that was only a few days ago! Even though it felt like an eternity. Less than a week, right?

"You know," Egdelwonk mused, rubbing his goatee, "come to think of it, you never followed up on the quest hook I gave you to investigate that shady weapon hawker who called the cops on you. I'm sure Ansel feels badly about that whole shebang. Who knows, perhaps getting some closure on it would do wonders for your relationship?"

"Don't remind me," I said. "Look, right now I'm pretty loaded down with things I've taken responsibility for and am in a tiny bit of a time crunch. Once I've checked Icereach off my list, gotten Mother safe and figured out where I stand with Jamjars and whether Kitty's still my enemy or we're capable of working together, I'll talk to Ansel and we can go find out why that stuff happened."

Egdelwonk gave me a look that was plainly challenging, though I couldn't parse exactly what he meant.

I shook my head. "I don't wanna deal with the Night District. I've gotta prioritize; I can't do everything. And it's not even raining right now, so I couldn't go down there even if I wanted to."

"Well of course you're never going to find out what you're capable of unless you try." Egdelwonk reached into his recycling bin, pulled out a fresh, clean sheet of paper, and sketched out a complete map of Ironridge with two or three strokes of a pencil. "Here," he said, folding it into a paper airplane and throwing it at me. "Locations of all your friendos. Oh, and while I have you here..." He pulled out three new copies of the contract Lilith had burned, and hoofed them to me. "Excellent thinking with the last one. Want some spares? For all I know they might even ward off windigoes."

I took them absently, still looking at the map. It was a beautiful, immaculate rendition of the city, ruined by crude, childlike crayon sketches of my friends' faces that made them look ugly and angry and stinky too, with little wafting scent lines and a few flies buzzing around. I showed it to him, silently asking why.

"What?" Egdelwonk shrugged. "It's a perfectly good map of where your friends are in the city. That is what you came here for, isn't it? Chop chop!"

I wandered toward the door in a daze. Honestly, at this point I couldn't remember why I came here at all.

After another long, song-filled chandelier ride back to the ground, ho ho, I left Egdelwonk's domain behind, deciding to seek out Corsica first. She was not only my best friend, and not only the one mare who had demonstrated an ability to beat Ludwig, but the closest, too, the map indicating her as being in a sector of the Ice District reserved for employee amenities.

I hadn't found my way here before, though granted, I had only explored once. The sector was built around a cafeteria that was much fancier than the one in Icereach, with curved, wavy walls and stylized bistros and tables in all shapes and sizes backed by real cushioned benches. The benches had their backs to each other, forming raised islands, the smaller of which were decorated with potted plants and the larger ones containing raised walking areas and even more seating.

Who made something this opulent just for their employees? I was a little jealous. The ponies eating here seemed to take everything for granted.

The cafeteria was ringed by a hallway, which was lined on both sides with amenity shops selling all sorts of knickknacks ordinary ponies might use to amuse themselves. I spied a bookstore, but the prices probably were higher than Eaststone Mall. And no matter how I sliced it, I didn't have the time or money for entertainment.

Eventually, I found the salon where Corsica was supposedly waiting. The door was wide open.

"Good evening!" said a cheery receptionist with a chin-length mane and far too much make-up. "What can I do for you, ma'am?"

"Trying to meet up with a friend," I explained. "Her name's Corsica? Unicorn about my age with a pink coat and raspberry mane. Any chance you know her?"

"Corsica..." The receptionist checked a ledger. "I believe your friend is currently in the steam sauna. Would you like me to ask her if she is accepting visitors?"

"Yeah." I nodded. "Tell her it's Halcyon."

The receptionist bowed, gave me a smile, and wandered off down a hallway, her hips swishing aggressively.

I didn't have to wait long. "Miss Corsica was surprised to hear you wanted to join her," the receptionist told me. "But she says you are welcome to do so."

"Thanks," I said, nodding for her to lead the way.

We passed several doors, walking through a clean white hallway, and eventually turned off into a side room containing a few wall-mounted lockers and a doorframe fitted with a heavy curtain. The walls were made of tiles, the ones near the curtain glistening with moisture, and there was a vent in the ceiling. The receptionist bowed again and walked away.

I had never done this before. Uncertainly, I pulled back the curtain with a hoof. "Hello?"

It was sweltering in the chamber beyond, and oppressively damp. Corsica was laying on a bench at the back, her mane wet and droopy, and she lifted her head just enough to blink at me with tired eyes. "You're going to ruin your clothes if you come in here like that, dumb-dumb."

I pulled back out, noticing that one of the locker doors was ajar and contained Corsica's shoes and ear ornaments. I glanced at the hallway. No one was coming... I had no idea what to do. I really wasn't thinking things through today, was I?

In my paralysis, my instincts tried to take over, but they just uselessly clashed and swirled, too. I could leave my coat and boots behind and go in there. I had no idea what the point was, and I didn't like undressing, but Corsica had seen my legs before, and apparently she saw something in sitting in the sauna. Even though Ironridge was supposed to be hot enough on its own without this.

Or, I could do nothing. Talk to her through the curtain. Carry on my way.

...Corsica hadn't looked so good when I peeked in on her, I decided. And even though my life was moving at a breakneck pace, I did technically have all night. Maybe I should take the time with my friend and see what she saw in this.

Quickly and carefully, I undressed save for my bracelet and slipped inside.

"Huh," Corsica said, eyeing me up and down. "You didn't strike me as the type for this."

"I'm not." I stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, feeling like I was in a display case. "I just... wanted to hang out, and stuff. What are you supposed to do in here?"

"Lie down," Corsica instructed. "Stop moving. Feel the heat. Relax. Do nothing."

I tried it.

It was... pretty boring.

I managed for a few more minutes, waiting for Corsica to say something, to do anything, but she really just seemed to be here to lie in a hot, steamy room and do nothing. So, I broke the silence instead.

"You alright?" I asked, shifting my head to look at her.

"No," Corsica grunted. "And you better not be here to ask me to do something. I overdid it on my talent down in that school and barely even have the motivation to lay here and sweat."

"...How long does it usually take?" I whispered. "To get better?"

"No such thing as better," Corsica said bitterly. "I get good enough to walk, and then your dumb butt makes me use it all over again. Forever, and ever, and ever, and ever, and ever."

Something told me Corsica wasn't feeling up to a raid on Icereach. Something else told me I would just make things worse if I tried to change that.

I needed to go to Icereach. I had to. But if I couldn't make that my goal right now... I closed my eyes, squeezed them shut, and temporarily let that plan go, sent the idea drifting off with the rising curls of steam.

"Anything I can do to help?" I asked, opening my eyes.

"Stop taking risks," Corsica grunted. "Stop making me worry about you. If that's even possible. We can't change who we are. Would be like asking Ansel to understand how girls work."

"Can't change who we are, huh?" I said, looking away. "I'm still trying to figure out who I am."

"Aren't we all," Corsica sighed. "Hard to see the future when we're more worried about today. But that's why I keep you around. You're good at that. Looking at the long term."

I didn't have anything to say.

"What's your plan now?" Corsica asked, weariness penetrating deeply into her voice. "You still got a vision for where we go from here?"

"Err... yeah," I told her. "I wanna leave Ironridge. But first we gotta get everyone important to me to come too. Like Coda and Mother. I think I'm real close to having a way out for all of us, though."

"Your mom?" Corsica raised a sodden eyebrow. "Isn't she back in Icereach?"

"I've got..." I hesitated. "A plan."

"The kind I should be worried about?" Corsica asked.

I gave her a look. "You like that I take initiative and try to seize the future, but not that I take risks that make you worry?"

"That's the problem," Corsica grunted. "There's no way that makes sense. Feels like it's gonna feel like this forever."

"...But it's not, though," I countered, aware that I had no idea what I was talking about and desperately hoping I wouldn't say something wrong. "You feel like that today because your talent's got you in a funk, but it'll be different tomorrow or a week from now. Even though it feels like forever, it will change."

"Sure it will," Corsica sighed, flicking an ear. "I'll feel good enough to use my talent again, and then be stuck right back here again. The eternal curse of being me."

"There's gotta be a better way," I whispered. "What about before you got your talent? What was it like back then?"

My train of thought threatened to fog. I was getting close to a subject that was locked behind my mask. Mentally, I tried to swat the fog away.

"I don't wanna think about it," Corsica moaned. "I was happy, I was ambitious, everything was better! I could commit myself without... without..." She trailed off. "Guess it wasn't a better time for all of us, though. Sorry."

"Nah. Get it off your chest," I urged, feeling slightly uncomfortable, but not because Corsica was bringing up my distant past. It was because she was this out of it, and still more concerned about my feelings than her own.

Corsica just snorted.

The conversation threatened to drop, and my gaze wandered to my blood-red legs. A memory of fear shifted slightly in my stomach. I remembered Procyon talking about how she didn't used to be a very nice pony, and the heavy implications that my legs looked like this because of the way I saw myself because of something I - or my other selves - had done.

"Hey, speaking of back then," I said. "What was I like? I mean, how did you see me? Back before we became friends?"

"What kind of question is that?" Corsica sounded dubious. "Wouldn't you remember better than I would?"

"An important one," I said. "To me. I'm not... I... Can you keep a really big secret?"

Corsica nodded.

I suddenly felt cold despite the sauna's heat, knowing what I was about to say. "I'm not... really..." I swallowed. "Whole, in my mind. Like there are multiple ponies named Halcyon in my head, all independent and stuff. But all the others are kind of buried. Me, I'm the same one you made friends with and have known since the avalanche. But before that, I'm not sure I existed. I have memories, and all, but I feel like my name and body and memories belonged to someone else."

"Dissociative identity disorder?" Corsica was fully paying attention now. "Is that what you're talking about? You think you have that?"

I blinked. "Disso-what? There's a name for it?"

Corsica shrugged, turning her shoulders upright. "I read about it while I was doing a cursory survey of other scientific fields when we first got here. Checking out what kinds of things weren't in Icereach. You know. It was a psychology thing."

I leaned in closer. "What did you read about it? How many ponies have it? Are there specific things that cause it? Is it physical or magical, or purely mental?"

"I skimmed like one paragraph in a summary!" Corsica pulled back. "It's a mental thing, and I don't know how widespread it is. Sometimes it manifests as a coping mechanism for dealing with trauma, so you can frame your memories as having happened to someone else. Other times, it just happens for no reason."

Purely mental, huh? That probably ruled out what I was experiencing, since I had gotten a physical look at a green crystal that apparently represented my mask when it was taken off. And I didn't have any traumatic memories I imagined as having happened to someone else. Though I certainly had a lot of memories that only Procyon and the third me were allowed to know...

"And I dunno how trustworthy the source was, anyway," Corsica huffed. "So don't get your hopes up. Why tell me this, anyway?"

Now that I thought about it, I honestly didn't know. Pretty much everything I was doing tonight was on instinct, wasn't it...? "I just felt like it," I said, truthfully. "And maybe it distracted you from whatever you've got going on. And I was thinking about it since you were talking about the way things used to be, and I'm... not sure how much I can trust what I can remember from back then. Feels like my life completely changed with that avalanche, too."

"You with this, me with my issues, Ansel with amnesia." Corsica shook her head and smiled ruefully. "It's like all three of us died and came back different."

"...Something like that. Yeah."

I looked away. Procyon was nowhere to be seen. There was still a lingering fear, deep down, but it felt almost weaker than before, as if it was giving up on its ability to ever control me. It was without purchase, desperate, piteous and afraid.

If only I could reassure that part of me, instead of scaring it further. But I trusted Corsica with my secret, and she repaid that trust. If this didn't help, I didn't know what would.

At least I was free. I had come a long, long way from thinking of my mask as a disguise the real me was wearing, something I would consciously take off and tweak. In fact, the only reason I still thought of myself as my mask was because I didn't have any better words to use.

And because I had physically seen the mask, held in another me's hooves. But that was neither here nor there.

I took a deep breath. Corsica's mood seemed better than it was before, if only tentatively.

"So you want me to avoid doing stuff that would make you worry about me for a while, yeah?" I glanced back at her.

Corsica met my eyes. "You'd better not be about to ask permission for a dumb plan."

I shrugged. "Guilty as charged. But if you tell me no, I'll listen."

Corsica looked down, conflicted. "Well, spit it out, then."

"I've got a way to get back to Icereach in a hurry," I explained. "And then back here again. I want to go get Mother and bring her back here. Also, I may have accidentally stranded Jamjars there last night by mistake."

Corsica gave me a how'd-you-manage-that look.

"It's complicated," I said. "And the situation in Icereach might be complicated too, which is why I'd want to get in and out as fast as possible. Problem is, it's going to involve getting Ludwig to cooperate."

Corsica slumped back down on her side. "Talk about dumb plans."

I shook my head. "Sorry. Before I saw how out of it you were, I wanted to see if you'd come along too, since you know how to deal with Ludwig. If you veto this, I'll put it off until you say otherwise. But once we've got Mother, I want to leave this city in a hurry. I think I can convince Coda to buy us an airship, and hopefully even join us. We can leave all these machinations behind, and maybe go somewhere we won't be so stressed out all the time, or can get ponies to treat us normally. I know you're real out of it right now and I know you've been having a hard time, and that's why I want to get all our things in order so we can move."

"So what are you asking?" Corsica squinted at me. "For me to come along? I'm not in any condition to do anything productive. Or do you want my blessing to go back there yourself?"

I shrugged. "Anything you can tell me about how to get past Ludwig, I'll use."

Corsica shook her head. "Just tell him he'll clean his own clock if he messes with you. Mention my name. He'll... He'll go along with it." She swallowed. "Or not. Ughhhhhhhhh..."

She rubbed her forehooves down her face. "You alright?" I asked, leaning closer.

"Just trying to think how to outsmart a rules lawyer who twists everything you say against you," Corsica groaned. "Without... ugh. Tell him if he tells you what my talent does, he'll be in for double pain."

I tilted my head. "You're worried he'll try to get revenge on you by telling me about your talent?"

"He knows what it does," Corsica sighed. "Figured it out pretty quick while taking my body for a joy ride. And I would really... rather you not know."

"I already know half of it, don't I?" I gently asked. "About how it drains you like this?"

"That's not the important part," Corsica wetly complained. "You'd never be able to look at me the same if you knew the truth. It's personal."

I grimaced. "I mean, so was telling you about my... you know..."

Wait a minute. Corsica was worried about me learning things about her she didn't want me to know... Technically, I had a way to make myself forget.

Of course, I was actively trying to undermine the wishes of the person who enabled it, and it had been a long time since we consciously worked together to modify what I knew. But still.

"If I learn," I promised, "I'll forget. There's nothing Ludwig can tell me that can stick in my mind if I don't want it to. The various parts of me... We don't all remember the same things, even though our history is mostly shared. I can segregate my memories. One of the buried parts can remember, and I can forget."

Corsica gave me an are-you-crazy look.

I shook my head. "Dead serious."

Corsica sighed. "Sure wish I could do that. Just forget things I didn't want to remember."

I didn't know what to say.

"Guess that makes you lucky," she said. "If you can grow up however you please, and just decide there are some burdens you don't want to carry. Some of us don't have that luxury. We're stuck with our past, and we can't change it. And trying only makes it worse."

"Well..." I bit my lip. "Well... I don't even know what it is I don't know. Maybe you've got issues, but you get to understand them. I don't get to know mine. My other halves don't even think I can handle knowing their issues. And you're telling me you don't think I can handle knowing your issues, either. Am I really so delicate? What if I want to help?"

Corsica got up, stood, walked across the room and grabbed me on the shoulders, her face right up in mine. Her wet hooves felt wrong against my fur.

"You help more than you could know," she said, not letting go. "Do you want to know what I would have done these last two and a half years if I didn't have you to cheerlead and drag me into a project you were enthusiastic about? Do you?"

"Try me," I countered, bracing myself for heartfelt hyperbole.

"Odds are, I'd have tried so hard to do nothing, I'd be a total recluse," Corsica said, stepping back and letting me go. "I didn't figure out how to avoid hurting myself with my talent all at once. Once I initially realized what it was doing, I could avoid triggering it and draining myself, but only by overcompensating and not caring about anything except for caring about nothing. I don't even want to think about what a pony would look like who defined themself by avoiding any sort of emotional investment, especially one as young as me. Odds are, I'd snap and... I dunno. But if I didn't have your enthusiasm and your ability to put up with my grumpy rear, I wouldn't have pushed myself far enough to find my actual boundaries. I might not be smart about my talent, or have the self-control to avoid overusing it. But I at least know now what I'll be getting into without having to run from every shadow and possibility."

My ears pressed back.

"So don't be hard on yourself for being innocent and pure, or wish you were anything but," Corsica said, lighting her horn and turning a valve that made the steam slowly stop coming. "Got it? The way you are now, you can still help ponies like me who have too much on their plates."

For a moment, I stared at her. And then I said, "I bet the other parts of me think exactly the same."

"Huh," Corsica said. "Guess we've got that in common."

I shook my head, getting up as well. "Don't think I'm weak, though. Or that I'll break if someone says the wrong words in my ear. It's not fair that you're carrying more than your fair share, but it's not fair that I'm carrying less, either. If I even am! I've been crippled by random phobias I don't understand and other junk I should be over by now for as long as I can remember. Don't show my legs in public! Don't trust strangers who offer me jobs! And what it's made me want to do, as I grow stronger and figure out who I am, is be someone who can take that all and hold my head up high. The other parts of me don't like that any more than you do, but I'm going to show them a way and it's not going to be a way that involves me being a pretty little face while they sit in the back of my mind and carry the hard stuff."

"Cool." Corsica pulled back the curtain, wrapping her mane in a fresh towel. "Just try to take care of yourself so you don't wind up like me."

"All I ever wanted to do for so many years was be like you," I said. "So don't sell yourself short either."

Corsica actually chuckled. "Whatever. So, who else is coming, and where's this route you found back to Icereach?"

I blinked. "You're coming too?"

"Might as well," Corsica grunted, still not back to her usual self, even though I had clearly talked her out of the worst of her stupor. "Guess your determination is rubbing off on me. I'm serious, though, the harder I push myself when I'm supposed to be resting... If you don't like seeing me like this, try not to do anything stupid. Don't make me get any worse."

I nodded, pulling over a towel for myself as well and focusing on my legs so I could quickly don my boots.

That had been... a conversation. I felt like I was sitting in a field of broken glass, where some massive glass walls had freshly shattered and strewn their pieces every which way.

There were new places I could go, now. New possibilities and new risks I could take, new unknowns to explore. All of it unsafe, but the familiar places were unsafe now too, so I might as well take the chance with something new.

My secrets were out there. A lot of them, some of the ones kept closest to my heart, though certainly not all.

The old status quo was gone, and now there was no room for failure. I would find a new, better one, or I would keep trying until I succeeded, no matter how far I had to search.

Separated From The World

The moon was still climbing in the sky when we got off the train in the Day District at the stop closest to the Gates to the Underworld. Toasty night air greeted me, even though I was still trying to cool off after my trip to the sauna. I had lived in Ironridge too long for complaining about the heat to have novelty, anymore, but I really wished it would just go away.

The barkeep greeted us with a wordless nod as we stepped inside the establishment. Apparently, it was too early in the night to go carousing, because most of the tables were empty. I had a mind to pass straight through to Fort Starlight, but apparently Corsica had other ideas.

"Gimmie something with ice," she said, plopping herself down on a bar stool at the main counter.

Well... sure. We had time to kill. "Same," I said, joining her.

The barkeep gave us an appraising look, giving me the faint sensation that I was being judged for my age. Then two glasses were slid out to us, mine filled with something cold, not fizzy and very sweet. Corsica, I noticed, paid for both of us.

I sipped, waiting for something to happen.

Nothing did.

Hadn't we just spent an hour doing nothing, sitting in the sauna? Wasn't it time to get busy again? Sure, we might have had all night to wait, but better to cross that bridge once everything else that needed doing was done, right? Worst case, we could take the teleporter and then wait in the hideout for dawn. We might even need that time to reach an understanding with Jamjars, assuming she was still stranded there and hadn't found her way to Icereach on her own.

There was just no reason not to go fast. I was antsy; I had committed to a risky plan and now it was time to see it through. Just like during the Aldebaran incident itself, waiting was the worst part.

Ironic, given the number of times over the past week I had wished my life would slow down, give me a break and be normal for a change. And Corsica didn't look bothered at all.

I reminded myself that, even though she had agreed to come with me, she wasn't in a condition to do much of anything at all. If I didn't need her for getting past Ludwig, part of me wanted to tell her to stay in Ironridge and take it easy...

Restless, I glanced to the alicorn statue set into the wall. It was just like the rows of statues in storage in the hideout, except the gem in its choker was red and I was fairly sure the other ones had been green. Why those statues were there was one of the many mysteries from the Aldebaran incident I had never solved, even now that Leif was willing to tell me everything.

The first time I was here, I remembered the barkeep telling me that statues like this used to be used to pray to the Night Mother, back in the east. Maybe she would know.

"Hey," I said, getting her attention. "That statue..."

She raised an eyebrow, polishing a mug with a rag. An old, heavyset batpony who looked to be in her seventies, her eyes sparkled with ancient wisdom and weariness, as though she had lived a life every bit as eventful as mine, except my past week was her every week for decades on end. "If you want to pray to it again, don't let me stop you. That's why it's there."

"No, it's just..." I shook my head. "Where did you get it? What's this particular one's story? It used to be used in the east, right?"

The barkeep nodded. "Most of them were originally made in Mistvale. This one came from Garsheeva's temple in Grandbell, the capitol of the Empire. Sarosians weren't as uncomfortable with Garsheeva as griffons and day ponies were with the Night Mother. Garsheeva let them put their statues in the Empire."

"What was it like?" I asked. "I was born in the Empire, but left before I can remember. But you must remember things from before the war. What was it like, being able to talk to the Night Mother?"

The barkeep gave a single, dry chuckle. "Look at where we are now. The Night Mother did nothing good for sarosians. Just led us all to near extinction. Who knows how many more generations until nature finishes what she started?" She shook her head. "You're better off not remembering, kid. She seduced ponies. Helped them feel better for a time. Let them think they had a brighter tomorrow until the day they all died. It was a good dream, until it was over."

I bit my lip, my heart rebelling against that answer. "Is that how you see things when you're older?" I eventually protested. "That the destination is the only thing that matters, and not the journey? Everyone dies sometime or other. Was having a goddess who cared about you really so bad, when you look at the whole entire picture?"

"Everyone does die," the barkeep told me. "And new ponies are born to replace them... unless they aren't. Individual ponies might be mortal, but this race as a whole didn't need to be."

I didn't know what to say to that.

"Live your life," the barkeep urged. "You've still got it. Start a family, or don't. Think about what you want for your descendants, or your friends' descendants, and their descendants after them. And ask yourself if a comforting voice in your ear, and their ears, is worth it if it means that someday, that line will end."

I shrank back a little, wanting to be defiant but with no idea how to do it. Even Mother didn't sound like that. She at least had me, I realized; she knew that even if she had given everything she had to give, she had done it for me, and I had a chance to live my life because of it. This mare... had lost everything, hadn't she?

"My, my," a new voice announced. "Discussing philosophy? Without me?"

I blinked, then scowled in realization. It was Papyrus.

"Rude," the pegasus said, marching up and putting a patronizing wing around my back. "Also probably wise, but that's neither here nor there. How are you holding up against this old crone's nihilism, Butterfly?"

I partially shadow snuck, making myself slippery and folding into the stool to get out from under his wing. "You two know each other?"

Papyrus leaned on the counter, swiping my abandoned drink and taking a swig for himself. "Ol' Barkeep and I go way back. We were debating the nature of good and evil before the very cosmos were formed. Weren't we, you persnickety hag?"

The barkeep - whom I now remembered was just called Barkeep - sighed and went back to polishing glasses.

"Figured you'd show up," Corsica grunted, keeping her own drink safely in her aura. "We're going on an adventure. Might be dangerous. Want in?"

Papyrus's eyes twinkled. "Almost as much as I want to hear what brought on this discussion I just crashed. Someone got her talking about the Night Mother and the near-extinction of a fluffy little race, didn't they?"

"And what if I did?" I raised an eyebrow. "You're even younger than I am. There's no way you remember what the east was like before the way."

Papyrus gave me a suspicious look that slowly morphed into concern.

"What?" I asked when he didn't say anything.

He took a breath, then sighed. "Butterfly, I legitimately can't tell if you're pulling my leg or have well and truly forgotten that the whole reason we became friends in the first place is because I'm a knowledgeable expert on all things Griffon Empire. In fact, the last time we met I bullied you into letting me join a raiding party to the old Flame District, which you did to butter me up so I'd let you pick my sizable brain about the subject. A reward which you have yet to come and claim."

I felt my cheeks start to turn red.

"You did forget!" Papyrus brightened with glee. "Amazing! What a rube! Butterfly, have I ever mentioned that I really, really like you?" He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "We should hang out."

"Put a sock in it," I protested, squirming away, legitimately upset with myself for forgetting a thing like that. "My life is busy, okay? What are you even doing here?"

"Waiting for you to pick your poison, for one," Papyrus said, finishing off my drink in a single gulp. "Philosophical discussions or adventures in the making? Easiest way to make me forget about one is to offer an invitation to the other..." His tail flicked eagerly, like a cat.

"It's a rescue mission." Corsica stood up, finishing her drink as well and pushing her glass back down the counter. "Back room. Details are private."

Papyrus curiously followed along, leaving me to begrudgingly bring up the rear. "Another one, eh?" he said as we slipped into the back hallway. "I'm not sure how you'll top breaking a member of the Empire's most influential assassin trio out of an underground mad scientist lair, but consider my curiosity in your tender hooves."

"Don't think you wanna know how tender these are," Corsica threatened, tapping her shoes against the worn wooden floor for emphasis. "And believe it or not, that's exactly what we'll be doing."

I had filled Corsica in on the rough details for my plan and how we would be pulling it off, including working the teleporters, making the windigoes cooperate, settling any differences we had with Jamjars, climbing the Trench of Greg, finding Mother and getting ourselves back to Ironridge, adapting to new circumstances on the fly as they arose. And now Corsica gave those details to Papyrus, during which he listened curiously and eagerly.

"Now that's my kind of plan," he said when she was finally finished, his eyes glowing rapturously. "Another real, legitimate former acquaintance of High Prince Gazelle? Here's the deal, ladies: play along for half a second when I try to dupe her, and your endeavor shall have my loyal, unflinching support."

I gave him an incredulous look, though by this point I shouldn't have been surprised. "You'll help us hijack a teleporter, persuade a windigo, climb a mountain, get past anything that might have changed, and deal with everything that will inevitably go wrong at every step of the plan all for a chance to introduce yourself as the Empire's old prince, whom you just so happen to resemble, to someone who used to know him."

Papyrus shrugged. "And you wouldn't? It ain't healthy to have no goals in life, kiddos."

"We're both older than you," Corsica told him. "I'll take that as you're in, then?"

Papyrus winked. "So far in that if I went any further, I'd be coming out the other side. Now who else is joining this shindig? Something tells me Unless will be ticked if I go and have all the fun without her."

"Gross," Corsica muttered under her breath.

"Well, we were coming out to Fort Starlight to look for her," I said. "Egdelwonk told me she'd be here. After that, I want to invite Leitmotif and maybe Coda. You know who she is, right?"

"That little filly who talks big and thinks she's a goddess?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Fair warning, she's not wrong. And gods have an annoying habit of always getting their way, with the sole exception of when they run into a bigger and badder god. You put her on the stage, and you can kiss any agency you had in the situation goodbye."

I blinked. "That's kind of the point. We're tangling with the powers that be, here. There's nothing physical any of us can do to a windigo; it's just a words game to convince them to play along with us. With Coda on our side, we might have more options, not less."

Papyrus lazily cracked his neck. "Simple thoughts for simple ponies, I suppose. Gods don't join your side; they define their own sides. So unless you're secretly even bigger and badder than she is, you either join her side or pray she doesn't come to the table."

I hesitated, feeling a chill. "By that logic, maybe I am bigger and badder than she is," I told him. "Because she legitimately trusts me."

Papyrus looked deeply intrigued. "You really think that, do you? In that case, invite her along. I'm curious to see where this goes. As they say, seeing is believing."

"How should we do this?" Corsica asked. "Split up? Hallie finds Corsica and Leitmotif, Papyrus finds Unless, I stay here, and we meet back up here when we're finished?"

"Vetoed, because you're lazy and so am I," Papyrus drawled. "At the very least, I want to watch Butterfly petitioning Coda with my own eyes."

"Fine," Corsica sighed. "Work me to the bone, why don't you. Let's get this over with..."

"You wanna do what now?" Admiral Valey gave us a suspicious look, lounging behind her desk, across from the three of us in the middle of the room.

"A humble expedition to an insignificant colony you have no history with whatsoever, your mareness," Papyrus said, head lowered in a mockingly deep bow. "We request a goon squad to use as cannon fodder. Or, barring that, a single someone more familiar with the terrain and competent enough to keep up."

"Unless has history with Icereach?" I whispered. I felt like I would know if Icereach had any pegasi, so this must have been a long time ago...

"You can say that," Valey said, apparently not only hearing me but failing to recognize I was trying to be stealthy in the first place. "We both kinda do, actually. It's how I know her. And the short answer is: not really feelin' up to it right now. Sorry."

I raised an eyebrow. "You speak for both yourself and her, then?"

Actually, had I known Valey had a history with Icereach, either? I felt like someone had told me...

"Maybe you haven't heard this story," Valey said, folding her forelegs and leaning forward. "But your mom and her sisters once did me seriously dirty. And when someone does you this dirty, there's different levels of over it one can really be. For example, I don't hate their blood and everything to do with it, as evidenced by the fact that you're standing here in my fort and I'm giving you some good faith good advice, and have been looking out for you and even taking some risks on your behalf in secret for a while now. I even knew Elise and signed off on it when she took you and your mom to Icereach. However, I'm maybe not quite so over it that I'm jumping at the chance to send my loyal employees into danger in a place I don't like and they don't like either when I'm not even convinced there's anything to be done. Unless works for both me and Egdelwonk, and Cold Karma might have you forgetting that this is normal, but bananas, I care about my employees."

"What do you mean there's nothing to be done?" I asked. "There's... I mean... You know how things are likely to be in the future, right? Between Yakyakistan and Ironridge?"

Valey shrugged. "Whatever information you think you have, odds are ten to one I was the primary source. What of it?"

"Icereach is gonna close its doors," I said, stepping up and putting my forehooves on her desk. "Yakyakistan and Ironridge are gonna start fighting. The shipping route between them is gonna disappear and it'll turn into contested airspace and there'll be no way in or out. Either I get Mother out or I don't see her again until... however long this lasts, if it's over within my lifetime. I know less about world history than I'd like, but I know there's always a war somewhere."

Valey met my eyes. "No way in or out, huh? What about the way you're proposing right now?"

I blinked. The teleporters wouldn't be affected by air travel, would they...

"I just don't want to leave her behind," I whispered. "Please. We're gonna be leaving Ironridge soon, me and my friends. I wanna take the things that matter to me with me. And not leave them laying in my wake like a trail."

For a moment, Valey watched me. And then she stood up and nodded at Papyrus and Corsica. "You two clowns got anything to add? If not, I'd like a word alone with Halcyon here."

Papyrus made a wing gesture I didn't recognize and turned to leave, coupled with a smug smirk. Valey threw a wadded-up paper ball at him.

Corsica hesitated, looked like she was about to say something... and then said, "Fine. We'll be down below."

Valey waited a moment after they were gone. "So." She turned to me. "You just said you wanna travel, run away, and take everything that matters along with you."

I nodded. "That's the plan."

"What about everything that matters to the ponies who join you?" she asked, serious.

I hesitated. "Well, Mother never does much anyway, and I think Corsica's happy to come..."

Valey didn't let me escape her gaze. "So you'd like to live in a perfectly-insulated, tiny community that's portable because it's completely and totally separated from the rest of the world."

"Well, we don't have to be completely separated," I protested, feeling suddenly uncomfortable. "Just, I don't wanna stay in Ironridge. I know there's a better life out there somewhere else in the world, waiting for me to find it. What's so wrong with wanting my friends to come along on the ride? Especially if the alternative is getting locked away in Icereach forever?"

"...'Cuz I've been there," Valey said, still not looking away. "There's nothing wrong with wanting to protect your friends. It's admirable, and I do think being confined to Icereach forever and ever would be a pretty lousy life. But a mindset like that is gonna make it become a pattern. Nothing is perfect, kid. Sure, some lives are better than others, but the easier you make it to drift around, the easier it will be to leave when the going gets tough. And the more you get used to doing that, the less it'll take to make you reroll the dice and move on to the next place. We need things tying us to our homes so that when we're tempted to leave, it's not always an easy choice. And maybe sometimes you'll still make that choice, but it needs to be a hard choice so that you don't always choose the same way."

My backwards ears fell. "What are you saying? That it's pointless to keep looking because I'll never find somewhere good enough? That even though the world is massive, there are no good places at all out there to find?"

Valey shook her head. "There's plenty of good places. The problem is that the easier you make it to keep looking, the higher your standards will be because the less you lose from trying again. Wanting to help your mom is noble, and if I was in your position, I wouldn't be happy with my lot in Ironridge either. And that's why I'm not trying to stop you from going to Icereach, or your plan to leave the city. It's your mindset that worries me, because it looks super familiar and I've seen where it can take someone."

"You and your friends, when you traveled with Jamjars and Gerardo and Starlight," I guessed.

"Bingo." Valey got out of her chair and walked over to one of the many paintings on the walls, pointing to each pony one by one. "Maple. Riverfall mare, big idealist and serial gambler. She had a troubled past, you see - depression, and stuff. And the way she would face each morning was by telling herself that good things could happen. And then she'd take risks, on the off chance that they'd pay off and remind her that her worldview was correct. Also a great chef, and one of the most gentle souls I've ever met. But, she was too gentle. One day, some bad stuff went down that she couldn't live with, and she decided to gamble on going elsewhere. Not that she should have had to live with it, mind you. It was pretty bad. Just... not everyone gets the choice to run when they need it. And once she ran the first time, it was always easier to stick with her friends whenever they moved on, too."

She moved on. "Harshwater. First time I met her, she was a mercenary someone hired to kill me. Second... Nah, third time I met her, she was stranded out in Mistvale with a bunch of castaways. She had a crush on her old boss, who was a cad, and it made her easy to manipulate. Pretty sure I saved her life, like... three times that night? Used to be a lively lass, but after that she couldn't trust anyone, and so she glued herself to the status quo. Which, by the time we were back in civilization, meant following us."

She turned away from the paintings. "Every one of us had stories, and I could tell them all night. But the important part was, we were running from ourselves as much as we were running toward a home, and all of us either had a pretty damaged idea of what a home was supposed to be, or had never known one in the first place. You wanna wander because you don't think this place is good enough, and you left Icereach because it wasn't good enough either. But do you know what the thing you're looking for looks like? Because if you don't, you will wander and wander and wander and pass up chance after chance to settle down and be happy."

I wasn't even sure if this conversation was about me anymore. "Are you... talking about me?" I asked. "Or about your own story?"

"Both," Valey said. "I'm giving you a warning about what could be in your future. In a vacuum, wanting to get your mom out of Icereach is noble. In a vacuum, not wanting anything to do with Ironridge is smart. I just wanna make sure that you are doing these because you've thought heavily about each of them, and not just because of inertia."

I swallowed. "I don't have any inertia. I just... What about Gerardo? Doesn't he fly around and carry his home with him?"

Valey shook her head. "He's a special case. Birdo's not looking for a home, see; his home is the road. It works out for him. But, it doesn't work for everyone."

I looked away.

"Anyway, thanks for listening to my spiel," Valey said, sitting back down in her chair. "I just don't wanna see other ponies repeat the lessons I learned the hard way. You're serious about going back to Icereach, here?"

"Yes," I insisted, straightening my posture. "Whatever else, I need some time to decide how I wanna do things, and I'm not going to get it if I'm worrying about Mother. I know Icereach might just close off their borders, but she isn't a native, and there's always the possibility..."

"Yeah, there's always a possibility of a lot of stuff happening." Valey stretched. "Good luck out there. And, uh..." She opened a drawer, fished around in it with a hoof, and pulled out a pattern card. "Here."

"What's this?" I took it, tilting my head.

Valey nodded. "A teleport point to a clearing just north of the fort. We keep it pretty heavily secured, just in case. You know... if for any reason you're trying to teleport out of there and want to go not to Jamjars' house, but somewhere with friends to back you up in a fight."

I pocketed it gratefully. "Good idea. Thanks."

"Eh, don't mention it." Valey rubbed the back of her head. "When you've been at it this long, you learn how to predict where things are gonna go wrong. Have fun in Icereach. Bananas, I wouldn't wanna be there too."

"Thanks," I repeated, taking my leave. Well, we weren't getting Unless, but at least I had what I hoped amounted to Valey's vote of confidence. And a very heartfelt warning I wasn't sure I understood.

The teleporter in Fort Starlight, I was thrilled to learn, wasn't hard-wired to the Gates to the Underworld. And after a little persuading from Papyrus, the ponies operating it were only too happy to send us directly to Dead Herman instead.

After the familiar, unwelcome sensation of being turned into a slinky and walked down a flight of stairs, we were in an empty shack looking out on the all-night every-night carnival of Dead Herman, live saxophone jazz playing in the background and colored lights strung between every awning. I led the way to the lift, up into the ruined skyport, and through the elevated tunnels to the old airship concourse where Coda moored every night.

The ship was here, and it looked busy.

I was instantly recognized at the boarding ramp, the two cultists at the entrance eyeing me with expressions that were none too thrilled. My reputation around here had probably taken a hit after I stole their boss away for a night on the town, though as long as Coda had anything to say about it, I would still be a guest of honor, begrudgingly or not.

Papyrus surveyed the situation, and clearly thought something was funny, though whatever it was, he didn't spit it out.

Barely had I entered the airship's lobby, ponies taking up every lounge table and chair, than Coda appeared to greet me. "Princess Halcyon the Garbed!" she declared, waddling out from the throne room with eyes eager and head held high. "Long was my slumber and dull were my dreams, but I knew you would return 'ere the sun graced the sky!"

Papyrus stifled a laugh with his wing. "Princess Halcyon? Garsheeva's breath, you really do have her number?"

Coda gave him a suspicious look. "This loud one is quite odd. What about your princess's presence do you find so amusing, churl?"

Papyrus leaned against a wall and whistled far too innocently.

Coda stared at him in consternation. Apparently neither of them noticed that we were rapidly being surrounded by clergy.

"Your highness," a stallion whispered in Coda's ear. "The prayers of the faithful-"

"Are being earnestly offered and shall be earnestly received, you predictable pony, you," Coda chided, cutting him off. "Halcyon, know you this creature?" She pointed a hoof at Papyrus. "I fear he is unaware he is in the presence of divinity."

"Yeah, he's pretty dense," I agreed without missing a beat. "Any chance you've got a moment to talk? I wanna hit you up with an idea."

Coda's eyes glowed. "Does it perchance involve a repeat of our-"

"Your highness," a cleric urged, interrupting. "Remember, this is the mare who tempted you to abandon your-"

"Rudeness!" Coda glared at her. "Do not presume to interrupt your goddess, O faithful of mine! This is Princess Halcyon the Garbed, and your goddess demands she be afforded the respect that befits her station. 'Tis unlovely to do otherwise. Don't you agree, servant of love?"

While Coda was arguing, an elderly stallion drew up beside me, wearing the ornamentation of the cult. "Ma'am," he muttered in my ear, "the Princess appreciates the company your shoulder has provided, but-"

"But what?" Coda was there, patiently watching him. "Your goddess knows your thoughts. She knows how you meant to finish that sentence. And, in her mercy, she grants you a chance to rewrite it in a way that does not presume to know her mind as she knows yours."

I didn't need goddess powers to read that emotions in the room were getting high, particularly Coda's. It was clear she had received a talking-to since I ran off with her, and it was clear she hadn't agreed with what her clergy had to say.

The civilians in the room didn't need powers, either. One by one, then group by group, they began to pack their bags and file out as Coda stared down her clergy, oblivious to her disappearing clientele.

No one spoke, though I could tell Papyrus was sorely tempted to stoke the flames.

Suddenly, Coda noticed the exodus. "Oops!" She grinned. "It would seem my loyal revelers have decided we're closing up shop early for the night. Well, your ever-humble princess is not one to refuse the will of the people, so it seems we are done for the night, yes? All of you, take a vacation! Your princess commands it! Then it will only be fair when she does so as well, heehee!"

She glommed onto my side, and stared at the clergy with an expression that dared them to disagree.

Most of the clergy watched me with a gaze that told me there was a right choice, here, and a wrong choice. And they had a different idea of it than Coda.

I swallowed. It might be possible to get away with Coda one more time, but that would just make things even worse later, and this needed to be cleared up now. "You guys know that staying here all the time isn't what she wants, right?"

"The essence of service is to put the needs of others before your own wants," said an older stallion who elected himself to speak for the group. "This is a value Princess Coda has long understood. She has lived her life by it for years, up until you came here."

"Having social contact with ponies and living outside a bubble isn't a want," I told him. "It's a need. You can't just live a fulfilling life up here on an airship with no ties to the... world..."

My train of thought flashed back to Valey, vividly enough that I could swear I was right there, right now. "So you'd like to live in a perfectly-insulated, tiny community that's portable because it's completely and totally separated from the rest of the world."

"Who are you to say that when we have done so for two long decades?" the stallion countered.

"So have I!" I protested, taking a step forward. "You guys are old. Maybe you chose this life for a reason, but you remember stuff from before it. Well, I didn't! I grew up in a cloistered bunker that sheltered itself from the truth and the world at large, and I stepped out to see the world because I needed more than I had back there. And Coda's the same. That's why she likes me: because we're similar enough to understand each other, except I've done and am in the middle of doing everything she wants to do."

"What Princess Coda wants is the destruction of her wicked nemesis," a different cultist said. "She wanted this ever since the beginning. You are not trying to give her what she wants, but change it!"

I adamantly shook my head. "If changing your entire life's goal is as easy as seeing one pony doing one new thing and deciding you want to do that too, maybe it deserves to be changed. Did Coda decide to fight her mother with you because she explored all the options available to her, and then decided this was her true calling? Or did you only give her one option to explore?"

"To control such impulses is the function of self-restraint," another cultist argued, a pleading tone in their voice. "Our higher calling would not be noble if it was easy!"

"Would it?" I stared at them. "Does just being difficult make it noble? Trying to stop Chrysalis is good. I don't like her either. But Coda is a kid. Kids are supposed to spend their foalhood imagining and experimenting with all the different things they could grow up to be. I know this because it's something I never got to do, and my life is emptier for it! It's nice that you all have self-restraint, but you're restraining her, too!"

The very air felt like it could crack. "I know you feel like you're doing good, and fighting Chrysalis is good," I insisted. "But if I'm really leading Coda astray, then answer this. If it's so easy for me to tempt her into breaking your rules, how's she gonna make it through any tough decisions when it's time to fight her mother? What's she gonna do if Chrysalis asks her to join up and offers her freedom?"

Coda herself blanched, but as the cultists nervously shuffled, I began to wonder if I was getting across my point.

"That's because Coda is still young," one eventually said. "She hasn't yet had time to become firm enough in her convictions to test them against the world. They will crumble if she moves too early."

I stared at them. "She's the same age as me, no? Nineteen? If that's the case, explain me."

"I am not some delicate thing," Coda said from my side, speaking for the first time since the argument had started properly. "Am I? Or are all your supplications and professions of my strength merely lies you desire I hear enough to come to believe?"

"Princess, it is our duty to mold you..." A younger cleric bowed her head. "Our holy calling to deliver you to your faith, and your faith to you."

Someone cleared their throat, and I turned to look. It was Papyrus.

"You know..." he said, strolling forward. "Say I'm jumping to conclusions, but I recall a fascinating story from the final days of the Empire about a changeling queen who never got any say in how she got to live her life, who subsequently exploded in pent-up rage. Now, not that a lowly nobody like me who was far away from all that nastiness would ever presume to point hooves and say who might have been responsible for such tragic events. It's just, one potential thing taking responsibility might look like is to learn from one's mistakes."

The clergy, who had been too focused on me and Coda so far to pay him much notice, suddenly acknowledged him as one, stares of disbelief and occasional terror flickering across their faces. "You," one whispered.

"Me?" Papyrus blinked. "Oh! Right! Silly me, I got so caught up in this little family feud I forgot to even do the joke. No, I'm not Gazelle, I just look like him. Papyrus of Riverfall, at your service." He bowed theatrically low.

"P-Perhaps..." Coda's voice shook, and she took a breath. "Your goddess's clergy might leave it to her to determine the course of her future, trust her to find the best path to her calling, and give her the final say on matters such as these."

"...Princess." Slowly, the clergy started to bow, more and more of them joining in until they were all kneeling.

"I know my divine duty," Coda proclaimed. "And I tell you the truth; I would not have agreed to accompany Halcyon to the city had she not convinced me it would in fact bolster my preparation to face off against the fell Chrysalis. How can I be expected to do battle in a world I know nothing of, she asked me? And so I shall learn. Fear not, my subjects. Your princess... will not abandon you. But she proclaims herself ready to see the surface world."

"Then go." The head priest gritted his teeth. "...Take good care of our Princess."

I nodded as sincerely as I could. "You can bet on it."

And then we turned, and no one stopped us from taking our leave.

"Well," Coda said once we were back in the skyport proper. "That was most unnerving. And some mildly awe-inspiring wordplay from you, Princess Halcyon. In truth, I had talked to them many times since our last adventure, and was never able to muster my convictions with such strength."

"That's 'cuz you haven't lived enough yet to know what your convictions are," I encouraged, putting her down and patting her head.

She smiled at me. "How fortunate that you are here to remedy that. You are here to take me on another adventure, correct?"

I took a deep breath, praying that getting Coda involved in this mission was as good of an idea as it sounded. "Kiddo, you have no idea."

The Moment of Departure

"We are being followed," Coda remarked under her breath, once again disguised as an ordinary filly and riding on my back. Papyrus and Corsica flanked me as we strolled the streets of Dead Herman, more because Corsica didn't want to walk next to Papyrus than because I was the leader.

"Eh?" My backwards ears twitched.

"By my clergy," Coda added. "I know their minds well enough to recognize them even at a distance. Their thoughts run stiff with worry..."

I thought back to the confrontation that ensued as we left the airship. Clearly, Coda's escapades with me the night before hadn't gone over well with her followers, and things got charged enough that my own emotions got a little heated trying to persuade them that seeing the world was in the filly's best interest. Not that it was me, ultimately, who convinced them to let her go. Papyrus had been the one to actually cow them and make them back down.

Coda sounded worried too. "Ever have they acted in my best interest," she breathed in my ear. "I do want to see the world. I desire it with all of my being. Yet victory sits hollow in my breast when it was won over the objections of my most faithful. This will be alright, yes? They are merely overprotective, and will surely be reassured by witnessing us on an innocent and refreshing jaunt around the city?"

I grit my teeth. Yes, if I was acting solely for Coda's benefit, taking her on a safe, controlled tour designed to get her hooves wet and teach her about the world little by little, under her guardians' watchful eye, would be the best both for her and for their own peace of mind.

Instead, I was marching her off to war.

Resolving to myself that I would see her home safely, no matter the cost - a silly resolution to make when she was far more powerful than I was, but an important one nonetheless - I kept up my pace, walking towards the inn where I was told I would find Leitmotif. Coda had apparently given her some griffon gold prior to her last departure, with a general understanding of what it would be used for, and now claimed to be able to detect her at range, though it took several minutes of focusing each time she wanted to get a new reading. I still had Egdelwonk's map to guide us when she fell short, but this was something I wanted to let her have. The soupy sea of revelry and emotion that made up Dead Herman wasn't easy for her to traverse, and Coda was starved for a challenge.

We found the establishment, and after a word or two with the proprietor, learned that Leif was indeed waiting for me to show up. A moment later, Leif emerged, once again in pegasus form, with most of her body covered by a loose, paper-thin shawl. Her eyes locked onto Papyrus. He innocently grinned.

"...Quite the party," she eventually, slowly said. "Whatever you want with me, let's not talk here."

I nodded, swallowing. Me, Corsica, Papyrus, Coda, Leitmotif... The entire team, or at least the team I would get. Recruitment was over. Time to talk about what was about to go down.

On the far outskirts of town, I stopped us, pulling us off what might generously be called a mountain trail between Dead Herman and the Ice District. I took a breath, faced everyone... and started to explain.

"Some of you already know what I'm about to say, and others have no clue, so I'll keep it medium-short," I began. "I'm from Icereach. Isolated research colony in the mountains, about two weeks west of here by airship. My mother..." I nodded pointedly at Leitmotif. "Is still there. And I've got good reason to believe that Icereach is currently in the process of closing its doors to foreigners and travel into and out of the city is soon going to be impossible."

I moved my gaze across everyone else. "Personally, I like my mom and wouldn't want to never see her again. So, tonight, we're going to go to Icereach, find her, and bring her back to Ironridge."

Coda's eyes were wide with excitement, but Leif gave me a level look. "Two weeks one way," she said, voice laden with the assumption that I had a plan.

I nodded, opened my saddlebag and pulled out the pattern card I had looted long ago. "Near Icereach, there is a secret lair with a bunch of old technology that belongs to someone influential in Ironridge. Some of us may have visited it before." I gave Leif another look. "It turns out that lair has a teleporter, which used to be paired to one in Ironridge until I stole the key." I tapped the pattern card. "But I know where both teleporters are. We'll be using them to get in and out."

"You've got a way to power the teleporters?" Leif raised an eyebrow. "Those things aren't widespread, and the reason is because they don't run on conventional power sources."

"Yup." I nodded. "Windigoes."

Leif bristled. Papyrus grinned. Coda listened with wide eyes.

"Our ticket into Icereach is powered by a good friend none of us have any bad history with called the Composer," I told Leif, "with whom I've already worked out a deal. Our ticket out will be powered by Ludwig, and convincing him to play nice is something we'll have to do on the fly." I glanced at Corsica. "You've blackmailed him before." I turned to Coda. "And you're a goddess with love powers. This isn't a pleasure outing: we've got an agenda, and it involves parlaying with the forces of evil. I know you talk big, but here's your chance to be big as well."

Coda looked somewhere between excited and scared. "Tales of the wraiths of ice have crossed m-my ear before, but..." She swallowed. "I mean, yes! Your goddess will stand strong! This is what the power of love was made for..."

She looked nervously back at her ship.

I gave her my most encouraging smile, even though my reservations had suddenly redoubled about bringing her along. "We're going over this before we leave so that no one goes without really wanting to. If you don't think you're one hundred percent ready, I've got enough contingencies to do it without you. Even if it was just me, I think I could convince Ludwig to take my side."

"It's just..." Coda hesitated. "I do not have my crown. That is still affixed to my throne."

"What's that have to do with anything?" Corsica yawned.

Coda gave her a serious look. "A changeling queen's crown is the nexus of their power. By affixing it to my throne, I become one with my airship, allowing the ship to fly by the power stored within me, and allowing the apparatus that collects my prayers to function. While there are many other advantages to me being separate from it, it does mean that the powers I can call upon now are but a shadow of my true potential."

I hesitated. "...How big of a difference are we talking? Exactly how strong are you now?"

"I could not say," Coda apologized. "I have never worn the crown. In sitting upon the throne, I can resonate with the prayers contained within, acclimate myself to their presence, allow the whispers in the back of my mind to become a storm of voices. Ever have I been told that wearing the crown would be the final necessary step towards wielding my power against my mother. Alas, it would be decidedly impractical to live day to day with all of that emotional energy pressing unfiltered against my mind."

I thought back to the storm I had seen on that fateful night when I touched Coda's throne, in a world that might have been the inside of her mind. Conscripting a changeling queen to fight otherworldly forces without a solid understanding of how changeling queens even worked might not have been the best idea, come to think of it...

"Are we going to sit around all night hashing out the nitty-gritty, or is there going to be some action?" Papyrus complained, ruining my train of thought. "Look, Butterfly: the only reason you're playing the leader here is because you haven't been usurped yet, and I'm of a mind to change that if we don't pick up the pace. How much more do we really need to know to find that teleporter, use it, and stir up some trouble?"

I squinted at him. "We're preparing. Ever heard of double-checking your plans and making sure everyone has the same idea as you about what role they can play?"

Papyrus waggled his eyebrows. "Ah, but I thought the whole point of this endeavor is that you know literally nothing about how Icereach has changed since you left, planning is pointless and we'll have to play everything by ear. Is that not why you begged an accomplished improviser like me to join your little escapade?"

"It's because you threatened me with discussing philosophy if I didn't," I protested, my mind spinning circles as I looked for the best way to shut this down.

"Details," Papyrus sighed. "Butterfly, I like a dash of mad science every now and then, but you're operating under a terrible many assumptions here, first and foremost being that if cute little Coda fries the windigo with love energy, it's not going to be in any state to power any teleporters. If you must plan for contingencies, plan for ones that will take us in a beneficial direction."

"I..." I worked my jaw. "Look, excuse me for wanting every bit of leverage I can get against a creature that sees us all as playthings, okay?"

Papyrus pursed his lips. "And here I thought we were talking about the windigo, not me."

I sighed in defeat. "Fine, then. What's your plan for how to get back out once we've got what we came for?"

"Wing it." Papyrus's eyes glittered. "Do what feels best with the options we have. Maybe we can teleport. Maybe we steal an airship. Maybe we stow away to Yakyakistan. The more you accept the necessity of planning on the fly, the less time you'll spend resisting it and the more time you'll spend practicing. Isn't that right, Senescey?"

Leif's brow shadowed. "You can call me Leif, or Leitmotif."

Coda was watching with mixed fascination and concern. "This is quite intense," she remarked. "I can tell the loud one has little respect for me or my powers, but he is also quite fearless and has no sense of danger. You there!" She pointed a hoof at Papyrus. "From whence does your confidence flow? Your princess desires to understand."

"Me?" Papyrus put an angelic wing over his heart.

"He's maybe not the best person to take life lessons from..." I cut in hastily, giving Papyrus a shut up look. "Listen, we're going in circles and getting off track. Coda, I'm asking you and no one else: should we go back and get your crown?"

Coda hesitated, clearly still thinking about Papyrus. "I..."

Leif was looking at me. A very pointed look. A look that said, I told you I wouldn't be able to be around Coda without being tempted to use her for my own ends. Are you doing anything different?

"You know what?" I straightened up. "I'm... sorry for getting you mixed up in this, Coda. This isn't the kind of thing I should be taking you out to do, especially when your cult is trusting me to keep you safe. But we won't be gone for more than a day, and when we're back, I promise I'll take you to meet my mother and then show you the city some more. Normally. No... None of this. Can you forgive me?"

Coda stared at me for a long moment, and eventually she frowned. "What are ponies supposed to do in situations like this?"

I waited for her to explain.

"It is my royal duty to protect you and fight the powers of evil, no matter their shape and form," Coda explained. "By all rights, this mission is so adjacent to my destiny that they are as siblings. And yet all of you are so clearly uneasy with it. Even you." She glanced at Papyrus. "All that has ever been asked of me, for all of my life, is that I wield my powers with righteousness and oppose supernatural evil that is beyond the abilities of mortals. Why, then, does that run contrary to everyone's desires? Princess Halcyon, I am used to being surprised by, as she is an enigma. But here, she is not an outlier, but in consensus. I don't understand."

"You think about stuff a lot." I ruffled her mane. "And the only answer is that the real world is super different to the one you know. No matter what they say about your age, you're a kid. Kids aren't supposed to have duties like these. I'm probably too young for it too, but at least I've done this song and dance a few times. I wanna show you the world so you can get a bit of normalcy in your life, and dragging you off to meet a windigo isn't how to do that."

"And you believe you stand a chance without my holy power?" Coda countered. "What are my powers even good for if not what you propose to do tonight? Why have I lived my entire life preparing to use them so if I am to be told they are not necessary at the moment of truth? I want to join you! I want to see that all those long nights pandering to the faithful from my throne were not for naught!"

I bit my lip.

"Please do not turn me away," Coda murmured, averting her gaze. "I... am feeling like I am awaking from a very long dream, and know little of what to do. The world I bear witness to right now is so unlike everything I have ever known, and I cannot see how to reconcile it with my past. I do not want to leave the past behind, Halcyon. To choose wholly to live in either world and abandon the other... I think such a choice would make me unbearably sad."

"You wanna come because you want your powers to be good for something," I said, condensing down everything she had just told me.

Coda nodded, a tear threatening to drip down her cheek.

"This isn't a field trip," I warned her. "Whatever happens, it's probably gonna make your worldview get even more messy."

"All to be expected," Coda acknowledged. "I would not be here were I not desiring of new sights and experiences. And what value is there in preserving my present worldview if it is not sufficient to give me satisfaction and peace?"

"Not to interrupt," Papyrus interrupted, "but this has to be the most wholesome thing I've ever witnessed. Yech." He made a show of scraping with his wings at his tongue.

Leif gave me a look that suggested she was still concerned about my choices. Corsica looked too tired to care.

"Alright then." I stood straight again. "If that's how it's gonna be, you can come. We won't be needing your crown, though. Whatever you can do without it, you can do, and whatever you can't do... You wanna embrace the future, too, then you're better off being more like a normal pony when you can get away with it. And remember, frying the windigo is a last resort for when all the rest of us are out of ideas and we're really in a pickle."

"Understood!" Coda bounced in place, her eagerness returned in force. "I shall not fail you, Princess Halcyon the Garbed! Now, wherefore is this teleporter? Your goddess decrees herself ready to move!"

I pointed to the distant spires of the Ice District, and we resumed our walk.

As we did so, Corsica pulled up beside me. "You sure about this?" she whispered.

"No," I whispered back. "Definitely not. When everything goes belly up, first priority is protect the filly."

We entered the Ice District from the top, the same way we left when Corsica and I went to visit the rocket crash site near the Aldenfold. Coda spent the trip predictably wowed by the scenery, and Leif looked ill at ease - I noted that she had never officially given her consent to the plan, and wondered if it was unfair of me to brief her on it all at once in a group where Coda was going to dominate the conversation. But she should be on board, right? This was her own sister we were going to save. I remembered during the Aldebaran incident, opening the door to my apartment and seeing her and Mother sitting there, at the table...

I knocked on Jamjars' door, and it was immediately answered by Kitty, her hoodie drawn up tight and her tongue lolling eagerly.

"Hiya, lady!" she greeted, stepping back to let us in. "Lotsa friends?"

Coda's nose wrinkled in surprise. "Ah! This one is..." She glanced to me, alarm visible in her eyes.

"Let's maybe get inside before saying anything," I mumbled, herding everyone else through the door. This was a residential district, after all, and the hallway could hardly be expected to stay private...

The door clicked closed behind me, and I locked it for good measure. "Kitty, here's my team," I said, kicking the dust off my boots. "We'll all be going through the teleporter. Everyone else, meet the windigo who will be giving us our ride out."

Leif blanched. "You're the...? Impossible..."

Kitty smiled at her, then waddled forward and attempted to give her a big lick.

Leif dodged out of the way.

"Aww..." Kitty pouted. "Oh well. You gots one more in Jamjars' room!"

"One more...?" I walked the length of the hallway, pushing open the door and looking inside.

Unless was leaning against the window.

I raised an eyebrow. "Thought you weren't coming."

"Not allowed to come," Unless corrected. "And not getting paid for it. And, sure, I've got plenty of reasons not to want to, as well. But I thought about it and my bones just didn't sit right leaving you alone with Papyrus to face that place by yourself."

Papyrus poked his head in behind me. "Ayy, Bats! You made it! I say, someone had some coin to spend on luxury, here..."

"Don't touch the bed," Unless warned. "Unless you wanna think about who's slept in it."

"How'd you know where to find us, anyway?" I pressed, far more interested in Unless than Papyrus. "And what we're up to?"

Unless tapped her skull. "I've got eyes and ears. Just know how to use 'em, is all. We'll talk about what you owe me for this after we clear this job and go home."

Leif was the next to enter, looking so warily at Kitty she took a full moment to notice Unless, and Coda and Corsica brought up the rear. Unless noticed Leif, though, and for a brief moment I saw a less-than-thrilled look cross her face.

What a wonderful, stable adventuring party I had managed to put together. It felt like there wasn't a pony in this room who didn't have some manner of questionable history with at least two others. Oh well...

Kitty pulled open the sliding closet door, revealing the teleporter. "Kitty powers this from her room," she instructed me. "Just stand on it and wait for her to do her thing!"

I gathered everyone around as she left, the six of us forming up tightly on the dais. Everyone seemed to be talking, but my ears suddenly tuned it all out, and the world felt smaller and smaller around me. This was it: the jumping-off point, where I would face my past and be left with no alternative.

This was my last chance to turn back, to embrace my chaotic life in Ironridge, with all its pressures and good things, too. Once Kitty turned on this teleporter, I would have no free ticket back to safety: every move would matter. I'd be on the clock. I'd finish the mission, or else.

My bracelet itched around my foreleg. It was still my signature weapon, and I still had only the barest idea of how to use it. Back in Icereach, right before we left, I had been building a better weapon out of the inertial stabilizer rotor, I remembered; something I could use for situations that still called for force but weren't quite dire enough to entrust my fate to an unknown power. Ironridge hadn't left me a minute to remember that weapon existed, much less to work on it.

I remembered the Aldebaran incident, how I had all but paralyzed myself with fear, how I pushed myself to start a plan and then limped through the motions, and ultimately had to be rescued by my friends, by miracles, and by who knew what else. This time would be different, I knew... and yet so far, it was going exactly the same. I was starting a plan.

The teleporter console began to glow. Time to see if I really had grown.

The possibility that Kitty might have swapped the destination on the teleporter to send me somewhere I didn't want to go crossed my mind at the exact instant the teleportation hit, along with a hundred other what-ifs that came too fast for me to name them. My body twisted and compressed and whipped around, and in another instant it was over, an aftershock of light fading from my eyes.

Kitty hadn't lied. I remembered this room. We were in the hideout once again.

The teleporter we all stood on was inert, sealed in a small hewn-stone room, an unlocked vault door leading to a tunnel that, if memory served, would take me to the statue room. Leif looked slightly chagrinned, perhaps because her own inspection had missed this part of the hideout. Coda and Unless looked tense. Papyrus was halfway between a grimace and a grin.

Corsica sighed, lighting her horn and pulling the door further ajar. "Here we go again..."

I stepped through the portcullis, leading the way. Time to roll the dice and see how much things had changed.

Almost immediately, I knew something was different. It was too noisy. There were voices up ahead, and lots of them, not nearly something that could have been caused by just Jamjars and Ludwig. My legs tensed and my pace quickened, and I kept my steps quiet just in case as I rounded the final bend.

The statues had all been cleared to one corner of the entry hall, shoved up together, and in their place was a crowded barracks. It was the yaks.

The Icereach yaks, my friends with whom I had hung out, roughhoused and learned to fight for two years, had moved into the hideout and were using its front room as a military fortification. And some of them were visibly injured.

"What...?" I sucked in a breath. "Balthazar? Tarkov? Mustafa? Darius?"

I stepped through the entrance, Corsica and Coda and the others at my side... and immediately a net fell from above, ensnaring us. Several bright spotlights turned on, ensuring that shadow sneaking would be impossible. The net was coated in a sticky white powder that clung unpleasantly to my coat and smelled funny, and... and...

"And that's how to stop changelings from getting you with the same trick twice," I heard Jamjars' voice say, but it was hard to piece together where it was coming from. I felt like I was seeing the room through a long tunnel with black around the edges. My neck and face itched everywhere the net was making contact, and I struggled to push it... to push...

I came to with a burst of cold, and was suddenly very wet.

It was bright, and my head hurt. Someone was shining a light on me. Also, I was mostly underwater. And, most importantly of all, I was completely unclothed.

My instincts pushed me bolt upright, even though I was still dizzy, trying my best to keep my red legs beneath the surface of the water.

I was in a room... In a bathtub. Jamjars was watching me, horn lit. Balthazar was in the background, carrying an industrial flashlight. He didn't look happy at all.

"Three questions, and don't move a muscle until you've answered them correctly," Jamjars warned. "In Ironridge, what was the first job interview I arranged for you?"

"What-? Job interview?" I blinked rapidly, shaking the water out of my mane and fixing her with a glare. "Give me back my clothes!"

I cast frantically around, spying them in a pile near the doorway. My bracelet sat neatly on the top.

"Right answer," Jamjars said. "Moving on to the next: what's it matter to you?"

My body still felt disoriented, but I summoned my strength and pulled myself out over the rim of the tub... and into Jamjars' waiting telekinetic aura. Suddenly, I was floating in midair, helpless.

"I need an answer," Jamjars warned. "We can't afford-"

With a gasp, Jamjars tripped. And then, so fast that I couldn't see where she came from, Unless was there.

As Jamjars fell, Unless punched her in the belly, flipping Jamjars' hindquarters into the air. With one smooth movement, Unless grabbed her head, yanked her around in a suplex, and landed her on the ground, a hoof pressing her horn against the floor and preventing it from lighting. The aura around me went out, and I crashed to the ground in a dripping heap.

Jamjars snarled, but she was perfectly pinned, Unless holding her with two hooves in a careful position to prevent her from getting any leverage beneath herself. Balthazar snorted out a warning.

"How about," Unless warned, "since hostage situations are so fun, we do one on equal ground? Halcyon, yak boy, nobody move. Now let's explain ourselves and start from the beginning."

"...Changelings come to Icereach," Balthazar said slowly. "Pretend to be Halcyon and friends. Stir up trouble in city. Get dealt with. Halcyon and friends leave, then more changelings come and repeat trick. Not get dealt with so easily. Now Halcyon and friends come again. Changelings? Need to know."

Unless lifted one hoof... and with a flicker of green flame, it turned to black carapace, and then back to normal. Balthazar's eyes narrowed.

"There's your answer," Unless said. "Now, here's a hot tip: maybe you should be more worried about someone's intentions than their species. I had enough of folks not getting that before the whole fiasco in the east."

"Get off me..." Jamjars hissed, struggling.

"Nyaah. You started it." Unless stuck out her tongue at the captive mare, then turned back to Balthazar. "Now. If there's still any questions about whether we'd like to be on the same side, ask away. If not, I'm gonna need some clothes that aren't covered in stun powder for the kid to wear. Speaking of, you really couldn't think of any traps that would be slightly less inconvenient if we turned out to be good guys?"

"You're not the ones I thought would come through that teleporter," Jamjars said with a grimace. "And even when it was you, threatening something someone really cares about is an excellent way to weed out impostors."

Unless looked pointedly at Balthazar. "My identity speaks for itself."

Balthazar slowly nodded, and lowered his flashlight. "Unless pony not in doubt. What of other ponies? One look like known changeling from first incident."

"Long story." Unless flexed. "Maybe if we can all be civil for a bit, you can hear it, and we can hear yours. Now get on with your bad selves." She released Jamjars and stepped back closer to me.

Jamjars got to her hooves, fixing her mane with a venomous look. "Maybe to you, taking due precautions seems like a fool's errand, but to us it's a matter of life and death. There are fresh clothes in the cabinet there. Of all the ponies to get locked up with..."

She stalked away. Balthazar departed too, with a sad look.

I just sat there, shaking. Through something like this, I should have been able to hold myself together, especially when it sounded like Jamjars and the yaks had legitimate reason to suspect we were hostile changelings. But my guard was completely down, and a voice was echoing in my mind about blood on my hooves. My legs had been there for all to see, and Balthazar had just gone along with it? Even Jamjars knew that was important to me. Right...?

"Well, you heard her. Better get dried off," Unless said, mercifully looking away from me. "They're probably gonna need that tub to get the powder off your friends, too. Hope you weren't too attached to that outfit, because unless they have a laundromat down here it might take a bit to get the powder out without taking another dirt nap."

"You..." I struggled to find words, a creeping paralysis threatening my thoughts, this time, instead of my body. "How'd you...?"

"Avoid the trap? Sneak in here?" Unless shrugged. "You've seen one, you've seen 'em all. Probably dumb to ask if you're alright?"

I hesitated. She kicked me a towel, and I caught it and started drying myself.

"Tip from someone who's been there before," Unless said, her voice suddenly low. "If it feels like you just got betrayed by someone you thought you trusted... Don't try to deny it, I saw the look on that yak's face... don't think too much on it. There's a windigo here, I can smell it. I'm surprised you can't, actually. And windigoes... They've got this huge, invisible aura you don't wanna sit around in. Even the presence of a dead one can strain creatures' minds, lower their spirits and make it easier for them to be their worst selves. Live ones are infinitely worse, especially ones that aren't ponies like Kitty. Rule number one of dealing with these creatures is that you promise yourself, no matter what happens, you'll forgive anyone for anything they do once it's over, and hope they'll do the same to you. I'll bet you anything that yak isn't too happy with himself for going along with a plan like that to make sure you were the real you."

My thoughts still threatened to seize up, but I grabbed Unless's words and hung on. "Was Ludwig doing this last time, too? Is that why I... How do you know this?"

"If you aren't proud of anything you did back then, the windigoes certainly didn't help," Unless said, still respectfully looking away. "And I know because I've messed with windigoes before. They're about as nasty as you can get... Not quite the worst, but definitely within spitting distance. Now hurry up. That powder they used is neutralized by water, and I'm sure everyone who didn't outsmart that trap is waiting for their turn, too."

I finished drying myself, finding the cabinet stocked with a thick winter sweater and some sturdy rubber work boots. Not exactly a fashionable combination, but they covered the important parts. And so I sat by the bathroom in the hideout's living quarters, carefully transferring the contents of my satchel to a clean one so that it could be washed, a bowl of water nearby to rinse off any powder I got on my boots. I made a point of not speaking. My heart beat loudly in my chest, and after hearing Unless's warning, I realized that giving too much voice to my feelings would land me in exactly the same situation I had been in last time.

For what was about to happen, I needed all my competence. And while I didn't have the full story, I knew it involved changelings, and was eventful enough to have made all the yaks leave Icereach.

I only looked up when they brought Coda in for her turn getting a rinse. A worm of guilt crawled through me for leading her into a trap already, and I tried to quash it, but it just wouldn't die. Maybe this was Ludwig's aura making the guilt hit harder, but I really had failed her already.

Resolving that I would make up for it, I got to my hooves and followed her into the washroom. This filly was my responsibility, and she wasn't getting out of my sight again any time soon. Not if I had anything to say about it.

Corsica was already on her hooves, sitting there and helping, as a unicorn who could move ponies around without touching the powder. I pondered harder and harder who thought this powder was such a good idea when it was so hard to clean up, but like Unless said: don't think about it too hard. I didn't suspect any answer I could come to would lead to a greater degree of trust in anyone I was sharing the cave with.

Coda got dunked, and she spluttered, coming up soaked and dripping. Groggily, she recognized me. "Your princess has a headache..."

"It'll wear off," I told her encouragingly, ready and waiting with a towel.

As Coda dried herself, she briefly summoned a horn and lit it, then frowned, going back to being a pegasus. "You alright?" I asked, shifting uneasily back and forth.

"All explanations for what just transpired aside..." Coda groaned. "Tell me how far away from Ironridge we are, again?"

"Two weeks by airship," I told her. "No clue on the mileage."

Coda nodded, wobbling slightly. "Then perhaps it would interest you to know that my spell still... still says there is a changeling queen nearby..."

This Old Game Again

Eventually, I gave up on trying to get my party back together. Corsica was easy to keep an eye on because she was too sluggish to wander much, and Coda refused to unglue herself from my side, but Papyrus hadn't waited for everyone to wake up before running off to poke his nose into the current situation, Leif didn't feel like sitting around in plain sight to be ambushed again, and Unless was probably staging another counter-ambush in case we had a repeat of last time, but hadn't let me in on her plans either way.

"One more time," Corsica muttered under her breath to Coda. "You say Chrysalis is in Icereach."

Coda nodded. "One or more creatures with the wherewithal to trigger my detection. You will recall that in Ironridge, this spell returned a guaranteed false positive due to the presence of a certain imperial ex-goddess. As such, the city was a blind spot for me, and thus an excellent hiding place for my vile mother." She frowned. "Icereach, to my knowledge, has no such factor, and so the signal should be true. Unless there is something equally unspeakable here of which I know naught, though that would hardly be reassuring..."

"And you're sure you're not just detecting yourself?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Indubitably." Coda didn't even hesitate. "Were it otherwise, my spell would never return false, as it has on many occasions."

The thought crossed my mind that, depending how this spell worked, Coda could potentially be detecting windigoes. I thought better of it when I remembered there were windigoes in Cold Karma, but doubled back again because Coda did read positive there... I didn't want to say it, though. Even raising the possibility that this could be a false alarm felt like a jinx. Better to let myself hope that was the case and not have Coda immediately tell me a reason the spell didn't work that way.

"Well..." I got to my hooves. "No point in speculating when the yaks might be able to spare us the effort. Come on."

The hideout was so full, it was harder to find a place to ourselves than anything, and so finding yaks was a simple matter. Finding Balthazar, on the other hoof... Eventually, I gave up and stopped in the statue room turned barracks, which thoroughly reeked of unwashed yak. Coda watched the statues with intense interest, and I noted with some annoyance that the net trap had already been reloaded and was ready to use again.

I loudly cleared my throat, addressing the whole room. "Who are you trying to catch in that, anyway?"

The yaks noticed me. Awkward shuffling ensued.

"Trap set for changeling ponies," Tarkov eventually said, the biggest and most slab-faced of the yaks. "Not want to get hit from behind. Is very long story. World can change much in few weeks."

"Sorry you had to be the one to give it a stress test, buddy," Darius apologized with a rueful grin, the one yak who could speak without leaving out every third word. "Long story short... Well, actually, there's only so much this one can be shortened."

"Is that a challenge?" Papyrus drawled, emerging from the tunnel to the Nemestasis room. "Bet you I can fill these ladies in with twice the words and half the time."

"And just what have you been up to?" I asked, more keen on talking to Balthazar than him.

He shrugged. "Watching Senescey stare at some giant machine like it just asked to officiate her wedding vows. As for these shag bags, it seems an airship turned up about a week ago from Yakyakistan containing 'Corsica', a whole battalion of infantry, and some church chick with a pretentious title no one can be bothered to remember. Insults were exchanged, and voila, Corsica's now in charge. Of course, given that a fake Corsica already tried to take over Icereach half a year ago, and she came from the opposite direction you sailed off in... The only thing this one's got going for her is a very large army."

I stared at the yaks. "Is this true?"

"Real story have much more nuance than pegasus tell," Milton grumbled. "Cannot believe state of youth these days."

My heart chilled. Then not only were Leif's warnings about Yakyakistan invading coming true before my eyes, but Yakyakistan had changelings on its side... at best. Hopefully it wasn't the case that Chrysalis had Yakyakistan on her side, instead.

"And what about Jamjars?" I pressed. "What about Ludwig? Why set a trap on that door instead of, I don't know, literally the front entrance?"

Even as I pointed at it, I realized that the front door was, indeed, even more fortified than the way we had came in.

"You've explored Ironridge," Jamjars' voice declared, the mare herself walking out of the crowd, her mane fixed and her poise back after getting messed up by Unless. "You know who the power players there are. You might even know what various factions have to gain from aggression in the middle of nowhere like this."

I pulled out my stolen pattern card and showed it to her. "And you've explored this place. You might even know what I'm doing with a random trinket like this."

Jamjars gave something between a grin and a grimace. "Touche."

"It's called karma," I said, aware that we were speaking in front of a large audience, wishing I was talking to Balthazar instead. "Now then. Since we never got the chance to do so earlier, maybe we should put everything on the table and figure out where we stand."

"I took you in." Jamjars shrugged. "Asked no questions. Answered all of yours. Gave you unlimited freedom. Kept my secrets, of course, but never probed into your own. You sound like you're about to drop an ultimatum. But before you go and waste your breath, consider whether you could get what you want by just saying please."

I pointed a hoof at her. "Deals that good don't exist. What do you want from me? And what's with the stun powder? You knew I'd hate how you... You know..." I trembled, just a little.

"If you can't forgive your allies for being ruthlessly effective, you should have thought twice before coming to a place you need a windigo's help to get out of." Jamjars narrowed her eyes. "I know you know that. You couldn't have gotten in that way without finding out. And it was effective, because we're no longer having a conversation about whether you're real or agents of Cold Karma. As for what I 'want from' you..." She fluffed her mane. "I just want you to have a little agency in your lives. Get to make your own choices, realize and control your own potential."

I raised an eyebrow.

Jamjars rolled her eyes. "If you must have an uncharitable motive, let's say I have a vested ideological interest in screwing over someone who would prefer that you remain sheep who can't play the game, but it's unhealthy to look at life purely through that lens. Ponies have all sorts of reasons for doing what they do, often at the same time. And we're allowed to help others succeed purely because they like them, you know."

I stared at her. "If you're on my side, prove it with an apology for that stun powder stunt."

Jamjars sighed. "I've never been known as a champion of producing sincere apologies, particularly when I mean it, but I regret catching you in my trap."

Papyrus stuck his tongue out. "Sap like this is why I could never get into romance. It's always-"

Jamjars clenched her aura around his muzzle. "Shut up, the adults are talking. So!" She gave me a stressed smile. "Apology given, on to business. You're showing off my pattern card and you know what it does. Feel like contributing to the cause?"

"And the bath thing?" I wasn't about to let her off the hook this easily. "Setting a trap and taking precautions is one thing. Removing my boots because you knew it would get to me in particular is another."

At my side, Coda gave my boots a curious look. Great. Now I'd have to explain myself to her later, as well.

"Yes," Jamjars insisted with a grimace. "Apology. Given. And all that."

"It's as if the act of feeling contrition causes her to feel physical pain," Coda remarked. "This one certainly is cut from a different cloth than my usual admirers. Such ego..."

Jamjars' eye twitched, but she forced a very forced smile.

I didn't know how to feel about this. And this wasn't particularly the pace I wanted to deal with it, or the mindset I wanted to be in when I did. Who knew where Ludwig was, and how badly he was messing with the way we felt.

Corsica didn't look like she had any ideas either, though, and Papyrus clearly just wanted to stir the pot. I sighed. "Truce until we get back to Ironridge and you can answer every question I have without time pressure or whatever's going on in here."

"Excellent!" Jamjars uncoiled like a spring. "Now, about that pattern card, because I'm so eager to start bargaining with Ludwig to turn the teleporter on..."

I looked around at all the yaks, preferring to parlay with them instead. "You're backed in here because Yakyakistan's come to call. And now you want to use the teleporter to escape to Ironridge?"

"Yaks did not know teleporter existed when come to cave," Mustafa said, his mustache swaying with his breath. "In Icereach, Holy Sparkbearer ask yaks to help lock down city. Cannot fight home city. Cannot fight home country, either. Yaks found by windigo Ludwig. Windigo Ludwig let yaks stay in cave while try to convince to fight one way or other. Not sure what next."

"If Ludwig wants you to fight that army, he's not going to just help you walk away," Corsica pointed out. She glanced at Jamjars. "But if both sides of this teleporter are gatekept by windigoes, how did you even think it would be possible for someone hostile to come through it? Setting a trap there still makes no sense."

Jamjars shrugged. "Word reached my ear that trouble might soon start in the region, so I came here to lock the place down a little. But lo and behold, the key to the teleporter home was missing, and suddenly I found myself trapped. It's always healthy to keep a little doubt for your accomplices, and who better suited to tamper with the teleporters than the ones who ran them? For all I knew, my little basement dweller might have decided it was time to get rid of me."

I grimaced. Hopefully I never got paranoid enough to think that way... Though it was a legitimate concern, given how I had been treated by windigoes in the past. Ironic, too, given that Jamjars had just lectured me about paranoia.

"Where is Ludwig?" I asked, then hesitated. "Actually, before him, where's Balthazar? Been looking for him all over."

Milton pointed to the fortified exit to the Trench. "Balthazar take guard duty. Very noble."

"Any reason I couldn't go say hi?" I took a few steps closer, checking to ensure Coda was staying back with Corsica.

"Is night out," Tarkov warned, getting out of the way anyway. "Try not to become pony popsicle."

I winked, my mind drifting to my bracelet. "Duly noted."

Past the vault door, I had a bit of sheltered tunnel before getting to the open Trench itself, but the temperature was already plummeting. I shivered, relishing it. Living so long in Ironridge had almost forced me to forget what it was like to be truly cold.

Eventually, though, I lit my bracelet, turning it up just a hair past flashlight mode - I didn't want to banish the cold, but it felt like a decent idea to survive it. It didn't take nearly as much as my climb during the Aldebaran incident. Although it was midway through the night, the winds were still and the sky lacked a single trace of cloud.

I reached the Trench. Balthazar was waiting.

The yak was mostly facing south, watching Silverhorn's Plummet and the pass at Wystle Tower that led down to Icereach, but he sat to the south of the entrance so he could watch the cave, too. "Hey," I said, stepping out into the starlight.

"Balthazar have many dilemmas last few days," Balthazar said. "After civil war, all yaks take oath of pacifism. Only fight foes who want to fight. Use strength for peace. Simple oath. Simple life. All decisions easy to make when keep to important principles. But what to do when home fights home? Might be changelings in new army, but yaks, too. Changeling cannot be yak. Balthazar would have to fight own country." He shook his head. "No easy answers. And when Balthazar try to keep friends safe, end up hurting science pony Halcyon. Balthazar deeply ashamed."

I hesitated. "I'm... still pretty annoyed about that. But, I forgive you."

Balthazar hung his head. "Why Halcyon return to Icereach?"

"Looking for Mother," I explained, stars glittering in the purple cosmos above. "Things are... messy in Ironridge. I want to move on, try again to find somewhere new to see. But I heard things might be getting rough here, and didn't want to leave her behind."

He nodded. "Everything feel left behind now. Even if Halcyon find mother, what next? Icereach yaks are simple yaks, ask for little in life. Stability. Camaraderie. Good food. What to do when foundation suddenly gone? Yakyakistan is suddenly enemy. World has changed, and nobody ask if yaks liked it way it was. What now? Who yaks trust? How yaks make important decisions? Suddenly, old wisdom not seem like enough anymore. Ironridge pony Jamjars come and talk about dangerous changelings. How can yaks tell if advice is good or bad? Old ways of figuring out not work anymore. New world... is not yaks' world."

Balthazar. Unshakable, grounded, an endless fount of wisdom who never got distracted from what was important in life... reduced to this. I listened to him, and I knew for sure: it wasn't just me.

The world didn't just seem chaotic and unpredictable and dangerous because of some trouble-magnet quality unique to me and me alone. It changed, frighteningly and unpredictably, for everyone. I probably could have pulled aside any random pony in the Day District or Night District or even Sky District, and they could have told me that so many things in their life made no sense either. That they lacked a foundation, sometimes had trouble distinguishing between what was common sense and what was lunacy. Odds were, they might even struggle enough to build a foundation they could stand on that they would succeed, except it would be imperfect or different from everyone else's and the way they had made sense of the world would seem like madness to everyone else. And those differences would only perpetuate the feeling of chaos, of no absolute truth that could unify the world or ever bring it back together again.

"Where are you?" I whispered up at the sky, knowing my words wouldn't reach whoever created the world, but hoping anyway. Not the light spirit, no; I had seen that in person and talked with it and partaken of its magic. It was too real. Real enough that, since it existed, if it could have fixed everything, it would have. I sought something higher.

"Why aren't you real? And why aren't you here?" I breathed. "There can't just not be anyone out there. All this has to have some reason to it, some meaning we just can't see, something that Balthazar and all the yaks and everyone else can trust in who will never be wrong and never change and never let them down. Please..."

But all I had was myself. A tiny little thing, idealistic and unpolished and a lot less formed than most ponies, who had been created to take over the reins from another young mare who decided that she couldn't reconcile herself with her world and gave up on living. All I had was me, my friends, some poorly-understood magic, and a special talent in becoming anything I wanted to be.

...Actually, I had one other thing, one which had cost me dearly to obtain and seemed to be in very short supply: answers.

I knew, concretely and without the need for philosophy and speculation, the reason for my existence. I knew how to keep my head above water in this crazy world; not enough to prevent myself from taking hits, but enough to get some wins with my losses, to push an agenda and have a say in my destiny. I knew more than many about the state of Ironridge and Cold Karma, the reason for the dysfunctionality, the reason Yakyakistan was here and their intentions for war.

This current predicament, that had left my yak friends homeless and shaken their trust in their church and nation? I understood it. Not perfectly, but well enough to navigate. And because I had my bearings, knew which way was up and which way was forward, I had agency. I could make a difference.

I remembered Leif warning me vehemently, when telling me about the war, not to think that just because I had been forewarned, I had an obligation to change it. But now that I sat at the bottom of the Trench, my bracelet gently aflame, I knew that that didn't matter because I would have wanted to change this whether I had the power to or not. What mattered was that Icereach was my home, and I cared about the ponies who lived there. And thus it was my duty - all of our duties, but that included me - to do what we could.

And I could do quite a lot. I was getting my redo, and I would show the world how much I had grown.

"Hey, Balthazar," I said. "Fight me."

Balthazar rumbled curiously.

"For old times' sake," I insisted. "Can't let me get rusty when I might need to be in top form, here. Besides, it's freezing out. Gotta get moving."

Balthazar got to his hooves, marched to the middle of the snowfield, and turned, waiting for me to make the first move.

I focused on my bracelet.

I need to know what I can do, I told it, green energy dancing around its plain, black surface. If I'm really going to give my all and save my home for real, I need to be able to hold nothing back. I need to know that I won't freeze up again if I try to turn you on while others are watching. All the knowledge in the world won't make a difference if I don't have some power to back it up. And Balthazar's a big guy. He can take it. I'll be careful, turn it up a bit at a time, and stop before either of us get hurt. Mother said I'd be able to tell before that happened, right? Now... let's dance.

As I focused, the flames intensified, little arcs of green energy occasionally lifting off from the bracelet's surface, running through the air like weightless cords between two points, and with a little more leeway those arcs started crawling across me, too. I blocked out the entire world, concentrating, as if I was alone.

The cold receded. I felt... empty. Suddenly aware that I was just a shell with a mask. When the energy touched my body, it didn't quite feel like it was my body. The flames licked at the air, and tendrils of fear started licking at my mind.

You'll burn, it whispered. Mother sacrificed her leg so you could have this chance at life, and you're following her?

I squeezed my eyes shut.

Someone will see, it breathed. It won't be just a flashlight to them anymore. They'll know what you can do, and they'll ask more of you. You'll ask more of yourself. Safer to be nobody, and to hide away.

I focused on Balthazar. That was the point.

The fear constricted, and the flames went out.

Balthazar watched me. He didn't seem shaken or surprised.

I focused on the bracelet again. "This is my power," I growled. "Mother left it for me. And she wouldn't have done that if she didn't want me to use it."

The bracelet slowly re-lit.

It was harder this time. I had to nurse the flame along. It felt hungry, like it wanted to feed and I had nothing to offer it. Alive, not just an artifact with a switch I could turn on and off. There was no pain, though. Not even a bit.

Just fear.

I pushed harder, trying to open the bracelet further than I had done before, even though it was barely in flashlight mode. It wasn't the bracelet that resisted, though. It was something in me. I looked around for Procyon.

She was watching with a frown. As soon as I saw her, I felt another spike of fear that someone would see, and the bracelet went out again.

"This is stupid," I hissed, trying again to light the bracelet. "What am I doing, being afraid of myself?"

Memories quickly rose up to provide an answer.

I saw myself sitting in the hideout, deliberating with myself about whether I could really sneak back to Icereach and save my home from Aldebaran. Past me went back and forth on the subject, but fear of failure barely even deserved a footnote in her mind. She was consumed with fear of succeeding, worried that, in learning she really was capable of it, her view of herself would be irreversibly altered.

I... I really had been like that once, hadn't I? It was so obvious, now. My mask was still like a newborn, and the shell of me that appeared when I took it off was holding my hooves like a watchful parent, giving me those fears to guide the way my life developed, to steer me away from becoming the pony she didn't want me to be. I had been terrified of learning new things about myself, of changing who I thought of myself as, because I was so unformed that every bit of identity I had was precious to me...

All those fears were leftover guide rails from my creation. They were there because my other selves left me in charge to get away from who they were growing up to be, and didn't want me to follow down a path they knew we could take - and that I would try to do it.

Well, I was my own pony now, no longer half-formed and jumping at shadows. I was ready to shoulder whatever made them give up on existence.

"I no longer need your fear," I whispered to Procyon. "I can do this. Now watch me!"

And then I pushed the bracelet as hard as I could, trying to open it as wide as it could go.

Force hit me like a whipcrack as my own body revolted, rebelled and fought back. For half an instant, the bracelet started to glow, and then it was flung free from my leg, arcing through the air and landing in the snow. Something else in me was struggling, flailing, refusing to let me take this path, and for a moment it gained enough control that I couldn't coordinate my legs and collapsed to the ground, shaking.

"No..." I choked out. "I can do this... I need to do it! What are you so afraid of? You bailed and left me with this body, so why won't you let me make my own choices?"

The wind had picked up just a little, blowing toward me from Balthazar. I was fairly sure he couldn't make out my words, but at this point I wanted him to hear, just to spite my circumstances. And words or no, he could see me. This wasn't fair! I had grown, and by so much, too! I was so much stronger and more decisive than I once had been, less easily cowed by stress and chaos, freer from self-sabotage... so why couldn't I claim my reward? Why, now that I had the do-over that I had begged for, couldn't I stop holding myself back and fulfill the potential I knew I had?

Cold clawed at my hooves. Now that I wasn't wearing the bracelet, I remembered, laying facedown in the snow and the night was a terrible place to be.

Work with me, I demanded internally, scraping my way back upright. If you're that terrified of what I can do with the bracelet, you'd better be a whole lot more scared of someone else can do with it. Don't seize control of my body again, and I won't use the bracelet again until we have a proper chance to talk. Deal?

Nothing stopped me as I picked the bracelet back up, though I couldn't be too happy. Something I had never quite known was how much ability my other selves had to take control while I had it - every time I had removed my mask so far had been purely voluntary.

Now I knew, and I didn't much care for the answer.

I slipped the bracelet back on, a bitter taste in my mouth, and looked at Procyon with an accusatory stare.

"You can't do this," she replied. "You're pretending you've grown, but you haven't. You'll fail no matter how many times you try. Magic or no, we are the same pony, and you're trying to discard our fears instead of accepting them. And you can no more easily cut out parts of your emotions than parts of your personality. Which, if you think about it... Even Unnrus-kaeljos failed to excise me permanently."

"But..." I struggled to light the bracelet even enough to repel the cold. "I must!"

Procyon's eyes dug into mine. "Or?"

As if in answer, green lights appeared on the horizon.

Barely had I identified where they were coming from - Wystle Tower - before they were pointed straight at me, spotlights with enough power to light up the snow around me even far away on the Trench floor. I bristled, my ears pinning back. They were rapidly getting closer.

"Watch duty suddenly more important," Balthazar grumbled in warning, swiftly crossing the distance to me and grabbing me with a hairy hoof.

I winced, and not just from the contact: as he roughly grabbed me, my bracelet slid an inch down my leg, not yet properly fastened on. I tried to grab it and pull it back into place.

My wing resisted.

Are you bonkers? I thought frantically to any part of me that could hear. You'd rather leave that-

WHOOOOOSH!

With twin plumes of snow, two silvery things skidded to a stop in front of us before Balthazar was halfway back to the cave. They were vehicles, flying ones, but not like any airship I had ever seen. Sleek and curved, they had tiny wings that beat with emerald energy conduits and seats recessed into the tops, each one looking big enough for five or six ponies.

The wings looked familiar, I realized with a chill. Those were close cousins of inertial stabilizer rotors.

One was flying a white flag.

"I invoke the right of parlay!" a voice said, its owner dropping down from one of the crafts. "We mean you no harm!"

Two heavily-armored guards fell down to flank her, and the other craft pulled up, shining its spotlight down to illuminate the posse. It was hard to make out their colors under the sickly green, but the leader was a pegasus, perhaps a few years my senior, her mane done in a breezy cut that suggested a preference for speed. She wore quite a bit of jewelry, I noted, including jewels in her feathers, plus a tiara and a neck choker.

Balthazar tossed me behind him, starting to circle around toward the cave entrance.

"At ease, soldier," the mare commanded, her voice slightly raspy. "Please don't try to run again. Stay a while, and talk with us."

Balthazar continued circling, the night biting into my coat without even the barest flicker of green to protect me. Procyon was focused wholly on the newcomers.

"Balthazar only negotiate on neutral ground," Balthazar warned. "And only with other yaks present. Not with retreat route cut off."

The craft shining the spotlight, I realized, was being piloted by a yak.

"Who are you supposed to be, anyway?" I asked, my tongue fortunately working even though I couldn't guarantee my body would remain my own.

"I am the Holy Sparkbearer," the mare rasped, focusing on me. "Heir to the Church of Yakyakistan. See the regalia?" She shook her head. "I'm sorry for blocking you out here, but I need to talk to you! I dispatched with my army to Icereach in response to a mysterious distress signal from the embassy Yakyakistan maintains there, but can't find any information about how it was sent and everything in the city is somehow different from the way it's supposed to be. Case in point: you, yak, who are supposed to be guarding the airship dock and fled at the mere sight of our flag. Cooperation in this is not optional. It's extremely important!"

I blinked. Mysterious distress signals, huh? And everything being slightly different than it was supposed to be? This didn't mesh with the story I had heard from Papyrus and the yaks at all.

Balthazar narrowed his eyes. "Spark pony lies. Balthazar spoke words with you before yak exodus. Fail to reach accord, then leave. Not flee at first sight."

"What are you talking about?" The Sparkbearer stared at Balthazar in abject confusion. "This is the first time I've left my ship since arriving here. The guards weren't able to guarantee my safety in Icereach proper..."

Realization of what was going on here poured over me like syrup: someone was being gloriously gaslit by Yakyakistan's changeling infestation, and it was either me or the highest honchos the church had to offer.

Playing Spot The Impostor had been stressful enough when it was just me, Corsica, Ansel and Elise, but that was just the foals' league. I had a sinking feeling it was about to get much, much worse.

Ghosting Your Best Friend

There was no way to deny it: I was a ghost.

Moving without gravity or being able to touch physical objects was oddly intuitive. I just tried to go in a direction, and it worked. The hard parts were everything I hadn't expected to be a challenge: for example, without being able to feel the pull of gravity, I couldn't tell which way was down. Hovering upright with respect to the ground felt exactly the same as leaning to the side; it just made the ground look like a slope instead of feeling like I was about to tip over. For a moment, pretending to walk on walls and ceilings as if they were the floor was interesting, but then I tried to get right-side-up and couldn't shake the feeling that I was ever so slightly missing the mark.

I floated through a closed doorway, unable to open it myself. Passing my eyes through something solid, rather than blinding me, gave me an eyeful of mind-bending geometries that reminded me of the way my vision got distorted when shadow swimming, except my brain wasn't wired to make anything coherent out of them. It almost hurt to look at. Staring at the inside of a wall for too long, I soon decided, was a good way to stretch my sanity.

Find Corsica. That was my mission. Technically, since I couldn't interact with the world and had no agency, I didn't need to be in a hurry to do anything at all. But idleness wasn't my style, and drifting past yaks who were incapable of seeing me didn't help either.

...Not that Corsica would be able to see me, either. For all anyone but me knew, I was tied up in the old office, and if they went to look, that was exactly what they would see.

I wondered what they thought about how I had wound up this way. Though my energy had returned somewhat after talking to Halcyon - unlike Procyon, I had no other name for her - even thinking about everything I had just been doing threatened to make me tired again. Which made no sense when I thought about it, because without a body, how could I be tired? What could I spend energy doing, even if I wanted to?

"Well," Procyon's voice said, interrupting my musings. "Look what happened to you."

I raised an eyebrow as she floated out of the floor.

Her posture was hesitant, almost abashed. "Guess we're in this together, at least for the time being. Welcome to my world."

"What's your problem with the other me?" I asked, disinterested in small talk. "I could hear you, back there when you were arguing. You never talk like that to me. With her, it was like you were a completely different person."

Procyon shrugged, not quite meeting my eyes. "We have... a history together. Or, more accurately, she is my history. Like a faded snapshot of me who got left behind to ensure you matured properly, while I continued to grow and change, just like you. She represents everything I tried to turn my back on when I prayed to Unnrus-Kaeljos that I might disappear."

"Give her a little credit," I said. "She's not that bad. At least, not once I got to meet her."

Procyon adamantly shook her head. "You don't know what she's thinking. You don't know what it's like to be her. To be someone you can't stand being. To want, so badly, to be someone different that you would create a new personality for yourself and raise it to take over your body... or just disappear."

I bristled slightly. "How do you know?"

She met my eyes. "Because I did disappear to escape from being her."

"Not that." I waved my hoof with a scowl. "How do you know I don't know what that's like?"

Procyon floated backwards gently.

"I've always wanted to be someone else," I told her, letting my eyes drill into her. "I kept a list of every mare I saw that I wanted to be like. I deconstructed their personalities, daydreamed about their admirable qualities, everything that I wanted for myself. I tried them on like clothing and could never shake the feeling that it wasn't real, and I was just borrowing and pretending. I grew up feeling like a blank slate with a few scribbles on, like what I currently was was the best I could ever hope to be, and desperately wanting more. So don't tell me I don't know what it's like to want to be someone else."

Procyon slowly, intently returned my stare. "You've changed, then?"

"Yeah." I nodded. "Maybe not all the way. But I'm no longer afraid to actually make something of myself, instead of imagining it and feeling like a shallow fraud. So-"

"Then you should understand how I feel," Procyon interrupted, firm and resolute. "Because I, too, have changed. Nonexistence changed me. I sat in the void for hour after hour after hour, counting every breath for nearly three years. It made me value the things I once thought to throw away. Once, I felt like nothingness was a suitable alternative, but now I see that anything is better than being nothing. Which is why I fear her."

She turned back to face the office. "Don't you see, Halcyon? If you try too hard to embrace yourself, to lift up your past and bring us all back together... it would mean we would have to be her again. To acknowledge that part of us who was too afraid to change. You are better the way you are. I created you to be our most perfect self. Don't waste that opportunity on the part of us that would make us throw it all away."

"What is it you want?" I turned away. "Are you really me? When I talked to her, I realized... we knew how each other felt. The reason why we felt that way might be hidden, but not the feelings. But I don't know what you're feeling, and I don't know if I want to know."

"Good," Procyon said. "I've told you before that you're better off without me. My feelings don't belong in a perfect mare. Though I came to regret it, there were reasons I wished to erase myself, Halcyon. Reasons from which you are intended to be free. Leave me as a shade forever looking over your shoulder, and her as an empty consciousness at the back of your mind. Live the life that I was too foolish to live out myself. Being made to watch is not just all that I deserve, but better than I had dared to hope for. You, on the other hoof, should be free."

A chill ran down my spine, and Procyon sank back into the floor. What was she, my dark side?

I thought about my wants, my desires, my actions in Ironridge and Icereach and before. I had... Well, particularly since the avalanche, I had never desired to hurt anyone. Never held real malice. It had taken Ludwig's possession of Corsica to truly raise my ire, and that was more desperation than anything else. But I knew not all ponies were like this.

Leif had a cause she would do anything for. Papyrus seemed to enjoy tormenting others, even if he was technically on my side. The Corsica I let myself remember was my lazy, carefree friend, but I knew she hadn't treated me all that well before the avalanche, and neither had Ansel.

I generally thought of myself as a good pony, sure, and I didn't particularly want to change that, but... was it actually because I was split like this? Could a pony's desires be pulled apart, binned according to good and bad, and stuffed into separate selves, filtered out with a magical mask, leaving only the pure and the impure? If so, who got to do the binning, to decide what to keep and what to toss? And what would become of any of the resulting parts, diluted and less than a whole pony?

...It felt as if I was staring out into eternity, and there was absolutely nothing there. I felt deeply, desperately cold.

I had to find my friends.

Without floating through anything thicker than a door - I had no idea how Procyon navigated, and didn't want to become lost eternally in the void - I navigated the hideout, finding everyone congregated in the most obvious location: the Nemestasis room.

"But you must," Coda was insisting, her attention fixed on Corsica with a mixture of royal authority and childlike desperation. "I would know what could cause Princess Halcyon to behave that way! Your goddess entreats your aid, peon..."

From her tone, I gathered this wasn't her first entreaty.

"What do you want me to say?" Corsica shot back, looking weary and irate. "I didn't expect her to say that either, okay? You look at me like I've got any idea what goes through that mare's head."

"Cast aside your displeasure and help me!" Coda pleaded. "I must know the meaning of this!"

"You and everyone else." Corsica slouched her way over to the side of the room. "Someone change the subject back to this kid's parents. I can't deal with this."

Papyrus licked his lips. "Afraid that one's already been hashed and re-hashed, Princess. You know, if I was a big sappy believer in the magic of friendship and all that, I'd say you might be better served spilling your heart on the table so your true companions here could help with whatever's got you in such a mood. But I'm not and everyone's happier for it, so I suggest you all follow my example, stop worrying about who's planning to betray whom, and let this mystery marinate for a while while we see what the yaks are up to. All in favor?"

He raised a hoof. Unless grabbed it and yanked it back down. He gave her a wounded look.

"There are two reasons we're here," she told him firmly. "Your reason, and a good reason. Focus on the good one."

Leif sighed. "No matter how you slice it, we aren't making the flight to Icereach at night, and we're not operating the teleporter to Ironridge until Ludwig decides to show his face. Unless you'd like to enlighten us as to a more productive use of time, all we can do is wait and speculate. And we're waiting together so we don't have to worry about getting replaced by changelings."

I clenched my teeth. The mood in this room felt about as brittle as I remembered it being during our imprisonment in the Aldebaran incident, except these ponies weren't nearly as good of friends as myself, Ansel and Corsica. Not to hold us up as paragons, either: this was a slipshod team I assembled first and foremost for their willingness to come with me. Plus a lost kid who had no one to advocate for her and no one willing to take seriously her questions.

If Ludwig were here, he would have a field day.

"We could while away the hours telling emotionally destructive parables that cause us to question the basic tenets of our faith in equinity," Papyrus idly suggested.

Everyone else, even Coda, gave him a look.

"What?" He shrugged. "We've failed to rule out that there's some secret puppeteer pulling all the strings right now, and if I were an omniscient and omnipotent master manipulator who set this whole situation up through a convoluted series of improbable gambits, I'd have an end goal in mind because as entertaining as I might find this, I'd want to be productive while I enjoy myself. Now the obvious culprits for any stunts and shenanigans are the windigoes, and windigoes are quite predictable when you really get down to it. This little cave system is basically an emotional pressure cooker. Butterfly's already flipped her lid, two thirds of you look three quarters of the way there, and whatever the yaks are doing with this parlay business, you can be sure they're not going to come back any saner and stabler. And since everyone knows you can't stop the evil plan on phase one, why not have a friendly quarrel to speed things on their way?"

"Easy for you to say when you're already insane," Unless belched, lounging high up on a shelf. "I'm not particularly feeling up to losing my cool, though. If you've got enough of a death wish to walk into obvious traps for sport, though, then be my guest."

"You!" Coda zeroed in on her. "You haven't said a word yet about being bothered by Princess Halcyon's motives or conduct. Please tell your princess you have been holding out on her and can yet make sense of this all?"

Unless nodded. "Yeah, sorry about that. I totally have. All the answers, right here." She tapped her head.

Coda gaped, then narrowed her eyes. "And those answers are?"

Unless shrugged. "Just sayin' what you told me to say, boss."

Coda looked away, frustrated and upset. "Your princess does not understand from whence you find mirth in this..."

"It's a coping mechanism," Leif told her, focusing on the Nemestasis machine. "If you get a choice, sometimes it's better to pick a good way to feel than a bad one."

Coda stared at her without understanding.

"Well if none of you want the spicy tales, how about a nice vanilla one?" Papyrus stretched and yawned. "Maybe about old Izvaldi? I'm bored of not hearing myself talk. And after Butterfly keeps forgetting that she already earned a story or two about the Empire from me, it would be hilarious to imagine the look on her face when she learns she missed out."

I stuck my tongue out at him. I couldn't help it.

"Izvaldi is the name of my organization," Coda instantly reported, reciting the fact like a dutiful schoolfilly. "As well as the land of my birth. A landlocked province within the Griffon Empire."

"Yes, it was all that and less," Papyrus droned, not waiting for anyone else to stop him. "Dreary place, full of trees and grass and sunshine. Had most of the Empire's orchards, and about zero percent of its clout. In the end days, Izvaldi had lost its lord, not that it wanted anyone to know, you see."

At the prospect of a potentially real story, everyone else shut up and listened.

"You'd know this, Senescey, but for all you non-imperial-expats, sphinx succession was a tricky thing," Papyrus went on, pointing a wing at Leitmotif, who scowled. "Provinces are helmed by sphinxes, who are rare enough that the species' survival always seemed to hang by a thread. The imperial royal family, being the most important, always got the best pickings from the lesser houses' children to wed their own, and their daughters always went on to become empress. But the lesser houses had no such bulwark, instead breeding with common griffons and ponies - yes, yes, it was legal - and hoping against hope for another generation. And whenever a line was invariably extinguished, the imperial crown prince would get to take over that province as their own. The houses reinforce the imperial line, the imperial line replaces the houses, everyone inbreeds and the empress has to be a regular old foal factory to keep the whole system afloat. Until the days of High Prince Gazelle."

He said the name with a toothy grin. "Gazelle, who was a complete monster that no one in their right mind would ever introduce themselves as for a joke, had certain ambitions in life that called for inheriting a province with some clout to its name. In other words, not Izvaldi. Fortunately, his parents were assassinated before he gained any younger brothers, so there was no one in line behind him pushing for him to take an unpopular province and no one to enforce the rules when he cheated and helped Izvaldi pretend their old sphinx was still alive, ailing in a hospital in some Garsheeva-forsaken cave. Gazelle got to keep his paws free to inherit a more powerful province should any of their lords have a timely accident, Izvaldi got a steward and a sphinxless fake government to rule it in the interim, everybody won! Except for the caretaker government, who had to worry that Gazelle's plan could fall through at any hour of any day and their fraudulent rear ends would suddenly be out of the job."

Papyrus smiled sweetly at Coda. "That caretaker government now lives on your airship."

"I know." Coda frowned. "Such is written in the annals of my scripture. The founders of my sect did indeed raise me as penance for their wickedness in allowing my mother to come to power as she did."

Papyrus sighed fondly. "Yes, well, your mommy dearest was 'involved' in their experiments. As was your daddy, the griffon grandson of Izvaldi's last sphinx and officially the steward of its government. Your maternal grandfather, now, he was the vizier ruling that fake government from behind the scenes... Or was he your great-grandfather? Twisted bloke, might have been both. Either way, the world might never see a romance as dysfunctional as that of your parents ever again."

"You're enjoying this way too much," Unless dryly pointed out. Leif looked similarly unimpressed.

"Sue me." Papyrus made a show of not caring. "Now, where I'm going with this, and something I bet your scriptures didn't teach you, is that Chauncey - grandfather, great-grandfather, whatever guy - happened to have a former Icereach head scientist in his employ."

Leif took a step back, her eyes widening. "You're implying that Navarre was Coda's father?"

Papyrus lifted his ears in interest. "Oh, you see where I'm going with this?" He glanced at Unless. "Well, what about you, Bats? Think I'm onto anything?"

Unless waved a lazy hoof. "Nyeh."

"You mean to tell me you suspect my mother was an infidel?" Coda looked seriously at Papyrus. "Sin upon so many sins, does her wickedness never end?"

Corsica's interest was much keener. "You're saying there just randomly happened to be an Icereach Head Scientist in Izvaldi, in a position to become her father."

"Oh, there was nothing random about it." Papyrus aggressively shrugged. "Chauncey hunted him down and captured him on the outskirts of Icereach. I wouldn't be surprised if it happened in this very facility! I believe he wanted this Navarre's expertise to help in some experiments regarding windigo possession, which, surprise surprise, was also involved."

"Wait," Corsica commanded. "You're saying, after the way we treated Halcyon because there was no better explanation to this head scientist's daughter business, that you knew that Coda's mother and a head scientist had been in close proximity at the right time. You're saying we jumped her purely because this seemed too contrived to be a coincidence and we had no better explanation, and you actually had a better explanation."

"Don't look at me!" Papyrus raised his hooves indignantly. "I'm just postulating innocently about how little Coda could be related to this machine. I didn't know there was a machine here with a condition like this. Besides, I'm not the only one here who knew about Navarre! Isn't that right, Senescey?"

Leif glowered. "Shut up and stop calling me that. And... yes. I hadn't put two and two together. But I knew of Navarre's existence."

"If it makes you feel better," Unless volunteered, "I knew too."

Corsica gave everyone an incredulous look. "Right. Last chance to give me a reason not to untie her, because you all are way more suspicious than she is."

"Because she asked to be tied up," Leif said, looking away. "Whatever it is she knows, she had to have a reason for that."

I swallowed, floating. How differently this conversation might unfold if I was there...

"Before everyone drifts away, perhaps I might finish my wild speculation," Papyrus suggested in a tone that implied he would finish whether others wanted him to or not. "Izvaldi's government was desperate. They all wanted to change the rules so they could stay in power if the fragile status quo Gazelle put in place collapsed out beneath them. They had this sad, cultish 'us against the world' mentality going on long before they got an airship and shacked up to raise Coda, and when Garsheeva eventually came to squish them for their naughtiness, they answered her with copious amounts of explosives." He tapped on the Nemestasis machine. "This kind of explosives."

Coda's pupils went pinprick. Leif just sighed. "In other words, proof that their captured scientist was able to activate this machine."

"From all the way across the world?" Corsica asked. "Didn't you say they brought Navarre back to Izvaldi? How'd he use it if he wasn't here?"

Papyrus blew a raspberry. "Who asked you? Not like I know how this thing works. Maybe it's activated by magic."

Leif frowned. "Wireless mental magic does exist. It's called the Daydream Network, and it's a mechanism the Night Mother used to communicate with her followers, and now that Chrysalis uses to control her changelings. It doesn't have anywhere near that kind of range, though. It only covered the eastern continent with the help of hundreds of signal boosters and transmitters."

I wanted to point out that Icereach had wireless technology too, apparently good enough to allow Kitty to remote-control a Whitewing all the way from Ironridge. But apparently the prospect didn't cross anyone else's minds. If Izvaldi had an Icereach head scientist, though, they'd have access to just about everything that was invented or stored here up until that point...

"Navarre was a unicorn, right?" Corsica tilted her head.

Leif blinked. "Sarosian. Why?"

Corsica frowned. "Really? You're certain?"

"Unless there are two Head Scientist Navarres and only one of them was taken from Icereach to the Griffon Empire..." Leif shrugged.

"Huh." Corsica looked away in thought. "I've never heard of a head scientist being a native of Icereach before. I know little and less about past administrations, but that's pretty basic. And Lilith... She talked about it being a big deal that Coda was born looking like a batpony. The way she told it, batponies always breed true, so if Coda's father was a griffon and her mother a batpony, she should have been a griffon, too. The fact that Coda defied this rule was foundational to her research. Lilith told me and Halcyon all about this when we broke into her lab. But surely Lilith is close enough to Chrysalis that she would know if Coda's real father was a batpony and there was nothing out of the ordinary about her species."

Papyrus's face scrunched in a frown. "Curious..."

"Lilith is one of Chrysalis's elite peons, right?" Corsica looked at Coda. "You called her a Changeling Bishop, and said she acts as if created for a singular purpose. Why would Chrysalis create a minion to pursue a line of research based on a foundational premise she knows is false?"

Papyrus strummed his feathers. "Word on the street says Chrysalis was beyond outraged when her child was a sarosian. Percival himself assumed she had been unfaithful, and that doubt was the final blow that pushed her over the edge. All signs do point to her being a filthy cheaterpants, and yet it's as if she wasn't even aware of it, herself... Incidentally, it must have been quite a sight to see the look on her face when that went down."

Leif rubbed her chin with a wingtip. "Things don't add up, but the one irrefutable piece of evidence we have is that the machine works for Coda. Unfortunately, even if we conclusively figured out why Coda has Navarre's blood, that tells us absolutely nothing about whether it's really a coincidence that she's here now, tonight, in a position to use it."

I let their words soak through me. Since I couldn't help and provide feedback, it was easy to disengage from the conversation, and there were plenty of threads from earlier I felt like deserved more attention than the matter of Coda's parentage. For example, had they said a rocket was launched all the way to the Griffon Empire, to use as a weapon against Garsheeva?

That was a new one. I was almost certain I hadn't heard that before. And it brought to mind another important conversation, when Leif was telling me her original interest in Icereach's rockets was as a method for fighting Chrysalis.

It wasn't just conjecture. In her homeland, these had been used to target gods before. And everyone was suspicious that someone had manipulated Coda into being here on purpose, perhaps that the rockets might be used again...

"Ey there, friendo," a grating, metallic voice said, my body going rigid as I felt something rise up behind me.

I turned. It was Ludwig.

Nobody else in the room seemed to be able to see him.

"I have been waiting and watching your face for several whole entire seconds," Ludwig said, wiggling earnestly. "I thought it would be best for dramatic timing if I showed up right when you looked like you figured out something important! How did I do? And did you miss me?"

"You can see me?" I asked, hovering. "And they can't see you?"

Ludwig shrugged. "Your good old buddy Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III was sort of hoping you would have a more exciting reaction than that, little cigar. This is honestly kind of lame."

"Too bad. Guess I've toughened up since we last met." I shrugged. "Why are you a ghost like me?"

Ludwig did a loop. "Because it is convenient! All of these ponyos and hairy things would probably be a whole lot less interested in squabbling if there was a windindindigo like me out in plain sight to be spooked of. It is a basic trick, friendo: sometimes the expectation of a thing is worse for your nerves than the thing itself!"

"Lovely," I sighed. "And what do you want?"

"Aside from a few kicks and giggles?" Ludwig shimmered, sloughing off a cascade of white-blue mist in its wake. "Honestly, little cigar, I was getting pretty tired of no one asking that. It is always 'Ludwig, go here' or 'Ludwig, do that'! What I am actually personally wanting with my brain is for you to say you remembered when I said I owed you one and have come to collect! It would be pretty cool to be on the same side and trounce some bozos, friendo. I don't suppose your face is here to fight anyone and take some names?"

I circled Ludwig slightly. "And what if I am?"

Ludwig flew in a circle. "Then it would be an excellent excuse to tell the robobobot to get bent and go have some fun for a change. Honestly, all this kill-our-creator stuff sounds pretty good on paper, but is really boring to actually do. And I have a sneaky little hunch you probably would want us to knock it off if you knew how we were going about it."

I fixed him with a look. "Try me."

"Tell you all of our secret plans?" Ludwig stopped undulating, looking me straight in the eye. "Hmmmmmmm... Tempting, friendo, tempting. Honestly, I do kind of owe you one. And they would probably be more interesting plans anyway if you ruined them a time or two and made us think up new ones. And by us I mean the robobobot. Some windigoes have no chill, little cigar! But first, why not tell me your own secret plans? Maybe I can help!"

"Since when have you been interested in helping me?" I queried, dubious.

"Since pretty much always and stuff." Ludwig did another loop. "I literally almost took over Icereach for you before the rude raspberry ponyo made me take a hike, remember?"

I shook my head. "Right. What if I'm not actually looking to take over any cities?"

"Then that is a good thing!" Ludwig vibrated excitedly. "Because the city here would be a pretty terrible place to rule right about now, friendo. That princess ponyo from Yakystan who is getting the hairy things outside to trust her? That is literally Chrysalis. Yup. One hundred percent. And windigoes actually do not do so well in a fight against creatures that physically eat emotion. I would probably not back you up if you wanted to fight her in a hoof-wrestling contest."

If I had been drinking, I would have spit out my drink. "That was Chrysalis? You're pulling my leg."

Although... Coda had sensed a changeling queen...

"For serious, friendo," Ludwig insisted. "I am telling you the truth with my mouth."

This would... be an excellent way for Ludwig to turn me against a potential ally. And also an excellent way for me to ignore a legitimate warning and become a pawn in someone else's game. I wasn't exactly flush with options that didn't leave me vulnerable...

About the best I could do was trust the yaks to deal with her and not get duped themselves. Hopefully, if they were wrong, I would get us all a way out of here before it came back to bite them.

"You look kind of like this secret knowledge messes up your cool plan," Ludwig patronized with a hint-hint-wink-wink expression. "Why not tell your good buddy all about it so he can help you out? I am serious here, little cigar. Your face's side would be way funner to be on than any of these losers."

I sighed. "My mom. Disabled batpony, wears a bathrobe, lives in Icereach? Around forty? I want to get her out and bring her back to this hideout. Then, I want passage through the teleporter for me, her and everyone I came in with, plus any of the Icereach yaks if things take a turn for the worse and they need an escape route. I have the teleporter key. What'll that cost me?"

"Honestly, friendo, you are pretty legendary," Ludwig told me earnestly. "There is basically nothing I could do to make Jamjars believe my face when I said I did not take the key myself. Watching her try to figure out where it had gone was hilarious like you would not believe. Anyway, I would really like to help you, friendo! And I would even like to do it for free!"

"There's a but coming," I pointed out, not even needing to ask.

Ludwig wryly twisted. "You are a smart one, little cigar. You see, all the hairy things I have been letting live in my cave are just the teensiest bit too nice. I am maybe not the world's biggest fan of squishy niceness because it kind of diminishes my powers just a tad, which has nothing at all to do with me feeling more cozy as a ghost right now and I promise I would not lie. Going to Icereach and back is no trouble, but to power the teleporter my face will either need the hairy things out of this cave, or else a big fight nearby. Sorry, friendo. It is just the way I work."

I considered that. It... was definitely possible Ludwig was telling the truth.

"Fortunately," Ludwig insisted, wriggling, "if we went all the way back to Icereach, it would be pretty easy to start a war while we were there, if that is your style. Things there are wound tighter than the time King Father tried to cram my entire species into a box for several thousand years. But if you have a better idea, you are welcome to try it instead, friendo."

I narrowed my eyes. "Alright, fine. I told you my plan. Now tell me yours. Yours, Kitty's, whatever all the windigoes are doing."

"Oh!" Ludwig vibrated excitedly. "Sure, little cigar! So, basically, like ninety nine percent of us windigoes are trapped in a magic forcefield at the bottom of the world under the Yakystan glacier, which is sort of rude but honestly beats being in a box by like a whole entire large amount. We have been getting stronger through the deterioration of world peace for a while now, and the barrier is sort of getting weaker on its own just because it was never all that strong. But we thought, if Ironridge and Yakystan go to war and then Ironridge wins enough that there is a battle at the Yakystan capitol, it should give us the push we need to break the barrier and free ourselves once and for all! Then we would move on to phase two, which is basically to kill our dad once all of us are there and the world is a little messed up so we have some strength. I think that part is still being planned, friendo."

"You want Yakyakistan and Ironridge to go to war," I said, narrowing my eyes. "Convenient how you rule Ironridge, and the Yakyakistan rulers want a war because of that. It's like you get to call the shots for both sides."

Ludwig sighed. "The robobobot is annoying like you would not believe, but also pretty smart, little cigar. Most of my plans are just about how to get two dumb ponyos to say nasty things about each other's faces. She thinks bigger. Anyway, both sides already want to fight, so basically my job is to make a dust-up in Icereach so that they have an official excuse to begin. Which is a much more boring job than you would think, since Chrysalis is here and is much more aggro about it than me!"

"Fantastic," I grumbled. Much as I didn't want to say it, and much as I had harbored fantasies of protecting Icereach for real this time, Leif was right: just because I knew about the coming storm didn't give me an inch of power to stop it. The best I could possibly hope for was to take care of my own and get out of the way.

And if that meant making sacrifices and choosing priorities...

"Getting Mother out of Icereach," I said. "And back here, safe and sound. What's that gonna involve? If you're serious about helping. Pull it off exactly the way I want it, and I'll let you have fun with it."

"Well!" Ludwig shivered in genuine excitement. "First, friendo, what way do you want it? There are a whole entire number of ways we could pull off a thing like that. Do you want to keep being a ghost, or come along in person? How about any of your friendos? Would you like to borrow my totally cool powers again like I gave the raspberry ponyo last time? I still have the magic circle I used to do that! How about-"

"Rule number one," I interrupted. "No doing anything to any of my friends without their permission. And if it's all the same with you, I'd rather not get possessed by a windigo myself. And it has to be explicit permission, got it? No word games like last time."

Ludwig sighed. "Honestly, little cigar, I was pretty proud of how well I misled you by only telling the truth last time. You could at least compliment my face for it."

"Fine. You're very evil and cunning," I patronized. "Now, being absolutely clear: you understand how playing fair and respecting boundaries works? Or are at least prepared to get this done without harassing any of my friends? We haven't even started yet, and it's not too late for me to forget I ever gave you the time of night and go do this on my own."

"...Like this?" Ludwig looked to me for approval, then paused, fuzzed...

POMF!

Ludwig suddenly seemed very, very slightly less ghostly. Everyone in the room dropped what they were talking about, gaped at Ludwig and screamed.

"Hi there, ponyos!" Ludwig rattled, its voice sounding like gears with tines that were made of swords. "Your friendo Halcyon, who is currently a spooky ghost in this very room, wants to know if any of you would like to get possessed by a cool windigo today!"

A Windigo's Worst Nightmare

"Hi there, ponyos! Your friendo Halcyon, who is currently a spooky ghost in this very room, wants to know if any of you would like to get possessed by a cool windigo today!"

Everyone, even Leif, yelled in surprise. Papyrus's scream was almost funny enough to make me forget how badly this situation was going wrong; it sounded less like a pony and more like a violently strangled turkey call.

And then Coda turned to Ludwig, summoned her horn, lit it with a pink-black aura, and fired.

A huge glob of sickly-looking energy burst forth, visible for half a second before it crashed into Ludwig, sending black lightning crackling across his body. He fuzzed, twitched and lost a little altitude.

"Hie from here, demon," Coda threatened, visibly freaked out but also somewhat excited as she took a battle stance. "Or else speak! You are a windigo, are you not?"

"You can hit him?" Corsica asked, her own shock giving way to intrigue. "Huh. So why are you here now, then?" She raised an eyebrow at Ludwig. "Back for more? I didn't expect either of us would want to do that again."

Leif was bristling. "You're the one who lives here, then. You were in her apartment that day..."

Papyrus glanced at Unless. Unless shrugged, and I realized she actually hadn't been among those to scream. In fact, she didn't look surprised by Ludwig's presence at all.

"Ouchie," Ludwig complained, the energy from Coda's attack slowly fading away. "I do not think my face deserved that... What even are you, anyway?"

"You definitely deserved it," I retorted, floating closer. "In fact, I'm of half a mind to do it myself. And maybe I would, if I wasn't a ghost!"

I didn't have changeling queen magic, but I more wanted to get a point across than actually hurt the windigo, and so I raised a translucent hoof and slapped him anyway.

It worked.

Unlike everything else, where I phased through walls as if they were air, my hoof struck Ludwig. It felt like punching cotton candy, and there was no solid purchase, but he was tangible. Ice instantly shot up my limb in retaliation, and Ludwig reeled back in surprise. "Rude and not fair!"

I grinned a sharklike grin.

Coda apparently didn't notice that Ludwig had just been slapped. "I am the final note in the song of destruction, goddess of love and scion of Izvaldi, Princess Coda. As the archnemesis of evil, I command you to surrender!"

"I am surrendering as fast as I can, megashrimp," Ludwig insisted. "Enough with the friendly fire already! I have totally been summoned and stuff by your friendo to help your faces beat up some anti-friendos!"

"Megashrimp?" Coda's brow furrowed in indignation.

Corsica sighed, heaving herself to her hooves and stepping between Coda and Ludwig. "Kid, let me do this," she said with a look over her shoulder, then turned to Ludwig. "First question: what was that about Halcyon being a ghost?"

Ludwig wiggled unhappily. "It is pretty spooky, raspberry ponyo. She is right there, right now, listening to everything you say." He wiggled in my general direction. "She is also invisibly staring at your flanks a lot. I am wracking my whole entire brain trying to figure out why she looks like she enjoys it so much."

Corsica's cheeks reddened. "I wish for your sake you're making that up. Hey, idiots!" She glanced at Papyrus and Unless. "Go check on Halcyon and make sure she's still where we left her."

I had no idea what I could say to prevent the other me from being checked on. She'd want to be alone, obviously, but... With every second that passed, I felt more and more like giving Ludwig the time of day had been a bad idea.

"Right away, junior trash tyrant." Papyrus rolled his eyes, not bothering to get up. "Just as soon as I finish listening to this fascinating conversation."

Corsica slapped him with her telekinetic aura. "Not in the mood. Try again, Ludwig: what was that about Halcyon being a ghost?"

"You are looking at me like I have any idea why she be the way that she do," Ludwig slowly insisted. "I am serious, friendo. She is a ghost! A ghostly one. Kind of like me when I am invisibly stalking you. I think it is called an Iklofna, which is an old windigo word I heard from a cousin of a cousin that refers to how we are sort of spooky and half-existent and stuff like this." He flew through Papyrus, who yelped and batted at him like he was a swarm of flies. "See?"

"Lovely," Corsica told him. "Why's she like that?"

"Beats me, raspberry ponyo. Maybe she just decided it would be cooler to be like my face than to be like your face." He turned to me. "Ey little cigar, why are you a ghost, anyway?"

"Magic. Wish I knew," I replied, wishing I could talk to Corsica myself and considering going back to my body... except no one here seemed to be going to check on me. And even if they did, I wasn't all that sure what I would do, since I was tied up at my own request.

"She says magic," Ludwig translated. "Which honestly is a pretty lame answer, but those are the words that came out of her face."

Corsica frowned. "...Halcyon. If you're listening, what did we talk about earlier tonight, at the spa? General subject. No details."

I blinked. "Your special talent."

Ludwig bobbed in excitement. "Oh, that is saucy, little cigar! I am not comfortable repeating that in this much company, which is saying something because my face is pretty shameless. I suppose the most family-friendly way to put it would be 'Your special talent.' The adults in the room will know what I mean."

Papyrus whistled. Corsica slapped him again, but looked more pensive than before.

I, being invisible and having no one but my target to judge me, wound up for a much bigger punch.

This time, expecting his wooliness and getting close enough that I wasn't handicapped by the length of my legs, I landed a deep, solid blow, and sent Ludwig flying all the way across the room, until he hit a rack full of parts and tools.

Unlike last time, everyone noticed.

"What was that?" Leif glanced sharply around the room, focusing on everything but Ludwig, trying to find what had thrown an intangible windigo.

...Well, mostly intangible. He had, I noticed, hit the wall. More of gaseous and able to flow around normal blows... But not around me.

I ignored my friends, a wisp of curiosity morphing into an idea in my mind. I couldn't touch walls. Ludwig could touch walls. I could sort of touch Ludwig... Any desire I had held to work with him was by now firmly snuffed out. But I did kind of want to see what would happen if he got squished.

Painful memories dredged themselves up in my mind, of panic and despair as Ludwig, hitching a ride inside Corsica, fled the hideout with myself and Ansel helpless to give chase. I grinned, aimed, and flew.

Ludwig went flat against the wall almost instantly. But rather than feel the wall behind him, I began to press into something else. It felt like the windigo was the surface of a taut trampoline, bending back into the wall as I pushed. Some of Ludwig was clearly caught by the wall, staying in the room, but another part was in my hooves, being pushed out of it... What would happen if I kept pushing?

"Ow! Owowow!" Ludwig squirmed and flailed, yet it was entirely ineffectual. Cold washed over my body, colder than ice, yet without a physical form, I couldn't freeze and the ice couldn't restrain me. "Stop it! What are you doing, little cigar!?"

"Getting tired of your nonsense," I growled, pushing harder. "You had a great opportunity for a reset. We hadn't seen each other for half a year, and you could have turned another leaf, but you just can't help being compulsively annoying, can you? So forgive me if I don't feel bad for seeing whether you've got limits!"

I couldn't explain how I was pushing, given that I was a floating spirit who had purchase against nothing. It felt more like I was using my mind than my muscles, and as Ludwig continued to resist, I started to realize the cold was somehow hitting my mind as well: more a conceptual feeling than a physical sensation, thoughts of ice and wrath that made me shiver from the inside out.

"Knock it off, friendo!" Ludwig writhed, and ice started creeping into my vision. Not good. I had officially picked a fight now, and returning to the status quo might no longer be on the table. Could I win this? Ludwig was straining further and further the more into the wall I pushed, the more I spread apart whatever parts of him were physical and incorporeal. Would he give out first? How much could he take, and what would happen if he did? If only I had a little more...

I squeezed my eyes shut and wished for my bracelet's fire. And, suddenly, it was there.

A thin filament of ghostly light surrounded my foreleg, in exactly the position where I usually wore it. There were no voices in the back of my head to whisper doubt and fear, to tell me that I couldn't do it or that I'd suffer cataclysmic consequences. I commanded it to light, and fire pushed back the cold as Ludwig gave like wet paper.

Something snapped, and I tumbled into darkness.

"Oh no," Ludwig's voice said in my ear, missing its usual grinding, eldritch quality. "Oh, come on! No, no, no, you killjoy!"

I focused my eyes. Everything was monochrome, the world visible in only white and light blue. The light was almost blinding in its intensity, and while my eyes seemed more able to take it in than usual, it still hurt. In fact, I was ravenously hungry, and my entire body felt pretty not great... At least, the parts of it I could feel at all.

A quick glance down made me freeze: I was hovering in midair, and everything from my midsection down was smoke.

I was...

I was a windigo?

Everyone else in the room - it took me a moment to recognize them with the colors as messed up as they were - stared at me with a mixture of awe, disgust, and concern. "What just happened?" Leif asked.

Corsica took a half step backwards. "Ludwig...?"

A tiny mote of light no one was looking at pulsed next to me. "Cheater," it accused with Ludwig's stripped-down voice.

I didn't particularly need to have my friends nearby while I figured this out. Floating through the door, which was exactly like flying as a ghost, I undulated my way down the hallway, earned multiple shouts as I passed through the barracks, and slipped through a narrow opening where someone had forgotten to block the exit all the way to get outside.

Night sky greeted me in the trench, but I felt no cold at all.

"I'm a windigo," I whispered, my voice now sounding like rusty death. "This is Ludwig's body. I..." I looked at the mote of light. "I kicked you out. And stole this for myself."

"Yes, and your face was very intelligent and cool in doing so," Ludwig drawled. "Not. This is seriously lame, little cigar. Can we go back to our plans to break into Icereach together?"

I grinned a wicked grin. "You mean you don't like getting possessed? For real?"

"It is called a double standard." The light mote bobbed in midair. "I am great at making those, friendo. If you ever need some for yourself, I work on commission!"

I tried to blink... and realized I didn't have eyelids. Disturbing. "Ever heard the maxim about treating others the way you want to be treated?"

"Yup." The light mote vibrated. "It is for losers who lose a lot."

"Like you, apparently," I sighed. "Because now you're just gonna have to sit down and see what it's like for a while. Luckily for you, I'm not a megalomaniac who's out to crush your spirit, but I do see a whole lot of advantages in keeping you off the stage for a while and don't feel one bit sorry for giving you a taste of your own medicine."

The light mote buzzed in thought. "...I suppose karma is ironic, little cigar. But here is an idea, though: I bet you should totally give my body back because bad things might happen to you if you keep it and stuff."

I tried to raise an eyebrow... and realized I didn't have eyebrows. Was this why Ludwig wiggled so much? Was he just missing all other forms of body language?

Whatever. "Yeah, I'm sure I'll run afoul of an ancient curse, or something," I snorted. "Be more specific."

"Wellllll..." The light mote bobbed up and down. "Why do you think I possessed your rude raspberry friendo in the first place? Part of it was to see the looks on all of your faces, but there was more to it than that."

"Don't remember, don't care." I considered trying to scout more of the trench, but... I had windigo powers. There really wouldn't be many better opportunities than this to fly to Icereach, check out what was happening, and freeze anyone I didn't like. "You sure it wasn't just to mess with us?"

"I wanted to be a ponyo because being a windigo is lame," Ludwig insisted. "We have a whole bunch of limitations and stuff. I actually told your face about them like seventeen million seconds ago, which now that I think about it is sort of a lot. It is a pretty miserable existence, little cigar. King Father never thought about how we would feel when he made us, you see."

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," I said, gaining altitude. "Whatever I can or can't do in this body right now, it's a whole lot more than you can do as... whatever you are. And see if I cry for your loss."

Ludwig buzzed. "That is pretty mean of you to say to my face, by the way. Are you sure you would have said it if you were your normal self? I have a hunch in my brain that being a windigo is making you meaner, little cigar."

"Can't say I was feeling too charitable before I got your body, either," I told him. "So I guess you just get to deal with it."

"Fine." Ludwig shivered, drawing further away from me in the night. "Call on me when you get yourself into a mess you don't want to solve, stupid ponyo. I have a whole lot more experience having a windigo's face than you do."

He drew farther away, until I lost track of him. Good riddance.

I kept on climbing the trench, turning my thoughts to what had just happened... To what I had just done. The fact that I was anything but normal was already well-established, but... just what was I? My mask, the personality that made me me, could become a tangible magical object, or a detached ghost. Had I effectively forced my mask onto Ludwig, kicking him out and establishing myself as the personality his body was hosting? If so, how come I evicted him, rather than burying him in my mind like I did to the Halcyon who was currently in my own body?

If only I could ask Corsica about her experience with Ludwig. When she was his host, had she been disembodied like I was and like I had made Ludwig? Or was she stuck in there together with him, and with him in control?

Clearly, I had something in common with Ludwig, if we could both float around and possess others. Iklofna, Ludwig had said... I had never heard of that word before. And when I took over this body, unlike with Ludwig and Corsica, I did it without the aid of a magic circle. Did that mean I was like Ludwig, but more powerful?

My other selves were nowhere to be seen. I was on my own, and odds were decent I was about to stumble onto some secret about our capabilities without them around to stop me.

I shivered eagerly, still rising. True, I might not have had a magic circle, but there was something I did have: my bracelet.

How had I used it? Summoning it while pushing Ludwig felt deeply instinctual, but that told me nothing about how summoning it - or wearing it as a ghost - was possible at all. And I still didn't know what it did, other than that I used it!

There was a time I had worn it while not entirely real before, I realized: when I accidentally went inside Coda's throne, and first brought back Procyon. That bracelet was tied to me on a level that went deeper than physically wearing it.

Maybe it was from wearing it for years. Maybe it was from considering it my own. I knew too little about magic artifacts, and too little about my own past.

But whatever. My first priority was finding Mother.

I crested the mountains, hovering near Wystle Tower and looking down on Icereach from above.

A large airship filled the sky, too big to dock at the fortress. Vertical propellers all around its sides gleamed with neon magic, augmenting the massive dirigible and helping to keep the thing afloat. It looked like it was built around the dirigible, though, rather than simply underneath it; there was a platform on top as well that looked like a landing pad for normal-sized airships like the two that patrolled the skies around it and the one that actually was docked at the compound.

On its own, the ship didn't look more imposing than warranted, clearly designed for normal military use rather than as an egomaniac general's flagship of evil. But the searchlights on the ship that scanned the ground, and the spotlights on the ground that scanned the skies, gave the whole scene an eerie look that sent a shiver down my cloudy spine.

...Also, the lids to the rocket silos were open. That was a bad sign.

I floated closer to the tower, realizing I didn't have a perfect grasp of my current abilities and that it might be useful to practice before sticking my frosty face into the mess in the valley.

Fortunately, and somewhat oddly, my special talent still worked even though my real body was all the way back in the hideout, allowing me to pick things up with ease. Creating ice? It was as easy as envisioning a formation, then breathing out. The instincts I'd usually use to breathe, at least, since windigoes apparently didn't have lungs... I wasn't quite sure how I had been talking, earlier. Turning invisible was a little more instinctual and hard to describe, and harder still to test when I still couldn't fly through solid rock, so I wasn't sure I wanted to rely on that until I got to try it on a live pony. I could, however, go effectively anywhere air could go, and squeeze through the tiniest cracks and crevices with effortless ease.

Was that all? There were a few other things I could do that felt instinctual to my body, but didn't seem to have any effect, as if I was spinning a crank handle that wasn't attacked to anything. Maybe it was because I was only half of a windigo - possessed Corsica had been a windigo in a pony's body, so I was only as much a windigo now as Ludwig had been a pony then.

Satisfied with my preparation, I floated out toward the giant airship, in what I hoped was invisible mode.

No searchlights found me as I approached, determined to start this foray off by getting a closer look at my enemy. The side of the warship was painted with Yakyakistan's flag, and it wasn't hard to find an artillery deck where several yaks were loosely manning a giant cannon. The weapon looked like it was designed more to fend off other airships than to bombard the ground, and all the yaks wore unfamiliar decorated tabards that probably counted as military fashion. Happily, none of them saw me as I drifted closer, hoping to eavesdrop.

"Communication all clear. No targets," said a smaller yak next to a small speaker box on the wall.

The other yaks rumbled in acknowledgement. I could physically feel their stiffness and unease, though; these weren't soldiers who could both follow orders and be happy about it. In fact, so acute was the sensation that I knew which one was about to complain a second before they did it.

"Big cannon not Yakyakistan way," the uniformed yak grumbled. "Not seem like pacifist cannon to Makalov."

"Big cannon keep peace," another yak said, though I instinctively knew he was reciting a script he had accepted but didn't believe. "If never fight, no way to stop windigoes from breaking peace. Shoot windigoes, save friends in Icereach. Very simple."

"Big cannon not shoot yaks anyway," a third added, feeling more legitimate in their beliefs than the second. "Or ponies. Shoot windigoes. Windigoes evil. Not need to break vow to shoot evil because evil not count."

Makalov didn't seem satisfied. "Big cannon shoot anything big cannon pointed at. Principle of thing is problem. Way it used is just excuse."

"Principle of thing is shoot windigoes with big cannon," the third yak rumbled back. "Seem clear to Mordecai."

An excited little itch buzzed in my ghostly chest. What would a cannonball do to a mist monster? About as much damage as a paper fan. How would they react when they learned that? Or just when they saw me, in the first place?

Panicking them could work to my advantage. I could throw this entire ship into chaos with just a few tactical appearances, without even having to-

Focus. Get Mother. What was I thinking? I didn't need these invaders to be on any higher alert than they already were; that would just make my job harder.

That excited little itch turned slightly painful.

I ignored it and flew for the ground, aiming for the familiar entrance to the elevator shafts. The doors weren't airtight, and I squeezed through a tiny crack, becoming greeted with an empty shaft.

Hmm. Not exactly the sight I was used to navigating...

Drifting downward, I counted the number of doors, trying to time myself to emerge on the proper floor to reach Mother's apartment... Though, knowing Icereach, there were probably a million unmarked floors with secret things the elevator couldn't normally stop at, and I would vastly undershoot.

Somehow, I didn't, and emerged on precisely the right floor.

The hallway was crawling with ponies, mostly wearing similar attire to the yaks on the airship, and mostly looking a lot less bothered by what they were doing than the yaks. Made sense, since a smart commander would put any troops with questionable sympathies in the back when occupying a new area...

Mess with them, the feeling in my chest urged. They looked so high-strung, with the frowns on their faces and the tension in their eyes. Looking at them was like staring at cookie dough and wanting to lick it: tantalizing, and whatever were they there for if not for me to do it?

No. No breaking stealth until I found Mother. I swatted at the thoughts, and felt that itch in my chest tighten, like curtains getting balled up in a talon. Mission aside, I really wanted to mess with these ponies and pay them back for messing with my home.

Which... wasn't a feeling I would normally entertain. At least, I was fairly certain, but the more I thought about it, I couldn't tell. Was I being silly? Or had Ludwig been telling the truth about there being downsides to being a windigo?

Doubting myself only made the itch stronger. Just to quiet it, I promised myself I'd ruin some invaders' days on my way out.

I passed through an impromptu checkpoint that seemed to be designed to barricade civilians inside the housing complex. On the other side, I started seeing a lot more Icereach ponies, visibly agitated and conversing in hushed whispers in the halls. A sixth sense told me there were a lot more ponies in the apartments than usual.

Made sense. Odds were, the invaders were here to do something other than simply rule, and so they sent the entire population back to their quarters to get them out of the way while they accomplished their goals.

Hopefully, it meant Mother was here. I drifted through the corridors, the tension in the air caressing me like a tender blanket. These ponies were afraid. Mass fear like this, spread over so many, would take only a single spark to grow into action...

The idea should have terrified me, and yet it felt seductive, instead. I shook myself out of it and cleared my head, focusing on Mother. The itch in my chest tightened harder, this time making me physically wince. What was that?

I reached my old apartment, the nice new one that we had upgraded to after the Aldebaran incident, and floated under the doorjamb.

Mother wasn't home.

She was the last one to be here, I could tell. Artifacts of her life were everywhere, including that same Varsidelian spy novel she had read probably a hundred times by now. I saw no signs of a struggle, no signs of a search, and no signs of packing for a deliberate exodus... though some details I'd normally look for, like layers of dust, didn't actually show up to my windigo eyes. Seeing in just searing white and blue was surprisingly inconvenient.

Also, I was hungry, and had an incorporeal mouth.

Restless adrenaline washed over me, and with a growl, I left the apartment. Where would Mother have gone? She was a survivor, so she'd probably look for a way out. But I hadn't seen her on the way down... What if she was on an airship? Not sure how she'd get there, when she couldn't fly. Deeper into the caves, in hiding? Perhaps. But that wouldn't leave her any way out... Maybe I needed to check the surface again.

Minutes later, I was outside, the pang in my chest almost making it hard to fly as I passed up more opportunities to take high-strung ponies and start a brawl. I did the lungless equivalent of gasping for breath, which I didn't have words to explain: it was like a lazy creator had decided a creature should be able to breathe without giving it the apparatus to do so, and the laws of reality bent over backwards to make an exception so it could happen and the boss wouldn't get mad. But metaphors aside, what was going on with me? Or, well, with Ludwig? It was like I had a physical need to torment ponies, and not just a twisted desire for it. Like by stealthing on past, I was denying myself some necessary sustenance.

I scanned the area, searching for anywhere I might go if I was Mother...

Of course! The airship still docked at the yak fort! That was one she could have reached and stowed away on, exactly how she tried to take over the Aldebaran and flee half a year ago. I invisibly wiggled my way toward it, swimming like the air was water and I was a fish.

As I entered the gondola through its open door, a new scent reached my incorporeal nostrils, one I could identify instinctively: the fresh aftermath of a fight. It was intoxicating.

...No. Not a fight. A slaughter.

Dead ponies lined the floors, all wearing those uniforms. I was still myself enough to feel revulsion, though a wave of disappointment came along with it, and the idea of broken toys nudged at my consciousness. Upon examination, the first one had died of a clean puncture wound to the throat... as had the second, the third, the fourth and five more after that.

Perfect cuts. Deadly precision.

I drifted around, looking for the bridge, and began to get a worse feeling than usual.

Eventually, I found it, and it had two ponies who were still standing. One was Mother.

The other was a Whitewing.

The Whitewing's head swiveled, and its metal eyes locked onto me despite my invisibility. "Ludwig," it said in the controlled, pious tone of the Composer. "Why have you left your position?"

A thrill shot through my icy heart. Was I about to dupe Kitty? Think, Hallie. Use your talent.

Be Ludwig.

"Honestly, robobobot?" I said in the harsh, frozen voice of a windigo, becoming visible again with a pomf. "I got bored. So I thought with my brain, and figured, eyy, maybe I will go see what the robobobot is up to instead! So here I am. What is happening here, friendos?"

Beside me, the mote of light that was the real Ludwig returned, bobbing in approval. "Nice one, little cigar. You are good at being me!"

Neither of the duo noticed the light. Mother's ears flicked when I appeared, but she didn't look up from the ship's control panel.

"I already told you the plan," the Composer said. "Return to your post."

I did a loop in a way that I hoped was just as annoying as when Ludwig did it. "Oh, the plan? I might have forgotten just a few of the details. They were pretty boring too." I hesitated. "Actually, that is a lie. While you were telling my face, I was only pretending to listen and thinking up rude jokes about you to pass the time. So I never knew in the first place!"

"Unfortunate," the Composer replied. "Because I do not presently have time to enlighten you. Nehaly, how go the preparations?"

"Give me a minute," Mother grunted. "Never studied for a commercial pilot's license..."

I floated up to her instead, needing to know right now why Mother was siding with the Composer after the way last time had turned out. "Eyy, haggy, you are chumming it up with the windigoes? I thought everyone was having a whole entire crusade to squish our faces and stuff."

"Gotta do what it takes to keep my daughter alive," Mother said through clenched teeth, poking at dials with her one good wing. "Just the way it's always been."

I glanced expectantly at the light mote.

"I am going to be honest, little cigar," Ludwig said. "My face is pretty sure it wasn't paying attention to the plan either. All I was supposed to do was let the good guys into my hole and then let the bad guys in after them so they could have a brawl down there."

The Composer didn't seem inclined to further humor me. I vaguely considered trying to reveal who I really was, but trying to prove it sounded outlandishly difficult and even if I did, Kitty probably wouldn't take kindly to me usurping one of her pawns. So instead I floated, hovering over shoulders and trying to be generally as intrusive and obnoxious as possible.

Not because I wanted to make Mother's day any harder. It just felt like the right way to get some information.

The airship was moving, I realized. Mother was turning it about in midair, adjusting the bearing until we were facing the entrance to one of the four rocket silos.

I tried to blink, and again didn't have eyelids. Was this...?

Mother angled the ship slightly down, and accelerated.

The engines roared, the ship quickly speeding up on a collision course with the ground. As the floor lurched beneath us, Mother and the Composer both raced for the exit.

Were they insane? I undulated through the air after them, both of them leaping out the open door. Mother landed tumbling in a snowdrift, the Composer spread its wings and hovered in midair...

The small docking craft, however, was still accelerating, and moments later it crashed into the ground with a fireball and a terrific boom, landing right in the mouth of one of the launch silos and firmly jamming it with a pile of burning, mangled airship.

Sirens immediately went off, and searchlights from all the remaining airships fixed themselves on the wreckage.

"One down," Mother groaned, getting to her hooves and limping aggressively toward the next silo. "Three to go. As long as my daughter's in Ironridge, no one is bombing it on my watch."

You Can't Stop History

I hovered in midair, leaking frost, watching in white and blue as Mother and the Composer stepped away from the wreckage blocking Rocket Silo One.

Embers rose from the crashed airship as flames began to spread, all searchlights from the main airship carrier focusing on us. Voices were shouting below, inside the silos. Mother was already limping toward the second silo - the second of four.

To hear her tell it, she thought Yakyakistan was here to trigger a rocket strike on Ironridge, and that by disabling all four silos, she could protect the city - and thus me, whom she assumed was still there.

I shivered, despite being unable to feel the cold. All stakes aside, that was seriously cool. I had always known Mother could break every limit in my name, and had done so to get us out of the eastern continent, but getting to witness it up close, and this time not through a nightmare...

The twinge in my chest buzzed in excitement. All I had to do was follow and watch, and I'd be treated to the spectacle of a lifetime.

"Windigo sighted," a voice blared on a megaspeaker mounted on the airship carrier. "I repeat, windigo sighted as part of hostile force! All cannons, fire at will!"

"Do your thing," Mother grunted at the Composer, limping doggedly toward the next silo. How was she going to blow up this one? All the remaining airships were high in the sky, and I had never seen her fly on that wing...

Booms rang out across the sky, and flashes of light lit up the cannon decks on the carrier. I watched with a dizzy, rapturous feeling as the Composer spread its wings, drew its blades, launched into the air straight over Mother's head and sliced in half the one cannonball from the volley that would have hit her. Another cannonball, flying at an awkward angle, clipped the lid of one of the remaining silos, embedding itself squarely in the mechanism for opening and closing it.

Help her, I thought, somewhere in the distant back of my mind. But... why was I thinking that? Watching the violence felt too good. I was meant to be an observer and a cheerleader, not a participant. Besides, I wasn't even sure what good a little ice would do.

The cannons reloaded, but before they could fire again Mother and the Composer reached the second silo, dropping down inside. I hovered over the rim, torn between following them down and flying up to scare the cannoneers.

You came here for Mother, I reminded myself forcefully. Stay on track.

But it had been a lot easier to think that before the explosions started, and I felt how good they felt. Every time I passed up a chance to mess with ponies and start a fight before, an ache had been growing in my chest, moving up the scale from an annoyance to a legitimate pain.

"Focus," I growled to myself, hoping saying out loud would help. "Ignore the airship..."

"What was that that I heard with my ears?" Ludwig asked, the familiar light mote bobbing over to me. "Having trouble being me, little cigar?"

"No," I told him flatly, his presence giving me a spike of stubbornness that I turned into focus. I started into the silo, swimming through the air.

"Honestly, friendo," Ludwig said, "you will have, like, this much better of a time if you just go with the flow. Did I ever tell you about the time King Father created us and stuffed us in a box for thousands of years? We were made to do the bidding of some rando, not frolic and do whatever like stupid ponyos. The robobobot is super weird among windigoes because she actually cares about free will and doing stuff purely because she wants to, like a ponyo. But if you are trying to be a windigo for a change, it will drive you insane if you try to see the line between what you want to do and what King Father wants you to do."

I bristled. Obviously, Ludwig would say whatever it took to get me to give his body back, but this really wasn't the time...

"The best case," Ludwig went on, "is that you become all dark and broody and start writing poetry about whether you are writing poetry of your own free will, questioning where your emotions come from and whether they are really your own and all that. I say best case because apparently there are some ponyos who are too dumb to realize they are ponyos and ask those questions too. Philosophicerers, I heard they were called. So if you could find some, you would be in good company! And you could also mess with them because you actually know the answer and are too sad and stupid and ugly to accept it. Have you ever met a philosophicerer, little cigar?"

"And what's the worst case?" I asked, not really wanting to know.

Ludwig bobbed happily in midair. "The worst case is that you waste a whole lot of time trying to kill King Father when you could have just been enjoying yourself, and then you feel like a fraud."

What a terrible fate...

I focused my attention on the floor of the rocket silo. The Composer was finishing off the last of the Yakyakistani soldiers, all perfect, clean kills like the ones on the airship, and I felt a deep spike of frustration and betrayal that it was breaking the ponies rather than playing with them.

That... That wasn't how I wanted to feel. This was not me.

I tried to grind my teeth, but they were too incorporeal for it to work. At first, I thought I had a handle on this new windigo body, but ever since the violence began, it was like my temptations had been supercharged. Stop enjoying this, Halcyon! I... was not... a bloodthirsty windigo!

At the bottom of the silo, sitting on its launchpad, was a gleaming silver rocket. The sight of it almost brought me back to myself enough to forget about the tension in the air: normally, civilians like myself weren't allowed anywhere near the rockets, and the one time I had seen one was from the heavily shielded control room in the middle of the four silos, during a school field trip when I was young.

Curved silver fins formed a tripod that propped up the spacecraft, its body long and sleek and faintly ovular. Near the top, it tapered to a red nose cone that looked faintly detachable. Ostensibly, that cone was the part where ponies would actually ride during space travel, the rest of the rocket consisting of engines and fuel tanks that would gradually fall away as the craft completed different stages of its flight, until only the tip would be left to return to the world below. But now that I had heard the stories, about rockets being used before to deliver payloads of explosives... It sure would be easy to replace that nose cone with a single, giant bomb.

Odds were, it had already been replaced.

Sparks dripped down from above, leaking from the roof mechanism that had been ruined by the cannonball. Mother was scaling a scaffold tower that attached to the rocket, though it looked like most of the conduits and hoses the tower was meant to support had already been decoupled from the hull.

The smell of blood filled the room. None of the soldiers here had been shown any mercy. I struggled to keep my focus.

"There," the Composer instructed, standing on the ground and watching Mother. "You will need the green hose labeled EF3. Detach it from-"

"You're welcome to help," Mother hissed, struggling against the contraption. "This is... not..."

"Easy?" the Composer finished. "Precisely. As with our last meeting, I am far more interested in seeing the lengths ponies will go to to achieve their goals than in any particular outcome. I observe and enable, but to do the work myself would defeat the point. Can your care for your daughter truly-"

A retracting door in the wall slid open, revealing a lone pegasus.

"Not invested in any particular outcome?" she said in a familiar, raspy voice. "How convenient. In that case, would you mind standing down, please?"

My frosty eyes widened in interest. I hadn't seen her all that well last time, and windigo sight didn't make this time any better, but this was undoubtedly the Yakyakistan princess from the Trench. And she smelled like malice.

"Continue with your task," the Composer instructed Mother, before walking up and stabbing the princess in the throat.

My frosty heart raced in excitement.

The princess didn't seem particularly bothered.

"Save it," she said, pushing the blade back out and stepping away, the wound closing in a shower of green flames that burned down instead of up. Then she looked straight at me. "I had expected that my intentions in coming here were clear and welcome, but seeing as you and your ilk have been killing my lovely soldiers, that clearly isn't the case. Perhaps you can clear up this misunderstanding."

Think. Be Ludwig. "Ey, you've got some nice flanks," I told her, feeling dirty even as a windigo for saying it. "My understanding is that I am a spooky windigo who screws with ponyos to see the looks on their faces."

Internally, I winced. Was this smart? I was staying in character, but I was also antagonizing someone who may or may not be trying to start a war... Why was I doing this?

I needed to get out of this body before... before I changed enough that I no longer wanted to.

"Lovely," the princess spat, dropping some of her decorum. "I'll be sure to pass the compliment on to the real owner of this body if I ever see her again. Now I'll spell it out plain and pretty: I want a war. You want a war. So why are you trying to stop me from landing the first strike?"

The Composer shot Mother a look that said Keep working, then gave me a look that said your move.

What? Why was I being put on the spot for this?

"Because I don't like your face," I replied, internally scrambling. This... This wasn't what I wanted to be a windigo for! I needed to lower tensions, not inflame them! Even if it was very possible that I was negotiating with Chrysalis herself...

But that just meant I needed to be at the top of my game. Not tied up in a body that desperately wanted to cause chaos.

Ludwig bobbed eagerly beside me. He, I could tell, was enjoying this.

The princess frowned. "You get your chaos and conflict and whatever else your miserable kind lives for. I get a national crisis to manufacture unity and rally the populace behind their figurehead-"

Something clicked on the platform where Mother was working, and she audibly growled. The princess flicked her ears.

"You don't look like a windigo," she said, a horn materializing on her head in a gout of emerald flame. With a too-thick aura that looked worryingly like the one my other self had used to ghostify me, she grabbed Mother, yanked her from the platform, and held her in midair. "Ah... I know you. You're the one the fools in the Trench came here to save, aren't you?"

I wiggled, generating a small bolt of ice that encased the princess's horn, snuffing out her aura and freeing Mother. "Eyy, no messing with my toys, runt!"

"Halcyon is here?" Mother stumbled for cover, giving the Composer a piercing look. "She's not in Ironridge?"

Deep in my head, behind the bubbling excitement that I wished I could sweep away, I saw my chance. Get Mother. Get out. That was all that mattered...

"Negative," the Composer replied. "She is in Ironridge at this very moment. Near the top of the Ice District, where I am given to understand you desire to strike." It turned to the princess.

"Actually, robobobot," I cut in, "your face is wrong about that. She took the teleporter to my hidey hole over there." I wiggled in an eastward direction, then at Mother. "If you want to see for yourself, I will give you a free ride by my very own self! What do you say we ditch these losers and go check it out?"

The princess chuckled. "By all means. I could care less what you do, so long as you stop wasting my drones and stop trying to damage my new toys." She gestured at the rocket. "Halcyon... I know that name. Lilith gave instructions that we were to leave someone named Halcyon alone. Although, I've never been known to be a team player. And if she cares about you enough to come all the way out here, you might make a decent hostage..." She rubbed her chin. "I was thinking of stalling until I can launch this rocket right here and baking all of you alive in the exhaust, but that's a much more interesting idea..."

"Back off," I growled. "Halcyon is my toy! What are you interested in with her, eyy?"

Internally, I panicked harder. This was Chrysalis... or at the very least, a bishop I hadn't met before. I needed to be at the top of my game right now and I wasn't, because this stupid body kept interfering with my emotions! How could I do this!?

"Halcyon?" The princess looked up. "Oh, I know nothing about her. But from the sound of things, everyone here considers her valuable... You there!" She snapped her feathers at Mother. "Ten seconds to explain to me what makes this Halcyon special and why I should care."

Gambit time.

"Her face is stronger than yours," I said, vibrating. "I am not even kidding, friendo. She is also super emotionally insecure and easy to manipulate. Also she really loves rockets and if you shoot one at Ironridge, I am like fifteen entire percent sure she will think it is so cool that she won't run for the hills, so you should definitely do that if you want to make her easy to find. I heard she is even good in punching fights!"

The princess gave me a look that accepted that I was messing with her, and was pondering whether to be entertained anyway.

"...Interesting," she eventually said. "I'll take that under advisement. But since she's currently in a satellite of Icereach that is under my control, I suppose I don't have to worry about that for the time being." Her horn flickered. "My scouts report efforts to use the filly to activate the targeting system were successful. I've stalled for long enough. I think I'll use this rocket first, now that you've gone and broken the silo lid. If you have any interest in being my hostage, try not to be here when it goes off."

A circle of green flame rose up around her, and the ground inside it became shadowy and textureless, the princess sinking down inside. Immediately, the door she had entered through rolled closed, and an array of warning lights began to flash.

Mother swore.

"It seems your efforts were in vain," the Composer remarked.

Mother swore harder and punched a wall.

"I recommend you flee," the Composer said, spreading its wings. "Ride on my back if you must. This chamber is about to become unsurvivable for both of us, and I am not inclined to sacrifice such a useful body for the sake of dawdling."

"But... Halcyon...!" Mother turned back toward the scaffolding tower. "There's still time! I have to...!"

"I lied," the Composer smoothly said. "Halcyon is in Icereach, in the hideout where she was previously imprisoned, as are the closest friends she made during her stay in Ironridge. Understand that my assistance in your quest was born not of a desire to prevent this attack, but of a desire to see the lengths to which you would go to protect your own. As payment, I took it upon myself to shelter those you care about in advance."

Mother stared at it with a desperate expression.

"It is true," I added, wiggling. "But let us blow this dump and go see for ourselves! Of all the bad ideas I have seen ponyos come up with, staying here is definitely a bad idea."

"You wanted for them to bomb Ironridge," Mother said, focusing on the Composer.

The rocket's engine started to flicker.

I wasn't waiting any longer. "Out we go!" I proclaimed, summoning an ice pillar beneath Mother and the Composer that shot both of them high into the air.

The rocket's engine started to spark... and quickly, I got an idea. Pushing Ludwig's powers to the max, I jammed as much ice as I could into the silo. This would hold, right? It would prevent the rocket from-

As the ice materialized, the pain in my chest returned with a vengeance. I had almost forgotten about it while relishing the conflict and the tension... or maybe it had actually gone away, but it definitely wasn't gone now. I winced, struggling to stay aloft, and my control of the ice faltered, everything I had just summoned shattering to pieces.

Why? What was going wrong? Why couldn't I do this?

The bottom of the pit lit with an unholy glow as Mother and the Composer landed on the surface, a safe distance back from the rim. I was halfway to the ground, struggling to right myself. "Urgh..."

"Ludwig?" The Composer watched me with its monotone eyes. "What are you doing?"

"Eyy, friendo, you are not looking so good," Ludwig added, bobbing closer. "Tip from a pro: whatever you just tried doing, if it was to stop anyone from fighting or to be nice to anyone? Do less of that. It is maybe not the super smartest thing in existence for a windigo to be doing."

I ignored him, focusing and trying to resummon the ice.

Too late. The rocket fired.

The heat of its engines forced me back, scattering me like dust as it rose, a trail of white plasma in the air beneath it that faded to red as its nose broke the surface, then its body, and finally its fins. In a few short seconds it was high overhead, sitting on a tower of smoke that continued to expand, and it was rapidly accelerating.

Mother stumbled, her fur blown back, parts of her bathrobe smouldering from proximity to the fire plume. "Halcyon. Take me to her. Now."

"I have other work to see to," the Composer announced. "Cold Karma has already been evacuated in preparation for this strike, though its employees know it not. This war will, after all, be pointless without ponies to fight it. However, this body's control terminal is on the premises, and I will be needed in person to steer the situation." It turned to me. "Ludwig. You are to escort Nehaly to the hideout. From there, let everyone do as they will."

I trembled in relief. There was no way this could be described as going well, and yet... I had yet to lose. My own victory condition was right in front of me.

If only I could have afforded to be a little more ambitious in what that victory would look like.

I wasn't quite sure what the Composer's idea of escorting Mother to the hideout looked like. I wasn't sure it was a safe place to go, either - had the princess I met down there been real, or this same fake? But she mentioned a targeting system and a filly - ostensibly Nemestasis and Coda - and what that told me was that there might be a fight and I would be backing up my friends, windigo body or no.

Eventually, we closed in on the entrance, using a hollow ice cube as a transport to protect Mother from the elements that I pushed along an ice ramp I built as I went. The twinge in my heart was still there and still dangerous, but meditating on how I would take sides in a coming fight soothed it a little, and got me through the journey.

I needed to be myself again. Maybe being in my right mind would have caused me to collapse from a panic attack and get paralyzed again, but I didn't care. Better to suffer my own faults and failings than those of an insane windigo.

Inside the hideout, there had clearly been a battle. Operative word: been. Stun powder nets littered half of the entrance room, however, and snared within them were no less than four dozen unconscious, untransformed changelings.

Unless and Papyrus were guarding the door. The latter had clearly been in an epic scuffle. The former looked basically fresh. Unless raised an eyebrow at us. "Gonna guess you're not a changeling, frosty?"

I dropped Mother and floated up near the ceiling, not particularly wanting to subject my friends to Ludwig's weirdness - even if it was an act, and not the real thing.

Mother struggled to her hooves. "Where... is Halcyon? Tell me she's here..."

"Back room with Corsica," Unless said. "You want more intel, pony up some of your own first. What's going on out there?"

"It is pretty gross, friendos," I said, compulsively answering for her. "There was a super nasty changeling who just fired a rocket. I am pretty sure Ironridge is completely doomed."

"The Composer..." Mother coughed. "Implied it would only hit Cold Karma... Please, take me to Halcyon..."

"Oh, badness." Papyrus flicked his tail, looking actually mildly concerned. "Guess taking down this many here wasn't enough, was it?"

I sighed, took a breath... and forced myself to drop the Ludwig act. That rocket was flying, and for once, time was a lot more valuable than any of my secrets. "Look," I said. "Does anyone here know anything about rockets? How much time we have, whether we can do anything? I'll power the teleporter and can get us back. Halcyon has a key that'll tune the teleporter to Fort Starlight, which is hopefully outside the blast... Never mind, you already know about that. Is it worth it? Is there anything we can possibly do?"

Everyone squinted at me... and a faint flicker of understanding sparked in Unless's eyes.

"Fort Starlight is pretty far away from the Ice District," Unless said. "I've seen how big of booms these rockets make before, and unless they've juiced them up big time in the last twenty years, it should be safe there. Dunno if there's anything we can do, but we're not doing anything at all from here. What about Icereach? Anything to know about there?"

It was hard for me to think. "Look, just... get everyone who's a good guy and take them to the teleporter room. I'll turn it on. Details later."

Get Mother back to Ironridge. Writs of Harmonic Sanction for her and Corsica. Steal an airship - I wasn't even sure we had time to buy one anymore. Get across the border and away from all this. That was all I could think of anymore.

"You heard the freezebag!" Unless barked to everyone in the room, mostly other yaks. "Stories, catch-up and explanations can wait. For now, we clear this joint!"

I floated my way to the possession circle room, which I was pretty sure was also what Ludwig used to power the teleporter. The circle lit up as I drifted inside. I could feel... something... being borrowed.

No, the twinge in my chest protested, why are you helping everyone run away? There's still fighting to be done! Don't get rid of one of the armies!

I growled. My senses were clouded with blue and white, and I could feel my perception of time starting to slip. Something pulled on me, and I intrinsically knew the teleporter had just activated.

It happened again. The pain got a little worse.

"This isn't going to end well, little cigar," Ludwig told me, bobbing out of a wall.

"Shut it," I commanded, not in the mood.

"I am serious and stuff," Ludwig insisted. "Windigoes do not save ponyos. Or hairy things. They make them fight. Has your face forgotten for realsies all the important stuff I told you way back when?"

I tried to close my eyes and focus, but I had no eyelids. The pressure in my heart wasn't letting up.

"There is an ancient windigo artifact called the Lovebringer," Ludwig narrated. "And to make a really long story short enough for your piddly ponyo brain to remember, anyone who has it can say whatever they want and all windigoes have to do it. Otherwise they will be cursed with a super bad curse and stuff. And the only person to ever have the Lovebringer wanted us to make mortals fight..."

"Yeah?" I grunted, wishing I could sweat. "What about it?"

"Well, friendo," Ludwig patronized, "you are doing a pretty good job of invoking that curse."

"Knock it off," I growled. "You yourself promised to run this teleporter for me, didn't you? That means it's totally... possible..."

"Oh, that?" Ludwig did a loop, as a glowing mote of light. "I lied. Or maybe I misrepresented it. I seriously do not remember, little cigar. I say stuff without thinking it through all the time. Like, have you even met me?"

The teleporter yanked again... and suddenly, the pain reached a crescendo.

My senses fuzzed and blurred. It felt like my heart was pumping spikes through my incorporeal body, and I hit the ground in a puff of fog. My own thoughts suddenly sounded distant, so distant in my mind, replaced by a trio of shouting, singing voices exalting conflict and violence.

They didn't have control over my body either, though. It felt like no one did. I almost braced myself for Ludwig to swoop in and take back control, but the light mote seemed content to float and watch, one of the few things I could see at all anymore as bursts and bolts of pain wracked my body. I wanted to scream, but it felt like my jaw was detached, and when I tried to open it, the song I heard threatened to leak out instead.

The teleporter tried to pull again, but I had nothing to push into it.

No... I had to... had to...

The back door creaked open, the one to the secret passage that led to the bathroom. "What's going on?" said a voice I would have been able to identify if not for the pain.

With my last bit of energy, I focused. Corsica came into view... as did a body that was supposed to belong to... me.

I thought, and could think no more, my mind slipping into a sea of song-

Emerald flared in my vision, cutting through the blue and the white in a way that, I realized, the flames on the Yakyakistan princess had done as well, back in the rocket silo. And then my emptiness was there.

"This has gone on long enough," Halcyon's voice said, cutting through the song, a desperate, blank hunger beneath it, unfathomably deep and empty. The emptiness gripped me, needed me, longed for me, and I felt myself pulling apart, as if two halves of me were held together by wet paper, physical and incorporeal...

FLAAAASH!

My senses returned like a fog rolling in, replacing a visage no mortal was meant to see by sights and sounds that fit comfortably within my brain. I was tired and dizzy and aftereffects of the pain were still rolling across my body, but the song was gone, as was the pain in my chest. Most importantly, I was me again.

...Sort of. Halcyon was standing in the room across from me, and I realized with a start that I was still a ghost.

Ludwig's body, oddly, was nowhere to be found.

"You're going to regret that," the light mote said, sounding legitimately ticked off. "Little cigar..."

Corsica ignored it, her mane frayed, looking almost dead on her hooves. "You sure about this?" she asked Halcyon.

Halcyon nodded, closed her eyes... and lit her horn, which was already summoned. Part of me felt an unpleasant shock: wasn't that my secret to reveal? On the other hoof, I really wasn't feeling up to anything at all right now...

I jumped a little harder when her horn lit not with green, but a windigo-colored teal.

The circle reacted. I saw her react just slightly, as if she had just been pulled.

"What's going on?" I asked in a daze. "Corsica? Me...?"

"You're an idiot," Halcyon replied. "I can't believe I let you go off on your own. I'll clean this up, and then... I don't know. But you'll owe your friends a talk."

I'll clean this up, she had said.

This... it was...

It was the same as it had been before. Exactly the same. I hadn't done anything. I wanted a redo, and... once again, I was being saved by the actions of other ponies.

I didn't know how this made sense. Where was Ludwig's body? Why was the light mote still here? How was Halcyon powering the teleporter? What was Corsica doing here? What had happened while I was gone? Where was Coda?

Had I messed up? Should I have stayed here and focused on the princess and her entourage who I met out with Balthazar? Mother had done all the actual doing at the silos, Kitty had saved her, I had done...

I had done nothing. Again.

Maybe, if this was really my destiny, having another me to clean up after my messes when I failed wasn't so bad.

I let myself lose track of time, but it couldn't have been more than a minute. All I knew was that I should have done more: gathered more information, better understood my abilities, better controlled my panic attacks, lost less and won more. But, eventually, Halcyon stepped away from the circle.

"Just us left," she said, nodding to Corsica. "I've charged it up for one more burst. Let's get back to Fort Starlight."

Corsica looked like she could barely stand. Whatever had happened here, she had definitely been using her talent.

I swallowed, hovering alongside her. If I was going to tell her my story after this was said and done... Which, who knew, maybe would actually help me for a change... she deserved the chance to repay the favor. Maybe now I could finally learn what my best friend had been through on her half of the gauntlet, what her own self-destructive talent was actually good for.

The teleporter was charged and waiting when we got there. Halcyon and Corsica stepped in, and I felt myself dragged along in a flash. When I regained my senses, we were in a stony field in front of Fort Starlight, with a perfect view of the Ironridge crater and the old dam and the Ice District.

"That everyone?" Valey said. I saw a lot of yaks, but was too spent to take stock of everyone myself.

"Anything left to..." Corsica stumbled. "To do? That we can...?"

Valey frowned. "Cold Karma's already been evacuated. That dumb windigo is making a spectacle for the whole city out of this. Look."

I focused. The Cold Karma building was lit up in the night, a giant runic symbol projected over the top that I couldn't recognize from this angle. Where was it coming from? What was making it? Either way, it was eye-catching...

"Can't miss it," Valey said. "The Emblem of the Nine Virtues, if you're curious. Church thing. Dunno why Yakyakistan uses that as a marker for their rockets to target, but they've done it before... and don't even think about asking how they put it up there. Some spooky machine in Icereach."

"We could..." Corsica struggled to say. "Make a decoy? If I'm reading you right and the rocket tracks the symbol..."

"Thought of that," Valey replied. "Not as simple as it sounds. I'll explain later. Time's up."

From the west, high in the sky, a glint of silver streaked through the air.

When the Rush Comes

A splinter of silver flew into the sky, streaking over the western horizon.

Time seemed to freeze. I had begged fate to give me a redo, to prove to myself that I could do better than my last visit to the hideout. I had gotten that redo. I had held all the tools to make a difference. Last time, I hadn't made a difference.

This time, if anything, I had made things worse.

Before I could berate myself, time unfroze. The rocket grew larger at a mile per heartbeat, and all in an instant, it became a fireball and a roar, engulfing the peak of the Ice District. Red and yellow and white seared into my vision, black smoke coiled... but something wasn't right.

Numbly, I focused, and then I saw: beyond the explosion, there was a glimmering, translucent pink dome. A projected shield, fitting smoothly around the building. Inside it, Cold Karma was fine.

I didn't... have the mental capacity to process the significance of...

"My, my," a battered Papyrus said, sounding fake-scandalized. "Have we been boondoggled? Here I was believing we had a legitimate crisis on our hooves..."

Murmurs rose around me as the smoke lifted further and more ponies saw it too: Cold Karma, and Ironridge as a whole, were perfectly unscathed. The shield eventually flickered out, but not before lasting longer than it needed to, ensuring it could be seen, like a thief leaving a calling card at the scene of a crime.

"What happen?" Balthazar demanded, stepping forward, looking much worse than he needed to. "What rocket do?"

"Welcome to windigo town," Valey answered, stepping forward. "Whatever just happened, you can make no mistake they were behind it. Cold Karma is run by them. For everyone new to Ironridge..." Her eyes found Mother, and the entire population of Icereach yaks. "It's pretty hot here, especially down in the crater. Cold Karma is an air conditioning company that sources its coolant - and behind-the-scenes leadership - from windigoes. And if I were a windigo, I'd be pretty happy with myself right now."

She turned back to Cold Karma. "Whether it did damage or not, that rocket came from Yakyakistan. Yakyakistan are supposed to be our closest allies. But this is a declaration of war, and you can be certain it's one the windigoes will be all too eager to answer. Second, if I were a general preparing to wage a war, I'd want an answer to the most powerful weapons my foe has to offer... and this looks a lot to me like a successful test run. Third, and most important: most of you just got scared half to death by what turned out to be a bluff. Whatever you're feeling now, remember it and take it to heart, because it's an important lesson in how windigoes operate. Just know that you can never call a windigo bluff, because they're always set up to be able to go both ways."

Leif gave her a suspicious look. "You talk like you were expecting this to happen."

Valey returned a gaze that suggested they had some long-unsettled business between them. "Not gonna lie, I sort of did. But that's only because I've done this song and dance many times before." She looked away. "You stay in this business long enough, you learn how to quickly analyze situations. Now, who needs medical attention? Fort Starlight-"

I didn't feel anything, and only belatedly realized that was because I was still a ghost. But I saw everyone else, and they certainly did.

Several yelps reached my ears, followed by a low rumbling. Ponies stumbled, including my own body, which was still controlled by the other me. And, finally, I could see the ground shake.

"Is this an earthquake?" Papyrus hovered, looking indignantly at the ground.

"Why ground move!?" Tarkov stared at his hooves, looking deeply disturbed.

"That rocket just hit..." Leif hovered, looking worriedly at the Cold Karma building. "Is this a coincidence?"

"It had sure better be," Jamjars growled, taking a few shaky steps towards the distant building.

Mother tripped, fell over and swore.

Valey hovered too, a look of intense concentration on her face... and suddenly she frowned. "It's getting hotter."

"What heat have to do with earthquake?" a yak asked.

"It had sure better be," Jamjars repeated, notes of warning and desperation in her voice.

"Look!" another yak called out, pointing at the city crater.

The stars overhead were shimmering. Usually, the curtain of heat rising from the city could distort my view of the sky, but that was mostly when looking out from the Ice District in the daytime. At night, it wasn't usually this much, right?

Valey sighed, giving Jamjars a flat look. "What do you know, and what did you do?"

"Why are you trying to pin this on me?" Jamjars asked, trying to back into a defensive position without falling over.

I flew higher, partly because the group's chaos was doing no favors for my beleaguered ability to think, and also because I wanted to see the city floor itself. What I saw nearly made my heart stop.

Down below, Ironridge was littered with flecks of shiny, sparkling pink. As I watched, as the earth continued to shake, more of them appeared, and the ones that already existed grew bigger.

They were... crystals. Like the ones I had seen when we traveled through the Flame District core, when trying to save Leif from Lilith's school.

I remembered the distinctive shape of those crystals: bent and fluid, always rising, like massive flames frozen in time, as if they were trying frantically to escape from something far, far below. Back then, they had been inert, but now, they were growing.

I watched as a Day District street was pierced, a new spike of pink rising sharply into the air. One of the biggest spires, rising from the Night District, forked and spiraled into incredible patterns, and many smaller ones were beginning to do the same.

It would have been beautiful, if it didn't feel like the end of the world.

I flew back to the group, hoping I could get my other self to warn them. Back in the Flame District, I remembered, there had been the sensation of screaming in the back of my head, a voice I didn't recognize. Now that the crystals were here, I couldn't shake the feeling the screaming was back again.

When I reached the group, the dynamic had changed. Several more figures had shown up, including Braen - the small mare who first led me through Fort Starlight, and always wore a cloak - and two others in identical cloaks, one of whom was alarmingly tall.

My warning, it turned out, wasn't needed. The crystals were growing even faster, and several were now visible above the rim of the crater, twisting together into a spire that pointed straight for the heavens. "What's happening now!?" Papyrus demanded.

A visible, smoky aura was beginning to congeal around the crystals, somewhere between black and purple and blue and green, similar to the night sky at its brightest and most beautiful. A cool wind began rushing towards the crater, everyone's manes and tails beginning to blow, and a core of cold light burned brighter and brighter in the central spire that all the crystals were weaving into.

The light reached a fever pitch... and then it burst, a laser of immeasurable width shooting out past the moon, visible for the briefest of seconds. The laser caught the night sky like a rock thrown at a sheet that had been hung out to dry, and in an instant, it was all over.

The light from the crystals was gone. So was the screaming. So was the shimmering in the air from the heat. So was the shaking. So was the growth that propelled the crystals into the air.

So was the sky.

It was still there, per se. Except instead of black, it was gray, the most lifeless shade imaginable, devoid of both light and dark. The moon and the stars were there as well, but they seemed flatter, and the stars no longer twinkled with life. It was like someone had taken a picture of the sky, and then replaced the real sky with the picture. Except if the picture was gray.

Everyone looked to be in shock. And then my attention was caught by what should have been an irrelevant detail: the lighthouse I had seen earlier, next to the Ice District, the one that didn't show up in photos and only I could see.

The air shimmered around the lighthouse, and for a moment it looked like a shield around it had just fallen.

Valey, I noticed, was looking at it. "We've got a visible lighthouse," she sighed, more to herself than to anyone else. "That's... really bad."

"What happen?" Mustafa the yak asked. "What happen to sky?"

"What happen to city?" Balthazar added.

"It's cold out..." Leif remarked, shivering. "Like what you'd expect from mountains like these. It was just getting so much hotter, and then..."

The gray sky didn't seem to be providing any illumination, despite not being dark. If I didn't look at it, I could pretend it was still night out. As much as I could pretend anything, at least, when my train of thought was so smashed to pieces.

Something terrible had just happened. That was all I knew. And no one around me seemed to have even the beginning of answers.

Well... except for Jamjars.

"You!" she burst out, marching to the edge of the crowd and pointing a hoof.

It was Kitty.

"Hiya, lady!" Kitty chirped, wearing her trademark stupid grin, her tongue poking out and a bit of cake frosting on her chin.

Everyone seemed to take notice.

"Your calculations said this point was still several years away!" Jamjars accused, horn glowing, pointing a hoof straight at Kitty's dumb, smiling face. "Why is this happening now?"

Kitty's tongue poked out in an eternal, wordless reply.

"Here's an idea," Valey said, her words laden with menace. "How about, before the blame-trading starts, you two loons tell everyone what happened? Because once we get to the accusations, you're gonna have a bad time."

"Shut up; the professionals are talking." Jamjars brushed her aside with a hoof. "Kitty-"

Faster than I could process, Valey shot a leg out and tripped her, knocked her into the air, grabbed her head, suplexed her and pinned her against the ground. It was, a strange little part of my mind pointed out, exactly the same move Unless had used on her in the hideout, when I was waking up from the stun powder.

"Try again," Valey warned, holding Jamjars' head against the ground and staring at Kitty. "What. Did. You. Morons. Do?"

Jamjars growled. Kitty sighed... and put on her shades.

"Fine, cute Valey," Kitty said. "You owe me a cake afterward. At a guess, there's a teensie weensy little chance testing our shield like that may have prematurely burned out our power source. Guess it wasn't as infinite as some would lead you to believe."

She gave the hooded figures accompanying Braen a look that said, your turn.

The smaller of the two, who spoke with a mare's voice and carried an enormous sword on her back that could only be wielded by a unicorn, bared her teeth. "You talk like I ever suggested using a Tree of Harmony like that was a good idea!"

"But you pioneered the technology," Kitty pointed out. "Jamjars and the windigoes were just following in your hoofsteps."

"And not you?" the hooded mare replied, lifting her sword and pointing it straight at Kitty's face.

Only... I saw no glow from her hood suggesting the presence of a horn. Instead, when the sword flew, a disk of runic energy hovered around its handle, and a similar, larger one orbited the mare's barrel, forming outside her cloak. This was a kind of magic I had never seen before.

Everything here, I had never seen before. There was so much context I was missing. So much I should have known if I wanted to play the game, so much I never figured out.

What had I hoped to accomplish? Had I really thought knowledge was my ally? That because I knew more, I knew enough?

"No need for that," Kitty said, not even flinching. "I've always been more interested in observing."

The larger of the cloaked figures, also a mare, spoke. "Whether or not a Flame of Harmony is an infinite power source depends entirely on what you use that power for. That you managed to do this in mere years attests to a willful level of negligence and misuse. Your kind were deliberately trying to break this one."

Kitty shrugged. "Well, if that's true, maybe you should be more worried about all the windigoes in the Cold Karma core than me. They're the ones currently lording over the control room."

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Jamjars growled. "But if you really think Cold Karma was misusing it, maybe you should have lent us all your expertise instead of hiding in your stupid lighthouse!"

Part of me had an urge to do something. But even if I wasn't a ghost, what would I even do? And even assuming I could find something worth doing, would I be able to do it? Or would I just make a mess of things again?

I could... I could...

Coda.

The little princess hadn't said a word since going through the teleporter. She was sitting off to the side, back to her alicorn self, though apparently everyone had much bigger things to worry about than the presence of a gigantic alicorn filly.

What was it maybe-Chrysalis had said in the rocket silo? That she sent a team down to the hideout, and they somehow got Coda to turn on the Nemestasis machine so they could use it to launch the rocket?

Oh no...

I floated back over to the physical me, who was currently sitting at the edge of the group next to a half-conscious Corsica. "Can..." I hesitated to use my voice. "Can I have my body back? There's some stuff I need to... do."

She got up, nodded to Corsica, and walked out into the rocky wastes.

"Why?" she eventually spat, stopping in a cleft with a puddle at the bottom where no one else could see her. "I did you a favor by taking control and letting you work out your problems on your own for a while. And then you made me use it. I didn't want to have to interact with your friends or use my powers or save ponies. I didn't even want to wake up! Now look what you've done. I... I..."

I could see her threatening to tear up.

"If you haven't figured out what we are from all that, you will, soon enough," Halcyon pouted, sounding just as distraught as I was. "And I'm of a mind to just let you. See how you like it. Not like I can do anything about it if I wanted to. You're far too well-formed for that. And now you want to just take over again like nothing ever happened."

I felt like I had been punched. "What do you even want me to do? I... I had a bad time too, okay? I feel terrible enough already!"

"Yeah," Halcyon grunted. "Guess our feelings aren't so easy to untangle."

Something clicked in my brain. "The way you're talking right now..." I ventured. "You sound like Corsica."

"You think?" Halcyon shook her head. "That little habit of yours, wanting to be like other ponies? It didn't come from nowhere. Just how I used to cope with not wanting to be me."

Oh.

"...I'm sorry," I said. "I did mess up. I... dunno what I should have done. I don't know if there was a right thing to do at all. Maybe I'm just a kid who's messing with things way above her pay grade. Maybe I should stick to holding a normal job, like being a bridesmaid for hire. But every time I try to, I feel like there's gotta be something more out there, some significance that's missing from my life. Why did you make me that way?" I looked her straight in the eye. "If the reason for my existence is to be content in life and keep us living peacefully, ignorant of whatever you're running from... why do I feel so restless and incomplete?"

Halcyon looked away.

I waited for an answer.

"I dunno," she eventually replied. "I didn't try to. Maybe burying our nature that thoroughly just isn't possible. Or maybe, it's because we really are incomplete. You, me, Procyon... Just shards of a split pony."

I hung my head, then eventually looked up. "So. How are we gonna do this?"

"Do what?"

"Live with each other," I said. "I'm ready to take back my... our body now. You obviously don't want to be the one using it. But it's pretty obvious that neither of us trusts me, and with good reason. So what do we do?"

"You could kiss," Ludwig suggested, still a light mote, floating out of a rock. "I hear that is usually how ponyos make up and become friendos after having a fight. But honestly, I prefer the part where they duke it out."

Both me and Halcyon jumped. "Do you mind?" she growled, pointing her bracelet leg and lighting it.

Ludwig bobbed in midair. "If you want my face out of your faces, there is a pretty easy way to do that. And it starts with giving back my body, stupid cigar."

"Your body?" I frowned. "I thought I got pulled out of that. What happened to it?"

Ludwig whistled innocently. "You mean your face does seriously not know? Hoo boy, this is going to be a bit of a doozy to explain."

Halcyon frowned and looked uncomfortably away.

Ludwig noticed. "...On second thought, you look super not eager to explain it yourself, so you get to do the honors. Toodles!"

He floated away.

I stared at Halcyon for an explanation.

She fumbled for words, and eventually just sighed.

Not entirely sure what I was doing, I floated closer, reached out a hesitant, ghostly hoof... and approximated putting it on her shoulder. "It'll be okay."

"Dunno how you can bring yourself to say that," she dourly replied. "And get used to Ludwig, because thanks to you, we're stuck with him for the foreseeable future. If there's a way to get rid of him, I don't know enough about our powers to do it."

"This is..." I wracked my memories. "Back during the Aldebaran Incident. When Ludwig kept daring me to kill him, in our old apartment. This is what would have happened if I had taken the bait."

"I don't know," Halcyon said. "Possibly. Probably something like it. I only know enough about what we can do that I don't want to know more."

A loud shimmering reached my ears, and both of us looked up. It was Coda's airship, converging on the crowd where everyone else had gathered.

"Whatever happened to Coda, they're probably gonna be mad," I whispered. "But I don't feel like running from this. I messed up, and I deserve what's coming. Let me back in. I should be with her."

"...Fine," Halcyon sighed, her horn appearing, then flickering, as I turned from a ghost into a green crystal. "Your funeral."

I was... me again.

Sort of.

It was a wonderful feeling, being back in my own body, yet it wasn't quite the way I remembered it. For starters, I was more aware of my emptiness, the blank void that usually waited behind my mask. Now, though, the mask didn't seem to cover it perfectly.

Second, there was a tiny pinprick of wrathful cold in my chest. It sort of reminded me of the spark that had urged me to spread conflict when I was a windigo, only I didn't think it had the power to grow and hurt me like before. It felt contained, held in check. But it was still there.

I wanted it gone.

I didn't give myself time to think further, clambering back over the rocks to rejoin the group. The airship was lowering a lift, and on it were Howe, several of Coda's cultists, and Nyala.

The mare I had met only briefly, with the eye on her forehead. Golden and eldritch, with a slit so vertical it was thinner in the middle.

Yet another mystery I had never solved.

My hooves tried to fail me as I stepped out to meet them, but I pushed past it, striding into the open. I saw Nyala's eyes lock with mine, and I saw that she would suddenly rather be anywhere but here, but this time she didn't run.

The lift touched down.

"Hey, cult buddies," Valey greeted, flying over to the landing site with a commanding air. "Hope your night's going better than ours, but if it is, it's about to get worse."

"Princess!" The cultists - excluding Howe and Nyala - instantly rushed to Coda, bowing in respect. "Ill omens are everywhere! That crystal tower... We must leave this place immediately. Come, hurry!"

"Nay," Coda said, sounding dazed and vaguely shellshocked. "We shall not."

"Your Majesty..."

Coda summoned her focus, fixing them with a regal glare. "I know little and less of the affairs of this surface world, and it is precisely because I have spent too much time aboard that airship and far too little here, among its denizens. But I do know that my own negligence and naivete played a role in the events that are now unfolding, and it would be decidedly unlovely to abandon these ponies in their hour of need. Moreover, our opponents are windigoes, a fell force that cannot be dealt with save for the supernatural, and furthermore, my own mother is a player in this game. Were we to flee now, from a battlefield she may yet take to, what would be the reason for the years of preparation I underwent in the name of defeating her?"

The mood among the cultists hit a brick wall. "You found Chrysalis," one said.

"Perhaps." Coda scowled. "I was certainly deceived by someone who might have been her, because I was not worldly enough to sense anything amiss. But wherever she is, she has a hoof in this, and it is your duty to help me resist."

"What's resistance entail, dudette?" Howe asked, looking more to Valey than Coda. "If you've got a plan, ol' Howe's all ears."

"Nice to see you too, Pancake," Valey replied, using a nickname that was lost on me. "Short version: windigoes in Ironridge. Changelings in Yakyakistan. Both sides are hankering for a fight. The spooky sky is probably a lost cause, so with that out of the way, the plan is to storm Cold Karma and attempt a coup. Make no mistake, this is a bad idea: we're perilously low on anti-windigo weaponry, will probably all get ice cubed and might all kick the bucket. But we've got an extra army of yaks here to add to my own to deal with the flunkies, and if we can take over Ironridge by force before the first Yakyakistan warships arrive, we can at least make it so one of the sides in the coming fight are good guys."

Howe whistled. "You haven't changed a bit. The Howenator's not much for combat, but he might make a fine decoy, if you'll have him."

"What about the heat?" I asked, stepping forward. "If you remove the windigoes, won't everyone down in the city...?"

Valey sniffed the air. "They'll be fine," she said. "Got a good hunch that heat wave is gone for good. But if not, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. And by we, I mean not you." She pointed at Fort Starlight. "Halcyon. Corsica. You're sitting this one out."

I felt my fur bristle in surprise and shame. "What?"

"I second that!" Papyrus cut in. "What do you mean, our good buddies in the trash corps or whatever can't come?"

Valey gave him a look that said watch it, but my mind was too slow to read the significance of it. Though, speaking of the Junior Dumpster Despot Corps, I hadn't seen Unless anywhere since we got back... What had she gotten up to?

"Just like I said. You're staying here." Valey turned back to me, since Corsica needed no encouragement. "The two of you are obviously exhausted, and just because you've done it before doesn't mean it's where you belong. Besides, you've got a family reunion to get to." She nodded at Mother, who was limping closer.

I worked my jaw. But... I needed to redeem myself for...

"No buts," Valey said, reading my look. "I have a reasonable idea of the stunt you pulled back in that cave, and you are neither physically nor mentally fit to fight windigoes or anything else with us."

"Yes I am," I insisted, showing her my bracelet, feeling like I had nothing left to lose. "You just said you're low on anti-windigo weaponry, didn't you? I'm not. This works on them. You need me, and I need to be needed! Please, let me help you!"

Valey gave my bracelet a worried stare, and then met my eyes again with legitimate concern. "You've done all that you've done, plus however much else I'm not aware of, and you truly don't know how that thing works?"

I winced. Why did everyone but me...

"No I don't!" I shouted. "Because no one tells me stuff like this! It's why I always feel like I can make a difference and then I never can! If you're not going to let me help, at least help me!"

Valey looked conflicted, then glanced at Mother, who seemed confused.

"It's a deal," Valey promised. "If you sit this one out, in Fort Starlight, with Corsica and your mom, and if I survive and don't have an angry god monster on my tail forcing me to worry about other things, I'll answer whatever questions you want. I'd do it now, but we don't have the time." She pointed at the airship lift, which was currently hoisting a yak. "Those dudes have offered us a ride we'd be fools to turn down. Now, if you'll excuse me..."

"You sure about this?" Corsica called as Valey turned to leave. "I dunno much about your... capabilities. But the odds aren't in your favor."

Valey shrugged. "It would be nice if we had a little more on our side, but I've made miracles out of less."

Corsica nodded, then swallowed. "I wish... you succeed."

Valey saluted. "Bananas, I can't let you down when you ask like that. Just take care of yourself, okay? The last kid I knew who could do what you do... didn't deserve the life that she had."

I felt a lump in my throat as I watched the ship load up, Valey zipping off to coordinate. Every instinct I possessed screamed at me to stow away, not to just let someone save me again, or die trying. Not to live with my failures.

But... I didn't.

In fact, with how tired I was, even just fulfilling my end of the bargain and getting Mother and Corsica to the fort would be challenging. I forced down my disappointment, tried not to dwell on that tiny, frozen spark of anger in my chest, and focused on getting to safety.

I made it.

It didn't feel like an accomplishment. Corsica had passed out on the way and forced me to carry her, and Mother, after giving me a stern one-winged hug, did the same - though at least she had the decency to wait until getting to our room. And she also had the excuse of everything she had done crashing airships and trying to disable a rocket, all while being crippled.

And then there was me. Ostensibly fine in body, not that I felt that way, but emotionally spent. Past my limit. Finished.

Again.

I went outside and climbed up on the wall of broken airship hulls framing the central camp. Fort Starlight was almost deserted, the entire resident army having been packed into Coda's airship to fly off to battle. How they had fit so many yaks and ponies aboard the ship was summarily revealed when I saw a literal mountain of gold on the ground: Coda had emptied out her hold full of griffon money to make room for new passengers.

Smart. But it sure did make all that gold look worthless.

I could relate.

Everyone else was flying off to what might as well be the final battle, and I was... here. Spent. Having accomplished nothing at best. Or maybe I had just made things worse.

I climbed down to the gold pile. It was big enough that I could scale it like a hill, coins ringing around my hooves.

Some ponies, I heard, lived their lives for money. Amassing a pile like this was probably a feat only an emperor could manage... or a goddess. This gold had, I remembered Coda telling me, once belonged to Garsheeva, goddess of the Griffon Empire.

I flopped over at the top of the pile, making a bed of gold, hoping that whatever meaning anyone could derive from money might somehow seep into me, leaving me feeling less empty inside. Less like I was missing my purpose, or couldn't live up to the ones I chose.

Months ago, I remembered being terrified of pushing my limits, afraid that I would find out I could do something I didn't want to be able to do. What a silly fear. What I should have been afraid of was learning I couldn't do something I did want to do.

"Enjoying yourself?" a voice said.

I started, the motion sending out a shower of gold. It was one of the cloaked mares whom I hadn't met before. The bigger one, who had to have a custom robe and stood twice as high as a full-grown adult.

"...No." I laid back down. "I'm not."

She didn't press, so I continued. "I just wanted to feel... you know... It's hard, but..." I swallowed, seeing the gray sky reflected in a golden mirror. "I can't do it. The things I want to do, the pony I want to become. Maybe I'm holding myself back, or maybe I'm just not all that in the first place. It's just, I tried so hard over the past half year, and I thought I grew so much, and then it still ended the same. No different. Everything I did was..."

I trailed off, the words tasting bitter in my mouth. Why was I explaining myself to a complete stranger?

Something about her felt right, though I couldn't explain what. Although maybe she just felt normal, which seemed like right when everything else was messed up.

"Do you want to say 'pointless'?"

I lifted my ears.

"It is a frequent fate to spend effort on a goal and then fail to achieve it," the hooded mare told me. "That is something every creature that lives has in common."

I watched her curiously. Where was this going?

"But not all goals are equal," she went on. "Making a new friend. Passing a test. Getting a promotion. Winning a war. Bringing back a deceased loved one. Learning the meaning of one's existence. Or, in your case, wishing a dead god would return. Ponies say all sorts of things at my altar, but more often than not they come to confess their struggles and beg assistance."

"Your... altar...?" My eyes widened a little, remembering the one and only time I might have said something like that: while praying to the Dusk Statue in the Gates to the Underworld. "You mean the statue in the tavern? Barkeep?"

"That's the name I gave you," she said, pulling her hood down. "But you already know it wasn't my real one."

The face looking back at me was definitely not Barkeep's.

Nor was it equine.

The slitted eyes matched those of a batpony, but this creature had a full set of interlocking razor teeth, and a whiskery muzzle. And her ears, rather than being equine, were round like paddles.

It took my brain a moment to connect that I was talking to a real, live sphinx. Another moment later, and I realized who this sphinx likely was.

"Garsheeva?" I whispered.

"That's what they used to call me," she said, lifting a leg through a fold in her robe and showing off not a hoof, but a griffonlike paw. "You'll have to forgive me for using a physical alias as well as a different name. It's hard to keep a low profile with these... features."

I stared. A real, legitimate goddess. The one Coda wanted me to be finding all this time.

And somehow, instead of finding her, she had found me.

"Where were you?" I whispered.

Garsheeva shrugged. "In a lighthouse on the mountain north of the Ice District, controlling my sarosian body by remote... not that you'd have been able to see it. Until tonight, it was protected by a ward that's only passable by someone who's used a Writ of Harmonic Sanction."

My eyes widened... but that wasn't what I was interested in. "No, I mean, where were you?" I insisted, sliding down the mountain of gold until I was at the goddess's paws. "Your continent collapsed. Everyone needed you. Ponies like me have..." I swallowed. "I don't care about your rivalry with the Night Mother, or about Chrysalis, or about anything. You're a goddess. You could do something. Why weren't you there when ponies needed you?" I pointed in the direction of Cold Karma. "For that matter, why aren't you there, helping out, right now?"

"Because I failed," Garsheeva said simply. "I founded an empire, slaughtered thousands and manipulated millions, held in check my own worst nature, unsealed technology that should have been forgotten and empowered tyrants and despots. I ruined your mother's life, and her mother's life before her. For two thousand years, I dedicated myself wholeheartedly to a single goal, and in the end, I failed. Everything I had done was..."

She looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to finish for her.

I knew what to say, but I didn't want to say it. Unfortunately, she was very patient.

"Pointless," I croaked.

"What even were you trying to do?" I asked, after she responded with a nod.

"It doesn't even matter," Garsheeva replied. "Better that it be forgotten. However, I've done my time. Fate decided that I should survive, stripped of millennia of acquired power and set back to square one. But now all debts are cancelled. Anyone who owed anything to me is now free, and I no longer owe anything to anyone. The question is, are you the same?"

I recoiled. "What kind of question is that? You're a goddess. You're supposed to be better than everyone, an example everyone else can look up to! Why are you asking me to be the bigger pony?"

Garsheeva shrugged. "Reasons are nothing but dressed-up excuses. I certainly wasn't created to be perfect, and neither were the sphinxes I created to serve as my empire's royal family. In fact, we're a lot closer to the opposite of perfect than ponies are."

"That's not how it's supposed to work!" I insisted, bristling.

Garsheeva didn't seem bothered. "So you say. But there's only one question right now that matters." She flicked an ear. "You don't think giving up suits me. Are you the same?"

I stared. "But there's nothing I can do. Everyone else already flew off! And everything I've done before has only made matters worse! What are you even suggesting?"

"Is the world perfect?" Garsheeva pointed at the gray night sky. "Is this your idea of paradise? If not, there's always something to do. Pick a problem you can see, right now, and decide what better suits you: making an effort, with no positive outcome guaranteed. Or living with it."

I looked at the sky. I looked at the crystal tower, a luminous spike of pink protruding above the Ironridge crater, held up by numerous crystal filaments that fed into its midair base.

I remembered the voice I heard screaming.

No one was doing anything about that. Maybe there was nothing to be done, but were they certain? Had they tried going to the ether river to see what it was those crystals looked like they were running from? Maybe they already knew what was down there, and didn't think there was any point. But... had they tried?

"I see you already know your answer," Garsheeva said, pulling up her hood and turning to leave. "In that case, my work here is done."

"Wait!" I called, lifting a hoof to stop her.

She turned back over her shoulder.

"...If you've really given up on everything, and think everything you do is pointless," I said. "Why come talk to me? What do you think you've just talked me into, and why?"

"Nothing that exists is perfect," Garsheeva said, turning away again. "Not me. Not you. And apparently, not even my ability to give up on a principle."

I didn't press. An unspoken message lingered in the air, though maybe it was just one I wanted to hear and not one that had been intended: If I can try again after suffering a two-thousand-year setback, you can too.

That was a good takeaway. I nodded, satisfied with myself, and set about looking for one of those gas masks.

Time to break my promise to Valey, put myself back out there one more time, and try again.

In the Darkness, Crystals

I felt a heady buzz as I approached the bottom of the emergency exit stairwell with the door to the Flame District. Although I had prepared as best as I could, that amounted to little more than a gas mask and a sturdy coil of rope. Fort Starlight didn't have any convenient maps of the caverns laying about, and the only reason I had hope at all that this wouldn't be a futile errand was that a failed goddess seemed to think it was worth her time to talk me into it.

"Well..." I took what might be my last breath of fresh air for a very long time, slipped on the gas mask, and turned the final switchback on the stairwell to behold the rusted door. "Here we go."

Procyon was waiting beside the door.

I took several steps toward it, and she just watched me. "You gonna say anything?" I eventually asked, my voice muffled by the mask. "Long time no see, by the way. I've almost started missing your words of discouragement."

"If I tried to stop you," Procyon replied, "would it really change anything?"

I shrugged. "Well, odds are this'll all go belly up and you'll get to say I told you so. Although... since I'm down here on my own, going at my own speed, it's probably not going to fail like last time." I stared at the door. "No machinations and shifting situations for me to fail to understand. Just a good old test of ability. I doubt I'm gonna have a panic attack figuring out how to solve a stationary puzzle."

"You're not concerned about dying?" Procyon asked, flicking her backwards ears. "This cave is supposed to be dangerous."

"I do a lot of stuff that's dangerous," I told her. "Not exactly a new risk."

"...Alright," Procyon said, turning her back on me. "I think... you should go for it. See what's down here. Try to find what caused that crystal tower to appear, and see if you can do anything about it. Everyone else accepted this as a lost cause and went off to Cold Karma instead. If there's anything to be done, it's your prize to claim."

I squinted at her. "Are you feeling alright?"

She shook her head. "How many times is it I've told you not to do something, and then you do it anyway and get hurt? And somehow, try as I might to help you, you're getting on better with the shell I left behind to sculpt you than with your creator. With me." I could sense her grit her teeth. "Apparently, she made you work different from the way I'm expecting. So I'm changing it up. Have some encouragement. Maybe you'll still decide not to listen to me and go home where it's safe."

I turned to the door and dimmed my bracelet. "You know I can't do that. And not just for my own peace of mind. That sky... Everything that just happened isn't natural, and I'm afraid nobody is safe. But thanks for the vote of confidence, misguided as it is. Now..."

She sighed. I turned the bracelet all the way off, dropped into the floor, and swam.

This time, I remembered to un-swim as soon as I was able, and managed to avoid falling through the grate walkway that attached to the door's other side. I stood up, lit my bracelet, and examined the room.

A thick, smoggy haze met me, the air stinging my throat despite the mask. Hopefully I didn't do any long-term damage to my lungs by spending too much time in here... The stinging lessened a little as I pushed my bracelet brighter, to the edge of when the flames started to appear around my body. Maybe pain relief was part of its power.

Silhouettes of crystals and machinery reached my eyes, eldritch things that pierced each other and wound across the cavern walls and down a pillar in the very center. Last time I was here, I remembered, the crystals had glowed, lighting pink in response to the light from Corsica's horn. This time, they were inert. I jumped down from my walkway to a crystal, and it still had no response.

These crystals sure had looked alive, they way they grew and lit in response to Corsica, the way I heard a faint cry in the air when I was around them before. But now, they were just crystals.

I made my way down the crystal's main stalk, frequently clinging on with my wings as well as my hooves to manage the steepness. How I would get back up probably should have been more on my mind, but I had enough to think about just ensuring I didn't fall as I rappelled lower. And besides, when I was using my bracelet like this, I somehow didn't feel tired. I turned it up a little further, and it was like any physical maladies I had were simply suspended.

Turning it this high did make me more aware of my inner emptiness, though. I almost felt like I could feel the other me, and I could definitely feel that seed of cold I had been left with after being restored from Ludwig. The cold felt stronger like this. Like I was still insulated and protected from it, but was leaning against the insulation, like the frosty window of a high-altitude airship.

I wished I could know how the other me had gotten us this way...

My hooves landed on a broken catwalk, sitting at an awkward angle, its end mangled where the crystal pierced through it. Below, I could see through the haze just far enough to make out the crystal I was on merging into the wall. If I could go no further that way... Catwalk it was.

I jumped from the catwalk to a pipe, which provided excellent traction due to being covered in rust, and followed that for a ways to another catwalk that was more intact. This one had a ladder going down to a circular platform around a large machine, and I instantly felt my curiosity rise: you could tell a lot about a place by examining its machinery. The smog was too thick to see it properly from above, though, so I started down the ladder.

Whoever designed ladders really needed to consider a career change. At least I had wings to help hold on with, but most winged ponies would just fly, and everyone else-

Crack!

One of the rungs snapped out from beneath my hind legs when I stepped on it. My whole body lurched, and I clung sharply to the ladder to avoid falling... and that shift of weight caused it to crack again. Horrified, I watched in slow motion as one of the bolts holding it in place above me snapped, causing the ladder to swing and the other bolt to explode as well in a shower of rust. Untethered at the top, the ladder swung out over the void, with me still on it.

I let my instincts act for me and tried to drop off the ladder before it arced too far out, aiming to hit the platform below. But I was still clinging awkwardly to it after my first fall, and one of my boots got caught, twisting painfully against my leg and tangling me further in the falling ladder.

That was all the reaction time I had. The ladder fell over, hit the railing, broke off at the base and fell over the edge, with me still caught in it.

I spun at a dizzying speed, my bile starting to rise until an end of the ladder hit something solid, whipcracking its momentum around. Something slammed against my wing, and the socket erupted in pain that was too hot to process until something hit my back, and then I couldn't think anymore. My thoughts were lost in a burning shower of... of...

Everything was dark and peaceful.

I felt like I was floating. Were my eyes open? I wasn't as aware of my body as I usually was. I knew I was tired, though. This felt good. Everything I usually cared about was walled out by the darkness, thoroughly enough that I couldn't even remember what it was. I only remembered how scared I had been, how something had been going horribly wrong. Now, I was safe.

I needed this.

Except, there was a light. Something pearly and fuzzy. I wasn't looking at it normally. Instead, I was... aware it was there. As if I didn't have any of my normal senses here, and yet I had new senses to replace them. I couldn't describe it.

There were lots of emotions I felt like I could have felt about the light. I didn't remember what any of them were. Only a vague curiosity remained.

I reached out.

"Halcyon?"

"Halcyon, you... again..."

"This is entirely avoidable, you know."

"You have to take better care of yourself. Or at least listen to me from time to time."

"Ugh... I can't even say I told you so. The one time I decide to encourage you..."

"Get up. And please try not to make a habit of this in the future."

"Trust me, if you think your own questions are bad enough, just imagine what others will ask if they catch on..."

Pain pulled me out of a dream. My bracelet was burning, and I held onto that sensation to keep my mind afloat, even turning it higher as my consciousness tried to swim away again. It was... everywhere... but it was getting lesser. As I tried to focus, I slowly found it easier and easier, until my thoughts returned to coherency and I opened my eyes.

Procyon was close up in my personal space, watching me with a frown.

Her fur was mother of pearl. That color... felt like it had something to do with what I was just dreaming about, but why couldn't I remember my dream? I never forgot my dreams.

For that matter, why did I hurt so...

Oh.

I suddenly remembered how I had gotten here, and wondered how I was alive to be hurting at all.

My eyes followed Procyon's, tracing down her legs until they went from mother-of-pearl to a violent red at the hooves, like they had been soaked in... in...

I saw the surface she was standing on - and I was laying on - and scrambled to my hooves in shock. Something clicked in my mind that I never should have been able to stand in this state, not with any amount of determination or pain numbing, and yet, stand I did.

"Did... I do that?" I asked, swallowing, staring at the site where I had apparently landed.

"Try not to think about it," Procyon advised. "I mean it. Also, your clothes are probably doomed."

I was a little more worried about myself than my outfit, though it was impossible to check one without the other. One of my boots, from the leg I had caught, was completely missing, there was a big gash in the side of my coat - the nice one Corsica got for me - and everything was beyond dirty. My leg ached, and hurt when I prodded it, but it didn't move weirdly and when I put weight on it, it held.

There was a spot on my back that hurt more than usual, even with the bracelet on. And my right wing hurt at the base. My head hurt. My ribs hurt. My other legs hurt. And my whole body felt tenderized and... wrung out, like I was missing more of something than usual. But I could stand. Inexplicably, I could still stand.

I dimmed the bracelet slowly, and then a little more. As its power receded, I felt the pain more keenly, but didn't suddenly collapse.

Somehow, I had just fallen from an immense height. I doubted it had been the kind of fall a bystander could witness and not be thinking about weeks later. And somehow, I was, to use the word loosely, fine.

I realized that the gas mask had fallen off too during my tumble, along with my other supplies. And yet, the only time it got hard to breathe was when I turned the bracelet down.

My bracelet... I stared at it in wonder. However much I routinely overestimated myself, I had yet to plumb the depths of its power. And if it could heal me from a very lethal fall, clearly there was a lot I had yet to learn about it.

I looked to Procyon for an explanation.

She turned away. "Like I said. Try not to rely on it. You make too many miraculous recoveries, and ponies are going to start asking questions."

Miraculous recoveries... My mind went back to the Aldebaran incident, when I got hit by shrapnel, lost a lot of blood, and walked it off in just a few days. Was she referring to that? Probably not, since she wasn't around back then and I wasn't even wearing the bracelet at the time, the hospital having removed it. But maybe it healed me before they took it off? Although, I hadn't been using it at the time. But still...

Whatever. Just another question to add to the pile of things I didn't understand about myself. For now, my mission remained unchanged, and taking this fall had done nothing if not brought me closer to my destination.

I surveyed the area around me. Procyon and I were sitting on a large metal drum, and shortly below us was standing water. At least, I hoped it was water, but a little toxic industrial sludge never hurt anyone, right?

Who knew how much deeper this went. And after what I had just been through, taking my chances with a swim felt like a really bad way to test my luck. Probably best, then, to get a little height back and make it to the cavern walls, and hope I could find a side passage that went lower?

A few wobbly jumps and a low-hanging catwalk later, I found a growth of crystal that looked promising. It seemed to grow out of the wall just above the water line, then flop over like a vine into the cavern and snake back underwater. The wall at that point was sloping slowly inwards, though, and the crystal appeared to be growing up through a pre-existing tunnel that looked like it had once been an elevator shaft. I stumbled my way over, the missing boot doing more to hinder my step than my injuries at this point, and managed to reach the crystal.

It was, indeed, growing up through a pre-existing hole in the ground. And while it filled that hole almost perfectly, there were a few slight cracks left over, just enough that if I shadow snuck through the transparent crystal, I could use the cracks on my way for air.

Was I foolish enough to take that risk to get lower? I... wasn't sure.

As I thought, though, I began to feel something. It almost seemed to be picked up through my hoof, the bootless one that was now touching the crystal. There weren't any words, or even feelings. Just an... awareness. Like the crystal had some semblance of something that might belong in the realm of what someone could consider a person.

I focused on that awareness, and on my emptiness, trying to use my emptiness to pull on it like a thread. There wasn't much of a response, but I was unmistakably certain that I was doing something, and that whatever I was connecting with was down this elevator shaft, toward the crystal's roots.

Sucking in as big of a breath as I could hold, I extinguished my bracelet and dove.

I shadow swam as fast as I could, gliding down the elevator wall in pitch blackness. It was a fairly smooth surface, and I constantly was feeling for pockets of air above me instead of crystal; I tried to only breathe from every other one so that some would be left over for my return journey. Not that I had any clue how that would be possible... and, after a minute, I knew exactly how long that return journey would be, because I hit the bottom.

The elevator shaft's doors were gone, and I stepped out, lighting my bracelet to behold my surroundings. The first thing I noticed was that the air was a lot cleaner here. It was ancient and musty, but it didn't smell like spoiled chemicals and dying machines. It smelled like a cave.

The second thing I noticed was that the crystals seemed to be protecting this place. Behind me, the elevator shaft was filled in with crystal, the big vein of it that filled the shaft snaking in from this room and up... but when I shone my bracelet bright enough, I could see through the crystal, and there was liquid on the other side.

I wasn't even far enough down yet to go beneath the flooded central cavern. And by growing up like that, the crystal had kept the flood out while preserving just enough of the shaft for a batpony like me to sneak through.

The room itself looked half-finished, some of the rock covered in metal plates that were abandoned partway through installation. It was a tunnel, with the elevator shaft crystal growing out of the floor a short ways down, and beyond it were several layers of barbed fencing covered in ominous warnings about trespassers and prosecution. No obstacle to someone who could shadow sneak, though.

Past the fencing, there was a cave-in, though someone had bored a tunnel through it with what must have been an incredibly high-powered laser beam. Loose boulders and rubble were fused together into glassy slag, forming a perfectly cylindrical culvert through the blockage that was big enough for two Howes to traverse side by side.

What could have made something like this? It would have taken a tremendous amount of heat and energy... Not that I was complaining. Anything that made my journey easier rather than harder, I would welcome wholeheartedly.

I started walking, and after the collapsed section, the main tunnel continued. Huge veins of crystal seemed to break in and out of the walls at random, growing more common as I went along, until I felt like I was walking in a tunnel made entirely of stalks of dull pink. The path was straight and purposeful, but long, too, leading away from the central cavern and ever at a sharp downward slope. An old excitement tingled in my mind: for the me of a month ago, this place would have been a dream come true, a prime sampling site to unravel the mysteries of ether crystals.

Now, I had so much on my mind I hadn't even verified whether these crystals were made of ether.

Feeling a little like I should rectify that, I stopped to inspect one closely... but without my lab equipment, it just looked like any other crystal. It was pink, granted, unlike the predominantly blue ones in the Icereach chapel, but for all I knew the ether was just a different color in Ironridge. I had also never heard of ether crystals growing wild like this, though I did know their growth - namely, their fault planes - were influenced by events in the greater world.

I shook my head and continued. If I wanted to properly understand this, it would take months. Hopefully when I reached the bottom, my prior knowledge of ether crystals from Icereach would be enough.

The tunnel reached its end, opening out into a circular room with a pit in the center of the floor. An old, decrepit mobile crane sat parked in a corner, looking like it had once been intended to raise and lower things through the pit. I stepped up to the edge next to a broken-down half-bridge that probably was a loading dock for the crane, and peered down.

It was... dark. And no matter how bright I turned my bracelet, I couldn't see the bottom. Only more pit.

Sighing, I considered my options. Jumping? Probably not wise to repeat my stunt from earlier, even if I was curious just how much miraculous survival of blunt physical trauma my bracelet granted me. Climbing? The walls were smooth, offering no purchase at all... but I could probably still shadow swim down them just like I had done in the elevator shaft. All I'd have to do would be make sure I didn't accidentally fall out when coming up for air.

Someone more practiced with their shadow swimming, I knew, could go up and down walls at will, but I was already unsure about this method for going down, so I'd probably need some way else to get back up. Particularly when I had to turn off my bracelet to prevent the shadows from disappearing, and I actually did get tired when it was off. But, I'd figure that out when I got there.

I jumped into a wall and started sliding.

I must have spent an hour scaling the pit, or maybe two. I was tired, my muscles burned, my body tingled, my injuries from the fall still ached, despite not impairing my functions. I began to pass veins in the walls that reminded me of mana conduits, the kind used in technology, except naturally occurring and empty. Something about that felt... wrong. In Icereach, when you approached the chapel, you could see a similar phenomenon, with power rising up through the rocks in such concentrations it became visible. That was the underlying principle of a mana well: you dug a pit on the surface, buried a large crystal pylon, and eventually it would start pulling in the energy seeping up through the world's floor, much more diluted by the time it got to that point.

Here, the conduits were still present, and they did emit a faint glow, but it felt listless, like whatever force normally pushed it up to the surface was gone. My focus was more on avoiding them so their faint glow didn't eject me into the air, but part of me was glad I hadn't studied mana transference to the surface too thoroughly. I could instinctively feel that this was wrong, and having the scientific know-how to understand the consequences wouldn't make it any better.

At last, the bottom came into sight, and I eventually got low enough that I felt confident enough to drop. The pit opened up against a structure with a hole in the roof, allowing me to slip down into a room that had very clearly been constructed by sapient hooves. It had angular walls and was completely constructed out of a monotonous, chalky substance, and the floor was covered in a thin sheet of liquid...

I leaned down to sniff it. Raw ether. Unmistakably so. The same stuff that formed the river of ether at the chapel.

I was close.

The room had one exit, a few steps leading up into a hallway, and so I followed.

Several rooms later, I was getting suspicious that the chalky construction material wasn't actually what the structure was made of. There were occasional patterns on the walls that looked just ordered enough to be intentional, but so shallow and hard to make out that no artisan would have called them finished in that state. Following a hunch, I stepped off the main path, marched up to a wall, planted a boot against it, and scrubbed.

The chalk resisted slightly, flaked, and eventually came off, revealing a sheet of pristine pink crystal beneath. Exactly the same stuff as the crystal veins, except...

I bit my tongue, trying to describe to myself how it was different. It wasn't that it felt more alive, because it was clearly just as inert as the tendrils on the surface. But it had a memory of being alive. Like it had existed for so much infinitely longer than those new growths before going dim.

The chapel had always held an aura, a feeling that ponies had venerated something there throughout history. Every worn dimple in the stone floor, every crystal and every facet, you couldn't stare at it and not feel that it had a history. But this place, rather than feeling like it had a history, felt like it was made of that feeling. I couldn't possibly explain how I had deduced that, or what sense I felt it with. I just did. Some buildings just had history. This building just was history.

How did the crystals form this way, anyway? I rested my muzzle against the crystal, praying for understanding. Ether crystals grew naturally, could be grown in a lab, and could be cut and polished, but this crystal was solid and contiguous, without blemishes or fault planes or any indication it had ever existed in a form other than what it was now.

Perhaps it had been created by magic to resemble something else. I wasn't aware of any spells that could instantaneously form large quantities of crystals, ether or otherwise, but that would certainly explain the feeling I got about its history...

I stared at the rest of the room. Those faint patterns I saw... I cleared off a small space on one, and realized they were all intricate murals. If I had time to restore this entire place, I could learn everything down here.

...But as I rested my cheek against the crystal again, something faintly pulled on me. It was the same awareness I had tugged on before, and it was stronger now that I was down this far. It felt warm and gentle, feeble and delicate, kind and scared.

Right. History could wait. There was something even more important down here, and fate willing, I wouldn't be too late.

I stepped into a hexagonal room with a high ceiling, and several things immediately drew my attention. First was that a lot of the crystals here had been scraped bare: not in a methodical way that suggested someone cleaned it on purpose, but more like it had seen heavy activity and just naturally worn away. This room had clearly been frequented before.

Second, and the reason for all the activity: this room had machines. Modern-looking ones, sleek and opaque. Cables thicker than my barrel snaked from them down a door to the side, which looked like it led to a staircase winding down. More cables crossed the room, merging into the walls of what was undeniably an elevator shaft.

I set my teeth. Of course there was a different way down here. And, unlike the previous elevator shaft, this one looked both new and clear of crystal.

Curious, I stepped up to it and pressed the call button. Nothing happened save for a light that lit up on a panel above the doorway. Odds were, the carriage had a long way to travel to reach me.

Well, there was my way out, though it definitely didn't go to the relative safety of Fort Starlight. I turned to examine the room more instead, and my eyes fell upon its center, where a crystalline table stood, completely free from chalky film.

I tapped the table a few times, but nothing happened. It sure looked like it was supposed to be important, and was definitely part of the crystal structure, but it seemed just as inert as the rest of the place.

My eyes traced back to the spiral staircase all the cables descended down. Nothing for it but to see where they went.

After several rotations, the staircase opened back out into a room I was fairly sure was directly beneath the previous one. I was standing on a narrow crystalline bridge, connecting my opening in the wall to a trunk of crystal that reached up to the ceiling from the depths. It reminded me of the growths from the surface and the Flame District, only it was thicker, gnarlier and older, like an ancient, venerable tree. If these rooms did line up, the crystal table I had noticed would be directly on top of this tree...

I looked up. The crystal ceiling was drawn into facets that reminded me of constellations, if you looked at the night sky and traced them out. I looked down, already having a feeling what I would see.

A short distance below, the walls of the room broke off, hanging over an endless expanse of emptiness. And below that, there were stars.

The ether river.

Despite everything that felt wrong about the crystals and the stone and this building and everything else, the ether river looked normal, just like I remembered it. The tree, I noticed, was growing out of it, rising from the starry depths. And the cables snaked across the bridge, entering the tree through a doorway that looked like a natural fold in the crystal.

I stepped forward, my heart still. None of the tree was covered by flaking chalk, nor the ceiling it wove into. This was the core... and something about it still felt alive.

The entry passed over me, and I had to squeeze to fit through the tunnel along with all the pipes.

Step. Step. Now that I was walking on the cables themselves, they felt inert too, as if whatever they had been doing, they had since stopped. The stillness in this place sat like a spike in my side, and I hurried my step, ducking beneath an overhang and pressing through a final squeeze.

A room greeted me, round and faceted. The cables led into several giant drill-shaped machines around the edges that all pointed to the center, where a second, smaller tree grew, this one splitting at the top and weaving all of its branches up and outward into an immaculate crystalline brazier. And in that brazier sputtered a tiny few embers of pink flame.

Help me, the flame said in my mind, its voice sounding incredibly distant and muffled. Please, help me. I'm scared. Empty one, please, help me. Please, help me. Please, help me.

My heart pounded in my chest. "What do I do? I'm here, how do I help? What do you need?"

Please, help me, the flame begged. Please, help me. I don't want to hurt anyone anymore. I need my champion. Please, help me.

"Your champion?" I asked. "You want me to bring someone to you? Who, and where do I find them?"

Empty one, the flame whispered, please take me to Fluttershy...

"Take you?" My eyes widened. "I... Can I? How?" I reached a booted hoof toward the brazier... then thought better of it, pulled off the boot, and tried again.

The embers felt like a gentle caress against my hoof, but also like a lost, fearful child.

Please help me, the flame repeated. Please, please help me...

How did I do this? What should I do? I wracked my brain, and... the little spark of cold left over from Ludwig shivered uncomfortably in my chest. It didn't like this flame.

Somehow, though, my other self had attached Ludwig to me, in the process of pulling me back out of his body. Could I... do the same with this flame? Take it and carry it? It was what it wanted. And it called me empty one. When I was being rejoined, I remembered the pull of my own emptiness... Was that what I was supposed to do?

I used to think of my emptiness as a nothing, rather than a thing to be wielded. But over the past few days, that had been changing... Even if I could use it, though, I couldn't do so when my mask was blocking it and covering it up. Swallowing, I silently asked the other me for help, and took-

-off her mask.

Halcyon swallowed.

Please, the embers said in her mind.

"I'm not fit for doing this," she whispered. "Whoever you are, you deserve someone better. And, anyway, are you sure you want to share space with a windigo?"

Please, the embers repeated, not at all dissuaded.

Halcyon focused... and the roaring in her ears intensified as her emptiness became a void, boundless and bottomless, hungering and pulling at the spark of life sitting in the tree.

The spark let go.

Squeezing her eyes shut, Halcyon put her mask-

-back on.

I stumbled a little from the transition, but the more I did this, the easier it got to recover quickly from the change. The brazier was empty. The vestiges of life I had felt in this central trunk ebbed visibly away, and the whole structure seemed to groan a dying groan.

But the flame was still there. In me, in my chest, warm and gentle and comforting, a little seed of goodness and pink. It felt like... it was sleeping.

Responsibility settled onto my shoulders like a mountain. Ever since I left Icereach - long before I left Icereach - I had been driven by the feeling that there was more to life I hadn't yet discovered. The goal that drove me, my singular purpose - aside from staying alive and out of political monkey business - was to find a goal. To see the world and decide what I wanted to do with myself. I had a desire to be something, and nothing to be.

Until now.

Now, I was a courier, carrying a force I didn't understand to a destination I didn't know. Fluttershy, the flame had told me. Its champion. I had never heard of someone called Fluttershy before. It didn't even sound like a pony's name. And now, I had to find them.

This wasn't just a thing I was deciding to do on a whim, like returning to Icereach to look for Mother. This had been dropped on me, given to me because I happened to be curious enough to be in the right place at the right time, and my every instinct screamed that it was monumentally important.

I swallowed. Whether I wanted it or not, I had a job now, and I quietly swore to myself that I would see it through.

Ludwig rose out of the floor.

"Are you serious about this, friendo?" he asked, still a ghostly light mote.

I raised an eyebrow at him, much more interested in thinking about the flame.

"That was a shiny pretty whachamajiggy of niceness and goodness and blech," he griped. "Meanwhile I am a cool and handsome windigo of dastardliness. When you devoured my face the other day, I was kind of hoping it at least meant you had decided to join Team Windigo, but apparently you are just not a picky eater? Phooey."

"What do you know," I pressed, my voice dangerous, "about what I just did?"

"A whole entire amount," Ludwig earnestly promised, bobbing in midair. "Which I will be incredibly annoying by not telling you about and might be completely making up. I guess you will just have to be extremely paranoid about making the wrong decision and permanently screwing up your life while you figure it out for yourself, eh eh eh?"

"Enlightening," I told him, wishing I was alone. "Now take a hike."

Instead of Ludwig leaving, Procyon appeared.

"Ehh?" Ludwig vibrated at her.

Procyon floated closer... then suddenly pounced, catching Ludwig between her forehooves. Ludwig made an indignant, incoherent noise.

"That is my other self you're toying with," Procyon warned, not letting go. "Originally my body. Originally my powers. And even in this form, I'm still much more powerful than you. So unless you want me to experiment with exactly how much more powerful I am, you will let us handle our own affairs at our own pace and be a quiet passenger who doesn't interfere. Is. That. Clear?"

"Clear as your passionate desire to smoochy-smooch the raspberry ponyo, giant cigar," Ludwig squeaked out. "Though I would not get my hopes up if I were you. Your mug is pretty hideous compared to the little cigar's. You should just give up right now as long as she is on the stage."

Procyon glared and squeezed harder.

"...Ow?" Ludwig ventured.

Procyon released him. "Your job is now to stay as silent as the grave. I don't care whether or not you can leave: don't come back. Got it?"

Ludwig blew a raspberry and drifted off into a wall. "Good luck enforcing that..."

Procyon looked at me once he was gone.

"...Thanks," I said, slightly uncertain what had just happened. "I guess you don't want him hanging around either?"

"No," Procyon said, looking away. "He has no real power anymore. Nothing that you haven't stolen. Just words. But if he makes enough of a nuisance of himself, that would be a powerful incentive for you to find a way to get rid of him for good. Which... would involve learning more about us. And it should go without saying how I feel about that."

"So selfless." I rolled my eyes. "If you really want me not to worry or poke into things, give it to me straight: will anything bad happen as a result of Ludwig's power being... whatever happened to it?" I tapped my chest. "Or that flame. Or anything I just did."

Procyon glanced back at me. "If you never use it? Not a chance. If you do figure out how to use it... Well, then I suppose it would depend on what you use it for." She turned toward the exit. "And if you're worried about having Ludwig and that flame in there at the same time..." She shook her head. "When it goes wrong, it's going to be because you got a bad idea and acted on it. Not because of anything magical. Yet."

"Wow. Thanks for the vote of confidence." I rolled my eyes. With everything that had happened, I felt like me figuring myself out once and for all was a foregone conclusion: enough pieces were present. All I needed was time to think. "Let's get out of here."

Procyon didn't try to stop me.

Goddess of the Void

Pure silence filled my ears as I retreated up the spiral staircase. At the top, the elevator I had summoned on my way down was waiting for me.

I didn't feel like thinking as I made my way over to it. There was too much... Well, I didn't feel like thinking about the reasons, either. I let my legs guide me, and they wanted to go home.

The elevator doors closed around me, and with a smooth, well-oiled whir, it began to rise.

I lost track of how long it rose for. A pink presence hovered on the edge of my consciousness, and no amount of trying not to think could block out the looming sensation of inevitability, of importance and necessity and need. In going down to explore the bottom of the world, I had picked up a magical flame. What was it? I hadn't the faintest clue. But not even a fool could deny that it was important. And as long as I was carrying it, I was responsible for it.

If I messed up again, my actions could have consequences that extended far beyond me. I didn't know what they would be. That was just the sensation I got, trying not to think about it.

Beneath my mask, I could tell the other me was even more terrified by this than I was.

The elevator's momentum shifted to the side, as if it was rising at a slight diagonal cant. Whoever built it must not have had a destination in mind that happened to be directly on top of that crystal building...

Finally, after an age, the elevator slowed to a stop. As it did so, I checked myself: my coat was tattered and covered in long-dried blood, one of my boots was missing, and the rest of me wasn't doing much better. Oh well. I'd just have to deal with it.

The doors slid open.

I was in a factory, but not a familiar one. A long, wide hallway stretched off to either side, its ends curving around and suggesting it was circular. Dim emergency lighting showed off high walls and a distant ceiling. Everything was wrought from the same metal, the walls designed in an elaborate, ridged, angular, futuristic style that reminded me of Cold Karma's top floors, only less lavish and more technological.

The floor had similarly elaborate patterns, intermingled with conduits that probably would have glowed had the power been on. And yet, it was completely flat - much more flat, open space than would be required simply for ponies to get around a factory. This place was designed for something big to move through.

Ill at ease, I kept my bracelet off and wandered out into the hallway.

When I was a few paces away from the elevator, I stopped and looked back.

The elevator shaft protruded from the floor like a cylinder in an alcove, and from its roof branched innumerable hoses and cables, thick and well-shielded. The cables trailed up into the darkness, hugging the ceiling and splitting off to the left and right.

I took a few more steps back. The hallway seemed to be shaped like a gear, with many such alcoves lining its outer wall. Save for the one with the elevator, all that I could make out were taken up by gigantic glass capsules.

I couldn't make out what was inside.

My heart thumped. I approached a capsule.

The light didn't get much better as I drew nearer. A wide metal pedestal served as the capsule's base, and from it rose a glass tube about the width of a two-track subway tunnel. I couldn't make out the top, but it was full of some clear liquid, and looked like the glass was designed to retract into the floor.

There was a silhouette inside, squat, huge and immobile. After a moment of indecision, I gritted my teeth and lit my bracelet, letting my curiosity get the better of me.

It was a machine, suspended in liquid. At its center was a stalk-like, vertical core, connected to a base that sported three heavy-duty, double-belt treads, presently arrayed in a triangle but looking like they could change their orientation at will. At its top was an armored metal dome, an array of sensors on the underside that probably made up its face. The stalk had four mechanical arms that looked like they could rotate in any direction, armed with another armored dome, a light cannon, a heavy cannon, and an oversized claw. On its back, protruding down from the dome, there was a giant, smooth metal spike surrounded by several rings, exactly like the devices I had seen in the flame chamber down below.

Some of the cables from the elevator shaft, I realized, went into the capsule's roof. Odds were, the liquid in there had something to do with ether.

For a moment, it was hard to tear my eyes away from the monstrosity or its dock, and when I did, it was to look at the other distant alcoves that each held their own systems. If this was a circle, and the pattern kept up...

There could be over two dozen of these things.

This wasn't a mere factory. It was a hangar.

I noticed a control console in the alcove. Unfortunately, there weren't any keys laying around for me to steal, but there was a burnished placard.

Pavise-Class Soul Armor Unit 17, it read.

I stared at the thing again. And, suddenly, it hit me: I had seen one of these before.

A destroyed one, granted, and that hadn't been in good light either. But there was one in the hideout, guarding the long corridor to the front entrance, where we had gone in when Leif first took us there. So many things had happened that day, I forgot all about it... But now that I remembered, it was undeniably the same.

The hideout belonged to Kitty and Jamjars. And Jamjars, I remembered, had a statue in the upper levels of Cold Karma honoring contributions to weapons R&D. At the time, I thought she was somehow involved with the Whitewings, but... did she know about these, too?

I swallowed, and ran to check another alcove. It was the same. Heart pounding, I chanced a little more light from my bracelet, and the ceiling came into clearer view.

It was covered in Whitewings.

For a moment, I felt like I was looking at the underbelly of a military drop ship. Row after row after row after row after row of Whitewings, neatly folded and tethered upside-down into docks. I tried to count, and after a few tries got thirty-five in a single row, and the rows went all the way around the ceiling. Mental math, mental math... If I wasn't miscounting, there could be as many as ten thousand Whitewings in this room.

Each one of those things, I knew from personal experience, was strong enough to make trouble for an entire company of trained yaks, and that was when its pilot was more interested in learning than winning.

War between Ironridge and Yakyakistan... If even a fraction of these things took to the field, it wouldn't be a fight. It would be a slaughter.

And that was to say nothing of whatever the big ones were capable of.

"I thank you, Elise." The Composer's words echoed through my memory. "While I came to Icereach for other reasons, I had hoped as a side benefit to gain insight into any backdoors Icereach built into these Whitewings, allowing them to neutralize their own creations. Now you've not only shown me, but given me the opportunity to successfully test a fix. You have my gratitude."

Unless... Slaughter wasn't even the point. Because that wasn't how Kitty operated. When had she ever cared about bloodshed and wanton destruction? Winning or losing, killing or causing strife... What if the war with Yakyakistan was nothing more ambitious than a test run for this army's capabilities?

But if that was the case, what was it supposed to be used for once she decided its performance was satisfactory?

"Absolutely, friendo. You see, once upon a time, God was creating the world, and he got around to me, and he said, 'You, you will have an ugly face, and nobody will like your face,' and lo, it was so. I really hate that guy. Maybe one day I will kill him if I get the chance."

I felt a deep, deep chill.

The spark of cold in my chest seemed excited. The spark of pink seemed afraid. Personally, I agreed with the flame.

"We've gotta stop this," I whispered to myself. "I barely feel like I know anything anymore, but this is so much bigger than my own problems. Anything I can do, I can do. Come on."

"Anything, huh?" Procyon said, and I jumped a little as I realized she was still there.

"You got something in mind?" I raised an eyebrow, keeping my voice low.

"Just thinking out loud," Procyon said, surveying the weapons with an expression that appeared a lot more curious than disturbed. "Kitty controls those Whitewings by remote, right? Have you ever seen her control more than one at a time?"

I shook my head.

"Seems unlikely that one mare would need that many just as backups for herself," Procyon mused. "And there's too many of them for it to be a thing you'd need specialized equipment or training to use. Logistics get a lot easier when you're mass-producing machines than when you're trying to organize huge numbers of ponies."

"What are you getting at?" I gave her a look.

She shrugged. "Just thinking, if you really have a plan and want to avail yourself of as many tools as possible... They probably designed this so just anyone can pilot one of those, if they find the controls. And you're a fast learner."

I stared up at the Whitewings again. "Is this more reverse psychology? Seriously, it's not like you to encourage me."

Procyon shook her head. "Actually, this is very much in line with my interests. If you're acting through an avatar, that's a layer of insulation between us and the consequences of your actions. It's also the power of an external machine you're drawing on, rather than our own. Maybe you can even be satisfied enough with yourself to settle down and stop dreaming if you notch a win or two... which you will be able to do, because those things are powerful enough that resorting to violence is a guaranteed win condition."

I shivered. "Well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Anyway, this is probably Cold Karma's basement, yeah? I bet the core is close. If there's any chance Coda and the others are still trying to stop this..." I let my bracelet go dim. "You can fly around and invisibly do recon, right?"

"If you're going to ask for directions, just keep walking," Procyon sighed. "The core is in the center of this ring. There's a door a quarter turn away. Though, you... Well, I'll let you discover it for yourself."

She floated away.

"Wait-!" I stretched out a hoof, but it was no good. Gritting my teeth, I took one last look at the Pavise's containment unit, and started running.

Procyon hadn't lied. As I circled the hangar, an entrance came into view, just as huge as the hall I was in now. I quickened my pace, my gait uneven due to the height difference from my missing boot. It led straight to the center...

The core itself opened up before me, though my attention was stolen by something massive standing on the floor in the middle. It was only a silhouette, backlit by a bright windigo-blue coming from something behind it I couldn't see, but it was monstrous, and far more organic than the Pavise machines earlier.

It had wings. Leathery, batpony wings, fully extended and stretching from wall to wall. And a long, tapering tail that wasn't made of hair. And scales.

And claws.

My breath caught in my throat. A dragon.

It was breathing.

But it wasn't free, either. Its entire head was covered by some sort of machine attached to the ceiling, and it looked to be in some sort of mechanically-induced stasis.

Another weapon for the hangar, then. And by the looks of things, the centerpiece of the fleet.

What was the source of that light, though? I started circling it, craning my neck to see...

It came into view. A pony. A familiar one.

Coda.

Encased head to hoof in ice.

The fur on my back rose in alarm, and I ran forward. It was all I could do to stop myself from crying out.

"Coda," I whispered, "Coda...!"

The alicorn filly was sealed in an inch-thick layer of ice that conformed to her shape, radiating unearthly blue light. Inside the ice, frost poured like waterfalls from her unmoving eyes, her face set in a mixture of pain and determination. I skidded to a halt. "What is...?"

Coda didn't move.

Whatever had happened, had happened. The action was over. I was too late. Was I?

My heart beating out of control, the dragon all but forgotten, I reached out to touch the ice. It felt... hostile. Alive. But also curious. I could almost hear its intention in my mind, even through the sole of my boot: was I a friend? Did I share its cause?

It was... offering itself to me.

In my chest, Ludwig's spark danced. It was the same, exact kind of cold.

I stumbled backwards. "What... is this...?"

"That's what happens when you eat too much of a seven-thousand-year-old curse that you happen to disagree with, I'm afraid," Egdelwonk's voice said from behind me.

I whirled. He was standing on the dragon's tail, leaning casually against one of its spikes.

"You...!"

"Me," he said, giving me a frown. "Honestly, Halcyon, one of these days you're going to stop being surprised when I know things I shouldn't."

"What's going on here?" I shakily asked. "What happened to everyone? Why is Coda like this? Why are you here?"

Egdelwonk shrugged. "Oh, this and that. Your friends' coup succeeded, thanks partly to a certain someone using her body to seal away a power that's entirely capable of fighting back. Most of them are now playing bureaucrat, trying to get along with all the factions they didn't just depose. Except Corsica, the unsung hero of the hour who's still sleeping off a nasty bout of depression..." He leaned forward, putting on a monocle. "And you, who disappeared without a trace the better half of a week ago."

My eyes widened. "A whole week!?"

Egdelwonk waved a wing. "Oh, not quite, but to your friends it certainly feels like it. Honestly, Halcyon, you didn't think you could just fall to your death and then get right back up again without any consequences, did you?" He peered at me. "As far as these things go, you're lucky the slow speed is the biggest drawback. Although given why this happened, I suppose luck isn't quite the right word, is it..."

"What are you talking about?" I swallowed. "What do you mean, given why this happened? What do you know?"

"With a name like mine, isn't it obvious?" Egdelwonk snapped the spokes on his bat wing, and a dumpster poofed into existence in a cloud of purple smoke and polygons. "Anyhow, I'm just the welcome wagon. You look like garbage, there are plenty of ponies who want to see you again, and the solutions to both are one and the same. In you go!"

I whipped my head around back to Coda. "But...!"

Egdelwonk tsk'd. "She had plenty of warning and knew what she was getting into, and will still be here tomorrow and the next year and the century after that."

"You mean..." I stared at the frozen filly, trying to put two and two together.

"Ugh, fine." Egdelwonk rolled his eyes. "If you won't get in the dumpster and really insist on doing this here, wait one moment." He jumped in himself, and was gone.

I could only focus on Coda.

Changeling queens were... like giant reservoirs for emotional energy, right? And windigoes were made of emotions. One emotion, specifically: wrath. At least, to hear Kitty tell it, or whoever it was who had explained that to me. Certainly believable, when I felt Ludwig's spark in my chest.

Presumably, Coda had tried to fight them with the love she had absorbed from her followers throughout the years. It would have been a sensible plan from her point of view. But what she thought was love was only surface-level lip service, vain and shallow and lacking substance. One big attack, and the windigoes would have laughed it off without even a scratch.

And then... she would have fought them another way, trying to absorb them and seal them away, just like she did to the prayers of her followers. She wasn't really a goddess of love. That wasn't her true power.

She was a goddess of the void. And this was what happened when that void - the one I witnessed when I touched her throne so very long ago - bit off more than it could chew.

I set my teeth. There were no windigoes visible in the core, no sign that any of the weapons here had been recently deployed... Valey's coup had succeeded. But this was the cost? A kid?

A kid who had been raised her entire life to believe she was some kind of mythical, powerful savior, whose destiny and duty was to do things like this. And powerful she was. But... had she felt like she had a choice? Probably not.

Maybe there were no other good options. I knew nothing about how the coup had unfolded, nothing beyond what I saw right here and now. Maybe if she had been given a choice, Coda would have done the same. But it didn't matter, because she hadn't been.

I had... been trying to change that, to show her that the world was bigger than her little airship and there were all sorts of things she could be beyond a cult goddess and a hunter of legendary monsters. And she had been enjoying it, too. If only I had gotten a little more time, or made better use of the time I had, or...

I could have changed this. This was my fault. If there was a price to be paid for saving the city, anyone deserved to pay it more than her. Like me, for instance. I organized an expedition to Icereach, and then... and then...

"I did nothing!" I cried, slumping to my hooves. "I'm sorry! I'm so, so sorry..."

"Caught up in that turmoil, there was a young filly named Starlight, whom my system failed."

Memories rose of Elise, sitting in an office in Icereach after the Aldebaran incident, answering whatever questions we had to offer.

"I allowed her to shoulder a burden that wasn't right for a filly, by virtue of being unable to stop it. She, herself, was a runaway. Most of what I learned about her came after our brief meeting. She was exceptional, talented, incredibly resourceful, and also very lonely..."

I almost laughed. Unlike Elise, I didn't have some grand ideology that guided me into making the mistakes I made. I was just incompetent. But... I guess, now, I knew how she felt.

There had to be some way out of this, though. Something I could do... right? I held up my bracelet. Maybe...

Coda, I noticed, was wearing her crown. I had never taken too close a look at it while it was on her throne, but it looked comically small on her, perched daintily atop her head rather than fitting around it. And, it was black.

If I was to guess, the same kind of metal as my bracelet. And... about the same size, too.

What...?

The dumpster lid banged behind me.

I turned. Egdelwonk reached out, depositing Howe on the floor next to it, before flashing me a wink and retreating back inside.

"Woah," Howe said, stumbling slightly. "Not your garden-variety teleportation..." He noticed me. "Oh. Hey, uh, Halcyon. Little dudette. I see you, uh..."

I blinked at him. "What are you doing here?"

Howe shrugged, visibly less carefree than usual. "The Howenator heard someone was needed, and volunteered to answer the call. Wowza, you look rough."

"Thanks..." I shifted my weight, standing so that my bare leg was blocked by the others. "Err..."

It was hard to even appreciate Egdelwonk's sentiment. I didn't want to be around other ponies right now.

Howe was more looking at Coda than me. "You look like you've thought about this a bunch. Figured out what went down."

"...Yeah," I said, my ears pressed back. "Look, I... I'm sorry. I should've..."

"Ol' Howe's got a question for you," Howe said, still looking at Coda. "You think she's a hero?"

"I don't wanna think about that!" I punched the ground. "I wanna think about how I was too late! Apparently it's been most of a week I've been down here, and... and... I can fight windigoes too, okay!? I could have helped! It was my responsibility!"

Howe scratched his rump.

There were tons of questions I could have asked him, namely about things he wasn't asking me. Like, where had I been? Why was I so roughed up? Part of me wanted him to ask. Part of me was glad he wasn't. I didn't want to think about me. I wanted to think about Coda.

"What are they saying about her?" I asked. "Is she still alive? In some sort of stasis? Can this be fixed? What will it take?"

"You'd have to ask someone else about that one," Howe said. "The Howenator's gut says yes, yes, yes and lots."

I looked again to my bracelet. Maybe...

"You know, she thought this was her responsibility," Howe pointed out. "But you know that isn't right, and I know that isn't right. So maybe this isn't your responsibility, either?"

"Shut up," I seethed. "It's your stupid cult that convinced her that it was hers in the first place. Why were you all friendly with them if you thought this was wrong?"

Ludwig's spark throbbed in my chest. Fight, it urged me. This is his fault, not yours!

"...Eh. Ol' Howe can see when he's making things worse." Howe turned away, back towards the dumpster. "He'll leave you to grieve. Got a thing for you on the way out, though..." He pulled out a pattern card, then dropped it on the ground and walked away. "Coda said she owed you an airship for some reason or another. And, hers is technically hers to give away. Sort of a last will and testament thing, after she started freezing up. Tons of witnesses. So, there's the key."

I stared at the pattern card. My heart clenched.

Not like this.

"Oh, and..." Howe stopped just short of the dumpster. "Whatever answers you're looking for, after all that's happened... I doubt anyone who knows would keep them from you if you ask. Not after that, anyway." He nodded at Coda. "Would do it myself, but ol' Howe's getting a feeling you'd rather be alone right now. If he's right about that and you'd rather just figure it out for yourself, you could do worse than to check the confessional at the back of the third floor on your new boat. Hope you don't think too badly of us when you learn the truth."

I swallowed. Egdelwonk ported him away, then leered at me expectantly, staring out from under the cracked lid of the dumpster.

Giving Coda one more look, I stepped over and picked up the key. It looked... just like any other pattern card, save for the word Verdandi emblazoned on the side.

I had seen that before. That was the name of Coda's ship.

Whatever it took, I would find a way to set this right. I would help the pink flame, fix the sky, save Ironridge, and help Coda become a normal filly who could live and laugh and wasn't trapped in a block of ice, no matter how many miles I had to cross or inner demons I had to face to do it. I had a purpose, and along with it a frighteningly bleak picture of my own competence. In a way, it was the total opposite of how I had been at the beginning, searching for meaning and afraid of my own potential. But I could no longer afford to fail.

I still would fail, of course, and when I did I would get back up and try again and again and again, because I had a purpose and it was too new and precious to give up on.

This was who I was. Who... we would be.

"I promise," I whispered, under my breath.

And then I looked up and at Egdelwonk, still sitting in a dumpster in the middle of the most powerful weapons hangar in the world. "Any chance you can give me a lift? I have an airship I want to visit."

Egdelwonk dropped me in a room aboard the Verdandi, and swiftly left me alone. I recognized the room. It was the same one I had slept in after saving Leitmotif from Lilith's school, when Coda picked us up in the Sky District.

I left the room and stared out the hallway window. The ship was moored outside Fort Starlight.

Nobody else seemed to be aboard.

I wandered the halls just in case, but they were all empty. When I checked a window again, looking out at the fort's central clearing, it seemed a lot more populated than before. Maybe even some cultists, though it was a little hard to tell.

The third floor was mostly passenger cabins, which made sense if the entire cult lived and traveled aboard the ship with its master. I checked it last, after visiting the bridge and the throne room and the empty prayer altars, which felt so much different in the day, without their master and with nobody around to pray.

Two hallways. Four rows of cabins, the middle two back-to-back. And, at the rear, a door simply labeled 'Confessional'.

I wondered what this was for, when there were plenty of perfectly good altars down below. Though, if Coda's own cult had secrets they would rather she not be privy to, I supposed it made sense. For all her talk about being able to read their minds, I suspected she was just conditioned to the way they acted around her, and was actually very easy to hide things from.

The door was locked, but it was nothing a little shadow sneaking couldn't solve. Inside was a room little bigger than a closet, containing a desk and a chair and a stack of empty paper and a quill, and no ornamentation save for a tiny sculpture carved to look like the alicorn depicted in dusk statues.

I seated myself in the chair and pulled open the desk's only drawer. Inside was a tome labeled The Book of Coda.

So, I spread it out on the desk before me and started reading.

The following is a thorough account of the factors involved in the construction and ascension of the mare now known as Chrysalis, compiled at the behest of Dr. Zybar by his associates, meant to serve as a guide and manual as we seek to atone for this terrible sin.

Most instrumental to Chrysalis's power is a black crown forged of the metal Umhuxanjarn, which is anomalous in many ways. Umhuxanjarn is an immutable, unbreakable, unworkable and non-malleable material usually produced in small nuggets through an involved ritual involving sarosians, Mistvale arts and raw windigo hearts [see Appendix A for ritual documentation and details]. The crown was possessed of much greater size and detail than these nuggets, however, despite no known method for forging the metal being in existence.

More startlingly, accounts suggest that the crown was initially discovered following the murder of Lord Regent Victor, an event that placed great emotional stress upon the young Chrysalis, yet bore no resemblance to the ritual outlined above. It was concluded that Chrysalis caused the crown to manifest by her own volition, in order to attack or defend herself. The crown was subsequently appropriated by Chauncey for testing and eventual use in the Stanza project.

During the course of the Stanza project, altars were connected to a modified dusk statue that served as a receptacle for the crown [see Appendix B for schematics]. These altars were placed in a processing center for convicted heretics scheduled for execution and used to record their emotions and state of mind. The Stanza project succeeded in its goals, but we neglected to understand the significance of the impact of these experiments and infusions on Chrysalis.

Little is known about the link between Umhuxanjarn and a pony's soul other than that it conclusively exists: the crown belongs to Chrysalis just as a ritual nugget belongs to the sarosian from which it was produced. This property, which may be responsible for the immutability of the metal, created a duality in which Chrysalis experienced changes akin to what we were doing to the crown via the Stanza project. Upon inspection, Chrysalis's internal emotional flow was deeply abnormal, resembling a sack instead of the tree-like structure aligned with the skeleton that can be observed in normal ponies. The emotions with which we infused Stanza found their final resting place, instead, in her.

In short, the construction of Chrysalis can be broken down into three distinct phases: one in which she was imbued with emotional energy, and one in which she began to wield it. However, Chrysalis manifested the crown before our experiments on her began. We suspect her unique emotional physiology, which may be tied to the crown, was in place from birth, and our experiments involving Stanza merely served to empower her.

The circumstances of Chrysalis's birth are difficult to track [see Appendix C for a complete list of all hypothetical conditions]. Some, such as the experiments conducted upon her mother to allow sarosians to not breed true, are impossible to reproduce to exact specifications. Others rely on tools and equipment that are forever lost to us. However, the most promising factor is that Chrysalis's mother was a sarosian possessed of a different soul than the one she was born with. Due to the poorly understood link between the Umhuxanjarn crown and souls, parents with an unusual soul history make for extremely desirable test subjects.

While we lack the resources to produce such potential parents ourselves, suitable candidates are known to exist in the world. Thus, we must retool our fledgling organization to focus on public interaction and outreach. The only way to challenge Chrysalis and atone for our mistakes in creating her is to create another who is her equal, yet raised from birth to be on the right side of history.

If only Chrysalis's daughter hadn't been stolen, we wouldn't have to start from-

I dropped the book.

End of Act 2

...

Boop!

Corsica swatted at whatever had touched her nose, her eyes blearily struggling to open. "Wha...?"

"Congratulations," Egdelwonk said, lounging against a wall and retracting his wing. "You're promoted."

"Screw off," Corsica slurred, her body feeling like a distant slab, barely attached to her mind at all. "I'm trying to rest..."

"That's it?" Egdelwonk peered incredulously at her. "That's all the thanks I get?"

Corsica just grunted.

"Well, excuse me for thinking Halcyon's argh-I-failed-again shtick is getting a little repetitive," Egdelwonk groused, getting up and twirling in a circle. "Maybe I'm just salty she ignored my cool plot hook about the Barnabas weapon shop, but both of us know who's really been responsible for selflessly saving the day so far and both of us know you're going to do it again the moment you're out of bed. Anyway, welcome to the P.O.V. crew, we don't have any doughnuts, maybe now that there are two of you you'll be able to spice this production up a bit. Yadda yadda yadda..."

He rolled his eyes and stepped into a waste basket that was smaller than he was.

Corsica went back to sleep.

Reconciliation

Several days ago...

Corsica's body felt like it was made of soap.

This happened more often than she cared to admit. Trying to move her muscles, to use her legs, it was like she had to grab her body with her mind to move it in the ways she desired, only it was slippery and if she didn't keep a firm focus, she could drop herself on the floor in a heap. A marionette with its strings cut.

One would think that, with a special talent with consequences like this, the obvious solution would be to avoid using it as much as possible. Unfortunately, not using it took more focus than actually using it. And thus it was that the twin tasks of policing her thoughts and her actions took up about all of the effort Corsica could afford to give at any given moment.

That was why, when anything happened that was exciting enough to catch her focus anyway, it was both frightening and exhilarating: more often than not, it would end in an accidental or deliberate use of her talent. But the stimulation, the chance to break free from her control of herself, to feel and think...

She knew it would just make things worse in the end. But at times like those - at times like these - she couldn't help but let go and come alive.

"You mean to tell me you suspect my mother was an infidel?" Coda stared at Papyrus with incredulous, enlightened eyes. "Sin upon so many sins, does her wickedness never end?"

Corsica leaned against a crate in the Nemestasis room, her ears perked as Papyrus's long-winded story reached its point. "You're saying there just randomly happened to be an Icereach Head Scientist in Izvaldi, in a position to become her father."

Her thoughts kept racing back to an hour ago, when Halcyon - upon being lightly and non-seriously pressed about whether she could have known about Coda's link to Project Nemestasis - didn't attempt any sort of denial and instead asked to be tied up. They kept racing to a day before that, in a sauna in Cold Karma, where she mentioned feeling like there were multiple different people in her head, some of whom knew things she didn't know, and she was only one among many.

"All I'm saying is, if a certain secretive batpony from Icereach whom we know knew about this machine in advance happened to come to Ironridge with the intent of securing the friendship and presence of an elusive, wayward filly who happened to be the key to one of the world's most ridiculous weapons and bringing her back here, it would be an interesting plan to be in on, is all!"

"This machine is... dangerous. It seems to be a control panel by means of which Icereach can launch bombs through the air at any place in the world. And everyone is debating the possibility that you won my trust and brought me here exclusively to have me use it. I can see their intentions, and no one truly believes you did, but only Corsica is certain you didn't, either. And even she is trying to hide from her doubts. It does seem quite the coincidence that... I know not even how it would be possible for control of this machine to run in my blood. Is there anything...?"

Her thoughts kept racing back to Papyrus's and Coda's words... and to Halcyon's response to them: sure. Might as well tie me up.

What went on in that kid's head was sometimes painfully transparent, and other times a confounding mystery. Here, it was a mix of both: anyone could see that Halcyon really did doubt herself. But why, though? Even if it was possible that Halcyon had other selves she almost never talked about to another soul, those selves could think and conceal information from her, and had some grand master plan involving bringing together this machine and the filly who could use it, that didn't mean it was a reasonable conclusion to draw. Things weren't true just because you could drum up a wild theory explaining why they were possible.

Corsica wished-

No. Better not to think that way.

She hadn't found the strength at the time to point out how floppy that line of reasoning was, and despite knowing even less than her, no one else had thought to question it. That was how it happened. No point in wanting to change that, even if her own inaction was bitter to accept.

Corsica tried to accept it, but the bitterness bubbled over anyway.

"Wait," she interrupted, cutting off Papyrus's rambling speculation. "You're saying, after the way we treated Halcyon because there was no better explanation to this head scientist's daughter business, that you knew that Coda's mother and a head scientist had been in close proximity at the right time. You're saying we jumped her purely because this seemed too contrived to be a coincidence and we had no better explanation, and you actually had a better explanation."

"Don't look at me!" Papyrus squawked. "I'm just postulating innocently about how little Coda could be related to this machine. I didn't know there was a machine here with a condition like this. Besides, I'm not the only one here who knew about Navarre! Isn't that right, Senescey?"

"Shut up and stop calling me that." Leif gave him a dangerous look. "And... yes. I hadn't put two and two together. But I knew of Navarre's existence."

"If it makes you feel better," Unless belched, "I knew too."

Internally, Corsica sighed. Coda was a head scientist's daughter, she could control this machine, blah blah blah. If that really needed to not be a coincidence, Halcyon was suddenly one of the least-suspect ponies here, next to everyone who had actually been in the Empire at the time...

Halcyon needed to know. Whyever she was blaming herself for this, she didn't deserve it.

Corsica got to her hooves and announced her plans to the room. "Right. Last chance to give me a reason not to untie her, because you all are way more suspicious than she is."

"Because she asked to be tied up." Leif looked at the floor. "Whatever it is she knows, she had to have a reason for that."

Corsica squeezed her eyes shut. It was probably a bad reason. Changing it was the point. Maybe Halcyon would let it go if she knew... knew...

One little waver, the tiniest pushback to her plan, and Corsica's motivation was draining away like silicate through a colander. It was so hard to hold onto that, these days. She had memories of it being easier, when she wasn't this close to her talent's limit, but even those days paled in comparison to what she had been before the avalanche.

And those days would never return, so, really, what was the point? Why bother trying at all?

Sorry, Hallie.

Some time later, after a lot more conversation and a surprise visit from Ludwig with an even more surprising end, Corsica was trying again.

Her body was a little harder to hold up than before, courtesy of using her talent again. From the impact, it felt like a minor use, but even minor stuff felt major when she was this close to the edge. Some time off, a chance to recover... That would be nice.

Well, not nice. More like a minimum requirement. But still, Corsica let herself want it as badly as she dared.

She trudged through the hallways, alone. Most would call it reckless when there were changelings about, but this was the same kind of recklessness she was known for in Icereach: not so much an appetite for flaunting the rules as an inability to care. It was synergistic, when she thought about it: using her special talent lowered her capacity to care about things, and caring too much about things often led to accidental uses of her talent. If only that synergy could have converged on a state she enjoyed being in.

It was a dull duty that propelled her forward, more inertia than anything. Corsica had gotten good at using that kind of inertia to power her life. Drifting by, doing the same kinds of things she always did... it was a fallback for her medium days, when she was good enough that she didn't just stay in bed, but not so good that she got up and about because she wanted to. Most days were medium days. But the ones where no one else was around, where she couldn't just go with the flow... Those were the ones where it helped.

On bad days, it was a lot more necessary than a mere help.

She stopped outside the door and took a moment to collect herself. Going slow was something of a paradox: at times, it caused her to lose what momentum she had, to give up and walk away. Other times, it gave her a rest break, and let her regroup and continue stronger and more present than before. Fortunately, this time felt like the latter.

One moment... Two moments... Three...

Corsica got up, lit her horn and opened the door.

On the other side, Halcyon was sitting, well-lit and professionally, if comfortably, bound. Her green eyes instantly snapped to Corsica's. And, instead of all reasonable emotions, they flickered with fear.

"Halcyon?" Corsica blinked. "What...? Why are you looking at me like that?"

Halcyon shifted and tried to hide the expression, though it was still there. "Like what?"

This wasn't right. "You know anything about Ludwig?" Corsica asked. "He said you were a ghost?"

Halcyon shook her head, not meeting Corsica's eyes.

"That's... not how Halcyon would respond," Corsica said cautiously. Besides, as crass as Ludwig was, he had successfully relayed an answer when she asked a question to confirm Halcyon's identity... "What's going on here? You're not a changeling, are you?"

Halcyon closed her eyes, looking as if she wished she was anywhere but here.

"Well, I've got nothing." Corsica shrugged, sitting down against the opposite wall and watching the door. "Hope you don't mind if I crash here for a while too. Not like I've got anything better to do."

Doing nothing was a surprisingly effective strategy. Many times before, Corsica had realized that she could outlast almost anyone in a test of patience simply by zoning out, giving up for a while and becoming an inert slab of meat. Any problem that theoretically could be solved this way, she had the endurance to solve. More accurately, the lack of endurance, creatively applied... and after long enough, Halcyon proved to be no exception.

"Why are you still here?" she asked. "Don't you have anything better to do with yourself?"

"You'd be surprised," Corsica grunted, feeling a tiny bit better for indulging her laziness. "Though I could ask the same of you. You're thinking these alternate selves of yours somehow masterminded you into somehow manipulating Coda here for reasons you know nothing about? Is staying tied up to guard against that really the best use of your time?"

Halcyon clammed up again.

"I'm patient," Corsica warned. "Don't test it if you don't wanna lose."

"Please don't speak to me," Halcyon whispered.

Corsica's eyebrows rose. And, for a moment, she complied.

This wasn't Halcyon. Probably? Maybe. Honestly, Halcyon got pretty bad nerves at times too. But she also had a spark, an invisible drive towards a goal Corsica could never quite understand, and that was missing. This Halcyon felt small, almost uncomfortably so, like she was trying to hide, and had never spoken to another pony before.

Wait...

"Maybe I'm only guessing this because it's fresh in my mind," Corsica offered. "And shut me up if I'm off the mark. But you're one of Halcyon's... other parts?"

"...Yes," Halcyon said, glaring at the floor. "The one you bullied while you were dating Ansel."

Corsica's eyes widened. "Ohh..."

"You've clearly changed since then," Halcyon said, her gaze softening. "But, not completely. And you and the real me have a good thing going. So, sorry if I'm not more talkative. I don't want to ruin that for her."

Corsica didn't know what to say.

"In fact, just forget you ever saw me," Halcyon added. "And, please leave? You started fresh after the accident. There's no reason to get the past mixed up in what you two have now. There's nothing for you there."

"Sure you don't want the company?" Corsica offered. "I mean it, I've got nothing better to do."

Halcyon hesitated. "Anything I say to try to convince you is just going to make you want to stay. Save your energy for the side of me that you're friends with. Remember, I don't like you."

Corsica paused for a moment. "Fair. Sorry about all that."

Halcyon didn't reply.

"Guess I thought you were over it," Corsica eventually said. "After all, you never brought it up after the avalanche. Sorry. I'm not good at tactfully broaching stuff like this."

"That's because... I'm not her," Halcyon said. "Not the Halcyon you've known since that day." She sighed. "Ugh. I was terrified when she told you about me earlier, in the sauna. But I guess it makes this a lot less awkward than it could be..."

"I'm too done to feel awkward," Corsica told her, though it wasn't entirely true. "You've got stuff that needs to be said, lay it on me. I'm a big girl, I can take it."

"...No." Halcyon looked away again. "I don't have anything that needs to be said."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You sure about that?"

Halcyon withdrew into herself a little. It was... cute.

Tease her, some part of Corsica said.

"Well, I've got stuff I'd like to know," Corsica asked instead, ignoring the urge. "Why'd you always tag along with us if you disliked it so much?"

It wasn't a question she ever could have asked Halcyon normally. Part of it was her reluctance to think too much about the happier days of her own past, and invite the perils of wishful thinking. But, mostly, she didn't want to question it. Having Halcyon as a friend was a plus she didn't want to face her current life without. If it didn't make sense that things would turn out this way, so what? She didn't need answers, and prodding at the status quo might cause it to unravel, like waking from a dream.

But... now, this was different. It felt like she had stepped outside of time, and could take that risk with a different Halcyon with some measure of protection from the consequences. Or, not protection, really. Rather, her relationship with this pony wasn't yet settled. Maybe they would become friends, maybe enemies, or maybe never speak to each other again. Either way, now was the time to cast the chips and see where they landed.

...Probably. Corsica didn't trust herself to think too hard about it.

"You really wanna know?" Halcyon still refused to make eye contact. "I didn't have anything better to do. That's all there was to it."

Corsica raised an eyebrow, feeling like there was more.

"I'm sorry," Halcyon sighed. "That's a lie. But, the truth is, I'm not a very enviable pony. There's a reason I'm gone most of the time, and it's a different Halcyon you do science with and have sleepovers with and all that. I don't know how to talk about myself without making you pity me. And that pity is going to carry over to the Halcyon you know, who doesn't deserve it."

"What are you so sad about?" Corsica leaned against the wall. "The prime of my life is behind me. I've got a special talent that basically ruins my chances at ever making a concerted, long-term effort at anything... like having a family, or holding a job. I know a thing or two about this. I should be able to relate. But whatever you're thinking right now, I can't tell why you're thinking about it at all."

For some reason, Halcyon just cringed. "I'm sorry..."

"I'm going to start counting the number of times you say that," Corsica warned.

Halcyon squeezed her eyes shut and her ears back.

Corsica backed off a little, and settled for asking questions to herself instead of out loud. How close really were these two Halcyons? Were they really separate people, or just different facets of the same personality? She would have to read up more on dissociative identity disorder when she got the chance... This one certainly seemed to have more baggage. Or, at least, less strength with which to carry the load she had been given.

That sure was relatable. Corsica struggled to carry herself to the degree where it was physically hard to walk.

"Hey," she said. "The other Halcyon, the one I know... How much does she know about what you're thinking?"

"We're separate," Halcyon said. "She's not going to remember this conversation unless I make an effort to let her. But our feelings are tied together, so if one of us feels an emotion, it's reflected in the other to some degree."

Corsica chanced half of a grin. "So if I cheer her up, it'll cheer you up, and vice versa?"

Halcyon gave her a look of confusion.

"Listen," Corsica said, letting the grin evaporate into seriousness. "You've clearly got a lot on your mind with no good way to process it. For all I know, I'm the first pony not named Halcyon you've talked to in years. So tell me. I can keep a secret, including from the other you. I wanna know... more about how the two of you work."

Halcyon didn't look convinced... yet there was a spark of temptation, there deep beneath the surface. She was lonely.

"Come on." Corsica reached out a hoof. "You'll feel better. I promise."

Halcyon stared at the hoof. Her gaze wavered. She set her jaw.

And then she closed her eyes, turned away and sighed. "I spent years waiting for you to offer me the slightest invitation to do anything. I always invited myself when you never did. So why now? Why tempt me with that so long after I've given up, and with something I don't even want to do?"

"Guess I've changed." Corsica dropped the hoof and went back to leaning against the wall. "So have you. And everything else, to boot. If we've got a chance at a reset, might as well do things right this time?"

"Why do you want this?" Halcyon warily asked. "You've got the real me already. What's in this for you?"

"Nothing." Corsica shrugged. "Same as was in it for your other half when she reached out to me after the avalanche and I batted her away ten million times before realizing I needed it. I'm just returning the favor."

Halcyon looked away. From the expression on her face, she had far too much on her mind.

I felt a nudge from beneath my mask, and realized that it had been several minutes since dropping the Book of Coda.

Maybe longer. Time just seemed to have... frozen, and pushed me ahead without anything else catching up.

The nudge prodded me again. Other Halcyon wanted to talk.

I wished I knew how to turn her into a ghost. That would be a lot more convenient, when I was the one usually in control. But, even if I now knew the nature of my powers, that didn't mean I knew how to control them.

So, I took a breath, focused, and took off-

-her mask.

It didn't take long for Halcyon to turn me into a ghost. After she did, not one of us spoke.

"...Well?" she eventually asked, still wearing my tattered clothing. "Now you... I assume, with a reaction like that, you know. Though I guess it wasn't completely spelled out."

"I'm a changeling queen." I met her eyes. "We are a changeling queen. Chrysalis's real daughter. Mother didn't adopt us, she stole us. Our bracelet?" I pointed at her foreleg. "That's really our crown. It probably hurt Mother when she used it because... I dunno, she's not its real owner, or something. But it doesn't hurt us because it's ours. Coda... She's a different queen. One they recreated the conditions for making, somehow, to raise her as a weapon to clean up their past mistake. That's why she looks and acts much younger than us: she really is younger. That's... all true, isn't it?"

"So you know," Halcyon whispered, bowing her head and waiting for judgement. "Well?"

I stared at her, momentarily speechless. "You're not... gonna tell me something that makes this worse. That's really all there is."

Halcyon's mouth cracked open.

"You idiot," I whispered, feeling tears start to sting my eyes. "All that running in circles, doubting myself, fighting my fears and trying to use my powers... All of that was for something like this?"

Halcyon tried to make herself small. "You... don't understand. We were the cause of the war. Of the eastern continent's collapse. Chrysalis? Our real mother? She went berserk because we were born. Our mere existence caused the near extinction of our species! It plunged the continent into chaos, and-!"

"How is that our fault!?" I cried, interrupting. "Maybe that's true, but we didn't have any say in it, unless you're telling me that an infant who's too young to even see clearly can consciously direct the course of a war! I don't care about being a changeling queen! If anything, I'm happy I can now put a name to the things I can do, and now have better ways to research our powers than trial and error! But when you were thinking about all this, when you were 'deciding' what to and not to hide, did you ever stop to look at the one pony who was carrying all those same burdens right out in plain sight!?"

I sucked in a ragged breath. "What about Coda? Maybe she turned out to be a fake, but she thought she was exactly what you were afraid of! She always talked like cleaning up that mess was her duty just because of her history, even though it clearly wasn't! But if it was going to be anyone's duty, it should have been ours, because that was our history, not hers! And now she's the one who sucked up all the windigoes in Cold Karma and got frozen solid as a result! If you'd just told me, we could have been the ones to take that fall. Or, me and her could have shared it, and maybe neither... neither of us..."

Throughout my tirade, Halcyon grew more and more despondent, until at last I couldn't bear to push her any further. "I'm sorry," she said, misery plain on her face. "I guess I should have trusted you to be stronger than me after all. You really don't care about the war, or our history, or how all that blood is on our hooves at all, do you? In... in a good way. I guess hiding from my fear just made things worse."

"I don't understand," I whispered, wiping my ghostly eyes. "How do you look so defeated? How did this get to you? How did you find out? Did ponies used to blame you for this, or...?"

"That's... a long story," Halcyon said, grimacing. "But I suppose I don't have any right to keep it from you anymore. It'll... be easier if I restore the memories. If I can still do that, but since I'm repairing instead of taking away, and especially if you want it to happen, I should be able to..."

"Do it," I asked. "Please. I need to know."

Halcyon concentrated... and suddenly, I felt a thick blanket of fog rolling into my thoughts. Or, more like my thoughts were being heaved into the fog, as if my brain was being forced into an area I usually couldn't think about because it wasn't there. The fog seemed to gleam, as if underneath a burning sun, and for a moment, I panicked. Was this a good idea? I had never actually been conscious before while being modified...

And then the fog burned off, and I was in a dream.

My surroundings were vague, and clashed a little, as if I was half-asleep and half-awake, my conscience torn between two different worlds, one where I was hovering as a ghost and one that I was freshly experiencing, as if I was remembering in real time. Part of that vagueness, though, I realized was part of the dream: I was small.

Tiny, even. This was the rare kind of dream that predated my ability to remember normally, and even to see straight. Why did infant foals have to be born with eyes that couldn't focus?

"You sure have changed." A mare interrupted my musings, her voice raspy and... bad. I realized already that I must have seen this dream before, and there was some panic associated with recognizing it. And yet, now that I focused on it, that panic was coming from Halcyon. Her emotions, her experiences with this dream, were bleeding over into me.

"Not that I knew you that well, but... Wow. I can't believe you managed to get out. We'll see what kinds of asylum options we have, assuming you even want anything to do with us and don't just keep heading west."

It was hot in this dream. I felt like that used to be more noteworthy. Now that I had lived in Ironridge for a few weeks, though, anything less than the boil-you-alive heat of the Night District didn't seem that special...

"I'll be honest, Ironridge isn't in a perfect place. But if we're one thing, we're isolated. I'm sure we could get you somewhere where nobody will ask questions. If only Riverfall hadn't been forced to open up. This is exactly the situation we made it for..."

"It is what it is," said another voice, the pony holding me. She was much younger, but the weariness was undeniable. It was Mother. "My legs will hold out long enough. The further off the map, the better."

"Hrrrmmm..." an old, gravelly stallion's voice muttered. "Well, we'll put something together one way or another. Can't just leave you and that kid out in the dark."

"Can I see her?" the mare asked.

My anxiety spiked, and I felt myself awkwardly lifted, held by the barrel and dangling in midair.

"Her hooves..." she whispered. "It's like they're covered in blood."

"Wonder if it's fate," the stallion mused. "After all, to hear you lot tell it, a lot of blood was spilled in her name."

"It's true," the mare added, sounding haunted. "I was there when it started. Chrysalis talked about her. If only..."

"Yes, I know. If only." Mother interrupted with a hard, tired edge to her voice. "If only there was a way for her child to grow up away from all of that. She has her mother's power. I... had to use it to survive."

A rustle of clothing. Both other ponies gasped.

"You meed medical treatment," the mare said. "That's... not a normal injury."

"Yeah," the stallion added. "And not to miss the forest for the trees, but you've got a bit of a belly down there..."

Mother winced, then sighed. "Yes. I'm pregnant. I suppose you could say it was by choice, but not one with other options that involved escaping the east. Either way, if I keep it, I'll need room for one more." She paused. "But Faye is the important one."

Wait, what?

"She's not going to grow up without this power," Mother went on. "But she can still grow up in a way where no one recognizes her for what she is. She can grow up in a way that lets her make her own decision about whether to use those abilities to become a savior or a murderer... or, better yet, nothing noteworthy at all. But that won't happen if she's surrounded by ponies who can only see the ghost of her history, and her potential. The... blood on her hooves, as you put it."

Silence.

"We'll find something," the mare promised. "And quickly, too. I can't imagine you'd say no to a place to retire in anonymity yourself."

"I hope for all our sakes you can," Mother said. "I don't want to regret saving this kid. It's the first purpose I chose for my life, and with the condition it's left me in, it'll probably be the last. No more do-overs. Now, if you're offering any hospitality while you search... I need it."

"Come with me," the stallion encouraged, and I heard heavy hoofsteps leading away. "I've already got an idea, but let's get that leg of yours looked at before you hear it."

The dream cleared away, and I found myself back in the confessional, floating in front of my other self.

"How old do you think I was," she said, "when I first had that dream?"

I shook my head. I didn't know.

"Young enough," Halcyon told me, "that I didn't understand or process or even remember all that was going on. There were ponies, including Mother, and they were afraid of me. I remembered that one line... that my legs looked like they were covered in blood. I had this nightmare again and again... Now that we're older, we have more memories to dream about, but when I was very little, individual dreams were much more common. Or at least they felt that way. This was before I learned what death was, before I understood the difference between being adopted and living with your birth parents. Mother hadn't yet given me our bracelet. All I knew was I had this recurring, horrible nightmare, and it involved my... red legs."

I looked down at her missing boot. Red. Like blood.

"I don't know what memories of mine you have, of being little," she went on. "I... blurred that part a bit. But, when I was very young, I hadn't yet realized that my dreams involved reliving things that had happened to me before. I thought they were real, and happening to me in the present. Which wasn't great for my ability to understand time as a linear structure..." She rubbed her forehead. "I thought, every time I went to sleep, there was a chance I'd... have that happen to me again. Have ponies talking about me like..." She swallowed.

"I think I get it," I gently said.

"There were other dreams, too," she went on. "Others that I expunged for you. None were as important as that one. Several meetings she brought me to, when I was too young to be expected to remember, where they talked about how Icereach was set up. And I once dreamed about Mother... in labor with Ansel. She was alone for much of it, and mostly she talked herself through the pains. I can't blame a mare now for things they might say in a situation like that, but when I was younger... I didn't understand." She hung her head. "Icereach was created for us, though. The Institute. You know that?"

I wasn't even sure anymore. But I wouldn't have been surprised.

"Yakyakistan wanted a place to hide their finished rocket program, and maybe some other things," Halcyon said. "Ironridge wanted a place to hide some other things... and us. We were the big secret. That rule Elise tried to use to keep us from taking Leif's job offer? The obscure one we later found out only applied to our family? One guess why that rule was actually made."

"To keep us safe, in Icereach," I said, turning toward the door. "I guess... a lot of folks in Ironridge must know, then. About what we really are. This is the context I've always been missing. This is why so many factions were competing to recruit me."

Halcyon shrugged. "It's a safe assumption. I don't know for sure on a case by case basis, but the kind of creatures who come to power in a city like this? I can't imagine them not being the ones who would know about a thing like this."

"I'm sorry," I said, turning back to her. "I guess I can see why you were so afraid after all. It's like... the whole world knows, and is against us because of it. Everyone either is scared of us and wants to control us to protect themselves, or else sees us as a tool, and wants to control us for profit."

Halcyon nodded.

"Maybe I'm only taking this as well as I am because I've got bigger things to worry about," I said. "I guess there were a hundred different times over the last week when learning this in the wrong way really could have messed me up, weren't there? But, still..." I met her gaze. "I know now. And I can live my life like this. I'm going to have to learn more. Ignoring who we are isn't an option. But now that I know why we're such a magnet, I..." My voice choked up. "I just wish this had been in time to help Coda."

"If you're that set on it, you could probably still do something," Halcyon pointed out. "Siphon off some of the windigo power from her, or something. I just don't know that it would work out how you want it to. And I don't know much about our powers, either."

I took a breath. "Anyway. In that dream, Mother called me Faye."

Halcyon nodded again. "Our best friend from foalhood. She died, a long time ago. But what do you think really happened to her?"

I frowned.

"Mother... wasn't sure what it would be like, at first, for us to have friends," she said. "She was worried about the effects social interaction might have on us. On our powers. She understood so little about what we can do, but knew that Chrysalis fed on the emotions of others... So, the way she decided to test the waters was allowing us to become friends with one specific other filly. At first, we weren't the only refugees in Icereach, you see. There were a few others - mostly from Varsidel, since the east all got turned into changelings - that Ironridge sent along to make us stick out less. One of them had a kid about our age with some pretty severe birth defects."

She shook her head. "A little batpony like us. Couldn't use her legs. Couldn't use her wings. Had to roll around everywhere in a wheelchair. Always wore these leg bracers so she wouldn't flop around... Her name was Halcyon. And, you can probably guess what happened from there."

My mouth hung just a little open.

"She died," Halcyon went on. "Of... natural causes. And we... well, I, back then, didn't know how to cope with that. I missed her. And so I tried to bring her back, by... becoming her. I did my best at adopting her mannerisms. And I did a little too good at adopting her body. That was the first time I ever manifested our powers. And Mother... She couldn't figure out how to make me stop."

My body felt hollow. Which was a little obvious, since I was presently a ghost, but hollower than that.

"You've seen Procyon," Halcyon said. "Believe it or not, that's our true form. The way we used to look. To this day, I can't figure out how to shift back. Believe me, I've tried. I just know, from seeing myself in dreams. Her hooves, though? They're not nearly this red. And, I'm pretty sure that before I switched, my wings used to work. We weren't always flightless."

"You..." I stretched a hoof out, but didn't know what to say.

"I think the way we look, on some deep, deep level, is related to how we see ourselves on the inside," she went on. "This isn't like awakened changelings like Leitmotif, where they can shift at will. Our shapeshifting is tied to our identity on a much deeper level. And for all my shenanigans with masks and trying to mold myself, I still can't do more than a little this and that to make our disguise kit use seem more believable." She sighed a self-defeating sigh. "But... I guess that's a problem for you to inherit, now. So. What are you doing to do?"

I thought for a long moment... and then I got an idea.

"For starters," I said, "what if I start calling you Faye?"

"What?" She blinked.

I shrugged. "It was your original name. I've always been Halcyon, but you became Halcyon to... cover up your loss, but probably also to stop being the Faye in the dream. Besides, Procyon's got her own name. You deserve one too. And it might as well be something you've been running from for a long time, if we're really going to face our past together."

A tear appeared in the corner of her eye. "You're too good for this world. I didn't make you gritty enough. It's going to chew you up and spit you back out."

"Already has," I told her. "Many times. A bit too late to stop it. So, partners?"

I reached a hoof out.

"...Partners." She gave it a ghostly bump. "Halcyon."

"Faye."

For a moment, she looked thoughtful. "...That's going to take some getting used to. Now, do you want your body back? You've been gone for a week, to hear Howe tell it."

"Yeah." I nodded. "I've got a lot to catch up on."

Answers

Corsica woke up.

It wasn't a proper awakening, because she wasn't really awake. Just like she hadn't really been asleep. That was just what happened when you were bedridden for too long. Your existence entered a malaise where you were too well-rested to sleep, but too under-stimulated to do anything but.

The doctors of Fort Starlight periodically checked in on her, and kept her updated on how long it had been so she could keep a sense of time, though she didn't remember what they had said. Fortunately, Unless knew enough about the nature of Corsica's special talent that she had kept the doctors from panicking. There wasn't a whole lot doctors could do for her, anyway. Either she would regain enough willpower to get up on her own, or...

She didn't know the alternative. She had never pushed her talent this far before. But, worse than being bedridden, paralyzed and unable to do more than move her eyes? There weren't a whole lot of options to go from there.

Now, however, she felt different. Her thoughts were clearer, almost normal. She wanted to get up. And on other, much-less-severe mornings, that was usually the sign that meant...

Corsica focused, telling herself to move. Gravity still hit her with its full intensity, but she got one leg beneath her, and then two, and when she rolled out onto her hooves, she didn't even wobble.

Huh. Apparently she had rested for long enough.

She took stock of her surroundings. This was an old airship cabin, the floor listing at an awkward slant - an intact room in one of the smashed-up hulls that formed the wall around Fort Starlight's interior. Someone had bothered to make it look nice and homely, for an airship wreck. There was a mirror, and a small open cabinet holding her shoes and ear ornaments and even the scarf she used to wear when exploring the surface of Icereach, though she was pretty sure she had never taken that out of her closet once moving in with Jamjars.

A quick peek in the mirror told her her mane was ruinous, and a much quicker sniff told her she hadn't bathed in nearly a week. Eugh. For some reason, caring for her appearance never took any of her limited willpower, and instead was relaxing or even restful, so letting her grooming slip this much was nigh unheard-of. That wouldn't do. Abandoning her usual cosmetics, she started searching for a towel. Fort Starlight was a military installation, and its showers were hardly meant for looking good, but anything was better than this.

Towel, towel... bingo!

Corsica lit her horn, pulled it down... and was interrupted when her stomach growled hard enough to make her wince. How long had it been since she last ate?

Long enough that she wasn't sure she could make it through a shower.

Whatever. Not like she could afford to care what other ponies thought of her appearance anyway.

Corsica didn't spare too much effort on her surroundings as she searched for food, only stopping to look around when she had acquired a chair and a bowl of soup. The sky... Gray. Hadn't gone back to normal yet, huh? The sun was up, but it looked lifeless and dull, and somehow even staring directly at it didn't hurt her eyes. Also, the stars were still out. Weird.

The southern horizon was monopolized by an immense spire of pink crystal, reaching like a knifeblade for the heavens. Tall enough that the top was difficult to make out, it looked more organic than most crystal formations. And yet there was an order to the patterns in which it had organically grown, like a grafted hedge or tree. Almost like it was a shape something intelligent had chosen.

After two and a half years of studying ether crystals with Halcyon, Corsica felt like she could put down some interesting hypotheses for how this monolith had appeared, and why it looked the way it did. But... better to wait until Halcyon was here for that. She was the one who really got excited for that project, even though Ironridge hadn't been giving either of them much time to work on it.

And Halcyon would be back. She had disappeared; Corsica knew that much for sure. But with such a hefty penalty from her most recent use of her special talent, it must have done something big. Halcyon would be fine.

There wasn't a way for it to be otherwise.

"Corsica?"

Corsica blinked. It was Halcyon.

"Did I just-?" She felt a momentary spike of alarm, and rubbed at her eyes.

Halcyon tilted her head. "Did you what?"

"Never mind," Corsica sighed, relaxing. Must have really been a coincidence... though she reddened a little at being caught with her mane like this by a pony she actually cared about. "Look..."

She got up, walked over, and without warning grabbed Halcyon in a full-body hug.

"Hey!" Halcyon squeaked in surprise. She also smelled like soap, and was wearing her old coat. The dumb one from before her birthday.

"Got any idea how long you were gone for?" Corsica asked, not letting go. This wasn't something she frequently let herself do, and Halcyon usually didn't appreciate it, but after the price she had just paid, she deserved it.

"Howe... said almost a week..." Halcyon sounded nervous, and started squirming just a little.

Corsica sighed, let her go, stepped back and looked her over. Something about the way Halcyon was carrying herself... She couldn't put a hoof on it, but something was different. Hopefully she hadn't messed anything up too badly.

"Don't bother with excuses," Corsica said, sitting back down and returning to her soup. "Let's just say you owe me big time. For making me worry." She pushed at her snarled mane with a hoof. "Fixing this might be a good start, if you think you're up to the challenge."

It was mostly a peace offering - Halcyon had asked to do that, once, months ago in Icereach, and Corsica felt just a little bad for accosting her with a hug. But she was also fishing for a reaction indicating Halcyon did or didn't remember the last time. Because some part of her, deep down, was hoping that this was still the other Halcyon, the one she met in the hideout, and they could talk some more...

If that was even how it worked, and the other Halcyon wouldn't remember that too. Maybe it was a dumb test. Corsica sighed.

"Err... yeah. Sure," Halcyon replied, sounding distracted. "Look, I... have something to tell you. In private. Are you busy?"

Corsica gave her an expression that said I'm eating soup.

"Right. I..." Halcyon looked away, as if she had just been distracted by something invisible.

"Lemme finish my soup," Corsica said. "And take a shower. And then we can talk. Good?"

Halcyon pointed halfheartedly at Coda's airship, visible over the opposite wall. "There's a bath up there. Much nicer than the ones here. Didn't actually realize it until I trekked all the way back to Jamjars' to get my clothes, but... One moment. I'll be back."

Corsica watched, slurping her soup, as Halcyon beat a slightly-too-quick pace out through the main gate of Fort Starlight.

Some days, Halcyon's thoughts were plain and easy to read. But other days, she hadn't a clue what that kid was thinking.

"Do you mind?" I asked, staring at Procyon, a safe distance away from Fort Starlight. "I've literally just been on my own for hours on end, during which you could have floated around and waved at me as much as you want, but now I'm trying to talk to my best friend. What is it?"

Procyon raised a colorful hoof, cutting me off. "Yes. I know. Good on you for taking space and handling yourself as well as you are after all that. I just wanted to let you know, before you got too familiar or vulnerable or anything, that Papyrus has been spying on you for a while now."

I blinked.

"I didn't think it was worth coming out to mention when you weren't saying anything interesting for him to hear," she said, turning away. "Now I'll stop interrupting you. Good luck."

I watched quizzically as she floated away. "That's all?"

Procyon stopped and shrugged. "I've got plenty of thoughts and plenty to say, but you look like you're doing fine without it. Why risk ruining that? We'll talk later. It's not like I'll be going anywhere, ever..."

And then she was gone.

I turned to look for Papyrus. He wasn't impossible to find.

"What are you doing up there?" I shouted up at a giant pile of rubble, the pegasus peeking out at me from an alcove three quarters of the way up. "You're not very good at hiding."

"Me?" Papyrus innocently put a hoof to his chest, then soared down to meet me. "I was practicing monologueing to myself! Admirable quality, always wished I had a friend who enjoyed it too. I'm being completely serious, by the way." He gave me a serious look. "Anyway, what have you been up to, Butterfly? Most days I'm pretty fast at finding fools who fear being followed, but ever since the sky went topsy-turvy, it's like you blinked out of existence."

"That's kind of private," I countered, straightening my priorities in my head: give Corsica and Mother my spare Writs of Harmonic Sanction, and skip town before anything else happened. A very simple list that didn't need to involve Papyrus.

"Private?" Papyrus's eyes twinkled. "I love private things! But, if they're really not for me to know, I suppose I could be persuaded to butt out. Nice coat, by the way. Much better than your old one." He gave me a wing signal that I was pretty sure meant cool approval.

"Thanks...?" As always, I wasn't sure how to handle him.

Papyrus swaggered. "By the by, I've been on loan recently to Fort Starlight - Egdelwonk's orders, don't ask - and Valey's had me looking for you. Apparently you made her some sort of promise to stay out of trouble and let the adults handle things, then gave her the slip the moment her back was turned?"

I didn't remember making such a promise. Granted, I had been exhausted at the time, so maybe I was just forgetful... but I wasn't about to tell that to Papyrus. "I'm pretty sure I'm older than you," I said, turning toward the compound. "So, is she waiting for me right now?" I might not mind a chance to press her for answers, now that I knew enough that it would be harder to hide them from me...

"Perhaps," Papyrus mused. "She was in a meeting in Cold Karma, but maybe that's wrapped up by now. And if it isn't, I'm sure it will be soon. Plus, after the last few days, you're the last pony who gets to complain about being kept waiting. Now hop to it, Butterfly! If you get there before her, you'll have the room to yourself to practice your monologues."

I scurried along, more than a little annoyed, not about to waste the invitation to be rid of him.

Valey wasn't there when I arrived. But, I was a good guest, so I waited, and waited... and eventually, after the sun had moved enough that I realized it wasn't casting shadows anymore, like all its light had become ambient instead of point-source, Valey returned.

"Politics reek," she greeted, bags under her eyes as she collapsed into the shadows and swam under her door, not bothering to unlock it. "And you can totally come in," I heard from the other side of the door.

Feeling a little weird about it, I swam in after her.

When I surfaced, Valey was already at her desk, hind legs on the table. She seemed to want me to speak first.

I didn't know what to say.

She sighed and sat up straighter. "So, uh... What did I tell you," she began, "about sitting this one out?"

Oh. Maybe I did remember that.

My backwards ears fell.

"Listen, kid," Valey said. "I'm too nice to give you this talk in a way that'll make it stick, so just, like, pretend I'm a massive hypocrite who's chewing you out right now for running off to do something important to you while doing the exact same thing myself. Nice? Nice. Now that we've got that over with, you alright? Anything you need? My hooves are just a little full at the moment, but still, I'm here for ya."

My muzzle scrunched in confusion. "What?"

"What do you need?" Valey shrugged. "Advice, answers, resources? You look better than you did a week ago. Back then, you look like you'd just dragged yourself through the foothills of Griffonstone. Couldn't just let you fling yourself back in for more. Now that you've slept it off, or did whatever you did, what next?"

I took a deep breath. "You knew," I said. "About... what I am. And why I was in Icereach. And why everyone in Ironridge was so eager to get me on their team."

Valey nodded seriously. "Yup. Sure did. To be honest, I was gobsmacked when I first realized you didn't know. You wanna make sure we're on the same page, with whatever you just found out?"

I swallowed. "Coda's... a fake. That they made because they didn't have me."

"Not a fake," Valey sighed. "She's the real thing, just as much as you are. But, uh, yeah. You know..." She gestured at the window. "Her mom? Nyala? She was my sister. Bananas if I know what she was thinking, joining up with that group for a plan like that. Especially when she knew about you, in Icereach." She folded her forehooves on the desk and leaned forward. "Well? What do you wanna know?"

"Why now?" I asked. "I tried so hard to get answers, and got so much resistance. Why just straight-up offer to tell me?"

"World changed." Valey shrugged. "Stuff I've been trying to stop since soon after you were born is now in motion. Buying more time is no longer an option. The first time we met, you were getting harassed by every division of Cold Karma to join up with them, and were super paranoid I'd try to recruit you too, remember? I said I wasn't gonna make that offer, because I figured maybe if I used what influence I had to take some pressure off you, you could have a bit more time to grow up and live normally before choosing what you wanna do with your powers and your life. Now, that time is up, so I might as well put everything on the table."

I looked away, searching for words. "After all this, I almost don't know... what to ask, anymore. What about Jamjars?"

"What about her?" Valey raised an eyebrow. "Did she know who you were? Yeah, I can't imagine she didn't. Impossible to know what that mare is truly thinking, though. She's a real piece of work. Letting you stay with her wasn't a mistake, was it?"

"What do you mean?" I asked. "I haven't really gotten to interact with her once I realized that she owned the hideout. You know, where..."

"Yeah, I know the one," Valey interrupted. "Honestly, we're really not sure what to do with Jamjars at this point. She very obviously had something to do with the little apocalypse out there, but it's not like any of us can ask her and expect a remotely helpful answer. So she's kind of just tied up in a dungeon right now."

"Tied up in a dungeon?" My ears pricked in alarm, then went back down. "What happened between you, anyway? It's always a thing everyone is vague about. No one's told me the real story."

Valey gave me a look. "Guess you're never gonna rest until you hear it start to finish, huh?"

I met her eyes. "Please?"

Valey sighed... then opened a drawer and pulled out a familiar scroll. "Gerardo probably showed you this on your way here. Maybe I showed it to you myself. Don't remember. Anyway, know what this is?"

I swallowed. "A Writ of Harmonic Sanction."

"Bingo." Valey nodded, juggling the writ with a wingtip. "So, this might be a bit of a story, and I might repeat a few things I already told you just because I've danced around this a lot, so it'll be better to have the full story at once. Starlight... She's a filly who was traveling with us, with me and Gerardo and Jamjars and whoever else you know on our big airship tour of the world. Thing is, Starlight's an Equestrian. The Plains of Harmony, south of the Aldenfold? That's what they call it there. No one really knows how, but this pre-teen unicorn filly with a defective horn hiked across a mountain range so big, the first generation of airships couldn't even summit the initial cliff face. Seriously, don't question it. Barely even registers on that filly's resume of miracles. And, if you know what this is, you know that Equestria doesn't really think highly of their border being crossed."

"Starlight didn't have a writ?" I guessed.

"Nah." Valey shook her head. "Didn't matter at first. No Equestrians up here to care. Eventually, though, we hopped the border to Equestria, a whole boat full of a dozen-odd ponies. Did it to escape all the badness going down in the east. By some fluke, Chrysalis or her invasion knocked out all the power, which caused the magic barrier that usually repels ponies without writs to drop. So, all of us made it to Equestria, mostly without writs."

I nodded, listening intently. "And then there was something about it they could do."

"Yeah..." Valey rubbed at the back of her neck. "They were surprisingly chill about it, thanks to us being a bedraggled boatload of refugees and a million other extenuating circumstances, and we even got to parlay extensively with their boss. Princess Celestia? She's an alicorn. The real deal, not a pretender like Coda. Anyway, after we had a bit to recover, we went back to the border to go live in Ironridge again. And, on the way, we passed through Starlight's hometown."

She shifted uncomfortably in her chair. "Our lives, on that ship? It was rough for all of us. We were trying to figure out who we were, clinging to each other because we all had the same problems, but that just meant they were problems none of us knew the answers to. But it was particularly hard on her. She had powers none of us understood, like fate itself would sometimes bend over backwards to accommodate her and other times form an impassable wall in her way. And after we stayed a day or two in her old town, she made the decision, along with this mare called Maple, to stay there. Settle down, get off the journey. Thing is, Maple was a northerner. Not a native Equestrian like Starlight."

I held my breath.

"We had spare writs, believe it or not," Valey said. "Well, one spare writ, by that time. So, the idea was, with the whole group's blessing, we'd give it to Maple, and she and Starlight could legally stay there. And Jamjars..."

She hung her head. "I've tried so many times to empathize with what must have been going through that kid's head. She probably thought she was losing her only friend, or whatever. But, anyway, she stole the writ and used it on herself so Maple couldn't stay behind. Poor idiot didn't remember that Starlight would need a writ to stay with us, even if she changed her mind about staying in Equestria. We couldn't afford to bite Equestria after they'd been as nice as they had been to us. And, so, eventually... Starlight stayed behind, alone."

My heart felt like a bowling ball. "What was stopping you from breaking the law and just taking her anyway?"

"You don't understand." Valey shook her head. "Starlight was miserable. Even before that stunt, but that was the final straw. She needed to stop, though. Every last one of us was on board with saying screw Equestria and bringing her back, except for her. We even flew back across the border the very next day to try again. But she had made up her mind."

"That's not right," I protested stiffly. "You could have done something..."

"Oh, we did do something," Valey vowed, her eyes becoming deadly serious. "We went off looking for more writs. Simple, right? All we had to do was find one more, and then Maple could take it and fly south to meet her. Which, as soon as we got one more, she did." She looked at the writ in her wing. "This part, I told you a lot more about. But if you need a reminder... we had a bargain with Princess Celestia that, if we could ever get six of these and have all the bearers of them together, as friends, within the next fifteen years, she'd open the gates and let everyone through, forever." She scowled. "Probably don't need to do the math for you, but we didn't make it in time."

I didn't know what to say. "Why didn't Princess Celestia...?"

"Do anything about it?" Valey shrugged. "Well, we were in the middle of a major international incident at the time, which believe it or not wasn't the Chrysalis one. Eventful year, that one. I've seen Celestia once since then. It was after Maple left, and it kind of ended with me having more obligations than before, not less. By then, enough time had passed that I just asked her to leave Starlight alone, since that kid needed less special attention in her life, not more."

She got up and paced over to the window. "Anyway, not long after we parted ways with Starlight, I got tied up in this windigo business that's culminated in our present situation. That one, I'm certain I told you about: there's a million and a half windigoes sealed by a barrier under Yakyakistan. They wanted to reinforce the barrier with a certain harmonic artifact of mine, and if Starlight ever learned I gave it up she would come to get it back for me. Starlight can also beat windigoes in a fight. So, Yakyakistan was basically being coy and asking me for bait to lure Starlight over to deal with their windigo problem."

I knew about this. "Ludwig told me the same thing," I offered. "The windigo at Icereach. He said the reason they wanted to start this war was to make Yakyakistan lose on purpose. He said if there was a big final battle at the center of Yakyakistan, the chaos from it would give the windigoes enough of a boost to escape once and for all."

"Did he?" Valey rubbed her face with a wing. "Bananas, that's some good intel. Sorry you had to deal with a windigo to get it. Those things can drive even the sturdiest soul insane in a matter of minutes."

"Speaking from experience?" I guessed.

Valey shrugged. "You know Kitty? I knew her before she had that body. She, uh... once kidnapped me and dragged me halfway across a continent to go hang out in a seaside resort town. It's a long story."

I squinted. Even a windigo wouldn't do something so... out there.

"Yup." Valey nodded, seeing my look. "So, enough about the past. You asked about Jamjars. What else do you want to talk about? And if you're out of ideas, what are you going to do next?"

"What are you going to do next?" I asked. "With Ironridge? And your coup?"

"Politics." Valey scowled. "Never been my favorite part. Ironridge presently contains no less than four Changeling Bishops, and that's only the ones I know of. Three of them are involved in Cold Karma's government. We've sealed the windigoes here for now, killed the leader of the military and usurped Junior Karma, and have a real position in the government. But we don't have the resources to fight those bishops, don't have the resources to keep the government running without them, and don't understand why they aren't moving against us when Yakyakistan is presently under changeling control and also our primary enemy. So what I'll be doing, one way or another, is flailing around in the dark trying to learn why things are the way they are and hoping I can do so before I either break something or get backstabbed. Sound like fun?"

I blanched, then almost brightened. "Sounds exactly like what I've been doing since getting to Ironridge."

"Poor kid." Valey shrugged. "Yeah, if you thought it ever stops being that way, I hope I broke it to you gently. I'm guessing you aren't super eager to help with that."

"Not really..." I backed away, though somehow felt immeasurably better knowing that someone this powerful felt the same way I did.

"Hey, though." Valey kicked her desk. "If you've got nothing else, mind if I ask what you were doing the last week? Some folks were, uh... worried. To put it gently. Corsica in particular, you owe the biggest thank-you-slash-apology your inclinations can manage, if you know what I mean."

"I was trying to talk to her when Papyrus started stalking me to tell me to meet with you," I sighed. "Anyway, I'm... err... Probably a dumb question after how much sensitive information you've given me, but you can keep a secret, right?"

Valey nodded, and pursed her lips in interest.

I reached into the pockets of my coat and pulled out my remaining two Writs of Harmonic Sanction, one in each wing.

Valey's jaw hit the floor.

"...Are those real?" she eventually managed.

I nodded. "Stole 'em from Jamjars, I think. Six months ago. Found them in a secret compartment in the hideout after being stranded by Aldebaran. There were originally three, but I used one on myself before I learned what they were."

My gaze drifted to the window. "I've heard Coda left me her airship. So, I'm gonna give these to my friends and go to Equestria. No particular reason there instead of anywhere else. And for all I know, the pony I'm looking for could be anywhere. I just want to get us all a break from Ironridge."

Valey chuckled weakly. "Three whole writs, huh? Wonder who she stole them from. Any chance this pony you're looking for is Starlight?"

I shook my head, thinking of the faint spark of pink in my chest. "Their name is Fluttershy, and I know basically nothing about them," I said. "Sound familiar?"

Valey looked thoughtful. "Never heard of 'em, but that's definitely an Equestrian name. Rule of thumb, if it sounds like a flavor of ice cream, it's probably an Equestrian. Bananas." She pulled out her own writ again. "And here I was thinking of trying to foist this on you."

I blinked. "Me? Don't you need those to reunite all your friends with Starlight?"

Valey shrugged. "Kinda. Sorta. Look, I told you about how the best I can possibly do in these circumstances is keep the north's problems in the north, right? Keep all this mess with windigoes and changelings and stuff as far away from Starlight as possible? So even if I can't see her again, I can still stop her from having to deal with this?"

I nodded. "Yeah..."

"I dunno how much longer I can keep that up," Valey said. "You see, for, uh, reasons... Equestria might not be super happy with what's currently going on up here. You can probably think of a few yourself. There's a pretty decent chance they're going to get involved somehow before all this is over. And Starlight needs to not get swept up in that. So, I was... kinda hoping you could find her, and warn her. To stay away."

"To stay away?" I blinked. "You mean you want me to come tell her that you need help."

"What!?" Valey stood straight up. "Bananas, that's the opposite of what I said."

"But it's what you meant, right?" I guessed, a sixth sense telling me beyond certainty that Valey believed her old friend could fix this, and knew she couldn't do it on her own. "You can't say it directly because you don't want to betray your duty to her. But, it's been nearly twenty years. Wherever she is now, she's all grown up. Maybe... she's ready to handle it, now. Asking a foal for help wouldn't be right, but you're hoping that maybe now she can really manage it. Properly, this time."

Valey looked ashamed, and didn't meet my eyes. "Look. You... remind me of her. Just a little. You might be older and better-adjusted, but you're still in over your head. You've got powers you never asked for, don't know your place in the world and are lacking a place to call home, right? I never could connect with Starlight nearly as well as I wanted, even though I'm basically her aunt, or her cool big sis. If it's you... Well, you'll probably be better at reading her than I will. You wouldn't have the ghost of how I failed her looking over your shoulder. And, if you decide that asking her for help isn't right? That it would be better for her to stay wherever she is now, and let the world sort out its problems on its own? I wouldn't mind if you were out of harm's way with her."

"No," I said resolutely. "I will search for her. In fact, I even have a lead on where she might be, and know how to get more. But even if I can't convince her to come back, or decide I shouldn't convince her that you need each other, I will be back. You're right that I don't have a home, and that's not gonna change if I keep abandoning every place I've been before I can put down ties. I have real power. It's bogus to suggest that I've got a responsibility to stop this war because I'm Chrysalis's daughter. But whether I deserve that responsibility or not, I want it. And if nothing else, I'm going to find a way to save Coda."

"You heard about her, huh?" Valey raised an eyebrow.

"Saw her." I shrugged. "I went down to the bottom of the world. Found an elevator back up. Went straight through the hangar with all those Whitewings."

"Bananas...!" Valey gritted her teeth. "I knew we should have scoured the blueprints more thoroughly..." She focused on me again. "How'd you get down? What were you doing for a whole week? And what did you find? I... kinda assumed it was a lost cause after the sky..."

"I went through the caves." I shrugged. "It was a little rough. Apparently being a changeling queen means I can regenerate from injuries. I don't think I was too late, though. Do... you know anything about a pink flame, down there?"

Valey was completely taut. "Yep. Know it well. Used to go down there all the time before the Steel Revolution. What did you see, and what did you do? And what do you mean, you don't think you were too late?"

"It's a long story," I began. "But if there's anything you know that might help me with what I'm trying to do, I might as well tell you everything..."

Apologies

Over the course of an hour, I told Valey almost everything. How I met with Garsheeva. The screaming I thought I heard, coming from the crystals. How I talked myself into making the descent. What it was like down there, and how I fell when the ladder broke. The structure I found at the bottom of the tunnels, and how it was made of crystal. The pink flame, and the machines nearby. How the flame had called for help, and how I had absorbed it into my emptiness. I didn't talk about my other selves, or my mental state. But on the details of my excursion, I spared no words.

Valey, for her part, never interrupted, not for the slightest question. And, when I finished, she sat back and sighed.

"Well?" I asked, feeling hollow and a little fuzzy after opening myself so thoroughly to another pony.

"So, first off," Valey said, leaning forward and crossing her forelegs. "You're probably immortal. Didn't get the greatest look myself, but your mom had a real nasty habit of healing off her injuries. You got any sort of history with injuries? Large, small, anything?"

I shrugged. "...Yeah. I got put in the hospital once back in Icereach after some shrapnel hit me. From the Aldebaran incident. It felt kind of strange at the time. My memories are a little hazy, but I thought it should have been much worse than it was. I don't think there's been much other than that. I used to spar with the military yaks for fun, but they went out of their way not to hurt me too much."

"Sparring with military yaks?" Valey raised an eyebrow. "Bananas, those guys are tough opponents. Yeah, though. Wish I could tell you more about how that regeneration ability works, but you're probably better off asking an immoral scientist about that one..." She rubbed the back of her head. "Either way, if you can contain an entire flame of harmony, you're made of ridiculously sturdy stuff. Even with the flame in such a weakened state... I don't wanna bore you with magical techno-jargon, but let's just say that's not a very safe thing for most mortals to do."

"I'm a scientist," I said. "I like techno-jargon."

"Then I should introduce you to Shinespark," Valey said, leaning back. "Her hobbies are science and philosophy. Great combination if you like talking about things that mean stuff to only two other ponies in the world."

My face fell. "Would have been nice if you did that a few days ago. Though, I guess I didn't need her help to get down there after all."

"Sorry." Valey shrugged. "As you might be able to guess, it's not just a place we want anyone to be able to get to. And, also a place that the wrong ponies already are. Moving on, though: how much do you know about the flame you just gobbled? Or the place where you found it?"

My backwards ears fell. "...Nothing. But, I could understand if you told me. Back in Icereach, me and Corsica were studying ether crystals. We had a chapel deep in the caves, with access to the ether river. We-"

"Yup. Practically grew up in that chapel," Valey interrupted with a nod. "Go on, though."

I collected my train of thought. "We were studying the fault planes that form in the crystals in response to magical stimuli. We discovered that many of them line up with the dates of major historical events, implying that something significant happening all the way across the world can affect the crystals all the way in Icereach. But I never saw anything like that flame."

Valey nodded slowly. "Alright. So, brace yourself, because this is going to be a lot to take in. First off, the river of ether is called the Lifestream. You know what ether is?"

I frowned. "We've pretty extensively studied it. It's not a normal substance by any known laws of physics. Sometimes it has no chemical properties at all, and other times it produces enough energy to be a base for fuel. It can alternately be crystal or liquid, but doesn't seem to have freezing or melting-"

Valey cut me off with a shake of her hoof. "Nah, nah, not how it works. What it is."

I gave her a blank stare.

"Ether," Valey said, "is the world's will to exist. It's a material that's, like... not only physical. It's a duality, because it's just as much an idea that you can hold in your head as a thing you can hold in your hooves. Sparky explains this better than me."

I blinked at her. "How do you know this? Are you sure? How would you even design an experiment to test something like that?"

"Uhh..." She shrugged. "Honestly, it's been a while. It wasn't through empirical science. My friends and I learned pretty much everything we know through stubbornness and risk-taking and finding the right ancient entities to talk to. Like that flame." She pointed a hoof at my chest.

"What is it?" I pressed. "The flame, then?"

Valey nodded at me. "You're from Icereach. Pretty close to Yakyakistan. You probably know the basic tenets of their faith?"

My ears fell again. "Not from any trustworthy source. Icereach didn't make it easy to learn these things."

"Alright, then." Valey straightened up. "There are nine virtues that the yaks venerate. Three societal virtues: love, hope, and knowledge. Six personal virtues: laughter, loyalty, kindness, honesty, generosity, and the spark. The societal virtues are traits that Yakyakistan believes should be embodied in a fully enlightened society in order for it to evolve: knowledge provides a foundation and a building material, love provides the direction to use it in, and hope provides the will to use it in the first place. The personal virtues are traits individuals are supposed to dedicate themselves to. Like, picking your favorite and focusing on it. In case you're wondering what a spark is, it's supposedly a wildcard trait for the glue that keeps ponies with the other traits together. So, got all that?"

I slowly nodded.

"Boss." Valey tapped her forehooves together. "So, I'm not a historian and couldn't tell you exactly how their faith evolved, but it's not completely bogus: those nine virtues are real. There are, in the lifestream, nine focal points scattered around the world, each one corresponding to its own virtue, where there is a crystal palace and a flame of harmony. Ironridge is built on top of one of them. Ours is Kindness. The flames are like intelligent power sources at the hearts of the crystal palaces. You could think of them as hyper-distilled shards of the world's soul, sitting there and doing whatever in their seats of power. And now, one of them..." She leaned forward and tapped my chest. "Is apparently mostly dead and guttering on in you."

My eyes grew wider and wider the longer she talked. "A piece of the world's... soul? The world is alive?"

"That's what all the evidence I've seen points to." Valey leaned back again. "Now, maybe you're thinking, bananas, this seems really dangerous, why is that hot bat telling me all this? Or maybe you're thinking about how screwed you are because you stuck your neck out and acted on instinct and are now in too deep. Well, I'm telling you this because you really did stick your neck out and are now in too deep."

"But..." My eyes wavered. "The gray sky. This flame... You mean, like, the world is dying?"

"Eh." Valey shrugged. "If it makes you feel any better, it was already down two flames before this one. That said, yeah. I can tell you with a pretty high degree of confidence that not only is this world in the twilight of its life, but it's not the first world to exist, either. There was a world before ours called Indus. And when it met its end, every single one of its inhabitants banded together, pushed science past its limit, and created a new home for themselves in this world. Hopefully we've still got a few thousand years left for technological advancement before we reach that point, but one day it'll come."

I stared at her. "You can't be serious."

"Why not?" Valey raised an eyebrow. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not rolling out the welcome mat for the end of all things. And if you want to help prolong the world's lifespan, doing what the flame says and tracking down this Fluttershy is probably not the worst you could do. But... even ridiculously exceptional individuals like you and me have our limits. If you wanna do some good for the world, bananas, we could use you. But I know what happens when someone with too much power and not enough stability in their life gets handed more than they can carry."

I swallowed. "If that was on the table... When everyone was arguing when the tower first appeared, you made it sound like someone did this on purpose. Or, someone else made it sound that way. Sorry, I've... had a lot on my mind. But would someone really do that?"

Valey shrugged. "Yeah, Jamjars sounded a little guilty when she was arguing with the windigo. I think I told you, but that's why we've got her locked up now. She always was a schemer. I've had my hooves a lot more full with preparing for the future than litigating the past, though, so I haven't exactly had the time to investigate and properly cast blame."

"Can... I talk to her?" I ventured. "I'm still... wrapping my head around everything that's happened. Everything I've learned. She must have known who and what I was, though."

Valey nodded. "You wanna ask if she was planning to use you for something or other?"

I bit my lip. Honestly, I wasn't sure how to articulate what I wanted to ask. It felt like there was something I needed to say to her, and it was all jumbled up in my head and I wouldn't understand what it was until I just went and said it. I felt betrayed, sure, but I just... wanted to see what she had to say for herself.

Valey read my look. "Yeah, if you want to, you can chat her up. I probably don't need to give you the lecture about not getting super manipulated, right? Words are powerful tools, even for someone who's locked up."

"Thanks," I said. "I... Are we done, here?"

"Up to you." Valey stretched in her chair. "If I were you, I'd need some time to think before I had too much to ask. I'm sure that no matter how long we spend here, you'll kick yourself for forgetting something the moment you step outside the door."

"I can come back, though?" I asked. "If I need to ask more?"

"If you don't, I'm dragging you back anyway," Valey said. "Got some stuff to give you for your trip, if you're headed to Equestria."

I couldn't think of more to ask, and so we left the office, heading for where Jamjars was being kept. My train of thought felt fuzzy, the big picture blurry and obscured. Did something need to be wrong? I was fed, clothed, washed, not under physical strain and not pressured by any immediate daily obligations. If I ignored everything Valey just told me, everything I had learned about my past - and I was pretty sure I could ignore it - I would feel normal.

Blissfully, pleasantly normal.

Thinking about that sensation, basking in it as we walked, I realized how badly I deserved a break.

The muffled mental silence didn't get to last, as we entered a darkened room that looked like a maintenance corridor for the blown-out building Fort Starlight's airships were piled together in. It was certainly more solid than the ships up above, and with more level flooring, too. A few words were exchanged, and I was ushered into a room with a reasonable amount of amenities that could roughly be described as a makeshift jail cell.

Jamjars was laying in a hammock tied between two lifeless mana boilers, playing with a length of yarn in her aura. She looked over at me as I entered without turning her neck.

The door closed behind me. We were alone.

I noticed the complete lack of restraints in the room. There was a vanity, a proper bed, a bookcase, even a few paintings on the walls. I even saw an unsecured ventilation shaft that a determined escapee could crawl through, if they were limber. This felt less and less like a prison and more like they really just didn't know what to do with Jamjars, and she was staying here by choice rather than going to the hassle of getting out and then figuring out what to do next.

"Well," Jamjars said when I didn't talk. "I imagine Valey or someone else has been filling your head with talk about what a hag I am, and now you're here to see if the rumors are true. It's times like this that make me hate losing, I guess... Might as well get on with it. What can the evil Jamjars, source of all things bad in the world, confess to now?"

She was good at hiding it, but there was an undeniable bitterness in her voice. She sounded more sad than guilty or defiant. A skilled actor could do that on purpose, of course, to build sympathy and lure someone into a trap... but I was tired of being that paranoid, no matter how warranted it might be.

"Why do you think everyone hates you that much?" I asked. "You're taking the conclusions I'll draw for granted."

Jamjars just raised an eyebrow.

I tried harder to tell what she was feeling. She was hurt, and not physically...

"Look, I'm not here to pry," I said with a shake of my head. "Valey did tell me some stuff about you, but I wanted to hear your side of it as well. And... you know, about what I am, and why I was in Icereach."

Jamjars rolled her eyes. "Cruel, manipulative Jamjars, opening her home to you and maintaining a no-questions-asked policy for anything you wanted to get up to."

"Knock it off!" I snapped. "I want to hear your side of things, not what you think everyone else would tell me! Why are you wallowing in here, anyway? If you're evil, you'd be plotting your escape, but if you're good, is Valey really not willing to offer you a chance? Because this is a way more cushy room than is given to someone who's ran out of chances."

Jamjars gave me an owlish look, trying to read me.

I sighed. "Just say what you're thinking. I'm not interested in politics and I don't have a side. I'm just trying to make some sense out of the things that have happened in my life. Or do you really have such a low opinion of me that you think I must be trying to trick you just because... I don't know, what even has happened since we were on good terms? So I found out that you own the hideout and were probably responsible for the Aldebaran incident. My life's changed so much since then that that's basically ancient history."

Jamjars kept trying to read me, and I finally realized what I wanted to say.

"You did offer me a pretty good home," I told her. "And a job, no questions asked. Like you said. It was nice. If you were trying to use me for something, I haven't figured out what it is, and that's saying something because everyone else was painfully obvious in trying to get me on their side. I just wanna know why."

"Is being a decent pony off the table?" Jamjars shrugged. "I'm not you, but I can imagine what it must be like. Perhaps I just saw someone I felt for, and felt like giving you a better chance than the world would give you otherwise."

"...Is that really all there is?" I wasn't sure how much to press.

"Oh, you could go mining in my psyche for weeks and never run out of reasons to pin something on," Jamjars explained, rolling her eyes at the ceiling. "If I was feeling up to it, at least."

I got an idea. "Do you regret what happened? With the crystals, and the sky? That wasn't part of your plan, was it?"

"That you even need to ask proves you've spent too long talking to Valey," Jamjars sighed. "I'm not a mad scientist, and I'm a lot more interested in saving the world than breaking it. How many ponies do you know that would do something like that on purpose?"

"I dunno." I shrugged. "The windigoes? Maybe someone working for Chrysalis?"

"Windigoes aren't ponies." Jamjars waved a hoof. "And Chrysalis might have been one once, but she gave up her claim to equinity with what she did. I would know. I was there."

I nodded. "Alright. If you regret breaking the flame of harmony, will you help me fix it?"

Jamjars gave me a suspicious stare. "Do you have a plan, or just determination?"

"A plan," I said. "And I'll tell you it if you lighten up a bit, or at least tell me why you're being so prickly."

"Use your empathy," Jamjars said, rolling over in her hammock. "You should be good at it. Start with thinking about where I am right now, and how I got here."

"In a dungeon," I said. "Mostly powerless. Not completely, but all the moves you do have would have consequences worse than just doing nothing. So, you feel cornered."

"Congratulations," Jamjars muttered. "And?"

"She's scared of you," Procyon said.

I blinked, turning to her.

Procyon shrugged. "She was there when Chrysalis ascended. She told you, just now. She's seen changeling queens at their absolute worst. And the last time you two meaningfully interacted, she trapped you with stun powder and then removed your clothes and washed you to neutralize it. You weren't pleased. Your life is eventful enough that you might have even forgotten, but remember that she was likely thrown in here mere hours after that event. I can't read her mind, but I suspect she thinks you're here for vengeance."

I looked again at Jamjars, realizing Procyon was probably right.

"Look," I said. "I... forgive you, for the stun powder. You were probably under a lot of stress at the time, and I know windigoes aren't good for ponies' thoughts. Don't do it again. But, it's okay."

Procyon was right. Some of Jamjars' tension seemed to loosen.

"...Why?" she eventually asked. "It's kill or be killed out there. You make one mistake, and it's all over. If you're thinking that because you're generous with others, it'll come back to benefit you, you're-"

"I don't think that way," I interrupted. "I'm not in everything for myself."

Jamjars sighed, and didn't continue.

"If you..." I chewed on my words. "If you want, you can trust me. Sometime soon, I'm leaving Ironridge and going to Equestria, to look for Starlight. Already got my writ and my airship sorted. I don't know how she thought about you, but you obviously cared about her."

"Are you?" Jamjars raised an eyebrow. "Good luck."

"Think I'll need it?" I asked.

She took a deep breath. "Equestria isn't a nice place. I've only seen a few small areas of it. But any country with a border policy like theirs? Splitting up friends and family, just because they didn't have enough impossible-to-obtain writs? There's no justification for that. Princess Celestia seemed nice on the surface, but she could have just given us all writs and let us stay together, no matter which side of the border we were on. I needed Starlight. I tried everything to keep us together, and it only drove her further away. I wouldn't be surprised if she never wants to hear from me again, even though every one of my plans is made with her support in mind. You don't need to hear about my troubles, but you do need to temper your expectations. I saw how much Ironridge's government was out to get you. You don't want to be in a country that's even worse."

I blinked. I... hadn't really thought about that before.

But she was right. If Equestria really did enforce their Writs of Harmonic Sanction, even when the result was what Valey described... maybe I needed to temper my expectations that the next destination would be better than Ironridge.

Temper them severely.

"Thanks for the heads-up," I told her. "But I'm still going. And I will tell her that you miss her."

Jamjars closed her eyes. "...Thanks. Just don't get your hopes up."

I looked away. "Tell me about when Aldebaran came to Icereach. You must have known about it. I'm not mad anymore. I just want answers."

"What's to say?" Jamjars shrugged. "I didn't have much of a hoof in it. That hideout is legally owned by me, but Kitty still looks like a kid, and was much younger when we became partners. Part of our contract was that I do all the public-facing things, and paperwork. Not like I wasn't a kid myself at the time. That incident was... supposed to be an aptitude test of sorts for Aldebaran. Kitty enjoys taking the measure of her prospective minions. I was something of an intermediary, both having ties to Icereach and being the one who discovered Aldebaran in the first place. I was trying to get you and your friends out of Icereach before all this war business started, but you know better than me how that went down."

"You really just wanted to protect us?" I looked levelly at her. "All the crazy motives flying around Ironridge, and you're that nice?"

"I thought we already established you believed I was a nice, cuddly, harmless princess of goodness and niceness," Jamjars grunted. "Make up your mind. And excuse me for feeling a smattering of kinship with you when all three of you had parent issues and so did I. I'm not so twisted that I can't look at kids in a place I once was and not want better for them."

"Mother was a good parent," I gently protested. "She gave everything she had and more for me."

Jamjars snorted. "Giving everything you have and more is called going into debt. I'm sure you love her, but you just haven't seen a real relationship yet to be jealous of."

I tilted my head quizzically.

"Don't give me that look," Jamjars sighed. "Just because I'm a chronic bachelorette who carries out seductive mail correspondences with lonely, divorced officials twice my age to gain power and influence doesn't mean I can't recognize a healthy family when I see it. Ugh, Starlight never appreciated how lucky she was..."

"And you also adopted a windigo," I pointed out. "Why did you take in Kitty, anyway? How long have you been working together, and what for?"

Jamjars hesitated. "That's... dangerous. To say."

"You do a lot of dangerous stuff," I pointed out. "And if you really had a good reason to do what you've been doing, and just don't trust anyone to see it charitably because you're not used to being trusted, isn't it better to have someone else know? I'm already neck deep in dangerous secrets. My very existence is a dangerous secret."

Jamjars looked conflicted. "You don't know what you're asking."

"I'm a changeling queen," I whispered. "The world is alive, but it's dying. Yakyakistan and Ironridge are going to war, and if there's a battle over the Yakyakistan capitol, it could unleash a swarm of windigoes that causes untold devastation. All that's to say nothing of what could happen if Yakyakistan wins, since it's probably controlled by Chrysalis. And I have a chance to make a difference against all of that. What could be more dangerous than that?"

I was trusting her, by saying what until now was unspoken. I didn't know for sure that all of this was information she knew. And given how everyone else treated her, it was probably stupid. But it felt like the right choice.

Jamjars just shook her head.

"That's all I get, eh?" I shrugged, giving up with a wry smile.

"I'm never going to be remembered fondly, no matter which course I choose," Jamjars said. "So, it's not much of a sacrifice for me to pursue my goals through unsavory means. Maybe history will judge me for associating with the windigoes. Maybe it won't. Either way, Valey and her friends are trying to do right by themselves, you're trying to do right by yourself, and I'm trying to do right by myself within the means that I have."

I squinted at her. "You know, you say that, but have you ever sincerely apologized to Valey? For trying to keep your friends together? You were a kid at the time, and in a really bad situation. When she told me about it, she sounded more regretful than vengeful. Are you that certain your bridges are burned beyond mending?"

Jamjars scrunched her face. "Certain. Two hundred percent."

"Even if-" I lifted a hoof in protest.

"I burned them the first time and I burned them again and I'd keep doing it over and over as long as I have bridges to burn," Jamjars interrupted. "I did it with you with the stun powder, and even if you're feeling charitable now it's only a matter of time until it happens again. Doesn't matter if I want to or not. This is my lot in life. I was born without the ability to sincerely apologize and raised to live with the consequences. My admirable qualities are looks, money, influence and cunning, and that's a set that's meant for drawing ponies in and manipulating them for the short term, not forging lasting friendships. And I had the gall to try for something better than that with you, and three weeks in, look where it's gotten us."

"Where has it gotten us?" I raised an eyebrow. "You in jail and having me as a visitor instead of nobody? I'd say that's a pretty good start."

Jamjars gave me a look. "I still haven't apologized. For the stun powder. Or the bath. You forgave me, apropos of nothing, and I still can't say it."

"How come?" I asked, sounding as non-judgemental as I could.

Jamjars clenched her teeth.

"I guess it could sting a little, admitting you were wrong," I ventured. "If you were expecting yourself to be perfect. But you've been kinda self-deprecating down here. Not exactly sounding like someone on an ego trip. And now you look mad at yourself for not being able to spit it out. Like you want to, and you can't."

Jamjars sighed and deflated.

I frowned... then got an idea. It made me cold just at the thought of doing it, but I was stronger now. I could do this.

Off came a boot. Just one - no need to overdo it. "Look," I said, showing off a bloodstained hoof.

Jamjars gave me a confused glance.

"It's fine," I insisted, feeling very much not fine, turning to catch the light better to emphasize my point. "I'm... alright with this." Very much not alright, but it was for a good cause. "It's not that bad."

"Stop it." Jamjars looked away. "And put that back on. I can see the discomfort on your face. Making it something that doesn't need an apology won't fix my problem, anyway, and it's my problem, not yours. I've already complained to you too much already. Go get on with your plans to visit Equestria."

I stared at her for a long moment, trying not to let my relief show as I re-booted my leg. This mare clearly had a lot on her mind and seemed like she could desperately use a friend who had a stable life situation and saw her as an equal... which wasn't me on either count. Maybe I could ask Valey to give her another chance, though from what I had seen, they might not just be meant for each other.

Oh well. I had a herd of windigoes trying to break free, an evil changeling queen, and a dying flame of harmony to deal with. Maybe it was for the best that Jamjars hadn't plied me with any more duties or dangerous secrets that I'd suddenly feel compelled to take up a job for. With my track record, I was woefully underqualified for my current duties as it was...

"Alright." I walked for the door. "See ya. I hope you can make some more friends, because right now, you sound like you need one."

I thought about my talk with Jamjars all the way to the Ice District, which was a much longer trip than usual because power brownouts had apparently staggered the train service. It had to be made, though, because Coda's airship was going to be my home for the foreseeable future, and that meant I had some belongings to retrieve.

My feelings toward her still weren't perfectly straight, but I could live with the way they were. Long ago were they days when my worldview would keep me up at night if it had any flaws and inconsistencies. I had a vague picture of a very flawed mare who was unable to manage normal relationships and had taken me and my friends in because she was lonely. Her interest in my powers and history likely centered less around using me and more around a hope that my uniqueness would make me something of an outcast, and thus more relatable to her.

Maybe. Jamjars was hard to read. But at the very least, she didn't seem to mean me any harm, and that was a state of affairs I could live with.

I shadow snuck under the door, announced my presence just in case, and looked around the house. A few things were in slight disarray, as though the place had been hit by a very minor earthquake, and it was ever so slightly dustier than usual. But, this was the second time I had been back since visiting the crystal palace, so I didn't feel like searching too thoroughly.

Hmm... I stared at my door. Well, the door I shared with Corsica. If I was inviting her to come with me, maybe I should move her stuff too...

Down the hall, a different door creaked open, and Ansel stepped out.

"Hallie!" he greeted, relief evident on his face. "I've seen neither hide nor hair of you for an entire week! You're not avoiding me, are you? Though it would be fair if you were, but I assumed, since Jamjars and Corsica have also been gone..." He rubbed the back of his neck. "You've probably seen what an uproar the city's in. Listen, whatever you've been up to, I just wanted to apologize for Blueleaf. I wanted to show you a good time, have a little adventure, you know..."

I stared blankly at him. Blueleaf... The weapons shop... Getting arrested...

How long had it been since I had last talked with my brother?

In terms of waking hours, probably barely three days. In terms of life-changing events, multiple lifetimes. I couldn't even remember what we had last done together, beyond how it ended.

A wastebasket sat at the end of the hallway, behind Ansel. I spotted Egdelwonk peering out, holding a tiny sign that said I told you to follow up on the weapons emporium.

Well. This was a relationship I would need to spend a lot of maintenance on.

Crossroads

I stared at Ansel, at a loss for how to begin.

When he realized I wasn't answering, his apologies eventually trailed off, until he finally broke eye contact. "I know that look," he sighed, looking at the wall. "It's the same one you wear when you realize you've lost track of time in the lab. You forgot all about our time in Blueleaf, didn't you?"

My ears folded back.

"How did you manage that?" Ansel veiled his incredulity, but it was still there. "I've just had the most eventful week or two of my life, and it was still all I could think about. We got thrown in jail, for goodness' sake. On false charges. I know you can get a bit absent-minded at times, but that's not the kind of thing..."

"I've had an eventful time too, alright?" I looked away as well. "I'm not absent-minded. I've just had bigger things to deal with than a little jail time. If it gives you an idea, I went back to Icereach. And, I met Ludwig again."

Ansel's jaw dropped. "You're kidding."

"Wish I was." I turned back down the hallway, motioning for him to follow. "I also learned more than I'd like about who I am, and figured out what I'm gonna be doing with my life, at least in the short term. We might wanna sit down."

"So it's like that, is it?" Ansel followed me with a raised eyebrow. "And here I thought I was special. Dare I guess what the master plan is this time?"

I eased myself onto a couch, my body still pretty sore from everything I had been through. "I've got an airship."

"Of course you do..."

"A big one." I nodded. "And multiple Writs of Harmonic Sanction. I'm going to Equestria."

Ansel watched me levelly, looking for any sign that I was pulling his tail. I had none to give.

"You realize," he began, "how phenomenally valuable those things are. I don't know how you got them, and I don't want to know, but you could sell them. Even if the buyer stiffed you and you walked out with a fraction of their real value, you'd still have enough to found an entire organization dedicated to whatever goal it is you want to achieve."

I shrugged. "Already used one on myself. Besides, I couldn't settle for living out my days in comfort and obscurity when we were in Icereach, and neither could you. And now that option's gotten a whole lot less unappealing."

Ansel shook his head. "I wasn't suggesting it hadn't. I can't go back either. And I'm not questioning what you're doing with something that should by all rights be unobtainable, or your commitment to this goal you're wanting to chase, or any of that. I'm just asking: have you done the math, and are you certain that the best way to go about whatever you're trying to do isn't to pawn off a useless slip of paper in exchange for functionally unlimited amounts of every other resource imaginable?"

I thought of the flame, begging me to take it to Fluttershy, its champion. I thought of Valey, assuring me that was an Equestrian name. I thought of Starlight, and her adventures with her friends, ones that ended in a way I still wasn't sure I fully understood but knew needed to be set right. And of how she could allegedly kill windigoes, and the filly I was responsible for who desperately needed someone who could do just that.

"I have to go," I told him. "And I've already got the resources I need. I think having some friends along for the ride would be a whole lot more helpful than an extra pile of money."

With a wing, I reached into a pocket, pulled out a rolled-up writ, and offered it to him.

Ansel just winced.

I retracted my wing slightly, forcing myself not to process this until he elaborated.

"Whatever you're looking for, you're not going to find it in Equestria," he said, eyes held firmly closed.

"How do you know?" I pressed.

"Because..." He hesitated. "It's where I'm from. Before I... became... your brother. This isn't something I ever wanted to talk with you about, but if you've seriously secured a means to go there, you need to know."

My ears somehow managed to stand straight up. "You..."

"I am," he said, folding his forelegs and still not looking at me. "And I'm only telling you this so you can take me seriously when I say it isn't worth it. Don't try to pry; I won't talk about it. Just know that there's nothing there for us."

What did I even ask first? "Do you already have a writ, then?"

Ansel just waved me off with a hoof.

"What's wrong with it?" I pressed. "You're not changing my mind, but if there's anything I can know about, to be prepared for..."

"Let's put it this way," Ansel signed. "You know what I was like back in Icereach. Particularly before the Aldebaran incident. I wanted to cling to the status quo and never let it go, because it was far and away the best I had ever had. A couch to sleep on. Occasionally running water. All I had to do to earn my keep was take care of a cranky invalid, and I had a sunny optimist like you around to brighten the days when that didn't feel good enough. It might have turned out not to be as stable as I hoped, and the last few days in particular have taught me that my situation isn't as unchangeable as I once feared, but have you ever stopped to think about how I got that way in the first place?"

"I never questioned it." I looked down. "It was way better than what I used to have, too. Why poke the illusion and risk it falling to pieces?"

Ansel nodded. "I always knew you felt the same. Listen, I've never poked or prodded too hard into why you felt that way, but for me... Do the math yourself." He slumped. "This wasn't what I was imagining we would talk about the next time I saw you."

Press him, part of me insisted. I felt defensive when he badmouthed the south, and I didn't know why. It couldn't be that bad, though, right? The Aldenfold spanned the entire world, so there had to be at least as wide a land below them as there was above. The conditions in one little part of it couldn't speak for the whole thing, could they? I wanted him to be wrong, but...

"Alright." I let it drop. For now. "What did you want to talk about? Aside from apologizing for getting arrested. Seriously, it's... not something I'm thinking about anymore."

"Well, I was mildly hoping you had nothing to do with yourself, or at least some free time," Ansel began, eagerly accepting the out. "Or barring that, that I could talk you into making some. I was building up to this last time, in Blueleaf, but I've been spending a lot of time in the Earth District. I've got some pretty good friends there, believe it or not, and was sort of hoping I could make introductions." His ears fell. "Of course, the odds that you'd hit it off and get attached to our cause are somewhat contingent on you remaining in the city where we're located."

"Oh."

He nodded. "It's a shame. I think you'd really like them. And, honestly, you were right that neither of us were going anywhere in Icereach. It was stunting our potential by not offering ideas for what we could be when we grew up, or causes for us to commit ourselves to. Maybe I was too aggressive just now, trying to convince you not to do something you really believe in. I know I wouldn't sway easily if you tried to take mine from me. I guess I was just hoping wherever we went from here, we could do it together."

Everything clicked in my head. "So you're... probably not coming with me, then."

Ansel sadly shook his head. "I've spent my whole life clinging to meager offerings, and before that searching for something even that good. Now, I've got something I'm legitimately excited about. You're my best friend, Hallie. And for a while, I got in your way and tried to stop you from leaving because you were the only thing I had. But now, well... I've got more than just you. And that means my decision is no longer so one-dimensional."

I didn't answer.

The way Ansel was talking, it sounded like he expected our conversation to go this way. Like he already knew exactly what we were going to talk about, and his answer was a foregone conclusion that didn't need to be debated, only presented. And he kind of acted like he expected me to feel the same.

Maybe I did. Everything important I had done in Ironridge, I had done without him. Even Corsica had been less of a true partner and more someone I just invited along. All the things I had to do, the reasons I wanted to go to Equestria? They were my reasons, and not anyone else's. Maybe finding my own way, independent from my friends, was just something that naturally happened to everyone as they grew up, and both me and Ansel subconsciously understood what was happening before we could articulate it.

That left just one, unasked question hanging in the air, and I knew both of us were thinking it: what was more important to us? Our goals for the future? Or our friendship in the present?

I needed to go to Equestria. Ansel wanted to stay here. One of us would have to make a sacrifice.

...Actually, maybe the reason we weren't being dramatic about this was because this was exactly the same conflict we had been rehearsing since before the Aldebaran incident. Ansel had a better reason for staying in place, now, but we just had done this so many times we knew how it would go.

"...I've gotta go," I apologized. "But, once I've found what I'm looking for, my road leads right back here, to Ironridge. So take care of yourself, yeah?"

Ansel gave me a shoulder hug. The physical contact still felt weird, but I appreciated the sentiment.

"Wait right here," he said, getting up and walking for the hall. "I've got a gift for you. And after that, you'll probably need a hoof with getting all your stuff to this airship of yours."

Corsica sat on a balcony in Fort Starlight, fashioned from half of a broken airship deck and a railing torn from a different ship. A long-empty soup bowl sat in front of her. She needed a shower. Halcyon had ducked out after acting weird, said she'd be right back... and it had been hours, and still no Halcyon.

Not that Corsica minded waiting. But at this point, she almost felt like doing something more productive with her time.

Her steps weren't springy, but were still lighter than usual as she made her way through the fort, searching for a way up to the Verdandi, the airship which supposedly contained a better shower than the ones in a military installation. Now that she was properly fed, it was a lot more obvious: she had pushed herself too hard, knocked herself unconscious from overuse of her special talent, and her mind had given itself more time to recover than just the bare minimum required to function again.

She felt... decent. Halcyon was okay - not that there had been any doubt, but now she had seen it with her own eyes. Today was a good day.

Corsica stopped on a high-up ramp between two smashed, upside-down hulls, far enough above the ground to get a good look at the sky and the crystal spire that dominated it. Even from this far back, the tower was so tall that the top was hard to make out. In the distance behind her, the Aldenfold loomed, a cliff face rising above the mountains with even more mountains on top, and she took a moment to eyeball which might be taller. The tower... It was hard to say, but her money was on the tower.

Most of the tower was an organic weave, various tendrils of crystals rising up from the city spiraling together before coming into a braid. But near the top, past the threshold where she couldn't see it clearly anymore due to the angle, it changed, growing slightly bigger but substantially more complex. Had anyone tried to scale it, yet? With an airship, it should be easy. What was up there? Was it functional? If not, what was the alternative, and why had it formed like that?

She stirred her brain for insight. If only she could get closer, maybe take some samples...

It was probably some cousin of ether crystals. That was a safe enough guess. Clearly, the tower had been conjured by some degree of magic, and the primary difference between conventional, mineral-based crystals and ether crystals was in how they reacted to magic: normal crystals were pass-through and inert, making excellent mana conductors or foci, while ether crystals reacted heavily to magic, such as in the formation of fault planes. In fact, Corsica suspected that if she could take a core sample from the tower, analysis would show it being made of one giant, singular, contiguous fault plane.

Just a hunch, based on how abruptly the tower appeared. The real experiment would be to go back to the chapel, take a new sample there, and see if a new, minor fault plane had appeared on the same day as the tower. Not that Icereach was very accessible right now...

Corsica batted an ear. There were probably more important things to be doing than speculating over the origins and purpose of the crystal tower. It wasn't like she could do anything with any epiphanies she had, after all.

Then again, it wasn't like she was looking to be productive, either. So maybe wasting time on idle curiosity was a perfect thing to do.

Corsica kept musing as she found a way into the Verdandi, determined conclusively that no one was home save for a lone guard from Fort Starlight keeping watch, and let herself inside. The bath initially didn't impress her, until she realized she had stumbled upon the one shared by all the normal cultists. Coda's personal bath, on the other hoof...

Giving flowery, over-the-top praise wasn't Corsica's style. When she found something she liked, she preferred to appreciate it by using it, instead. And so use it she did.

Hours later, warmed and dried and pampered, Corsica considered her options and decided she wasn't really feeling up to hiking back down to Fort Starlight. If Halcyon wanted to find her, she could come look in the place she told her to go. The ship's lobby was plenty cozy, with big lounge chairs and a wide, tall window that offered a decent view of the tower and Ice District together. So she lit her horn, repositioned a chair, and settled in to think.

"Yo," a voice eventually said from the entrance.

"Hey," Corsica greeted, not bothering to turn her head. It was Unless.

"Intel says Halcyon hasn't given you the lowdown yet," Unless said, walking up beside Corsica and staring out the window. "On her plans. That kid... I told her she owed you, and then she said like two words to you before wandering off to do her own thing."

Corsica shrugged. "I shooed her off. Still getting myself back together after being... ugh... for a week. Thanks for covering for me."

"Yeah, no worries." Unless kept looking straight ahead. "With what we know about your condition, I was half worried you'd wake up blind and with no ability to use magic. That, or completely freak out, start hallucinating and run away."

"Doesn't sound like a thing I'd do," Corsica grunted.

"You'd think." Unless shrugged. "From the readings we got on you, your coma was actually a lot more similar to the ones induced by that cursed sword I told you about. The symptoms, at least. Surprising, since the causes are basically polar opposites. But it's encouraging that your soul can heal from this state on its own."

Corsica let out a joyless cheer.

Unless frowned. "Yeah. I know. Anyway... Got something for ya."

She unfurled a wing, holding a scroll of faintly shimmering fabric inside.

Corsica regarded it. "What changed your mind?"

"Nothing." Unless shrugged. "Was just waiting for the right opportunity. What I didn't expect - and what you won't expect, either, unless you've really been holding out on me - is that Halcyon somehow has three of these. And she's got the same idea as you."

Corsica's eyes widened a little.

Unless glanced at her and nodded. "I just about fell out of my chair when she told me. Point is, you won't have to journey alone."

Letting her burdens weigh heavy on her shoulders wasn't something Corsica usually let happen, but a sigh of relief escaped her all the same. "Why two spares? You think we're going to drag Ansel into this a second time? You could save yourselves the resources, only let the two of us go. Even if he wants it, he doesn't have nearly as good a reason as me... if you can even call my reason good."

"Two spares?" Unless blinked. "Nah, this isn't one of Halcyon's. It's mine. Whoever she gives her other two to, that's up to her."

Corsica squinted at her. "You found four writs in your closet just for us. And you're giving them all away purely because you feel like it."

"Believe me or don't." Unless brushed her mane out of her eyes. "They're Halcyon's writs, not mine. Although I did vaguely hint to her that if she's going anywhere in Equestria, looking for Starlight might not be a bad goal, so you should be able to stick together the whole way."

"And this is really worth it to you?" Corsica asked. "You've been collecting these for longer than I've been alive. Helping me doesn't help you, and it's questionable how much I'll even be helped just by meeting someone else who uses the same kind of magic as me and had this special talent before."

Unless winked. "Starlight can give, take and move around cutie marks. If you want to be normal, she can absolutely put you back to the way you used to be. And if you decide you don't, maybe you two can share strategies for living like this. And don't get this wrong, I'm not doing it just for you. I think Halcyon stands to gain just as much from meeting her."

"And what about you?" Corsica held the writ tentatively, partially offering it back to Unless. "You don't want to see her again too?"

"Nah." Unless waved her off with a wing. "We've been over that. If she and I meet again, it's gonna be here, in Ironridge, with her coming back under her own power. I promised to keep the north's problems out of her fur, and this feels enough like breaking that promise as it is."

Corsica sighed, taking the writ again and studying it. "Suit yourself."

Unless nodded to herself for a moment. "By the way. Thanks for going on that adventure with me back to Icereach. These days, I've got too much riding on my name to go kicking face like I used to. Getting to be a faceless mook in an adventuring party for a day... Prolly wasn't a great day for you, but I had a ton of fun. Brought back some magic I'd forgotten about from the good old days."

"Thank Halcyon, not me," Corsica said. "She was the one who dragged us all along."

"Yeah, but she wouldn't get the significance." Unless scratched her rump. "Kinda surprised I haven't messed up yet and tipped her off to who I really am. You got me on day one. Being a changeling is hard... Think I should tell her?"

"Halcyon?" Corsica shrugged. "Your call."

"Eh. Probably won't, then." Unless saluted with a wing, strolling away and leaving Corsica with the writ. "Give myself something to look forward to if you somehow do return."

Ansel and I together pulled an industrial cart laden with the sum total of my and Corsica's belongings, since I couldn't imagine a world where I left without her, and we already discussed the possibility several times before everything exploded. The pockets in my coat weighed heavy, one with two spare Writs of Harmonic Sanction, and another with a book, containing Ansel's sloppy writing and as much information as he had been able to commit to paper regarding the section of Equestria he once knew.

Poor Ansel. The fact that he foresaw this day clearly enough to write a guide book, so that his knowledge could be of use to me even if he stayed behind... I was on a clock, I knew, with Yakyakistan likely flying their invasion force east even as we walked. But part of me wanted to drop the cart anyway, go down to the city floor and meet Ansel's friends and retrace his hoofsteps, learning what he had been doing over the days we had spent in Ironridge.

How different would things have gone if I had chosen to commit myself to the lower districts, rather than the upper ones? Would I be here, right now, in this exact same situation, except preparing to split our group in the other direction, me and Ansel on one side and Corsica left alone? What would I have dropped, what wouldn't I have been able to juggle? And what wouldn't I have dropped, that fell to the wayside on the path I did choose, like my nascent friendships with my co-workers at Jamjars' wedding agency?

I tried to go down there, I really did. My first days in Ironridge had involved so much exploration, but the heat proved impenetrable... Knowing what I knew now, though, I had a hunch surviving it would have been a simple matter of turning on my bracelet. The flames protected me from biting cold and poisonous fumes, brought me back from Whitewing shrapnel and a lethal fall, yet didn't actually burn me as flames were wont to do. Odds were a hundred to one they would protect me from overheating, too.

Ansel didn't speak about his friends, the cause he had adopted and made the purpose of his life. I didn't speak about mine. I had the sense that, if either of us tried to explain ourselves, it would be like judging our desires against each other, an unspoken contest of who had the worthiest reason for charting their course, laden with the implication that whoever had the weakest reason was a fool for not joining the victor. But I didn't want a contest. I didn't want to know if Ansel had discovered something of world-shattering import, didn't want to be tempted to abandon Coda and the pink flame. I didn't want to know if it was a mundane purpose, like he had found his calling working at a laundromat. I had struggled for too long to commit myself fully to something to dare try and tempt him away from his commitment.

And him... Maybe he felt the same. But, he was silent, so I couldn't really know.

"Hey," I said, as we finally approached Fort Starlight, my bracelet lit for a little extra power to help me through the end of the trek. "Promise me something, yeah?"

"What's up?" he puffed, sounding almost too winded to talk.

"Silverhorn's Plummet," I said. "You know. The lookout at Icereach, over the Trench of Greg."

"Right around where the avalanche happened," he agreed. "What of it?"

"That's where I waited," I explained. "On that day, the old Ansel and Corsica wanted to visit the tower alone, so they made me stay behind. I thought they were gonna prank me and find another way down, and leave me there all night, so I made him promise to meet me again there on his way home. He didn't really get to keep that promise. It was the last thing we ever said to each other."

Ansel raised an eyebrow. "And what's that got to do with me?"

"Just thinking," I said. "You've got something important to do in Ironridge. I've got something important to do in Equestria. When all's said and done, let's promise to meet again there, at Silverhorn's Plummet."

Ansel tilted his head at me. "How would we even coordinate that without meeting each other elsewhere first? And anyway, isn't that a pretty awful omen, given what happened last time?"

My ears fell. "I was thinking of it as a way to right past wrongs. I know you're not that Ansel, but... I dunno. Maybe it was silly and sentimental."

"You certainly are that." Ansel kept pulling. "But, fine. We can go there again, and this time not die of an avalanche, when both of us are old and gray and fulfilled in life. If that's your idea of coming full circle, who am I to say otherwise?"

I felt my cheeks redden just a little.

"Promise."

We got everything aboard the ship. Corsica was already there, prettied up to a degree that she had done nothing but groom herself since we last parted ways. I remembered too late that I had gotten distracted from offering her a writ, but it turned out not to matter, since Unless had given her one, courtesy of Valey.

Four whole writs. I really hadn't been planning to have this many. But, on second thought, I realized why Valey must have given the go-ahead: two of her old acquaintances back in Equestria already had writs. Starlight's adoptive mother, who went back to search for her alone, and a recipient I hadn't heard much about who was the reason the group only had one writ by the time Jamjars stole it. That meant we would have six total. The same number Valey and her friends were initially trying to get together all in one place.

Too late for their bargain with Princess Celestia, which supposedly expired several years ago. But the symbolism, if we could find those two ponies as well, was probably too important to pass up.

After all, this journey was being sponsored by just as many sentimental reasons as practical ones.

I talked to everyone I could find, thinking who I should give my remaining writs to. Nicov didn't want one. Unless turned them down. I didn't want to invite Papyrus. Nor Kitty. Jamjars both had a writ and wasn't coming. Probably not Howe, Nyala or any of the cultists. I sort of wanted to talk to Garsheeva again, but there didn't seem like much of a point. I had learned the lesson she approached me to teach. And it wasn't like I could just invite her along.

In the end, my decision proved much more straightforward than I feared: the writs were for Mother and Leitmotif.

I hardly had to do any convincing. Leitmotif wasn't the kind of pony to turn down a free offering of something this valuable, and while Mother and I hadn't spoken since Icereach - since I left Icereach a month ago, in fact, not counting when I was a windigo - no words were needed to know that she was coming with me.

Some would say I owed her a proper conversation. But, they probably weren't the kinds of people who knew her as well as I did. Mother said so little, did so little, that she could speak through the smallest of actions, and convey an understanding that couldn't be put into words. She had always known who and what I was. Now I, too, knew the answers to those questions. She gave everything she had and more to ensure I could grow up in a safe, secluded enough environment to make my own decisions about who to become, free from outside bias. She devoted her all to my future, for reasons I still couldn't quite understand but knew for certain to be sound. So as long as there was any life left in her body, that was what she would continue to do.

Leitmotif was a little more complex. I hadn't forgotten the oath we made that day atop the Sky District: she would help me with my research into ether crystals, and in return I would let her use my research to help track down Chrysalis. It had been an untested oath up until now, with me finding precious little time to study the underground up until the point I put everything on the line and discovered the pink flame. But going forward, it was going to be much more important. Chrysalis's fate and mine were inextricably linked, both by blood and the path I had chosen. And knowledge of the bottom of the world was intrinsically linked to the flame I had saved. In order to restore Ironridge, to fix the sky and rekindle the flame and do whatever needed to be done with the crystal tower, I would need to learn everything and more.

And... Leif and Mother were sisters. I knew little and less of their history, and most of what I had once learned, I had certainly forgotten, or conflated with other details. But from the way they treated each other, their parting had been an incident both of them regretted. Their reunion, in my old apartment during the Aldebaran incident, had been cut short.

Their problems... were theirs to work out, but it was within my power to give them the chance.

I pored over the airship's manual as everyone else made their preparations. Someone had to fly this thing, and my talent let me learn in a hurry. Goodbyes were probably said, not that any of us who were leaving had particularly strong ties to anyone staying behind save me and Ansel. We didn't need to be in this much of a hurry, but there were plenty of reasons not to go slow, either. Least of all, Coda...

She should have been here with us. I wanted to show her the world. I would be back to do it. This I swore, looking out the large windshield at the crystal tower and the Ice District where she lay entombed, surrounded by countless slumbering war machines.

It would be lonely, I decided, to be so strong and so wise and so certain of yourself that you had no one left to look up to. One reason among many why Coda and I must have gotten along so well. Under my breath, sitting at the controls, I whispered a vow that once I did save her, I would continue what I had started, and be not just her equal, but her hero.

The signal arrived. Everything was ready. Had I forgotten anything, left any ends untied? Probably. Certainly. But that was why I would be back. We had plenty of food, stacks of notes and a whole book detailing Valey and Ansel's knowledge about Equestria. Some of the griffon gold had been loaded back into the hull - valid tender in Equestria, I was told. I had one lead on Starlight's location: a note from long ago, found alongside the writs, mentioning she lived in a village on the Catantan Peninsula. And I had determination and friends aplenty to accompany me on my way.

I pulled a lever, and the ship began to rise.

Cosmos

I rotated the Verdandi in a circle as we gained height over Ironridge, taking in everything the horizon had to offer.

A mid-afternoon sun was edging toward the west, illuminating mountain after snow-capped mountain. Those mountains had been home to the sum of my existence so far, Icereach tucked neatly into their western border, and Ironridge their east.

Twelve days, it took us to cross them, flying in cramped quarters on Gerardo's airship meant for two. And yet, to the south, they hit the Aldenfold's cliff face, and against the Aldenfold they were barely a blip in the terrain, their soaring slopes and deep valleys amounting to naught against the king of all mountain chains. Those mountains - the Aldenfold - were my destination and prize.

Perhaps I should have asked Valey how long it would take to cross them. Though, since she had taken charge of provisioning the ship, I figured we'd be fine.

To the east, the land grew less and less mountainous, mossy coniferous forests finding purchase on the gentler slopes. The Ironridge crater stood out like a tropical bloom, its floor filled with canopies of unimaginably lush foliage that soaked in the heat like ambrosia and grew denser and denser still. But beyond the crater's rim, trees grew tall instead of broad, their blue-green foliage sloped for weathering rainstorms, a completely different ecosystem than what now grew in the shade of the crystal tower.

The tower itself became easier to see as we gained altitude, rising into the lifeless sky. There was a beauty in the way its roots latticed themselves together to make up the body, a pattern to its weave that looked too deliberate to be organic, and yet too organic to be deliberate. It had tiers, I could see as I rose, each one about one mountain-height apart, where the structure became slightly thinner and slightly more intentional all at once. And then, just before its needle-like peak, it bloomed like a flower, several large, crystalline petals arrayed like a satellite dish around the tower's tip.

Free-floating petals, I realized. Held up by nothing, unattached to the spire itself - or if so, by only the flimsiest of crystal filaments, too small for me to yet make out. And they were slowly moving, tracing a gentle orbit around the core.

"What do you suppose it's for?" I heard my own voice say.

I jumped a little. "Procyon?"

"No," the voice said. "Just me. Faye... if you still want to call me that. Too lifelike for a voice that's just in your head? I figured I should find a way for us to talk. One that didn't involve switching over, at least."

I rubbed at my ears. "Sure doesn't sound like it's in my head. Are you floating around? Like a ghost, the way I was?"

"No..." Faye sounded regretful. "I don't think I can do that. You're a special case, since I more or less made you and passed control over to you. But this was my original body, so I don't think I can evict myself so easily. If I could, I'd be long gone by now."

Guess it was pointless asking if she had tried, then.

...How about this? Is this better? Faye asked, this time sounding as if her voice was in my head, rather than my ears.

"Either one works." I shrugged, looking again at the crystal tower.

Okay. Faye remained in my head. So... The tower. What do you think it does?

I studied it again. "...Dunno. I guess it does look kind of functional. At first, when I saw the crystals on my way to rescue Leif, it felt like they were growing upward to run away from something. Maybe they wound together like that for structural stability, so they could get higher and farther away? But it still does look deliberate."

I wonder if there's a way to ask the flame we absorbed, Faye mused. I can feel it, deep inside us. It feels... dormant. I don't think it would respond, even if we knew how to poke it. If we need to know, I guess there's nothing for it but to find this Fluttershy champion.

"You think Ludwig would know?" I craned my neck at the tower's peak, which was getting closer as we continued our ascent. "Not that I'm unhappy with his silence, or any-"

"You called, stupid cigar?"

I sighed.

Ludwig floated out of the ground.

"What do you want?" I chanced, feeling like anything I uttered would break a fragile, beneficial status quo.

"Well, I was sort of hoping for my body back," Ludwig explained, bobbing in place. "And I am pretty sure my face is still supposed to be trying to murderize King Father, though who knows what the status of that plan is these days. And I would also like to see an epic brawl between you and the stowaways on your ship I should probably not tell you about-"

"What!?" My ears stood straight up.

"-which I was totally making up to annoy you, friendo." Ludwig's light orb floated in a cheeky circle. "But we have pretty firmly established you are an outrageous crone who only cares about your own face and nobody else's - congratulations, I knew you would get there one day - and thus you couldn't care less about a poor cool guy like me. So I am sort of scratching my intelligent head about why you would ask me what I want."

I gritted my teeth. "Rewind. What was that about stowaways?"

Ludwig whistled. "I am stoking your paranoia, little cigar. Knowing you, now you will not be able to get the image out of your head of this whole entire ship getting blown to smithereens because you brought along someone whose face does not have a Writ of Harmonic Sanction. That is how you work, eh eh eh?"

I held up my bracelet. "I'll burn you."

Ludwig blew a raspberry. "Unfortunately, friendo, you burned me too badly last time and now I am a roasty-toasty charbroiled windigo with nothing left to burn, so that will probably not work again. Threat taken, though. I understand my face is not desired, so I will make like you and run away. I hope there was nothing about that tower you wanted to ask your super-ancient, all-knowing windigo friend!"

He darted into the floor and was gone.

I felt a vein in my brow twitch.

Not to say I told you so, Faye apologized, but there was a reason I made you afraid of using our powers. I didn't want something like this to happen. Now we're stuck to him and I have no idea how to undo it.

As irked as I was - at Ludwig, not Faye - the potential that Ludwig wasn't pulling my leg about un-writted stowaways took precedence. "Do you think you-"

Yes, Faye interrupted, I know it was me who made you a ghost in the first place, and then absorbed Ludwig to put us back together! Please don't remind me...

My ears folded. "I'm not blaming you. I'm not even talking about that. I was gonna ask if you could take over piloting for a bit so I can float around and search the ship for stowaways, just in case."

...Oh. Faye sounded dejected. Right. I... Forget I said anything. Sure. We can... do that. Here goes...

Another mask swap later, and I was disembodied, hovering over Faye's shoulder as she stood at the ship's controls.

We were almost clear of the Aldenfold's initial cliff face, but our new height only served to drive home just how much higher the mountains went. That sheer barrier, a wall of rock and waterfalls so high that the trees looked like green sand below and the Ironridge mountains were indiscernible in elevation from the flatlands to the north, wasn't the primary bulk of the mountains: it was the entrance gate, a test to weed out unqualified adventurers from the real trial yet to come.

I drifted through the windshield for a better look, and abruptly realized that my flight was based on my frame of reference: now that I no longer thought of myself as inside the ship, I could see it moving, and had to fly to keep up with it. But the sensation of doing so was almost exhilarating enough to make me forget about Ludwig, and I looped and soared, taking a circuit around the aircraft and a final look at the crystal tower, its pinnacle now not that far above us. It was hard for the tower to impress, though, now that I could see the Aldenfold up close.

These were mountains on a scale that dwarfed Icereach, the valleys three times as wide and five times as deep, whole ecosystems opening up at the bottom of each basin as we grew high enough to see inside. Lakes and forests and rivers, plains and meadows, fields of flowers and gentle cliffs and fallen trees all nestled between more mountain walls that, up close, looked as imposing as the Aldenfold had from below.

Miles below, the mountains that separated Icereach and Ironridge were soaked in snow that never thawed, yet here the climate seemed to start and stop at whims. The Verdandi accelerated, finally high enough to begin moving southward, and I saw springtime fields bounded by slopes of autumn-colored trees, moving up to snowy mountain faces and peaks, except those peaks were just the edges of plateaus that were in the full grip of summer. Deserts were rare, but lakes had sandy beaches, and as we advanced further into the sky I began to see pocket-sized rainstorms wandering the atmosphere like intelligent creatures. And always, we rose, mountains stacked upon mountains awaiting us ahead, three and then four and then five layers high. Each ridge we crested was just an invitation for more to join our sights.

The terrain was surreal. It was impossible. It was like someone had taken what I knew in my heart the wider world to be, then scrunched it up and thrown it in a blender and poured out the result on top of a mountain chain, the environments and residues pooling in the valleys and draping over the mountaintops like sheets of snowy, forested film.

Could someone live here? How had these mountains been created? Was this a fluke of nature, or a gift from some divine entity, hidden away where only the most adventurous could ever lay eyes on it? I felt like, if I looked away, it could disappear, like the mountains were in a state of flux and only assumed physical form when I beheld them, like each individual forest and meadow only existed for me, right here and now, like they had snapped into existence out of the fabric of creation purely to provide a backdrop for my travels.

Maybe I was right. Maybe these rivers and waterfalls had only ever been beheld before by me, and no one would ever behold them again. Maybe the mountains were so vast that even if all the ponies in the world came and settled here and flew across these peaks day after day after day, this particular viewpoint might still go forever un-rediscovered.

I had... given myself so many reasons to live, in Ironridge. Coda. Chrysalis. The war. The pink flame. Those were the duties that spurred me forward. And yet, I had none of them when something pushed me to leave Icereach, to see the world as a whole.

This, these mountains, this sense of wonder... This was what I had originally been looking for. This was what I always wanted. This flight, this freedom, seeing the world open up like a book and knowing its beauty.

Someday, I had to learn, I needed to know: why was it here? What was it all for?

Flying across the Aldenfold, the wind sharp and powerful beneath my ghostly wings, I knew there was an answer, and I knew it was beautiful.

...Searching for stowaways could wait. Being paranoid, taking precautions, all of that was meaningless. Right now, I held my heart's desire in my forehooves, and it was mine to appreciate.

Corsica strolled onto the bridge, taking a proper tour of the airship that was going to be her home for the next who-knew-how-long. Halcyon was here, sitting in the wide-backed pilot's chair at the controls.

Halcyon gasped a little, her ears pointing straight at Corsica's hoofsteps, and when she didn't turn around or call a greeting, Corsica frowned.

"You again?" Corsica guessed, stepping closer.

"Hi," Halcyon said, tucked into herself, eyes not straying from the mountains as the ship streaked forward, continuing to climb.

Corsica took a seat in a co-pilot's chair, not having a clue what to do with the instruments in front of her and ignoring them as a result. "Been wondering when I'd run into you a second time."

"Why?" Halcyon asked. "We've... been over this. You and I aren't friends. The me you know isn't here right now. Spend your time with her, instead. I'm just taking a shift as pilot."

"I'm curious," Corsica said, ignoring her question. "You talk about how you don't wanna be friends with me because we've got bad history together. Fair enough. I probably didn't make myself very easy to get along with back then either. But if you really didn't want to change that, why'd it change? I don't know how you work, with multiple ponies in the same head, or whatever. But the other you sure was persistent about getting on my good side after the avalanche."

Halcyon frowned at the mountains. "You're whitewashing your memories. I was always like that. It was you who changed and let her in... too late for it to matter to me."

"Maybe I am." Corsica shrugged. "I try to stop myself from dwelling on the past. Most of the time, at least. Reminds me of too many things I'll never get back. But if I was so bad to you, what did you see in me in the first place?"

Halcyon clammed up.

"Come on," Corsica beckoned. "I won't tell the other you, if it's embarrassing."

"...It's not embarrassing," she said. "I just don't want to remind myself."

Corsica tilted her head. "You haven't been reminded about it already?"

Halcyon gritted her teeth. "That's the point."

"And how bad is it, really?" Corsica leaned back in her chair. "I dunno, maybe it's awful. I'm not you. But now that I've committed the egregious sin of making you dwell on our awful shared history, why not think out loud?"

"...Fine." Halcyon sighed. "I admired your fearlessness. You never seemed bothered by the consequences of your actions, or afraid of your future. I followed you around because I wanted to know how you did it."

"You wanted someone to hide behind?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Huh. Well, guess you can see where all that not-being-bothered got me now."

Halcyon shook her head. "Getting the talent you did, when you got it... That wasn't your fault. Even if you consider it karma for the way you treated me, you were a victim. It didn't happen due to a flaw in your worldview."

Corsica blinked. "You sure about that? I thought special talents appear because you believe in them, or something."

Halcyon stubbornly stared at the mountains.

"Though mine is pretty abnormal..." Corsica rubbed at her flank, a mess of triangles and geometry sitting on it, looking like the first drawing a foal produced using a stencil. "And I dunno what I was believing in while unconscious. Wonder what the rest of the world knows about how you get these. Icereach never had much to say, and I didn't research it in Ironridge."

Halcyon still refused to speak.

Corsica gave her a look, then settled back into her chair. "Well, let's talk about something else, then. If you were so eager to have everything to do with me, why did you stop?"

"Isn't that what you always wanted me to do?" Halcyon's brow shadowed. "I just got the message. That's all."

"If that's really all there is to it, you sure you wanna stick by that now that my message has changed?" Corsica gave up on looking at Halcyon and joined her in staring out the window. "Sure, I've changed. But with your reasoning, I can't even tell whether you think that's a good thing or a bad thing. Did you like the way I used to be, or not?"

She could practically hear Halcyon's scowl. "That's the problem. You don't know what it's like to be attracted to something that's bad for you. And besides, you keep asking why I wanted to be friends with you back then. Well, why do you want to be friends with me now?"

"That's a pretty bold assumption," Corsica countered. "I'm curious about you. Whether you think of yourselves as distinct ponies or not, your thoughts are still floating around in the same head, right? I am friends with at least a part of you. I just wanna learn about other sides of her." She crossed her forelegs.

"There's nothing interesting about me to learn," Halcyon said, her voice turning glum. "You already proved that to yourself when you rejected me over and over before the avalanche. Trying to second-guess yourself, you're just wasting your time."

"No. I'm doing science," Corsica countered. "Old me was young and stupid. I was blind to my limitations, or the way the world worked. And I knew nothing about the kinds of relationships I'd want to have in the future. What reason is there to re-evaluate a conclusion if not finding a new viewpoint and evidence?"

Halcyon sighed. "Right. So, now that your old privileged life has fallen apart, you're seeing me as a replacement to fill in the gaps."

"Is that so bad?" Corsica shrugged. "The fact that those gaps appeared meant I was doing something wrong in the first place. Wouldn't have happened if my life had really been perfect. Maybe you're just better than all that."

"Do you really believe that?" Halcyon's tone darkened. "Do you earnestly think that the only reason bad things ever happen to ponies is because they deserve them? What about the eastern continent, and all the ponies who died or worse because Chrysalis did what she did? That would imply that every time a pony sins, they're acting as an agent of justice, because whoever was hurt by it deserved what was coming. You're saying everyone can surrender to the darkest parts of themselves with no moral-"

"Where's that coming from?" Corsica forcefully interrupted. "Sorry if I'm not a philosopher who thinks through the important ramifications of every word I utter before saying it. I'm just saying I messed up, and you deserve a chance."

Halcyon was silent for a moment, but eventually she sighed. "That's kind of you to say. Maybe you have changed. But you still have no idea what you're talking about. Be friends with the other me. Enjoy her company. But that's not my place in the world to fill."

Corsica turned in her chair to face her. "What are you, the voice of doubt that whispers in the back of Halcyon's head?"

"Yes," Halcyon said, still staring out the windshield. "I suppose you could say I am."

"Lucky her," Corsica grumbled. "Wish I could separate myself from my own doubts and fears. Just pretend we're two different people. Maybe if I could, I'd have a half of me that only got along with her, and a half of me that only got along with you. But since I can't, I guess I'll just have to settle for both of you."

Halcyon should have smiled. It really felt like that should have got a smile out of her... but instead, she just sighed. "Where do you get so much optimism?" she asked. "You're starting to sound like her."

"The other you?" Corsica shrugged. "Guess she's just rubbing off on me. Or maybe anything just looks sunny next to your gloomy butt."

Once again, Halcyon failed to smile... though she at least had the decency to look conflicted, as if she was considering it. More than anything, Corsica was pushing this because it was a challenge, and even a talent like hers couldn't fully squash her old competitive spirit. And besides, it felt nice to be stubborn about something when her determination was usually in such short supply. But at the same time, this Halcyon...

The filly she befriended in Icereach had a too-good-to-be-true aura about her. She was cute and innocent and stubborn and cheerful, but it always felt like she lacked an edge she by all rights should have had with all they had been through together. An edge that anyone should have had, really, just by living through the more mundane trials that occurred in life.

This was Halcyon's missing half. The cynicism to brace against life's ills, to take a few punches without being caught flat-hoofed. Not that Corsica was frequently open about her personal struggles, but when she was, it was hard to feel like Halcyon would really understand and empathize. Instead, she might try to understand and then confuse herself, because she lacked the framework for processing... all of this. Often, Corsica felt like she was bracing herself against Halcyon's problems for her, like that day when Halcyon submitted their research paper under the wrong name, and it fell to her to reassure her friend that it wasn't the end of the world as a result.

Here, though, was the side of Halcyon that was missing any belief that it was worth getting up to try again. Everything the other Halcyon had in abundance, this one was lacking. Trying to be optimistic in her presence made Corsica feel like a sandwich, one Halcyon on either side of her, both needing different things from her - or, her wanting to give both of them different things. The things they really needed from each other to be complete.

Maybe if they were complete, then Corsica wouldn't feel so awkward thinking about... Well, never mind.

Cynical Halcyon had stopped complaining about her presence, at least. Maybe they could just hang out for-

Like a light switch being flipped, the dead gray sky turned blue.

"Woah!" Corsica sat straight up, paying attention again to their surroundings. "You see that too?"

Halcyon was quickly looking between several meters on the dashboard. "We're so high," she muttered, almost reverent. "I think this is the peak."

Corsica stared out the window. Around them, the peaks were as jagged as jagged could be, triangles so perfect they would make a geometry teacher swoon. The environmental variation in the foothills had given way to an immaculate glacier at the top of the world, and the suddenly-blue sky was tinged with black on the horizon, as if the atmosphere itself buckled to keep the mountains covered. If they could maintain this elevation while going straight forward, they could be in outer space.

A chill of wonder ran through Corsica's fur as they crested the edge of the glacier and the Aldenfold began to descend, an infinite sea of terraced peaks stair-stepping down before them.

"Glad I got to see this with someone," she murmured.

"...Yeah," Halcyon agreed. "I bet... not many ponies have ever seen this before."

Together, they stared out the window, matters of friendship forgotten as they took in the world.

I had more important things to be doing, I knew. And yet, what could be more important than experiencing this?

Gravity didn't pull on me as a ghost. I could decide for myself which was was down, and as we skipped over ridge after ridge and peak after peak, I started to let myself believe that the slope was actually level.

Ahead, miles in the distance, the Aldenfold ended, too distantly for me to make out exactly how. But my angle made the flat ground beyond the mountains appear to rise like a mountain itself, higher and higher into the heavens. Mountains and forests, rivers and valleys disappeared into the fog of distance, covered by clouds and weather that were far lower than I was, spreading out to a distant, faintly-glowing horizon.

Beyond that horizon was the blackness of space.

Blue sky and starry space touched in a luminous arc. Below that arc were weather systems, clouds and continents, oceans and islands, geographic features the size of my hoof that would take a week to cross by airship. Above that arc were stars and galaxies, the presence of the evening sun not strong enough to block them out through the thin atmosphere. From this point, at the apex of the Aldenfold, I could behold the south in its entirety.

It occurred to me to look back, but it was too late, the north having already been swallowed by the glacier's peaks. Part of me wanted to return and witness the north the same way, but that view could wait: after all, I was bound by oath to return. The sight would just have to be my reward.

Once again, the south consumed my view, stretching from the world's tallest mountain to its very edge, lit from above by the sun and from behind by countless stars. As the sun drew lower, shadows began to stretch, and I could make out mountains not by their height but by the darkness they shed over the land. Come night, would I see cities, patches of light where ponies thrived?

Would that they could see their home from such an angle. Taking it all in, I could almost understand why Equestria wouldn't want this sight to be free and available to all ponies. A view of creation like this should be reserved for the one who created it.

...Or maybe not. Perhaps the world would be a better place if everyone could see it in its entirety, comprehend its scale, know beyond the secluded lives they had led up until this point. I had thought Ironridge was big, that I was breaking my isolation by going there and witnessing the world as a whole. And yet Ironridge was insignificant compared to the scale I now beheld.

If you wanted a better view of the world than this, about your only recourse would be from the surface of the moon.

"Makes you wonder where these mountains came from," Corsica mused as the Verdandi sped down the slopes, passing peak after peak, the otherworldly diversity returning to the mountains' ecology as Equestria drew nearer and nearer.

"I guess so," Halcyon replied, not sounding excited to talk, but much less reticent now that the topic had changed from her relationship with Corsica. "Maybe they've always been here."

"Always, huh?" The blackness had disappeared from the horizon, and the edges of the world faded from view as the ship lost elevation. "Maybe."

A few more ridges, and Corsica no longer felt like it would be futile to count the mountains between them and flat land. Already, Halcyon had re-oriented the ship and started lowering their speed, slowing their descent so they wouldn't slam into Equestria the moment they cleared the last of the Aldenfold. It didn't look like there was a southern counterpart to the mountain wall, the peaks and ridges instead fading away into lesser and lesser foothills that were still mountainous, but no longer stacked in an incline.

They passed another ridge, and Corsica recounted. One more, and then it looked like there was a trench they could fly through, and a large plateau after that. Then one more ridge, and... just normal mountains beyond there. She felt the floor press against her as the ship leveled off, saving height to clear the next ridge.

"That's not right," Halcyon said under her breath as the ship reacted, the ridge squeaking past underneath.

"What?" Corsica looked up in passive alarm.

"Had to push it harder than usual to get enough altitude," Halcyon said. "This is supposed to be powered by Coda's throne, so it shouldn't be a fuel issue. Maybe we've pushed it too hard for one day and need to let the engine rest?"

Loud hoofsteps announced someone entering the bridge. Louder, certainly, than Leif or Nehaley would use.

Corsica and Halcyon both looked back in alarm, trusting that the ship wouldn't mysteriously veer sideways and crash into a wall of the trench they were now skimming down. It was Papyrus.

"What are you doing here?" Corsica asked, her eyebrows raised in alarm. She got up, stepped between him and Halcyon, and gave her a motion that would hopefully be interpreted as I've got this, see to the ship.

Papyrus shrugged. "I don't know, something about pretty pony Halcyon not choosing to spend one of her outrageously expensive writs on a qualified airship technician and Unless not having a whole lot of other writ-bearing and generally handsome friends she could ask to cover for that mistake. By the by, do you happen to have a fuel light on that dashboard? Because your friendly local engine room dweller is now here in person to tell you you're running on fumes."

Halcyon bristled.

"Hmm..." Papyrus strolled to the front. "Still got plenty to land her, I bet. Think we can make it to that plateau?"

"You want us to land in the Aldenfold?" Halcyon sounded as if she was forcing herself to function through her terror, but also doing a pretty good job of it. "Who knows how many miles away from civilization? How does this ship even run out of fuel?"

Papyrus shrugged, rubbing his chin with a wing. "Well, dumpster corps intel does say Coda fed herself on the emotional equivalent of junk food, so you can't expect the energy from that to last forever. And it's been a while, but unless I'm mistaking this particular upcoming plateau for another that looks just like it, there's a village not far below with nice enough houses they probably have trade lines to the rest of civilization."

"I want to look at the throne myself," Halcyon said shakily. "But I'm the pilot, so we'll need to land first. You're certain landing here is a good idea?"

Papyrus whistled an over-the-top innocent whistle. "A whole lot fewer ways it could go wrong than being in an airborne airship that's out of fuel."

"Point taken." Halcyon gritted her teeth and shifted several levers, causing the ship to slow further. "Just gotta do this gently..."

My journey through the Aldenfold had reached the fringes. I needed to get back, be responsible, take the next shift piloting so Faye could rest, maybe figure out how I was going to let our body sleep, since night was falling and it undoubtedly needed sleep too. By now, the magical climate had relaxed its hold on the mountains, and the terrain I soared through was little more than run-of-the-mill crags and canyons, just at scale. But part of me just wasn't ready to relinquish that feeling, the freedom and wonder of gliding above the entire world. Just a little more...

The trench the ship flew through came to an end, opening out onto a wide plateau with long grass and a thick grove in the distance ahead. The sun was low enough on the horizon that the shadow of mountains to the west had started to cross the grass. And instead of flying on, the ship extended its landing gear and came to a bumpy rest near a river that flowed out of the trench. It rocked once, twice and then was still, the glowing comet that formed its engine winking out in a twist of magical fog.

Huh. Apparently Faye wasn't waiting for me before taking a break. Well, nothing for it but to get back and rest in my own body.

Science

Why does the wind blow?

Scientists are well-equipped to answer this. We can tell you about the collision of rising hot air and falling cool air, and then about density and gravity, and then about thermal expansion and the bouncing of gaseous molecules. For every phenomenon that occurs, we understand it by understanding the phenomena that combine to produce it, exploring back along a never-ending chain of cause and effect. We understand the mechanism by which the wind blows, and the mechanisms that cause those mechanisms, and the mechanisms that are caused by the wind as well.

But that doesn't feel good enough.

Are we only ever to know the world in terms of one thing causing another? Even once we can perfectly describe every natural law in existence, we still will be powerless to explain why we were given these natural laws in the first place. If the gravitational constant was different, yet all other laws of the universe were adjusted accordingly so that the math remained seamless, science would have nothing to say on the matter. All science amounts to is a tool, founded upon the assumption that the world is cohesive and consistent, to explain parts of the world using other parts as a basis.

And a powerful tool it is. But my questions - questions like why is the sky beautiful, or why were we given this world instead of one of the infinite other potentially consistent worlds that only a god or an artist could imagine - belong to a different domain.

I want to know the meaning of all this. Not just how it works, but why.

I put down my quill and frowned. It was no use. Even trying to distill my thoughts into writing couldn't get the euphoria I had felt during the day's flight out of my head. The Verdandi was grounded, out of power and after sundown in the Aldenfold's southern foothills, and collectively we had decided to get some rest before deciding what to do about it in the morning. But spending a week in a cave being maybe-dead hadn't done great things for my sleep schedule, and any hope I had of defying that was completely shot by the memories of the Aldenfold buzzing around in my head.

Soaring through those mountains, macrocosms and microcosms of environments all mish-mashed together in an unending slope... I felt like I had been touched by something primal. There was no way to articulate it without feeling impossibly silly and presumptuous, and such feelings were responsible for a mountain of discarded drafts next to my borrowed desk already. I mean, I didn't even know whether there was something magically special about those mountains, or if this was all in my head.

Either way, a well of restlessness pumped through my limbs. Just earlier today, I had known my purpose after a lifetime of searching: find Starlight and Fluttershy, save Coda and the pink flame, stop the war and stand up for the places I had visited so I could one day embrace them as home. I thought that this was the answer to the question that drove me out of Icereach, that spurred me to fly on and see the world, and for a few precious hours, everything had made sense. But now, it felt like I had just glimpsed the answer to a far greater question, one I didn't understand well enough to put words to.

What had I learned? What was it I wanted to know? Why had that flight felt so special? If I understood myself as much as I thought I did, then how come something could unexpectedly mean so much to me? And what did it mean, anyway?

Was I thinking in circles, understanding less the faster I went, succeeding at nothing save for confusing myself? Or was I like a marble in a funnel, orbiting faster and faster the closer I got to the center, this busy, dizzy train of thought a sign that I was so close to something I needed to find?

Think. Put your thoughts into questions, Halcyon. Do this empirically. I wanted to know... who made the world the way it was. And what they were thinking when they did it.

Taking a deep breath, I summoned my focus, crumpled the previous sheet and started again.

Corsica slumped over a desk, her horn glowing for light, her chin resting heavily on a hoof and her eyes as close as they could functionally get to the paper.

It was night out, and she was supposed to be sleeping, but she felt a rare desire to do something, and the past day's flight across the Aldenfold stuck out in her mind as an event in severe need of questioning. Arrayed before her were a series of sketches: she didn't like drawing ponies, but was great with depth and perspective, and had a pretty good visual memory, so capturing and reproducing the terrain of the Aldenfold had been her first task.

The mixed environments themselves were one dilemma. It was heavily documented that this mountain range was steeped in magic, starting with the strange storms that gained in intensity as they fell down the cliff face. What would one of those storms be like to experience up in the mountains? Plenty of the sights she had seen showed little sign of being blasted by blizzards: none of the trees showed branch distribution bias that could have indicated extreme winds in a prevailing direction, and the presence of sand should have been unthinkable. But it was hard to focus on what kind of magic could have caused that when her attention kept being stolen by the sight she had seen from the peaks.

Corsica's drawing, as faithful as her memory would allow, showed a distant, gradually curved horizon, and stars shining through a black-tinged sky. The horizon was the first thing that struck her as odd: it didn't look infinite, and wasn't as high in her field of view as it should have been.

Conventional wisdom held that the world was flat, but finite. Material about the edge of the world was hard to find in Icereach, but she read up a bit on it in Ironridge: in the north, the edge curved out from the Aldenfold in a semicircle. She suspected the world as a whole was circular, and the Aldenfold just cut off roughly two thirds of it that the north was unaware of - it was almost obvious enough that she was surprised the existence of the south was treated like a secret.

The conditions of the edge itself were harder to get hard data on: rumors of magical storms, desertification, infertility of all life, and great cracks and canyons were all documented in various places, but she hadn't had luck finding firsthoof accounts beyond those of solo adventurers. Nothing from professional surveying teams, and nothing from anyone who claimed to have been to the very precipice. But, either way, it existed.

That meant there were two possibilities for the distant rim she had seen from the peak of the Aldenfold: either it was the edge, or some other rise tall enough that she couldn't see past it, like another Aldenfold that divided the world into three, rather than two. Either way, if she could see it from the Aldenfold, then anyone could see the Aldenfold from there.

In the north, her perception of the Aldenfold had always been based on its initial cliff face, which was just a fraction of the real thing. Since she had spent her entire life in the shadow of the cliff face, it was conceivable that she simply couldn't see the full mountain range past that cliff face, and thus never realized how tall it was. But was the Aldenfold really visible from anywhere in the north, all the way to the edge of the world?

If that was the case, she expected she would have at least seen mention of it in an account somewhere. Maybe it was the kind of thing everyone took for granted and nobody talked about, but it still felt like an odd omission. Maybe it was possible that the surface elevation of the north was much higher than in the south, and thus the Aldenfold didn't appear as tall there?

Maybe.

All this was ignoring the matter of the daytime stars. In order to see that, they must have been nearing the edge of the atmosphere. Would even that much height serve to make the Aldenfold distinguishable from so many thousands of miles away, though? Several triangles occupied another sheet of paper, calculations accompanying them and determining that a few dozen miles wouldn't nearly be sufficient to view the edge of the world from the angle she had drawn. Even at several hundred miles tall, that would be pushing her suspension of disbelief, and there was no way the Aldenfold was several hundred miles tall. And even if it had been, how would everyone have managed to breathe?

...However they managed it, they did so at a height that was high enough to see the stars. Corsica got up, pushed in her chair, took a last look at her work, and left her room, deciding that the ship's airtightness deserved an inspection.

Working hypothesis: the view from the top of the Aldenfold was an illusion.

Corsica stood in the frame of the ship's main entrance, studying it as the door hung open. While it did look designed to be airtight, there was a big difference between keep-the-heat-in airtight and spaceship-grade airtight. This door was sturdy, but not nearly sturdy enough to nullify all risk of blowing outward in a zero-pressure environment.

What was more, across from her was the ship's panoramic window on its starboard flank. Corsica wasn't an expert in the field of pressure-resistant windows, but her gut told her one this big and flat would be the ship's first failure point for sure.

She had no easy explanation for what could have caused the alternative, but it was clear that this craft hadn't actually just been to the edge of outer space.

"So what are you doing here?" a voice said to her side.

Corsica turned her head. It was Papyrus.

"Isn't that my line?" She shrugged. "Just checking on the ship. Sure looked like we flew high today."

"Oh, I didn't mean out of bed," he said, taking a few steps closer and stopping at an angle to her, appearing more interested in the wall than in Corsica herself. "I meant on this journey. Writs of Harmonic Sanction aren't exactly trivial to obtain, and there are precious few ponies who would actually use one instead of selling it. I've never been able to figure out your heart's desire, and now I'm all the more curious."

Corsica didn't look at him. "Then you'll just get to stay that way. I've told you before, I'm just not that ambitious. Believe it or not."

Papyrus's eyes glinted. "Everyone has ambitions."

"And what are yours?" Corsica continued to stare out the door, unbothered.

Papyrus shrugged. "I'm just in it to learn the meaning of existence. A humble goal, really... Of course, I already had my writ, so there wasn't much opportunity cost. But then, when is there ever?"

Corsica snorted. "Liar. You couldn't get a more generic answer than that."

"Fine," Papyrus sighed, "I was in it to see the look on Butterfly's face when she saw I stowed away. Which wasn't as interesting as I'd hoped, now that I've seen it... Satisfied?"

"No," Corsica said. "But I didn't care that much anyway. Why do you keep calling her that, anyway?"

Papyrus looked wounded. "Corsica, Corsica, Corsica, you can't just expect me to spill all your best friend's secrets just because you asked nicely. I mean, who would do such a thing? Besides me?" He flicked his tail.

"Whatever." Corsica rolled her eyes. "So, what do you think of these mountains? Are they an illusion? Somehow made of magic? I'm trying to see how our ship didn't explode from atmospheric pressure differentials."

"What do I look like, a scientist?" Papyrus shrugged. "They're certainly magical, though. Want to see a cool trick?"

"Do I?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Look over there." Papyrus pointed over her shoulder. "See that light?"

Corsica looked. They were at the edge of a meadow, perfectly flat and without hills, though the grass soon gave way to a forest. And in the center of the forest, something was glowing with a faint, midnight-blue light.

She nodded. "What about it?"

"The last time I was around these parts, I recall quite a similar landmark," Papyrus said. "Perhaps even the exact same one. Feeling up for a walk? If that light turns out to be coming from a meteor impact thingamajig, we'll know for certain." He gave Corsica a knowing look. "But if so, what are the odds that we could spend an entire day flying through uncharted territory and pop out within a stone's throw of the one place within a thousand miles of here yours truly has been before? Why not a mile to the west, or twenty, or a hundred? Because Ironridge isn't due north of here; we've skewed substantially to the east. And at a suspiciously perfect angle, to boot..."

Corsica squinted. "You've been here before, you say. And you haven't just been up and down this entire mountain range?"

"Can't say that I have." Papyrus looked smug. "Perhaps I'm off my rocker, but that's why I offered a way to be sure!"

"...Alright." Corsica got to her hooves, sizing up the jump to the ground. "I'll take you up on that."

The Verdandi didn't have any lights on, but the stars were bright enough in the sky that Corsica had no trouble making it out as she trudged toward the forest, Papyrus leading the way.

Her hooves felt so strange on the grass that, after a few steps, she stopped and removed her shoes. Concrete and metal, brick and cobblestone, Icereach and Ironridge had nothing that even remotely compared to what she felt now. The ground was soft and almost spongy, cushioning her steps like slippers and brushing her fetlocks with dew. She poked at it. It tickled, and was slightly pliant beneath her hooves.

Papyrus glanced back, giving her a look.

"Sue me," Corsica snapped, turning her focus back to the ground. "I've... never walked on dirt before."

Papyrus snickered.

Note to self: this was actually pleasant. She had always known what dirt was, of course, but always assumed it would be like the packed earth of the Icereach yak fort training grounds, which was basically stone with slightly better traction. Here, though, was a material that gave just a little under her hooves, yet sprung back, unlike snow. And it smelled fantastic. Why wasn't this used for floorings in Icereach? Maybe it didn't survive so well in the cold?

Acting on instinct, ignoring the fact that Papyrus was watching, Corsica crouched down, tipped over and rolled, wanting to feel it with more than just her hooves. She twisted her spine back and forth, rolling and rubbing, feeling it against her sides and back...

"Oh, you poor, deprived soul," Papyrus said, shaking his head.

Corsica glared at him, still upside-down. "Don't try me."

He shrugged and kept walking.

Corsica flipped herself upright, feeling... good. And a little wet from the dew, but it was warm enough here that wetness was pleasant rather than a bother. And maybe just a little bit silly, not that she particularly cared what anyone else thought of her rolling in the grass. On a good day, why shouldn't she savor new sensations?

...Her coat was slightly muddy now. Maybe that was a reason. Oh well. Not like there wasn't a cure for that.

They reached the edge of the forest. Corsica hadn't been in a real forest before, either, but at the very least she had looked down at the Night District from above, and this one seemed... strange.

The flora were vibrant, big and lush and in full bloom, with twisted trunks and titanic leaves forming a riot of life that spoke of little competition and infinite resources. Ironridge and its extreme tropical heat had produced a canopy that could perhaps rival this, yet the temperature here was downright pleasant, and there were no signs of industrial fertilizers or any other equine activity that Ironridge used to manage the forest for its fruit-growing empire.

Moreover, despite the sheer quantity of plants, none of them seemed to be fighting with each other. The trees weren't planted in any discernible pattern, yet there was room enough to move between them. Plants didn't compete to choke each other out, instead moving aside for each other like gentlecolts at a dignified party. Even the meadowgrass thrived on the forest floor, the canopy leaves leaving space so that just enough sunlight could reach it during the day. It was as if the laws of nature themselves had been rewritten, as if the principle of survival of the fittest no longer existed, as if the plants were imbued with the will and desire to exist in perfect harmony with each other, and had grown in accordance.

"...This isn't an illusion," Corsica muttered, putting a hoof against a winding trunk and finding it perfectly solid. "Certainly magical, but it sure is real enough."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow at her, as if that should never have been in question.

"What caused this?" Corsica asked. "Mister I've-Been-Here-Before-And-Know-Everything? Got any insight?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Perhaps a wizard did it?"

Corsica frowned. Something so anomalous had to have a better reason than that. Unfortunately, botany was just about the last subject Icereach would ever teach, so she didn't have the know-how to probe further... All she could do was keep walking.

The stars burned so brightly overhead, it felt like daytime, only if the sun's light was blue and silver instead of yellow and gold. What would this look like during the daytime? Optics and atmospheric science, she understood. Could she figure out anything about these mountains' unusual visuals by watching a few solar cycles, by setting up camp here and just hanging out for a week?

It sounded like a much more interesting way to kill time than her usual fare. Maybe she'd do that sometime.

Just as the source of the blue light was becoming visible through the trees, Corsica's hooves clinked against something hard.

She knelt down and poked it, the ambience in the air bright enough that she didn't even need her horn. It was glass, clear and smooth, covering the ground in a rippling sheet that thickened as it went forward. Was this natural? The hard layer blocked the grass and smaller shrubs, but some trees had forced their way up through it anyway, their trunks leaning in the direction she was going, even bigger and more vibrant than those at the edge of the forest, reaching and grasping to get closer to something at the center.

There was no detritus on the glass, Corsica noticed. Not a single twig or fallen leaf. Either this forest had a mechanism somehow keeping it immaculately clean, or these trees had never shed so much as a seed pod. Which possibility was more outlandish, she didn't know.

Finally, Papyrus stopped. Only one layer of trees remained, and Corsica passed him, stepping through into a clearing where the glass was too thick for even the trees to grow.

The majority of the clearing was taken up by a pit, the glass dropping down in a sheer bowl, and it was that bowl that held the source of the light. Spiraling, winding, twisting up into the air were threads of blue, dancing together into a helix, spreading out and becoming one with the night sky, which was so close and luminous Corsica felt like she could touch it from the tops of the trees. The light gradually rose and rotated, like filaments of flame rising at a hundredth of their normal speed, tracing an ever-changing pattern into the air. And it was for this pattern that the trees reached, their broad leaves seeming to strain at their stems to touch it.

Heart pounding, Corsica backed up a few paces, found the nearest tree trunk, and began to climb.

The stars were close. Just as close as they looked. She stood on a leaf, so strong that it barely bowed beneath her weight despite being connected by a stem thinner than her horn, reached up a hoof and batted at one, and it flowed around her like glitter suspended in water. Corsica sniffed, then stuck out her tongue, tasting the air.

Mixed with the scent of plants and life, it was there, a faint sweetness Corsica knew well from her time in Icereach's labs: ether. Hovering over this forest was a gaseous cloud of the same substance that flowed in a river beneath the chapel. The same thing Icereach thought it could use as rocket fuel.

Did that explain the stars she had seen at the apex of the mountains? Perhaps it did. Those could have been not the normal stars in the night sky, but either itself, a layer in the sky they had approached closely enough to see. Of course, that begged the question of how it got there, and whether it covered just the Aldenfold or the entire world. It certainly looked like the cloud in this place was being caused by the blue light in the crater, but this couldn't be the source of all the Aldenfold's ether. Unless it was? Hard to tell.

Now that Corsica thought about it... Someone in Icereach would have known or said something if the night sky itself wasn't just a blanket of ether, right? It seemed too obvious to question before, but this was proven, right? Outer space, beyond the world's atmosphere, wasn't just an empty, black void... right?

Not like she could do anything about it if it wasn't. She turned her attention down to the pit. It was bright at the bottom, but it didn't particularly look like there was anything down there... Just light. Climbing down from the tree, Corsica trotted closer.

Ether didn't hurt ponies, she knew for a fact. It was still treated as a hazardous substance because it was known to produce an intoxicating, heavily addictive effect on batponies in liquid form, but to unicorns like her, it was inert.

...She wasn't that sure about its effects in gaseous form, or whether they had been much studied. For that matter, she wasn't even aware ether had a gaseous form. Although if they had flown near or through a cloud of it at the peak of the Aldenfold, hopefully Halcyon was alright... Maybe she'd check on her later.

But investigating the light came first. Corsica didn't feel a trace of weariness in her body; the slippery sensation she felt when it was hard to get herself to do what she wanted was nowhere to be found. The rising spiral was too far for her to reach from the edge of the pit, but the slope looked gentle enough that she could probably climb her way back out again...

Swallowing her reservations, Corsica slid down the wall and into the pit.

The light blazed around her as she skidded to the bottom. Papyrus was nowhere to be seen, and even had he been here, she doubted he could serve as the voice of reason. Her fur felt like gravity had been flipped, and a wondrous, lifting sensation coated her. A few paces ahead, the glass was blue, and the light was at its brightest.

But there was nothing else there. No source for the power she felt tingling along her spine. It was just there, springing into existence, slowly and purposefully and eternally.

If there was something here, acting upon the world in an empirically measurable, quantifiable way, she couldn't see it. Certainly, she could see the effects: the forest was real enough, and so was the ground beneath her hooves. And certainly, those effects weren't just spontaneous. They had a cause, and it was right here. But how did it work? What was going on in this place, and could it be replicated? Preserved, understood, applied?

Papyrus mentioned a meteor. Corsica didn't see one, but this crater and the glass around it could certainly be an impact site. Perhaps someone had already taken the meteor itself, and all other effects here were residual?

The blue energy continued rising, rotating, leaking into existence. If it was residual, this might change her entire concept of what residual meant.

Corsica considered touching the light... but she had probably pushed her luck too far today with hooves-on science already. Of all the ponies in the world, how many others had spent years studying ether and related phenomena in a facility with ready access to the stuff? If anyone was equipped to figure this out, it was her, so she needed to take her time and do it properly. And she really, really wanted to figure it out.

...She frowned. How long had it been since she last felt a sincere, legitimate desire to do something, let alone one this strong? This couldn't be all because of resting for a week. Was this place messing with her feelings, somehow?

And if it was, was messing with really the right phrase? Her feelings had never felt her own, not since she got her special talent. This felt more like she could desire and be curious normally again, more like fixing than messing with.

Acting on impulse, Corsica reached out and stuck a hoof into the source of the spiral of blue.

A sense of nostalgia poured into her, so powerful it knocked her entirely off her hooves and sent her rolling to the wall of the crater. Of longing, and love, and sacrifice, and selfless hope for the future. Of darkness and determination, of reaching out in the face of futility, of resignation and acceptance, of uncertainty and finality, and of the will to affect change in the world. Corsica stumbled to her hooves, and for the briefest moment, it felt as if she was hurtling through the emptiness of space.

This place... had been touched by a being of immense power, or an act of immense significance. And the land remembered, in the same way that you could go to the chapel in Icereach and tell that it had once been important to ponies who were long erased from history.

The energy spiraling into the air, the fantastical plants and trees... had these emotions at their source?

Corsica frowned, and looked at the hoof she had touched the energy stream with. Emotions were the realm of psychologists, and had no place in explaining real-world phenomena like the forest around her. But she couldn't deny what she had just felt. Was it possible for feelings to act directly on the world like this? Even if not, it was certainly possible for them to be transmitted by touching a mysterious light. Either way, it felt like the branch of science needed to comprehend this, let alone explain it, didn't even exist yet.

Unless it just didn't exist in the north, and was common knowledge in the south... but that was a boring possibility. Why couldn't she pioneer it, instead? With Halcyon at her side. Ether was obviously related to whatever was going on here, so they had about the best background they could have. They could do it!

And besides, just being here made Corsica feel like she had no special talent. For a reward like that, almost anything would be worth studying.

She took a breath and sighed. First things first, see what Halcyon thought about it... or maybe check on Papyrus. He hadn't come into the clearing with her, she remembered.

After a slightly more difficult climb than she had intended, she made it out of the crater, and looked around for Papyrus. Before she could spot him, though, her eyes fell on something else: two little mounds of stones, stacked neatly beside each other near the edge of the clearing.

Corsica paced over and craned her neck to inspect them. They looked like... grave markers?

To an unknown mare, one read. To an unknown stallion, the other added.

...Corsica wasn't good with death, so she decided not to dwell too hard on them.

It didn't take too much extra searching to find Papyrus. He was hiding behind a tree, shoulders slumped, looking smaller and less arrogant than usual.

"Well?" Corsica asked, remembering why they had come here in the first place. "This your meteor place?"

"One and the same," Papyrus sighed, getting to his hooves. "Had your fun? Because now that I've seen it once, I've suddenly lost my appetite to come back here."

"What is this place?" Corsica asked. "You know something about it?"

Papyrus hesitated. "...You'd have to ask someone who was there when it mattered."

I stared at another sheet of paper, collecting my thoughts and about to begin again, when a knock sounded at my door.

My ears flicked. "Eh? Come in."

It was Corsica.

"Hey," she said, carrying herself straighter than her usual lounging posture. "You still up?"

"Can't sleep," I admitted, my window curtains open and my bracelet aglow. "You too?"

"Something like that," Corsica said. "Any chance you're thinking about the stuff we saw? During our flight, in the mountains."

"Yeah." I looked away. "Kind of hard to forget about after an experience like that."

Corsica tilted her head, trying to get a look at all my crumpled papers. "You trying to figure out how it works?"

"What it means," I corrected. "It felt like... I dunno how even to describe it. Why do you suppose these mountains are here? I bet someone made them, for a reason."

Corsica looked contemplative. "Dunno about that," she eventually said. "Maybe. But if you wanna know what they do, I've just been out scouting with Papyrus. Got some observations I'd like to hear your thoughts on."

Holy

"Where'd you even... get all this stuff?" I puffed, trudging through a forest, my back laden with several bags that were collectively twice as big as I was. Inside was supposedly a full suite of scientific instruments looted from our lab at Icereach... or at least half a suite, since Corsica was carrying the other half.

"From Icereach," Corsica said, as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Yeah, but when?" I pressed, my thoughts itching to focus on the trees and grass and stars surrounding me, yet pounded back into reality by the weight on my back. "I helped you pack, remember? When we were leaving? And I also lugged all our stuff to the ship from Jamjars'. I think I'd know if you were carrying these around all the time..."

Corsica shook her head. "Nicov brought them six months ago. Remember? After the mess with Aldebaran, Graygarden wanted to pay us off so we wouldn't make too much of a fuss about what happened to us on his watch?"

I blinked... and remembered. "Oh yeah..."

"I take it you never followed up with him to see what he learned, yourself?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

My neck itched. "I had a lot going on, okay?"

"Didn't miss much," Corsica said, flicking her tail and leading the way. "He looked, but it turns out Ironridge doesn't have a tourist-friendly elevator to the bottom of the world. But since Graygarden was bankrolling the thing, I just had him throw in a bunch of stuff we could use ourselves if we ever made the trip ourselves. It's been sitting at Fort Starlight ever since."

That was... either remarkable foresight or remarkable luck, but either way, it was working out for us now. Nicov or someone else must have loaded this onto the ship at Corsica's behest while I wasn't looking.

Now all I wanted was to know why we were taking equipment meant for studying ether crystals at the bottom of the world into a forest in the tallest mountain range in the world.

It was a special forest, certainly, and I didn't just say that because I had never properly been in a forest before... Those few times I tried to go to the Night District and was turned back by the heat three steps in didn't count. I wanted to put down my bags, relax and extend my senses, feel the air around me... A sense I couldn't describe told me the trees were alive, and the winds, and the earth beneath my boots. Usually, though, when I was in a crowd, I felt crushed, like I needed to withdraw into myself as my personal space shrank.

Not here.

The presence around me felt like family, only in a form I had never experienced before. Strong, trustworthy, dependable, like someone who held their head high and held yours up when you needed it, too. Instinctively, I felt like this presence should make me uneasy, yet instead I felt secure, like I could walk and know I wouldn't stumble.

In my chest, Ludwig's little spark of cold felt diminished. But the pink flame felt strong.

I opened my mouth, but closed it before I said anything, the blue light in the distance getting stronger through the trees. I hadn't yet told Corsica about the flame, or even what I had been doing for the week I was underground. I needed to, but there just hadn't been a right time. Maybe soon?

Standing in this place, I felt like I could do most anything, and it would be alright.

Ahead of me, Corsica was entering a clearing, saying something about the sky and a new, gaseous form of ether, but I couldn't make myself focus on that. It wasn't just that I felt like I could do something. I needed to do something, like a restless determination had suffused my bones and was cradling my mind. It didn't matter what, so long as it had significance. If only I knew how to give this feeling a direction...

The trees opened up at last. Corsica slung down her bags, and I gently did the same, more on instinct than intent as my focus was stolen by the light rising up before me. The glassy ground dipped down in a crater, and a blue double-spiral of flame-like light filament wound softly up from the depths. Just beholding it, my body felt alternately cold and hot, and I let out a puff of breath that materialized in the frosty air. There was something immensely powerful here, and I was resonating with it like a plucked guitar string.

"Halcyon?" Corsica's voice rang distantly in my ears.

That spiral... I needed... I reached a hoof out...

"Halcyon...!"

Feelings flooded my mind as I closed my eyes and turned on my bracelet. I was drifting on a great tide of determination, of a fervent desire to live to see another tomorrow, a blend of sacrificial love and a stubborn perfectionism that could never accept a result that was won through sacrifice as being good enough. A chorus of voices, a chorus of feelings, countless hearts wishing as one.

I felt like... I could sink in, accept the chorus, lose myself in it and become one with it, and let it become one with me... except instead of drifting through it, I was being carried by a spark of pink.

"Halcyon!"

I pried my eyes open. My bracelet was burning, and a filament of blue was touching my hoof, reaching out of the crater like a curious tendril, its sapphire mixing with my emerald at the very tip.

And then my bracelet's glow changed to pink, and a small spark of pink traveled out from my hoof, flowing back down the filament like a marble through a pipe. The connection broke, separating me from the filament just as Corsica's hooves closed around my barrel, dragging me forcefully away from the edge.

"Hey-!" I protested, my senses returning all at once.

"You alright?" Corsica asked, standing over me and looking frustrated and concerned.

"Yeah, I..." I shook my head to clear it. "What just...?"

From the crater, the blue spiral began to shift and change.

Both of us turned to look, Corsica apprehensive and me curious, as it spun abruptly faster, the ends of its filaments converging into a ball of otherworldly midnight blue... and slowly, that ball took shape, holding the form of a pony.

It congealed further, hovering at the lip of the crater, until we were being watched by an astral pegasus hanging in midair, her mane and tail long and lush and curled at the very ends. Her coat was made of gentle midnight flame, and her mane and tail of stars, but her eyes held a familiar pink energy I could still feel inside me... yet could feel out there, as well.

Corsica's jaw was loose. I didn't know what to say either, but I tried anyway. "Are you...?"

"You heard my call," she said to me in a gentle, whispery voice.

"What's going on?" Corsica asked, looking back and forth between the apparition and me. "Hallie?"

"I am called Kindness," the stellar pegasus said, hovering with her wings outstretched, but not flapping. "Where are we? I did not realize this place of power existed in the world, yet it was sufficient to resuscitate me. To you, I am deeply thankful."

I got gingerly to my hooves. "We're in the Aldenfold. The mountains south of Ironridge? You're the pink flame, right?"

Corsica gave me a clueless look that ever so slightly demanded an explanation.

The pegasus simply nodded.

I looked between them, completely unsure of who to talk to first. This really would have been easier if I explained everything to Corsica when I first had the chance...

"Do not be alarmed," the pegasus said. "You are good ponies, I can tell. Over the past years, I have been gravely weakened to the point of unraveling, but thanks to you, that did not come to pass." She focused on me. "But I can see that not all sits well with you. You are confused, my little ponies?"

I glanced at Corsica and swallowed. "This is... what I was doing while I was gone for a week. I went down to the ether river, after the crystal tower appeared. I wanted to find out why, and thought I could hear the crystals calling for help... It's a long story. I found..."

Corsica stared levelly at me.

I sighed. "It's a lot to explain..."

After half an hour of explaining the same things over and over, Corsica had heard too much.

"Look," she sighed. "You're obviously dancing around something to explain why this endeavor took a full week. Maybe you don't think I'd believe you, or maybe you just like your secrets, so can we focus on this?" She nodded at the pegasus, who had waited patiently throughout the entire exchange. "It's related to the ether river and the crystal tower. You saved it, and it asked you to take it to find someone in Equestria. Right?"

Halcyon hung her head. "I know I should have explained this earlier-"

Corsica waved a foreleg. "You probably tried, and I shooed you off while eating my soup this morning." She turned to the pegasus. "So... what's up?"

The pegasus regarded her. "...I don't know."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You don't know what's up?"

The pegasus shook her head, looking slightly dejected. "This situation is outside of everything I was created to do. My seat of power is broken, and I am greatly diminished. You have saved me, but I know not what to do. Furthermore, these mountains block my perception. From here, I can see nothing of the world."

"Alright," Corsica said, "let's start at the beginning. What are you?"

"I am Kindness," the pegasus repeated. "A shard comprising one-ninth of the world's soul."

Halcyon's ears perked up. "Oh, right! Valey told me about this..."

Corsica gave her a sideways look. For a scientist, Halcyon wasn't very good at keeping all her information concise and delivering it all in one piece... "And what else did Valey say? Anything that would be good to know sooner rather than later?"

Halcyon looked at the ground. "Look, I've had a lot to think about..."

"Valey is known to me," Kindness said. "My home played sanctuary to her many times over the years."

"Alright." Corsica turned back to the pegasus. "Let's say I believe everything you say. The world is alive? It has a soul?"

Kindness nodded. "Ponykind has forgotten much over the millennia. When the world was created, it was decided that certain concepts or emotions should have inherent power, that good might have an incorruptible weapon to use against evil. My siblings and I, the other shards of the world's soul, were created to arbitrate these forces and provide structure and enforcement to the new laws of nature that our creators desired. We are artificial life, and not people as ponies understand each other to be, so to think of the world as alive as you perceive it would be misleading. However, it does have a will."

Corsica looked her up and down. "Natural laws, huh? Got any proof? We're scientists. With equipment." She gestured to the bags at the edge of the clearing. "An experiment we could peer-review would be pretty groovy. Just sayin'."

Kindness shook her head. "I am not Knowledge. I am Kindness. My domain is not to question or understand the circumstances of our existence, but to care for the creatures who partake in it."

"Knowledge, then? That's another one?" Corsica lit her horn, floating over a notepad and beginning to write. "What are the others?"

"Knowledge, Hope and Love," Halcyon interrupted. "Then Kindness, Laughter, Honesty, Loyalty, Generosity and something called the Spark. Same as the Yakyakistan faith tenets. Valey explained this too."

Corsica threw the notepad at her. "You take notes, then." As Halcyon caught it, she turned back to Kindness. "So, how about the crystal tower? What's the deal with that?"

"The crystals are born from me," Kindness explained. "Through my power, they can be conjured and shaped. However, in my hour of need, as my focus slipped, they took on a form of their own. All I wished for was to flee."

"Well, that's sort of what they were doing, right?" Halcyon looked up from the notepad, where she was hastily scribbling. "If you're trying to get away from something, going as far up as you can manage isn't a bad idea. What were you fleeing, anyway?"

"The misuse of my power," Kindness said. "Emotions are self-replenishing, infinite over time yet finite at any given moment. They are prone to feedback loops: when you help your fellow pony, you feel good and encouraged in doing so. For millennia, ponies have drawn upon the power of my siblings, such as Love and Knowledge. Willingly given and used for purposes that align with their domains, the emotions of the world are vast indeed. However, for too many years now, my ponies in Ironridge have been using the power of Kindness to create weapons of war. Such a perversion was painful beyond measure. It tempted me to feel nothing at all, so that I could not be used against myself. And such temptations ate away at me, combined with the pain, until I became diminished to the state you see now."

Corsica looked at the hovering pegasus with concern. "What would happen if you got diminished further?"

"Nothing," Kindness said. "I have already been forced to abdicate my domain. The laws of nature that I imposed in my portion of the world have already begun to unravel. My existence means little if I cannot fulfill my duty. However, I still want to exist."

"Laws of nature?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Like, science will just stop working? Math won't exist anymore? That stuff?"

"I think she means the gray sky," Halcyon whispered.

Kindness nodded. "Worlds have existed before without us, but they all met their ends, worn away by the scouring of entropy. We were conceived as a solution to that when our birthplace faced the same scourge, and its ponies realized that they could not otherwise last forever. Indus, our world was called. Though I remember nothing of it, I know my own purpose."

Corsica scratched her chin. "And a magical embodiment of kindness somehow changes the laws of entropy? It still exists, you know. Entropy is easy to observe wherever you go."

"No," Kindness said. "But we provide an exception to the laws. A conduit between the material plane and the realm of emotions and souls, by which one might more directly affect the other. I am sorry. I cannot explain exactly how it works. As I told you, Knowledge is not my domain. I merely know that, without us, energy in the material world is a zero-sum equation, that will disperse and dilute no matter what. Energy in the emotional plane, by contrast, comes and goes, multiplying itself and canceling itself out, never stilling as long as life exists. The mana energy that seeps up through the ground and ponies collect in wells to power their machines? The flow of that energy comes from us, as does the heat I attempted to use to push ponies out of Ironridge so that they would stop misusing my power. Through us, so long as the world and those within it desire existence, we can replenish the energy that is lost to space, the finite materials that, once broken down, can never be recovered. That is our duty."

Halcyon looked shaken. "So without you, all the mana wells in the north will eventually dry up?"

"Perhaps," Kindness told her. "Or perhaps my siblings will be able to intervene. I am not the first of us to lose my home. There is precedent, far to the southwest of here. However, as you can see... in pinning our ability to survive for eternity upon the changing tides of emotion, we render ourselves vulnerable to those who do not desire harmony. Ponies were gifted the capacity to choose selfishness over selflessness. Because of this, our system can and will fail when they simply lose the desire to coexist."

"Seriously?" Corsica's voice was less steady than she expected. "So just because one bad apple was misusing your power to create weapons..."

"Back when the tower appeared," Halcyon cut in. "Kitty and Jamjars obviously had something to do with it, but they sounded surprised when things broke down this early." She turned to Kindness. "And the thing that pushed you over the bring was conjuring a shield to protect the city from a missile. I get not wanting to make weapons, but how'd you get hurt by that?"

The astral pegasus hung her head. "I was already gravely weakened by the time my powers were called upon. Understand that I am not independent from the ponies that live upon the land. Souls are born from the Lifestream, the great river upon which my crystal palace is built. There is always cruelty in the world, to which I am painfully sensitive, but just so am I sensitive to the kindness that ponies show one another as they go about their lives. I can weather much simply by watching the feelings that ponies express for others and affirming my purpose in them. However, Ironridge's air has become stagnant of late. There is a seed... Something vile in the city. A powerful knot of noxious emotions that choked me whenever I tried to recover my strength. Perhaps without it, I could have weathered the misuse of my powers indefinitely. But, assailed on two fronts, I was drowning."

"Noxious emotions..." Halcyon frowned. "Like a changeling queen? You don't mean Coda, do you?"

"No." Kindness gently shook her head. "Coda was known to me. She is a child for whom I care. I could not see the source of the miasma of which I speak. The foul emotions which comprise it are opaque to me, and prevented me from understanding what was inside. I know only that it was in the cities at the forest floor, what you called the Night District. And I know that it touched many, many ponies."

Halcyon gritted her teeth.

Corsica glanced over. "You alright?"

She sighed. "That's where Ansel spent most of his time. When he said he wasn't coming with me, he made it sound like he had found a really important cause, something he needed to do... I wonder if he knew about this? If he was trying to do something about it, maybe he really was doing something as important as we are."

"I dunno about that," Corsica said. "Guess it's on him to take care of himself. So..." She turned back to Kindness. "Anything more we should know? Aside from the fact that the world might slowly be ending, and Halcyon is somehow acting as your vessel until we get you to this champion pony?"

"How about this place?" Halcyon asked. "The crater, the power here. What is it?"

Kindness focused on the crater. "...I don't know. The Aldenfold are a part of the world we cannot see. I knew not that this place even existed. It is a holy place. There is nothing here anymore, but something once occurred here that was so significant, a memory of it has been scarred upon the land, and that memory itself is strong enough to imbue the land with immense power. The site of the convergence of countless wishes, innumerable ponies united in their desires... It is this kind of power that my own existence exists to permit. I wish I could have seen whatever occurred."

"Huh." Corsica looked around again at the crater. "...Well, we did come out here to take some measurements on this place... Any chance you mind if we get some scientific readings on you, too?"

Dawn was approaching by the time Corsica and Halcyon made their way back to the Verdandi. They had plenty of data that needed to be analyzed, and plenty of discussions to have and conclusions to draw about the things they had observed, but a few conclusions so far seemed inevitable.

First, 'ether' as a concept might have to go. It was becoming clear that there were several very different things with slightly similar properties that were getting lumped together under the same label, and an entirely new classification system for a new group of materials would likely be warranted in the long run, but that would have to wait to get ironed out until they knew a lot more. Second, whatever Kindness was made of - and the blue filaments, and the gaseous ether, and even the glass and some of the plants growing near it - probably fit into their old concept of ether, underscoring why that concept needed to evolve.

Third, Halcyon had something she wasn't saying.

It had to do with her bracelet, and with how she hadn't been enthusiastic about letting Corsica watch when re-hosting Kindness, or however that had worked - the astral pegasus explained that she probably wouldn't be able to continue manifesting like this once they left the crater, and then Halcyon lit her bracelet and the apparition just floated inside.

That was a head scratcher. Part of Corsica wanted to wish Halcyon would tell her, but... that would be crossing a line.

Oh well. Plenty of other things to ponder and think on, like whether and how all this tied into their original research on ether crystal fault planes. If the ether river really was based on emotional energy, then perhaps world events of great societal importance could be causing the ripples that formed the fault planes much more directly than they expected...

I had trouble holding my head high as we returned to the ship, the moon low in the sky and my legs starting to feel the burden of lugging heavy equipment while being awake for too long.

It felt like I had missed an opportunity. Could haves and should haves swirled around in my brain, mostly about how I didn't explain to Corsica earlier what happened to me in the caves, or how I could have reached deeper into the energy in the crater, but never did. But the biggest thing that was bothering me was that even now, I couldn't bring myself to explain to her that I was a changeling queen.

I was supposed to be over this. It wasn't fair. When I first learned, I was less bothered by it than the fact that Faye was so scared of letting me find out. But even with the feeling of the crater at my back, that I could do anything and it would be okay, I just couldn't bring myself to spit it out.

Not on our way there. Not once Kindness had appeared, and I was stumbling my way through an awkward explanation of how I had gotten in that situation. And not now, on our way back.

It should have been fine! Why wasn't it? Why couldn't I do this? I... I... The harder I struggled, and the more I failed, the less it actually felt like I could do it.

It didn't make sense.

You can't run from who we are, Faye's voice told me inside my head. This is the same thing that happened in the trench, when you couldn't use the bracelet in front of Balthazar, remember?

Then what was I supposed to do?

...I don't know, Faye conceded. I'm rooting for you, I really am. But... maybe us being split isn't working in your favor right now. We're terrified of this, Halcyon. Of who we really are. You're hiding from that fear, but it's still there, just so hidden that you can't understand when it stops you. If you felt it, the whole thing, all at once, then you'd know why we can't do this.

Then how was I supposed to overcome it?

How do you know overcoming it is even a good thing? I know it's inconvenient, but healthy fear keeps you safe. I know I promised you that we'd be in this together, and I'm not trying to discourage you. I just want to explain why this is impossible.

I frowned. It was going to become a whole lot less convenient next time something like this happened, and questions about how I was doing what I was doing got in the way of an important opportunity to learn about some new phenomenon. Besides, Corsica knew I was dancing around something. She was plainly suspicious. I didn't have to go out and advertise it to the world, but my best friend and science partner needed to know.

In that case, take a rest and try again tomorrow. No sense in doing it while your emotions are high. The calmer you are, the better.

...Right.

Having someone to confide in like this helped a lot, actually. I wished that, soon, I could do the same with Corsica.

We returned at the crack of dawn to find the ship abuzz with activity. Papyrus looked like he was arbitrating, and Mother and Leif were both there... but so was someone else.

They were a small mare, probably about sixteen, wearing incredibly tight-fitting clothes... or not? Something about them was very off, the way she fit into...

She was an alicorn. And her wings, though furled, had the telltale glossy blades of inertial stabilizer rotors poking out where the feathers should be.

A Whitewing.

Except this one was smaller - and, particularly, thinner - than the models I saw in Icereach, and in the Cold Karma weapons hangar. Instead of silver, she had a golden, amber sheen, and was more visibly a she instead of an it. Someone had taken a lot of care to make her look more equine and less machine, to the point where I couldn't actually tell if the cute little suit jacket and miniskirt she was wearing were part of her body, or real, detachable clothes.

She turned to look at me. Instead of the monochrome, pupilless eyes most Whitewings I had, her eyes were luminous and mechanical, looking similar enough to real eyes to be endearing instead of creepy. She had cornea, irises, and a flexible enough face to give me a smile.

"Hello!" she called out, greeting me and Corsica in a soft voice that I knew I had heard before. "You were out when I made my grand entrance. I didn't mean to exclude you. I'm very sorry."

Wherever I had seen this creation before, not knowing was bothering me intensely. I wracked my memory...

"Braen?" Corsica asked, taking a step forward.

"You remember!" Braen bounced a little on her hooftips, showing off a fine motor control I wasn't quite sure even normal Whitewings possessed.

And then it clicked: this was the robed, hooded waif who first showed me the way to Fort Starlight, on the day I got arrested and escaped through the Flame District with Kitty. She had introduced herself as Shinespark's daughter.

Well, now I saw why she had been so heavily covered up.

"What are you doing here?" Corsica asked, giving me a look to see whether I recognized the creation before us.

"I was sent along by Mother and Other Mother," Braen explained, rocking cheerfully on her hooves. "To keep your engine room technician in check!" She pointed a hoof straight at Papyrus's face. "And to provide moral, emotional and physical support!"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow at us. "Well, you two don't look as oh-Garsheeva-get-me-out-of-here as a certain unnamed former revolutionary." His tail flicked at Leif, who scowled. "Already been introduced, I take it?"

"What's going on here?" I glanced at Mother for an explanation.

She just gave Papyrus a resigned look, then turned to me, chewing yet more bubble gum. "Be careful what kinds of company you keep."

"Yes, yes, Larceny, Halcyon is absolutely taking your unfounded suspicions to heart, she's so good at it that I wasn't even invited to be here," Papyrus sighed, glancing back at me. "She's been in this mood ever since I pulled the introduce-myself-as-Gazelle trick. Although that was when we first met... Is she always like this?"

"How about," I gently suggested, "you go back to the engine room and work on getting us back in the air, stop annoying my mom and let us talk to Braen in peace before I find out how good of projectiles this heavy science equipment makes?" I patted the bags on my back for emphasis.

Papyrus whistled innocently and backed a few steps away. Corsica looked impressed.

"The engine's not going anywhere, chief!" Braen told me, standing at attention. "She's alllll out of power. I've triple-checked her three times already."

"I took a flight while you were out," Papyrus added. "There's a village two days' walk away, or less if we flew the landlubbers down a cliff. I say we walk for it."

"Before we think about that," Corsica said, pointing a hoof at everyone in the room. "Writs? Especially you and you?" She pointed at Braen and Papyrus. "We're not going anywhere near civilization until all stowaways are accounted for. And you'd better speak up now if there's anyone else."

"Already got mine." Papyrus shrugged. "Kids these days, talking like being born into privilege is unusual!"

"I need no writ!" Braen smiled again. "I have a mechanical body!"

Leif shrugged. "Airships don't need writs. I don't know what Equestria will think of a talking machine."

A talking machine...

Instantly, Papyrus and Corsica and science and Kindness lost all importance in my mind. It didn't matter what Braen was doing here, or whether she needed a writ, or how bad I was at detecting stowaways on my own ship, or whether there might be more that I should be looking for. Here and now, only one thing mattered: all my life, I had been talking to machines, treating them like people and considering them my friends.

Here, by some miracle of science that I would not rest until I understood, was one who could talk back.

Frustration

Corsica frowned, watching from the sidelines as Halcyon peppered Braen with questions. Evidently, she hadn't been properly introduced to Shinespark and Valey's mechanical 'daughter' before... and was much more interested in making up lost time than with any other new acquaintance Corsica had seen her make.

Something like annoyance flickered in her gut. They had just returned from a very eventful scouting mission, talked with an alarming arcane entity that seemed to be living inside Halcyon's bracelet, had a wealth of new data to analyze and theories to formulate, and yet the expression on Halcyon's face told her these things were now the furthest possible things from her friend's mind. Halcyon looked like she had taken everything that happened, everything the spirit said for granted and moved on.

It was... it was bad science! First off, if they took everything the spirit said at face value, it would revolutionize science as they knew it. The world being alive, and having a soul? That soul being split in pieces, tasked with breaking the law of the conservation of energy in order to permanently counteract the pull of entropy? The crater's energy coming from 'the land remembering' an event of immense significance there?

Corsica wasn't a huffy traditionalist who poo-pooed new theories because they disagreed with established scientific canon. She was a researcher of an obscure, poorly-understood phenomenon who was looking to advance that kind of new theory herself, actually. But having those theories handed to her on a golden platter by a magic ghost felt like cheating, and not just because she hadn't worked for them. The spirit, when asked, had been unable to provide ways they could empirically verify what it was saying. And that meant the accuracy of what it said depended entirely on whether she and Halcyon had stumbled by accident upon some grand cosmological authority that the entire history of science had never seen before... or whether Halcyon had been taken in by some manner of fraud.

She couldn't write off either possibility, not when Halcyon believed so strongly that there was something special about the bottom of the world waiting to be found. It was equally plausible that Halcyon had really found her special something, or that she had been found by something that was exploiting her belief. What kind of thing would do that, or for what reason, were a mystery.

There was a third, much more likely explanation, too, and that was that Halcyon had stumbled upon something that wasn't a secret, and was new to them only because Icereach was living behind an information wall and they hadn't been in Ironridge long enough to learn about it. It was especially likely because Halcyon mentioned hearing about some of the things the spirit said from Valey - who, conveniently, hadn't mentioned any of this to Corsica.

If that was the case, sitting down and figuring out who to trust and catching up on missing information was just about their only choice.

Either way, she wished Halcyon would question this more, and help her question it to boot. Braen was likeable, sure, but was this really the most important thing...?

Oh, forget it. Maybe Corsica was just salty that Halcyon was being so talkative now after repeatedly dancing around something she had done in the caves while meeting this kindness spirit. Halcyon never talked that deeply about herself, so it shouldn't have come as a surprise, but now she was hiding something about the work they had shared over two and a half years.

Corsica closed her eyes and sighed. Better not to read too much into it. Either Halcyon would remain her partner, or she wouldn't, and there wasn't much she could ethically do about it.

"How do you, like, stay powered?" I asked, eagerly poring over every inch of Braen's metallic body, having long since concluded that her 'clothes' were actually metal parts of her exterior. "What's your energy source? How long does it last between charges?"

"Braen consumes many sources of energy!" Braen responded, eagerly showing off the mechanics of her joints and at one point even detaching a leg so I could see how the socket worked. "From normal mana to scary magic! I can even regenerate power supplies in my sleep!"

"Did you just refer to yourself in third person?" I pressed, examining an outstretched wing. It was clearly some form of inertial stabilizer rotor, but more curved and organic, and the blades were actually styled to look like feathers.

"Yes!" Braen beamed. "Ever since Nicov came to Fort Starlight, I have known that yaks are my spirit animal! However, speaking like a yak is hard. What is more, Mother gets very annoyed when I try to practice. She says it would draw tooo much attention. That is why I accidentally sound like a normal pony from time to time."

I took a step back and thumped myself on the chest. "Science pony Halcyon love yaks too. But yak speech of Braen need practice. Say 'a' too many times."

Braen regarded me with an expression of wonder.

I cleared my throat, my voice unaccustomed to going that low. "But, err, don't expect me to sound like that all day long. Also, I could swear you sounded like a dainty little waif when we met outside Fort Starlight?"

"Such are the trials and tribulations of being machine," Braen said with a shrug, apparently trying to take my advice to heart. "Mechanical bodies can be made however their maker wants them to be. I... err, Braen has to think long and hard about what to be when I grow up."

I regarded her with a smile. "Can the 'their' and 'the' and try again. Mechanical bodies..."

"...Can be made however maker wants them?" Braen's eyes lit up.

"See?" I straightened up. "You'll get there. I think we'll get along just fine."

In the background, Leif, Mother, Papyrus and Corsica were all watching, and I was only paying them a percent of my attention. "Don't get to watch something like this every day," Leif muttered, glancing at Mother. "This what you had in mind when you started raising her?"

Mother shrugged.

Papyrus waggled his eyebrows at Corsica. "Going once, going twice..."

"Shut up." Corsica slapped him with her aura, looking like she was thinking about something else.

After multiple solemn vows that there were no other stowaways aboard the Verdandi and an hour spent taking inventory of exactly what we wanted to carry with us, we set out for the village Papyrus had reported. Myself and Corsica had gotten little to no sleep, and already spent much of the night carrying hefty equipment to and from the crater, but that was our problem and I, for one, had a changeling queen bracelet to help me push through it. Leif looked ever so slightly concerned about our condition, but after too many weeks in Ironridge I was no stranger to pushing my physical limits. How hard could two more days of mountaineering be?

On my back, I carried my original coat, the one I wore when I fell in the Flame District still shredded, left behind in a room on the ship. I carried two satchels, one with my usual indispensable belongings, and another stuffed with pages and pages of raw measurements taken at the site of the crater that now wanted for analysis. Although, how dispensable my belongings actually were was suddenly up for question: when was the last time I had used my chess set, or my disguise kit, or my ocarina? All of these were for purposes I had found better ways to do as I grew and changed.

They still felt like a part of me, though. Things that were there at the beginning of the journey, and would stay along until they could see it through.

Corsica had agreed to leave most of the lab equipment behind. We had no idea where we would be going next after visiting this village, but locations where we could study ether were very rare, and it wasn't implausible we would be coming back up this way at some point in the future, either to investigate the crater or to recover Coda's airship once we had a new power source to get it back in the air. And dragging that equipment back up the mountains would be a whole lot worse than getting it down.

Speaking of power sources, I had gone to see Fugue again before we locked the airship and set off. Coda's throne was cold and inert, her crown missing from its head. Severed of its connection to her, it must have been only a matter of time before its residual energies ran dry. Why didn't I think of that when accepting the ship? I had even seen the crown on Coda in Cold Karma's basement, where she was interned in ice.

The possibility of replacing it with my own crown, my bracelet, had crossed my mind. But after thinking on it, I was fairly sure it wouldn't work: the ship was powered by the flattery Coda had absorbed from her worshipers. I had never done anything of the sort. As a changeling queen, I was empty, unfed and unformed, with only a single windigo and a half-dead embodiment of kindness rattling around in my... wherever changeling queens kept these things. So it stood to reason I didn't have enough stored emotions to run an airship.

And even if I did... I couldn't tell Corsica what I really was, so how could I tell someone like Papyrus?

Maybe one day, I would conquer the fear Faye insisted lived on inside us, find and dedicate myself to an emotion like Coda had tried to do with love, and then return and try to power the ship myself. But not today.

And so we set off. The journey started easily, dawn bringing warmth and long shadows as we marched south across a flat, grassy plateau. The forest with the crater was to our west, and I could still see an ethereal, shimmering quality to the air above it when I squinted right.

Not a cloud graced the sky, and the air was perfectly temperate, a breeze blowing in from the forest that smelled like growth and life incarnate. It was hard to tell how far the meadow stretched; behind us, it gave way to snow-streaked cliffs and canyons, and ahead, a few more snow-capped peaks poked up above the horizon, warning of a treacherous descent above. But I could only look at the eastern horizon for so long before being blinded by the sun, and during those times I found no trace of anything but grass and sky.

This was a different kind of beauty than the mountains as seen from above, with all the environments mish-mashed together without a care for the laws of geography. I could still tell those laws weren't being respected, but instead of feeling like a patch on a quilt, the plateau felt like an island, tranquil and welcoming yet surrounded by soaring vistas and hostile slopes.

I wondered why nobody lived here. Surely, enough things grew here that it would be easy to farm, and if the storms were too fierce then the grass wouldn't have found dirt to grow in. Speaking of storms, it was so flat that drainage should have been impossible, and yet the ground wasn't muddy at all, even though the grass had a vibrancy that I assumed could only come from plenty of water and care.

Eventually, we reached the plateau's end, Papyrus flying overhead to guide us and ensure we stayed on course to the village. It was so abrupt, it was as if the ground had been cut by a precision laser saw, the dirt wearing away to stone and a few feet later the stone dropping off in a wall more sheer than the walls of a house.

We were near a canyon in the plateau, and as I hugged the edge and looked down, I could see water jet out of the canyon far below and enter free fall, a waterfall pouring out of the side of a much bigger cliff that must have looked beautiful from below. At the bottom, in the distance, the water pooled and collected and became a river winding its way through a valley to the south, until a lake far in the distance where the valley seemed to widen out, the mountains that formed it gradually becoming more and more gentle.

On the far side of the lake, still shadowed from the morning sun, several telltale lights graced the windows of what must have been cottages. There was the village.

"Right, then," Papyrus said, walking up behind me. "There's a path by the river at the base of the cliff, so if we fancy a little skydiving then everything should be dandy. I did spy a switchback over yonder for anyone less aerodynamically inclined, but let's say it looks like a bad idea and leave it at that."

He gestured to the southwest. I looked, and across the river canyon saw a thin strip of rock from the same strata as the plateau hugging a mountain ridge that made up the western side of the valley below. Hugging the base of the mountain slope was something that might have passed for a treacherous path, but just looking at the snow pack on the peak, feeling the warm air around us, seeing how far it was to the bottom...

Corsica was staring too, and her expression looked vaguely nauseous. I didn't have to ask why.

"Right." I looked over the edge again. "So how are we getting down, again?"

Papyrus winked three times at me in rapid succession. "With our wings, dummy!"

Corsica gave him a look of annoyance.

I cleared my throat. "Well, err... You know, Mother kind of has a war injury, and..."

"Yes?" Papyrus fluttered his eyelids at me.

"Anomaly detected in Papyrus's attitude," Braen warned curiously, marching over and looking sideways at him. "You are correct that some among us cannot fly. But why focus on Halcyon?"

I gritted my teeth. "He's making fun of me because I don't like admitting out loud that I can't fly either."

Papyrus looked mock surprised, but Braen patted me on the shoulder. "That is okay. Papyrus is very rude."

"Me?" Papyrus held a wing to his chest. "I'm just trying to delicately handle a sensitive-"

In a show of strength that belied her lithe form, Braen stepped forward, picked Papyrus up and threw him off the cliff.

With a yowl and a rustle of feathers, Papyrus swooped back up over the cliff edge, though he remained hovering well out of Braen's reach. "Speaking of rude..."

Braen pointed a hoof at him. "Don't forget why I'm here, mister! Other Mother sent me to keep an eye on your shenanigans!"

Corsica laughed. "Great. So, who's getting carried by who? Dibs on not Papyrus."

Braen was already at my side. "Dibs on Halcyon!"

Mother and Leif glanced at each other.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow at Corsica. "Now look, I know you were the first to speak, but the math is saying otherwise..."

"You can carry the luggage," Corsica said, floating her bags over to him. "Someone's gotta do it. The responsible fliers can just make two trips."

Papyrus stared at all our bags. "If such is the price of currying your fickle favor..."

Riding on Braen's back was a sensation I was wholly unable to describe.

It wasn't like flying disembodied across the mountains, in which I was truly alone. Nor was it like riding on an airship, which felt little different than setting hoof in a building. But it wasn't like riding on a flesh-and-blood pony, either. The part of me that normally resisted physical contact was tense, in a high state of alert, waiting for some signal that just never came. The closest experience I had had, I decided, was riding the trains in Ironridge, where I existed in a perpetual state of anticipating getting bumped into.

Instead of making me uncomfortable, flying with Braen made me anticipate being uncomfortable. Which was still uncomfortable, just... in a different way.

Her flight was much less hover-y than the Whitewings I had observed during the Aldebaran incident, involving heavy use of her actual wings. That made me think back to the inertial stabilizer rotor that was still in my satchel, and the weapon I had once tried to make with it. What would Braen have to say about that? At the very least, maybe it would be handy to have around as a spare part...

We descended quickly, and were at the bottom before I could even complete my thoughts on the process. Braen dropped me alone, as we were the first ones to arrive, saluted, and flew back up to help with the supplies.

Here in the river basin, it was cool, but not cold. All the trees were coniferous, and as they got thicker, I could see a dense carpet of pine needles covering the path ahead. Braen hadn't put me down by the river itself, but rather on the western slope, on the path I had seen that looked in danger of avalanches, right where it exited the valley, made a switchback and began to climb.

A natural silence surrounded me as I stared into the forest at the path ahead. Which was to say, it was anything but silent: I could hear the distant burble of the river, and the even more distant rush of the waterfall, and all the tiny cracks and noises of the forest, sounds that would normally be invisible if it weren't for the absence of all the things I was used to hearing.

How many ponies got to be here, and to hear this? Hopefully, the ones who did had stopped to enjoy it. I glanced at the path leading up the mountain slope, and it was covered in a thin layer of gravel and scree mixed with occasional drips and dots of slush that must have rolled down from above. There were no signs of regular maintenance.

I didn't get to appreciate it for long, however, as Papyrus arrived with the first load of luggage and Leif arrived with Mother and Papyrus flew back up to get another load as Braen came back with Corsica. It took one more trip after all that to finish getting our stuff - I questioned why we had packed so heavily when Corsica left behind the lab equipment and Mother wasn't known to be a heavy traveler, but maybe I was just underestimating how hard it actually was for pegasi to carry loads. By the end of his second trip, Papyrus looked legitimately ready to collapse, even though he had only flown back up the cliff face once.

At least it made him less talkative as we entered the forest. The sensation of my boots sinking into pine needles was so alien and interesting I was tempted to take off my boots to experience it directly, but then again, with so much company...

I resisted the temptation and pressed on. The path hugged the river, which swelled several times as tributaries joined it from the mountains to the east, until it had gone from a large stream to something you could sail with a very small boat.

With how big the Aldenfold were, you'd have thought it would be larger.

After a while, a gigantic fallen tree trunk blocked the way, much larger than any of the other trees near the river. Where had this come from? Maybe there was some different environment up above, and it fell from one of the bordering mountain ridges? I shadow snuck beneath it, and while I waited for the others to make their way across, I noticed that someone had used a very sharp knife to carve an awkward but effective series of hoofholds that one could use to climb over.

From the amount of moss on the log, and how it grew into and around the hoofholds, this hadn't been recent. Also, they were surprisingly close together. The rest of the trail hadn't received any maintenance, and the log wasn't so big that it would be impossible for a full-grown pony to scramble over...

Thinking about it, this almost looked like it had been done by a foal.

The log drifted from my mind as we kept walking and left it behind. By now, the hours of hiking and lack of sleep were beginning to take their toll in earnest; we were traveling lighter after a break for food, but that could only compensate for so much. It wouldn't be long before the sun slipped behind the mountains, close to us as they were, so I made the most of the light to turn my bracelet up a little while I still had a chance of not getting spotted.

Step. Step. One hoof after the other. The sun slipped away, and I trudged on through the forest, a resilience to boredom born of crunching numbers in a lab for hours on end carrying me forward. How Leif and Mother were still going, I didn't know, the former having been locked in Lilith's science purgatory for months and the latter having three usable legs, but at least they presumably had gotten a full night's sleep. Corsica and Papyrus looked even more dead than me, and another hour of marching saw both of them using Braen as a crutch at the same time.

And then, just as I was beginning to fear I'd need to steal one of their spots, the trees lightened and abruptly gave way.

Ahead of us was the lake I had seen from above, and beyond that, several smoke plumes, which almost alarmed me until I realized they probably had chimneys here. Non-industrial ones, used for heating... With a sigh of relief, I collapsed on the ground.

Across the lake, in the early evening gloom, a bonfire was flickering to life, several colorful ponies visible around it. It didn't take long for one of them to notice us, and point us out to their friends. Several waved.

Braen waved back. Some of the ponies left the bonfire and started skirting around the lake, following a trail that would eventually lead to us.

Two of them, specifically. As they got closer, I started being able to make them out: one unicorn, and one pegasus, both mares.

The unicorn was a compact, tubby yellow mare with a special talent depicting a fish, probably in her mid-50s. The pegasus, about half her companion's age, was also short, but not nearly to such an extreme, boasting a white coat and an even whiter mane and tail that looked more like they were made from silk than hair.

"Greetings!" the pegasus called first, though she was bringing up the rear.

"Don't see this every day," the unicorn added, stepping close, her horn lit for illumination. "You six have the look of folks who've come a long way."

"You can say that again," Corsica grunted, leaning against her bags. "Got any hospitality for weary travelers?"

"And not-so-weary travelers!" Braen added, carrying about half of the group's stuff and still looking chipper and hale.

Both of the townsponies gawked at her.

"Excuse our robot," Papyrus cut in with a half-dead smile. "Our airship ran out of fuel mid-flight, and we've been hiking for weeks. As my friend here said, any hearth or place to rest our hooves, we'd make well worth your while..." He showed off a few griffon gold coins from Coda's stash.

Not that I was complaining, but... why was he being polite now? Usually, he couldn't help himself.

The pegasus sniffed the air. "Not weeks," she decided. "Definitely not weeks. But I can't think of any other way so many ponies would come from this direction..." She glanced at her companion. "Do they have you-know-whats?"

"Yep." The unicorn's horn went out. "Except, uh... whatever you are. No offense." She nodded at Braen. "You're not showing up to the spell at all, so I suppose you're good?" She looked to everyone. "Northerners, I take it. Didn't think I'd live to see another writ holder, much less five in the same place. The name's Fish Fillet, or Fishy, and I'm the mayor of this here town, known on the maps as Sires Hollow. I'm sure you all have a story, but that can at least wait until you're back by the fire."

She gave us a look that suggested she wanted our names before we started walking.

"Leitmotif," Leif started. "Leif works too. These are-"

"You can call me Papyrus," Papyrus cut in, interrupting her attempt to introduce him. "The name's been in my family for generations. A storied one, really..."

Leif blinked at him. As everyone else went around introducing themselves, I detected a very well-hidden note of tension leave his shoulders... What was that all about?

"And I'm Fluffy Fleece," the pegasus with the impossible mane finished. "Professional artist, interior designer, upholsterer and barber by popular demand."

"Huh," Corsica said. "Do all Equestrians have two names?"

"Do all northerners have only one name?" Fishy shrugged. "Just the way things are here, kid. But let's get to know each other back where it's warm."

"Starlight," Fishy said as we settled in around the fire, which apparently was being used for a village cook-out and thus a perfect place for us to rest and seek food. "That's a name I'll never bring myself to forget."

There were six or seven other ponies around the fire, looking visibly curious to meet us, yet we were deep in conversation with Fishy and Fluffy when we arrived, and something about Starlight's name seemed to act like a signal, causing all the other ponies to wait and listen rather than ply us with questions.

"She's been through here, then?" I pressed.

"Aye." Fishy nodded, the word cutting itself short in her mouth. "She grew up here around twenty, thirty years ago. I was friends with the ponies who adopted her. Her parents in this town, not the adventurer ones... Well, I doubt you'd be asking about her if you didn't already know her story. I'd given up long ago on any of her friends coming calling after her..." She surveyed us. "Don't recognize any of you, though. But I bet you at least know the group that was with her last time?"

I tilted my head. "You mean Valey and Gerardo?"

Fishy nodded again. "Valey. Gerardo. Maple. Amber. Shinespark. Slipstream. Harshwater. Grenada. Even Jamjars."

"Quite the memory for something that happened two decades ago," Corsica remarked.

"In a town like this, not enough happens for it to be worth forgetting," Fluffy explained. "I've heard it's different in the big cities, and things are busier. But you see, Starlight already got forgotten after the first time she ran away, and then everyone had to remember her when she came back. So when she ran away again... This time, we remembered."

"I suppose it was too much to hope for that she'd still be right here, snuggled up in her old home," Papyrus sighed.

Fishy nodded. "I take it you'll be just passing through, then?"

"Depends what our options are for travel," I admitted. "First off... do you have a map? The most recent thing we know is that she might be somewhere on a place called the Catantan Peninsula."

"The Catantan Peninsula?" Fluffy Fleece brightened. "That's not too far away. Well, not in the grand scheme of things, at least. Close enough that some ponies in this village have set eyes on it!"

"I have!" volunteered another of the ponies around the fire, a weathered stallion who looked like he had seen a lot in life, yet still had a fire in his eyes.

I brightened too. "Seriously? That's pretty lucky. Who are you?"

"Name's Hard Harvest," he said, his red face marred with stubble. "I run a ship out of port, bringing back big-city goods for the ponies here... or I used to, before they expanded the road and I switched to land caravans instead. Catantan is way to the east, about four months by my boat. It's about as far as you can draw a map and have the map still be useful."

"Out of port?" Corsica tilted her head. "There's an ocean nearby?"

"Sure is." Fishy waved a hoof to the southeast. "Well, more like water access to an ocean. It'll make sense once you see a map, I promise."

I was more fixated on the time. "Four whole months on a boat?"

Hard Harvest nodded. "Yeah. Usually you wouldn't make the trip, since there's nothing much out that way and it means you can't make it to Snowport and back before the weather turns."

My face fell. "Gonna guess there are no high-speed boats that make the trip on commission, then?"

"Or airships?" Papyrus wore a cheekily pleading expression.

Fishy barked out a laugh. "If we waited for someone to invent a faster boat to go out and trade with the world, we'd still be living in holes in the ground."

I gave my friends a look. For whatever reason, Mother and Leitmotif didn't share it.

"But you said there was a road?" Papyrus pressed. "One that's now fast enough that boats are obsolete. Any chance that happens to go remotely in the direction we're interested in?"

"Yes and no," Fishy answered, floating a tray off the grill that was built over the bonfire pit. "Here. Get some food in your bellies before you think too fast about moving on."

I chowed down into some form of vegetable bake. Icereach's censorship, Ironridge's political drama, even the magical mysteries of the Aldenfold were suddenly very old news. Now, my mind needed to wrap itself around the reality of a very new challenge: finding a way to travel cross-country through a world I knew very little about.

Directions

The stars had come out by the time I set hoof in the Sires Hollow town hall, my legs wobbly from a day of hiking and a night without sleep. Everyone from the bonfire had followed us, plus some new curious ponies we picked up on our walk through town. I was certain they had all introduced themselves, but my mind was foggy enough from exhaustion that Fishy and Fluffy were the only ones I could remember for certain.

It was nice, though, being exhausted for ordinary reasons and not because I had spent the day running from unwanted corporate advances and trying to understand a city that made no sense. Tonight, I felt like I would get a very good sleep.

"Right over here," Fishy beckoned, motioning my entourage over to a corner of the high-roofed, stone-and-log building. A large table was sandwiched between two wide sofas in front of a hearth that was starting to burn low for the night, and into the surface was engraved a worn, detailed and wholly unfamiliar map.

My eyes took it in eagerly, locating first the compass rose - happily, that was a concept that existed both north and south of the Aldenfold. That would mean... yes, a vast mountain range formed the northern edge of the map. The Aldenfold, then.

The map was centered on a sizable body of water that ran right up against the slope of the Aldenfold. To the east, it was open, the coastline smooth and curved, cutting down from the mountains and curving south, southwest and then west. To the west, it was broken up, the waters fragmenting and mixing with the land, as if mountain valleys had long ago sunk below the surface, creating waterways that were too big to be called rivers yet too long and narrow to be seas or oceans. The shape reminded me of a griffon's hand, with the palm in the east and the talons stretching out to the west.

"Fancy," Corsica said, poring over it with her horn lit for illumination. "So where are we?"

"Sires Hollow is here," Fluffy Fleece explained, reaching with a wing to tap the northwesternmost corner of the map. "And the Catantan Peninsula..." She walked all the way to the other side of the table. "Is here."

Her feathers rested on the eastern coast of the sea, which ran off the edge of the map shortly after connecting the southern mainland to the Aldenfold.

Braen tilted her mechanical head. "Why is it called a peninsula?"

"Nobody knows," said a red stallion I felt like had called himself Hard Harvest. "There's nothing out there but desert. It's actually a land bridge - map doesn't show it, but the ocean proper starts on the other side."

I scrutinized the map again. Sires Hollow was easy to spot now that I knew where to look, right up at the very end of the northwesternmost talon, a slim channel of water that hugged the Aldenfold closely. The water probably started just east of town... That meant that, if we sailed from here to Catantan, we would be going in a perfectly straight line the whole way.

For four months. Any alternate routes would only take longer and longer.

I felt a lump in my throat. Four months out, and four months back, plus however long it took us to find a way back across the Aldenfold, and that was assuming my intel was accurate and Starlight still was on the Catantan Peninsula, and it haven't even told me where on the peninsula her village was... We weren't going to make it. The war between Yakyakistan and Ironridge would be decided long before our best-case scenario for return.

"There are trading towns here and here," Hard Harvest explained, pointing at several spots on the map. The first was near the center of the map, at the eastern end of one of the land spurs that separated the talons from one another. The second was near the southern edge of Catantan, just before the coast made a hard swing to the west. "Well... more like supply outposts than towns. Fort Greenwater and Fort Redsand." He gestured to them in the same order again. "There's a land route from Redsand across the peninsula to get to the open ocean."

"So we could get a boat from here to Fort Greenwater, and from there to Fort Redsand..." I studied the map. The comments from earlier about taking a road suddenly made a little more sense. I could see a path leading south from Sires Hollow, going through other towns at the tips of the other talons. From any of these towns, trips to Fort Redsand would take about the same amount of time. Fort Greenwater would be primarily useful as a midpoint if you wanted to sail from one of the talon-tip towns to another... but now that there was a decent road between them, it would obviously be much faster to go that way. So if we went south along the road to a different talon-tip town and found that it was busier, we might have better luck getting a boat to Fort Redsand in the east.

I blinked, and did a double-take when I realized the parts of the sea were actually labeled as various talons and the Palm. Had I subconsciously noticed that before, or did great minds just think alike?

"So is this map all of Equestria?" Corsica asked. "What do you get past the edges?"

Fishy chuckled. "Oh, no, this is just our backyard. You'd need a four-by-four of these tables to show the whole thing, or more. Equestria's populous areas are all to the south, though. The way I hear it, most of the country is towns in the wilderness like us."

Hard Harvest nodded. "Down here... This is Snowport." He pointed to the town at the tip of the southernmost talon. "It's the biggest city in our neck of the woods. Cargo from the west flows through here, and even some from the south. All of it goes through Fort Redsand to reach the ocean, and then to the big cities on Equestria proper's east coast. If you really want to reach Catantan in a hurry, your best bet would be to take the roads south to get there, then look for a ship headed east that's faster than my old trade boat."

"Snowport, huh?" Corsica looked intrigued. "Any chance they've got real snow? Been too long since I've seen that good stuff."

"But we saw snow on the way here," Braen pointed out. "On the mountains!"

Corsica rolled her eyes. "You know what I mean..."

"I'm afraid not," Hard Harvest said with a shake of his head. "Ever since the Crystal Empire returned, the blizzards that gave that town its name have let up. Place is downright pleasant now, much to the dragons' dismay."

Corsica looked peeved.

"Dragons?" Papyrus cut in, a distracted look on his face. "Do tell..."

"Not a common sight up north?" Fishy guessed. "The ice dragons have been friendly with Equestria since time immemorial. Most of them live far to the west, on the Cernial Plateau, fighting their holy war and not having much to do with the rest of us, but some of them are adventurous types who live for wanderlust. Our little trading ecosystem here starts at the far eastern edge of their territory." She pointed at the western edge of the map, which looked almost as mountainous as the Aldenfold. "Snowport is run by them. Up until a few years ago, it was the be-all, end-all gateway between west, south and east."

"Until a few years ago?" I pressed, hearing dragons and trying not to think of the one I'd seen in the Whitewing hangar with Coda. "What happened?"

"The Crystal Empire," Fluffy Fleece explained. "Everyone thought it was a myth - a lost mountain city with ponies whose coats glistened like ice dragon scales. It was a popular local story, since we're very close to where it supposedly used to be. The Crystal Mountains - that's these ones, west of here - were locked in a perpetual blizzard, so no one could actually go exploring to look for it. But then one day, just over two years ago, the blizzard let up, and the city was right there. Its ponies didn't realize they'd aged a day since a thousand years ago."

"At least, that's what the travelers say," Fishy added. "We're not the most popular stop for traders when it's much faster to just catch a boat east out of Snowport, so all of our news comes from our own locals who make the trip and then tell us what's what."

Hard Harvest shrugged. "I haven't been to the city itself, but I've seen its citizens. Crystal ponies, they call themselves. They're the kind of thing you gotta see to believe."

"How hard is it to reach the Crystal Empire now?" Corsica asked. "And how well-connected are they? You make it sound like they've usurped Snowport as the place around here where everyone wants to be?"

"Everyone says they have an alicorn princess," Fishy said. "It's hard to know the exact situation - I don't know if the bigwigs in Canterlot consider them a vassal state, or a separate country, or even a second capitol. But they're important enough that any of those sound plausible to me. Snowport's still relevant, of course, since the Crystal Empire itself is landlocked. Kind of a dead end, as far as trading is concerned."

Fluffy nodded. "I hear it's mostly tourists. I sure would like to visit someday..."

"It's not that far from Snowport," Hard Harvest explained. "Gotta circle around a bit to reach the pass through the Crystal Mountains, but it's an established road."

I glanced at the rest of my friends, who were all looking at each other.

"Not that I'd ever question Butterfly's information," Papyrus said, "but tourist traps are known for ponies coming and going, and Starlight was awful at keeping a low profile. I'd wager if we went to this so-called empire and asked around for a bit, we could find someone who's heard of her."

"Really?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "One particular pony, and you think if we just ask around in a busy city, we'll randomly find someone who's heard of her?"

The locals in the room shuffled uncomfortably.

"Got something we should hear?" Leif asked, breaking her silence.

Awkward coughs and muttering ensued.

"It's just that you mentioned Starlight," Fluffy said. "Even after all these years, no one's quite sure what to make of her story."

"What is her story?" I asked. "We've heard some stuff, from the north, but not everything. What was she like down here? And what happened to her?"

Fishy sighed. "Starlight was an orphan. Her parents were treasure hunters who must have been from out of town - I was just a fishmonger at the time. Then a meteor fell, and landed up in the mountains." She gestured to the Aldenfold on the map. "Her parents must have taken her with them when they went up to go search for it. A few days later, she was brought back by another foreign treasure hunter who said he found both of her parents dead. Anyway, he took the meteor, and we took in Starlight."

A wistful look appeared in her eyes as she went on. "The ponies who adopted her... They were well-meaning folks. Friends of mine. Good ponies, through and through. Celestia, it feels like I'm explaining this to Starlight all over again..." She wiped at the corner of her eye. "But they weren't... Well, Starlight went through a rough patch when one of her friends left town. His name was Sunburst, and he had enough talent that we pooled our resources to send him off for a big-city education. And her parents just didn't quite know how to help her through it. She went downhill for a while, and eventually ran away. Everyone thought she must have died. Her parents couldn't handle it, and went their separate ways. And then, the better part of a year later, she came back."

Fishy cleared her throat. "She was with an airship full of adventurers from up north, who had adopted her again. Hardened folks. You could see it in their eyes that they were dead tired and had seen multiple lifetimes worth of hardship and suffering. None of them had used writs - don't ask how they got here without them, nobody knows - but they had one spare. They knew their path was no place for a filly, so they wanted to see her old home on their way back to the north. They were trying to make a decision, see, whether to give her the writ so she could legally go north with them, or give her new mother the writ so they could stay and live here together."

"Wait," Corsica cut in. "So she could legally go north? You mean Equestrians need writs to cross the border, too?"

"Sure do." Fishy nodded. "Anyway, what wound up happening was Starlight and her new mom decided to stay here. Then, right before they could set the decision in stone, another filly they had with them took the writ and used it herself, and Starlight had to stay here all on her lonesome. She almost killed that other kid right then and there. And when she didn't, it gave me this hollow feeling, like this outcome was even worse."

"Jamjars?" I breathed.

"Yep." Fishy hung her head. "That was her name. Wasn't certain I remembered it at first."

It hadn't quite sunk in, when I heard it from Valey and again when I heard it from Jamjars. But this time, it did. That was why Gerardo and Valey and everyone else hated Jamjars. Seeing the look on Fishy's face, what she must have witnessed in order to look this way...

"You were there, then?" Corsica guessed. "When it happened?"

Fishy nodded. "Yep. Newly appointed mayor. First crisis I really had to deal with, too. Those two kids, staring at each other on that ship deck... Starlight had this black knife, and was still as a stone, even when Jamjars shot her with her horn to try and defend herself. It's a sight I'm going to remember until my dying day."

"I was there too," Fluffy whispered, ashen.

I blinked at her. She couldn't have been much more than a kid herself at the time...

"I thought for sure we'd be at ground zero for a major international incident," Fishy said. "Those adventurers had some big name recognition in the north, and they knew things about Equestria that they could use to their advantage. If we had raised a hoof to try and stop them from taking Starlight anyway, I fully believe they could have started a war. But Starlight wouldn't let them. She stayed here, and refused to go with them. And they left. That night, a major earthquake struck the town that we all thought was some sort of omen. In the morning, Starlight was still here, but she had her cutie mark. And she was... different. Everyone knew something must have happened, but she never said what. And then she tried to live a normal life - made a valiant effort, really - but you could feel it on the tips of your fur every time she walked past that she wasn't long for this town. She started disappearing for days at a time. And then one day, a few months later, she said goodbye and joined a convoy and never came back."

My heart hammered heavily. The way Valey told this story, she sounded so detached, like it had happened to someone else. Not Fishy. Nor Fluffy, nor the rest of the townsponies listening in the background...

Maybe that was just Valey's way of coping. I suddenly wondered, if we did find Starlight, exactly what we'd find.

A quick glance at the rest of my friends told me most were thinking the same. The older ponies, Mother and Leif, looked more resigned, as if they were used to stories like this, or had lived them themselves. Braen and Corsica looked disturbed, and I took a moment to appreciate the range of facial expression that a machine was capable of. Papyrus's face was stony and impassive.

"...Thanks," I eventually said. "For... remembering that for us."

"I wasn't going to forget it anyway," Fishy said with half a smile. "But I think it's my turn for a question or two. Why are you looking for her? When her friends left, they promised to one day get enough writs for each and every one of them and then come look for her again. And here you come, calling after her with an unheard-of amount of writs together in the same place, and not a single member of her original group."

"We were sent by her friends," I said. "Or some of them, at least. They can't afford to travel anymore. They're too important, and have too much counting on them. But we... or, I, at least, really wanted to see the world. And so our interests lined up, and they asked us to look for her and find out how she's doing."

I deliberately omitted any part about potentially calling Starlight back to the north. After what I had just heard, that would be in poor taste at best. And besides, doing that in the first place was technically my idea, and contingent on meeting her and deciding it was a good idea at all.

Fishy nodded thoughtfully. "You're... not the first. One of her friends came back already... Her new mother, Maple. Never seen her since, either. Wherever they are, I hope they found each other and are happy. It's hard to think of someone who needs it more."

"What about Fluttershy?" Corsica cut in. "Every heard of a pony by that name? Starlight's not the only one in Equestria we're looking for."

"Fluttershy?" The crowd started muttering. "You mean the Element of Harmony?"

I blinked. "She's well-known enough to have a title? That's a good sign..."

Fishy nodded. "I take it you're pretty new to who's who in Equestrian culture. She's something of a modern-day folk hero. One of the friends of Princess Twilight. Equestria's newest alicorn, if you didn't know."

"Newest?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Fluttershy, or Twilight? Guessing the latter? Is that the one you said was in the Crystal Empire?"

Fluffy Fleece sighed. "Equestria has four alicorns. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna govern the sun and moon. They're a diarchy. They rule Equestria together from Canterlot, which is in the middle. Princess Twilight is the Princess of Magic, and she's too new to have any lands that she rules. Princess Cadence is the Princess of Love, and she's been ruling the Crystal Empire after it returned. Does that clear things up?"

At the words Princess of Love, my heart sank a little. Whether or not this Cadence was a real alicorn, I doubted I would care about her more than Coda any time soon.

"Illuminating," Papyrus told her. "Got any other gods or powers that be for us to be aware of? You mentioned a holy war the dragons are involved in?"

Fishy shook her head. "The ice dragons are real hush-hush about their religion to ponies. I couldn't tell you much about their war, or who they're fighting or why. I can't think of any other powers that sane ponies would worship, though."

"As insightful as all this is," Mother interrupted, "some of us are old and have been walking all day. Do you have anywhere we could spend the night?"

I sheepishly lowered my hoof and let my next question die on my lips, remembering that I, too, was dead tired. "Err, right..."

"Oh!" Fishy looked slightly embarrassed. "Sure. Should have asked that myself. Come with me. There should be some good spots laying around..."

Most of the townsponies went their own way as we set out for a house Fishy claimed was empty. "All the houses in Sires Hollow are owned by the mayor," she explained. "We don't have a lot of buildable land, and our population is too small to afford to waste something as hard to build as a house. So whenever a house opens up, from its occupants dying or leaving or moving in with a new spouse, it goes back to the town hall, and then we keep it in reserve for next time someone needs it."

"Really?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Do ponies get better or worse houses depending on how important they are, or do you try to keep everything roughly equal?"

"The latter." Fishy shrugged. "I doubt it would work for a place much bigger than ours. The only way it works for us is that if someone gets too ambitious and wants to rise above the rest, they'll probably just leave instead. And since we're small enough that everyone knows everyone, you don't want to get a reputation as a serial freeloader. In a place this remote, everyone being in it together is the only way to survive."

"You've got some nice amenities, though," Corsica pointed out, looking around as we walked. "Yards, glass windows..."

Fishy nodded. "All thanks to generation after generation of our ancestors. Hard work, minimal waste, and community support for our traveling traders has let us slowly enrich ourselves through the years, but it takes conscious effort to maintain. Everyone here knows that as much as we have, we still have little enough that if we ever turned against each other, we wouldn't have enough to survive. By making it easier to leave than to be selfish, we do our best to make that not an option."

"Is that sustainable?" Corsica tilted her head. "What if too many ponies leave?"

"It happens." Fishy shrugged. "The next town down south isn't doing so well on that front. Too many of its younger ponies getting up and going out to see the world. But we can't try too hard to fight it. If we forbid our youngsters from ever leaving, how will we get the next generation of traders who go out into the world to bring back the things we need to live the way we do? The best we can do is try our best to raise them right and make them feel like Sires Hollow is a place worth coming home to."

"It must have been very sad when Starlight ran away," Braen observed. "Sires Hollow must have felt like they didn't try hard enough to raise her right."

"You can say that again," Fishy said. "Especially since it wasn't the usual case of someone feeling like they were destined for bigger things. She was-" She blinked, looking again at who had spoken. "You know, uhh... I hope you don't find this rude, but you're pretty eloquent for a machine. You are a machine, right? How do you, like... you know...?"

Braen shrugged. "Braen is made from advanced technology. Mother created me to be hope for all ponykind. However, she raised me very close. Many rules. This is the first time I have been able to go where I want and talk freely to new ponies. It is very interesting."

Fishy pursed her lips. "Raised you, huh? Sorry if I'm being intrusive. Never met someone like you before."

"Not at all!" Braen saluted. "I am curious about you, too."

"What do you mean, hope for all ponykind?" I cut in. "When you say mother, you mean Shinespark, right? I thought I heard that somewhere?"

Braen nodded. "Halcyon is right. Shinespark created me. Her love is very great. So is her attention to detail, and skill with machines. This journey is like a test run to see how well I am made. When I get home, Mother will extract data and make a new, more-grown-up body for my next phase."

"A more-grown-up body?" Fishy looked intrigued. "So you can grow and learn, and are made by an inventor who upgrades your body to look older as you age?"

"Yes!" Braen looked pleased. "Right now, I am still a new Braen with little worldly experience. Before, I got to watch ponies, but rarely interact with them because Braen project is top secret. Had to wear disguises all day long. Now that I can for-real meet you, I will surely grow much, much faster."

Fishy chuckled. "Wouldn't be the craziest story I've heard. Anyhow, the house should be right over here..."

A key turned, and we stepped into a dark foyer that was quickly illuminated as Fishy switched on the lights. "Here you are!" she announced, stepping back and waving us inside. "Home sweet home, for as long as you decide to stay with us. Though I assume you'll be taking the first caravan south?"

"Yeah." I nodded. "We're not in the world's biggest hurry, but four months is still pretty long, you know?"

Fishy winked. "It'll feel shorter when you're older. I'll see what I can organize, and maybe we can get one heading out within the week for you. Sleep well, now!"

She turned to leave. All the other townsponies save for Fluffy had gone home, leaving us alone with the ephemeral pegasus.

"My house is just across the street," Fluffy said, pointing and preparing to set off. "I'm a bit of a night owl, so if you need anything, don't hesitate to ask!"

I nodded, said goodbye and turned to look around at our new lodgings.

It had clearly not been lived in for over a month, but the house was clean, as if it was regularly seen to by ponies to stop it from falling into disrepair. The hedge was a little overgrown and there was a light coating of dust on the floor, but nothing that would cause a sneeze if you stepped too hard.

"Right," Leif said, coming down the stairs from above. "I count four bedrooms, so two of us are going to have to double up. Who's volunteering?"

"I can sleep standing up!" Braen cheerfully announced.

"I'll take Hallie's room," Corsica added, stepping over to my side.

Leif winked. "Well, that was easy." She gave me a look that was slightly more serious. "Oh, and, Halcyon?"

"Eh?" I looked up.

She met my eyes. "You're kind of our self-appointed leader right now. Which you have the right to be when you provided most of our writs, are the one who visibly cares the most about this expedition, and I agreed to follow you anyway before all that. But if you will accept some advice from someone who's done this before too many times to count?" She raised an eyebrow. "Try to get some sleep tonight. You were pretty out of it today."

I reddened. "Oh. Err, right. Sure..."

Papyrus yawned. "She's the leader? For the record, I never was consulted... Mmm, bed..."

One by one, everyone stumbled off to their rooms, our bags spread out near the door where some helpful townsponies had left them, until it was just me and Corsica remaining.

I yawned too.

"Big couple of days, huh?" Corsica asked, looking not quite in a hurry to go anywhere.

"Yeah." I licked my lips. "You, err... what do you think? Of this town?"

"Nice enough." Corsica looked away. "Not nearly as interesting as you, or your secrets. Get some sleep, but... you know you can tell me anything, right?"

Oh. This was about me dancing around that I was a changeling queen.

"I'm sorry." I lowered my voice. "I actually can't. It's not because it's you, or anyone else. It's just... the words don't form in my mouth. I've tried to say so many things, and it's like I'm fighting myself the whole entire way. I want to, but I'm not the only me. I don't know... all of how I work. So some of the things I can't do, I just don't understand."

"Must be rough." Corsica sounded mostly neutral. "Maybe you can toss it over to the other you, then, and I can pester her about it. Just keep in mind that you're not someone who's happy with the status quo. If you were, you never would have left Icereach."

"You're not either," I pointed out. "Back when all this began, you were the one who most adamantly wanted to go."

She shook her head. "Only because I wasn't trying to be nice to Ansel like you were. What I'm saying is... Ugh." She glared at the floor. "Read the subtext, alright?"

I hesitated.

Corsica watched me, and when I couldn't get together anything to say, she marched over, stepped into my personal space and stared me straight in the eye. "Our research was your project that you got me in on and turned into our project. Now we've got some revolutionary new data that could completely change everything and rightfully should light a fire under both of us to figure this out once and for all. I've always known you had some personal reason for wanting to understand those fault planes that goes beyond just the curiosity you've told me about, and the longer we've studied this, the more I've hoped you'll someday tell me so I can experience our breakthroughs along with you. And now, it... it feels like you're making connections that are on the home stretch, and you're not telling me. And you're not even that focused on it. You're, you're... You're ignoring everything that just happened in the mountains with the crater and that pegasus spirit and focusing on Braen and shipping routes instead. Are you trying to make me think there's not actually anything there, that I'm not missing out at all? I don't get it."

My breath stuck in my throat. Corsica stepped back to give me room to answer.

"I..." I swallowed. "I don't know. I don't understand myself well enough to answer that. Maybe I'm more afraid of some of the answers I'm finding than I think I am. Maybe I'm trying not to think about it because I'm running from the responsibility. I..."

"Rather than run from the responsibility, why not share it?" Corsica stared intently at me. "I want to help you."

"Because it's too hard to believe," I squeaked, fumbling for answers I knew weren't accurate, but were still the best I could manage. "I... It'll sound silly if I say everything out loud."

"Try me." Corsica kept up her stare. "It doesn't matter if it's silly, or even if it's correct. I just wanna know how you feel, what you're thinking about. Some days, the inside of my head feels like a sinking ship. I'd rather focus on any silly problems as long as they're not my own."

It was an olive branch. I could almost taste how badly she wanted me to trust her. And... her fear of something, too.

I opened my mouth, took a breath, and closed my eyes, ready to see what I would be able to say.

Fear

Halcyon worked her mouth, and nothing came out.

Slowly, Corsica's heart tightened. Get a grip, she told herself, but trying to steady her thoughts was like trying to prop up a house of cards mid-collapse.

Halcyon had always been eccentric and always enjoyed her secrets. Why was Corsica reading into this now? They had come this far together. It wasn't like-

A small green gemstone materialized in Halcyon's forehooves.

Halcyon blinked at it, and then sighed. "That's not fair..."

Corsica didn't even need to ask. The difference in her friend's demeanor was stark. It was obvious she wasn't talking to the same Halcyon as five seconds ago.

Halcyon looked up, but didn't meet her eyes. "...So? How does it feel?"

Corsica frowned. "How does what feel?"

"Being desperate," Halcyon said. "You know who you're talking to. What I was like, what I wanted. What you did to me. Just so we're clear, I don't take any pleasure in the tables being turned like this. Nor do I enjoy the irony of our situation."

How were you supposed to answer that?

"Come on." Halcyon got up, beckoning Corsica into the kitchen, which was a little further from the bedrooms where everyone else was retiring. "We might as well have a talk."

"What's to talk about?" Corsica followed her. "You've got a point. I guess you would know how I'm feeling. Unlike your other half, we probably understand each other all too well."

"I dunno." Halcyon sounded halfway between wistful and annoyed. "But she's not listening right now. After throwing it over to me like that, I think she can deal with it if I keep the memories of what we say here all to myself."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "It works like that? You can just decide what memories to share and not to share?"

"I can." Halcyon shook her head. "Because I'm the original, I remember everything, like it or not. The Halcyon you know is like... a mask, or a lens. It's still the same me underneath, but shaped differently by her experiences."

Corsica thought about that for a moment. "You know, not that I mind," she eventually said, "but you're being a whole lot more open than the last two times we talked. Before, you'd say nothing to half the questions I asked. Now you're telling me stuff just because."

Halcyon shrank. "What choice do I have? This isn't my body anymore, and neither is it my life to live. You're her friend, not mine. The only thing I've ever done since meeting you again is tried to avoid interfering with that. You had a good thing going. And now something is somehow wrong between you and it's somehow my job to fix that, even though I don't know the first thing about this. I'm trying, okay?"

"Sure about that?" Corsica gave her a look. "If so, I appreciate it. But do you really have no desire to hang out with me for your own sake? You even just told me everything we say here stays between the two of us. Sounds to me like you want this for you."

Halcyon looked down.

Corsica waited.

"...I was wrong about you," Halcyon eventually said. "You haven't just changed. You've changed a lot. You told her you'd rather focus on any problems, as long as they weren't your own, and you meant it. You've been trying to live vicariously through my other self, just like I have. You... probably wish you didn't have to go on being you anymore."

Corsica winced. "You don't mince words, huh?"

"They were your words, not mine." Halcyon shook her head. "Though they could have been mine, too."

"Well." Corsica took a chair and sat back. "You see where I'm coming from, then, at least? I've been riding along on this ether crystal business for over two years now. But after that stuff at the crater... I'm worried it's going from being our journey to being her journey. And that she's taking stupid risks, but forget about that for now. I don't really have a right to complain; it's not like I'm entitled to being her sidekick. And maybe it's different for you, since you're stuck with her, like it or not."

"Believe me. She has... no desire to leave you behind." Halcyon smiled faintly, but it disappeared beneath a quiet frown an instant later. "It's just that her journey doesn't always go to places others can follow. You see, I never had much of a foundation in my life. When I created her, I decided to change that, so I tied a lot of her emotions to an encounter I had in the Icereach chapel, on the day you and Ansel emerged from your comas. She told you about it, after the Aldebaran incident... or, at least, the version of it that I allowed her to remember. An encounter with a light spirit." She turned her eyes down. "As a result, Halcyon is fascinated with the divine. But what she really wants is to understand herself... This is just the lens I've given her to do it. At the deepest levels, she's not trying to unlock the mysteries of science, or of the divine. She's trying to discover her place in the world."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "And you think trying to understand her is a hopeless goal for the likes of me?"

Halcyon shook her head. "The answers she seeks don't exist yet. She's grown tremendously, but she's still only half-formed as a pony. She has to create those answers, and creation is a process of trial and error. She's not trying to hide things from you. She's just very ambitious, and embarrassed by the scope of her ambition. And she cares about you, and the answer to her question, too much to give you an incomplete one she knows isn't good enough. That's the real reason for her secrets."

"Still only half-formed as a pony?" Corsica huffed. "What's so special about that? Isn't everyone?"

Halcyon blinked, looked confused, and then shook her head. "No. I know my place in the world, and... the world would be better off if it was left vacant forever. That's why-"

"Then why not make a new place?" Corsica interrupted, leaning closer and narrowing her eyes. "Isn't that what you just said your other half is doing? If she can, why can't you?"

Halcyon worked her jaw, then sighed. "That's the reason I split us and created her. So that she can find a new way to interpret her destiny, free from me and my baggage."

Corsica frowned and sat back. "If you really believe that, then maybe you shouldn't be encouraging me to stick with her. I've got baggage too, and I have no clue what I can do with my life beyond living for the present."

"But she hasn't succeeded in getting rid of me," Halcyon countered. "In fact, I tried my hardest to disappear, and it was her who sought me out and dug me up again. She's chosen not to be free of this, against my better judgement. So if you want to be a part of this, I don't think you're going to hear any complaints from her."

"...And what about you?" Corsica asked, meeting Halcyon's eyes. "What do you want?"

"For her to succeed where I failed," Halcyon said. "Namely, at living with our destiny. I told you she's embarrassed by the scope of her ambitions, but they didn't get so big for no reason. You saw that... thing, at the crater, that's living inside us. That called itself Kindness. This... isn't a thing that could happen to an ordinary pony."

"Well, I'm hardly ordinary either, so maybe we're a good fit." Corsica leaned in again. "What is it? The Kindness thing."

Halcyon shook her head. "I don't know any more than she told you at the crater. After the crystal tower appeared in Ironridge, Halcyon followed her gut, went to the Flame District to search for the cause... and this was what we found. It was her decision to try to help it."

Corsica's heartbeat quickened. "So you just... let a thing from the ether river you know nothing about come live in your body."

"I suppose that's not wrong," Halcyon admitted. "Understand that my other half's fascination with the divine, I created to revolve around an encounter with a 'thing from the ether river'. I don't think she could have chosen any differently."

"And that doesn't bother you, or concern you at all?" Corsica leaned even closer. "Getting voluntarily inhabited by something you know nothing about? I know a thing or two about... Look, you remember Ludwig..."

Halcyon looked down.

"Also," Corsica whispered, "you don't think she could have chosen differently? Because of the way you made her to be? Then what makes you think she has a choice about her place in the world? About who she grows up to be? Wouldn't that mean any of her decisions on that front ultimately boil down to your decisions when making her?"

Halcyon recoiled a little.

"This is..." Corsica swallowed. "Who you really are. The other Halcyon, she lets you think of yourself as two different people, but it's still you deep down. She just gives you some distance between yourself and the consequences of your actions. Consequences like getting shot down again if you took the risk of trying to befriend me again, and it didn't work."

"...I did tell you as much a moment ago," Halcyon said, her voice tight. "But it's not purely mental. Here."

She held out the green gemstone that had appeared when she switched.

Corsica squinted at it.

"My mask... This is what it looks like when I don't wear it," Halcyon explained. "This is her... or, her minus me. Without it, I couldn't switch to her even if I wanted to." She pulled it back. "I don't know why I can make this. I just can."

"Huh." Corsica pondered it, and really didn't know what to think.

"...Anyway." Halcyon stretched. "Do you... have anything else to talk about? Because we should get to bed."

Corsica nodded. "This light spirit. The one you said you made the other Halcyon care about. This is still the same thing, right? You might want some distance between yourself and the decision to investigate, but you want to know what it was all about, too."

Halcyon hesitated. "...No. If I did, I wouldn't be keeping secrets about it from her. When I was creating her, all I wanted was a way out. I was more concerned with giving her something to live for than what would happen if she actually achieved her goals."

"Right," Corsica said. "In that case, you might want to take a little more agency in the decisions the two of you make. You might be scared of the consequences, but I can tell you you'll regret it a lot more if you do nothing and she gets you possessed as a result."

"...Understood," Halcyon said, looking none too happy.

I was me again.

It was mostly dark, with moonlight filtering through the curtains. I was on the floor, wrapped in a blanket, a bed nearby that presumably held Corsica.

One way or another, our conversation had ended, but I couldn't remember a thing.

Hey, Faye said in my mind. You there?

Yeah...?

I'm not sure Corsica is going to ask you about this again, Faye said. For better or for worse. She cares about us, and wants to understand us better. But when I'm the one who actually works up the courage to talk to her, there's going to come a time when she asks me first instead of you.

My heart stopped.

Don't think it was easy, Faye admonished. You should know by now that there's nothing I like talking about less than myself. But... just consider that it wasn't my fear that held you back, there. It was yours. I know it can't be easy, being handicapped by all of my baggage around our identity as a changeling queen. But don't let the presence of an excuse stop you from pushing yourself. Okay?

I didn't know what to think. Since when was Faye the voice of encouragement? What had I missed out on?

If I had been the one to have that conversation, would I be changed for it too?

Maybe she needed it more than me.

Maybe. Faye sounded ambivalent. Good night.

Good night.

After breakfast - which was more like a late lunch, after how long we slept - at the town hall, I suddenly found myself with absolutely nothing to do.

It made sense, after all. As novel as we were, and as quiet as Sires Hollow appeared, our hosts certainly had better things to do than follow us around forever. So, now that I was rested and washed and well-fed, I decided to take some initiative and go exploring.

The first thing I did was to head east, looking for the water. It didn't take long to find: the town was nestled in a protective valley, and a low pass marked the only sensible path. Before long, I had gentle cliffs on either side of me, walking a path of large gravel and packed earth, and at the apex, I saw what I was looking for.

It was... water. Flat and motionless, reflecting the sky, bounded by perfectly diagonal rock that plunged beneath the surface without an inch of shoreline, stretching all the way to the horizon... as narrow as that horizon was.

The sunrise would probably line up perfectly. If only I had gotten up sooner.

Ahead, the path wound down a ways, eventually ending at an old, well-cared-for wooden dock with a medium-sized boat docked and room for another, or perhaps two smalls. With shores like that, though, the water was probably deep; I could easily imagine a massive ship sliding up to port, and then using smaller boats to ferry its passengers the last step of the way...

We've never seen the ocean before, Faye remarked in my thoughts. Except the ether river, though that's different... although maybe not so much. If it stays this still at night, do you suppose it'll reflect the stars?

I looked down into the water, reflecting the cloudless sky. There was a thought to think about.

As I stared, I became aware of Procyon hovering by my side.

I glanced at her. "Been a while. Or am I just losing track of time?"

"Both." She stretched. "Or either. Depends on your expectations for me. Two days could be nothing, or an eternity, depending on the context."

I wasn't really sure what to say.

"Don't mind me, though," Procyon encouraged. "Just here to remind you I exist. Unlike some ponies, I'm content with my role as a spectator."

What's that supposed to mean? Faye said in my head.

Procyon didn't acknowledge her.

"Okay. That's... great," I said. "But I'm having a nice morning, and don't need it ruined by you two bickering, so if nobody minds..."

"Did someone mention bickering?" Ludwig's entirely unwelcome voice interrupted.

"No, nobody mentioned bickering," I hissed, getting to my hooves as my interest in taking in the view suddenly waned. "Silence is golden, yeah?"

"What a shame." Ludwig drooped back toward the ground. "If you ever need help winning a bickering contest, say the-!"

He was cut off as Procyon pounced on him, knocking both of them inside the road. I decided not to wait and see how that would turn out.

I wasn't feeling particularly introspective as I made a swift trot back into the town, Faye's admission to me last night and the specter of having to think about Ludwig doing their level best to gum up my thoughts. Exploring, exploring... Maybe I could go look for the road that led south out of town? Maybe-

"Well, someone's in a hurry. Anything I should be running from too?"

It was Papyrus.

I sized him up. "Just looking for a distraction. From my thoughts. You've got a real opportunity here to make me not regret running into you for once, so try not to blow it, okay?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Regret is a strong word, Butterfly. But believe it or not, I've been in a rare productive mood, and thought I'd do a little to help out. Care to see something interesting?"

"Productive?" I took a step forward and tilted my head. "Like what?"

He didn't answer, turning and waving a lazy wing for me to follow.

I gave chase. Papyrus led me all the way to the other side of town, to the last row of houses whose backyards were encroached upon by hills as the mountains started to rise. Try as I might, nothing looked out of the ordinary or unusual at all... and it continued to do so, even after Papyrus stopped in front of a house that had no unusual qualities whatsoever.

"That one," he said, pointing at its trimmed hedge and large upstairs window. "That's where Starlight used to live."

I glanced at him, and then at the house, and then again at him. "How do you know that?"

"I asked!" Papyrus gave the house a smug look. "And about far more than just her old haunts, at that. See, I'm not rightly sure what you and the rest of your chums see in seeking out a long-lost wonder filly, but I do recall an incident this one time where you bribed me for some information by letting me tag along on an adventure and still haven't come to collect your dues despite me making multiple jokes about it at your expense. So, I found myself with some free time, and thought to myself, 'Papyrus, old colt, you learn from your successes, and this seems like a prime opportunity to set yourself up in the same exact-'"

"Yeah, yeah, you're brilliant and I'm bad at keeping consistent priorities," I interrupted, cutting him off. "And now you're about to say you've spent all day grilling the locals for information on Starlight that I need to pay you for so you can laugh when I forget to collect."

Papyrus gave me a flabbergasted, innocent look that said Who, me?

"Yes, you." I pointed a hoof at him. "How about we say that since you still owe me, we forget the empire and you spill the beans on whatever particularly juicy secret you learned about Starlight, instead?"

"Who said anything about juicy secrets?" Papyrus shrugged. "All the details I learned were disappointingly mundane. But go on, try your luck! Spitball some questions and maybe you'll find one I can answer."

I squinted. "Are you volunteering to be helpful?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Shocking, I know. But we are in this together, and for several months at minimum. Is it such an awful idea to have a working relationship?"

"Huh. Okay." I took a step back, then glanced at the house again. "I... Err, north of the mountains. Back in Ironridge. How well did you know ponies that knew her?"

"I got around." Papyrus straightened a feather. "What does that have to do with this place?"

"I'm just curious why you're here," I told him. "On this trip. I asked you before, and you pretty well dodged the question. Now you're telling me you went out of your way to gather information about Starlight to be helpful, which my gut says actually means you knew about her before. Plus, you've got a writ, which doesn't happen to small-town ponies from the middle of nowhere."

Papyrus chuckled. "Oh, yes it does. And Icereach is way more isolated than Riverfall. But if you blow this opportunity asking about my own upbringing, I'm warning you, I can and will bore you to tears."

"Try me," I gamely threatened. "I know a thing or two about being bored growing up."

Papyrus looked disappointed that I called his bluff. "On second thought, are you sure you wouldn't rather-"

"Yes," I pressed. "Riverfall. Your home. Your reasons for stowing away on my boat. Tell me."

"Didn't I already?" Papyrus looked mildly offended. "I'm here because you forgot to hire an airship technician with your once-in-a-millennium bounty of writs, and the qualified choices Unless could call on to bail you out are very few and far between. Which is now a moot point, seeing as your airship currently needs a lot more than a technician to get airborne once again. This, in turn, leaves me with nothing to do, and a bored Papyrus is a nosy Papyrus who wants to know what his friends are up to." He dangerously waggled his eyebrows. "Now ask the right questions, or I'll start asking some of my own."

I hesitated. "Where did you get your writ?"

"Wrongamundo," Papyrus sighed. "I'm the illegitimate child of a trophy wife to a Varsidelian military baron who was exiled for her indiscretion, but not before being showered with pointless gifts such as the writ I now bear. If that explanation doesn't strike your fancy, my grandfather once served in Yakyakistan in the private militia of a war hero whose popularity allowed them to cover up copious amounts of looting, and my writ was stolen from a collector's mansion and remained in my family ever since. It's also possible that my great-great-great-great-great grandmother was the empress of the Griffon Empire, and on a class field trip to some ancient ruins the slight match in my bloodline was enough to unlock a magical seal, bestowing me with a fantastical amount of treasure that was mostly confiscated by the school board, save for the writ because they didn't know what it was."

I listened appreciatively. "You know, those are actually pretty good. I got my writ during the time I was kidnapped. The kidnappers held me in an abandoned smuggling den, you see, and I found the writ stashed away while searching for a way out."

Papyrus gave me a look. "That one is actually true, so it doesn't count."

I rubbed the back of my neck. "And the true reason you have a writ is boring enough that you're too embarrassed to say it?"

Papyrus grinned, showing his teeth.

"Fine, I'll stop asking," I groaned. "You're pretty annoying, you know that?"

He shrugged. "Runs in the family. Say, how do you feel about your own family, Butterfly?"

"Eh?" I tilted my head. "What's that got to do with anything?"

"It's just that I couldn't help but notice a high degree of nepotism in the way you handed out your writs," Papyrus casually explained. "Now, I wouldn't throw shade because someone has no friends to invite instead - no shame there, I'm the same - but you basically completely ignored utilitarian purposes in deciding who to pick! Senescey is competent, but trustworthy? You do know her history, right? And Larceny is... well, you know."

"What's that got to do with anything?" I repeated, feeling like whether or not I asked would have no bearing on whether I got the answer. "Also, I would have invited Corsica if Unless didn't give her Valey's writ first."

Papyrus dropped his tone to a whisper. "Kid, I'll let you in on a secret: I'm rambling because you keep refusing to ask me about what I want to talk about. But trust me, there are a million and one places I can take this subject that would be less comfortable than just playing along."

"I'm older than you," I pointed out. "Anyway, think I'll pass. No offense, but you're kinda rude sometimes."

Papyrus looked disappointed.

I left, but doubled back before heading properly to the house we were staying in. Hidden in the bushes, shadow sneaking for cover, I saw Papyrus still right where I left him, staring at Starlight's old house with an expression lost in thought.

Sires Hollow wasn't massive, but it still took me a couple wrong turns to find the way back home. When I got there, I realized the delay was lucky: Braen and Leitmotif were appearing, and towed behind them was a covered wagon.

I stared at the thing for a moment. "Where did you get that?"

It had two harnesses, a canvas roof, and comfortable room in the back for up to eight ponies, or fewer plus cargo. Braen looked to be doing the bulk of the work pulling it, with Leif mostly there to keep the steering balanced - in terms of real hours, it hadn't been that long since Leif was atrophying in a laboratory jail.

"I was learning about money!" Braen greeted, the wagon creaking and trundling along behind her. "Mother and Other Mother never entrusted me with so much money before."

"We spent some of the griffon gold that we carried down from the ship," Leif explained. "And before you ask, yes, this is a mandatory expenditure. Sires Hollow only sends land caravans every two months or so, and we can't carry enough food on hoof to avoid risking the market conditions in midpoint towns. Which, if my research is accurate, might not be favorable."

I looked at the wagon. I looked at myself, with my bracelet, and then at Braen.

This was going to be a long walk, and it would probably be the two of us doing most of the pulling.

"That look tells me you didn't think of trying to buy one of these yourself," Leif sighed. "Don't worry about Sires Hollow, or our finances. We'll probably sell it once we get to Snowport, and it'll stay in the same trade ecosystem. If they miss it, they can buy it back. Have you looked at food yet, or does that still need doing?"

I blinked, then shook my head.

Leif nodded. "What about a road map? Consulted anyone who knows particular dangers we'll want to watch out for? Better yet, have you tried pricing a guide? There are plenty of ponies in this town who know the way, so we can shop around for one who's compatible with our group, knows their stuff and offers the right price."

"No, I... haven't thought of that at all..."

Leif nodded again, though I could tell she was slightly worried about letting me be the leader. "Any climate concerns? Will we need traveling clothes? Those of us who don't already have them, at least?" She tipped her head at my old coat. "I've already confirmed that griffon gold is valid tender in these lands, and that we shouldn't encounter any language barriers, but this whole plan is dead if we get to Snowport and then fail to barter a boat from the dragons, so someone needs to get a good handle on what makes them tick. But we did buy camping gear along with the wagon, so don't worry about that."

"I'll... err..." I swallowed. "I'll start making a list."

A full hour of planning passed, during which Leif did most of the actual work and I had it driven home again and again how little I actually knew about all this. I woke up, went to explore the town, felt like I was being productive... but the actual productivity was happening here all along. Left to my own devices, I probably would have stayed in Sires Hollow for a full week, then pushed myself out onto the road entirely unprepared because I felt like I had to get going but didn't know what else to do.

And so I wrote, tracking our lists and ledgers, all the while pondering how much more smoothly things could have gone for me in Ironridge if I understood the kinds of things it would be useful to consider when making a plan.

We worked fast, sending Braen to purchase supplies and Corsica to make sure she didn't get scammed, and set Papyrus to work packing the wagon when he got back. Fortunately, we were enough of a novelty that the townsponies were feeling generous, because the more I wrapped my head around all the things we needed, the more I realized a simple truth: we should have carried way more money down from the Aldenfold.

As it was, it seemed likely we would arrive in Snowport with cash to spare, mostly from selling the wagon and any camping supplies we would no longer need. However, the Catantan Peninsula was huge, and we'd probably need to wind up buying them back again in Fort Redsand after crossing the sea, so that money wasn't disposable. I looked at our finances, pondered how much we could keep...

But even then, assuming everything went perfectly and we found Starlight, we would need more money for the return journey. And that wasn't even taking into consideration finding Fluttershy.

"We're not gonna be able to pay for the boat ride," I said, putting my forehooves on the table. "Even if they come dirt cheap, we'll have to save everything we have for the parts where failure would be unacceptable. At least if we get stranded in a major port town, there should be plenty of ways to make more money."

Leif barely even looked at my ledger. "Well, that is why I said barter for passage," she remarked. "When a single, powerful faction controls a place, there are plenty of opportunities to trade favors."

I hesitated, realizing what she was saying.

"We're..." I swallowed. "Gonna have to get involved in politics again?"

Leif shrugged. "It's the fastest way. And even if you're willing to slow down on your goal, I'd rather not compromise on speed for mine."

I felt myself turn slightly green, remembering all the faction wars in Ironridge...

"And if that's really so bad, make Papyrus do it," Leif grunted. "He's more competent than he acts. Now here, double-check the portion sizes on this food list, and I'll go ask around town about a guide. We shouldn't leave later than dawn tomorrow without a great reason."

"R-Roger," I said, taking the list and skimming it.

Leif left, and I was alone... except I wasn't. Procyon was hovering over my shoulder.

"Welcome back," I muttered under my breath, holding it up so she could see. "Any chance you wanna help with the brain work?"

Procyon tilted her head at me. "Since when do you need help with anything?"

I gave her a blank stare.

"Our talent?" She pointed at my clothed flank. "Quickly picking up any skill? Remember?"

I blinked. "Quickly picking up any skill that helps me pretend to be someone else," I breathed, correcting her quietly in case anyone was listening.

"But it's the same thing, right?" She raised an eyebrow. "You can't convincingly impersonate someone without being able to do what they do. That's how it always worked for us."

My eyes widened a little in realization. Yes, that was how it always worked. But...

At some point, after the Aldebaran incident and before today, I had stopped thinking of myself as an imposter and started believing I could be something for real. And I also couldn't remember the last time I had properly utilized my talent.

In fact, I was almost curious if it still did anything at all.

Spiral

Corsica sat on a second-story hotel balcony, Halcyon's bracelet clasped loosely in her forehooves, letting her mind wander to kill time.

The last town on the road to Snowport, this hamlet was long and narrow, built into a valley that became one of the talons as it dipped below sea level to the east. Between the presence of the hotel, the sign to the south claiming 'Welcome to Stillwater', the large number of tiny storefronts built into the bottoms of two-story houses, and the very good view afforded by her balcony, Corsica guessed this place was far more accessible than Sires Hollow, and frequently used as a tourist destination. It wasn't that far from Snowport, and was clearly prepared for visitors...

Yet the streets were far from bustling, even though it was the middle of the afternoon, and unlike the carefully imported amenities of Sires Hollow, nothing here felt new. It was a decent guess, then, that ever since the Crystal Empire returned, it had sponged up a large slice of the tourism industry.

Corsica rolled Halcyon's bracelet along the worn wooden railing. Now that she got to look at it up close, it was unlike any heirloom she had seen before. If Stillwater really was a tourist town, they'd probably have ponies here who dealt in collectibles and could get the bracelet appraised... Going behind Halcyon's back to learn about her prized possession might not be the most upstanding thing to do, but Halcyon had clearly messed herself up with this somehow and wasn't doing a whole lot to understand or fix that.

The bracelet was plain, almost remarkably so, made of a metal blacker than ink at midnight and forged into a featureless, unadorned band. There was nothing signifying it as a bracelet, or anything other than a hoop. But its forging was also immaculate: even on painstaking inspection, there were no blemishes from being hammered, no telltale line from the removal of a mold if it had been poured. It was as if some higher power had commanded into existence a ring, and what they got was as close to a conceptual ring as possible, with none of the ordinary trappings or characteristics of being real.

"I wonder how you work," Corsica mused under her breath to the bracelet, rubbing its edge and staring through the center like Nehaley had done. Nothing. "Wish I could find a little clue..."

No clues presented themselves. The metal was inert and ordinary to her touch, and she didn't see anything unusual when looking through the center. It wasn't some magical looking glass, didn't have anything inside... In fact, it almost felt a little too empty. The more Corsica looked at it, the more she felt like something was supposed to fit inside the circle.

Maybe it was just because that space was usually taken up by Halcyon's leg, and she was unaccustomed to seeing the bracelet on its own, though. Still, she pondered that, and couldn't quite shake the feeling that there was more to it than that.

I sat on the roof of the hotel, looking out at the road we had ostensibly came in on from the north. I tried to remember it, and with enough focus, I could envision myself trudging in, bracelet burning, pulling the wagon with Braen... but there was no way to tell if that was really my memory, or if I was just empathetic enough to imagine myself in that situation instead.

My leg itched in the absence of my bracelet. I pulled my sleeve up and pushed the cuff of my boot down, checking for any signs of burn damage like had occurred for Mother, but there was nothing. Just a little dent in my fur right under the lip of my sleeve, caused by years upon years of wearing the bracelet and hardly ever taking it off, like you saw on the necks of ponies who wore tie collars to work every day.

I felt like something was missing, though, something beyond the bracelet and two weeks of hazy memories. Maybe my memory-dreams could fill in the blanks for those, but there was something else, too, something I couldn't quite-

"Ey there, little cigar!"

I turned, frowning as Ludwig rose out of the floor. "What do you want? I'm kinda busy right now."

Ludwig bobbed happily in midair, still reduced to a glowing mote of teal light. "Eh, I was bored, and you looked like you were in a funk, so I thought this would be an excellent time to let you throw your brain at me instead of whatever you are brooding about, friendo."

"A distraction might be welcome, but not if it's coming from you," I said, turning back to the mountains. "So I think I'll pass."

"That is pretty cold," Ludwig remarked. "All I wanted was to help you forget for a moment how screwed you are."

I swatted at him with a wing. "I'm not screwed! Now buzz off."

Ludwig drifted out of the way and sighed. "You know, for how rude you are to my face, I could almost think you didn't suck me up and bring me along with you on purpose, stupid cigar."

"You're in windigo jail," I told him. "It's not a pleasure cruise."

"What a pity," Ludwig crooned. "I guess that means your tiny brain does not want any of my help with the problems you came up here to figure out?"

I swatted at him again. "If you want me to talk to you, then instead of tempting me with special knowledge you probably don't even know in the first place, maybe try insulting me a little less? And don't just switch to praising yourself instead."

"Yikes. You are a pretty demanding boss, little cigar." Ludwig bobbed unhappily. "Hmmm... it was pretty cool how you made it half of the whole entire way through that blizzard that one time before deciding to pass out? And you have a titanic brain. How is that? I am not super used to flattering faces other than my own."

My jaw hung slightly slack. "Is that what a legitimate effort looks like from you?"

Ludwig bobbed in a circle. "Fine, fine, I will get to the point: I am starting to actually believe you are an idiot who is only keeping me around because you know so little about your own spooky powers that you cannot figure out how to let me go. So I was thinking, maybe we could scratch each other's backs a little, and I help you figure out what you are currently having a failure to understand, and in return you let me go, yes yes yes?"

"That's three more insults," I pointed out. "Or four, I lost track. How about, if you know something that would be useful to me, and isn't just gonna get me bent out of shape with worry, you tell me, and if it's actually useful you get a few brownie points for your troubles?"

Ludwig considered this. "Can I spend brownie points to get you to punch out a random stranger in a bar for no reason and start a brawl?"

I gave him a look.

"Eh." He started floating away. "I think I will keep my helpful knowledge to myself. Have a bad one, little cigar."

My eye twitched. He was gone.

You think he could actually know something? Faye asked in my head.

"I dunno," I sighed, turning once again to the mountains. "But if he does, it's not worth the price of finding out."

Sorry I saddled you with him, Faye apologized. I didn't know what else to do at the time. Maybe if I had a better grasp of our powers...

"You know anything about what happened to us just now, on the road?" I asked. "Or did you feel like you lost the last two weeks, too?"

Sort of, Faye admitted. I've got a few ideas.

I tilted my head.

Remember when we went to Lilith's school, the second time, and she was telling us how changeling queens work? Faye quizzed. She was describing how important it was that she didn't accidentally make a new one. The way she made it sound, changeling queens are like vessels for emotion, and we gain our powers by being filled with some resonating desire. Like how Chrysalis was full of negative emotions, and Coda was full of the prayers of her followers.

I nodded. "But we've never done anything like that."

Right, Faye said. Lilith made it sound like an unformed changeling queen would be just empty. A void... like us. Now, we're probably a special case, because we've eaten Ludwig and that pink flame. Neither of those is pure emotion, though: they're intelligent, and also pretty much emotional opposites. So when we use our bracelet, I would guess the power we're drawing on is literally what we've eaten. And the reason it went wrong is probably either because our diet so far is an incompatible mix, or because we don't know how to draw on them, or we can't draw on them at all because they're alive. Either way, I think we were borrowing against power we don't yet have.

I narrowed my eyes. "But... if you're saying, like, we used too much power, then how come we're fine now that we're separated from the bracelet? We are fine, right?"

I don't know, Faye apologized. All of this is pure conjecture. From what we saw of Coda's crown, I do think the bracelet is a link, somehow, between the physical world and the emotions stored inside our body... but she had a throne, and we don't. And I don't understand how if the emotions are in us, they would manifest as power using the bracelet. Why should it be necessary? There's too many differences and too few data points.

"What do you think even happens if someone runs out of emotions?" I asked. "Probably nothing good, right? I just don't get why, if that's really what happened to us, we're fine the moment we stop touching the bracelet, and then not fine the moment we touch it again."

I wish I could tell you, Faye lamented. I agree that it doesn't make sense. There has to be more to it than that. Maybe Ludwig really does have information...

"We'll do it without him," I promised. "We'll figure out how this works, learn to not overdo it like the last few weeks, and kick Ludwig to the curb so he isn't tied to us anymore. I promise."

Faye hesitated. Have you thought about what you'd eventually like to align us with?

"Eh?" I blinked.

Lilith said changeling queens start out empty, and their powers mature as they become filled with emotion aligned to a particular purpose, Faye repeated. We're definitely still empty... or something close to it. And we could live out the rest of our lives this way. Not that I'd mind that. But you're pushing our boundaries and trying to learn more about our powers and their limits. And I'm all but certain that one day, if you really want to transcend those boundaries, you're going to have to start filling us with emotions from an external source.

I felt my backwards ears sag.

Hopefully that day is a long way off, Faye added. I don't like the idea of being reduced to a vessel for someone else's will. Which might be surprising, considering I dreamed up you to live my life for me, but... we're still a part of each other. It would be different if we were hooked up to a machine like Coda's throne, literally taking in the wishes of other ponies. But if you're determined to keep going down this path, it's a day you should probably think about before it arrives.

"I don't..." I didn't know what to say. "I need to see more of the world before I can make a choice like that. I need to live more. A lot's happened to distract me from my goal, but that's why I left Icereach in the first place. And even though I've got a goal now, finding Fluttershy and saving Coda, that's a near-term goal. Not what I want to do for the rest of my life. I just don't think I can answer that."

Then maybe it's good that you've hit a roadblock in testing our changeling queen powers, Faye said. Because I'm not ready for that day, either.

Corsica paced through the streets of Stillwater, which was only wide enough to have three of them before the valley edges started forcing buildings up onto terraces. Domiciles, grocers, a hardware store next to a blacksmith... There!

Her eyes settled onto a sign reading Antiques and Oddities, hanging above a storefront that looked like amateur hooves had intentionally tried to make it old-fashioned... though she knew little enough of architectural mores in Equestria to say for sure that this wasn't cutting-edge modernism. Halcyon's bracelet rested safe in her dainty saddlebag, but soon it would get to come out and about: if neither the metalworker nor the antique shop could tell her anything about it, both of them were frauds.

If she were in charge there, she mused, the blacksmith would be making antiques and using the shop next door as an outlet... but these ponies must have been doing this for a living for decades, so odds were they had an even better money-making scheme cooked up. It probably wouldn't be great for tourism to have the local stores be run by charlatans, but this town did look like it was presently in dire need of cash. Was it wise to enter a potentially unscrupulous vendor with a friend's valuable heirloom and no contingencies in case anything unfortunate happened? Was this a venue where a little healthy paranoia might be justified, given the importance of what she was handling?

She pulled out the bracelet and looked it over. Yeah, probably.

Although, on second thought, she had just used her special talent barely an hour ago. It was a small use, but right now most of her woes centered around hiking cramps and noodly legs, and she wasn't in a hurry to change that. Better to wait and see if anything untoward actually happened before burning what might turn out to be a bigger use.

A bell jingled as Corsica stepped inside. The interior of the souvenir shop was dark and claustrophobic, but in an inviting way, the air tingling with mystery and adventure in a way that coddled tourists would probably find irresistible. A winding main aisle led to a low counter in the back, dozens of glass cases built into the wall behind it, stacks and shelves taking up all the floor space save for a small area just in front of the desk. From the sound of things, there were at least two other shoppers browsing already, which was a good sign.

A stallion with cracked spectacles and a flyaway mane sat behind the counter reading a tattered novel, looking like he was trying to appear older and more eccentric than he actually was. He looked up, gave Corsica a hefty nod, and went back to reading.

"Hey," Corsica said, sauntering up to the desk. "Any chance you do appraisals? Got a family heirloom here. Not looking to part with it, just learn about what it is."

The stallion straightened up, setting his book aside and adjusting his spectacles. "Let's see what you've got," he said in an artificially-creaky voice.

"May or may not be magic," Corsica warned, sliding the bracelet out and dropping it on the counter. "Just in case."

"Magic, hmm?" The stallion leaned over it. "Well, we do have a village wizard for that, so you might want to try your luck with him... I say, this is almost remarkably unremarkable."

He lifted it gingerly, weighing it with a hoof and inspecting it from multiple angles, giving it a tap and listening closely to the sound. He held it up to the light, studying how it reflected, rolled it back and forth a few times, and eventually pushed it back to Corsica.

"Well?" Corsica tilted her head.

"I'll admit, I'm stumped," the stallion said, sitting back. "I've never seen a material like this before, and there's no sign of who made it, or for what purpose. Usually, bands like this have some inscription on the outside, either magical or ornamental, and some form of mark identifying the smith on the inside, here." He tapped the ring's inner edge. "Why anyone would create something like this is completely beyond me. It has no visual or functional purpose, after all. And what that usually means is it was fashioned by a wizard for a purpose only they can know. It also has no wear whatsoever, which is unusual for an heirloom. I'd be careful with this, young missy. It probably wasn't made to be carried around like a trinket during someone's daily routine."

Corsica nodded. Figures. "You mentioned a village wizard? Where could I find them? Any point in taking it to the blacksmith next door?"

The stallion rubbed his chin. "That smithy's run by my daughter. If there's anyone who can tell you what kind of metal this is, it would be her, but she inherited the trade from me, so the odds of her knowing anything more are slim. Wouldn't hurt to try, if you've got time to kill. She'd certainly be curious. Even if you did know what this was made of, though, that wouldn't tell you much as to its origin or purpose."

"Right..." Corsica picked up the bracelet again, taking another look at it herself. This was harder than she had been hoping.

"The wizard's over on the southern ridge," the shopkeep went on. "Takes a bit of a climb to reach him, but at least you can't miss it. Eccentric fellow - he changed his name to Corvus Crombus, if it gives you an idea. But he's all about strange enchantments, and could almost definitely tell you about any spells it's under."

"Do I hear talk of strange enchantments?" a new voice interrupted.

Corsica turned to look. Out from between a rack of clothing and a shelf of boxed oddities strode a creature roughly twice her height, bipedal and clad in an impressively angular armored uniform. It had a thick tail and lizardlike features, and scales that seemed to catch the room's dim light and amplify it into a subdued, purple-tinged rainbow of polygons.

She had never seen one before, but there was only one thing this creature could be: a dragon.

The shopkeep's eyes widened. "Sir Seigetsu!" He tipped his spectacles and bowed his head in a gesture of respect. "Forgive me, I didn't notice you come in!"

"There is nothing to forgive," Seigetsu answered with a tiny nod of his own. "I was the one who was eavesdropping. However, I find the artifact you were discussing to be most interesting." His slitted eyes brushed over the bracelet, then found their way to Corsica. "Might I have a look at it? Preferably outside, where the light is better."

Corsica blinked. This sounded like the start of trouble... "Sure," she said, scooping up the bracelet and nodding to the shopkeep, keeping up a perfect composure. "You ever seen something like this before?"

Seigetsu just beckoned for her to follow.

When they got outside, Seigetsu gave her a look, and extended a claw. "Would you permit me to test if this is a genuine article? If not, rest assured you will be duly compensated."

"A genuine what?" Corsica raised an eyebrow and didn't hand the bracelet over. "You know what this is?"

Seigetsu didn't retract his claw. "That's classified," he said in the same professional, feminine tone he had used since appearing. "However, if I'm right in assuming you don't know what it is you hold, it would be in both of our best interest for me to verify its identity."

Corsica hesitated... then held out the bracelet. "Alright. Wish you give it back right after, and don't skunk me."

Seigetsu sniffed the air, and his eyebrows rose in mild surprise, but he said nothing, instead taking the bracelet, walking a few steps away, and placing it on the ground, standing up on its side. When he was satisfied it wouldn't start rolling, he backed up several paces and motioned for Corsica to stand back.

He took a stance... and in his hand, something gleamed. One second, nothing was there, and the next, he held a bright purple sledgehammer, minimally decorated and made of a completely uniform metal with a bizarre color and sheen. Seigetsu tensed, leapt, brought the hammer down over his head with a double-handed swing, and landed it squarely on Halcyon's bracelet.

"Hey-!" Corsica's voice was drowned out by the sound of cracking rock as Seigetsu stepped back and straightened up, looking over his handiwork. The sledgehammer vanished from sight, and beneath where it had struck, the stone was fractured, the bracelet driven more than halfway into the road... but not deformed at all.

"Hmm." Seigetsu bent down, and with a grunt, managed to yank it free. He inspected the bracelet. "Yes, it does appear to be the real thing. No phony could withstand such a blow."

Several ponies nearby had turned to look, but none of them seemed overly intent on staring. "You just ruined the road," Corsica pointed out, gesturing at the spider web of cracks in the stone around the gouge where Halcyon's bracelet had been driven.

"A small matter," Seigetsu said, leaning down and dragging a claw through the rock as if it were putty. After a few moments of sculpting, the crack had all but disappeared. "There. Good as new."

Corsica stared at the ground. And then at the bracelet.

"Earth dragon blood runs in my veins," Seigetsu explained. "I doubt you would appreciate the full significance of that, so suffice it to say I possess some of their powers, as well."

"That's great," Corsica said warily. "So, the bracelet..."

Seigetsu inspected it. "You'll be wanting this back now, won't you?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You think?"

For a moment, Seigetsu didn't reply. He was stalling, but for what? Corsica's special talent tingled in annoyance, and she suppressed a frown. It should have been more instant than this...

"...Hmm." Seigetsu was obviously waiting for something. "You keep your composure better than most." He hid a slight grin.

"What are you talking about?" Corsica kept her voice steady, thoroughly unnerved. Why wasn't it working? Unless this dragon somehow knew-

Seigetsu snapped his claws, and a sensation like a spike of static was driven into Corsica's special talent. Her vision blurred, and the world in front of her seemed to shatter and fall away... and then she opened her eyes, and everything was right back to normal. Except, she could no longer feel the previous use of her talent, looming in the back of her mind like an iceberg waiting to break off and fall away.

"You have a rare gift," Seigetsu said, holding the bracelet as Corsica struggled to get her bearings back. "But a magic so new has no effect on a race as old as dragons."

"You..." He did know. And not only that, but her special talent didn't even work on him? "How?"

"Here." Seigetsu offered back the bracelet. "I was not interested in keeping it. Such things are not so easily separated from their owners. I was merely surprised you thought to compel me to do what was already inevitable. And with such a powerful effect, at that..."

Corsica snatched it with her aura, floating the bracelet immediately close. "Who are you?"

Seigetsu nodded. "Special Inquisitor Seigetsu of the Holy Cernial Convocation. It is my job to wander the lands in search of those who would misappropriate my church's most sacred relics, or share its teachings with those who must not learn them. And here I find you, in possession of an exceedingly dangerous weapon with seemingly no idea what it is."

"Care to enlighten me, then?" Corsica asked, long hours of getting her privacy invaded and expectations shattered by Egdelwonk the only thing that kept her from stammering.

Seigetsu considered this. "No," he eventually said. "That will not be necessary. But let us take a walk. You may not be what I came to this town for, but now that I've found you, I'd be a fool to leave empty-handed. And in lieu of that weapon, I think you could stand to give me a most interesting story."

He started to walk, and Corsica felt her hooves drag her after him almost of their own accord. "And what about you? What's your story?"

"I just told you," Seigetsu said. "I am a Special Inquisitor. You, however, have been most tight-lipped. Who lent you this weapon, and to what end?"

Corsica didn't need to hesitate. "That's classified. How about a few reasons why I should trust you, first?"

Seigetsu folded his arms behind his back. "As we have established, your magic is powerless to affect me. Additionally, you know less about the powers you carry than I do. Were I to attempt subduing you by force, there would be little you could do to stop me. That I have opted for dialogue instead, and even allowed you to retain your weapon, should speak to the purity of my intentions."

Corsica frowned. "Anything else?"

Seigetsu wasn't finished. "Furthermore, my half-brother administers a major port town only a few days south of here, a factor that greatly contributes to my presence here and something any local would surely know. That you do not recognize me implies you are a traveler. And, provided we can get along, any traveler could do far worse than ingratiating themselves to the local rail baron."

Corsica winced. If that was true...

"The reactions of others to my presence should, I hope, attest to the truthfulness of my identity." Seigetsu nodded to the various nearby townsponies, most of whom were trying to stare without looking too hard like they were staring. "Now then. I have told you much and more of myself, and offered multiple gestures of goodwill. I think it is time I heard about you."

Corsica weighed this. If Seigetsu was bluffing, it would be a dangerous bluff to call. He had multiple powers she had never heard of before, including one that seemed to directly countermand her special talent. And the way the townsponies treated him certainly befitted a religious inquisitor, especially the owner of the antique shop. And Halcyon's plan to catch a boat to the Catantan Peninsula was contingent on haggling and getting involved in local affairs in order to barter passage, since they couldn't afford it - if this went right, they could potentially get in with the owner of the fastest ships in the land, assuming the port town Seigetsu mentioned was Snowport.

On the other hoof, Corsica had no idea what the religious mores of the dragons were, and whether or not anything in her story would seriously offend them. Doubly so, considering she knew so little about what Halcyon's bracelet actually was.

Seigetsu kept walking.

"...The name's Corsica," Corsica eventually said. "I'm just passing through. Traveling with a group of friends. Not looking for trouble."

"I see," Seigetsu said. "And where are you going?"

Again, Corsica hesitated. If this was going to reach the best possible outcome, Seigetsu would need to learn her destination one way or the other, but she wasn't sure if she wanted to reveal enough to imply that her starting point had been Sires Hollow just yet. That would tell the dragon she was from over the Aldenfold, which the ponies in Sires Hollow had advised her not to make the biggest deal about... If only she could grease this situation along with her special talent.

Ever since she had gotten it, it had been an unwelcome and intrusive companion, always present when she wished it would leave. Now, the tables were turned, and it felt alien beyond belief.

"We're trying to reach the Catantan Peninsula," Corsica said, hoping her coddled instincts wouldn't lead her astray. "Figured we'd get a boat out of Snowport."

Seigetsu frowned. "There are not many ways in which a trip to Snowport would take you through Stillwater. Unless..." He snapped his claws again, and a fuzzy sensation briefly passed through Corsica. "Most interesting."

"Oh yeah...?" Corsica waited, not about to give away anything else.

"You claim to be traveling in a group," Seigetsu said. "And you all possess Writs of Harmonic Sanction?"

"I do." Corsica emphasized her flank. "Isn't that what you were checking?"

Seigetsu looked mildly amused. "I asked about your companions."

"If I say yes, you're going to ask to meet them," Corsica pointed out. "To see for yourself. That many writs in one place is supposed to be unprecedented."

"Mmm." Seigetsu nodded. "But I would like to meet them regardless of your answer. Such a large crossing is unprecedented indeed, and of great interest to my role as inquisitor."

"Well, we've all got writs," Corsica said. "So don't get your hopes too high on there being stuff to inquisit."

"Noted." Seigetsu kept walking, never emotionless but always unflappably calm and still sounding just enough like a mare that Corsica was starting to worry if she had misgendered him. But the shopkeep had said Sir, and he sounded like a stallion, too...

"Your companions," Seigetsu said after Corsica failed to change the subject. "Is the owner of that weapon among them?"

Not much point in trying to hide it... "What do you mean, 'owner'?" Corsica asked, trying regardless to dodge the question.

Seigetsu scrutinized Corsica's eyes. "...I cannot tell if you are trying to mislead me," he eventually said. "Or if you truly are that ignorant about what it is that you carry. These constructs are not toys."

"If you believe that, you could tell me what's so dangerous about it," Corsica challenged.

"No," Seigetsu repeated. "I merely wish to know where you got it."

"From a friend," Corsica said. "Who inherited it from her mother, who stole it from somewhere a long time ago." True, as best as she knew it. And besides, if there really was an imperative to keep the origins of the bracelet secret, best to give that duty to the pony who knew where it came from, especially when that pony had once been a practiced criminal.

"Most interesting." Seigetsu nodded. "And how long is 'quite some time ago'?"

Corsica shrugged. "Twenty years, give or take. You want to ask her yourself, both of them are traveling with me. I'm done getting grilled over their thing."

"Hmm." Seigetsu looked intrigued. "Thank you, Corsica. I think I should like that very much."

Unenlightened

I was still on the roof when Corsica got back to our hotel. It was a position that afforded me an ample view of my friend's approach... as well as her new companion.

Tall and heavily dressed, the creature glistened everywhere it wasn't covered by fabric, prismatic purple dancing from its scales. It had a sharper, more pronounced jaw than any pony, and no visible ears, a hefty tail swinging behind it to balance its two-legged gait. It walked patiently, with its claws clasped behind its back, a tall, rimless hat sitting above its slitted eyes.

Dragon, Faye said in my mind.

"Yeah," I whispered back. "What do you suppose Corsica's doing with it? They don't look like they're talking..."

Want to go find out?

I nodded, parkouring down from the roof.

"So these are your friends," the dragon said, standing before me in the hotel lobby, Corsica standing awkwardly at its - her? - side. Mother, Leif, Braen and Papyrus stood at mine. Our hired guide from Sires Hollow was nowhere to be seen.

"Yup." Corsica pointed at us one at a time. "Halcyon. Leif. Papyrus. Braen. Halcyon's mom. You wanna give them your big title yourself?"

"Nehaley," Mother corrected.

"And Leitmotif," Leif added with a nod.

"I see." The dragon bowed. "I am Special Inquisitor Seigetsu of the Holy Cernial Convocation. And you, I have heard, are most new to these lands."

"We are," Leif said, stepping forward. "From the lands north of the Aldenfold. I assume you're here to check our Writs of Harmonic Sanction?"

Seigetsu snapped her claws, and a brief, strange tingle ran down my special talent. She nodded. "You do appear to be in order. You, however..." She turned to face Braen. "What manner of creature are you? Unless my eyes are mistaken, you are wholly mechanical."

"Indeed!" Braen proudly held a hoof to her chest. "If airships don't need writs, then neither do I!"

Seigetsu looked amused. "That is for the magic to decide, not you or I." She looked to Corsica, and then to Leif. "This is quite a group you have, here. Would you mind if I asked some questions? My office will be most curious to know about a border crossing in such unprecedented numbers."

"I've already answered plenty," Corsica said, waving a hoof and marching over to a bench where she plonked herself down, still holding my bracelet. "This one's on you."

"Of course," Leif said, giving me a look that said serious time, leave this to me. I swallowed and nodded.

"You are the leader, I take it?" Seigetsu said, looking us all over but settling on Leif. "First, I would like to know a little of what you all know of these lands. This question goes for anyone: to the best of your knowledge, what percentage of the world's area is located south of the Aldenfold? Including both land and sea."

I blinked. What kind of question was that? Fishy had mentioned the map in the town hall and its relative scale to the rest of Equestria, but how did that stack up to-

"At least half," Leif answered. "It can't be narrower than the Aldenfold, and the north is relatively long and thin."

"Probably about seventy percent," Papyrus added. "Though I doubt even you know the exact number. Airships are too new down here for you to have even seen every corner of your turf, let alone surveyed it."

Seigetsu nodded. "Does this match with the rest of your expectations?"

Seventy percent, huh? I nodded. "All I know is, it's probably big."

Mother just shrugged.

"So you've been here before, or at least done your research." Seigetsu focused on Papyrus. "Well, that simplifies things. I imagine you have a destination already in mind."

"Are you offering to help us get there?" Leif asked.

Seigetsu gave her a look. "Perhaps. Mostly, I am curious why, having a rough idea of the scale of these lands, you chose to cross the Aldenfold so far from any established pass, and are now proceeding through the middle of nowhere on hoof. Surely a team with the resources to obtain so many writs also has the resources to secure themselves a capable airship."

"Out of fuel," Leif apologized. "We planned to fly straight to our destination, but underestimated quite how high the ascent would be, and had to leave our ship a day north of Sires Hollow."

"I see." Seigetsu nodded. "Such a story is plausible. It also makes you conveniently difficult to track. From what I've seen, I very much doubt you to be smugglers, but I am curious: if you were, what kind of contraband would you attempt to traffic?"

I blinked. "What kind of question is that?"

"A roundabout one," Papyrus proclaimed from his corner. "Our friend here is asking how much you know about what's actually banned in this place. They probably also know that Equestria uses the same currency as the Griffon Empire, which is practically worthless up in the north. I myself haven't the foggiest what's actually illegal to take across the border. But if I were a devious blackheart, I'd come here empty-hoofed, scoop up a load of things I know will sell well in Varsidel, then head home and make all my profits up there, where I know the market."

Seigetsu looked intrigued. "Well, aren't you perceptive. Everything you've said is correct. Fortunately for you, I care little what you attempt to leave Equestria with. That is your own nations' problem to deal with. There is exactly one thing Equestria does not allow across its border, and that is creatures without possession of a writ. Do you know why that is?"

I shook my head. Nobody else had an answer, either.

"It is to limit the spread of information," Seigetsu told us. "This land owes much of its stability to restricting each region's problems to itself. In the north, you have territory wars, shifting borders, political machinations and the rise and fall of nations, along with all of the volatility enabled by such a precarious status quo. For most Equestrians, lives come and go confined to the same bubble of community, all lived out within the same village, farms and pastures. The next village over might be home to distant relatives, and the lands beyond swiftly fade into legend. By slowing the entry of northerners to a trickle, we ensure that the stories they leave behind quickly fade to local legend as well."

I stared. It was like... an entire nation of Icereaches, all stubbornly hiding from each other while living side by side? It couldn't be. That wasn't right. "Why would you even do something like that?" I protested.

"I told you," Seigetsu said to me. "To hold the land in blissful stasis. Surely you have at least heard of the condition of many lands up north. Twenty years ago, a great empire fell to ruin, as did another forty years prior to that. The lands they leave behind devolve into chaos and turmoil. No price is too great to spare these lands that same fate... which brings us to you."

She surveyed all of us once again. "A crossing in such numbers is unheard of. I think it probable that a group of your numbers could have a much greater impact than a single wanderer. At the same time, you are all here legally. You have your writs. The magic attests to it. By the laws of my station I can neither stop you nor turn you away. And so instead, I ask you: why have you come here? Tell me, that I might speed your journey along and keep your impact to a bare minimum."

"This is a tourist town," Corsica pointed out. "You're telling me ponies never leave their own villages, yet they still manage to come all the way out here to slack off and chill out. And the town just south of here is a major port town. Nothing you just said makes sense with any of that."

Seigetsu studied her. "...No. I suppose it wouldn't."

There was, I noticed, a clerk at the hotel desk, sitting and reading a newspaper. Their ears were perked, ostensibly listening to everything we were saying. But if anything, I got the impression they were more interested in us than what the dragon was talking about.

Corsica stared. "That's it? You're not gonna say anything more?"

"Perhaps trade functions differently where you are from," Seigetsu said. "The routes are longer than any one creature will usually ever see. Ships, trains and caravans walk back and forth between trading towns where goods are handed off or sold from one carrier to another. To most locals of this area, the world as they know it extends from Snowport in the southwest, perhaps up to Sires Hollow in the north, and to a town known as Fort Redsand on the eastern edge of this sea." She pointed out a window, to where the water could be seen glittering in the distance. "But what lies beyond that? This is something few here have ever seen."

"Yourself excluded, of course," Corsica pointed out.

"Naturally." Seigetsu nodded. "Though even my own travels have their limits, as my duty more often than not dictates where I am needed. However, were you to travel to Fort Redsand, you would find the horizon of creatures' awareness expands to the east, and shrinks to the west. And should you reach Snowport, those who know of the southern or western lands would become more common, and those who have been to Sires Hollow would grow ever sparser. This is our societal order. And strange though it may seem to you, it has underpinned one thousand years of prosperity and peace."

"No it hasn't," Papyrus interrupted, pointing a wing. "You dragons are having a holy war out on your plateau. Or was that all hearsay?"

Seigetsu looked bemused. "You heard correctly. But this only serves to further my point. My people are embroiled in conflict, yes. But that conflict does not touch these shores."

Papyrus folded his forelegs. "Noble of you to have everywhere else as your top priority."

"Now then." Seigetsu straightened up, ignoring him. "I have been told you mean to travel to the Catantan Peninsula. As such, I would like to offer you a deal. Return with me to Snowport. Do your best to keep a modest profile, try not to be overly flamboyant about your experiences in the north, and in return I shall do my utmost to secure passage for you on a speedy vessel. As this may prove difficult to enforce, I will be trusting you to act in good faith for the duration of your stay here. Have we an accord?"

Leif sized her up. "I assume that means you'll be coming with us?"

Seigetsu gave her a look. "Presumably, it would be you accompanying me. Unless you intended to walk the rest of the way to Snowport?"

"You've got an alternative?" I asked, my backwards ears perking.

"Naturally." Seigetsu looked amused. "I could hardly fulfill my duties were I to spend all of my time traveling on foot."

"I think," Leif cut in, "we could use a moment alone to discuss your proposal. That alright with you?"

"Of course." Seigetsu bowed, then turned to leave. "I shall be waiting outside. Take all the time you need."

Once the dragon was gone, we congregated back upstairs, huddling up in one of our rooms. "Well?" Corsica said.

"I'm sure you can appreciate the irony of this coming from me," Leif began. "But we know nothing at all about that dragon beyond what they've said. Despite that, they made a convincing enough case for us to follow them on their private transport that at least some of you are thinking about it. You realize how this could very easily end."

I shuddered.

"The idea that Equestria would have some sort of border police is a sensible one," Leif went on. "But I don't know enough about this land or its customs to tell whether our new friend here is the real thing. You?" She glanced at Papyrus.

Papyrus shrugged. "I've never heard much about security dragons, but admittedly my old stomping grounds were considerably to the east of here."

I gave Papyrus a look. "Have you seriously been here before? When, and what for?"

Papyrus winked at me. "That's for me to know and you to pickle your brain guessing at, butterfly. Now how about you? Got any insights of your own to share?"

"I do," Corsica cut in. "When we were walking around, the way the townsfolk treated him, I was pretty sure he's a known face around these parts. Probably who he says he is, for better or worse. But, he was real interested in Hallie's you-know-what." She inconspicuously flashed my bracelet. "Wanted to know who 'owned' it. And then didn't say a thing about it while he was here. So I can guarantee he's got an agenda he wasn't saying."

I should have been focused on this news about my bracelet, but... "Wait a minute, he? That dragon isn't a girl?"

Corsica groaned. "Do I look like I know? Ask them yourself..."

Okay...

"Anyway, he or she or whatever is also really strong," Corsica warned. "My vote is, we go with them. They're apparently connected to the higher-ups in Snowport, so if we stiff them, we can kiss our odds of seeing Catantan any time soon goodbye. If we take the gamble, maybe we get skunked, or maybe it pays off. But if we don't, we lose for sure."

"Sounds fine enough." Papyrus yawned. "Personally, I'm ever so slightly averse to spending time around the immigration authorities - personal reasons, wouldn't apply to any of you - but after staring at my mug for that long without starting anything, either they're exceedingly patient or not actually looking for trouble."

I tilted my head. "What do you mean?"

Leif groaned. "He's talking about how similar he looks - and acts, by the way - to a certain-"

"-heinous despot who's wanted across all of Equestria for causing a major international incident or two, yes, I'm aware," Papyrus interrupted. "High Prince Gazelle? Perhaps you noticed I've stopped making that joke since we made our crossing? Now, he was a sphinx, and I'm clearly a pegasus, and he also met an explosive demise well before I was born, so any police dragon with a sensible head on their shoulders should be able to tell that there's no actual relation. But anyone familiar with religious inquisitors, law enforcement, or, Garsheeva forbid, border security should know that looking like a famous criminal on its own is plenty reason to start a brawl."

"Yes," Leif grunted. "That."

Papyrus winked.

"Okay," I sighed. "So we could potentially be in trouble if anyone stops us because you look like a criminal, despite your innocent demeanor that would never suggest you're up to no good." I turned to Corsica. "What was that about my you-know-what?"

Papyrus gave me a look. "If you're talking about that sketchy bracelet you were burning for the last two weeks, I'm reasonably sure everyone's already familiar..."

I sighed harder. "Yes, the sketchy bracelet I was burning for the last two weeks, which is now broken because I know too little about how it works, thank you very much. That you-know-what. Anything else that's apparently obvious we should put on the table just so everyone knows how obvious it is?"

Leif studied me in a way that made it painfully obvious she had something else on her mind. "...I'm good."

Corsica cleared her throat. "Seigetsu was mostly curious where the you-know-what came from and who it belonged to. I think that might be on you to deal with, whenever he asks again?" She tilted her head pointedly at Mother.

"Okay." Mother was chewing a wad of gum again. "As long as he doesn't expect a long response."

Braen waved a hoof. "Seigetsu was more interested in me than let on. Seems like a very patient dragon."

"They were interested in a lot of things," Leif sighed. "And half of them were probably decoys. They've been doing what they do for far too long."

Mother snorted.

"So what are we at, then?" Papyrus cut in. "Five votes to go with the dragon, and two undecided?"

I glanced at him, Braen, Corsica, Leif, Mother and myself. "There are only six of us here."

Papyrus gave me a look I couldn't parse.

"I'm inclined to agree with Corsica," Leif said. "I don't trust Seigetsu, but I've seen our finances, and we need to gamble if we're going to make it where we're going in time. And this is a gamble that at least has a chance of paying off."

Corsica glanced at her. "Of all the ponies here, I'd expect more caution from the one who literally just spent half a year in changeling jail."

Leif grimaced. "Don't remind me. But I think you've overestimated how we have to operate. We don't have the resources to meticulously plan out every move in a zero-risk environment. That's not how the game works. You take risks to get pieces on the board, and you make good enough use of what you get that it's worth whatever you gave. If this dragon is the real deal, I think we have to get what we can from working with them."

I raised an eyebrow. "And you aren't at all afraid of the same thing happening that you did to us back in Icereach?"

Leif shook her head. "Actually, I think that's a near certainty. We are talking about accepting a ride to a location that we could only leave under our own power on hoof."

I frowned at her.

"Are ponies always this paranoid?" Braen asked. "Mother never seemed to trust anyone either. It sounds like a very sad way to live."

"Err..." I lost my train of thought. "Yeah. Sorry, but that's actually the way it goes a lot of the time, at least for me."

Mother shrugged.

"Ugh," Papyrus groaned, "we're not getting anywhere with this. All explicitly opposed to trusting the shiny, androgynous dragon, raise their appendages?"

Nobody raised a hoof.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow at Leif. "See how easy that was?"

"Fine," Leif sighed. "Someone make sure this dragon is for real, figure out how our ride will work, and I'll go sell the wagon and anything we no longer need to recoup some funds..."

Unfortunately, we weren't lucky enough to learn that Seigetsu possessed an airship. What the dragon did have, however, was a motorized wagon.

"That looks nifty," I said, admiring the cart, which was about the same size as our own. "Are we all gonna fit?"

"The roads are as even as could be expected for so far out in the country," Seigetsu explained. "We should make it to Snowport with only a single night spent on the road. Pack accordingly. Any possessions or supplies you no longer need, I am sure the townsfolk would be more than happy to convert into gold. Upon arrival in the city, you may avail yourselves of our hospitality, though I understand if you desire some spare provisions as a failsafe. But extra weight will slow down the cart, so please do not overpack."

"Noted." Leif looked through the space in the back, then nodded to herself. "Right. See you soon. I have some bartering to do."

"Might as well see if our tag team is as sharp as it used to be," Mother said, stretching and following her.

"Hmm. I see someone knows better than to barter without an accomplice," Seigetsu said when it was just us, Corsica, and Braen left. "Well, we leave at first light of dawn on the morrow. In the meantime, I would hardly be surprised if you harbor reservations about traveling with someone you just met. But, seeing as we have plenty of time before we begin, perhaps we might spend some getting to know each other?"

I nodded. "Sure." Trustworthy or not, if Seigetsu was interested in my bracelet, she might have something important about it to share...

Corsica never quite left my sight as we relocated to the roof of the hotel, and Braen tagged along, too, but I could tell now that Seigetsu's primary attention was focused on me. "Those are impressive garments you wear," she said. "Might I inquire as to where you got them?"

"These?" I looked down at my old, tryhard-cool coat and boots, brought out of retirement after I ruined Corsica's new coat in the Flame District. "Made them myself a long while ago. They're not my main clothes. I just use them as a backup, since my good stuff got damaged."

Seigetsu nodded appreciatively. "You regularly dress this way, then?"

I nodded. "Never go without them. Is that unusual in Equestria?"

"No." Seigetsu shook her head. "Particularly not where I am from, on account of the weather."

I took a breath. "Speaking of clothes, I hear you're interested in my bracelet."

Seigetsu's attention focused. "So it does belong to you, then."

"What do you know about it?" I asked, aware that we had just been discussing whether or not to trust this dragon. But as long as I only asked questions, and didn't give away anything a religious order would find potentially dangerous...

"You suspect I know more than you do?" Seigetsu looked intrigued. "Know that I have no desire to press you for information you do not wish to divulge. However, as inquisitor, yes. It is my duty to know about relics such as these. What is it you would like to know?"

I bit my lip. Now I couldn't ask any questions without telling her something about what I didn't know...

Being this paranoid was awful. I could easily trust the ponies of Sires Hollow, but why not now? I didn't even remember how our group chat had arrived at the conclusion of dragon not trustworthy. I just wanted... ugh...

"Actually, I might be good," I lied.

Seigetsu looked even more intrigued.

"If you're answering questions now," Corsica said, wandering over, holding the bracelet, "what is this and where have you seen them before?"

I blinked. If Seigetsu had seen changeling queen crowns before, that would mean Coda, Chrysalis and I weren't the only-

"I cannot tell you," Seigetsu calmly replied. "To say as much would be a grave affront to your friend's privacy." Her eyes met mine. "Am I correct in assuming that you, at least, have some idea of what it is?"

A changeling queen crown. I swallowed and nodded.

Corsica gave me a look that said if you expect me to foalsit this thing, I reserve the right to try to find out what it is.

I sighed, focusing on Corsica. "I didn't give it to you. Mother did, and only because I can't hold it right now, remember?" I turned to Seigetsu. "Yes, it's mine, I know sort of what it is but not how it works, and may or may not have recently broken it. If you want us to trust you, helping me fix it would go a long way."

Corsica grumbled and walked away, dragging a confused Braen along with her. "Should have let Nehaley field the questions on this one... Don't dig yourself in too deep, okay? You can't trust luck to bail you out of bad situations every time."

Seigetsu looked amused. But, as soon as Corsica was gone, she turned back to me. "Broken, you say? In what way?"

I fixed her with a look. "Before I elaborate, can you fix it, and why should I trust you?"

"I could ask the same thing," Seigetsu said. "You clearly have some idea what this weapon - and by extent, you - are capable of. Why should I, an agent tasked with maintaining the stability of this land, trust a foreigner with so much unbridled destructive potential?"

I swallowed. "Because I'm a decent pony who would never do something like that?"

"The equinity of those who accept such a power is actually a matter of fierce debate," Seigetsu told me. "A debate I have no stake in, but a fierce one nonetheless."

"Accept such a power?" I bristled ever so slightly. "Best I can tell, I was born like this."

Seigetsu's eyes widened in suppressed shock. "Can that be true?"

Oops. Had I said something I wasn't supposed to...?

"If so, I pity you," Seigetsu said, folding her arms behind her back. "I had wondered why you appeared so young."

So young? "I knew someone like me who was half my age," I said. "At least I'm old enough to live my life with this burden and try to make decisions about who I want to be, without letting it define me."

"Half your age?" Seigetsu whispered. "Despicable..."

I was getting more and more sure we were really talking about the same thing, and Seigetsu wasn't just bluffing to get me to reveal something I assumed she already knew. "I didn't like it either," I emphasized. "Anyway, you sound like your top priority is making sure I don't use these powers to get up to no good."

"You have the right of it," Seigetsu told me. "I assume your friends know much less about your current state than you do. Corsica, in particular, is quite suspicious of your weapon, though I suspect she knows naught of its true relation to you. I trust that keeping your secret should serve as a gesture of goodwill?"

"That would be pretty basic decency," I said with a small bow. "Which is more than I could ask from some of the honchos I've met. But what I'd really like is to learn more about my powers. I've only ever been able to test them through trial and error, and somehow, no one else has ever gotten hurt, but just recently I broke the bracelet somehow, and now I can't touch it without completely losing my ability to focus. Can you help fix it?"

Seigetsu considered this. "No," she eventually said. "I am afraid that is beyond my expertise. However, there is a sect within the church that most certainly holds the knowledge you are after. Once we are in Snowport, I could arrange a meeting between you and their representative there."

Forbidden religious knowledge? Count me in! "That would be great," I responded, eager.

"Then it sounds like we have an accord." Seigetsu nodded. "If you would permit me a question in return... You said you were born this way. Were either of your parents like you?"

"You mean..." I tapped my leg where my bracelet would sit. "Yeah. My mother."

"Your mother?" Seigetsu looked thoughtful. "Now that is interesting. Corsica mentioned your mother to be among your traveling companions?"

I shook my head. "Nehaley is my adoptive mother. She, err... won custody of me at birth. I've never met my real mother." Possibly excluding an encounter in Icereach during my ill-fated rescue mission...

"I see." Seigetsu nodded. "Well, I think I have learned enough of your private matters. For now, I shall choose to trust you, Halcyon. And I hope you will understand when I keep a close eye on you regardless."

Morning arrived, and we set out. The stallion who had guided us from Sires Hollow - I couldn't even remember his name, so heavy was my brain fog surrounding the last two weeks - had departed to go on his own way, our wagon and much of our food was sold, and Leif's saddlebags were once again flush with cash. I wasn't sure how I felt about her being our official treasurer, but she was less likely to get ripped off than I was and I trusted her far more than Papyrus.

The motorized wagon was fast, rolling along the bumpy road a little slower than I could go at a dead sprint, but much faster than when me and Braen were at the helm. Seigetsu sat at the controls, which were clearly designed for claws and not hooves, saying little that was relevant about Equestria but happily accepting any news we had to share of the north. Ironic how hungry for knowledge she could be when her stated purpose was propping up a world order based around ponies having limited knowledge of the world they lived in...

I hadn't recalled it while talking with her on the roof, but that was the real reason not to trust the dragon: she was the south's equivalent of Icereach's censors, except instead of censoring anything at all related to the divine in the name of science, she was a representative of the church. Of course, it was possible that she had good reasons to keep her silence, but possible and probable were two different things, entirely.

Rather than stew about it, I focused on the scenery as it rolled by, much more able to appreciate it now that I wasn't running for sixteen hours a day. The land was definitely getting flatter as the foothills of the Aldenfold petered out, and the biggest mountains were now to our west rather than behind us. Though near the end of the first day, we crested a final ridge, and I could see where they, too, ended: ahead of us stretched a vast, endless basin, with more mountains so distant on the horizon that they formed a hair-width blue strip atop the land. The snowy peaks to the east stayed tall for a while, but after several peaks they, too, descended and curved away to the west, until I lost sight of them behind their own shadow. And there in the basin, right about where the Crystal Mountains vanished from sight, I could see a large, sprawling town next to a wide harbor, the water opening out to the east.

Snowport.

We set up camp there for the night, as the weather looked good and someone had clearly used this spot as a base camp before. I was still recovering from my ordeal pulling the cart, so I took a stiff walk before bed to allay my cramps, and was treated to a view of lights shining from the city in the dark - not enough to blot out the stars, but enough to make it obvious where the city limits really were.

There was a castle, I could tell. A good, old-fashioned stone fortress, the kind you could read about in children's books. Most of the town was clumped around it, and I could even see a raised wall, though it seemed slightly pointless when the lights and dwelling spilled out into the fields beyond.

Civilization. And, hopefully, much more civilized than Ironridge.

I crossed my wings, said a brief prayer, and headed back to the camp to get some sleep.

Civilization Ho!

We stopped about an hour out from Snowport, as the road grew straight and well-surfaced and farmland and homesteads began popping up on the city's outskirts. A pleasant breeze rustled through my mane, cool enough that I didn't feel uncomfortable in my thick coat, but hardly cold. The mountains' shadow was growing as the sun edged toward the horizon, but I had a feeling we would outrun it: to our right was the last peak in the Crystal Mountains, and beyond it, the chain curved sharply away and descended into foothills. Just a little further south, and the horizon would no longer be made up of snow-capped ridges high in the sky.

"I should tell you a little about Snowport ere we arrive," Seigetsu said, getting out to check the wagon. "The stone fortress you see near the water is the seat of government, from which my brother rules. To the south, on the far end of town, are the rail yards, which as a safety precaution are largely off-limits to those who do not work there. Beyond that, we have a hospitality district meant for sailors and railworkers from other lands. As you will have access to the amenities in the castle, you should have no need of those facilities."

"By which you mean we're not allowed to mingle with other travelers, lest they get the right idea about what exists in their backyard," Papyrus cut in.

Seigetsu didn't look impressed. "A crude way of putting it, but not wholly unjustified. While I will not stop you from wandering and speaking as you please, I would at least ask that you see for yourself the benefits wrought by our way of life before making jokes at its expense. Some of them may surprise you."

"I've got a question," Corsica said. "Aren't trains faster than boats? The map we saw made it look like this is as far south as the sea goes. Why make a port town here instead of just continuing the rails along the coastline?"

Seigetsu folded her arms behind her back. "Although motorized trains exist, the vast majority of them are pulled by ponies, which was even more true nearly a thousand years ago when these tracks were first commissioned. As a result, ships are capable of carrying substantially more cargo per trip, and are preferred where possible because of it."

"Trains as a form of powered public transit only exist in Ironridge, at least up north," Leif remarked. "Even the Griffon Empire didn't have them."

"You also want to hand off the cargo between ponies with different sets of skills," Papyrus pointed out. "Keep the ambitious ones from getting too far from their precious homes too easily. Isn't that right?"

Seigetsu didn't look amused. "No, I don't suppose I can deny that."

I had something different on my mind. "The tracks you use were built a thousand years ago? Who maintains them? And how did they get designed, anyway? If everyone is only aware of the areas near their own cities, how did you decide what tracks to build where?"

"Equestria was not always the way it is today," Seigetsu explained. "It was restructured in the wake of a calamity long ago, and the trains were conceived as part of that restructuring. As to their resilience, they were both designed and constructed by Equestria's sole remaining monarch, Princess Celestia. Her enchantments have fortified them heavily, and they usually only need maintaining in exceptional cases of malicious mischief. Most times, they are more durable than the ground on which they are built."

"A calamity?" I perked my ears.

"Did you assume our desire for stability was founded on idle fears?" Seigetsu pulled out something that looked like a cross between a giant marker and an ink stamp. "It is based on experience. Long ago, Equestria was a diarchy, ruled by the sister alicorns Celestia and Luna. Then, as is wont to happen between gods, a war arose between them, and Celestia emerged victorious over a sundered land. They have since been reconciled, but it was so recently that none yet know what consequences it will have on Equestrian policy, let alone whether their reconciliation will endure."

Corsica looked intrigued. "How recently is recently?"

"Three years ago," Seigetsu said. "Their legend is known in some capacity all throughout the nation. Now, please make use of this."

Papyrus crossed his eyes at the marker-stamp.

"Yellow ink," Seigetsu explained. "Marking yourself with a dot above or near your cutie mark will identify you a a ward of mine, and new to the city. While not required, it just might save you a large amount of headache were anything unfortunate to occur."

I glanced at my coat, which completely covered my special talent. Cutie mark... She called them the same thing as Ansel.

Seigetsu saw my look. "Worry not. It washes out in the rain."

"Think I'll take my chances with the headache," Papyrus yawned, patting his rump.

Corsica sized the stamp up. "Same."

"Braen will take stamp!" Braen declared, reaching for the device.

My curiosity choosing now to overwhelm my paranoia, I took it too. Oddly, Mother didn't, but Leif did. Soon, we were back in the wagon and moving once again, Snowport close on the horizon.

Snowport gradually increased in density as we got further and further into the city, rather than beginning all at once. The street we entered on turned into a main thoroughfare, used more for moving than for standing around chatting; once the farms stopped and buildings became regular, streets began branching off to either side, filled with ponies and markets and lively conversations. There were more than a smattering of griffons, too, and dragons accounted for at least thirty percent of the population.

The dragons were the most interesting, because they came in all shapes and sizes: some tall and bipedal like Seigetsu, others long and noodly, some that were squat and barrel-shaped, and a few that went beyond four legs and had six. Relatively few had wings, but a quick glance up at the sky told me all the winged ones just had better ways to get around. Without fail, though, all of the dragons had sparkly scales, and were some shade adjacent to blue.

We rode through the north section of town, and eventually came to a river that looked like it had been artificially straightened, a proud stone wall guarding the far bank. The road crossed the river and the wall via a drawbridge guarded by two tall, Seigetsu-shaped dragons. Given the amount of traffic that was passing through and the complete lack of stops or inspections, I gathered the guards were strictly ceremonial.

Beyond the wall were more houses, this time stacked two or three floors high, sharing walls and looking like they had been built by a cohesive architectural plan instead of simply grown up around the roads. I tried and eventually failed to guess how many creatures could live in a city this size: five digits felt much too high, and four a bit too low. The place was certainly lively. I couldn't imagine I had seen less than two hundred already walking the streets alone.

The street opened out into a massive plaza that was clearly intended as the center of public life. A circular, paved-stone field surrounded a statue in the middle of a large moat that depicted a huge, noble-looking dragon of the noodle type, with a gaping maw and long, flowing whiskers. Surrounding the field on all but one front were buildings with important-looking stone facades, and the final front was taken up by the castle itself, three tall spires rising from its stone keep to provide an impressive view of the surroundings. An inner road circled the moat, and an outer road circled through the buildings that ringed the plaza, parts of their faces cut away to allow traffic to move straight through them. It reminded me of the train stations in Ironridge, except built by a civilization for whom moving around was much more significant than just a means to an end.

"Who's that?" Corsica asked, pointing at the statue. "Looks important."

"That is Saint Tadashi," Seigetsu said, keeping her eyes on the road. "An important figure from the history of our religion."

"How'd they become a saint?" I pressed, curious.

"I cannot tell you," Seigetsu answered. "Most of the world's religions are governmental supplements used by gods to codify and enforce rules for those who adhere to them or live in their lands, and as such must be spread widely within those lands and have adherence be mandatory. For the ice dragons, by contrast, our religion is synonymous with our culture. It is handed down rather than enforced, and we do not share it. As such, neither do we expect compliance with our tenets from ponies and other creatures who live in our land. It is for us alone."

I gritted my teeth. At least that wasn't as backwards as Icereach censoring the laws they expected their citizens to live by, but still...

"And yet you somehow find work as an inquisitor," Papyrus pointed out, "presumably going town to town and enforcing the tenets of the faith."

"Yes," Seigetsu said. "I do. Usually, that involves taking action against those with unduly loose lips, as well as cataloguing any damages they may have caused. Of course, my presence also serves as a deterrent against those with an unhealthy level of curiosity."

My face fell further. "And what do you do if someone does learn your secrets? Surely this whole thing can't be completely airtight."

"We have our ways," Seigetsu said. "You in particular jumped at the chance when I offered to introduce you to them earlier."

I blinked. Who had I... Oh.

The faction that supposedly could help fix my bracelet.

"I've got one," Papyrus cut in, interrupting my train of thought. "That holy war of yours. Don't you think it would be alarmingly easy for a bad actor - say, someone aligned with whatever you're fighting against - to turn the public against your interests? Even if you happen to be fair and magnanimous rulers whom the public would happily back, all that goodwill would be quite easy to manipulate if left unchanneled."

"You presume that we have an interest against which the ponies and other creatures of the public may be turned," Seigetsu said. "As I explained to you before, your thoughts are not our domain. So long as you abide by the laws of orderly conduct which are writ plain in the city's ledgers for all to see, you are free to think and believe as you will, even should that mean you sympathize with our enemies. We neither ask for nor desire your adherence to our culture."

"Just so long as we don't tell too many stories about the north," Corsica said. "Can't be caught expanding anyone's horizons, now."

Seigetsu looked amused, steering the cart up to the gates of the castle and beginning to slow further. "You conflate the ice dragons with all of Equestria. Even in parts of the land where we are unheard of, you would still find society moving along premade paths and information slow to travel. That is the design of Princess Celestia, who is a goddess and whom we do claim fealty to due to living under the umbrella of her lands."

"So are these your lands, or aren't they?" Corsica pressed. "Because I'm pretty sure you called them yours earlier."

"Both," Seigetsu said, as if it was a simple matter. "Our lands are part of Equestria. In fact, our presence here predates that name. When the alicorns appeared and first began to coalesce Equestria as a nation, my ancestors simply decided their goals were compatible enough with our own, and opted to join them rather than opposing the new divinities. Ever since, we have been allies of the crown, and found no contradictions in living under both their tenets and our own. Now, if I might put this conversation on hold... we are here."

We rolled through one of the castle's main gates, through a tunnel and past a checkpoint at which Seigetsu exchanged a few words with a draconic guard. Beyond there was an indoor stable where about half a dozen such motorized wagons were parked, with room for half a dozen more.

Maneuvering around a stone support column, Seigetsu parked the wagon, motioning for us to disembark. "You may bring your belongings, or leave them for a porter to collect. I would offer you accommodations first, that you might freshen up before an audience with my brother, but he is not usually the type of person to care..."

Not the type to care about looks, huh? That sure could be taken in a good way or a bad way.

"Sure," Corsica volunteered. "I could do with a bath."

"Eh, I'm good." Papyrus straightened his wings. "I just had one yesterday."

Corsica gave him a look.

I almost smiled. That was an exchange that could easily have happened between her and Ansel... And that made me remember how Ansel had stayed behind in Ironridge.

Whatever his reason for staying, hopefully it had led him somewhere as interesting as the basement of a castle owned by a bunch of censorship-happy dragons.

Seigetsu led us through a door, up a staircase and through a maze of passages, each one slightly larger than the last. Most had vaulted ceilings and were constructed entirely of stone, save for lavish carpets and paintings in the alcoves portraying inspiring vistas, armadas of dragons, and boats and trains. Nothing was too grand, though: this felt like it had once been primarily a military installation, then half-converted to a seat of civilian government with the expectation that it could be quickly converted back if the lands were ever in need of defending.

We were escorted into a wide room containing a huge, low table that was strewn with documents, a gigantic rug, and a hearth containing a blue, brightly-glowing crystal that somehow seemed to be putting out cool air, a pleasant feeling in the stuffy confines of the castle. Two small windows near the roof let in a breeze, and Seigetsu motioned to some chairs near the side.

"Please wait here," she instructed. "I highly doubt that my lord brother will do anything other than drop what he is doing to meet you."

We waited, and Seigetsu waited with us, claws clasped behind her back, no longer in a talkative mood. And after about twenty minutes, the door burst open, and several figures strode in.

Chief among them was a bipedal dragon with a similar figure to Seigetsu, sporting icy blue scales and a suit of heavy chain mail emblazoned with the same crest I saw on a tapestry mounted over the ice hearth. That had to be Snowport's ruler... but my attention was stolen by the pony who entered in behind him.

They were a batpony. A stallion, probably around sixty years old. Like me, he was heavily garbed, thick robes and a miter covering everything below his gray neck and gray mane. Yellow irises were the only hint of color about him; even his robes were gray... and as he stepped across my vision, I felt an uncomfortable tug in my chest, as if something invisible and greedy was grasping at my heart.

The stallion glanced at me, raising a very impassive eyebrow before turning back and following the armored dragon, sticking at his side.

"Well come and well met," the dragon said with a bow, his voice undeniably masculine, a slight shortness in his breath that suggested he had been out exercising minutes earlier. "As you've doubtless heard far too many times already, I am Lord Terutomo, and this is my fort. But come, six of you at once from the other side of the Aldenfold? You, my friends, undoubtedly have some tales to tell! I would hear every word and more, so long as your needs have been suitably tended to?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Well, aren't you friendly."

Terutomo nodded. "Better to waste hospitality on those who don't deserve it than withhold it from those who do."

"In that case," Corsica interrupted, "could we get some food? I've been living on rations for weeks."

Several others heartily agreed.

Terutomo nodded thoughtfully, his gaze sliding over to Seigetsu, who was giving him an intense look. "Why don't you all take that up with my men, here," he said, motioning to the dragon guards who had followed him into the room. "It seems my distinguished sister wants a moment of my time, but rest assured you will be treated with the finest Snowport has to offer."

Distinguished sister! I gave Corsica a look.

She groaned.

The two official dragons slipped out, and the strange batpony followed them, the grabbing sensation in my chest dissipating once he was out of sight. Papyrus instantly started chatting up the guards, but I couldn't concentrate. What was that? What had he been?

How possible was it that this was who Seigetsu had promised to introduce me to, the faction representative who could help fix my bracelet? The idea suddenly crossed my mind that anyone who knew enough about changeling queen crowns to fix them when they broke might not actually be that safe of a pony... Hopefully Seigetsu had a really good reason for dealing with someone who gave me such an unsettling feeling.

"Hey." I nudged Corsica, steeling my resolve and making my decision. "Gimmie the you-know-what back."

"What?" Corsica hissed under her breath. "Why? Won't you go all... you know?"

"If I do, then give me a minute and take it away again," I whispered. "But on the off chance it's fixed itself while I wasn't looking, I'd like to know, just in case this goes south and I need a weapon."

Clearly dubious, Corsica slid the bracelet stealthily towards me, so that no one else could see...

I touched it surreptitiously with a wing, and instantly I was on a formless road in the wilderness, hitched to a wagon, my legs burning from exhaustion as I ran and ran and ran.

Get to Snowport. That was the only thing that mattered. Get to Snowport. That was my overriding desire. Get to...

"But..." I panted, speaking between gulps of air. "Aren't we already there?"

Didn't matter. I had to get there. That was the only thing keeping me going, and if I didn't keep going, I would collapse, utterly spent. I had to. I pushed on, kept pushing... Pushed my eyes open.

My legs wanted to move. I could barely stop them from moving, even when I suddenly felt Faye pushing against my consciousness, lending her own instinct to mine as I commanded my body not to give in and start running, and my bracelet demanded the opposite. It was inert, not glowing, but it was loud, like ten thousand echoes of my own thoughts beating back at me all at once.

Stop it, I commanded the bracelet with the biggest drop of force I could spare. We're not running anymore. We no longer need to go... to go to...

The intensity didn't wane, and I pulled back my wing, afraid that I would finally snap and lose control.

"Well?" Corsica whispered, tucking the bracelet back away again.

I felt stunned. The feeling abruptly receded from my mind, like water draining from a bucket after it had been tipped over. The compulsion to get to Snowport... "I'm fine," I whispered back. "Or, I'm sane, at least. Gotta think about that for a sec."

I think... I get it, Faye said in my head. Tell me if this makes no sense, but we're an empty changeling queen, right? What if, by burning the bracelet for so long while thinking about exactly one goal and nothing else, we turned ourselves into an echo chamber, somehow? And touching the bracelet lets us get back in tune with that desire inside of us?

That would be... Maybe? I held a hoof to my forehead. How, though? We didn't have a throne, or any altars like Coda. And what was the point of collecting prayers from so many ponies if my thoughts on their own could be this strong?

I don't know, Faye said. We're speculating about something we know nothing about. But, when you think about it, normally we just have one or two ponies' thoughts in our head. Experiencing two weeks of your own thoughts compressed into a single desire at a single second is bound to be intense. Maybe we're underestimating what it's like to be a changeling queen who isn't empty.

I thought about that.

After all, Faye pointed out, We almost never saw Coda touch her crown. And who knows what it was like sitting on her throne, but she didn't seem to like it much.

I frowned. That sure would be inconvenient, if feeding my bracelet meant I could no longer wear it. And what about Ludwig, or the pink flame? Those hadn't influenced me like this...

Unless they can, and just haven't wanted to yet, Faye said. They are sapient, after all. Either way, now that we've successfully held it for a moment, we should practice holding it more often, I think. It would be nice if we could get rid of that desire to go to Snowport, but if we can't, or if something like this happens again in the future, it would be good to have the mental fortitude built up to resist it.

...Yeah. Good idea.

"Our deliberations have concluded," Seigetsu announced as she stepped back into the waiting room with Terutomo and the unsettling batpony. "Now, I have other matters I must attend to. I trust you will be content in my brother's care."

Without waiting for an affirmation, she left, along with one of the guards, who carried a copious list of Papyrus and Corsica's meal preferences. Mother and Leitmotif weren't picky, Braen didn't need food, and I was happy enough to have whatever Corsica was having.

"Well then!" Terutomo greeted, now that we were alone with him, one guard and the batpony. "My sister tells me you were frustratingly tight-lipped about your reasons for being here. Is your business a secret I actually shouldn't pry into, or was she just bad at making herself out to be trustworthy?"

"If it was a secret, would you leave well enough alone?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Unhappily, but yes," the dragon said with a shrug. "Unless it pertains to the immediate needs of my troops and civilians. Of course, I'm told your goal lies on the Catantan Peninsula, and if that's true I'd imagine you'd be all too eager to plead your case to the overseer of most naval traffic on our fair sea."

I uneasily cleared my throat. "Hey, before we get too far into talking business... Who's that?" I pointed a hoof at the batpony.

"That's Yelvey." Terutomo's face fell. "Seigetsu wasn't kidding when she said she left explaining what he does up to me, was she?"

"She did seem awfully fond of dancing around subjects," Papyrus said.

Terutomo sighed. "Yelvey is the priest of the local chapter of the Order of Silence. It's a sect, controlled and overseen by the Holy Cernial Convocation, and its very few members have the power to erase memories."

All of my fur stood on end. "What!?"

The reactions of my companions, I noted, didn't match mine. Well, Corsica and Braen's did. But Papyrus looked intrigued, and Mother and Leif just looked weary.

"Does the public know stuff like that?" Corsica queried. "Or are you letting us in on forbidden knowledge to scare us into staying tight-lipped?"

Terutomo nodded. "The public is aware of this power. And while I endeavor to govern in ways that uphold the trust they display, the real reason we are allowed to keep it is because certain facets of life in this world make it incredibly useful to be able to come to the castle and ask to forget something you'd rather not know."

"Are you serious?" I narrowed my eyes. "Try me."

The dragon gave me a look that suggested he was beyond accustomed to answering this question. "Have you ever heard of a class of magic that only exists when no one is aware of it?"

I blinked.

"It sounds preposterous, and by all rights it is," Terutomo explained. "But it does, in fact, exist. The workings of our society are underpinned by several magics of immense power and significance that cease working for any individual the moment they become aware of them, which can be incredibly inconvenient for anyone who unknowingly depends on them and then suddenly finds them no longer serviceable. Accidents are unavoidable, particularly when some individuals need to know to do their jobs, or else found out and decided to live with the consequences of knowing. And so the public trusts us with this power because their way of life depends on having it available."

"That's... That's bogus," I complained, trying to find some way that such a magic couldn't actually exist.

"Sounds pretty dumb to me," Corsica said, getting up. "If you're for real, you wanna tell me just what this forbidden knowledge is? Then I'll tell everyone here if it's actually a good reason, and then you zap me if I want to forget it. It's not a painful zap, is it?"

"It isn't something one would exactly do for fun," Terutomo explained. "But you'd hardly be the first to request, or go through with, something like that. Memory erasure isn't gentle; it destroys everything from the present up until a given distance back in time. You'll simply find yourself with a splitting headache and not even an inkling of what it was you learned or anything that happened since."

Corsica looked disturbed.

"Does the magic even work for machines?" Braen asked. "I am not affected by the Aldenfold."

Terutomo stared at her. "I have, quite frankly, no idea whatsoever."

"Then tell!" Braen urged. "Not-knowing magic might not even work on Braen in first place, so maybe have nothing to lose from hearing about other magic!"

Terutomo stared at her a moment longer, then beckoned her over to a corner and lowered his voice too low for me to hear. Corsica looked somewhere between annoyed and jealous.

Eventually, they straightened up. "Who would make a spell work that way?" Braen asked. "Why not just make it affect everyone?"

"Presumably, inherent limits in the power used to weave it," Terutomo said. "It is, after all, quite a powerful effect."

"Well?" Corsica insisted. "Is it a good reason, or not?"

Braen hesitated. "After Catantan," she said. "Where are we going? Back to Ironridge, or not?"

I thought about that. Even assuming we found Starlight first try and had no troubles recruiting her, there was still the matter of Fluttershy and the pink flame... "I'm not sure that'll be our only stop," I admitted. "Though actually, that's something to research while we're here..."

Braen shook her head. "Then is important Halcyon not know. Many apologies."

Internally, I groaned.

Corsica's groan was much louder. "It's actually a good reason? If I knew, would I want to forget?"

Braen looked slightly ashamed. "Probably."

"And you?" I pressed. "What are you gonna do? Does memory erasure even work on machines?"

"Not going to find out." Braen shook her head. "Important part of mission is collecting performance data for Mother. If Terutomo spell is real, would be invaluable data for Mother to have, knowing whether or not my body is affected."

"Spoil me too, old chap," Papyrus cut in. "Very technically, I'm being bribed to be here as a bodyguard by her mommies, so anything she can't do, I probably don't need to do either. Besides, I know more about this place than most of us, so chances are I've heard about this in passing already."

Terutomo sighed and beckoned Papyrus over. After a moment of whispering, Papyrus burst out laughing.

"Bwahahahahaa!" He slapped his forelegs with his wings. "I don't know what kind of psychopath thinks up a system that vexing, but I like them already! ...Actually, I do know, but can't say it because spoilers. Let's just say my opinion of their megalomania has risen substantially, and also the rest of you almost definitely would want to forget if you learned this. It's the kind of thing done by someone with way too much time on their hooves who gets a kick out of watching everyone run around clueless in the dark, let's put it that way."

My eye twitched.

"This is really stupid," Corsica said.

"Really, really stupid," I agreed.

"Needless to say, I think I'll keep my forbidden knowledge," Papyrus said, walking back to his chair with a lazy wing salute. "If I have to bail on the party because of it, too bad, so sad, but I might have already known it anyway. And don't try to think about it too hard, girlies, or this will drive you legitimately insane." He winked at me and Corsica.

I felt my blood pressure rise.

"It's okay," Braen said, walking over and patting me on the shoulder. "Reason is actually a good reason. Halcyon and friends can do more not knowing. And when we all go back to Ironridge, Braen can tell you all about it!"

True. There was that... I calmed down just a little, trying not to pay attention to Papyrus as he giggled to himself and Corsica threatened to slap him.

"Quite the close-knit crew, I see," Terutomo remarked, raising an eyebrow from the spoiler corner.

"I'm the leader." I shrugged. "I've got one best friend, two family members, and two stowaways along for the ride. You take what you can get, sometimes."

A slap echoed out as Papyrus said something I didn't catch and Corsica actually hit him.

"Well!" Terutomo clapped his hands together, and Yelvey took it as a signal to quietly - too quietly - leave. "Now that we've got that on the table and none of you have gone running for the hills, perhaps you might avail yourselves of my city's hospitality? My chefs shouldn't be too much longer, and now that you know the basics about how to come running here if you accidentally hear the wrong thing and regret it, you're more than welcome to take a tour of the place! And get washed up." He pointed at the yellow mark on my flank, and others'. "And get rid of those. Those mark you as someone who hasn't yet heard the rules about how to unhear things and might not have even realized there are things worth unhearing. Just so others can be courteous."

"I still think this is stupid," I sighed. "How do you even know what we do and don't know, anyway? Without knowing what we need to not talk about, how do we know not to talk about it?"

"Seigetsu did her best to figure out," Terutomo said. "It's quite possible you do all already know. But so long as you do your own level best to avoid discussing far-away places in detail with anyone who isn't already cleared for it, you should be just fine, and if you do mess up then anyone who actually cares will know what they need to get fixed."

I wasn't pacified, and wasn't convinced there wasn't more to this that he could say, and just wasn't saying. I wasn't sold on this being a safe or effective kind of magic to have around, no matter what safety net was in place: merely setting the precedent meant there could be any number of similar spells around, all doing different things. What if Terutomo knew about this spell, the one he told Papyrus and Braen, but not others that functioned on the same principle?

In a world like this, the ones who actually kept the secrets would have absolute power. It was a stage that was far, far too ripe for conspiracies and intrigue. And the keepers of those secrets, I had a bad feeling about... and was all but certain their road was entwined with my own.

Local Vibe

Faye stepped out of the shower and buried her mane in a towel, wrapping another around her tail and starting the long process of drying her body with a third.

I hovered nearby, listening as her stomach audibly growled. Our food wasn't ready quite yet, so we had been shown to our quarters early, much to the delight of anyone who wanted to wash up. The castle was spacious enough and its lord generous enough that all six of us were granted our own chambers: for the first time in my life, I had a private bath that wasn't shared with housemates or anyone else.

It was a little awkward to use, being designed for dragons that could exceed my own dimensions in any number of ways, but aside from having to stand on our hind legs to reach the shower controls, it was surprisingly luxurious. Stone tiles with colored mineral veins formed the walls, the ceiling and large swaths of the floor. Whoever had built this had access to a top-tier quarry, and someone they wanted to impress. It also looked newer than the rest of the castle, especially the old-fashioned walls and exterior. Someone had spent a lot of money renovating this place and keeping it relevant.

"Thanks for letting me do that," Faye said, sponging water out of her fur.

"There are things it's worth living up front for," I said with a shrug. "Instead of just staying in the back of my mind and spectating. Life's little pleasures. You know?"

"Yes, I know," Faye sighed. "You've banged your head against our mental blocks too. You know how it is."

"It's still worth saying," I pointed out. "Anyway, have you noticed how nice this place is?"

Faye nodded. "I was actually just thinking the same thing."

I folded my forelegs in midair. "I wonder why. You think they just have a lot of money from taxing the trade, or something?"

"Well, I've been thinking," Faye mused. "And one thing stands out to me. Seigetsu made it sound like this town is pretty out of the way in Ice Dragon territory. The war, the church's seat of power... They're all far away. And Lord Terutomo seems like a nice enough guy, but if this is really the middle of nowhere from his church's point of view, what do you suppose he's doing all the way out here?"

I blinked. "Yeah, that's a good point. Good leaders probably don't get shipped off to places like this without a reason. You think he's actually got some dark, scary secret? Or that he's being punished by the higher-ups with an unimportant assignment?"

"I don't know," Faye said. "It's possible he's not as nice as he seems. There's apparently at least one supernaturally good secret keeper in town. But this also could be a situation like Icereach, where there's something a lot more important about this place than most ponies are aware of."

"You mean like how Icereach was holding a finished fleet of rockets loaded with explosives?" I asked.

"Like that." Faye nodded. "Or how it was also holding us."

Right. Enough ponies in Ironridge knew about who and what I was that I had been sent off to an insular research colony to hopefully grow up free from knowing about changelings, their queens and their impact on the world...

"Let's switch back," Faye said, finishing up with her drying. "We wouldn't want to be late for dinner."

"Sure," I said, drifting closer. My old, unwashed coat hung on a bar near the door, feeling more and more like a relic of a distant past. But it was a choice between that, or showing off my blood-colored legs, and I wasn't sure either of us were strong enough to handle the alternative yet.

Hopefully we could wander the city, and would find a clothing shop that sold something a little more suited to who we were now.

Corsica ate until her stomach hurt, and then ate far too much more.

"You dragons sure didn't slack off in cooking class," she said, collapsing with her chin on the table when she was actually, legitimately sure this time that she couldn't eat another bite. "Blurrrrgh..."

Terutomo chuckled, holding court at the head of the table. "My people have always been proud of our culinary traditions. But come! Now that you are fed and rested, will you not tell me more of your quest? What takes you to a barren desert like Catantan?"

Corsica glanced at Halcyon, who was still packing food away on account of not eating quite as ravenously. Was there any coherent strategy in place for what to or not to say? This was the kind of thing they should have coordinated earlier...

Nobody spoke, and Terutomo looked moderately disappointed. "I'm starting to get the impression you lot aren't very talkative."

"Don't take it personally," Corsica said, heaving herself upright. "We've had a lot of dust-ups with untrustworthy officials. In Ironridge, nobody needs a reason to take advantage of you beyond you leaving your guard down. This is just the way we've turned out."

"And now that we're here," Halcyon added, "instead of a breath of fresh air, we're running into magics we can't hear about without breaking them and religions that are for dragons only. It's not that we want to be antisocial. Just getting some mixed signals about whether or not this is the way things are done."

Terutomo looked thoughtful. "Honestly, I've never known anyone to be that interested in our religion and customs before. Tell me, in your homelands, is this sort of information readily available, something creatures are constantly sharing with each other? Or is it the same way as it is here? I can't tell if you're telling me you've got culture shock about how differently things are done here, or if you're saying you're too used to secrecy to take hospitality at face value."

"The latter," Corsica said. "Trust me. No one tells you anything in Ironridge."

"I see," Terutomo said. "And I can't impress or delight you into changing your minds and opening up a little?"

Halcyon said nothing. Corsica had nothing to say.

"I have, after all, opened my home and my city to you," Terutomo pointed out. "Done no wrong by you, unless I've crossed a cultural rule I was unaware of. And from the briefing my sister gave me, you seem to want to book a lengthy journey on one of my ships. Now, I daresay you'd be hard-pressed to find a friendlier transport mogul, or even another one willing to hear out your request at moment's notice, completely for free. So forgive me if I'm confused why you aren't making use of this opportunity to petition me."

Halcyon looked like she had just swallowed a fly. Leif was giving her a look that said if you want to be the leader, you need to lead.

Corsica took a deep breath. She had not signed up to be the face of the party and didn't particularly want to be on the hook for anything wrong she said to the dragons, but-

"Fine," Papyrus said, grumbling and getting to his hooves. "I'll do it. Cowards, the lot of you." He flashed a look at Halcyon and everyone else on her side of the table, then cleared his throat, turning to address Terutomo. "I'm a special envoy from Ironridge. Technically a bodyguard, but capable of acting in a more official capacity than any of these goons, at the very least. Ironridge has recently experienced some unforeseen transitions in its government and world alliances, at least with countries north of the mountains. Its new rulers have a bit of a history with the monarchy here, and while it would be grossly inaccurate to call them opposed to each other, the Equestrian Crown isn't, shall we say, the very first and foremost party we're here to petition for aid. Rather, we're looking for some old war heroes and friends who may or may not currently be living in Equestria. A 'getting the band back together' deal. Our friends at the top have a tenuous enough position that they'd like to get some of their old friends back on the stage, you see."

Terutomo looked pleased. "Now that's more like it! And as such you prefer to keep your silence in the presence of official channels who may have cooler relations with your city's new rulers."

"You catch on quick," Papyrus said with a swagger. "So? What'll it be? Now I imagine you're going to want to hear more about who exactly it is we're working for."

Terutomo considered this. "I think you may have underestimated our sovereignty from Equestria as a whole. Not that I blame you, when the line is as fluid as it is. Any bad blood between your new government and the Equestrian monarchy would be entirely up to the Holy Cernial Convocation to decide whether it applies to us as well. And while I do report to them, Snowport is my city, and as such the jurisdiction of decisions like that falls to me, at least as far as matters like lending you a boat are concerned. Hearing what I've heard from you, I do think I would like to be convinced of the nobility of your cause before I put down resources to backing it. But, if you're lucky, I'll be the highest authority you'll have to convince. Now, does that loosen any of your tongues a little?"

Halcyon opened her mouth. "We're looking for a mare called Starlight, and another called Fluttershy. First one's probably in her late twenties, second-"

"Fluttershy?" Terutomo perked up. "The Element of Harmony, Fluttershy?"

"Yeah, that," Halcyon said. "I heard that title back in Sires Hollow..."

"Well, she, at least, shouldn't be too difficult to find," Terutomo said, folding his arms. "The Elements live in a town called Ponyville - fantastic name, I know - about a day trip south of here by train. That said, I had no idea she was known in the north, let alone considered a 'war hero' there."

"She's not," Papyrus droned. "That one is-"

Halcyon's eyes lit up, ignoring and interrupting Papyrus completely. "Only one more day? For real? That's awesome!"

"-less important," Papyrus sighed, finishing after Halcyon and giving her a pointed look. "My overexcitable sidekick here just wants her autograph, or a smooch or something. The one most of us are here for is Starlight. Starlight Glimmer."

Corsica narrowed her eyes. Terutomo was paying closer attention than usual, and at Halcyon's reaction, a bit of tension left his shoulders. Odd...

"Not a prohibitively expensive ride, then?" Corsica asked, shuffling that observation to the back of her mind.

Terutomo shook his head. "Not in the slightest."

Leif pointed a wing at Halcyon. "We need to have a talk about exactly what you're going to tell this Fluttershy to convince her to help us," she pointed out. "But if we're really lucky enough to have her live so close to Ironridge, maybe she should be our last stop before we return. Unless we're skipping Starlight and Catantan, we have a lot of traveling still ahead of us, and most ordinary ponies don't like spending months on the road."

Halcyon frowned. "True... but we don't even know if we're coming back this way in the first place. Not unless we can get the airship flying again."

"Well, what options do we even have?" Corsica asked, leaning in. "As far as I'm aware, the only two real border passes are in Yakyakistan and the ruins of the Griffon Empire, both of which are about as far from here as it's possible to get."

"Legend says Starlight had an airship," Papyrus pointed out. "An alarmingly durable one, at that. Some even say you could ram a mountain at hyperspeed with it and the mountain would lose. Its cruising speed might be a decade or three out of date, and its fuel was notoriously hard to get a hold of, but maybe it's still alive and kicking?"

"I can't say I've ever heard of an airship like that," Terutomo said. "Equestria does have a number of airships, but the only ones capable of an international flight like that are military ships used by the Holy Cernial Convocation. Not that they would refuse you if asked by Princess Celestia... I assume you know this, considering you're searching for her by name, but Fluttershy has close ties to the crown. Princess Twilight Sparkle is the leader of the Elements, after all, and she was Her Majesty's personal student prior to joining her mentor as a divinity. If you're that wary of the monarchy, then be aware you're searching for someone whose relations to it are about as close as they come."

Halcyon blinked.

"Anyway, you all look like you have a lot to think about," Terutomo declared, getting to his feet. "Remember, even though Ponyville is only a day away by train, I'm still very curious what sort of stuff you lot are made of. Enjoy my city, meet my people, spend some time here. However much of a hurry you think yourselves to be in, if you're on the right side of history, it would be very much worth your while to stop and build some ties here. I'll see you again in... mmm, three days ought to do it. Enjoy yourselves out there."

He walked to the door and left, and soon Corsica and her friends were alone.

The castle, it seemed, was open to the public, and no one stopped me or anyone else as we explored and gradually found our way out to the plaza again. The corridors felt intentionally difficult to navigate, as if they had been designed to confuse an invading force, but I didn't mind. Nothing jumped out at me to take advantage of my confusion.

"Well, this is the softest prison I've ever been in," Mother remarked once we were outdoors, the sunset having completely disappeared from the horizon, a pleasant night breeze blowing in from the west.

"Prison?" Braen tilted her head at her. "We seem to be completely unshackled."

"Not all prisons are made of chains," Leif told her. "We might be free to do whatever we want, but we're being watched and graded on our performance. That dragon is deciding whether to help us, and he made it fairly clear that if we leave town early, he'll take that as a sign that we aren't interested in working with him. All things considered, this is a much lighter test than he could have put on a foreign delegation seeking free passage... but that's all the more reason not to underestimate it."

"The bigger question is, how much do you want his help?" Papyrus asked, stepping into view. "Because you left me to do the talking there, and I had to make some stuff up because I don't actually know why you hold your tongue sometimes."

"I think Papyrus makes a great leader," Braen declared. "Very confident when speaking."

Papyrus chuckled and grinned.

"There is a conversation we need to have, though," Corsica pointed out. "About why we're all here. Halcyon is the one with the plan. I'm her friend, and I've got nothing better to do. You two..." She pointed at Leif and Mother. "You're here because you're related to her? Because she just couldn't decide who else to give the writs to?" Finally, her hoof settled on Papyrus and Braen. "And you're here because someone thought we'd need backup and sent you along. But are any of these reasons really good enough?"

"And what if they aren't?" Papyrus casually threatened. "What are we going to do about it, randomly go our separate ways the moment something interesting comes up?"

"Yes," Corsica grunted. "Or have no satisfying answers when someone important wants to know why there are this many writ bearers all in one place, which is apparently so hard that it's never been seen before."

Papyrus shrugged. "Well, I'm lying about having nothing better to do, and you probably are too, and I'll eat my hat if she isn't either." He pointed at Leitmotif. "For all I know none of us are being honest about what we're here for, but you do have a point about our story not being compelling or coherent. So I vote we put our heads together, piggyback off what I started, and fib up a solid alibi that doesn't leave all of us staring cluelessly and hoping someone else will answer when pressed about it again."

"That's probably a good idea," I admitted.

"Excellent! Our fearless leader concurs," Papyrus declared. "So? Anyone want to put their real reasons on the table so we can claim they apply to all of us, or are we just going to keep looking for these two mares because Halcyon is lonely?"

I bristled. "I'm not lonely! I just..."

Papyrus stared at me with round, innocent eyes.

"Shut up," I told him. "It's... personal. Look, we're searching for Starlight because she can do something about the you-know-whats that are sealed under Yakyakistan and can also help Coda, and we're looking for Fluttershy because she might be able to fix the ginormous crystal tower that appeared in Ironridge for reasons. Neither of which sound remotely compelling or believable, I know."

"I'm just here because the alternative is wasting away in Ironridge," Mother said. "I've seen Halcyon this far. I'll see her a little farther."

"A touching story," Braen said. "I wish my own mothers were here on this journey. I am collecting performance data for Mother that she can use to help answer the question."

I tilted my head at her. "What question?"

Braen stared levelly at me. "The question Braen was built to answer."

"Well, now I'm curious," I said. "What is that question? You do know, right?"

Braen looked at everyone. "Mother is very concerned with what kind of legacy she will leave. Always thinking in terms of nations and decades. Always tell Braen, world is not perfect place, so is our duty to leave it better than we found it. But what does 'better' mean? Problem that confounds Mother again and again is that different ponies seem to have different definitions. Perfect world to one pony not look like perfect world to other. So, Braen was created to travel entire world, meet all sorts of creatures, and find out what they think is good in the world. What makes world worth living in."

My jaw hung just a little slack. "Seriously? Your mother made you to do that?"

"Indeed." Braen bowed to me. "It is exciting mission. As Halcyon was told, this is first time Braen finished enough to be allowed outside unsupervised. Life of Braen up until now marked by lots of curiosity and too many rules. But now, can finally travel world, collect data and experience things worth experiencing!"

"Well, someone knows the point of their existence," I said, impressed. "But that doesn't quite line up with what we told Terutomo, does it..."

"As for me," Leif said, "I'm here because Halcyon and I made a contract. She has some research she's pursuing. My own objectives hinge on learning the result. And so, I'm helping her until she can see it through, provided no more-promising avenues open up."

I shivered just a little. Even after Leif had started following me, I never made any particular efforts to get close to her, and times like this reminded me that we weren't actually that close, despite being technically family. Not that I made efforts to get close to anyone, but still...

"Like I said," Corsica cut in. "I'm just here because Ironridge stinks. And to follow Halcyon."

"Right," Papyrus yawned. "So the robot and the two old-timers might be telling the truth, and the rest of us are definitely lying. But none of your stories actually can cover all of us, and I'm the smoothest liar, so I say we officially change up the group and promote me to leader. All against?"

I tentatively raised my hoof. "Hey, hold on. What exactly does being leader entail? Because if you just wanna be the professional bluff maker..."

"Ponies should contribute according to their talents," Leif interrupted. "Whether we can count on Papyrus to have a silver tongue when he needs to isn't the question. The question is whether his slickness is what we want to be represented by." She gave me a hard look. "No matter who gets the arbitrary badge of 'leader', the reasons I'm here won't change. That said, Halcyon, your agenda would have suffered back there if Papyrus hadn't stepped in, and it still didn't go as well as it might have if you took charge yourself. Papyrus might have done this before, but he's also messed this up badly before. So you need to decide whether you're going to set the course for your agenda, or drift along and accept the risks of waiting for others to do it for you."

"Come on, lady," Papyrus groaned, "that was years ago! What does a guy have to do around here to live a little slip-up down?"

Leif focused solely on me.

"I..." I swallowed. "I don't know how to weigh it. I don't know how to gamble on whether to trust someone. How to tell, in the moment, whether saying something will hurt my cause. I just don't want to mess this up."

"Failure is a part of life," Leif said. "It hurts. I know better than most, and there might be others here who know even better than me. But if you let that be a reason to do nothing at all, then are you even living? Besides, you'll never learn to roll with your mistakes if you don't make them." She turned away. "If you're not confident you can attempt it, then step aside now and let Papyrus take over. I want to see you grow, but I need to see you achieve your goals and finish that research."

"I'll do it," I insisted, taking a step forward. "I can do this. It's not that hard. I know there's a lot riding on me, so you don't need to turn up the pressure. But I... I used to be great at this, and I can do it again. Next time we need to decide whether to trust someone like that, I'll just go with it, okay?"

Leif looked, if anything, even more worried, but she nodded and stepped back. "Well. Carry on, then."

"Anyway," Papyrus yawned. "Now that we've settled our little leadership spat, I motion that we get some shut-eye. Also, I was going to vote against myself if I did win that contest just to annoy my backers." He winked at Leif.

"Eugh." Corsica shook her head. "This soon after dinner? No, thanks. I need to walk that meal off first."

"Gonna tour the city?" I asked. "See what's what? Mind if I come with?"

Braen nodded. "Me too!"

"Have fun with that." Papyrus saluted, turning and strolling back into the castle.

"Same," Mother grunted, turning to follow him.

Leif hesitated.

"Well?" Corsica looked at her. "You in, too?"

"...I think I'm going to do some solo recon," Leif said, sinking into the shadows. "I'll see you around."

We had seen the northern corner of town, were presently in the east, and had heard the south was nothing but rail yards. Not once, however, had the west come up in conversation, and so naturally that was what we decided to go check out.

The walled center of the city ran right up against the slope of the final mountain, and so the area beyond the western gates was essentially completely cut off from the outskirts we had seen when entering. Another drawbridge marked the exit beyond the walls, and suddenly an open road stretched beyond us, disappearing rapidly into the starry horizon.

This side of the city didn't seem nearly as developed as the sprawl running out to the north. Part of that, I suspected, was the wind: with no mountains or walls to interrupt it, it blew in from the west, countless miles of momentum behind its push. Tonight, it was gentle, but that wouldn't always be so. Another part was the trains: I saw lights moving in the distance as one approached and another departed, passing each other. The rails were close enough to the left that too much urban sprawl could quickly get cramped, and if they were at all noisy, building on the northern side of town was probably much nicer.

However, the city didn't stop immediately, either. Particularly to the north of the road, tucked up against the mountain, there were buildings and dwellings, a long line of them stacked between the road and the slopes. And the moonlight, at least, suggested that all the area around the tracks was farmland, supplying food to the denizens of the city, or making a surplus for export.

"Bet you that's where the farmers live," Corsica said, horn lit for illumination, nodding at the buildings to the right. "Wanna go look for a tavern or something?"

"A tavern?" I gave her an incredulous look. "I thought we were out here because you already ate too much!"

"Not for food, dummy!" She flicked my face affectionately with her tail. "For gossip! See what the locals are talking about. What better way to get an accurate picture of a city's character?"

I blinked. "Oh, right... How stealthy do you want to be about it?"

Corsica shrugged. "Why would we be stealthy? If they throw us out for not buying anything, they throw us out."

I glanced down at myself and hesitated. "It's just... I know no one's said anything yet, but you remember that creepy stallion who was in the castle when we first arrived? The batpony."

"Yeah." Corsica nodded. "What about him?"

I swallowed. "It's just... Batponies had a kind of reputation in Ironridge. Call me scared, but I'd rather not go through that whole song and dance again because someone mistakes me for one of those memory-erasers."

"That's stupid," Corsica huffed. "You've seen all of one of them here. Who's to say they're all batponies, or all batponies are them? Or even that there's more than literally one guy? Besides, you've been in plain sight since we arrived here, and no one has said anything."

Except Seigetsu, who wanted to introduce me to them because they presumably knew about changeling queen crowns, meaning whether the public recognized it or not, I was connected to them...

Corsica studied my expression. "You don't look convinced. Well, I wish nobody heckles you over it. For tonight, at least. Can't get too greedy."

I rolled my eyes. "If only fond wishes were in the habit of coming true."

"Who says they can't? Maybe I'm good luck." Corsica wobbled a little on her hooves. "Hey, you know what I heard brings really good luck? Lending your friends a helping hoof from time to time. I'm tired. Wanna give me a ride?"

"Hey, no, you were the one who wanted to come out here," I protested, dodging her attempt to slump onto my side.

"If Corsica is exhausted, I can give rides," Braen helpfully offered, standing and mostly listening to our conversation.

"Nah." Corsica steadied herself and straightened her mane. "Don't worry yourself. I'm just teasing someone who's not smart enough to appreciate it. Come on, let's go find a place to put our hooves up."

I hurried after her, scowling. "I'll have you know I'm plenty smart! Now get back here!"

Before too long, we were in what could generously be described as streets, straight enough not to be claustrophobic but crooked enough that anyone driving Seigetsu's motorized wagon would go insane trying not to clip a building's corner. The ground was sharply sloped, and just as many buildings seemed to be underground as above ground. With its love of angles and disrespect for their proper usage, the architecture felt almost like it was deliberately making a counterpoint to Snowport's elegant fortress, and I felt like seeing it during the day would reinforce that notion a hundredfold.

"Yo," Corsica called out to a dark, hulking figure at the edge of my vision. "You know any good places to get a drink around here?"

The creature walked closer, into her illumination. It was a four-legged fish.

Not a dragon. Very undeniably a fish.

I blinked several times.

The fish made a series of glubbing, blubbing noises that somehow assembled themselves in my head into coherent thoughts and words: around that corner, loud place, door's always open. Can't miss it.

Corsica saluted. "Much obliged, friend!"

The fish glub-blubbed again, something that I felt like should mean Enjoy your stay in Freedom Town! And then it lumbered away.

I looked at Corsica. She looked at me.

"Well, he seemed friendly enough," I remarked. "Or she. Or it. Do you have any idea what species that was?"

"Nope." Corsica shrugged. "But something tells me this might be their neck of the woods."

"That species is never before recorded in my data banks," Braen said, stepping up close beside me. "I would be deeply interested in meeting more!"

"Well, you heard them," I said, leading the way. "Let's go check out that address!"

For a moment, as she stepped through the door, Corsica had to hold her nose. An overpowering smell of salt and brine washed over her, and she eased herself into it, trying not to choke.

The tavern was packed, but also amply built, with a double-height ceiling sporting sturdy wooden rafters. Several batponies hung by their tails from those rafters, nursing mugs and leaving the floor up to the heavily amphibious life that provided much of the tavern's clientele: lots of fish and fish-adjacent things with legs, several spherical frogs, even a massive walrus squished in behind the far corner table. In addition, Corsica counted two polar bears wearing business suits, bowler hats and sunglasses, several things that looked like a cross between griffons and ponies, and some less-aquatic life as well: several chunky, furry things with pink noses covered in tiny tentacles and titanic claws that looked primed for digging, a squad of vest-wearing canines with dim colors and droopy ears and jowls, and an exceptionally lanky bipedal cat, who was tending rapidly and gracefully to the bar. And, of course, a few normal ponies and griffons as well, but they were in the heavy minority.

As a general rule, Corsica noted, the less pony-shaped a creature was, the bigger it tended to be.

"Woah," Halcyon whispered, standing in the door next to her. "You can't find a place like this in Icereach."

"Nope," Corsica muttered back, though the tavern was so loud that she wouldn't have been overheard unless she screamed herself hoarse. On her other side, Braen was vibrating with so much excitement that Corsica reached out a hoof to restrain her, just in case.

"Studly guy coming through," a gruff voice warned behind her. "Watch your step, clear a path..."

It was another suit-wearing polar bear, his black nose standing out like a punctuation mark.

Corsica squished to the side along with Halcyon and Braen, and the bear lumbered past. "Come on," Corsica beckoned, dragging the two of them forward in its wake. "This looks like a great place to get a read on the pulse of this town."

Centaur Sweat

Corsica dragged me and Braen to the head of the bar, less because I was dragging my hooves and more so we didn't get split up in the overcrowded space. The bar stools came in just about every size except teenage mare, which turned out to be fortunate as the single one that was available could fit all three of us at once.

"One sec," the elongated cat tending the counter said, sliding over to us an actual second later. "Woah, new faces," he greeted with a flutter of his eyelashes, leaning in with his chin on a forepaw. "Fresh into town, by any chance?"

"Just rolled in," Corsica said, squished between me and Braen. "Lively place you've got here."

The cat pulled himself up and did an elaborate bow. "Well, in that case, your first drinks are on the house. What can I do you for?"

"Something non-intoxicating," Corsica said without hesitation. "Other than that, surprise me."

"I'll have what she's having," I added, a little overwhelmed by the intensity of the room.

"Braen is tragically unable to drink," Braen apologized, opening her mechanical mouth and showing off her lack of a throat.

The cat whistled, taking the presence of a mechanical pony entirely in stride. "What a pity. Gimme a few more seconds..."

As he glided off to the taps, I took quick stock of our neighbors. One was a spherical frog, about the height of a large stallion and sporting droopy, pleated ears that hung almost halfway down its body. It was watching us with unconcerned curiosity, holding almost perfectly still save for its tongue, which occasionally snaked out, wrapped around its tankard, and lifted it to take a drink.

The other was a bipedal bird-thing with wings for arms, fluffy enough that it was a little hard to wrap my mind around its anatomy. It had a peg-leg, and looked tipsy enough that it had probably been here for quite a while.

A clunk on the counter heralded our drinks as the bartender scooted back in front of us. "Enjoy," he said with a bow.

I took a sip. Whatever it was, it was warm and heavily spiced. Some kind of tea, though made with plants that probably didn't even have a category up north?

"Diverse clientele you've got, here," Corsica remarked, taking a bigger mouthful and barely avoiding choking from the intensity.

The cat nodded. "First time in an Abyssinian bar, I take it?"

"That happen a lot around here?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

The cat whistled innocently. "More than anywhere else in Equestria, I'd say. Our kind don't exactly mingle with the genteel folk outside the dragonlands, and your pretty princesses don't facilitate much travel to our end of the map... Name's Roy, by the way. Fauntleroy, if you're feeling fancy."

"Well met, Roy," Corsica replied, proceeding to introduce us in turn.

"Impressive, impressive." Fauntleroy nodded along. "Never seen a mechanical pony before. Guessing you must hail from some interesting places yourselves."

I glanced at Corsica. If the dragons and the Equestrians really wanted a tight lid on information, how much should we say? Though, this cat's expectation that we were from far away suggested that distant travelers weren't nearly as rare around here as Seigetsu wanted us to think they were...

"You can say that again," Corsica chuckled. "Anyway, just trying to get a feel for how things are around here. What's the people's verdict on the local rulers? Are they good eggs?"

Fauntleroy swaggered. "Well, I'm about as biased as they come, but-"

He was interrupted by a loud crash. I winced, expecting a bar fight... but it was just the bird-thing to my left, having passed out and fallen off its stool.

"Whoopsie!" Fauntleroy leaned all the way over the counter, peering down at it and making a face. "Hate to cut you ladies off, but duty calls, and all that. If you want to mingle, though, try that table over there. All goodly folk, barkeep's honor..."

I followed his gesture to the far corner table, the big one with the walrus.

Fauntleroy himself ducked into an adjacent room and began filling a pail with water. Deciding I didn't want to get splashed by the inevitable dousing, I slipped from my stool, mug clutched close to my chest in a wing. Corsica and Braen followed suit.

Everyone sure was at ease here, I noted as we pushed through the crowd to the recommended table. Getting rowdy and letting loose, maybe, but that wasn't a thing that happened at a place where you could randomly get dragged into schemes and politics. This was... probably a good place. As overwhelming as it was, I made a decision that I liked it here.

"Hey there," Corsica said, poking her head up above the rim of the corner table. "Got room for a greenhorn adventurer or three?"

All eyes turned to her. In addition to the walrus, this table had more spherical frogs, more bird things, more four-legged fish, a pair of batponies who looked like twins, and a three-headed beast that looked like a lion, a goat and a snake all sharing the same torso, with the snake making up the tail. The polar bears in business suits, I noticed, were all seated at the next table over, deep in conversation with-

My breath caught in my throat. It was a relatively ordinary creature by the scale of everything else in this room, with the head and torso of a simian but the body and horns of a bull. Its face was old and wrinkly, and it wore a thespian smile, with closed, upturned eyes... save for the third eye in the middle of its forehead. Golden, burning, with a pupil so slitted it was shaped like a barbell. And staring straight at me.

It was exactly the same third eye I had seen on Nyala's forehead that day on the Verdandi, the one nobody else could see.

A deep, deep shiver slid down my spine, and I adjusted my seating so that Corsica was between me and that eye.

"Your table comes highly recommended," Braen announced, dragging my focus back to my more immediate surroundings. "I'm Braen! This is Corsica, and this is Halcyon."

Pretty much everyone was now staring at us. "Well, I'll be," the walrus said, peering at us with a round, grandfatherly face. "A mechanical life form? You sure do see new things every day."

"Indeed you do," said Fauntleroy, sliding up behind us with an expression that suggested he had just dumped a bucket of water all over an unconscious bird-thing. "Kiddos, meet the local court. Upstanding fellows and fellowesses one and all, responsible for keeping our corner of the town just a hair less grimy than its reputation would suggest. Court? Meet, uhh..." He scratched his head. "Eh, I already forget their names. But I like 'em. Oop, thirsty customer, toodles!"

He scooted away.

"The local court, eh?" I sized up the table once again, suddenly a little more wary. "So you're law enforcement?"

"Of what few laws there are to enforce that the dragons don't handle themselves," the walrus lamented. "It does make for a boring caseload, sometimes. The name's Jones. Judge Jones! And I'd be deeply obliged if you did any lawbreaking you're planning to do in an interesting and exciting manner."

I squinted. "Are you encouraging us to break the law?"

"Just stating the obvious," the goat head on the three-headed creature said, shrugging the shoulder on its side. "We're all sinners here anyway. Just trying to be thoughtful about it."

I squinted harder. "You're encouraging us to... thoughtfully break the law."

"You're pretty new around here, aren't you?" said the snake head.

"I won't deny it." Corsica rested a foreleg on the table. "What context are we missing?"

A frog's tongue flicked out. "Given that you aren't screaming and fleeing at the sight of us, either far too much, or far too little..."

"Should we be?" I backed away as much as my chair would allow. "Screaming and running away?"

At least half the table chuckled.

"No, no!" Jones the judge urged. "There's no need for any of that, now..."

"But some ponies would?" Corsica pressed, leaning forward. "Pretend I know nothing, because I probably do. What's up with that?"

"Well, we are Abyssinians," the goat head pointed out. "The Kingdom of Monsters? Not so known for fitting in with your pastel-colored Equestrian society."

"Life would lose its flavor without the rough edges," the lion head muttered. "But that's not an opinion everyone shares."

"And there are some - or even lots - who make 'rough edges' a bit too generous of a descriptor," the snake head sighed. "You're really adventurers, and haven't ever heard of a monster attack?"

"Maybe they come from a good part of town!" Jones insisted, his blubber shaking as he slapped a fin for emphasis.

Corsica cleared her throat. "Or from far, far away. Anyway, what do you think of the rulers around here? Terutomo and all that. Looking for some opinions from down on the ground."

"Ah, Terutomo," Jones sighed. "He has a good heart, for a dragon. Quite an exciting story, too!"

"He's fair enough," a bird-thing said. "Might even believe in all the rhetoric coming out of Cernial. Better him than most others."

"But he's still a dragon," a frog pointed out.

"Yep," the lion head groaned. "Still a dragon."

"Which matters because...?" I blinked. "Wait, the dragons' holy war-"

"Is against Abyssinia," the snake head finished for me. "We're the mean, nasty, impure enemy. Boo for us."

"But you all live here in Terutomo's town," Braen pointed out.

Jones looked awkward. "Well, you see, little mechanical pony... one of the things the dragons do is always leave a hand open to us. There are quite a lot of Abyssinians living in dragon territory."

"They're trying to claim the moral high ground," the snake head griped. "Showing that they're so good, they'll obey the laws of fair conflict, and treat us nice off the battlefield to prove a point. They even make it taboo to talk too much about the war, to avoid anyone hurting our feelings by making out like we're the enemy. As if this war is being fought over hurt feelings."

"Better than not being able to live here," the goat head pointed out. "You remember our days in Abyssinia. The cities there are a dump. The land is rotting, the laws of nature themselves are coming apart at the seams, and all anyone can do is talk about how to profit off the changes instead of how to fix them."

Jones slapped a fin again. "And Terutomo really does mean-"

"So what are you fighting over?" Corsica cut in. "If the dragons are really keeping their silence for your sake, surely you can tell us yourselves."

Jones shifted in his corner, the walls of the building groaning against his girth. "Have you heard the legend of Saint Tadashi?"

"Well, we've seen his statue in the plaza," I offered. "But no one would say who he was, or what he did."

"History grows murky with age," the lion head said, its voice quiet and subdued. "However, both Abyssinia and the dragons claim Tadashi as their own. They say that in ages immeasurably long gone by, the world was beset by unspeakable calamity that threatened the end of all races. The ponies devised a countermeasure by which they might be saved, but did not recognize our species as worthy of sharing in it. Tadashi was a hero who stole some of the ponies' power, and with it saw our ancestors through the calamity. His tomb lies in the lands now known as the Cernial Plateau, under the control of the Ice Dragons. And the war is now being fought over the belief that the power he stole was entombed along with him, and it will soon be needed again to save us from the second coming of the calamity."

My ears pressed back. "So you're fighting over who gets this power, because you think you're about to need it to survive."

The goat head's face fell. "We're not so unified as we were back in those days. The Ice Dragons have switched sides, and sing to the ponies' tune now. They probably think they don't need Tadashi's power, because if the calamity does return, they'll have access to the real thing instead of stolen dregs."

"But for some reason," a dour frog said, "they guard it anyway, and refuse to share."

"You have to look on the bright side," Jones insisted. "Maybe things will be different this time! They're letting us live on their lands, after all, and Terutomo for one seems to believe it is a genuine sign of unity! Maybe they mean to share the ponies' power with us as well!"

"That's an awful big maybe to stake the survival of your race on," the snake head quipped.

I leaned closer. "How sure are you this calamity is returning? You're talking like the end of the world is a near certainty!"

One of the batpony twins spoke up, reminding me there were in fact other ponies at the table. "If you went to Abyssinia, you'd feel it too. Ever since that crystal tower appeared twenty-five years ago-"

My blood ran cold. "Crystal tower?"

"Yeah." The batpony's voice was sticky, like she had just been eating too much peanut butter. "In the desert, near the shore of the channel between the mainland and the big island. It grew out of the ground all at once, and ever since then nothing has been right. Soil turns to sand and stone turns to mud. Metal rusts faster than ever, and when it comes to gravity, the water has a mind of its own. And before the war started, some scholar found writing in Tadashi's tomb talking about a tower as well, that probably dates to the last calamity. The end is certain, mark my words."

I felt the pink flame flicker dimly inside me.

"Twenty-five years, huh?" Corsica pressed. "You've checked this place out pretty thoroughly, then?"

"I was there when it first happened," the batpony insisted. "The place was hollow, with rooms and corridors and everything! Almost looked intelligently designed. It was so tall, though, that I had to turn back way before I reached the top. I never saw anything but crystals. Anyway, several years ago, a really powerful monster moved in and claimed it as their castle, so it's no longer open to the public."

Corsica was giving me a look that said I don't even need to ask if you're thinking what I'm thinking.

I nodded. Yeah.

"A-anyway," I stammered, trying not to get flattened by the renewed gravity of my quest. "Bottom line, is Terutomo a good guy or not? Just wanna know whether we should trust him."

"He's always done right by us," Jones insisted. "Without trying to look too much like he's doing right. He walks a fine line with this war business, despite being so far removed from the front lines."

"How come?" I pressed.

The same batpony as before spoke up, sporting a conspiratorial tone. "Well... You know the Earth Dragons, right? Tiny tribe, takes our side in the war? They say Terutomo's dad had a dalliance with one back when he was a noble of some renown, and that Seigetsu is actually a half-breed with one leg on either side of the war. Now, anyone who knows her will tell you she resents any implication she's not a hundred and ten percent on the Ice Dragons' side, but what about the rest of her family? Her dad lost his noble status after his indiscretions came to light."

"And now here his children are, restored to minor yet still-noble posts," Jones proclaimed. "If you ask me, they must have done something noteworthy to get back up this high!"

"Oh yeah?" The batpony folded her forelegs, staring Jones down. "Well, if you ask me, the reason they're stuck in a posting so far from the glorious battlefield is because the higher-ups are worried Seigetsu's mixed blood will make Terutomo easy to manipulate. They probably don't want a backdoor into the system."

Jones' mustache drooped. "Well, yes, but-"

"Trust me, I'm a criminal," the batpony smugly insisted. "If I was trying to push that family around, I'd lobby Terutomo to give us stuff on the grounds that it could help his sister too, since she's one of us. You know, a little whisper here and there, get some cultural leniency going so we can get away with anything bad we want to do!" She leaned closer to me. "In fact, the reason why it's such a good plan is because that's basically what they're already doing. The Ice Dragons love giving us symbolic handouts to make us feel better about how many of us they're killing in the war. Sorry, did I say us? I mean to make themselves feel better. All you gotta do is debase yourself to the right dragon, and volia..."

Jones cleared his throat with gusto. "We are supposed to be the good guys, Yunie, thank you very much... I'm going to have to open a case against you if you carry on much further with that line of thought!"

Yunie shrugged and sat back. "Just telling it like it is, pops. Besides, she's a bat." She pointed at me. "If she's going to fall in with anyone, it'll probably be us."

"Pops?" I glanced between Yunie and Jones. "You can't actually be...?"

"Oh, it's a figure of speech," Jones chuckled.

I sat back, feeling silly for even asking.

Although, now that I thought about relationships, and the accompanying topic of how old people were... Yunie and her twin were pretty clearly twenty-somethings. And she said she had explored a crystal tower twenty-five years ago.

Apparently, I had found another changeling. Why was it that every changeling ever used their powers first and foremost to lie about their age?

Fauntleroy sidled back up to our table, his sharp eyes taking in the state of everyone's tankards. "Evening evening evening, any of you lads and lasses need a refill?"

Several mugs were scooted his way. He collected them, and the whole table watched him go.

"I don't think any are more likely to sing Terutomo's praises than he," the goat head remarked.

"Oh yeah?" Corsica tilted her head, curious.

"When Terutomo was first posted here," Jones started. "Must have been six, seven years ago, even. He strode into town, didn't even let a vehicle carry him. Swore that he would do right by his ideals and make this a city everyone could be proud of. And to prove his point, before he even set foot in the castle, he strolled the streets and decided to mentor the first scruffy urchin he stepped on. Found little Fauntleroy holed up in an alley, and now look at the cat today! A successful business owner! Oh, young Roy has a bright life ahead of him, even if it does mean he won't be bringing any more amusing defenses to my courtroom..."

"Sure," Yunie scoffed. "Keep saying how great he is. I'm telling you, a dude like that has 'manipulate me' scrawled all over his bum-bum. All. Over. It. I can prove it, if you want!"

Braen cleared her throat. "What is meaning of 'bum-bum'?"

As they argued, I sat back and let myself think. This was exactly the sort of testimony I wanted: how the lower dregs of society judged their leader to be, not the politicians and business owners whom he was paying off and who probably had agendas for me as well. The more I heard, the more I wanted to trust Terutomo and earnestly petition for his help getting to Catantan. But, at the same time, I couldn't really feel like I was in a hurry to get out of here.

My cup was still warm. And, for once, I didn't feel threatened by the creatures around me, or like I had anything to prove. If I was only traveling for my own sake, I could stop here for a while, and maybe be quite happy.

...Except for the persistent mysteries still plaguing me, like the creepy eye on that one guy's forehead.

"Hey," I interrupted. "Not to change the subject, but who are those guys over there?"

"The syndicate?" The snake head gestured at the table I was staring at. "Cross between a weight-lifting club and a masquerade ball. Basically, a bunch of muscle maniacs who think being professional makes you cool. Gentler souls than the facade they put on, but not someone you'd want to get on the wrong end of in a dark alley." It squinted. "Never seen the centaur, though. His kind are pretty rare."

"Wasn't there a centaur in the news a year or so ago?" a frog asked. "Someone who went on a bigger-than-usual rampage in Central Equestria. What was his name...?"

"Tirek?" Yunie suggested.

"Yeah!" The frog blinked excitedly. "Tirek! I heard he almost toppled the monarchy! I wonder if this guy knows him?"

"Just because he's a centaur doesn't mean he knows every other centaur in existence," the lion head muttered.

The frog looked slightly embarrassed. "Well, there can't be that many centaurs out there..."

At the other table, the centaur with the third eye seemed to have heard us. "One moment, gentlemen," he said, creakily getting up and trotting over on cloven hooves before smiling at us with an expression that belonged in a creepy theater troupe. I knew he was only unsettling me because of the eye, and that I couldn't judge him fairly because of that. But that eye made me really, really not want to judge him fairly.

"Howdy," Jones greeted, not looking remotely disturbed. "I don't believe I've seen you around!"

"You probably haven't." The centaur amicably shrugged, his third eye fixed on me. "I do a lot of traveling. Duma, peddler of rare wares, at your service." He bowed. "It must be at least twenty years since I've been through this particular township. Usually, I roam out west, where war makes people desperate and more in need of supplies. Now, forgive me for eavesdropping, but I could swear I heard someone speak with great interest about the topic of centaurs?"

The frog glanced around the table, looking deeply uncomfortable. "Uhh... You know Yunie, heh heh, always interested in things that are none of her business!"

Yunie and her twin gave it deep, identical scowls that were so perfectly synced, they were probably professional mimes.

"Is that so?" Duma looked unflappably pleased. "Well, knowledge isn't my usual ware, but I can certainly peddle that as well. What would you like to know about centaurs?"

The snake-goat-lion thing made a covert gesture toward Jones, who helplessly shrugged.

"I've got one," Fauntleroy announced, sliding onto the scene like a hockey puck. "What kind of things do thirsty centaurs like to drink?" He brandished a clipboard and a pencil, full of fulfilled orders.

"Oh, nothing, I'm quite good," Duma cheerfully replied, holding up a hand. "I actually came here to make money, not to spend it!"

Fauntleroy pursed his lips. "Uh-oh. You know how much rent I pay to run my business here, right?"

Duma smiled at him. "...More than I can afford, no doubt. Charity for the itinerant poor?"

Fauntleroy gave him a warning look.

Behind his back, Duma pulled something out. It was a tiny, tiny glass vial containing a few drops of purest crimson liquid, held so that everyone except Fauntleroy could easily see it. To the barkeeper, he continued to smile.

"Well, I see we've failed to come to an agreement," Fauntleroy sighed. "Excuse me, noble gents?" He leaned over the table with the suit-wearing polar bears. "Got a non-customer making paying customers uncomfortable, here. Drinks on the house to the first one to escort him out?"

As one, the polar bears rose to their feet. "Sorry about this, buddy," the middle one said. "Still friends, right? Just can't say no to free ale."

Duma chuckled cheerfully, putting away the vial he had been showing off. "What a pity. Oh well! I suppose I'll just peddle my knowledge from that conveniently dark alley just across the way. If anyone wants to buy, or perhaps purchase any material goods, you'll all know where to find me!"

I watched, unnerved, as he was escorted out. What a relief to see someone else getting busted for a change...

"What was that red stuff?" whispered the frog who had accidentally lured Duma over. "Some kinda drug?"

"Probably," the goat head said. "Nothing any of us need, that's for certain."

The lion head and snake head bobbed in agreement.

Jones narrowed his eyes. "I'm of half a mind to investigate this. My courtroom could use some activity!"

"Selling drugs isn't exactly illegal around these parts..." a bird-thing pointed out.

"I'm not sure that was a drug," Yunie whispered. "You didn't hear this from me, but I hear the bigwigs at Cernial have a special red substance that has something to do with... you know... them."

"Who?" Corsica asked.

"You know!" Yunie waved her wings. "You're not supposed to make me say it. The ones we don't talk about!"

"Oh, the ones we're supposed to pretend don't exist, except when we need them?" the frog asked.

Yunie nodded furtively.

Jones' eyebrows rose in realization. "Oh, you mean the memory erasers!"

Yunie frantically shushed him. "Shut up, pops, you want them to come for you!?"

"Oops!" Jones slapped a fin over his mouth, glancing around and lowering it a good moment later. "Although, I actually wouldn't complain if my courtroom got a case involving illegal memory mod-"

This time, it was Yunie's hoof that silenced the walrus.

"How bad of an idea would it be for me to go out and ask him myself?" I asked, straightening up.

Everyone looked at me. "You want to stick your nose in trouble?" Corsica asked, incredulous.

I shrugged. "He's looking to make money, and I'm flat broke. And you guys can watch out the window, or something, and back me up if anything bad happens, right?" Besides, I needed to know what was up with that eye... and Corsica had a point. Maybe I was just incapable of not asking for trouble.

"Hoho, you're nuts, kid," Yunie hissed. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll back you up." She hugged her twin, who still hadn't said a word this entire time. "Hey, pops, we're going out to get a case for your courtroom. Tell Roy to have a keg waiting for me when we get back, yeah?"

"Have fun," Corsica told me. "But don't kid yourself that I think this is a good idea."

"Good luck!" Braen added, earnestly waving her hoof.

I stepped out into the night, vaguely aware of the two batponies shadowing me. "We'll cover you," Yunie whispered, sinking into the shadows. "Now go get 'em!"

I stared at the entrance to the alley where Duma was visibly waiting, his third eye glowing in the darkness. What was I doing?

Bad idea. Bad idea. Bad bad bad-

"Hey," I said, walking closer.

"Well, hello there!" he greeted, stepping out into the light of the moon. "Here to buy, or just window shopping?"

I wasn't about to waste any time. "What's with the... you know...?" I tapped my forehead.

"How do you mean?" It was impossible to read his expression when he never stopped smiling and never opened his eyes. His normal eyes, at least.

"Ugh, never mind." I shook my head. "That red stuff. You were obviously trying to sell it, back there. What is it?"

"You mean this?" He pulled out the vial, which almost looked faintly luminescent. "Why, I'm almost surprised you haven't seen it before. Unless you're just playing coy to try to drive the price down, which I'm sorry to say won't work on me. You did arrive in town from the north tonight in the company of the one and only Seigetsu, did you not?"

"Maybe," I told him. "What's that got to do with anything?"

He smiled at me. "You really aren't what you seem. How delightful."

"You've got two minutes to explain yourself before I get tired and go back inside," I warned him.

"Fine, fine, I can tell when a product isn't appreciated," Duma sighed, not sounding in the least disappointed. "How about a fresh new set of robes, then? Your current clothes are looking quite a bit old."

I blinked. "You've got a set of robes just randomly for sale?"

He smiled. "I'm very resourceful! And always prepared."

I glanced at my old, worn-out clothes.

"Well?" Duma asked. "You strike me as a fine young mare who would never want to be seen in public without them, for intimately personal reasons."

I shuddered. "What do you know?"

"Lots of things! But I'm very good at guessing, too." Duma shrugged. "For example, I'm guessing none of your dragon hosts have ever seen you with your clothes off, have they?"

I took a step back. "Well, no..."

"And you wouldn't want to change that," Duma preached. "Well, then it would be simply terrible if anything were to happen to them and you didn't have a backup. Going once, going twice..."

"Are you threatening to ruin my clothes?" I hissed, my hackles rising.

"No, never!" Duma beatifically smiled. "And I'm not trying to establish business rapport so I can sell you some of this, either!" He pulled back out the red liquid.

"And what's that supposed to be?" I asked warily.

"Formula L," Duma said, waggling the vial. "The real thing, not a fake. If you really don't know what this is, then I'd advise you run away very fast. But if you do, you'll find very few others who are willing to part with it for cash alone, no strings attached."

I took another step back. "And what's 'Formula L'?"

"Centaur sweat," Duma said, his voice perfectly serious. "People pay good money for this. I mean it!"

"That's gross," I said, turning away. "I think I'll pass."

"It has magical properties!" Duma urged as I walked away.

"Pass!" I insisted, heading back toward the bar.

Duma sighed airily, retreating back into his alley. "Tip from a merchant," he called after me. "If anyone else tries to sell you this, pretend you already have some, not that you don't know what it is. And never take off your clothes!"

I bristled, ignoring him. I had learned nothing at all, and gotten weirded out for my troubles. But at least nothing bad had happened.

"Dude," Yunie whispered, surfacing beside me when we were almost back to the door, her doppelganger in tow. "That was more sinister than the gates of Tartarus! He's part of a cabal or something for sure!"

"And you're not?" I raised an eyebrow. "Him more than others, but you seem to be enjoying conspiracies a little much yourself..."

"Sue me. They're interesting!" Yunie shrugged. "So what did he mean by never take off your clothes?"

I flinched. "No idea. I-"

Yunie lifted my coat, sneaking a peek at my barrel.

"Hey!" I slapped her away. "Knock it off! Ever heard of a lady's privacy?"

"Why?" Yunie shrugged. "Didn't see anything in there worth hiding. Besides, I'm showing you everything, aren't I?"

"That's not how it works," I groaned. "Also, you're at least twice my age."

"Okay, okay," Yunie pouted. "Everyone likes to look their own way. Point taken. I just wanna know what he thinks you're hiding! It's not the usual thing..."

"Beats me-" I said, freezing halfway through opening the bar door. "Wait, what 'usual thing'?"

Yunie whistled innocently. "Whoops! Forget I said anything. I'd get in super trouble if I told you. Hey, look at the time, it's almost time for my, uh, thing, haha, gotta run!"

She slipped into the shadows, mute clone following suit, and was suddenly gone.

Memory Gambit

"How'd it go?" Corsica asked as I slouched back into the seat she had been saving me. "Looked like you got mugged on your way back."

"It wasn't a mugging," I grumbled, checking my bag just in case. "She wouldn't do-" I cut myself off, realizing what I was saying, and where. "I mean, she better not have? Doesn't look like anything's missing..."

Jones the walrus chuckled jovially. "Oh, Yunie loves spicing things up in my courtroom! Of course she would! But probably not to anyone she's just met. Unless she doesn't like them." He rubbed his chin with a flipper. "Not anything valuable, at least. Or anything that couldn't ultimately be returned. Actually, now that I think on it..."

His voice devolved into muttering, and I made up my mind that everything I'd actually miss was still in its proper place. The rest of the table were shuffling their seats, unwinding what had clearly been a pileup next to the window to watch my dealings with Duma, and I got the feeling they were much more interested in the centaur than Yunie. I could still see him, lurking in that alley in the shadows...

"So?" One of the polar bears who had been talking with Duma at the next table over leaned over. "What'd you think of him, little miss? Always good to get an outside opinion on new business clients, you know?"

"Didn't look good," said the frog who had drawn Duma over to our table in the first place. "You skedaddled fast on him, you know?"

"Let her speak," the goat head on the three-headed beast sighed.

"He creeped me out," I reported with a shrug. "Kept making weird insinuations. Felt like out of everyone here, he was focused only on me. I wouldn't trust him to sell me something completely mundane and ordinary."

The polar bear strummed his chin.

"Not up to anything illegal, you think?" Jones seemed to have forgotten all about Yunie, and his eyes glittered with excitement. "We could open a tribunal-"

"What did he want you to buy?" the polar bear asked.

"A random set of robes, and a bottle of centaur sweat. Same thing he showed off at the table." I folded my booted forelegs on the table. "Any of those mean anything to you?"

The frog chuckled. "Centaur sweat? Who'd pay for that? Wait, if there's a market for it, I wonder if I could sell my own saliva..."

"Robes?" The lion head perked up. "Pony robes?"

I tilted my head. "Well, I didn't see them, but presumably. You know something?"

"Robes aren't fashionable," the lion head muttered. "Not around here, at least. A smart merchant wouldn't come here to sell them."

"Since when do you know about pony fashion?" the snake head hissed.

"It's always been a hobby of mine," the lion head bluntly stated. "Don't tell me you didn't know that."

The snake head sighed. "You learn new things about your roommates every day..."

"Roommates?" I asked. "Is that how you think of yourselves?"

"It's one way to think about it," the goat head lamented. "When you've got three people stuck in one body, you make do however you can."

Three people in one body, huh? Faye said in my head. Sounds like us.

Yeah...

As I thought about that, something warm and heavy fell on me from the side. It was Corsica, and it looked like she had fallen asleep in her chair.

"Err..." I shifted, not wanting to drop her down the awkward crack between my chair and hers, but instinctively shying away from the touch.

"Oh my!" Jones's brows went all the way up. "The lady has been drugged with a sleeping agent!"

"No," I grunted, pushing back my unease and trying to stabilize her so she didn't fall anyway. "Probably just had a big day... Hey, wake up!"

Corsica grunted, pushing herself back up onto her seat. "You're no fun..."

"You did that on purpose?" I furrowed my brow at her.

Corsica yawned.

"Uh-oh," Fauntleroy said, sauntering over. "You know, we do have rooms here on the cheap..."

"Will not be necessary," Braen interrupted, balanced like a gargoyle on her own chair. "Can only spend so long carousing before need to get back to friends. Besides, Braen could carry ten passed-out Corsicas at once!"

Corsica blinked, seeming to just remember that Braen was there. "Killjoy," she sighed, sitting upright. "Fine. I'm awake..."

Half the table chuckled. I didn't see what was so funny.

"So!" Jones clapped his fins. "Back to the matter of the tribunal! How many crimes do you think we can bring this Duma in on, eh?"

"Is being creepy a crime?" I asked. "Because technically, he hasn't done anything but that..." Mostly, I just didn't want to be involved with him any more than necessary. "You could just, like, forget about him."

"Yep," Yunie's voice said from under the table. "This much creepiness is definitely a crime."

"Yunie?" Jones craned his head, trying valiantly to fit it under the table to see. "Whatever are you doing down there?"

"Shush! I mean, what?" the voice carried. "Nobody here but us dust bunnies."

I glanced beneath the table myself. Two pairs of eyes were lurking side by side in the shadows.

"But if Yunie was here," the voice whispered, "she'd totally tell you that guy's about to get busted by the inquisition."

Muttering reverberated around the table.

"I told you centaurs were bad news," said the frog. "Never said otherwise, right?"

Jones sighed. "You had to go and say the I-word... Case closed, I suppose."

"The I-word?" Corsica yawned. "Inquisition? You got a truce to stay out of Seigetsu's way, or something?"

"More or less," Jones explained. "The dragons give us a decent amount of freedom for self-government here in Freedom Town. But one of their conditions is that when both of us want to take action against a wrongdoer, they always get the first say."

"And it's specifically their laws this dude is probably breaking," Yunie said from under the table. "Don't quote me on that, though. I just know he was acting suspicious."

"How many laws do the dragons even have?" I pressed. "They didn't tell me about any extensive codes of conduct when I was entering. Just..."

Keeping silent about religious stuff. Right.

What were the odds that 'centaur sweat' was actually important to their religion?

Halcyon? Faye prodded in my mind. Maybe this is the kind of thing we should stay away from.

Maybe it was.

"Well..." I stretched. "Been nice meeting all of you, even though I only learned like two of your names. But I'm starting to think like it might be time to head home for the night."

"I suppose we never did finish introductions, did we?" said the goat head. "I'm-"

"Leeroy," said the frog who had been most talkative. "Pleased to meet you!"

The snake head gave him a look.

"...Sam," the goat head finished after an awkward pause. "And my roommates are Karen and Clarke." It nodded at the snake and lion heads, respectively.

"Abyssinians have interesting naming conventions," Braen remarked. "Never have heard anything like!"

Several others around the table who had only spoken once or twice started introducing themselves as well, and my brain rapidly reached its limit for new name memorization. "Well, it's been real," I said, adjusting my coat and preparing to leave. "See you again sometime, maybe?"

"Of course!" Jones chortled. "And if anyone wrongs you, remember to stop by my courtroom to get a free sample of justice!"

We avoided Duma's alley on our way back to the city proper, thankfully encountering no trouble on the darkened streets. "So," Corsica said, looking as if she could tip over from a light breeze. "Anything you wanted to say back there, but couldn't around strangers?"

"I dunno," I muttered thoughtfully. "I... actually really enjoyed that, though."

"Well, duh." Corsica didn't sound in the least surprised. "Everyone's gotta come out of their shell sometime or other."

"Duma does kind of worry me, though," I went on, debating whether to tell Corsica about that illusory third eye. "The way he talked, the things he said to me... Maybe he's some harmless buffoon, but I got the impression he knows things he shouldn't. About... me."

"Things you're willing to talk about?" Corsica raised a tired eyebrow. "Or am I still lugging your bracelet around while being kept in the dark about what it's good for?"

I gritted my teeth.

Halcyon... Faye said in my mind. I know this might sound backwards, coming from me. But... maybe we should tell her.

I glanced at Braen, and then back at Corsica.

"Tomorrow," I whispered. "It's too late tonight. But, tomorrow, I'll do my best to tell you everything."

Corsica looked at me. "What do you mean, do your best?"

"I'm a coward," I whispered. "About a lot of things. Including myself, and how you'll take it. And I've never told anyone else before, so I don't know if I'll be able to make myself... follow through." Even saying this, right now, I felt an uncontrollable shiver shake my body.

"Alright," Corsica said, looking back at the road ahead. "I'll hold you to that. Please."

I bowed my head.

"Anyway, you'd be the one to know about Duma, since you met him," Corsica went on. "But if he really has crossed the dragons in some way we're not supposed to know about, I wouldn't worry. Seigetsu is incredibly strong, and has all sorts of powers I've never even heard of. And there's a whole fort of dragons here. It would be nice to know more, but... that's not what I'm really thinking about."

"You've got something else on your mind?" I guessed.

Corsica nodded. "Back in Icereach, I was a delinquent. Deny it all you want, but I burned bridges with Graygarden and I enjoyed doing so. You wanna know why?"

My heart sped up just a little. "How come?"

"Because I didn't see a place for myself in the future," Corsica said. "After I got my special talent, I couldn't figure out what I wanted to do in the world, or whether there was anything I could even apply myself to over a long term without... you know. And because I didn't have any plans, that meant I had nothing that could be derailed by getting into trouble. There were no stakes. I didn't care because there was no reason for me to care. You see where I'm going with this?"

I felt a little fuzzy. "I... You're telling me stuff about your own secrets so now I owe you one?"

"What?" Corsica blanched. "No! That's... Dummy. Look, my point is that Freedom Town and that bar and that clientele had disreputable written all over them. They're living behind enemy lines, by the grace of their enemies' leaders. Probably face a lot of resistance from regular civilians, integrating themselves into society or moving up in it. Case in point, they're stuck in their own corner of town. But, talking to them, they didn't feel hopeless. It felt like they were amused by that being a stereotype of them. Genuine amusement, not bitter. Who do you know who laughs that way at others' pity for them?"

"I..." This was a lot to suddenly wrap my mind around. How come I hadn't noticed any of this?

"Someone who legitimately doesn't need it," Corsica went on, keeping her voice quiet. "Someone who secretly pities you in return, because even though the established societal order says you're higher on the pecking order than they are, they're happier than you and they know it. They wouldn't treat their legal system like that if crime was something they were actually afraid of. So what I want to know is, why are they so happy? What do they know that gives them hope for the future, even though by all outward appearances they're stuck here with nowhere to go?"

I swallowed. "You think it could be anything illegal?"

"Dunno." Corsica shrugged. "Does it matter?"

"Well, if we're trying to avoid getting caught up in another conspiracy-"

"Who cares about conspiracies?" Corsica interrupted with a huff. "I just want... Never mind. Maybe you wouldn't get it."

I stared after her. "Corsica?"

Corsica didn't look back, but she could hear Halcyon's hoofsteps had stopped.

That kid... Ugh. She talked like her own problems were so bad, so why couldn't she put two and two together? Everything with her was always about a conspiracy, or a magic flame she found somewhere, or... Always about things other than herself. If Halcyon could just focus on herself for a change, maybe they'd finally be able to relate to each other.

Paradoxically, it was Halcyon's ability to always look at things beyond her own problems that drew Corsica to her. Corsica didn't want her to change. And then there was Halcyon's other self... Maybe she actually couldn't think about her own problems deeply enough to empathize. At least, not without switching over.

Corsica sighed. She just wanted to know how the Abyssinians were happy with what they had so she could do it too.

Corsica realized too late that the room she had been put up in had windows facing east.

The sun seared in, reflecting off the water and hitting her bed like a laser, prying her eyes awake. Blearily, she took in the mechanical clock on the wall: about four hours had passed since she climbed in bed and passed out. Bluuurgh... Not enough. Especially not after using her special talent again last night...

She rolled over, buried her face in a pillow, and tried to go back to sleep.

Someone knocked on her door.

"Have you ever heard of a late night out on the town?" Corsica loudly moaned.

"Apologies," came the voice of Special Inquisitor Seigetsu. "I shall leave you to your sleep."

Someone that important, coming to wake her at the crack of dawn? Didn't they have butlers and maids for that, or something? Maybe... maybe...

Nah. Whatever it was couldn't be more important than sleep. Corsica covered her eyes even harder and went back to sleep.

The next time she awoke, the light had completely moved on, and the clock told her it was the middle of the afternoon. Grumbling and disheveled, Corsica dragged herself out of bed, resolving to spend at least an hour in the shower.

There was a piece of paper on the floor, shoved under the door.

We got our boat ride. Sorry you missed the meeting. Hope you aren't too mad about any of the concessions we made!

-Papyrus and Leitmotif.

Corsica sighed.

A much quicker shower than planned later, annoyance forced her out the door, all dressed up in her usual shoes and ear ornaments. What concessions had those two made? And why hadn't Halcyon been the one to leave a note? Of course she had slept through something important, but for all she knew, they were just making up these concessions, just to annoy her... Or maybe even that there had been a meeting at all.

Actually, there shouldn't have been. Hadn't Terutomo said three days? Corsica was certain he had.

With the urge to go back to bed growing stronger by the minute, Corsica located a castle employee, got some directions, and soon found the bulk of her friends lounging on a windswept balcony, taking in the panoramic south. A quick sweep of her eyes told her everyone but Halcyon was here.

"Well?" she demanded, marching ominously up behind Papyrus. "What's with the letter? I'll have you know I cut my shower short for this."

Papyrus blinked at her in confusion, a moment passing before recognition dawned in his eyes. "Ohh, you're that homely chick who has eyes for Halcyon! I was-"

Corsica turned around and bucked him so hard, he flew over the edge of the balcony.

Nehaley whistled. Braen looked confused.

Papyrus hovered up over the edge, rubbing his rear. "Fine, fine, I probably deserved that. But you were the one who slept in..."

"This," Corsica spat, "is why you're still single."

"Guilty as charged." Papyrus shrugged. "Need a few more shots to soothe your ego?"

Corsica picked up the chair he had been sitting in with her aura. "I will throw this at you."

Leif sighed at him. "How you have enough self-control to do what you used to do is beyond me. Now do you want to tell her about your fancy arrangement, or do you want to make her less likely to say yes first?"

Corsica put down the chair and grew a dangerous grin. "You need my help for something?"

Papyrus flung his forehooves up in the air. "For crying out loud, lady, I'm a teenage colt with no role models! Have some realistic standards! I can get away with running my mouth a little when it doesn't matter."

"My standards aren't the problem," Leif warned. "The problem is your carelessness. I know what your game is and know you think there are no stakes in the end, and there's not a lot I can threaten you with other than ending it early. But even if you think you can do whatever because your future is set in stone, mine isn't, and neither is that of anyone else here. Including yourself, believe what you will. So... stop trashing everyone's opinions of you."

Papyrus gave her a frustrated, petulant look. But Corsica was barely looking.

Even if he thought his future was set in stone... It was the same thing she had been talking about with Halcyon, last night. Or trying to talk about, at least.

What was his goal, then? For all the time she had spent being his co-worker, Corsica knew precious little of Papyrus's actual motivations. But if he didn't like the place he saw for himself in the world, and didn't see any reason to walk an upright path...

Well. At least she wasn't being that odious when she let herself stop caring.

Corsica huffed, still mad at Papyrus but no longer to the point of kicking him off a cliff. "Fine. Moving on... You actually had a meeting and got Terutomo to give us passage?"

"We did," Papyrus groaned, looking away from Leitmotif. "And it turns out I was able to barter swift passage, in exchange for some expertise in an obscure field. I know plenty of things, you see, including some things that the dragons don't. They want me to... let's see... act as a 'consulting expert' and give a once-over of a project that may or may not be related to things I've seen before."

"How cute," Corsica said. "And I'm going to get dragged into this how?"

"Well, it's extremely confidential," Papyrus said, recovering his smug demeanor. "To such a degree that, after seeing the details and providing my expertise, I'll need to have my memory of the situation wiped. Want to come too?"

Corsica blinked. "What? Why?"

"Well, it wouldn't benefit you anything if you didn't remember the experience," Papyrus pointed out. "But it still might be fun. And I did mention that you and I worked together often in Ironridge. If you came along, you could hold me to the straight and narrow, at least in their eyes! Of course, dear Senescey would be better at that, but for some reason she refused."

"Use your brain," Leif deadpanned, "and think about why."

"Lemme get this straight," Corsica said, tapping the ground. "Terutomo will give us free passage if you help him on a confidential project and then have your memory wiped so you don't remember what it is you helped with. And you want to know if I want to come along as a tourist, do nothing but observe, and then get my memory wiped too."

"Welll..." Papyrus shrugged ambivalently. "When you put it that way, I suppose it does sound a little pointless, but it could also be fun! Even if you don't remember having fun, does that mean you never had it?"

"Sounds messed up," Corsica remarked. "Although it somehow feels like you're legitimately offering this to be nice to me."

Papyrus winked. "Would you prefer a rude denial or a too-eager agreement?"

Corsica gave him a look.

"Anyway, the dragons were technically the ones who asked, not me," Papyrus went on. "Like I said, they don't know me, and figured it would be easier to tell if anything sneaky-sneaky was going on if I was in a group. But I was the one who thought of you, so technically yes and no at the same time!"

Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"This isn't something I'm forcing you into," Papyrus pointed out. "If you're really that ambivalent, just say no."

"...Where's Halcyon?" Corsica asked, looking for a way to change the subject without committing.

"Busy," Nehaley said.

"Seigetsu come for her," Braen explained. "Say there special ponies who she wanted to meet."

"Special, huh...?" Corsica narrowed her eyes. Something about last night, maybe? With Duma?

Papyrus flexed a wing. "For what it's worth, she's probably going to be all day."

Corsica gritted her teeth. "...Alright. So if I don't come with you, I'm not doing anything else interesting today, then. You got any leads whatsoever on what this is about? That I'm allowed to know now?"

Papyrus leaned in conspiratorially, lowering his voice so no one else could hear. "Autonomous. Mechanical. Weapons. Same boat as the Whitewings, or even our mascot over there." His eyes flicked briefly to Braen. "Well?"

Corsica hesitated... and then a thought crossed her mind.

Seigetsu could countermand the power of her talent. But if that was a dragon thing, then Yelvey - or, whatever the name of the batpony who supposedly erased memories was - might not be able to do it.

Maybe Seigetsu could do it remotely, or maybe she would remember what Corsica could do and would stand guard as Corsica got wiped. But there was always the chance that she would forget, and Corsica could cheat the system and get away with her memories intact.

That was an interesting possibility. Interesting enough that, when weighed against how little else she had to do with her day, it won out.

"Sure. Whatever." She tossed her mane, stepping away from Papyrus. "Count me in. Wish they mess up and let me keep my memory, though. When do we see this spooky thing?"

"Unlikely," Papyrus chuckled, "but one can hope." He glanced at the sun. "We leave in an hour, or maybe less. Come on, let's go tell them we've assembled a party!"

Not enough time passed for Corsica to question the suddenness of her decision before Seigetsu and two draconic guards were walking her and Papyrus through the castle's dungeons. She could feel the pending use of her talent hanging in her mind like an anvil ready to fall. She had said the words, and there was nothing she could do to take them back, short of Seigetsu intervening like before. Yet so far, the inquisitor had done nothing.

Was that because she detected nothing, or was waiting to act until after Papyrus had accomplished his business? Corsica couldn't know. She almost hoped this one did get countermanded: a wish this big wouldn't be one she could just walk off, or pretend her way through. If they were on a boat for a month, that would provide ample recovery time, to be sure. But up until then, she would be useless.

The balance was ironic, or maybe even poetic when she thought about it. In order to trigger her talent, all Corsica had to do was impulsively want something to happen... or just say the magic phrase, which often went hoof in hoof. And she paid for it with her desire to have things happen. Couldn't truly overuse it when using it too much stopped you from being able to use it more.

"Some fancy dungeons you've got here," Papyrus pointed out. "But not a lot of prisoners to fill them. Relics of a bygone era?"

"No," Seigetsu said, leading the way. "This castle was originally conceived as a storage facility. As it was built along a popular trade route, our people had need of a holding space for confiscated illicit goods. The dungeons are merely a maze to aid in the protection of the most secret chambers. So though they are old, they do still fulfill their original purpose."

They descended to another level, the masonry wet and the floor protected by a grate that prevented it from being swamped. This was below sea level, so water must leak in down here... There were probably pumps somewhere, keeping the place dry. The passages were alternately wide and claustrophobic, and though there were frequent features that looked like landmarks, they were all identical to Corsica's untrained eye. Everything was made of the same large, green-gray bricks, with sconces on the walls that lit automatically at Seigetsu's presence.

"We are almost there," Seigetsu encouraged, descending another staircase. By now there wasn't just standing water; it was flowing, and no amount of care could prevent Corsica from getting her hooves splashed despite the grates. In her mind, she had always envisioned underground waterways as being majestic feats of architecture, with canals and gates and bridges, domed ceilings and water pouring in from grated pipes protruding from the walls. But this was like none of that: just a regular, brick cellar, partially flooded.

One final staircase, and they reached a dead end. Seigetsu walked up to a brick wall, put a hand against it... and the masonry softened, folding aside into the wall and revealing a way through.

It reminded Corsica of when the dragon fixed the crack she had made in the road in the previous town, molding the rock back together like it was putty. Except here, this was obviously a door designed to be opened by the same magic.

A round, dome-shaped room opened out before Corsica, with a moat collecting water around the edges, several pumps sputtering away. A raised island in the center held a durable contraption that could only be an elevator.

Seigetsu stepped onto the elevator, and beckoned for everyone to follow.

With a press of a button, it began to descend, passing through a solid metal bulkhead.

"So," Papyrus began as the road closed back up behind them. "Am I going to get the details on this job, or is everything still hush-hush even with the memory eraser?"

"I suppose I can tell you some of it," Seigetsu said, facing the cylindrical metal wall of the elevator shaft. "The short of it is that there is a great weapon which belongs to my people. However, due to the war in Cernial, it cannot stay in its rightful resting place for fear of it being plundered by our adversaries. As such, the Holy Cernial Convocation chose to inter it here, far away from the front lines."

Corsica caught her breath, remembering what the Abyssinians had said last night. "Does this have anything to do with Saint Tadashi?"

"Why, yes." Seigetsu glanced back at her with a gleam in her eyes. "I can see you've been busy around town. Been talking to our western cousins, have you?"

"What?" Papyrus blinked. "You learned interesting factoids and left me out?"

Corsica blew a raspberry at him. "That's why I had a reason for sleeping in." She turned back to Seigetsu. "If you mean the Abyssinians, then yes. I have."

Seigetsu nodded. "And just what did they tell you?"

Corsica hesitated. Seigetsu was an inquisitor. Odds were, she already knew everything the creatures in Freedom Town talked about, especially with how talkative those creatures were...

"They said the war is being fought over Tadashi's tomb," she ventured. "That long ago, Tadashi saved both of your peoples from a calamity. And they thought the power he used to do that was still in the tomb. They said they'd need it if they wanted to survive that calamity if it ever came again."

"I see." Seigetsu folded her hands behind her back as the elevator opened out into a massive room. "Then the only thing I need tell you is that the power sequestered here is no agent of salvation."

Corsica's breath caught in her throat as the room lit up before her. It was perfectly spherical and constructed entirely of metal, though the upper half seemed to be coated in some screenlike substance. Inside, a ring-shaped walkway surrounded the middle, connected to the wall where the elevator touched down, with another vertical ring in the middle, like a set of gimbals. Lining the inner ring were a series of conical devices that glowed and fluctuated with energy, and hovering in the middle was a dragon.

This dragon was quadrupedal, lean and long-legged, with a pair of proud wings folded at its sides, with proportions almost reminiscent of a pony. It was perhaps three or four times the height of a full-grown stallion, and had a long neck, with a blank, spherical head that had no face. Its tail was a conical spike surrounded by several hovering rings, looking exactly the same as the spikes lining the ring that held it. And it was entirely made of metal.

"What the...?" Corsica drew in a breath.

"Huh." Papyrus stared at it. "I was wondering where that thing would turn up next."

"So my suspicions were correct," Seigetsu said, walking out towards the rings that entombed it. "You do know of Aegis."

Papyrus looked it up and down. "It was a regular sight in the Griffon Empire, at least for a while. Provided you knew where to look, of course. Belonged to a kid who swore fealty to Garsheeva."

"This is precisely the sort of information we desire," Seigetsu said, staring at the dormant dragon. "Corsica. I don't suppose during your tenure with Egdelwonk, you encountered any depictions or knowledge of this figure?"

"Nope." Corsica was still staring at everything in the room. "Can't say that I have."

"Nothing at Egdelwonk's," Papyrus agreed. "Though I'm pretty sure I've seen this figure, name and all, on a comic book series that's peddled in Ironridge. If you want my take, someone who knew about Aegis wanted to dumb her down a little in popular culture, just so rumors about her being real would be less interesting and less likely to take hold."

Seigetsu nodded. "A sensible ploy. And you say Aegis belonged to a child?"

"The Imperial Seer," Papyrus said. "Or something like that. I forget her exact title. Never interacted with her much. If you want my help in tracking her down, I'm afraid the last place I heard of her being was on the other side of the world, southeast from here. Two decades ago, to boot."

Seigetsu frowned. "What was her name? Do you recall her features?"

"What's it to you?" Papyrus shrugged. "I volunteered to tell you anything I knew about your weapon, assuming it happened to be a thing I had seen before. If the topic's going to wander, I might need more payment..."

"What do you mean, 'seen it before'?" Corsica pressed. "And that you never interacted with someone in the old imperial government 'much'? You talk like you were there before you were even born."

Papyrus winked at her. "I have ways of getting around."

Seigetsu raised a hand to stop them. "Staying on topic, please. You won't tell us more about Aegis's owner without further negotiations over material reward?"

"Hey, I'm broke, alright?" Papyrus gave her a pleading look. "Can't blame a colt for trying."

Seigetsu sighed. "If you really have seen this much then you should have some idea of what Aegis is capable of. This machine bonds itself to an operator and attempts to follow their directives with as much power as it is given. Having it in custody is not good enough if the pony who was last known to possess its loyalty-"

"Alright, alright!" Papyrus waved his wings. "You don't want someone feckless and irresponsible potentially gaining access to the doomsday device. If it makes you feel better, she really did seem like an alright kid! But in the interest of cooperation, what if I told you that Starlight Glimmer - the selfsame exile my friends here are seeking out in the desert - would know a lot better than me about this thing's operator?" He gestured at Aegis.

Seigetsu gave him an inquisitive stare.

"I'm being serious!" Papyrus shrugged. "Also, I bet you Starlight could beat your Aegis in a fight, but that's neither here nor there. So, what do you say? Wipe our memories and call this a day, then you or your best goons join us on our mission, dedicate every available resource you have to helping us fulfill it faster, and then you'll have her all to yourself to help with your little missing-pilot issue. Sound like a deal?"

Seigetsu frowned... and turned to Corsica. "What about you? Does your search for this Starlight have anything at all to do with connections she may have to the powers that be? Is this at all a feasible assessment?"

Corsica blinked. "Whatever I say, you're just going to take me at my word?"

"Well, you have little to gain by lying to me, seeing as your reward has already been promised and you won't remember your own conduct here," Seigetsu said. "Dealing honorably is also our way. It is my hope that you will repay that. If you don't, I won't have lost anything I possessed a week ago. But if you do, goodwill has a tendency to endure."

Corsica hesitated. "Then... probably. I dunno much about her, other than that she's supposedly..." She touched her special talent with her tail. "Like me. But some folks up in Ironridge think she has a reputation for being able to deal with supernatural problems."

"And there you have it," Papyrus said. "Looks like you've got even more to gain by helping us find her speedily than you thought you did."

"Hmm." Seigetsu closed her eyes. "So it would seem. How convenient for both of us." She opened them again. "I suppose it is time to put our cards in order and have Terutomo see about authorizing your trip."

Corsica took a step. "Since we're all the way down here and I'm going to forget everything anyway, you wanna tell me a little more about what's going on here? Just out of pure curiosity. Nothing more."

"Isn't it obvious?" Papyrus swaggered. "They've got themselves a superweapon and are deathly scared of word getting out that it's not in Cernial where all the warmongers expect it to be. If that happened, Abyssinia would completely change up their tactics and cut through Equestria proper to invade this place instead."

"That's about the right of it," Seigetsu said, stepping toward the elevator. "Of course, Aegis was not in Saint Tadashi's tomb when the war started, and in fact has never been there. Instead, it has been lost to history... but Abyssinia doesn't know that. What we've been 'deathly scared of' is precisely the scenario that happened about twenty-five years ago: Aegis turned up at an unrelated corner of the world in the hooves of someone who knew how to use it. Fortunately, due to the information barrier between north and south, word of that has been slow to spread. But the most important secret is that it was captured by Her Majesty Celestia and returned to our possession some two decades ago, and is now here, rather than Cernial."

She walked inside, waiting at the controls for everyone else to join her. "I trust you appreciate why we cannot take any chances with this knowledge being leaked. Although Abyssinian legend holds that this power saved our ancestors from destruction, Aegis was in fact party to the clash of divinities that caused that cataclysm in the first place. Our god... and a mechanical one, at that."

"A clash of divinities, huh?" Corsica raised an eyebrow as the elevator clanked into motion. "Who was it fighting?"

"The progenitor of the Abyssinians," Seigetsu said. "A figure who, thankfully, they recognize for his role in the devastation and fear rather than revere: the King of All Monsters."

"The King of All Monsters?" Corsica frowned. "He got a real name, or is just stuck with that?"

"No." Seigetsu waited patiently while the elevator rose. "Thousands of years ago, perhaps, but that name has been banished from the pages of history more thoroughly than the one who wielded it."

Corsica looked down. "...Right."

Seigetsu said nothing.

"Look," Corsica began, taking a breath. "I... don't particularly like the idea of getting my memory wiped. And I trust myself to keep secrets, especially when I understand how important they are. But..."

Seigetsu watched her.

"If you're serious about all that, then this is probably something it's better not to take chances on," Corsica said. "I don't know if you're serious. For all I know, you could be pulling my leg and all of this is made up. But just in case the stars align in exactly the wrong way... maybe you want to do that snappy thing from the last village."

Seigetsu nodded, then slowly raised her claws... and snapped them, a familiar pounding, tingling stab hitting Corsica's special talent. Her vision briefly cracked, and then her wish was gone, no longer lingering in the back of her mind, just like before.

"I was curious if you would volunteer that," Seigetsu said as Corsica recovered. "Know that if you hadn't, you wouldn't have gotten away with it. I could sense the power around you from the beginning. However, that you did is a testament to your nobility. I think we will get along just fine going forward."

Corsica felt cold. Unfinished wishes were usually ominous, a calm before the storm, a signal she was about to feel a lot worse than she did at present. But they were comforting, too; insurance against fate. Her only means of being in control in the world.

And now, she had lost that means, had no cards on the table. Her wishes couldn't actually change established continuity; they weren't that powerful. They only operated within the realm of chance, could only change things she didn't know about, had never verified that they were set in stone. Things she had never observed, or taken for granted. Or the future.

If she was going to keep or lose her memories here, that would be completely up to chance.

The elevator finished its ascent. Seigetsu remade and then reclosed the door to the dungeons, and led everyone on a winding, rising route... but not one that went outside. Instead, they stopped in a room in the upper dungeons, once the dampness had receded and the architecture began to acknowledge that someone might want to spend time here. One of the guards marched away.

"I have sent word that we are ready," Seigetsu explained. "Actually, I had instructed Yelvey to wait here in advance for us, but it seems we were faster than he was expecting. I hope you will forgive the inconvenience."

"Eh." Papyrus shrugged. "Not like I'll remember it anyway. You know you can't take away my memories from before, right? Not without erasing absolutely everything?"

"You mean of the information you just gave us regarding our charge's previous whereabouts?" Seigetsu nodded. "I was not intending to. Knowledge of what we have in our basement is the only thing that-"

"Sir Seigetsu!" A breathless dragon came charging up, doubled over and panting. "There's been an... an incident!"

"What!?" Seigetsu straightened up, inspecting the dragon. "Who sent you, and why?"

"An incident with Yelvey," the dragon gasped. "And... Halcyon..."

Convocation's Shackles

I awoke just before dawn to a polite, well-formed knock.

"Nnngh..." I stirred in my sheets. "What's up...?"

"Milady," said an unfamiliar voice that probably came from a guard. "I've been sent to remind you of an appointment in thirty minutes."

"An appointment?" I rolled over. "Don't have any..."

"This says it's classified," the guard read. "And was arranged at your behest by Sir Seigetsu. Does that stir your memory?"

By Seigetsu...?

"It's about our bracelet," Procyon said, sitting across from me in bed.

That shocked me awake. "Where'd you come from!?"

"I was sent by the Office of Itinerary," the guard said, understandably thinking I was talking to him. "Your reminder has been delivered. Have a nice day."

Receding footsteps heralded his departure as I scrubbed my eyes open. "Haven't seen you in what feels like forever," I whispered, blinking at Procyon.

Procyon shrugged. "Would you prefer if I changed that?"

I tilted my head. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"I don't get along well with our other third," Procyon reminded me. "You've been spending more and more time trying to build bridges with her. And while that might not be an activity I approve of, I've decided to... let your will be done, I suppose. My role is as a spectator, remember. Nothing more. It's your life now."

I frowned. "Are you trying to make me feel like I'm pushing you out? By hanging with a crowd you don't like?"

"Not everyone can get along, Halcyon," Procyon said. "It's not an insinuation, it's an uncomfortable truth that everyone has to deal with. Anyway, I was scouting this castle while you were sleeping, and you have an arrangement with that creepy old batpony who erases memories. Seigetsu did offer to introduce you to someone who understood more about our bracelet, didn't she?"

"Oh, this is that?" I shook my coat out and started to dress, sleep fading and memories of my situation crowding in to replace it. "Well then, let's get going..."

The sky was turning purple in a pre-show to dawn when I stepped outside my room, entirely unsure where I was supposed to be going.

"So you can really fly around and scout stuff out while I'm sleeping?" I whispered. "How far away usually are you? Is that why you disappear completely at random intervals?"

Procyon nodded. "I come and go as I please. Although I'm anchored to you, it isn't a physical tether with physical limitations."

"Then don't you get lost?" I started to wander, trusting that if I was really meeting with a secret sect and hadn't been given a location in advance, they would have ways of finding me. "How do you find your way back to me?"

"I can smell you," Procyon explained. "Well, not smell, since I don't have a corporeal body and can't breathe. But it's the same sensation." She tapped her muzzle with a wing. "I couldn't explain what you smell like, either. I can simply tell."

"Weird..." I wondered why I couldn't do that when I let Faye take over. Or why she was permanently in my head, and never an external ghost. Or why I became a ghost like Procyon whenever she took over.

Why did all three of us play by different rules? I expected this to be complicated; we were a changeling queen with a magically-split personality. But even though I could comprehend it, there was no rhyme or reason to the way it had turned out.

"We're being watched," Procyon pointed out, nodding at a small servant's door hidden next to a pillar in the wall.

I turned to look. It was Seigetsu.

"What are you doing, sneaking around?" I asked.

"Taking care of unrelated business," Seigetsu explained, stepping out into the hallway. "My job involves a lot of sneaking around, in case you didn't know. I gather you are on your way to meet with Yelvey?"

"I think so," I told her. "But, I... don't exactly know where to go..."

"He has a habit of finding those he is looking for," Seigetsu said, confirming my suspicion. "But, if you like, I have a few minutes before my next engagement and would be most interested in escorting you."

I raised an eyebrow. "You wanna see what he says about me, eh?"

Seigetsu folded her claws behind her back. "Well, I cannot deny I am curious. He has been most tight-lipped ever since I reported my discovery of you. Not that the Order of Silence is known for being forthcoming."

"Okay. Sure," I said, grateful for the company. Somehow, my paranoia had yet to rear its head about this meeting, beaten down by the prospect of forbidden religious knowledge... but when it inevitably did, having someone around who had gone three days without attempting to do me dirty was much better than I could do in Ironridge.

Yikes, I was paranoid.

Chuckling nervously under my breath, I followed dutifully as Seigetsu stayed put and went absolutely nowhere. And, sure enough, a robed shadow graced the servant's entrance moments later.

Yelvey.

Just like before, looking at him put a strange tugging sensation in my heart, as if gravity weren't quite normal all of a sudden. He wore gray robes and a gray miter trimmed with silver, and when he saw me, he slowly, stiffly bowed.

"I have been awaiting you, child of Nencosay," he said in a stage whisper. "As, I am sure, you are awaiting answers as to the purpose of your curse."

Nencosay? Curse? I nodded, my throat feeling a little dry. "Hey there."

Seigetsu looked intrigued. "So, you confirmed my suspicion?"

"It was the most likely hypothesis," Yelvey rasped. "But let us not speak of these things here. Come, child. Let us return to my sanctum."

"I see." Seigetsu gave him a look. "I take it to mean I am not to be privy to your conversation?"

Yelvey nodded. "That is the way of things. Come." He wandered into the servant's door.

Hesitantly, I moved to follow... but was stopped by a light tap from Seigetsu.

"Eh?" I flicked my ears.

"Here," Seigetsu said, passing me a paper-thin, domino-sized strip of wood with some markings on the surface. "A good-luck talisman. Try not to break it. It is merely symbolic in our culture and has no actual power, but nevertheless I am certain as long as it is intact, nothing bad will happen to you."

Yelvey turned his head and raised an eyebrow.

"Err... thanks?" I pocketed the talisman. It felt flimsy, and surprisingly breakable... What was that all about?

"Take care in the shadows," Seigetsu said, turning and marching away.

Yelvey said nothing, continuing down the hall and expecting me to follow.

So I did. A prickling unease crawled across my coat as we descended, fueled primarily by the bizarre sensation I felt when looking at him. Did he feel the same for me? I hadn't felt anything like this for Coda, so it couldn't be caused by him being another changeling queen... Changeling king? Maybe he was an acolyte who knew about my powers even though he didn't have them himself. But then what did he have? Something about this stallion was deeply abnormal and wrong.

After no less than five hidden or secret entrances, it began to feel like we were in a crypt. In fact, this actually was a crypt: holes methodically lined the gray brick walls, boxes slid into each one that were a perfect size and shape to be coffins. Worn inscriptions covered the walls, magical torches sat in stone pedestals on the ground, and the floor and ceiling and even walls slanted slightly as they widened out into an altar room.

"W-why are we in a tomb?" I asked, realizing I didn't have the first idea where Icereach and Ironridge kept their dead.

"The Order of Silence are keepers of that which has been forgotten," Yelvey said, his many shadows dancing on the ceiling in the torchlight. "What better secret-keeper than the dead? What better place to know that which must not be known than the home of those who have come and gone before?"

"That which must not be known," I said, following him into a side room. "What do you mean? Why not? Do you know useful things about what I am, or don't you?"

This room contained nothing but a staggeringly large map, built into the floor and lit from above by stone chandeliers. It was just small enough that, from one edge, I could identify the point to which Yelvey walked: our own location. The sea which was shaped like a griffon's hand.

It had taken us weeks to run down the western coast, traveling day and night. A boat from Sires Hollow would have taken months to cross it - hopefully a slow boat, that would have to make landfall every night so its crew could sleep, but months nonetheless. And if anything, the ponies of Sires Hollow had been underestimating when they said Equestria was four times as big in every direction.

Underestimating badly.

The world seemed to be drawn like a capsule, with the north cut off by what could only be the Aldenfold and the south growing fainter and fainter, replaced by a depiction of an enormous tree. If you added in my knowledge of the north, it would probably be shaped like a flat, circular plane, with Equestria making up the dominant landmass in the middle and ocean to the east and west. Most of the world's borders were on water, although the western ocean was considerably smaller, and a lot of land touched the edge there, too. The western ocean also had a massive island, about the size of the griffon talon sea here.

Hadn't the Abyssinians said something about Abyssinia being an island to the west? That was the only thing that was plausible, but it was so far away...

Yelvey followed my gaze. "That is Abyssinia," he explained. "This is Cernial." He pointed at the region against the Aldenfold at the western edge of the world. "We are here." He pointed to Snowport, where he was standing. "I have heard you are looking for someone in Ponyville. It is here."

It took several seconds of walking for him to get there, and when he did, he was standing near the middle-south of the map, across the Equestrian heartlands and halfway to the giant tree. He tapped a point, then looked at me.

I stared at the distance. That... was halfway from where we were to the southern edge of the world. About twice the distance from Snowport to Catantan. And I had been told this was a day trip.

"Your trains are seriously that fast?" I asked incredulously. "They can go that far in a single day?"

"Yes," Yelvey said. "And no. The tracks are the work of a goddess, imbued with power beyond mortal comprehension. The trains can ignore the distance they travel, arriving at any destination within a day..."

I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach, realizing what he was going to say the instant before he said it.

"...as long as those riding the trains are unaware of how much distance is being crossed."

Questions and realizations collided in my mind at the speed of dimensionally-transcendent trains. Who designed something like this? What kind of power could even make that possible? This was why Equestria functioned on an information lockdown about neighboring regions: to paradoxically preserve the ability of its people to go there, by keeping them in the dark about how far away they actually were. This was the dangerous knowledge Terutomo couldn't tell us: we already knew how far away Catantan was, so there could be no shortcuts. So did probably everyone in this region who used to sail the talon sea for their livelihood. But he didn't want us to be locked out of visiting anywhere else in Equestria that we decided to search.

One question - and a lot of indignation - quickly drowned out all the others. "Why did you tell me that?" I accused, glaring at Yelvey. "You know I need to go there, right?"

"That is simple," Yelvey said, walking back out to the alter room. "It is insurance. A guarantee that, at the end of this meeting, you will consent to having your memory of our encounter wiped."

I felt cold. "What?" I thought I was here so I could learn about what I was...

"All those who bear our curse must be controlled by the Holy Cernial Convocation," Yelvey said. "It is for the greater good. Our powers could give rise to great evil and suffering if left unchecked. However, we are accomplished liars. I cannot take your word for it even if you professed a willingness to join our shackles and abide by our laws. Because of that, I must study you through a series of trial-and-error meetings, starting each one with a fresh slate as I empirically learn the workings of your heart. With such a grave matter, there can be no room for error."

"Oh yeah?" I bristled. "And what would you know about that? Are you in the habit of doing this regularly? Do you use brainwashing to bend everyone in this castle to your whims?"

Yelvey gave me a dead stare. "That is precisely the sort of scenario Cernial's control of us is required to prevent. And we have erred before. There was once a cleric among our ranks, Nencosay, who slipped Cernial's control and crossed the Aldenfold, forever lost to our reach. Always have we been watchful in the event that she would reappear. And now Seigetsu has discovered you, hailing from the north with our curse and claiming you inherited it at birth from your mother."

I took a step back... and remembered the talisman in my pocket.

If it was intact, Seigetsu was certain no harm would come to me. But a memory spell couldn't repair a broken strip of wood. Was it a way to send Seigetsu a message, if I did get my memory wiped, that foul play was involved?

"Alright," I said, straightening up. "So, since I'm not gonna remember anything, you have room to tell me everything and see how I react. Before you try manipulating your way to my heart, or whatever, why not try the clean and straight approach?"

"It shall be done," Yelvey rasped. "What are your questions?"

Well, for starters, how sure was he that this Nencosay was my mother? Sure, I didn't know that much about Chrysalis, including where she was originally from, or whether that was her real, original name. But Lilith did. Back in Lilith's school when I bargained for Leif's freedom, Lilith claimed that Chrysalis was created as part of a scientific experiment, and gained her powers by accident. She spoke with firsthoof experience, and claimed she had been there herself. Not that I trusted Lilith, but how did that add up with Chrysalis being a runaway cleric from Cernial?

...Not that I was telling this guy anything he didn't already know.

"Figure it out for yourself," I told him. "You're gonna have to put on a pretty strong show of good faith to win me over now."

"I am not trying to win you over," Yelvey told me. "Merely experimenting about how to and not to do so."

I snorted. "Alright. Then tell me about my powers. I was born with them, so how do you get them normally?"

"By coming in contact with the physical manifestation of a Nightmare Module," Yelvey explained. "It is a black crystal held by the Convocation. Nightmare Modules are data. They are the name of the powers we can use, and they modify our bodies to enable their use."

"That's it?" I tilted my head. "It's got nothing to do with anything else?" Like trying to modify batponies so they could have more races of children?

"That is all that is involved," Yelvey rasped. "The transformation is fast and painful. It only functions for batponies. And our loyalty is proven to be ironclad before we are permitted to take up the mantle."

Halcyon? Faye said in my mind. I know we don't know much about us. But I think they don't know about changeling queens, and have mistaken us for something completely different.

Yeah. I was starting to feel that way too.

I've got an idea, Faye said. Can we switch over?

Go for it.

Moments later, I was hovering in the air as she assumed control. "That's the reason for the fancy robes, right?" Faye said, tapping her chest. "The 'changes' to our bodies."

Yelvey nodded.

Wait, was that the reason Duma tried selling me robes last night? Did he mark me as one of them, as well? Or else as someone trying to pass myself off as one of them...

The robes he wanted to sell probably looked exactly like Yelvey's official wardrobe. I'd bet anything on it.

"Can I see?" Faye asked. "Sorry if this is taboo, or anything. It's just, I've only ever known myself, who's like this. Separated from Mother at birth. And..."

Yelvey nodded. "It is taboo. But the taboos are not enforced in the shadows."

And then he began to disrobe.

The first thing he did was remove his contact lenses. With a slight gasp, I realized they were just like the ones in my disguise kit: designed to make his irises appear a different color. Without them, his eyes were completely gray, and not a hint of color touched his body.

Then came the miter, showing off a relatively normal gray mane... and then came the robes.

Yelvey was a normal, colorless batpony down to his neck and chest. But as my eyes traveled lower, he fractured, his coat disappearing in a flaky pattern like a surface that had the paint scraped off. And beneath it, instead of skin, was a purple void.

It was like a pony-shaped portal to another world, distant clouds and energy disappearing slowly into a vortex that crackled every so often with cold, white lightning. His hindquarters were gone, and his tail, and all of his hind legs. Inside that void, near his rump, floated a gray special talent. And as he removed his sabatons as well, I could see that the effect extended to his front legs as well. Although, his hooves were still intact: they were just connected by strips of void where his legs should be.

I swallowed, impressed at how straight Faye was keeping her face, even betraying a hint of false curiosity on purpose. I shouldn't have been impressed. I used to be able to do that too, before I stopped using my special talent and started trying to be my own pony. But at a time like this, it sure was handy to have around.

There was no doubt about it, though: whatever magic Yelvey's order was based around, it wasn't the magic of changeling queens.

"Wow," Faye said, a perfect crack in her voice. "I still don't trust you. But, wow."

Yelvey stood for a moment, then returned his clothes to their proper positions, once again appearing to be a normal, creepy old batpony. As he did so, I felt a tugging as Faye switched us back.

There you go, she said in my head. Now we know for sure. Better that you take the lead, though.

I swallowed again. "Thanks. But just so we're clear, I'm not returning the favor." I hugged my coat tightly around myself... and suddenly remembered Yunie sneaking a peek under my coat in Freedom Town.

This was what she was looking for. She knew about this, then?

"You have seen," Yelvey said. "All of our number look like this. But know that it is forbidden to look upon another in our state. I only permitted it because your memory of this meeting will be purged."

That... sounded like a rule designed by an impostor to help them stay hidden...

I wonder how he thinks a mare in that state can even have children in the first place, Faye mused. Wouldn't the relevant parts of her not even exist?

"Alright," I said, ignoring her and taking a step to the side. "Next question. How does Cernial control you? What kind of shackles do you want me signing up for?"

"Your fortitude is incredible," Yelvey told me. "It is the fortitude of one who has never known better. Perhaps by being born with the urges of the corona, you are inured to them. If so, that will present a problem we must solve. Do you understand what I mean when I speak of the corona?"

"You said it," I told him. "I've been like this my entire life. Don't really know what's normal and what isn't."

"The corona that appears around other ponies, measuring their value and worth," Yelvey elaborated. "Accompanied by a strong desire for them to be yours."

I nodded. "Oh, yeah, that." I lied. "It's not too bad. What of it?"

Yelvey frowned. "So you don't recognize the pressure your mind exists under. No matter. We use this as an antidote to the corona's effects." He pulled out a tiny vial of red liquid - a worryingly familiar vial. "Formula L. You aren't familiar with it, then?"

"Nope." I hid my recognition, expecting it just in time to brace myself against a reaction. "An antidote, huh? What's it do?"

"It is sourced exclusively from the Convocation," Yelvey told me. "Its supply regulated, and the secrets of its creation held as a critical state secret. It contains love in physical form, enough to sate the emptiness and cravings of our curse. Though you may be too inured to the symptoms to recognize them, that will surely change after you experience relief for the first time in your life. Prove me wrong."

I took a step back. "How do I know you're telling the truth?"

Yelvey looked at me. "What reason have I to lie?"

It was a decent point. If I actually wasn't the same thing as him, it probably wouldn't have any effect on me, but he wouldn't know that. From his perspective, he was openly trying to give me a mind-altering substance. There wasn't much dastardly intent it was possible to conceal by lying...

And since I was a changeling queen, if he was serious about that containing emotional love, however that worked, I very well might be able to harness its power in ways he knew nothing about.

"...Alright." I held out a wing. "Gimmie. But if I'm not gonna remember this, what's the point of wasting something so valuable?"

"I told you," Yelvey said. "I merely wish to gauge your reaction. Should it prove as potent as I expect, I could perhaps give you some in another setting where you do keep your memories, and explain to you the origin after the fact."

He gave me the vial.

"You sure are honest about how evil you are," I told him.

"Amorality comes with our curse," Yelvey told me. "That is why we have Cernial to dictate our morality to us. Otherwise, we are only capable of living in a framework centered around ourselves and the needs of the corona, consciously or not. What you see as evil, I know to be liberation: shackles to hold us to a correct path we are incapable of seeing ourselves. It grants a sense of purpose amidst the empty void."

"Still evil." I took the vial of what might legitimately be centaur sweat. "What do I do with it?"

"Breathe in," Yelvey encouraged.

Was this a bad idea? Maybe. Probably. I sure wasn't in a cushy situation, but at least I had cards up my sleeve he didn't know about... Potent ones, too. Here was hoping this really did do something I could use as a changeling queen.

I uncorked the vial and inhaled.

It felt like... voices in my ear. Quiet, gentle, steadfast and caring. Not baseless adulation like had been given to Coda. A rush beat through my heart as I realized this might actually be real: it sounded exactly like the empty rush I remembered in my ears from the old days in Icereach, when I took off my mask and passed control over to Faye. Except instead of emptiness, it was love.

And I could steal it.

I didn't understand how. The option presented itself on instinct, and my body acted with the barest nod of approval from me. I could feel the haze around me siphoned away, until it was sitting somewhere deep in my chest, tiny and invisible unless I knew to look for it, just like Ludwig and the pink flame.

Well... success? Now that I had done this, I realized I had forgotten an important part of the plan: I knew how to absorb things, but didn't have the foggiest how to use them.

Yelvey was watching for my reaction.

"Is that it?" I met him squarely in the eye, summoned my focus, and tried to look like I was trying desperately not to falter. "Weak... Weak stuff."

Yelvey gave a small smile.

"Hate to break it to you," I said, pocketing the empty vial - I had no use for it, but I wasn't even about to give this guy free garbage. "But I'm on a mission. I've got a purpose, and it's got nothing to do with my corona, or selfishly feeding my curse's desires. And that mission is gonna take me all over the world. So, much as I'd like to stay and join your cult, that's not gonna happen. And no matter how many times you try and wipe my memory, that answer's not gonna change."

"We'll see," Yelvey said calmly.

"So?" I asked. "Got anything else, or are you gonna give up for today?"

"Actually, we have a unique opportunity," Yelvey said. "I've heard from Seigetsu you know little enough about your powers that you cannot yet use them, and may have never seen them used."

I raised an eyebrow.

"Before we adjourn, I'd like to show you what it looks like when I use them during day-to-day operations." He started walking towards the exit. "Come."

I followed uncertainly. Yelvey made as if to walk out into the coffin hall... and then all of a sudden, he pounced into the shadows, to the side.

A moment later, he rose up, lifting a visibly terrified batpony with one hoof. From the looks of things, they were paralyzed. My mind flashed back to Icereach, when Mother had somehow paralyzed me on Aldebaran's ship... Was this the same thing?

More importantly, the pony he had caught was Yunie.

"You were bold to come spy on us," Yelvey said. "That deserves a hefty price. How did you know the way down here? When did you learn it? How long ago?"

Yunie shook in mute terror.

"Well, I suppose we'll have to start with at least a month, then," Yelvey told her. My eyes caught sight of a black knife floating next to him, probably the same material as my bracelet. It was pointing straight at Yunie's forehead.

"Oh, no you don't," I threatened, walking up behind him. "You think you can just randomly-"

The knife embedded itself into her forehead, but no blood was spilled. Instead, there was a surge of blackness that crackled with gray static, spilling out into the room from the knife and flowing around all of our hooves... and Yunie dropped unconscious to the floor.

"It is done," Yelvey told me. "Using our power is as simple as that. She will soon awaken, and-"

"My, how considerate!" came Duma's voice from the shadows.

Yelvey instantly tensed up. "Who goes there?"

"Me!" Duma said, stepping out from behind a pillar with the same upturned smile on his face as ever. "I promised good money for a guide down here, and now I'm not even going to have to pay it! What an upstanding member of society!"

"This place is forbidden to all but the Order of Silence," Yelvey growled, raising his knife again.

"Wait! No need for violence!" Duma waved his hands at the knife. "All I am is a humble merchant. See?"

He turned his hands around. Clutched in between each and every finger was a vial of Formula L.

Yelvey's jaw dropped.

Duma strolled in a circle until he was standing at my side, still facing down Yelvey. "My associate and I have come to Snowport to scout out the market," he explained in a voice that was high-pitched and carefree, reaching down and patting me on the head. "The Convocation's tyranny really can be unbearable at times, we believe. Haven't you ever wished you could slip their fetters and fly free? The reason she doesn't need your Formula L is because she's already topped off on mine!"

I reached into my pocket and snapped the good-luck talisman. Whatever was going down was too big for me to understand immediately, but Seigetsu needed to know.

"T-that's blasphemy," Yelvey stammered, staring greedily at the vials. "Peddler of fakes!"

"Oh?" Duma casually tossed him a vial. "See for yourself!"

Yelvey greedily opened it and breathed in, and his pupils dilated. "Impossible... But the Convocation..."

"Has never cared one whit about what you want, have they?" Duma smiled. "You talk a lot about what they want, and what the corona makes you want, but what about what you want? What if you were freed from both? What would you do then?"

"This is heresy..." Yelvey sagged, his resistance visibly waning.

"Heresy is fun!" Duma cheerfully proclaimed. "Why is it that only batponies can use this power? Why were you chosen to use it if you weren't meant to use it at will? Why listen to the Convocation when they need you to use it for them?"

"You're seeking a contract," Yelvey accused. "My service in exchange for an infinite supply..."

Duma looked aghast without dropping his smile or opening his eyes. "Oh, no no no! I don't want your service. Only your freedom! It's quite a tempting offer, isn't it?"

He turned his hands around, showing of a fresh new supply of vials.

Yelvey snapped. "Give me those!" he demanded, lurching forward.

Duma scattered them across the ground, sending the stallion scrambling to pick them up.

My blood was cold. Sure, Yelvey was evil, but he at least served the established order. And now he was getting bought out right before my eyes... What was I supposed to do? Should I pick a side? Could I pick a side?

I glanced over to Yunie, and decided it was time to run.

"You know," Duma cheerfully told me, "with the cold reception you gave me last night, I thought you didn't even recognize the sign! How glad I am to be wrong."

I bolted.

Grab Yunie and leave with my memories intact. While Yelvey was distracted, grab Yunie and leave-

"Oops!" Duma's meaty hand closed around my barrel and hoisted me in the air, showing a strength that belied his hunched figure. "I guess I was right after all. Such a pity."

"Nnngh...!" I struggled, unable to shadow sneak, unable to call on the power of my bracelet as it was nowhere in sight-

"A moment of your time, friend?" Duma gestured to Yelvey, who had just finished scooping up all the vials. "It seems this isn't my assistant after all! Silly me, how could I be so mistaken. Or perhaps she is, and I've just yet to win her over. Would you mind resetting her memory back to this morning, please? Then take her back upstairs and tell everyone there was an accident while she was practicing her powers, and she hit herself instead!"

"O-of course," Yelvey said, lining up his knife to point at my forehead.

I snarled. "No! Get off me! You can't-!"

The knife struck home, and a flood of static caused my vision to briefly dissolve. When it passed, I was still in Duma's hand, unable to move my body.

"Perfect!" Duma set me down. "Now get on with your treacherous self. I'll be here, with plenty more Formula L whenever you run out while enjoying your freedom!"

Yelvey lifted me onto his back, apparently deciding to get Yunie later, and stashed me somewhere in the passages.

Time started to speed up, like it always did when my dream hit the unimportant parts.

Wait, my dream...?

My memory had been wiped. I could remember, now. There was nothing but static since I woke up this morning! And yet, I had seen it all, just now, in a dream, as if I was living it the moment it happened.

This had happened before, the first time I met Egdelwonk. My power...

It could bring back erased memories.

Borrowed Time

Yelvey dumped me in what appeared to be a storage room deep in the castle dungeons, and then closed the door, leaving me in utter blackness.

As I lay there on the floor, my dream halfway between fast-forward and normal, something started to nag at me: remembering things I had consciously seen was one thing, but now I was remembering things from when I was unconscious. Had the memory spell knocked me out with my eyes open? Or was I experiencing this now in real time, suspended in a state somewhere between wakefulness and sleep?

Whatever the case, Yelvey eventually returned, depositing the unconscious Yunie in the same room. And then he left, once again.

This was bad. Snowport had a rogue memory manipulator on the loose, and nobody knew about it except me... and I was stuck here in some kind of half-coma. While I might have a resistance to Yelvey's most dangerous weapon, it wasn't the kind of thing I could use to protect anyone else, and giving any indication that I had it at all could seriously undermine my advantage in a war of information. Egdelwonk's relentless stalking came to mind, the way he would make fun of me for any possible time I told him something I might have been better off keeping to myself...

It was like he expected me to wind up in a situation like this, where I would sink or swim based on my ability to keep secrets.

So, what could I even do?

One option would be to raise the alarm as broadly as possible. Yelvey probably couldn't brainwash the entire city, right? Of course, his power was supposed to be immutable, and he was also a respected church official, so my word against his would sound pretty flimsy, especially if I looked like I was mad about getting memory wiped myself. The two pieces of evidence in my favor were the broken talisman, and the fact that I was demonstrably not under the same curse as he was. But only someone who already had a good degree of knowledge could even properly contextualize that... which meant going to Seigetsu.

Did I want to throw my lot all in with the dragon inquisitor?

She worked for Cernial. Yelvey did too, at least before Duma bought him out. And Yelvey hadn't been a saint before that.

Not like I had many other options...

A dim light appeared in the corner of the room.

I cast my senses over to it, the fast-forward on my dream disappearing. It was the head of a shadow-sneaking batpony, their mouth open and something small and luminous inside.

That was genius. All they had to do was close their mouth to turn the light off and submerge again... And with the source of the light where it was, even though I could see where they were, I couldn't make out any features whatsoever. I wanted one of those.

After looking around for a moment, they swam closer. Suddenly, I remembered the precariousness of my situation, and my admiration turned to fear.

Instead of going to me, though, they first went to Yunie. A few pokes of a hoof... and a sigh of relief.

Then they turned to me. I got the same treatment.

"Yikes," they whispered around the dim light, spitting it out into a wingtip and finally illuminating their face. It was Yunie.

Suddenly, I remembered, and felt silly for forgetting: there had been two of her, back at the bar. Identical twins, it looked like, though only one of them had ever spoken.

"Uh, guess you met a sticky fate too?" Yunie hissed. "Hmm. Uhh... Hmm." She glanced back at her twin, and then again at me. "Uh, I'll get you out of this. Gimmie a minute, I need to steal some stuff."

Instead of stealing things, she first walked back to her unconscious twin, put another hoof on her, and frowned in concentration. "Hmmm..."

Her special talent glowed - a talent that, I now saw, depicted a short link of chain.

The other Yunie stirred, then groggily got to her hooves. Both shuddered at exactly the same time.

"Still able to walk," the first one muttered. "Sorta. Good enough. Alright, alright, alright..."

The one that had been unconscious leaned on the first one's shoulder. The first one popped the light back into her mouth, and both were gone.

I stared at the darkness as my dream began to fast-forward again. Those were not normal twins.

Moments later, after another fast-forward, a brighter light turned on. It was Yelvey.

He scooped me onto his back, and once again started navigating the tunnels. Something felt weird, though... Or rather, a lack of weirdness. This Yelvey didn't have the strange sense of gravity I normally felt when looking at him, as if something inside him were tugging at me. That wasn't because I was unconscious, was it? No, I had felt it earlier, when he brought me here from the crypt room. Maybe he had used so much of Duma's Formula L that it was reducing the effects I felt from his curse, as well?

We were almost to the surface when we ran across a small patrol of dragon guards. And, by the expressions on their faces, they were looking for us.

"Your Eminence," one said, not using the title with nearly the weight it felt like it deserved. "Sir Seigetsu believes you to be late to an appointment of utmost priority. You are aware of this, yes?"

"And who is that on your back?" another added, before being kicked by the third.

"My guest and protege," Yelvey calmly rasped, still speaking in a stage whisper. "There was an incident regarding her. You can tell Seigetsu that the duties of my order supersede all other obligations, including hers, and that I apologize for the inconvenience. I will see to Seigetsu when and only when I am ready."

"An 'incident'." The lead guard folded his arms. "Elaborate."

"That is my business and none of yours," Yelvey said, beginning to move on.

"Halt!" the lead guard ordered, preparing to snap his claws. "Your order is permitted here by virtue of necessity, pontiff. Have you forgotten who makes the rules around here? Your presence is required by Sir Seigetsu under the authority of the Holy Cernial Convocation!"

If I had been awake, my eyes would have widened. The castle's guards treated someone so powerful like this?

They probably found him and his powers just as creepy and unnerving as I had, when I first learned Snowport kept someone who could erase memories around. Even if his presence was a necessity to their way of life - or, at least, to their ability to use the train tracks - a lot of people were probably nervous by default about the possibility of a secretive organization coming in and wiping their memories for reasons they would have to trust were good.

These guards had the law on their side, were in private with Yelvey, and if all three of them turned up with wiped memories at the same time after searching for him to remind him of a meeting, that would raise huge red flags. This was the perfect time for a confrontation. And probably every other time something like this happened, which was probably all too often.

Of course Yelvey's loyalty had been easy for Duma to break if he got treated like this. Not that I felt sorry for him, with how he had treated me, but still...

"Tell Seigetsu I will be on my way," Yelvey insisted. "But that resolution of this incident takes precedence."

"We'll see what Sir Seigetsu has to say about that." The lead guard waved at another guard, who took off running. "Now stay put!"

I could feel Yelvey tense up. There were only two guards left; what was he going to do?

Hopefully nothing. At least while I was unconscious, I liked my odds better with the dragons than without them. It was odd, though: right before attempting to wipe my memory, Duma and Yelvey had said something about pretending I had an accident while practicing my powers. If that was the case, why was Yelvey trying to avoid Seigetsu? The ostensible next step of the plan was to report to her, right?

I didn't like this. I needed some agency. But I was unconscious, and all the usual tricks I used to wake up from a bad dream weren't working! If only I could move, even a little, I could try to make myself fall off his back, or-

Another Yelvey appeared around the corner.

His eyes widened, and in less than a second, he turned around and fled. But it was a second longer than the guards needed to see him.

"What's going on?" the leader barked. "Hey!"

Both of them took a few surprised steps, starting to give chase... and then abruptly remembered that would leave my Yelvey unguarded. Before they could coordinate who went and who stayed, mine bolted in the opposite direction, leaving angry shouts in his wake.

Two Yelveys... The second one didn't have that weird tugging sensation either. All of a sudden, I realized what was going on here: both of them were changelings. The second one was creating a diversion for the first one. And, odds were, they were Yunie and her twin.

Corsica followed Seigetsu at a swift trot, hurrying to keep up with the dragon's long stride.

"I expect this should go without saying," Seigetsu said as they ran, Papyrus and several guards bringing up the rear. "But I apologize for this delay, and ask that you refrain from discussing sensitive information until we can get this all sorted out. Now..."

They rounded a corner, and nearly crashed into a guard who was barreling down the hall at a dead sprint, some quick footwork from Seigetsu allowing her to sidestep what would have been a painful collision.

"Sir!" the guard panted, skidding to a stop. "Sir, apologies! Have you seen Yelvey come running this way?"

Seigetsu's brow furrowed. "Running? I haven't seen him hurry anywhere in all my years. What happened?"

"Sir...!" The guard straightened up and saluted. "We found Yelvey in the tunnels after searching as per your orders. He had an unconscious mare on his back-"

"Halcyon, I know," Seigetsu interrupted. "Why was he running? What happened after you sent the dispatch to find me?"

"He refused your summons, Sir," the guard reported sharply. "Wouldn't tell us anything about what was going on. And then a second Yelvey appeared on the scene, and both fled in opposite directions while we were distracted! I suspect it might have been changelings, Sir."

"What?" Seigetsu's tail lashed. "Where is Halcyon now?"

"Taken by one of the Yelveys," the guard said. "Looks to me like a kidnapping."

"Sound the alarm," Seigetsu instructed, turning around. "You all know the protocols for this. I must attend to my brother and the command room." She waved to Corsica and Papyrus. "You two are not to leave my side until further notice. Understood?"

Corsica nodded, tense. "You got it."

Papyrus had the good sense to keep his mouth closed.

Led by Seigetsu, they and the remaining guards swiftly made for the exit to the dungeons. "Changeling impersonations, kidnappings..." Papyrus said as they ran along. "Does this sort of thing happen often around here?"

"No," Seigetsu said, looking like she was slowing down so the other guards could keep up. "It is much more common closer to the front lines. But I think you can imagine why we would always be prepared."

Corsica's mind shifted to the superweapon in the basement. "Yep. Got a decent idea."

I could hear stomping on the roof overhead as Yunie carried me through the final floor of dungeons, the surface just above. She had shed her disguise and returned to her original form, and met back up with her twin, who was now silently tailing us. How was it fair that she got to recover so much more quickly than I did?

From the sound of things, as well as Yunie's demeanor, the alarm had been well and truly raised. This stank. I wished I could ask her what was going through her head: as far as I was concerned, the dragons were still my allies, and I wanted to be found. Yelvey and Duma were the ones who did me dirty. Although, from Yunie's point of view, everyone on Cernial's team might look like one side, and everyone on Abyssinia's would be the other.

Maybe. How much did she know? Duma talked like Yunie's twin had been paid to guide him down there, so she might have been bribed by him and certainly knew her way around the dungeons. But also, the twin had been memory-zapped, and yet they were still acting with perfect coordination. Did they have some kind of telepathic link? I instinctively wanted to assume Yunie knew everything I had seen down there, but I really couldn't safely assume that.

What were her goals for me, anyway? If only I could wake up and ask...

Yunie peeked around a corner, only to draw back as a squad of guards approached, preparing to march past. If only I was awake. I needed to be awake. I was-

"Right," one of the guards said, "here's our station. Let's put this door on lockdown."

Yunie rapidly backed off as the guards spread around both sides of the door, turning on bright, portable lights to ensure no shadow sneaking was possible and settling in for what looked like it would be a long vigil.

With a soft hiss, she retreated into the dungeons, taking me with her.

A few minutes later, after another near run-in with a patrol, Yunie snuck me under a decrepit door into an out-of-the-way storage room. She perked her ears, listening for any nearby footsteps, then seemed to determine she was far enough out of the way and there were enough old crates in this room to hide behind should anyone try to search it. And then she set me down, stretched out, and sighed. "Well, this is a mess."

Was she just going to hunker down in here and try to wait for the heat to blow over? Maybe. If so, odds were I would come to down here, sometime or other.

I could already feel my dream slipping into fast-forward again. Time to wait this out, and then figure out what I was supposed to do...

"Sire," said a dragon entering the command room about thirty minutes after Corsica, Papyrus and Seigetsu had first reached it. He carried a courier's bag and knelt on one knee. "I have reports from squads three, five, seven and nine. No new sightings or suspicious activity of any kind."

"Well, no news is good news," Terutomo proclaimed, standing over a table fulled with rosters and diagrams. "It's seeming less and less likely this is a coordinated infiltration, and more likely it's the work of a few disgruntled activists. On the bad side, still no trace of Halcyon or Yelvey, be they real or fake." He nodded to the courier. "Bring me more updates. Keep doing your rounds and return when the situation changes, or in an hour."

The guard nodded and lumbered off.

For a moment, the command room was still. Most of the dragons who remained were poring over paperwork files - civilian registrations, Corsica had been told when she asked. No one seriously thought they would be able to identify the culprit behind a changeling kidnapping solely from clues in decades-old paperwork, but it turned out there was precious little else to be done during a lockdown when the situation was completely unevolving.

"I am to blame for this," Seigetsu sighed as the silence settled in. "As an inquisitor of Cernial, I have training in recognizing changeling disguises that can scarce be afforded to every common foot soldier. Had I but arrived on the scene before the impostor was able to flee..."

"How sure are you the Yelvey who bailed was an impostor?" Papyrus asked from the corner where he and Corsica were made to wait.

"I beg your pardon?" Terutomo looked up from his rosters.

"Seems to me you're sitting around and twiddling your claws while there's productive guesswork to be done," Papyrus said, standing up. "Answer me this: how hard is it to incapacitate someone who can make you forget why you wanted to incapacitate them in the first place?"

Seigetsu looked up as well. "I see your point. However, difficult does not equate to impossible. If we only focus on the most likely outcomes-"

"Then you have the biggest chance of guessing the bad guy's game," Papyrus finished for her. "Right?"

Seigetsu looked cross. "I was going to say, we influence the investigation with our biases of which factors to weigh most heavily. For instance, while it is implausible that Yelvey could be easily rendered unable to communicate with us, it is equally implausible that he could be persuaded to voluntarily do so. The Convocation would not allow the Order of Silence the powers it gives them without methods in place to control the ones who use them."

"Right, right, right," Papyrus said. "Listen, every single ruler throughout history has had methods to ensure their subjects bend to their whims, and oh so many of them fail badly enough that they get deposed, or worse. Maybe things are happier down here, but in the north, just within living memory, we've had more collapses of societal order than you can count, including the terminated reign of a pair of millennia-old goddesses in the Griffon Empire. You think they didn't have contingencies every bit as robust as your Convocation's?"

Seigetsu sighed. "As I recall explaining to you before, Equestria's information barrier exists in large part to dampen the spread of such cataclysmic change. I have a working knowledge of conditions in the north, as well as its history. Such upheavals as regularly happen there are not the norm for Equestria. Our society is stable."

Papyrus chuckled. "You said it dampens upheavals, not eliminates them entirely. Look at the war going on in your home country and tell me with a straight face that there's no possible way anyone could seek to sabotage you back here, for no other motive than because they resent your peace and tranquility."

Seigetsu frowned.

Papyrus shrugged at her. "Still don't get it? Thinking your deterrents against treason are infallible is a rookie move. So, while there was certainly at least one impostor involved, who's to say your sinister minister didn't snap his chains and make this an inside job?"

Terutomo gave Seigetsu a look. "He has a point. Perhaps we should consider it. After all, you yourself have often been bothered by the lack of transparency behind Yelvey's comings and goings."

"I have," Seigetsu admitted. "Using an unrelated incident as an excuse to investigate those suspicions smacks of dishonor, but when you put it like that, this presents a precious rare opportunity..."

Papyrus yawned. "I'm sure Halcyon cares a whole lot more about your honor than getting rescued." He glanced at Corsica. "How many times has she actually been the damsel in distress? I bet she hates it."

Corsica snorted. "More times than me. And she does." She looked up at Seigetsu and Terutomo. "I've got a question, though. How come you haven't asked me to use my special talent to help out? You can tell I haven't already used it."

Terutomo tilted his head. "Have I been briefed on what it does?"

"Ethical reasons." Seigetsu folded her arms and turned away. "And personal ones. If you use it I will not stop you, but I would never try to control such a power myself, beyond protecting myself and my interests from its use."

Papyrus said nothing, though Corsica was pretty sure he already knew what her talent was and how it worked.

Maybe... she should save it for now. Making broad, vague wishes was both more taxing and often resulted in more stressful outcomes than limited, specific ones. Of course, there was something to be said for preventative measures: trying to turn back the hands of time was about one of the worst things she could do with her talent. That never worked out well.

She had gone through with one... maybe two wishes since the long hike from Sires Hollow, judging by the state of her mind. Smaller ones. If she knew her own limits, she could get away with a big one and stay functional. Unfortunately, she didn't see much of a way she could ensure that the situation would resolve satisfactorily with no more need for further wishes. The last time she had wished everyone would be satisfied with the outcome of a stressful situation, it had been right before getting possessed by Ludwig... and she remembered how that one had worked out. Never again.

At the same time, saving it when Halcyon had literally just been kidnapped? When was there a better time to ensure things didn't go off the rails?

"Wish this is a misunderstanding, and whoever bagged Halcyon actually means well," she muttered under her breath, low enough that hopefully no one would hear. Having this special talent at all was the biggest unbalancing factor in her life; every time she did anything to acknowledge she had it just felt wrong. And asking anyone else to believe in its power would be even worse. Add that to how many times she had regretted what she wished for...

Seigetsu was watching her. So was Terutomo. And Papyrus. And several other dragons in the room had taken note, as well, and were trying not to look like they were staring.

"Also," Seigetsu said, "I did mention that all dragons can resist and identify that power you use. While our kidnapper shouldn't be so lucky, you might draw some stares just slinging it around like that."

Corsica felt her cheeks turn deeply red. "Can all of you just... see it?"

The dragons doing paperwork shuffled. "I'm just paid to work here," one said. "And keep my mouth closed? About the church and Inquisitor's business?"

Corsica groaned. She wished-

She managed to stop herself from thinking anything just in time.

Finally, at long last, I came to.

My body felt like it was made of sludge. I had a strange, stinging sensation on my face where the memory knife had struck me that was more unnerving than painful, and gray static was receding from my senses, as if I had just crawled out of an ocean of the stuff. This was... not a sensation I wanted to repeat twice.

"You awake?" Yunie whispered from nearby, her light turned off, the room bathed in complete darkness.

I groaned in reply, making a tactical decision on the spot: don't tell anyone I could remember things I wasn't supposed to. "Where am I...?"

"Uhh." Yunie trailed off. "So, that's kind of a long story? What's the last thing you remember?"

How should I answer that? "I woke up," I mumbled slowly. "And... was going to a meeting? I think..."

"Nice," Yunie whispered. "I hate meetings. So, you want the bad news, or the bad news?"

"Nnngh..."

It wasn't that hard to pretend. I really did feel like something had messed me up.

"Okay, so the first bad news is, I found you unconscious in a storage closet in the castle dungeons?" Yunie started. "And you've probably had your memory wiped. And I'm pretty sure when the spooky clerics wipe peoples' memories, they're not supposed to leave them in storage closets, so you probably got on the wrong side of something bad. Uh, second bad news is, we're now hiding in a different storage closet because I might have tried to carry you out of there and might have accidentally put the whole entire castle in a lockdown, yeahhh..."

"How'd you manage that?" I pressed, keeping my voice down. I already knew, of course, but I was curious how honest Yunie would be.

"Bad choice of disguises." I could hear Yunie shrug. "See, the dungeons - especially the part I found you in - aren't, like, places civilians are allowed to go? Including me. And I might have picked the wrong guy to pretend to be so I could pull rank when dragging your corpse up into the daylight. Everyone makes mistakes though, right?"

I rubbed at my face. "What were you doing down there if it was so illegal?"

"Uhhhhh..." Yunie fidgeted.

I waited.

"Okay, so this is a bit of a story..." Yunie sounded deeply uncomfortable. "So, uh, the guy you were meeting is Yelvey. He wants you to join his cult because you've got the same curse as him. Sound at all familiar?"

"I was going to get some information out of him," I said. "Right. That's what Seigetsu said she set up the meeting for."

"Totally," Yunie agreed. "Completely legit. Except you don't actually have the same thing going on at all, do you? You're just pretending to, and no one is smart enough to just check under your clothes because it's taboo..."

"...Keep talking," I sighed, wanting to hear more before I started correcting her.

Yunie fidgeted again. "Yeah, so, see, after you left the bar last night, I went to go stalk that Duma guy because I thought maybe he'd be trouble, and that's interesting? And he told me that you were, uhh... You know, like..."

She trailed off. "Look, I did try to save you and didn't even ditch you when the going got rough, so you're not gonna wreck me if I know your secrets, right?"

What did she know? That I was a changeling queen? Or something even I didn't know? "Spill it," I sighed.

"He said you're a foreign agent," Yunie whispered. "Sent here to like, uh, hijack the reins of government, or something?"

My ears stood straight up. "He what?"

"Except he was confused," Yunie went on, "because you didn't seem to recognize him. And he said he was sent here to support you in your mission. Anyway, he thought you were going to try to blackmail Yelvey or something and compromise his integrity. And I know a bunch of stuff I shouldn't, like my way around these tunnels, so he bribed me to help him follow you down there? And I really hate spooky clerics and really like money, so it was an easy bribe."

My fur stood on end. Duma thought I was a foreign agent, and he was assigned to support me? Who was he mistaking me for?

Was there someone still out there who might be dangerous and unaccounted for?

At least that perfectly explained his weird behavior toward me. If he thought I was his collaborator, he had probably been throwing all sorts of signs and passwords into his demeanor, and his strange insistence on selling me stuff I didn't need... Those products were probably exactly the sort of support materials he thought his collaborator needed.

Everything made far, far more sense than I wanted it to. And Yunie's account matched up well enough with what I had seen, so I didn't even have reason to doubt she was telling the truth.

"Anyway," Yunie went on, "You're pretty obviously a foreigner, but I'm guessing you're not a secret agent? Because I actually spied a little on your meeting with Yelvey, and it sounded a whole lot more like he was telling you how cool being a spooky cleric was and you were telling him to get bent."

"Sounds like something I'd do," I agreed. "Did Duma show up, then? Did you see anything he did?"

"I was... somewhere else at the time," Yunie apologized nervously. "I might have gotten rumbled and had to dip. You know how it is."

Hmm. So she knew all the things her twin had seen up until the point she got captured and memory-wiped... Just what was that twin? Some sort of second body she could remote control and borrow the senses of, like Kitty and the whitewings? It obviously had to do with her special talent... A talent like that would be incredibly useful to have.

If she didn't want to tell me that, well... fair enough. I wasn't telling her about my own way of cheating the memory erasure, either. But everything else she had said matched up close enough with my memories, and that was reason enough to trust her in my book.

"Right." I pulled myself together, shaking off the worst of my symptoms and standing up. "Should go without saying, but no, I've never met Duma before last night and don't have any mission he's supposed to be helping me with, even if I am a foreigner. So there's probably someone else out there he's looking for, and he got distracted on me. What did he say he thought I was doing? I need as much detail as possible."

"Why?" Yunie sounded visibly confused. "It's not your problem. All we've gotta do is wait out this lockdown and then get out of here, and you can have nothing to do with the clerics or their church ever again."

"If someone's up to no good and we know about it, we can't just let them get away with it," I pointed out. "And Duma just screams 'up to no good'. Tell me I'm wrong."

Yunie groaned. "Oh, great, you're a goodie-goodie. Actually, we could just let them get away with it? Because, uh, we owe the local government nothing? And it belongs to a nation that's waging war against our own?"

"Maybe they are," I sighed, noting that she was lumping me in as an Abyssinian. Did she take me being a changeling for granted? "But just because we don't need to do anything doesn't mean we shouldn't. Even if they do some shady stuff, should we really just stand by and let someone make things worse?"

"Blechhh," Yunie complained. "Fine. You sure are invested in a place you've spent all of two days in. But just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. And anyway, it sounded like he just thought you were trying to get a corrupt official on your side, or something. You know, get your foot in the door, influence policy just a little, earmark yourself some money, maybe get someone to turn a blind eye so you can pull a heist... Manipulating them a little to get a piece of the pie, like literally everyone else does?"

"Is that how you do things in Abyssinia?" I stared at her outline in the dim light. "Sounds like Ironridge. Also, you didn't make it sound like ordinary governmental corruption earlier. But it doesn't matter if it's big or small or if this is the norm here or anywhere else. If I'm really not allowed to have an altruistic motive, then let's just say Duma's been stalking me, Yelvey bumped me off, and that's reason enough for me to try and mess up their plans."

Yunie hesitated. "Eh. When you put it like that... What are you even gonna do, though?"

I instinctively tried to turn on my bracelet, only for it to be nowhere to be found. "Find some guards, get caught, go see Seigetsu, and tell her Duma is in these dungeons and has some tools that would make it really easy to buy Yelvey's loyalty." And had already done so right in front of my eyes. Talking to Yunie had steeled my resolve; my earlier hesitation about throwing my lot in with the dragons was suddenly nowhere to be found.

"Aw man. Seriously? I'm gonna get super arrested," Yunie whined. "Do you know how big of a crime impersonating an authority is? Hard pass. How about this: you do that on your own, don't say a word about me, and we call us even for me trying to save you back there. Even though I messed it up. Deal?"

"I'll try to keep it quiet," I promised, hoping I wasn't badly overestimating my agency in this situation. "But I, for one, am not gonna be a bystander when there's something I can do, even if it's for someone who does things in a way I don't like. Because that isn't..."

I felt my special talent faintly tingle.

"...the place I want to have in this world."

Binding Allegiance

I could feel Yunie's gaze on my back as I walked toward the door of the storage closet, the force of her doubt pushing on me like a wall. Was it that strange, wanting to throw my lot in with Seigetsu instead of standing by and doing nothing?

Obviously, helping Duma was out of the question: he was creepy, ordered my brainwashing, and I didn't even know the first thing about what I would be helping him to do. Yunie was right about one thing: trying to win over a corrupt government official wasn't a goal, it was a means to an end. And I had no idea what that end could be.

But even if all of those reservations were set aside, he was still trying to subvert the system. It didn't matter how good the system was, or whether I liked the dragons' rules: everyone doing anything they could get away with was how you wound up with Ironridge, where every single facet of the status quo was the product of a bad reason and three layers of intrigue, and nothing worked in a sane or sensible manner. Order was important. Once you had everyone playing by the same rules, and those rules were on the table where everyone could see them, then you could make sure those rules were good. But breaking them wasn't a substitute for changing them... Right?

I shadow snuck under the door, and emerged in complete blackness. I still didn't have a light.

In my head, Faye sighed.

"Yeah?" I whispered.

Just thinking, Faye said. About our differences. I agree with Yunie, you know.

My ears flicked.

I'm not surprised that you don't, though, Faye went on. After all, one of my biggest goals in making you was for you to always search for an external solution for your problems. I didn't want you looking inward, and discovering the power I tried to bury.

"You didn't look for an external solution too?" I whispered.

No, Faye said. The problems I was running from, no one could help with. I was who I was, and that wasn't something anyone else could change. If they could have, they would have done so. Mother knew what I was, and Elise. Probably Graygarden too. And the best solution they could come up with was to isolate me in the most secure and secluded place in the world. They knew that more attention would only hurt, and hiding me was the best option. I was never expecting for you to learn about me or our past at all. But there are a lot of problems other ponies encounter in their lives as well. Normal problems, that aren't like being a changeling queen. I thought if you searched outside of yourself for answers to problems like those, it would help keep you from discovering your potential. That's why I changed it.

"But you didn't change it all the way," I whispered. "Even now that I know, I still haven't told anyone."

You haven't, Faye agreed. And you also found me again anyway. So there's a limit to what I could change.

Just more proof that, deep down, we really were the same person.

I'm sorry, Faye said. I didn't mean to sidetrack you. It's your life now, so you get to call the shots. Go, warn the dragons. We do need their help to get a boat still, after all.

I hesitated. "Would you really rather I didn't?"

That's not it, Faye insisted. I just... I think it's admirable that you can commit yourself to causes. From my point of view, your reason looks like a flimsy accident, but seeing how fast you flipped from distrusting the dragons to wanting to help them... Maybe I'm just jealous. Go, and see if it works out.

In the darkness, I hung my head. Was that really all this was? Was that why Yunie was so surprised by my choice to help Seigetsu, as well? Did my logic really not make sense except to me, and was it really because I was deciding this purely based on impulses my creator had given me for an entirely different, now-obsolete purpose?

I closed my eyes, took a breath... and decided I didn't care. It felt right. I might not have begun life as my own pony, but I was now, and had been growing more and more so with every event in my life. And those same instincts told me to keep going, wherever it would lead me in the end.

As if on cue, a light began to appear, probably about two corners away, along with the muffled steps of a patrol that was clearly trained in stealth.

I waited in the middle of the hallway.

"Who goes there?" asked the first guard to spot me, the patrol warily bunching up behind him. "Halcyon?"

"In the flesh," I replied. "You know the way out of here? I've got some information your bosses might be really interested in."

"We'll see about that," the leader said, turning on a bright lamp to disable shadow sneaking. "Apologies, but we need to take you into custody long enough for your identity to be verified. Standard protocol for changeling threats. Please come quietly, and if you're legit we can get this cleared up as quick as possible."

I swallowed and nodded, suddenly remembering I had a bad history with getting arrested and hoped this would go more smoothly than last time. "Sure." Hopefully their method of detection wouldn't throw out any false positives due to the fact that I was, in fact, a changeling...

A door burst open in Terutomo's command room, emitting a panting runner. "Sire!" she said, saluting smartly. "Squadron Seven found a pony appearing to be Halcyon alone in the tunnels near the surface. She is cooperating and claims to have important information. Requesting an identity verification?" She bowed deeply, then stood at attention.

Seigetsu nodded, with a look at Corsica. "Well, that worked out nicely." She turned back to the runner. "Lead the way. You two, with me." She snapped her claws at Corsica and Papyrus.

Corsica stood just as the weight of her wish resolved in her mind, almost causing her to stumble. All at once, she felt like going back to bed; the kind of lethargy that sapped so much of your desire to do things that even recreation and leisure lost their luster. But this was just life. She had stayed on her hooves through a lot worse. All you had to do was run through the motions, pretend everything was normal, and hope you'd be able to push yourself hard enough to seem convincing if anything required real effort and commitment. Not pleasant, but... normal. Not as bad as it could be.

It still felt like Seigetsu was watching her, though. Seigetsu knew what her power did to the world around her... Did she know what it did to her, too?

After a march through the castle that was too unimportant to focus on, they arrived in a small, brightly-lit room where Halcyon was sitting under the watchful eye of six whole guards. All of them looked relieved when Seigetsu appeared, including Halcyon.

"You've been causing quite a fuss," Seigetsu remarked. "I suppose this just isn't your lucky day, now is it?"

Halcyon shrugged. "This kind of stuff is more normal than I'd like. Anyway, you want to make sure I'm the real me, right?"

"I do," Seigetsu said. "Search your pockets and show me any wood that you find there."

The guards mostly gave Seigetsu strange looks, but Halcyon didn't hesitate, pulling out a few fragments of something small and broken. "You mean this?"

Seigetsu took it and inspected it. "You are the real Halcyon, alright. Now then, what do you know of your situation, and what can you tell us about what happened to you?"

"It's a long story," Halcyon began. "You ever heard of something called Formula L?"

Seigetsu's brows both rose. "Go on..."

"Last night, we went out to explore the town a little," Halcyon said, nodding at Corsica. "She can back me up on this. We met a centaur named Duma who claimed to be a merchant from out of town, and he tried to sell me some."

Seigetsu took a sharp breath. "This would have been helpful to know when it happened!"

Halcyon squared her shoulders. "I didn't know how important it was! We don't have anything like that back up in the north. Point is, you see where I'm going with this?"

"I remember the stuff," Corsica said. "What's it have to do with anything?"

Halcyon glanced at the guards. "How much sensitive stuff should I be discussing?"

Seigetsu shook her head. "This chamber is soundproofed and all of my brother's soldiers are sworn to utmost secrecy. However, I already understand your point." She squinted at Halcyon. "You have recently had your memory erased. Do you know this firsthand or from some other source?"

"You can tell that just from a glance?" Corsica asked.

Seigetsu ignored her.

For a moment, Halcyon looked stuck. "Yeah. But it wasn't a very big one. A... friend... or two from last night apparently followed me down there, and told me some of the stuff they saw. They're the changelings you're still chasing, and I don't think they're hostile."

Seigetsu waved a guard toward the door. "Friend or foe, if they are your primary source for this information then I must question them myself as soon as possible. Redouble the search!"

A guard saluted and charged away.

Seigetsu focused again on Halcyon. "Just to be absolutely certain, what is your understanding of what Formula L does?"

"It's a drug," Halcyon said. "That your Convocation uses to control the Order of Silence. It mitigates some side effect of their power, and they can't imagine living without it."

Seigetsu squinted. "You speak as though you consider them foreign. Have I mistaken you as being among their number? Not of those enrolled in the organization, of course, but as someone who holds the same kind of power."

"...Yeah," Halcyon hesitantly said. "I think Yelvey still thinks I am. But whatever they've got going on is completely different from me. You know what they look like, under the robes?"

"I've heard tales," Seigetsu said.

Halcyon squeamishly lifted her coat, showing off her chest, barrel and flanks for about two seconds before dropping it again. Corsica winced in empathy: she didn't understand Halcyon's aversion to being seen without her clothes, but it was a strong one.

"That raises numerous questions," Seigetsu said, glancing at Corsica. "For starters, how you came to be in possession of that weapon... but those can wait. You say you were offered Formula L by a centaur named Duma. Where did this take place, and were there witnesses?"

Corsica nodded. "I was there. It was in a pub in Freedom Town. The slum to the west? The place was owned by a cat guy called Fauntleroy."

"Never got most of their names, but there were a ton of witnesses," Halcyon added. "Including a walrus called Jones. And I bet he'd know better who else was there."

Seigetsu snapped her talons at another guard, who sprinted out of the room as well. Then she turned back to Halcyon. "Know you aught of Yelvey's whereabouts?"

"You don't know?" Halcyon asked. "No. According to my source, Duma was trying to buy him out. Oh, and Duma apparently mistook me for someone else, who he was supposed to be helping? Dunno who, but that means there's someone else out there for you to be worried about, and his idea of helping them involved trying to get Yelvey's loyalty."

"Curses!" Seigetsu hissed, snapping at two more guards. "Relay all of this to my brother immediately, and call for backup. I must defend the you-know-what at all costs!"

"The thing you just showed us?" Papyrus asked. "That you-know-what?"

"...Yes," Seigetsu said through gritted teeth. "Yelvey knows of it. Actually, I have very little transparency into what he knows and doesn't, but that one is certain. Also, all centaurs are considered nobility by default in Abyssinia, which in case any of you haven't figured out yet is the kingdom we are at war with at Cernial. There is only one conclusion that can be drawn!"

Corsica got to our hooves. "Want our help? You know what I can do."

"Sounds like fun," Papyrus added. "Besides, we already know about it. Worst case, I make a divine meat shield."

Seigetsu hesitated, already halfway out the door. "...I suppose I wasn't intending to let you wander off on your own anyway. Although this could be the end of our secret regardless of what you know. Come if you will. But know that centaurs are princes among monsters. When I attempt to take him into custody there will almost assuredly be a battle, and nothing I can do will remotely guarantee your safety."

"If you're going, I'm going," Halcyon insisted, following too.

"Very well, then." Seigetsu struck up a swift pace. "Try not to fall behind."

I had to run too quickly to question what I had gotten myself into, but my brain tried it anyway.

Seigetsu wasn't just taking this seriously, she thought it was a code-red emergency. No pressing me for exact details of how I knew what I knew, no mounting a plodding, bureaucratic investigation: that could continue in the background, while she jumped straight to action.

That was a good sign. Her confidence almost made it easier not to question my choice. Knowing my luck, now Duma would turn out to be a decent guy whose creepiness was just an unfortunate character flaw, and sabotaging his mission would run counter to my own goals in the long run... but there was no time for second-guessing. My cards had been played, and it was time to see where they landed.

We barreled through layer upon layer of deeper dungeons without pausing to check directions, and at last came to a brick wall that looked like something massive had crashed through it by force. Seigetsu sped up when she saw the damage.

Just beyond it was a small, circular room that looked like it was meant to house an elevator, except the elevator had already descended. Without hesitating, Seigetsu vaulted into the pit.

Her guards took it a little slower, preparing to scale the walls in a slightly more sane fashion. Corsica pulled up at the edge of the pit... and then Papyrus put a wing on my and her shoulders. "Come on, I'll catch you! Go go go!"

Before I could resist, he pushed us off... and true to his word, I got a landing that was merely very uncomfortable instead of actually dangerous.

The chamber we landed in was metal, spherical, and brightly lit, a circular walkway suspended in the middle and a ring inside of that. Hanging in the middle of the ring was a figure I had only seen once before, on the cover of a comic book I bought for Coda: a vaguely equinoid metal dragon.

And, sure enough, there was Duma.

Seigetsu held out a hand, motioning for everyone to stand back. "This location is extremely restricted," she announced, facing Duma. "For what reason do you come here?"

Duma smiled. "Is it? Oh my! I was just seeing the sights! I'm afraid I don't have any business right now."

"This place is protected by a complicated maze and multiple layers of security," Seigetsu said. "One does not simply find their way here by accident."

"Hmmm," Duma mused. "No, I suppose not. Too bad I don't care about that. You, on the other hand..." His golden, third eye fixed itself on me. "Long time no see, emissary! Do you recognize me yet?"

"You are talking to me, not her," Seigetsu warned. "Where do you know this mare from?"

Duma shrugged at her. "Unless you're buying, I'm afraid I don't find you terribly interesting. You're not a client, yes? Although if you are, I have quite an array of products that can expand your influence at home and abroad!"

"I am interested in your confession," Seigetsu threatened, approaching. "Now step away from the Aegis and surrender into custody. I did not attain the position I hold without the ability to deal with your kind."

"The Aegis?" Duma's brows rose in curiosity. "Is that what this is? And here I thought it was an art installation! Should you ever want to sell it, I do sales work on commission..."

A hefty hammer materialized in Seigetsu's hand. Minimally decorated, it was bright purple and completely monochrome, looking to have been cast seamlessly from the same metal with no further working whatsoever. She reached back, then flung it at Duma with a vicious spin.

Duma didn't seem remotely bothered... until the hammer hit him, and in a quick pulse of energy it shifted, transforming from a hammer into a mass of purple chains, all cast from the same monochrome metal. The chains snaked tightly around him in a single burst, wrapping until they were so tight that Duma was completely immobilized.

"Now then-" Seigetsu began.

An orb of energy appeared between Duma's horns. It crackled, pulsed, swelled... and then burst forth in a laser, aimed straight at Seigetsu.

The inquisitor dodged nimbly, seeming to realize what was going to happen moments before it did.

"Resorting to violence already," Duma sadly chided, still smiling. "Is taking in the sights a little really so wrong?"

"You are resisting arrest by a Special Inquisitor of the Holy Cernial Convocation," Seigetsu threatened, the wall behind her smoking and blackened where the laser had struck. "If you truly have stumbled onto a national secret by mistake, then we can and will erase it from your memory before letting you walk free, but that will no longer be an option as your offenses become more openly deliberate!"

"I'm truly sorry! I am," Duma chuckled. "But I don't acknowledge your system of justice, and therefore its laws don't apply to me. It's simple, really."

Seigetsu strode closer.

"And besides," Duma lamented, "I'm not sure you could wipe my memory even if you wanted to! There I was, conducting a pleasant business transaction with your cleric, and suddenly, he decided he didn't want to be your slave anymore and went away! For the life of me, I can't figure out why."

"The Order of Silence is a devout circle populated only by those who undergo trials of utmost rigor to be permitted to join its ranks," Seigetsu declared, reaching into a pocket and pulling out a stone the size of a hoof.

"Except you're this terrified his loyalties could be purchased with Formula L..." Papyrus whispered so that only me and Corsica could hear.

Duma's energy orb began to glow again. "Please, keep your distance! Such a beautiful room you have here, and it would be a shame to ruin it with fighting."

Seigetsu tossed the stone up in front of her face, then punched it, sending it flying forward. It struck one of Duma's horns... but instead of landing a solid blow, it contorted like putty, wrapping around the horn and partly insulating it, causing the aura it was generating to flicker and destabilize.

"My, that's incredibly rude!" Duma looked offended.

Seigetsu pulled out another rock.

Suddenly, Duma seemed to take the fight seriously. He tipped over and thrashed, striking his encased horn on the ground multiple times before the thin layer of rock cracked and fell away. Immediately, the energy orb prepared to fire again, even though he was on his side.

I had barely a moment to think when I saw that this time, it was pointing at me and Corsica.

Before I could do anything, though, Seigetsu reacted, jumping into the laser's path. The chains binding Duma vanished, and in her hands, purple metal reformed, this time in the form of a tower shield. Seigetsu braced herself against the shield, and the laser hit it, fanning out to the sides in a shower of sparks and energy.

We were safe, but Duma was free.

"Ho ho!" Duma chuckled. "Noble of you, but I'm sure they can take care of themselves. Speaking of, there's someone here I'd really rather have a conversation with than you..."

Seigetsu reformed her hammer and threw it again, but this time Duma dodged, jumping out of the way with far more power than a creature his size should have possessed. And when he landed, he was bigger, his arms bulkier and his face more youthful and his frame scaled up to accommodate more girth. He flexed, still smiling, and looked again at me.

"What's your problem?" I asked, taking a step back.

"Actually, that's my line," Duma said, completely ignoring Seigetsu to focus on me. "You have the mark. You are the emissary. And even if it was a fluke, you are here, where I was told to find you! Infiltrating the ranks of the Order of Silence? Attempting to steal the Aegis? I was sent here to help you acquire power! I was told you were awaiting me! O emissary, why do you not recognize when I call?"

Ignoring Seigetsu proved to be costly. This time, the purple metal reformed into a long pike, fully extended, its tip already buried in Duma's side. He snarled, spinning, attempting to hammer the shaft with a fist, but Seigetsu was too fast, already retracting it and whirling around for another thrust.

Duma moved his fist to block it, but the lance split apart, elongating into two dozen shards of purple metal connected by a whip-like purple thread. Seigetsu lashed it, and it ignited with crackles of purple energy, wrapping around Duma's arm and hissing with power. Seigetsu pulled, trying to unbalance the centaur.

It didn't work. Duma pulled harder, yanking the whip forward and Seigetsu off her feet... but the dragon actually expected this, flying into the momentum, shifting her weapon into a short axe and lunging with it straight at one of Duma's horns.

The hit connected, leaving a hefty scratch and a shower of sparks. But before Seigetsu could retreat, Duma's meaty fist closed around her, grabbed her, spun her and flung her straight at a wall.

Seigetsu spun in midair, cushioning her impact with her legs, and bracing to jump off again. But Duma had bought himself a few seconds, and with them, he returned his focus to me, not even thinking about pressing his advantage.

"I've got no idea who you are, or what an 'emissary' is," I told him. "I'm not trying to gain any power or manipulate and governments. I'm telling you, you've got the wrong girl. Now leave me alone!"

Duma looked speechless. "Do you not know the glorious purpose for which you've been chosen? The cause to which so few are permitted to contribute?"

Before I could answer, Seigetsu was back, turning her weapon to a ball and rolling it underneath Duma from behind. It exploded out into a long shaft, striking both of his hind legs and pushing them so far apart that he stumbled tripped and collapsed, catching himself halfway with one hand.

"We're lucky he doesn't seem interested in hurting us," Papyrus whispered. "Although, to be fair, we're doing absolutely nothing to help. Think I should go in there and mix things up a little?"

Corsica stepped on his tail. "Of course not, you idiot. Besides, they're staying back too." She gestured to Seigetsu's guards, who all seemed deep in concentration near a control panel by the elevator.

As Duma was off-balance, Seigetsu summoned her chains again, binding him once again as before. "Now!"

The guards did something... and suddenly, Aegis's bindings disappeared.

The energy tethers that held it, hovering, in the middle of the innermost ring winked out, and it fell solidly to the floor below, showing no signs of life. Then, almost immediately, the tether coils shifted, reignited and fired their energy straight at Duma.

Papyrus's eyes widened with glee.

The repurposed restraints blasted the centaur, who howled. "Be lain low by the ingenuity of Cernial!" Seigetsu shouted, holding the chains firmly in place as the energy surged.

Beneath the tempest, however, Duma's horns charged up again... and this time, they fired straight for the guards surrounding the control panel.

"No!" Seigetsu shouted, summoning her shield again and moving to block... though this time, I could tell she wasn't going to be in time.

With a discipline that no amount of training could instill, the guards bunched up, shielding the control terminal with their bodies.

I felt like I was frozen in time. Seigetsu was out of position. Duma was firing his laser, still getting zapped but no longer bound by chains. The guards were being pushed back, clumped up and attempting to share the blast, even though I had no idea if any of them could survive. I had to act... Had to do something.

Anything.

"Give me that," I mumbled, taking my bracelet from Corsica, who seemed unable to resist.

I slid it on and lit it, my mind suddenly assaulted by an overpowering urge to get to Snowport at any cost. I reeled, nearly losing control of my sense of self... but my new mission was too important. It had to win out.

Whatever emotional energy I had gummed up my bracelet with was still energy. It was power, and it was mine to use. All I had to figure out was how to use it.

My instincts focused as I flew forward, commanding the power, rallying it and pushing it into my legs. I didn't need skill; I didn't need to understand myself. All I had was the knowledge of my own potential, and it became crystal clear as time inched by: this power was mine to shape as I wanted. It could do what I needed it to do. I just had to use it.

I struck Duma from the side, punching him with full force, expelling every emotion pent up in my bracelet and more, pushing with my mind instead of my muscles. The determination to reach Snowport, the distilled love from Yelvey's Formula L, every other emotion I had forgotten I was feeling all the other times I used my bracelet whirled together into a spiral of colored flame, burst into being around my leg, and enhanced my strength a thousandfold for the split second that I needed it.

Duma's laser faltered just as the guards began to fall, leaving the terminal unscathed. My blow manifested, knocking the centaur back into the lasers, sending him flying into the center of the containment ring, until he landed, draped over the bottom of the ring, stunned.

"Why?" He looked at me as the flames kept burning, his smile finally vanished, exchanged for confusion. "If you truly don't understand, then why oppose me? I could offer you so much..."

And then Papyrus flew through the air, landed on the control terminal, and punched in several commands. With a whir, the containment ring reactivated, trapping Duma cleanly inside.

Before I could celebrate, before I could even think about what I had done, my flame sputtered. I had forced out everything I had, not held back... and with a short pop, the very last of those things tumbled out of my bracelet, landing on the ground in a pile of pink embers.

The flame from Ironridge! My heart stopped-

There was another pop, and Ludwig burst into the room, cloudy body and everything.

For a split second, he circled in disbelief, and then made a beeline for the exit. "I'M FREEEEEEEEEEE!"

"No!" Seigetsu shouted, hurling her hammer at him. Her aim was true, but Ludwig just drifted around it, funneled himself up the elevator shaft, and was gone.

"No," I cried, much more concerned about the pink flame than a windigo I had never liked anyway. "No, no, no!" Where was it? There, the last traces of an ember sliding off the edge of the walkway...

I jumped after it, not caring if I got hurt in the fall. I should have cared; the force caused my legs to buckle, and for a moment I couldn't tell if I'd broken something. But I reached the bottom just in time to see Aegis... and the pink flame floating into an exposed crystal on its chest.

Armor plates shifted, moving to cover up the crystal. A faint pink glow began seeping across the dragon's body, moving through veins in the metal that had been invisible before, but I could suddenly see.

"You alright?" Corsica asked, running up to Seigetsu and the injured guards.

"Seems to be no mortal blows," Seigetsu said. "But just barely. They need medical attention urgently. As for me, I am fine."

"I'm on it." Papyrus saluted, taking wing. "Always been good with mazes. You need any other messages delivered?"

"No." Seigetsu shook her head. "Tell my brother the immediate danger has passed, and that we will need an urgent council to determine our next steps. If that thing that flew off was what I think it was, we are all in deep, deep trouble."

"A windigo?" Corsica asked. "Looked like it to me."

Seigetsu sighed. "That is what I was afraid of, yes. If you and your friends truly know what they are then I think we have a very candid meeting ahead of us... I would very much like to know where that one came from." She nodded at Papyrus. "Now hurry. My soldiers need as much speed as you can buy them."

Papyrus took off, and nobody made any move to stop him.

Corsica walked to the edge of the walkway, which was faintly scorched by Duma's laser. The centaur himself was hanging in the containment ring, wearing an almighty frown. And beneath him, down on the room's sloped floor, Halcyon was standing face to face with Aegis, who was faintly glowing and pulsating with pink.

"Hey," Corsica said, not glancing back at Seigetsu. "Once you get your first aid done good enough, you might want to come take a look at this."

Pink Consequence

I stood, frozen, in front of Aegis as it slowly began pulsing with life. "What...?"

With a whisper-quiet thud, Seigetsu landed in front of me and to the side, eyeing the metal dragon up and down, tension evident in her posture. "Return to your slumber, Divine One," she said, her voice calm. "I apologize for rousing you, but had need of your restraints for a moment. 'Tis not the time to awaken."

Pink light flickered weakly across the surface of Aegis's cone-shaped tail. "This vessel," it said in a voice like soft metal, hard and gentle at the same time. "It's so familiar..."

"COMMAND ACKNOWLEDGED," a completely different voice echoed, also coming from the dragon. "PILOT OVERRIDE ACTIVATED, BUT SYSTEM POWER LEVELS CRITICAL. DO NOT BE AFRAID. I AM NOT GOING ANYWHERE."

"Pilot override?" Seigetsu took a sharp breath, then summoned her purple hammer. "Identify yourself immediately!"

"Please, I mean you no harm," Aegis said, once again in the kindness flame's voice. "I was vulnerable, and sought shelter. This vessel cried out to me, and I knew it to be safe."

"Should I be privy to all this?" Duma called out from above. "I know we're not exactly feeling friendly at the moment, but you did defeat me, and it would be so embarrassing if I heard something you didn't want me to hear because you forgot I existed!"

"Your memories are slated to be expunged, centaur," Seigetsu threatened. "Hear what you will."

Duma didn't sound at all bothered. "Keep telling yourself that!"

Seigetsu ignored him, turning once again to Aegis. "Who are you, and how long have you dwelt within my goddess?"

"I am the Element of Kindness," Aegis said, still flickering faintly with pink. "Regulator of the central north. I had resided within Halcyon until but a moment ago, but lost my place amid her attack and had to seek shelter anew. I mean you no harm."

Seigetsu slowly turned to me. I could feel Corsica watching me from above, and the weight of their gazes flattened my ears against my skull. "It's... a long story..."

"Then I would hear the short of it," Seigetsu commanded. "There will be time enough for full explanations later. What are this Regulator's intentions for the Aegis, and did you come here specifically to seek it out?"

I swallowed and took a step back. "N-no. I didn't know anything like this was here, honest. The only reason we're here in Equestria is because we're looking for two ponies. One of them is called Fluttershy, and she's related to this spirit..."

"Hence you referring to yourself as the Element of Kindness," Seigetsu said to Aegis. She turned back to Halcyon. "My brother did mention your interest in Fluttershy. I think we would be better served by a change of venue where you can tell me everything in detail." She sighed. "Preparations will need to be made for the Aegis's transfer now that its location is undoubtedly known. Its new pilot claimed to have resided within you up until a moment ago. Can you coax it back out?"

"...Can I?" I asked the metal dragon. "You know it's going to be easier to carry you around with me instead of in something that big. And I don't think the authorities here want me running off with their goddess, even if I found a way to carry you."

Aegis flickered with reticence. "Existing within you was... tenuous. This cradle is so much safer... Can I ask you to bring Fluttershy here, instead? I don't think I can move, anyway, so you don't have to worry about me getting up to no good."

"So much for that," Seigetsu said, teeth clenched. She looked at me. "I cannot both question you, keep an eye on the Aegis and move to a more private location without running the risk of Aegis fleeing under its own power. Much as I appreciate your intervention in that battle, I hope you understand the utmost delicacy of this situation. And so, we wait for backup to arrive."

Backup eventually arrived, consisting of Papyrus and a team of medics, soldiers and engineers. The wounded were immediately evacuated - not counting Seigetsu, even though she had done the bulk of the fighting. The engineers checked Aegis, and soon gave Seigetsu the assurance she was waiting for.

"It's bonded to an operator, alright," a lanky dragon in an oily hat reported with a salute. "But they've got no more power to give it than your average Equestrian. The most it could do is blink an eyelid... if it had eyelids, sir."

"Appreciated," Seigetsu said, standing just as formally as she had been since we settled in to wait. "I want a full interrogation team on the prisoner. No one is to be allowed in this room with less company than five others; I will not have my soldiers bought out or subjected to mind games. Prepare the Aegis for transport, but wait on my signal. I have matters of my own to attend to."

She beckoned to me, Corsica and Papyrus, all of whom followed along.

Before too long, we found ourselves in a soundproofed chamber very much like the one I had been taken to after being discovered in the dungeons. Seigetsu was there, along with three other guards, Corsica, Papyrus and me.

"Excellent. Now we can do this properly," Seigetsu said. "You must tell me everything. Of the Aegis's new pilot, your relationship with it, and the powers you used when confronting Duma."

"And why should we?" Papyrus challenged.

Seigetsu raised an eyebrow. "I should think it obvious."

"Let me put it another way," Papyrus said. "That fight was going badly for you and you know it. Duma clearly wasn't trying, had just about demolished your backup, and the two of you were at what could generously been described as a standstill. If Halcyon hadn't come out of nowhere with whatever it was that she did and if I hadn't both conveniently been expecting it and knew how to work your machine to capitalize on it, you'd be toast. In other words, I think you're the one who owes us."

Seigetsu narrowed her eyes. "If your assistance was genuine then it was very much appreciated. However, Duma implied he was here and searching for the Aegis at your behest, and even were he to be lying, you both ferried in a creature that has taken up residency in the Aegis and a live windigo. I trust you need no explanation of the relationship between windigoes and this situation?"

My ears fell. "I know nothing at all about Aegis, and if I knew how to get rid of Ludwig earlier, I would have done so. Does helping you fight Duma seriously count for nothing?"

"It counts for quite a lot, actually," Seigetsu said. "And in fact is the reason I am now trying to learn your intentions rather than jumping to the obvious conclusion. And I'm starting to suspect you really are unaware of the gravity of what it is you've just unleashed."

"Well, she was missing when you showed us Aegis earlier," Corsica pointed out. "You wanna go over that again, just so we're all on the same page?"

Seigetsu looked at me, then nodded. "Very well. As you are hopefully aware, the Holy Cernial Convocation is at war with Abyssinia. Long ago, there was a conflict between our respective gods that dwarfed even the clash that birthed modern gods such as Princess Celestia and the north's Garsheeva. It brought the world to such ruin that nothing habitable remained, and our ancestors - dragon and monster alike - were seen through the calamity only by the grace and heroism of Saint Tadashi, a dragon revered by both nations. It is over Tadashi's legacy that our war is now fought."

She clasped her hands behind her back. "Aegis is our god. And yet, you have seen the truth of it for yourself: not an individual person, but a mechanical weapon to be piloted by whoever lays claim to it. The mission of Cernial is, and has been for many thousands of years, to prevent the reoccurrence of such a tragedy by any means necessary, including the imprisonment and zealous guardianship of the Aegis. We no longer know the motives of whoever piloted Aegis in that ancient war. Only that motives are irrelevant next to the destruction of the entire world. No cause is pure enough to warrant unsealing that power and risking such devastation again. And many causes are worse than others."

Seigetsu sighed. "The god of Abyssinia we remember only as the King of all Monsters. And the windigoes, or so the legends go, are a brood he created out of pure spite at the end of that conflict, after the gods had fought each other to a standstill and their life forces were all but spent. They are his servants and enforcers of his will. Unlike the Abyssinians, who are possessed of the same freedom of thought as dragons and ponies, windigoes are driven by a singular supernatural impulse to sow conflict and create war. There can only be one explanation: they are carrying out their creator's hateful final testament. And now, by your hooves, these creatures have learned the location of the most powerful weapon ever to have existed."

Papyrus chuckled. "Is that all? If it makes you feel better, there was at least one windigo in the old Empire who knew about this thing before it found its way into your clutches."

"No." Seigetsu gave him a look. "That does not make me 'feel better'. But I trust I have conveyed the gravity of the situation?"

I wasn't sure whether to keel over or push back, so I chose the latter. "I'm not a friend to any windigo," I promised. "In fact, I've had more bad run-ins with them than most. But you know that one's had a break with his creator? Some others have, too. They're starting to resent their circumstances, and want to get revenge on the one who made them."

Seigetsu stiffened. "Is this true?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Eh, I wouldn't put it past them."

"Then that would mean they intend to use the Aegis to fight the same opponent as last time," Seigetsu said, voice dark. "Which begs the question: why did you bring one here?"

"I wouldn't have if I had a choice!" I squirmed. "I'm... not very skilled with the things I can do, right? I was fighting that windigo earlier, and just absorbed him somehow..." Not accurate, but the truth was much more complicated. "And I couldn't figure out how to get rid of him. And now I was trying to attack Duma, and everything just fell out at once, including the Kindness flame..."

Corsica gave me an oh really look that didn't make me feel any better at all.

"Then it sounds as though we have our next topic to discuss," Seigetsu said, pointing at my bracelet. "When first we met I mistook you for the daughter of a member of the Order of Silence who escaped from the Convocation some three decades ago, and assumed you had inherited your mother's power. But it seems no longer likely that is the case. I have never heard of a pony who could 'absorb' windigoes, or summon one of those without considerable amounts of forbidden magic."

I folded my ears, my blood-red legs beginning to burn.

"You've made a pretty good case for why your secrets are important," Papyrus cut in. "Ever consider we might have good reason for keeping ours?"

Seigetsu gave him a look.

"Stop me if I sound like a broken record," Papyrus went on. "But we did save you back down there. And just look at her face now! Positively swimming with malice and nefarious secrets!" He motioned to me like a salespony showing off a home appliance. "Actually, she looks deeply uncomfortable and cornered, and I say this as an expert in making people feel uncomfortable. Clearly an act, and beneath the mask she's chortling to herself about how all her windigo buddies are going to steal Aegis and blow up the world. Clearly."

I gaped at Papyrus. For someone who was normally such a jerk, why was he defending me?

Seigetsu fixed her gaze on Papyrus, completely ignoring me. "What is your game?"

Papyrus innocently smiled. "Getting a fast boat to Catantan so we can hang out with an old friend who almost certainly won't want to kill me. Which, tragically, entails keeping a low profile and not getting involved in your war's politics. By the way, unless I very much misheard things, that centaur was constantly making overtures for Halcyon to join his side, right? If she really was up to no good, don't you think she'd have chummed up with him and tossed that fireball punch at you?"

"I see your point," Seigetsu said stiffly. "But I cannot abandon my duty as Inquisitor when there is critical context left undiscovered."

"And what'll you do if you don't like what I have to say?" I asked. "I barely know what I am myself, let alone how anyone else will react to it. Papyrus has a point: Duma seriously creeps me out, and I wasn't going to side with him, but I could have, and chose to help you instead. If it turns out I'm the product of something majorly heretical, are you going to repay that by catching me and turning me over to your church?"

Seigetsu seemed to relax and genuinely consider this.

"That's what Yelvey wanted to do," I added. "He clearly had no intention of ever letting me walk away from this place. Err, according to the changeling who found me."

Seigetsu narrowed her eyes.

"They've got a point," Corsica added. "You do owe us."

"I cannot derelict my duty," Seigetsu eventually, slowly said. "However, Equestria is large, and Cernial's reach does not extend beyond our borders... of which this town, might I remind you, is at the edge of."

Some of the other dragons in the room looked uncomfortable. "Sir..." one started to say.

Seigetsu shushed him with a raised hand.

"Are you saying you'll give us our boat?" I asked tentatively.

"I am saying that while duty binds me to report to my superiors, I think I can use my personal judgement on matters such as helping you get where you are going," Seigetsu said. "And should the Convocation disagree, you would be too far away for them to do anything about it. Of course, that is still conditional upon my judgement. I would still hear everything from you."

Papyrus cleared his throat. "Strictly speaking, wouldn't it be conditional on Terutomo's judgement? He's the one who owns the boats, after all. Might we make our case to him as well?"

Seigetsu sighed. "I suppose," she said, "that is reasonable."

Once again, we were escorted through the castle, arriving in the same reception room where Terutomo had first greeted us... only now, it had been transformed into a war room, with Terutomo at the center.

"My friends!" he greeted, raising his arms and rising from his chair as we entered. "I've heard from no less than half a dozen wounded soldiers what went on down there, and by all accounts you struck the decisive blow in Snowport's favor even as the fiend tried to tempt you with power?"

"It was more complicated than-" Seigetsu began, before Papyrus cut her off.

"Eh, he wasn't very tempting," Papyrus dismissed with a wave of a wing. "Kept spouting nonsense about us being chosen ones, or something. Anyway, happy to serve, can I get a medal?"

"I suppose that might be in order," Terutomo agreed, drawing an ireful look from Seigetsu. "But first, I want to hear all about it from the source... Sister, is there something I should know?"

Seigetsu stepped forward and whispered for a solid minute into his ear, a look of consternation appearing on his face.

"Well, that's troubling," Terutomo said when she finished. "Might we step into the back room for this? Someone, go and get some medals anyway, but I think we need to get just a few things sorted out first."

Once again, I was pulled into a back room along with Papyrus, Corsica, Seigetsu and now Terutomo. "Well," Terutomo said when the door clicked shut. "You don't look much like a windigo collaborator to me, and frankly I've never known anybody who could endure their presence for more than a minute or two, not that there's a huge sample size." He rubbed the back of his head. "But you somehow accidentally brought one down there and let it out, huh?"

Shaking just a little, I held up my bracelet. "It's this," I said. "It gives me the power to... absorb emotions, and things that are made of them. Like windigoes. That windigo was called Ludwig, and I imprisoned him with it a while ago because it was the only way to stop him. But I don't know everything it can do. Just now, I was trying to use its stored power to attack Duma, and that made everything in it come back out... including Ludwig."

Terutomo looked curious and concerned. "Is that so? Would you mind if I looked at it for a moment?"

Hesitantly, I removed the bracelet and offered it to him.

He took it, instantly holding it up to his eye and looking through. Then he tapped it with a claw a few times, shrugged, and gave it back to me.

"Well?" Seigetsu asked him.

"It's a genuine article," Terutomo said. "And yet the report I read says you have nothing to do with the Order of Silence, and aren't afflicted by their curse?"

I shook my head. "Nope. Completely different."

"And this weapon," Terutomo pressed. "Where did you get it?"

"It's mine," I said. "I don't know where it came from. My mother had it when I was very young... Adoptive mother, if it matters. And then she gave it to me when I was old enough. But I could always use it better than she could. I can just tell that it belongs to me."

"And yet you confess uncertainty as to how to use it," Terutomo mused, rubbing his chin. "You've never had a capable instructor in its use, then. Or met anyone else with one of these."

I thought back to the small chip of metal, of the same substance, that supposedly belonged to Leif. Where were she, Mother and Braen, anyway? "No, not really. I've mostly figured it out through trial and error."

"That's deeply worrying," Terutomo said. "Something bigger than any of us is clearly going on here."

"You think?" Seigetsu raised an incredulous eyebrow. "Brother, this is-"

"The Abyssinian scriptures," Terutomo said, interrupting her. "You're well aware that the reason they started this war is because they believe they're seeing the signs of the end times returning. The calamity brought about that destroyed our previous world."

I blinked. "By your gods fighting?"

Terutomo nodded. "Well, one of those signs listed in their scriptures is ponies becoming able to manifest these at will."

My eyes widened.

"I've never been to Abyssinia myself," Terutomo proclaimed. "But I try to stay at least a little abreast of the sentiments of the common folk there. It's why I allow so many of them in my city, and let them run their own lives and manage their own affairs in their own sector. Turns out that when you treat them right, they're remarkably friendly and talkative. So all I've had to go on has been hearsay from some friends of mine down there... but this is evidence right under my nose." He closed his eyes and sighed. "Why are our nations fighting if those times really could be about to return...?"

"Hold up," Papyrus interjected. "I was under the impression this previous world was destroyed by a battle between two gods. You know, giant lasers and explosions and the like? At least, that was my impression of what a divine battle would look like, not that I've ever seen one to know for sure. What do conditions in Abyssinia or ponies making metal bracelets have to do with that?"

Seigetsu frowned. "How relevant is this to the matter at hand?"

"It's a spot-on question," Terutomo answered. "And the truth is that we don't know. Abyssinian and Cernial's accounts of history differ a lot when it comes to the end of the previous world. Partly because it was so long ago, and it's a miracle any records have survived at all, but I'd guess the bigger reason we see things differently has to do with whatever our gods were fighting over in the first place... not that any records have survived of what that was, only that Abyssinia's god was the one who started it. Our nations agree on that point, as well."

"What do you know about those days?" Corsica pressed. "What other stuff does everyone agree on?"

"Not much," Terutomo apologized. "We know our previous world was called Indus. Ponies and equinoids were the dominant race. Dragons and monsters were in the minority. The calamity razed our world until nothing was left but metal and stone, the scriptures say: no water, no soil, no crops or wood. And Saint Tadashi was the one who saved us when the ponies left us to fend for ourselves. And, that's about it, as far as what both sides know."

"So... what do you know about my bracelet?" I asked, relieved by his disinterest in pressing the matter of Ludwig. "Seigetsu knows something about it too."

Terutomo scrutinized me. "I suppose we could do some tests to see for sure. The thing is, I only know what they're supposed to be capable of, and have a hunch yours isn't nearly at full power."

"Why do you say that?" I tilted my head.

Seigetsu summoned her hammer again. "For one, it is black," she said. "Devoid of color. And for two, I have yet to see you cause it to change form. Even the Order of Silence can do that, though not nearly with the ease that we can."

My eyes widened as I took in the hammer again. "Wait, is that-?"

Seigetsu nodded.

"It's a tenet of our scripture we don't like to discuss with outsiders," Terutomo explained. "These weapons are known as Umhuxanjarn. Through rigorous training, dragons can summon them from thin air, alter their form at will, and perform numerous other feats. We hold them not merely to be divine, but connected to our souls on some fundamental, mystical level I'm not the best suited to explain. Certain types of Abyssinians can summon them as well, although theirs work a little differently. Both sides restrict the knowledge to their upper circles, though, out of fear of what could happen if our lay soldiers got captured and that knowledge found its way into the rank-and-file of the other side. When properly employed, these can be... devastating."

"So you cover up valuable military secrets under the shroud of religion," Papyrus said. "Clever. Did you take that one from the old Griffon Empire?"

"And what about ponies?" Corsica pressed. "You said it's a problem if we can make these too?" She looked sideways at my bracelet.

Terutomo slowly nodded. "Abyssinia thinks it would be. From our perspective, it's more complicated than that. You see, ponies can't make them. Understand that in both Cernial and Abyssinia, batponies are seen as Abyssinians rather than ponies, so you and the Order of Silence don't technically break that rule... except our classification might be wrong, because getting the Order of Silence to manifest theirs takes a lot of doing, even beyond accepting their accursed power. And even once they have them, theirs are much more limited than ours, as if they're somehow shackled as a race. That's another part of why we keep this quiet: given our beliefs about them, it could easily be interpreted that we were claiming to be a higher order of being than the ponies we coexist with. Which couldn't be farther from our intention, of course, but we can no more easily control your ability to summon these weapons than we can go back in time and change scripture."

"But..." I looked at my bracelet. "You think this is shackled? I never did anything special to summon it. In fact, I don't even think I can. It just always existed."

"You're clearly a special case," Terutomo said. "Which is why I'm worried, and curious what would happen if we tried teaching you how to use it as if you were a dragon. It is my personal belief that the Abyssinian scriptures at least hint at a truth, and these weapons were in some way related to the conflict between our gods. Although I would hazard a guess that the real sign they warn of is not the uncovering of these weapons in ponies, but the breaking of whatever seal binds their power."

Chills ran up and down my body. "So... there's a really good reason for me to not push my limits and figure out what this can do. A really, really good reason."

"Perhaps." Terutomo shrugged. "Or perhaps yours is sealed just like all the others, and nothing you could do could break it. Or perhaps you are already an exception to the rule, and consequences will come whether you understand what you can do or not, in which case would it not be better to have that knowledge? After all, even the most fearsome of tools can still be used for good or evil depending on the whims of its wielder."

"Does that apply to Aegis?" Corsica tipped her head at Seigetsu. "Because she was pretty sure earlier that it didn't."

Terutomo hesitated. "I would rather see the Aegis used for good than for evil. But in that particular case, it would be much better for it not to be used at all."

Seigetsu nodded. "Speaking of the Aegis, I must go and oversee it. It sounds as though you have firmly made your decision about whether to trust these ponies, and I will abide by it. I pray your reasoning is sound."

With a gentle swish of the door, she stiffly departed.

"...Thanks," I said when she was gone. "For being... reasonable about this. I was kind of afraid after I threw in my lot with you, it would go... you know..."

Terutomo shrugged. "For the sake of transparency, I am still evaluating you. I just find that a smile costs nothing, a truth my sister takes her duty too seriously to grasp. That said, no, I don't think your intentions are in doubt. You'll forgive me for having to make certain?"

I slowly nodded.

"As long as we get our boat," Corsica said.

"Right. Your boat." Terutomo sagged a little. "As inclined as I am to help you, I am going to need a little more before I can send you merrily on your way. If you recall, you weren't very forthcoming with your plans and motives the first time we met. And, having seen a slight bit more of you since then, I can make some guesses as to why, but at the very least I need to know what you're intending to do in Equestria with all these powers of yours. You're searching for two ponies, at least one of which is known internationally. Why?"

I took a few deep breaths. Terutomo was a lot more easygoing than Seigetsu, and most importantly he seemed happy to accept talk about my bracelet without pushing about me being a changeling queen. "It's like this..."

And then I told him about Ironridge, the gray sky and the crystal tower, and the almost-extinct flame I recovered in a crystal palace at the bottom of the world. Papyrus looked intrigued. Corsica looked stony. Terutomo sat impassive through it all.

"...Also, there are windigoes involved in all of it," I finished. "But let's talk about the first half of our story before we get around to the second."

"I think," Terutomo said, "that what you need is not a boat to Catantan, but a train to the Crystal Empire."

My ears flicked.

"It is Equestria's nearest seat of power," he went on. "Close enough that all of you could go there together on an overnight train." He looked pointedly at Papyrus, and I suddenly remembered Papyrus had been told about the trains.... or, at least, I presumed that was the forbidden knowledge he was given. "The six element bearers, Fluttershy among them, have close connections with Equestria's royalty, and their leader even counts herself among them. This would surely be the fastest way for you to assemble all of the ponies you need. And if all this is true, then time is of the essence. You do not have the time to sail to Catantan and back, even if your information is accurate. Better to let someone else make the trip in your name, and the Crown has ample resources at their disposal to arrange for that."

"You think we can just waltz in there and ask for a meeting?" Corsica asked. "With some of the most important ponies in the nation?"

Terutomo nodded. "If I send a representative bearing the weight of Cernial's authority, then absolutely. Although I would wager the number of writs you possess would be plenty to attract their attention even without my help..." He rubbed his chin. "But if my sister's reports about the windigo are true, then the Aegis will no longer be safe here. It was returned to Cernial after its discovery some twenty years ago, and then sent to Snowport for safekeeping. But Cernial's resources are limited, and entirely dedicated to the war effort. Perhaps we will need to return the Aegis to the Crystal Empire as well, and deliver it back to Equestria's control for the time being. And that would necessitate a lot more than a single representative..."

I perked up a little. If Aegis needed to go to the same place we would be meeting Fluttershy, that would work out well for the pink flame...

"I must think on this, and get back to my work," Terutomo said, standing up. "You all are free to wander the castle with escorts, although as we still are lifting the lockdown protocol I would advise against frivolous travel. We shall talk again the moment things have calmed down, ideally after my men have located Yelvey. And once again, I thank you for your service to Snowport. My family always honors its debts."

He bowed deeply, then walked away.

Coming Clean

The upper hallways of Terutomo's castle were freezing, and when we passed by a window, I realized why: a blizzard had sprung up.

A heavy blanket of snow already covered the ground and the rail yard, which the window I found was facing, and more was accumulating by the minute. It was a familiar kind of blizzard, the same as we got up in Icereach: heavy black clouds roaring by, close above, and yet a seeming absence of wind just beneath them, the thick snow falling straight and undisturbed.

"That sure happened fast," Corsica remarked, stepping up to look as well.

"Beautiful, ain't it?" a guard accompanying us said, folding his hands behind his back. "Ever since the Equestrians reclaimed the Crystal Empire, weather like this has been rarer and rarer. But sometimes, fortune still smiles."

I felt a small sparkle of kinship for the ice dragons, remembering they, too, were at home amid the cold. Although there was such a thing as too cold... I took a step back from the window, just in case.

"...Anyway," Corsica said. "Maybe we could get a room that doesn't have windows, in that case."

The guard nodded. "Of course."

I wasn't paying attention to when Papyrus slipped away, and in fact only recognized that he was gone when Corsica led me into a snugly decorated space that looked like a cross between a hotel chamber and an office break room, and the guard didn't follow us inside. "I'll be across the hall if you need me," he said, stepping away and leaving the door slightly ajar.

Corsica lit her horn and closed it.

I blinked at her. "What are we doing here?"

Corsica sat down and stared at me, inviting me to figure it out for myself.

I scratched an ear. After being grilled by Seigetsu, fighting Duma, getting arrested, waking up with my memory not-quite-wiped, and being harassed by an old pony intent on recruiting me into his cult, I had just been following along with wherever we were going, happy to have a moment alone with the inside of my head... I had nothing.

Corsica sighed and turned away. "Bet you're feeling pretty lucky, huh? Not every day Papyrus comes to someone's rescue like that."

"What do you-?" I blinked. "Oh. Yeah. He did get us a friendlier audience, didn't he?"

"I dunno about that," Corsica huffed. "It looked like a standard good cop, bad cop routine to me. Still, you got to avoid spilling your secrets by some miracle of fate. Big relief, isn't it?"

The hostile note in her voice was more than enough to put me back on edge. "What are you on about?"

"Don't worry," Corsica said, "it's just the bracelet, nothing more. Miss 'what if I'm the product of something majorly heretical'. I'm surprised the dragons didn't press more deeply. Maybe they just don't know you as well as I do. You wanna know how I'm feeling right now?"

I swallowed. "Do I?"

"I've spent months," Corsica growled, turning on me, but keeping her distance. "Years, even, trying to get to know you better. I'm your best friend. We've crossed continents and gotten kidnapped and worked for a godlike janitor together, and still, it feels like every time you learn something or know something, I'm the last pony to know. You're out of my reach, and getting farther away. Last night I finally got you to promise to tell me everything, and actually let myself get my hopes up you'd follow through. And what do I have to do today? Sit there and listen as a couple of dragon inquisitors drag things out of you you never told me voluntarily."

"I..." My heart skipped a beat, and I took a step back.

"I know they didn't get the full truth," Corsica said coldly. "There's still something major you kept just out of sight from them. But what if you hadn't? What if they had pushed just a little harder, cornered you just the right way? If you were me, what would be worse? Still not knowing? Or having to find out like that?"

She gritted her teeth and punched the floor. "I just want you to trust me! Not... not... all of this...!"

I was floored. "Corsica..."

"Maybe this is my talent talking," Corsica grumbled. "In fact, it almost definitely is. I told you what happens to me when I overuse it. But you know why I was using it? To keep your sorry butt safe. During your... your escapade with Yelvey, or whatever it was you were doing down there! I never use this power on myself! Ever! It's always for you! And you just... You don't... Please..."

She started trembling, and trailed off, waiting for me to make the next move. But I was too frozen to speak.

Halcyon... Faye prodded in my mind.

I couldn't move. Why couldn't I move?

What would I say if I did move? I didn't know how to handle something like-

Faye sighed, the green crystal that made up her mask materializing in her forehooves.

She looked at it for a moment. This - Halcyon - was supposed to be her future. A version of her that could live less encumbered by her own baggage, more separate from her past. But if that separation was holding her back...

"It's me," she said, looking up at Corsica. "The original."

Corsica blinked once.

"I figured..." Faye started. "You should hear this from me. After all, it's my history to face. She just inherited it. I know she's the one you've grown attached to. Not me. But, I don't think she can talk about herself. It's a block on some deep, subliminal level... One that I created to protect her. So, if it's my fault that you two are in this situation... I should be the one to make it right."

"Protect her from what?" Corsica whispered.

"Me," Faye said stiffly. "You know that Nehaley... adopted me. The pony she adopted me from... was Chrysalis."

Saying it made her feel oddly hollow, as though the ground she was standing on had cracked off, but not yet started falling away. Corsica's eyes widened, but Faye didn't give her a chance to respond. "The war that destroyed the eastern continent was fought over me. My existence was the final straw that pushed Chrysalis over the edge. The blood of... my entire race is on my hooves. And I have my mother's powers. Everything she can do, I can do... if I ever learned how."

She took off her bracelet, holding it out in front of her. "This isn't a bracelet. It's a crown. My changeling queen crown. A focus for my powers. Growing up, I was terrified of myself. I almost didn't even have a sense of self. The little annoyance you made fun of for tagging along with you and Ansel? That wasn't really me. It was just an empty shell. I'm not even sure if I exist now."

Corsica's ears quivered as she listened.

"The Halcyon you've known for the last two and a half years?" Faye shook her head. "She's another self that I created. A different me that I could pretend to be. One who didn't know who she was, or what she could do, who searched tirelessly for an outside solution to her problems so she'd never turn inward and discover her potential. That's why she was so driven to unravel the mysteries of the light spirit. But, I made her too curious. Eventually... she started to figure it out anyway."

"How long has she known?" Corsica asked. "How long have you known?"

"Since before I was old enough to understand it," Faye said. "But she only figured it out on that final day in Ironridge, when she got back from the caves. She still doesn't know everything. Some of the inhibitions I created her with, though, are so strong that they're preventing her from properly processing or acting on what she learns. I think... I might have made her too simple, too straightforward or too innocent for the life she wants to live. It's probably because I've never much interacted with people before. I created her solely for the task of living with herself, without a thought as to how she'd live with others."

Corsica's eyes softened.

"I'm sorry," Faye said. "You... really have changed. I think you'd be a great friend for her, if she could let you in. And it's not her fault she couldn't tell you the details about the pink flame, or the mission she accepted when she found it down there in the tunnels. Being a changeling queen... My body is like a giant battery for emotion. The flame is made of that, and so is Ludwig. That's why she was able to absorb them. But even I don't understand much about how these powers work. A lot of the things she's been doing, she doesn't understand at all. That's why she can't tell you about them. She still has a mental block against facing the unknown. Like even acknowledging these powers at all would jinx it. You heard her back there, with the dragons, making it sound like it was all the bracelet, and not her herself."

"Is she listening?" Corsica asked. "Right now. Or is this conversation purely between you and me?"

Faye shook her head. "It's just you and me."

Corsica hesitated. "...When you went down there. It took you the better part of a week to come back. What kept you for so long?"

Faye took a deep breath. "As a changeling queen, we're... functionally immortal. Not invincible, but we seem to have supernatural healing and regenerative powers. You remember how surprised the doctors were after she got hit with shrapnel during the Aldebaran incident. Well, while climbing, she slipped and fell... and it just took that long for our body to knit itself back together."

"Huh," Corsica said. "Think it was worth it?"

Faye tilted her head. "What do you mean?"

"Being a changeling queen," Corsica said. "Coming back from a fall like that. If you weren't... If you were an ordinary pony... you'd be dead. But it sounds like you already wanted to not exist so badly, you developed a split personality long before that. So?"

"...I don't know." Faye studied the floor. "Honest. I don't know what our future holds, or what we'll do from here. We hold the potential to create a disaster just like Chrysalis... or if Terutomo is right about the existence of my crown being a harbinger of the end times, maybe something even worse. At the same time, she still has things she wants to accomplish with her life... Dreams and ambitions. Saving Coda, stopping Chrysalis once and for all..."

"Wait a minute!" Corsica blinked. "That's right, Coda! What about her? Wasn't she supposed to be Chrysalis's daughter too? Does that make her your sister, or something?"

Faye chuckled weakly and shook her head. "No. She's a fake heir. A real changeling queen, though. Her cult didn't have the real thing, but believed that another changeling queen was the only thing that could actually oppose Chrysalis. So, they recreated the experiments and made a new one."

Corsica's eyes widened. "That's..."

"Despicable?" Faye sighed. "It doesn't matter. She exists, and now the other me will stop at nothing to help her. Well... nothing except confronting her past, I suppose. But if you asked her, she would say yes. It's worth being a changeling queen to have the opportunity to help Coda and walk alongside her. She's... very attached."

"So, Coda could get through to her where I couldn't, huh?" Corsica laughed bitterly. "Well... you're welcome, I guess. I might be the reason for your existence."

"What?" Faye furrowed her brow.

"My special talent," Corsica said, taking a deep breath. "It..."

Faye cringed.

"What?" Corsica blinked. "You don't want to know?"

"I know how important secrets can be," Faye said. "And I didn't tell you so we can all start sharing everything with each other. I told you because you've stood by Halcyon long enough that you deserve to know, she couldn't tell you herself, and it was going to seriously damage your relationship if it stayed hidden. Maybe it already has. But I know too many things I have to keep to myself already. I don't want to know more."

Corsica rolled her eyes. "And how do you think I feel? You think I want to be the only pony in the world who knows what my special talent does? It's a heavy burden, and you're the only pony I know who could even begin to appreciate that, let alone help carry it. These things are harder when you're alone. You've at least got the benefit of dividing up your head into multiple people to help manage the load, but I can't even afford that much! I don't just want to understand you, I want you to understand me!"

"Why?" Faye asked, looking at her with genuine confusion. "Secrets are safer when nobody knows about them. Halcyon is walking a dangerous road, trying to use our powers while keeping them under wraps, and it's not going to hold much longer. You were right to be afraid the dragons would get the truth out of her, and they still might before we leave this place. But you've done a much better job, haven't you?"

"...No." Corsica looked away. "Actually, Seigetsu figured out exactly how my talent works the very first time she saw me, gritty details and everything. The only reason you haven't noticed is because you... or, I guess, the other you... is bad at figuring out what I'm thinking."

"Oh." Faye sighed. "Fine. You... can say it. I'll keep your secret. Including from her. If you want Halcyon to know, tell her directly yourself."

"Well, it's not that complex," Corsica said, suddenly awkward. "It... I... Look, remember when I was in the hospital, after the accident?"

"Yes." Faye nodded. "A lengthy coma. I was at your bedside almost the whole time. That was... when I finally decided I couldn't live as myself anymore."

Corsica huffed. "Yeah, of course you were there. Do you remember who wasn't there?"

Faye blinked.

"Graygarden," Corsica said. "I heard it from the nurses. And later, from the stallion himself. Apparently, he visited once, for a few minutes when I just got back in... and then never again until after I woke up. Some garbage about work keeping him busy."

Faye's eyes widened in realization. "I wasn't paying attention at the time, but no, you're right. I never saw him there."

"I still haven't had a good and proper talk with him about it," Corsica said. "Haven't had a good and proper talk since then with him about anything. Probably never will. But when I first found out about it, I told him... told him I wished he wasn't my father."

Faye tilted her head.

"And then a few days later," Corsica went on, "I learned I had been adopted."

Faye frowned.

"Things went on the way you remember for a while," Corsica continued. "You were there. I had a brand-new talent. Told ponies it was for geometry or whatever, but the truth was, it seemed to make me good at everything. Not just good at it, but like I'd meet with success before even trying. Except no matter how little effort I put in and how much I succeeded, I got so drained and so tired, like my life force was gone and I was a listless bag of meat. And I could remember what it used to be like, how I was so vibrant and eager to live, and..." She shook her head. "My special talent makes my wishes come true, at the cost of my capacity to want things. It's as simple as that. Once I realized something was wrong and none of the doctors could diagnose it, it was a matter of quick trial and error... When I wanted to figure out how my talent worked, it helped with that, too."

She closed her eyes. "I wished that Graygarden wasn't my father, and suddenly he wasn't. I didn't want him to have a charitable reason for ignoring me while I was injured, and so I never found one. I destroyed that relationship without even knowing what I was doing, and it wasn't the first. During the Aldebaran incident, I wished we'd all get home and everything would end alright. All those 'miracles' you were talking about afterward, how they must have been the work of the light spirit? Just me. And I wished that if we weren't happy with the outcome of Ludwig's game, we'd have the chance to get revenge, remember? When he was there in your house, daring you to fight him... You already had the power to do what you did the second time around, when you possessed him back, or absorbed him into your body or however it went. If you hadn't let him go, you could have done that then and there. You could have done that with your changeling queen powers... which you gained so that my wish could be fulfilled."

Faye narrowed her eyes. "I was born a changeling queen long before you got that special talent."

"That's not how it works." Corsica shook her head. "I was born long before then too, and it still changed the circumstances of my birth. As long as I don't know something about the past concretely, nothing is beyond my talent's reach. It can... retroactively change the past for anything outside my own memories, and everyone else's perceptions will be altered as if the world had always been that way all along. Of course, the alternative is that time is static and the course of history has always been set, and this thing instead controls my mind to make me desire things that already exist, but that's hardly any more comforting..."

Faye sighed.

"Can you even imagine how it feels to be me?" Corsica pressed. "To know that either everything I interact with is an illusion, or that I'm the illusion myself? To be unable to strive toward any goal whatsoever, because any effort I put in is ultimately meaningless and I could just say the magic words instead, but also because I have no effort left to give? I'm so tired, and I want it to end. I wish I had never received this talent to start with, but I know that if I hadn't, both of us would have been dead many times over, and how is being dead any better than the alternative? In fact, the reason I manifested this to begin with was probably because somewhere deep down, even while I was unconscious and comatose, some part of me just refused to accept my fate and die. But whether I want to wish things had been different or not, it doesn't matter, because wishing this talent away is the one thing even it can't do."

"That's... really how you feel, huh?" Faye looked seriously at her. "You truly hate having it that much?"

"I don't know." Corsica gritted her teeth. "How can I even want to give up this power when I use it on a regular basis to keep us safe? Especially when it's you I'm saving? Listen to you. You're a changeling queen, you've got powers you don't understand, you've got some terrible things in your past that arguably aren't your fault but still wouldn't have happened if things had gone differently, you're the only pony who can even begin to understand me, and I might be the same for you. And now we're finally talking, and... I don't know where to go from here."

"...Can I ask a favor?" Faye asked.

"If you want a wish, I'm all tuckered out. But asking is free."

Faye's brow furrowed. "Don't tell... the other me. About what your special talent does. At least, not until she's able to tell you on her own about who and what we are."

"Oh?" Corsica glanced at her.

"It wouldn't be fair," Faye said. "And I'm not sure how she'd handle it. She's still only half-formed. Even though she leads almost all the time, you've seen how she breaks down and can't talk about herself when pressed. The light spirit, those 'miracles' back in Icereach... She hasn't thought about them for a while. They're no longer her driving force. But, she's still trying to figure out what to do with our powers, what kind of future she wants to have for herself, and who she wants to be. I just don't want to take away the platform of faith she's been standing on before she's ready."

"Huh," Corsica said. "Makes sense. But, you know, you're kind of treating her like a child."

Faye shrugged. "She is one. Sort of. But I am, too... We all are. We're barely even adults yet."

"Doesn't change our position in life," Corsica muttered.

"No," Faye agreed. "Anyway. I'll... work with Halcyon about this. If she's going to be embracing our powers, that means keeping them a secret will be less and less possible. And you're the first she should have by her side. I'm going to keep this conversation a secret from her, if that's alright with you, because I want her to tell you this on her own terms. I just... told you now because I could feel how much you were hurting."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You mean that literally?"

Faye nodded. "I do."

"Huh." Corsica turned away. "Well, I guess I can wait for her, then. Sorry for... pressing you like this. I've got a heavy burden. It just got a little much."

"I understand." Faye shook her head. "And if you ever want help figuring out more ways to live with your power, or discovering more about how it actually works... My powers might be suited for that, even if I don't have much control over them."

"Thanks." Corsica stood up, then faced the door. "What next?"

"I suppose we wait out the storm, then take a train to the Crystal Empire," Faye said. "Everything Halcyon told the dragons about the pink flame is true. She's scared of the responsibility she's taken on, and has trouble acknowledging it by talking about it, but it does weigh heavily on her. She... can't ignore it, and that means I can't either."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "But the flame is now in that Aegis thing, which is bound for the Equestrians for other reasons. And you've given the dragons a decently full report. We could always just... do something else."

"We've still gotta protect Ironridge." Faye shook her head. "And rescue Coda. Don't forget, Ansel is still back there, along with a ton of other ponies. Chrysalis doesn't have to be my problem, but... she's a problem that Halcyon has chosen to make her own."

"Gotcha," Corsica sighed. "Seems like an awful big problem to tackle for someone who can't even spill a secret she's bad at keeping to her best friend, but whatever. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it, I guess. And worst comes to worst, you'll have me around to blow out my mental stability ensuring you once again don't die."

"Have you got any leads whatsoever on how to not do that?" Faye pressed. "Some way to make living with your talent more manageable, or... anything?"

Corsica shrugged. "One or two. Starlight supposedly knows a thing about it. According to Valey, she used to have this exact same talent when she was a pre-teen. If I'm this badly off, I doubt someone who was a little kid at the time fared any better, but she might have insight about how to get rid of it and still live with herself after losing the power. Also, Coda thought she could use her changeling queen powers to influence this somehow... but that felt all kinds of gross, so don't even think about trying the same thing without a long and rigorous study."

"Right." Faye nodded. "Starlight. We need her to save Coda, too... unless I can master my own powers well enough to split the burden of sealing all those windigoes, so that it's not too much for either of us to bear. But I don't think we're learning that in time to confidently apply it without a tutor, and I have no idea where we could find a friendly changeling queen."

"Guess we'll cross that bridge when we come to it," Corsica said. "Oh, by the way... if I'm going to be spending more time with you, instead of the other you, is there anything different I should call you, or think of you as?"

Faye hesitated. "...Faye."

Corsica blinked, the gears in her head visibly turning. "Oh," she eventually said. "That makes... so much sense, now..."

I felt slightly disoriented after coming to, aware that I had missed out on something and completely in the dark about what it was. By the change in Corsica's demeanor, however, it had been big.

If you're jealous, Faye said in my head, there's a simple fix: talking to her yourself. She wants to listen. Just... whenever you're ready.

I swallowed. The tension of that moment had clearly passed, but...

Better not to dwell on it. Take the peace when it came, and figure out what to do later.

"Hey," Corsica said, strolling out into the hall and spotting our guard lounging against a wall in an intersection three doors away.

The guard saluted. "That was quick. Bored already?"

"If we're going to be getting a move on, you know where the rest of our friends are?" Corsica asked. "Nehaley, Leitmotif and Braen? And Papyrus too, I guess."

The guard frowned. "Well, I know where their accommodations are, but no promises. This way, if you would?"

We trudged through more frosty corridors, the blizzard outside still barreling through at full force. And, soon enough, we came to the block of rooms where we had been put up for our first night.

The guard knocked on Mother's door.

"I'm home," Mother's voice sighed from within.

The door opened, revealing her and Leitmotif in a room that thankfully didn't have a window. The two were sitting at a table, drinking tea and hunched over a large spread of papers that Leif quickly swept off the table and stuffed into her satchel. The guard bowed and backed off, leaving the four of us alone.

"Hey," Leif greeted. "There's been quite the ruckus around here today. Either of you involved?"

Corsica nodded. "You could say that."

"Is Braen here?" I asked. "We could... do with a team meeting."

Leif shook her head. "She left early this morning. Said something about Freedom Town. Doubt she'll be back until this weather clears up... though knowing her, she might not even notice the cold."

Huh. Maybe she had gone back to the bar to chat with our friends from last night?

"Anyway," Leif said, patting the satchel. "I've been doing some investigating as pertains to our mission. Chrysalis has had a high profile in Equestria over the last few years, and the residents are talkative. They had a lot to say."

I blinked, remembering that we were also trying to stop Chrysalis in addition to getting the pink flame to safety and now whatever I had gotten myself into with Aegis and Duma and Yelvey. When had I sighed myself up for so much...?

"Since we're currently almost certain Chrysalis is in the Yakyakistani capitol, your ether crystal fault plane research will be," Leif went on, "though I'd still like to continue that avenue of pursuit because if that was somehow a false alarm and we tagged along with a military campaign against Yakyakistan for nothing, it would be a huge waste of time and resources. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like we're lucky enough to have an access point to the bottom of the world here in Snowport, and I haven't had a lot of luck coaxing credible legends of incredibly deep, nearby holes out of the townsfolk. But I think our next best move is a trip to the Crystal Empire. From everything I've heard about it, it's probably connected directly to the ether river. You two are the experts, but if I were you, I'd be drooling over the chance to press your studies and theories there."

I glanced at Corsica. She looked at me.

Leif gave both of us a look. "You do remember the reason I joined up, right? You're not getting too distracted with all these other fun adventures while there's still work to be done?"

"All of our lab equipment is back on the ship in the mountains," Corsica pointed out. "Anyway, why did you join up? I wasn't paying much attention when Hallie was passing out writs."

Leif sighed. "I'm helping Halcyon with research the two of you were involved in that targets ether crystal fault planes because I believe their formation can be used as a method of tracking Chrysalis. After you rescued me from Lilith's school, I sighed on. Remember?"

"Sorry," I apologized. "It's been... a busy month. I do still want to do that, though."

Corsica smugly grinned. "I'm starting to see the drawbacks of keeping the details of our mission too close to your chest."

"Yeah, yeah," I groaned, "point taken..."

"Mission creep is dangerous," Leif said. "I don't know what context I'm missing, here, but something tells me you're taking on too many conflicting goals at once, are having trouble balancing them, and just got a stern talking-to?"

I winced. Saying I don't remember here would be the kind of thing Papyrus would do, but in this case, it was true...

"Not really, but close enough," Corsica answered for me. "That's why we need to have a team meeting, though. Luckily for you, the Crystal Empire is decently high on our priority list, but I think it's high time everyone came together and formally put all their reasons for being here on one table at the same time and in the same place."

"What's this about tables?" a voice said from the door.

It was Papyrus, accompanied by Braen, both of whom were caked in snow.

Leif greeted them with a salute I didn't recognize.

"There's an excellent joke to be made here, and all the wrong ponies to make it to," Papyrus sighed. "Anyway, I've just rescued my adorable charge here from an inquisitory tribunal related to her meeting last night with a certain centaur, which for the record she was enjoying far too much. Is everyone seriously all in the same place at the same time? Wow, fancy that. Maybe I should leave again so it doesn't get too productive in here?"

"Nope," Corsica said, closing the door behind him, "everyone stays. We've got a long overdue conversation to have about what everyone's here for, how we're operating, and how we pretend to be a somewhat functional team."

Train Trouble

As Papyrus explained, for the fourth time, that he was tagging along in pursuit of humble psychological enlightenment, to be Braen's bodyguard, and for a few cheap laughs, Corsica found it impossible to focus. This usually happened when she overused her talent, but even if she was running at full capacity, she had a hunch nothing would be different.

For one, she had a strong suspicion nobody at this table was telling the truth about why they were here. Leif, at least, probably wasn't lying about what she wanted: to use that ether crystal fault plane research as a means to an end of tracking down Chrysalis. But every time Corsica tried to learn why she was looking for her, Leif masterfully changed the topic, and Corsica didn't have the mental energy to push the point.

Nehaley's excuse was perhaps the most believable: she was only here because Halcyon tossed a writ in her face. And however much Halcyon was or wasn't thinking things through, it checked out that she would spend a writ for no other reason than to keep her family close at hand. She always used to be torn, back in Icereach, by the ideas of following Corsica out into the world and sticking close to Ansel, after all.

Well, look where they were now.

Braen repeated the story she had given on their first day in Snowport: that she was here because her mother created her to wander the land, collect data and meet ponies. Potentially accurate, but she was a robot, so did she count? Corsica still had no idea what to think of her, or how equine she actually was. Mostly because she hadn't been willing to spare the effort to think about it.

Then there was Halcyon, delivering a much-more-awkward repeat of what she had told Terutomo about the pink flame in Ironridge, which Corsica knew now wasn't the full story after cornering Halcyon and dragging a little more out of her other self. That conversation was the real reason she was distracted, now, and it didn't even make her feel better.

Halcyon was... a changeling queen. Okay. She was so afraid of herself that she had developed a split personality to cover it up. Okay. She was also too ambitious to leave well enough alone... Well, duh. But what Corsica really wanted wasn't to know things, but for Halcyon to talk with her.

Maybe it should feel like a victory, getting Halcyon's older, inner self to come out and talk with her instead. But no matter how much she tried to frame it that way in her mind, it came across as Halcyon avoiding her, and making someone else do the work of explaining her actions. Why couldn't she do the talking herself? Why wouldn't she? The more excuses her other half gave, the more it felt like those excuses were empty noise, and Halcyon herself just didn't want to.

The same side of Halcyon that reached out when she needed it, obsessively and for no reason, until she dragged her out of her spiral and into a presumably-pointless research project about ether crystals that turned out to be just what Corsica needed. Back then, Halcyon had gone out of her way to talk with her, to try to connect with her, and it had been Corsica who was dragging her hooves. So what changed...?

Throughout the conversation, Corsica did her part to lie about why she was here as well: a few dutiful speeches about going to find Starlight and helping Ironridge deal with its windigo problem. No one called her out about how no one could inherently be that heroic. Maybe because they knew they re all making up their reasons, too, and they could all pretend not to acknowledge it together.

Corsica didn't say a word about how she was looking for Starlight for personal reasons, trying to track down a mare who had reportedly lived with her special talent before, so she could find out how she did it. And she especially didn't say anything about just being here to stick with Halcyon.

The meeting ended. Time to deal with the real world again, and get back out of her own head.

Standing in the train yard, accompanied by a cadre of high-ranking guards, Corsica finally got her first close-up look at Equestrian trains.

The yard was about half full, and it seemed to have three different kinds of locomotives. Some were brightly colored and whimsically decorated, made of sunny colors like red, pink and orange, with lots of curved trim and an old-timey vibe. Others were sleek, aerodynamic and painted with metallic shades of pastel colors, still too bright and whimsical to belong in industrial Ironridge, but undoubtedly designed by a more future-oriented pony. The third were relatively unremarkable, painted a dim shade of gold and lacking much artistry or flair in their design.

It was one of those golden trains that she and her draconic entourage clustered around. Only two cars were being attached to the locomotive: a plain-looking boxcar that was clearly designed to haul freight, and a car with windows that looked designed for passengers.

"Wonder what powers it?" Corsica mused, searching the engine for any telltale signs of fuel storage.

"The rails do," a wide, quadrupedal dragon with pleated spikes on his back and a tail that ended in a wrench tip answered, lumbering over. "Handy, isn't it?"

"The rails?" Corsica glanced over at him.

The dragon bobbed his triangular head. "Sure thing. They're made with alicorn magic, after all. Some say Princess Celestia uses them as a reservoir for her power, and keeps it there rather than on herself most times. You can see for yourself if you get a little closer to the tracks... Or maybe you can't? I can never quite wrap my head around how pony vision works. But as long as the trains have the princess's blessing, and they're on the tracks, the tracks will share their power with them and along they'll go."

"You don't say?" Papyrus asked, wandering closer as well.

The dragon perked up. "You a fan of trains as well?"

"A fan of hearing how goddesses store their power, actually," Papyrus mused. "You know, the Night Mother did something similar, stuffing all her excess power into a network of crystals and altars spread throughout the cities in her country, back up north. I bet there used to be whole conventions of goddesses where they'd share these tricks with each other. Train tracks, crystals... I wonder which one actually came up with this, and why it's such a good idea that they decided to share. After all, they could just keep all that power in themselves, instead..."

The dragon looked nonplussed. "Well... uhh... Fan of theology, huh? Sorry. I know more about trains than that! What I do know is, it's a great thing Princess Celestia does it how she does it, because otherwise we'd have to build all these tracks ourselves, and lug along entire cars full of fuel. Who knows what we'd even use for that." He scratched himself and stared at the trains. "Who knows how much slower they'd go, as well..."

"Hey, you!" another dragon shouted at him. "Stop slacking off and help me do a safety check on these axles!"

With a dutiful nod, he lumbered away.

Corsica glanced at Papyrus, unsure if she wanted to keep this conversation going.

"Completely apropos of nothing," Papyrus said, apparently making the decision for her. "If you were a goddess, what would you want to be the goddess of?"

"Huh?" Corsica tilted her head.

"Well, you could always be the goddess of megalomaniacally trying to rule the world," Papyrus explained. "But that's kind of standard. I've only ever met... I mean, I've only heard of one god or goddess who didn't have any territory to their name, and they didn't seem all that happy about it. But these divinities tend to have domains as well, things their power is tied to on some level us poor mortals can't understand. Things like..." He rubbed his chin. "They call old Celestia the Princess of the Sun. And it's quite believable if you've ever seen her fight. Fire magic, all over the place! You could almost burn yourself, just thinking about it..."

"Huh," Corsica repeated. "Never thought about it. Not sure I'd have a domain. What about you?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Oh, I'd probably be the god of getting on everyone's nerves. No ideas for you, eh?"

"Dunno." Corsica wasn't feeling up to this conversation, but wasn't feeling up to ending it, either, so inertia carried her along. "Would I need one?"

"Who can say?" Papyrus took a few steps toward the train. "Could be interesting fodder for conversation with the alicorns, though, assuming we get dragged before them to plead for aid for Ironridge like my gut says is inevitable."

A small suspicion started to nudge at Corsica's mind. "You've got something you want me to say to them on your behalf."

Papyrus's cheekily-innocent expression gave everything away. "Well, on the off chance that I somehow got too terrified to speak in the presence of someone who would actually do something about it if I ran my mouth the wrong way..."

Corsica stared at him.

"Look," Papyrus sighed. "I'm smart enough to read the stakes in a room. I know how to stick to running my mouth when the worst that'll happen is a few hurt feelings and maybe a punch to the face, and how to get serious when something bigger is going down. And I also know that parlaying with goddesses is about the most serious time there is. So if I happen to find myself suspiciously indisposed at the moment of truth, chalk it up to me being a team player, don't ask questions and pretend like I'm there in spirit, alright?"

Corsica hesitated. "You're unsure enough of your grip on your own tongue that you're preemptively bailing on any important meetings we're going to have, and think the royalty are going to directly take interest in our mission."

"Well, of course they are!" Papyrus waved a wing. "It's not like you're asking for the help of someone only two steps below them on the chain of command. I'd bet you Fluttershy and Celestia even have tea together from time to time! Not to mention I've got the distinct impression that even if innocent little Halcyon thinks she's only here to ask for the aid of two particular ponies, the way this is going to end involves us beseeching the military intervention of all of Equestria in the north, which would definitely involve pleading our case to the toppest of the top brass."

Corsica sighed. "You realize that out of all of us, you're the best suited to actually making that case, right?"

Papyrus looked taken aback.

"Halcyon has too many mental blocks about what she can talk about," Corsica said. "She doesn't trust anyone. Not her friends, and certainly not the authorities. I'm clinically lazy, and Leif is almost certainly up to something illegal. Nehaley doesn't care, and Braen... I dunno about Braen. You're sinister, but at least you're not afraid to put your cards on the table to get what you want. You know how this team of ours works."

Papyrus chuckled darkly. "It's cute that you feel that way about me, especially the implication that I'm not up to anything illegal. But I'm serious, I'll be keeping my head down. In fact, this might be the last you'll see of me for quite a while. But you're right about the rest of our friends, and that's why I'm expecting you'll be the one who actually takes point, here."

Corsica frowned.

"We treat Halcyon like the leader because she doesn't ask questions, doesn't get in our way and isn't smart enough to question the status quo," Papyrus whispered. "But I know your type. You're not actually lazy. You'd move continents to get what you want, and you can do it, too. You're just..." He glanced at her special talent. "Very particular in what you choose to care about."

"What of it?" Corsica narrowed her eyes.

"Just saying." Papyrus turned to leave. "Nobody else is going to steal your show, and there aren't many better opportunities to further your agenda than getting to plead your case to a goddess. Just spend some thought in advance so you know exactly what you want your agenda to be."

At last, the dragons finished their preparations and asked us to board the train.

On the way here, I had seen the passenger station where normal ponies and dragons got on and off the trains, and also the freight stations where goods were loaded and unloaded. Why unload the goods and ship them by water if the trains were so magically fast, when ridden by ponies who didn't know how far they were going? I didn't know. But there was probably a reason, somewhere.

We didn't go to either of those stations, though. The dragons took us way out into the middle of the rail yard, where we boarded a short train after a short wait, consisting only of the engine, a passenger car and a car that was undoubtedly carrying Aegis. I climbed into the passenger car via a makeshift boarding platform and beheld a wide, well-maintained array of plush benches set across from one another, so that groups of passengers could converse with each other more easily.

Several other dragons accompanied us, plus an entire entourage of guards I was sure were waiting in the other car with Aegis. The last one to board was Seigetsu.

"You're coming too?" I asked, blinking.

"Did I not say I would?" Seigetsu asked, standing as the doors closed and everyone else took a seat. "You shouldn't need a reminder of what it is we're transporting. If Abyssinia is aware of Duma's plot, as I have no doubt they are, it would be foolish not to expect them to try to interfere with our transport." She summoned her purple hammer, patted it, and dismissed it again. "Rest assured, we are ready."

I swallowed.

"I also sent word on ahead to the Crystal Empire," Seigetsu confirmed. "And they acknowledged with a response. We are trying not to make this train overly conspicuous with an immediately visible guard. Instead, the Crystal Empire's aerial forces will be stationed in the mountains to our north, observing the train from a distance and ready to intervene at the first sign of trouble."

"Hadn't realized this was a high-risk trip," I explained, suddenly nervous. "Are you sure this is... you know, wise?"

Seigetsu shook her head. "We have also prepared four visually-identical trains that will set out at substantial intervals from each other, three of which are decoys. Ours will not be the first. Should the Abyssinians spring a hasty ambush, they will find themselves foiled for want of a prize, yet set upon and vanquished by the Crystal Empire's finest either way. Rest assured that though we may be far from the front lines, we are no less experienced in how to operate safely when under threat. You will be perfectly fine."

Now that she said it, I felt like I had been jinxed. "So... how long until we set off?"

"The interval between trains is roughly two hours," Seigetsu said. "About the amount of time it takes to pass within the Crystal Empire's territory. Whether or not all goes well I will receive a report as soon as anything newsworthy reaches the city. The order in which the trains leave is being randomized and obfuscated to help foil spies, so I do not know yet which turn ours will be. I would advise settling in for a wait."

I glanced around, noticing a small bistro at the end of the car. Well, at least we were prepared to sit around for a while...

Time passed in what felt like fits and starts. Sometimes, I would look at the clock to see that only five minutes had passed; other times an entire half-hour would be gone. Eventually, a guard entered the car, passing a slip of paper to Seigetsu and departing without a word.

"The dice have spoken," Seigetsu said. "It seems our turn is nigh."

The train jolted, and I felt its engines come to life.

"No trouble with the first one, then?" Papyrus asked, swaggering over.

"No," Seigetsu said. "Nothing out of the ordinary. That is a heartening sign, as it would be the most likely one to be attacked."

I hissed under my breath. Please, please stop trying to jinx it...

"I take it you are familiar with some form of combat?" Seigetsu said as the train began to roll. "Your lack of hesitation in the stasis chamber certainly suggested as much."

"I've done my time." Papyrus shrugged. "Don't know how much I'd count on anyone else in my group, though."

"How likely actually is it that the train is going to be attacked?" I pressed. "Duma kind of made out like he wasn't expecting to find Aegis down there. Did you learn anything after we left?"

"No." Seigetsu shook her head. "He has been frustratingly tight-lipped. Or rather, all too talkative about subjects that are irrelevant. It is clear he is proficient in wasting my interrogators' time." She sighed. "The bigger worry is that we have been completely unable to find any trace of Yelvey. My soldiers breached his inner sanctum and completed an extensive search, and while we did not find the stallion himself we were able to locate an empty vial of the type of enchanted glass used to hold Formula L, but without the Convocation's proprietary watermark on the bottom. So, it seems that part of your story adds up nicely."

I glanced out the window as we left the train yard, switched onto the main tracks, and began to pick up speed. "The Order of Silence don't have any powers they could use to stop a train, do they?"

"Theoretically, yes," Seigetsu said. "But mostly things anyone else could do. Felling a tree and dragging it across the tracks, for instance. And as Yelvey is old and somewhat infirm, I don't think he presents the greatest threat in this scenario."

I settled back into my seat, uncomfortably watching the land roll by.

Ahead of us and behind, my window looked out on farmland, probably tilled by the residents of Freedom Town, or maybe some dragons who felt like walking a long way. Right now, though, it was fallow, covered in a heavy blanket of snow from the recent blizzard. The skies were clear and blue, the clouds having completely receded into the distance... In Icereach, storms arrived suddenly and then slowly trailed off. Here, maybe it was the opposite?

At one point, we passed another train running the opposite direction. It looked like a freight train, carrying car after car after car of goods. Apparently, the dragons didn't think the threat was severe enough to close down inbound traffic? Or maybe they had no way to get a message out that far in time?

If I were bent on stealing Aegis, I wouldn't waste my time on trains going the wrong way, personally. Maybe the dragons were just really, really confident in making the same assumption.

Hopefully, it was a safe one.

Again, I found myself watching the clock. By the time half an hour passed, the farmland was receding, replaced by empty, gentle hills. The track was raised just enough to see over them, to a forest in the distance and a low mountain range beyond that. I switched to the other side of the car, and saw that we were still following the mountain range that had extended south from Sires Hollow. Now, judging by the angle of the sun, it was running almost due west, with just a little south still left in its trajectory.

What was the Crystal Empire like? A valley ringed by mountains? From the external geography, that seemed like a good guess... I squinted upwards, trying to spot the guards that were supposedly watching out for us. The mountains were so tall, though, I couldn't be sure if I was seeing them, or if it was just a trick of my eyes.

Another hour passed, and a track merged into ours, coming from the south through a pass in the low mountains. I could see an upcoming pass to the north, accompanied by a high elevation gain, entering the crystal mountains... Was that the moment of truth?

We approached the switch where the tracks merged with the ones heading to Cernial, in the west. I stuck my head out of the window to try and see what was ahead, and although the train blocked half of my vision, I couldn't see anything threatening. Was Seigetsu's ploy actually working? Was nothing coming to get us? The train was losing speed, preparing for the junction...

I held my breath as the train switched rails. The wheels clunked... and then we were heading north, picking up speed again, mountains closing in on either side, the tracks to Cernial receding in the background. Instead of skirting the Crystal Empire, we were heading directly into it, getting further inside its boundaries with every second. If I had been an ambusher, my window of opportunity would be shrinking fast.

We passed through a checkpoint staffed by armored ponies that seemed to glitter in the sun, and I let out a breath along with what felt like every dragon in the car.

"What did I tell you?" Seigetsu said with a smile. "It seems we won't be getting to see any action after all."

"Odd, isn't it?" Corsica asked. "You'd think if this Aegis is such a big deal to Abyssinia, and they really did know about it, they'd have tried to capture it for certain. Even if you bamboozled them with this multiple-trains thing, they'd still have attacked at least one of them."

Seigetsu shrugged. "Perhaps. Or, perhaps, Duma truly was an independent agent, or he found the Aegis by mistake, as he claims."

Tension receded further, and the Crystal Empire came into sight.

From a distance, it looked like a massive dome, with some kind of castle or tower in the center. As we got closer, I realized the dome was made of magical energy: snow drifts and glaciers bordered the tracks as we approached, but just inside it was lush grass and specks of color that had to be flowers. The dome drew closer, and I realized the tracks ran right through it moments before it was upon us. The dome passed through the train, approaching us like a wall, and then through everyone else, and through me.

It felt like... passing through thick water with no surface tension. Time didn't actually slow down as we made the jump, but the barrier seemed to catch on me and hang on, as if I wasn't quite as impermeable as everyone else. It slipped through me like snow through a compressed sieve, and as it did I heard a chorus of sparkling voices, blending together in a harmony of prayers for prosperity and peace.

Slowly, I blinked myself back to reality, feeling vaguely like I had just gazed through a kaleidoscope. Nobody else seemed to have been as heavily affected, though some of my companions were visibly checking themselves over.

"Welcome to the Crystal Empire," Seigetsu said, folding her arms behind her back.

"Nice place," Corsica said, in a tone that suggested she might legitimately be impressed. "Now what?"

"I shall act as your escort up until we encounter the royalty," Seigetsu explained. "I must report on the status of the Aegis situation myself, and have a keen interest in seeing that you get where you are going. Fortunately, it seems all this chose to happen on the day of a significant cultural event, and all the princesses are already in attendance."

"Well, that's convenient," Corsica said.

"It is not so rare as you might think," Seigetsu explained. "They seem to enjoy each other's company, which for a nation with shared rulers is much preferable to the alternative. Much preferable."

"Does Cernial often have rifts among it leadership?" Corsica asked.

"...Yes," Seigetsu admitted. "Albeit ones that are often resolved out of the public eye. Fortunately, we have not ever had one so deep as to involve questioning the value of our mission as a whole. The necessity of cooperation means that, in the end, we find a way to cooperate."

I tilted my head. "You're talking like there's an alternative?"

"Oh, there's an alternative, alright," Papyrus said. "If you want to see what it looks like, go ask the Griffon Empire."

Seigetsu nodded. "Or the Equestria of a thousand years ago."

"Remind me what that was, again?" Corsica frowned.

"Two sibling alicorns decided they no longer wanted to play pretty and share power together," Papyrus said. "One got greedy and tried to hang onto more than her fair share. The other rebelled, and it didn't go so well for her. That's the story that got told in the Griffon Empire, at least."

Seigetsu frowned. "Greed did not factor into it. Princess Luna grew jealous of her sister, Princess Celestia, because ponies slept during the night and were awake during the day... They are the princesses of moon and sun, respectively, if you did not know. That jealousy led her to become susceptible to a monster known as the Nightmare that corrupted her beyond recognition, forcing her sister to seal her away. Its taint has recently been purged and Princess Luna has been welcomed back as a member of the royal family, and she is by all accounts most happy to have her ordeal be over. It is an important story to be familiar with, and a difficult one to avoid hearing at some point, and I bring it up now that I might ask you not allow it to overly color your perceptions. Since returning, Princess Luna has learned from those mistakes and joined her sister in being a staunch ally of dragonkind."

"You sure about that?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "See, the version of the story I heard involved these magical doodads, and a few hurt feelings up north as well... But what do I know, I'm just an amateur historian with a mysterious past. I'm sure you've got much more first-hand experience than little old me."

Seigetsu gave him a look. "I am unaware of any 'magical doodads' in the tale. But if you truly think my version of the story is lacking, you could always press them for details yourself."

"Nah." Papyrus shrugged and turned tail. "I'm good."

The train rolled to a stop, pulling up at a station that for some reason was built on the distant outskirts of the city, rather than near the middle. I hurried off, wanting to watch as Aegis was unloaded.

Corsica followed me, and the rest of my entourage, and Seigetsu, and the dragons... and eventually the train started up again, moving along without the boxcar being touched at all.

"Where's it going?" I asked, my ears falling in disappointment. "Some secret storage facility?"

Seigetsu chuckled. "You think we would have told you if it was actually on that train?"

My brows scrunched in confusion. "But you said you were coming to guard it yourself!"

Seigetsu shrugged. "I came along specifically to guard you, in case our train was targeted. Every train in the convoy was told that they would be carrying the Aegis, in order to minimize the potential for information to be leaked to spies. As I said, we take this matter seriously."

My face fell. "Then how come send us in a convoy like this at all? I thought you were only following us because you wanted to keep an eye on us and the Aegis at the same time. We could have gone on a different train, one after the Abyssinians would have thought Aegis had been moved."

"To give you a taste of how we operate," Seigetsu said. "My brother was convinced you would find the experience thrilling or enlightening. Additionally, we couldn't very well send you on your way with no security whatsoever. Whether he was mistaken or not, Duma certainly pegged you for a bad actor, and thus it is a safe assumption others could make that mistake as well. Rest assured we brought more than enough firepower to protect you in the event things actually did become a conflict."

"Your brother sounds like a real piece of work." Papyrus rolled his eyes. "Train scare appreciated. Now, do my eyes deceive me, or are we stuck walking?"

"Walking is not so bad," Seigetsu said. "Besides, the gardens of the Crystal Empire are quite pleasant. The year-round weather stability granted by this shield, combined with the latent magical properties of the place, do wonders for the local flora."

I glanced at the flowers. They were plentiful, sure, and vibrant... but also looked somewhat unhealthy, as if they had just suffered a brief, violent cold snap. Maybe the earlier blizzard had affected them, somehow? I didn't see any traces of snow anywhere inside the shield...

They looked hardy, though. Enough that with a little care, they'd probably spring back good as new.

...Almost like the forest around the meteor impact site in the Aldenfold, I realized. This place didn't seem to have many trees, but its odd lushness reminded me of that grove nonetheless. Was that same kind of energy present here, too?

I looked at the town ahead of us, seemingly carved entirely from crystal. Rising above the buildings was a crystal tower, almost like the one in Ironridge... except not as high, and looking carefully crafted and sculpted rather than organic and wild. It was still tall, though, taller than any ordinary building I had ever seen, and much taller than any of its surroundings.

My heart told me it was related, somehow. I wondered if I would get to find out why.

The Emissary

As we wandered the streets of the Crystal Empire, me and Corsica and everyone who made the trip from Ironridge following Seigetsu and flanked by more dragons, my sensation that something wasn't right was growing.

No one had come to greet us at the train station, despite the fact that Aegis's security apparently constituted an international emergency, or the fact that we weren't the first train in Seigetsu's convoy to arrive, or the fact that Snowport had apparently been coordinating with the Crystal Empire to have guards in the mountains watching the trains, ready to intervene if there was trouble. Seigetsu, normally unflappable, looked somewhere between annoyed and unnerved, and there was no one anywhere for her to take it out on. The town around the crystal tower was a ghost town.

A beautiful ghost town, at least. Appropriately, the Crystal Empire was made from crystal, with grainy, glittering streets and faceted buildings that looked like natural crystals had just happened to grow up in the shape of houses. After the building material, the most immediate thing that stood out to me about the architecture was how it clearly wasn't designed for a dense population: houses had yards that separated them from the streets and each other, with sparkly sidewalks and cute little porches. Most were a single floor high, and with relatively small footprints, probably unsuitable for families with more than two or three foals.

Instead of functional spaces, space here was spent on aesthetics, like street intersection plazas with statues, or even wedges of crystal that served no clear purpose whatsoever. The quaint little standalone houses reminded me of Sires Hollow, except Sires Hollow had clearly maximized space efficiency with careful planning to cram a vision of some utopia into a small valley in the middle of nowhere. The Crystal Empire looked like more like something that could have colored their vision of what utopia was.

But even the small population indicated by the houses couldn't explain how empty the place was. And so when we finally did see a pony, a lone mare with a watering can trying to resuscitate a garden that looked like it had been stepped on, Seigetsu immediately hailed them.

"Excuse me," Seigetsu said, striding up. "Can you tell me where everyone is?"

The mare looked up from her work, apparently not at all unused to running into dragons, her coat glittering like the holographic foil on a trading card game that used to be popular when I was a filly in school. "At the castle," she said, pointing a hoof toward the crystal tower. "We haven't had a Crystalling this eventful in forever! The after-party energy got a bit much for me, so I left early to fix up my flowers, but most everyone's still going at it like there's no tomorrow."

"Ah." Seigetsu adjusted the brim of her hat. "They're all at a party. Of course. I thank you for your time."

She continued walking, nodding for the rest of us to follow. The sparkly mare waved, then went back to her gardening, apparently unconcerned with the way my eyes - and the eyes of every non-dragon in the party - were still fixed on her as we retreated. With a coat like that, you probably got looks a lot.

Do you suppose the shine is part of living here? Faye mused in my head. I wonder if it's based on the environment, or if she's actually a different race. If we mastered our shapeshifting powers, maybe we could look like that, too.

Good question. Fur that looked like faceted crystal felt gaudy, unnecessary, beautiful and unrealistic... but I wanted it. It was just like the old, oversized coat I had gone back to wearing ever since Corsica's new one got ruined in the Flame District. Somehow, I was most comfortable in my body when I looked like I was trying too hard.

"What is 'Crystalling'?" Braen asked as we walked. "Reason that mare gave for party."

"A local tradition involving the christening of a newborn foal," Seigetsu said. "I did mention all of Equestria's royalty happened to be here today for a cultural event. It just so happens that this foal is the daughter of the Crystal Empire's reigning alicorn."

"And that just happened to fall on the same day this business happened with Duma?" Corsica mused. "Think it's a coincidence?"

"Mmm... I suppose it is possible." Seigetsu considered this. "The Princess's pregnancy was no secret. Had Duma's plans involved it, it would not have been difficult to arrive in these parts near the time of the birth. Of course, it seems more likely his arrival was timed to coincide with his yet-undiscovered collaborator. And since we know so little of their motives, goals or identity, it would pay to remain vigilant. After all, we may well be the only ones doing so." She frowned at her surroundings.

"You're bothered by the complete lack of anyone too, eh?" Papyrus guessed.

"I do not resent the Equestrians their carefree lives," Seigetsu said calmly. "After all, many sacrifices are made so that they can have them. That is simply the role that we who live on the outskirts are meant to play. However... I do find it inconvenient."

"How noble of you," Papyrus remarked, sounding unimpressed. "You know, back in the Griffon Empire, everyone took what they could, when they could, and never felt bad about it afterward. You've got your inquisitor powers, a noble lineage, can swing that purple hammer around... Ever thought of doing right by yourself for a change? What do you actually get out of this arrangement?"

Seigetsu sighed. "That sounds barbaric, and doesn't leave me the least bit surprised that when their order collapsed, the collapse was swift and total."

"Don't dodge the question," Papyrus pressed. "Come on, I'm curious! What's in this for you?"

"If you even need to ask, I can guarantee you wouldn't be satisfied with my response," Seigetsu said. "And so I prefer not to say."

"Spoilsport," Papyrus whined.

"Speaking of things not to say," Seigetsu continued. "I aim to secure a full audience with the Equestrian royalty, both to report on and discuss the situation in Snowport and to introduce you. I should hope this goes without saying, but please leave the speaking to me wherever possible. Once my own business has concluded and the Princesses know who you are and why you have come, there will be ample time for you to make your own cases yourselves."

Fine by me. I suddenly realized I hadn't been thinking about or preparing myself at all for a meeting with a goddess, let alone four of them... or however many answered Seigetsu's call.

Would it suddenly be easy to discuss my mission with the pink flame? Or would I keep tripping over my own secrets, like I had back in Snowport? The last goddess I had gotten to know was Coda, and that sure had ended well.

As we drew closer to the crystal tower, the gardener mare's predictions of a party came true in full force. At least two hundred ponies were dancing, carousing, devouring dainty appetizers and generally having a great time, their coats sparkling brightly and brilliantly. Holding court on a makeshift tower in the center of the mob was a tiny purple dragon about half my height, looking like it was telling a story that enthralled everyone close enough to hear it over the din.

"...Ah," Seigetsu said, scanning the party. "I suppose that's where the royal guards are, as well."

Sure enough, a smattering of bulky stallions with color-coded mohawks and holographic plate mail were participating in the festivities, living it up and clearly not thinking about greeting us at the train platform, or waiting in the mountains to defend the trains.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Well, we'll just leave them to it," Seigetsu said, leading us in a circuit around the farthest outskirts of the crowd. "Hopefully the castle itself is guarded... but if not, I know my way through it. Sometimes it is hard to wrap my mind around just how carefree they are allowed to be."

"You think the castle might be unguarded due to a party?" Leif asked, skeptical. "What good are guards if they're that easy to remove?"

Seigetsu folded her hands behind her back. "We shall see."

Grinning, Papyrus bumped her shoulder. "You thinking about that one time with that one place you tricked you-know-who into breaking into way back when?"

Leif's gaze darkened. "Yes. And I'll thank you never to mention that again."

Mother was so quiet, it was hard to remember she was even there. But I noticed she was now walking a few paces further from Leif than she had been a moment ago.

The tower, it turned out, was guarded, albeit by ponies stationed just in sight of the party, constantly shooting it wistful looks, and probably on a strict rotation with the guards who were currently out carousing. When they saw Seigetsu, however, they immediately stood at attention, looking as if their reason for existence had just been validated.

"Special Inquisitor, Sir!" they barked out with perfectly synced precision, then knelt in a bow. "We've been awaiting your arrival, Sir."

"I can see that," Seigetsu said, looking them over. "Are the Princesses able to receive us now? I would understand if they have more..." She nodded at the party. "Pressing matters on their mind."

"Follow me," one of the guards said, opening a door into the tower. "Princesses Celestia and Luna are currently away on business relating to your own, and should be back shortly, but Princess Cadance will receive you in the meantime."

We followed him into an elevator that rose rapidly through the tower, and after a series of corridors found ourselves in a small-but-regal reception room that looked like it was kept ready around the clock as a backup in case the throne room was either busy or uncalled for. And then, after a wait just long enough that the lone guard remaining with us was starting to get uncomfortable, an alicorn arrived alone, unattended and carrying a mountain of books.

She looked... surprisingly ordinary. Her build was the same as any other mare, perhaps a little bit taller, but not enough to be noticeable unless you really looked closely. She had an above-average horn, though not nearly as long or sharp as Corsica's. And she had wings.

Aside from that, she was a completely ordinary-looking lavender mare, with a straight-cut bang and tail that had a classy double-stripe. She looked friendly, approachable, wore no jewelry or regalia whatsoever, and had the air of someone trying to pretend that they weren't badly out of their league.

"Hello!" she began with a gracious bow. "My name is Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship, Element of Harmony and currently the acting Princess Cadance because the real Princess Cadance hasn't gotten any sleep since the baby was born and needed someone to cover for her. Also, this is the first time I've ever actually greeted foreign dignitaries solo, and I didn't quite have enough time to do proper research on your culture to ensure I don't make any cultural faux pas, so please excuse that if it does happen? But, um, let's get this started! I thank you for coming all this way to pay your respects to the baby, and allow me to welcome you to Equestria!"

Seigetsu slowly blinked, rising from her kneeling position. "You... don't know who we are, do you?"

Twilight Sparkle blushed, and her ears went all the way down. "Um, the Crystal Empire is, um... still kind of newly returned, and nobody has modernized its system yet for briefing officials on duties they're about to undertake, which I promise I will drop everything to fix tomorrow? Or today? Can we start over?"

She took a deep breath, closed her eyes and steadied herself in what looked like a practiced routine to avoid panic attacks. "Welcome to Equestria, I'm Twilight Sparkle, the Princess of Friendship. May I... ask what brings you here today?"

Seigetsu nodded. "I am Seigetsu of Cernial, come to seal a trade agreement that was previously arranged with Her Majesty Princess Celestia. The details are rather arcane, but fortunately already dealt with by her and my negotiators. I merely came to finalize the deal in person."

"Oh!" Twilight looked abashed. "I should have guessed it was something like that. Is there anything I can do to help? We've had an eventful day, and Celestia is currently out cleaning up the aftermath, but she should hopefully be back soon?"

Seigetsu shook her head. "I'm afraid there is nothing you can do, though only because so little remains to be done. And it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

"Thank you," Twilight said, valiantly keeping her composure. "Um, is there... anything else? I'd hate to end on an awkward note..."

Seigetsu proceeded to explain about the other trains, and how it would be nice to have a posse of guards ready to receive them at the platform, but I had had just about all I could take. This was Twilight Sparkle? The pony who was supposedly in close contact with Fluttershy? Why wasn't Seigetsu introducing us?

Clearly, Twilight was operating in some level of information vacuum, given how far Seigetsu was going to obfuscate what was happening with Aegis without actually lying. But how little actually did she know? Too little to be allowed to know what we were here for, and what was going on? An Equestrian alicorn, one of the four most important ponies in the realm?

How was Fluttershy going to be able to have anything to do with the north if even her boss had a bag over her head? How did anything ever get done in this society?

For the first time, it occurred to me that maybe nothing did get done. I had made it my mission to come here on the hope that two specific ponies, Fluttershy and Starlight, would have magic answers for my problems and could fulfill and complete my quest, but what if they didn't? If even Seigetsu was afraid to speak plainly to an alicorn princess for fear of telling someone something they weren't supposed to know, how could I hope to get anywhere in a place like this? It was horrible.

Well... I could just disregard the rules and say whatever I wanted to whoever I wanted, consequences come as they may.

That almost sounded more appealing as an act of resistance than a way to get what I wanted. Though it could probably nicely accomplish both.

I wasn't paying attention as our conversation ended and our group was shepherded back to a waiting room by the one guard the Crystal Empire could apparently spare to watch us. "Well, that was awkward," Corsica said once we were seated.

"Indeed," Seigetsu said, the only one of us to remain standing. "But, I suppose it is to be expected. Twilight Sparkle is Equestria's newest alicorn. I imagine Her Majesty is taking a measured approach in bringing her into the fold on foreign policy. Goddesses are not known to lightly cede absolute control over areas they deem important, and promoting someone new to act as their equal must be seen as an extraordinarily delicate task."

"Sorry that didn't go smoothly," the guard apologized. "She's right about the Empire's infrastructure. I served with Prince Shining Armor before he married and became a prince... You know the Crystal Empire was supposedly sealed away a thousand years ago, and only recently returned? For all the ponies inside, it was like no time at all had passed. Everyone here is from another era. An era when the diarchs were basically carefree adventurers with no bureaucracy at all, to hear the crystal ponies tell it. We've been doing our best with the resources we have, but it's actually very hard to keep everyone on the same page with how small our crew is. Especially on a day like this, where everyone badly needs a break to blow off steam... If I had known Princess Twilight would be stepping in there, I would have tried to prepare her better. My bad."

"You are remarkably candid," Seigetsu told him. "I appreciate it."

The guard shook his head. "It's been a big day. You think you've had problems... The Empire had a 'power failure' that took the weather shield down for a bit, and we almost got flash frozen during the Crystalling ceremony. Add that to the request we got from you guys... Princess Luna is currently in the mountains watching your trains, along with all the pegasi in our force, and Princess Celestia covertly went to Snowport to watch over the Aegis there, until you finish your exercise to try and provoke an attack from Abyssinia. You know, if you want to go enjoy the festivities instead of waiting around in this room, I'm sure no one would mind."

"I thank you for your offer," Seigetsu said. "But I have never been one for parties. Was the cause of this power outage determined? Based on my knowledge of your infrastructure, such an event would be severe indeed."

"Accident," the guard said. "Not Abyssinia, if that's what worries you. We-"

The doors to the elevator slipped open, and out stepped another guard, accompanied by a pony.

"You still waiting for Cadance?" the guard said when he saw us, and I realized he was the other one who had been down at the entrance. "I've got another petitioner who wants to speak to the crown. No appointment, no connections, nothing. But she's come a long way to get here, so I couldn't just turn her out on the streets..."

The pony behind him looked nothing like anyone I had ever seen before. Her coat was a mix of black and white, separated into jagged stripes that wrapped around her neck, legs and barrel in a pattern that reminded me of a giant spring. She had no fetlocks covering her hooves, and her tail was long and thin, only poofing out into a brush of hair at the end. Her mane was done up into dreadlocks, but it wasn't voluminous enough to give the full effect, and made her look smaller instead of larger.

And she had that same third eye I recognized from Duma and Coda's mother.

My breath caught in my throat. And she was staring right at me, too.

"Cadance is asleep," our guard said. "We're waiting for Her Majesty Celestia to return. What's she here for?"

The striped pony stepped forward and bowed. "I am Nanzanaya, emissary of the zebras of the Aptann Valley, and I have come to beseech Equestria's aid for my people. I greet you all as a friend! Though, I hear we are all petitioners together?"

"The Aptann Valley?" Seigetsu's brow rose. "In the far south? That is quite a distance for one to travel alone. I hear the trains do not reach remotely that far."

Nanzanaya nodded. "It was an arduous journey. Speaking of which, if we are to be waiting for a while, do you have a bathroom?"

She glanced at me again as she said it, and I shifted in my seat. What was it with creatures having that third eye and reacting differently to me? Were they somehow aware I could see it? Something told me she wanted me to follow.

She called herself an emissary, Faye said in my head. Innocuous, given what else she said. But that's what Duma called us...

This couldn't be the pony Duma had mistaken me for, could it?

"A bathroom?" The guard who had shown Nanzanaya in looked up. "Sure, there's one right over here. I'll show you."

"Actually, I'll come too," I said, getting to my hooves. "Been traveling a while to get here, myself..."

Nanzanaya gave me a smile of understanding.

The guard nodded, showing us out into a hallway. My legs jittered as I walked; I thought I had closed the door on my opportunity to find out what Duma's deal was when I sided with Seigetsu against him. I hadn't wanted to dwell too closely on the what-ifs, on whether that creepy centaur who undermined the authorities and rubbed me the wrong way might actually know things I wanted to know too, things I couldn't learn in the closed-off world Seigetsu stood for. Was I seriously getting another chance?

Although I had met her barely a minute ago, this mare's first impression was at least better than Duma's. She wasn't trying to sell me anything, wasn't making insinuations about knowing things about me I didn't want anyone to know. Instead, she looked excited and vaguely relieved, like how I would feel if I was alone on a journey in a strange land and might have just met an ally I had been looking for for a long time... except if I wasn't a paranoid wreck, and actually got excited about meeting new people.

Now that I thought about it, though, why was she interested in me? If Duma knew little enough about her to mistake me for her, was it possible she was mistaking me somehow for Duma?

"Here we are," the guard said, leaning against a wall and pointing to a door across from him. "I'll wait here. Do what you need to do."

I followed Nanzanaya inside. It was an unremarkably opulent public restroom, with crystal sinks and crystal faucets and crystal floor tiles and everything... except for the toilet stalls, which were thoughtfully made from wood, and not transparent crystal. And just as I suspected, once the door had swung closed behind us, Nanzanaya turned on me with bright, eager eyes.

"Are you the ally who was prophesied to be waiting for me?" she whispered. "I never imagined I would run into you so easily! Fate moves in miraculous ways, sometimes!"

I blinked at her... and something told me I would quickly start to feel bad about myself if I intentionally deceived this young mare for too long. "Give me a bit more to go on?" I quietly offered. "I am here for a reason, but what's to say we're here for the same one?"

She pointed a hoof at my forehead. "You have the mark, of course!"

What...? Oh.

She pointed at her own forehead. "You can see my mark, right?"

"The eye?" I said, swallowing.

"Of course," Nanzanaya whispered. "You... wait..." She furrowed her brow. "You talk as if you do not know what the eye represents."

I took a step back. Good thing I wasn't attached to the idea of trying to deceive her, but-

Her face brightened in slow realization, and then in glee. "Truly? My ordained helper is uninitiated in the role she has been given to play? And I get to teach her? Oh, I've rarely been so glad to be a priestess!"

"You're... completely fine with me having no idea what you're talking about," I said, relaxing a little. "Well, you want to explain what this is about?"

Nanzanaya bowed. "As was said, I am Nanzanaya, a zebra emissary from the Aptann Valley. A foreigner I had never met before, bearing our mark - which allows us to see the mark upon others - was prophesied to come to my aid in my hour of need. 'Tis as simple as that! You are my new partner, and I am thrilled to have you."

"Tell me more about the eye," I pressed. "You say I've got one of these? And I can't see it, but it lets me see yours, or anyone else's if they have one?"

She nodded. "Precisely!"

"And where do they come from?" I asked. "You don't just walk up to ponies and tell them they have an invisible third eye."

Nanzanaya giggled. "If I told you everything all at once, where would be the fun in becoming your spiritual guide and teacher? I can tell you are skeptical about me, and may not even be aware of the divine fate that guided us to meet like this. And it would be terribly inconvenient if you decided you were satisfied with my teachings and departed, leaving me to fend for myself on my own. So, I will make a deal with you! We will travel together, and you will assist me loyally on my mission, and in return I shall illuminate to you the darkest secrets of the cosmos!"

I hesitated. "I'm here on an important mission too, you know..."

"Oh?" Nanzanaya perked up. "Do tell! Perhaps it will conveniently align with my own!"

"How about you go first?" I prodded.

Nanzanaya nodded. "I am here to beseech Equestrian military intervention against a grave threat to my people. Our peoples have no formal treaty, and thus it is something of a long-shot goal, but that is why it is all the more important I be creative and persistent in my approach."

"What kind of threat?" I asked, realizing how awkward it could be if we both were here at the same time to try to get Equestria involved in wars on opposite sides of the world.

"Our neighboring nation of Abyssinia," Nanzanaya explained. "They have long been fighting on their opposite border from us, against the ice dragons in Cernial - beings whom I believe I saw you in the company of! However, their king is an ambitious wizard, and his goals are changing. For years already, he has been despoiling our lands and forcing my people to move deeper and deeper into the valley with the magic emanating from his fell tower. And now we have proof that he is about to expand his grasp... So, what about you?"

I thought for a moment. How much did I want to say? This mare was openly admitting to not telling me everything, so I didn't exactly owe her the full story... "I'm from up north," I decided with a nod. "Looking for a couple of experts to help with solving a magical anomaly."

"Fascinating," Nanzanaya whispered. "Well, I'm sure I'll hear all about it in due time! For now, would you mind if I shared your lodging and meals? I spent all my resources on the journey here, and am sadly rather broke."

That might be up to the dragons, at least as long as we were their guests... "You know there's a huge party going on outside," I pointed out. "Lots of free food. Why not go load up down there?"

"Oh, I did!" Nanzanaya grinned. "It was the best I've eaten in weeks. Sadly, I'm not sure that party will last for the duration of my stay in this town... So, may I?"

"I'll... run it by my friends," I said, tapping my forehooves together. "Maybe. Don't get your hopes up."

Not long after Halcyon left to go to the bathroom, the elevator doors opened once again, rousing Corsica from her stupor. It was Princess Twilight.

"Aha!" She brightened, seeing the dragons and their party, and came trotting over. "I thought I might find you here! Sorry again about the wait."

Seigetsu looked up from a magazine she had found on a table near one of the waiting room's couches. "Can we help you?"

"If you're busy, I wouldn't want to waste your time," Twilight started, once again carrying a large stack of books and papers along with her in her aura. "But, after our last meeting, I realized Equestria's trade relations with the dragons is a major blind spot of mine. I didn't even know we had trade relations with the dragons! So, I went down to the castle library to do a cursory study of the subject just in case something like this happens again, and wouldn't you know it, all the books are over a thousand years out of date, because that's how long this castle has been gone for! Not that there's anything wrong with a perfectly preserved snapshot of history from a thousand years ago, of course, but you don't exactly get the opportunity to volunteer to modernize an entire royal library every day. So, um, I was wondering... As a dragon, what kinds of topics about you do you feel like it would be useful for the ponies of the Crystal Empire to have easily-accessible information on? This goes for everyone in the room."

Corsica perked up. An Equestrian royal who was a fan of easily-accessible knowledge? Princess Twilight seemed a little clueless and a little too enamored with the sound of her own voice, but that wasn't a thing she had been expecting to find today.

"It's been less than twenty minutes," Seigetsu said. "You really had time to get to the library and back, let alone search for anything there?"

Twilight shrugged. "I'm a fast reader."

"I see," Seigetsu said. "Much as I appreciate the offer, I would hate to keep you from the party out on the grounds. Surely you have better things to do than converse at length with the likes of me."

Twilight gave her an incredulous look. "Are you crazy? This is a rare opportunity! I almost never get to meet dragons aside from Spike. Besides, I was at the party for a while, and it got a little pointless after Spike started telling the same stories he's already told a dozen times before." She glanced at Corsica and the other ponies in the room. "Spike's a dragon, by the way. Err... You are with them, right? I guess I took you for Equestrian diplomats making sure the dragons' drip goes smoothly, but I probably should have asked. If it's not too much of a tangent, how are draconic diplomatic envoys even structured, anyway? Sorry. I'm... new to this." She tapped her forehooves together sheepishly.

Corsica glanced at Leif, at Nehaley, at Braen... Papyrus, true to his word, was suddenly nowhere to be found. And then she looked to Seigetsu.

"Perhaps," Seigetsu said, slowly getting to her feet, "I ought to enjoy myself at the party after all. But I'm sure you'll be able to have a productive and enlightening conversation without me. Try not to stray too close to any topics that might prove sensitive, would you?"

She said it directly to Corsica... and, from an angle that Twilight couldn't see, she winked.

It was just a wink, with no words attached. But Seigetsu didn't need words to make it say 'I'm annoyed that no one was at the train station, tired of being made to wait, disturbed that they don't seem to be taking a matter of international security as seriously as I am, and if a junior princess who's this curious accidentally finds out something a princess really ought to know, it's no problem of mine. Have fun indulging her.'

At least, that was what Corsica read it as.

Twilight looked awkwardly after her as she disappeared into the elevator. "I have no idea what I'm doing to rub him the wrong way. Probably some matter of protocol, but I really didn't want to leave you here, waiting..."

With a slight rush of victory, Corsica noted that even an alicorn princess, goddess of Equestria, could mistake Seigetsu for a dude.

"Seigetsu's always like that," she said, standing up and offering a hoof. "Don't take it personally. We're only loosely affiliated with them, and were mostly here for an introduction." She gestured to the rest of the ponies in the room, plus Braen. "Name's Corsica. We're envoys from the far-off land of Ironridge."

Twilight's pupils shrank to pinpricks, and then got huge. "Did you say Ironridge?" she breathed, her voice suddenly squeaky.

"Ohh?" Corsica grinned. "So you've heard of it, then?"

Twilight smiled awkwardly. "Would you mind terribly if I delayed you for just a moment longer so I can go round up some friends who would love to be a part of this moment too? I'll be as fast as I can!"

The lone remaining guard cleared his throat. "Actually, Your Highness, that's what we're here for. May I?"

"Oh!" Twilight jumped a little. "Right. Could you go find Rainbow Dash, please?"

"And Fluttershy?" Corsica ventured. "If she's here too?"

Twilight tilted her head. "You know Fluttershy?"

"Uhh..." Corsica hesitated. "Heard some stories. Big fan. No biggie if she's busy or not here, though."

"Sure, go find Fluttershy too," Twilight told the guard, who saluted and left the room. "So, is here good, or should we go back to the reception room? And are you really all from Ironridge? I know about writs, and gathering three at once just isn't something that happens north of the border. Or is it four?" She looked sideways at Braen. "Actually, scratch that, I have more pressing questions about you. But what are you all here for? And how's Ironridge doing, anyway? Last I heard, it was recovering from a brief civil war instigated by a rogue ambassador from Yakyakistan, but that info is almost two decades out of date."

"Not good," Corsica said, shaking her head. "But we'll get around to that. It's troubled on a lot of fronts, and we're here to petition Equestria for aid."

"Oh." Twilight's enthusiasm suddenly drained, replaced by a pensive, nervous look. "Wait, when you said you wanted to meet Fluttershy..."

Corsica's spirits rose. "Any chance you already know about a hypothetical connection between her magic and that city?"

"Well, I guess, but..." Twilight fidgeted, the gears visibly spinning in her brain. "If that's really why you're here, then that's really bad."

Corsica grinned. "Glad you know about it, because I only understand a vague overview of what's going on. On top of that, Yakyakistan is also invading. For real, this time."

Twilight looked like she had just dropped an ice cream cone.

"Apropos of nothing," Corsica continued, getting a perverse kick out of ruining this newbie goddess's day and ready to keep the bombshells rolling. "Ever heard of a shape-shifter called Chrysalis? Maybe she's just a problem up in the north?"

Twilight sighed. "Yes, I know her, and you're enjoying this."

"Guilty as charged," Corsica agreed. "But bear with me, I've earned this. We're reasonably sure she's taken over Yakyakistan and is behind the aggression. Also, there are a really lot of windigoes trying to use the war to break a seal that currently imprisons them so they can freeze over the world. We're trying our best up there to sort it out with the tools we have, but figured it would be worth sending someone down here to see if big, bad Equestria can spare some help for a neighbor in need."

Twilight squeezed her eyes shut, then forced them back open. "Who sent you? Who's in charge up there? I might have heard of them."

"Does 'Valey' ring any bells?" Corsica asked. "She specifically sent us to track down a mare called Starlight, who supposedly could kill windigoes a long time ago. You aware of anyone who could do that anywhere in Equestria? We figured the fastest way to find her would be ask the crown, and see what resources you princesses have for tracking down ponies. Even if we can't get anything else, we thought she might be able to help."

For a moment, Twilight was quiet. Then she said, "No. I'm afraid that doesn't ring any bells. But I'll see what I can do to help you on my own."

The Hero Returns

I stood in a waiting room high in the palace of the Crystal Empire, surrounded by benches, pillars and crystalline potted plants, staring in disbelief at the mare I was supposed to find halfway across the world, in the opposite direction I had just been going, weeks or months to the east by boat.

She noticed me staring, and started to stare back.

"...Starlight?" I guessed.

"That's my name," she said, sounding just a little uncertain. "You know where Twilight is? Did she leave you to wait for me, or something?"

My ears rose hopefully. "Starlight from the north?"

Starlight's eyes widened in alarm.

"I thought you would be on the Catantan Peninsula!" I said, my heart racing, feeling utterly surreal. "I've been looking for you, but-"

Starlight's horn burst with teleportation magic, and in less than half a second she was gone.

"But..." My hoof fell. What?

The guards, too, looked surprised. "Starlight?" The one who had escorted her in looked around.

I wasn't sure who to look to for an explanation, and no one seemed to be forthcoming... except Nanzanaya. "Aha! Was that the target of your quest?"

"Where'd she go?" I asked anyone who was willing to answer.

"Beats me," the guard said, taking off his helmet and scratching his head. "You know her from somewhere? She looked at you like you were a ghost."

"I've heard of her," I frantically admitted, reality starting to catch up. "How well do you know her? Is she prominent in this city? Where would she go?"

The guard looked a little taken aback. "Woah there, slow down! Aren't you with the Snowport delegation? Also, just to be certain, you haven't seen Princess Twilight, have you?"

"Twilight was just here," Leif said from behind her magazine. "Something came up and she had to leave. No idea when she'll be back."

The guard gave her a suspicious look. "Something came up?"

"Heading to Snowport with some others from the delegation to search for Celestia," Leif said, part of my brain noticing that she never used the princesses' titles."

The guard frowned. "She just sent me to go fetch Starlight... Huh. You know, Shining Armor is never this fickle."

"Guess not," Leif said, going back to reading, not even questioning who Shining Armor was.

"Excuse me," I pressed. "Where did you find Starlight? How hard would she be to find again, and where is she likely to go? And do you have any leads at all on why she did that?"

"Maybe." The guard squinted at me. "Look, I know you're a dignitary, but if someone in Princess Twilight's immediate circle decided they want nothing to do with you badly enough to teleport away, I'm not sure I should be helping you find them..."

I got to my hooves, eyeing the elevator. "Would you stop me if I wanted to go ask around about her? Maybe carouse at the party a little?"

One of the other guards stepped up and whispered into the elevator guard's ear. He nodded in response.

"Sure," a third guard said - it was getting hard to keep track of which was which. "Either of you ladies want to come too?" He glanced at Nanzanaya, Leif and Mother. "Sorry we've had to keep you all waiting, here."

Nanzanaya was glued to my side. Mother had fallen asleep. Leif just raised an eyebrow and held up the magazine. "Mind if I borrow this?"

A guard tilted his head. "Well, I don't see why not..."

"Guess I'll come keep an eye on you." Leif stretched, sighed, and joined us, though I got the feeling she was talking more to Nanzanaya than me.

"Affirmative," the elevator guard said. "Right this way, if you please..."

The party was still going full swing when we made it outside, a gentle breeze blowing through the wide plaza in front of the tower. My thoughts were all jumbled up; there were dozens of questions I should have been asking - questions of Leif, questions of Nanzanaya, questions of the guards - but all of them were squished down beneath thoughts of the mare I had just seen. Leif was even looking at me like I was supposed to ask her something, though...

I started walking, only to stop abruptly when I nearly ran into someone. It was Procyon.

Procyon silently motioned for me to find a nearby alcove, presumably so we could talk without looking ridiculous, and I nodded. "Hey, err..." I glanced at Leif and Nanzanaya. "How badly would you mind giving me a moment alone, just really quick? I need to... get my thoughts in order."

Leif gave me a flat look. "I remember you being a much better liar than that."

I felt, once again, like I had been slapped.

"If you've got something to do, go do it," Leif said, waving me away. "But there's... Ugh." She rubbed her face with a wing, the magazine clasped under her other. "Right now, what is your number one, highest top priority?"

"That was Starlight," I insisted. "You saw her. She was right there!"

"And?" Leif watched me.

For a few minutes, Halcyon was frozen. And then her mask slipped off of its own accord.

Faye winced, the emotional force of the party buffeting her like a jubilant storm, her emptiness roaring in her ears, begging to devour it, to become that celebration and have that celebration become her. The usual distant smattering of stars she saw when assuming control was instead bright and immediate: a cloud of pinpricks of light, one in each pony, easily identifiable in the herd of revelers. There was a reason she never wanted to take her mask off in public. Many reasons, actually... but chief among them was this, and now it had happened without her bidding.

Without Halcyon's bidding, either.

"You," she grunted, pointing a booted hoof at Leif, trying to focus through all the voices begging for entry to her mind. "Go investigate why Starlight might have ran away. Find a way to find her again, contacts or relations or something, but don't approach or do anything to spook her until we know more. You." She moved her hoof to Nanzanaya. "Assist her in every capacity. My judgement of character has been taken advantage of before. I want others to get a look at how you operate too. All clear? I need to sit down for a moment, I'm not feeling well."

Leif nodded in judgemental approval. "Smart. I'll be back when you need me."

Nanzanaya seemed to consider this... then left along with Leif. "We'll be back!"

Immediately once they were gone, Faye bolted, running through the streets away from the party in search of a place where her head was quiet, Halcyon's green gem tucked surreptitiously into a pocket on her coat. It was difficult, though; the streets seemed to carry the celebration's echoes like pipes, preventing it from ever going further than the back of her mind.

Eventually, she stopped, panting, after clambering up onto the roof of a squat house. She sat down, pulled out the mask, and stared at it.

Procyon floated up out of the ground.

"You," Faye said, giving her only half a look. "You were there. You sensed something was wrong too, didn't you?"

"...Yeah," Procyon said. "What happened? My link to our body isn't as strong as yours or hers. She was acting erratic, and then froze up all of a sudden."

Faye just stared at the crystal. Then she tensed, let her bracelet flicker...

...And I was a ghost.

My mind felt like it was made of cheese. "What...?"

"Slow down," Faye said. "Don't do anything. Something happened to our setup, here, and we need to fix it before worrying about anything else. Because that was not the place where I wanted to be randomly forced to take control."

"What happened, anyway?" Procyon repeated.

I shook myself out to clear my thoughts. "Feels like... I was thinking about Starlight..." My thoughts finally started to crystallize. "This feels like when my bracelet got stuck thinking about reaching the next town," I said. "When it was hard for me to think about anything else. Did that happen again? I... can't really think of other things to think about, right now."

Faye frowned, holding out the bracelet and flashing it a few times. "No, I think this is more mundane than that. This is a problem with you, not one that extends to the rest of us." She looked up. "You're not trying to avoid thinking about what Leif said in the waiting room, are you? Recklessly throwing yourself into your work to avoid dealing with the consequences?"

I froze up again.

"Looks like that's it," Procyon sighed. "I think... it's time we had a talk. About who we are, and who we're going to be going forward. If Starlight really is here, and we can find her again, this is going to be a major turning point in our journey, assuming we don't scare her away permanently."

Faye looked unsettled.

"Like I've said many times, I'm content to take a back seat," Procyon went on. "I've mostly been leaving things up to the two of you, being a happy spectator. Apparently, there's some bad blood between me and Faye, Halcyon has preferred more to take her side, and I'm more than content with that arrangement. But if Leif is right about Corsica - and I think she is - then something needs to change."

Faye's brow was overcast.

"You agree with me." Procyon pointed at her. "I was listening, during that conversation you had in Snowport. You resent getting dragged up front to smooth over Halcyon's relationship shortcomings. It's not an arrangement that works for you." She pointed at me. "It's not an arrangement that works for you, either, who wants to keep Corsica as a friend. You're so fearful sometimes, when it comes to sharing information and trusting others, and so fearless at other times, like just now, when you launched into your full story with Starlight and scared her away in two sentences."

"Remind me again," Faye grunted. "Were you the one who was advocating for Halcyon to go digging into our secrets and embrace our past, or against it? I recall you being so inconsistent on this front, I gave up trying to imagine how a part of me could have gotten that way."

Procyon frowned. "Last we properly talked, being a changeling queen was still a big secret. Things have changed."

"You bet they have." Faye stared at the ground. "I feel like I have less control than ever. Sometimes, I even have to come up front now to protect our interests. Even though that was supposed to be what I wanted. To have someone else to do it all for me. But now I can't entirely let go."

"Is this because I coaxed you back into having a bigger role in our life?" I hesitantly asked.

"Yes," Faye said bluntly. "But it's not your fault. If I had wanted you to be different, I should have just made you different. This is the lot all three of us have to work with."

I looked away. "That talk you had with Corsica. Was Leif...?"

"Telling the truth about not everything being perfect?" Faye answered. "Corsica would say so. I think she's feeling shut out, or left behind by our quest. I don't really understand it perfectly myself. But... do you remember that day, in Ironridge, when we abducted Coda from her airship and had a fun day around town?"

I nodded. That was a memory I had buried, along with the rest of my interactions with Coda, until I could find a way to save her.

"That day felt perfect," Faye wistfully mused. "Our thoughts were one, there. It felt normal, like we were just part of an eccentric, normal family. I think being able to live like that should be our ultimate, end goal. With Coda, with Corsica, with Ansel and everyone else we care about. Don't you?"

Procyon looked her up and down, and eventually gave a small nod. "I was wrong about you. You have changed. The you I left behind was an empty husk, just there to control our body and be a fallback for Halcyon while she grew into the role. Someone who just wanted, like I once did, to fade away."

Faye reddened just a little. "Oh. Well, I..."

"I think it's a perfect goal," I said, nodding in remembrance. "And... that's what we're trying to get Starlight's help for. To save Coda. But what do I do about Corsica?"

"I don't know." Faye shook her head. "It's my fear you're being paralyzed by when you try to talk about that. Residual bonds from when you were made. It was me who gave you the instinct to hide all the time, to live under a mask and never say what you were really thinking. Or maybe that's just a consequence of how our split works. What's clear to me, though, is that even if we're the same pony inside, Corsica doesn't see us that way. Talking to me, for her, wasn't the same as talking to you. It's you she cares about. Not the rest of us."

"I wish I could help," Procyon said, staring off into the distance. "But if there's a way to let me take control of our body, we haven't found it yet... not that we've looked very hard. I somewhat doubt there is, though, simply because I was fully erased, while Faye only became a recluse."

"What should I tell her, though?" I asked. "Let's say I'm in control next we get a chance alone. What does she want to hear? I've..."

I didn't want to admit it, but I had put that aborted conversation so far out of mind, I couldn't even remember what Corsica was pressing me over when I handed over control.

"Do I look like an expert on relationships?" Faye's backwards ears fell. "Remember how well Corsica and I got along when it was just me in our body. Or how well I did with Ansel. You were always far more of a people person, even if you thought of yourself as an awkward nerd. If anyone should know what to say, it would be you."

"Or Leitmotif," Procyon pointed out. "She's looking out for us. I've been following her around occasionally, and her excuses for staying with us are flimsy. She claims our ether crystal research could help her find Chrysalis, but you remember our ill-fated return trip to Icereach. Odds are ten to one Chrysalis is currently either there, in Yakyakistan, or with their army, wherever it is now. Anyone serious about tracking her down would be looking there, not on the other side of the most impassable border in the world."

Faye nodded. "And it shouldn't be hard to see that the fault plane research hasn't been our top priority for a while."

"Yeah," Procyon said. "But she's still here. Maybe she just cares about us. If you asked her for advice, in person, she might have something a lot more gentle to give."

I thought about that.

"Or you could ask absolutely anyone else," Faye pointed out. "The ponies in this city are currently in a fantastic mood. I bet any number of them would be willing to offer friendship advice to a stranger right now, purely out of the spirit of communal unity."

"And Twilight Sparkle is the Princess of Friendship," Procyon added. "I don't know how you earn a title like that, but she'd be a fraud if she didn't have anything to say about this situation."

I blinked. "Didn't Leif say Corsica was with her right now?"

Faye nodded.

"Then maybe she's already giving some advice on how to deal with me," I sighed. "Anyway. I'm... sorry for freezing up, back there. I guess I let myself get tunnel vision to avoid dealing with the more immediate problems."

"I'd say no worries," Faye said. "But try not to let it happen again? When you break or shut down, I actually get forced into control. Remember, you're still separated by nature from some of our senses as a changeling queen. Part of my resistance to taking control in public has to do with... that."

"Actually," Procyon cut in. "Have you noticed anything different about this city, compared to the others we've been in, on that front?"

Faye nodded. "It's impossible to miss. It feels like the streets themselves are conduits for emotion, like the organ pipes on Coda's throne." She looked back towards the tower in the distance. "I wonder if a substantially skilled or knowledgeable changeling queen could use this entire city as a funnel in the same way, collecting the thoughts and feelings of everyone living in it."

My ears stood up in alarm. "Do you think that's currently happening?"

Faye shook her head. "I doubt it. We've seen what ponies look like when they get too drained before, and it looks exactly like getting emotionally tired the normal way. But these ponies aren't tired. If anything, they're much more intense and vibrant than normal, like they're being amplified instead of drained. If we somehow gorged ourselves on this... Well, there would be a lot to take."

My thoughts went back to Coda, and how she tried to use her own stores of flattery and false love to contain the windigoes in Ironridge. Maybe a changeling queen souped up on something more powerful...

"And even if we did take it," Faye pressed. "First off, we'd have to figure out how. Second, it would probably make us enemies of Equestria. And third, I'm not sure we could do it while retaining our sense of self. You felt what it was like to be suffused with purely our own determination to reach Snowport. How could we possibly contain the power here and expect any better of a result? If we tried to use it, we'd be less likely to gain the power of the city than we would be to become an avatar of the city."

I shuddered. That was a compelling argument to remain the changeling queen of nothing, and never have an emotional store aligned with a force, feeling or cause. Even if it meant not making the most of the power we had been born with, my identity was all I had.

And losing it wouldn't mesh well with my goals.

"Right," I said, floating closer and straightening my back. "I'm... ready to take over again, if you want. And I promise I won't freeze up this time."

"Priority check," Procyon said. "What will you do if you find Starlight?"

I nodded. "Be maybe a little more discreet."

"And find Leif," Faye added. "I don't know if you were aware enough to remember, but I sent her out to find why Starlight ran away, and where she is now."

"And what about the zebra?" Procyon asked.

"Nanzanaya?" I rubbed the back of my neck. "I've got no clue. She knows stuff I'd really like to know, but I guess it's not relevant to my bigger goals... I guess that's second priority, then. Can't get too distracted."

"She's trouble," Procyon said. "If you want to know how much... Well, you'll find out soon enough, I'm sure. But I think hanging around with her is going to get you into more things than it will get you out of."

That wasn't reassuring.

"Alright," Faye sighed, reaching a hoof toward me. "Here you go."

I closed my eyes, ready to accept being stuffed back into my body.

Some time later, I was back at the outskirts of the party. Procyon was out scouting, but I got the impression she wouldn't be too far away: even if we hadn't formalized it, that last conversation felt like making peace between ourselves. Maybe she would take a more active role in our life, now.

My thoughts were once again free and working smoothly, even if I still didn't know what to think about Corsica. I had more just given myself permission to kick that can down the road, rather than paralyze myself on it now.

Instead, I turned my focus toward the party, which seemed to be centered on the same tiny dragon standing on a fountain and telling stories I had spied earlier. Curious, I edged closer, getting the attention of a stallion near the edge.

"Hey," I said, loud enough to be heard above the din. "Who's that?"

"Spike the Brave and Glorious?" The stallion nodded up at the dragon on the pedestal. "He's the hero of the Crystal Empire! Multiple times over. Big sensation. But if you didn't know that, I'm guessing you must not be from around here? Might be more likely then you'd know him as Princess Twilight's scribe."

I glanced at his sparkly, glittery, holographic fur, and then at my own drab noir overcoat. "Safe guess. Any chance he does autographs?"

The stallion looked thoroughly pleased at my eagerness to join in the hype. "Oh, well, sure, once he's talked for long enough! Last autograph line closed about an hour and a half ago when he switched to this tale, but I'm sure he'll open a new one before long if the demand is here! Now grab a seat and get in close. I've heard this one before, and he's just getting to the good part!"

Multiple autograph lines at the same venue? An hour or two of distance was enough to rekindle demand for a second one? I glanced again at the little dragon and nodded in respect. That took a pretty dedicated following. Or maybe just a fan base who had nothing better to do for entertainment.

Or a cult, like Coda's. Hopefully not, though.

I shadow snuck my way through the crowd, figuring that if Twilight's inner circle was relaxed enough to be handing out autographs and carousing at parties, it probably wouldn't be impossible to strike up a friendly conversation with someone in it, and learn more about Starlight. Somehow, the crystal ponies seemed to detect that I hadn't heard Spike's stories a million times before, and generously made room for me near the center of the pack.

"Now, running up a spiral staircase that tall takes work," Spike was narrating, munching on a bag full of colorful gemstones, sitting casually on the head of a fountain statue that, I now realized, depicted himself. "And even Spike the Brave and Glorious has a finite amount of stamina. So, I wracked my brain, and I said to Twilight, 'Hey, Twilight! Why not use a gravity spell so we can fall up the staircase?' And just like that, we were falling up, and rode the underside of the stairs like they were a greased ramp, all the way to the top!"

He tossed another handful of gemstones into his mouth, and while he chewed, he took a moment to survey the crowd. His eyes fixed on me.

In fairness, I did stand out a little...

"Hey, uh... You, with the wings!" Spike pointed at me. "You want to be my stage hand for this next part? Usually I get Rainbow Dash or Fluttershy to do it, but they're at the castle for something. Whaddya say? Chance of a lifetime..." He grinned and flexed.

I blinked, realizing I was being asked to do a job that likely involved flying. "I, err, actually don't know what that entails..."

Spike tilted his head at me, speaking with his mouth full. "Wait, seriously? This is your first time here?"

I nodded.

"Wow. Okay. I thought I didn't recognize you." Spike shrugged. "Wow. Um, did you just get here?"

I nodded again.

Spike stood up on the statue. "Alright, I hereby call a vote of the people! Should I, Spike the Brave and Glorious, carry on with the conclusion of my story, or should I restart from the beginning? I wouldn't want to, um, actually spoil anyone who hasn't heard it before. Just in case it's actually as good as I think it is."

The crystal ponies looked legitimately consternated by this. A pink earth pony with no holographic fur and an unreasonably poofy mane bounced up in the background, yelling, "Twilight would never forgive you if you did!"

Spike's crest fell.

"Maybe an autograph would suffice?" I asked, tapping my forehooves together.

"Oh! Sure. Autographs are easy." Spike started climbing down from the statue. "I know my table was somewhere around here..."

The crowd didn't dissolve, but they didn't stand at attention either, as if they were used to Spike spontaneously starting and stopping like this. True to the stallion's word, several ponies had already lined up before he even found his table, and the little dragon made his way through the line in short order before finally getting to me.

"So," he said, leaning on his hands. "Where's my newest fan from? Or, uh..." He lowered his voice. "Were you trying to discreetly get my attention about something? You do look kind of important."

"I'm part of the Snowport delegation, if you know what that is," I said, figuring it would be safest not to mention the north for now. "And I'm just trying to have a good time. But if you're free to chat, I'd love to? Seems like you know your way around here."

Spike regarded me curiously. "The Snowport delegation? Is that those diplomats Twilight got called away to deal with?"

I nodded. "Yeah. I did see her in the castle, at least."

"Really?" Spike frowned. "Huh. If you're here, that means she's probably finished with you, but I haven't seen her anywhere. Oh well. Welcome to the Crystal Empire!"

I smiled. "Thanks. Any chance you'd mind me as a shadow for a bit? I don't really know what I'm doing here, or who the good folks are to meet around here."

Spike chortled to himself. "Oho, well, if you're looking for the right ponies to meet, I know just the crowd. Come on, follow me!"

This was certainly going more smoothly than last time, I reflected, now that I was being smart about it and not barreling in headfirst without thinking. The place Spike led me turned out to be a confectionery stand, staffed by an orange earth pony mare in a straw hat and selling all manner of baked goods that reeked of apples. Several other ponies were there too, including a white unicorn and the pink poofy mare from earlier, all of whom notedly lacked the crystal sheen. The pastry seller, though, I couldn't shake the feeling I had seen somewhere before...

"Howdy, Spike," the familiar mare said, nodding at him and me. "Who's this you've got with you?"

"One of the bigwigs Twilight had to go meet," Spike explained. "Figured I'd give 'em the good old tour, you know?"

"The pleasure is all mine," the unicorn insisted, extending a hoof. "I'm Rarity."

"Halcyon," I replied, bumping her dainty appendage with my dirty boot and earning a slight recoil.

"Name's Applejack," the familiar mare added. "And feel free to take something on the house." She pointed around at her apple cart. "Wouldn't want any dignitaries to get less than the best we've got to offer."

"And I'm Pinkie Pie!" the poofy mare insisted, looking me up and down with big, baby-blue eyes that reminded me faintly of Kitty. "Nice to meet you!"

"If I may ask," Rarity cut in, before I could say anything in reply. "That's a very distinctive set of fashion you have there... Is there any chance you're a fellow fan of Shadow Spade?"

I blinked. "Never heard of them. I mostly made this myself to avoid attention, but they've kind of..."

Rarity's eyes glowed.

"Now now, Rares, let's not get so carried away we don't give her the chance to speak," Applejack said, motioning for Rarity to stand down. "Anything we can do for you? Wouldn't want you to have nothing to do, especially if you've already finished your business with the Princesses..."

I rebounded. "Nothing wrong with a little vacation time. You talk about the Princesses like you know them personally?"

"We're only Twilight's first, bestest friends," Pinkie Pie promised, leaning in. "Why? Are you looking for embarrassing personal details you can use as leverage in important negotiations?"

I took a step back. "Well, not exactly-"

"Or maybe you're trying to learn all her phobias so you know exactly the right things to say to get through your discussions most productively!" Pinkie tapped her hooves together. "Ooor maybe you're a harbinger who's got some epic, nation-shattering secret and you're just trying to get to know us a little before begging and pleading for our help with it, which is kind of silly because of course we'd help you anyway, but how are you supposed to know that? Or maybe you're not even a diplomat at all, and are an undercover author trying to do field research into how we live, so you can write bootleg stories about us and share them with all-"

Applejack forcibly closed her mouth, throwing me a sheepish expression. "We're an eccentric bunch. Sorry about that."

I earnestly laughed. "Well, I can see you're not all uptight. You are nobles though, right? Or something close? I heard someone say you had titles..."

Applejack blanched. "Noble? About as far from it as you can get, I'm afraid. Unless you count being friends with Princess Twilight. Honestly, though, what with how she got promoted, I wouldn't be surprised if nobility works real different wherever you're from."

"We do have quite a few titles, though," Rarity cut in. "Perhaps you're thinking of the Elements of Harmony?"

Perfect. That was what I was hoping for!

"Oh, I have heard of you!" I told them. "At least, as a group. Are these all of you? I heard there were others, like Fluttershy and Starlight?"

Applejack shrugged. "Well, Starlight's not an Element, per se, but we do know her. Fluttershy is, though. Both of them were down here up until a while ago, but left to go to the castle when some guards came to see 'em. Rainbow Dash too. What are the odds you just missed each other on the way down?"

"Pretty high, sounds like," I chuckled. Another success: they knew Starlight, and talked about her like a casual acquaintance. "I guess they haven't been back yet?"

Spike glanced around. "If they have, I haven't seen them. And I've been keeping a pretty good eye on the comings and goings. Speaking of which, I should probably get back to my fan club. You all good, here?"

"Sure seems like it," I told him. "Thanks for the introductions. I'll definitely see you again before I leave."

Spike saluted and wandered away.

"So," Applejack said once he was gone. "What brings you to the Crystal Empire? Or is it dusty official business? Forgive me if I'm being presumptuous, but you don't strike me as a bureaucrat."

"I hate bureaucrats," I said, making a show of sticking out my tongue. "It might be a little... sensitive, though. I wasn't just asking if you were nobles to make small talk. I mean... are you close enough with the powers that be that I should be talking to you, if there was actually a problem I'm here because of?"

Rarity chuckled. "Darling, we're basically Equestria's on-demand problem-solvers. If it's not a matter to be solved with laws and money, and is big enough to bring to the attention of the Princesses, I'd bet you anything we'll be involved in the fixing somehow."

Was that so...? "In that case..." I hesitated. "How many places are there I might accidentally make you freak out if I told you I was from there, and not Snowport? Just in case the Snowport thing was a cover. To stop ponies from freaking out."

Applejack screwed up her brow. "Freaking out about where you're from? What do you take us for, some kind of high-and-mighty aristocrats? I was born on a farm and raised on a farm, by parents who were born on a farm and raised on a farm, by grandparents who settled that land and built that farm with the sweat of their brows.

Rarity, however, looked thoughtful and slightly concerned. "...When you mentioned knowing Starlight's name..."

I gave her a sheepish smile. "Is there anywhere she might freak out if I happened to say I was from?"

Rarity's ears fell. "Oh dear."

"What?" Applejack gave her a look. "What would...? Oh."

Rarity lowered her voice. "You're from her village, aren't you? Way out east of here? No judgement, darling."

I blinked. "To the east? Oh, so she does have ties to..." I shook my head. "Actually, I'm from the north."

Rarity and Applejack looked at each other.

"Nailed it," Pinkie Pie whispered under her breath.

"Yep," Applejack said, taking off her hat and holding it over her chest. "I'm guessing you up and said that to Starlight without a word of warning, didn't you?"

"How bad would it be if I did?" I hesitantly asked.

Rarity shrugged. "Frankly, you'd have to ask either Twilight or Rainbow Dash, since they're the ones who actually know her best. All I've heard has been second-hoof, but apparently the idea of someone coming and looking for her hasn't been something she's been looking forward to. Apparently, she's had a beastly time of it up there a long time ago, and hasn't been looking to go back... not that it's my story to tell, of course. Now, frankly, as a concerned friend, I have to ask: you're here. You knew her name. You're looking for her in particular, aren't you?"

I sighed. "If I can't find her, or can't get her to listen, I'll make do without. But, yeah, I am. Now that that's on the table, is there any chance you can help me find her again? And... talk to her without spooking her into fleeing?"

In the back of my mind, I suddenly realized: Leif had been there when Corsica gave her 'full report' to Twilight. She would have known all this already. And I asked her to go and figure it out for me, and she left instead of telling me what she already knew... Was she trying to make me figure this out for myself?

"Well, I do have the stall to run..." Applejack pointed to her wares. "How about I keep an eye out for her around here, and you three go check places she might be in the city? And you check back in here in an hour if you haven't found her yet."

"No need," Pinkie said, striking an odd pose and focusing on the base of the tower. "My expert intuition says she's... that-a-way."

The moment she said it, I caught a faint glimpse of lilac and purple through the crowd. "Handy intuition," I breathed.

Sure enough, in a matter of moments, Starlight appeared once again, looking ever so slightly frazzled and like she was deliberately seeking out her friend's pie cart. When she saw me, she immediately froze once again.

Maybe it was because she had already seem me once before. Maybe it was because this time, she saw me in the company of her friends, and knew that even if she could run from me, they weren't running. But, slowly, she came closer.

Looking at her, I didn't get the impression of some legendary hero, as Ironridge had told it. I also didn't get the impression of someone who was broken or beaten down beyond the point of return, as my limited experience so far in Equestria had indicated. Aside from the faint tingling in my eyes when I looked at her, she looked like an ordinary pony who had just been threatened with a conversation she really didn't want to have.

Probably the same way I looked when confronted by Corsica.

"Hey... girls," Starlight sighed, stepping up to the other Elements and ignoring me.

"Guessing you've already had a run-in with your visitor?" Applejack asked.

Starlight closed her eyes, then looked at me. "Fine. Get it over with."

Don't mention being from the north again, some part of me suggested.

Put everything on the table at once, another countered. No surprises left over. Best to only get her to agree to something once.

I ignored both of them. "Don't worry," I told her, creating a new plan on the fly, going purely with what felt right. "I'm not here to ask you to go back."

Starlight listened, and didn't say anything.

"Up in the north," I said, "they say you once killed windigoes. I need you to teach me how to do that too. So I can... save a friend who's counting on me."

Tired and Jaded

"Up in the north," I said, "they say you once killed windigoes. I need you to teach me how to do that too. So I can... save a friend who's counting on me."

Starlight blinked at me.

"Well, that sure is something to ask somepony you've just met," Applejack remarked.

"Windigoes?" Starlight tilted her head. "Ice monsters as old as time, feed on feelings of distrust between ponies, conjure blizzards and sometimes really like wedding cakes? Those windigoes?"

"They did the cake thing for you, too?" I asked, surprised.

Starlight relaxed. "Sorry. I thought you were... Never mind." She massaged her temple. "Sure, why don't I just teach you the secrets to ridding ponykind of a scourge that has endured for thousands of years? I can totally do that. Just got back from fighting them this morning, so I'm nice and fresh on what to do. How do you want to do this?"

Pinkie Pie snickered.

My brow creased. "Okay, I get that I scared you, and I'm sorry. And I know it's not exactly an everyday request. But I've been through a lot to get here. No need to make fun."

Pinkie guffawed. Even Starlight raised an eyebrow at me that was half-amused.

I felt my cheeks redden. "What?"

"Well, you see, darling..." Rarity started. "You've got a... funny sense of timing."

"Can't say I've ever seen a windigo for myself," Applejack said. "But the weather around the Crystal Empire is real magical, and kind of intelligent. And whether it was windigoes or something else, Starlight's not lying about the lot of us bashing our heads against it during the little incident this morning with the Crystalling."

"It was a group effort, though," Rarity added, tapping her forehooves and clearing her throat. "Everyone here, including all the townsponies, pitched in. Still, there's a certain irony to you making that specific request on today of all days."

I blinked. "That blizzard from this morning?"

"You were close enough to see it?" Starlight raised an eyebrow. "Good thing you weren't any closer. Anyway, irony aside, you know 'teach me to kill windigoes' isn't something you just walk up and ask someone as a serious question, right?"

"But you've done it before," I pressed. "At least, that's what the stories say."

Starlight's horn twinkled, and I felt a brief magical shimmer pass through me. "A Writ of Harmonic Sanction," she said. "You found one, and spent one, just to chase a musty old story."

"Is it really just a story?" My ears fell, daring her to agree. "I heard it from the ponies who knew you best. From-"

"Don't," Starlight interrupted, a strained look on her face. "If you want me to give you the time of day, don't mention anyone I used to know. Please."

I winced. "Sorry."

"Anyway." Starlight turned away from me. "I've got nothing to teach. Yes, I've met windigoes, which is more than most ponies can say. They're something you survive, not something you fight. Not unless you're cornered and have no other options. And even then, things that can hurt them are so rare, you'd need fate itself to drop one right into your hooves to even stand a chance. And if luck could be controlled or taught, I wouldn't be talking to you right now."

She looked at the crowd of partying ponies, once again crowded around the fountain and listening to Spike. "You said you're trying to save a friend. Singular. Are they possessed?"

I hesitated. Was this really happening? "Similar, but not quite. I've... seen others get possessed, though."

"Unfortunate," Starlight said. "I've only seen one windigo possession before, and I still don't understand what happened to resolve it. You might be able to get somewhere by talking to the windigo, but that's a recipe for insanity whether or not you succeed, and it might involve some bargains you don't want to make. But if you've really seen this multiple times already, I'd imagine you know that."

I swallowed and nodded. "It's... more than one. I'm not sure how many. What about killing them? You have done it before, right?"

"Multiples of them?" Starlight raised an eyebrow. "Then you're almost certainly screwed. Windigo strength grows with the presence of nearby windigoes. And when they get strong enough to use their powers directly, they usually skip the talking and go directly to freezing. If they haven't done that yet, you might have a chance, but you'd run the risk of upsetting whatever delicate balance is preventing them from doing so... which is probably why you want to kill them. Right." She sighed. "You're in too deep. This is all for the sake of a single pony, right? Have you considered just... walking away?"

I blanched.

"Probably not, then." Starlight turned to face me and took several steps forward. "Probably feels like an abhorrent idea when you've already got some experience with this and know there's at least a way to keep trying. But ponies die all the time. Friends break apart and stop seeing each other, and you meet new ponies to fill the void until the day you, too, eventually die. That's the natural cycle of the world. You can fight it, but you can't change it. Fighting it only ever ends when you choose to stop. Is this really the rock you want to break yourself against?"

Still, she was avoiding the question of how to kill them. But in the background, I saw Applejack and Rarity looking vaguely stunned and impressed.

"...Sorry." Starlight pulled herself back together with a deep breath, relaxed, and gave her friends a halfhearted smile. "Wasn't expecting to get pulled back to that place today."

"You know," Applejack pointed out, "Most folks, when asked how to kill a pack of windigoes, wouldn't be able to actually give a serious answer with a straight face."

"Not just a straight face, but one of the most serious I've ever seen," Rarity added. "That was... a bit of an experience to observe."

"I know, right? I caught it on camera," Pinkie stage-whispered to Rarity, holding a disposable camera.

Impressive, serious, yes, very impressive. "But you still didn't tell me how to kill them."

Starlight gave me a deadpan look. "I had already had an emotionally harrowing day before you showed up, am trying to enjoy a chance to relax at the end of it, and you aren't getting my hints that that maybe it's better not to spend your time thinking about how to kill ancient monsters, no matter how good your reasons may feel. If you want to press this, go enjoy yourself at the party and get some laughs in. Once it's over, make your case to Twilight, not me. And if she determines this is worth putting effort into and asks me herself, then I will give you the time of day again, hear more details about your situation and help brainstorm a serious strategy for getting to a solution you can live with. Final offer. Take it or leave it."

I sighed. Convince Princess Twilight? Right. Perfect. Good thing I had missed the train on that, and Twilight was now probably all the way in...

With a burst of lavender teleportation, Corsica appeared on the road leading into Freedom Town alongside Princess Twilight, Fluttershy, Braen, and three spell-dazzled polar bears. Twilight immediately doubled over panting.

"You alright, there?" Rainbow Dash asked, arriving in a rainbow-colored streak, having opted to fly to save on teleportations and apparently capable of matching Twilight's speed.

"Whew!" Twilight straightened up, wiping her brow. "If I'm ever looking for coursework ideas, remind me that teleporting polar bears around makes for an excellent endurance test. I'm hoping this is actually Snowport, and not just a hamlet halfway along the road?"

"This is Freedom Town," Braen explained sagely. "Slum on outskirts of Snowport. Many monsters live here. Much more easygoing than dragons of Snowport."

The street wasn't crowded, but a four-legged fish was touching up a display on a building in the distance, and a spherical frog was rolling from the entrance of one alley to another. Fluttershy was visibly entranced.

"I've never seen anything like this biodiversity before," she murmured when looked at.

"So, you think this is our town?" one of the polar bears asked, rubbing the back of his head. "Can't say it's doing anything for me one way or another."

"Me neither," another grunted. "Can't say it doesn't feel like home. But it doesn't feel like it either, you know?"

"This stinks," the third complained.

"I-I mean," Fluttershy started, snapping back into her focus. "I'm sure we can just ask some of the locals if they know you, right?"

"Don't want to dawdle too much," Corsica pointed out. "It would be pretty awkward if we came all this way looking for Celestia and then missed her because we got distracted. But I know a bar around here that would be a great place to ask. If the barkeep doesn't know you, no one would."

With a little help from Braen and no complaints from the group, Corsica led the way back to Fauntleroy's bar. It wasn't quite as packed as she remembered it, but was clearly gearing up for the evening rush, Fauntleroy standing in the back and quickly adding to an impressively large collection of polished glasses.

He looked up, clearly recognizing some of the newcomers. "Hey hey, good to see you again! Guess my humble establishment earned a thumbs-up?"

"Here for some networking," Corsica said, sauntering up to the bar. "Specifically on behalf of these guys." She threw a nod at the polar bears.

"That's what bars do best." Fauntleroy winked. "Aside from serving quality food and only the most vintage drinks. Mind if I ask what you're falling in with the syndicate for?"

When one polar bear opened their mouth to speak, Fauntleroy cut him off with a wave. "I know, I know. It's 'confidential'."

"So you do know us!" Another bear perked up. "I'd ask what a syndicate is, but probably should explain first..."

One by one, the bears described their situation to a progressively less jovial Fauntleroy. When they all finished, he sighed.

"That's messed up. That's not supposed to happen..." He held a paw to his forehead. "That's messed up. I'll... pass this up the chain to some friendly ears I know in the government. But yeah, I know who you are, I can get you back in contact with your old friends, uhh... hoo boy."

"Is there a precedent for this sort of stuff around here?" Rainbow asked, looking around. "Because you sound more surprised that it did happen instead of that it was able to happen at all."

"Huh? Oh, yeah." Fauntleroy turned his attention back to her. "The bar's kind of a regular crisis hotline. Comes with having an open door and all that. Definitely never had an incident with one of they-who-shall-not-be-named going rogue before, though. At least, not this rogue. And not recently. You know what, don't ask me why the church plays with fire, I'm just a barkeep... Can I get you something? Nice colors, by the way."

"Who's they-who-shall-not-be-named?" Twilight asked, stepping up. "And what do you mean about the church playing with fire? Does memory modification have a precedent around here?"

Fauntleroy raised a lazy eyebrow at her. "You're from far away, aren't you? Free advice to help fit in: I know being an alicorn feels flashy, and all, but it's kind of taboo to use as a disguise around here. Rubs the dragons the wrong way. And it's a dead giveaway, too. If you want to go overstated without crossing the line, take some pointers from your pretty friend, there." He nodded at Rainbow Dash.

"Disguise?" Twilight blinked. "I'm not-"

Corsica realized what Twilight didn't know, what Fauntleroy assumed and what Twilight was about to say just in time to come to her rescue. And then she thought about it, and decided that doing nothing would be far more gratifying.

"-wearing a disguise," Twilight finished. "The wings are real, see? I'm Twilight Sparkle, Princess of Friendship?"

Rainbow bit her lip.

"Yeah, sure you are, buddy." Fauntleroy nodded along. "I dig the method acting. Just don't come crying to me when you get caught, okay? Word on the street is there's something big going down and Equestria's attention might get focused here, and they don't have the greatest relationship with changelings."

Twilight's brow scrunched... but before she could speak, Rainbow shouldered her aside. "Anyway, you mind if we cut and run? These burly dudes will be safe in your care?" She pointed to the polar bears. "We've got an, uh, important thing to get out of the way of, involving national spotlights and stuff. Toodles!"

And then she dragged Twilight out of the bar.

Fauntleroy watched them go, and then glanced at Corsica. "She was the real deal, wasn't she?"

Corsica blinked. "If you could tell, why do that?"

Fauntleroy shrugged. "Because Equestrian alicorn princesses don't walk into dingy bars in Abyssinian towns flaunting themselves for all the world to see, and I'm the type that's nice enough to try to teach it gently. I don't know what she's doing out here if she didn't read the rules of the road first, and I'm sure there's a great story behind how you found yourselves in her entourage, but you should go do her - and the relationship between our countries - a big solid and get her into the dragons' fort by any means necessary. I've got this memory thing sorted, now go take care of yourselves."

Corsica slowly nodded. "You're a cool cat. I owe you one."

Fauntleroy winked. "Come back when you're finished so I can count it against your tab."

"Did he just mistake me for a changeling?" Twilight asked, out in the street once everyone had assembled, sans polar bears.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure he mistook you for a changeling," Rainbow said, rubbing her head with a wing. "And maybe me, too. Does that mean changelings are common in this town? Have we just walked right into a big hive of them?" She glanced back at the open road. "And should we be getting out?"

"Actually," Fluttershy said, keeping her voice low, "I think he was trying to give you some advice. But maybe we shouldn't linger here."

Corsica glanced around at Freedom Town's buildings, slightly lopsided and with a disrespect for angles, built partially into the ground as the mountain slope began to rise. Its denizens had seemed mostly harmless when she came here with Halcyon... Mostly. But the polar bears had been doing something out by the train tracks, during an internationally sensitive time. And Twilight, as an Equestrian princess, probably would draw a lot more attention than two random mares from the north, especially when she and Halcyon hadn't been openly advertising their origins.

Right. It was... probably better to get out.

Fluttershy was the only member of the group who clearly wanted to stay and sightsee, but she was smart enough to read the room and also knew the mission, and before long everyone was at the gates to Snowport's central walled-off castle town, with only a few odd stares earned along the way.

The gates were guarded by dragons with uniforms. There was a very long line.

"Uhhh..." Rainbow frowned at it. "Think they'd be mad if we just flew over, or tried to teleport past?"

"Looks like city is still in lockdown," Braen remarked.

"I guess it makes sense that there could be security measures in place if Princess Celestia is visiting," Twilight said. "But surely they'll let us through, right? Unless..." She glanced back in the direction of Freedom Town, then turned to Corsica. "You said you just came from here, right? I need as much relevant information about what's going on here as possible. What was that guy talking about with the polar bears' memories, and with a church? And what's with there being changelings here, or the lockdown? I need everything relevant. This place is giving me a strong feeling we can't just walk up and start asking questions."

Corsica sighed, preparing a rapid-fire list of answers to questions an Equestrian alicorn princess really ought to have known herself. "Dragon church has memory magic that's usually a tightly-controlled state secret, changelings seem to be considered Abyssinians - that's the nationality of Freedom Town, back there - and the lockdown is probably still going on because Celestia is here, but it started because someone tried to steal weapons from a vault under the castle. Look..." She squared her shoulders at Twilight and took a breath. "I'm not saying you shouldn't know this stuff, but I jumped through a lot of hoops to figure it out, because everyone around these parts doesn't like sharing."

Twilight took all that in with a bothered expression. "And you're saying it's worrying that I need to ask these questions about a town in my own country."

"Oh, no." Corsica waved a hoof. "I was just looking forward to seeing you use your royal privilege to crash through this brick wall like a house of cards and make it look silly. And the looks on everyone's faces when you do. Don't you think getting all the answers from me is a little boring? You could just walk up to those guards, show them your princess certification, and blow their minds."

"Yes, like I totally blew the mind of that long cat back there," Twilight pointed out, sounding slightly exasperated. "Actually, I don't have a princess certification beyond the horn and the wings, and understandably that doesn't count in a changeling town, which I've never been to before. But even in other towns, royal privilege is a lot less useful than you would think it would be, at least for the kinds of problems I get called on to deal with."

"Yeah, tell me about it," Rainbow said, hovering upside-down. "I'm pretty famous too. We all are. But fame alone doesn't solve stuff that's worth solving. it can sometimes even be a liability, as crazy as it sounds... like if you need to go under cover. Which, I'm getting the feeling would be nice here."

"The point is," Twilight said with a nod, "I appreciate that you're looking to this outing for entertainment - or, at least, I appreciate it to an extent - but this actually is serious and we could use your unreserved help."

Braen looked at Corsica. "Well? Princess pony seems sincere. Not want to steal Corsica's show, but maybe we should do more with our connections to help. After all, we need their help for Ironridge."

Corsica's ears fell. "Yeah, you've got a point. Alright, fine. You three in back, me and Braen up front. If we can convince them to let us send a message to Snowport's leader, he can get us anywhere we need to go."

"Back from the Crystal Empire with Princess Twilight?" One of the guards checked a dossier as another sized the group up and down. "Lockdown means lockdown, I'm afraid, but we can definitely pass a message back up to command for you."

"And we could get you a more secure waiting room in the guardhouse," another added. "If this is legit, it wouldn't do to keep an Equestrian Princess waiting out on this side of the walls."

"Sounds great." Corsica saluted. "I appreciate it. See?" She turned back to Twilight and the others as the gate rose and the dragons beckoned them through. "Easy."

"You being able to do it easily was kind of my point," Twilight pointed out, a winged dragon taking off towards the castle as another beckoned them toward the gatehouse. Her eyes followed the flier. "I wonder why they don't just send messages using dragonfire."

Rainbow shrugged. "Maybe they just like flying? You could have contacted Celestia with dragonfire from Spike, and yet here we are in person."

Twilight blanched. "Spike was having a great time at the party! I didn't want to take that from him. Besides, weren't you curious to see a town this big that isn't on the maps, too? Although it would have been more efficient..."

"You send messages via dragonfire?" the guardhouse guard asked, looking slightly intrigued.

"Well, my assistant does," Twilight explained, glancing at everyone else. "Just write down something on a scroll, breathe a little fire on it, and away it goes to the intended recipient."

The guard shook his head. "Then your assistant must be an earth dragon. Probably a trustworthy one, too, to get a position that close to royalty. You're lucky. Sneaky traitors, most of them are. Always using their magic to lurk in the dark..."

"You have a rivalry with another faction of dragons?" Twilight looked intrigued.

Internally, Corsica groaned. Listening to Twilight learn things had been fun for a while, but it was starting to get old...

The guard started explaining, covering nothing Corsica didn't know and looking a little wowed and impressed that he got to be the one to break this news to someone so important, plus rather happy that we were making his job so easy. Before he could finish, the flier returned.

"Lord Terutomo wishes to receive you in the throne room immediately," they said, bowing. "Also, Her Majesty Princess Celestia will be there. If this is a prank and any of you aren't legit... none of us will hold it against you if you take the opportunity to make a discretionary exit."

"Understandable, but I'm good," Corsica said with a wave.

Twilight nodded. "Can we go see her now?"

The guards nodded. "Right this way."

My normal method of having fun at parties was to drift aimlessly and let the tides of ponies carry me along, and so drift I did, to the point where my ears began to ring with Spike's slightly repetitive stories.

Where was Twilight? And why did I have to miss out...?

"Hey," Leif said as I almost bumped into her, standing next to a snack table with Nanzanaya.

I blinked at her, pulling myself back to the real world. "Hey?"

"I found Starlight," Leif said. "Saw you find her, too. With the way she looked, I figured it would be better not to let her see me. Unlike you, I don't need a lesson in subtlety..." She glanced at Nanzanaya. "Your friend here is a bit of a hoofful. Are you doing anything important, or just killing time?"

"Unless I can randomly find Princess Twilight, killing time," I admitted. "Any chance you've found something more productive to do?"

"Keeping an eye out," Leif said. "Gathering information. Have you learned yet what their vague 'incident' this morning at the Crystalling was caused by?"

"A big storm moved in, didn't it?" I asked. "That may have been magical, in a windigo-ish way? And might have been because there was a power failure on the barrier?" I pointed out at the glowing dome surrounding the city.

Leif nodded. "You know what powers the barrier?"

I shook my head.

"It's an artifact called the Crystal Heart," Leif explained. "I'd rather not get into this too heavily in present company, but..." She nodded at Nanzanaya. "It's a crystal - shaped like a heart - that is heavily suffused with emotions the Crystal Ponies want to share with the rest of the world. They curate and purify it using a process that will probably remind you of something. It's apparently delicate, and this morning's incident was caused by accidental tampering. And it's also apparently powerful enough to perpetually hold back this, as you put it, storm that may have been magical in a windigo-ish way."

My thoughts flashed to Coda, and her perpetual buffet of weak flattery and false love. It wasn't hard to see what Leif was implying. Take the power of the heart, infuse Coda with it, and she might become strong enough to contain the Ironridge windigoes with no ill effects. Or maybe even more than just them.

Or I could do it myself.

"It probably wouldn't be great for the ponies here if anything happened to it, then," I said. "I mean, if just a little blip was enough to cause a blizzard this morning."

"No," Leif remarked. "Probably not. Still, the ponies here are quite knowledgeable about it. Maybe they'd have some insight on the subject that could be useful to you. If you're finding yourself with nothing to do, why not check it out?"

"...Yeah," I said. "Good idea. By the way, now that you've been hanging out with Nanzanaya for a bit, what do you think of her?"

"Airhead," Leif said. "I don't trust her."

"That's a mildly rude way to speak about someone who is right here," Nanzanaya pointed out, her creepy third eye staring at me and reminding me of why I wanted her around.

Leif shrugged. "If you two want to talk, have at it. Or, I can keep watching her, if you really think that's what's best for your cause. But downtime is precious. Even if you're just using it for rest and recuperation, that's a good use. But there's a lot of interesting stuff elsewhere in the city, if you're feeling like exploring. Not to mention the castle..."

I glanced up at it. "How mad do you think the guards would be if I took a peek around? Or are you deliberately trying to tempt me into terrible ideas?"

"Your call," Leif said. "I've heard the 'government' here is too new to have fully moved into the place, let alone used it to sequester sensitive state secrets. It's guarded, but more to ensure nobody becomes lost, or finds something dangerous that nobody remembered has been sitting there for the last thousand years. That building was originally the capitol of an empire, not a single-family home for some young royals and a contingent of guards."

My ears perked at that. "The palace hasn't even been fully explored since they moved in? Are you serious?"

"Depends what you mean by fully," Leif told me. "They've mapped the place out and seen all the major rooms, and everything. Probably plenty of secret passages and hidden doors, though. And potentially uncategorized stuff in storage."

I stared up at the castle.

"Your call on what to do," Leif said. "Personally, I'm enjoying the party, and don't mean to stop until you need me for something else. Just thought I'd tell you what I found out."

I sighed, already feeling the tug of an unexplored castle. That sounded like a really fun way to kill time... and also a really good way to get yet another quest hook I couldn't properly juggle on my plate.

Nanzanaya was looking at me with a gleam in her eyes that was hungry for discovery.

"Not hard to guess what your preferred option is," I told her.

The zebra shrugged. "It does have the potential to be interesting, does it not? Besides, if I happened to learn anything curious, I would then owe you one, and we all know how much you wish for your curiosity to be sated by me."

Or, Faye whispered in my mind, we could think twice before exploring a castle, belonging to someone we want to be friends with, without permission and with someone we know nothing about?

That was a good point. "I think maybe I'll mingle," I decided. "That Crystal Heart stuff sounded pretty interesting. Gotta see if the locals have more to say."

"Oh!" Nanzanaya's ears fell. "Alright. I suppose I shall explore the castle on my own, then."

She vanished into the crowd, towards the elevator entrance that would probably take her back to the waiting room.

I winced.

Leif nodded approvingly. "Gutsy and suspicious. I'd say you've got three options: cut ties and pretend not to know her, go after her, or pick a goddess and pray she doesn't get caught."

"Come on," I sighed, starting off in the direction she had gone. "I still need to know what she knows about some magic I've ran into. Let's go try and rein her in before she gets us in trouble. Give me a hoof, here."

Everyone was led inside the castle, up to a long room with a wide window overlooking the harbor, an ornate stone throne sitting before the window silhouetted by the light. Terutomo was standing next to a contingent of guards, opting not to sit.

"My friends!" he greeted. "I didn't expect you back so early. But it appears you've brought company?"

"Long story, but yes." Corsica pointed at Twilight and her friends, stepping aside. "It's their show, not mine."

Twilight bowed. "You're the ruler of this town?"

"I am! Call me Terutomo." Terutomo motioned for her to rise. "But before we get too into the pleasantries, I believe you came here looking for a friend of yours..."

Corsica turned around.

In the door behind her was something that was probably a pony, except twice as tall as a full-grown stallion and more slender than the fittest mare, with wings the size of bedsheets and angular, violet eyes and a horn that beat out even Corsica's own by a wide margin. Her mane and tail looked almost gaseous, flowing together in an invisible wind the way Elise's used to do in Icereach, and her coat was so white you could start to see pink if you stared at it for too long.

"Princess!" Twilight bowed harder.

"I didn't expect to see you here, Twilight," Princess Celestia said in a warm tone, her body covered in golden regalia that Twilight could stand to take a queue from if she wanted to look regal. "And hello to the rest of you as well." Her eyes briefly passed over Corsica's special talent, and hid a flash of concern. "I have some idea of what you are here for. Rest assured that the business that brought me here is concluded. You have my full and undivided attention."

Twilight gave Corsica a look that asked do you want me to try to make your case for you, or are you capable of speaking for yourself?

Corsica shrugged at Twilight. "Knock yourself out."

"If Corsica does not want to speak, then Braen will," Braen said, stepping forward. "I am Braen. Mechanical child of Valey and Shinespark. Have heard you met my mothers long ago, in place called Kinmari. Discussed possibility of life for Mothers and all their friends in Equestria. Eventually decided Mothers would return to Ironridge instead. Try to rebuild after Steel Revolution and make into good new home. However, ran into many problems. Did not so much lose power as lose faith in the ponies they were trying to lead. It is question that has haunted Mother Shinespark for many long years: how can one create enduring paradise when ponies, as flawed, imperfect beings, would make it no longer paradise by living in it? Mothers achieved dream for a time with power of determination, but then dream collapse and is now collapsing further."

Her mechanical head fell. "Ironridge is in grave danger. Ponies who could save it are tired and jaded, and spark has gone out. Other Mother Valey use stubbornness to preserve status quo in name of old promises, made to ponies who are no longer here to hold her accountable, because cannot be betrayed by someone who no longer here. But status quo is crumbling and maybe broken for good. Need to fight for Ironridge and rebuild, or it will be lost forever. So Mother Shinespark create Braen to travel world with important mission: find ponies whose spark has not gone out, and learn secret of rekindling it. Learn new model for city - for life - that won't break again after achieving it. Permanent enough to be worth fighting for."

The room was silent.

"Since she only mentioned it in a roundabout way," Corsica added, "there's a war brewing that's designed to unseal all the world's windigoes. Think you can lend your neighbors a hoof?"

Plea for Aid

The Crystal Empire's palace brushed the sky, a secluded observation deck at its tapered pinnacle. Gleaming white crystal spires surrounded and supported the central column, concealing floor after floor after floor of hallways and reception rooms and archives, living chambers and kitchens and armories and anything anyone could think to put in an ancient castle. Toward its base, the tower grew wider, and at its bottom was the door Halcyon and Leif entered, searching for an elevator in pursuit of Nanzanaya.

The Empire's streets converged in a plaza around the tower's base, radiating out like the pattern of a snowflake, and it was those streets that housed the festivities, ponies dancing and eating and listening to Spike tell his tales. At one corner of the festivities, there was an apple cart selling all manner of baked goods, staffed by Applejack, still in the company of Rarity, Pinkie Pie and Starlight. And, like all good traveling stores, it had a small wastebasket.

A pair of eyes watched from that wastebasket, taking in the scene as Starlight and her friends stood around, themselves watching the direction Halcyon had last disappeared in.

"Well, she certainly seemed like a character," Applejack remarked, taking it on herself to break the silence. "You think she was serious? About windigoes, and knowing you and whatnot?"

Starlight saw her look and gave a nervous laugh that slowly trailed off. "Prooobably? I don't exactly advertise myself as being the pony to go to if you need a thing like that. Or advertise myself as much of anything, at least these days." She sighed. "I suppose I should have been ready for someone to try and find me."

"With all due respect," Rarity began, "I wasn't there when you were telling this story to Twilight and Rainbow, so forgive me if I don't know how to approach this in the most sensitive fashion, but... You sounded less than thrilled about the possibility. And I got the impression any claims about windigoes, as outlandish as that may be, weren't even the reason for it."

"It's a long story." Starlight shook her head. "But you're right."

"Is it a story we should get the cliff notes on?" Pinkie asked, swaying from side to side. "Or just drop it and get back to the party? Because your mood has taken a nose-dive."

"The short version is, I had some high-achieving friends up there from when I was a filly," Starlight said. "And I parted ways with them to get some pressure off my back so I could get my life straightened out. Which, obviously, I had mixed success with, but if I hadn't, it probably would have been worse. And I just... am not ready for the temptation to get mixed up in that again. Which probably sounds funny after what we just did today, but trust me. It was on a whole other level."

Rarity nodded. "Well, I gathered that much. What are you going to do about her, then?"

"My visitor?" Starlight shrugged. "Exactly what I said. Let her talk to Twilight instead, and see what she says."

"Maybe I'm missing something," Applejack said. "And I don't want to be pushy. But even if you had a rough foalhood up there, you were acting like you didn't even want to hear news about the place."

Starlight sat down and slumped. "I don't. I... It's complicated. I don't want to learn that after all this time, my friends are still living on the edge of a knife, have never found a better way, nothing's changed, and they desperately need my help. I don't want to learn that they succeeded in building a home and settling down peacefully like we dreamed of, because I wouldn't want to know the reason they would do that and then not come back for me. And I don't want to learn they failed, and are dead because I wasn't there. There's just no way it ends well for me, you know?" She looked at Applejack, daring her to understand.

"Oh." Applejack awkwardly looked away.

"And there's not even the teensiest possibility they did all live happily ever after, and Halcyon is the messenger sent to bring you the good news?" Pinkie winked.

Starlight shook her head. "If that's the case, she wouldn't have been talking about windigoes. She wouldn't have carried herself like that, either. And even if it was the case, then I'd have to choose between going back and staying here." She straightened up. "Unless the rest of you have an inexplicable hunger to see for yourselves what it's like up there. Which... something tells me you do."

"Well, I can't deny I'm curious," Applejack said. "Though I know better than to disregard the warning of a local. Anyway, not to change the topic, but what did you all think of Halcyon? Ignoring why she's here or where she's from."

"Hmmm..." Pinkie stroked her chin. "Good question, Applejack. She's hard to read, that one. She smiled a lot, but she never quite seemed to feel it. I'd put equal odds on her being a cold-hearted manipulator, or just having too much responsibility on her shoulders to properly get into the spirit of meeting new ponies while still wanting to be polite."

"I know what you mean," Applejack replied. "I didn't get the impression that she had anything out for us, but she talked like she never quite said what she meant."

Rarity waved a dismissive hoof. "In other words, she's a scion of the business world. Ponies do that all the time, darling. A little hospitality goes a long way toward getting what you want, even if you don't quite feel it in the deepest depths of your heart."

Applejack narrowed her eyes and tapped the pastry cart. "I run a plenty successful business without needing to put on any false faces, though."

Rarity winked at her. "That's because you're an upstanding mare who pins her strategy on a trustworthy brand name rather than the contents of her bank account, as I also do when peddling my wares to the ponies I know. But we live in a small enough world to make that possible, and if our new friend is truly from the north, the same can't be said for her. She's a fresh face in town no one here has met before, of course she's going to put on her best smile and try to make a good first impression."

Applejack shook her head. "Suppose I can't argue with that. If she's really on a mission to help some friend of hers, I guess I can't fault her for wanting to pull out all the stops to get the help she needs, either. Still, some ponies do prefer an honest approach to a polite one."

"Actually..." Starlight hesitated. "That might have been my fault. I encountered her up in a waiting room in the castle, after being told Twilight was waiting for me. When she recognized me, it caught me a little off guard, and I... ran off." Her ears folded. "She was probably walking on eggshells just now to not spook me again. Or any of you, just in case you reacted the same."

Applejack nodded in acceptance.

"Anyway," Rarity said, "I just hope she sticks around long enough I can get another look at that coat of hers. Self-tailored garments are quite rare, and even if it was egregiously bold, seeing it casually worn out in public like that is giving me all sorts of ideas. If none of you want to hang out with her and see whether she's a stand-up kind of mare once you get to know her, I would be happy to do the honors."

Pinkie giggled.

"Well," Egdelwonk said, rising from the wastebasket, "I'm glad at least one pony here appreciates my little gift."

Everyone jumped. "What the-?"

Egdelwonk snapped his wing spokes together, and in a poof of purple geometry and smoke, he quintupled in length, his form abruptly shifting as limbs became other limbs and his whole body grew even more mismatched. After a second, he was less a pony and more a noodle dragon with the head of a goat, sporting a paw and a talon and a cloven hoof and asymmetrical horns over his red-on-yellow eyes.

"Discord?" Applejack's eyes narrowed. "What are you doing here?"

"Just dropping by to offer the boop, so to speak," he said, leaning against a crystalline house and peering at Starlight.

"Discord?" Starlight frowned. "This is Discord?"

"The one and only," Applejack said with a straight face. "Lord of Chaos, on-again-off-again tormentor of Equestria. Some sort of creature called a draconequus. Kind of a frenemy of ours, but we get along as long as we respect each other's boundaries. Which is to say, we've had kind of an eventful day..."

"Shockingly, I'm not here to start trouble," Discord said. "Merely following it at a distance for some good laughs. But now that my wayward employee has finally crossed your paths, I figured it would be an opportune moment to poke my head up a bit."

"Your wayward employee?" Rarity glanced back at the castle. "You couldn't be talking about Halcyon."

Discord shrugged. "Well, it's not like any of you were taking initiative and keeping an eye on the north. I run a little firm up there, keeping an eye out for ponies and pony-adjacent things with certain types of potential and giving them a little nudge when there's somewhere they ought to be. Of course, it would be somewhat counter-productive to the whole Lord of Chaos thing if I tried too hard to preserve order and stability, but I can make an exception here and there if it looks to be sufficiently entertaining."

Starlight took two steps back.

Discord's face drooped. "I suppose you're not interested in answering the call?"

"Hypothetically?" Starlight raised an eyebrow. "If you're an acquaintance of my friends who spends a lot of time in the north, and you want something from me that involves it? A really good way to start would be to find a better time to ask."

"Suit yourself." Discord turned and walked away, waving a talon above his head. "Just remember that this story was yours to begin with, and if you ever want to be the protagonist again, all you have to do is ask."

"Since she only mentioned it in a roundabout way," Corsica told Celestia, Princess of the Sun and all of Equestria, "there's a war brewing that's designed to unseal all the world's windigoes. Think you can lend your neighbors a hoof?"

Princess Celestia listened to all of this, looking thoughtful, and then she nodded at Twilight. "What do you make of this?"

"Me?" Twilight looked taken aback, glancing between Braen, Corsica and Celestia. "I hadn't even heard that bit before! At least, I mean, I heard about the windigoes, but..." She shook her head. "What I made of it was that you needed to hear as soon as possible, Princess."

Celestia faintly smiled. It was a pleasant smile, not a mean one, but it didn't reassure Corsica that the matter was being taken quite seriously enough to get an army immediately marching to Ironridge's aid.

"Well?" Corsica asked. "Do we get anything?"

"That remains to be seen," Celestia said, turning back to her. "Understand that I have heard from many petitioners over my reign, many of whom speak in dire and apocalyptic terms in hopes of rushing me to a hasty and favorable judgement. I can tell that you are no ordinary petitioners. You come with the air of ponies who are here not because you were the best for the job, but because you were the only ones for the job. Additionally, I have already heard some of your story from Lord Terutomo."

"And so you need some time for your bureaucracy to spin its wheels and give us a response," Corsica guessed. "That it, then? Anything else for us to do here?"

"How much time will bureaucracy take?" Braen asked.

Celestia shook her head. "Enough that I would prefer to leave you pleasantly surprised if I can hurry it along. First, I would meet with your members one on one. Then I must confer with Luna, and do some investigating into the circumstances behind your story. Only then can the wheels even start to move. However..." Her eyes found Twilight. "Luna and I are not the only Princesses in Equestria. I see you have already found your way into the company of one who is much more willing to jump into action at a moment's notice. While you wait, I think you could do far worse than get to know each other a little, and broaden each other's perspectives of the world."

Corsica blinked. Princess Celestia wanted her to let Twilight in on all of whatever secrets her weird country might be keeping?

As inscrutable as this monarch was from afar, she was even more confusing in person.

"Princess," Twilight said, flustered. "Are you suggesting you want me to go off to the north with them, fight Chrysalis and a bunch of windigoes and stop a war between two countries?"

"That is your judgement call to make, Twilight," Celestia said. "Although I would be skeptical if you told me you didn't come here at least in part to ask my permission."

Twilight bit her lip. "But... I mean, of course I want to, but Starlight..."

"By becoming involved with Starlight, you already have one hoof across the border," Celestia continued. "It is your decision whether to continue on that path. However, if you are looking to make that decision with another, perhaps Starlight would be a better pony to consult than me."

Twilight looked down.

"Now then." Princess Celestia surveyed the group. "Unless anyone has anything more to say, I am deeply interested in meeting with all of you in private, one-on-one. If there are no objections?"

"Sure," Corsica said. "Let's get on with this."

Soon, Corsica found herself in a padded, soundproofed room with no windows, quiet enough that she could hear her own breathing. It was austere yet cozy, decorated like a study, and yet clearly the kind of place ponies were taken to discuss confidential secrets.

Corsica's mind was blank. Several times, she tried to restart her train of thought, but it usually went to Halcyon or something equally unproductive and sputtered out. She had done her time, dragged herself to Equestria and gotten the attention of its rulers. She put herself out there, overused her special talent in doing so and spent herself dry, and until she got a good, long dose of doing nothing, that was all she had to give.

And yet, Princess Celestia had followed her. The door swung closed behind her. Whatever the princess wanted, they were alone.

"...Sorry," Corsica said, mustering the strength to give her a look. "Took a lot to get here, and I'm bushed. If there's something you want, I'm probably not gonna read your signals."

"I couldn't help but notice your cutie mark," Celestia said, tapping the radiant symbol of a sun on her own flank. "That is what we call these here, though in the north I believe they use many different names."

"What about it?" Corsica glanced at the squiggled mess of geometry and angles that was the source of so many of her woes, and also probably the reason she was still alive. "You recognize it too, huh?"

Celestia's special talent blurred, the sun losing focus and scrambling, until it was also a scribble of runes just like Corsica's.

Corsica blinked at it.

"I know what it is you carry," Celestia said. "I assumed not all of your present company could say the same, which is why I wished to speak to you about it in person."

"...Like I said," Corsica told her. "If you've got questions, ask 'em. I can't pick up on what you're putting down right now."

"I had thought to give you the opportunity for questions," Celestia said. "Information about our situation cannot have been easy to come by where you are from."

Corsica shrugged. "I worked it out. A little trial and error, a little not having a life. It's called an artifice. A more 'special' special talent than usual. One of a set of three. Lets me magically get my way when there's something I need, in exchange for sapping my ability to care about stuff. Right?"

"You are well-researched," Princess Celestia said.

"Believe it or not, you're not the first one I've met who had another of these," Corsica went on. "And I've already heard they don't all do the same thing, so it's not like our situations are identical. You're functional enough to rule a continent. I can't even keep a relationship straight."

"You refer to Valey," Celestia guessed.

Corsica nodded. "Guess you just know about everything, don't you?"

"Many things," Celestia confirmed. "Mine is the Artifice of Knowledge, after all. However, there are some things I do not know. For example, the location of your own artifice, prior to you appearing before me today."

"Oh yeah?" Corsica tilted her head.

"It was lost approximately twenty years ago," Celestia said. "The artifices were created with the intent that they would always be wielded by immortals. Little planning was given to their behavior in the event that they should suddenly find themselves without a living host. And yet, in the case of yours, that is precisely what happened. May I ask how you came by it?"

Corsica shrugged. "Had an accident. Long coma. Doctors figured I'd never wake up. Then it showed up while I was unconscious, and I instantly got better. Why?"

"Peculiar," Celestia mused. "...Forgive me if this is a conversation you would rather not have now. With that artifice's function, I struggle to believe you can still walk, much less cross the border on a mission to forestall a war. I had hoped to meet like this for your benefit, but I sense you would rather be sleeping."

Corsica tossed her mane. "Don't worry about it. There are no good days for me. I came here because Valey said I should look for someone she used to know called Starlight. Sounds like you and Twilight already know her. Apparently the artifices are all different, so you can't compare using one to using another, but Starlight's got some power that puts her a lot more in the same boat as me. You know anything about that?"

Celestia hesitated. "Do you know where the artifices come from, and what they are?"

"Probably," Corsica muttered. "Run it by me again, just in case."

"Yakyakistan has nine tenets to its religion," Celestia said, "which as a northerner you may already know. Six personal virtues, meant to guide adherents' lives as individuals, and three societal virtues, intended as goals for civilizations as a whole. All nine of the virtues correspond to artifacts of immense power, fundamentally integrated with the nature of our world. In a past epoch, there was great tension in the world relating to these artifacts and who would wield them, particularly the three societal virtues. The artifices were cutie marks created by my sister, Princess Luna, as an attempt to remediate that conflict. Each corresponded to one of those virtues: Knowledge, Hope and Love. While the power of the artifacts themselves was nothing short of world-shaking, the artifices existed as pale imitations, each carrying a shadow of its corresponding virtue's power. Luna's hope was that by fighting over the artifices instead and relinquishing our claim to the originals, the stakes in the conflict could be lowered, as well as the imbalances that drove it."

Corsica listened.

"That was more than a thousand years ago," Princess Celestia went on. "Today, that conflict has been firmly confined to the history books, but the artifices still exist, along with the intent underlying their creation. I wear mine to this day to honor that intent."

"You know, for a pale shadow, these seem pretty strong," Corsica pointed out. "It's literally 'make a wish and it comes true'. Unless there's a dragon nearby."

Celestia nodded. "An ability that would be all the more potent in the hooves of a divinity who could power it from an external source, rather than drawing on their own soul. The other two are no less mighty: the Artifice of Love allows its bearer to briefly glimpse the future, and my own Artifice of Knowledge allows me to control the motion of the sun and moon across the sky. It is a responsibility that must not be misused and cannot be abdicated. However, as powerful as they seem, understand only that the stakes in the conflict they were created during were much, much worse."

Corsica thought about it. "So what does that have to do with Starlight?"

"Starlight, too, is connected to the Virtue of Hope," Celestia said, "just as your artifice is. Only her connection is stronger and much more primal in nature. Twilight Sparkle and her friends, in fact, all have this in common: the six of them, sans Starlight, are all connected to the personal virtues. But she is intimately familiar with the demands and pitfalls of the realm of Hope. I believe she even wielded that artifice for a short time herself. Meeting with her might do both of you much good."

"That's how it feels on good days," Corsica admitted. "If she's really the same, I want to see what answers she's come up with for living like this. But what would an answer even look like? Tempering my expectations for the future? Learning meditation or some advanced form of resilience? Some spell to erase the cost of using it?"

Celestia looked intrigued. "Have you ever tried wishing for such a spell?"

"Yup," Corsica said. "No dice. There are a few things I just can't wish for. Guess that's one of them."

"Your artifice functions on a principle of equivalent exchange," Princess Celestia said. "It is powered by your desire to change things. Attempting to use it to create such a desire in yourself would be a zero-sum equation."

"What about the others?" Corsica asked. "Do you pay a penalty every time you use yours? Does Valey?"

Celestia shook her head. "I suspect Valey has not yet fully unlocked the power of her own artifice, although hers is the one about which I know the least. As for my own, the price for its power was already paid long before its creation."

"What?" Corsica squinted. "How's that work?"

"I am afraid I can say no more on that topic," Celestia apologized. "There are some things that are meant to be forgotten."

"Oh. Right." Corsica rolled her eyes. "Don't suppose you can pay down the cost of using mine, too, and then forget about that as well so I can use it for free?"

"It is not impossible," Celestia said. "The being who owned your artifice for the majority of its existence went to great lengths to pay its price in advance, building up a wellspring of stored emotion that she might call on to power it at will."

Corsica's brows rose. "How'd they manage that?"

Princes Celestia took on a grim smirk. "Live sacrifices."

Corsica's face went right back down. "Oh."

"That was the Griffon Empire's Garsheeva, if you were curious," Celestia said. "She was... a contemporary of mine, though I disagreed with many of her methods. I suppose you might call her a rival, though the fact that her nation has fallen and mine endures to this day gives me no sense of satisfaction. It is a tragic sight to see bastions of history crumble against the flow of time."

"According to the dragons, you go to some pretty epic lengths in the name of national stability," Corsica pointed out. "Not to knock your system, but you know that not all change is bad, right?"

Celestia looked amused. "The dragons are zealous keepers of my laws. I find they make reliable allies, even if they lean towards caution instead of moderation. I gather you have had some frustrating encounters with my nation's segregation of information."

Corsica gave her a daring look. "You really want me to say it to your face?"

The princess chuckled. "In your time since meeting Twilight, have you figured out yet why Equestria has the structure that it does?"

"Nope." Corsica flicked her tail. "And you better not be upset if Twilight learns anything from us she's not supposed to know."

"There is little danger of that," Celestia said. "She will be ill-equipped as a ruler if she does not have first-hoof experience with what lies beyond her own backyard. From what I have heard from the dragons, the challenges you face in the north are daunting, yet she has undertaken many tasks before with a risk of catastrophic failure. I bid you take your time and allow everyone to prepare properly for this endeavor. But, when the time comes, I think she will be among the finest help I can offer you... and you can repay me by showing her your side of the world."

Corsica leaned against her chair. "Don't thank me too early. For all I know I'm never going back. If you really get how bad this artifice is, maybe you can write it off as a disability and let me live out my life with government welfare in a village somewhere."

Celestia tilted her head. "Would that really make you happy?"

Corsica looked away.

"How long have you had your artifice?" Celestia asked.

"Two and a half years. Give or take."

Celestia nodded. "And how many times have you used it?"

"Too many to count." Corsica shook her head. "Within the last month alone? Probably dozens. The moment I recover enough to even think about having goals, oops, there it goes again. I dunno why I have so little self-control. Or maybe policing your thoughts is just that hard. Always feels like a good deal, right before I use it. Turning your wishes into reality only stinks once it's over and done with."

"Few could manage such a feat," Princess Celestia said. "Perhaps that lack of self-control you lament is simply a sign of an indomitable spirit. You are right about the severity of your circumstance. But however much you stumble under those burdens, do not lose sight of the fact that you are yet carrying them. You did retain enough agency to cross the border, after all."

"Enough to get dragged across by a friend, maybe," Corsica admitted. "And I'm mostly just here to look for Starlight, or speak for the party when she's feeling too secretive. She's not here right now, but it's her quest."

"You are referring to Halcyon?" Celestia guessed.

"That's the one." Corsica lazily swung a hoof. "Dunno why I'm the one getting grilled here instead of her. She's the one who gets to know all the dangerous, important details that are too scary for the rest of us. I think she just missed it because she just snuck off at the wrong moment and missed seeing Twilight return."

"I am looking forward to meeting her," Celestia said. "Although your enthusiasm about your relationship with her doesn't seem very earnest."

Corsica huffed. "It's a personal problem. Not like she's been stonewalling me about important details that could affect our mission ever since we left Ironridge, or anything."

"As silly as it may sound, those problems are actually Twilight's area of expertise," Princess Celestia said. "Perhaps confiding in her and asking her advice would both help in your relationship with Halcyon, and with her, as well."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You really want me to hang out with her, huh?"

"I think you could benefit from each other's perspectives," Princess Celestia said, straightening up. "And in more ways than one. If your aim is to speak at length with Starlight, an introduction from Twilight is probably the best way to do it. She is... mildly skittish, given her recent history. Now, speaking of other perspectives, I would speak with your mechanical companion as well. Before I go, is there anything else you would like to ask me?"

"...Nope," Corsica said after a moment's thought. "I'm good. But just a heads-up, we ran into a memory modification mystery on our way here, and I got the feeling Twilight and her friends wanted to go digging once they got our more important business out of the way. Good idea or bad idea?"

Celestia gave a little smile. "Your concern for their well-being is touching. I will encourage them to sit this one out, though it is ultimately their decision. The dragons' decision to utilize that spell is somewhat controversial, particularly among those few who know that spell's origin. As such, they prefer to clean up their own messes involving it, out of a sense of duty and to help reinforce the notion that they know what they are doing. And while Twilight and her friends are well-accustomed to dangerous situations, I see no reason that would necessitate their involvement here beyond plain curiosity, so long as the dragons keep the situation under control."

"Speaking of under control," Corsica said. "You got any plans for that Duma guy? Or the big metal dragon? Or the spirit thing that's currently living in it?"

Celestia's expression grew more serious. "The later two have both been relocated to the Crystal Empire. While Seigetsu was running her decoy with the trains, I piloted the Aegis and flew it to a secure location in the castle under cover of an invisibility spell. It will necessitate a meeting to determine what to do with them from there, but that is nothing you need worry about. As for Duma, the Convocation does love its inquisitions. I would hate to interfere and deprive them of such an interesting case."

"I think you've got a pretty annoyed inquisitor in the Crystal Empire already," Corsica pointed out. "But that's a problem for future you to deal with. Now, mind if I go take a nap?"

"Of course." Celestia's horn flickered, and the door swung open. "I wish you the best with your cutie mark and with your friendship with Halcyon, and will be curious to hear from you when you think you know why I built this nation to be the way that it is."

Corsica nodded, walking out and through a small lobby where several dragons were waiting along with Braen, Twilight, Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy. They all perked up when they saw her.

"My turn?" Braen asked.

"Knock yourself out." Corsica waved her past, tunnel vision kicking in as her thoughts turned to sweet, sweet slacking off. Preferably involving a bed.

Her gaze passed over Twilight as she walked, and she momentarily dragged herself back into the present. That mare... The conversation had turned to her almost as much as it had the artifices, and certainly more than the current state of the north. In fact, it had been less of a conversation and more of Celestia just telling her stuff. And she had only ran into a censorship wall once, when asking what it meant that the price for using Celestia's artifice had already been paid, long ago.

How could someone run a nation in which information was so rarified, so restricted, that memory erasure magic was regularly employed to patch leaks, yet be so forthcoming in conversation? And why was Celestia so interested in encouraging Corsica to goad Twilight into situations that could make her learn things in spite of those rules? And what had she been going for, asking multiple times if Corsica knew why Equestria was constructed in such a closed-off way?

It just made no sense. Why would anyone spend so much effort building up such a questionable system for no apparent purpose, then stand idly by and encourage the first pony to come and accidentally poke holes in it, even while their own subjects worked tirelessly to build it back up? Why would Equestria's junior princesses not be chosen from among a group that was already in on the plan, so there was no danger of them going off and doing their own thing once they learned the truth? Why had Celestia seemed eager to send Twilight so far away, even, to help deal with Ironridge's problems in the north? Why not send armies, or magic, or technology, or anything but an inexperienced heir?

Maybe Halcyon could figure it out. Then again, maybe Halcyon had already figured it out and just wasn't telling anyone.

Corsica sighed. If being a little more open about herself and her goals got her in as friends with Twilight and the other Elements, and Halcyon missed out because she was being too stingy with information? Then it would stink to be Halcyon. This was... probably the better deal.

Probably. Only time would tell.

Frozen in Time

The good news was, the upper levels of the Crystal Empire's palace were completely unpopulated. Everyone seemed to be down at the party, especially the guards. Leif and I passed a small number of servants and studious-looking ponies who seemed too wrapped-up in whatever they were doing to be down below, but we barely even needed to hide. Their disinterest in the party seemed to extend to us, too.

The bad news was, I had no idea how to find Nanzanaya.

"What do they even do in a room like this?" I asked, peering around an open entryway that branched from a hall into a large room, without a door or even hinges. The room was flat and orderly, glowing crystals arranged on the ceiling like strip lighting. Four rows of crystal desks took up most of the floorspace, arranged back to back with privacy dividers and crystal chairs and ample room for each pony. But the desks were all barren, and there wasn't a worker in sight.

"It reminds me of Icereach," I murmured, wandering through the unused office space. "Back there, we had a few rooms like this too. A lot of them were also empty, probably since most of the scientists went to work on personal projects in their labs rather than collaborative office work like this would be for. But we didn't have nearly this much space."

This was the fifth such room I had stumbled on so far.

"What's unusual about it?" Leif asked, following behind me. "This place is called the Crystal Empire, even though it's more like a single, sparsely-populated city. But they say it was frozen in time for the last millennia, so it's likely they used to have much more land than they do now. The capitol probably got sealed away, and the rest of their lands taken over by the dragons or subsumed into Equestria. But the infrastructure for running a large empire would still be here, even if they now have no lands to administer with it. That means space for an army of paper-pushers."

"...How often do national borders change?" I asked, letting that idea sift through my head. "Maybe I'm too young to get an idea of geopolitical time, or maybe it's been happening my whole life and I just haven't noticed because Icereach is so isolated. I guess I'm realizing, I've been thinking about the war between Ironridge and Yakyakistan as something that has to be stopped at all costs, because of the windigoes and Chrysalis. And because it's a war, so ponies would die. And it does need to be stopped. But is it abnormal?"

"How often do borders change?" Leif stopped beside me. "In the north alone, I would say at least once a week. Maybe once a day. Go back enough to take the Griffon Empire's instability out of the picture, and you still have the war in Varsidel. Try to rewind before that, and you're into Imperial Yakyakistan territory, when they were poking at their neighbors day in and day out. And even before the Griffon Empire fell, its own states were constantly jockeying for power, land and influence. When a new lord takes over an existing province and renames it for their own family, is it even the same province anymore? Mistvale no longer exists as a nation. Its lands are unclaimed and its people are dead. I've heard the far northwest has only the ruins of an ancient civilization, meaning the same thing must have happened there long, long ago. War will never be abnormal."

My backwards ears fell.

"...Not without fundamental change, at least," Leif admitted. "But I'm not sure how deep that change would need to go. I've tried quite a lot over the course of my life, and learned a lot more about what doesn't work than what does. What I do know is that if it bothers you, about the worst thing you can do is sit around feeling sorry for the state of affairs. Don't wallow. Stay on the move. Know all of your resources, and track them jealously. Don't miss opportunities because you were too stingy to use them, but don't commit them all to one endeavor, either."

I bit my tongue. "This is another lecture about how I did in Snowport, isn't it?"

Leif shrugged. "Just general advice. If you want to apply it to your own situation, that's your prerogative. Or you could ignore it and try to find your own way. I haven't met with success yet, so for all you know, I don't know what I'm talking about. Up to you."

We moved on, and so did my train of thought. Obviously, in Snowport I had been too conservative, hadn't told Terutomo or Seigetsu enough to win them over and had just made myself appear suspicious. But with Starlight, I had arguably told her too much, and prematurely scared her off before I could impress upon her the importance of my mission. Why did striking a balance have to be so hard?

It was fear, I knew. I hadn't completely broken the shackles that bound Procyon and Faye. I could stay complacent, keep dangerous information to myself, and play it safe. Or I could push hard, fight myself and temporarily break free enough to put what I knew out there... but when I ignored those shackles, so too did I ignore prudence. I could only do it if I stopped thinking and suspended my better judgement. There was a middle ground, and I needed to hit it, but I couldn't see it or aim for it while mustering the strength to put myself out there. Was that my problem?

I thought of Corsica, and how I might not be telling her everything she deserved to know. But when I tried to turn my focus to the things I should tell her, my mind went blank again, doused in a peaceful contentment that wanted me to believe everything was fine and I had nothing left I needed to do.

We entered a tall room with multiple levels, stacked balconies overlooking a central area with a circular pool. Someone had clearly outfitted this room for swimming and recreation, with a few reclining chairs and racks of towels near the pool, and some ropes with strings of floats nearby that could cordon off the pool into lanes for races. But my machine-attuned mind instantly understood this wasn't the room's original purpose: transparent crystal pipes full of water rose up along the room's walls, threading their ways onto balconies and into shadowed blocks of crystal I couldn't make out from the floor.

An open-air elevator took us up one level, and I got a closer look at where the water from the pool was going... or rather, where it was cycled through.

Industrial-sized washing machines. Probably at least three dozen of them. All made completely from crystal.

"The ponies of the past must have worn a lot of clothing," I mused, walking further along the platform, seeing another machine that was likely a water purifier, allowing the water in the storage pool to be reused. "Strange, isn't it? With those glittery coats, you'd think they'd want to show off a little. Maybe their culture used to pride itself on modesty."

"It's possible," Leif said. "In my experience, cultures that uphold modesty or purity as a virtue either have some shortcoming they're building a facade to hide, or else go to ugly extremes to enforce those ideals. But don't forget that clothing can show off a pony's body and features as well as cover them up. Not everyone uses it like you do. If I had to guess, they did it just to accentuate themselves even more."

"You don't have a very high opinion of the crystal ponies' forebearers," I pointed out.

Leif shook her head. "Perhaps I'm jumping to conclusions. I've just never seen a power structure that doesn't foster some level of decadence at the top. It doesn't matter how small you make it. It's inevitable. But the ones that get big enough to call themselves empires would always be the worst."

"The Crystal Empire sure does seem small now, though," I remarked. "You saw how many ponies were at that party. I bet every single one of them could live in this castle with room to spare, forget the rest of the city. And one castle hardly counts as an empire."

"Being frozen in time is a major societal disruption," Leif said. "It would probably result in all sorts of anachronisms as systems built for a different age adjust to the current one. Because of that, it might be premature to judge them so early when they're just rejoining the rest of the world."

Through my boots, I could still almost feel the touch of the crystal, an invisible buzz that brimmed with vibrancy. "How do you suppose they managed that?" I asked. "Being frozen in time, I mean. And why? This place feels pretty magical, but that's still a lot to ask for."

"Dunno." Leif stepped back onto the elevator, and we resumed going up. "If you're curious, ask the locals. Many of them would have existed a thousand years ago, before whatever happened to them. Personally, it doesn't interest me that much, so I spent my time inquiring about other things."

"It doesn't interest you?" The room fell around us as the elevator rose. "Seriously?"

"...Perhaps a little," Leif admitted. "I've certainly never heard of anything like it before. An entire city, vanished and returning a thousand years later as if no time had passed at all? It would take serious power to accomplish even a fraction of that, far beyond what any mortal should be capable of. However, it would be a power of stasis. And I've always been much more interested in changing my lot in life than keeping the world around me the same forever."

"When you put it that way, maybe Princess Celestia did it," I speculated. "After all, she's apparently built this country to be impervious to widespread change, to hear the dragons tell it. All conflicts are localized. No secrets need to spread, especially ones that might tempt ponies to step beyond the safety of their own backyard and appreciate how huge the world really is. And that gets on my nerves, because I want to know everything and see the world, have new experiences and keep searching for the kind of life I want to live."

I looked down at the distant pool. "But that might not always be a bad thing. You think everyone constantly fighting wars in the north is bad, right? What if you just had the power to press a button and suddenly the borders of every country and province get frozen right where they are, and no one can fight anymore?"

"That's a good point," Leif said. "But imagine if someone else had that power. Would you really be comfortable with them being able to make that decision for you? What if they took away your ability to fight for the things you want in life before you've gotten them? With enough power, you can quash someone's ability to fight... but removing their reasons for fighting is a lot harder."

The elevator stopped on a level that connected to another hallway, this one carrying the air of a maintenance corridor even though it was just as wide and opulent as the halls on the lower levels. I felt like Leif had more to say, but when I prodded, she just shook her head.

"We're supposed to be looking for your zebra friend," she told me. "I doubt speculating over this castle's history will help with that."

"But we've been up and down this place and still seen no trace of her," I sighed. "We didn't just lose the trail, we never even had it in the first place. So have you got anything better to do?"

"I know where she is," Procyon whispered, hovering just around a corner.

My eyes snapped to her.

Procyon shrugged. "I did say I'd try to be a little more helpful around here, didn't I? So I followed her after she left."

Leif was watching me with the curiosity of a scientist who was about to confirm a hypothesis.

"Don't worry about her." Procyon shrugged. "Or do worry. It's up to you, how much to tell your own teammates about your situation... but if anyone, better someone you've known for a while than a stranger. Anyway, are you interested?"

I held perfectly still.

"This seems to me like a good way to get in trouble," Procyon said, beckoning with a hoof and floating off down a hallway. "So does having anything at all to do with that zebra. She rubs me the wrong way. But as we've established, you're a lot less risk-averse than your past lives would suggest..."

"I've got..." I swallowed. "A good feeling about going this way," I mumbled to Leif, starting to follow.

Leif studied me, considering something. I felt like an experiment in a lab.

My ears twisted. "...What's that look for?"

"You're getting information from a source I can't see," Leif mused. "That's the only explanation for your sudden mood swings, erratic behavior and changes of plan. Or, at least, the most likely one."

"That's a little personal to just go and ask someone," I said warily. "...But what if I am?"

"Nothing." Leif shook her head. "Just be careful which voices in your head you decide to trust."

I raised an eyebrow.

"The Night Mother spoke to her followers through telepathy," Leif explained. "And you know where it got us."

Oh. Well, I was only stuck in my head with several older copies of myself.

I wished I had a telepathic link to a real goddess.

"We should split up," Leif said. "Cover more ground that way. If you've got a lead I know nothing about, I can't judge for myself whether I want to follow it. Good luck out there."

She darted into a shadow, waiting halfway submerged for my response. Was this really something to run from?

Well, from her perspective, it probably did look suspicious, didn't it...

"Sure." I nodded, and she was gone.

Time to see what Nanzanaya was up to.

As I climbed higher up the tower, the hue of the crystals changed, growing darker and more resplendent, yellows and pinks and teals being replaced by deep blues and indigoes and greens. Patterns carved into the floors had probably once helped ancient ponies to navigate, but their meaning was lost on me.

This tower... I felt like it had a function, something beyond being a piece of architecture, landmark and administrative building. I couldn't shake the sensation that the whole thing was connected somehow, that you couldn't change part without changing the rest. Like it had been chosen as a capitol rather than constructed to be one.

You think the crystal tower that appeared over Ironridge has rooms like this, too? Faye asked in my mind.

I furrowed my brow. Yunie, the batpony from Snowport, mentioned a crystal tower appearing somewhere in Abyssinia, and talked about exploring it and finding it full of pre-made rooms and corridors...

Exactly.

But this place was at least a thousand years old. And if the town was so sparsely populated now, would that have meant it was sparsely populated in the days before it was sealed? For all I knew, it had already been in the twilight of its imperial days even then.

How long ago had this tower appeared? And had any kind of calamity accompanied it, like the sky turning gray up north?

Procyon beckoned me through a final doorway. This one, I had to shadow sneak beneath.

The room on the other side was massive.

It was probably still a storage area, though one intended for something grand: the roof was so high up, it was lost to sight in the gloom, crystal chandeliers shedding dim light and hanging down on long, long chains that stretched up into the blackness. The ground was polished to a mirrorlike sheen, support columns bordering a walkway around the edge.

In the center were two figures: Nanzanaya, and a hulking silhouette that was unmistakably Aegis.

My breath caught in my throat.

"You came too!" Nanzanaya perked up when she heard me, spinning around with a gleam in her eyes. "Wasn't this a fantastic idea? This old castle will never run out of stuff to find! Did you know they even kept things like this up here?"

I stared more at Aegis than at her. "What's that doing here?"

It was supposed to be in Snowport. Or on a different train to the Crystal Empire. Or...

I whirled around. If Aegis had already arrived, it wouldn't have been left unguarded. And the fact that I hadn't seen any guards probably meant that they didn't want to be seen.

"Well, have fun exploring," I told Nanzanaya. "I've got somewhere important to-"

Where the door had once been, there was now only a solid crystal wall.

My heartbeat sped up.

"Have you been enjoying yourselves?" asked a voice from the shadows.

"Who are you?" Nanzanaya asked, sounding a lot more curious than I felt.

A single chandelier did more to illuminate the room than all the rest, casting a lone puddle of light onto Aegis. As I watched, ponies stepped out of the darkness from all directions, at least twenty of them and all looking the same: dusky manes, black goggles and tight bodysuits, watching us with expressionless faces.

One of them was strikingly different. A mare who stood about a head taller than me, she wore a graceful, full-body suit of plate armor made from dark blue metal. Her horn, long enough to rival Corsica's, was covered at the base by a silver crown, and she watched me with sharp, angular eyes, her mane and tail flowing together in a cloud that looked like it was made from ether.

On her sides, I saw the unmistakable armor coverings of wings. An alicorn.

"Recently, word arrived from our allies in Snowport of a certain incident. They suspected it might have been the doing of Abyssinia," the alicorn said, staying at the edge of the light. "My aid was requested in a ploy to catch any co-conspirators waiting to capitalize on the disturbance. So, I took up position in the mountains, watching the trains run, carrying ostensibly critical cargo. I expected a hijacking or holdup. Imagine my surprise when, instead, I detected an unusual power coming from within the train itself."

She took a step closer. "We hadn't expected any collaborators to simply travel from Snowport to the Crystal Empire and attempt a theft once the furor had died down. That would be unusually bold and unusually clueless... unless one was possessed of tools that make sneaking in the dark a preferable alternative to brute force. So, I decided to follow you, and made sure to place as few obstacles in your path as possible. And now it seems that hunch was correct."

Nanzanaya glanced between me and the alicorn, then pointed a hoof at me. "I'm with her. Is she not supposed to be here?"

"I was only following her to keep her out of trouble. And she's not with me. Not really." I shook my head, deciding that anything I had to gain from keeping Nanzanaya safe was heavily outweighed by everything I had to lose. "You know Seigetsu? Dragon inquisitor from Snowport? I'm here with her. She'll vouch for me. I already was involved with that incident in Snowport, and I'm not here to mess with your metal dragon."

"I am aware of that," said another voice from the shadows.

It was Seigetsu.

"What...?" I took a step back.

Seigetsu gave me a small bow. "I'm sorry for leading you on like this. While we were on the train, Princess Luna and I were in close contact. She was, after all, the one standing guard in the mountains in case Abyssinia stirred up any trouble. When she detected a suspicious power signature coming from the train, however, she requested my aid in testing you. Understand that this is not normally how the dragons of Cernial operate, but a request from a Princess constitutes the most extenuating of circumstances. So, I pretended to be unimpressed with the Crystal Empire's security arrangements, insinuated they weren't taking this matter seriously, and then left you on your own to see if you would take the bait and wander off. And lo and behold, not only did you find your way directly to this chamber, but you even rendezvoused with someone I had never seen before arriving here today."

I felt like gravity doubled as her words sank in.

"To be clear, every effort was taken during Aegis's handoff to maintain security, including multiple layers of obfuscation," Seigetsu said, touching the brim of her hat. "While Princess Luna and I ran the trains to see if Abyssinia was behind this, Princess Celestia traveled to Snowport in secret to move Aegis herself. She was never on the trains, not that any number of guards would have been sufficient to protect her if she had been. Now then." She nodded to the alicorn, presumably Luna. "I have done what you asked of me. The floor is yours, Princess."

Luna nodded, stepping forward, scanning me and Nanzanaya with her eyes. "I have been told of your reasons for being here. You are an emissary from Ironridge." Her eyes found me. "And you, from the Aptann Valley."

She looked to Nanzanaya, who didn't shrink back.

"I expect those stories are at least partially accurate," Luna said. "It is even possible that you both found your ways to this chamber completely by accident. But the power I feel on you cannot be denied. Why is it that you, both of whom appeared here suddenly and simultaneously before the Aegis, are invisible in the eyes of gods?"

My eyes widened. "What?"

Nanzanaya's posture straightened.

"You will tell me everything," Luna declared. "This is not a power that can be permitted to exist unchecked in Equestria."

"What are you talking about?" I pressed. "What do you mean, invisible in the eyes of gods?"

Luna watched me.

I glanced around for something, anything I could say to get myself out of this mess... and my gaze fell on Nanzanaya's third eye. What had she said, that having the eye allowed you to see it on others? But presumably not on yourself? And Luna thought we both were under the influence of some exotic magic? What were the odds...?

"You explain it," I told her. "You understand it better than me."

Nanzanaya smiled up at Princess Luna. "Perhaps you would prefer to hear it from each of us in private, to ensure we don't hide behind each other's explanations? We really don't know each other that well."

Luna nodded. "As you wish."

Her horn lit with blue, and a translucent dome came down around her and Nanzanaya, just opaque enough to prevent a skilled lip reader from doing their job. Not a single sound from inside reached my ears.

I gritted my teeth. Technically, I had just tried to throw her under the cart there and make her do the talking, but still...

Instead, my attention found its way to Seigetsu. "Did you really set me up?" I asked, squinting at her.

"No," Seigetsu said. "I simply helped a friend by giving you a choice. One both of us were curious to see your answer to. No one made you explore this tower, and certainly no one showed you the way to this particular room."

No one, huh? Well, technically, there had been Procyon...

Procyon was nowhere to be seen. But now that I thought on it, she had warned me.

Half a dozen thoughts about what to say flitted through my head, but all of them got vetoed. There just didn't seem to be anything I could say right now that wouldn't make my situation worse. My mission relied on getting Equestria as my ally, and any gambits or ploys in front of their princess would be a terrible way to clear the air.

I rubbed my head with my wings. Hopefully Corsica was having a better time with Princess Twilight than this.

"You look worn out," Twilight remarked, sitting with Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy near the room where Celestia talked with Corsica, shortly after Braen was called inside.

"You think?" Corsica shrugged. "Big day. Big life. Any chance you'd be offended if I went and crashed for a while?"

"Well, not offended," Rainbow said. "But you know it's barely even evening yet, right?"

"Maybe we should go back to the Crystal Empire before going to sleep," Fluttershy suggested. "This town seems... um, nice, but... it's nice."

Corsica gave her a look.

"Everyone seems on edge here, and I feel like it has to do with me," Twilight mused. "I can't stop thinking about how that bartender shooed us away. Something isn't right here, and I'd like to get to the bottom of it."

"You mean like how it's normal to assume any slightly-glitzier-than-normal ponies are changelings?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "Yeah, I definitely smell a fish. The question is whether we want anything to do with it. Normally, when there's a problem that's up our alley, the map table calls on us. But it didn't send us here. We walked into this on our own."

"We used to solve all kinds of problems before the map table, though," Fluttershy pointed out.

"Yeah, I know." Rainbow folded her forelegs and huffed. "It's making me feel lazy for even thinking about leaving this alone. But Princess Celestia is here, and she seems like chums with these guys, right? Maybe we just wait until she's done with Braen and then ask her what's up."

Twilight frowned at her. "It's not like you to be the voice of moderation when we're faced with a potentially new problem to solve."

"Ehhhhh," Rainbow complained, waving a foreleg in a circle. "I know that, but changelings in particular just creep me out. If we're beating them up, that's great, but this town can't be completely rogue if Princess Celestia is on good terms with the higher-ups. And that means changelings are probably integrated into the society somehow. Basically, whatever's wrong here is probably not the kind of problem you can solve by going fast and winning." She kicked idly at her tail. "Bet it's right in your courthouse though, Twi."

Twilight looked to Corsica. "You've spent more time here than we have. What's your take on this place?"

Corsica forced herself to focus. "On what part of it?"

"Well, first off, on why I got the reception that I did," Twilight began. "They didn't think I was an alicorn, they thought I was a changeling. Right?"

"What kind of history does Equestria have with changelings?" Corsica asked.

Twilight stared at the ceiling in thought. "Oh, just a few years back, their queen, Chrysalis, impersonated Princess Cadance and kidnapped and replaced a ton of ponies in Canterlot - that's the capitol, if you didn't know - and tried to mind-control my brother and take over Equestria. No biggie. It's clearly perfectly fine that we might have a town with a bunch of changelings in this close to Cadance's new domain, and that would be a foolish thing to freak out over, right?"

"I got kidnapped by changelings, once," Corsica said. "They weren't part of an evil army, though. Just sky pirates impersonating a legitimate employer. Not like I appreciated it, but they could think for themselves. So, supposing some changelings decided they wanted to live as peaceful, unaffiliated villagers, would Celestia be chill enough to know about them, let them keep a low profile in a town somewhere and leave well enough alone?"

"That makes sense," Fluttershy said. Then she blinked. "Wait, you got kidnapped by them? That's not something most ponies would sound so casual about."

"Okay, so the changelings here might be just random peaceful villagers," Rainbow admitted. "But you still said something out by the gates about the dragon church having memory magic. And something suspicious definitely happened to those polar bears."

Corsica leaned against a wall. "Yup. Kidnapped. Don't worry, I'm over it. Anyway, the polar bears are somebody else's problem now. We did a good deed, got them connected with someone who knows who they used to be. I think that bartender's a decent enough guy. Do you really want to get involved with a mystery someone else has under control when you run the risk of losing all your memories for it?"

"Hey, Twilight," Rainbow said. "You don't suppose the memory magic the dragons have is the same as the stuff from Starlight's story, do you?"

Twilight furrowed her brow. "I suppose it's possible. How does it work? Do you know anything about who uses it, or whether it's supposed to be reversible, or has any limitations?"

"Basically nothing." Corsica shook her head. "It's tightly controlled by a cult called the Order of Silence, which is controlled in turn by the head of the church. The one pony here who could use it was an old dude called Yelvey, and he bailed this morning or last night or something."

Twilight frowned. "Yelvey... Was he a batpony, by any chance?"

Corsica nodded. "Yup."

"Was he sort of gray?" Rainbow Dash added. "Did he wear big, giant robes that covered most of his body? And did you ever get a look under them?"

Corsica gave her a look. "Yes, yes, and no. That mean anything to you?"

"Then it's definitely the same kind of memory magic Starlight knew about," Twilight said, grimacing a little. "I'm sure Princess Celestia already knows about it, but if anything, we'd want to go to Starlight or Princess Luna about this. Although both princesses probably already know all about it... I'm definitely going to ask about this later, but I think we should just assume someone who already knows all the details is already on this case. Besides, I'm feeling a little like getting back to the Crystal Empire and taking a rest after all the day's excitement myself."

"And you still have to tell Starlight about her visitors," Rainbow pointed out. "Assuming everyone we left behind hasn't found her already."

Twilight sheepishly grinned. "Yeah, she'd probably be real mad if that happened. Anyway, here's to not poking our noses where they don't belong, not getting in trouble with a town of maybe-passive changelings, not getting our memories wiped and going home safe and sound at the end of the day?"

"Yay," Fluttershy whispered.

"Just as long as we're clear that if Princess Celestia is holding out on us somehow and everything here is actually held together by string and duct tape, we're coming back and fixing this place up a bit so it can stop giving me the creeps," Rainbow insisted. "But yeah. We helped some polar bears. We saw Celestia, and she didn't think your report was super panic mode. Now it's time to go back and see the look on Starlight's face when she learns she's got visitors."

"How am I holding out on you, now?" Princess Celestia asked, appearing in the doorway with Braen.

"Yo." Rainbow saluted with a wing. "Is this place cool? And would it benefit from us messing around a little and seeing what problems we can root up?"

Princess Celestia chuckled. "I don't think there's any place in Equestria that couldn't. However, this particular town is in good hands, and I am currently heading back to the Crystal Empire, so staying around would mean missing out on a free ride."

"I wouldn't mind a ride," Twilight said, still sounding ever so slightly tired from her marathon teleport session to get here.

"If you do have any business here you'd like to come back for later, I would be happy to give you some contacts, though," Celestia went on. "Dragon society is somewhat removed from the norm of what you've dealt with before, Twilight; particularly the ice dragons. And in this particular situation, you may benefit from bringing a larger team with more experience abroad. But right now I have much to confer with Luna about, so if you are coming, I would leave quickly."

Corsica nodded, psyching herself up for dealing with Halcyon again. Hopefully her secretive friend hadn't withheld the wrong info from the wrong pony and gotten into trouble while she'd been gone...

Moving Too Fast

I fidgeted in the Aegis room, Seigetsu and Luna's goons keeping a watchful eye on me as Luna stood with Nanzanaya underneath a luminous, soundproof dome.

The tension in the air made my spine crawl, even though I knew it was all me: the goons didn't seem to be expecting any further trouble, and Seigetsu was standing at attention, only half watching me, looking deep in thought.

Yeah. She had better be deep in thought. Pretending to be upstanding and straightforward, then lying about her reaction to the Equestrian guards having a party during a major operation, all to trick me into thinking it was safe to go looking for her metal dragon. Which wouldn't have been a problem, since I wasn't actually looking for it, if I hadn't stumbled upon it by accident while chasing that stupid zebra, who for all I knew was looking for it...

Halcyon, Faye said in my mind.

My ears perked ever so slightly.

We need to hear what they're saying in there, Faye whispered. Right? What if... I take over, and turn you back into a ghost, so you can float inside and eavesdrop?

I blinked. That was a bold plan, for someone who wanted to interact with the world so little that they created me to live their life for them.

Y-Yes. I guess it is. But if Nanzanaya has gotten us in this much trouble already, shouldn't we try to learn what we can from her before we have to part ways for our own safety? Besides, depending how much trouble she's in, this could be our last chance even if we can clear our own names. Unlike in our case, though, we don't know that she's innocent.

I took a breath. Alright. Faye's turn.

"Hmm?" Seigetsu glanced over at us as I materialized, first as an emerald gemstone and then swiftly released into ghost form.

"Just stretching." Faye looked at where the door had been, an ordinary wall of crystal still replacing it.

She didn't see me? Not that I expected she could, but so far, so good...

I nodded to Faye, then floated towards Luna's shield.

"I meant what I said." Luna's voice reached my ears the moment my head was halfway through the barrier, its magic doing nothing to impede spirits. "Invisible in the eyes of gods. I have practice detecting things that are trying to hide from me, even from afar, but it isn't a kind of practice that is possible for most. Where did you acquire this power, and for what purpose?"

Nanzanaya straightened up. "If you think it's that much of a problem, would you like to help me get rid of it?" She touched the third eye on her forehead. "This isn't a power, it's a curse. A curse that is widespread among my people, progressive, and has no known cure. You probably think you're clever, being able to spot me through it, but I can promise you I was trying to be seen. Why else do you think I would make my way here, where all the royal attention is currently concentrated?"

She pointed a hoof out at the room, and at Aegis in the center of it. "The longer I take to bring aid to my people, the more 'invisible' we will become. It's a trick of the perception, giving everyone around us the idea that we're not worth paying attention to. The more important or powerful someone is, the earlier it will affect their senses, since they usually have better things to be doing with their time. But it eventually comes for everyone, from the highest ruler to the lowliest drunk wandering the streets."

Her brow creased. "By the time I embarked on my journey to Equestria, our way of life had already begun breaking down. Carts colliding because their pullers didn't notice each other in time. Shoplifting by those whose curses are already far along. I was chosen to come here because I was one of the least-afflicted. As a result, I can still have normal interactions with all but the most powerful ponies. So, I'm sorry for trespassing somewhere so important. I have no designs on any of the secrets you keep in this castle. I merely wanted to take no chances in getting your attention."

I hovered, slack, in midair. A curse? That made ponies gradually become less and less noticeable? That couldn't be the invisible eye thing that I shared with her, right?

My mind ran over the possibilities, polishing them furiously. How many experiences did I have with ponies, especially powerful ones, not noticing or forgetting about my existence? Especially recently?

Well, I had been aggressively courted by just about every faction leader in Ironridge... and that was barely a month ago. If anything, I had the opposite effect on me. That was overwhelming enough to count as proof all by itself. But then that would mean that our connection with the third eye was something completely different.

"I see," Princess Luna said, looking the zebra up and down. "And so you assumed that because such an effect is worrisome to us, we would help you to end it. What kind of help are you seeking?"

Nanzanaya's eyes sparkled with success. "Our neighbor, Abyssinia, has constructed a dark tower near our border, and is charging it with vile energies. Our scholars and mages are certain that is the source of the effects. I don't know if destroying it can reverse the curse, but at the very least it should halt the spread. Also, the location of this tower is not far from your border as well, so your nation stands to benefit from lending us a helping hoof."

Luna appraised her.

"You know the history between you and my people, Princess of Dreams," Nanzanaya said, her expression going completely neutral. "I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, here. But if you did want to make amends, this would be such a good opportunity, you could wipe the slate clean with a single move. And you wouldn't even have to face my people or enter the valley to do it. Bring down that tower, and we could even be friends again."

Luna's expression grew harder. "You have made your point. Now, if you truly have no designs on the Aegis, how did you locate this room?"

"You mean that metal dragon thing?" Nanzanaya pointed over her shoulder at Aegis. "...You probably wouldn't be convinced if I told you I've never seen it before, given where I'm from. I didn't realize it was what was up here, though. It's the real deal, isn't it?"

"That is none of your concern."

"No, it isn't!" Nanzanaya smiled and shrugged. "I'm merely here to secure help for my country in whatever form you can provide it. As for how I found this place, it was mostly a matter of trial and error. I'm quite fast on my hooves, you see."

Luna scrutinized her.

"It was a safe assumption there would be something in a dusty old castle like this someone important was protecting." Nanzanaya didn't break eye contact. "Anyway, what do you think? My condition obviously unnerves you, and I'm here to ask your help in making it go away. Want to be partners? Or do you need some time to think it over?"

"I think I've heard enough," Luna said. "Have you anything else to say for yourself, or should I go and see if your story matches up with your companion's?"

"Oh, it probably won't," Nanzanaya casually admitted. "I've never met her before today, and couldn't tell you a thing about what her deal is. Try not to tell her too much about me, though, would you? We've hit it off pretty well, and a big part of that has been the aura of mystery I'm cultivating!"

Faye sat in silence as Luna and Nanzanaya talked, Halcyon visible halfway through the sound barrier out of the corner of her eye. Assuming control here, in this place, surrounded by so many ponies... It was all she could do to keep her composure and not to freak out.

Steady. Breathe, she told herself, focusing on the rise and fall of her chest beneath her rugged old coat. No one knows you're you right now. Just focus on staying calm.

Something about the atmosphere wasn't quite right, though. Faye concentrated on that wrongness, tried to pick it apart, and suddenly it was obvious: the stars she saw whenever she assumed control, the little pinpricks of light that each corresponded to a pony, somewhere off in the distance.

There were lots of them below her hooves, down where the city would be. And something much brighter than a star should be, somewhere around the party's edge. But up here, in the room she was currently trapped in... None of Luna's guards had stars.

They were all dark. Lounging around, standing at attention, whatever they were doing, each and every one lacked that spark. Seigetsu had one. Luna had one, also brighter than normal. Nanzanaya had one too, though it looked as if it was hidden by a thin shroud.

She had been able to see those for almost as long as she could remember. At an early age, she had figured out no one else could see them and no one knew what she was talking about if she mentioned them, and ever since then, they had been her secret, just like the distant rushing in her ears that went away whenever she became Halcyon.

No books ever made mention of them. They were obviously a changeling queen thing, because she could also dull them in her senses by taking off her bracelet... not that she ever made a habit of that. As best as she could figure out, they were just somehow associated with life.

But still, Luna's guards had no stars.

Were they zombies? Machines? Some sort of arcane constructs? Faye shivered, her bracelet feeling cool around her leg. If only she could be anywhere but here.

There was one bright spot to being in control, though. Back on the streets, she had gotten the sensation that the entire city functioned like a giant changeling queen throne, its roads and crystals serving as pipelines for emotion between the ponies and some powerful, hyper-suffused core. The castle, it turned out, was the same: her boots provided only a thin layer of insulation between her and that network, which was currently supercharged with feelings of jubilation, relief and the reclamation of something precious that had been lost.

Would the caves beneath Ironridge have felt the same, if she visited there at a time when the Kindness spirit was healthy and whole? Faye pored through her memories of having that spirit within her, and slowly came to the conclusion this was different. The Crystal Empire didn't have any central presence or intelligence governing its power, even if all those emotions were being concentrated into a core. All that power was just sitting there, waiting to be used.

So Faye didn't feel bad about the tiny quantities leaking through her boots and into her hooves. She didn't pull on it or try to take it, but she didn't push it away, either, and the proximity of those emotions gave her the strength she needed to keep her cool.

And then, finally, the sound barrier dropped.

"You shall wait with my soldiers," Luna instructed, motioning Nanzanaya over to the starless ponies with a nod, nothing but their manes and tails visible beneath full-body flight suits and reflective goggles. Then she turned to Faye. "It is your turn to explain these circumstances. Would you prefer the privacy of my silence?"

Faye swallowed and nodded, giving Halcyon a glance that hopefully said your turn, hurry.

Halcyon nodded and flew closer as Luna's horn glowed, preparing to summon the barrier again. Faye focused, Halcyon's floating form dissipating as she was converted back to a mask-

Luna's shadow grabbed the emerald stone.

Faye blinked, still trying to reassimilate herself, even though the gemstone was no longer in her hooves, swiftly being carried across the floor by a shadow shaped like an appendage, stretching out from the princess's hooves.

"What is this?" Luna asked, her shadow going back to normal after depositing the gem containing Halcyon at her hooves.

Faye stared, then swallowed, her train of thought beginning to snarl. How had Luna done that? What had just happened?

Luna picked up the mask in her aura and held it up. "If you meant to conjure this as a weapon, my reflexes are far too quick for a trick like that." She stared at the mask, her horn glowing as she held it aloft. Her brow furrowed in confusion and disbelief. "What is this?"

"It's mine," Faye said quietly, her brows shadowed by her bangs. "Give it back."

"Why and how did you create this?" Luna asked, slightly more forceful. "I would have noticed it if you were carrying it when you entered."

"Give it back," Faye repeated, barely even registering that Luna had never finished the silence bubble. "I need it. Please."

From where she was standing, Seigetsu raised an eyebrow, her expression visibly curious.

"Need it for what?" Luna pressed. "This substance is-"

"Is mine, is what it is," Faye growled, her senses and goals and inhibitions draining away like receding floodwaters as Luna held onto the mask. "This is not up for negotiation. Whatever you want my cooperation on, give that back or you're not getting it! Give it back, now!"

"May I see that, actually?" Seigetsu asked, walking toward Luna and holding out a hand.

Luna looked taken aback by the force of Faye's outburst. "I am above being intimidated by this display," she warned. "Calm yourself and explain how and why you managed to create this artifact."

Faye looked frantically around for something, anything she could use to stop this. Her mind was hers to mold. It was the one thing that conclusively, certainly, irreversibly belonged to her and could never be surrendered, compromised or taken... until now.

Luna was holding a piece of her identity. The most important piece.

Nothing mattered more than getting it back.

"Give it back," Faye whispered, trembling, slipping off the boot on her bracelet leg. "I'm supposed to be your friend. I came here for your help, and to help you! So give it back now, or I'll... I'll..."

Discord, Lord of Chaos, draconequus, symmetrically-challenged individual and part-time janitor known as Egdelwonk, reclined against a support pillar near the base of the palace, watching from the outskirts as the ponies partied on.

Behind him was a cavernous interior, open to the air and hollowed out beneath the palace, level with the streets and accessible from every thoroughfare in the city, the castle supported above it by massive crystals to every side. In the dead center, gentle, flowery runes converged from the streets into a flowing sigil around a sculpted spike of crystal, a matching spike hanging down from the ceiling straight above. The two spikes crackled softly with energy, and rotating in midair between them was a crystalline heart, surrounded by a halo of rainbow and radiating a peaceful hum.

Suddenly, the world around the heart seemed to contract like a heartbeat, letting out a pulse of distorted light. When Discord turned to look, tendrils of black had seeped down through the top spike, and the heart had stopped spinning, caught by the ends of the tendrils like a forest of tiny hands.

Discord lifted his sunglasses with a single talon. "Oh, well that's interesting."

From high in the sky, the wave of distortion was much more visible as it radiated out, stretching all the way to the edges of the weather control shield that formed a dome around the Crystal Empire.

Corsica, sitting in a chariot formed from solidified golden telekinesis with her mane whipping in the wind, leaned over the edge and stared. "What was that?"

"It looked like a fluctuation with the shield!" Twilight leaned out to watch as well, pressing far too closely into her personal space. "That's not good!"

"With the shield?" Fluttershy looked concerned. "The one that's powered by the Crystal Heart? But we just fixed that this morning!"

"I know." Twilight swallowed, looking grim. "But what if we didn't fix it good enough? I should have stayed in the Empire to keep an eye on it! What if our repairs were incomplete, or I made a mistake, or-"

"Yeah, well, I'm gonna go check it out," Rainbow Dash said, diving off the side of the chariot and blasting ahead in a bolt of speed.

"Princess?" Twilight looked up, her ears falling.

"Steady yourselves in your seats," Princess Celestia encouraged, flying ahead of the chariot with her horn blazing yellow. "I think Rainbow Dash has the right idea."

Chromatic crystal stretched up from the floor, surrounding and encasing Faye's blood-red hoof. Her bracelet burned with emerald, flames lancing out and crackling across her leg, and the crystal burned as well, multicolored flames of its own dancing and sparking up from the floor.

Her mind was petrified, her mouth frozen mid-sentence as her soul and her emptiness hovered next to a vast reservoir of emotion, squished up against it, only a thin veneer of surface tension preventing them from merging with the force of a waterfall. If Luna didn't give back her mask, she'd what?

She'd what? She'd what?

The inside of her body yelled the question at her with equivalent force to the power she had reached through the floor to touch, and her fear rose up like a dragon to snuff out any sort of answer.

"Her hooves," the voice of a twenty-years-younger Shinespark whispered. "It's like they're covered in blood..."

"Wonder if it's fate," a gravelly stallion mused. "After all, to hear you lot tell it, a lot of blood was spilled in her name."

Corsica glared at her special talent, sitting in a closet in Snowport. "In fact, the reason I manifested this to begin with was probably because somewhere deep down, even while I was unconscious and comatose, some part of me just refused to accept my fate and die. But whether I want to wish things had been different or not, it doesn't matter, because wishing this talent away is the one thing even it can't do."

A nurse tried to comfort her in a hospital room, but she was merely running through the motions. If only she understood that Faye knew nothing whatsoever about avalanche first-aid, despite having a talent that could let her learn it in a heartbeat if she had ever previously cared about pretending to be a field medic. That nurse would have felt just how much she was willing to give to have a talent that could simply let her pull expertise from the void instead, without needing something to learn from or time to learn it.

Gray static clouded Faye's vision, and then suddenly claws of color began shredding and tearing at it, the emotions from the city driving into her fear, puncturing it and tearing a ragged gash in the curtain of nothing. And through that tear, she saw a golden light, and heard a new voice.

"Two wishes? You are greedy indeed..."

"Cease this at once!" Luna's voice boomed with power, pulling her halfway back to reality, but she was still paralyzed. What could she cease? She wasn't doing anything. The moment she tried to call upon her powers, no matter how dire the situation, even for a cause as important as protecting Halcyon, this happened.

This always happened.

Maybe her fear was protecting her from worse consequences.

Or maybe it just made her useless.

"What's going on?"

Applejack shoved her way through a crowd of crystal ponies that were vacillating between confusion and panic, creating enough of an opening for Rarity, Pinkie Pie and Starlight to slip into the central plaza as well.

Discord tapped the ground with his lone hoof, holding up a talon and preemptively sighing when she opened her mouth with an accusation. "Believe it or not, I have absolutely nothing to do with this one. But if you're going to deal with it, are you sure one of you doesn't want the boop? Having an extra point of view up there would really smooth things along..."

Rarity was ignoring him. "Sweet Celestia, the Crystal Heart!"

"Today's really not its lucky day, huh?" Pinkie guessed, bouncing along beside her. "Hey Starlight, you think-"

"That looks like it has nothing to do with our repair job," Starlight said, narrowing her eyes in frustration and marching up to the entrapped heart. "Now, let's see..."

She put a hoof on the crystal spike, lit her horn with a bright teal aura, and closed her eyes. "There," she said after a second, focusing on a point far above her. "Whatever's causing this is up there. And whatever it is, I am not in the mood!"

Her horn bristled with power...

Faye was just conscious enough to understand what was about to happen as Luna hardened her telekinesis into a sword, pointing it at the hoof that was attached to the floor.

What was she thinking? Of course she couldn't try to threaten a princess, even if she actually was in control of her powers and had the mental fortitude to use them. Why even-

A pillar of crystal erupted from the ground next to her, crackled with teal energy, morphed itself into the shape of a boot, and kicked her so hard that the connection holding her to the ground shattered. Faye went flying, taking out two of Luna's goons on her way, until she hit a wall and crumpled, out cold.

Discord emerged from a puff of purple smoke and lopsided polygons just in time to keep a viewpoint on Aegis's room as Faye went down, rubbing a talon down his face in exasperation. Before Luna or Seigetsu could question his presence, Starlight teleported in too.

Starlight's eyes quickly found Faye, and her battle stance melted into disappointment. "You? You did that? You've got to be kidding me..."

Faye didn't respond or move.

"Starlight!" Luna started in surprise.

"Oh. You're already here?" Starlight blinked at her, then sighed. "Guess I didn't need to get involved, then-"

Her eyes fell across Aegis.

Starlight sat down heavily. "It's just one blast from the past after another today, isn't it? Do I want to know what that's doing here? And does it have anything to do with her?" She pointed a hoof at Faye.

Seigetsu watched Starlight, clearly intrigued, but didn't speak up.

"...The situation seems under control for the moment," Luna said, nodding to Starlight. "My thanks for your intervention, although I would have been fine without."

"What even happened here?" Starlight asked, glancing around and surveying the room. "I don't want to know, but I've got the feeling fate is just going to keep bludgeoning me over the head with it until I acknowledge the messenger at the door."

"That is a long story," Princess Luna began. "Though the shortest version is that I detected a pair of intruders sneaking into the room where the Aegis was being kept. As for why it is here, perhaps it would be better to wait until my sister has returned, so that we can brief you along with Twilight Sparkle and the Elements. That would keep unnecessary retellings to a minimum."

"Great," Starlight groaned. "The way you say that makes it sound like it's definitely going to become my problem."

Luna hesitated.

"What's she doing here, anyway?" Starlight jabbed a hoof at the crumpled Faye. "And should anyone go check on her?"

"Probably getting herself into a very convoluted misunderstanding that's entirely her fault," Discord said, stepping out into the light. "I can vouch for her integrity with gusto, if it makes a difference. She's almost as good at telling the truth as I am!"

"Discord..." Luna warned. "I know you are attracted to situations like this, but your feedback would be better appreciated in another venue."

"Oh, don't worry about me," Discord insisted, waving a talon. "I'm just buying time until... Actually, there they are right now..."

Corsica ran through a newly un-crystalled door with Braen, Twilight, Fluttershy, Rainbow Dash and Princess Celestia, skidding to a stop when she saw the contents of the room and quickly piecing together what had happened. There was Halcyon's boot, abandoned on the ground, and far away from it, laying in a corner... Yep, there was Halcyon.

"You idiot," Corsica grumbled, picking up the boot with her telekinesis and dragging it over to its crumpled owner. "What did you pick a fight with? And why would put yourself on the line when there's a princess right... there...?"

Halcyon was out cold. Her bracelet was hot, and the sleeve around it was in tatters.

Corsica sighed, stuffing the boot back on and lifting her friend in her telekinesis, turning back to face the rest of the room. "Any of you know where a hospital is around here, or at least some place where she can rest?"

"You know this mare?" a dark alicorn asked, ostensibly Princess Luna.

"Yeah." Corsica's telekinesis twinkled. "What of it?"

"I need to take her into custody," Luna explained, her voice cold and curt. "While thinking it was unguarded, she snuck into this room with an accomplice, then proceeded to pull an unknown weapon on me when I attempted to question her. Rather than backing down, she then attempted to use some form of disharmonic power to attack this castle's core. I know not what your relationship with her is, but I will expect your compliance in getting to the bottom of this."

"Princess," Starlight hissed, poking Luna conspicuously with her telekinesis, then recoiling as if she had just accidentally violated a major social contract. "I mean... Look at her cutie mark."

Luna took a sharp breath.

"What's this?" You two recognize this too?" Corsica turned so her flank was more easily visible. "Whoop-de-doo for you, I guess."

"Wait, what's special about it?" Twilight asked. "Or did you explain this to me already, and I forgot because it's been a busy day? I'm gonna go with you didn't? Actually, what's going on in here in general?"

"Great idea!" Starlight strode forward, her voice cracking as she patted Twilight on the back and pushed her into the middle of the room. "Why don't you deal with this, and only come get me if it's something you actually think I'm needed for, huh? Literally one day to put my thoughts together is all I ask, so how about-"

She bumped into Fluttershy, who was staring, transfixed, at Aegis.

"Something's calling to me," Fluttershy whispered. "From... whatever that is. I can feel it..."

Aegis's eyes lit up with pink. "FLUTTERSHY," it said in a voice that seemed to echo in Corsica's head. "YOU HAVE A DELIVERY."

The armor plates on its chest shifted, exposing a glowing, crystalline core... and several embers of pink dripped out of that core, tumbling across the ground like a stream with too much surface tension, tracing a path straight towards Fluttershy. She leaned down to meet it, and it melted into her, until all the embers were gone and the armor plates had shifted back into their original positions.

"Oh my," Fluttershy whispered, looking mostly normal except for some quality that couldn't be captured in words, and maybe not even in a picture, yet had definitely increased. "This feels just like wearing my Kindness pendant." She met Corsica's eyes. "This must be what you were talking about when you said the reason you were here was related to my Element in Ironridge. Some sort of spark of Kindness, except it feels diminished and broken down. But why was it in that metal dragon?"

"I am certain everyone has an abundance of questions," Princess Celestia said, cutting in. "But it seems that the immediate crisis is resolved, and so I would take charge of anything not immediately related to the Aegis's security. Sister, a briefing, please."

Luna nodded. "Appreciated. First off, that mare there needs to be detained for questioning, ideally in a location where she cannot come into contact with the crystals. Second, do you have any idea what this is?"

She held out a chunk of emerald crystal that Corsica recognized instantly as Halcyon's mask.

Celestia frowned, examining it. "Some sort of crystallized emotion, all but certainly. However, I can't get even the faintest indicator of what emotion it is. Perhaps we should continue this conversation in private?"

Corsica's heart sped up. Halcyon had lost that? And presumably then did whatever she did to cause that shockwave... Maybe a combination of stupidity and desperation?

She couldn't let that thing get damaged or taken, though. Not under any circumstances. That was her Halcyon, the one who had been there for her after she got her special talent, and all throughout the years where she struggled under its weight.

And if the princesses didn't even know what it did... It wasn't getting away. Not on her watch.

"Hey," Corsica said. "Not to butt in on something important, but how much weight does my word carry around here? She's in trouble, I'm her friend, but I've been a model citizen around here, and you're asking questions you're not likely to find the answers to on your own."

Princess Luna looked up. "You know what this artifact is?"

Corsica glanced at Seigetsu. Whose side was that dragon on, right now? Either way, her special talent probably wouldn't work on alicorns... Whether she could pull this off or not would be all on her.

"No, but I've got an idea," Corsica bluffed. "It's related to this alternate system of spellcasting she was developing to allow non-unicorns to use magic like we can. She probably freaked out because she doesn't want anyone reverse-engineering it, since it wasn't patented yet - patents were real important where we come from. Not that I think that's more important than clearing her good name. Kid's prone to freaking out a lot, and I'm certain this was a misunderstanding. So if you really want to know what that gem was supposed to do, give it to some scholarly type with a lab, and I can give them the right pointers they'd need to figure it out quick."

Celestia glanced at Twilight. "Twilight, would you like to take a crack at this? You seem to be getting along well with Corsica."

Corsica gave herself a mental hoofbump. It seemed she had read Twilight properly as a fellow science nerd.

"Um, sure," Twilight said, accepting the emerald with her telekinesis. "This crystalline structure sure is unique..."

Mission complete... enough. For now. Talking Twilight into giving her the stone, or at least not doing anything stupid with it, would probably be far easier than one of the rulers whose sensibilities Halcyon had apparently just violated enough to get punted into the corner of a room.

As she carried Halcyon, Corsica furtively slipped off her bracelet as well, opting to keep that safe too for good measure. However they were going to turn this bad of a start around enough to win military aid for the north, she couldn't see... other than that it would probably involve her doing the majority of the work while knowing a minority of the details.

Halcyon would owe her big for this. Just as soon as she got out of idiot jail.

My Research Budget...

Corsica was forced to relinquish Halcyon's unconscious body before she was allowed to leave.

"Not to throw shade at your justice system, or anything," Corsica said, watching as Luna's flight suit-wearing goons gently took her friend. "But did she really do something bad enough to warrant getting swatted like a fly?"

"Some things are more important than being gentle," Princess Luna responded. "For example, the safety of each and every pony in this city. The weather around this city is intelligent and magically hostile. We keep it at bay through use of a shield projected by this castle's core. Just this morning, the shield was briefly destroyed by an accident, and only the heroic actions of Twilight Sparkle and her friends were able to repair it in time to prevent a permanent mass exodus... or else the death of everyone here. Your friend here was initially being questioned over suspicious activity. However, she repeatedly escalated the situation rather than answer my questions, up to the point of assaulting the castle with unknown magic. Whether or not there was an innocent explanation for her actions, she needed to be stopped at all costs."

Corsica narrowed her eyes. "You mean that shock wave we saw while flying here..."

"Might I ask your relationship to this mare?" Princess Celestia cut in.

"Friends," Corsica said. "Business partners. Traveling buddies."

"This might be my fault," Twilight said. "When I met Corsica in the waiting room, after hearing what she had to say, I tried to jump into action immediately, and got the idea to whisk everyone there off to look for you, Princess." She bowed to Celestia. "I should have at least taken the time to meet the whole delegation, or at least make myself aware of who was here. She might have gotten desperate, or tried to take matters into her own hooves because she felt like she was left behind? All I was thinking of was raising the alarm."

Luna focused on her. "Taking what matters into her own hooves?"

"Yo." Corsica waved a lazy hoof. "I'm getting tired of explaining this, so it's going to be short: we're from the north. Ironridge, specifically. Things are getting bad up there, and we're here to petition our friendly southern neighbors for aid. We're not here to act suspicious, refuse to explain ourselves or damage any important weather shields, so I can't speak for whatever she was doing." Her hoof slowly found Starlight. "Also, you look kind of like the pony we're supposed to be looking for."

"I probably am," Starlight sighed, looking like she wanted to melt into a puddle. "Starlight? Starlight Glimmer? Famous little kid from the north whom ponies still seek out twenty years later to ask for advice on removing windigo infestations? That sound like the pony you're looking for?"

"Nice to meet you," Corsica said. "You look about as thrilled to be here as I am."

Starlight picked Twilight up in her telekinesis, earning an undignified squawk, and put her down between herself and Corsica. "Deal with this?"

"Hey!" Twilight protested. "I've been... ugh, Starlight!"

"It sounds as though you have enough need of our cooperation that you won't be wandering off," Luna said, taking the floor. "In that case, I would ask that you stay with Twilight Sparkle for the time being. I will wish to speak with you later about your friend, once she wakes up. But first, I have two questions. I assume you came to this room in company of everyone else here?" She nodded at Twilight, Celestia and the others.

"Yup." Corsica nodded.

Luna's eyes fixated on her. "Have you any other history with this room? Did you know aught of where it was or what it contained?"

Corsica blinked... then glanced at Aegis. "You mean that? The thing the dragons used to keep in their basement? Why don't you ask her?" She pointed a hoof at Seigetsu, who was quietly standing off to the side with her arms folded. "She told us a bunch about it. Also, we were there and helped them protect it from that centaur guy?" She narrowed her eyes at Seigetsu. "Actually, if you've been here all along, you wanna tell me what happened to Halcyon?"

Seigetsu adjusted her hat. "Your friend sought this room out the moment it appeared no one was watching. In the presence of an accomplice I hadn't seen before today, no less. And you apparently saw for yourself what happened when she was questioned about it. Understand that after that business with Yelvey, Snowport has lost its usual means of enforcing confidential contracts, meaning I now have to place an unusual amount of trust in you and your friends. My current assessment is that you've never been completely forthcoming about what it is you need Equestria's power for, felt that your mission to acquire it isn't going as smoothly as you'd like, and have started taking stock of your other options. I doubt Halcyon seriously intended to steal the Aegis, but she certainly knew we had sent it here and likely wanted to see for herself what manner of security it was protected by. What concerns me most is her alleged collaborator, who is a much greater unknown."

Corsica tensed. Had Halcyon been thinking that? Could Seigetsu be right? Sure, she left Halcyon behind and hadn't put in a single word for getting Twilight to wait for her, but that was because Halcyon kept leaving her behind, not explaining things, running off with mysterious zebras, never talking to her... so Halcyon had it coming, right?

Of course she did. But that still didn't mean she would understand if she got a dose of her own medicine.

Maybe she really had done something desperate and stupid.

"Well." Corsica composed herself and looked back at Luna. "That answer your question? I know a pretty decent amount about this thing. At least enough to know how valuable it is. And I knew it was in this city somewhere. But I've got no desire to mess with it. And all of you have something else I want more, so I've got a good reason to be on my best behavior. Sound reasonable?"

Princess Luna nodded. "All of you may go, except for Fluttershy. Twilight Sparkle, I trust this mare can rely on your hospitality for the time being?"

"Of course, Princess!" Twilight bowed.

"Except for me?" Fluttershy raised her head. "You mean because of that thing that came out of the dragon?"

Seigetsu cleared her throat. "That thing you speak of originated from Halcyon. I was there when it entered the Aegis. My impression is that she carried it down from the north much as you are carrying it right now."

"How can that be?" Fluttershy asked. "It definitely feels like it's related to my Element, or is even part of it somehow. But I'm the only one who can use the Element of Kindness. I'm not sure someone else could just do... whatever I'm doing right now with it."

"Perhaps that will be another question for Halcyon when she wakes up," Princess Celestia said. "I would like to talk with her myself, this time. Unless you can tell us anything about what that was, Corsica?"

Once again, all eyes were on Corsica.

"Not much," Corsica sighed. "She got it from some caves deep beneath Ironridge. It's some sort of spirit that used to live down there and 'regulate the laws of nature' or something. But now it's half dead because someone was misusing its power. It wanted to be brought to its champion. Which, apparently, is you." She nodded at Fluttershy.

Starlight's eyes widened. "A spirit from the caves? You don't mean a crystal palace?"

Corsica shrugged. "I never went down there. Ask the kid who's currently unconscious."

Luna's eyes narrowed. "This is a Flame of Harmony?"

"It feels like it's sleeping," Fluttershy reported. "But now that you've said all that, I'm certain you're right. This is related very closely to my Element. And I think it's hurt somehow."

Twilight glanced frantically between Starlight and Fluttershy. "Okay, so, apparently this is actually real and actually happening. What do we even do about that? Princesses?" She looked to Luna and Celestia. "Have you ever resolved something like this before?"

Celestia hesitated, then lowered her head. "...No. We have never revived an extinguished Flame of Harmony before. If such a thing can be done, it would need to be pioneered from scratch. However, you do have considerable resources at your disposal."

Twilight stared at Starlight.

"...Fine," Starlight sighed. "Let's go sit down in a more comfortable room with fewer important ponies, and I'll help brainstorm some ideas."

Twilight opened a door to a room lower down in the palace, where the crystals were brighter and there were plenty of windows to let the evening sun in. A whole suite of rooms stretched out before everyone, several individual bedchambers, bathrooms and amenities surrounding a cushy central room with three couches, a hearth, a kitchenette, a big table and even a fish tank built into the crystal. "Well, here's where we stay when we're up here," she said, nodding to Corsica. "Make yourself at home, I guess?"

Rainbow Dash immediately pressed a button on the wall next to the door. "Dunno about you girls, but I'm famished. Let's call in room service?"

"Room service?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "That's a luxury I can get behind."

"Yeah." Rainbow pulled out a menu and passed it around. "You figure out what you want, write it down on something, leave it outside your door with payment, push the button to summon someone, and bam. Easy."

"Don't worry about the cost, though," Twilight said. "I draw a stipend for princess duties and research, so everything's covered by me."

Corsica took that as permission to flop on a couch. "Swanky. Get me whatever sounds good."

Eventually, Starlight took the spot opposite her.

"So..." Twilight slipped in next to Starlight. "That was eventful."

"You can say that again," Starlight said, folding her ears. "Listen. If you make the call that we should have anything to do with the north again, I'll... I'm not making that call myself."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Two decades later, and you're still that averse to getting mixed up with Ironridge politics again, huh?"

"It's not just Ironridge," Starlight said. "I saw your cutie mark. I'm guessing you know how it is."

Twilight perked up. "You did recognize that, up there. What's so special about it?"

"That's an artifice," Starlight told her. "My artifice." She turned to Corsica. "I don't know how you came by it, but I'm guessing you have some mixed feelings about what it does."

"You could say that." Corsica shrugged. "You want the truth? Halcyon came here with big, grand ideas of getting the ball rolling and helping to save Ironridge and stuff. I can't afford to care about that, beyond what I owe her as a friend when she needs me to stop her mission from going down in flames. I'm here because I heard you had this talent once before, and I wanted to find out how you were able to live with it."

Starlight laughed.

Corsica frowned. "Is that a good laugh, or a bad laugh?"

"Do you really want to know?" Starlight raised an eyebrow. "First, tell me how long you've had that and how often you use it."

Corsica hesitated. "Two and a half, going on three years now. And I use it more often than I'd like, but not enough as it sometimes feels I need to. Probably at least every other day."

Starlight shook her head. "I had it for less than a month. Before I figured out how it worked, I just suffered the consequences until my emotions got eaten by a sphinx for a quick-and-dirty reset. Then I just didn't use it at all, until I found a way to remove it."

Corsica gave her an owlish look. "Until you could get rid of it? After only a month? You had to have found a better way than that. I had it on good authority-"

"You want me to get rid of yours, too?" Starlight asked, perfectly serious. "I can take it away."

Corsica blinked.

"Starlight..." Twilight started.

"Wait, what are we talking about?" Rainbow asked, stepping back from the door after finishing the room service order. "I thought I heard someone say this is an artifice?"

She pointed at Corsica's flank. Everyone nodded.

"It turns hope into power," Starlight explained. "What form that power takes doesn't seem to be consistent. Originally, Garsheeva had it. Goddess of the Griffon Empire? She used it to manipulate cutie marks, change their powers or augment them and make them stronger. When I had it, it let me use magic without taking a toll on my body."

At Corsica's look, she blinked. "I had a defective horn as a kid. Long story. Anyway, I'm guessing it does something pretty substantial for you, along with some pretty severe mental side effects."

Slowly, Corsica nodded. "You could say that."

"Like what?" Rainbow pressed.

"I'm not looking for pity," Corsica insisted. "Just to learn how other ponies in this situation have lived with it."

"You have three options," Starlight explained. "Do what Garsheeva did, and find an external power source other than your own mind. Do what I did, and learn to live without it. Or, find your own way. I don't know which of those is worse."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You make it sound like the third is a distinct possibility."

"It always is," Starlight said. "That's the Artifice of Hope. To still be standing at all after almost three years with it, you must have a will made of steel. The kind of determination that can make a new path even where one doesn't exist. That's what I have, even without the artifice. When you look long enough and hard enough, finding a way isn't the problem. The problem is being satisfied with what's likely still a half-perfect outcome. Be honest with yourself, if you found me and I happened to possess a miracle solution, what were you planning on doing next?"

Corsica shrugged. "Probably taking a well-deserved nap. And then doing something about Halcyon. Maybe taking a more active role in this Flame of Harmony business."

"Then your struggles would never end," Starlight pointed out. "You'd be trading out one problem for a new one, or even several new ones. If your goal was to be at peace, you'd just be chasing your own tail in circles."

"Who said anything about being at peace?" Corsica pressed. "I don't wanna sit around, spending my life doing nothing but existing. Feels like I do enough of that already, when I overuse my talent and have no energy left for anything! I used to have so many ambitions, and I want to be free to feel them again! I want some agency in the world that doesn't just come from making wishes and hoping they'll be enough. Right now, living with this talent is like... trying to stamp out all my desires so I don't accidentally spend energy on them that I can't afford to spend. I don't want to part with this talent, even if you do still have a way to get rid of it, because that would mean sacrificing the most powerful means of achieving goals I've ever had. I just want to be able to let myself feel those goals again. To have something to strive for. I miss being able to give my all against a challenge, instead of knowing that whether I succeed or not depends only on how much I'm willing to give."

Starlight nodded. "Do you have a good life, then? Don't have to worry about where your next meal is coming from, or whether the next pony you'll meet will be a friend or foe?"

Corsica chuckled. "If I did, you really think I'd be here with an S.O.S. team from Ironridge? Whatever your experience was with politics up there, I can assure you it hasn't gotten better." She adjusted her legs beneath her. "I'm not interested in everything becoming magically perfect, though, or whatever. I just want to be able to give as good as I get. On my own merits."

"You make it sound like you'd be happy just being rid of the artifice," Starlight said. "But you realize that without it, you'd have that much less ability to actually achieve your goals."

Corsica's ears fell. "...Yeah, that's the part that gets me. I know how I feel about this now, but it'll feel different in each and every situation where I'd actually use my talent. Do you have any idea how many times I've used this to keep Halcyon alive?"

"Well, I was going to spell it out for you, but you just saved me the trouble." Starlight shook her head. "Anyway, if you do want to be rid of it, let me know. But in the meantime, don't we have a Flame of Harmony to worry about?"

"Yes, we kind of do," Twilight insisted. "And it's probably more than just a minor, trifling issue? What do we even do about that?"

Starlight sighed. "I'd need to know more about what happened to make it like this, but there are probably three different things that would need to happen. First, we'd have to revive the flame and restore its strength. Second, we'd have to get rid of whatever conditions did this to it in the first place. And, third, we take it home. The latter two involve going to Ironridge, which I think I've made my feelings on crystal clear by this point. But, I doubt I'm going to let myself off the hook for helping with the first."

"You got any ideas about how to do that, though?" Rainbow scratched the back of her head.

Starlight shrugged. "Gather as many things as we can that could potentially help all in one place, play it by ear and hope for the best?"

"I suppose we could start like that," Twilight began. "First off, we'll need the flame and Fluttershy, obviously. Getting all the Elements of Harmony together might help too, though our pendants themselves are preoccupied..."

"Pendants?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Right. I suppose this would all be new to you," Twilight explained. "So the six Elements of Harmony kind of refer to a lot of different things. There's the concepts themselves. Then there are me and my friends, each of whom represents one of the concepts. Then there's a set of magical jewelry we use to focus the Elements' power, again one for each Element. And, finally, there are these Flames of Harmony, which Starlight is the expert on but apparently there's also one for each and they live in crystal palaces at the bottom of the world. With me so far?"

Corsica nodded.

"So you're thinking we get the six of us and all our jewelry together in one place," Rainbow said. "Problem: we haven't done that in a long time. See, there's this crystal tree in a ravine near our town that's pretty closely tied to the Elements, and this one time we had to give all the jewelry back to it to avert some calamity... and I kinda don't know what would happen if we tried taking the jewelry back out again."

"That tree is the tip of another crystal palace," Starlight explained. "And, speaking of, it would be a pretty good place to try doing this. I'll be helping, of course, but if we had another Flame of Harmony to lend us their power and their crucible, it would probably make for a good result."

"So you've just got another place like where Halcyon found this flame in your backyard?" Corsica asked. "That's convenient. How many of these are there, anyway? And do you know where the others are?"

"There's nine in total," Starlight explained. "Six for the Elements of Harmony, and three for what Yakyakistan calls the Societal Virtues, which aren't as well known here in Equestria. Three of them are in the north, one of which is out of the question because it's apparently broken. Two of them are far east of here. One of those is almost impossible to reach due to being deep under the ocean, the other I'm not setting hoof anywhere near for personal reasons. Two of them are far to the west of here. One is also broken and the other is in the middle of a war zone involving some dragons I think you've met. And then there are two to the south, one of which is also broken and really far away to boot, and the last being the easy one in Twilight's backyard. So we don't have a lot of better options."

Rainbow hesitantly lifted a hoof. "Hey, so I've always been meaning to ask... The Crystal Empire doesn't have one? Despite being super harmonic and made entirely of crystals?"

Starlight shook her head. "It doesn't, and I couldn't tell you why. Remember that I was, you know... busy when it first came back, and haven't really gotten the chance to properly look around? Or had reason to look around. I've been trying to have as little to do with this stuff as possible."

"You've never been to a broken one, right?" Twilight asked. "I don't suppose it's possible that the Crystal Empire is one that was broken so long ago, no one even remembers some tenth element that used to be here, is it?"

Starlight shrugged. "I guess I don't know."

"You might be onto something," Corsica pointed out. "I've seen a broken one, up in Ironridge. There was a huge earthquake, and then the crystals rose above the ground, turning into a gigantic spire so high you couldn't even make out the top. And if all the working crystal palaces are underground, then this one stands out for being a tower on the surface too."

Twilight rustled her wings in contemplation.

"Well, either way, if it's broken, it's not going to be much help to Fluttershy, right?" Rainbow suggested. "So I'm pretty sure the one in Ponyville is our best shot. I've always wanted to see what it's like down in a crystal palace, anyway!"

"I'm sure it'll have all sorts of scientific value," Twilight said. "I wonder how thoroughly explored it's been. Probably thoroughly, considering the Princesses used to have their castle built right on top of it. I can't imagine they did that without knowing what was there."

"Used to?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

Rainbow Dash whistled. "Heh, yeah... uhh... I guess the north doesn't hear much about Equestrian history, does it? Basically, about a thousand years ago, Princess Luna went rogue and turned into a monster known as Nightmare Moon, and she and Celestia had a battle that completely destroyed their old castle. Eventually, Nightmare Moon lost and got banished to the moon for a thousand years, and Celestia built a new castle in the current capitol of Canterlot."

"This happened a thousand years ago," Corsica said. "And she got banished to the moon for a thousand years."

Twilight rubbed the back of her neck. "Well... yeah. That's actually how me and my friends became Equestria's heroes. Princess Luna kind of turned into a fairy tale over that much time, and when she returned not even four years ago, pretty much no one was ready. But, fortunately, we banished the Nightmare with the Elements of Harmony, and now she's good again."

"You say this like you weren't already famous for being an alicorn," Corsica pointed out.

Twilight blushed. "Oh, I wasn't always an alicorn. I was a normal unicorn back then. I guess you could say I got promoted?"

Corsica's eyes widened with interest. "How does that work?"

"It's a long story. Have you ever heard of Star Swirl the Bearded?" Twilight asked. "Equestria's most famous mage, patron saint of magic and one of its founding fathers? He lived about two thousand years ago, back when Equestria was being founded by refugees windigoes in the north? I'd imagine he would have at least some cultural relevance up there."

Corsica shrugged. "Couldn't tell you. I grew up in Icereach, which you've probably never heard of, but-"

Starlight sat up straighter. "Icereach?"

"Okay, you have heard of it," Corsica sighed. "Anyway, it's incredibly insular and tries to forbid a lot of knowledge about things that are religious, supernatural or historical in nature. Anything that doesn't relate to the grail of science. So, no. I haven't heard of him. Doesn't mean nobody knows him, though."

"Hold on," Starlight interrupted. "I'm sorry to change the topic, but... you didn't happen to get your artifice while you were in Icereach, did you?"

"I did." Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

"How did it happen?" Starlight pressed, looking slightly hesitant. "Did it involve, by any chance, a near-death experience?"

Corsica blinked. "I was buried in an avalanche and in a coma for weeks. It appeared while I was unconscious, and I came to right after. How'd you guess?"

Starlight looked bothered. Twilight blinked.

"You're thinking about Valey," Rainbow guessed.

"Yeah," Starlight said. "I'm guessing you have no clue what caused it to appear, then."

Corsica flicked an ear. "Nope. What's this about Valey, though? I know she's from Icereach, but she's a batpony. Batponies are born with their special talents, right? Did she get hers in an unusual way?"

Starlight nodded. "In a way that defies all the known rules of pretty much everything related to this. And getting a cutie mark while you're unconscious is both unheard of, and not all that different from what happened to her. I wonder..."

Twilight glanced at her after she trailed off. "Starlight?"

"Probably best not to speculate." Starlight shook her head. "I'm not looking for any more problems to solve than have already been deposited on my doorstep. I'll help you revive the flame, give you what advice I can, and that's it."

Corsica looked sideways at her. "I get that you had a rough time in the north, as a kid. But it's starting to feel like you've got more reasons than that not to want to go back for round two."

Starlight looked away.

"She has her reasons," Twilight apologized. "I'm still thinking about what to do, myself. Everything you told us seems pretty urgent, almost like the flame is the least of our worries. But don't worry. We'll figure something out that both protects your home and everyone involved can live with."

"A burnt-out Flame of Harmony is the least of your worries?" Starlight sagged. "Go on, then. I'm going to hear it eventually. Might as well tell me the full deal."

Corsica took a breath, hoping this would be the final time she had to explain all this. "Yakyakistan has been taken over by changelings, including their queen, Chrysalis, and is mounting an invasion of Ironridge for real, unlike when you were there. Ironridge has been taken over by a corporation run by windigoes who want Yakyakistan to invade, because they're hoping to use the war to break some seal imprisoning the majority of their kind. Your old friends have been fighting up there with everything they have to ensure those problems stay out of your hair, because apparently you just matter that much to them, but they're running out of ways they can stall and have started taking more desperate measures that so far may or may not have only succeeded because of my blessing."

She patted her special talent. "When I left, they had just taken over Ironridge from the windigoes via a coup. It involved some sacrifices that may or may not be reversible with proper help, but definitely shouldn't have been made in the first place. They need a lot of help. And I was told that you, despite no longer having this artifice, still have an ability just like I do to pull victory out of an impossible situation. I know it broke you before, and it's breaking me, but maybe if both of us were there we could do it together."

Starlight squeezed her eyes shut. "I guess that's one reason they never would have come back for me. Not the worst. Not the best, either."

"Dunno if this will help," Corsica said. "But one of them did come back for you. Does the name 'Maple' ring any bells?"

Starlight sat straight up.

"Guessing she never ran into you," Corsica said. "But the moment they got a writ to spare, she took it and went after you. Sounds like she never made it?"

Starlight mutely shook her head.

"Maple!?" Rainbow Dash banged a hoof on the couch armrest. "Come on, Starlight. If that's true, we've at least gotta find out what happened to her, right? What if she's still looking? Or what if she gave up and is living in some random town in Equestria right now? Going back to the north is one thing, but what about looking for your friends who are already here?"

"...Alright," Starlight said through gritted teeth. "Alright. The Flame of Harmony is urgent, so we go back to Ponyville and do that first. And we'll pick up my airship while we're there, because that'll make getting around much easier. And then we'll go try to track down Maple."

"How would we do that, though?" Twilight asked. "As a princess, I should be able to get access to just about any records anywhere, but following a trail this old... We might as well be starting from scratch. When did she come, anyway?"

"Don't remember." Corsica shook her head. "Probably not recently. I think it was before everything in Ironridge fell apart again."

"Do you at least know how or where she crossed?" Starlight asked. "The Aldenfold doesn't have many easy passes."

Again, Corsica shook her head. "Probably not in the east. The Griffon Empire's been a mess since everything collapsed. I'd guess she either took an airship from Ironridge, or went through Yakyakistan back when they were our allies. Where around here would an airship even go, anyway?"

Twilight rubbed her chin. "Beats me. Especially before the Crystal Empire returned. Maybe Snowport? The maps around here are surprisingly incomplete, since a place like that could be left off them..."

"Well, the dragons owe me a big one, if we need to go there again," Corsica said. "But our first trip there felt a little sketchy. And if Seigetsu has something against Halcyon... I doubt my word will be any good unless that gets smoothed over."

"That reminds me..." Twilight pulled out Halcyon's emerald mask. "I apparently have to figure out what this thing is, now." She gave Corsica a serious look. "Your friend isn't up to anything actually bad, is she? I'm not going to get bitten if I try to give her the benefit of the doubt, right?"

"Hard to vouch for her when I've gotten bitten as well," Corsica sighed. "Me and her have been at odds lately. But I've got a hunch that if you gave her that back with no questions asked, it might win her trust, maybe. A little."

"Can I see that?" Starlight asked, reaching a hoof out for the gem.

"Sure." Twilight passed it over.

Starlight frowned, holding it. "It almost reminds me of a Nightmare Module. This is data of some kind, housed within a prism of crystallized emotion."

"I should probably also mention," Corsica added. "If you break or damage that in any way, Halcyon will probably never, ever forgive you."

"That's not something you'd say about an experimental spell prototype," Twilight pointed out. "What do you know about what this is?"

"Less than I'd like," Corsica admitted. "Listen, I don't particularly like defending stuff about Halcyon that she doesn't even explain to her best friend. All I know is, take my word for it that that thing is extremely valuable and probably not dangerous. Giving it to me might be too much to ask for, but keep it safe."

Twilight looked at Corsica in concern. "You must have a pretty serious chip on your shoulder to be talking about a friend that way to ponies you've just met."

Corsica huffed, rolling over. "You can say that again."

"What happened?" Rainbow asked. "Crossing the Aldenfold is supposed to be some epic accomplishment for the awesomest of the awesome. Especially in a group. I'd have expected you to be thick as thieves."

"I think I've poured out enough of my heart in an effort to win ponies' trust for one day," Corsica said. "In case you didn't know, this special talent makes ponies dirt tired, and I've been past my limit for a while now. Let's get some food, you do something for me for a bit, and then I'll dump even more of my soul out on the floor. Sound good?"

"Actually, helping with relationship issues is kind of what I do," Twilight pointed out. "I could probably help you with this, too. Once your friend clears her name so I can talk to her too, at least. Assuming she's actually innocent."

Corsica grunted. "Yeah. Maybe."

"So, different topic," Rainbow said. "Since you sound so enthusiastic about that one, and all. How did you guys get over the mountains? Have you got an airship too, or something?"

"Sort of." Corsica shrugged. "Had to do an emergency landing in the mountains outside Sires Hollow when it ran out of fuel. If you've got a ship too, it would be nice to go check on it, maybe get some of our stuff."

"Well, if it's any sort of conventional fuel, I'm sure we could bring some to get it back up in the air," Twilight offered. "Although knowing northern airships, I'm going to hazard a guess that it's not..."

Corsica shrugged. "My best guess is it's tethered to the life force of a pony it got too far away from, but honestly, I've got no clue how it runs."

Twilight looked aghast. Rainbow looked intrigued. Starlight looked as if this was business as usual.

Before anyone could inquire further, a knock sounded at the door. "Room service for Princess Twilight?" a voice called.

"Yes!" Twilight jumped to her hooves. "That's our food! Coming!"

"Finally." Corsica rolled onto her back, relishing the thought of a real feast for once.

The door clicked as Twilight swung it open. "What the-?" She turned back around. "Rainbow? This is a ton of food. Did you really add on this much?"

"Oh yeah." Rainbow smirked, waving the food in with a wing. "You're paying for it, right? So I figured I'd totally wow that's a lot." She gaped as the banquet properly came into view. "Okay, I didn't order quite that much."

"Starlight?" Twilight glanced around as the porter saluted and walked away. "Corsica? Did either of you...?"

Corsica beheld the trolley. There were four ponies here, and yet the food looked like it had been prepared for ten.

She shrugged. So did Starlight.

Rainbow scratched her rump. "Well, I'm not complaining. Maybe the portions here are just that generous?"

"And fancy." Twilight frowned. "Some of this is way more upscale than anything I'd buy. I see my order here, but some of these extras look like they cost ten times what anyone but a Canterlot food critic would pay..."

"Yeah!" a new voice said. "Your order looked too small and too plain for the five of us, so I added those on. I hope I didn't get too little!"

There was a zebra standing in the corner of the room.

Rainbow gaped. "How long have you been here?"

Starlight frowned. "...Weren't you being held by Luna's guards up in that room earlier?"

The zebra shrugged. "They got bored, I guess. Anyway, I've been here since you were ordering the food. The name's Nanzanaya, and I'm Halcyon's ward! Since I'm officially under her hospitality, and you're her friend..." She pointed at Corsica, then at Twilight. "And you're under her hospitality, I figured I ought to come join you too. Especially when I'm still wanted by the authorities for that business upstairs. So, staying under the watchful eye of a Princess like you is just where I belong!"

Everyone stared at her. "Did you hear all of that?" Corsica accused. "Everything we were talking about?"

Nanzanaya pointed at the food. "It's not my fault if you all didn't notice me. Now, are we going to dig in? I've been traveling a long way to get here and am completely broke, and I'm ready to put your generous hospitality to use!"

Twilight's face fell as she looked across the exotic meals on the trolley. "First off, don't spy on a princess or sit in someone's room unannounced. Second, you'd better be paying me back for this. That was my research budget..."

Sign the Contract

Slowly, Faye came to.

Head groggy, she tried to focus, pulling together whatever she could remember about her situation. Luna... Aegis... Nanzanaya... Connecting to the castle with her bracelet. Halcyon being taken.

Halcyon was still missing. And, now, so was her bracelet.

Cold isolation washed over her like dark rain as the room came into focus around her. She was inside a bubble of some sort, transparent and glowing and held about a pony's height off the floor, being generated by several crystal spikes pointing towards it from the floor and ceiling of the room. It felt completely unremarkable, devoid of both temperature and texture, just barely large enough for her to pace in a circle without hitting a wall.

Her bracelet leg boot was completely destroyed, and her coat singed enough that it was probably a goner, too. But beneath the shredded remnants of the boot, her leg looked perfectly fine. Nothing at all like Mother's crippled side. It was as good as new.

Memories of how she got here and what she had done started bubbling up like blood from a wound. Halcyon's curiosity had taken them up into the tower, and then it had placed her in charge, while Halcyon went to spy on Nanzanaya... Halcyon had been taken. And she panicked in response. She had drawn on any form of power she could reach for, anything to hide behind, anything to protect her, and had connected with the castle as a result.

Right in front of its ruler.

Faye's stomach crawled as tendrils of inevitability wrapped themselves around her barrel. She couldn't blame this on Halcyon. Halcyon hadn't even wanted to go up the tower; she only did it to look for Nanzanaya after the zebra ran off! This was Nanzanaya's fault, or... or...

Hers.

She couldn't run from it, or deny it. There was nothing to hide behind anymore, and nowhere to run. If she hadn't tried to become another pony to cope with her life, hadn't used magic she barely understood to physically do so, maybe she wouldn't have panicked when that coping mechanism was torn away. If she just could have lived with herself without trying to hide...

Her emptiness whispered through her ears, and she clawed at them with her hooves to make it stop. Bereft of purpose, substance, form and function, a core of nothing roiled in her heart, hideous and inescapable, a permanent reminder of everything she wasn't. Where did she go from here?

Coming to Equestria had been a mistake. She didn't need the help of anyone here to stop the war in the north and save Coda, not that she would be able to get it. Who could keep fighting if she just opened herself up and swallowed all the discord that was causing it? Engulf the windigoes, engulf Chrysalis's own power and hatred and whatever else drew her to invade other countries. It was the one thing her emptiness could do: absorb other things, just like it yearned to do.

She was the only one holding herself back. She had other powers, too, ones she was too afraid to even try to master, and others she had somehow still managed to keep completely hidden from Halcyon. But the more afraid she was, and the less other things she felt about herself, the more she saw that fear reflected back in her emptiness, like the worst version of herself was staring at her from her reflection in a pool.

...She blinked. That wasn't her reflection in the containment bubble. It was just Procyon.

"Well, this is a fine mess," Procyon said, acknowledging that she had been noticed. "What now?"

Faye just shook her head. "I don't see a way forward," she whispered. "Where do I go from here?"

"Are you asking where we go, or how we get there?" Procyon tilted her head. "For us, it seems like a pretty important difference."

"Both," Faye whispered. "All of Halcyon's goals are smashed to pieces because we couldn't see them through. Equestria will never help us now. But even if we had something new to do, would we be able to do it?" She looked at her bloodstained hoof. "It's so ironic. When I first made Halcyon, she was terrified of her own potential because I didn't want to find out what our powers were capable of. It turns out being able to do too much is the least of our worries."

Procyon hovered in midair, folded her forelegs and looked away.

"What would you do if you were in charge?" Faye breathed. "For that matter, why haven't you ever asked to be?"

"I'm not sure I can be," Procyon explained. "Remember, I erased myself from existence. Even if some aspect of our magic was able to claw part of me back, I'm still not really here. It's just a feeling I get... I don't think I could take control even if all three of us wanted it."

Faye looked away.

"That said," Procyon went on. "I don't know what it feels like to be you, right now, but you're clearly miserable. And it might be that some of that is being caused by the hole I left when I disappeared. You remember Halcyon's interactions with Coda. She didn't carry herself as if she was living behind a mask, or as if it was as hard to be her as you find it being you. In other words, not all of your current problems might come down to being a changeling queen."

Faye's backwards ears perked just a little, still filled with the sound of the void.

"I don't deserve to come back, and I don't particularly want to come back, either," Procyon told her. "I had my reasons for leaving, and they haven't changed even after I've felt how boring nonexistence can be. I've made my peace with being an observer. And besides, the hole I left doesn't exist cleanly for me to fit back into, anyway. You've grown while I was gone, into something more than an administrative shell. Still, maybe thinking about things from this angle rather than the I'm-a-changeling-queen angle will get you and Halcyon closer to a way to live with yourselves."

"Halcyon might not be coming back," Faye whispered, her eyes snapping to Procyon's. "And even if she does, what then? She's breaking down too. Our relationship with Corsica is in dire straits. Trying to hide behind her is no longer working, but it's all I know how to do."

"Then there's a goal for you," Procyon said, pointing a hoof at her. "See how long you can make it before bringing her back. Even if you get the gemstone back, don't immediately use it. Don't worry about what you do in the meantime. As both of us know, if you could remove your mental blocks, this entire mission in Equestria would be unnecessary to everything we want to do in the north. I bet it'll be easier to live without Halcyon if you tell yourself you wouldn't use her right away, even if you had her. And maybe you'll find a new, better way to cope along the way."

Faye bowed her head. That sounded like the very last thing she wanted to give herself to look forward to. If she pinned her hopes on that, what kind of hopes could she even have?

Procyon saw the look in her eyes. "Hopes of finding a new path, beyond the ones you know lead to dead ends."

"...Right." Faye squeezed her eyes shut. "If you're certain. I guess there's not much else I can do right now, is there."

Procyon saluted, then sank into the floor.

Faye took a breath, then raised her voice. "Hello? Is anyone there?"

Might as well let the world know she was awake now.

A figure stepped into sight from around the corner. It was Seigetsu.

"You're still not done with me, huh?" Faye asked, looking the special inquisitor up and down.

Seigetsu nodded, standing roughly at eye level with her due to the raised containment field. "I've been thinking about what I've seen, and trying to determine what your goals are and where you stand."

"And?" Faye swallowed. "What have you decided?"

"As you know, Equestria delegated protection of the Aegis over to my people," Seigetsu explained. "As the ranking representative of Cernial, that does give me a great deal of say in matters of its security, even though I have just handed her back over to Equestria. As such, it wasn't impossible for me to convince Her Majesty that the investigation of you be placed back under my care."

Faye watched and waited.

"What you did with this castle was very foolish," Seigetsu went on. "Frankly, I think you're lucky that its actual ruler has been asleep this whole time. I don't believe you acted with malice. Merely an unprecedented degree of carelessness. I do find it most suspicious that you made your way here so quickly once everyone's backs were turned. But you also did me and my country a service when you intervened in my battle against Duma. So, I'd like to hear your side of the story."

Faye swallowed.

"And for your sake," Seigetsu added, "I advise this time not leaving anything out. I can guarantee you will not find a more sympathetic ear with the power to let you out of this cell."

"Alright." Faye took a breath. "You... You're sure about this, right? I don't have a whole lot of other options, and I'm not sure how much worse my situation can get from here. But that's the thing about ponies who have nothing to lose. There's nothing more you can do to hurt me. If you betray me again, I won't have any more reason to continue helping you."

"Putting aside the matter of whether doing what I told you my job was counts as a betrayal, I understand and agree," Seigetsu said. "Now then. My ears are open."

Faye tried to shift a little to hide her bloody leg. "Okay. That green jewel that was taken... It's a coping mechanism. It's magical, and it's unique to me. I'm not very trusting, or stable, and I rely on it a lot. So, I freaked out when it got stolen. Without it, you might as well think of me as a completely different pony from the one you know."

Seigetsu nodded slowly.

"I didn't come up here purely for fun," Faye went on. "I was chasing the zebra - Nanzanaya - to try to keep her out of trouble. Do you remember in Snowport, how Duma mistook me for his collaborator?"

Seigetsu listened impassively.

"I think she's the one he mistook me for," Faye continued. "And I think she mistook me for him, as well. Whatever sign they have they were trying to seek each other out by, I somehow accidentally have it too. I wanted to stay close to her to try to learn more about it, and figure out what Duma thought he would be helping her to do."

"Is that so?" Seigetsu finally looked intrigued. "And what is this sign?"

Faye hesitated. "A third eye in the middle of our forehead that's only visible to others who have it, too. And we can't see our own."

Seigetsu stiffened. "What kind of eye? What does it look like?"

"You recognize this?" Faye's heartbeat rose.

"Answer the question," Seigetsu urgently demanded.

"It's golden," Faye said. "And slitted. Wider at the top and bottom than in the middle."

Seigetsu slowly exhaled.

"What do you know about this?" Faye pressed.

"As Special Inquisitor I am permitted access to some sources of information I cannot simply share without reason," Seigetsu explained. "Tomes and scrolls locked within the Convocation's forbidden archive being a prime example. How much have they told you of this eye, and do you know why you or any of them have it? For that matter, have you ever met anyone else with it before?"

Faye swallowed again. "Duma didn't tell me anything. Nanzanaya told me I have it, and it's what lets me see it on others. She called herself a priestess and said someone with it was prophesied to help her with her mission here. She seemed happy that her prophesied helper was someone who didn't know anything about it, and said she'd teach me in exchange for my help."

"Help doing what?" Seigetsu pressed.

"She didn't tell me the details yet," Faye said, hanging her head. "But she wanted Equestria's military to get involved in defending their border from Abyssinia, it sounded like. There's probably more to it than that."

Seigetsu nodded. "I explained to you before that centaurs are akin to Abyssinian nobility. Yet this Nanzanaya is working to secure Equestrian intervention against Abyssinia, and by your account she and Duma are aligned. Have you any thoughts or explanation on this?"

Faye shook her head. "Maybe Duma wasn't actually an Abyssinian agent. Maybe Nanzanaya is a traitor to her country. Maybe both of them are fighting for something other than a nation. There are too many possibilities to make a good guess."

"I would remind you of your consorting with windigoes," Seigetsu said. "Abyssinia is the Kingdom of Monsters, and windigoes are among the most mythical types of monsters. Is there any connection here?"

"I don't think so," Faye insisted. "Ludwig - that's the windigo who was in my bracelet - was a northern windigo. His job was to guard a particular cave with a teleporter inside that was involved in the windigoes' plans for the north, and to be a power source for the teleporter. It sounded like he had been there for a long time. I can't see what this would have to do with Abyssinia, and he never mentioned it to me. All the windigoes I know of are currently focused only on the north."

"I see." Seigetsu clasped her hands behind her back. "Once again, have you ever met anyone else with this eye?"

Faye nodded. "Once. A mare in Ironridge. We didn't speak with each other."

Seigetsu appraised her, then slowly nodded. "If I let you free, right now, what would you do?"

Faye's brow shadowed. "...Try to get back my emerald. And also my bracelet. And then I don't know."

"How would you feel about making a bargain for your freedom?"

Faye raised an eyebrow.

"I will request custody of your emerald," Seigetsu said. "And your bracelet. Nanzanaya will be released unconditionally. From now on, you will work for me, pretending to be her prophesied accomplice, assisting in her plans and learning what you can. I will follow your travels at a close distance, and you will report everything you do and learn about her to me. These two treasures of yours will serve as collateral to ensure your loyalty, and I will keep one or the other on my person at all times. You can have the other, and can trade which one is in my possession at any time. This will remain in effect until such time as I decide otherwise. And should you prove sufficiently trustworthy in helping me unravel this mystery, in payment I shall see to it that you are allowed to peruse the Convocation's forbidden archives to see for yourself what information we have on this third eye."

"Is that all?" Faye chuckled weakly. "Getting hired under pressure by someone I don't trust? You'd feel right at home in Ironridge. I'll... take your bargain."

Seigetsu bowed. "Your acceptance is appreciated. Remember, the quicker you are able to earn Nanzanaya's confidence, the faster we can finish this and you can be free of our arrangement. Excuse me while I collect your belongings. I will return to let you out as soon as they are in my possession."

"While you're at it, could you get me some new clothes?" Faye's backwards ears fell. "I... ruined mine, and I can't function when others are looking at my body."

Seigetsu nodded, turning to leave. "That should be easy enough to arrange."

Twilight, Starlight, Corsica and Rainbow Dash looked awkwardly around at each other as Nanzanaya leaned casually against the couch.

"Okay," Starlight sighed, focusing on the zebra. "Maybe I'm crossing some zebra cultural boundary by pointing this out, but you're definitely crossing a cultural boundary here by spying on us and taking Twilight's money to buy food."

Nanzanaya's eyes widened. "Is that how hospitality works here? Oh, well! Water under the bridge, right?"

"My research budget is not for frivolous expenditures," Twilight added. "Anyway, more importantly, you were spying on us! And you're already supposed to be in Princess Luna's custody for whatever it is you were doing upstairs, remember? Has it ever crossed your mind that we might have been discussing things others weren't meant to be privy to?"

"I meant no harm by it!" Nanzanaya cheerfully insisted. "Besides, I'm your friend by association, so we're practically family, right?"

Upon seeing everyone's looks, she deflated slightly. "This isn't really getting me anywhere, is it?"

"This is a private residence, you know, buddy," Rainbow pointed out. "Give us one good reason we shouldn't call the guards on you."

Nanzanaya sat down. "For one, I can be of great use to you. From your conversation, I gather you're concerned about the giant crystal towers and accompanying breakdown of the natural order that appear whenever something happens to what you call Flames of Harmony."

Twilight narrowed her eyes. "What do you know about those?"

"Well, I live in one," Nanzanaya explained, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. "So do all the zebras where I'm from. You wouldn't happen to be interested in seeing it for yourself, would you? It sounds very relevant to your interests."

"The one due south of Equestria?" Starlight guessed. "What do you want from us?"

"From your nation, or from you in particular?" Nanzanaya shrugged. "I suppose the latter would depend on just how capable you are. An excellent place to start would be getting my benefactor Halcyon out of jail, seeing as she's a lot freer with her hospitality than you seem to be. But if you were feeling generous, I wouldn't say no to some help ensuring the survival of my people, either. That's what I came to this land to get, after all."

"Let me guess," Starlight sighed. "Whatever it is involves me doing something other than sitting around and trying to enjoy my life?"

Nanzanaya blinked. "Actually, I haven't the faintest idea who you are, other than that you seem very knowledgeable. Mostly, I need military action. But if any of you are in a position to advocate for that, I could throw in a second crystal tower to sweeten the deal..."

Rainbow narrowed her eyes. "Who are you?"

"A humble emissary from the Aptann Valley." Nanzanaya bowed. "Nothing more and nothing less. Anyway, I should mention that the primary threat to our nation is a fortress that's been built out of another such tower. Any invading force attempting to eliminate the threat would undoubtedly set hoof in the place. Are you at least interested enough to allow me to share dinner with you? Because I really am starving."

Twilight considered this. "Fine. But I'm contacting Princess Luna anyway, and if you're not supposed to be here, you're answering to her."

She opened the door. Standing on the other side was Seigetsu, her fist raised to knock.

"Oh!" Twilight took a step back in surprise.

"Hello there," Seigetsu greeted. "I've come to..." Her eyes found Nanzanaya and Corsica. "I see you are entertaining guests."

"You could say that," Rainbow complained, watching as Nanzanaya shoveled down as much food as possible before anyone could take it away from her.

"For what it's worth, we're not trying to hide her if someone's looking for her," Twilight pointed out. "She just showed up here. Also, I'm guessing you're actually a lot more important than I thought you were, even though I just know you as a trade representative."

"Her Majesty has decided to allow that zebra to go free," Seigetsu explained. "After consulting the facts, it was determined her part in this was a misunderstanding. I would commend you for looking after her, but Equestrian royalty hardly need me advising on their activities."

"Her part was a misunderstanding?" Corsica perked up, her mane in a bedraggled state emblematic of too little sleep. "What about Halcyon's?"

"Halcyon's circumstances are somewhat different, given that she attacked the castle," Seigetsu said. "I was able to put in a word in her favor, but the situation is still somewhat delicate. I believe that you, Your Majesty, would have an especially relevant appreciation of the importance of the Crystal Heart."

"You could say that," Twilight admitted.

"Is Halcyon awake?" Corsica interrupted. "And can I talk with her?"

"Yes." Seigetsu nodded. "Although her release is also imminent, provided some necessary collateral is put up to ensure this incident will not happen again. Your Majesty, do you still have the green jewel that was entrusted to your care earlier?"

Starlight lifted it in her aura. "This?"

Seigetsu extended a hand. "If you would?"

"You're just going to keep that to ensure she behaves?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "And did she agree to this, or are you just counting on her not flipping her lid again the moment she sees someone with it that's not her?"

"She agreed to it," Seigetsu promised. "Though it is slightly more involved than that. For that matter, I am also looking for the bracelet she wielded in the Aegis vault."

Corsica held up a foreleg. Around it was Halcyon's bracelet. "You mean this?"

"Well." Seigetsu crossed her forearms. "That was easy."

"You want both of these, huh?" Corsica stood up, flaunting the bracelet and taking the emerald in her telekinesis. "How about I, and everyone else here - sans the zebra - come with you, see how she's been treated, watch you let her go, and if she tells me to my face that this was the deal, then I'll give them to you?"

Twilight and Rainbow were watching with curious expressions, both clearly trying to figure out why Seigetsu had so much say in this. Corsica stood with a challenge in her posture, trying to ignore how much debt she was incurring on her strength of will. Nanzanaya kept eating.

"That sounds perfectly fine with me," Seigetsu said. "Anyone who would like to is welcome to come along."

She departed, leaving Twilight and Rainbow glancing between her and Nanzanaya.

"Go knock yourselves out." Starlight waved them along. "I'll keep an eye on this hooligan. Might as well enjoy whatever peace and quiet I can get before I get asked about windigoes again."

After Seigetsu left, Procyon didn't return. Faye simply existed, alone with her void, for long enough that she knew only the sensationless touch of the containment field and the rush of emptiness in her ears.

Could there be merit in what Procyon said? Was it possible that not all of her woes could boil down to being a changeling queen, that some instead could be consequences of splitting herself up like this?

If Procyon was telling the truth, she hadn't been alright before that. Not if Procyon had wished to disappear the way she had. But...

She shook her head. Having something else to blame it on wouldn't change what she was. The only thing that could get rid of this emptiness, she knew instinctively, was having something to fill it with. That was just her lot in life. And having experienced trying to fill it, even a little bit, with her own desire to get to Snowport on the road from Sires Hollow, that might not be something she would ever be comfortable doing.

If only the world had more changeling queens. Someone she could look to as an example.

But it didn't. As far as she knew, it only had two: one who was evil, and another who needed an example to look up to even more than she did.

Memories of conversations flashed through her mind, of ponies making comments back in Icereach about how she and Ansel had basically raised themselves. Not true, Faye would always counter. Sure, they didn't have a father, but Mother had given everything to get them to Icereach and safety. She had given far more over that year than most ponies gave in their entire lifetimes. She had been a great parent, only she had put in all the work up front. And it had been enough.

...Now, for the first time, Faye wondered if those ponies might have had a point. If Chrysalis had been in her life, and had been a normal parent instead of a genocidal maniac, what could she have learned from her about how to live with who she was?

It was a pointless question to think about. Chrysalis was irredeemably evil, and no amount of thought or action could change that. It was too foolish to even consider.

For some reason, the idea filled her thoughts anyway.

It only dissipated when footsteps announced the return of ponies - several, by the sound of it. Instinctively, Faye lay down, trying to hide her bare leg from sight.

From around the corner stepped Seigetsu, accompanied by Princess Twilight, a cyan mare with a remarkable every-color mane, and Corsica.

Corsica was wearing her bracelet.

Faye's eyes widened, memories from her infancy rushing in of Mother wearing that bracelet, her side consumed in a blaze of green. "Take that off!" she demanded, the visions morphing before her eyes until it was Corsica writhing on the ground, unable to protect herself or even stand as unchecked power crippled her body. "You have no idea how dangerous that is! Get rid of it, now, hurry!"

Corsica took a step back in surprise. "This?" She held up her bracelet leg, then slipped it off, depositing it on the cold crystal floor. "Okay, there. You're welcome. Better?"

The visions faded like smoke. Corsica was fine. Faye couldn't stop her shoulders from trembling.

"Here we are, then," Seigetsu said, nodding at everyone in the room. "Your friends wanted to see for themselves that you had agreed to all the conditions for your release. Namely, the use of collateral."

As Corsica set down her mask, also in plain sight, Faye's skin grew clammy. There it was. Halcyon...

She swallowed. "The deal is, Seigetsu gets one of those. I get the other. She follows me around until I've been proven to be trustworthy, and we can swap who has which one at any time I want. So I have access to both of them, but never at the same time. Right?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You agreed to that?"

Seigetsu nodded. "That is the gist of it."

"I agree," Faye confirmed, trying her best to keep her voice from shaking.

Seigetsu snapped her claws with a spark of magic. "Then let the shackles be released."

The crystal pylons projecting the sphere flickered and faded, and the sphere winked out, depositing Faye roughly on the ground.

Halcyon and her bracelet were both right in front of her.

"Well then?" Seigetsu folded her hands behind her back. "Which one will it be to start with?"

Halcyon. Halcyon. Halcyon. Halcyon-

But she was helpless without the bracelet.

But without Halcyon, she couldn't hide. She would have to stay up front. And it wasn't like she could bring herself to properly use the bracelet, anyway.

She reached for her mask...

As both of us know, if you could remove your mental blocks, this entire mission in Equestria would be unnecessary to everything we want to do in the north.

Procyon's words echoed through her head, and she hesitated. She couldn't stay up front. Letting Halcyon do it was the only way. And besides, how would Halcyon feel if Faye didn't choose her? The bracelet was just power. The mask was a person.

Halcyon is me, though, she thought to herself. An idealized version of herself, according to her own flawed ideals. And if there could be a third way...

Her hoof touched the bracelet, and it quickly slid into place on her exposed leg. "This one."

"Very well." Seigetsu pocketed the mask. "Should you change your mind, I won't be difficult to find. You are free to go where you will. Here is your other request."

She dropped a worn traveler's cloak at Faye's hooves. It wasn't high fashion, but seemed appropriate enough to what she would usually wear. Unfortunately, it didn't come with boots.

"Good." Faye's throat was dry. "Because I probably won't last a day before I do need to switch. I..."

Corsica's gaze followed the mask, concern written on her face.

"Can I go somewhere where I can lay down, please?" Faye whispered.

Seigetsu stepped aside, motioning that all were welcome to leave.

"Well, let's get back to home away from home," Twilight said. "We can catch a train to Ponyville in the morning. It's a long ride, so you'll have plenty of time to tell me all about what you thought you were doing, messing with the Crystal Heart like that. Also, you should really see my friend Rarity about that garment."

"Yeah, uhh..." Rainbow rubbed the back of her neck. "It's got real... rugged... charm?"

Faye tried to follow, and tripped before she could even get to her hooves. She hadn't realized how badly her legs were shaking.

Corsica noticed, though. Quietly, she stepped over, knelt down, and hoisted Faye onto her back, burned coat and all.

"What-?" Faye's senses rebelled at the close contact, as usual.

"Hey, idiot," Corsica greeted under her breath, heaving herself upright with Faye atop her. "You're welcome. For this, and everything else."

"What did you do?" Faye mumbled, not able to summon the willpower to resist.

"Made some friends and salvaged your agenda," Corsica said, tromping along heavily after Twilight and enduring a snicker from Rainbow Dash. "You owe me big for this one."

"Salvaging my agenda?" Faye's backwards ears rose just a little.

"Turns out I've got natural charisma," Corsica grunted. "More than certain batponies and zebras I know. If you want to pay me back, for starters, deal with your new marefriend before she gets too badly on Twilight's nerves. And if you really want to go above and beyond?" She jostled Faye in a way that may or may not have been deliberate. "Giving me the time of day every once in a while would do more than you think."

A Discordant Interlude

To Corsica's surprise, Halcyon hadn't made any moves to stop being carried, even by the time they reached Twilight's suite. This was supposed to be a nice gesture that Halcyon quickly grew uncomfortable with and left behind to walk on her own, not an actual test of endurance...

Although, this was Faye now. Halcyon, Corsica's best friend since the avalanche, was a green gemstone in Seigetsu's pocket, and would remain that way until Faye changed her mind and wanted her back.

Several other mares had arrived in the suite since Corsica was there last, most of whom she didn't recognize and all of whom looked like they were there for some good after-party carousing... all except Starlight, who sat at the end of a couch looking lost in thought. Nanzanaya was still here and hadn't slunk off, thankfully.

While Twilight moved to make introductions, Corsica made a beeline for one of the bedrooms adjacent to the central lobby. She had lost count of how many times today she claimed to be past her limit while signing up to do even more, and there was not going to be another before she finally got some sleep. Nothing could interrupt.

The room beyond the door was dim, inviting... and had two beds. A perfect quip about how to decide who got the bed she had been planning for the entire walk back died on Corsica's lips. Oh well.

"Here." Corsica kicked the door closed behind her and deposited Faye on the floor. "You can make it the rest of the way on your own, right?"

Faye sat up, a pensive look on her face. "Have... you already eaten, then?"

Corsica blinked, remembering the ongoing feast in the other room that probably actually would all get eaten now that more ponies had showed up to help with it. "Right... I'll go get something for both of us. Bring it back in here."

She swung the door open. No one seemed to begrudge her as she swiped two plates and loaded them down with food, though she did get a couple curious looks from the newcomers.

"There." Returning to the bedroom, she passed one plate to Faye. "You mind if we save the chitchat for morning? I'm... past my limit..."

Well, add one more to the counter of how many times she said that today.

Faye nodded quietly. "I need some time too. To get my... thoughts in order."

"Yeah." Corsica chewed quickly, eyeing her bed. "I bet."

The party in Twilight's suite carried on late into the night, as far as anyone standing outside the door and eavesdropping would have been concerned.

The rest of the castle was much quieter. The Crystal Empire lacked the bureaucracy that would require operating around the clock: its butlers and cleaners and archivists could do their jobs just as easily by daylight, and the regiment of soldiers under the Prince and Princess's command were blissfully snoring in their bunks, save for a small few keeping a subdued vigil throughout the night. The Crystal Heart spun in its holder, vibrant and free from signs of tampering. The streets below were trashed and empty, the city's denizens waiting for morning to clean up the previous day's excesses.

And on a bench in a waiting room near a spare reception chamber, surrounded by weathered magazines and potted plants, Nehaley dozed lightly, her burned side covered, as ever, by a bathrobe she hadn't even taken off in the presence of royalty.

"Hmm," Discord said, frowning at her. He snapped his talons, and in a burst of purple geometry, a cuddly blanket materialized around her.

He smiled at his handiwork. "Much better! I swear, Halcyon is so bad at keeping track of her teammates..."

Nehaley shifted under the blanket, but didn't wake.

At Discord's side, Papyrus chuckled under his breath. "In fairness to her, some of us are awfully attached to our independent streaks."

The duo left Nehaley and started wandering the hallways, taking a circuit that conveniently avoided any sightings by guards. "So?" Discord eventually asked. "You're successfully flying under the radar. Braen's pledged not to out you and the others are either happy to be rid of you or just don't care. What next?"

"I don't know," Papyrus said, his demeanor proud but his tone worried. "I'm good for exactly one swift kick in the rear to Starlight or any princess who gets too complacent, and then I'll be out of cards to play. It doesn't help that my reasons for coming all this way are feeling awfully flimsy now that I've actually found her. What's more, this Ponyville they'll all be gallivanting off to tomorrow is only reachable with that silly railroad magic."

Discord raised an eyebrow. "Wishing you could take the long-distance trains too?"

Papyrus shook his head. "I hadn't expected a situation where we would all find Starlight together, then everyone plus her would take a teleporting train somewhere else and leave me behind." He snorted. "All this makes me think I need some new goals. I've always been better at shameless ambition than sitting around twiddling my pinions."

"Welll..." Discord put his hands together and dramatically strummed his talons and claws. "If it's a little more excitement you're after, care to pop back to Ironridge with me for a spell? The war room meetings are endless and for some reason everyone expects the humble janitor to attend, but I'm certain you could spice things up a little."

Papyrus's eyes gleamed with curiosity. "That's on the table?"

Discord shrugged. "Well, taking passengers with the trash can teleport has a few minor limitations, but for someone as closely attuned to chaos as yourself, we could go just about anywhere..."

Papyrus pursed his lips in interest. "Could it, perhaps, let me follow that train as well?"

"Oh, Papyrus," Discord chuckled. "You think Starlight doesn't know how far apart these cities really are? You think Celestia and Luna don't know? If you really want to take the train, there are workarounds. Granted, many of them have to do with me, but suffice to say you've come to the right draconequus. Now then, Ironridge? I've got about two minutes before fashionably late becomes unfashionably late."

"...Right. Count me in." Papyrus nodded. "If nothing else, the look on Valey's face ought to be worth the trip."

High in the administrative level atop the Ice District, in a conference room pleated with black marble and red carpet and gold filigree, Egdelwonk lurked at the bottom of a wastebasket, Papyrus at his side.

The basket was conspicuously placed to provide him a point of entry, and Valey and Lilith - the room's two sole inhabitants - occasionally gave it expectant glances, though the door was the focus of most of their attention.

One wall was completely taken up by a giant screen, controlled by a hefty box of buttons and levers built into the table in front of Valey's seat. The seats themselves were enormous, perfectly suited to Lilith's figure, appearing perfectly flat and unforgiving yet with enough give that any corporate executive would be hard-pressed to find something more plush. Valey lounged in hers, one foreleg draped over the side, the screen currently set to a high-resolution camera feed pointed west of the city.

A wall of lights on the horizon heralded Yakyakistan's distant fleet. Three giant carrier airships and twenty mid-sized raiders, according to what they could see in the daytime.

The ships didn't advance. Neither did they encircle Ironridge and attempt to build a perimeter. They simply waited.

"With all due respect," Lilith said, her voice icy, "I fail to see the point of these. The situation has not changed."

"Yeah, yeah." Valey was fixated on the screen. "We all know how apathetic you are about defending Ironridge. For showing up at all, you got my thanks."

"As long as my children continue to call this city home, that is enough. You should know better than to question my commitment."

"Mhmm." Valey nodded, her gaze boring into the screen, as if staring hard enough would let her predict the invaders' plans. "So how's that going, anyway? With Coda?"

"These things take time," Lilith bitterly lamented. "You of all ponies should know this. If only we had access to Stanza, we could transplant Coda's soul to an ordinary body and leave her windigo-infested one to rot. But recreating that abomination is out of the question, and the real one is at the bottom of a collapsed crater in the Griffon Empire. Don't remind me that I could still take all of my children and leave this city and seek it out on our own."

"As we've established, you're not gonna do that," Valey said disinterestedly, still focused on the screen. "Because you don't leave anyone behind. And some of us batponies - like me - aren't giving up on this place so easily. Right?"

Lilith audibly ground her teeth.

The door slid open. In stepped Samael, Estael, Junior Karma and a small host of bodyguards.

"I suppose that means it's my turn to arrive," Egdelwonk sighed, climbing out of the trash can, leaving Papyrus inside to watch and intervene whenever he felt like it. "What a beautiful hodge-podge of defenders this city has."

"Good. You haven't kept me waiting," said Junior Karma with a nod. A wiry stallion with a stiff mustache and immaculate business suit, he was the only pony who looked truly at home in the dark, opulent conference room, even if everyone knew he was only the formal head of a company that had been hollowed out by dangerous bargains and special interests long ago. He carried himself with an aura of power, belying how little the room's other occupants knew him to have. "Admiral? What's our status?"

"Yo." Valey gave him a small wave. "So, everyone remembers how they tried to encircle the city when they first got here, and we downed four of their ships with the northeastern anti-aircraft stuff. Since some of us were feeling forgetful at the time about why we only had anti-aircraft stuff pointed in that direction, Yakyakistan used to be our ally, everyone was mostly worried about that pirate king guy, and I didn't have a seat at the table to lecture anyone about priorities. Anyone want to re-litigate that, or am I good to proceed?"

Junior Karma raised a single eyebrow. "You were reinstated as admiral for your military expertise. As I myself made clear, I expect any dissent should defer to you from now on."

"Gnarly." Valey kept watching the screen. "Anyway, tonight we're moving all our weapons to the western front, since that's where Yakyakistan has been waiting to stay out of range ever since. If all goes well, then by morning we'll be able to launch a surprise attack and hopefully take out some of the big ones. If anything goes wrong and they get off their rears and attack right now, it might get ugly. Which is why I want everyone here, in the command center, while this goes down."

Samael, one of the twin directors of public security, cleared his throat. "What makes us more vulnerable tonight than any other night? My impression of the situation has been that we're doing this because we don't have sufficient deterrence aimed at the fleet to ward off a large-scale assault. In spite of this, Yakyakistan has done little more than minimal raids to remind us they are here. While they are technically enforcing a siege even without surrounding us, Ironridge is one of the known world's biggest exporters of food, and Yakyakistan one of its biggest importers."

Valey nodded at the screen. "Yep. Our best hope is that they are trying to siege us, and are too stupid to know that it won't work. Hence why we want to get these weapons more evenly distributed before they can catch on, if that is the case. But I think Chrysalis would be smarter than that. She probably knows Ironridge is completely dysfunctional, and just wants to break us a little with pressure before moving in for the kill. In which case, now would be the opportune time to strike, right before we regroup and improve our defenses."

Junior Karma's sharp eyes flicked between the ponies in the room, and he imperceptibly nodded.

"I should mention," Estael said. "I've had three more petitions from Jamjars' kid. She's still offering to help us."

"Is that giant tower still out there?" Valey asked. "Crystals and all?"

Estael nodded.

"And you can see what the sky is still like." Valey pointed at the screen, the airships hovering against a backdrop of lifeless gray. "We need all the help we can get. But Kitty is not here to help."

"In that case-" Lilith stood up.

"Hold that thought," Valey hissed, flinging out a hoof. "Look. They're moving."

Junior Karma regarded the screen. "You're right. How curious." He turned to Valey. "An amateur would think you made a good prediction, and wanted the authorities on site to help command the defense. But that's not what's going on here, is it?" He regarded her intently. "You've just finished telling us how our best defense against an attack is currently disassembled and in transit, even though it wouldn't have helped with an attack from the west anyway. That's a non-sequitur, Valey. You've got a plan, and are looking for an audience while you show off."

"Heh." Valey touched the brim of her hat. "Close, but not quite. Now, it looks like... six raider ships incoming. Hit the air raid sirens. It's probably a real attack."

Estael punched a button. In the distance below, the sirens began to wail.

"We're actually gaining more out of this than I expected," Valey said, still watching the screen. "See, a problem I've been trying to figure out since I got this job is how I can trust you lot. Nothing personal, you understand, but I've got a bad history with Chrysalis. And now I'm fighting her again, and find myself allied with some powerful changeling-adjacent things who kind of remind me of her. How do I know one of you isn't a mole? Or worse, Chrysalis herself, here to spy on us and gather intelligence?"

She tapped the desk as the sirens wailed. "I figured it wouldn't hurt to talk like we were suddenly, secretly vulnerable for a night, in the confidence of this chamber, and see if and whether that info would get to the army out there and convince them to take the bait. Of course, as some of you noticed, we're not actually more vulnerable than usual. And now I've learned three things: someone is getting information from this room. They're also incredibly hasty. I thought I was going to have to wait half the night for something to start, but no, they started moving the moment I said we were open. That means it's more likely a tap or bug than a deliberate conspirator, since no conspirator would be that transparent about their leak. And third, they're led by a tactician who's very easy to influence."

Valey got up and started to pace. "I mean, when you think about it, the only benefit we were getting out of moving the cannons to the west is a one-time surprise attack once they're online. A smart general, after picking up intel like that, would stay where they were until we were committed to the move, then just put their ships on the east side of the city instead. Assuming they wanted to preserve the status quo, of course, which is so far what this fleet has been doing. Now then. Assuming this place is bugged, and the invaders can hear me..."

She looked around at the rest of the room. "What's it going to be? Stand your ground and I'll destroy you. Circle around to the other side of the city and I'll know you're listening. Or stay the course and find out what I had planned for your little raider ships if it turned out you let me lure you into a trap?"

Some of Samael and Estael's guard fidgeted.

Junior Karma's eyes snapped to them. "Nobody leave this room," he instructed. "We have a strategic exercise underway."

Everyone watched the screen.

Slowly, the advancing ships stopped, turned around, and started maneuvering to rejoin the main fleet.

Valey nodded to herself. "Message received. Either they're stupid, have given this up for a lost cause, or want us to know we're bugged. Alright, goons. You're listening. How about a parlay? If you'd like to meet face to face, fire one cannon shot off at nothing to the south."

"That wasn't the most appealing invitation," Estael pointed out.

"But it was tailored to its recipient," Samael said. "Chrysalis knows Valey."

On the screen, no shots were fired. The entire armada began to turn, slowly circling the city clockwise.

Valey whistled. "Heading around to the east side. I think they're mocking me."

Junior Karma's eyes narrowed. "I assume you have a plan for this eventuality, as well? After stripping my headquarters of its defenses and moving them to the west side, you've now invited their armada right to its doorstep."

"Oh yeah. Lotsa plans." Valey kicked back in her executive chair. "For starters, putting this big building in between their ships and the city. If they're going to advance, better it gets blown to smithereens than the civilians."

"You have no idea what kind of power you would be squandering through the loss of this facility," said a new voice, cool and pious.

It was a Whitewing.

Junior Karma glared at it. "Who let that in here? I ordered this room be sealed off!"

"This is my house," the Composer tonelessly explained. "In it, I go where I will."

Valey tapped the armrest of her chair in annoyance. "In the middle of a plan to save Ironridge, here. Which wouldn't have been necessary if you bozos hadn't gotten us into this fight in the first place. Are you here to watch a master at work, or are you about to make my night a whole lot harder?"

"Think of me as an impartial observer," the Composer offered, as calm and reasonable as a lawyer advising a client to take a plea deal. "But Ironridge has the power to win this fight on offense alone, and many more like it. Continue with your own plans if you must, but do so in the knowledge that there are better ways. Much better ways."

Junior Karma looked to Lilith. "I thought I entrusted the creature controlling these to your laboratory for safekeeping."

Lilith bristled. "You of all creatures should know the difficulty of forcing a windigo into subservience. Lest we forget, they stole your company right out from under your nose and left you a powerless figurehead in a suit, Karma."

"Stole?" Junior Karma looked mildly offended, as though the subject of his offense was too far beneath him to warrant more than a little disgust. "I used them to create the technology that powered our rise to dominance, Lilith. The same rise that has given you every resource you presently have."

"Can it, nerds," Valey barked. "No fighting in the war room! If you want something useful to do with yourselves, figure out how Yakyakistan is listening in on us. I'll use this to my advantage as long as I have to, but if I can't talk with you in private then none of you will be allowed to be in on my plans."

Egdelwonk observed all this passively, glancing back into the wastebasket at Papyrus. He raised an eyebrow as if to say, want in?

Papyrus shook his shadowed head.

"Fleet bearing is one o'clock," Estael said, wandering over to Valey's chair. "Assuming they're going due east of us, we've used up half our time until they get where they're going. Then what?"

Valey punched a button, and the screen flickered to a different camera feed, this one more centered on where the fleet was going now. "Depends how wide of a berth they give us," she said. "If they come close enough, maybe we can get them with regular..." She pounded the table. "Would someone figure out how we're bugged? My gambit's played out and I need some room to spitball new ideas, here!"

The fleet stopped circling and took a tack due east, ostensibly looking to get around behind the Ice District without coming into range of close-range weapons.

"See?" Valey sighed.

Samael gestured to his and Estael's compliment of guards. "All of you are dismissed. Return to headquarters."

As they left, he walked up to Valey's chair as well, standing on the opposite flank as Estael. "Continue discussing strategy," Samael advised. "If one of mine has been compromised, it should be readily apparent if they start ignoring us. My units travel as groups to ward against impostors, and every one of their names is known to me."

"Strategy, huh?" Valey stared at the screen. "What, like telling them what I wish they would do next and seeing if they just magically do the opposite to spite me? No one's dumb enough to keep falling for that forever. At least not if it was gaining me any real value. Maybe if they wanted to taunt me and show off that they're still listening in. Although, at this point, a smart commander would pretend they were no longer hearing me even if they still were, so I wouldn't be able to learn whether I had just successfully de-bugged myself..."

At a distance, the Yakyakistani armada made no moves to change their strategy, settling into position above the rugged, rocky foothills east of Ironridge.

"Why did you tell them that?" Estael frowned. "Now they're going to do the same thing whether they're listening or not, and stay the course."

Valey smirked. "Yeah, well... It just so happens this course they're on works out well for me."

Everyone turned to regard her.

"Think about it," Valey said. "Airships rush Ironridge from the west, and I shoot them down over the mountain rim. What happens? They've got enough momentum that they probably land in the crater, potentially exploding, starting fires, crushing things and killing people. Pyrrhic victory. We've already established I'm not doing a surprise attack, since I told them about that and they moved. So what's the point of having the cannons to the west?"

She turned back to the screen. "To the east, though... Nothing down there anyone would miss if it got squashed by airship debris. This building is blocking their line of sight to the rest of the city, just like I said. Furthermore, the obvious reason anyone would have their armada wait around as long as this one has, instead of pressing the attack, is because reinforcements were on the way, in which case it would be in our best interests to go on the offense ourselves, and clean this wave up before the next one gets here. And I suspect Chrysalis herself is actually in that reinforcement wave, because the tactics I've seen on display tonight match up perfectly with those of a mindless sycophant. Egotists like Chrysalis don't like having competent underlings."

A fiendish grin spread across her face. "Also, this would be a great time to mention that the soldiers in charge of moving the cannons happen to answer to me and no one else, aren't involved in Ironridge politics, and all of them had secret orders from me to leave the cannons online and pointing east and only make it look like they were being taken down and moved. However deep our bug goes, I bet it hasn't hit them."

On the screen, the formation of the airships began to break down.

"And they're still listening," Valey said smugly, folding her forelegs and pressing a button with a wing. "This round goes to me, it looks like. Light 'em up, boys. I want that valley lined with as many ships as you can sink."

Cold Karma's eastern flank roared with cannonfire, the gray sky around the armada lighting up with explosions as ships were hit.

"Hey." Valey nodded at the Composer as three raiders spiraled to the ground in plumes of flame. "Hard to tell if they're gonna run or fight back. If it's the latter, you built this place sturdy, right? Because it's first in the line of fire."

The Composer watched her. "I suppose you have chosen to find out."

More cannonfire lit up the sky. Another raider went down in flames, and one of the three motherships was flagging, smoke pouring from one of its massive engines. It was just trying to stabilize, but a second mothership was fleeing to the east, and the third had turned broadside to Ironridge and flashed with the promise of return fire.

"Brace yourselves..." Valey muttered.

A distant rumble echoed through the building as something struck, far below.

The raider ships had a mix of discipline, too. A few had turned to flee, and a few were preparing to return fire. One, however, was rushing Cold Karma, piling on more and more speed.

Valey watched it intently on the screen. "They're ramming us!" she barked into the microphone. "Focus the one that's ramming us!"

She switched a part of the display over to a second camera, this one focused much closer to the building. Five pegasi leapt from the side of the speeding vessel as a cannonball tore through it, but the impact wasn't enough to halt the ship's momentum. It crashed into Cold Karma's building facade with the force of a meteor, hard enough that the floor shook beneath everyone's feet.

"...If you will excuse me," the Composer said. "I need to ensure no harm comes to the core."

Valey gritted her teeth as the Whitewing left. "Scumbag. Bananas, more of them are following suit! Shoot them before they get close! I want those ships down in the canyon, not in our basement!"

"It seems every strategy has its limits," Junior Karma remarked.

"Put a sock in it," Valey told him. "It worked as easily as it did because they put someone incompetent in charge. Which, by the way, tells us for sure that impostors are in charge and not real Yakyakistanis, because they got to refine military tactics down to a science in their war way back when. Our best chance to capitalize on that situation was with a head-on fight, and I got us one. Now we've just gotta win, and then find a way to re-fortify before more arrive."

Three more raiders were angling to ram Cold Karma. "At the rate others are getting shot down and deserting, there's maybe one more ramming wave left after this one," Valey calculated through gritted teeth, "but I want it cut down to zero! Cannons, fire!"

Another wave of anti-aircraft fire rang out to meet them. The two front-runners were hit, and the third was missed completely.

All three vessels had ponies spring overboard, a skeleton crew yet again for each one. One of the struck raiders careened into the valley, exploding and turning into a fireball on the ground. Another hit Cold Karma, sending a second shock wave up through the floor even as more cannonballs from the ships that were staying to fight rocked the building's outer wall.

The third ramming vessel sped forward, bereft of its crew, seconds away from impact. "Brace yourselves!" Valey shouted, grabbing onto her chair.

Suddenly, a vicious green-black laser fell from the heavens, tearing through the ramming ship like a sledgehammer, driving it off course and pulverizing it against the ground. An after-image of the beam lingered onscreen as if it had been burned into the camera. Everyone in the room was frozen.

"That laser..." Valey whispered. "No way..."

She hammered at buttons until a new camera feed came into view, this one pointed up at the skies directly above Cold Karma. A new airship was there, sleek and narrow and painted so that its prow resembled the face of a shark. A cannon on its underbelly swiveled on a mount, dribbling green energy, protruding down through an aperture shaped like a giant eye. The rest of the ship was decorated with a ribcage motif, flagrantly loud and cheesy and designed to be the kind of thing ponies would get mad about losing to.

"What's he doing here!?" Lilith spat.

Estael took two steps back, face clouded with anger. "Pirate King Rhodallis?"

"Wait, what?" Valey blinked at her. "You mean that's not... Bananas, never mind who I thought it was. Is that seriously what his ship looks like? Actually, scratch that, if he's helping us, he's helping us. Fight first, ask questions later!"

Junior Karma frowned at the video feed. "Pirate King Rhodallis has been harrying Ironridge's air security almost since I founded this company. Whatever he's doing here, you can be sure he's no friend of ours."

"Okay," Valey said, turning the camera back to the Yakyakistani fleet. "Buuut..."

Over three quarters of the surviving ships were now in retreat, and several of the staying ones appeared undecided. A second laser dropped from the pirate ship's cannon, carving a line in the valley between the armada and Cold Karma, as if in a demarcation of territory. Rhodallis' ship gradually lowered until it was on level with the other ships, staring them down.

Every remaining Yakyakistani ship turned to flee.

For a moment, the skies were still. And then the pirate ship lazily drifted up to the Cold Karma building, chose an unoccupied airship dock, and extended a gangplank.

Lilith looked as pale as a sheet. Samael and Estael didn't look much better.

Valey raised an eyebrow at them. "Looks like he wants to parlay. I'm gonna go meet him on the roof. Is there anything you wanna tell me first about why this guy scares you this much? Because from what I've heard, he's just some random criminal who attacks Ironridge military ships for fun and then lets everyone walk away free once he's had his laughs."

"Military ships whose power we sorely need today," Junior Karma said. "That stallion is the single most demoralizing thing to happen to our forces within the last twenty years. It's because of his influence that we're so low on active-duty soldiers. Do you know how many of those ships we just shot down were Ironridge ships, left at joint bases operated by Ironridge and Yakyakistan because our city could no longer supply the motivated troops to sail them? Whatever his reasons for behaving in such a manner, I won't be surprised at all if coming to our aid today only reinforces his hold on his goals."

Valey looked him up and down. "...Not a fan of armies. You can see what Chrysalis is trying to do to this city with hers. If his whole thing is scaring city-states into demilitarization, maybe he and I will get along."

Junior Karma bristled. "You don't know what you're talking about. If we could rely on the power of our own well-trained, loyal soldiers, we wouldn't-"

"Sir!" a guard standing outside the door interrupted. "Sir, we have-!"

Too late. A stallion stepped through the door who could only be Rhodallis.

Lean and muscular, clad in black-and-purple plated armor that did more to accentuate his body than conceal it, he surveyed the room, a chocolate pegasus stallion with a ragged black mane. A lone lieutenant accompanied him, though he had enough bandoliers and holsters on his outfit to supply weapons for a crew of six.

His cutie mark was a blank, empty circle. Exactly like Samael, Estael and Lilith's.

"No rooftop welcoming party?" Rhodallis asked, his voice dripping with arrogance that could cow even Junior Karma. "Perhaps you wanted to impress me before we met with the decor in your lair? It's... alright, I suppose." He surveyed the majestic black marble and intricate architecture of the meeting room.

Valey's eyes were focused on his exposed flank. "So that's why they don't like you. You've got a history with them. You're a changeling bishop too, huh?"

"A changeling bishop?" Rhodallis swaggered, one wing wrapped around the hilt of a greatsword, giving Valey his attention. "So that's what you've decided to call us? You've got a functional pair of eyes, I'll give you that much. Is that all you know, or have my beloved siblings spilled the beans on what we actually are?"

The room's other bishops scowled, pressing as far away from him as they could stand.

Valey raised an eyebrow.

"This is our domain," Lilith hissed. "Traitor. You aren't welcome here."

Rhodallis chuckled. "Did I just hear the wind, or was it the senseless whining of someone I'm not here to talk to? You, I'll do business with. You are worthy."

He unsheathed his sword and pointed it at Valey, the tip hovering an inch away from her muzzle.

"I'm gonna guess," Valey said, "that you saw we were in a scrap, gave us a free sample of what you could do, and now want me to pay you to keep defending this city when more reinforcements arrive."

"Heh. You're sharp." Rhodallis twirled his greatsword. "But what do you think a guy like me could want from a girl like you?"

"You say that like you've already got something in mind," Valey said warily, leaning forward in her chair.

Rhodallis sheathed his sword. "Of course I do. Rondo, roll out our demands."

"As you wish," his lieutenant muttered, pulling out a scroll and unrolling it on the table with a flourish. It bounced twice, taking up nearly the full length of the conference room.

Everyone cringed at its lengths. But written there, in heavy red print, was only a single sentence.

Join my crew

OR

give me Coda.

Valey's eyes slowly narrowed.

"Hopefully it goes without saying," Rhodallis swaggered, "but that offer's for you and you alone. As far as I care, you and I are the only ponies in this room."

Junior Karma and all the other bishops gave him murderous looks.

"I assume you think both of these are gonna be permanent arrangements," Valey said.

Rhodallis shrugged. "Oh, they'd last until I got bored, or had no further need of them. Hardly permanent. In fact, there's nothing in this world I hate so much as the idea of doing the same thing, forever and ever... Not many things, at least."

"Murderer," Lilith hissed.

"Your friends here don't seem to think too highly of you," Valey pointed out. "And you seem to be returning the favor. Do I have even a single shred of evidence to suggest right now that you're trustworthy?"

Rhodallis seemed unbothered. "Desperate times call for desperate measures, kid. You're backed into such a corner that you're hanging around with them, and that tells me you either don't know who they are or are too desperate to care. Unlike them, however, I have the strength to get things done around here... provided I can find a reason to use it. So are you going to give me that reason, or do you want to keep playing house with a bunch of garbage?"

"Believe it or not, I put up a pretty good fight against those ships myself," Valey said. "Sure, you put a hoof down on the scale, but I was going to win either way. You just spared me some damages. So if you really wanna bank on my desperation, how about waiting and letting me think on it?"

"Because," Rhodallis said with a forceful grin, "you're in a position of power right now. On your own turf, surrounded by allies you've chosen, in the aftermath of a victory you did earn for yourself... to a degree. If I came to you in the middle of an assault, I'd be twisting your arm. But I'm not interested in you coming to me crawling and broken and begging for aid. I'm offering while you do have a choice. If you want to wait, I'll still be here... but remember that I gave you the chance to join forces with your head held high. Any humiliation you endure by coming to me later will be on your own head."

"I think I can live with that," Valey said, watching him levelly.

"Oh, I know you can." Rhodallis licked his lips, then turned to leave. "I do love that indomitable spirit..."

Rondo followed him out.

In the pirate king's wake, Junior Karma looked thunderous at having been so cowed. Lilith's eyes were hidden beneath the shadow of her bangs. Estael was fuming.

"You surprise me," Samael said. "And yet, perhaps you don't. It's clear you have no loyalty to anyone in this room, and have only allied with us for the convenience of defending your home. Yet still, you chose us over him."

"Not a hard choice," Valey grunted, switching the camera back to Rhodallis' ship. "You were a known evil. Besides, domineering guys aren't my preferred allies."

Samael looked away.

"If there's a war going on between your changeling bishop factions," Valey said, "and you don't want me on his side, by the way, you might want to think about telling me the details. Especially what your relationship is to Chrysalis, and to each other."

None of the three bishops said anything.

"Eh, whatever." Valey got up and stretched. "Have our lookouts keep watch for more ships, but in the meantime, get those holes down below looked at, recharge our energy supplies, do anything you can to prepare for the next wave, and someone figure out how we're bugged and deal with it. Thanks."

She, too, turned to leave.

Egdelwonk yawned. "I sure do love meetings where I show up and stick around and then am not expected to do anything. Remind me why the janitor needs to attend these, again?"

Everyone gave him a look.

"On second thought..." Egdelwonk made for the wastebasket. "Forget I asked."

Back in the Crystal Palace, Egdelwonk dusted himself off, rapidly growing back to his form as Discord. Papyrus, however, leaned against a wall with a dizzy, delirious smile on his face.

Discord raised an eyebrow at him. "Someone certainly looks like they enjoyed doing nothing."

"How could I have interrupted?" Papyrus whispered, his voice tight with the strain of pent-up laughter. "I haven't seen the sparks fly that good since the old days in the Empire! Why am I looking for Starlight to tell me who I am and why I'm still here so many years after my story should have ended? The gambits, the arrogance, planning and adapting on the fly and fighting for stakes that are real and matter... This is who I've always been. I can feel myself again!"

He flexed his wings. "But this time, things are different. Whatever I try to do, I could have a real shot at it, instead of being destined to sabotage myself at the pinnacle. This rush isn't as all-consuming as it was before. My heart is pounding, but my head is still level. I could... truly achieve something great, and really do it this time, and all I need is a direction to go in. Maybe if I pick right, I could even get others on my side this time, and not try to go it alone. Obviously, I'd have to, since this body is so much weaker than my old one and I'm starting with fewer resources to boot, but it's a small price to pay if it means I keep my sanity in the end. Maybe, maybe, maybe..."

"Well, you look like you'd enjoy your own company for a while," Discord said, strolling away with a wave. "Give me a yodel if you need to keep pace with any cheating trains, and remember that I'm technically on the Equestrians' side, so I will have to tip them off if you get up to anything they'd approve of less than normal. Ta-ta!"

"Sure. See ya." Papyrus waved him on, brow furrowed in thought. "Before anything else, I'll still have to see Starlight, since if I can't get her blessing on some level or another then it's all pointless. Beyond that, how hard would it be to manufacture a pretense for visiting the old Griffon Empire...?"

Element of Magic

Faye awoke to a sensation of gentle wind, that slowly vanished with the vestiges of sleep.

Her dreams had been awkward, an all-too-familiar memory of the days before the avalanche, when Corsica and the original Ansel had been dating and she tagged along even though she wasn't welcome. Those memories of Corsica - rude, invincible and self-assured, possessed of a boundless confidence that she could create her own place in the world and knew who she was - clashed against the Corsica she saw now, blankets kicked off, upside-down and leaning against the wall, sound asleep in a royal guest suite in the Crystal Empire.

Faye's bare hooves touched the floor, and she realized what that sensation had been: the castle's magic, concentrated somewhere far below. The same magic she, in a fit of panic, had tried to seize yesterday.

It didn't feel bothered by her presence. In fact, it didn't seem to think much of anything at all. It was just power, just emotion with no will behind it, waiting to be used by someone bolder than her.

For a moment, she felt dizzy as the memories of just how badly she had messed up washed over her. It was a miracle she was waking up like this, instead of in prison or worse. Seigetsu had to have serious clout around here to bail her out, and serious reasons for putting that clout on the line to do so as well. Even if the terms of Faye's release essentially amounted to indentured servitude, with part of her soul posted as collateral and with the goal of spying on and betraying someone Halcyon had wanted to befriend...

It still felt too good to be true.

And then Halcyon's absence hit her like a hug from a windigo.

The door to the common room seemed to grow and twist in her vision, its frame taking on a menacing angle as it loomed over her. She flung open the door to the closet, but it was empty: nothing that could hide her hooves, or her special talent, or her body, or her identity as the catalyst for a war that destroyed and enslaved her people. Her bracelet hung heavy around her leg like an indictment from a court, on display for all the world to see.

Heart pounding, she hid inside the closet, pressing herself against a wall, out of sight from anywhere in the bedroom. Her teeth ground together, her lungs heaved, her eyes squeezed themselves closed...

But she had chosen this.

Given the option, she had taken her bracelet over her mask. And she could switch back at any time. All she needed was to find Seigetsu, who would certainly be close by. She... was exposed, but she had ventured out from cover under her own volition.

She was in control.

Slowly, Faye's breaths grew steady and less violent. It hadn't used to be like this, had it? From her earliest days, she remembered the nightmares, the confusion, not being able to understand the difference between dream and reality, past and present. The days after she started calling herself Halcyon were the most normal she had ever felt, taking over someone else's identity and sliding into it like a brand new pair of boots.

Then had come the day she realized she wasn't actually Halcyon. It had all been one big epiphany, born of her muddled self-examination in the days and weeks after putting together how her dreams worked, once and for all. That day had given her a choice, and she chose to live out the charade, not all out of fear but because she wanted to be something more than what she was. She wanted an identity, and taking it from others was all she had ever known.

Was she rejecting who she had been before, or had she not been anyone at all? Was she running away from her past, or towards the future? It had always been...

She took a final, steadying breath.

It had always been both, at the same time.

Faye remembered her room in Icereach, a shrine to herself filled with things she used as proof of who she was. It had been a sanctum, a place where she could hide and find balance. She remembered the fear that drove her there, not just fear of her powers and the harm a changeling queen could cause, but fear that she could lose everything else she had become. A fear that her identity, her very being wasn't yet permanent, held together by wishful thinking as it was.

A fear that, if her past caught up with her, if she backslid to the filly she used to be, to a timeless, chaotic existence of nightmares and confusion, she would lose all of her progress to everything she had worked so hard to become.

That was what it had always been about. It wasn't what Chrysalis had done. It wasn't what she could do, if she desired it. It was the possibility of a return to that time of formlessness and fear. Her blood-red hooves, her changeling queen powers... They were just links to that time.

All she was afraid of was her own fear.

There hadn't been panic attacks like this back before the avalanche. Maybe splitting herself like this hadn't been the right move, after all? Before that, she balanced herself by keeping a firm eye on who she wanted to be. But in handing herself entirely over to her persona as Halcyon, ignorant of the past and carrying only her hopes for the future, had she inadvertently left herself with only her past, and no hopes going forward at all?

And when Halcyon failed, blinded by her tunnel vision to the consequences of her actions, Faye was left with no practice living with herself, nothing to help lighten the load that was dropped on her shoulders. She wasn't stronger, cutting herself in half like this. All of this - not necessarily her bad decisions, but her inability to cope with their consequences - came down to that one thing. In trying to strip herself of what she didn't like about herself, of everything she saw as holding her back, she had only managed to handicap herself and create a self that was perpetually incompatible with the world around her.

She let out a light breath, and almost chuckled. "I wonder what Halcyon is going to say if I tell her about this."

Unraveling this mess wouldn't be easy. She wasn't even sure if it would be possible; for all she knew this was magical thinking and her problems couldn't be so clear and simple. Splitting herself had happened over time and almost on instinct, and she didn't understand the first thing about what she had done to herself on a magical or metaphysical level. And she didn't have a clear picture of where to go from here, either.

But there were a few things to do that might not hurt. First, she had to see her deal with Seigetsu through to completion. Halcyon was a part of her, and if Halcyon couldn't do this on her own, then Faye couldn't either.

And... maybe it was time to make herself stop wearing clothes.

The panic attacks would come. She knew they would. But she also knew what the blood on her hooves really represented. It had nothing to do with the war in the east. It was just a permanent, inescapable reminder of the possibility of forgetting who she was.

Faye stood up, steadied herself, walked out into the bedroom wearing nothing but her bracelet, and opened the door to the lobby.

Pinkie Pie and Applejack were there, both of whom she recognized from the previous day's party. They were busying themselves with the suite's kitchenette, and across from them on the couch Princess Twilight was reclining with what looked like a stack of legal treatises, though she looked up when Faye came in.

"Hi," Faye said shakily, glancing down at herself just in case. Her new resolution hadn't changed anything; her legs were as stubbornly red as they had ever been.

"Mornin'," Applejack greeted, apparently unbothered by the fact that Faye had been in jail for assaulting a treasured magical artifact just last night. "Hope you like apples, because I've got a bit that didn't sell last night, so it's leftovers for breakfast."

"Good morning!" Pinkie crowed, standing with her back to the workspace and wielding a spatula with her tail.

"Ah, you're awake!" Twilight slipped in a bookmark and closed her book with gusto. "I remember seeing you with the dragon envoy, though I don't think we've met properly. But I've heard you both came here to try and save a dying Flame of Harmony, and also attacked Princess Luna and the Crystal Heart with dark magic?"

She raised a skeptical eyebrow, offering Faye a chance to sort this out in plain and simple terms.

"Guilty on both counts," Faye admitted, voice shaky as she handled her thoughts like a balance beam, trying to ignore how blatantly everyone was looking at her. "If you have questions, I can try to answer them, though I can't promise you'll be satisfied with the answers. As for what I was in jail for, I... sometimes have panic attacks. I was just reaching for whatever I could to defend myself. I'm sorry."

Twilight gave her a look that was clearly trying to figure out if this was all there was to the story. Eventually, she shrugged. "Well, far be it from me to blame anyone from freaking out from time to time. If you'd like to build some bridges, would you mind telling me everything you know about the Flame of Harmony you brought here? I've been trying to figure out how we're going to revive it, and it's not been easy."

"Right down to business, huh?" Faye gave a little smile. Corsica hadn't been kidding about trying to salvage her agenda. "Okay. What do you need to know?"

Twilight looked appeased. "Specifically, any and all steps you had planned out before coming here, and how you put those steps together. What information sources were you drawing on that were authoritative enough to warrant this many Writs of Harmonic Sanction, and is there any more we can somehow get out of them?"

Faye shook her head. "The flame asked me to take it to 'Fluttershy,' whom it called its champion. Ponies who knew about Equestria told me that was an Equestrian name, and I got lucky from there that you were famous enough to track down easily." She hesitated. "Fluttershy is part of your friend group, right? Has she...?"

"Oh, she's still sleeping." Twilight nodded over her shoulder at one of the closed doors. "And she got the flame just fine. So you say the flame itself talked to you? How did that work, and can it be replicated?"

"Probably?" Faye guessed. "When I first found it, it seemed to be using the last of its strength to call out to me, and it was silent for a long time after. But while we were crossing the Aldenfold, we found a crater near the edge that was full of some kind of power, and while we were around it, the flame was able to manifest and talk again. I have some notes and measurements from when that happened."

Twilight's eyes sparkled. "Notes and measurements? Perfect! And it was able to grow stronger, though, I'm guessing that was only temporary?"

Faye nodded.

"Well, in that case..." Twilight scratched down a few things on a clipboard held in her aura. "I'd rather not waste any time with this. We'll be on a train to Ponyville in less than two hours, where I have access to another crystal palace. Even a temporary re-manifestation like what you saw would allow it to talk, right? And then I'm sure it could tell me more detailed steps to resuscitate it permanently. If all goes well, we'll go to bed tonight with a concrete plan at worst, and a healthy flame at best." She scratched her head. "How did you transport the flame, anyway? Fluttershy said it's not something any old pony would be able to do. Do you have a special connection with her element?"

Faye hesitated, then held up her bracelet. "It's magic. I act first, and question how it works later."

Twilight gave the bracelet a suspicious look. "If you don't want to tell me, you can just say so. I suppose that green gemstone you were carrying is a secret too?"

Faye hung her head. "I'm making a pretty big effort to have a... normal conversation, and not freak out right now. Maybe when I know you better, I can tell you what it is. Sorry. I'm doing my best."

Twilight, to her credit, backed off.

"Huh. You sound totally different from yesterday," Applejack remarked, strolling over with a hot plate. "If it's the nerves getting to you, know that none of us are the type to carry a grudge over old incidents when it's clear everyone wants to move on together. Of course, we'd all appreciate it if those bygones stayed bygones and you didn't do something like that again... but you don't have much to worry about on our account with whatever stuff you may or may not have been mixed up in before. Anyway, breakfast?"

Breakfast was served, and the morning progressed with the rest of Twilight's friends gradually waking up or returning from wherever they had been and joining the table. After an age, introductions were complete and Faye had a good idea of who was who: Applejack was the Element of Honesty, a straightforward apple farmer with a funny accent. Pinkie Pie was the Element of Laughter, a bubbly mare who came off as impulsive but was surprisingly good at not saying the wrong thing. Rarity was the Element of Generosity, a seamstress and entrepreneur who seemed both the least bothered out of anyone in the group by Faye's actions the previous night, and also the most interested in her body and how it could be made to look with proper, fashionable accentuation.

Not hiding under an oversized coat. Accentuation.

Then, there were the Elements Faye hadn't seen before, or had met mainly in passing. Loudest among them was Rainbow Dash, Element of Loyalty, a pegasus with an eponymously-colored mane whose claim to fame was apparently being the fastest living thing in Equestria. Fluttershy, Faye realized at long last was a spitting image of the form the flame had taken when materializing at the crater in the Aldenfold, butter yellow with a pink mane and a countenance that suited her job as a veterinarian.

Starlight was present too, and she and Faye respectfully avoided engaging the other, both due to Halcyon's awkward introduction the day before and the apparent fact that it was Starlight, not Luna or anyone else, who stopped her when she was reaching for the Crystal Heart. The other non-Element in the group was Spike, the tiny storyteller dragon from the party, who worked as Twilight's aide and seemed to be something between a little brother and a son to her. Their relationship seemed to be the most wholesome one in the room, and Faye was sure there was a deeper story behind how they knew each other.

And finally, there was Twilight herself, alicorn princess of Equestria, leader of the Elements, multiple-time savior of the land and all its people, and element of...

"Magic," Twilight explained around a mouthful of apple pie.

"The Element of Magic?" Faye furrowed her brow. "But the other five are all virtues or ideals or concepts someone can espouse. How come that one's different from the others?"

Applejack shrugged. "Well, it just is. Even the jewelry we used the elements with, hers looked different from the rest of ours."

"I do see your point," Rarity agreed. "But what of it? How or why the Elements work, and especially why they are the way they are, is a little beside the point when you're faced with a job that only they can do."

"Most people would agree that honesty and kindness and the others are virtues, though," Faye pointed out. "Magic is... a lot more broad. You can use magic for good, but there are bad kinds of magic, too. And the others are all personality traits."

"I've thought about this too," Twilight admitted. "And the best answer I've been able to find is that my element isn't actually always magic. It's a wildcard element that becomes whatever is needed to draw the other five together, also known as the Spark. The Elements of Harmony have been wielded many times across the ages, and we weren't always the ones to do it. My role as an element is to bring all the others together. And since my cutie mark is in magic, I suppose that's just what the Spark became for me as well."

Faye's ears perked. "I thought these were forces of nature. That sounds more like a deliberate and intelligent strategy."

"They're both," Starlight said, speaking up from her corner next to Twilight. "The Elements of Harmony were created along with this world to keep it true to its creators' vision for it. As for why they chose the things they chose to be elements, or what they were thinking when they did it? They're so long gone that no one will ever know."

"How do you know that, then?" Faye asked.

Starlight gave her a glance. "From talking with the flames. You're not the only one who can find their way into a crystal palace. And some flames are more talkative than others."

"I don't know about talking to the flames," Fluttershy said, working out a tiny tangle in her mane. "But I can definitely feel this one. You might not be able to know why or how, but you can still understand them." She glanced at Faye. "You understand, right? I don't know how you carried it, but you must have at least spent time around it."

Faye swallowed, still feeling like she was on a tightrope every time someone looked in her direction. "I... suppose I do, yes."

Rarity glanced at her too. "Darling, if I may... Despite all the ice-breaking we've done, you still look as if you're in dire discomfort. Is there anything we can do?"

Faye tensed. "I..."

Now everyone was looking at her.

Keep going, a part of her said. You've done well enough this far.

Yes, and it's enough, another part said. You deserve a break.

You thought this was working at all? a third part butted in. They've been staring all along. They all know, now. And nothing you say can take that away.

What did you think you would accomplish, doing this? a fourth part agreed. Outing yourself to even more ponies? Way to go, genius. Way to trample on all the effort Halcyon made to hide-

"Enough!" Faye squeaked, her voice cracking as she squeezed her eyes shut. "Please, just... don't look at me so much..."

There was a bit of shuffling in the room. Faye's eyes were closed, so she couldn't tell who had obliged.

"Umm," she heard Twilight say.

"Darling...?" Rarity ventured. "Are you quite alright? I only asked because I meant to help, not to cause further discomfort."

"It's my issue," Faye said, prying her eyes back open. "I should be able to deal with it."

Everyone was still watching her, except for Starlight. Thanks, Starlight.

"Not to be pushy," Twilight said, "but you did mention you did what you did last night because you had a panic attack. So if there's anything at all we can get you or do for you to stop that from happening again..."

Faye desperately clawed her way back up onto that mental tightrope, certain that talking about it would send her tumbling all the way off. The last thing she needed was to draw even more attention... She was trying to change, she really was, but wasn't there a way to do this just a little more gradually?

"Ugh, you guys party loud," Corsica's voice groaned from the door to their bedroom.

Blessedly, everyone's attention shifted to Corsica, and Faye felt her heart rate go down. Corsica herself was standing in the doorway and rubbing an eye, coat unbrushed and matted where it had gotten caught beneath her in the folds of her sheets. Her mane and tail were so snarled, they reached almost double their usual volume, almost comparable to Pinkie Pie's. As she leaned against the doorframe, her eyes met Faye's, and she blinked.

"Why are you completely naked?"

Faye slipped on her tightrope again. "My... clothes didn't really survive yesterday..."

Corsica squinted. "Could have sworn I made Seigetsu find you something. Anyway, does anyone have a brush? And a spare set of clothes so the nerd can stop feeling awkward about herself?"

"You know, if this is really all it was, you were welcome to speak up earlier," Twilight said as she and everyone else marched through the palace corridors. "No one wanted you to feel uncomfortable. Hey, some of us even enjoyed ourselves helping out."

She shot a conspicuous glance at Rarity, who was still fussing with the hem on Halcyon's new robe. Apparently, according to Twilight's historical knowledge, Rarity's fashion sense, and the soldier who had curiously shown them to the room where it was stored, this was the robe of a Crystal Magistrate, a position in the government of the Crystal Empire circa twelve hundred years ago that had few official duties and seemed mostly to exist to allow the higher members of society to hold state titles befitting their social stature.

Faye remembered Leif predicting such a thing last night, as they explored the washing room, and now here it was, fabric and all: the betters of the Crystal Empire's old society felt that flaunting their extravagant, shiny coats reflected poorly on their moral character, and as such took even more extravagant means to hide them in public. The robe was huge and flowing, concealing her form beneath a multitude of folds, with a hood that could be pulled up to shroud her face in shadow. Stitched and embroidered, it was magnificent in its austerity, all the craftsmanship neatly hidden away on the inside, tied closed with silken ropes, rugged on the surface yet immaculately soft against her fur.

It came with boots, too, the kind that looked like something a philosopher might wear, yet on the inside felt more like high-top slippers. The only downside was how heavy it was, but that was fine. Even before her years of yak training, Faye had always been able to lift well above her weight class.

There was even a little face mask, tucked away inside the neck of the robe, that she could raise to completely conceal her identity if she wanted. Ironic, given her relationship with masks. She decided not to use it.

"Being uncomfortable was the point," she muttered, hiding in the hood like it was a cave even as the robe billowed behind her. "I don't like having a problem being looked at. I just wanted to change, and I'm going to keep trying after I've had a little time in my comfort zone."

"You know, if you're looking for something that's a little more halfway between this and nothing, I'd be happy to oblige..." Rarity eagerly pointed out.

Faye didn't respond. This robe was neither mobile nor practical, and it would certainly draw stares. But she liked it.

"Hey," Corsica said to her as they approached the final elevator that would take them outside the castle. "What about, you know... everyone else who came with us? I realize you don't run the tightest operation, here, and are probably just trying to get by until Seigetsu gives you the you-know-what back. And I guess I don't have room to talk after ditching you yesterday. But have you thought this through?"

Faye blinked. That was... a subject she really had no idea how to deal with. Ostensibly, Mother and Leif would be coming along, but coordinating that really hadn't turned out to be her strong suit. Braen and Papyrus, she had no idea.

For that matter, she still didn't know how she was going to take a train to Ponyville when it was far enough away to need the train's magic.

"How many companions do you have, anyway?" Twilight asked, apparently having eavesdropped. "I know about Braen. She and I had a meeting with Princess Celestia earlier this morning, and she's decided to stay here in the Crystal Empire until you get back. Seeing as this is supposed to be a quick back-and-forth, and she's not needed for the stuff with the flame, she figured she could pursue her own research here more effectively than on a train."

"That is already taken care of," Seigetsu said, stepping out from behind a pillar with Nanzanaya at her side.

Corsica stopped and blinked. "Hey."

Twilight nodded respectfully. "Special Inquisitor. What do you mean?"

Seigetsu gave a small smile. "That mare is my ward, as of last night. Seeing as I'm taking responsibility for her actions for the time being, I felt it prudent to tie up some loose ends I didn't think would otherwise get handled, and have had a talk with every one of her companions save Corsica. We felt the logistics of this trip would be simpler - Leitmotif, in particular, felt her own odds of getting into trouble would be much lower - if they accepted the Crystal Empire's hospitality for the time being, under the assurance that Halcyon and I will be returning this way the moment our business in Ponyville is concluded. This mare, however, will be accompanying us."

Twilight gave Nanzanaya a look, and then turned back to Seigetsu. "If you're volunteering her to come, does that mean you're footing the bill for any eating expenditures incurred on our travels?"

"Perhaps," Seigetsu said. "Now, before we reach the train station, I must have a word in private with Halcyon. Might the two of us walk together for a ways?"

"Alright," Faye agreed, eyes on Seigetsu's pockets. Was it her imagination, or was her mask crying out to her from within them? One more day, she told herself, and she would swap the bracelet out and get Halcyon back.

But last night had been the first time in years she had gone to sleep and woken up as herself, with no masks in sight. The solution to her personal struggle lay with both her and Halcyon, she knew for certain. It was useless trying to do this all on her own... but it would be equally useless trying too hard to get Halcyon back, and making her do all the work. She had to be able to live as herself, too, at least a little.

One day. If she could make it twenty-four hours, that would be a huge step in the right direction.

Outside, the weather was immaculate, without a hint in the sky that the Crystal Heart was the only thing keeping the empire from being savaged by a brutal blizzard. "What do you want to talk about?" Faye asked, pulling down her hood once everyone else was out of earshot.

"In Snowport, my brother spoke of a powerful magic that only exists for those who are unaware of it," Seigetsu said. "I recall you seeming quite vexed by the conversation, and made a note to myself that you would likely seek out what that magic was. Have you discovered it?"

Faye's ears pressed back. So that was what this was about.

"I have," she admitted. "Yelvey told me all about it during that meeting that went south. It was supposed to be collateral so I would consent afterward to having my memory wiped."

Seigetsu chuckled. "After the incident in question, you were most insistent you did have your memory wiped, and only recalled the details because they were told to you by a changeling who came to your aid. I suppose they told you these details as well?"

Faye froze.

"There's no need for that," Seigetsu said, motioning for her to keep walking. "I suspected you weren't telling me everything back then. Now that we're working together, you might as well explain yourself. I'm going to find out eventually, and we've established you aren't a skilled enough con artist to keep your stories straight over time."

Faye glowered, then sighed. "Your memory magic doesn't work on me. I can remember things that are tampered with or taken." She glanced up at Seigetsu. "I'm only telling you this because this is clearly a prelude to you offering me some workaround that will let us ride the trains despite knowing how they work. So you should know in advance if it's the kind of thing that might not work on me."

"Interesting," Seigetsu said. "Your secret is safe with me. And worry not. I have a high degree of confidence my workaround will work. Which brings me to my next question: did you tell Princess Twilight or any of her friends about the trains? If so, I will need to meet with them about this workaround as well. And I would rather get a head start on that if possible, because they have a disagreeable history with it."

"I don't think so?" Faye wracked her memories. "I've haven't discussed it on purpose. But Twilight was bothered by how she didn't know about Snowport's existence, and seems like the kind of pony who researches things she doesn't know. So it's possible she found out part of it on her own."

"I see." Seigetsu nodded. "Then I shall approach her about it discreetly. Now then..."

She snapped her talons, and out of a nearby trash can stepped Egdelwonk.

Faye blinked. "You two know each other?"

"Well, I do happen to consider myself dragon-adjacent," Egdelwonk proclaimed, holding a hoof across his chest. "Although I suppose you haven't seen the form I usually use around Equestria yet, have you...?"

With a pomf of purple geometry and starry mist, Egdelwonk's barrel turned into a noodle, and after a bit of writhing he straightened himself out into an incredibly long draconid thing with plenty of features stolen from a pony, a goat, a griffon and too many other animals to count.

Faye gaped just a little... and then realized of course someone who looked like Egdelwonk would have a true form. There was no way he had ever been anything but a... whatever this was... pretending to be a pony.

"The real name's Discord, Lord of Chaos," Egdelwonk proclaimed, standing up on two legs with a flourish. "A draconequus, if you're unfamiliar with my ilk. Once upon a time I was a miscreant of small repute, but ever since Twilight and her friends came along I figured a change of pace was in order, and now I'm nice and chummy with Team Harmony. Really, ask Twilight! She'll say I'm a saint. So now we have tea parties and make friendship bracelets together and stuff, and the world is safer for our efforts."

He smiled beatifically. "Also, the Princesses asked very nicely for me to join their side because I can break the rules of their little train game and they were tired of taking months to get from edge to edge of their kingdom. Imagine making friends for purely practical reasons! I'm sure they legitimately enjoy my company as well, but sometimes you need to get from the Crystal Empire to Ponyville in a hurry, you know?"

Faye took a step back. "What does this involve?"

Discord shrugged. "Dousing your body and mind in primordial chaos. Turns you gray, flips your personality and special talent inside out, extremely fun and disorienting experience you should absolutely offer to your friends as a prank. For most ponies, it should wear off in a day or two, particularly if they've got friends around to remind them who they really are, though in your case..." He rubbed his chin. "I'm not quite certain you aren't already Discorded, courtesy of someone else. After all, you are a whole lot less colorful than you used to be, and I suppose it would explain..."

Faye blinked.

"Oh, forget I said anything!" Discord waved and moonwalked away. "I'll be stalking the train just in case, but see if you can't already ride just how you are right now!"

Into the Ground

The train car Faye and Seigetsu entered was mostly empty... entirely empty, actually, after a look around.

Faye's thoughts weren't on the train, however.

"I'm not quite certain you aren't already Discorded, courtesy of someone else..."

Egdelwonk's - or Discord's - words rattled around in her brain. What was that supposed to mean? Turning her gray, flipping her personality inside-out? But Halcyon could hardly be considered an inversion of her. An idealized self, according to a flawed set of ideals, maybe, but Halcyon wasn't even here right now. How could-?

Procyon stared at her from a seat on the train.

Her coat was tinged with color, mother-of-pearl instead of plain silver. Her mane and tail were silver instead of gray. And her hooves, instead of being a singular, bloodstained red, held all the colors of the dawn.

She gave Faye a look that seemed to say I told you so.

Faye didn't make eye contact. What did this mean, going forward? Just this morning, she had been full of thoughts about how she and Halcyon were two halves of the same whole, who needed to work together to move forward. But where did Procyon fit in with that? The easiest way to think about it had always just been to ignore her. It didn't instinctively feel like she fit in anywere. Like she was different, a whole other person, and one Faye and Halcyon had an awkward relationship with at that. But if she was the original, and Faye was somehow an inverted version of her...

What was Faye the opposite of, anyway?

No sooner had she thought the question than she wished she hadn't asked. An image filled her mind's eye of her own power, the bracelet enveloping her in flames of green. What would she be if that didn't scare her, but excited her instead? Who would she be if she embraced her place in history, if she relished the power she had inherited and lusted after every chance to use it?

None of that made sense next to any of her memories. It wasn't possible. If she had once been like that, she couldn't have ended up where she was now, wouldn't have the history she remembered herself having. She could even see her own history in mirrorlike dreams, more accurate than any conscious memory. Unless...

A distraction blessedly came at just the right moment, courtesy of Seigetsu tying herself up.

"What are you doing?" Faye stared at her as she took her place in a seat, proceeding to bind her legs in place.

"Restraining myself," Seigetsu said as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Once I am done with what I can reach, would you mind getting my hands?"

Faye rubbed at her eyes, but this was definitely happening. "Why would you do that?"

Seigetsu nodded at Discord. "To avoid debasing myself while... under the influence. The train's magic makes precious few exceptions, and alas, I have no better way than this one."

Discord grinned. "She gets remarkably cuddly when souped up on chaos."

Seigetsu's eyes shadowed. "I would appreciate it if you kept such details to yourself from now on."

"Right, then..." Faye trotted away, but looked on curiously as the process was completed. Discord finished the bindings himself, snapping a talon and conjuring restraints out of a beautiful pink lace rope tied with an elaborate bow, and even gagged Seigetsu with cloth featuring a print of his own face. Seigetsu closed her eyes and sighed... and Discord tapped her on the nose with a talon.

A wave of gray washed over her from head to foot, covering her uniform as well as her scales. The process took about a second. She opened her eyes, blinked, looked confused and then disappointed.

"And there you have it," Discord said, strolling past and ruffling Faye's mane. "You're free to untie her. She'd probably love you for it, at least up until she's back to normal. I'll be gooning out in the refreshments car with Fluttershy and the others if you'd like to gab, but otherwise, feel free to go where you will! Next stop, Ponyville!"

He snapped his talons and disappeared in a puff of smoke. Moments later, the train began to roll.

Faye blinked, realizing she was still alone in this car save for Seigetsu. That was probably by design, actually. It would cause nothing but questions if passengers who didn't need to know saw a dragon inquisitor bound, gagged and completely gray on the train.

Curious, she walked closer to the tied-up dragon, noting how Seigetsu's clothes had turned gray along with her. Her own robe, looted from the palace, didn't have any color either, she realized... not that it had any to begin with. What about her other garments? Usually, she didn't dress in colors. Did she?

The coat Corsica gave her had colored trim, right? She was fairly sure it did, but now that she thought about it, could she go back and check? That coat was probably still in Fort Starlight, ruined from her fall in the Flame District.

There was nothing for it but to try wearing something colorful once she got to Ponyville. That could give her a hint about whether this was really what had happened to her.

She sighed, looking around the train car for anything worth staying here for. Being alone for a bit might be nice, particularly if it wasn't in a cage in the palace. But at the same time, shouldn't she be busying herself winning Twilight's favor and doing things that might gain her leverage to help Ironridge? That was what Halcyon would want. Maybe she should switch cars...

But there was something here, now that she looked. One of the seats by the rear exit seemed to push at her eyes, encouraging them to skim over it, to move along and pay no mind to what was there. But now that she realized, and forced herself to focus on it, she was fairly sure there was actually nothing there... Nothing at all. Not even a seat. Just a patch of empty darkness that felt the same to look at as balancing on a sphere of ice.

What was that?

Faye trotted closer, until she had to actually turn her neck to look away. And her neck tried to turn, almost as if it was being pushed by a weak subconscious magnetic field. But she held her ground, and squinted into the darkness. "Hello?"

"So you can see me," said a voice that Faye took a moment to realize belonged to Princess Luna.

She jumped a little. "No, not really!"

"At ease," the darkness said. "However acrimonious our first meeting, we are not enemies. And this is merely a spell that allows me to pass on these trains unaided. In hindsight, I should not be surprised someone like you was able to notice me."

Faye warily took a step back.

"You have nothing to fear," Princess Luna's voice insisted, sounding like she was still expecting Faye to flee.

Something in that expectation provoked Faye's legs to steady themselves. "So you... have your own way of skipping the train's magic?" she asked.

"Not one that can easily be shared with others," Luna explained. "But yes. I do."

Faye didn't know what else to say. This was awkward. And she didn't really want to be here. It was thanks to Luna that she was now separated from Halcyon. And even if she was confident enough to control her power, there was nothing to reach for here that could help her.

At the same time, this was one of Equestria's monarchs. One she had gotten off on the wrong hoof with, yet would need the support of to secure an intervention in the north.

For anyone more charismatic than her, anyone better at winning friends, this would be a golden opportunity to advance Halcyon's agenda. If only she was anyone else, someone like Corsica, who didn't stumble when it came time to take action... but she wasn't.

But for Ironridge's sake, and for Coda's, and even for herself, she had to try anyway.

"Look, I-I'm sorry," she said, stumbling over the first words that worked their way up into her mouth. "About... yesterday. In the Aegis room. I didn't mean to do that."

"Would that it were easy to undo things we regret," said the darkness. "Alas, it is not. But second chances are more than many can wish for, and you yet have one."

Faye fumbled with her memories, trying to keep what she knew of this princess straight in her mind. Long ago, someone - Lilith, maybe? - had told her Luna was allegedly responsible for the creation of all batponies. And then Seigetsu said Luna had been banished from Equestria for generations, only recently returned after repairing a rift with Celestia.

"Is it true that you created batponies?" she asked.

"...It is," the darkness said. "Although I was unaware legends of that persisted commonly in the north. Much and more of my legacy there had credit claimed by another."

"How come?" Faye asked. "I mean, why did you make us?"

"Why do parents have children? Why do artists create art?" The darkness seemed to shrug. "My reasons were little different from those. And yet I have never met a batpony who did not eventually ask that question. Was this the reason you were expecting?"

Faye allowed herself to look away. "I don't know what I was expecting. Do you mind if I sit here?"

"You are welcome to."

So she sat down, taking the seat across from the darkness.

"How come..." Faye swallowed. "You're just okay with me being here? You know where I'm going, right? The whole point of this trip is to try to revive a Flame of Harmony. It's going to be done in the home of a second Flame of Harmony. The consequences you could suffer if a bad actor got involved don't seem worth taking any chances with. And someone with my track record..."

The darkness was quiet for a moment. "You have accurately voiced my concerns. I understand the mission that brings you to Equestria relates to the resuscitation of this flame. While I did not know this when we met inside the Aegis's chamber, it would not have changed my feelings on the matter once you assaulted the Crystal Heart. But do not underestimate the value of a dragon's oath. In claiming you, Seigetsu has taken responsibility for all your actions, be they good or bad. She would not have done so had her judgement not warranted it. And Seigetsu has my trust."

Oh. So if Faye messed up again, it would be on Seigetsu's head, huh?

"Additionally, the place you will be visiting is Twilight Sparkle's domain," Luna continued. "Her title is the Princess of Friendship. Though that may sound silly to a northerner, Celestia and I give ourselves no say in who she chooses to place her trust in. The decision on whether anyone is to be allowed in that place rests with her alone. And Twilight Sparkle has a history of being generous with second chances."

Faye looked away. "That's good to know."

"If you are eager to redeem yourself," Luna's voice said, "I do have some questions we never had the time for yesterday."

Faye's backwards ears folded. "Such as?"

"Why is it," the darkness asked, "that you are hidden from me?"

"What do you mean by that?" Faye asked. "You said something about being invisible in the eyes of gods, but I don't think I'm invisible."

"So, you do not understand what I am talking about," the darkness clarified. "Are you aware of any curses you may be under? Have you had any dealings with other godlike beings?"

Faye hesitated. "Maaaybe... What is it to you?"

"Alicorns can perceive the world in a multitude of ways," Luna explained. "Some of which took centuries for my sister and I to understand how to use. In particular, we can see the color and form of a creature's soul - a technique I explored during the creation of your kind. However, you appear as if shrouded in an impenetrable haze. I can see your body with mortal vision just fine. But to whatever lies within that body, I am as blind as any other."

"You can... see souls?" Faye asked. "What's that like?"

"It is merely a tool we stumbled across in trying to understand our own powers," Luna said. "One of many that Equestria's younger alicorns have yet to learn to use. However, I am more interested in your circumstances. According to Discord, you are evidently able to bypass this train's magic without doing anything special whatsoever."

Faye focused on the window. "He says I can."

"And you think there is nothing more to it than that?" Luna asked. "A question for a question. Indulge me, and I will answer in turn whatever you have to ask, be it about your race's history or otherwise."

"He says I might already be chaos-flipped," Faye sighed. "Or whatever you call it. Don't you think asking someone their thoughts on finding out they might have lived their whole life as the opposite of who they were supposed to be is a little personal?"

"As is asking a god why they would create your people," the darkness answered. "Or many other questions you could choose to ask."

"Well, I guess it's possible," Faye admitted. "It sounds wrong. But you could convince me it was true. I just heard it now, though. I need to do some testing, and see if the idea holds up with what I can observe for myself."

"Spoken like a scientist," Princess Luna said. "Supposing it was true, could it be related to why I cannot see you?"

Faye shook her head. "I don't know. I can't say that it isn't. If it happened, it would have been two and a half, almost three years ago. You said I'm shrouded in fog? What does the fog look like?"

The darkness shifted, as if leaning in to scrutinize her. "Like a golden mist, encapsulating roughly four hooflengths around your body. It travels with you as you walk, and never lingers."

Golden mist. Just like the light spirit.

"Have you ever heard the name..." Faye swallowed. "Unnrus-kaeljos?"

The darkness exhaled. "I would ask where you have heard it, first. Though it seems it would not be hard to guess."

"What does it mean?" Faye asked. "Have you met them, too? What are they, and where do they come from? What do they want?"

"...For all of those questions," the darkness said after a moment of thought, "you would be better served searching for answers in the Crystal Palace beneath Twilight Sparkle's castle than asking me."

"Why?" Faye pressed. "What's down there?"

"In Equestria's early days," Princess Luna said, "the nation's borders were ill-defined. It was populated by indigenous dragons, as well as small, sparse villages of ponies with little to no trade. Civilization resembling the way you think of it now only came to these lands two thousand years ago from the north, carried by a great many refugees, led by my sister and I, fleeing the destruction of Old Unicornia where Yakyakistan now stands. Ours was a struggle to survive, to rebuild the comforts of our old homes, and also to explore the lands we had taken for our own, in the Equestrian heartland beyond the belt of land claimed by the dragons."

Faye's backwards ears perked. The answer to that question required a history lesson, huh?

"Our world has nine Crystal Palaces, each with its own Flame of Harmony," Luna explained. "In those days, all nine were intact. There was no Aldenfold splitting the north and south, no flames that had gone silent through our own folly. Six of them formed a hexagon around the Crystal Empire - back then, the true center of the world. Three of them formed a triangle near the outer edge of the world. Six and three, for what Yakyakistan's faith now knows as the Personal and Societal Virtues. Or, as we call those six, the Elements of Harmony."

Faye nodded, listening keenly.

"My sister and I discovered the power of the Elements, and sought to visit each and every one of the flames," Luna went on. "At Equestria's zenith beginning some thirteen hundred years ago and ending with the creation of the Aldenfold, our borders encompassed five of the six palaces dedicated to the Elements, with the sixth held by our sworn allies, the dragons of Cernial. And the Crystal Empire, its name an anachronism even in the days of Equestria's first founding, was a vassal state in the heart of our lands. Now, tell me: were you sovereign monarch of so much land, as we were, where would you choose to put your capitol?"

"In the center," Faye pointed out. "I gather you didn't have the trains at the beginning. You probably wanted somewhere close to all your provinces to easily administer them. And if you were specifically trying for all these Flames of Harmony to be within your borders, you would want to be equidistant to them. Hence, the Crystal Empire."

"That would be sensible," Luna said. "But it is not what we did. Guess again."

Faye furrowed her brow. "Near Yakyakistan, then. If you came to the lands as refugees, you would have taken the first suitable place to settle that you could find. And those lands would have been where ponies first started settling down, and where the oldest and biggest cities grew up."

"It would be easy to think so, from this side of history," Luna agreed. "But the first land we reached was Cernial. And though we forged a friendship with the dragons, we could not claim their land as our own."

Faye thought harder. "Well, your current capitol is close to Ponyville, where we're going, right? So you figured it would be better to be on top of one of the flames than far from them all."

"Precisely," the darkness praised. "But the city of Canterlot was only constructed a thousand years ago, after the rift between myself and my sister and the destruction of our original castle. That castle was constructed not merely in the neighborhood of a Crystal Palace, but directly on top of it. And out of all the Crystal Palaces within our borders, we chose that one specifically for a reason."

"There's something special about it," Faye guessed. "Something that's different from the others? I noticed Twilight's Element seems different from her friends', as well."

"In more ways than one," Luna said. "She has always been the leader among her friends. So, to answer your question as to what is down there: something you would not have seen just by visiting the palace in Ironridge, or the others anywhere else in the world."

Faye's brow furrowed. "That was an awfully long preamble for an answer that's basically 'wait and see'."

"What more is needed when you will be seeing for yourself before the night is upon us?" the darkness asked. "Some things are better seen than heard about."

Faye sighed. "So if you went to all that work trying to include the Crystal Palaces in Equestria's boundary, why make the Aldenfold? Actually, is it true you made them?"

The darkness seemed ashamed. "I could not tell you. Equestria was restructured substantively in the wake of the war between myself and my sister as she assumed sole control. She withdrew from many places our nation once laid claim to, and did create the mountains and split the world in two."

"How come?" Faye asked. "And how? The amount of power it would take to make a mountain range that big across the entire world..."

"The same power that was used to create the world in the first place," the darkness explained. "The three Societal Virtues, like the Elements of Harmony, are not mere concepts but immeasurable power that can be wielded by certain beings. My sister used hers, the Virtue of Knowledge, known as the Noble History, to reshape the world in many ways before forswearing that power and sealing it away. She created the Aldenfold, and she created these train tracks and their enchantment as well. As to why she would do these things... First, it is my turn for another question."

"Go ahead." Faye swallowed.

The darkness didn't hold back. "What power did you employ on the Crystal Heart?"

Well, great.

How could Faye answer that? Honestly? Evasively? Did it even matter? It probably did matter, actually. If Luna's special alicorn senses were obscured and she could only perceive her with plain old eyesight, her identity as a changeling queen might actually be a secret. But if she told a lie here, would she be able to keep her story straight later? Would she even remember the details, even if she wasn't forced into a situation where she would be outed?

"If you are not comfortable saying," the darkness offered, "I am not forcing your hoof. You merely will not learn the answer to your question."

"If I tell you," Faye said, "it'll actually be a satisfying answer, right? This will explain why Equestria is so stingy with border crossings and the spread of information? Why someone would set up a train system that works like this, why you let the dragons erase memories when someone learns the wrong thing, why it's so hard to find the truth around here? You're really offering to tell me that if I tell you this?"

The darkness hesitated. "All of those things are closely related, and stem directly from the actions my sister took immediately following her victory. But you will not likely be satisfied with what I have to say."

"Why?" Faye pressed. "Because it's too dangerous to tell someone like me the full story, and you'll hold back important details? Or just because I won't think the reasons are good enough?"

"...I would have my answer first before I answer that."

"What were you fighting over, anyway?" Faye dodged, trying to buy time and work up her courage. "Did it have to do with this?"

"It was a war of jealousy in which I was in the wrong," Luna said, her tone indicating that it was Faye's turn.

Faye swallowed. She tried to speak, but the words caught in her throat like bile. "I'm..."

There was no panic, this time. Only a clammy inevitability: she couldn't do this. Her secrets were all she had. If she wasn't the mare who couldn't talk about who she was, then who was she?

"I can't tell you," she said, her head hanging and her voice bitter. "I'm sorry. It's not that I don't want to. When it's only that, any old person can put up with stuff they don't want to get stuff they do. I just can't make myself. I wish I could. But I guess you can keep your secrets for now."

The darkness watched her. "That is more resignation than I usually hear in the voice of a secret-keeper. Are you being blackmailed?"

Faye shook her head. "No. Though, I guess that's what I would say if I was. There are some things normal ponies can just do or talk about where I just can't, for no good reason. Can't explain it. Can't justify it. Can't do it."

"Do you suspect this is related at all to your ability to ride this train?" Luna asked.

"Probably," Faye sighed. "But when I think about it like that, I'm not sure if I want to change. I'm sorry, I haven't had much time to process that yet. I don't have well-formed thoughts on it yet."

"Then take the time you need to form those thoughts," the darkness bade. "We shall likely meet again before your time in Equestria is over."

After several hours, most of which were spent in awkward silence in the refreshments car as Corsica joked with Twilight and her friends and Faye couldn't find a way to join in, the train began to slow, approaching a rustic station at the edge of a town in a hilly meadow near a large, dense forest. The buildings were colorful and made from a mix of painted timber, thatched roofs and fired clay, with dirt roads and whimsical shapes guiding the architecture. Most buildings had two floors, and the fields surrounding the town seemed to be a mix of farmsteads and orchards, the breeze carrying a sweet scent of flowering buds to Faye's nose.

Near the train platform, the most immediately-visible thing was an open-air market with wooden stalls and lively hoof traffic. The ponies of this town didn't seem to think much of staying indoors, with every business and establishment having outdoor seating or else a storefront that was easily peruseable from the road. Almost no one wore clothing, save for a smattering of hats on the stallions, and a couple of foals tumbled together out from one alley and into another, their laughter mixing into the sounds of haggling, barter and the wind.

"Home sweet home," Applejack announced, adjusting her hat. "Welcome to Ponyville, you two."

"Huh. Looks pretty chill." Corsica nodded in approval. "I like it."

"It's peaceful ninety-seven percent of the time," Pinkie Pie informed her. "The other three percent being when it gets invaded by giant eldritch behemoths, but that's just Equestria for you."

Right. One of the things Faye had picked up while listening to everyone talk on the ride was that Abyssinia or its war with Cernial weren't really known or talked about down here... but they still came to call occasionally, in the form of lone Abyssinians wandering the land. Most Equestrian ponies, apparently, had no skills for dealing with that other than running and hiding. Which, in some cases, turned out to be very much justified.

"Right," Twilight explained, stepping over to Nanzanaya, Faye and Corsica - by her demeanor, Faye guessed she hadn't yet learned to do whatever soul-sight Luna had been talking about, and couldn't notice anything off about her whatsoever. "So you can probably see my castle over there? That's where I'll be putting you up for the night, and where I need to go while everyone makes a quick run home to drop their luggage, but after that we're not going to waste any time in visiting that Crystal Palace. Understood?"

"Aye aye!" Rainbow Dash saluted, and was gone in a blaze of color.

Everyone else dispersed as well, leaving Spike and Starlight with the noble assignment of showing the newcomers around the town.

Starlight seemed ambivalent about this. Spike clearly relished the role.

"And this," he explained, striding pompously down the main street and pointing out establishments as he passed them, "is Quills and Sofas. Emporium of exactly what it says in the name."

Faye and Corsica stared. It really did seem to be a shop that sold just those two things.

"Your local culture is fascinating," Seigetsu remarked, no longer gray or tied up, having caught up with the group shortly after the train station.

Nanzanaya was more focused on the eateries they passed, her unnerving golden eye impassive even as her real eyes darted excitedly about. "Sure like the smell of that one!"

"That's Sugarcube Corner," Spike explained. "Great bakery. Two thumbs up. Pinkie works there, lives with the couple that owns it and helps them out in exchange for room and board. Might be able to get you a discount! Though, uh, Twilight warned me not to let you anywhere near her money."

Nanzanaya rolled her eyes. "As if she could say no to a friend of a friend."

Spike gave her a smug look. "I dare you to try it."

Nanzanaya immediately started heading for the bakery. "Challenge accepted."

Spike stared after her, eyebrow raised, tapping a foot and tossing his coin pouch repeatedly with a hand.

"What's her problem? We had refreshments on the train," Corsica pointed out.

Faye shrugged. "Maybe she's just not used to having readily-available food? She did say her homeland is in trouble."

"It's possible," Seigetsu agreed warily.

Spike raised an eyebrow at her. "So, like... are you following us all the way down to the flame for whatever Fluttershy's doing?"

"Unless Her Majesty explicitly requests that I do not," Seigetsu said. "...And by that I mean Princess Twilight."

"You'll have to ask her yourself," Starlight said. "But what about Nanzanaya? Call me cautious, but I don't trust her."

"Don't trust her with what?" Spike raised an eyebrow. "Money, duh, but you think she'd get up to no good down in the Crystal Palace?"

"She does have a tendency to go running off on her own," Seigetsu said. "I would be most interested to observe her when she thinks she is unwatched. She has made her intentions in coming here quite clear, but any caution you chose to exhibit on her behalf may not be unwarranted."

Starlight shook her head. "Actually, I'm more worried that if we all leave her behind up here with no one to watch her, someone will regret it when we get back. If she did come here with the intent to sabotage the Crystal Palace somehow, the absolute worst time to do it would be when so many of us are down there to stop her. But I've met a ton of nefarious people in my life, and every last one of them has been smart enough to know not to tamper with the world's foundations. Believe it or not, it's usually the good guys who are behind that when it happens."

Seigetsu nodded slowly, considering her words.

"Well, you're the ones who live here," Corsica pointed out. "You never had any instances before of someone trying to mess with this place?"

Spike glanced at Starlight. Starlight glanced everywhere but at him.

Corsica tilted her head.

"I mean, there was one time," Spike suddenly said. "We had the town almost get overran by these nasty black vines. But that turned out to be the result of the tree getting weaker because it didn't have the Elements - the physical things, the jewelry - because Twilight and her friends were using those, and they fixed it by giving the jewelry back to the tree. But there wasn't really a villain involved with that, so, you know?"

Starlight frowned at him. "You told me about giving the Elements back to the tree, but didn't mention vines. How did this happen, again?"

Spike shrugged. "I dunno, it was a while ago. Twilight probably remembers better than me. I think the tree was creating some sort of force field that kept the vines at bay, or something, and it just weakened?"

"And it's just the tree for the Element of Magic," Faye said, "but you had to give it all six Elements?"

Her brow creased in thought. Was this related to what Luna had said about this one being different?

As Spike nodded, Corsica asked, "we're not going to run into that barrier trying to make it to the bottom, are we?"

Starlight looked concerned. "I suppose we'll find out. I've been as far in as the lobby before, but never all the way to the bottom of this one. Hopefully we can get there; we don't exactly have a lot of other options. But maybe if there is something bad down there, we'll all be able to deal with it."

Seigetsu listened with interest.

"It's also possible this 'barrier' you're talking about is the ether river itself," Starlight added. "In which case, I'm not aware at all of the possibility there could be anything beneath it. It's supposed to be the foundation of the world. But if there was, it wouldn't matter, because the flame we're looking for is above the surface. Either way, if there's a problem that blocks our path, let's deal with it when we come to it. I've visited a lot of Crystal Palaces before, and none of them have been completely straightforward to get to. Stands to reason this one will be the same."

Nanzanaya came trotting back out of Sugarcube Corner, a jumbo cupcake balanced on her back. "I got," she announced to Spike, "free stuff."

Spike raised an eyebrow. "Not on anyone's tab?"

"Nope!" Nanzanaya grinned at him. "Now, where to next?"

After half an hour of walking and sightseeing, everyone emerged on the far side of Ponyville, the town giving way to grassy hills that sloped down to the edge of the forest. Dark and broody, it reminded Faye vaguely of the old Ansel when he was having a mood.

"The Everfree Forest," Spike narrated in a dramatic tone. "A little more dangerous than most ponies have the stomach for. Magic doesn't always work right there, hence why it's so wild - normally, the pegasi manage Ponyville's weather, but they can't control the stuff that goes on above there. And it's also right where we have to go!"

He strolled along a path to a cottage nestled right up against the edge of the woods, where Twilight, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash were waiting, standing around and watching for the others. "Hey, Spike!" Twilight waved.

"Hey, everyone!" Rainbow bellowed, doing a flip in midair.

"Hi," Fluttershy said, looking slightly embarrassed by the forcefulness of her company.

"Well, that just leaves three more," Twilight said as everyone gathered around together. "Anyway, now that all the newcomers are here-" Her gaze found Nanzanaya, and her face fell. "Are you coming with us?"

"Should I not?" Nanzanaya frowned at her.

Twilight pointed a hoof at her. "How about you give me your best reason why you should? Because I'm still ticked about the food thing."

"You're trying to revive a diminished Flame of Harmony," Nanzanaya said. "I've never gotten the opportunity to do that, myself. But I did live my whole life in the shell left behind by another that disappeared. If this doesn't magically go as smoothly as you hope, my extra perspective could help you make a breakthrough. Besides, I'm here to make a substantially large ask of your nation. You might think me a goof, but I can read the stakes. If I help you here with something that really matters, that will be a big credit to my name."

"What do you mean, a shell left behind by one that disappeared?" Rainbow pressed.

Nanzanaya shook her head. "When these flames give up the ghost, their underground Crystal Palaces become massive aboveground crystal towers. Ask them if you don't believe me." She pointed at Faye and Corsica. "They've seen one appear with their own eyes. There used to be a palace in the Aptann Valley, but it underwent that transformation a thousand years ago. And the resulting structure is where my people have lived ever since."

"Wow," Fluttershy breathed.

"Incidentally, that's your castle, is it not?" Nanzanaya nodded back at Ponyville.

Near the town's edge, on the side close to the forest, was what looked like a treehouse with a giant tree grown around it, only the whole thing was made from crystal, tree and building alike. It glittered teal and periwinkle in the mid-afternoon light, refracting the sun with its myriad branches.

Twilight nodded.

"How much do you know about how and why it's here?" Nanzanaya asked. "From what I've heard since arriving in Equestria, it's a very new fixture. Even your own reign predates it. Clearly, it's not the same thing as the Aptann tower. It's not nearly big enough, for one, and I don't sense anything wrong with the laws of nature in this region on the scale a full collapse would cause. But this forest has always defied your magic, hasn't it? And the entrance to the Crystal Palace presumably connected to that castle is in the middle of it?" She raised an eyebrow.

Twilight swallowed.

"All I'm saying is..." Nanzanaya shrugged. "If you like knowing things, you might have a lot to gain from being friends with me. I don't know this area's history, and can't tell you what the things I've observed mean. So why don't we give cooperation a shot? I promise, as long as Equestria has a chance of being the key to my people's salvation, I am your stoutest ally."

Twilight carefully sized her up. "That's a lot of words that didn't include 'sorry about the room service incident'."

"Is that really what matters more to you?" Nanzanaya looked genuinely confused. "Hospitality sure works funny here. But I'm sorry about your research budget."

"There. Was that so hard?" Twilight raised an eyebrow, then nodded in approval. "Alright. But stick near me at all times. No one runs off to investigate alone, no matter how interesting the Crystal Palace is. That goes for everyone. Got it?"

Everyone nodded. "Wise words," Starlight said.

Moments later, Applejack, Pinkie Pie and Rarity appeared over the hill, and the group was complete. "Let me lead the way in the forest, everyone," Fluttershy announced as they sortied in front of the entrance, reminding Faye of Spike's interrupted warning. "I'm friends with most of the forest's creatures, and know the paths. Our goal is a ravine on the edge of the castle ruins in the center. At the bottom of the ravine, Twilight's tree is in a small grotto. And once we find that, I hope someone else knows what to do."

"Right," Twilight encouraged with a nod. "Move out!"

Traversing the Everfree, Faye could see why it creeped the townsponies out. The canopy was almost impenetrable, making it seem more like a bright night than the middle of the afternoon, green and blue foliage choking the ground and cutting off the sky. But Fluttershy moved through it as if tending a garden, stepping deftly across gnarled roots and fallen branches and ducking under hanging vines, and eventually the sun once again broke through the leaves, the party emerging unaccosted at the edge of a vast, overgrown clearing. On a hill in the distance was a ruined castle, but Faye's focus was tugged downward instead, pulled by a sensation that had been growing all throughout the forest.

It was like the Crystal Empire, a mass of power and emotion waiting far beneath the earth. But unlike there, it felt aware of her presence.

She walked by instinct alone as Fluttershy and Twilight led the group on a steep, narrow path that hugged the cliffside, descending into the ravine. What was this feeling, deep down beneath her? Magic wasn't a feeling, instinct, emotion or ideal, as she had pointed out to Twilight back in the Empire. If this flame was the flame of Magic, what kind of personality would that breed? The Kindness flame had been predictably gentle and kind, but this one...

It wasn't just one thing. An immeasurable longing, a powerful restraint, an eternal sadness. Feelings that pulled at her, yet backed off and left her alone. Emotions complex enough to deny themselves, to sate themselves with existence at the bottom of the world, and yet powerful enough that in the time it took her to blink, she was at the bottom of the canyon. Had she really been herself this whole journey? If she leaned into the feelings in this ground, tried too hard to sense them, they would consume her and she would become them.

The power in this place was dangerous.

"Here we are," Twilight said, and Faye saw the tree. Made of crystals that looked closer to diamonds, it had five major branches sprouting into hundreds of smaller ones, growing into and out of the wall at the back of a shallow cave. Each major branch held a colored gemstone inset into the junction where it split, and the main trunk held a final stone, each one perfectly matching the special talent of one of Twilight and her friends.

Sans Starlight, of course. Starlight wasn't an Element.

Twilight stepped closer, looking down at five golden necklaces and a crown, arranged lovingly together on the ground at the foot of the tree. "...Hasn't changed a bit since the last time I was here."

"Well?" Rainbow asked, floating around. "Where do we go now? There's supposed to be a way further down from here?"

"Give me a minute," Twilight said, staring at the tree. "Starlight, you said there was a way, right?"

While they talked, Faye stepped closer to the tree, seeing her reflection in each and every one of its facets. The gemstones, the Elements of Harmony given physical form... She realized with a tingling feeling, not even sure how she knew for certain, that those were made of the same material as her mask.

Were they... idealized forms or pieces of a person? Somebody else's masks?

"There," Starlight said, stepping back from the tree, horn glowing. Faye pried her attention back to the main trunk, where a door was carving itself into the crystal. "That's our entrance."

"Woah," Rainbow said, landing to inspect the door. "...So is that a whole tunnel? How far down does it go?"

"To the bottom," Starlight said. "Presumably. But this first room is all I've ever seen before. Who's ready to explore their very first Crystal Palace?"

"I am!" Pinkie shivered in excitement.

"I was born ready," Rainbow insisted.

"Can't say I didn't come out here for something else," Applejack volunteered.

"Well, if it's half as dazzling as the exterior then the trip will hardly be in vain," Rarity added. "Though here's hoping for a successful mission as well as the fun of exploration?"

"Mhmm," Fluttershy firmly agreed. "This is right. The flame wants to be here."

"Then let's go in," Twilight said, leading the way as the crystal door finished carving itself and slid open.

The others followed her, first her friends, then Faye and Corsica. Nanzanaya brought up the rear, followed last by Spike and Seigetsu.

The door gently sealed itself again behind them, melding into the crystal until no trace of it remained.

Beneath Dark Waters

The upper streets of the underground city were confusing and mazelike, connecting arbitrary buildings instead of helping pedestrians travel in a desired direction. The lower streets, by comparison, almost made Faye want to dawdle in order to experience more of the place before she got where she was going: the central structure was always cleanly visible in the distance, the roads around it arranged in a radial, snowflake pattern.

And dawdling, Twilight was happy to do.

"Uh, Twilight? You know the flame is supposedly that way, right?" Rainbow asked, pointing toward the central complex as Twilight steered the group down yet another side street, steeply angled and invariably connecting to yet another main thoroughfare.

"Hold on," Twilight chided. "Aren't you interested in the shape of this place?"

"I think you could leave out the last bit and just go with 'aren't you interested,' Twilight," Rarity pointed out.

"Yes, but this road layout," Twilight insisted, stopping the group and turning to face everyone. "It's exactly the same as the Crystal Empire, just blown up to about four times the scale."

Applejack blinked. "Now that you mention it, I suppose I can see the similarities..."

As they talked, another faceless crystal golem walked by. "Nothing but bad news all day long," it lamented. "I wonder if the old days were actually happier, or if it's just nostalgia speaking like everyone says?"

"On your hooves, soldier," another said, radiating shallow encouragement. "You're not going to get anywhere with that kind of defeatist attitude!"

The first one hunched its shoulders, but didn't even turn to look at the second, still walking on its way. "Case in point. See that guy? He thinks everything that happens is a problem for someone to solve. If only these 'problems' could actually be solved by low-effort truisms, maybe that would be a useful philosophy."

The second one tensed up as well. "No need for that, dude. I was just trying to help."

"I'd be happier if I didn't have this argument today," the first said, walking away.

The second one actually stopped and sagged, if only for a moment. "That's what you get for showing kindness to strangers," it lamented, moving on its way as well. "I hate this world."

Once again, it was obvious from everyone's reactions that only Starlight and Twilight had heard the exchange. Starlight looked pensive. Twilight looked disturbed.

"...Twilight?" Applejack asked, noting her friend's expression.

Twilight shook her head. "Something is wrong with this place, but it feels too vague to put my hoof on what. And it's not the faceless thing, it's what ponies choose to talk about. You would never have heard an exchange like that in the streets of Canterlot."

Starlight gave her a look. "Wouldn't you? Not ever?"

Twilight shook her head. "No, you wouldn't. Well, maybe not absolutely never, but when ponies complain, it's usually because something is wrong in their lives. Things like 'my job just cut my hours,' or 'I stayed up all night finishing that assignment and the professor only gave me a C'. Tell me I'm wrong, but those two sounded like they were just sick and tired of everything."

"Mmmmmm..." Pinkie Pie raised a skeptical eyebrow. "I didn't hear the whole shebang between them, but have you really never met someone who's tired of everything before? What about Cranky Doodle Donkey?"

"Or me?" Starlight muttered.

Twilight looked peeved. "Alright, so my point doesn't hold up under pressure, that's not so unusual, blah blah blah. Still, anyone else who heard that, tell me your first reaction was 'this place is normal and healthy and fine'."

Faye looked back to the central building, a twisting flow of emotion pumping sluggishly up from it and through the crystals around her. "I'm not sure those are the words I would use to describe it. But remember that everything out here is coming from in there."

"Right," Twilight said, looking queasy. "But why would my flame be surrounding itself with this?"

Rainbow shrugged. "Well, I'm not the one telling us to slow down the pace."

"Right," Twilight sighed, regaining her composure. "No more dawdling. Let's go."

As the central building grew close and took up more and more of the skyline, the population of golems grew thicker, to the point where all of them were talking past each other and their words became a meaningless storm in Faye's ears. She could, with effort, pick out individual ones to listen to, but their words lacked permanence somehow, and even seconds after she let go of one train of thought, she couldn't remember if it had been meaningfully different than all the others she had heard so far. And it didn't even feel like she had forgotten anything worth remembering.

Fortunately, she had had much of her life to practice tuning out the noise, ignoring other ponies and the rush of her void in her ears alike, and keeping her own thoughts clear and isolated proved to be a challenge she was prepared for. Starlight, too, looked fine, as did everyone who couldn't hear the golems. But Twilight was visibly in distress, her ears constantly flicking and an overwhelmed expression on her face, like she was trying to disengage from the crowd so hard that she might accidentally walk off the edge of the road.

"Twilight?" Fluttershy asked, circling her. "Are you alright?"

It took Twilight a moment to respond. "They're so loud, it's hard to hear myself think!"

"I could try clearing them out," Rainbow offered. "Want me to?"

"N-No," Twilight managed, shaking her head. "I'm fine. As long as there are fewer of them up ahead."

Throughout this, Seigetsu watched impassively, Nanzanaya was holding her tongue, and Corsica looked about the same as she always did. "Perhaps," Seigetsu suggested, "we ought to find someplace to rest?"

"I'm fine," Twilight insisted again, pushing on. "Keep moving."

As she navigated the crowded street, taking care not to bump into any golems, Corsica noticed that the golems were frequently failing to do the same.

Many of them failed to adjust their paths for each other, resulting in glancing collisions at a rate that would have started a brawl even in physically-disinclined Icereach. They weren't making way for her, either, leaving her to nimbly sidestep time and time again.

She couldn't hear their words, but made no effort to goad anyone into translating. Their body language, even without faces, was plain and easy enough for her to read: many of these golems, if not every last one, was like her. They had given everything they had to give in pursuit of some goal or other, worked themselves to the bone, and were deprived of suitable chances to recover, to the extent where tired had become their new normal.

It was just a hunch, of course, but having lived like this for so long, Corsica somehow knew she wasn't mistaken.

"Hey," she whispered to Seigetsu, falling back near the rear of the group.

"What is it?" Seigetsu murmured.

"This is a weird question," Corsica whispered. "But you know how you can counteract my special talent? You can tell when I have a use pending, right?"

Seigetsu nodded. "Yes, I can."

"Is there any other magic like mine going on down here?" Corsica muttered. "Can you see it anywhere else? Especially on those golems."

"...No," Seigetsu said after a while. "This place is steeped in a multitude of powers, but nothing with the same effects as your own. Have you reason to suspect otherwise?"

Corsica shook her head. "Just speculation. Trying to figure out what these are, and why they behave the way that they do."

By some mechanism she didn't understand, she actually had the energy to be curious about this. Maybe it was Twilight's earlier observation, about the golems sounding sick and tired of everything. If that feeling was pervasive here, then Corsica might finally, for once, be on even ground with most of the things around her.

The idea of normalcy was borderline intoxicating.

It was almost tempting to use a wish to get some clue as to how the golems worked, maybe to find a way for her to hear them too, but she didn't dare squander her ground when she was actually ahead. Instead, she matched Faye's step, waiting for her friend to notice her.

As the crowd started to thin with still no reaction, Corsica got tired of waiting. "Hey," she said, nudging Faye's shoulder. "Listening to them is that bad, huh?"

Faye jumped a little. "Not if you tune out everything," she said with a shake of her head. "It feels like the more of them there are, the less they have to say."

Corsica nodded. "Got any idea what determines who can hear them and who can't?"

"None," Faye apologized, still looking closed off. "Or maybe too many to narrow it down. I don't know enough about Starlight or Twilight to tell what's relevant to this that we might have in common."

"Seems like an important thing to figure out," Corsica said. "I know one thing Twilight and Starlight have in common is that they've both used the talent rings in this place. Have you ever done something like that? Maybe in the Ironridge palace?"

Faye shook her head. "No. And it's the kind of thing I'd remember if I did."

"Hmm..." Corsica put her head down and frowned.

The crowd thinned further as they reached the far side, but one more intersection and it returned with a vengeance. This street seemed to be ramping up, a final climb before the road itself entered the central complex, and golems here were more orderly in where they chose to walk, sticking to sides of the street so that the influx and outflow to the complex didn't collide with each other.

"Well?" Rainbow Dash was hovering around Starlight. "What are they talking about now?"

Starlight sighed. "They're all agreeing with each other. Loudly. Mostly about how unreasonable someone else is."

"It's a waste of words!" Twilight complained, exasperated. "Why say it so many times if everyone already knows it? Also, a lot of them already said what I just said, so I'm starting to sound just like them and it's freaking me out."

By now, however, the crowd was dense enough that they had little choice to go along with the flow, and soon they were swept through a massive open archway akin to the ones in the lobby where they had first seen the city. And then they were once again indoors.

This lobby mirrored the other one in opulence and style, as if both had been designed by students from the same school of architecture. Fortunately, it was big enough to dilute the crowd of golems, many of them streaming off to enormous elevators in the wings. A little further in, and the center of the room was filled with mostly-empty benches interspersed between fountains flowing with starry ether.

"Here," Twilight panted. "Here looks good. Maybe now I could use a break."

Corsica watched as all of Twilight's friends took her request for granted, settling in on the benches, and pushed back a small sting of jealousy. None of them had heard the golems. Neither had she, but that was beside the point: Twilight's friends had no baseline to gauge how hard that had been on her. For that matter, walking through an arguing crowd wasn't supposed to be hard or exhausting at all. And still, not one of them questioned her request.

Sure would be nice to have friends as thoughtful as that.

"Hey," Corsica announced, for once not feeling like sitting around and doing nothing. "I'm going to go take a look around this room. Might not be able to hear the golems, but if this is the city's most important building, stands to reason the lobby will have a map. Right?"

Rainbow jumped to her hooves. "Same! Uh, take it easy, Twilight. Anyone else?"

"The city's denizens have shown no signs of hostility," Seigetsu agreed. "But this atrium is quite large. Perhaps we would be best served by splitting up, and meeting here again in a short while."

"Knock yourselves out," Twilight encouraged, looking perfectly content to stay on her crystal bench, hard crystal cushions and all.

Corsica's wandering took her to the perimeter of the atrium, which was shaped like a massive plus. The walls of the entry wing were entirely covered in elevators, and most of the crowds converged around those, so she took her search to the side wings instead, which were much more sparsely populated.

A bank of kiosks lined one wall, reminding her of help desks, except they had no signage or indication of what they were for, and also no golems staffing them. Instead, they each had an empty talent ring.

Curious, Corsica approached them. What would happen if she used one? There didn't seem to be any obvious mechanisms nearby for it to control. For that matter... she cast her gaze out over the nearby golems. None of them had special talents.

That was odd. Why would this city be filled with technology none of its citizens could use? Unless they used it some other way...

Corsica decided to loiter, standing far enough from the kiosks that she wouldn't be conspicuous but close enough that she could easily observe the comings and goings at all of them. And, soon enough, a golem came along.

It stopped at a kiosk, and seemed to consider it for a moment. And then it grew a face.

Corsica barely had time to confirm that she wasn't seeing things before it stuck its head into the recessed ring alcove, touched the ring with its face, and the ring lit up with a nebulous, formless light. When it pulled its head back, it was once again faceless.

A dozen things clicked all at once in Corsica's brain.

That was why the rings were positioned so awkwardly for touching with one's flank: they weren't meant for it in the first place. All the golems were faceless because this technology was ubiquitous in their city, and every single one of them just happened to have their face in a ring somewhere at all times. As she continued to watch, the golem stood at the kiosk for several minutes, and then its face reformed, the light in the ring going out. Almost immediately, its face disappeared again, and it went on its way.

But it hadn't used a second ring... Maybe they could recall rings they had already used before? Send their faces back wherever they had been before they called on them to activate things like the kiosk, or the elevators in the entry tower? Or maybe they could simply hide their faces at will, and didn't like wearing them when they didn't need them to activate a ring. Either way, Corsica felt like she had just made a major breakthrough in how this city worked.

Time to test if it worked the same for her.

Strolling confidently forward, she stepped up to a kiosk, leaned in, and touched the ring with her face. It was much easier to reach than with her flank. But nothing happened.

Next, she used her flank, shifting awkwardly to reach the ring. With a flash of light, a copy of her special talent materialized in the ring, just like it had done for Starlight and Twilight before. But unlike the golems, when she checked herself over, nothing was missing. Her talent was still there.

"Welcome," said a cool voice she couldn't tell if she heard with her ears or her mind. "You have reached Macrothesis automated support. Language translation is now automatic. Please ask your questions."

What were her questions?

"Well..." Corsica tried to get her thoughts together. "I'm a visitor. I haven't been here before. And I don't know much about how to use this thing."

"Acknowledged," the support desk said. "Previous-generation manual input is also supported. For assistance locating friends or relatives in a refugee camp, please hold up. For details concerning today's trial of Inquirarch Vulpecula, please hold forward. To apply for a position with the Hypothetorium, please hold left. For technical support in using one of our products, please hold right. To file a complaint with our equity department, please hold back. For more options, or to quit, please hold down."

Corsica blinked. "I have never used this before, and have no clue what any of that means. Can I talk to someone in person? Using sound? And not whatever this technology is?"

"All in-person customer service representatives are currently busy," the support desk politely told her. "Please rest assured that Macrothesis automated support is made with the latest advancements in equine interaction technology and is more than capable of handling your requests. Please explain what you would like to do."

"What's in the physical center of this building?" Corsica asked. "Down at the bottom? And how do I get there?"

"The Hypothetorium has many facilities that are free and accessible to the public," the support desk said. "All of our important public-facing functions can be learned about through this support terminal. Unfortunately, the location you have specified is not publicly available. Perhaps you are here instead for assistance locating friends or relatives in a refugee camp, or for details concerning today's trial of Inquirarch Vulpecula?"

Corsica frowned at the ring, getting a feeling this wasn't going anywhere. "How do I disconnect from this thing?"

"The Macrothesis third-generation soul interface can be disconnected using the standard mental command," the support desk said. "For backwards-compatibility, manual disconnection is also supported. Gently strike the outside of the ring with a hoof to regain your face and sever the connection."

Corsica reached out a hoof to tap the ring.

"Before you go," the terminal asked, "would you be willing to leave a review about your experience with this Macrothesis automated support terminal?"

Corsica tapped the ring.

With a twinkle, her special talent vanished, and the kiosk's voice vanished. A powerful sense that she had just wasted her time washed over her, even though she had objectively learned a great deal of importance. But this thing, and the way it talked... it reminded her of something an Icereach scientist might make, and she hated it.

"You don't like those either, eh?" said a voice from behind her.

Corsica jumped a little. It was a golem with a face.

"You can actually talk?" Corsica asked it, surprised.

The golem chuckled dryly. "If you need to ask, you must be having a rough time of it. Are you fresh in from one of the highland towns?"

"Something like that," Corsica said. "Let's just say I'm not from around here. How come you can hear me? And I can hear you? Is it because you still have a face?"

The golem nodded. Even though it had a face, the detailing on the crystal was rough enough that it was hard to tell if it was supposed to be a mare, or a stallion with a slight build.

"I've never been a fan of this stuff," the golem said. "No one truly knows what those rings are doing. They give you convenience, sure, but you know the Hypothetorium wouldn't make this stuff as cheap as it is unless they're getting something out of the deal. But you don't need me telling you stuff you already know. I just use it when I have to, since there's no truly avoiding it."

"Or," Corsica suggested, "you could pretend I'm really, really new, and explain the stuff nobody in their right mind wouldn't know about what these rings are?"

The golem laughed and shook its head. "I'm not interested in poking fun at needless complexity. Not today, at least. Most of us highlanders are celebrating the Inquirarch's downfall, but I just... I'd rather have the other guys win than nobody win, you know? Feels like if things keep going along the track they're on, civilization as we know it is toast. We need someone to be a hero, even if it's not the someone we were hoping for. Anyway, I need to get a seat in the gallery before all the good ones fill up. Maybe I'll see you around."

Corsica watched it go, a sense of lingering melancholy in the air. Had she mishandled that? Maybe. Not badly enough to make an enemy, at least. But it felt almost less like she had missed an opportunity, and more like there hadn't been one in the first place.

Except she had still learned a lot. What did the golem mean by highlands? The surface? Somewhere outside the city, definitely. Now that she thought on it, though, it was probably talking about the same Inquirarch as the support kiosk...

Feeling a little like she was walking into a trap she herself had set, Corsica walked back to the kiosks, chose another ring, and tapped it with her flank.

"Welcome," the kiosk said as her special talent once again flashed into existence in the ring. "You have reached Macrothesis automated support. Language translation is now automatic. Please ask your questions."

"Can you tell me about the Inquirarch?" Corsica asked. "Some sort of trial going on today? Who are they, and what did they do?"

"Inquirarch Vulpecula, a high-ranking member of the Hypothetorium and inventor of the soul interface ring, stands accused of embezzling funds from government agencies, as well as disregarding safety regulations regarding live test subjects and data protection regulations governing the retention of unauthorized Macrothesis customer data for use in research. The trial is being conducted in the Oculatorium on the seventeenth floor, and is scheduled to commence in thirty-eight minutes. Public seating is available on a first-come, first-serve basis, and viewing will be broadcast throughout the Daydream Network on public channels across the city. As emotions around the trial may be running high, civility is encouraged and requested of all observers. Would you like to hear this information again?"

"Sounds like fun," Corsica said. "Is he-"

"Acknowledged," the kiosk said. "Inquirarch Vulpecula, a high-ranking member of the Hypothetorium and inventor of the soul-"

Corsica groaned and closed off the connection. "That is not what I meant and you know it. Dumb machine..."

Maybe she should have listened to it again, though. In between all the tech jargon, she felt like it had said some phrase she knew, or had heard before... What was it, though? Something stuck in her memory, but she couldn't place what...

With a sigh, Corsica gave into her curiosity, activated the ring once more, and prepared to listen over and over again until she could figure out what connection she was trying to make.

After innumerable tries, Corsica got it. Somewhere, probably back in Ironridge, Leif had mentioned the Daydream network. A wireless form of mental magic that had something to do with changelings, though she couldn't recall the specifics. But that was enough information to probe deeper.

She made her way back to the benches where Twilight and the others were hanging out, most of the other explorers already back. "Did you find anything?" Rainbow immediately asked. "Because I searched this entire room like three times looking for a map, along with every single room adjacent to it, and got nothing."

"Maybe a little." Corsica looked at the group, but mostly Faye. "Does the phrase 'Daydream Network' mean anything to you?"

Starlight looked confused. "Yes, why...?"

Faye's eyes lit up in recognition, but she didn't speak.

Corsica raised an eyebrow at Starlight. "Any chance it's a form of wireless mental magic that all these golems are using to speak with each other?"

Twilight frowned. "Well, I considered the possibility, but-"

"It shouldn't be," Starlight said. "The Daydream Network was invented by Princess Luna a thousand years ago, around the same time the castle on top of this Crystal Palace was destroyed. The castle must have been built much earlier, and the Princesses likely built it to claim this land because they had figured out what was down here, and wanted to claim this city, too. Which would mean the city predates the Daydream Network by a substantial amount of time."

Twilight gave her a look. "Unless Princess Luna 'invented' it by copying it from down here."

"Yeah," Starlight said. "If she copied it from anywhere, I would have expected it to be Indus. But maybe it was here, all along."

"Still think this place isn't actually Indus itself?" Rainbow asked.

"Fairly positive, and my reasoning hasn't changed," Starlight said. "Anyway, if it is the Daydream Network, that goes a long way to explaining why those of us who can use it are who we are."

Twilight gave her a look. "Well, Halcyon I understand, since she's a batpony, and you I get too, but why me?"

"Presumably because you're an alicorn," Starlight said. "Luna wouldn't have taken over a system she couldn't intrinsically interact with, herself."

"A fair point, darling," Rarity cut in. "Although, a question from the peanut gallery... You're saying Princess Luna found rather than created this magic, and yet it was magic uniquely suited for her as an alicorn to use all along? Judging by our own experiences, there are eleven of us in this party and three of us randomly happen to be able to use it. I suppose it could be a coincidence that it was a match for her, but the odds wouldn't have been in her favor."

Twilight considered this, too. "Coincidences do happen, but you're right that her stumbling upon a magic system that was perfectly set up for her to use would be unlikely. I think we need to ask her ourselves before we can draw too many conclusions, though. We're operating almost entirely on assumptions, here." She turned to Corsica. "How did your investigation fare, anyway? You must have come up with something to float that idea."

"And for that matter," Applejack cut in, "anything the rest of us should know about what a Daydream Network is?"

"Like Corsica said," Starlight explained. "It's a form of wireless mental magic. Originally, batponies in the north used it to communicate with their goddess, the Night Mother. And, it's also what Chrysalis uses to control her changeling drones."

"So I can hear them because I'm a batpony," Faye said. "But I haven't seen them act like they can hear me."

"Talking along it and listening to it are different," Starlight said. "The latter seems mostly automatic. The former, I haven't done enough to know for sure how it works."

"I might be missing something," Fluttershy said. "But Starlight, you're not a changeling, right? Or a batpony, or an alicorn. So why can you use it?"

"That's..." Starlight hesitated. "A long story."

Twilight nodded sagely.

"Yeah..." Rainbow rubbed the back of her neck. "One that might be a little touchy to tell around strangers? Starlight's call, of course."

"I wouldn't want to put you out of your comfort zone," Seigetsu said, speaking up. "But if you have knowledge or abilities that might avail us in this place, I hope I can trust you to use them where needed."

Starlight shook her head. "We'll cross those bridges when we come to them. Anyway, what Twilight said. How did you learn this?" She looked straight at Corsica.

Corsica pointed over her shoulder. "Information kiosk. Not very intelligent, but I could actually hear it once I put my butt in the ring."

"There's a help desk we can actually interact with?" Twilight instantly brightened. "Well, why didn't you say so? I know all about navigating bureaucracy. Where is it!?"

"Before we waste any more time with it," Corsica interrupted, "it mentioned something about an important official being put on trial for corruption today. It sounded like they were the researcher who created those rings in the first place. Dunno if everyone will be able to listen, or if legalese will be easier for you to parse than whatever the crowds are saying, but we could learn something interesting."

"A public figure on trial for corruption, huh?" Applejack stood up. "Wonder if that's got anything to do with the funk these golems are supposedly in. Can't be much fun having someone you look up to turning out to be a cad."

"Also," Corsica added, "it made it sound like parts of this building, including where the harmonic flame might be are off-limits to the public. If a high-ranking official is on trial, there might be other important golems there too. This might be a good place to scope out who has the knowledge and authority to get us where we're going."

Rainbow nodded. "Yeah! Like, suppose this guy was innocent and getting framed by someone, and we bail him out, and then he owes us one..."

Starlight hesitated. "...I wouldn't count on that. If this place is a projection controlled by the flame, it likely exists in a static state without changes to the status quo. Harmonic flames aren't known for frequently changing the emotions they're made of, after all. If someone important is on trial, I wouldn't be surprised if they've been on trial since this place was created, and will stay there as long as it exists."

"Ugh." Rarity shivered. "Imagine reliving a day like that over and over again for the rest of your life."

Twilight, however, looked deep in thought. "Starlight? Didn't you tell us about once visiting a place where ponies were locked inside memories of the most important days of their lives, reliving them over and over?"

Starlight shook her head. "That has hopefully nothing to do with what's going on here. But if it does, I'm going to have a lot of explaining to do, here."

"Good," Applejack said. "Because I'm getting tired of having no clue what the rest of y'all are talking about."

Rainbow smirked at her. "Should have spent a week without sleep listening to Starlight's story with me and Twilight, then."

Pinkie Pie bounced between them. "So, where is this trial thingamabob?"

"Seventeenth floor," Corsica said. "Someplace called the Oculatorium. Probably got ten to fifteen minutes to get there. Ready to go fast?"

Twilight nodded firmly. "Let's go see what this is all about."

Far From Grace

As she elbowed between golems, pushing through a corridor that had standing room only, Faye felt grateful for a great number of things. Chief among them was her ability to tune out noise: when the golems were on their own, they spoke in well-defined words, but with this many of them, their words tumbled together and lost coherence, becoming a sea of pure emotion instead. And it was a stormy sea.

Indignation and frustration crashed into apathy and despair, which in turn warred against righteous fervor and vindictive glee, or else embarrassment and shame. But if the emotions battering her defenses were a sea, then the noise from the golems was merely surface turbulence. Beneath it, the heart of the city remained, steady and unchanging: duty, solemnity and grief, a powerful pull that felt like it could yank her straight down through the floor, and an equally powerful push that gave her ground to stand on.

She was also grateful that pushing the golems aside to clear herself a path didn't trigger her usual reaction to touching ponies. Whatever they represented, they felt just like plain old crystal to her. Faye was so used to feeling otherwise that the lack of sensation was almost endearing. It reminded her of why she treated machines like friends... and made her suspicious that these golems were some sort of machines, too.

But more than anything else, she was grateful that she wasn't Twilight.

Twilight looked haunted as she flew above the crowd, her pupils reduced to pinpricks. Starlight had a steady frown on her face, but was probably at least as good at tuning out the golems' noise as Faye was. Not so for Twilight.

"Are you still with us, darling?" Rarity asked, her and the rest of Twilight's friends visibly unsure what to do about this, all the more so because they had no idea what she was actually experiencing. Were they aware of how little there actually was that could be done? The problem was these golems, and short of forcibly silencing each and every one of them...

But the Daydream Network was supposedly how Chrysalis controlled her changeling hive, right? And Faye was a changeling queen. Theoretically, taking control of these communications and forcing the golems to be quiet - or at least blocking them from reaching Twilight - should be within Faye's abilities.

Theoretically. In practice, armoring herself against the warring emotions felt like a nice and safe thing to do, and she didn't think she had the strength to oppose or control this sea all by herself.

"Starlight?" she asked, making her way closer to the pony who seemed to know the most about this.

Starlight glanced at her with the expression of someone who was wearing noise-canceling earmuffs, but was paying attention anyway.

Faye took a breath. How to phrase this in a way that didn't make it too obvious what she was, and what she wanted to do...? "You said the Daydream Network is what Chrysalis uses to control changelings, right? If it's this loud and busy, how did she get strong enough to control it all by herself? It feels like all I can do just to keep my own head, here."

Starlight shook her head. "If you feel like you're keeping your head in the middle of this, you're doing far better than most could hope to. But you're thinking about it backwards. Chrysalis was a harshly tempered soul, but not in a way that could overcome a chorus like this. Rather, she became a chorus like this, took it inside her and gave it a body. Actually, it was forcibly put inside her, but that's a longer story... But listening to these golems is the closest experience to being around Chrysalis you will hopefully ever have."

Faye shuddered and let Starlight take the lead again. How was she supposed to think about herself and her own powers and potential when she kept learning things like this?

She needed Halcyon back. Her present sojourn taking the lead was going better than she possibly could have hoped, but Halcyon was the part of her that had any drive to come to terms with her powers and use them to make a positive difference in the world. But the more she learned, the more it sounded like a changeling queen's power wasn't a strength, but a weakness: the potential to become a vessel for a chorus like this, to lose herself and give this angry, chaotic crowd a body with which it could force its combined strength on the world.

Facing that reality and not having an immediate panic attack was only a minor step. The true challenge was figuring out how she could possibly call upon a power like that and then still retain any agency to ensure it got used for good in the world.

The hallway around the Oculatorium was long and curved, making a circuit around the room with periodic entrances opening out to staircases that provided access to stadium-like seating. It was completely full.

Starlight lit her horn, picked up a dozen golems in her telekinesis, and levitated them halfway across the room, freeing up seats for Faye and everyone else.

"Did you really just do that?" Rainbow asked, agape.

"Better take them before more golems do," Starlight said. "They'll probably get over it. And if they don't, I'll figure something out."

As Faye slipped into an uncomfortable, crystal-cushioned chair that would have been plush and opulent made out of a real material, she felt some ripples in the sea of emotions as the golems realized and reacted to what Starlight had done. She found that she could actually pick out the ones who had been moved, incredulous and offended but also enjoying the attention as other golems talked about how wild it was that some random ponies with faces would do such a thing, and others speculated on how they had made anyone fly through the air in the first place. An argument seemed to be brewing over whether or not it was new technology, with some golems certain it was, and others claiming they worked in the industry and had never heard of such a thing.

Plenty of them agreed that stealing the seats had been incredibly rude, and plenty of them seemed to want to do something about it... but not the ones who had been actually moved. And despite all the talk, none of the faceless golems near the stolen seats showed any indication with their body language they were aware this had just happened so close nearby. None of them made any physical moves to evict her, either.

These golems were mystifying.

"They don't know what telekinesis is," Starlight remarked as everyone finished seating themselves. "And they sound as if they're not used to flying regularly, either. These might not just all look like earth ponies, but all have originally been earth ponies, too."

"Well, Ponyville is a majority earth pony town," Applejack said. "Course, we were only founded by settlers in search of farmland within living memory, so there's probably no connection. Strange, though."

Down on the floor, a circular panel of booths surrounded a platform connected to a door by a single walkway, with some seating that was separated from the gallery by a recessed wall. Several golems had begun congregating there, ostensibly important but not visually distinct in any other way from the others. Faye tried to listen to see if they were participating in the mental debate, but if they were, she couldn't pick them out.

And then, suddenly, one of them tapped a hoof on a desk, and a louder voice on the network rose above the sea, clear and coherent. "Court Administrator Barrows, calling this trial to order."

The sea of emotion suddenly calmed and tensed simultaneously, arguments halting as every side listened to hear whether something would be said that furthered their own cause. It was hardly quiet, though, a wave of speculation still ongoing in the background. And, beneath it, the city's heart was as strong and steady as ever.

"First, will the prosecution announce their presence?" Barrows requested. His voice sounded generic, but some part of Faye's brain automatically confirmed that it was him, with all the certainty of a sixth sense.

A group of three golems entered from the bottom door. "Inquirarch Bootes," one declared, "Head of the Committee for Accountability and Oversight of the Hypothetorium."

"Mercat," another announced. "Lead civilian prosecutor as assigned by the Macrothesis Guild of Law."

"Inquirarch Indus," the third said, sounding less than excited to be here. "Steward of the Afterlife."

Twilight sat bolt upright. "Did he just call himself Indus?"

"What!?" Rainbow immediately jumped on her. "I told you! What did he say? Gah, why can't I listen too?"

"Maybe we can," Corsica said, staring at the armrest between her seat and Faye's. "Look at this."

Wedged into the crack between the chairs, underneath the armrest, was a crystal ring. There was one between every chair.

"That's, uh..." Rainbow scrutinized hers. "Not in a very accessible position. Like, at all."

Twilight fiddled with hers. "It looks like it's supposed to be removable, but because it's all made of crystal, it's stuck in place..."

"These let me talk with the terminal in the lobby, though," Corsica pointed out. "They might let us all listen in on what the important ones are saying now, too. I can't think of why else they'd be here."

"But how do we get them?" Fluttershy asked.

"Stand up," Starlight instructed. "Don't put weight on your chairs, just for a moment..."

Most everyone gave her a confused look, but obeyed. Starlight lit her horn, and after a moment of being surrounded by her aura, the chairs melded down into the floor, leaving the rings easily accessible.

Applejack gave her a look. "Do you just have a spell for everything, or something?"

"Well, that's how being an accomplished mage works-" Twilight started to say.

"No," Starlight said. "I just have a working relationship with Crystal Palaces. Now hurry up. This one is more interested than usual in retaining its original form."

Corsica tapped her flank on the ring next to Faye's chair, since Faye herself probably didn't need it. Immediately, a voice turned on in her head.

"-of disregarding safety regulations concerning live test subjects," someone was saying, sounding as if they were speaking directly into her ear at a modest volume.

"Woah," Rainbow said once hers was connected. "Okay, can we make this rewind, or something? I want to hear what they said from the start."

"No," Starlight grunted. "If you want to get the most out of this, then listen first and speculate later."

"Next, introducing the defense," another voice said.

A lone golem appeared in the doorway. Unlike everyone else in the crowd, he had a face.

"...Inquirarch Vulpecula appears to be wearing his face," a golem said. "Inquirarch, you are aware that we are broadcasting live, and no one can presently hear you?"

"He can't hear you when you say that," another said. "One moment..."

One of the golems in the center suddenly grew a face. "Inquirarch Vulpecula!" it called, using audible words. "Your face is on!"

"Yes, I'm aware of that," Vulpecula replied, also aloud. "I assumed it would be a courtesy."

"Inquirarch Vulpecula and Court Administrator Barrows are exchanging words in real space," a golem said through the ring. "Please hold tight while we get everyone connected again..."

"...You're aware of it?" Barrows asked, confused. "Inquirarch, no one can hear you like this. Protocol dictates trials be held through the Daydream Network in the name of transparency and public accountability. Ponies from all over Macrothesis are tuning into this from their homes-"

"And who created the Daydream Network?" Vulpecula interrupted. "I did. Who presides over it, administers it, and filled it with countless backdoors to ensure it would always be theirs to control? I understand, Administrator, that you have some concerns about my conduct while in office. And it is the right of the people to choose their leaders and then hold their leaders accountable. But by trying me in my own house, where your words themselves are reliant on me to reach their destinations, you would make a mockery of justice. We shall do this fairly, as it was done in the days of eld. For if you cannot even indict me without the power I have given you, what hope do you have of survival after I am gone?"

He tapped a hoof on the floor, and a shockwave rippled through the air, lightly brushing Corsica's mane and extinguishing her talent in the ring like a candle. Twilight, Starlight and Faye looked hit harder, and over the span of about a second every single golem in the room grew a face.

A panicked and very audible muttering immediately sprung up.

"Order! Order!" Administrator Barrows shouted, his voice sounding as if it hadn't been used in weeks as he banged on his desk with a hoof. "Order, I say!"

"Inquirarch, are you aware of what you are doing?" said another of the prosecutors in a dangerous voice. "This is an unprecedented breach of protocol that will all but seal your judgement!"

"I have been aware since before I took my first step along this path," Vulpecula said, his voice possessing a reverberating quality that rose above all the rest. "More aware than even you are now, Bootes. The question is, are the people aware of everything they would have to lose by rejecting me? Can you take my gifts for granted and then turn your backs on their creator? Can you survive without me in this dying world, forsaken as it has been by the gods? Who among you could take my place? The Hypothetorium has many geniuses of a caliber to rival my own, but can any of them boast of being free from sin? You decry my excesses and call me here to judge whether I am guilty, but your eyes are clouded. Of course I am guilty. Who among you wouldn't take what they are owed, sacrifice the weak so that the strong may live, and ruthlessly advance their own vision given the power? The question you must answer is whether my gifts are worth the trade."

"Inquirarch!" Barrows bellowed. "Silence! You will not make a mockery of my courtroom!"

"I have said my piece," Vulpecula said, still carrying over Barrows even as he spoke calmly. "Now pass your judgement, that I might return to my research quickly, or else leave you to perish for want of a savior."

Pandemonium reigned in the gallery, golems with faces milling about in a panic.

"This is madness," Twilight said, her mane frazzled. "At least they're not in my head anymore, which is fantastic, but this is so chaotic even Discord would be hard-pressed to keep up! Why is something like this in a Tree of Harmony? Especially my Tree of Harmony?"

"Because," said a voice as weathered as time itself, "our Element is not like the others."

Corsica blinked. Standing next to them was a hulking figure, completely covered in a hooded robe made from brown sackcloth. Inside the hood was only darkness.

"What-!?" Twilight jumped back a little.

"Come," the figure said. "I will show you."

Corsica felt compelled to blink again, and when she opened her eyes, it was gone.

"What was that?" Applejack demanded. "Come where?"

"I felt a power not unlike that of a dragon," Seigetsu warned. "Whatever it was and wherever we go, proceed with care."

"Starlight? Have you ever seen anything like that before?" Rarity quizzed, nervous.

"Hard to say." Starlight shrugged. "It could have looked like anything underneath that giant robe."

Turning to see the giant, however, had brought something more pressing to Corsica's attention.

"Look." Corsica pointed to the way everyone had entered - all the doors leading to the outer corridor were now closed, ornate crystal blocking the way. The only visible exit from the room was down in the middle, where the Inquirarchs and court team had entered through. "If we're supposed to be going somewhere, there's only one way to go."

"You think we should just follow it?" Rainbow asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes," Twilight insisted. "I need to understand what's going on here."

Getting down to the bottom didn't present too much of a challenge, since Faye was physically inclined and most everyone with her either could say the same, fly, or both. The administrators had all left, ostensibly declaring a mistrial and resolving to reconvene at a later date with additional charges in place for contempt of court, but Vulpecula was still there, standing and watching the gallery. No other golems had yet thought to approach him.

His crystalline face followed the group, but he seemed to be waiting for something.

Nanzanaya glanced at Seigetsu. "May I take point for this one?"

"Do as you wish," Seigetsu said, folding her arms.

"I did not devote my life's work to breaking down the barriers between ponies so they would be hesitant to approach each other," Vulpecula said, watching her. "And yet despite the ease with which my technology lets them do it, it is almost as if they have forgotten how. But you... Ah. You are different."

"Right on the money," Nanazanaya said. "And you're someone who doesn't let a little hubris stop them from trying to serve their home."

"You will find many targets in this world more susceptible to flattery than I," Vulpecula warned, turning to leave. "I take what I want by force, and create it when it does not exist. The whims of others, I found too fickle to rely on to meet my needs. Come."

"Does the fact that you're currently on trial mean nothing to you?" Twilight asked. "You're just going to nonchalantly chat up strangers about flattery?"

Vulpecula shrugged. "You did take the initiative to come down here. But I digress. My duty is to save this dying world, as is the duty of the Hypothetorium as a whole. I cannot allow trifling matters such as the manner in which the people desire salvation to interfere, and neither must my colleagues. That they do only indicates how much more work falls to my shoulders."

He passed through the door, into an ordinary hallway with a low ceiling. "Got any tips and tricks to pass along?" Nanzanaya asked. "Hypothetically, you know. Supposing a girl was looking for her own way to protect her home at all costs."

"That depends," Vulpecula said. "Do you consider your home to be worth saving?"

Nanzanaya frowned. "Of course I do. What kind of question is that?"

"This world faces threats beyond measure," Vulpecula said. "Desertification of the highlands draws more refugees by the hour. As the population rises and trade dries up, commodities that were once plentiful become scarce. Construction on Hypertheory, our sister city, proceeds at a blinding pace, but even if all the ingenuity of ponykind can outrun the physical threats to our world, what about the threats we pose to ourselves? The fabric of our society is fraying faster with each generation. Only a ruthlessness beyond measure can provide us with the power to survive, but will it leave us worthy of it? I have little confidence that someone like me is worthy to live in the utopia I can build through the power of science. But I know precious few who are different. Tell me, if you consider your home worth saving, does that extend to your people, as well? Do they deserve a world not faced with the threat of annihilation?"

"Of course we do! Everyone does!" Twilight burst out. "Is that even in doubt here? Is that why everyone in this city acts like they're in such a malaise?"

"...Yes," Vulpecula said, still walking. "There are many who question our right to exist. Few who would willingly surrender it, but many who struggle to take up arms in its defense. I am glad to hear your world is different."

Twilight blinked. "Our... world...?"

"In many of my laboratories," Vulpecula explained, "researchers labor tirelessly to breach the boundary between the worlds of the mind and of the body, in search of a means of salvation. Long has it been known that emotions, drawn into the physical realm, are most naturally embodied in the form of crystals. Memories have proven exponentially more difficult to work with, as they are the providence of a higher order of mind. However, under specific circumstances, we have been able to change the forms and compositions of emotional crystals based on the emotions elicited by recorded memories. It is theorized that a sufficient quantity of crystals, backed by significantly strong emotion and a sufficiently amplified and isolated memory, could create a complete and interactive simulation of that memory, playing out in the physical world for all to observe and experience."

Everyone was quiet.

"I follow the research of my subordinates keenly," Vulpecula continued, walking along and not watching the party. "Closely enough that I should like to think, were I to exist as a projection in such a simulation, I would be able to tell. Of course, to conclusively prove myself to hold such a state of existence would require more agency than such a projected memory would possess. But now you come, ponies with the strangest ideas about the world you live in. You don't stink of loneliness or despair, and even take it for granted that your fellows are worth protecting at all costs. If I'm wrong, of course, and this is yet reality, far be it from me to care what you think of me for proposing such. But still, I cannot help but wonder."

Rainbow Dash shrugged. "Yeah, you pretty much hit the nail on the head. Must be disturbing, being aware of the fact that you're not real."

"Oh, I won't be aware of it for long," Vulpecula said. "And it isn't much different from what this world is always like, these days. But if our efforts to save our people somehow did meet with success... then I am glad."

Before anyone could speak, he was gone.

Faye looked around sharply. Behind the group stood the hooded giant.

"You!" Twilight jumped.

"After a series of mistrials, Inquirarch Vulpecula was convicted and removed from office by a vote of the public," the giant said. "His arrogance proved too reminiscent of the gods for the people to stomach, even though they knew that without his mind, they would lose a great tool in their fight for survival. Some believed that it was imperative that life endure at any cost, no matter what they would have to suffer themselves to become. Others believed that the end of the world and the disappearance of the gods was a trial, one in which it was our duty to find the right path forward... or else not live on at all."

Once again, the giant was gone.

"Twilight?" Rarity bit her lip. "This place is giving me the heebie-jeebies."

"This is kind of metal," Rainbow said. "Except that it was probably also real."

Clacking hoofsteps announced the approach of more golems. It was Court Administrator Barrows, Prosecutor Mercat, and Inquirarchs Bootes and Indus. All four of them still had faces, and were talking out loud, walking with purposeful strides that suggested they were still going to ignore everyone they came across, even though they could actually see and hear them now.

"...Never in all my days," Barrows was fuming. "What is this world coming to!? Of course he made the accursed Daydream Network, that doesn't give him the right to sabotage-"

Mercat shook his head. "It was less rowdy than the Corndol trial two months ago. This is just the new normal now. The only way to get a lid on it is to be more forceful and remind defendants why rules are rules! And prosecutors, as well. The amount of frivolous suits that come into my office looking for someone to help press them..."

"I could care less about the procedural issues," Indus grunted. "The only thing that matters is that these spliced souls from his experiments can't properly move on. If their host body dies, they stick around like ghosts and my powers become useless on them."

"He's done a lot more than just that," Bootes growled. "The Hypothetorium is the best and only hope of equinity, and we need the public's support. There's a loud enough faction already accusing us of trying to usurp the role of the gods in society, and seeing that stallion up at the stand confirming what they're thinking is only adding fuel to the flames."

"Better to all perish as equines than be stuck in purgatory for eternity," Indus said. "Unless you would prefer a future where we live endless lives as intangible ghosts on a hunk of desiccated rock."

"What I would prefer," Bootes sharply insisted, "is a future where we rejuvenate our dying world and society both! And Vulpecula is prioritizing only the first at the expense of the second!"

"I doubt he'd tell you that," Barrows scoffed. "He'd probably tell you all this soul manipulation research is supposed to 'metaphysically change us' and 'make us nicer people'. As if someone like him has a right to talk about what a model citizen looks like..."

"Who does, though?" Mercat asked. "Genuine question. Everyone these days can tell you what's wrong with each other, but no one has a compelling vision for what we should be doing. Only what we shouldn't. Except for a few nutjobs like Corndol, but they get shouted down by anyone with a sane head on their shoulders."

Barrows shook his head. "A job for the philosophers, not the courts. And you know how much authority that has around here."

"More than you would think," Indus said. "Recall that there was enough clout during this very facility's construction to build it safely over top of that old church, rather than bulldoze it like most of the Hypothetorium wanted. Few will answer honestly when asked for their thoughts on the old systems of authority, but I believe they command more respect than the polls still show."

Bootes shook his head in disgrace. "Construction money that could have gone towards Hypertheory, or research budgets, or supporting the evacuations and refugees, or even the Tower of Babil... Do you know how many Inquirarchs in the Office of Architecture are still sore about needing to build around that ramshackle thing?"

"Now you sound like Vulpecula," Barrows accused, as the group moved on around a corner. "He's the one who always..."

A crystal wall rose up behind them to block off the passage, and another one lowered, revealing a staircase down. At its top was the hooded giant.

"Why are you showing us this?" Twilight whispered. "Is this really what the world once looked like? There's no doubt about it: this is Indus. A memory of it. The world that came before ours."

The giant regarded everyone, nothing but blackness under its hood. "After Vulpecula's fall, people who had already been consumed with the question of equinity's worthiness to exist began actively seeking solutions. Signs of decay were all around us. The Hypothetorium took increasingly draconian measures to control the land, using their power and technology to construct cities with nigh-infinite housing, manipulated plants to create industrial quantities of food in exchange for little space and water, ensured that Macrothesis and its surrounding valley could provide for the entire population of the planet. But no amount of technology could erase the despair of the refugees, having lost their ancestral homes amid a shrinking world, and all the distractions we made to take away the pain only allowed us to grow further apart."

It turned down the staircase. "Families disintegrated. Siblings warred over ideology, marriages split apart, and role models were in precious short supply. Eventually, the populace turned on science itself and began to question its methodologies and practitioners, even as they lived only by the grace of its bounties. The Hypothetorium chose to maintain control by force, abandoning its claim to moral superiority, re-instating Inquirarch Vulpecula and pursuing a strategy shaped by survival and nothing else. And in response, the people cried out for deliverance from any who would listen: the Hypothetorium, oblivion, or even the gods themselves."

Once again, it vanished from sight. Faye's heart was pounding, and she broke into a run in pursuit.

Stairs flew by beneath her as she somehow kept her balance, no end to the staircase in sight. This wasn't right. The world should never, ever have been allowed to reach such a state. Why couldn't anyone have done anything? Why didn't anyone stop it, long before it got that bad? The war in the north was a brewing cataclysm, and yet it was still a battle with a clear evil to be resisted. But the hooded giant's words poured into her like a bucket of resignation: everyone had seen the end coming, and been too scared or mistrusting or unable to work together to even agree on what a better future would look like.

She knew how that was. Fear of herself was always her greatest obstacle, mistrust of how she would use her powers and responsibilities. Halcyon had been a solution to that, a version of her designed to look to a higher power for guidance, and not be the arbiter of her own fate. That was why Halcyon believed in miracles and saw them in everything, why she loyally sought out the light spirit and searched for a purpose that was bigger than herself. And Faye wouldn't have been able to make her that way if, on some level, she didn't want an infallible god to put her faith in, as well.

But such a thing couldn't exist. If it had, it would never have allowed the world to reach such a state.

She stopped to catch her breath, and allow the others to catch up. And as she did so, the staircase around her began to shimmer and change.

The crystals grew from an opaque blue to a violent orange as tendrils of emotion wrapped around her, reaching up from the floor and prying her eyelids open. The walls reached the consistency of glass, and then weren't there at all, and she was standing on the roof of the tallest building beneath a burning sky, a second sun hanging low in the sky.

It shuddered with radiance, a golden equinoid emitting light enough to blot out the sun, surrounded by a halo of energy, runic wings stretching five times the length of its body out to either side. Faster than Faye's eyes could track, the silhouette of a dragon appeared above it, its conical tail burning with a rainbow of light. A laser dropped down, and reality contorted to contain it, rings of rainbow energy encircling it on its journey to the ground.

The golden equinoid teleported out of the way, and a sphere of power appeared on the ground where the rainbow had struck, lingering for several seconds before vanishing, a perfect crater carved away in its wake.

As the rainbow dragon wheeled, looking for its opponent, the golden figure returned, its wings changing form and brimming with energy. Golden swords emerged from the runes, shooting and twisting through the air, leaving lingering trails of light.

The dragon charged, wheeling between several missiles and blocking another with a massive shield, barreling into the equinoid and grappling it, the two tumbling toward a second city on the horizon. The sword missiles arced around in search of their target, but many missed, slamming into the skyscrapers instead in plumes of flame.

A mind-rending screech rang out, and the equinoid dodged another rainbow laser, this one shooting out horizontally across Faye's field of view. Her head swung to follow it, and it impacted a distant mountain wall that extended as far as she could see - a ring, or something akin to one, around the valley where the beings were fighting.

Faye took several steps forward on shaky legs. The city across from her was burning, and the one down below her was burning, too.

The gods wheeled through the sky, trading missiles and lasers, the light from one impact scarcely having vanished before the next one struck ground. Sword missiles streaked through the air, leaving crazed patterns of light, like a camera trained on the stars set to too high of exposure and then spun at low velocity. An unbearable heat penetrated her coat like a chorus of screams, and a laser soared so close overhead that she could see the lightning coursing along the beam's length, caused by the plasmafication of the air.

Faye turned, stumbling, looking for the stairs, for how to go back. Starlight and Twilight were there too, both just as transfixed as she was. And so was the hooded giant.

The giant regarded everyone sadly as the air began to shimmer, the staircase fading back into existence. "The gods returned."

"Twilight! Are you alright?" Applejack was shaking her.

"What happened?" Rainbow demanded. "Starlight? Uhh..."

Faye tried to stop herself from shaking as the palace released its grip on her, reality fully reasserting itself. The hooded giant was already gone. "Who else saw that?" she asked, looking to Twilight's friends, then Corsica. "Did any of you see that?"

"I saw it," Starlight whispered, haunted.

"What did you see?" Fluttershy asked. "It looked like there was some kind of enchantment on the walls, but I didn't see anything beyond that."

"That was Aegis," Twilight said, ears flicking rapidly in agitation. "And... and... must have been the other titan, as well."

"This," Starlight said, "must have been how Princess Celestia found out about the end of the previous world. And why she and Luna are so scared of Aegis falling into the wrong hooves."

"Yeah," Rainbow insisted, "but what did you see?"

As Starlight and Twilight slowly explained, finally sitting down to get everyone on the same page, Faye was left to her own thoughts... except for Corsica. "You alright?" Corsica asked.

"Physically," Faye said. "I..."

Corsica waited for her to get her words together.

"Ludwig told me," she eventually whispered. "And the Composer, too. Kitty. They told me the windigoes' goal, the reason they were trying to break out, was to kill God, who they called their father. I wonder if that's who I just saw."

Corsica kept listening.

"I saw them fighting," Faye said. "Two gods. One was Aegis, and one I didn't recognize, but they looked equine. I don't know why they were fighting, or who started it, or who won. But if they were the gods of the previous world... Maybe if one of them left Ludwig and the windigoes behind, to live on in this world..."

"You saying you think there's a chance the windigoes might actually be on the right side of history?" Corsica asked. "Don't forget who they are and what they're like."

Faye shook her head. "No. I'd never side with the windigoes. Just... if it's at all possible that they're fighting someone who could do something like what I just saw, maybe I don't want either side to win."

Corsica nodded.

"Hopefully I'm wrong, though," Faye said, straightening up and testing her legs. "Hopefully that wasn't actually the windigoes' father. Because they seem to think their dad still exists and is in need of fighting, and we know Aegis still exists. I'd... rather not imagine seeing what I just saw there, except for real."

"Everyone?" Fluttershy asked, standing at the front of the group. "I don't want to push anyone who's not ready to move on. But I think this staircase points exactly in the direction we want to go."

Faye looked up, reorienting herself. Fluttershy was right. The core of the city was straight ahead.

"Right," Starlight said, her normally solid facade heavily shaken. "Let's keep going and get this over with."

There would be time enough to think later. Plenty of time to unpack her feelings on the windigoes, and how a fear just like her own had destroyed this society, and how the light spirit had been golden, too. But for now, Faye picked up her hooves and kept marching on.

Descent to Madness

A pall hung over the group as they continued descending, Faye's ears folding in an attempt to block out the memories of fiery destruction. Those would be returning to haunt her dreams, she knew. But it was no use.

How could she reconcile this with the way she had made Halcyon? The previous world had done a fantastic job destroying itself on its own, without the help of its gods, and then they returned to seal the deal. There was no way to interpret the fight she had seen benevolently. But Halcyon...

In the days before she was taken, Halcyon had been increasingly unstable as the pillars of her identity were chipped away. She fixated on the goal of finding Starlight, ignored her friends and tried to run from her troubles with Corsica. Part of this, surely, was because chasing the light spirit had been a foundational goal Halcyon was made around, and fate itself had conspired to give her more important things to do. But the most generous way to interpret the vision she had been given was that gods were unreliable.

Faye didn't want to think about the conclusions a cynic could draw.

Either way, she resolved to herself not to share the memories of her time in this place with Halcyon, whenever they were reunited. Halcyon wouldn't be thrilled if she ever found out, especially after they had been making an effort to be closer together, but this was important. Maybe once Halcyon was more stable, she could better handle it.

"Not that I wanna jinx anything," Rainbow Dash said, hovering alongside the group, "but the mood in here is kinda... not what I was expecting from a Crystal Palace expedition."

"You think!?" Twilight burst out.

Rainbow backed off, holding up her forehooves. "Woah-"

Twilight finished. "This is all wrong. There is nothing harmonic about a place where golems intrude on your private thoughts, arrogant ponies ruin science's good name, we get haunted by mysterious cloaked giants, and random staircases show apocalyptic visions of the end of the world! A place like this existing somewhere in the world, sure, that's one thing. But not in the middle of a sanctum for harmony! If the Princesses knew about this and built their castle here, why didn't they do anything about it? Why doesn't my element's flame do anything about it? What can I do about it? And why here, of all places? There's too many questions, and none of this makes sense!"

"Well, there's a whole barn full of context I'm sure I'm missing," Applejack announced. "But at least one part of this makes a whole lot of sense to me. I bet you anything the state of this place is related to those black vines what invaded Ponyville when we had to give back the Elements to the tree."

"Hypothetically speaking," Rarity added, "suppose you tried thinking at this from a different angle. If someone had a supreme amount of ancient chaos they needed to seal away, what better place to keep it neutralized than one of the most harmonic locations in the world? Perhaps Luna and Celestia built their castle here not to have close access to a resource, but to stand guard over a threat?"

"Hopefully that wouldn't mean the flame is busy, and can't help us with my own flame," Fluttershy murmured.

Faye tried to focus again on the core of emotions rising up from below without getting pulled in, which was a lot like trying to look at the sun while a crowd of paparazzi were firing off camera flashes from all directions. But it was still the same solemnity she had felt from the surface, bereft of aggression of malice. This place was a monument, not a jail. And if it was a jail, it was for something that remained here of its own accord.

But Twilight looked mildly heartened by Rarity's suggestion, and there was no good way to talk about the emotions she was sensing without risking outing herself as a changeling queen, so she held her tongue.

"Starlight?" Pinkie asked. "You aware of any giga-baddies forgotten by conventional history who could randomly happen to be locked up down below?"

"The world is full of things like that," Starlight said, her face stony. She didn't elaborate.

"...What about you two?" Rainbow looked back at Seigetsu and Nanzanaya. "Either of you got a clue why this place is the way it is?"

"Legends of this time persist amongst my people," Seigetsu confirmed. "After so many years, it is difficult to separate fact from myth. However, none of them speak glowingly of the ponies of this era. Perhaps the master of this place desires a reminder of what ponykind was before coming under its influence."

"Mmm..." Nanzanaya mused. "Well, if you can kill or evict a Flame of Harmony, maybe you can corrupt one as well?"

Applejack put a reassuring hoof on Twilight's shoulder. "If that's the case, then maybe we can purify it again?"

Twilight squared her shoulders. "Whether we can or can't, we won't find out by lingering on this staircase. Come on, everyone!"

The group started moving again, once again with her at the lead.

By the time the stairs ended, Corsica had been going down for so long that standing on flat ground felt like going uphill.

They were in a wide hallway that stretched to the left and right, lined with support columns and geometric decorations in the crystal. It was just as heavily ornamented as the atrium up above, albeit with a lower ceiling. Nondescript doors studded the walls, and the ends curved gently out of sight.

"Well? Which way now?" Twilight glanced at Fluttershy.

Fluttershy pointed at the wall directly in front of them. "Still that way. We're very close."

"You think this hallway might be a circle around wherever we're trying to go?" Rainbow asked.

"Shouldn't be too hard to find out," Applejack said.

Rainbow saluted and sped off.

As she disappeared around the curve, everyone else seemed inclined to rest their hooves after the staircase. Instead of joining them, Corsica opted to check out one of the doors that lined the hall - all closed, and all giving her an office vibe. Each one had a ring.

Experimentally, she gave the first door's ring a tap.

"Welcome," said a familiar voice as her special talent winked into existence in the ring. "You have reached the office of Inquirarch Andromeda. What is your business today?"

Yup. Office space. "Can you open this door?" Corsica asked, tapping on the crystal.

"Inquirarch Andromeda is available by appointment only," the ring responded. "Your identity does not appear to match any registered appointments. Would you like to apply for an appointment?"

"When would he be available?" Corsica asked.

"Inquirarch Andromeda has her first opening seven months, one week and four days from now, a twelve-minute slot at four thirty-seven AM. Applicants are required to submit to a background check and all meetings are subject to administrative approval. Would you like to apply?"

Classical bureaucracy. "Is that actually the first opening?" Corsica asked. "Or is this a pre-set 'go away' message for anyone who doesn't try to reach your boss through the proper channels?"

The ring was quiet for a second. "Touche," it eventually said. "In order to reach the administration with inquiries too urgent or complex to be handled by this Macrothesis automated support system, please go to the Office of the Secretariat on the fourteenth floor. In the future, please remember that, while capable of understanding humor, this Macrothesis automated support system is not a toy. Have a nice day."

Corsica's talent faded from the ring of its own accord.

"Huh," she said aloud, staring at it for a moment longer. "Strange machine."

Cursory checks of the next few rings revealed that all of the doors belonged to Inquirarch offices: Antlia, Apus, Aquarius. Before Corsica could go too far, though, Rainbow Dash returned, flying in from the opposite direction she had left in.

"Yep," she confirmed, skidding to a halt with a salute. "It's a ring. There are four big windows that show what's in the middle, the closest is just back that way, and I bet it's exactly what we're here for."

That caused the mood to lighten a little. "Excellent," Twilight insisted, jumping to her hooves. "...How did it look? Good omen, bad omen...?"

Rainbow just waved her along with a shrug. "Come on and see for yourself."

Looking out the panoramic window, Faye felt as if she was staring into the eye of an emotional storm.

The hallway was a ring, and she could see its other windows interspersed along cardinal directions in the distance. It was supported by great crystal pillars that grew up from the ether river just a stone's throw below. In the middle of the ring, a shallow cluster of slick, shiny black rocks broke the river's surface, never rising more than a foot or two above the river, their surfaces cracked and weathered like pine cones, as if they had been shaken and hammered and just barely not broken apart. And in the middle of the cluster of rocks, there sat a small, dilapidated church, completely undecorated yet made from large crystal bricks that glowed with a faint rainbow sheen.

That church was the heart. And in the space immediately around it, Faye could sense nothing but calm.

"Usually, there's a tree trunk there," Starlight muttered, barely audible. "But that's the core. There's no mistaking it."

"But how do we get there?" Rarity asked. "This is quite a nice view, but it makes it rather apparent there's no way down there."

"The way is there for those who seek it," said a voice bent and broken with age. "It is right in front of you."

Faye spun around, along with everyone else. It was the hooded giant.

Part of its robe lifted, revealing a wizened talon. The talon snapped, and the window retracted slowly into the ceiling as the ether river began to ripple. A bridge of rainbow crystal broke the surface, snakelike and winding, rising into place to connect the window ledge to the dark rocks below.

"Who are you?" Twilight asked the giant as it withdrew into its robe once again.

"I am the keeper of this place," it said, turning toward the church. "Come. My house is just ahead. I have looked into your hearts, and all of you are welcome to enter."

Faye followed its gaze... but when she looked at it again, it was gone.

Rainbow tapped the bridge, still hovering. "Seems solid enough?"

Single-file, the group proceeded.

Faye stepped off the bridge and onto the rocks at the end. Slick and shiny, they somehow provided impeccable traction, bare inches from the river of ether. Ether flowed through the tiny cracks in the surface, and through the bigger cracks between stones, and she followed the group carefully as Starlight picked out a path toward the church that involved the least jumping from stone to stone, keeping the number one rule of working with ether from Icereach in her mind: if you were a batpony, don't fall in.

The surface of the river would actually feel solid, and she wouldn't sink. But physically touching the river itself was a sublimely addictive experience, and only the most iron-willed of sarosians could willingly leave it again without the aid of friends to pull them out and keep them from ever returning.

Climbing across the rocks, trying not to slip on the impossibly rough footing, felt like walking upside-down on invisible black clouds across the midnight sky. Faye leaned in out of curiosity, the river so close that she had to mind her tail to avoid it dipping in, and a spangle of constellations more vivid than any she had seen from afar greeted her, humming with energy, occasionally flaring up with ghostly wisps and tendrils of green. She wasn't touching it, but could feel it in her mind already, a shadow of the force that intoxicated other batponies and refused to let them go: an infinite, steadfast potential and hope, a determination to clutch at the future and shape it as she desired, an indomitable and inextinguishable will to survive. It was so pure and singular that it almost - almost - drowned out the force of the Crystal Palace's heart, here at the center where that emotion was still.

Or perhaps it was because of the steadying influence of the river that this place was still at all.

The church was set low on the rocks, no foundation to raise it above the ether. Even the slightest ripple in the river's mirrorlike surface felt like it could intrude over the lip of the door, and yet this place was too peaceful for that to ever be possible. It was an enforced peace, as if Faye's heart itself was holding its breath to avoid disturbing something truly ancient and slumbering. But despite the precarious positioning, she knew this place was safe.

Ironridge's palace, with its dying flame, hadn't felt at all like this. Was this how every intact palace felt? Or was this one different still?

Inside the church, a single aisle was flanked by three rows of pews, leading up to an open space with an altar: a flat, circular crystal table. She felt like she had seen its like before, in the Ironridge palace, though this one was connected to the river at its base through shallow channels carved into the crystal floor. High on the wall, at the back of the room, was an emblem depicting a dragon and an equine embracing each other in harmony. And beneath it stood the hooded giant.

"This is..." Twilight whispered, standing at the forefront.

"Welcome, Blood of the Shackles," the giant said, its voice reverberating. "I am Convergence. The flame of this palace and the first Element of Harmony."

"You're a Flame of Harmony?" Twilight whispered. "But you have a body."

"Long ago," Convergence said, "the world was beset by two intractable calamities. One was the destruction of the physical realm, spurred on by entropy and the war of the gods. The other was the collapse of society, as ponies lost the ability to trust one another and could no longer agree on a vision for the future, or even their reason for living. The ultimate solution to these problems was the creation of a new world, underwritten by new natural laws that provide guidance and a universal moral compass to ponies in their lives while also holding the ravages of entropy at bay. Laws with which you and your friends are intimately familiar."

"The Elements of Harmony," Twilight said.

"The World of Harmony is all that any of you have ever known," Convergence continued. "Even you, dragon, whose people do not partake in the cycle of purpose. Even you, zebra, whose fathers and forefathers before them live in a land where those laws have broken down. Even you, children of the north, where society bears many traces of the one that necessitated this change. To all of you, the Elements of Harmony are immutable, the laws of this world absolute. But they were not handed down from on high. They were chosen as lodestars by ponies as flawed as any other. Throughout the millennia since this world was given life, philosophers have debated why the Elements are what they are... as well as the true nature of my own. Twilight Sparkle, what is your answer?"

Twilight took a step back. "What do you mean? What do I think my Element is? Why do I think the other Elements are laughter, kindness, loyalty, etc? As opposed to anything else?"

"Yes."

"My Element brings my friends together," Twilight said. "The other Elements. That's why you called yourself Convergence. It's a wildcard, the glue that adjusts for our uniqueness as ponies and becomes what we need to compliment each other's strengths and bridge across our differences. And their Elements are what they are because those were all things that are missing in the city out there. No one listens to each other, or apologizes when they bump into each other. No one is happy. No one gives each other the benefit of the doubt. But why do you surround yourself with this?"

"You are... correct," said Convergence. "And yet also incorrect. The tenets that constitute absolute good in this world were but lucky guesses, stumbled upon by desperate ponies in search of any answer that could save them. But what of the evils you fight against? Experimentation produces successes and failures alike. Chaos was originally created as a corrupting agent by those in search of ways to invert the problematic aspects of our natures. In your world, oriented by design around an absolute truth, such inversions are usually deleterious. But in these days, it was seen by some as a possible avenue toward the salvation of their minds."

Applejack narrowed her eyes. "You sure about that? Because it sounds an awful lot to me like a way for some ponies to make others fall in line."

"Such concerns were numerous," Convergence said. "And played a large role in why that experiment was ultimately regarded a failure. Others met with failure as well. Long before the world's desertification became regarded as apocalyptic, ponies tried to ignore it, or else responded to it using more conventional means. One of those means, as resources rose in scarcity, was to prioritize their own well-being over the other peoples of their world. This formed the beginnings of a rift which culminated in events well-enshrined in your own history."

It focused on Seigetsu.

"You are referring to Saint Tadashi," Seigetsu said. "Who stole power from the ponies and used it to carry monsters and dragons safely through the calamity."

"The legends," Convergence breathed, "are accurate. And the consequences endure even today. Many of the foes faced by the Elements are Abyssinians, whose nation and history can recall no time when things were any way but the way they are now. One of the greatest failings of this new world was that it was created only with ponies in mind. Its creators had not anticipated that other forms of life would endure. And, in this world's early days, their newfound peace was fractured nigh instantly by those unsettled grudges, carried over from the last world."

"But my people now hold Equestria as esteemed allies," Seigetsu pointed out. "Despite our ancient history, Cernial showed mercy on the refugees of Unicornia two thousand years ago, and that faith was repaid in multitude."

"A commendable act," Convergence told her. "Once they learned of this history from me, Equestria's rulers were also determined to make amends. But even though you have bridged one ancient rift, another opens to replace it. Now you war ceaselessly with your Abyssinian kin."

"...Yes," Seigetsu admitted. "We do."

Twilight swallowed. "Where are you going with this? You... must know why we're here, right?"

Convergence focused on Fluttershy. "You come in search of succor for my injured sibling."

"We do," Fluttershy said, staring into the void of its hood. "We don't know what it will take to save my flame, but another Crystal Palace was the best hope we had."

"...You are correct," Convergence told her. "The energies of another flame, administered within their seat of power, will be sufficient to return Kindness to a self-sustaining form."

"So you can help us, then?" Twilight's ears rose. "Can we get right to it? I know I'll feel a lot better about this once we have what we came for."

"No," Convergence said solemnly. "I am uniquely unsuited for that role."

Twilight's eyes widened. "What do you mean?"

Convergence looked at her. "Because... of all the failed experiments endured to create this world, I am by far the greatest."

Twilight took a step back. An audible shudder ran through the room.

"What do you mean?" Twilight whispered.

"The Elements of Harmony were created to bridge a paradox; to meet two requirements in stark opposition to each other," Convergence said, its words echoing out from beneath its dark hood. "We had to embody rigid and unchanging ideals that would not become deformed by the flow of time. We also had to be equine enough that we could be applicable to ponies' daily lives, and not an abstraction only relevant to philosophers and the world's physical laws. Ultimately, this was achieved through a process involving the sundering and tempering of souls. While complete souls are both too flexible and too weak to endure the one-dimensional demands of our duty, it was discovered that souls could be split into more rigid, less complex parts that each embody a facet of the original person. This technique became the basis of the construction of the flames: souls stripped of everything unnecessary to their duties and identities as Flames of Harmony. We were people, once. But we became something lesser, so that on our backs, the world might be reborn."

Everyone listened with wide eyes.

"I was a prototype for that process," Convergence went on. "The first successfully created flame. However, the only purpose in my creation was to prove the soundness of the process. Prior to this, the plan that resulted in my genesis was only regarded as one fool's errand among many. The framework for what principles ponies wished to be guided by had not yet been established: there was no concept of Generosity, Laughter, Kindness, Honesty and Loyalty as all being guiding forces in the lives of ponies in the future. Though I was created with all the power of my siblings, my purpose was chosen purely for ease of experimentation. It had no philosophical significance beyond that single fact."

It bowed its hooded head. "I am Convergence: the desire of a fractured soul to become whole again. My creators believed that if this desire was isolated first, then it would not be present in the rest of the soul, making it easier to remove and manipulate. Twilight Sparkle, you have used this power to draw the other Elements together and hold them in an orbit around yourself. They are stronger together. But the true nature of this power is to mend shattered souls and make them whole again. It can return the Elements of Harmony to their original, whole states... and in doing so, unmake them, and deprive this world of its very foundation."

Twilight was perfectly still.

"This is why I cannot aid you, even in the salvation of my sibling," Convergence said. "Were she to be remade by my power, Elemental Kindness would cease to exist, and the world would crumble. You must seek another way."

"My Element is..." Twilight whispered, staring frozen at the ground. "The power to unmake other Elements? Drawing them together is just an accidental consequence of that? The first step in the process?"

Convergence watched her.

"Does that mean I'm a threat to my friends?" Twilight asked. "That if I-"

"No," Convergence said. "The Elements were designed to be incorruptible and singularly focused, to never stray from our duty. But I have already told you of another tool designed to change the course of all it touches."

Its cloak began to shimmer, and then tear, except it was less like the fabric was tearing and more like the space around it was being rent by a thousand needles of time. And when it was gone, a thing remained.

It could generously be called equine, but was far too long, its body hunched and coiled up into the rough shape of a giant despite being lithe and graceful. It had a white mane, twice as long as Princess Celestia's, and black eyes with white pupils. Mismatched horns grew from the top of its head, and its body was covered in a zebra pattern of black and white, except the white was dragon scales and the black was fur.

"That looks like Discord!" Applejack gasped.

"No way..." Rainbow breathed.

"Harmony is anathema to chaos," Convergence said, its voice echoing with power and age. "Chaos is anathema to Harmony. But to a being that was created to contain a paradox, a balance is yet possible. Every minute of every day, I make a choice to affirm that balance. And in return, that balance gives me a choice. I cannot change the nature of my power, but I may yet set its course. And I choose to remain here, surrounded by this reminder of the reason for my existence, so that every night, I might choose for the world to see another dawn."

"Then those vines-" Rarity began.

"The product of a minor disturbance in the balance," Convergence told her. "Yours is an age of great change in the world. One that makes it all the easier to question my path. But seeing your own conviction and willingness to sacrifice your power for the benefit of those around you reminded me of my duty to do the same. You have nothing to fear from reclaiming your Elemental stones and wielding them once more."

"Will the necklaces be able to help us restore Kindness, even if you can't?" Twilight asked.

Convergence considered this. "...Perhaps. However, there is another possibility."

Fluttershy rocked on her hooves.

"I have many siblings," Convergence said, its eyes sweeping the room. "Some of them reside still in their palaces, flung far across the world. Others have been displaced, and wander far from home. Had you the aid of such a transient flame, you would need only a suitable place to perform the resuscitation. And though my power itself is unsuitable for this purpose, my altar could still safely avail you. Have you the determination to try such a plan?"

Twilight shuffled awkwardly. Rainbow rubbed the back of her neck.

"I assume you mean the flame brazier," Starlight said. "Where is that, anyway? This looks like a map table room, but we're at the bottom already. The Lifestream is right there." She pointed at the channels in the floor where the ether river flowed in.

"...I will show you," Convergence said, raising a wizened talon and snapping it.

The round table crackled with black energy, and then began to turn gray.

Twilight and all of her friends froze, but Seigetsu and Nanzanaya leaned in curiously. The table lost all color, and then began to sag, its edges sloughing off and falling to the floor in clumps of ash. Some of them landed in the ether channels, melting away like snow in running water.

The table continued to collapse, its edges falling off or slumping in until it was an indistinct mound of melting gray. It crackled a few more times, shrinking more and more as the ether ate away at its base, until it was barely a hill.

Underneath it, instead of floor, was more ash. The ether pooled in the middle of the room where the table had been, and the floor kept sinking... until suddenly it gave way.

With a rush of ether, the ash was finally consumed, washing swiftly away and leaving a hole in the center of the room.

Faye stepped closer. It was a staircase.

Carved entirely from that glassy black rock, a thin stream of ether cascaded down its steps, the stairs steep and narrow and the headroom frightfully low. Two mares could fit side by side, but not two stallions. Light itself seemed unable to penetrate the tunnel, a bleak, glistening passage beneath the bottom of the world.

"My place of power," Convergence said, "lies below."

"That goes beneath the river," Corsica pointed out. "What's even down there? Nobody at Icereach could ever detect anything at all."

"You will have to see for yourself," Convergence said. "But I will warn you. The way back up will remain open for you, but the way ahead is shut. Since it was sealed, no mortal has ever glimpsed the end. I offer you this chance because, perhaps, you will be different, and because I wish greatly for my sibling to be revived. But do not rely on the prospect of reaching my altar. Against this trial, my duty forbids me from assisting you."

"If it's a trial that awaits us..." Twilight swallowed. "We'll just have to succeed. But I have one question first. You said... the Elements are made from souls that have been narrowed down. Is that all that gives them their power?"

"...No," Convergence said. "It isn't. On its own, a sundered soul is nothing more than a person who has been deliberately shaped toward a purpose."

Twilight nodded. "And how were the original people who became Elements chosen? Were they picked from society for exemplifying their virtues? If so, who did you used to be?"

Convergence glanced to the wall, at the crystal sigil of an equine and a dragon. "That is a question you must discover the answer to yourself. I can tell you are dissatisfied with the balance I have struck, the purpose to which our power is dedicated. But once before, ponies set out to change the nature of their world, and ultimately met with success. If you think your ancestors' work was not good enough... then change it again."

Twilight hesitated, then nodded again, almost jumping toward the staircase. "I think I understand. Come on, everyone!"

"You know, you're rolling with this better than I expected," Rainbow admitted as she started to descend. "But don't you think there's someone important whose permission you should be asking before we go ahead with this plan?"

Twilight hesitated.

"It'll be fine," Starlight sighed, moving to follow them. "It'll be absolutely, completely, perfectly fine."

Everyone continued to file down the staircase, Seigetsu having an awkward time with the roof but also an easier time with the footing. Faye brought up the rear.

As Corsica's tail disappeared into the gloom, she hesitated, looking back up at Convergence. "You said..." She tried to keep her voice low. "About... the nature of your power, to put shattered souls back together..."

"I cannot see the composition of your soul," Convergence told her. "Around you, my sight is hindered. But I know what you believe to be your circumstances. You have the opportunity to choose your own path. Whether or not there exists a correct one, the choice is yours."

Faye sighed, and continued down the stairs.

To Bind the Broken

Faye stepped out from the crystal tree and into the canyon on the surface world, and was greeted by stars.

"Oooo," Pinkie said, looking up at the night sky. "I must have totally lost track of time while we were down there!"

"We won't have any trouble getting home, you think?" Rarity asked, glancing around. "I can't imagine a place like the Everfree is less active at night than in the day, and the few times I've had reason to find out weren't the most pleasant experiences..."

"It'll be fine," Fluttershy reassured her. "I know these woods."

Twilight, however, was standing at the front of the group. "Look," she said, nodding down the canyon.

Waiting for them was Princess Luna.

"Princess!" Some of the ponies, as well as Seigetsu, bowed.

"I have been awaiting news of your return," Luna said, stepping forward, her mane shimmering like a cloud of ether.

"Has something happened?" Twilight asked, her ears folding in worry.

Luna shook her head. "On the contrary, I desired to know how your expedition fared. Did you meet with success?"

Twilight slowly blinked. "Were... you expecting us to? You must have known what was down there, right?"

Luna nodded. "Indeed. Hence why I was not certain of your success. Your efforts were stymied, then, I take it."

"It's complicated..." Twilight shuffled. "But yes."

"I see." Luna turned her gaze to Corsica and Faye, Seigetsu and Nanzanaya. "And what of your companions? Did they repay the trust you showed in them by allowing them into that place?"

Twilight hesitated. "It... might have been nice to get a heads-up first about what was in there before I made that call, but I suppose so."

"Not every inconvenient truth can be learned at a time of your own choosing, Twilight Sparkle," Luna said. "By associating with these ponies from the north, by becoming invested in their causes, you draw yourself ever closer to a path in which such truths will be numerous beyond measure. Am I wrong?" She fixed Corsica and Faye with a look.

"Pretty much spot on," Corsica remarked with a shrug.

Faye tilted her head and frowned. "You sent her on purpose into a place where she'd learn some uncomfortable stuff with strangers just to teach her a lesson?"

"That's, um..." Twilight rubbed the back of her neck, looking equal parts embarrassed and annoyed. "Actually exactly something they might... I mean, Celestia was my teacher. Before I became an alicorn. And, it often involved a lot of learning from my mistakes." She glanced back up at Luna. "But this wasn't even a mistake, though. How was I in control of what was down there?"

Luna shook her head. "You were not. The only thing you had control of was how you reacted to it. Rest assured, we would not have sent you in so unprepared had we not already explored everything that place had to offer, and known it to be safe. But where these ponies may lead you, you will not have the luxury of knowing that we have gone before. That is why we desired, above even the success of your mission, that this be an experience you could learn from."

"That door, then," Twilight said. "With the twelve key words. That's the door to Indus, isn't it? Were you that confident we wouldn't be able to open it? I thought Indus was supposed to be full of dangerous knowledge. What would you have done if we had gotten through?"

Luna regarded her. "It took my sister and I nearly three hundred years to open that door, after we discovered it while exploring our new nation. One day, as a future ruler of Equestria, you will have to come to terms with the history that lies beyond it for yourself. Finding the keys will be a journey that you can undertake with companions of your choosing, or even alone. Know only that there is no urgency to the matter. What you see on the other side will help you grow as an immortal goddess and a leader... and nothing more."

Twilight glanced at Nanzanaya. "And it's not a bad thing that some ponies I may not completely trust yet saw it and now know how it works and where it is?"

"The way is guarded by a being of unfathomable might," Princess Luna said. "Even an army of alicorns would be hard-pressed to match a Flame of Harmony given corporeal form. And the tree behind you will not open lightly, either. Precious few could even make the journey to that door save from in your approving company."

She turned to Faye, Corsica, Seigetsu and Nanzanaya. "But even if such protections were not in place, I trust none among you would seek to betray Twilight Sparkle's trust in allowing you to know of this place."

"You need not even ask," Seigetsu confirmed. Everyone else nodded.

"In that case, I will accompany you back to your castle, and then take my leave for the night," Luna said, looking up at the starry sky. "You undoubtedly have much to think about."

"Yeah," Twilight sighed, giving her a grateful nod. "You can say that again."

Corsica had seen Twilight's castle from a distance when walking through town, but after visiting the crystal city, it seemed somehow that much less impressive. A giant crystal tree, with a crystal castle built into it with a treehouse aesthetic, made out of the same stuff as the city... Beautiful, but it didn't have nearly the scope of the architecture below.

Thankfully, it also didn't have any noisy golems.

Much to Twilight's gratitude, Pinkie Pie had offered to put Nanzanaya up for the night, meals included. That left just Corsica, Faye, Seigetsu, and Twilight entering Twilight's castle... and, for some reason, Starlight and Rainbow Dash.

"You live here too, or something?" Corsica asked, glancing at the pair.

"I do," Starlight said, not taking her eyes off her course.

"Nah." Rainbow hovered along, starting to give Faye the impression that she never walked so long as she could help it. "But I've got a hunch we're not just going straight to bed, and I've got some ideas about what just went down back there."

"The kind of thing we should leave to you three?" Corsica asked. "Seemed like that was a little more personal than you were intending."

Twilight looked conflicted. "Kind of you to offer, and I could use a little alone time after all that. But we're probably going to wind up discussing what we do next, and that's invariably going to concern you as well."

Faye nodded. "Makes sense to me."

"I will allow you to have that discussion on your own," Seigetsu said, walking with her hands clasped behind her back. "I've always preferred early mornings to late nights."

Inside the castle, Spike was waiting, and after a short greeting and a very brief summary of events, he left to show Seigetsu to her room, while everyone else migrated to a lounge on the second floor, sandwiched between the library and Twilight's personal study.

"...So," Twilight said, taking a deep breath once everyone was seated. "Options."

"One," Rainbow said. "Honesty Flame. The one in the ocean. Starlight, didn't you go there on a submarine owned by a school with ties to Princess Celestia? Are they still around? That might not be an awful way to go. I bet if we asked her to pull some strings, she could get them to let us use it again. Assuming that place still exists?"

"Kinmari Marine Research Academy," Starlight said. "It does still exist, and it might be our best option. It's also very far away, and there are no trains on the ocean to speed things along. You two are on a timetable, right?"

Faye nodded. "Once we get the flame fixed, we need to take it back to Ironridge. And we also need to get back in time to do something about Yakyakistan. Though, I don't know what we can do."

"Okay," Rainbow said. "Two: Laughter Flame. The one, uhh..."

Twilight gave Starlight an understanding look.

"The one you don't want to visit for personal reasons," Corsica said. "Look. Personally, I don't have a whole lot to lose if Ironridge gets murderized. I know how that sounds, but I've got plenty of more pressing things to worry about. You know... personal issues. Ones I don't really want to explain to every passing stranger. So, you not wanting to go to this flame and not wanting to tell us why, that's totally understandable to me. But what I don't get is why you can't just stay behind and let everyone else go do it. If you not being able to go there is the biggest issue with the Laughter Flame, why don't we just do that?"

Starlight looked extremely awkward.

"If we explain, it wouldn't leave this room, right?" Twilight asked. "Not that I'd be making the final call on whether we explain that, or anything. Just making sure we're all on the same page."

"Well, now I'm curious," Corsica said, leaning forward on her sofa. "But I can keep a good secret."

"Same." Faye nodded.

Starlight sighed. "Go ahead and tell them."

Twilight arched her eyebrows. "Really? I mean, well... If you're sure..."

Starlight waved her on. "Or if you don't want to, I will. Twilight and her friends are Element bearers. They've been chosen by the Flames of Harmony to wield their powers in some fashion. The flames are the source, Twilight and her friends are the wielders. That all makes perfect sense? Not fuzzy on any of the details?"

Faye and Corsica nodded.

"Well, I'm a Flame of Harmony," Starlight said.

Corsica's eyes widened.

"Are you serious?" Faye leaned in.

Starlight nodded. "Hope. One of the 'broken' ones... Though in my case, the flame is considered broken because it's not at its palace, where it's supposed to be. Instead, it's out wandering the world in the form of a pony."

Corsica whistled. "Well, that explains a thing or two."

Starlight nodded again. "My presence on any mission to rekindle Kindness means we'd have two flames present instead of the usual one, and it's hard to see how that wouldn't be a benefit. The reason it was still worth trying to get to Convergence's place of power was so I could try to do the job myself, using its facility. The odds of that working are about the same as any other flame being able to do it without me, but we were already so close, it was worth a try."

"So..." Faye was still trying to re-adjust her train of thought to this situation. "Does that mean you're unfathomably ancient, and remember the previous world, Indus?"

"No," Starlight answered. "I'm around thirty. No documented birthday, so it's hard to know for sure, but I was found as an infant after a mountaineering accident. The working theory is that during that accident, I became entangled somehow with the flame. Either way, I'm in some respects a normal pony and in other respects a manifestation of the world's will to exist. It's a lot of fun."

Corsica frowned. "Then wouldn't you be in the opposite boat as me? If you're supposedly hope incarnate, you sound awfully tired and worn out."

"Princess Luna wasn't lying earlier," Starlight said, "when she talked about physical manifestations of the flames being unstoppably powerful. My particular power twists destiny, reality or whatever so that as long as I'm chasing a goal, it can never become fully out of reach. For example, as long as I care about living, either I can't die or someone nearby will magically discover a way to reverse my death. But this power doesn't help me actually achieve my goals. It only stops me from being forced to give up on them by circumstances outside my control. And the influence of the flame, or perhaps just my nature, makes me an eternal perfectionist who can't settle for good enough and can't give up. It's exhausting. My entire life, I've been trapped in a cycle of denying myself to find some measure of peace, and pouring everything I have into an endless quest that will never make me happy. Now do you understand?"

Corsica tried to imagine it, and it made her shudder. Her own wishes were granted by her talent, for no actual effort but at a cost to her ability to want them. If Starlight was telling the truth, then her wishes were forever dangled right in front of her face, and no amount of effort could ever fully realize them. They were opposites, and yet the same, in a twisted way. It was as if Corsica took everything she wanted, looked at it in a mirror, and saw only her present situation looking back.

"That's nuts," she eventually said. "You're serious, aren't you? This is why you're so reluctant to get involved with the north again? You're currently in the part of the cycle where you deny what you want, and are chilling with Twilight here and trying not to think about all the things you want to fix in the world."

Starlight nodded. "According to the other flames, I won't ever be truly satisfied until the entire world has been restored to the way they were all created to keep it. But that's an impossible task, and the reason they were created the way they are, giving their powers to champions instead of using them themselves, was to prevent the demands of this existence from driving them insane. Right now, I have a plausible chance that with Twilight and the other Element bearers, the next time we set out to do something, we'll have a shot at really succeeding. But I'm not ready to take that risk yet and put myself back out there. Because I know that even if we somehow succeeded at something as big as stopping Yakyakistan's war, it still wouldn't be enough."

Faye kept her mouth closed.

"That's rough," Corsica said. "But it gives me a stupid idea. If the other Flames of Harmony can choose Element bearers to do their jobs for them, can you?"

Starlight blinked.

"Hey, that's a good point," Rainbow said. "I never thought of that before!"

"Just saying." Corsica shrugged. "If you can, I'd volunteer. A mystical link to a font of divine determination sounds exactly like what I'm missing in life. And if you're too scared to throw yourself back in the great northern meat grinder, all I'm missing is the motivation to try."

Rainbow Dash pointed a hoof at her. "Girl, if I didn't know what your cutie mark meant, that would raise all sorts of questions."

Corsica grimaced. "Don't go shouting it around. I'd rather not tell everyone I meet what it can do. Or the price for using it."

Starlight shook her head. "Anyway. Have I sufficiently cleared things up, about why we'd be better off if I was present on any mission to rekindle Kindness, and why I'd really rather not revisit the north?"

Faye nodded.

"Right." Corsica cleared her throat awkwardly, caught in between the chill from imagining herself in Starlight's situation and admiring her for just putting something like that right out there... never mind that everyone in this room had at least an idea of her own. "So, our other flame options. After those two, we've got the one in the dragon war, which was an obvious no. What about your own?" She looked to Starlight. "Presumably, it wouldn't have any benefits over going to Laughter without you, since we'd still just have one flame. But if we went to your old palace, could you activate it again?"

Starlight looked like she hadn't fully considered this possibility. "I... don't see why not. But you're right that it wouldn't give us the advantage of having multiple flames. Also, with how much we found in Twilight's crystal palace that even I didn't know about, the odds of us running into unforeseen complications are incredibly high."

"Remind me where the Palace of Hope would be?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "That's not the one super far in the south, is it?"

Starlight nodded. "It is. The one in the zebra lands, where Nanzanaya is presumably from. I don't know what all of you think about her request. Personally, I'm even less inclined toward getting involved in that than I am to returning to the north. On the bright side, we'd at least have a willing guide to the area. But while the likelihood of us making it to the palace is high, the odds of getting caught up in something are all but certain."

"So that leaves our best options as Laughter and Honesty," Twilight said. "One is much slower, but you could come, Starlight. The other... Are you certain you don't want to face your old village again?"

Starlight winced.

"For what it's worth, we would come along and vouch for you," Rainbow offered. "Or we could even smuggle you through, and you wouldn't have to interact with anyone there."

"Maybe." Starlight took a deep breath. "I'm not that thrilled about extensive travel anywhere, though I suppose I did just go with you to the Crystal Empire. Maybe we should all sleep on it, and I'll realize in the morning how silly I'm being. I don't know. I just... don't want to start something again I might not be able to stop."

"Sleeping on it is good," Twilight said. "Even if we decided tonight, it's not like we'd act on it."

"Right." Starlight got to her hooves. "See you tomorrow. And, you two..." She looked over her shoulder at Faye and Corsica. "I don't envy your position. However this ends, good luck."

She trotted out the door, and was gone.

"Sooooo..." Rainbow interrupted as Twilight rose to follow.

Twilight raised an eyebrow. "Yes?"

"Before you bail, Twi, I've got a theory," Rainbow said, rubbing her forehooves together. "Might be crazy, might be crazy awesome. You remember how we all got our cutie marks, right?"

Twilight smirked just a little. "Hard to forget."

"Yeah, yeah, well, I know you do," Rainbow said. "But you two northern nerds haven't heard yet, have you? How we initially became marked as Element bearers?"

"Nope," Corsica said. "You gonna tell us?"

"I did a sonic rainboom," Rainbow Dash said, holding a hoof to her chest. "Legendary, mythical aerial maneuver that no one but me has ever done in living memory or reliably recorded history. Dunno if they have these in the north, probably not. It involves a big, flashy explosion in the sky that you can see for miles around, right? I got my cutie mark when I did it, and all five of the other Element bearers got theirs at exactly the same time, as it was going off. Pretty neat, right? Our friendship and our roles as Elements was basically predestined, and all ties back to me. You seeeee where I'm going with this?"

Twilight took a sharp gasp. "That's ridiculous!"

"Is it, though?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow at her. "You've gotta admit, Convergence probably wouldn't have told you that the ability to draw together the Elements was hereditary if it didn't know for a fact it was relevant. What if my great-great-great-five-times-great grandparent was another Element of Magic?"

"But you're the Element of Loyalty," Twilight protested. "You can't have two Elements at once, can you? And if you did, wouldn't your cutie mark look more like mine than yours? For that matter, upon doing the rainboom, wouldn't this have made you the Element of Magic and not me? But I was chosen anyway. None of that makes sense."

Rainbow shrugged. "I mean, didn't Princess Celestia use all the Elements by herself in the old stories? I'm not trying to cramp your style, I'm just saying, what if?"

Twilight looked at Rainbow with the expression of an elder watching unwanted youngsters on her lawn.

"Okay, okay, I won't mention it again." Rainbow waved her off, turning her gaze toward a window. "I'm gonna get some shut-eye as well. Try not to stay up all night!"

With a zip of light, she too was gone.

"That mare," Twilight said, frazzled. "...Anyway. Can I get you anything? Spike should be able to show you to your rooms, or I can?"

"Thanks," Corsica said. "Think I could use some shut-eye too."

The three of them set off down a long, curved hallway encircling the second floor. "What do you think of Starlight's reasons for not going back to the north?" Corsica asked as they walked. "I get where she's coming from. But her friends are still waiting for her. And they've been waiting for as long as I've been alive. Think about it."

"I think both she and they deserve the closure, and to see each other again," Twilight said. "And I think the north needs to be saved. But at the same time..."

"Was there even more she wasn't telling us?" Corsica guessed.

Twilight nodded. "I'm not sure if I should be telling you this, but Starlight used to have... visions. Whenever she went to a Crystal Palace, she would see these disturbing, apocalyptic worlds with nothing but rock and falling ash. We suspect they were warnings about a bad future, but we never learned for sure. The only thing we do know is that when she gave up and stopped trying to fight for her friends and the north, the visions stopped, as well. Going to my own palace with us must have taken a lot of courage from her, risking seeing one of those visions again - if they are a warning of the future, it would mean that by getting involved with your mission, she was putting that bad future back on track. And it would take a lot more courage for her to leave Ponyville and go traveling in search of another Crystal Palace. But going all the way back to the north and continuing her old fight? She has this on her shoulders, as well."

"Sounds like a complicated existence," Corsica said. "That got anything to do with why she doesn't want to go back to the Laughter flame?"

Twilight shook her head. "Actually, that's something yet again completely different. But this time, it's really not my place to tell you. We should think about this in the morning, alright?"

Corsica continued following. "Sure. Just remember that if safeguarding the future is really her biggest goal, then letting these flames go out might not be the best way to do it."

"You're welcome to remind her yourself," Twilight said, approaching a pair of doors. "Anyway, these rooms should serve nicely. If you need absolutely anything at all, give Spike a holler, okay? He keeps weird hours."

"Will do," Corsica said, peeling off and opening the door to her accommodations.

Faye swung the door closed behind her, and was blissfully alone.

Here, she could still feel the distant heart of Convergence, the feelings permeating that city welling up through the crystals. But they were far away, and it was almost like the crystals of this castle were dominated by a different set of emotions: nobility, earnestness, righteousness, friendliness and curiosity.

This new set of emotions was polite, and mostly left her alone. Here, she felt like she could get a good night's sleep.

Faye crawled out of her giant Crystal Empire robe and doffed her boots. As nice as that robe looked, she couldn't shake the feeling that it was less 'her' than her tattered old coat, or Corsica's new one that she had ruined in the Flame District... If all her obligations could kindly hold off for a day or two, she would definitely see about getting something new for herself.

Maybe she would even ask Corsica to come along and help pick it out. That seemed like the kind of thing that could help mend bridges between them, right?

She made to climb in bed... and realized she was still wearing her bracelet. Down in the city, she had resolved to trade it back for Halcyon tonight, since she wasn't using it for anything and had more than proved the point to herself that it was possible to take the lead and talk to other ponies again. But did she really want to wake Seigetsu over this at this hour...?

Probably not. As long as she did it first thing tomorrow. A new fear was starting to take form in her heart, one she had never thought about articulating before: what would happen if she completely, entirely left Halcyon behind?

Better for that possibility to remain unexplored. She was what Halcyon was missing, and Halcyon was what she was missing. To actually move forward in life, they would have to work together from now on.

At least to an extent. Faye wasn't sure how she would break the news to her superstitious other half that she had borne witness to a war between the gods, and was even less sure what she would do if she dreamed about that while Halcyon was in control.

Oh well. Halcyon wasn't here tonight, so if it happened tonight, at least, it would be fine. Faye crawled into bed, closed her eyes, and waited for sleep to claim her.

Faye was walking, and from the heat, she could only be in Ironridge.

To her right was a canopy of trees, indicating she was low down in the Day District, near the border of the Night District. Probably on her way home from working for Jamjars - a suspicion that was soon confirmed when she turned and saw Lalala, one of her old co-workers, keeping an unbothered pace beside her.

"What did you want to ask about?" Lalala asked as they walked.

"Everything, sort of," Faye said, the Halcyon of the past speaking for her. "But, specifically, I was wondering if you'd ever heard of an entity called Unnrus-kaeljos."

Unnrus-kaeljos? Faye immediately started paying more attention. She couldn't remember ever having a conversation about this with anyone outside of her own various selves, before, but if she was dreaming it, it must have happened. What had she said, or been told, that she forgot?

"Hmm," Lalala hummed, her ears folded thoughtfully. "Yes, it rings a bell. I couldn't tell you what it means, or even whether it's an entity, but I've seen the word before."

Faye perked up.

"I told you about my background, right?" Lalala explained. "I grew up in Silverwind, on a school campus frequented by archaeologists. Many thousands of years ago, there used to be an ancient civilization there, and bits and fragments of their knowledge come back to us from the digs. Tablets and writings, some of which were translated, others we were never able to. If I recall correctly, Unnrus-Kaeljos was one of the words on the infamously unsolved Aldenfold mural discovered about forty years ago."

"Aldenfold mural?" Faye pressed, just as curious then as she was now.

"One of just many ancient mysteries that desert has surrendered to time," Lalala elaborated. "The Aldenfold mountains are said to have risen from the land one thousand years ago, when our modern calendar began. Yet the civilization of Silverwind existed between five and seven thousand years ago, and the word 'Aldenfold' appeared in a prominent mural that was discovered largely intact. That implies the word had a meaning before it was given to the mountains, but to my knowledge no one ever discovered the purpose of the mural."

The word 'Aldenfold' appearing on an ancient mural, huh? Faye's thoughts instantly went to the door beneath the crystal city. Halcyon of the past wouldn't know to ask about that, but if there was any chance these were related...

"What did it look like?" she asked. "This mural."

"I never saw it for myself," Lalala said. "It was too big to bring home, carved onto the wall of what had once been a palace or temple of sorts. I just know it had words that couldn't be translated."

Words. Multiple words, that couldn't be translated, but could evidently be phonetically read.

It had to be. Presumably this mural wasn't also a door, but it could easily have been a copy of the door's surface, made in an era when the door and the land below it hadn't been completely forgotten. And if there were archaeologists studying this mural and trying to translate it, then any hints they might have gathered could be invaluable in piecing together the keys!

Assuming she actually wanted to go to Indus. Faye suddenly realized she cared more about solving the puzzle on the grounds that it was an impossible puzzle that took two alicorns three hundred years to solve than to actually open the door.

Come on, come on, what would Past Halcyon ask next...?

"Where did you hear about it?" Lalala asked instead, continuing the conversation herself. "I hardly ever hear ponies talk about Silverwind, let alone the things that are found there."

Faye shrugged. "I met someone who mentioned it in passing. Made it sound like a god, or something. It got me curious, and I wondered if you knew."

Lalala shook her head. "As far as I know, the Meridi - the civilization responsible for most of the history in Silverwind - worshiped only the Aegis as the one true god."

As she spoke, her voice started to grow tinny. Was the conversation moving past the part her dream wanted her to remember, and speeding up? This didn't feel quite like that. In fact, something didn't feel quite right in general, a tension in the air that defied easy explanation, as if the dream itself was made of taut twine.

Faye said something else, but the words were muddled, as if she wasn't fully in control of her mouth. And then it hit her: she actually was in control of her mouth. She had stopped walking. The scripted dream still tugged at her muscles, but it had lost purchase, tearing like wet paper.

"What's going on?" She spun around, hearing her own voice loud and clear. Lalala had stopped moving, as had all the other ponies around her. They looked almost two dimensional, even.

This wasn't right. What was wrong? Her dream was-

The sense of gravity in her heart intensified, tugging her gaze upward to the sky, where the fabric of reality itself suddenly buckled, as if something was punching the world from another dimension. And then it tore, fire from on high exploding into existence, at first a fireball and then a sea of red, a visage she knew all too well from earlier that very day.

Ironridge was gone. In its place were towers, burning buildings and a far-off city, surrounded by distant mountain walls. She knew what was directly overhead before even looking.

From on high, Aegis exploded with radiance, three lasers narrowly missing their mark and slamming into the landscape around her, carving rainbow spheres out of reality that lingered for several seconds and left nothing in their wake. The dragon's opponent swooped in a circle, burning with gold and trailed by energy projectiles in the form of innumerable swords, seeking their enemy like a swarm of bees.

One of the swords came dangerously near, impacting the other side of her roof. Faye jumped out of the way as a ring of fire flung itself from the sword, barely managing to hide behind a boxy rooftop ventilation duct, feeling ash singe her face and her ears wilt from the heat.

This was different. This was wrong. She had seen their battle, but this wasn't just reliving a memory in a dream: she was in full control, and their attacks weren't the same. That projectile hadn't come nearly so close the last time she was here.

"What's going on!?" she screamed. "Why are you fighting!? Stop it! Let me out of here!"

But her body wouldn't wake up. This felt real. More real than any of her memories. What was happening?

She was still wearing her bracelet. All around her, the world burned with caustic emotions, but if she couldn't use her powers to defend herself in a dream gone horribly wrong, where could she? She lit it, pushing the emerald flames all the way to the max.

"Stop it!" Faye cried, pulling on everything around her, concentrating it and pointing those volatile feelings back in a beam aimed straight for the dueling gods. And then she released them, and emerald flames flew forth.

The entire world froze, as if someone had paused a movie.

Faye's heart was hammering out of control, her bracelet still coursing with green. "What's going on?" she whispered. "Please, let me wake up..."

One of the gods - the nameless equinoid, the King of All Monsters, the golden sword wielder and presumably Ludwig's dad - started to descend.

Light rippled around it as it drew on level with her burning rooftop. Half of the building had collapsed where the sword struck, and the half that remained was strewn with flames that rippled and danced with the city's pain.

The god came closer.

Faye couldn't move as it arrived, facing her, barely a stone's throw away, a featureless equinoid with a halo of runic light around its barrel, two wings of light growing out from the halo as it ceaselessly spun.

"Why am I here?" Faye whispered. "This is horrible. Who are you?"

"I AM UNNRUS-KAELJOS," the god said. "AND MY HANDIWORK IS AS TERRIBLE AS YOU SAY. WE HAVE MET BEFORE."

Despite the blistering heat, Faye felt cold.

"Why am I here?" she asked. "What do you want from me?"

The light spirit watched her, holy light wafting from its wings and polluting the burning sky. "LONG AGO, I BATTLED TETRA, THE GREAT DESTROYER, IN ORDER TO SAFEGUARD ALL THE CREATURES OF THIS WORLD - A WORLD I CREATED. IN ATONEMENT FOR THE DEVASTATION WROUGHT BY OUR BATTLE, I THEN BANISHED MYSELF FROM EXISTENCE, THAT MY CHILDREN MIGHT LIVE BETTER IN A WORLD FREE FROM THE FOLLY OF GODS. BUT YOU HAVE THE POWER TO REMEMBER THAT WHICH REALITY HAS FORSAKEN. BECAUSE OF THIS, I WAS ABLE TO ANSWER WHEN YOU WISHED FOR A SIMILAR BANISHMENT, YEARS AGO."

Faye swallowed. "And what do you want me to do? Why are you here, now?"

Unnrus-kaeljos gleamed all the brighter. "TO DISPEL THE DOUBTS YOU HARBOR ABOUT AIDING MY LOYAL SERVANT, NANZANAYA."

Before Faye could say anything else, the fire faded from the sky, the heat and the lights vanished, and she awoke in Twilight's castle in a cold sweat, the night sky still visible through the window.

Panting, Faye heaved herself out of bed, running to the window and gulping down some fresh, non-smoky air. Her face still felt burned, her fur singed, her heart racing-

"I saw it too," Procyon said, hovering just outside the window.

Faye jumped.

Procyon shrugged. "Hopefully invasive dreams like that don't happen too often. But look on the bright side: at least now you can stop thinking in me-and-Halcyon terms, and acknowledge that I was once a part of us, too."

Salvation for the Wicked

"Pathetic," Papyrus said, silhouetted on the windowsill by the pre-dawn sky, a hungry grin on his face.

"Papyrus? What are you doing here?" Faye broke through her surprise to speak first. "Didn't you stay behind in the Crystal Empire?"

"I'm not here for you, Butterfly." Papyrus dismissed her with a flick of a wing, focusing intently on Starlight. "Come on. Say my name..."

Starlight's shock congealed into an icy stare. "Why are you here?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Isn't it obvious? I'm here to ask that very question of you."

Starlight's gaze almost faltered. In the silence, Faye noticed Corsica lurking in the hallway just around a corner.

"Look at me," Papyrus hissed. "No claws. No chaos. Still a scumbag, but no signs of delirium or mania. I begged you for death, ripped you apart and threatened everything you held dear. And somehow, you look surprised to see me? So tell me, Starlight, why am I still here? And make it quick. I've been wondering this for so many years, I'm starting to feel like making my own answer."

Starlight looked as if her very existence was a contradiction. "...You wanted me to kill you. I just didn't feel like letting you win."

Papyrus actually deflated. "So that's really it, then. I suppose I was a fool to hope for anything more meaningful than that."

"Papyrus?" Corsica asked, stepping out from behind the corner with her eyes narrowed. "What's going on here?"

"That's High Prince Gazelle to you," Papyrus drawled, flinging a lazy hoof at her. "Murderous mastermind, soul eater, lord of a dead empire, singly responsible for destabilizing the east to the point where Chrysalis could tip it over and the sole saboteur of Starlight and her friends' old dream to settle down peacefully in Equestria. Unless you have a better explanation for how a backwater Riverfall colt could have the appearance, personality and memories of the biggest walking calamity in living memory than 'Starlight didn't feel like letting me win,' in which case I'm all ears..."

Faye felt a conflicting rush of emotions, but somehow, the dominant one came up as disappointment. Had there been a puzzle here she missed out on the chance to solve because Papyrus was annoying and she always tried her best to ignore him?

"Ohh," Corsica said, as if this all made perfect sense. "So that's why Egdelwonk hired you."

Papyrus flicked a feather at her.

"So let me get this straight," Faye pressed. "You're not just a Gazelle impersonator, but allegedly the real thing, even though you're clearly not a sphinx and also weren't even alive back then? And-"

"Of course you know each other," Starlight interrupted with a sigh, getting up to leave. "If you want to talk about this, do it without me. This was not how I wanted to start any day, now or for the rest of my life." She shot a glare at Papyrus over her shoulder. "If you try anything to ruin my life here, I can and will end you. You have no powers anymore, and even when you did, you know how that turned out."

Papyrus grinned. "Leaving me alone with your new friends? Imagine how differently things would have turned out if you trusted me this much all those years ago."

Starlight quickened her stride, so stiff it looked like she might fall over. She nearly collided with Spike as she rounded a corner.

"Woah!" Spike jumped out of the way, pulling a cart laden with pancakes. "Is everything alright up here? I heard some voices getting raised..." He squinted at Papyrus. "New guy? Should I know you?"

"He's not on Twilight's guest list, and he's definitely not on mine," Starlight said, resuming her retreat. "If you find any reason at all to banish him from the premises, or send him straight to Tartarus, you'll get no complaints from me."

She stalked off in a rush, leaving Spike glancing around, confused. "What was that about?"

"Old family friend," Papyrus explained, casting a reluctant gaze after Starlight. "Long story..."

Faye frowned, trying to get a deeper read on Papyrus than his flippant mask, but he was harder than most ponies to parse. She desperately wanted to pin him down and question him for hours, but if the premise of his story was true...

She glanced between him and Spike. High Prince Gazelle was supposed to be a notorious criminal as far as Equestria was concerned. Spike directly served one of Equestria's princesses. This situation could quickly go in a direction that involved Papyrus getting locked up far beyond her reach.

Did she really care, though?

Spike looked Papyrus up and down. "Should I go wake up Twilight to deal with this?" He glanced at Faye and Corsica. "Or is he a friend of yours? Because Starlight doesn't usually run off for no reason..."

"Don't bother," Papyrus said, raising a wing and leaning back against the open window. "I'm just on my way out anyway."

He let himself tip over backwards, out the window, and was gone.

On a hill in the distance that offered a good view of Twilight's castle, Discord lounged in a tree, crocheting a sweater with three front sleeves.

He watched idly as a figure swooped away from the castle, hugging the ground and beating a swift trajectory. Eventually, Papyrus crested the hill and landed, not bothering to straighten his mane.

Discord raised a single eyebrow. "I see you're still in one piece."

Papyrus shrugged. "Was that part ever in question? She couldn't kill me back then, she couldn't do it now." He sighed. "Still, I have to admit: that was less fun than I thought it would be."

Discord clacked his crochet needles together as he worked. "Were you really doing that for fun?"

"Among other reasons." Papyrus looked back at the castle. "But I'm lucky I don't care anymore about what she had to say. Because if I did, I would have been disappointed."

"Said the stallion who's clearly not disappointed," Discord lazily countered. "For someone who wasn't doing it for fun, to further a cause or because they cared, you certainly came a long way to give her a piece of your mind."

"Put a sock in it." Papyrus turned his back on Discord. "I still did care when I joined up with that crew for the mountain crossing. And perhaps we're just drawn to each other by morbid curiosity. But what really ticks me off is that someone so vindictive, so determined to get in the last word, and with so much power... is still, after all these years, a desolate slug. I deserved to have lost to someone who was going places in the world, didn't I?"

"Did you?" Discord asked, disinterested.

"Shut up. Who asked you?" Papyrus narrowed his eyes at the castle. "She could probably beat you to a pulp. She beat me. And what's she doing with all that power? Pressing her agenda, changing the world? I was ready to meet a hero or a conqueror or an angel or any number of paths an ambition like that could have taken someone down, and instead I heard the most feeble tirade about how the only reason she hasn't gone back to look for her friends is because she's too scared of having to show a little backbone! All that power, that fanatical determination, and she's squandering it!"

Discord kept on crocheting. "Sounds like someone's jealous."

"Better a world with someone in charge than one left to the aimless bickering of insignificant powers," Papyrus spat. "Say what you like about the mess I left behind, at least I tried to make of the world what I wanted. But why was she so dead-set on stopping me from having my way if she didn't have any plans of her own? Did she stop me purely out of spite? Was she a higher power, fated to oppose me? All I know for certain is what she's done with twenty years of uncontested supremacy: absolutely nothing."

Discord rolled his eyes. "So much for not caring about what she had to say."

Papyrus gritted his teeth.

"By the by," Discord added, "did you happen to get 'her blessing' on whatever it was you were planning on doing next? Because last I heard, that was the present rationale on risking the wrath of Starlight and Equestria's royalty alike, yet I'm still in the dark about whatever it is you're even planning."

Papyrus sighed. "Well, not killing me does count as implicit approval in certain jurisdictions. But I didn't happen to mention my plans, either." He looked away. "Why did I keep my memories? She brought back Gwendolyn, too, and she remembers nothing. But that's not the case for me. If we were meant to have a chance at normal lives, so be it. But how could that be the case when I remember every sin, every lie and every conquest? Even after finally facing her again, I can't understand a bit of what she was thinking."

Discord shrugged, returning to his crocheting.

When Faye finally found Starlight, full of pancakes and empty of answers, it was in the castle's kitchen, snacking on leftovers and looking like her thoughts were anywhere but here.

Starlight glanced up. "You again," she said, returning to her meal.

"Too soon?" Faye asked. "I can come back later. Just..."

"Just wanted to ask how I could be getting followed by an undead sphinx?" Starlight guessed. "Or did you already know about him?"

"I knew him," Faye said. "But I didn't know what he was. He knew a lot of strange stuff about the old Griffon Empire - or at least he claimed to - and was vague about how he knew it. But a historical figure coming back from the dead isn't my first guess for why someone would know about history." She hesitated. "He said you brought one of your friends back from the dead, too. Is that true? Can you really do that?"

Starlight sighed, and her ears fell. "The universe is never going to leave me alone, is it?"

Faye took a step back. "I can ask Twilight instead..."

"I've never brought someone back from the dead," Starlight said. "But I do have a different definition from most ponies of what counts as being all the way gone. And a different understanding of what it means to be alive, as well." She looked at her drink. "Life is fragile. It's for the best that you don't think too hard about where it comes from, or where it goes, or why anyone would want to meddle in those processes."

"I think I've got a pretty good idea of that already," Faye pointed out, remembering Lilith's determination to find a new way to create more batponies, and her own desperation to save Ansel and Corsica from the avalanche.

"Most ponies have wanted to," Starlight said. "Have you ever known someone who was pregnant, or had very young foals?"

Faye frowned. "Not closely, no."

"Life comes from other life," Starlight said. "You had parents. Even someone like me had parents. Creating new people is something only done by the most powerful of creator gods... or by most of the creatures in the world, living their ordinary lives and starting families. It's both miraculous and mundane, two sources that are as different as you can possibly imagine... but only until you try to imagine otherwise. What if Princess Luna, in creating batponies, was playing by the same set of rules through which millions of other ponies in this world were born? What if you could understand those rules? What if the formation of a soul, if its process of bonding to a new body growing inside a womb, was something you could interact with and manipulate?"

Faye listened, still.

"I can't tell you where new souls come from," Starlight went on. "And I can't tell you where they go when their body dies and the time comes to move on. But I do know how to interrupt that flow, tether them to this world and hold onto them without needing a body. And I know how to put them back together again, and how to give an old soul to a new infant body instead of allowing nature to take its course. It's not healthy knowledge to fixate on. Thinking too hard about using it, you'd only be standing in the way of time's inevitable course. But in Gazelle's case, he was under a curse. He had lost everything. He wanted to die. And I just didn't want to let it end that way."

"So you killed him, and then captured his soul?" Faye asked. "And... then he was born again in Riverfall?"

"I gave it to a friend whom I trusted to use it well," Starlight said. "And not just him. His sister, too."

Faye looked at the floor in thought. Being able to do a thing like that... Where would it end? You could save someone from certain death, but would have to be present to do it. And to put them back together, you'd have to wait decades for them to grow up again. Or was there a way to do it if you still had their original body?

"Fugue, you see, is a locus of my power," a memory of Coda's voice said. "Touching it would expose you to the raw emotional suction that contains feelings within me, the power of which is great enough that it could very well devour your soul in its entirety. Of course, should that happen, I would possess all the necessary pieces to put you back together again, so you would be alright in the end aside from a brief experience of being dead."

Had Coda been speaking accurately there? Could what she described work on the same principle as what Starlight just said she could do? Presumably, whatever Starlight did was done using her Flame of Harmony powers... but, as a changeling queen, was there a chance Faye could do it too?

She had a degree of control over Halcyon, after all, who was potentially a piece of her own soul. What if she could do that to others? Applying the principle Coda had warned her about, in which a changeling queen's emotional suction could theoretically tear her apart by separating-

Faye squeezed her eyes shut, trying to halt that train of thought. Starlight was right. She probably was missing dozens of pieces, but it really was possible for a sufficiently special pony to figure out how to cheat death. Or maybe she wasn't, given what had really happened two and a half years ago, the side of the truth she had still never shared with Halcyon...

Either way, changeling queens were a product of the blunders of mortal scientists. If she thought of herself as a tool to be used by other ponies, rather than a pony herself - which was probably how Coda's cult thought of Coda when creating her - then anyone could do this.

What would the world look like if every last one of its ponies could stand in the way of death like that? She didn't know anyone who wouldn't jump at the opportunity, but everything would be completely different. And just trying to imagine how felt wrong, in some way.

...Actually, she did know one pony who would try to turn down the opportunity. Starlight.

"I think I get it," Faye said, looking up at last. "Why you feel like you're on a slippery slope, and if you dig too deep or reach too far, the things you let yourself reach for will grow faster than your ability to obtain them and you'll never know peace. Because if you can save your best friend that way, why not save an acquaintance? Why not save anyone around you? Why not make an effort to be in as many places as possible, to predict the future so you'll always be where you're needed? And that's just one of the things you can do. Isn't it?"

"Sounds like you do." Starlight bowed her head. "And then?"

"...But listen to yourself for a moment." Faye straightened up. "Do you realize how reasonable you just made it sound, cheating death? Like you can just decide you want to do this, and boom, you find a way?"

"I explained this to you earlier," Starlight sighed. "That's how my power works. If I have a goal I'm pursuing, it can't become impossible... with the exception of wanting to do nothing and be left alone. It doesn't come with a guarantee I can get there. Usually, I'll only make it halfway before the goalposts are moved again. But for me, there's always a way."

"We need that power," Faye said. "Stopping Chrysalis and the windigoes? Rekindling the Kindness flame? We need a way forward. Starlight, please..."

"I want to be alone right now," Starlight grunted. "I've had an unpleasant morning, and you already have your way. Go visit Laughter with Twilight and Rainbow Dash. They've got no compulsions about going back there..."

Faye gritted her teeth, turned around and walked away.

Panting from the run there, Corsica crested a hill on Ponyville's outskirts, fairly sure it was the place she had seen Papyrus stop in the distance. Odds were, he wouldn't still be there, and she really didn't feel like burning a use of her talent to change that. But as long as she framed this in her mind as a little morning exercise, it was still possible to push herself to get there.

And there he was. She checked herself to ensure she hadn't accidentally used her talent anyway, but felt mostly sort of fine.

"Well, well," Papyrus said, leaning against a tree. "Not every day you come looking for me on purpose."

"Excuse you, I was just out for a morning run," Corsica countered. "Not my fault I ran into your supposedly-undead corpse." She leaned on one leg. "So were you just taking the 'I'm Gazelle' joke to a slightly worrying level in order to torment an already unstable unicorn, or are you actually a forty-something stallion pretending to be a teenager for kicks and giggles?"

"What's it to you?" Papyrus asked. "Frankly, I've got nothing to lose from just telling you, but I'm slightly sour that meeting wasn't a bit more eventful and not in a particularly friendly mood."

"You need to sling some dirty insults, I can give as good as I get," Corsica offered. "I just wanna know whether I might be on any intelligence agencies' lists of suspected bad guys for associating with you."

Papyrus kicked a leg. "You got on that the moment Egdelwonk hired you, I'm afraid. Regardless, you're a chauvinistic dandy with a dumb mane. And you're fat, too."

"Somewhere between not applicable and false," Corsica said. "You're a nerd who can't bench fifty pounds and has never kissed a mare. Feel any better?"

"Guilty as charged. And somehow, I do!" Papyrus grinned. "So, gonna ask the obvious question?"

"I already did," Corsica pointed out. "And you changed the subject."

Papyrus whistled innocently.

"Gazelle?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "And if so, how?"

"That's what they all say," Papyrus groaned. "Are you really going to make me tell my second life's story to you? What's in this for me?"

"If you keep dragging this out, I could go ask Starlight instead," Corsica pointed out. "She clearly had something to do with it."

Papyrus sighed. "I'm a Riverfall colt. Second youngest out of a brood of five. Single mother, which is ordinary there, actually raised by her instead of in a community pool, which isn't. I like boats, martial arts, scary stories, spicy food, singing loudly in the streets at night, and my favorite color is purple. When I was thirteen, I got written up in school for convincing every other student in my class to mirror their seating arrangement for a day and then gaslighting the teacher to make them think we had always been that way. My first-"

"I didn't actually want your life's story," Corsica interrupted. "Just the part about who you used to be, and how that connects with the scrawny bum you are now."

Papyrus looked at her with lidded eyes. "Then you shouldn't have been so passive-aggressive when I offered to tell you my life's story."

"Forget this," Corsica said, turning to leave. "I'll go hear it from Starlight instead."

"I've got no clue how I was reincarnated," Papyrus called out as she was leaving. "I didn't even find out that's what this was until I left home for Ironridge."

"See?" Corsica turned around with a smirk. "That wasn't so difficult." Her face straightened, and she sat down. "What do you mean?"

Papyrus sighed. "My birth was a documented event, with papers. One of the few in Riverfall that ever was, so be grateful. In hindsight, everyone must have known I was going to be special, and was paying attention from before the beginning."

Corsica settled in, no longer making jabs now that she was finally getting somewhere.

"I have one younger sister," Papyrus went on. "A year and a half my junior. Adorable thing, very precious. At some point between her birth and me being old enough to speak properly, I started having a recurring nightmare in which she turned to dust right before my eyes, over and over again."

"You remember something from when you were that young?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"Don't try too hard to understand it," Papyrus encouraged. "You'll hurt your brain. Now, it turns out the original Gazelle had a little sister too, and she died in exactly the same way I saw in my nightmares. Poof. Turned to dust. It was arguably the most traumatic event in his entire life, beating out the time his parents were assassinated, or the time Valey and Starlight beat him to a well-deserved bloody pulp and left him in the bottom of a muddy ditch, or even the time he learned in a forbidden library that all sphinxes were gods on the same level as Garsheeva, and her regime was merely structured in a way to prevent them from amassing the power to challenge her. All of those were moments that also started cropping up in my nightmares."

Corsica nodded. "That's rough, buddy."

"The older I got, the more varied those dreams became," Papyrus explained. "Or perhaps they were varied from the beginning, and I was too young to remember all but the most important. I always kept quiet about these, though. Younger me was cunning enough to realize that dreams like these weren't normal, and it was better to hide something like that from everyone else in my life. Now, Riverfall didn't have the kinds of resources I needed to realize I was dreaming about the life of a historical figure, especially since the post-collapse Empire was such a difficult place to study. But I noticed other things that were amiss."

Corsica listened, noting that he actually seemed to enjoy telling this.

"For one, there was a doctor from Ironridge who came to give my sister and I monthly check-ups," Papyrus carried on. "Compulsive note-taker. Asked all sorts of bizarre questions, which in hindsight must have been psychological exams to see if we had any sort of the mania or personality flips emblematic of sphinxes. But that's what made me even more certain I was special, because he paid the same kind of attention to my sister, and I'm all but certain she suffered none of these dream-memories I relived my past life through."

He waved a hoof. "Anyway, one day I did what all Riverfall colts who think they're something special do, and hoofed it for Ironridge. And soon I found myself being stealthily stalked by a pegasus with a familiar demeanor who called herself Unless. You know who Unless really is, right?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Valey?"

"See, you're smart," Papyrus said. "Or she told you. Probably the latter. I had some memory-dreams on my side, and rustled her faster than you can blink. And the threat of spilling the beans on her double identity was good enough to prompt an exchange of information, and lo and behold, here I am now."

Corsica looked him up and down. "Huh."

"Before you ask, I wasn't supposed to keep my memories," Papyrus told her, pointing a hoof at her forehead. "No one has figured that one out yet, not even me... unless Starlight knows, but I doubt she's telling. My sister didn't keep hers. She doesn't even recognize the name 'Gwendolyn'. If I didn't remember, perhaps this would be a blessing, a chance to live a life out from under the shadow of my old body and station. For her, it certainly is, and that's why she's back in Riverfall, not allowed to be a part of this adventure."

"So Valey stomped you in your old life, knew who you were after you came back, and still hung out with you in the dumpster corps?" Corsica asked, skeptical. "All the history I've heard made it sound like you two didn't get along. Not that I've heard all that much."

Papyrus shrugged. "We had an understanding, back in Ironridge. She kept a close eye on me to ensure I wouldn't do anything truly psychotic, and I... didn't do anything truly psychotic. Unfortunately, mystery reincarnation can't cure being a jerk, but sphinxes were substantially worse than that. These things..." He patted his special talent. "For ponies, they're a sign of your greatest strength. For sphinxes, they were a sign of your greatest weakness. It was every sphinx's lot in life to inevitably sabotage that which they cared most about in their pursuit of it. The ones that went down in history as good rulers had flaws that merely stayed out of the way of that. And the ones that didn't were numerous."

"What's yours do?" Corsica asked.

Papyrus gave her a sly grin. "Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Not if it's going to involve doing this old dance again," Corsica pushed back. "So are you glossing over the part of how you actually came back because you don't know, or just want to listen to me asking twenty-eight more times?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Why? Got a dead somebody you'd want to bring back, sans memories, as your biological child? That's kind of weird, don't you think?"

Corsica frowned. "No. I'm just curious. This isn't exactly something that normally happens."

Papyrus gave her a wink. "Perfect, because if you did it would still be impossible for multiple reasons. Besides, kids these days have too much trouble deciding what they're doing to do with their lives when they haven't been given an undeserved second chance at it. No need to foist that burden on more of us."

After a moment, he added, "Speaking of which, if you were me, what would you do next?"

"What do you mean?" Corsica shrugged.

"Well, I've just completed my new life's goal," Papyrus pointed out. "First I was trying to figure out why I was having those dreams, and once I did, I wanted to find Starlight and ask her what could have possibly possessed her to spare me. After all, I didn't have any other plans, and if she had some plan for me, that would save me the trouble of deciding what to do with myself. But she doesn't. And my goal in my previous life - paving the way for my sister to have a perfect existence - is basically already accomplished, too. Sphinxes toiled for two thousand years to break free from the curse of their existence, Garsheeva included, and Starlight solved it just like that, because she couldn't stand the idea of me getting to go out on my own terms."

Corsica nodded.

"So what next?" Papyrus shrugged. "I've got no continent-spanning inheritance, no god powers, and no psychosis to sabotage whatever I apply myself to. I've also had the clock wound back nicely on my lifespan, have plenty of potent skills, am irredeemably rude, and would instantly be imprisoned anywhere in Equestria or the Griffon Empire if I could manage to convince the wrong person I really am who I am. What do I do with myself?"

"What do you do with yourself?" Corsica leaned in. "Assuming you're telling the truth about all this, which, you're just crazy enough that I believe it..."

Papyrus preened a wing. "Well, theoretically, I could go take over the Griffon Empire a second time. I did it once before, after all, and now unification could actually be a good thing. Or I could stay here and pester Starlight, because the idea of someone as passive as her getting the last word really rubs my feathers the wrong way. Or I could wander the world in search of a new cause, perhaps try to clean up some loose ends from my previous life. No ideas from you, eh?"

"Sorry." Corsica shrugged. "My first idea would be for you to go stop the war between Ironridge and Yakyakistan, but that's probably out of your league."

Papyrus groaned. "That would be my first idea too, but for once I might be a little outmatched. Just a bit. It does sound fun though." He licked his lips.

"By the way," Corsica said. "Still Papyrus? Or Gazelle, now that you've put this out there?"

"Still Papyrus, if you please," Papyrus replied. "Dreams or no, I feel at least some disconnect my old life, and jokes aside my old name has some unfortunate baggage in these lands. Although, come to think of it, I do love calling Senescey by her old name, so I suppose I couldn't blame you too much if you had a slip of the tongue..."

"Nah. Unlike you, I respect my friends' names." Corsica stood up. "...Is this the first time you've ever told anyone all this, by the way?"

"Of course." Papyrus yawned. "I couldn't very well go telling anyone my goals and motives before I've fulfilled them. Don't you remember Egdelwonk's code of conduct?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You still care about that?"

Papyrus chuckled. "It's more useful than it sounds. Run along now. I'm sure you have plenty of stuff more interesting to do than getting harassed by me, and I've finished my story, which means I need a new way to entertain myself."

"Right," Corsica said, trotting away. "I'll leave you to it..."

A Round Table Meeting

Talk of Papyrus spread faster than Faye was expecting, and by the time the sun was properly up, Twilight had convened a meeting to discuss what to do about him.

She sat in the castle's throne room, a huge, cylindrical chamber taking up multiple floors at the center of the building. In the very middle was a crystalline table that looked exactly like the one down in Convergence's chapel, and around it were six thrones, each one decorated with one of the elements' special talents. But since most of those friends hadn't arrived yet, the spare thrones were filled by Faye, Corsica, Starlight and Seigetsu instead, with only Twilight and Rainbow Dash getting proper claim to their chairs.

Faye herself got the Honesty throne. She couldn't call it a good match.

"Right," Twilight said, putting her forehooves and wings on the table and looking like she had skipped both breakfast and her morning shower. "So, apparently, High Prince Gazelle was in my castle this morning, and nobody even thought to prepare me for the possibility he might still be alive?" Her gaze was fixed purely on Starlight.

Starlight still looked weary, but at least now like she was expecting this. "I told you, I caught his and Lyn's cutie marks before finishing him off, remember?"

Twilight frowned.

Rainbow dug around in her ear with a hoof. "That... might ring a bell? There was kind of a lot going on at that point in your story."

"Well, maybe I remember that," Twilight admitted. "But I definitely don't remember you saying what you did with them after that."

Starlight looked away. "I was already worried you were going to drag me back to the north because you didn't think my reason for leaving my friends was good enough. I didn't want to tell you those two might have come back in case it gave you any more reason to go there than you already had. And remember, Gazelle is an Equestrian criminal. As a Princess, it would have been your job to do something about him. And even if you felt like neglecting your duty, Princess Cadence was listening at the time as well."

Spike cleared his throat. "So, as someone who didn't spend twenty hours a day for a whole week listening to every in and out of Starlight's story, and ignoring the fact that you're talking about coming back from the dead like that's just something that happens around here..." He tapped his claws together hesitantly. "Mind filling me in on exactly what this guy did?"

"According to the reports that reached our borders," Seigetsu cut in, "he attacked a school on an island off Equestria's eastern seaboard. The damage included injuries to roughly five students, two of which required hospital stays, as well as the vandalization and near total destruction of a historical archive."

Spike glanced at her. "You sure know a lot about something that happened so far away."

Seigetsu shrugged. "When a world leader is the one committing a crime, it tends to cause quite a stir. Especially since the incident in question was influential on Equestrian border policy, and my people are effectively charged with maintaining a segment of that border. I do not doubt that there were additional details and circumstances I am not privy to. However, my knowledge should be in line with what any member of the public could have, were they old enough or had a mind to know."

"Accurate enough." Starlight nodded.

"I find it hard to believe he'd grow an altruistic spirit overnight," Twilight said. "I'm all for giving second chances, but if he's dangerous to the ponies of Ponyville, I can't just leave him out there and hope nothing goes wrong. At the very least we need to get him back here so we can talk to him and see what he has to say for himself."

"Probably just insults," Corsica added. "Maybe a joke about who you are or aren't dating. I've known him for over a month now. He's pretty rude."

Everyone looked to her.

"Not saying he doesn't deserve to get dragged before the authorities," Corsica went on. "Or that I'll vouch for his behavior. But I tracked him down after he showed up here this morning, and he seemed like he hadn't planned out what to do after this."

"You followed him?" Twilight pressed. "How did you track him down?"

Corsica shrugged. "Watched where he went. Was still there when I caught up."

"Here's an important question, though," Rainbow cut in. "Suppose we do catch him, and he's still evil. What then? We could fight him, and Starlight especially could kick his rear, but she made it sound like he was strong enough that doing so would tear this place up more than the Tirek incident."

Twilight blanched.

"He's not that strong anymore," Starlight said. "He's just a normal pegasus. I'm sure he knows how to fight and could take any of you in a one-on-one, except maybe Twilight. But he won't cause craters doing it, shouldn't have any spiky breath lasers, and can't eat your cutie marks."

Rainbow raised an eye. "Yeah, but you haven't seen him since you squashed him, right? For that matter, I'm assuming you made him into a moon glass foal, right? Have you ever even seen one of those after they're born, at all? I'm just saying, he could have anything up his sleeve."

Starlight hesitated for long enough that it was clear she hadn't considered this. "Fine. If you aren't confident you can handle him and want him brought in, I'll take care of it."

"Moon glass foal?" Faye tilted her head. The stuff Elise had mentioned could be used as a changeling detector? "What-?"

Starlight vanished in a blink of teleportation.

Everyone looked at each other. After barely a minute, just as Rainbow looked ready to break the awkward silence, Starlight appeared again, Papyrus held captive above her in a chunk of floating crystal.

"There you go," Starlight said, levitating the crystal over to Twilight. "Now what?"

Twilight looked like she legitimately hadn't expected this.

"You can just get up, track someone down, and haul them back that fast, huh?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Sounds useful."

Starlight looked uncomfortable. "When you've lived through certain circumstances, you know how to hurry. Now if I release him, can you do what you need to? Trapping someone in crystal is not a long-term solution to a problem."

Twilight nodded, still looking slightly unprepared. Rainbow leaned in, ready for a fight.

Starlight released the crystal, and it disappeared in a flash, depositing Papyrus on the table. He glanced around at all the attention.

"Well, this is a little more like it. I guess." He gave a bored yawn. "You there. Purple one, frumpy mane, face that looks like a low-level bureaucrat who's too new to realize how much their job stinks yet. You're the one who gave the order to haul me in?"

Twilight blinked owlishly at him. "I'm lavender, not purple. And my mane only looks like this because I got out of bed to come deal with reports that my palace was broken into by a notorious criminal. And I like my job, thank you very much."

Papyrus pointed a feather at her. "Systematically denying every insult that comes your way? That's going to make you frighteningly easy to play with, you know. Have you considered getting some thicker skin to go with the fake wings?" He grinned, and added in a stage whisper, "Major dedication for wearing those on the job, by the way. Makes you look slightly more imposing. And in your sleep as well! Color me impressed."

Corsica gaped at him. "Do you have no sense of self-preservation?"

Twilight reddened. "Look, I'm a real alicorn. Now are you or aren't you High Prince Gazelle, and if so, what are you doing back in Equestria? Or alive at all?"

Papyrus gave himself a surprised look. "Me? High Prince... Didn't that guy die twenty years ago?" His fake stupefaction continued for a moment longer, and then he perked up. "I mean, yes, that's me! I'm also a half alicorn, and an honorary member of the Holy Cernial Convocation. Would you like to buy a used wagon?"

Twilight fumbled for words. "What? No, I... Look, Starlight said...!"

Papyrus flashed her a toothy grin. "First time interrogating someone who could fight back, eh?"

Twilight glared at him. "If it's a fight you want, I don't have to hear your side of the story. And you are rapidly burning through my willingness to give you a chance."

"Alright, buddy." Rainbow Dash stepped up. "Let's do things this way: you're mouthing off to an Equestrian princess. Convince us to not throw you in a dungeon."

Papyrus raised a lazy eyebrow. "Do you want an earnest explanation, or is this just another invitation for me to toy with someone who's too soft for their own good?"

Rainbow and Twilight both stared levelly at him.

"Well, for one," Papyrus began, "you're horrifically incompetent and clearly need my help and cooperation to become less so. For two, you've caught me at a time when I'm in between major schemes, and actually have no reason to avoid prison. Three, I doubt you have a prison that could hold me anyway, and four, do you even hear yourselves with these charges you're throwing around? Next you'll be telling me I'm friends with a windigo."

Rainbow frowned. "This is kind of putting me in the 'throw him in a dungeon' camp, not gonna lie..."

Twilight groaned and shook her head. "Starlight, do you mind...?"

Starlight sighed, once again locking Papyrus inside a hunk of crystal and shaking her head. Within the crystal, Papyrus smirked.

"That wasn't quite how I was planning for that to go," Twilight griped, rubbing her face with her wingtips. "Is it common for ponies up north to treat each other so rudely?"

"No offense," Corsica said, "but accusing someone of being a long-dead criminal mastermind is pretty out there. Even if it's true. I'm guessing you've never been in a position of power before over a smooth-talker with nothing to lose?"

Twilight sheepishly winced. "Fine. I admit it! I'm new to this. Go ahead and tell me how much of a fool I am for giving him a chance. But I've had enough ponies actually take that chance that it's still worth offering, okay?"

"If it makes you feel better, you're not the only ones he's rude to," Faye said, squinting at Papyrus. "Still, you'd think he'd show at least a little decorum in the face of a nation's leader. Unless he's resigned himself to his fate and is having as much fun as he can on his way out, which would be like him..."

Seigetsu watched the proceedings with the expression of someone who came to watch a historical documentary and was instead treated to a comedy laced with adult fear.

Twilight gingerly glanced at her. "Have you got any ideas how to handle this?"

Seigetsu nodded. "Generally, justice systems don't drag defendants into courthouses immediately following their arrests in order to avoid this precise sort of thing. There is a waiting period involving the serving of an indictment, the gathering of evidence and the building of a case, with trained detectives who know how to keep their cool around a defendant who is uncooperative. And while you did an admirable job of keeping your composure given the circumstances, I trust you can now see why such training is required."

She glanced up at the crystal. "As for your captive, Equestrian law is admittedly murky on the status of criminal offenders who have passed away, but as a princess and given the circumstances I think most of the judiciary would be sympathetic to your decision to impound him. Beyond this, your position as princess affords you broad powers to grant clemency to offenders. Interviewing the accused and affording them a chance to influence your judgement is well within your rights. However, I think this stallion has made his stance on that rather clear, and unless he has a change of heart you have nothing further to do here."

Twilight looked caught between embarrassment and admiration. "I... knew all that."

Rainbow just looked impressed. "How do you know all that?"

Seigetsu gave her a look. "Have you forgotten what my job is?"

Twilight sighed. "As nice as it is to get a first-hoof lesson in how much experience I still need with certain aspects of ruling, and as wonderfully liberating as it was to do it in a room full of people I only met two days ago, we still have to figure out what to do with Gazelle. First off..." She turned to Starlight. "Given how he reacted, I believe it, but are we absolutely, one hundred percent, beyond a doubt certain that this is he?"

Starlight glanced up at the crystal. "Yes. Also, he's politely trying to get out. And these crystals aren't soundproof, so he can hear everything we're saying."

Twilight bit her lip.

Faye glanced around. If Halcyon were here, she'd probably be upset at this distracting from the more important conversation: what to do about the flame, and Ironridge. But out of everyone here... Corsica had no love lost between her and Papyrus. Twilight and Rainbow Dash clearly had no idea how to handle this. Seigetsu had no stake in the proceedings going fast. And who knew what Papyrus was thinking?

This could last all day.

She cleared her throat, realizing it was up to her to intervene on the behalf of Halcyon's goals. "Look, how about this? Corsica and I knew him from back in Ironridge, and Seigetsu's a professional. None of us can afford to waste time sending him to jail or hauling him through a justice system for what he did back then, at least if we can avoid it. Why don't the rest of you step away for a moment, and see if between the three of us we can... I dunno, talk some sense into him?"

Seigetsu eyed her. "To what end?"

Faye had an answer to this. "Me and Corsica know him. He's been at least formally on our side for the entire journey here. You literally hosted us in Snowport, you know this. And if he really is someone who fought Starlight a long time ago, he might have a better understanding than any of us of what makes her tick, and how to motivate her again."

Starlight blanched. "I'm right here, you know."

Twilight, however, looked conflicted. "And you three can handle yourselves if anything goes wrong?"

"I have substantial training in multiple martial styles," Seigetsu promised. "And many contingencies besides that."

Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "If you three can school him, I kind of want to watch..."

"No," Starlight said, getting up, "you don't. I'm going to Sugarcube Corner to pretend like my peaceful life here isn't falling to pieces, and if you're smart, you'll come with me. He'll be free as soon as I leave this room, and whoever stays here, he'll be your problem then."

Faye stayed put. So did Corsica. Spike glanced around the room before getting up to leave, and with a dirty sigh Twilight dragged Rainbow along, the door slamming behind them.

Instantly, the crystal around Papyrus broke once again. He looked somewhere between relieved and disappointed.

"You mystify me," Seigetsu told him, motioning for Faye and Corsica to leave this to her.

Papyrus gave a distracted nod. "It's what I do."

Seigetsu wasn't finished. "You remember our dealings in Snowport. You recall that I was aware of your identity for much of this time, but agreed to keep my silence about it in exchange for your cooperation on the Aegis matter. Although I owe fealty to Equestria's monarchy, my duty to Cernial takes precedence in times of conflict. With your cooperation I could have extricated you from almost any situation, or at least given you the chance to flee. And yet you seemed determined to convict yourself independently of all that by mouthing off to a princess. Have you lost all desire to live?"

Papyrus blinked at her. "Oh right, I did have that on you! Silly me for forgetting." He rolled his shoulders, looking downcast. "I just figured my time had come and I might as well get in one last laugh on my way out. Forgive me if I've had a lot to think about."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Asking forgiveness? That's not like you. Also, your insults seemed a little lamer than usual today."

Papyrus sighed. "I'm off my game, thank you for noticing." He shot a glance at Seigetsu. "And are you certain you want to be talking plainly about all the things we had going from Snowport? If that puffy princess has this place bugged, you're going to lose a world of trust with her, which unlike me, you actually have."

Seigetsu tapped a claw. "I did not get the impression that she was the kind of pony who would think to do a thing like that. And if she is, perhaps she will learn a valuable lesson from overhearing me. My own lifespan is far shorter than that of an alicorn, and her office is higher than mine, so I think it beneficial to both our nations if she learns at my expense."

"That's a twisted worldview you've got right there," Papyrus said. "Not that I've got room to be talking. So... you think I can goad Starlight into getting back on her hooves and helping out with your plan." His gaze rolled over to Faye. "What's in it for me?"

Faye blinked. "You're making this a transaction? What do you even want? Until this morning, I thought you were just a weirdo who was following us around for secret reasons, but now I'm even less sure what those reasons are."

Papyrus gave her a lazy grin. "Well, I could make demands, but why don't you hit me with an offer instead?"

"That's a trick question," Corsica dryly cut in. "You don't want anything. In fact, you have no idea what to do with yourself now that you've finally tracked down your old nemesis, and the height of her reaction was to go away."

Papyrus rolled his eyes. "Thanks for ruining the joke early. But she's right, you know." He motioned to Corsica, still staring at Faye. "The 'secret reason' I followed you all this way was to scare Starlight silly when I saw her again. Ever since I found out who and what I really was, I've been living for one reason alone: to hunt her down one more time. Partly to see the look on her face. Partly to learn why she brought me back. And now all my worst fears are confirmed: she had no plan whatsoever. And that makes me presently unemployed."

"Which means there's nothing stopping you from helping us," Faye pointed out.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Nothing stopping me from hindering you, either, and messing with people is usually more entertaining. But I'll hear you out. You're trying to sell me something to do, and that's exactly the sort of thing I'm looking for."

Faye bit her tongue. Convince him to help? An earnest, straightforward offer like that?

If only Halcyon was in the lead right now. She was the one who most cared about this mission.

"Well, if the windigoes get their way, they'll overrun the world, or worse," Faye tried. "And you saw what the sky looked like in the north. You've gotta have at least some investment in the continued well-being of the world when you live in it too."

"Eh. Maybe." Papyrus made a show of not caring. "Tip from a professional: don't try appealing on moral grounds to someone with a history like me. I'm directly or indirectly responsible for the slaughter of an entire race. If there exists such a thing as a cosmic scale to weigh your sins and virtues after life, I'll never be back in the green anyway... not that I can even find out when Starlight denies me the release of death."

Faye took a step back. "What do you mean, 'slaughter of an entire race?' Chrysalis-"

"Was bullied into doing what she did by none other than yours truly," Papyrus lazily interrupted. "The school incident everyone likes talking about, that was small time mischief. I'm sure you've heard all about the things Chrysalis did after she snapped, but did you ever bother to learn why she lost her marbles?"

"She's got real power, alright. And she's got blood on her hooves, insomuch as her existence was the catalyst that sent Chrysalis off the deep end... Way ol' Howe's heard it, the thing that finally broke her was seeing that filly for the first time. See, her lover at the time was a griffon noble - friendly fellow, if a little desperate - and so she thought her kid would be a griffon, seeing as batponies always breed true. Guess they didn't realize she'd been made into something not a batpony anymore. He thought she cheated on him. She couldn't explain it. And she'd had a pretty bad life up until that point anyway, and just... snapped. Two leafy ears and two leathery wings, a new baby bat no one knew at the time was a queen herself, and a spark that burned a continent to the ground."

Howe's words from Ironridge echoed through Faye's mind, forcing a shiver. According to him, it had been Chrysalis's daughter - her - that finally lit the fire. She gritted her teeth, pushed back the memory and lifted her eyes to meet Papyrus. "Yeah. What of it?"

Papyrus looked intrigued. "Did you know Chrysalis used to be an ordinary bat? Crystal, they called her, forbidden consort of the Izvaldi province's regent? Did you know that for years, I used her as leverage to keep her star-crossed lover in line as my pawn? He needed that position to be far enough above the law that they could be together. Did you know her evil grandfather experimented on her for years, and I turned a blind eye so I could have him as a card in my pocket in case I needed to remind the other provinces why they hated sarosians? Did you know that when she finally attacked the Empire, it was me she came for?"

Faye took another step back.

"Did you know it was my machinations that allowed her such a military victory in the first place?" Papyrus pressed. "For months before that, I had been scheming, tricking royalty into assassinating one another, manipulating troop formations so they would be in position for me to take command of for my ultimate coup, with the entire half of the Empire's army I deemed least loyal stranded halfway across the world? Did you know that Valey and Starlight and their friends tried to help her escape the pressure and run away, and I kept dragging them, and by extension her, back in?"

He took a step forward, and Faye took a further step back. "Coda's cult said it was Coda who did it," she pushed back, ignoring the fact that it had really been her. "That... when Coda was born, because she was a batpony and batponies always breed true, Crystal's husband thought she had been unfaithful. Because he was a griffon."

"True," Papyrus said, a hungry gleam in his eyes, "all true. But who told Lord Percival sarosians always breed true? Who got dragged along by pure circumstance when Crystal was in labor? Who happened to be there when the foal was born? And who was it who laughed his fool head off during the moment of truth, who put two and two together for the anguished couple when they were coming to terms with what happened?"

Faye felt hollow. Corsica's brow was furrowed with concern and suspicion. Seigetsu had one hand halfway for her weapon.

Papyrus saw their reactions, and nodded to himself, satisfied. "Let you get the wrong idea, it wasn't pure hubris. I had noble intentions from the start, and even had some sense beaten into me eventually, though it was too late to matter. Even before I lost my old body, I was appalled at the things I had done, how far from my path I let myself go astray. But I was never alone. Up until the Empire's fall, one of its most closely guarded secrets was that sphinxes were fundamentally insane. Unstable creatures born from a bad blending of chaos and harmony, we had a tendency to corrupt the ideals closest to our identities. I wanted to conquer the fractious Empire and present it to my sister, clean and shining. And instead I destroyed it from the inside out."

He finally sat back. "Our history was bathed in blood. I was far from the first sphinx to commit atrocities after leading myself astray. Merely the last one to do it. And for all of that history, those few of us who knew about the curse in our bloodline dedicated every effort to breaking it, so that we could live and lead without betraying everything we held dear. And that's what really gets me about all this. Don't you see?"

He showed off his round, un-pawed hooves, his flat teeth, his ordinary ears and tail. "The curse is broken. Two thousand years, and the last of the sphinxes is finally free. No more mania. No more powers. And yet I still remember all of that blood-soaked history, and still feel every drop of the blood on my hooves."

Faye's stomach twisted. Papyrus was completely different from her, and yet their circumstances were far more similar than he knew.

Unless... did he know? He just said he had been there for her own birth. Presumably, he had seen her as an infant. And she looked nothing like Coda.

"You can't drag me into your crusade with talk of atonement or being a good guy," Papyrus finished, ignoring Corsica and Seigetsu and giving her an intense look. "None of that can ever bring back your people, or wash away the memories. They might have happened in a previous life, but it was still me, and I'm still a rude dude who's more at home scheming than making friends. The one thing I want... The only thing I want... is a reason to justify why I came back, why it was me instead of any one of the hundreds of thousands of more-deserving souls in Mistvale."

Seigetsu and Corsica might as well have not been there. This question was for Faye alone.

He had to know. Somehow.

So, she pulled off a boot, and showed him a blood-soaked leg.

"I don't have an answer to that," Faye said, old fears about showing her legs swirling in the distance, like the eye of a storm. "Maybe it's just random. Or maybe some higher power in the universe didn't feel like letting your race's story end like that. But I do know what it's like to search for a reason why you were the only one to survive. And if your sphinx curse played a role in what you did, I also know what it's like to have blood on your hooves, and not really know how much of it is your own fault. So if you come with me, and I do find that reason, I'll be sure to tell you my answer, as well."

Papyrus barked out a laugh. "I like your attitude, Butterfly! Unfortunately, you've been a pretty passive expedition leader thus far, and I'm liable to get bored if I hang out with your group for too much longer. But until that happens, I suppose I could refrain from mouthing off to the purple nerd and give Starlight a few small prods toward helping you. Provided you vouch for me so I don't get arrested or turned to princess paste by an angry alicorn laser."

Faye shook her head. "Whatever you say, pal."

"Well." Seigetsu straightened up. "I suppose that settles that."

"Hey, Papyrus," Corsica cut in. "Never thought I'd see an emotionally vulnerable side from you."

Papyrus flicked his tail in interest. "I can't say I'd call that particularly vulnerable, but I'm curious where you're going with this..."

"You realize," Corsica went on, "that if our positions were swapped and I was where you are right now, you'd be making a romance joke?"

Papyrus grew more interested. "Hankering for a little revenge? I didn't know you shared the sense of humor, but it's certainly a prime-"

Corsica punched him.

"Ow," Papyrus whispered, winded.

"I don't." Corsica winked. "That was for thinking about it."

Papyrus gave her a dirty look. "But you were the one who brought it up-"

Corsica punched him again. "That one was for goading someone into killing Halcyon's entire race." Then she tripped him with a hind leg. "That one was for still being aloof about it." Finally, she clubbed him over the head. "And that one was for good measure. Now: no more whining about who you used to be. You were helpful in Snowport, and you can do it again if you put your mind to it. But being a sphinx is something you can never do again. Your past might be a dumpster fire, but you've got no more curse saying what you can or can't do with your future, and some ponies here would kill to have it be that way around. Now stop wallowing!"

Papyrus stood up, smiling tenderly. "Point taken. But try that in a duel where I'm honor-bound to fight back, and you'll be singing a very different tune by the time we're through."

Corsica flipped her mane and strolled away.

"You have the most fascinating bonding rituals," Seigetsu remarked.

"You're not concerned that we're making friends instead of trying to lock him up like Twilight?" Faye asked her. "He did just confess to some pretty heinous crimes."

Seigetsu shrugged. "None that were committed under the jurisdiction of the Convocation. And I have little to lose in trusting you when my own abilities are sufficient to curb any further misbehavior. Besides, his crimes are much less recent than your own."

Right. Seigetsu was still her probation officer.

Maybe this would be a good time to ask for Halcyon back? Though, catching up the other part of herself after such an eventful two days would take some serious doing...

"But, if you are finished with your inquiries," Seigetsu said, still watching Papyrus. "Might I trouble you as to the exact mechanics of your reincarnation? As Special Inquisitor, I feel it is relevant to my job if others might utilize this method to escape the law."

Papyrus shrugged. "You know about moon glass, right?"

Faye tilted her head. Earlier, Rainbow mentioned something about a moon glass foal, and if it was about to become relevant...

"I'm quite familiar with it," Seigetsu agreed.

Faye cut her off. "Maybe the rest of us would benefit from an explanation?"

"If you don't know, consider yourself lucky," Papyrus said, waving a wing. "And get preemptively mad, because I'm about to tell you anyway. Moon glass is a black space rock that can give brands, or something resembling them, to blank ponies who carry it around."

Corsica nodded, as if she already knew this. But Faye's jaw dropped. "Seriously? I thought it was for killing batponies."

"Oh, it can do that, too," Papyrus explained. "Call it a special talent or a cutie mark or whatever else, but brands are tied somehow to a pony's soul. I don't follow the finer details, but the basic idea is that your kind have weaker links between those and their bodies than the rest of us. So a blank pegasus, earth pony or unicorn can pull a brand out of moon glass and take it as their own... but a piece of empty glass can pull the brand right out of a sarosian. Your mind goes with it. And that's how changelings are made."

Faye's eyes widened as she took this in. "So Chrysalis..."

"Was like a giant vacuum for these things." Papyrus nodded. "And, yes, this means you can bag a bat's brand and then stick it in a normal pony... or anyone else's brand, if you have the power to break a stronger bond. Starlight does. And that's what happened to me."

Faye squinted. "So you were re-bonded to a newborn, then? Or a foal who was still in-"

"To an ordinary, blank mare," Papyrus interrupted. "But that bond is even weaker than a sarosian's, and it's easy for the brand to go somewhere else. All you have to do is knock her up nice and good, wait out a year of partial possession by a demonic prince or whatever else have you, and boom! A newborn clone, soul bonded all nice and proper, sans race and usually memories, though apparently I'm an aberration on that front. Simple as that."

Seigetsu looked mildly disconcerted. "You make it sound awfully simple for something so... unnatural. I suppose that sarosians are rare in many areas of the world, knowledge spreads slowly and moon glass only appeared three decades ago. And I've spent considerably more time trying to confiscate this substance than getting to know ponies who have used it, let alone expectant mares. Yet still..."

Papyrus shrugged. "You declare things taboo when they break the 'natural order,' or fail to conform to your expected worldview. Can't fault someone more desperate than you for coming along, chaining those breaks together, and coming up with something even more outlandish. Need I remind you, Chrysalis herself was a byproduct of an attempt to make a machine that could create new gods."

"Hold up. What do you mean by partial possession?" Corsica asked. "You mean by having a talent that doesn't originally belong to her or came from a weird source, but has a soul attached, that mare essentially is, like... two people sharing the same body?"

A memory rose in Faye's mind of Lalala, with her miscolored eyes, claiming that was the sign of moon glass... and then it quickly faded as she realized the real reason Corsica was asking.

Faye swallowed. She knew what it was like, sharing headspace with others, but at least those others were actual parts of herself, split off by Unnrus-kaeljos' power. A situation like this would be more like her and Corsica sharing a body. Or her and Starlight. Or her and Papyrus...

"Pretty much," Papyrus confirmed. "Can't say I've ever tried moon glass myself... that I can remember. Although I recall my life as a deranged sphinx, I have no memories of sharing the mind of my mother."

Corsica squinted.

"Probably for the best, when you think about it," Papyrus cheerfully told her. "I'll bet the experience of being pregnant with yourself could give pretzel brain to even the most hardened philosopher."

"I really didn't need that mental image," Corsica sighed, shaking her head and walking away. "Either of those images."

"You're welcome!" Papyrus called, happily giving chase.

Fading Embers, Burning Sparks

The cheerful populace and sunny skies of Ponyville were not enough to get Papyrus's words out of Corsica's head, even as they left Twilight's castle behind and tried to catch up with the others.

According to him, there was some sort of bond between special talents and souls. That sounded feasible enough. For most ponies, at least ones who developed special talents rather than being born with them, the talent was closely tied to their identity, to who they were as a person.

Also according to him, there were ways to pull out special talents from ponies and move them around. That sounded outlandish, except it was also part of the reason she came to Equestria in the first place: rumors that Starlight could do just that. Corsica wasn't any closer to making a decision on the subject than she had been the last time she set hoof in Fort Starlight, but it was still an option. An ultimate, no-take-backs answer to how to live with a talent like hers: just don't live with it. Throw it away.

But would doing so cost her a part of her soul?

Corsica wasn't sure. This talent hadn't appeared on her flank in anything resembling a normal manner. It was also a talent that had existed on other ponies before she was even born, so the odds of it being attached to her in the usual way were incredibly low. But she also never felt like her mind was invaded by alien thoughts, so it probably didn't have another soul attached already. Supernatural weariness aside, the one time she could think of where her mind hadn't been her own was during her possession by Ludwig. And if that was what sharing a body with someone else felt like, she was beyond certain she wasn't doing it now.

...There had also been the time she was unconscious from talent overuse, and Coda tried to help by polluting her head with flattery and lust. But that definitely didn't count.

The rules and mechanics Papyrus described had to apply to her somehow. Her situation was too abnormal for these other edge cases not to be relevant. Was it possible that someone had used moon glass on her while she was comatose, recovering from the avalanche? Moon glass that contained a special talent with no soul attached?

Back in Icereach, during the Aldebaran incident, Elise had made her touch an empty piece of moon glass, she remembered. Ostensibly because any changeling would have known what it was and not touched it, but it had done nothing to her. Maybe empty moon glass could only steal loosely-attached special talents from batponies, and not from other ponies, even if they had loose bonds? It made sense, if blank ponies could pull special talents out from the glass...

But all this wrapped around to the one question Corsica was both morbidly curious about and really didn't like pondering: Papyrus said his reincarnation revolved around a blank mare receiving his special talent, soul still attached, and then getting pregnant and having it move into the new foal.

So what would happen if she got pregnant?

Would she lose her talent, and her foal be born with it instead? Would nothing happen? Would her foal be born with the talent and no soul at all, or would it reveal that she had been sharing with someone all along, and somehow never noticed? Or would the foal get the talent and a new soul, tightly-bound, even though her talent had apparently moved throughout history on its own up until now?

Corsica couldn't think of a situation where it would be useful to know the answer to a question like that. And she had no intention of ever finding out, talent or no. But even though it was just a thought exercise, it proved impossible to evict from her brain.

She did get a chuckle out of watching the other ponies out on the street, civilians chatting or shopping or walking between destinations. None of them, she could say with absolute certainty, were thinking about anything remotely as bizarre as she was. It was almost a good enough feeling to balance out the weirdness of thinking about this in the first place.

Just in case, she glanced over at her companions, trying to read their minds instead. Seigetsu was characteristically stoic and at attention, as if she was trying to memorize everything that passed her gaze. Papyrus was clearly scheming; even though she had called him out on it back in the castle, she didn't buy for one minute that he actually had nothing to do. In between goals, sure, but the thing about ponies who weren't her was that when they had nothing to do, boredom prompted them to change that. She doubted even accomplishing his life's goal could keep him down for long.

And then there was Faye.

Faye was deep in thought. Faye was bad at hiding when she was deep in thought, a trait she shared with Halcyon. Unlike with Halcyon, if Corsica asked, there was at least a twenty percent chance Faye would tell her part of what was on her mind. Optimistic guess.

Halcyon herself, Seigetsu was still keeping hostage in order to keep Faye in line. Part of Corsica resented that. Another part of her remembered it was she herself who turned Halcyon over to buy Faye's freedom, back in the Crystal Empire. She also remembered how that whole mess had been Halcyon's fault in the first place... and, before that, Halcyon incessantly ghosting her, leaving her in the dark and punting Faye up front to do the talking when she was completely cornered.

It had been long enough for Corsica to let herself start to forget how annoying that was. Only barely long enough - not even two days - but long enough, all the same, perhaps because today was shaping up to be a good day where brooding, existential dread and unwelcome blasts from the past visited the ponies around her instead of Corsica herself. She stole a glance at Faye's bracelet, a sure sign that a trade hadn't been completed while she wasn't looking, and sidled closer.

Maybe, since it was a good day, it was time to have a little fun.

"This is supposed to be your job, you know," she muttered under her breath, low enough that only Faye could hear.

"Eh?" Faye perked up, her ears trying and failing to point forward.

"Broaching conversation when one of us is brooding?" Corsica poked her. "I didn't expect you to let your other half stay on sabbatical so long. That's usually her thing."

Faye looked down. "Actually, I was just thinking about how to get her back."

"How?" Corsica blinked, realizing that this might actually be a time Faye was willing to talk. "What more is there to do than ask Seigetsu?"

"Not like that..." Faye shushed her, motioning to Papyrus, who was clearly in his own world, and Seigetsu, who clearly wasn't. "It's more like, how do I catch her up with all the things that have happened over the last two days?"

Corsica thought back to the crystal city, Convergence and the sealed door. "Yeah, that might take some doing. You can't just, like, share all your memories with her, though?"

Faye kept her eyes awkwardly on the ground. "...I could," she admitted. "But Halcyon really wasn't doing alright. Barely an hour or two before she was taken, she froze up all on her own, and I got kicked back into control. And some of the things we saw down there, I think would push her in the wrong direction. I do want her back, really. I don't want to be the one up front all the time. But the way we were when we left off, she wasn't tenable. And our mission is so far from finished, we can't just break down. So what do I do with her?"

Corsica wracked her brain for the empathy to imagine herself in Faye's situation, and came up wanting. "No clue," she admitted. "You could stick her up front, and I could... like..."

"You remember how she was treating you," Faye pointed out. "It was driving a wedge between you two. She wasn't letting you in when you wanted it, and was then freaking out about alienating you. You should be someone who could help, but I don't know if there's a way for you to get through to her."

"If I ever thought you were faking this before..." Corsica rolled her eyes. "You know how many teenage mares in the world would do something stupid, ignore their friends, and then see nothing awkward whatsoever about asking that very same friend for tactical advice on how to fix things without actually apologizing or trying to fix them?"

Faye's ears pressed back in embarrassment. "You were the one who asked me. And anyway, nineteen barely counts." She tilted her head. "Are you even still nineteen? Did I miss your birthday?"

Corsica shrugged. "Think I've still got a week or two before the big double-decade mark. But if you think it'll make me act like any more of an adult..." She trailed off, getting an idea. "Hey, here's a plan. Let's call my birthday a deadline. You get Halcyon back by then, get it through her head that she was being a dummy and can talk to me about whatever's on her mind, and then we both write this episode off as us being dumb kids and call it water under the bridge. Sound fair?"

"That's not how it works," Faye muttered sheepishly. "I can't make promises for her. Even though we share a body, and were the same person at one point, we aren't anymore. And I think there was a lot more wrong with her than just her relationship with you. Do you have any idea how many times she's been betrayed recently? Or how many things she's had to leave behind that are central to her identity?"

At that, Corsica hesitated. "Well, if she wants me to, she's welcome to tell me. And so are you, by the way. I know I'm humoring you with this split personality thing, and I know I believe it just from how I see you act, but on some level you're still the same person."

Faye glanced at Papyrus. "I swear, I spend so much time bracing myself for him to say something dumb, I can already hear a two-for-the-price-of-one joke in response to that."

Corsica blinked, frowned... and decided that merited revenge. "Speaking of Papyrus. You know how he was talking about extra special talents giving you multiple people stuck in one body, right?"

Faye nodded.

"And the way he was reincarnated," Corsica went on. "Anyway, you think if you got Halcyon back, and then got pregnant, she could literally become your-"

Faye's eyes went wide as she caught onto Corsica's train of thought. "Don't finish that-" she started, then sighed. "Well, now that's going to be stuck in my head. For your information, I'd rather fight Chrysalis with a stick. Why were you even thinking about something like that? And what compelled you to share it with me?"

Corsica had been holding her breath, and finally let it out with a grin. "Daughter?"

Faye gave her a rude look.

Corsica giggled. "First off, you were the one who brought him up. Second, I was already pondering that earlier, so now you know my pain. And third, it's a good distraction from whatever else you were stuck on, right?"

"You have an interesting definition of good," Faye mourned. "But it sure is a distraction, alright. Who even figured something like this out?"

"Starlight," Papyrus called from up front. "That mare's mind works in strange ways."

Corsica glared at him. "Were you eavesdropping on us?"

Papyrus looked back over his shoulder and shrugged. "Only as of ten seconds ago when you got loud enough to hear. What are we talking about, by the way? I just assume everything is her fault on some level."

"Nothing a colt like you needs to know," Corsica called back, smugly sticking close to Faye.

Papyrus rolled his eyes, made a kissy face at them and went back to scheming.

"Odds were," Corsica muttered, remembering to be quiet again, "he was the one who invented it and that's not even how he came back, and he just wanted us to have to think about it. You're still welcome, for sharing the load."

Faye sighed. "Actually, I talked to Starlight in the kitchen before he got dragged in, and from what she said, he might actually be telling the truth. But it's not like this matters to either of us, right? Neither of us are blank, neither of us have any dead people we want to bring back, and on top of that, moon glass would probably kill me." She blinked in realization. "At least, I don't have anyone dead like that. You're not...?"

"Nope." Corsica shook her head. "And even if I did, I'm pretty sure you need their special talent for it to work. Which isn't something I imagine you can easily get."

Faye lowered her voice further. "It might still merit thinking about, though. Because... Papyrus said Chrysalis stripped the special talents and souls from all the Empire's batponies, turning them into changelings. And there are other ponies who supposedly died back then, but are still here today, like Leitmotif. And if Chrysalis can do it, what about Coda? What about ponies who know about changeling queens and are researching these things, like Lilith. What I'm saying is, there could be other creatures out there in similar situations."

Corsica felt a chill. "Oh yeah? Well..." She stopped talking entirely, mouthing her words for Faye to read. "You told me your real mother was Chrysalis. If she could do that, steal and hoard special talents, who's to say that you aren't...?"

Faye's pupils constricted.

"And who's to say that I'm not, either?" Corsica returned her voice to a whisper. "I have a weird talent that appeared in a weird way at a weird time. What if it did that because I had it all along, and it was just waiting for a time to show up? I never met my mother. What if... you know?"

For a moment, Faye looked stony. "If you were, would it matter?"

Corsica blinked.

"If either of us had been someone else in a previous life," Faye repeated, "would it matter? To Papyrus, it only matters because he remembers it. And he was so famous, some people actually recognize him. For that matter, I don't know what happens when we die. Maybe that's how it works anyway, and Starlight just did it herself for him instead of letting nature take its course. So, I think this is something we shouldn't worry about, even if it could be true."

Corsica tilted her head. "You sure? If I used to be someone else before becoming who I am now, I feel like I'd owe it to my past self to try and figure out who they were, and what they wanted to do with their life."

"Positive." Faye closed her eyes.

Corsica squinted. "...I feel like Halcyon would agree with me on this. Do you know something...?"

"She and I are more different than you're giving us credit for," Faye said, shaking her head. "And I just don't like thinking about having a history I couldn't have changed, but still have to feel responsible for."

Corsica winked. "Fair enough. Here's something else to think about: why not go and ask Seigetsu to trade? Right now. Stop thinking, start doing. Today's a good day for me - shocking given how early it is, I know - so trust me on this. Don't bother filling her in on the last two days, just switch. I'm tired of your mopey butt going solo."

Faye gave her a skeptical look. "What are you suddenly on about?"

"Dunno. Maybe talking with you has made me feel like doing something useful." Corsica gave Faye a push with her telekinesis. "Quick, before I realize what a sloth I'm supposed to be and come to my senses."

Faye stumbled along, seeming to comply. Corsica could practically feel the inertia coming off her: procrastination, a desire to prepare, fear that she would mess something up by acting too hastily - and it was a poor match for the Halcyon she knew, hater of bureaucratic obstruction and professional science snoop.

Actually, it sort of fit Halcyon too, notoriously unable to take action when push came to shove, who would concoct a beautiful plan and then stop trying the moment phase one began. Fitting that someone as paradoxical as that would be split into separate selves that couldn't reconcile with each other into a single person. But right now, Corsica wanted Halcyon's energy back. And in the precious window of time she had where everyone else was getting facerolled by life and she was inexplicably okay, it was time to act on her desire. With her intuition to guide her, she might not even need her talent.

Corsica watched in satisfaction as Faye stumbled up to Seigetsu, and made the request.

I felt like I was struggling beneath a cold, black lake.

My limbs felt heavy and disused, trying to climb anyway, chasing a glimmer of green that grew into a bonfire as I rose, and then a window, and then a world. And then I slid back into my body, doubling over and catching my balance as reality poured itself like a bucket over my head.

I gulped down sweet, flowery air, that smelled of blossoms and fertilizer, waiting for my world to stop spinning so that my memories could re-orient themselves. What had I just been doing? Taking control back after being on my own for a while, but...

The Crystal Empire. There was supposed to be Luna, and Aegis, and Nanzanaya. In a dark room.

I was in danger. Arrested for trespassing. And yet there was also blue sky.

Cobbled streets. Thatched roofs, none made of crystal. Ponies standing around and talking. Tranquility on the wind.

And also Papyrus and Seigetsu, the former completely distracted and the latter watching me with passing interest.

Seigetsu had been in the tower, in the Aegis room, helping Princess Luna. Betraying me.

What was going on?

The sound of hoofsteps barely alerted me in time as someone approached from behind, grabbing me and putting me in a headlock. With a spike of panic, I tried to light my bracelet, but it was missing-

"Woah! A nerd!" Corsica's joyous voice cried out, and a hoof was aggressively ruining my mane.

"Hey-!" I tried to struggle, but it was no use.

Corsica swung around in front of me without letting go, her grinning muzzle barely two inches from my own. "You alright there?" she asked, letting up on the noogie. "You looked like you were really spacing out."

"What's happening?" I asked groggily, breaking free from her grasp and stepping back just enough to protect my personal space. Also, my coat was gone, replaced with a pious, oversized robe. "Where are we? And why am I wearing this?"

The discontinuity reminded me almost of when I remembered my first meeting with Egdelwonk. Had I been sleeping? Did my dreams just repair a hole someone had left in my mind?

Corsica finally looked a little more serious. "That's actually a long story and it'll take forever to fill you in on the details, but the short of it is you probably don't remember the last two days. Crystal tower, Aegis room? I ditched you to go hang out with Princess Twilight because you ditched me to go hang out with the zebra? Those are the last things you were there for?"

I squinted. Did I believe that?

Might as well see where she went with this. I nodded.

"The important things you need to know are," Corsica went on, dropping her voice to a whisper. "You're sort of on probation for that thing with the Aegis room. Seigetsu has your bracelet. No, you can't get it back. Second, Papyrus is literally Gazelle, not just a joke, and the other you might have made a bargain with him you'll live to regret, but for now he's on your side, not being a mass murderer, and probably better at knowing what makes Starlight tick than you are. And last, everything's good between us now. We had some heart-to-hearts and got all the awkward stuff sorted out and in the past, so don't worry about that. You good to walk?"

"Hold on," I pushed back. "How about you start with where we are, and then prove that you're not Egdelwonk and he had nothing to do with this."

An apple core bounced off my head. Glaring, I turned, already knowing what I was going to see.

"For the record, I had less than usual to do with this," Egdelwonk said, lurking deep enough in a wastebasket beside an outdoor diner that all I could see were his red-on-yellow eyes. "Want some local specialty?"

A bat wing talon rose out from the basket, holding another apple core.

I sighed, turning back to Corsica.

"I'm serious." Corsica shrugged. "I bailed you out so hard you could have practically kissed me - not that you did, or anything - and we're basically even now. All that stuff you were freaking out over earlier is water under the bridge. And you're getting your head screwed back on right now, as opposed to any other time, because there are currently no stakes and everything is going reasonably according to plan, and all we have to do next is watch and wait. Any of this getting through to you?"

I had absolutely no idea what to think.

Corsica tried her absolute best to read Halcyon, stopping short only of using her special talent, and still had absolutely no idea what she was thinking.

A blank, jaded look was fixed on her friend's face, as if Halcyon was unconvinced this was reality and not a mirage. For a moment, Corsica wanted to wish anyway to read her friend's mind, to gain some sort of insight, to know the right words to say. Sure, they hadn't actually smoothed things over thanks to Halcyon being gone and Faye not being the one Corsica had a quarrel with... but if she could convince Halcyon they had, maybe that would be all it would take to normalize things between them again. If Corsica could get over it, convince Halcyon she was over it...

This was too important a chance to pass up. She wished she could get a tiny clue of what Halcyon was thinking.

On command, the insight slid into her head even as a rhetorical lumberjack knocked a modest chip in her determination for the day. And what she got told her that Halcyon was presently a paranoid wreck who wasn't going to trust the ground beneath her hooves, much less anything anyone said. No matter who was saying it.

Faye hadn't been kidding about the betrayals wracking up in Halcyon's life. Forget Aldebaran and everything from Ironridge, that was old-school. Just since they crossed the mountains, Halcyon had been betrayed by her airship, her body, her instincts, Yelvey the shady Snowport cleric, Seigetsu, and even Corsica herself, not to mention getting off to a bad start with Princess Luna and maybe the dragons, and never trusting Papyrus or half her team in the first place.

Corsica looked her up and down, and with a slow, familiar despair, realized that nothing she could possibly do could reach this mare.

Why had she been feeling optimistic about this, again?

A look of brief surprise flashed across Halcyon's face, and suddenly her posture changed.

"You're back?" Corsica guessed, assuming Faye had re-asserted control.

Faye's ears fell. "She's still watching, this time," she whispered. "I... don't know what I was expecting, letting you talk me into that. And it looks like I've cost you your good mood. I'm sorry." She flicked her tail.

"Don't be," Corsica said, trying to scrape her spirits back together into a pile. "I think I've got a better idea of what's going on here, if nothing else. You... just let her keep watching, and we'll see where Papyrus can get us? And maybe she'll trust you to fill her in on the important stuff?"

Faye looked somewhere between skeptical and resigned. "Right." She nodded. "I guess we'll see."

They started walking again, each in silence. Corsica's head spun once again, this time with things she could do for her friend.

It was abundantly clear to her now how bad that incident in the tower's Aegis room had been for her friend. Halcyon took it like a brick wall took earthquakes. Faye appeared to take it better on the surface, but only because she was laying down. But Halcyon had lost her spark, and Faye never had hers in the first place...

Valey had lost hers, too, back in Ironridge. Starlight had lost hers, here in Ponyville. Corsica sometimes had hers, but it was so unreliable it was worth nothing at all. But if no one did anything, Chrysalis or the windigoes would win. The world could face another changeling invasion, or else freeze solid.

That spark was the only missing ingredient. If Starlight was really as phenomenally powerful as her friends believed her to be, all it would take was the will to fight on to make a difference. But with what little energy she had, where could Corsica make a difference? How could she focus on something small enough that it would be a goal she could achieve? Even trying to return the favor to the mare who got her back on her hooves after her special talent appeared was like trying to move a mountain with a toothpick.

Maybe... she could confront Princess Luna, try to clear up whatever misunderstanding had come between them, undo the things that had knocked her down one blow at a time? Maybe that wouldn't be possible. What about Seigetsu? The dragon had shown an openness toward underhanded dealing before, as long as it served what she saw as the greater good.

What about the ponies around her? Could she rely on Papyrus to be the spark Ironridge needed? One of history's great villains, trying to figure out why he had been given a chance at round two? Certainly not. Leitmotif and Nehaley, back in the Crystal Empire? They weren't even here... and she still remembered how Leif had treated them during the Aldebaran incident.

Jamjars? Someone else back in Ironridge? Corsica never interacted with Jamjars enough to truly learn what her deal was, but had a solid read on her as a soloist who only trusted others when she had collateral held over their heads. Not someone who could inspire others to win a war, not someone powerful enough to do it on her own.

...Twilight?

Twilight was barely staying on her hooves handling things in Ponyville. She might be an alicorn, and she might have time still before life reduced her to a guttering stub, but Corsica doubted that mare could stop a tax evader, much less a war. And she was gung ho enough to try it anyway, and hurt herself in the attempt.

Corsica plodded onward, searching for a way out where she knew none existed.

The atmosphere inside Sugarcube Corner was unfittingly festive for Corsica's mood. Much of this seemed to be the fault of Nanzanaya, who was delighting the shop's two owners with how much she could put away. In fact, it seemed to have devolved into an eating contest with Pinkie Pie.

Rainbow Dash was loudly egging the contest on. Fluttershy was quietly following suit. Rarity and Applejack both looked mortified by the quantity of sugar that was being guzzled, Starlight looked like she was indulging in a badly-needed distraction, and Twilight wore the fiercely protective grimace of someone afraid for their research budget.

Everyone looked up as Corsica, Seigetsu and Faye entered... and Papyrus brought up the rear. Only Twilight, Starlight and Rainbow Dash even recognized him.

"Ladies," Papyrus said, swaggering only slightly as he tossed them a bow. "Thanks to your silver-tongued and deep-pocketed friends here, we've struck an accord and I'm now nominally on your side and not about to repeat the mistakes of decades past and all that. Sorry about all the insults, by the way. No hard feelings, Princess Puffball?"

Twilight gave him a look. "You say one thing, and then you mean the other... Why do you keep calling me that?"

"Nicknames are fun." Papyrus shrugged.

One of the shop owners, a short, rotund mare with a mane that looked even more like ice cream than the average pony's, waddled over. "New customers, dearies? Or here with your friends? Or both!"

"Get whatever you want," Twilight sighed. "And please don't make me regret offering."

"One of those, if you please." Papyrus pointed absently at a pastry display case while swiping an apple with his tail. "And might there be a back room we could dine in? I've got a stellar joke I've been practicing the whole way here, and I'm afraid someone won't catch the punch line over the noises those two are making."

He pointed with a feather at Pinkie and Nanzanaya.

"Of course," said the other owner, a lanky stallion with a short goatee. "Right this way, any who are coming!"

Papyrus didn't need to motion for anyone to follow. Twilight, Starlight and Rainbow automatically gave wary chase, trying their best not to look suspicious to the shopkeepers. Corsica just followed at an ordinary pace.

"Right then," Papyrus began, putting his forehooves together on the table as the door behind them swung closed. "I-"

"Hold up," Twilight interrupted. "Supposing you've really had a change of heart and these two convinced you to play fair..." She glanced at Corsica and Faye. "That is what happened, right?"

Both mares nodded.

Twilight turned back to Papyrus. "Have you got any explaining to do for yourself?"

"The chaos made me do it." Papyrus dismissed her with an idle wave of his hoof. "That passes as an excuse for some redeemed baddies around here, or so a noodly dragon-goat-thing friend of yours tells me. And I'm a master of insincere apologies too, so you won't want me to waste my time on those. Happily for you, actions speak louder than words, and I've had the whole walk over here to prepare my act."

He thumped the table, burrowing into Starlight with a poker glare. "You. Flame of Laughter. Go there. Fix things. And then go make up with your friends."

Starlight gave him a blank look. "Why do you care?"

"Because, I've been around them long enough to see the before and after," Papyrus swaggered, though his tone was serious. "And on the wrong side of history often enough to get a taste of their idea of justice at their prime. Remember the first time we fought, in the rain on the outskirts of Izvaldi? You remember how little you hesitated when you decided I needed to be stopped? I know how your horn used to be. I know how badly you hurt yourself in that fight. Valey, too. I remember the feeling of my claws sliding through her flesh... and I remember how easy, how natural it was for you to drop what you were doing and stick it to the bad guy. You needed no hesitation, despite the danger! And all for what, because I was being rude to someone who frankly deserved it?"

He leaned in. "You remember all those times I told you I didn't fight fillies, and you got in my way anyway? Remember how you hunted me down after the end because you couldn't stand the knowledge that I might still exist somewhere in the world, doing things you couldn't control to people you cared about? Remember all that?"

Starlight frowned.

"Let it marinate in your brain for a bit, and then consider this." Papyrus tossed his apple, caught it, and bit down with a sassy crunch. "You've got a place you need to go. Fate of the world hinges on it, blah blah blah, nothing new for you, I'm sure. And the one and only reason you can't bring yourself to do it is 'personal reasons'. Sounds like you've got some history there, eh?"

Starlight narrowed her eyes. "You were listening when I said that?"

Papyrus casually gnawed the apple. "In my defense, it took some time to work up the courage to see your reaction to my presence. I am mortal now, and part of that involves an instinctual and sometimes inconvenient desire to remain among the living. Nevertheless, imagine this: suppose I took my leave of you, went to this Flame of Laughter, and threatened to take some pictures and bring them back to you? Or maybe you've got a bad history with ponies who live there, and I threatened to tell them all where you live now? Innocent actions, the same thing you turned a god into charcoal over once before. Would that get you up and motivated?"

"You have a very backwards understanding of how I work," Starlight said, closing her eyes and turning away. "I saved you and your sister so that you could get the chance at normal lives you were previously denied. Is taking that not enough?"

"Same to you about the backwards understanding thing." Papyrus stuck out his tongue at her. "My old goal was plain and simple: give Gwendolyn the world, and make her want for nothing. Thanks to you, that's now something that's less a matter of conquering nations and more a matter of leaving well enough alone, giving me nothing much to do. Except there's also a deranged changeling queen and a swarm of windigoes threatening an area very near and dear to her, and while I could take a page from your playbook and grab her and run away, look how well that worked out for you."

Starlight grimaced.

"And I tragically lack the preparation time and position of power necessary to pull off a stratagem to head off this war all by myself," Papyrus lamented, "and am no longer a super god capable of doing it through brute force. So technically, by haunting you, I'm still doing what I've always done: trying to keep my sister safe, this time by goading you into saving the world. I bet you've got plenty of things you never got the chance to do before it was too late, don't you? How would you feel if you slacked off yet again, the windigoes did their thing, Lyn died again due to your inaction, and I once again went berserk over it and ruined your happy little life here?"

"You have no powers anymore," Starlight warned, her voice hard. "If you think-"

"That I can beat you for real after all this time, then I'm sorely mistaken?" Papyrus winked, taking another crunch off the apple. "Oh, I'm very much aware. But I could probably still make enough of a nuisance of myself that you'd remember me."

"You're making a pretty big nuisance of yourself already," Twilight pointed out.

Papyrus innocently curled his lip. "Guilty as charged, but I suppose that's the point. But fine, then. If you won't get off your rear to avoid a repeat of history with me, won't you at least do it for Lyn? She, unlike me, deserved to be brought back, and also unlike me you've yet to see the fruits of your labor."

Starlight looked away.

"Valey won't be able to do it," Papyrus said. "She's given everything to keep up the good fight, and that spark you two shared back in Izvaldi is almost gone. But even if she's fading, she's still alive. It's not too late to see her again, you know. And Shinespark! Garsheeva's breath, the kinds of magic that mare delved into to restore her horn and support Valey from the shadows... If anything happened to her, that's an awful lot of power that could fall into the wrong hooves. And Gerardo is still sailing the skies with Slipstream, on a never-ending hunt to keep his promise to you all those years ago. Wouldn't you like to tell him it's all over, and he can finally come home?"

Starlight squeezed her eyes shut. "Please stop," she whispered.

Papyrus leaned in, resting his chin in his hooves. "And what about Maple? The way I heard it, it didn't even take a year for Valey and the others to get their first writ from Yakyakistan, and she immediately left to go join you in Equestria. I take it she never finished that journey, eh?"

Starlight froze up.

Papyrus took another smug bite from his apple.

"So sad," he mourned after she didn't respond, crying crocodile tears. "So many friends for whom it isn't yet too late... until it is. Sit on your haunches and bury your head in the sand, it'll all be fine... until it isn't! But who will be next?"

He broke out in a sharp grin. "With the way things are going up there, it could even be all of them at the same time."

Twilight and Rainbow Dash looked ready to intervene, but Starlight beat them to it.

"You...!" Her horn pulsed, and a spike of crystal formed around her hoof, drawn back and ready to impale Papyrus where he sat.

"Hit me if you want," Papyrus drawled, throwing the apple core at a wastebasket over his shoulder and missing, not even flinching despite his peril. "But I'm just giving voice to what you already know to be true. Hitting me would be like hitting yourself. Like what you're already doing, day in and day out, every time you bludgeon the voice inside you into submission that's telling you the same things as me."

He got out of his seat. Starlight's crystalled hoof was shaking, and he batted it aside with a wing. "With such a war against yourself, what do you think is going to be left at the end? The good, precious angel who risks everything to stop dastards like me? Or a hollowed-out shell who cares about nothing and thus can do anything, and has no limits to stop her when she goes astray?"

Starlight looked like it was she who had been stabbed. "How... do you...?"

Papyrus licked his lips. "I've tasted your psyche. Remember the hospital, in Kinmari? I know the innermost depths of your fears. Was too insane at the time to make anything useful of it, I'll admit. All I saw in you back then was a kindred soul who could grant me the release I desired. But now, I know how to break things, and I know what makes you tick. And whatever walls you've put up, whatever excuses you're using to keep yourself from doing what you once knew needed to be done, are mine to devour."

Starlight only stared.

With a chuckle, Papyrus turned his back on her and made for the exit. "I've said my piece. Barring anything changing, the next train to the Crystal Empire has my name on it, as do any airships I have to steal to get across the mountains. Just because I've had a slow start doesn't mean I'm not about to try and protect Lyn my way. You can come, or you can stay. But your life here has been nothing more than a pretty illusion. All the work you've left unfinished will haunt you until it's finally too late... and it'll be High Prince Gazelle who brings the news."

He closed the door with his tail behind him, the pastry he had ordered held proudly in his teeth.

Rainbow Dash whistled.

"Starlight, are you...?" Twilight gingerly reached out a hoof.

"Gather anyone who's up for a walk," Starlight said distantly, getting to her hooves. "I need a trip to the canyon in the Everfree to get some things. And then... we're going to Our Town."

Twilight and Rainbow perked. Corsica did too, presuming that was the area near the Flame of Laughter...

"I don't know about anything after that," Starlight said stiffly, gathering her things. "I can't go back to the north. I can't. But..."

"We'll be there with you," Twilight whispered, putting a hoof on her back.

Starlight pressed her eyes closed, took a deep breath, and opted to leave the rest unsaid, squeezing her way out the door.

Alone in the Everfree

I hovered as a ghost, airborne, as Faye walked in a solemn procession of ponies through a blue-purple forest, the bright morning sky reduced to a gloomy dusk by the dual canopies of giant leaves and crawling vines. I hadn't regained control since earlier, when she kicked me out.

Since before Papyrus - who, unless I was missing something critical, really was Gazelle - chewed Starlight out and excused himself with a smirk.

There were too many questions to ask. Where were we? Had I really been gone for two whole days? Why was I gone, and where had I been? Why didn't I remember? Where was the bracelet? What had transpired with Starlight and the Elements, to get them into the situation I awoke to? What was up with the way Corsica had been acting when I came back? Why was Seigetsu here? Last I remembered, she was betraying me in the Aegis room, yet no one seemed bothered by her presence.

The most important question of all, I was finally starting to wrap my head around: yes, this was really happening. Not a trick of my senses. Not a misread situation. Real. And that made room for me to think about the next most important one: what Faye was doing, prancing around in public in control of our body.

So I asked her.

She folded her ears. The visual equivalent of it's complicated.

Good. If the answer had been anything else... Well, I'd be worried anyway, but at least that one made sense.

But I wanted more.

"My whole reason for existing is to be up front, because you didn't want to," I pointed out, trying to keep the worry from my voice. "I know we're a special case with our abilities, but this can't have been something you went back on lightly."

If you want to come back up front, feel free, Faye responded silently, thinking at me. Feel more than free. I just thought you needed time to get your bearings back. After all, you... you've had it rough lately.

It was true. A hundred old stressors orbited my ghostly head, and new ones as well, blending into a soup that made it difficult to tease apart one cause from the other. But for the moment, they backed off, waiting.

Perhaps because I had been gone for two days, and the world had changed so much around me my old knowledge might not be valid anymore.

More likely because nothing I did right now mattered, because I wasn't in control.

I thought about that, rolled the idea around with my mind like a ball of putty, and couldn't tell if it was correct. It felt correct. Watching Faye, someone older and more competent and more attuned to the current situation than me, yet still fundamentally also me, take charge was liberating. I noticed she and Corsica walking close together in the line, and from their postures I knew that whatever walls my stumbling had allowed to grow up between us were breaking down. Corsica looked as worn-out as always, but she didn't feel mad at me.

And yet, despite all that, I remembered the resolution to the Aldebaran incident, more than half a year ago. I remembered how my own plan bore no fruit thanks to my botched execution, yet everything turned out alright anyway, thanks to the competence and sacrifices of my friends, with a bit of divine luck on the side. I remembered how, at the moment of truth, my role was rendered obsolete, I had no part to play, and could watch from the sidelines as a meaningless face in a crowd.

I remembered how bitterly that stung. And because of that memory, I couldn't trust that sitting in the back with Faye up front was nearly as great as it seemed to be.

"Do you need me up front?" I asked, trying another angle. "I don't know that I wouldn't make a mess of the situation, but that hasn't stopped you from turning our life over to me before."

It's complicated, Faye thought again, signalling it more directly this time. I'm changing, Halcyon. I've been forced out of my comfort zone and had to adapt. There are still long-term consequences to me running our life, I'm sure of it. But the short-term ones are maybe... more survivable than I thought.

She was quiet for a moment, then continued. It's not dire. I can do this... some of the time. But I do need you up front eventually, in the sense that I can't steer our life correctly. And you need to change too. The path you've been on for these last few weeks isn't tenable. We need a new paradigm. One that involves less division of duties. More sharing of responsibility. More guiding our life as a team.

Some part of me I hadn't been paying enough attention to unwound at her confirmation that I wasn't suddenly unnecessary. Tension drained from my shoulders, and I flew more easily.

Seigetsu has our bracelet, Faye went on, and I could feel her choosing her thoughts carefully. It's a hostage, to ensure we behave after what happened in the tower. Initially, that hostage was you. But I bartered a swap.

My ears faced semi-forward in alarm. "How did she do that? Did she know what I was?"

Faye considered this. A lot has happened, but I think as far as she knows, your emerald is just a magical coping mechanism for me. Not a piece of my soul.

"A piece of your soul?" I stared at her. "I thought I was your mask. A collection of traits, mannerisms, memories..."

Seigetsu might not know, but I told Starlight about our split, Faye hesitantly thought. I've been trying to get her to warm up to us. And she might be more like us than we thought. Not the same, but she might know something about the way we are. Magically, I mean. And after the last two days, I think our multiple nature might be something a lot more significant than a mental condition backed up by changeling magic.

"And Procyon," I added, remembering our pearlescent third half. "And whatever light wave magic separated her out first."

Faye looked like she wanted to say something, but didn't.

"Does anyone else know?" I asked. "If you shared our secrets with anyone, or if they found out, I..." How did I feel about that, really? "I should at least know."

Faye shook her head. I made some sort of pact with Papyrus to get him nominally on our side. I was thinking with my heart, not my head. It might mean trouble for us later, but... Anyway, I didn't tell him anything. But I think he might already know we're a changeling queen.

I stared at her, wordlessly requesting elaboration.

He's literally Gazelle, Faye explained. The Empire's old High Prince. Reincarnated. Somehow. Maybe I'm just self-conscious, but the way he talked about himself in relation to starting to war... It reminds me far too much of my nightmares from the east, the ones I didn't share with you until after Ironridge. Maybe it's a coincidence, but it felt like he was pushing me on purpose, like he had reason to believe I might feel the same.

I frowned. "It... could be a coincidence, I guess."

Also, Faye added, he claimed to have been there when we were born. Saw it - saw us - with his own eyes. And even as a newborn, we would have looked pretty different from Coda.

Thinking about it, I breathed out. Supposedly, this wasn't our original form: Procyon was. But Procyon still had a green mane, colorful hooves... Had Papyrus ever seen my hooves? I couldn't remember. It wasn't the kind of thing I willingly showed ponies, but he was nosy. And even if the color shades were wrong, the emphasis was still in all the right places...

As I began to accept this, a second possibility rose in my mind. If Papyrus really was Gazelle reincarnated - I had no idea how that was possible, but the world was full of supernatural impossibilities - then he would be another link to my past.

Before, the only one I possessed was Mother. And guiding her thoughts back to those days felt sacrilegious. But offending Papyrus...

I smacked myself to break that train of thought, realizing that no matter how I framed this, I was considering trying to have a productive conversation with Papyrus. But still. It was a possibility.

"What about Corsica?" I asked, focusing again on how the two of them were walking closer than we probably would have if I was still in charge. "Why was she acting that way earlier, when I came back? And how do things stand between us now?"

Faye shook her head. That's for you to figure out. By asking her. Which is what she wants. She's your friend, after all.

"And not yours?"

Faye looked conflicted. I looked up to her a lot. But things were different between us in those days. I know I just said I wanted us to share our decisions more, but our relationship with Corsica is something you need to build for yourself. She and I have too much between us already for it to end well, even if it looks cordial to you.

I stared at Corsica, sifting my memories for the way things used to be.

For a moment, I was distracted by the contrast in demeanor. This Corsica was borderline haggard, her mane limp and sporting a few loose strands, carrying herself along with a stubborn sag in her shoulders. Even after the Aldebaran incident, she hadn't been like that, at least after she got a few weeks to recover.

There had to be something I could do to help her, to change that. Anything at all.

And then I caught up with Faye's meaning. The way things used to be, when I tagged along with the original Ansel, pestering him and his marefriend. Annoying. Never accepted. For whatever reason, never giving up.

For me, that felt like another lifetime. But it only felt that way because those were Faye's memories, and for her, they would be so much more recent than to me.

Maybe she was right. I swallowed, then nodded. "Should I go talk to her now?"

Maybe hold off on that for a moment, Faye suggested. I think Papyrus finally got through to Starlight after a lot of wearing her down, and we've almost gotten where she's taking us. Just pay attention for now, and you might be able to catch up on some of the way things are.

Corsica trudged along as the sky lightened around her, the thick forest finally coming to an end.

Even out from under the trees, the core of the Everfree still felt dimmer than Ponyville, as if the sky was slightly confused about how to put away the night. But Starlight's destination wasn't the sky, nor was it the ruined castle on the hill: it was the canyon, the same place where they had entered the crystalline Macrothesis the day before.

"Starlight?" Rainbow asked, hovering along as they began the descent to the canyon floor. "Are we going back to-?"

"No," Starlight said, her brow shadowed, looking almost as weary as Corsica felt. "But close."

Maybe it wasn't an apt comparison, Starlight's exhaustion to Corsica's. Seeing someone else take the lead, first Papyrus with his bullying and now Starlight with her mystery trip, let a part of Corsica relax. The part that was always on standby to clean up messes, to step in and save Halcyon's agenda by making that kid's problems her own.

It helped. Didn't make things perfect, but it sure did help.

Corsica reached the bottom, glancing back at Faye and wondering if it was really still Faye, or if Halcyon had taken the lead again. Getting to speak with Faye more was interesting, but if those two started swapping at a regular pace, it would become a real problem for her ability to tell them apart. And also a problem for how to think of them. Right now, Halcyon was siloed in her brain as the real thing, and Faye was... Halcyon's past self? From before they made friends, except not annoying.

Maybe it was Corsica's perception that had changed, and Faye was the same as she always was. Doubtful, though. This Faye didn't seem like the kind of pony to relentlessly, innocently stalk her and fan filly over her every move. But if Faye had changed, had diverged from who she had been back then, it was all the harder to figure out how to think of them.

Both as the same pony? That wouldn't work. Both as completely separate individuals? That didn't feel quite right, either...

"Here we are," Starlight said, having taken the group in the opposite direction down the canyon and now facing a wall patch that was grown over with crystals, forming a massive sheet that stretched nearly halfway up to the surface.

"What's this?" Rainbow pressed.

Only those who had been in the back room when Papyrus gave his speech had come, and Papyrus himself was nowhere to be seen. Only Seigetsu, Corsica, Faye, Rainbow, Starlight and Twilight... and out of those six, Twilight was the only one who looked like she was following the point of the expedition.

"Starlight," she said, "is this...?"

Starlight lit her horn, put a hoof to the base of the crystal wall... and like a pleated mechanical door, it began to retract into the ground, sliding into itself.

On the other side was a cave big enough to fit Twilight's entire castle. And in that cave was a giant airship.

It took Corsica a minute to realize this was actually an airship and not a beached sea ship, and even then, she wasn't certain. It dwarfed the Aldebaran in both length and width, and matched it in height if you counted the prow and stern. Two floors underneath the deck, she guessed, both with more headroom than Gerardo's cramped little ship.

Coda's Verdandi was a better size comparison, albeit a little taller. But the Aldebaran was what stuck in Corsica's mind, because like it, this ship had a wire contraption suspended above the deck that seemed to be built around supporting several large, metal hoops, all pointing straight forward.

She remembered the storm that powered the Aldebaran, windigo power, living clouds reaching down and funneling through those hoops like a tornado. But the Aldebaran had been black and sleek, elegant yet gaudy, with a hull forged from the finest metal.

This ship was entirely wooden. And yet its varnish didn't bear a single scratch.

At Starlight's command, the crystals shifted more, growing into a staircase that provided a walk-up gangplank to the vessel. She looked like she wanted to say something, but couldn't find the words.

"The Immortal Dream," Twilight said, naming the ship for her. "It... looks exactly like I imagined it would. Can we go aboard?"

Starlight nodded. "We'll... need to fly back to Ponyville and get provisions before taking her anywhere. And the trains would be much faster. But there are places the trains don't go."

Corsica knew what that meant. Even if Starlight didn't want to say it out loud, stepping outside her front door to rekindle the Flame of Kindness had a high probability of not ending with that, even if they succeeded.

Rainbow was already on the deck, and Faye and Seigetsu drew closer as well. Corsica, however, gave the rings above the deck a wary look. "Out of curiosity, what does this thing run on?"

Starlight stared at it too. "Me."

Corsica climbed the crystal stairs, feeling a faint tingle as her hooves touched the deck. This place... Something about it felt almost like the chapel in Icereach. Halcyon was the one who loved that place, but that hadn't stopped Corsica from needing to find her there from time to time. She didn't share Halcyon's superstitions, but the chapel still had the air of an ancient sanctuary, as if ponies had been venerating it and seeking refuge there since time immemorial.

So did this airship.

"How old is this?" Faye asked, evidently thinking along the same lines. "It looks brand-new, but feels... different."

"Twenty years," Starlight said. "Since she first flew. But she was alive before that."

"Alive?" Seigetsu gave her a curious look.

"Fly on her for long enough," Starlight promised, sounding dazed. "And you won't be able to think otherwise."

Was that what she felt? Was that just superstition, or real magic? Corsica looked around, and saw three doors on the deck: two leading to the prow, and one to the stern.

"Every other airship I've seen had the entrance in the side," she remarked. "Not the top. Why's this one different?"

Starlight slowly walked toward the prow, letting the crystal staircase fade away now that everyone was on board. "I don't know the current trends in northern airships. But this one was designed to sail the skies, or the sea. So the entrances need to be on top."

She waved everyone forward, towards the left front door. It slid open on rails rather than swinging on a hinge, and yet didn't offer the slightest resistance from rust, warp or age.

Beyond was a staircase, its wood an autumn blend of deep reds, yellows and oranges. The steps had been reinforced to prevent slipping, and they curved gently along the inside of the prow, reaching a landing near the very front of the ship.

To Corsica's right was a wall with a door. Ninety degrees beyond that was a balcony leading back into the main belly of the ship, and beside it was another staircase, a switchback leading further down.

Starlight took the door.

Inside was a large room covering the right half of the ship's prow, a little wider than the landing so it could also cover the center. Balanced there, in a line along the wall so as to evenly distribute their weight, were racks and cases of equipment, wired lovingly together with some of the best cable management Corsica had ever seen.

Not that Icereach scientists weren't capable of making their inventions pretty. In fact, they wasted a lot more time on it than a productive operation should have allowed. But this ship's innards had been designed from the beginning to fit together into a harmonious whole, the machine cases bearing a style of metalworking that was usually reserved for antique furniture. Even the latches to open the cases looked like tiny, metal pegasus wings that folded up when undone.

But all of that paled next to the technological centerpiece: a giant cloud of metal rails, contiguous and twisting, hanging from the ceiling and serving a purpose Corsica couldn't even begin to fathom. Was that technology? Art? Art imitating technology? It looked moderately homogeneous, so whatever it did, it probably all served a single purpose. Perhaps some sort of reaction chamber, or even an energy core? Maybe-

Twilight's eyes glowed with the light of scientific inquiry, but Rainbow Dash was looking askew at Faye. "You alright?" she asked. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

Faye shook her head. "It's... nothing."

Starlight gave her a look too. "You've seen something like this before?" Then she caught herself. "I... probably don't want to know..."

"The rings above the deck, too," Faye murmured. "I hoped it was a coincidence, but this looks exactly like the Aldebaran's engine.

Starlight looked somewhere between disappointed and relieved. "I suppose the technology wouldn't have died out when I left with this ship. Shinespark and Arambai must have built more of them."

"Except, the other place we saw it," Faye continued, "was on a pirate ship, and it was powered by windigoes."

Starlight frowned, then shook her head. "Pirate ship or no, this one used to use windigo hearts as well. Windigo hearts serve as a disharmonic battery that can trap and contain the ship's fuel."

Corsica glanced up at the ceiling. "So this ship summons a blizzard whenever it's turned on, too? And hangs from the storm like a creepy cloud gondola?"

Starlight was speechless.

This snapped Twilight out of her science trance as well. "Shinespark and Arambai fought to protect Ironridge from windigoes. According to you, they both have firsthoof experience with how dangerous these creatures are. Although you did use windigo hearts as batteries, so if they took the same concept further..."

"That's impossible." Starlight shook her head. "I'd have to see for myself, but that fundamentally can't work. Windigoes aren't harmonic life forms like ponies and griffons. Their only use to us was as containers for the power of the Flames of Harmony, and doing that only works when they're dead. There must have been something you were misunderstanding. But summoning a blizzard..." She squeezed her eyes shut.

"Back up," Corsica encouraged. "Forget how they're breaking the rules. What rules are they breaking? What's this thing supposed to do normally, and how's it work?"

Starlight sighed. "It's called a harmony extractor, which is a fairly large misnomer, but the name stuck around from before its inventors knew how it worked. And for specific types of creatures such as ponies, it borrows your life force, essentially turning the machine into an extension of your body so long as you're connected."

Corsica lifted her ears, curious. Back in Ironridge, when talking with Valey about her special talent, she was fairly sure the other mare was dancing around a lot of technological insight that would have been fascinating if it was more relevant to the matter at hoof. If Starlight's old friend group had invented this, then this was probably what it was.

"The magic of living creatures has a rigid classification system," Twilight explained, taking over for Starlight. "I don't know if you use the same frameworks for understanding in the north, but there are three mechanically distinct categories: magic performed by machines and learnable unicorn spells, magic inherent to all members of a species, and magic given by your cutie mark. As an example, species magic is how pegasi fly."

She turned to the cloud of rails. "Conventional mana technology and unicorn spells operate by the same principles, and can do mostly the same things. But species magic comes from a spark of life that Equestria really doesn't understand as well as I wish we did. Machines aren't alive, so the best they can do is try to replicate the effects within a different system of mechanics... but harmony extractors change that. When a pony can share that spark of life with a machine, the machine can suddenly employ species-class magic instead of just mana technology. In this case, pegasus flight."

"So do you have to be a pegasus to make it do that, then?" Faye asked. "Or a batpony?"

Twilight shook her head. "No, you don't. The effects don't seem to differ in breadth depending on what race connects to the machine, provided it's a harmony-based one. So, windigoes don't count." She sucked in a breath. "Which implies that at our core, we're all the same regardless of the shape of our body: different types of ponies, griffons, yaks, and most importantly, the world itself."

"Which matters," Starlight said, "because even though it's the same kind of spark, it's not always the same strength. Normal pegasi might be able to fly on their own power, but they can't spare enough to make an airship do the same. The world, however, is strong enough that just bottling up a bit of its fire is enough to run the ship for weeks. And since we happen to have..." She glanced around, triple-checking that Seigetsu hadn't followed them to the engine room, then lowered her voice. "A portable, pony-sized piece of the world's soul..."

Corsica nodded. She got the picture.

"You all might want to watch this from up on deck," Starlight encouraged, gesturing to the door. "It'll be more impressive out there."

A low hum was building in Faye's core as she emerged from the staircase out onto the deck, finding Seigetsu with her hands clasped behind her back, studying the wire cage that held up the ship's metal rings.

That hum was coming from behind her, from beneath her, and yet all around her at the same time. The longer Faye was awake, the more the glow she saw around ponies faded into obscurity, an unremarkable part of her perception that she instinctively tuned out and ignored. Far removed from the stars she saw when coming out after an extended slumber, when those lights were bright enough she could see them in the distance through solid walls.

Yet suddenly, they forced their way back into her perception, hard enough that the glare made her wince and stirred the hungry emptiness in her core. Because the entire ship was glowing.

She squinted, but it was still there, an ethereal light picked up with a sixth sense instead of her eyes. An infinite source to her infinite drain, the feeling increased in intensity, thrumming like a waterfall in a desert as blue lightning began to crackle along the wire mesh, leaving tiny midnight flames to arc along in its wake. A mist rose from the contraption, like ether yet full of galaxies instead of stars, gravitating toward the area bound by the rings.

The tension in her core reached a fever pitch, and suddenly the mist snapped together in a filament - and then a second later, that filament burst alive with power, like a slice in reality that split apart to admit something more. A comet tore its way into existence, trailing stars, its burning head hovering in the rings above the bridge and its tail streaming off across the deck. A caged god, deep blue and burning like the night sky.

Starlight appeared on the deck in a blink of teleportation, her horn glowing midnight blue instead of its usual teal. She stared up at the comet with the expression of an engineer, eyes flitting about, and then nodded in satisfaction, sliding open the rightmost front door.

Inside, beneath the ship's windshield, an array of instruments gleamed, burnished brass protecting the wooden trim without compromising the color. A single captain's chair swiveled in the center, black and majestic, with plenty of space behind for others to gather and watch the ship's course.

Starlight hesitated before the chair, and Faye wondered how long it had been since she sat in it last.

Instead of taking the chair, Starlight walked a circuit of the bridge, running her hoof along the walls, checking every console and instrument. Built into the front of the dashboard, off to the left, Faye saw the first indisputable sign of the ship's true age: a terminal that had to be older than she was, its design belonging to an age where artistry and functionality bore equal importance in designing a machine.

None of modern Ironridge, where all you cared about was results. None of modern Icereach, where scientists chased patents and sought out ways to waste time. An elegant machine, from an age where ponies broke new ground, yet made machines that were worthy of being the first of their kind.

"It's been a while," Starlight whispered, putting her hoof on the chair. "Sorry I left you here in the forest, all alone."

So that was why they weren't just taking the trains. Things clicked in Faye's brain all at once: Starlight saw this ship as a friend, and wanted its support if she was going to be testing her longstanding limits.

Halcyon's ghost rose out of the floor beside her. "I've explored the whole thing, I think," she said. "There's a mess hall, a big hold, eight normal cabins and one big one. A library, too. I don't think we'll be cramped for space, no matter who comes along."

Faye glanced at Corsica.

Halcyon nodded. "This'll be the first time since Icereach I've had my own room."

Good. Having no space to call her own was probably one of the things weighing on Halcyon. Faye knew how thoroughly they had turned their Icereach room into a private sanctum, and Halcyon had only continued what Faye had started, building an altar to herself and who she wanted to be. Losing that might have been the beginning of her unmooring, or at least related to it.

As she thought, Starlight's aura gripped a lever and moved it, the knob at the tip brightly-colored and the brass handle long, so it would be satisfying to pull.

The ship didn't even lurch beneath them. And yet gravity seemed to increase, and the cave outside the windshield began to move as the ship started to rise.

Patiently, Starlight maneuvered them out into the canyon, taking as much care not to bump into the walls as she would if it was a friend's body she was piloting. Faye could feel the ship's responsiveness even without being in that seat, and they rose faster once the open sky was visible above.

The rim of the canyon passed before them, and then the ground fell away, the sky brightening further as they passed the canopy, too. To the side was the forest's ruined castle, but Starlight turned until that was out of sight, pointing them toward Ponyville instead.

Rainbow Dash sized the distance up, then soared out the open door. "Race you back to the castle!"

Starlight barely acknowledged her, Twilight's tree palace dead ahead on the horizon.

Twilight stepped closer, putting a wing on Starlight's shoulder. "How long has it been since you've flown this?"

"Not long," Starlight whispered. "I've had to travel, sometimes."

Twilight nodded.

"But when I returned to Sires Hollow, almost twenty years ago..." She took a deep breath, caressing the control panel with her aura, and then turned to Twilight and returned the nod. "That was the last time I flew with friends."

An Old, Dear Friend

The Immortal Dream arrived in Ponyville, hovering over Twilight's lawn, ponies down in the streets gaping up at its sparkling, midnight blue harmony comet.

Too little time had passed for Corsica to explore the ship. Ponyville and the Everfree canyon were right next to each other as far as airships were concerned, and leaving the deck would have meant stepping out of sight of the comet. That thing... Corsica stared at it, ignoring the vistas and the wind.

She wanted to touch it. Something about it whispered to her of a pony she hadn't been in years.

"Right," Starlight called over the comet's shimmer, and Corsica tore her eyes away, realizing everyone else had gathered on the deck as well. "If you're all serious about this, then we're leaving before I can have a change of heart."

"We'll load provisions in Canterlot," Twilight explained. "They'll have better infrastructure for this sort of thing, and we should be able to requisition everything we need from the Princesses. Since we haven't even told the others about this, we should do this while they're getting ready and deciding who wants to come. I'll be needed for that, so Rainbow, can you go round everyone up and let them know? Once the ship is loaded, we'll be back for you and anyone who's coming."

Rainbow threw a sharp salute. "You got it. Anyone else wanna come with?"

She mostly looked at Faye and Corsica. Corsica gave the comet one last glance... but odds were, she'd have plenty of time to look at it later while they flew. And there was something she needed to finish here in Ponyville first, especially if Halcyon was back, but still out of sorts.

"Yeah, I'll come with." She nodded, stepping up. "So do I jump, or...?"

Faye blinked as Rainbow Dash, with no hesitation, grabbed Corsica and backflipped off the edge. Corsica yelped indignantly.

She was glad that wasn't her.

"That's basically the same thing I did to Coda, the time I took her out to see Ironridge," Halcyon pointed out, floating beside her. "Though, since she was the flier, I guess our roles were reversed..."

A moment later, Rainbow hovered back up over the railing. "Anyone else?"

Faye shook her head. "Canterlot is the capital, right? I'd like to see it, if that's okay. As long as we'll have time to grab my satchel when we're back to pick you up?"

"Oh, definitely," Twilight promised. "I've got a few things to grab from my castle as well before we go."

"Perhaps I might accompany you," Seigetsu suggested, volunteering herself as well. She glanced back at Faye. "I assume you need no further motivation to remain on this mission, but it would be imprudent to split you from Nanzanaya overmuch. I will see to her participation."

Rainbow looked skeptical, mostly at Seigetsu's size. "Uhh, I'm not sure I can fly-"

Twilight had other concerns. "You're bringing-?"

Seigetsu cut both of them off by jumping, unassisted, over the railing. Faye looked down after her to see that she was fine... and hadn't even squished Corsica with her fall.

Confident that there were no more takers, Rainbow Dash soared away for real, and Starlight walked back onto the bridge, turning the ship once again towards the horizon.

Canterlot was within sight of Ponyville, seeing as it was built into the side of a mountain. A train track connected them, and Faye could even see an engine chugging along, making real progress that didn't seem distorted by magic. The magic of the rails, she supposed, didn't do anything to journeys that were short enough to make through conventional means.

Still, it was far enough away for the trip not to be instant. And that left Faye standing at the rail, staring at the passing hills, with plenty of time to think.

"Haven't been this high up since flying on the Verdandi," Halcyon said, drifting beside her. "I wonder if Coda's going to be mad at us for losing her ship. It's not like we can tow it back across the mountains."

"That's the second time just now that you've mentioned her," Faye murmured. "She on your mind?"

"Yeah." Halcyon nodded. "Just... trying to get my priorities in order, now that it sounds like we've gotten the harmonic flame thing into the hooves of someone more capable than us. And you know we've gotta help her."

Faye nodded, half-committal. "What is she to you?"

"I dunno," Halcyon said. "Can't say for sure when I've never felt anything else like it. But I've been thinking, across the memories you left for me and everything I did in Icereach and then Ironridge after that. And what I've decided is that the day we took Coda down to see Ironridge, that was the happiest I've ever felt."

Faye kept her mouth shut.

"It's not like this is a new goal, or anything," Halcyon went on. "I can't forget how I felt when I saw her, in that basement in Cold Karma. But I've got such a bad track record with seeing my plans through to the end, I..."

She swallowed. "I dunno. We've also got a whole war to stop. We're probably already too late. Maybe trying to do that was an unrealistic goal in the first place. Leif sure thought it was. But what about saving one little kid? That has to be... something we can do. I don't know if I should be under any illusions about being able to do more than that. Maybe biting off more than I can chew is how I've gotten into the trouble I've been in. But tell me I shouldn't be able to fight for one single pony."

Faye took a deep breath. "I talked to Procyon while you were asleep," she said, noticing Procyon - as usual - was nowhere to be seen. "She said the reason she's so different from us is because we're different sides of the same person, but she was forcibly removed. So there's some of us in each other, but none of her in us. She said something about how, because of this, we only ever pick goals that we won't ever achieve, so that we never had to risk achieving them. Like she was our ambition, or our will to change the status quo."

Halcyon frowned.

"You've tried pushing our boundaries so many times before," Faye went on. "And you always stumble. My fear always holds you back. I know where it comes from. I know my nightmares, these things that were imprinted on my mind before I was old enough to think about why. And I've been pushing back, trying to be stronger than them too. For both of us."

She closed her eyes. "I have a cohesive answer for how we got to be this way, where our limitations come from. So does Procyon, but her answer is completely different from mine. Neither of our answers have any holes for the other answer to fill in. Can they both be true at the same time? Or is one of us wrong, somehow? I know what I remember. Everything that made me what I am happened long before we met Unnrus-kaeljos. But if I got all my memories from Procyon, the same way your memories were doctored by me..." She looked at Halcyon, giving her a serious stare. "Is this what I put you through? Do you... wonder about this?"

Halcyon looked slightly concerned. "No. That doesn't sound like my experience at all."

Faye tilted her head, surprised.

"Do you not remember?" Halcyon pressed. "I don't think I sprung into existence all at once. Most of the time, I felt like I was changing my own memories, whenever I took off the mask. I always had this vague awareness of what I had changed, in the deepest part of my mind, like a bookmark on the table of contents just so I'd know it was there if I needed to change it again. I felt in control of what I didn't know, like I could change myself to remember again if I ever really needed to. I think I even did that, during the Aldebaran incident." She frowned. "If you aren't aware that stuff is missing, then this is completely different."

Faye's jaw hung slightly slack. Eventually, she swallowed. "I... slept a lot during the years after the avalanche. Sometimes, I'd wake up more, when it felt like I was needed to protect you. I think I remember that, in the bunker, but... That was me. I don't think it was you, when the mask was off. It couldn't have been. Right?"

"I thought it was me, just without putting any acts on," Halcyon admitted. "I didn't even know you were a separate person yet. But my... I dunno, my reasoning behind who I was felt contiguous at the time. Switching was harder, too. I needed to play that song, remember?"

Faye looked at herself. "You think when we used to do that, we were one person? Both of us together at the same time?"

Halcyon mirrored the gesture. "To tell you the truth, I never even knew there were any discontinuities in my life at all, like you going to sleep and leaving me in charge. I just thought the avalanche completely changed my life, so much that I wanted to start changing everything about me."

"What if that is how it happened?" Faye put a wing to her forehead. "You remember being vaguely aware of the things I was hiding from you, but not of any discontinuities like being created? What if I've got it backwards, and you were the original all along? Could you have created me to put a face on the secrets you didn't want to consciously remember, some sort of secret-keeper? Is it possible-"

"That doesn't make sense," Halcyon interrupted. "First off, Procyon doesn't think that's how it happened. And I've never seen you turn into a green crystal like me, right? Implying you're the most deeply connected with our body."

"Unless I can use that power and you can't, because you gave it to me..."

"I feel like I'd remember that," Halcyon whispered. "Or at least be aware that I had forgotten it." She raised her voice again. "Anyway, third, the first few times I ever interacted with you involved you writing letters to me when I took off my mask, remember? You kept telling me to stop looking for you or idealizing you."

Faye looked away. "I remember that."

"And the first real time you took over to interact with someone was the day Procyon came back," Halcyon added.

"I was suspicious of her," Faye admitted. "I still am, to an extent. She rubs me the wrong way. At first, I thought she was something completely different, because no buried part of us would have wanted to be uncovered again... At least, that was how I felt at the time. now, I don't know what to think. But if she's right and we cut away the things we didn't like about ourselves, and she's the result... I guess that would explain it."

"But then where'd you come from?" Halcyon mused. "Couldn't she have filled the role you do?"

Faye shook her head. "According to her, I was an empty shell left behind to regulate you while you grew into our life. And then I grew into what I am now, instead of staying an empty shell, somehow..." Her eyes focused. "I guess that does line up with what you said. Maybe you really are the elder of us. At least, for the part of our existence that counted us as individuals."

"Either way," Halcyon said. "I don't like any outlook that tells us we're fundamentally incapable of achieving lofty goals. Sure, I've choked a dozen times at the moment of truth, and I can't even describe how that feels. But it's gotta be something we can just push past together if we try a little harder together, right? If it's physically possible, then it should be possible. Mental blocks can be difficult, but there's no way Procyon could have taken something that makes this actually impossible. Right?"

"If you want to find out, there's an easy way to do it," Faye replied. "Take off your clothes in public, and see how long you can go before freaking out."

Halcyon blanched. "You're the last pony I ever expected to hear suggest that."

Faye bit her lip. "I'm not suggesting it as a way to stay comfortable. Just as a way to see if we really can find the fortitude to push through our blocks when we work together."

"Would you really work with me on that?" Halcyon raised an eyebrow. "You're the one who knows why we're bothered by our legs."

Faye closed her eyes. "If you want to, I will."

I realized too late that going to Canterlot meant a high chance of interacting with the Princesses. And to make matters worse, Faye chose our arrival to kick me back up front, with a warning in no uncertain terms that she wouldn't let me take off my mask for this.

Form your own opinion of what they're like, she demanded, sitting in the back of my head. Without me to prejudice you. All you saw was Luna catching you in the middle of something admittedly suspicious.

Uh huh. I could feel her fear of other things too, and it didn't take a genius to figure out that if our capture resulted in me getting taken for two days, it must have been bad. How could Faye not be terrified of someone who forced her up front for two whole days?

Even I couldn't do that. I had some ability to relinquish control, but not as much as Faye had to enforce it.

And it turned out both Princesses were waiting for us.

An air traffic control stallion dropped onto the ship's deck to guide it to a loading dock, looking thoroughly intimidated by the two alicorns who had arrived before him. Princess Luna actually looked less fearsome than I remembered. Part of it was the bright morning light, free and inviting compared to the Aegis chamber in the Crystal Empire. Part of it was the sleep-deprived expression on her face.

Most of it was her sister, who dwarfed her as badly as she dwarfed Twilight.

I was good at reading ponies, and Princess Celestia was easy for me to read. This was someone who could afford to give anyone the benefit of the doubt, because she knew she was strong enough to pick up the pieces if she ever made a mistake.

A key made of admiration turned somewhere in my chest, and I quietly added her to a long-neglected list of mares I wanted to be like.

Luna was the one who spared me a glance as they boarded, but both were clearly here to speak with Starlight and Twilight. "Princesses," Twilight said, dropping into an ornate bow.

"We received your request," Luna said, meeting the bow with a nod. "You will have everything you asked for. This is not a mission Equestria can afford to under-fund."

Celestia's eyes flicked to the harmony comet.

Starlight followed her gaze, but waited for her to make a remark.

I detected... not a tension in the air, but a current, as if these four could communicate their intent without fully voicing it. Twilight knelt in a show of respect. Starlight was still clinging to her fence, dangling from the top of it and not yet embracing her jump. The Princesses were here to give their blessing, yet both of them had to know Starlight's position. Neither of them wanted to make her regret her decision with fanfare she wasn't looking for.

"I have every faith that you will succeed," Celestia eventually said, touching Twilight's shoulder with a wingtip.

Starlight took a deep breath, and finally spoke. "I can't lie to myself about the scope of this trip. Princesses. If we restore the Flame, I think it's going to become like Generosity - intact and wandering the Lifestream, but unable to return home because its palace has been damaged, by whatever killed it before. The only way this ends is with some of our number going back to Ironridge."

She let a guilty glance slip my way. "The visions..."

It was Luna's turn to step forward. "Long have I searched for the meaning behind your visions, Starlight Glimmer. I could gather no evidence and draw no conclusions about them you did not find for yourself already, long ago. Would that they had appeared in any less conspicuous a circumstance, and we could safely dismiss them as a foal's nightmares. But fear not. The phenomena you showed me could not occur in the world's natural state. Were they premonitions of the future, it would take a rewrite of the very laws underpinning our world for them to occur. And the nature of your quest is to preserve the Flames, thus fighting against such rewrites. I give you my oath that your fears will not come to pass."

"That's right." Twilight put a hoof on Starlight's shoulder. "And I'll be with you every step of the way."

Princess Celestia pulled out a scroll that I recognized instantly. A Writ of Harmonic Sanction.

"...Keep it," Starlight said. "From Our Town, the Crystal Empire is on the way to Ironridge. And I already turned down one of those from Cadance. We'll need to resupply anyway after such a long trip, and it would be... more appropriate for me to use that one. If I decide to go."

Twilight gave her a look.

"I still have the ship's old batteries," Starlight told her. "I could fill them, and then stay behind. You'd have enough power to get to Ironridge, and anywhere else in the north after that."

Twilight shook her head. "If we really went on without you, I wouldn't take this ship. You deserve to see your friends again, not be separated from yet another one."

Starlight took a breath. "We'll see when we get there. Right now, one thing at a time."

Twilight nodded.

"Sorry about this." Starlight pulled herself together, looking up to Luna. "Someone so reluctant to embrace the road in front of them must seem like an awkward fit for the Virtue of Hope. Your old power deserved someone more unbreakable. But I'll... try to do myself justice."

Luna smiled at that. "You wielded my Nightmare Modules long before you embraced the power of the Immortal Dream. Surely you have learned a thing or two about the kinds of power I leave behind."

Starlight blinked at her in confusion. "Are you implying you made this? I thought the Flames of Harmony were from-"

"They are," Luna said. "But you recently learned something of their method of creation, did you not?"

I tilted my head, not following any of this.

"They were people," Twilight whispered. "Broken down into shards that were more rigid, less malleable, able to better embody rigid concepts like Hope."

Princess Celestia looked tempted to issue a correction, but let it die on her lips.

"But people change," Luna told Twilight and Starlight. "Even so transformed, no one is truly immutable. The Flames of Harmony have weathered their lives of thousands of years, but over its millennium with me, I left my mark on the Immortal Dream as surely as it left its on me. It is not purely the virtue of Hope as it once was, but also that of Determination: the ability to carry on when you cannot see your way to the future, and all hope is lost."

Starlight's eyes slowly widened.

"You are a fitting avatar for it," Luna whispered. "No matter where your path may lead, even in the depths of despair it will never forsake you."

Starlight hesitated, then nodded, just as a crew of ponies bearing crates boarded the gangplank and their privacy was lost.

I hadn't realized provisioning an airship would involve more than just food, especially when this one was powered by its captain, but the amount of stuff ponies were bringing on board soon proved me wrong. And whether I wanted to explore belowdecks or not soon became a moot point, as Starlight conscripted me to help change out all the dusty bedding from the cabins.

They were situated on the first sublevel, taking up both sides of the ship with a single hallway providing access to all of them, sandwiched between a small library to the front and the hold at the rear. Five to the starboard side, four to port, but the frontmost of the port ones was the size of two normal rooms.

"This one is the captain's quarters," I guessed, looking inside and determining there was only one bed that needed changing. Some of the cabin beds were round, unlike the rectangular ones I had seen everywhere else, and had a consistency closer to bean bag chairs than mattresses.

"When we could afford it to be." Even though she was working, Starlight walked slowly, one hoof stuck in the past. "It changed hooves a lot. Officially, it was Shinespark's room, but she gave it up whenever we needed an infirmary. And Jamjars once won it from her in a gambling contest when she was distracted. But that didn't even stick for a day."

"I bet they've all got stories," I guessed, the history of this ship taking on a presence I could almost reach out and touch, like the chapel in Icereach. "What about this one?"

I pointed to the next one back, port side middle.

"That one was usually a spare," Starlight said, walking in with a load of non-dusty bedding and arranging it with her horn. "Our crew changed sizes a lot. We weren't always flying at capacity... except sometimes, we were far over it. Don't ask me how many of these rooms I've spent a night in, I don't even remember." She pointed at the starboard rooms, second from front. "That was mine when I had a choice, though. With Maple."

"Was she...?" I racked my memories.

"My mother," Starlight said. "Adoptive. For the second time, though I was too young to remember the first adoption, so it doesn't count." She stared at the room for a moment. "...Gazelle said she came looking for me long ago, but she never arrived."

My ears fell. "I don't remember if I heard anything about that. I'm sorry."

Starlight took a deep breath.

"Do you think she would have crossed the Aldenfold from Ironridge, with an airship?" I asked. "If so, she might have gone through Snowport. The dragons are pretty meticulous with their information. Maybe it's possible she bought a train ticket there, and they have a record of it somewhere? A... trail you could start following?"

Starlight stiffened, just a little. "They would. That's... how things work for me. And I'd happen to have something they want in exchange for that information, just randomly."

"I dunno," I apologized. "You could always ask Seigetsu."

"...Once we've been to Our Town." Starlight stood up and moved on to the next room. "The Flame needs to be our priority."

Port side, second from rear. "This was Jamjars' room," Starlight explained, needing no bidding to keep talking and telling stories. "You might still be able to find holes in the walls from where she tacked up her posters. She spent more time in this place than anyone else spent in their rooms, and was picky about who she allowed in. It was more like a lair than a bedroom. Hard not to see why someone with her tastes in decorations would have wanted a space for their own, though."

I remembered far, far back to my trip aboard the Aldebaran, being put up in a room that probably belonged to Jamjars and getting a read on that. Back then, I wondered if whoever made that room might have been like me, building a shrine to themselves because no one else would understand them.

Then I remembered the way Jamjars and I parted, with her laying bitterly in a jail cell in Fort Starlight.

How had that even ended? I had been too tired at the time to push an agenda. She had betrayed me - I was more mad about her stunt with the stun powder in the return trip to the bunker than about finding out she worked for Aldebaran. Part of me wondered if I should have been more forceful in trying to understand her, to build a bridge between us. At the same time, maybe getting away had been the right call.

"And this room..." Starlight moved on to the rear port room. "You were maybe an hour away from being born here."

My backwards ears stood stiffly. "What!?"

Starlight gave me a look.

"You..." I swallowed. "You know who my mother is?"

"It didn't click for me until the day after you were arrested," Starlight said, lowering her voice. "You know who you are, right? They wouldn't have kept something like this from you?"

"Yeah. I know." I sighed. "Just figured it would be a bit more of a secret than it apparently is around here. Is it that obvious, or what?"

Starlight shook her head. "Very few would be able to tell. Like I told you, there's something about you that's shielding you from diagnostic types of magic, and it's not your parentage."

"Then how did you know?" I asked, straightening sheets in the room, no more conspicuous than any of the others.

"I know what a changeling queen crown looks like," Starlight said. "And I was there when you were born. With colors like yours, it was hard not to remember. You have very distinctive legs."

I felt another spike of panic. "You've seen my legs!?"

Starlight gave me a strange look. "Yes? You were unclothed for a whole hour at breakfast the other day? I was there?"

What?

Starlight tilted her head. "Are you alright?"

Faye sighed, gently nudging her way in to take control. "I remember it," she said. "But she doesn't. She doesn't have my memories from the two days she was gone."

A look of realization dawned in Starlight's eyes, and it quickly did battle with confusion. "There really are two of you," she eventually said. "How do others keep track of which is which?"

"They don't," Faye apologized. "I'm too new to coming up front for anyone to have figured this out before."

Starlight frowned.

"What were you doing, taking off all our clothes?" Halcyon asked, materializing as a ghost. "I thought you were insane for asking me to do it, but there was a precedent? You weren't already spooked enough, getting stuck up front without me?"

Faye glanced at her. "Look, my clothes were ruined, alright? You've noticed the new robe we're wearing. It's... the only one we have now. I just had nothing for a while."

Starlight followed Faye's gaze, suspicious. "She's right there, isn't she."

Halcyon perked in surprise. "You can see me?"

Starlight made no reaction.

"Yeah," Faye said. "Can you...?"

Starlight squinted, then relaxed. "I told you, something is blocking my ability to magically perceive you. And whatever that something is, there's another blockage right there."

"Well," Halcyon said, "I guess that confirms I'm something real and magical, and this ghost stuff isn't just a quirk of our mind... not that that was in doubt..."

"I'm handing control back now," Faye said. "Didn't want to interrupt your conversation. Just, it's better not to talk about the last two days with the assumption that she was here for them."

And then she put back on her mask.

I settled back into my body, still trying to wrap my mind around the fact that Faye had willingly gone around not only in front, not only in public, but without clothes. I wasn't even sure I could do that without her holding me back. Was Seigetsu holding her at swordpoint, or something?

"Well, I guess that explains how you saw me," I said. "It's me again, by the way. Halcyon. The other half is called Faye."

Starlight furrowed her brow, then nodded, getting back to work.

"So I was almost born there," I said as we moved on to the next room, starting on the starboard beds. "There's gotta be a story behind that. I know basically nothing about my past, other than who my mother is and what she did."

"Before she became Chrysalis," Starlight said, throwing the bedding out into a pile in the hallway. "She was a batpony, named Crystal. I didn't like her and didn't interact with her. Valey was the one who put up with her, and at least half of what I knew about her came from listening to Valey complain. But Crystal had a bad life, worse than maybe anyone else I've met. She was in love with the griffon regent of the imperial province of Izvaldi - who, as best as I can tell, was your father."

I listened, not at all questioning why she was telling me this. Mother never told me about the past. Neither did Papyrus.

For some reason, Starlight was doing it for free.

"Due to a quirk of Garsheeva's law, Lord Percival - the regent - was dependent on his office to be allowed to be with Crystal," Starlight went on. "And it was an office he wasn't supposed to have. But Gazelle helped him to keep it, and in turn had him on a tight string as a puppet. And his love for Crystal was the chain that kept him under Gazelle's control."

She took a deep breath. "Percival was a good griffon, but some of his subjects exploited his generosity relentlessly. Including a cult of scientists led by a stallion called Chauncey. He was the one who incubated Crystal's powers and made her what she was. I don't know if she was a changeling queen before he got to her. She might have been, just not yet filled with emotions. But he spent years funneling into her the darkest thoughts he could conceive of, harvested from an underground prison for heretics on death row. Don't ask why he did it. It doesn't even matter anymore. But by the time we met her, Crystal was bitter, jaded and resigned to her life as a science experiment turned political hostage."

I folded my ears.

"She never truly lost herself to her power, I think," Starlight said, moving on to the next room and starting back towards the prow. "But she didn't need to. What she went through would have broken anyone, and she was already broken by the time we found her. Cynical. Powerful. Pregnant, too."

She shook her head. "Valey couldn't leave well enough alone. She was trying to find who she was in those days, and our crew got filled up with ponies she saw herself in - untethered mares searching for their place in the world. So, over the months, Valey kept ignoring Crystal's rejections and tried to make her a part of our lives. Eventually, she succeeded. Crystal joined us and came to live on our ship, under our protection, out of Chauncey's reach so he couldn't use her to manipulate Percival. Gazelle still could, of course, but it was the best we could do for them. And she stayed with us for a whole month."

Starlight paused at the next room. "The night that Crystal went into labor, Gazelle and his minions tried to stage a coup. It failed, and we got conscripted as their getaway ship, flying at double speed the whole night to make it to Izvaldi so Crystal could be with Percival. We made it an hour before dawn. Crystal was reunited with Percival just in time. Gazelle was kicked off the ship."

And then they thought Percival wasn't really our father, Faye said in my mind. Because batponies always breed true. And Papyrus said he laughed at them for it, and that was the spark that pushed Crystal over the edge.

"I think I've heard the rest," I breathed, repeating what Faye had told me.

Starlight nodded. "If we had found a way to keep Gazelle off our ship. If we had been just an hour slower, and it happened here instead of Izvaldi... Crystal could have been around friends instead of enemies. It might have saved hundreds of thousands of lives."

A familiar clammy shudder rose up my legs.

"Intentions have nothing to do with it," Starlight said. "We thought we were helping, pushing the Dream harder to get her to Percival. None of us could ever have predicted what would come. And yet the fate of nations turned upon that event. Going on this adventure, trying to restore the Flame of Kindness, inevitably getting pulled back to Ironridge again... it could lead to something catastrophic, even though everyone pushing to do this is only trying to help."

I cringed. "Do you blame me for what happened? If it was such a pivotal moment that every last thing counted, does that mean every last thing is to blame?"

"No more than I blame myself for it," Starlight answered. "That situation is unique in that there really was someone to blame: Gazelle and Chauncey, and indirectly Garsheeva for creating a society that set them up to become what they were. But other times, there's no blame to be cast. The world breaks down without malice, and lives are ruined by happenstance alone. My adventure started because my best friend moved away, and the pain never left, even to the very end. The question you should be asking isn't whether you're to blame for what happened, but what role you want to have in what happens next."

"That's the question you're grappling with," I guessed.

Starlight nodded, changing rooms once again. "I have the capacity to play any role. There is nothing I can't do or become, be it angel or destroyer, teacher, fighter, jailer, doctor, or god. And all I want is to live in peace in a world I don't have to lie to myself to recognize as good enough."

She looked up. "In a way, you're the same. A changeling queen is a vessel for emotion. What you feel becomes your power. Crystal was filled with malice, agony and despair against her will, but those aren't the only forces in the world, or even the strongest. You could play any role, align yourself with any power, become a key to solve any situation... and all it would cost is giving up on a future in which you remain yourself and live out your days in peace."

"I can't do that," I said, tensing my wings. "Live out my days in peace, I mean. Because... me and Chrysalis aren't the only changeling queens out there. There's another."

Starlight's eyes widened just a little.

"Her name is Coda," I told her. "She's a new one, just a kid. She was created by the same scientists who made Chrysalis."

Starlight sucked in a sharp, angry hiss. "They... Again? What were they thinking...?"

"They're trying to atone for the damage they caused," I explained. "They want to kill Chrysalis, and they figure the only way to match her power is with another changeling queen, this one fed on love instead of despair. But they don't know what they're doing, and have been raising her on empty flattery with no knowledge of the world around her at all. She's gonna get creamed, go insane, or both. I have to help her."

"Why didn't you tell me this earlier?" Starlight whispered, frantic. "That's... The kind of power changeling queens are capable of..."

"But she might not even get the chance to go that far," I continued, "because just before I left, she sacrificed herseslf to seal away the windigoes that were running Ironridge, and is locked in some sort of stasis with them. She's a good kid. She desperately wants to fight for the good guys, and she trusts me too. So before I can even think about living out my days in peace - and between you and me, that's ridiculously boring - I've gotta get her back, tell her cult to shove off, and bring her with me so she can have a good life too."

Starlight let out a breath.

"She's pretty set on fighting Chrysalis, though." I stopped and shook my head. "It might not be possible for her to live at peace with herself until she's been dealt with once and for all. And that shouldn't be her problem. So it might need to become my problem, instead. But I've also got a war to think about. And no matter how powerful a changeling queen like me might be, I don't understand myself well enough to use those powers. So... I need your help. To accomplish my goals."

Because even if I couldn't see them through by myself... maybe Starlight could.

Starlight looked me up and down.

"Well?" I asked, waiting for her to say something.

"...The north hasn't broken you yet," she said, turning and moving on to the next room. "Take care of yourself, and know your limits. Because until that happens, there's always a chance."

A Reminder of Home

After a bit of back and forth, I claimed the rear left room as my own.

I couldn't feel anything special about it, of course. I would have been surprised if I did. Even if my dreams let me remember things far earlier than normal, they had never showed me things from before I was born. In fact, I checked all the rooms just to be sure, and this one didn't seem different from the others in any meaningful way.

But according to Starlight, it was a link to my history. And I needed no more reason than that to want it for my own.

I spent the whole flight back to Ponyville in that room, dusting it and testing out the new bedding and staring out the window, simply trying to suffuse it with my essence. Mine. My room. Just like back in Icereach, one I wouldn't have to share with anyone else.

Such bliss.

I was almost disappointed when the ship finished its flight, settling down on Twilight's lawn with landing gear that had been tucked into its wooden belly. I didn't have anything to claim the room with, having left my satchel back in Twilight's castle, but I'd also need to leave the room to go down and get it, and didn't want anyone else claiming it while I was away...

Then I remembered what Faye had said, about somehow going out in public without her clothes.

I looked at my coat - borrowed from the Crystal Empire, more of a posh robe that was far removed from my usual style. I looked at my boots beneath it. And then, feeling self-conscious and silly, I crawled out of the coat and left it hanging on the door.

I'd still have the boots. And I could be at least half as brave as Faye was.

Corsica couldn't tell if she had accomplished her mission as she walked toward the landed Immortal Dream, trailing everyone else who had decided to come: Seigetsu, Nanzanaya, and every last one of Twilight's friends.

Oh, she had set out with a goal in mind. And that goal was now well and properly in hoof. She just couldn't tell if anything she did had influenced it succeeding. In fact, she was pretty sure she hadn't.

That was a nice feeling, knowing things were going her way without any effort expended. Getting up and walking around Ponyville didn't count.

Of the five, Applejack and Rarity were the ones whose presence most surprised her, seeing as the former had a farm to run and the latter was an entrepreneur. And she wasn't sure what connection Pinkie Pie had to this mission either. Fluttershy, at least, was required to carry the flame, and Rainbow Dash had nothing if not an adventurous spirit.

But she wondered if Seigetsu and Nanzanaya would really be here if not to keep an eye on Halcyon. It was particularly awkward when, best she could tell, Nanzanaya was only there for Seigetsu to also keep an eye on her. Hopefully this mess would get sorted out soon enough and Halcyon could get out from under Seigetsu's supervision. Corsica didn't care for the idea of those two following around forever, even though neither of them had done anything to her, personally.

It probably shouldn't have bothered her. This wasn't her trip, she hadn't commissioned it, didn't own the airship and wasn't giving input on where they were going or why. She had accomplished her own reason for coming to Equestria: meeting Starlight. And it hadn't changed as much for her as Valey hoped it might.

But this was still Halcyon's trip, right? Halcyon... or maybe Faye now... still had her goals of saving the Kindness flame, and that was the point of this trip.

And their original crew, which Halcyon had chosen all for this purpose back in Ironridge, was now nowhere to be found. Only Corsica was still clinging on, like a stubborn barnacle, except less because she was stubborn and more because she had nothing better to do.

So she couldn't help feeling a twinge of annoyance at how many passengers were here who had nothing at all to do with Halcyon's goals. She knew it wasn't Halcyon's ship, and there was nothing wrong with some of Twilight's friends treating this like a vacation, or Seigetsu dragging Nanzanaya along for no good reason at all. She knew it. And her own goal had even been to drag one of these ponies along.

But still, she felt as if Halcyon was being taken advantage of.

"Alright," Starlight instructed, standing in the doorway to the bridge with everyone else on deck. "This won't be just a day cruise, so we need to go over some ground rules for airship travel. First off, this is my boat. I'm the captain. I'm not happy this is how it works, but that means my word is law. If and when things go wrong, and in order for things not to go wrong, that's important."

She took a deep breath. "The engine room is off limits when I'm not there. None of you want to find out what it's like to have the system lose power at cruising altitude, and I never want to experience it again. If you think something is wrong, find me first." She took a few steps. "Likewise, the kitchen is the domain of the chef, no exceptions. Pinkie, I assume that's you?"

Pinkie rapped her chest with a smug hoof. "Girls, you'll be eating like queens."

"I can help out there if you need a hoof," Applejack volunteered.

Starlight nodded. "Next, cabin fever is a real problem and I doubt being the Elements of Harmony makes you immune to it. Everyone needs their own space, and we've got..." She did a quick count under her breath. "Six, I make seven, two of you and two of you... Eleven of us fitting into nine rooms. Who's sharing?"

She looked expectantly at Corsica and Halcyon, who for some reason wasn't wearing her coat. Again.

Hopefully she was actually becoming more comfortable with herself and not pushing herself to prove a point, but the uncomfortable look on her face made Corsica doubt that.

"Actually," Rainbow volunteered, "can I take Grenada's old spot, in the lookout?"

Starlight glanced back at her. "With the hammock?"

Rainbow slapped the floor with a grin. "Feels like my style."

"Anyone else?" Starlight looked around, fishing for volunteers. "Whoever doubles up gets the big room. That's the captain's quarters."

"I'll take a roomie!" Pinkie volunteered.

"Actually, I could go with Halcyon," Corsica offered. "We've been rooming together for a month or two now, so we're used to each other."

Nobody missed the look of disappointment on Halcyon's face. Corsica found herself completely unprepared for it, and after a second to process it, was surprised at how much it hurt. Was... this about something she'd recently done?

Pinkie reacted first. "You cooould always stick it out with me! What do you think, pink pal?"

"Uh, sure. That works," Corsica said absently, still running over recent events in her head. True, things hadn't been going fantastic between her and Halcyon lately, but at least the last few days... Quietly, she spent a wish ensuring that Halcyon hadn't secretly always felt this way about rooming with her, and just never told her.

A weight settled in on the back of her mind as it came true, and the world seemed a little duller in her senses. Seigetsu stared right at her, but did nothing to stop it.

Using her power to control what her friends thought of her was usually one of her hard prohibitions, a line she didn't cross. And now she had done it almost without thinking. Maybe Seigetsu should have stopped her.

Corsica closed her mouth and tried her hardest to stop thinking before she could let herself spiral.

I sighed in relief as roommate allocation was finished, leaving me with my precious claim intact. Corsica looked less happy than I expected about getting her own space again... though she had gotten paired off with Pinkie Pie, but that wasn't it. Did she just enjoy being my roommate that much?

Starlight was talking again, so I'd have to ask her later. I nodded along as Starlight explained basics I'd heard from Gerardo long ago, almost wondering if she was stalling because she didn't want to actually go... and then, to my great surprise, she started to explain about the trains.

"Realistically, there's no way we're making it to Our Town and then the Crystal Empire without a million questions about this, because you're going to see how far apart they really are," Starlight finished, "which is why I'm telling you now, all at the same time, instead of repeating myself when you come asking one by one later."

"That's completely preposterous," Twilight sputtered. "You're saying every map of Equestria ever is deliberately compressed a thousandfold in between the important parts? How could a class of magic like this even exist? I've studied every school of magic imaginable, and there's nothing whatsoever about magic that only exists when you're not aware of it! That just doesn't happen! Who did this? And how?"

Corsica was looking sideways at Seigetsu. "This is your big, spooky secret, isn't it? The one Terutomo was telling Papyrus and Braen?"

"Guilty as charged," Seigetsu admitted, folding her hands behind her back. "You can imagine, as a town on the intersection of major tradeways, how necessary it would be for our livelihoods to have a way for citizens to unlearn this information."

"You knew?" Twilight pointed at her, and then at Starlight. "And you knew too, but you took the train with us between the Crystal Empire and Ponyville. And you're saying that's actually a weeks-long flight?"

"It doesn't affect me," Starlight said with a shrug. "Too many different reasons that could be for me to pin it on just one. I never bothered asking the princesses."

"I have my own ways to mitigate it as well," Seigetsu said. "I would advise speaking with your princesses to learn their own ways of bypassing it, as the rulers and saviors of such a vast land do need to be able to traverse it easily."

Starlight nodded. "And if any of you would really rather not know this, I do have... my way... to make you forget. Just in case."

Everyone looked at each other, except Twilight, who was staring off into space with a ferocious eye tick.

I had to admit, seeing them so annoyed made me feel just a little bit better about how stupid this system was.

"I just can't believe I haven't found out about this sooner," Rainbow complained. "Like, I've flown between Ponyville and Canterlot hundreds of times. Was that, like-?"

"Perfectly legitimate," Seigetsu told her. "Those two towns are within an ordinary distance of each other. As, I would expect, are most of the places you visit."

Starlight nodded. "From what I've heard, the only places you've been that actually required this system to reach are the Crystal Empire and its surrounding area, Our Town, and Griffonstone. Places like Canterlot, Manehattan, Cloudsdale... All of those are within the same little bubble at Equestria's core. And of the three that are far away, the Crystal Empire is the only one that you regularly travel to." She turned away. "Ask the princesses if you want to find a better way back and forth between here and there. Otherwise, you've... got my airship. If you're going to be traveling the world, this is something you need to know."

"What I need to know," Twilight demanded, "is how I never knew about this sooner! I just... Equestria... How does this even work!?"

"Magic," Pinkie chirped, the only one of the group who seemed completely unsurprised by this revelation.

There was no point to me asking what a Princess of Equestria was doing, not knowing about something like this. Twilight was asking it for me. And as much as I had been looking forward to seeing someone else's reaction to this, the nature of the trains almost felt like old news by now.

It was satisfying, but that was it.

"Well, that was the last item," Starlight said, raising her voice. "I figured no one would be in the mood to listen to more after that. So, let's get going."

She stepped onto the bridge, leaving the door open behind her, and a short while later the ship began to rise.

Corsica's luggage was limited to what she had been able to carry out of the mountains, and was a far cry from the bags she loaded onto the Aldebaran, or even Gerardo's ship before that. And even then, she had packed light, limiting herself to four or five bags at Ansel's incessant nagging.

So now she found herself with a giant room, shared with a mare she barely knew, with little enough stuff to show off her side of the room that she could carry it all in one go.

"What'cha doin'?" Pinkie asked from right behind her.

"H-Hey!" Corsica jumped, startled, and spun around to face her new roommate. "Weren't you freaking out on the deck with the others?"

"Yep!" Pinkie shrugged. "It's pretty fun. But you slunk off looking down in the dumps, and I couldn't let that stand. What's up?"

Corsica straightened a frayed tuft back into her mane. "I always look like this. It's pretty normal."

Pinkie Pie bored into her eyes with her own overly-innocent blue ones. "You suuure about that?"

Corsica blinked. "Yeah. Do you think I shouldn't be?"

"Beats me." Pinkie's mane bounced. "That's your call! I just wondered if you really meant it. Sometimes ponies say the strangest things to get out of conversations when they could just say, 'Eh! Not feeling it.' So what do you wanna talk about, roomie?"

Corsica looked at the room's single proper bed, and then at the second, smaller bed someone had obviously dragged in here earlier in the day. "Guess it makes sense for us to know each other a little. Why'd you decide to come along?"

"For fun, obviously!" Pinkie gave her a look asking if this should really be in doubt. "I've never been on a cross-country airship trip before. But also because Starlight's got a bad case of the heebie-jeebies about this whole adventuring thing. After she spilled her story to Twilight and Rainbow Dash, we all got together and decided that whenever she tried taking the first step toward facing her past, we'd all be there to back her up. Including me! So, here I am."

"That's pretty stand-up of you," Corsica said.

"Twilight and Dashie are her true confidantes," Pinkie added furtively, covering her whisper with a hoof. "The rest of us don't even know half of what happened up there in her foalhood!" She straightened up. "Doesn't stop us from turning out to help, though. Not like I need much encouragement when it's a free cruise, right? So, what about you?"

Corsica took a step back toward the beds. "Why am I here?"

"Let me guess: to save the world?"

Corsica shook her head, looking toward the porthole window. "Same reason as you, actually. Supporting a friend. And I felt it would be better than sitting in one place."

"You mean that batpony?" Pinkie asked, blithely ignoring the reticent tone in Corsica's voice. "Halcyon?"

"Yeah," Corsica said. "What do you think of her?"

Pinkie hummed thoughtfully, making a show of taking the question seriously... or maybe that was just how she was. "Needs to get out more. Like you! And kind of jumpy and paranoid. Nice, though. Interesting fashion sense. Are batponies as rare where you're from as they are around here?"

"More than half the population," Corsica said with a shrug. "Why?"

"I bet Rarity would have a field day with her," Pinkie mused. "Anyway, I definitely need to hang around her more to see what her deal is, because she's harder than usual to read, and I'm a great reader."

"Think I'm hard to read too?" Corsica asked.

"Nah," Pinkie promised. "You're an open book."

"Oh yeah?" Corsica raised a weary eyebrow, contemplating a nap as the best way to work through her post-wish emotional hangover. And then remembering she was supposed to not be thinking about what she had just done with that wish.

Her face fell. "Try me."

Pinkie needed no second invitation. "You need to blow off some steam. Wanna head up to the bridge and ask Starlight what she does to pass the time on long boat rides?"

"No dice," Corsica apologized. "I'm dead tired. Happens a lot. Like I said, it's normal for me. I don't have any steam to blow off."

Pinkie raised an eyebrow. "You sure about that?"

"Shouldn't I be?" Corsica looked back at her. "You just told me a moment ago I was the best judge of this."

"And you are," Pinkie sang. "But even the pros make mistakes sometimes, right? What's a friend for if not to ask you whether you're jumping too quickly to conclusions? Because my intuition says whatever you would do if I wasn't here, you've done it a bajillion times before, and it never works quite as well as you'd like."

"And you think you've got a better idea," Corsica said, skeptical. Although maybe she shouldn't have been? This mare practically vibrated with life. Either she had no idea what it was like to walk in Corsica's horseshoes, or she knew exactly what Corsica was missing.

That was a gamble worth taking. "Alright." She nodded. "Lead the way."

Pinkie grinned a wide, toothy grin, and bounced her way out of the room, apparently too excited to walk.

When they reached the deck, several other ponies were there already: a jaded but curious Twilight, an arrogant Rainbow Dash, and Starlight, wearing a poker face. "Contest?" Corsica guessed.

Starlight sized her up. "Debating teaching Rainbow Dash how to fight. Either of you want in?"

"Ooo!" Pinkie grinned. "Spectator sport!"

Rainbow sized Corsica up. "Could be fun to have a rival. But you'd better be good to keep up, you hear?"

Twilight glanced their way too. "Starlight made a pretty good point: anyone who's seriously considering going to the north had better be familiar with how to defend themselves. And given the amount of scrapes she got in when she was there - as a filly, I might add - I think it's a great idea. But..."

"There's a catch," Corsica guessed.

Rainbow rolled her eyes.

"My teacher wasn't the... fairest instructor," Starlight said, watching Rainbow. "I'm not sure copying her methods will work."

"Yeah, but my skills aren't fair either," Rainbow complained. "So even is even, right? Hurry up and show me some moves, already."

"I'm guessing," Starlight went on, looking to Corsica, "even if you haven't studied self-defense, you at least have been in some situations that made you wish you had learned it... if not full methods of offense."

"I used to spar for fun," Corsica admitted, thinking back to her training sessions with Balthazar and the yaks. "Never won a single time, so I'm used to getting wrecked. Wanna try me? If my self-esteem can survive a yak, I think it can survive you."

Starlight looked legitimately impressed. "Sparring with yaks, huh? The techniques you use there won't work on me, but they're tough opponents. Everyone, clear the deck."

"No," Rainbow protested, "me first-"

Starlight used her telekinesis to cordon off a rectangular shell covering three quarters of the deck with only her and Corsica inside. It didn't look like it cost her a bit of concentration.

"Don't worry about me, or the ship," Starlight instructed, taking up a position at one end of the field. "I haven't done this in a while, but I'll be alright. And I reconnected the ship's batteries, so it can make it weeks without me. Now, try to land a hit on me."

"Just land a hit?" Corsica blinked her horn. "That simple?"

"You have one minute," Starlight said, "until I bring down the shield and let Rainbow help you." Rainbow was already banging on the telekinesis like a locked door, frustrated. "I won't use my horn until you use yours, and same for our cutie marks. Your time starts now."

Corsica considered, and decided she'd be better off with those treaties in place, turning off her horn and giving Starlight the benefit of the doubt - her own horn was controlling the telekinesis shield, after all. Starlight waited, impassive, paying full attention to Corsica. Undoubtedly she would be confident in her speed to issue a challenge like this... but how confident?

No way to find out but to test. Corsica approached her at a stiff march, and when Starlight didn't budge, Corsica whipped around and swung her tail - longer than her forelegs, and Starlight didn't specify getting hit with what.

She felt nothing connect. By the time she could look over her shoulder, Starlight had moved, and was standing just a hair out of reach.

Corsica still had momentum, and she pivoted into a hind kick. This time, she watched Starlight dodge, but there was barely anything to the motion. Even a slightly different angle, even a little more reach would have caught her, but Starlight dodged as if she had a hundred tries to prefect the most minimal response, and the kick went wide.

Starlight wasn't even that fast. it felt more like Corsica missed.

Well, she'd see about that. Corsica threw her shoulder at Starlight in a classic yak tackle, putting her head down and her butt out to cover as much horizontal distance as possible. This maneuver would force Starlight to move.

Except somehow, it didn't. Starlight sidestepped around Corsica's haunches, and then back into her path when Corsica tried to catch her with another tail whip, except Corsica had already stumbled to a halt to avoid tripping and couldn't capitalize on the maneuver. The end result was that Starlight had taken a few steps back, and was still untouched.

So Corsica swiped at her, and then swiped again, summoning her focus and trying to chase which way Starlight went. "Come on, overwhelm her!" Rainbow called through the shield as each kick fell frustratingly short, as if Starlight wasn't really moving and Corsica kept missing on her own power, even as she stumbled after Starlight around the arena. "Go faster!"

Corsica tried. She really did try, but couldn't shake the intuition that speed would make her desperate. Starlight wasn't actually that fast, when she slowed down and focused on what was happening. But her control of herself was excellent, and her ability to read-

"Alright," Starlight said, the glow around her horn dying as the shield fell. "Minute's-"

Rainbow needed no invitation to join the fray, if it could be called that. She soared past Corsica in a blur, plowing into Starlight... except when Corsica looked, Starlight wasn't there. Rainbow missed.

Rainbow Dash whirled, snapping a hoof around with speed it was almost hard for Corsica's eyes to track, pivoting into a kick and then a wing slice. But Starlight dodged each one with a humble backstep or sidestep, starting her movements before Corsica could even read what Rainbow was doing.

Rainbow tried to tackle her, but again, she missed, Starlight moving just as rainbow finished the wind-up for her dash. As if inertia was a myth, Rainbow pivoted and tried to dash her again, but Starlight had already stepped back where she was originally standing, her posture relaxed, as if she was avoiding a jostling crowd rather than someone in close quarters trying to punch her.

No, that wouldn't make someone nearly this relaxed.

Corsica stilled her focus, quieted her thoughts and poured everything into her reflexes, trying to anticipate Rainbow's next move. Starlight's back was to her, and she was still a combatant. She should be analyzing, not gawking.

There. Rainbow charging Starlight, but her angle was just a little off, so it was obvious Starlight would dodge to the left. Corsica jumped forward, preparing to strike...

It was a juke. Rainbow swerved, aiming for the same spot Corsica was, and yet Starlight wasn't there. She had gone the other way, the way Rainbow originally threatened.

Corsica's hoof connected with a metallic thonk on Rainbow's forehead, and she realized with a sharp spike of guilt that she forgot to take off her special shoes for this.

"Ow!" Rainbow complained, falling back and rubbing her head, looking mostly okay. Rather than leap back into the fight, though, she stared at Starlight, equal parts accusatory and baffled. "How, though? I'm faster than you. I know I'm faster than you. No one alive is as fast as I am."

Starlight opened her mouth to start explaining. "Your speed doesn't matter if-"

Rainbow rushed her from a dead standstill, no indication and no warning. A streak of rainbow-colored light lingered in her path as she blasted across the deck... but Starlight was a pace to the side, and she missed, crashing into the far railing in a tumble.

"Rainbow...!" Twilight came running over.

"As I was saying," Starlight went on. "Your speed doesn't matter. You could aim for where I am, or for where I will be. But if I want to be in the place you aren't aiming for, who wins? You're not used to fighting someone who knows your every move."

"Yeah, but you said you wouldn't use your cutie mark if we didn't use ours!" Rainbow complained.

"And were you using yours?" Starlight asked.

Rainbow scratched at her flank. "Well, it's not the kind of thing you can just turn off..."

"Neither is mine." Starlight nodded, and then glanced to Corsica. "And neither is hers."

Rainbow glanced at Corsica. Corsica glanced at Starlight.

"Remind me what yours does, again?" Corsica asked.

"Lots." Starlight shook her head. "But, if you're not put off by that, then keep trying. Hitting me isn't impossible; I told you, I'm rusty. Or you could have a go at each other, and maybe learn something from that." She looked back at the bridge. "The way I learned was by being given an iron wall to practice on... and hang out with. So, take it or leave it."

Corsica took it.

Two hours later, Corsica realized she had forgotten what it meant to be exhausted.

Sitting around in a funk, without the mental stamina to do anything? That was a different kind of tired, one that left her body to crust over like a spring that was compressed and then left to soak in water. But right now, her muscles burned, her blood was pumping, cold mountain air scraped the back of her throat, and she collapsed to the deck with the awe-inspiring knowledge that her body had given in before her mind did.

It felt indescribably good, even if she knew she used to be stronger than this, able to keep going for longer. How had she let herself forget how good this was? She was exhausted, and at the same time, she was alive.

And somehow, despite giving herself in to Starlight's training, she hadn't managed to land a single hit. She had tried. Tried hard enough that her special talent should have slipped her control and activated on its own, but it hadn't. And she couldn't remember it happening while fighting the yaks, either, now that she thought about it.

She was too tired to think about the implications of that now, but filed it away for later, because she did not want to forget this. There was something there, a way to understand her special talent better, to control it rather than letting it control her life.

Maybe that was just the adrenaline talking. But if it was, she was glad for it.

And she was hungry, too. Really hungry.

"You stuck it out longer than I thought you would," Starlight said, slightly winded from all her dodging - though not as much as Rainbow Dash, who was upside-down and panting on the deck with her wings flopped loosely to the sides. "You're dedicated."

"I'm stubborn," Corsica corrected. "And I enjoyed it."

Starlight looked wistful at that.

"What's with your style, though?" Corsica asked, still flat out on the deck. "You basically didn't show anything off except how to dodge. No attacks, no magic, no anything."

"Have to start with the basics." Starlight shrugged. "I was trained by having things thrown at me. Dozens, hundreds, thousands of times, until I learned to dodge almost presciently." Upon seeing Corsica's look, she hastily added, "Soft things."

"Makes sense," Corsica said. "But, you know, I've got a pretty good horn. I respect the basics, but I can learn to use this, too."

Starlight stepped over and took a closer look at Corsica's horn. "I'll bet. You don't see many that shape and size. Do you have any signature spells?"

"Signature spells?" Corsica asked. "Developing those wasn't as much of a priority for me as... other things were, growing up. But I did have the nicest horn in Icereach."

For some reason, Starlight sighed.

Halcyon chose that moment to come wandering over. "What do you all look so satisfied for?" she asked, mostly focusing on Corsica... and still wearing only boots, no robe.

"Because I spent two hours accomplishing absolutely nothing." Corsica groaned, rolled to her hooves, grinned... and her stomach betrayed her with a growl. "Do you know if there's any food?"

"Yeah," Halcyon said. "They've been testing out the kitchen down below. I was just coming to get you."

"...Tough," Corsica decided, flopping back onto the deck. "I'm too beat to make it. Carry me?"

Halcyon blinked. "You what?"

"Come on," Corsica challenged. "I carried you back when they let you out of jail. Pretty please?"

For a moment, Halcyon looked confused, then seemed to listen to something no one else could hear, and finally shook her head. "Carry your own carcass. I'm not about to break my back trying to lift it."

Oh well, Corsica thought, resigning herself to walking and pressing her hooves beneath her. It was worth a shot.

Halcyon seemed to be in good spirits today though, despite her missing coat. When she wasn't, she was bad at hiding it, so Corsica was confident in her guess. And she didn't want to hide how she felt, herself.

She owed Pinkie Pie a thank-you for kicking her out and sending her up here. After all, she suddenly remembered, it was exactly the same thing she used to do for Halcyon back at home.

The Aerial Boredom Factor

The first day on Starlight's airship was over before Corsica could even process it had happened. But as the days dragged on into a week, she began paying attention to how everyone else was coping with being stuck in a flying box with nowhere to go and nothing to do.

Rainbow Dash was the most restless of the bunch, which was peculiar as she was also the only one fast enough to go out for a fly and still keep pace with the ship. And go out for a fly she did, whenever she wasn't taunting Twilight about all the things she had seen that weren't on any of Twilight's maps.

Twilight, for her part, had never gotten over being told about the train magic, constantly demanding info about the world they were flying over and starting a valiant project to map the terrain they passed - a project that collapsed about thirty-six hours into the voyage when she finally fell asleep and no one else was capable of filling in to her standards.

Corsica had shared a little of that incredulity when she first heard. Not on the same level; she was a tourist who had only been here for weeks, and Twilight was a princess and a scholar who had every business knowing a thing like this. But hers had quickly evaporated when she realized the true reason all this empty land could have been kept a secret: it really was empty.

Unspoiled reaches of hills, plains and mountains alternated with rivers and forests, crisscrossing the landscape. Corsica started playing a game with herself by looking for good places to settle down and start a village. A valley between three isolated peaks, the narrow passes choked with trees to hide its existence from outsiders? A delta where two rivers converged into a lake, acres of plains ripe for farmland sprawling out in the shadow of a mountain range that could protect against high winds? A horseshoe formation of water around an inland peninsula, a sparse, tall-trunked grove with room for houses between the trees, a mountain steppe that could provide shelter for cool-weather crops and spectacular views of the land below...

And not one of these places was occupied. Ponies were nowhere to be seen.

"You ever think about how much land is just sitting here, completely unused?" Corsica asked Rarity, the only pony who happened to be around at the time.

"Hardly," Rarity said. "While I can see the appeal of roughing it in the wilderness as an occasional vacation tactic, isn't it so much more natural for ponies to live where other ponies already are? Perhaps if you were a hermit who wanted to get away from it all, and I'll admit to these vistas being a fantastic muse. But what's the point of having a muse if no one is around to see what it drives you to create?"

"Hermitism ain't got nothing to do with it," Applejack said, wandering into earshot and furrowing her brow before striding over.

Corsica glanced at her, sensing a story. "Oh yeah?"

Applejack shook her head. "Frontier life's not for everyone, sure. But Ponyville was founded by my family on commission from Princess Celestia herself. I can't give the lecture half as well as Granny Smith, but leaving your life behind to settle uncharted lands takes gumption and grit, and a whole 'nother sense of purpose. Resources, too. Living off the land is great and all, but you need yourself a hoofhold before the first round of hard times arrives, and it sure ain't gonna knock before coming in."

Rarity raised an eyebrow at her. "But Ponyville was hardly uncharted, you must admit. It's visible from Canterlot, darling. And the Princesses used to have a castle right next door!"

Applejack gave her a self-sure look. "Well, that only tells you how much harder it would be to colonize a place as remote as this. Two hundred years ago, you could ask the same question about why no one had settled Ponyville. And the simple answer for this place is, the right ponies just haven't come around to do the job yet."

"You think they ever will?" Corsica asked.

Applejack blinked. "Well, sure, someday. Might not be any of us left alive to see it, but why wouldn't they? As long as they don't turn it into some eyesore of a city, this here is good land. Only right to treat it like such."

"But what if that never happens?" Rarity prodded, following Corsica's train of thought. "After all, these hills and valleys seem to have gone unspoiled for thousands of years already, and you seem to agree with me that the forces keeping ponies from wandering in and making a mess of them are quite robust. So who's to say they won't stay this way until the end of time?"

"The end of time ain't exactly a regular occurrence..." Applejack started, then trialed off. "You're not thinking about what that Convergence said, are you? And all the stuff we saw down in that city?"

"Not in a doom-and-gloom sense," Rarity carefully said. "Though I think I am realizing something. If this world truly was created by our own distant ancestors, by ponies, and yet is so much larger than we have any realistic use for even thousands of years later, don't you suppose they could have made it this way as art? Perhaps these landscapes are beautiful because someone wanted to create something beautiful, and that's all there is to it."

"Sounds wasteful to me," Applejack mused. "Why would you make something no one's got a use for? Seems more likely to me they just wanted to be prepared for the future, and not have us go running out if we needed that land."

Corsica frowned out at the hills, a series of cliffs covered in lush greenery opening up on the other side of a snow-capped line of mountains. "Or it could be they overestimated the amount of space we'd need."

Rarity gave her a look. "Forgive me if I'm out of touch with the rest of the world, Corsica, but that city we witnessed down below was far and away grander than any we've conceived of in the modern age. Why, I'd bet you could fit the entire population of Equestria inside the real thing, give or take. If anything, they'd be expecting to need less space than modern society does."

"Unless they weren't living that closely together by choice," Corsica pointed out. "Some of them thought we were refugees, remember? It sounded like ponies from all over their world were being forced to move to that city. So maybe it was designed to hold the entire population of..." She trailed off, a different thought hijacking her stream of consciousness. "You think they might have made it this big to prepare for some event that would cause livable space to become much smaller?"

"If they did, not much we could do about it from up here on an airship," Applejack stiffly said. "Personally, I see more sense in appreciating the present than catastrophizing about the future, and I'm usually the last to rest on her laurels."

"Come now," Rarity chided, "you have to admit speculating about the distant past can be interesting."

"I don't know the context," Starlight said, wandering over, "but it's only interesting when the distant past isn't trying to kill you."

Rarity and Applejack both chuckled.

"You here for anything?" Applejack asked. "Or just appreciating the view?"

"I've appreciated this view for longer than I care to reflect on," Starlight said. "I'm glad you're enjoying it, though. Just checking in on the crew and seeing if anyone's found anything interesting to do."

"We could always fight again," Corsica suggested, a lingering soreness in her muscles from too much exercise that was far more welcome than the feeling of atrophy from laying around.

Starlight looked at her with something approaching fondness. "You're enjoying this that much?"

Corsica flexed.

Starlight shook her head. "I... don't know if I should encourage that. This isn't supposed to be fun. Fighting for your life is terrifying, and should never be anything but. Preparing for that should be a necessity, not recreation. But I had fun learning, too. Or, as much as I could appreciate anything, back then. So maybe it's me who doesn't understand how this works." She glanced around for Rainbow Dash, then shrugged. "If anyone else wants in, they can hear us and show up later. Let's clear some space."

My lair was finally starting to feel like my own.

I had precious little resources to use for customization. My lifestyle up until now, especially recently, hadn't been conducive to having or carrying around belongings to decorate with, and I couldn't even rearrange the furniture since all of it was bolted down.

But limitations aside, I had myself, and I had a lock on the door. And that was all I needed.

Laying flat on my back, on my bed, with my robe and boots set aside on a hangar and rack by the door, safe in the knowledge that this was my room and my space and no one would dare to intrude, I had everything I wanted, and could finally, truly relax.

Well, not quite everything. Seigetsu still had my bracelet. And I had no idea how I was going to get it back.

The ship's funny new-ship smell wasn't nearly as strong as it had been during that initial flight to stock up at Canterlot, but it never completely faded, either. My window was just barely too small for an adult to comfortably fall out of, though such restrictions didn't apply to me with shadow sneaking, and I almost wished I could fly so that I could comfortably use it as an exit and seal up the strip of space under my door. The lights were a good hue, faintly blue, except for some reason relaxing, despite the fact that blue light was usually bad for that. I could hear the harmony comet shimmering in the distance, keeping the ship aloft.

I closed my eyes, at peace with the present, and tried to reach for my past.

Sleep didn't come on demand, and even if it could, I couldn't control what I dreamed. And even if I did, my dreams couldn't reach back before I was born, and they couldn't go to places I had never been. But still, I let myself imagine, reaching a hoof into the darkness for the mare who had given me life, and gone on to slaughter my entire race.

"Who are you?" I whispered, imagining my words drifting not into the air, but somewhere else. "Why did you do it? What did you feel?"

The blackness on the other side of my eyelids absorbed my words, and didn't respond. I could feel my emptiness, in a way that reminded me of how I used to take my mask off, when Faye and I weren't quite separate yet. There were almost no stars here... Only a few, on the ship, and a quasar directly above, where the harmony comet would be.

"Did you really care about me that much, that I could have been the final push that sent you over the edge?" I breathed, my words winding between the stars. "How would things be today if you didn't do it? How are things today, the way you did do it? Why are you in Yakyakistan, invading Ironridge? It can't be about me, can it? Not anymore. Do you even know I'm alive? What are your goals? Or is it only instincts and emotion? Have you given up on the idea of a world where you get a say in the way things go, and are just lashing out? Or is there a plan, something you think is worth all the things you're doing? If there is, I'm sure I'd never agree with it, but I want to know. Where are you going? Where am I going? Who do I look to for how to live with my power, for how to have a normal life and how to teach Coda to do the same? Why... aren't you here for me?"

I wish I knew, Faye said in my mind, hovering beside me in the darkness like a flame of light.

We listened, but the universe gave no answer. Rather, it didn't give a ready one. But I could feel them out there, dozens of answers, none of which had decided to become true yet. Like a cloud of possibility, willing me to reach in and struggle for the things I wanted to see in the world.

That feeling was a lie. Nothing I did could change history, could rewrite what was already set in stone. That wasn't how things worked in the world. I couldn't change how Chrysalis felt, why she had done the things she had done.

But I still felt it. Why-

The real world intruded, in the form of a knock on my door. It was a little harder to open my eyes than I expected it to be.

"Who is it?" I loudly mumbled, the harmony comet somehow burned into my vision even though it was separated from me by solid wood. "Is it dinnertime already?"

"Oh, nobody important," the voice of Nanzanaya sang through the door. "Merely your long-neglected partner and beneficiary... You do remember my name, right?"

"Err, yeah," I said. "Do you want me to come out? I'll need to get dressed..."

"Would it make you comfortable enough to finally converse with me if we each remained where we are and spoke through this door instead?"

I hesitated.

"I've been doing my best to ingratiate myself to your traveling companions and familiarize myself with the culture of these lands," Nanzanaya went on. "And while I understand the urge to be a broody recluse and have been deeply patient about it thus far, I'm starting to think you don't actually want to work with me."

So... did I tell her the truth, or...?

"Which in and of itself is fine," Nanzanaya continued. "Except our working together is a prophesied matter, and I'd prefer not to upset my benefactor powers that be by going against their wishes. Also, destiny is rude and will drag you kicking and screaming into this unless you work with me willingly on your own."

I bit my lip.

"And finally," Nanzanaya went on, "we're both in the same boat with Seigetsu stalking us, and if we're going to pull a fast one on her it really might be better to do this as a team. Don't you think?"

"Alright, alright," I sighed, walking over to pull my boots on. "Give me just a moment..."

Talking about how I was missing two days worth of memories was awkward. Doing it with ponies I barely knew was doubly awkward, and it was especially so when Faye went out of her way to remind me to tell Nanzanaya of this. Was there something the two of them had discussed during those days, something I ought to know? If so, why couldn't she just tell me instead of making Nanzanaya do the work, and risking her leaving stuff out?

But I did it anyway, because I was also tired of ponies forgetting or not knowing about this hole in my memory. And, thankfully, Nanzanaya took it all in stride.

Which shouldn't have surprised me, as she soon reminded me what I'd overheard in the Aegis room, just before being taken.

"Forgetfulness is a part of life," she said with a shrug. "Sometimes it's even magical. I've heard of plenty of magic before that can make someone forget you exist. The dragons have it. We've got another strain down south, though ours is a bit less controlled than it is here. So, you could say I've seen this before."

"You have?" I pressed, not yet having mentioned why I couldn't remember those two days. "What causes it? How come?"

Nanzanaya grinned. "Mmm... It's a secret. Unless you tell me what's up with your amnesia first?"

"Pass." I already knew what she had said in the Aegis room: that her people were afflicted by a curse caused by a dark tower Abyssinia was building on their border, causing them to gradually forget each other. Whether that was true or not, I mostly wanted to know if the story she told Luna would match up with the story she told me. But not badly enough to talk about my own situation.

"Pity," she said. "Then I guess my lips are sealed."

"So what exactly do you want from me?" I pressed. "I know we're prophesied to work together, and all that, but I've got my hooves more than full taking care of matters in my own home, right?"

Nanzanaya gave me a look. "So forgetful... I need to convince Equestria to mount a military intervention against Abyssinia. This shouldn't be difficult. It makes overwhelming tactical sense for them to do so. Their allies, the dragons, are already at war with the monster kingdom. Equestria shares a border with both of them, and could become embroiled anyway if the conflict escalates. And my people, the zebras, have a fraught history with Equestria that could easily be repaired with such an act of goodwill. With Equestria's aid we could form a coalition of three against one, and even the new power Abyssinia is amassing would surely be no match for the alicorn goddesses. The only limiting factor is the low credibility of my name, and Equestria's apparent unwillingness to involve themselves in matters beyond their borders... which, might I say, is not how they did things a thousand years ago."

She stared out the window - we had moved to her room, since I wasn't letting anyone into mine. "You seem to have had some manner of success establishing a rapport with the ponies on this ship, all of whom wield considerable power. I have been struggling to do the same. And while my own efforts may eventually bear fruit, they would go so much faster if you could lend your good name to mine."

"I don't have a good name," I pointed out. "I'm still considered a wannabe Aegis burglar because of that stunt you pulled in the Crystal Empire, remember? Why did you even do that?"

"I meant it to be a surefire means of contacting the powers that be," Nanzanaya sighed. "A method of ringing their doorbell, as it were. Though in hindsight, I suppose I did imagine you would take more advantage of the opportunity than you wound up doing..." She shook her head. "But what's done is done. Thanks to you, we now have a lengthy airship ride with the ponies who all but certainly would be at the vanguard of any effort to assist my homeland. And any military commander worth their salt knows that if the general who would be risking his or her life at the forefront of an operation is in favor of it, that opinion is worth more than any other."

I shuffled my hooves. "You know I'm currently invested in getting them to help out my own homeland in the north, right? Because that's kind of in the opposite direction from where you want them to go."

"True," Nanzanaya said, not in the least dispirited. "But you also have met with success in getting them moving in that direction, which means your talents and methods could be employed to my service as well."

"Actually, it was mostly Corsica who won them over," I pointed out. "I did basically nothing, and not for want of trying. So why don't you go pester her about it instead of me?"

Nanzanaya pointed at my forehead, where she allegedly saw an unnerving golden eye just like I saw on her. "Because she's not my prophesied ally. You are."

No, she was just mistaking me for that, when she was likely looking for Duma the centaur instead. Not that I was telling her a thing like that.

"But what's in this for me?" I pressed. "I need their help for the north. Your prophesy says I'm supposed to help you, but does it say why I'd want to? Because I'm not really seeing that."

"Admittedly, the prophesy made no mention of you not jumping at the chance to contribute," Nanzanaya said. "In fact, it made it sound like you would already have perfectly good reasons to assist me of your own volition. But should you need incentive, might I remind you that I am a priestess and you a mere dabbler in powers you do not comprehend? I can pay you in information. Anything you might like to know about your circumstances, I can tell you, for the price of your commitment."

"Give me a freebie," I told her. "To prove you're not a hack. What's the deal with these forehead marks? Where do they come from, and why do they not exactly scream 'good guy'?"

Nanzanaya sighed, then lowered her voice. "It is the symbol of our god, the Traveler in the Deep: Unnrus-kaeljos, Maker of Deals. On rare occasions, those with desperation in their hearts who descend to the floor of the world will meet him, and be granted any wish in exchange for a price. This marking is given to all who have accepted such a deal, so that we can identify each other. You know the being of whom I speak."

I swallowed. "You could say that. Who is he, and what does he want?"

Nanzanaya smiled mysteriously. "Is that your way of asking why you should trust him?"

"Well, I wasn't gonna be so blatant," I offered. "But sure."

"To answer that, I would have to trust him myself," Nanzanaya quietly replied. "Unnrus-kaeljos is maddeningly vague, and reality itself seems in on the charade. My order exists in large part to keep memory and knowledge of him alive. Such can only be accomplished through the telling of oral tales: words written down about him will slowly rearrange themselves, becoming inaccurate and then innocuous before removing all mention of him altogether."

I shuddered.

"I was inducted into this order independently of meeting him, after others spied the symbol on my forehead and drew me in," Nanzanaya whispered. "One thing we believe to know for certain is that Unnrus-kaeljos is not of this world. I do not mean the blackness of space, but perhaps another dimension or paradigm entirely. We have expended a great deal of effort trying to learn and reproduce the exact mechanism by which he is summoned, relying mostly on gathered testimonies of those who met him of their own volition... which is all of us. From our gathered testimonies, we believe he leaks into this world through some type of crack or fissure in reality, but understand nothing of the mechanism underlying that, or even the nature of such fissures."

I thought about ether crystal fault planes.

"How many of you are there?" I asked. "Back at your home."

"Of our order, in total?" Nanzayana shrugged. "Three. Counting myself and not you."

"Must be lonely," I remarked.

"Oh, to an extent," she admitted. "None of this stops us from talking to others about it, not that there's much of a point in doing so. In fact, we have a fourth member who lacks the eye, and merely happened to believe us. She's even younger than I am, not that we can afford to be picky when the master is getting on in years. Part of my duties entail diligent memorization of our entire body of knowledge about Unnrus-kaeljos, so that I can someday pass it on as well to the next generation."

"And you want me to help you with that," I guessed.

Nanzanaya nodded. "It would be welcome. Though as you are native to an entirely different area of the world, I might hazard a guess you would be even more useful standing vigil in a different community, keeping watch for marked ones whom we miss. Have you ever met others with this mark?"

"...Yeah." It felt safe to say. "A couple of times."

"I knew it," Nanzanaya whispered. "As the keepers of this secret, Halcyon, we are guardians of sorts. What does Unnrus-kaeljos desire? Could a wish made to him be employed to nefarious ends? Is he benevolent, or is he wicked? Should such questions ever become answered, it would do well for someone to exist who is prepared to use the answers. That is why we watch."

"And what does your invasion have to do with that?" I asked. "The one you want Equestria to mount against Abyssinia."

"Nothing," Nanzanaya said. "And everything. Were my homeland to fall, and my order along with it, our accumulated knowledge would be wiped out. Were we to flee, to abandon a home with accessible connections to the underworld, ponies might become cut off from Unnrus-kaeljos, and we would lose our supply of those with the ability to identify each other and pass this information along."

My gaze softened a little. "So more than any mystical chicanery, it's about trying to survive."

"Not purely," Nanzanaya admitted. "I did still seek you out by our symbol. In part because our shared connection could form the foundation for a bridge of trust between us, but also because whatever the price, Unnrus-kaeljos is known to grant great power. By virtue of your contract with him, you are not a nobody, Halcyon. You are sure to be a mover in this world, and that makes you a better ally than most."

"Well, what about you, then?" I asked, feeling slightly hollow. "What did you ask him for? And if it's so great, why not do this by yourself?"

Nanzanaya chuckled. "Ah, but I did set out to do this by myself, didn't I? As for what I asked for, I can't simply tell you everything in one go. I trust I've given you enough to consider giving me the time of day once in a while, yes? At the very least, I still need the details of your own encounter with our god to add to my collection, and you surely have questions that can only be answered by the lore in my noggin."

"I guess," I said. "But just so we're clear, I'm not so curious that I'd throw Ironridge and Icereach under the cart and tell Twilight and the others to turn around, okay?"

"You'll get hooked eventually," Nanzanaya said, waving toward the door. "Now get on with yourself. I'm sure you've got whatever I interrupted to get back to."

A short while later, Faye stood near the prow, with me hovering beside her as a ghost, watching Starlight sparring with Corsica and Rainbow Dash. Some days I joined in, but not today.

"Do you trust her?" Faye whispered, though the wind was blowing and she would have needed to shout to be overheard.

"No," I said instinctively. "Maybe a little more than I used to, but she could have been making a lot of that up. She did know about how the light spirit met us, though. Or at least, it did the same to her."

"I wonder what Procyon would have to say about this," Faye murmured. "That zebra said we always got something in exchange for a price, but..."

"But we didn't pay one?" I guessed. "Unless it's something we aren't even aware of."

Faye shook her head. "I don't know. It's possible that Procyon would have considered something a price, but the way we are now, we don't. After all, what price could you extract from someone who wants to disappear?"

"Maybe the price was that it was temporary, and I brought her back."

Faye hummed skeptically. "Some tricksters might think that way. Others wouldn't. I'm not sure... if there's any way to know for sure."

I tilted my head. "Even asking Procyon?"

"I trust her about as much as Nanzanaya."

I sighed. "Well, at least we've got each other."

Faye said nothing.

"What if," I ventured, "it just... doesn't matter? What if we ignore Unnrus-kaeljos and just get on with our lives, with trying to help Ironridge and Coda? Maybe it's counterproductive to get hung up on something that happened so long ago, to keep searching for meaning in a part of our life that changed everything and just learn to live with the way things are now?"

"That's not something I ever thought I'd hear you suggest," Faye said. "You used to be constantly searching for the supernatural in every facet of our life. Now Nanzanaya says this, and you can think about not chasing it?"

"Guess I'm getting jaded," I said. "Or maybe I'm being more clear-eyed with myself about what it is I'm chasing. Before, back then, the concept of a god might have just been the word I put to something I couldn't describe, when I wanted a reason for why things are the way they are. But we know so much more now, like about Chrysalis. I... want to know what she was really thinking, why she did what she did, if she regrets it and wishes her life had gone a different way. And I think that's the same impulse that used to make me look for supernatural excuses. That feeling of always looking up, because I want there to be a roof over my head. Right?"

I looked up, as if to emphasize my point. The harmony comet shimmered back down at me.

"If there's one thing I've learned," Faye said, "it's that we have an impulse to run from our past, and it never works out forever. I think it will matter. Call it superstition, but it's one born from experience. I'll bet you anything this isn't the last we've heard about Unnrus-kaeljos in our lives."

"Well, let's cross that bridge when we come to it," I suggested. "For now, want to go join in with Corsica and the others? We're not getting chased or arrested, and crippling paranoia seems to have passed us by for the day. Might as well enjoy it."

"...Yeah. Good point." Faye reached out a hoof. "You take the lead for this, though. I've got some thinking to do."

Their Town, Not Ours

As the terrain grew flatter and more arid, Faye noticed it growing closer as well: Starlight was flying the ship at lower and lower altitudes.

She didn't question this, but she did wonder. It wasn't like they could just run out of power, and Starlight didn't strike her as a daredevil. But at least it made for an interesting view.

Some mad engineer had designed the ship with a window on the bottom; a long, rectangular pane of something akin to glass set into the floor of the mess hall. Normally, it was covered by the grand table, but that could detach from the floor and retract onto the ceiling using tiny winches that attached to the corners, cleanly clearing the room. That was how it was now, Faye sitting on a bench and fiddling with her wing spokes, watching the desert scrub rush past.

Halcyon was out in ghost form, taking a flight around. Faye wondered what that must be like, not only detaching as a ghost but being able to fly. They had tried halfheartedly a few times, but some instinct told her she couldn't do this like Halcyon could, and even if she could, she wasn't sure she wanted to.

Even if she had turned control over it to another for a few years, this was still her body.

Being alone left her with time to think, and inevitably her thoughts turned to Unnrus-kaeljos and Nanzanaya. Nothing about that situation sat well with her. The light spirit she had seen in a vision in the crystal city was overwhelming in its callous, destructive might, and doubly so when it appeared to her after in a dream. And calling Nanzanaya its loyal servant, and ordering Faye to trust her... That didn't add up with Nanzanaya's assertion to Halcyon that she was a guardian of the unknown.

Perhaps Nanzanaya was lying, knew far more about the light spirit than she let on, and the two of them were in cahoots to manipulate her? That was the most straightforward answer, but it also didn't make sense. Why wouldn't their acts be coordinated? Why would they contradict each other, and in doing so make Nanzanaya look less trustworthy than she wanted to appear?

Perhaps they were both benevolent, somehow, and Unnrus-kaeljos thought its word would carry weight, and speak to Nanzanaya's good intentions even if she didn't know it was speaking with Faye? But that would mean not only was this ancient destroyer well-meaning, but dumb enough to not realize how it looked to her. That was just implausible.

The safest solution, contrary to what she told Halcyon earlier, felt like dropping both of them and running away. Except for one big problem: she needed to get her hooves dirty with this in order to get Seigetsu to give back her bracelet and leave her alone. Spy on Nanzanaya, get in her good graces and find out what her true motive and goal was, that was the deal. And Faye wasn't confident enough in what she had learned to go to Seigetsu and claim she had done enough.

And that led to the biggest conundrum of all: that deal had been made within the two-day hole in Halcyon's memory, while she had been nothing but a green jewel in Seigetsu's pocket. As had the entire trip to the crystal city, and both visions of Unnrus-kaeljos.

Halcyon didn't know Unnrus-kaeljos' true nature as one of the gods who destroyed Indus. She didn't know that Unnrus-kaeljos wanted her to trust Nanzanaya and considered her a loyal servant. And she didn't know that they were spying on Nanzanaya for Seigetsu.

So how should Faye break it to her?

She almost didn't want to. Halcyon was paranoid enough as it was without knowing they were in the sights of an ancient, possibly-evil god. And Nanzanaya was bound to be more crafty than she acted. If she suspected Halcyon had an ulterior motive for working with her, it would be easy for her to feed them false information... or, at least, less-trustworthy information than usual. Perhaps the best way to hide from Nanzanaya that she was being spied on, and hide from her that Faye already knew things about Unnrus-kaeljos, was for the pony interacting with her to not know about those things at all.

Faye closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and shuddered. It wasn't like she was a stranger to keeping secrets from Halcyon. That was basically the point of her existence. Even after their reconciliation in Ironridge, there were still other things she had never told Halcyon. Important things, things she barely even cared to admit to herself.

Like exactly what she had wished for, down in the tunnels in the days after the avalanche.

That particular memory also contradicted what Procyon said she had wished for, so Faye couldn't even know if what she remembered was true. But there was no way Procyon's disappearance could have tampered with these more recent memories. She had been visited again by Unnrus-kaeljos. There was no possible other explanation. And Halcyon...

In all of Halcyon's searching for the divine, her staring up at the heavens and down into the chapel, Faye knew what Halcyon couldn't yet articulate for herself: Halcyon was searching for an absolute good in the world, a reassurance that there was a plan and everything would be okay. Learning that there really was a god, or two gods, whom together had destroyed the previous world... Halcyon didn't need that.

She was doing so well, after the troubles she had in Snowport and the Crystal Empire. Faye didn't want to set that progress back. And there were so many benefits to keeping her mouth closed.

So, that was what she would do. Maybe after Seigetsu left them alone, Nanzanaya had gone her separate way, and they had their bracelet back safe and sound, then she could tell Halcyon. After a little more time, when she was sure Halcyon was strong enough to take it.

"I get why you could miss the ground after being in the air for a week," Corsica said, wandering onto the bridge, "but try not to miss it so hard that we have a bumpy reunion, okay?"

Starlight was at the controls, a distant expression on her face. "We're almost there. And... I'd rather not be seen approaching."

Corsica looked out the windshield. The desert around them was absolute, made less of sand and more of dusty clay, brownish-gray in color and fading into snowy mountains in the distance. Those mountains had appeared on the horizon sometime while she was sleeping, and from their height and distance, she suspected this was the Aldenfold.

Funny. It didn't look nearly high enough to produce the views she remembered seeing on the voyage to Equestria, though it was still pretty high. Maybe the mountains were lower in this area, or maybe they were already high above sea level.

"So," Corsica lectured, crossing her forelegs and leaning on a wall. "You ready to tell us what that's about, yet? If this place is so frightening it took a lecture from Papyrus to get you to come here, you think maybe we should be prepared?"

Starlight swallowed. Twice. "There's a town, near the entrance to the caves that will get us to the crystal palace." She hesitated. "They might... use the entrance to those caves for storage. So, we'll have to sneak through. Leave the ship out of sight, maybe in the mountains. The town is in a depression to shield it from the wind, which is why we're approaching low. To stay out of sight. It..." She sighed.

"Oh yeah?" Corsica nodded. "What are they gonna do to us if they catch us? Are they cannibals? A secret Yakuza headquarters? A reclusive tribe of combat monks?"

Starlight blinked.

"Because between you and me, I bet we could take them." Corsica twirled, flipping her mane. "I've gotten pretty good over the last week, you've gotta admit."

"Don't fight them," Starlight whispered. "Please."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "They're that strong?"

"Get Twilight to tell you."

Corsica glanced between Starlight, the windshield, and the ship's controls. This was not the look of a world-wise pragmatist steering the team clear from danger. It was the look of a frightened filly who had broken a wrathful parent's favorite vase.

A look Corsica knew well, because Halcyon often used it to get out of things back in Icereach. And she knew exactly how to handle that.

Lighting her horn, Corsica nudged up the ship's altitude control. It began to rise.

Starlight slammed it back down with both forehooves, then crystallized it in place, summoning a beautiful spire of teal crystal with a jet of light from her horn. She gave Corsica a frantic what are you doing look.

"Uh uh," Corsica said, putting her own hoof on the lever - she couldn't move it, but this was more about posture and messaging. "I know what it looks like when someone's avoiding things. This is about you not wanting to take responsibility for some mess you've made, isn't it?"

Starlight hissed in recognition. "Look..."

She didn't continue, even when Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"I will put a gag on Twilight if she tries to explain this before you can," Corsica threatened. "What did you do?"

Starlight wilted, stubbornly continuing her silence.

"Everyone's got some skeletons in their dirty laundry," Corsica said. "Come on. You want mine? I alienated my dad, my friends, pushed away everyone who used to be or could have been close to me because I didn't understand how other ponies worked, or how I worked either. Boo hoo. Now it's your turn. Go on."

Starlight was close to breaking, Corsica could tell. So she pushed a little harder. "If it's actually serious, I won't rub it in. Don't worry, I'm a professional at this."

"...It's called Our Town," Starlight finally sighed. "I founded it. I ran it, up until... I don't know, a year ago? With an iron hoof. Made all the rules. Bad rules, compensating for my own insecurities and failures. Didn't let anyone leave. Actively recruited, with empty promises. Eventually got ran out of town by everyone who lives there. End of story."

Corsica suspected there was more. "So basically you were a school ringleader bully. But as an adult. Been there, as a kid. What else?"

Starlight gave her an are you crazy look.

"Come on," Corsica nudged. "That's the sort of trouble mundane ponies get into. You're a Flame of Harmony with allegedly unstoppable powers. Sure there was no eldritch magic involved, anything that makes it ten times worse?"

Starlight gritted her teeth. "Well, there was, but it doesn't change anything. I'm not immune from having normal-pony problems just because I'm special. Big surprise, right? What my rules were, or how I enforced them, or how I got overthrown aren't what matters here. The only thing that matters is that if anyone in that town sees me, or my airship because everyone there has seen this ship before, we're going to get a frosty welcome and the best way I can atone for what I did here is to leave those old wounds undisturbed and not make all of them re-litigate this. And the only reason I'm here anyway in spite of that is because someone else couldn't leave well enough alone either. Which is why we're going to sneak into the caves and try not to let them know I'm here at all."

Corsica nodded. "Sure thing, fearless leader. I will do exactly as you command. Any chance Twilight and her other friends were involved with your history here?"

Starlight gave her a deeply unappreciative look. "They were."

"Well, I wasn't." Corsica straightened up. "So how about you hide your ship on the outskirts like you want, and then I go check out the lay of the land myself, along with anyone else who wants to come and is a stranger around here. No mention of you, scientist's honor. And then we come back here and I give you all the lowdown."

"...It's a better plan than the alternatives." Starlight shook her head. "But that means it's on you if you slip up and disturb the peace here with word of my presence."

"Hey, don't worry." Corsica flashed a lazy grin. "I love disturbing the peace. In case you didn't notice, a peace this uneasy deserves it."

As they drew closer, Corsica finally saw what Starlight meant about the town being down in a depression. The plateau didn't meet the mountains in a great wall, like the Aldenfold's Ironridge face, nor did it slope down into foothills like the outskirts of Sires Hollow. Instead, it was separated from them by a broad gulch, the mountains rising up on the other side at a straight forty-five degrees, the snowline beginning only just above the plateau's elevation. Trails were tucked into their folds, and the terrain immediately became like what she was used to at Icereach, though it was too close to see beyond the initial mountain wall.

On the plateau's side, the gulch wall was lazy and meandering. While it would almost certainly hold a river in runoff season, Corsica saw ample hollows on the plateau side where one could build a village that was both well-drained and protected against wind and flooding. When Starlight confirmed which one actually held Our Town, Corsica realized she needn't even have guessed: there was a tiny, ramshackle train station nearby, connecting the town to the outside world.

She felt like making a jab about why they didn't just take the train and benefit from its strange magic - evidently, Starlight had a way around that, as she had been in the Crystal Empire. But the answer was too obvious to question. Starlight was stalling about facing her past.

"So, you're the only other one who's coming?" she asked, standing on the deck and glancing up at Seigetsu.

"That would seem to be the case." Seigetsu stood at attention, hands folded behind her back. "Seeing as your friend has decided not to show, and everyone else was bade remain behind."

Corsica wasn't sure what to make of Halcyon's absence. Nanzanaya getting told to remain behind made sense; Seigetsu probably didn't want her charge requiring attention while exploring a new locale. But Halcyon had been in her room, and mumbled something about being busy when Corsica knocked.

Maybe she was just feeling under the weather? Either way, Corsica wasn't about to drag Halcyon out for a fun time while also trying to sort through Starlight's issues. Today was a good day, and this week had been a good week, but if she wanted the next week to be good as well she would have to respect her limits. So Halcyon got left to brood for now.

"Are you sure about this?" Twilight said to Starlight after the ship touched down, sitting on its landing gear with the harmony comet extinguished. "We have a good rapport with the townsponies here. We could tell them you've changed-"

"Certain," Starlight said. "The ones who have never been here before get to scout out the lay of the land and feel the town's mood. It's the gentlest option we have."

Corsica was positive Starlight meant gentlest on herself, even though she talked like she was worried about the townsponies. Maybe she thought she was, and was just out of tune with her own feelings. That sure happened a lot. But this had been Corsica's plan in the first place, and that meant she had no reason to disagree with it. Stretching, she felt a blast of wind ruffle her mane, hot desert air mixed with mountain cold.

"Feels almost windier down here than up in the air," she complained, trying to fix her aesthetic before it was too late.

Starlight jumped at the opportunity to talk about anything else. "The harmony comet projects a weather shield around the ship. Without it, you could have been blown off the deck many times over, even at a normal cruising speed. And I had us making triple time. No reason not to, when we have infinite fuel."

"We oughtn't delay," Seigetsu spoke up. "If everyone who is going is ready, then let us be off."

"Yeah." Corsica followed her to the ship's edge, where Starlight had made another crystal staircase to get down. Did this ship really have no natural way on and off? "Let's go."

She jumped the last part of the way, catching herself on limber legs. The ground crunched beneath her hooves like snow, even though it was just dust and brittle dried mud. This area probably got some spectacular storms to produce that.

The wind was lessened slightly in the ship's lee, but the moment she stepped out into the open, it hit her again full force, and she had to shield her eyes. Dust storms were probably common here, too. What had possessed Starlight to found a town here, of all places? She saw so many good spots while they were flying...

But maybe it was better than it looked. The view was nice, mountains on one horizon and flat nothing on the other. And there was something pleasing about the crash of wind in her ears. It was different than Icereach's wind. There, the wind was mixed and twirled by mountain walls and valleys, bearing the scent of frost and snow. Here, there was a component of that, but another wind that had carried on for endless miles without an obstacle, picking up dust and salt and sand, blowing straight and true. The two winds did a dance around her, hot and cold, snow and dust, water and sky, the heat of the sun a distant afterthought on the late afternoon horizon.

No shrubs grew in this climate. Nothing gave the world any signs of life. And yet Corsica felt alive.

"Majestic, isn't it?" Seigetsu asked over the wind, striding up beside her. "And somewhat ironic, when you consider that we've arrived here faster than if you took a boat from Snowport."

Corsica blinked. "Huh?"

"This was your original destination, was it not?" Seigetsu asked. "You came petitioning us for passage to the Catantan Peninsula. Unless my sense of distance is greatly addled, Fort Redsand should be several days' march in that direction." She nodded to the southwest, judging by the sun and the mountains.

Things suddenly clicked in Corsica's brain. "This is where we were originally trying to go to look for Starlight?"

"That it is," Seigetsu said. "The eastern coast of the Griffon Hand Sea, multiple months by boat from Snowport. I suppose it is fortunate for you that you did not get the chance to sail here."

Corsica stared. "There's a train station right here. We could have just..."

Seigetsu shook her head. "That was one of the first things I verified upon learning your intentions. You already knew the width of the sea. The trains would not have been able to carry you here with their magical speed."

"What happens if you try anyway?" Corsica asked. "If someone who knows about the real distance tries to ride a train?"

"It depends," Seigetsu said. "If that real distance is, in fact, short enough to traverse normally in a single day, then the magic never applies and it will work the same regardless of your knowledge. The route between Snowport and the Crystal Empire, for example. But if someone attempts a trip that is magically shortened, the train will never arrive at its destination. It will run onward through phantom terrain for eternity, and if it turns around, it will find itself back at its origin within moments."

Corsica's eyes widened.

"You hail from the north," Seigetsu said. "You came here with a Writ of Harmonic Sanction. It is the same defense mechanism employed in the Aldenfold to prevent unwanted crossings. Though I have never tried it, I suspect your writ would have a similar effect on the trains. Were a party comprised of writ-bearers who knew the extent of the tracks to attempt a long journey, they would likely arrive at their destination as if no magic was present whatsoever, at the end of a lengthy travel."

"And you keep knowledge of that under wraps?" Corsica asked. "Surely ponies who know about the trains have tried to test this for themselves before."

Seigetsu shrugged. "Legends do exist among the populace of ghost trains that never reach their destinations, running ever onward yet remaining close to home. They are rare enough occurrences to remain in the realm of legend, but common enough that most conductors have heard of them and would turn back if they thought something similar might be afoot. Train crews can be a superstitious bunch, which works out in our favor. After all, knowing that trains sometimes fail to reach their destinations is not enough to give away the true length of the journey."

"What's it all for?" Corsica asked. "Who creates a system like that, and how? If they just wanted to make it easier to get around, why not remove the weird conditions? And if they wanted to make it harder to get around, why not just have no trains at all?"

"None but Her Majesty Celestia can know for certain," Seigetsu said, marching onward into the wind. "One thousand years ago, she wielded an ancient power to remake Equestria and the surrounding world, in preparation for ruling it alone after the fall of her sister. I have told you how we benefit from this system, how it is used to localize conflict and limit the spread of information, holding Equestrian society in a peaceful stasis. The only knowledge we have is inferred from those results. I believe she did it this way because this is the result she desired to achieve."

"It just makes no sense." Corsica focused on the approaching gulch. "What kind of power can even do something like this, creating 'phantom terrain' where there isn't any, or bridging terrain together where there's more than it looks? I was paying attention the whole ride to Ponyville, and it all looked seamless. If I had been walking alongside the train, would it have been an illusion, or could I have felt it with my hooves? This violates everything we know about the conservation of matter, the three-dimensional structure of space..."

Seigetsu listened and didn't respond.

"What would happen if you took a phantom train, rode it for a few days, then got off and walked around? What would happen if, while you did that, someone else did the same thing? Would you meet each other? What if you got off at different times, when you thought the land around you was different? Could two ponies occupy the same absolute position in space at the same time and see different land around them? How would the worlds they see merge back together if they walked back home at the same time along the tracks? Can a phantom train hit another train running in the opposite direction? What if you built a village out in phantom train-land? If the terrain didn't actually exist on the real map, since it's phantom-generated, would the village exist too? What if...?"

Faye lay on her back in her bed in her room, the door locked and her clothes off, Halcyon off on a ghostly adventure to explore Our Town that nobody else got to know about. The official team, Corsica and Seigetsu, could do their thing, thinking they were alone and not realizing they had a third pair of eyes. As far as they were concerned, she was here, having a nap or something.

She wasn't sure she saw the point in such subterfuge, but Halcyon seemed to think it was a good idea, so she went along with it. Not like she could say no to sitting around and doing nothing.

And then she saw Procyon.

"Where've you been?" Faye lurched upright, covering herself swiftly with a sheet.

Procyon gave the floor a disdainful look. "This might come as a shocker to you, but I don't... really like heights. I've been following along at ground level."

"Figures." That was probably related to why they couldn't fly. "While I've got you here," Faye said. "What do you think of Unnrus-kaeljos?"

Procyon blinked. "Isn't that your call to make? What do you mean?"

"You were there for that dream," Faye said. "At least, you said you saw it too. When Unnrus-kaeljos told me to trust Nanzanaya, and that she was his loyal servant. But on this voyage, she told Halcyon she's more like a guardian who doesn't trust his intentions, and..."

She finished explaining Nanzanaya's stance, then looked up at Procyon for appraisal. "I just need a second opinion on what to make of this. From... someone who's seen him too."

Procyon looked faintly unnerved, but held a hoof to her chin. "I suppose it's out of the question that both of them are telling the truth and good guys? You sound like you've made up your mind that Unnrus-kaeljos is untrustworthy, even though he did give us what we asked for. Could always be that Nanzanaya has a good heart, and he knows it?"

"I considered that," Faye explained. "But that would mean he somehow doesn't realize how this whole thing looks to me. And you'd think if they really were both on the same team, he'd give her the time of day once in a while too, so she'd know more about him than that. And forgive me if I'm not jumping at the opportunity to trust someone who appears to me in visions depicting the end of a world."

Procyon nodded along. "I agree. In that case, once we assume Unnrus-kaeljos isn't naive and knows you wouldn't trust him, it seems like the logical conclusion is, he's trying to bias you against Nanzanaya."

Faye blinked.

"Think about it," Procyon said. "You say she's a guardian of sorts, someone trying to position themselves to keep this unknown threat in check? If I were an evil god, and one of my powers was to make it hard for others to accumulate knowledge about me, I would feel threatened by those who make an effort to do so anyway. And I would want to isolate them to prevent them from sharing that knowledge."

Faye rolled that idea over in her mind. That would imply Nanzanaya was trustworthy, or at least in an enemy-of-my-enemy situation... but it also made much more sense than anything she had come up with. She nodded. "You might be onto something."

"You look hesitant," Procyon guessed. "Got doubts about trusting Nanzanaya?"

Faye nodded.

"Unnrus-kaeljos wanting to push you away from her doesn't guarantee she's altruistic," Procyon said. "Not all bad guys are on the same team. It could be possible she's the type of pony to fight him because she wants to steal his power for herself. But based on your description, I at least believe that Unnrus-kaeljos doesn't want you working with her. Even if she does turn out to be untrustworthy, that means there could be some considerable benefits to working with her, depending how well you can mitigate the fallout of a betrayal. And I think it's more likely that she is what she says she is, anyway."

"You do?"

Procyon nodded. "You want to know more about the light spirit who granted our wish years ago, don't you? Halcyon certainly does. It seems quite believable to me that other ponies who have been in the same situation as us would feel the same. After all, having met Unnrus-kaeljos then and now, is your instinct to buddy up with him and help him achieve his goal, whatever it may be? Or is it wary curiosity? You don't trust him, but you want to know more. So it seems to me that the safest assumption to make about others who have met him would be the same."

"That... makes sense," Faye said. "She could be just like me. But then again, I'm not that trustworthy of a pony myself."

Procyon shrugged. "Well, you've got me there. Unfortunate if you think that way, since I tried to take all our negative qualities with me. But you still came to me for advice on this, and I've told you what I think about myself. So if you're willing to give my ideas the benefit of the doubt, why not do the same for Nanzanaya?"

Faye thought about that.

"There's no harm in listening," Procyon pointed out. "At the end of the day, the actions you take based on the information you've learned are your choice. Not mine. Not hers. Not the light spirit's."

"Good talk," Faye said, taking a deep breath. "Anyway, I've got some nothing to do. You want to hang out, or go explore the town with Halcyon, or...?"

"I think I'll be on my way," Procyon said, turning towards the door even though she was a ghost. "By the way, it's Corsica's birthday today. In case you aren't as adept at tracking that as I've always been. If you wanted to do something nice for her. Your call."

She drifted out through the door, and was gone.

Corsica's birthday, huh?

Faye got out of bed. This year made twenty for her. No more dumb teenager jokes. She knew it was going to happen at some point on this voyage, but Procyon was right; she hadn't been tracking the exact day. And judging by Corsica's lack of mentioning it, she wasn't either.

Maybe she would do something nice for her friend. Corsica seemed determined not to leave well enough alone and only hang out with Halcyon, so it wouldn't hurt to repay that and keep the lie going a little while longer. Right? Right.

Corsica would probably even enjoy it. And while she was off exploring Our Town, Faye had plenty of time to prepare.

The Other Reason Why

Our Town had exactly one street, lined with houses on both sides. At the far end was a lone, bigger building, and the near end grew out of a trail that Corsica and Seigetsu had followed down the gulch wall, sloping down from the ramshackle train station.

In a way, it reminded Corsica of the surface of Icereach, a town in a valley that hadn't even tamed the wilderness within its walls, let alone beyond. Odds were, this town had an underground component too, since she saw no traces of agriculture whatsoever.

There were plenty of ponies, though. Even though it looked like a desert, the heat wasn't oppressive, coaxing ponies out of their homes to mingle in the street, which was more of a public plaza than a road. Cords strung across the street between houses played host to a mix of colorful pennants, and one group of ponies appeared to be having a cookout.

"Looks like they're doing well enough for themselves," Corsica remarked, nodding to the village outskirts. The two rows of houses were built on patch of land that had been artificially raised to be safe from flooding, but it was wide enough to accommodate a full four rows, and the edges looked freshly-moved - a sign they were in the early stages of an expansion.

"So it would seem," Seigetsu said. "Perhaps we can accomplish our goal quickly."

Corsica glanced up at her. "Our goal is stalling until Starlight builds up the courage to come through here herself. Not sure we can speed that along."

Seigetsu folded her arms. "I don't believe that was the plan as stated."

"But it was the plan as unstated," Corsica pointed out. "And if we're really here to get a read on the local vibe, I'd say it looks good enough already."

Before she could press her case, some of the locals appeared to notice them, and a pegasus zipped over. "Hey there!" she greeted, sporting a charcoal coat and an off-white mane. "Nice horn! And are you a dragon? What brings a pair like you out all this way?"

Corsica took point, ready with a bluff. "Yeah? Well, nice wings, yourself. We're treasure hunters, thrill seekers, you know the deal. Heard the mountains here had some caves that weren't on as many maps as they deserved to be."

The pegasus seemed somewhere between surprised, relieved, disappointed and curious. "No kidding? First time we've seen someone here for a reason like that, though I've heard much worse ones! The name's Night Glider. And if you're serious about caving, surely you'd want to take a load off in town first and get a fresh-rested start tomorrow?"

Corsica glanced down at the bustling, cheerful town. "Wasn't planning on imposing, but it sounds fun. What kind of amenities you got in a town like this?"

"Good ones!" Night Glider did a loop in midair. "And cheap ones. Treasure hunters ought to be flush in coin, right? Don't worryyy, we won't stiff you just because we're out in the middle of nowhere! Come on down! You'll never meet a friendlier bunch, I swear it on my cutie mark. Did I get your names, by the way?"

"Corsica." Corsica flipped her mane.

"And my name is Seigetsu," Seigetsu added, leaving off her title. "Your generous offer is much appreciated. Rest assured you will be compensated fairly in any transactions."

"Awesome, see you there!" Night Glider zipped away.

Corsica glanced up at Seigetsu. "Her promising not to rip us off isn't weird, right?"

Seigetsu kept walking forward. "You went through Sires Hollow, did you not? Towns built far from natural trade routes tend to have poorly-rounded economies and import as luxury goods things the rest of the world takes for granted. It is possible they have had poor experiences with those who do not understand that reality before."

"How far out of the way is it?" Corsica asked, flicking her tail back at the train station. "For anyone who doesn't know, isn't it just a day trip to the rest of Equestria?"

Seigetsu nodded. "A day trip one would only make with the explicit intention of coming here, rather than passing through. I would imagine the only traders who come here are natives who leave to sell their goods abroad and return with wares for the town."

Corsica stared at the town, its houses reinforced with quality lumber that clearly hadn't been grown nearby. "Guess you're right. But they can't be that starved for trade. Guess we'll see what's what when we get there."

The first thing Corsica noticed upon entering the town proper were the foals.

Our Town had a complete and utter lack of ponies her age. Corsica guessed that the youngest ones she saw were in their mid-to-late twenties, and there were none at all who were younger than her... until she got down to the infants. Just at first glance, there were three of those, one carried by a mother who was visibly pregnant.

Something was deeply unusual with this town's demographic, and Corsica had a hunch the catalyst for change had been Starlight's departure. What had she done, forbidden them from having families? Why would she do a thing like that?

Corsica and Seigetsu were warmly and enthusiastically greeted, and given a barrage of names that Corsica couldn't begin to remember. Night Glider had clearly spread her story around, and in no short order she was rapidly solicited with everything from mountaineering equipment to food to lodgings for the night. With copious offers of free samples.

In her youth, Corsica had always been the center of attention, rising naturally to the top of the school hierarchy by virtue of her money, parentage, long horn and sassy attitude. That had changed once she finished school, started hanging out with Halcyon and had her spirit crushed by her special talent, but it came with the enduring benefit of being comfortable in situations like this. Eager ponies crowded around her, talking over each other, woefully inexperienced in the ways of making guests feel at ease, and while Seigetsu was a master at controlling her appearance, Corsica could tell that even she didn't find this her preferred way to spend an afternoon.

Halcyon probably would have gotten overwhelmed to the point of panic. And Starlight...

What if Starlight was less afraid of being shunned and blamed than getting a too-friendly reception she didn't feel like she deserved? These ponies didn't carry themselves like their lives had been ruined and they had never recovered.

"Alright," Corsica spoke up, taking command of a situation that had been allowed to remain chaotic for just the right amount of time. "I've been traveling all day, and I'm famished. Which one of you was offering food, again? Was it you?"

She singled out a pink unicorn with a poofy grape mane, who beamed as all the other ponies made some room. "That's right! I run the bakery around here. Follow me, if you would?"

The unicorn led Corsica towards a house that was structurally identical to all the others, but lavishly decorated to indicate it was a bakery. "I'm a pastry chef by specialty, but I can make just about anything to order if you have special tastes! Provided you share the recipe, of course. Right now, I've got all sorts of bread, scones, chocolate cherry cheesecake, fresh-baked apple-"

"Gimmie the chef special," Corsica instructed, in an adventurous mood. "Did I catch your name, by the way?"

"Sugar Belle!" The unicorn swung open the door to her shop, which tinkled with a cheery chime - her section of the road was also the one hosting the cookout, and there were a mix of ponies both outdoors and indoors. "I, um, don't have a chef special, but take anything you like! The first helping is on the house."

"Sure about that?" Corsica asked, walking over to the counter and flipping a bit in her aura, letting her nose do the picking. "We are flush with cash..."

She settled on a doughy glazed bar that was obviously some sort of desert. It wouldn't ruin her figure, though. Nothing seemed to be able to do that. Back in the old days, she used to watch her diet incessantly, before her special talent came along and ruined her ability to care. And surprise, surprise: nothing changed, no matter what she let herself eat. All that worry had been for nothing.

Odds were, she had made a wish about this back before she realized how her talent worked, and now she couldn't change...

Corsica pushed that thought aside for the moment, chomping down on the pastry and getting a mouthful of custard filling. "Not bad," she praised with her mouth full, noting Sugar Belle hovering nearby. "See, I'm all about dessert for lunch. You get me. Nice place you've got here."

"Oh, I'm flattered you think that way!" Sugar Belle crossed her forelegs and blushed. "I really just do this because I enjoy it. Do you mind if I ask where you're from?"

Corsica glanced around, noting that the rest of the ponies indoors seemed to be there because they were the less-pushy types who were happier to leave and be left alone. For her part, Seigetsu had let herself get dragged off to see another part of the town. This was the one-on-one conversation Corsica was looking for.

"Nowhere," she answered. "And everywhere. I'd like to say I owe more allegiance to the places I haven't seen in the world than the places I have seen." She stopped to swallow, doing her best to channel her memories of Gerardo Guillaume and sound like a world-wise wanderer. "And now, that wandering brings me here. How about you? You a native, or came here from some other town?"

Sugar Belle shook her head. "No one's a native of Our Town. It was only founded seven or eight years ago. Before that, I lived in Canterlot. Not in the elite circles, alas..."

Corsica nodded along as she ate. "Huh. So everyone here is just the founding generation, then? I saw some kids out in the street, but they all looked pretty young."

Sugar Belle smiled and blushed. "Aren't they adorable? We've only got five so far, but the whole town thinks of them as our own. One day, they'll be able to say they're from Our Town, and then we really will have natives. Just a part of putting our mark on the map, you know?"

"So you only just got comfortable enough with your foothold here to settle down and start families?" Corsica asked, chewing. "Is seven years fast for that, or slow? Never thought about planting a new town before."

Sugar Belle shifted uncertainly. "You could say it's because of that. Actually, it's because we had a change in leadership, but they're sort of related. I don't suppose you've heard of Our Town by reputation before coming here, have you? Or was it really all about seeing the caves?"

"I mean, I knew it existed," Corsica said. "Heard we'd be able to stock up on supplies here, as well. Are you guys known for more than that?"

"Really? You heard you could get supplies here?" Sugar Belle relaxed, wiping her brow. "That's such a relief. I guess word has finally started spreading from the folks who have been here before."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You guys are that worried about getting your reputation out there?"

"Well, there's no reason not to tell you this," Sugar Belle said. "Under our old leader, Our Town was incredibly closed off from the world. it was essentially a place ponies went to escape from society... and didn't come back from. I have no idea what ponies actually say about us in the world abroad, if they know about us at all. I haven't left this town since I came here, and neither has anyone else, at least not after putting down roots. Save for our old founder, that is..." She shook her head. "Anyway, everyone here is trying to be future-oriented, really get us on the map as a tourist destination and get more ponies to visit. We do have some great desert views, right? So everyone's just a tad nervous that we might have an old reputation at odds with our new vision for ourselves."

Corsica's ears fell. "Sounds rough. That why everyone got so fired up when me and Seigetsu walked in?"

Sugar Belle giggled. "I hope it wasn't overwhelming. We just want prospective visitors to speak highly of us once they go back home, so word of mouth can spread. And we haven't had much practice welcoming ponies the 'normal' way yet, I'm afraid... You seem to be enjoying yourself, though?"

"Yeah, I'll put in a good word for you when I get the chance," Corsica volunteered. "You've got good snacks, at least. So who was this old leader of yours?"

"Hopefully you don't know her," Sugar Belle said, then caught herself. "Actually, I take that back. If you do know her, hopefully she really has changed, and it wasn't just a passing fancy. Her name was Starlight Glimmer, and she had some... extreme, and hypocritical, views. It's not the happiest story... You sure you wouldn't rather talk about something else instead?"

"Bad memories, huh?" Corsica guessed.

Sugar Belle shrugged. "Well, it's not that I mind talking about it. Always nice to air out old grievances with a friendly ear, you know? I just don't want to color your perceptions of Our Town when there's so many other things to talk about. Like you! Have you got another destination in mind after seeing the tunnels here?"

"I think we're heading west, but dunno if those plans are hashed out for sure," Corsica said. "Keep your plans flimsy, and then it's a good thing when you learn about something better to do." She folded her forelegs on the table. "Really, though, I don't mind hearing about your past. It's nice to know a town's character, the kinds of things they've overcome. And believe me, whatever your situation, I've heard wilder."

"Oh, well, if you're sure..." Sugar Belle glanced around, then leaned in and dropped her voice to a whisper. "The way we all used to live... was without our cutie marks."

Corsica's eyes widened. Valey had told told her about this; it was half of the reason she had sought Starlight out: if she really, truly decided that she would be better off without her special talent and the powers and tradeoffs it held, and if Starlight couldn't teach her a better way to live with those tradeoffs, she could take it entirely away.

But no one had told her Starlight actually did that to an entire village.

Suddenly, things made... marginally more sense. Sort of.

"Starlight did that, then?" she guessed.

Sugar Belle nodded. "She recruited all of us personally to come live here, as part of an 'experiment in equal society'. She learned about the things that were wrong with our lives, and promised us that they could be fixed by living somewhere where you were no different from everyone around you. Those promises have an intoxicating lure to ponies with certain backgrounds, and she had a way of making them that made you feel the depths of her convictions... at least until those convictions turned out to be a lie. We chased her out of town with help from some visitors - including a Princess - after we realized she never gave up her own cutie mark like the rest of us."

"A Princess?" Corsica leaned in, intrigued. "Which one?"

Odds were, it was Twilight, right? Twilight was the one who usually went around Equestria getting her hooves dirty with individual ponies' problems rather than sit around and pontificate all day, at least to hear her friends tell it. But that didn't sound like the kind of thing that would lead to Starlight coming back to Ponyville and making friends with everyone there, either.

"Twilight Sparkle," Sugar Belle said, swooning ever so slightly. "And the Elements of Harmony. Equestria's heroes. They came back once, several months ago, with Starlight, to tell us they'd patched things up between them and that she was trying to change. You know, so that she could apologize."

Corsica blinked. Wait, what?

Starlight had already been back here to apologize? And yet... she was scared of coming back here to apologize?

"And did she?" Corsica pressed. "Make amends? How did that go?"

"Better than anyone expected," Sugar Belle admitted. "A few nerves on both sides, to put it mildly. You could really tell she had been cowed, though, and we pretty quickly got the picture that she wasn't here for revenge. This probably sounds weird to you from what I've just said, but many of us were worried about her. Her betrayal stung deeply because we did believe in her cause, or at least understood it. I don't suppose you've ever felt liberated from something, but also like you've lost something precious at the same time?"

If Corsica thought about it hard enough, she imagined she would be able to spin getting her special talent that way, but she was more interested in knowing what Starlight was up to, dragging her hooves on something she had apparently already done. "I think I can relate."

Sugar Belle nodded. "Getting on without her has also made us realize how much she did for us. She basically carried Our Town on her shoulders, and it's been an enormous amount of work to keep the town functioning without her. So, it's tough to reconcile the ways I feel about her. And for me and many of the other townsfolk, seeing her contrition was the push we needed to make up our minds and let bygones be bygones."

"Huh," Corsica said, still trying to puzzle out why Starlight was stalling. Must be that she just hadn't let her lesson sink in despite learning it, and was panicking about nothing? Halcyon sure did that sometimes. Hopefully Twilight would talk her out of it, because they weren't swimming in free time...

"Now, I think that's quite enough about me and Our Town's sordid past," Sugar Belle declared, stomping a hoof for emphasis. "How about you repay the favor with some talk of your own? We hardly ever get news from the outside world, and who wouldn't be curious about what you're looking for in our caves?"

"...Well," Corsica began, making the executive decision that Starlight was being a wuss and these ponies would respond reasonably to the truth. "First off, it's not just the two of us. There's actually quite a few more hanging out just outside the town. We just came down here on our own to get a feel for things..."

I floated through the desert sky, liberated and free.

The flight to Our Town from Ponyville had given me ample time as a ghost, and I spent most of it pretending to fly. It was sensible that flying as a ghost felt different from flying in my body; after all, my body couldn't fly. But what I hadn't expected was that thinking about flying felt different.

In my body, contemplating it usually gave me a lump in my throat, some nebulous feeling between wistfulness and shame. Jumping off short ledges and flapping my wings just wasn't something I did, because it wasn't fun. I wasn't some dreamer, throwing myself off every cliff I saw and hoping that one day my wings would suddenly catch air. I had accepted my ground-bound state, made peace with it, and contemplating it further felt awkward or bad.

Not so when I was a ghost. Here, those feelings existed just as much as the ground and walls. I could run right at them, and they would simply never arrive. For all I knew, if I could isolate this state of mind, capture it and reproduce it when I was physical, that alone would be all the help I needed to finally take to the air.

It was easy to plan and get excited about things like this when I was a ghost. Those plans and mindsets never survived the transition back into my body, but right now I was a ghost, and so life was good.

Corsica and Seigetsu were getting mobbed by ponies at the entrance to Our Town, a fact that made me doubly-glad I was a ghost. Smiling, eager faces stumbled over each other in an effort to get a slice of the newcomers' attention, a visage that wasn't in the least overwhelming when I was protected from it by the veil of quasi-existence, just like a picture of an angry mob chasing you down was much less frightening than the real thing.

As usual, Corsica handled the situation like a pro, knowing just when and how to speak to avoid getting interrupted or flustered by those interruptions. Corsica was so cool... Part of me demanded that I follow her and listen in on whatever she was going to learn once she got the situation pared down to a better size. Another part suggested I tail Seigetsu, because I trusted Corsica to give me the parts that were relevant to my goals when we got both got back. And a third part wanted to go look at the foals.

The third part won out. It wasn't like anyone knew I was here, or was counting on me accomplishing stuff with my presence. And I was feeling good today, so I might as well make the most of it and enjoy myself.

Two of the foals were being watched over by their fathers at a table on the side of the road, which seemed to function less as a table and more as a general point of congregation. A third stallion was there too, not carrying an infant, and all three of them were watching the ruckus at the entrance.

"We haven't had a single pony in the entire last year show up thinking this was still Starlight's haunt," one of the fathers said, bouncing his infant as they looked around with wide eyes, too young for their irises to have developed. "My money says they aren't here for her old services."

"And one's a dragon," the lone stallion said. "He doesn't even have a cutie mark."

"The longer we go without it happening just makes me wonder more and more how things will go when it does happen," the second father pointed out, his own foal sound asleep. "For all that we've done to turn Our Town into a place ponies want to visit, the one thing we can't control, or even know, is how other ponies see us. Maybe Starlight didn't speak a word about this place to anyone she wasn't actively interested in recruiting. Maybe she spread a wide net. Maybe she badmouthed us in between leaving and falling in with the Princess. Maybe she even put in a good word for us later." He sighed. "I don't like that this is the one thing we're forced to leave up to chance, when it's practically the most important. You can't build a tourist town with no tourists."

I flicked my ears. Talking about Starlight already? Well, maybe I would learn something good here after all...

"You worry too much," the lone stallion said. "Time is on our side, dude! All this stuff we're building will pay off for us even if it doesn't wind up making money or getting us better-integrated with Equestria."

The second father sighed. "Forgive me if I can't get fully on board with your outlook. Times are good right now, but what about when they're not? What do we do if someone gets sick or injured?"

The first father seemed partly swayed. "Isn't that all the more reason to hope those visitors are here because word about us is finally starting to spread?"

The second one didn't answer.

"I want my kids to have opportunities too," the first said. "But a day we get visitors seems like the wrong day to freak out about what if that doesn't happen. And there's always the possibility they won't even be stuck here like we are."

I tilted my head. Stuck here? There was a train station just over the gulch rim. Had these ponies never explored their surroundings before?

They had to know about it. How else would they have gotten here?

"Would be great if that was the case," the second father said. "But we can't count on it. The fact is, we don't even know why the trains don't work for us, let alone whether they'll work for our kids. Is it a curse Starlight left on us? Is it because we came here via airship, rather than by train? Is it because we spent so long without our cutie marks? Maybe our kids will be able to go out and decide for themselves where and how to live their lives, or maybe they'll be stuck here like us."

I sucked in a breath. Starlight and flown everyone here on her airship.

The train magic was preventing every last pony in this town from leaving.

"Maybe having kids makes it different," the lone stallion said, leaning back. "But me, I haven't forgotten the spirit that brought me out here. Even if Starlight turned out to be a fraud, spending the rest of my days building out this town from nothing is exactly the life for me. Really gets you going, stepping back and going, 'I built that,' you know? I've got everything I need right here, exit or no."

The first father looked down at his foal. "Yeah? Well, I made this little guy." He sighed. "Might be crazy to say this, but I wish Starlight would come back. Odds are certain that she'd know why the trains only work for visitors. If she really has turned over a new leaf, maybe she could fix them."

"Hey, I didn't bring it up last time because I didn't want to kill the mood," the lone stallion said. "And besides, she came back once already to apologize. If there was something she could do, you'd think she'd have done it then. Ask yourself why you didn't ask her, if you wanted that badly to know."

My head spun. All of this was painting a very different picture than I had gone in expecting. As likely as it was that I could learn more by staying and listening, I needed to get back to the ship and share some of what I had overheard.

Aboard the Immortal Dream, I found Faye exactly where I had left her, and she wasted no time in turning control over to me when I explained what I had put together. Starlight and Twilight were both on the bridge, waiting in an awkward silence.

Starlight nodded at my arrival. "Getting restless?"

"Just had a thought," I said. "About the trains. You have some exception to them, right? You can ride them without tripping up the magic."

Starlight nodded. "If you're wondering whether my way will work for you, the answer is probably no. Did you forget something back in Ponyville?"

I shook my head. "How did you figure it out? Was it something you could always do, or did you have to discover a bypass?"

"I figured it out less than a year ago," Starlight said, clearly not wanting to say how she did it.

"So you couldn't use the trains before that?" I asked. "How'd you get to and from this village, airship?"

"I already said that," Starlight sighed, drifting back into contemplation. "Look, I've got a lot on my mind, so if you're just here to chat..."

"Fine, I'll spit it out," I told her. "You didn't happen to use your airship when convincing ponies to move to this town, did you? Because I've been thinking about how likely that would be, and what it would mean for their ability to use the trains to leave if so."

Starlight sat straight up, her pupils constricting. Twilight watched her reaction, suddenly worried.

"I never even thought about that," Starlight whispered. "Why didn't anyone tell me, though? Surely they must have tried and found out. They would all be stuck here. I... That was part of the point of using the airship, and I completely forgot I did that..."

"Not to put too fine a point on it," Twilight said, fully alert. "But you didn't give them a whole lot of chances to test what would happen if they left."

"Not then," Starlight protested. "Later, when we came back to apologize! You think they would have mentioned it if they tried and failed to leave but saw that I could do it just fine?"

"Well, you could always ask them to find out for sure," Twilight pointed out. "But you were glued to my side for that entire trip. Maybe they wisely thought me and the rest of the element bearers would get stuck here too if they made a fuss about it? There could be a lot of reasons, but you won't find them sitting in this cabin."

"Or, maybe they didn't trust me," Starlight darkly mused. "For understandable reasons, still, but... Or maybe they thought since I arrived on the train, I had somehow forgotten, and so asking me about it would trap me there with them even if they got me on my own? That's probably the real reason."

Either way, Starlight had been back to apologize already, like the stallions had implied. Which meant that this whole thing about sending Corsica and Seigetsu to test the water amounted to stalling, because Starlight didn't want to take to heart a lesson she had already learned, or else some irrational fear was refusing to dissipate.

Well... I couldn't blame her. I knew exactly what that was like. But maybe I could help Twilight to give her a gentle push.

"Look," I began, "I dunno what this is about having been here to apologize already. I'm guessing it didn't clear one hundred percent of everything up if you're still this nervous, but don't you think this is a pretty good opportunity to make it up to them? If they're really stuck, we've got a link to the outside world with this airship. We could give them a lift if someone needs it, deliver some mail, I dunno, buy something they can't get here and hire someone to take it to them on the train..."

Twilight nodded along. "What she said. Starlight, I know you're nervous about seeing the flame again, and about your visions. But those burdens will be easier to manage once you've got the reaction of the ponies here off your chest."

"A reaction which you should already know, if you've already done this before," I added. "Speaking of, you don't think that would have been an important detail to tell us earlier? Or was I just not around when you did?"

Starlight looked embarrassed. "And you would have taken this more seriously if you knew I had already been here to ask forgiveness once before?" She sighed. "You're trying to recruit me to solve a conflict in the north after we're done here. You've been sent to my doorstep by ponies who undoubtedly think of me as some mythical savior. But I am scared of this, even though I've already faced this fear and it turned out fine. I'm a coward, I'm irrational, I didn't learn my lesson, go ahead and say it. That's just... not what I wanted you to see me as, with what you're asking me to do."

My backwards ears perked. Was she worried about my confidence in her abilities?

But she didn't want to go back to the north. She was stalling and doing everything she could to get out of it. And yet rather than trying to tarnish her reputation to make me think she wasn't the one I needed for this job, she cared about protecting my opinion of her.

In some, that would be vanity. But this felt more like she had secretly made up her mind to join me, and was trying to reassure me that her aid really would be enough.

I grinned.

"Been there. Done that," I told her. "Sometimes, you learn that something's nothing to be afraid of, and then it doesn't stick even when you learn it five times over. It stinks. But it's not just you. That happens to everyone, okay? And even if it doesn't stick this time either, you won't have to face them again for a long while."

Starlight looked at the door. "If it was just them, I could have had this over with an hour ago. But even if this goes well, and even if our trip to the flame goes well, our next destination is..."

"The north?" I guessed.

Starlight shook her head. "We're going to Snowport to take Seigetsu up on her offer to search for any hints of Maple's passage. I owe it to her to... to find out what happened. But I don't want to learn that I was too late. That's the other reason I'm stalling."

Twilight reached out a hoof.

"I can tell myself the townsponies have forgiven me," Starlight said, walking out of reach and heading for the deck. "I can tell myself restoring the flame is objectively the opposite of moving toward a future where the world falls to ruin. But I can't tell myself Maple would have stopped looking for me if she still could, and I can't tell myself that search wouldn't have ended after two decades. Something happened to her, and I'm not ready to learn what."

Wasting No More Time

Wisely - albeit at Corsica's suggestion - Sugar Belle had assembled a small posse of ponies to climb the gulch wall and go parlay with the ship, so as not to make this harder for Starlight than necessary. Night Glider was there, apparently serving in official capacity as the town's best flier and thus designated scout. Also present were a blue unicorn called Party Favor whom Corsica suspected had been in the crowd that mobbed her, and a white earth pony called Double Diamond she hadn't met, but evidently Seigetsu had.

Gasps sounded from the three ground-bound villagers as they crested the wall - Night Glider had flown on above. "That is Starlight's airship!" Double Diamond pointed a hoof, his voice breathy even when he was excited. "And look! They've come out to meet us!"

As he said, Starlight was off the ship, backed by Twilight and all her friends, with Halcyon and Nanzanaya lurking in the background. Eagerness was the last emotion Corsica could detect on Starlight's face, and yet it was clear that she had actually been coming, and wasn't just waiting.

Corsica smirked. It really had been a mission to buy time for Starlight to get over her nerves after all.

"Princess Twilight!" Night Glider called, floating down at a reasonable height and raising a hoof in greeting.

"Hey, Fluttershy! Hey, Pinkie Pie!" Party Favor called, mirroring the gesture on the ground.

"See?" Twilight gave Starlight a gentle nudge forward. "Not that mad to see you."

Starlight pasted on a crinkly smile. "Uh, hi? Same old welcome wagon, I see..."

"What are you all doing back here?" Double Diamond asked, taking point among the villagers. "Starlight, everything's going alright at your new home, it looks like?"

"We..." Starlight tapped a forehoof. "Have need of a magical artifact I left deep in the mountain caves, to put it simply. Kind of urgent, so you'll have to forgive me if there's not too much time to visit, but by any chance has every last pony in the village been stuck here and unable to use the trains to get out?"

Night Glider landed dramatically. "You do know about that! And it's due to an artifact in the caves, you say!?"

Starlight shuffled awkwardly. "Well..."

Starlight was forced to explain it a grand total of three times: first to the welcoming posse, again in the town's entrance, and finally before a collective assembly of every resident the town had to offer, each time with increasing levels of discomfort.

"And so, because I brought you all here on my airship, you know how far away this place is from your hometowns," Starlight finished, repeating herself more steadily than I was expecting. I was practically a ball of nerves just from imagining myself in her position, and all I was doing was spectating. But Starlight carried herself with an ironclad resignation, as if she was too broken to break further, and thus could keep going indefinitely.

"So you're saying because we know the real distance the train would be crossing, it won't work for us?" a mare asked from the crowd. "That's not how it worked back in Manehattan. You could get from there to anywhere else in Equestria in just a day trip. What's the point of having a train station out here if it has such a limitation?"

"I didn't build it," Starlight said, deliberately leaving out the part that the rest of Equestria's train lines worked this way too - presumably, she wanted these ponies to still be able to use those if they ever got out of Our Town. "It was here and like this when I first explored this land."

"Come off it," said a macho stallion. "Why would somepony build a train what don't work?"

"Good question," Twilight muttered under her breath. "I still don't see the reason for all this..."

"Don't get the wrong idea," the macho stallion went on. "I wouldn't leave Our Town if I had the choice. I came out here for a reason, and I've put in too much work touching up this place to want to leave it just 'cause someone's trying to stop me from leaving. Still makes me wonder what was going through the head of whatever bloke designed this. Oy Princess, you happen to know?"

The crowd's attention turned to Twilight.

Flustered, she spread her wings. "No, I don't know why it's like this, and I just found out a week ago! But Equestria can't function if its ponies can't reach each other, so believe me, I will be doing everything in my power to find out, and in the meantime get you some connections to the rest of the world!"

There was a round of applause, but I got the impression it was too early for the crowd to get fully on board with anything anyone said. "Princess Celestia would have to know about this, wouldn't she?" a mare asked. "Or because you don't know about it, does that mean she doesn't, either?"

"I-"

Twilight was cut off as another stallion spoke. "Maybe no one's saying this for a reason, but I'm sure everyone's thinking it," he started. "But if you knew about this, why didn't you mention it last time you were here, to apologize?"

The question was directed straight at Starlight. The rest of the crowd fell into an awkward hush.

"I mean, none of you asked me," Starlight said with folded ears. "Would you believe me if I said it completely slipped my mind? I had a big week, and was trying to put the past firmly out of mind."

The crowd shuffled. "I told you I should'a said something!" one pony muttered to another.

"I saw that reunion was going better than it could have," Sugar Belle said, "and didn't want to make it awkward, just in case we were eternally cursed or something and there was nothing to be done..."

"I thought if you knew, you would have said something!"

"I wasn't there!"

Ponies piled over each other with excuses, and from the general embarrassment and tension in the crowd, I gathered that this matter really had slipped through the cracks last time, and no one here was comfortable with the fact that there wasn't a better reason than that.

If I was a less-jaded pony, I would have questioned how such a thing was possible, how every single pony here could have not mentioned the fact that they were completely stranded. But I had grown up in Icereach, a place where procedural delays caused by communications breakdowns and avoidance of responsibility were baked into the city's identity. And if ponies could let critical details go forgotten and unattended there, in a place that was ostensibly a bureaucracy, surely they could do it in the middle of an emotionally charged reunion with a tyrant who was trying to turn over a new leaf.

I glanced over at Corsica. "You getting any deja vu from Icereach's schedule slip, here?"

"That's what this reminds you of?" Corsica raised an eyebrow, answering under her breath. "Actually, it reminds me of a tactic Egdelwonk was drilling into me when I was working for him in Ironridge. It's easy to get everyone to forget something of critical importance by giving them something newer or tastier to chew on, even if it's shallower or less important in the long term. Classic sleight of hoof. Sounds like Starlight did it accidentally, making them fixate on how she had changed her ways instead of what they actually needed, and then leaving before they could come to their senses."

"Which is totally what we're doing now, right?" I huddled closer as the crowd kept on speculating. "I don't think anyone intends to stay here longer than it takes us to get down to the harmonic flame. This one assembly is probably all they're gonna get out of her. How many really important things do you think no one will think to mention with this much noise?"

Corsica frowned.

"Alright, that's enough!" Starlight cleared the air, waving her telekinesis around like a flag to get ponies' attention. "You're not going to accomplish anything by litigating whose responsibility it was to ask me about the trains! We're here now, and we can do something about it, so have you thought about what you need?"

The crowd quieted before her perhaps a little too respectfully - these were clearly ponies who hadn't grown unaccustomed to following Starlight's orders without question, and she knew it.

"Well," Night Glider spoke up. "Some of us had an idea to build an airship, not that we have the parts or the know-how. But you're saying that would work, since it's just the trains that are messed up?"

Starlight nodded. "It won't be a fast trip, but it's a good long-term option."

"This area is not so remote as to be completely inaccessible," Seigetsu said, stepping forward. "You are perhaps three to four weeks by hoof caravan away from a port town on a major trade artery known as Fort Redsand. Perhaps faster; my knowledge of travel times is more suited to mountainous terrain. From there you could barter passage to most any coastal area in Equestria, provided you have sea legs and are willing to wait a few months at sea. I realize such times may seem extreme for those used to Equestria's... closeness. But your situation is hardly unique. Much of Equestria's population lives in towns without train stations at all, and still they have learned to flourish."

The crowd muttered, discussing this.

"And you do have a train station, even if you can't use it," Twilight pointed out. "I can arrange for regular train service here for mail deliveries, provided you don't tell the conductor about this and make them unable to return too. And maybe we can set up a system where you can buy things from here, somehow, and then have them shipped to you, or ship things out to sell and have the profits come back here?"

The crowd murmured harder. "So wait," Party Favor cut in. "You're saying someone doesn't even have to see how far the trip is; they could get stuck here if we just tell them about it?"

Twilight bit her lip. "I don't understand this as well as I'd like, but that's my impression. Rest assured I will be testing and investigating the limits of this system as soon as I get a chance."

"Hey, I've got a question!" Pinkie spoke up with a bounce. "If trains come out here regularly, how come you didn't send for help with their conductors? And if they don't, how do you know the trains don't work for you?"

"Oh, they don't come here regularly," said a mare in the crowd. "We just tested with mine."

"And you are...?" Twilight asked as the crowd parted to let her forward.

A yellow unicorn with a blue mane and an average physique stepped up - I suddenly realized there weren't any ponies in the entire crowd with non-standard body types. "Name's Wheelcakes," she said, turning to show off a special talent of a train track. "I used to be a train engineer before I came here. So we tried to leave on mine."

"You have a train here?" Rainbow asked, hovering curiously. "I thought the tracks just dead-ended. Where do you keep it?"

Wheelcakes shrugged. "Well, when you're an engineer, you don't need to keep your train anywhere in particular. You just call and it comes."

Everyone looked at each other.

Twilight bit her lip. "Well, I've read that train operators have a special bond with their trains. But can you really do that? Just... summon your train at will?"

"Sure," Wheelcakes said. "I even called a few other trains, just to make sure it wasn't a problem with mine. If they're not yours, they're not guaranteed to listen to you, but then neither is yours if you don't treat them right. And there are always some nice ones out there willing to help out a stranger in need."

"Trains can talk to you?" Rainbow raised a skeptical eyebrow.

Wheelcakes gave her a fond, slightly patronizing look. "Never been around a pony with signature tools of the trade, love?"

Rainbow reddened and rubbed the back of her neck. "What, is this supposed to be common?"

"I talk to machines all the time," I volunteered.

Applejack nodded. "Have you even seen how we grow our crops down on Sweet Apple Acres?"

Rainbow floated away, embarrassed. "Alright, fine, sue me..."

"Anyway," Wheelcakes went on, "I tried to leave on three different trains, with some passengers. It was the same thing every time: we'd go and go and go, far longer than the trip should have taken, and the moment we tried to back up, we ended up here in minutes. The last time, I tried to get out of the train and explore a little, but I got this feeling in my bones, you know, and went right back to the train. Might have had a better reason than most to be adventurous, but you don't ignore an engineer's intuition."

"Have you heard about something like this before?" Starlight asked.

Wheelcakes nodded. "Myths and legends about trains that went on for infinity but never made any progress? Sure. Never met anyone who had actually experienced it before myself, let alone who could reliably reproduce it."

"Would you mind if we spoke more with you about this later?" Twilight asked. "We did actually come here for something important down in the caves, but if I could collect a complete testimony from you about your experiences testing this, that would go a long way toward helping my own understanding of this phenomenon, and helping find a way around it."

"Of course." Wheelcakes nodded along. "Already makes me feel better about not being able to get the trains out of here if a Princess of Equestria is stumped too! I'm up in that house over there, if you want to hit me up on your way out."

Soon after beginning the descent, Faye could feel the flame.

Sitting in the back of Halcyon's mind, keeping her thoughts to herself while her mask controlled their body, she had plenty of time to focus. This was different from either of the times she had been to a Crystal Palace before: in Ironridge, the flame had been nigh extinguished, and only through straining their senses while touching a crystal vein with a bare hoof could they feel anything at all. Convergence, on the other hoof, had pulled on her from the very surface, powerfully enough that she had to concentrate to keep her footing.

This flame - Laughter, according to Starlight - was a middle ground in intensity, and much more pure. Convergence had been a sea of emotions, many harmonious and discordant strands woven together around a theme, ebbing and flowing like a beating heart. Laughter felt more like a laser: one point source, one isolated strain, powerful and pure and unchanging. It was joy, relief and good cheer, a nostalgic feeling of rosy memories and a giddy excitement and anticipation, all woven into a single cord or baked into a single treat.

It was tempting. Part of Faye wanted to seize control, trade for her bracelet from Seigetsu and turn it up, drinking deep of the contentment in the air. She might have even done so, had Seigetsu not stayed back at the ship with Nanzanaya: that feeling wanted to be drank in. It told her, nudging on her mind, that it wanted its happiness to become her own. But unlike Convergence, it didn't try to overwhelm her or pull her in. It was like staring at a river, instead of a river bursting its banks and sweeping her away.

Laughter wanted to become her, but Convergence wanted her to become it. That was about as accurate as she could put it.

"These caves are something else," Applejack said, staring around at the high ceilings and lower floors as the party descended across a sloping rock bridge, still close enough to the entrance that a faint breeze blew against them. The walls sparkled with microscopic mineral chips in the shifting light of Twilight, Starlight and Rarity's horns, the stone slate gray with occasional bands of brown.

"The Aldenfold is riddled with them," Starlight explained. "I spent a week or two in them to get past the highest part of the mountains, the time I walked across. I'm not sure what purpose they serve, but they're everywhere."

"I can't believe no gem hunters have come here yet to despoil the natural beauty," Rarity remarked. "Not that I'm remotely innocent on that front, and I do believe a good gemstone shines brighter on the right dress than deep underground, but you can't truly use them in a way they deserve without having an appreciation for where they come from. And my fashion sense is telling me this cave is about to become a mother lode."

"I guess being out of the way does have its perks," Rainbow said with a shrug, hovering along.

"It looks fine," Halcyon said, sniffing. "But does anyone else smell something weird?"

Applejack's ears stood straight up. "Like mine gas? Can't say that I do, but..." She sniffed too, then again, harder. "Nope. Can't say that I do."

"What kind of weird?" Pinkie asked, bouncing over. "Because I've got a great sniffer, and there are at least twenty different smells down here I'd call weird."

Halcyon folded her backwards ears. "It's like... a new airship smell. The same way the Immortal Dream smelled when we were just starting to fly it, but it faded after the first day, I think. I wasn't really paying attention, back then, because I thought there was nothing unusual about it. But I smell it again now, and it's strange."

Starlight furrowed her brow. "The Immortal Dream isn't a new airship, though. It's been sitting in that cave for months since I flew it last. Are you sure you're not just smelling fusty cave smell?"

"A harmonic cave, at that," Twilight added, and Starlight nodded.

"I suppose so," Halcyon said, and let it drop. But to Faye, she added, Icereach never smelled this way, right?

Faye paid more attention, and agreed that she could smell it too. Icereach never had smelled this way, at least to her nose. And neither did the Kindness palace, or its surrounding cave. Though neither of them would have been as actively harmonic as this place...

Halcyon sighed in confusion, and kept walking. What Faye didn't tell her, retreating back to her own corner of their mind, was that she didn't think Convergence's city had smelled this way either. And nothing in any of her memories helped her figure out what this was.

The group reached a point where there was no other option but to wing it.

Rainbow dove off the edge, shooting the rest of the way down a claustrophobic craggy shaft and in through a hole in the ceiling of a larger room below, and Fluttershy gently followed suit. Twilight and Starlight brought up the rear, each of them lifting half of the ground-bound ponies in their telekinesis and flying carefully downward.

Corsica didn't mind being lifted as much as she could have. All unicorns learned from a very early age that trying to lift another pony in your telekinesis was one of the rudest things you could do, and she was fairly sure Equestrian mores about doing so were at least somewhat the same, if a little more relaxed. But she couldn't justify getting too uncomfortable when she was hovering next to Halcyon, a pony who by all rights should have been able to fly on her own, and yet couldn't.

Rarity, Applejack and Pinkie Pie gave her good company in ground-bound ponies who accepted this as a necessity, and none of them complained. It was for the good of the world, and all of them had suffered much greater indignities in the name of protecting the peace. But poor Halcyon.

The other reason she didn't feel awkward was because she was too busy feeling jealous of Starlight's flying spell.

To any outside observer, it looked like she was just lifting herself in her own telekinesis. But that was outright impossible, every unicorn foal had tried it and discovered it was the same as trying to fly by trying to push your barrel upwards with a hoof.

Eventually, Starlight and Twilight set everyone down, and the group resumed their usual progression method of following crystal staircases conjured by Starlight - staircases the ceiling hole had been too tight to accommodate. "That horn flying is pretty neat," Corsica remarked as they walked. "How'd you learn it?"

"It's not normal magic," Starlight said, sounding like she wanted to brood silently even though it wasn't good for her. "It's related to my role as a Flame of Harmony, and it's mechanically the same thing that keeps my ship in the air."

"Not something learnable, then?" Corsica grimaced.

Starlight hesitated. "...Maybe. Your cutie mark can make a lot of impossible things possible. Actually, I think it's even been used for this specific thing before. But it probably wouldn't do it in the way you're expecting."

"Eh. I've been feeling pretty good on this trip," Corsica said. "Don't want it badly enough to throw that away, though I suppose I haven't tried wishing for new long-term abilities for myself too often. But what do you mean, done it before? Is there a story here that's worth telling?"

"Not a relevant one," Starlight said, slinking back into brooding.

"Come on, tell it anyway!" Rainbow pressed. "Otherwise I'll try to tell it, and you'll get to listen to me botch your tale."

Starlight sighed. "Your artifice used to belong to Garsheeva. She used it to grant special powers to her top lieutenants, the ones who steered the Griffon Empire independent from the royal families. One of the ways she did that was by modifying and enhancing ponies' cutie marks. Cutie mark magic isn't subject to the same limitations as horns, or mana technology. Originally, Garsheeva bestowed the power of unicorn flight on someone seven or eight hundred years ago, using that method. But Garsheeva never reclaimed that modified cutie mark when its bearer died, and everything that uses the same mechanism today is derived from that mark in one way or another. End of story."

"What do you mean, never reclaimed it?" Corsica asked. "What's that got to do with anything?"

Starlight hesitated.

"Come on," Corsica prodded.

"Cutie marks don't perish when their owner does," Starlight eventually said. "They enter the lifestream - the river of ether down by the flames. And then they stay there, waiting for someone new to come back and bond to."

Corsica glanced at her artifice. "And that just happens? It's random, who gets what?"

"Not random," Starlight said. "It won't happen unless you're a good match for the hopes and dreams embodied in the mark. And I don't know how it works for batponies, since they get their marks before they're even born. This system was made before batponies, so it wasn't made with them in mind." She kept walking. "Also, it didn't used to be automatic. Before my flame 'vanished,' it was responsible for overseeing that cycle of cutie marks. An intelligent set of eyes to step in if a match wasn't going to be formed where one needed to happen, or if one was about to form that needed to be stopped."

"Your flame?" Corsica asked. "Is that why you have the power to remove them?"

"...Indirectly," Starlight said. "Much less directly than you think. But I suppose it has something to do with it. That would be more a question for Luna than for me..."

The group continued downward, along a sheer cliff wall and through a maze of tunnels with crazy slope grades, the caves alternating between wide and claustrophobic. Sometimes, Corsica felt like the walls were made of terrain features that belonged on the surface, squished and folded up like the land had been a wadded-up ball of parchment, with the caves left as natural holes in between.

Gemstones grew more abundant, first as isolated clusters and then as veins running through the rock. The deeper they got, the more common the crystal veins became, pulsing steadily with waves of baby-blue light that seeped up through them, reminding Corsica of blood vessels.

Those sluggish pulses grew brighter and more frequent as well, until Corsica almost felt she could extinguish her horn...

And then they rounded a bend, and a solid wall of crystal greeted them.

"Here we are," Starlight said, steeling herself and focusing her horn on the crystals. "The Palace of Laughter."

"When you say it like that, it sounds more like a carnival than an ancient ruin," Pinkie happily pointed out. "Is it too early to say this place is giving me all sorts of good vibes?"

"Well, it is your element's palace," Twilight pointed out. "Though I feel something in the air too. This place feels... more welcoming than the one in the Everfree."

On command, the crystal wall split and changed, forming into a doorway as it interacted with Starlight's magic. Corsica stepped through, expecting to be dazzled by another crystalline Macrothesis.

Instead, she emerged in a room made entirely of a weird, chalky film.

"What's this?" she asked, sticking her tongue out and rubbing at it with a hoof.

"The same stuff was in the Kindness Palace in Ironridge," Halcyon pointed out, following her in.

"It's some sort of ether residue," Starlight explained. "It builds up over thousands of years if the palaces aren't maintained, I think. You can rub it off..."

She took her telekinesis and scrubbed vigorously at a patch of wall. It took some effort, but the chalky flakes broke off as a sheet, revealing pure, faceted crystal beneath.

"It almost seems like a shame," Twilight said. "I suppose leaving these places alone is important for their own protection. After all, we're here because someone was misusing one badly enough to break it. But ponies should have a right to see and be able to appreciate what makes their world go around, and these places at least deserve to be kept clean!"

Some ponies have fun with cleaning, said a distant voice in the back of Corsica's head. But you're not here for that, are you? Come on down, I don't bite!

Everyone except Starlight jumped. "Did y'all hear that?" Applejack asked, looking around.

"My flame is really excited," Fluttershy said, touching her chest. "It wants to be here."

"That would be Laughter," Starlight said, looking at something down below the floor. "Since everyone here has a strong connection to either one of the flames or emotional magic, I suppose we'd all be able to hear them. We should... hurry, and get this over with."

The palace was bigger than Corsica expected, at least a dozen flights of stairs that had crusted into ramps forcing her to tread carefully. Eventually, they reached a room with a centerpiece that was completely free from chalk: a copy of the crystal map table in Twilight's castle, albeit baby blue and currently blank.

When Twilight approached, however, it sprang to life like a lazy foal caught napping by their teacher. Rather than showing a map, this one showed an array of dots laid out in a roughly T-shaped pattern, with four in a jagged line near one edge of the table and two far out, pointing toward the opposite edge. One of the dots in the line was noticeably brighter than the others.

Twilight frowned. "You said these usually display the Emblem of the Nine Virtues, with a hexagon inscribed inside a triangle. But if that's what this is, it's missing quite a few points..."

"It's missing three of them." Starlight tapped the table, its contents spinning at her touch. "Mine, Kindness and probably Generosity... which are all here, stacked on Laughter. I guess... maybe Generosity is here to help?"

"What would mine be doing all the way out here, darling?" Rarity asked, her perfectly curled mane slightly less perfect after the long spelunking session.

"Well, yours is one of the broken ones," Starlight admitted. "From what I understand, its palace is broken, but the flame is fine, so it just drifts on the lifestream without a center of power and can't do much as a result. Which might be what will happen to Kindness if we succeed here today."

Generosity is here to help, Laughter said, again speaking into Corsica's mind. Come on! We're just a little further!

Starlight and Twilight nodded, leading the way once again. Adjacent to the map table room was a tight spiral staircase, and after several revolutions it broke into a spacious chamber directly under the table. A glittering trunk of crystal rose up from a starry void below, branching out and connecting to the walls and ceiling, absolutely pulsating with life. Corsica glanced over to Halcyon, and offered her a shoulder when she saw her wobbling.

"Thanks," Halcyon managed. "This place is... a lot more intense than the one in Ironridge."

A narrow crystalline bridge connected the staircase to the tree trunk, and through natural folds in the trunk's surface, the pathway continued, opening out into a sanctum that was free from chalky residue. Concentric runes on the floor surrounded a smaller tree, growing up from the center of the main trunk, its branches split and spread and interlocking to form a brazier that burned with a flame the color of the summer sky, its dancing tongues trailing off into lively sparkles and motes instead of smoke.

To the side, another small tree had grown, looking like it didn't quite belong. It had a large, translucent bud made from polished amethyst, and a purple flame burned within, less robust than the blue one but still vibrant and healthy.

"Woah!" Pinkie gasped. "I'm vibrating!"

"This is the place," Fluttershy said, stepping forward. "Everything feels right about this. We can do this!"

"We can give it our best shot," Applejack said, tipping back her hat and setting her face in determination.

"Yeah! So how do we do this, exactly?" Rainbow circled the room.

Such a thing has never been done before, said the purple flame. There is no script to follow. However, we nine are forged from the intent to keep this world in its rightful state. It follows that the intent of your actions here should be more important than their exact form.

"I'm going to stand in the brazier," Fluttershy announced. "I think that's the focal point of this place's power. It won't hurt me, right?"

I'm as gentle as a summer breeze! Laughter announced, a new bud growing opposite Generosity's. Buuut I'll move over here, just so Kindness can have the pedestal to herself.

"Kindness is a girl?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "You guys have genders?"

Not in the sense that you understand them, Generosity said.

But it feels right, Laughter added. And maybe we used to, before we were made!

"...Right," Twilight said, sizing up the situation with a nod. "Let's all take up positions in a circle around Fluttershy, then, us Elements and Starlight. Umm..." She glanced at Halcyon and Corsica. "I don't suppose either of you have relevant magic to contribute?"

Corsica took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "I wish... that this plan succeeds."

She felt as if the ground shifted slightly around her. In her mind, a mountain appeared, ready to annihilate her if her wish was consummated: she had just tried to wish a god into existence. Pure dread settled over her as her thoughts caught up to her actions.

Starlight was looking at her with concern. And, she realized, so were both of the flames.

The tool you wield was not made for those who pay the price for their actions themselves, Generosity said. But for those who inflict it on others.

Yeah... Laughter added. It's made for gods, not mortals. Are you going to be alright?

"Well, what am I supposed to do?" Corsica's voice cracked. "Just sit by and not contribute to something as important as this? I'm just one pony, you think my life is going to matter a hundred years from now when I'm dead and gone but millions of others still call this world home? How can I possibly justify not helping, even if it's a price that's too big for me to pay?"

The flames sparkled.

Your heart is noble, Generosity said. You sacrifice beyond your own means for the sake of those you will never meet. You do so instinctively, without stopping to consider the cost. I sense, in part, this is because you have lost hope for your own future, but it is also because you care. You are worthy of my power.

Corsica blinked. "What...?"

Just this once, Generosity said, I will bear your burden.

A purple crystal vine snaked out from the smaller tree, winding over to Corsica, reaching up and then waiting for permission.

She didn't move.

It tapped her flank with a sensation like a static shock, except prolonged. After half a second, Corsica nearly blacked out, an intense vertigo ripping at her mind as gravity destroyed herself in her senses... and then it was all gone. The vertigo, the connection, even the mountain she had summoned in the back of her mind.

Racing through the tendril were angry blue storm clouds, crackling and sparking with midnight-blue energy, the tendril disintegrating in their wake. The clouds were sucked into the central bud, where they shared space with Generosity, slightly pushing the flame aside.

"What... are those...?" Corsica blinked, stepping closer.

Your scientists know this phenomenon as a premonition flux, Generosity explained. A means conceived by Princess Luna of allowing the artifices to skirt this world's prohibition on knowing the future. As the keepers of this world's fundamental laws, we are less than thrilled by their existence. But without the combined might of our nine seats of power, there is little we can do about something that merely pushes the line.

"Prohibitions on knowing the future?" Twilight's eyes widened. "This is a premonition flux? After hearing Starlight's story, I read all the papers I could find from the Kinmari Marine Research Academy, but that line of inquiry was supposed to have dead-ended when-"

Focus, Generosity commanded. The price has already been paid in the future. Restore our sibling.

What she said! Laughter added.

"Right." Twilight took a deep breath. "Everyone? Let's do this!"

Fluttershy held her head high, embers of pink flame beginning to waft from her coat in anticipation.

Twilight lowered her head and fired a horn laser at her. Rarity and Starlight mirrored the gesture, except Starlight's was midnight blue instead of her usual teal aura. Then Applejack, Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash somehow did the same, lacking horns, the energy streaming out from their chests instead.

Streams of flame burst from the two buds as well, all of the energy converging on Fluttershy as it intensified and swirled. Fluttershy's wings spread, her eyes turned to disks of silver plasma, her hooves lifted off the ground and her mouth hung open in a wordless cry... and the rainbow swirling around her fused with her mane, and her mane with it, the energy cloud taking on a gentle, fiery pink.

One by one, the elements' lasers broke off, and Fluttershy settled back into the brazier, burning with pink flame. She closed her eyes, and then opened them, her irises thoroughly changed to pink. "We did it," she whispered. "You say it'll be alright now... right?"

...I am restored, the pink flame said in a shaky voice, more feeble than the others as it bled back into the brazier. My power will take time to recuperate before it can be used again. My home remains destroyed. I shall drift in the lifestream like Generosity, my sibling. But even weakened, I am no longer fading. You have saved-

Corsica felt it in her heart before she heard it, like the world was drawing in a sharp breath. And then the Generosity bud exploded.

A brilliant flare of blue lightning rocked the tree, a storm that stretched from floor to ceiling and wall to wall. Twilight and Starlight reacted as one, encasing everyone in the room in teal crystals and those in a protective barrier, and still Corsica felt the fabric of space rent in twain, as if a hooflength was no longer a hooflength and a second was no longer a second for the briefest of breaths. And then it was over.

I endure, Generosity's voice came in her mind, sounding more like Kindness's than the strong flame it formerly was.

The tree, however, was ruined. Every crystal was cracked, half of the brazier smashed, and it was a miracle the thing hadn't fallen to pieces. Oh no! Laughter cried out, vanishing into the ground and becoming a sky-blue wave, running through the crystals and beginning to fuse cracks back together. My beautiful home!

Starlight blinked, then snapped to attention, lighting her horn and beginning to seal cracks with her own crystal magic as well.

Everyone else was transfixed... save for Halcyon, who darted out the door.

My heart hammered in my chest as I left the tree's interior behind. I could feel all three flames' presences, they would be fine. And even if they wouldn't, the others were better-equipped to deal with it than I was.

The room around the tree had cracked from the force of the blowback as well. What had that been? Something related to Corsica's wish interacting with the Generosity flame as it came true. I didn't have the time to understand fully. I had a hunch, and I had to investigate. Nothing else mattered.

I reached the bridge, and knelt down to examine the cracks. That disturbance, that shock wave, that feeling that time and space had suffered an earthquake somehow... Ether crystal fault planes were spread by radiating shock waves that originated in points, in response to events on the surface world. Cracks in reality, cracks in the crystals, perhaps the use of all the elements in one place? Or was it the premonition-

The bridge broke under my weight, too narrow and not yet reinforced by Starlight and Laughter. I fell along with it, unable to catch myself.

A large slab of crystal landed in the ether with a splash, and I landed atop it, floating in the river. From down here, I could see forever, the rock never dipping down all the way to the ether river, a thin sheet of air separating the world's crust from its starry foundation.

And in the distance, I could see a golden light, steadily building and drawing nearer.

God of the Void

A golden light hung on the horizon like an upside-down sunrise, the stars of the lifestream fading as they were overwhelmed by the colors of dawn. My eyes stung, and I tried to look away, but the light moved with me, as if it came not from a point in the distance, but the inside of my retinas.

The fallen chunk of crystal from the bridge that I sat on wobbled, turbulence striking the river's normally mirrorlike surface. The new cracks that riddled the Laughter tree burned with light, and then sprayed it like jets from a pressurized fountain as the surface of the river rose in a bulge... and then that bulge gave way, rippling outward in a wave. And as it crashed back down around the base of the tree, left in its wake was the source of all light.

It was a wave frozen mid-crest, golden energy streaming up its wall and frothing at the apex, a radiant film that seemed to push back reality with a quality that didn't belong in this world. And within the wave was a core of even brighter light, backed by a spinning halo and more runes that seemed to change like a fractal, like white clouds in an alien yellow sky. I thought I could make out a quadruped somewhere within that core, but it was like looking at the sun, only I somehow had yet to go blind.

"Unnrus-kaeljos," I whispered.

"Halcyon," the god of the deep replied, its mighty voice ending as a whisper after echoing across dimensions.

"You know my name," I said, my fur standing on end. "Have-"

The light wave stood still, light rushing up its wall and peaking without crashing back down. "...This world abhors my presence. My time here is limited, especially so close to the heart of the enemy. So let us skip the formalities we have already done before. What boon do you ask of me?"

"What... boon?" My head spun, still racing to catch up. "You mean like when I asked you to take Procyon away?"

"Do you desire power?" Unnrus-kaeljos asked. "Or perhaps knowledge? You may even ask on behalf of your friends. But hurry. The Flames of Harmony are already aware of my presence, and only the state of this palace delays their response."

"I don't... need any more power," I said, the world rushing around me. "I barely even know what to do with the power I already have. Answers would be nice, but I wasn't remotely prepared for... I mean..."

"Hurry," the light wave urged. "Our time together is nearly at an end. Someone approaches."

My backwards ears pressed flat against my skull. "How can I condense everything I want to ask you into a few mere seconds!? I need more time!"

"...To give you that, all I require is your trust. Step into the wave."

My fur stood on end. "What?"

"You may ride with me as I circle the world," Unnrus-kaeljos offered. "Though it will be only a few scant moments, it is more than we have here."

Halcyon? Faye said in my mid. This is a bad idea.

"I know that," I responded aloud, my heart hammering. "But... this is our chance to learn everything..."

"I will not force you," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "In fact, that may be the one thing I am incapable of. Or have you forgotten how you clawed things back from my realm so many times before? Were I to take you, you could escape. Of that, I am beyond certain."

"I..."

I wanted to go. My legs were locking up, but I needed this chance. I had all but forgotten about getting closure for my past with all the distractions that had entered my life: surviving Ironridge, saving Coda, reviving Kindness, finding Starlight and making sense of Equestria's nonsensical trains. And now, here it was: a chance to learn from the source what had happened after the avalanche, when I was split in three. The god I had reached for when I stared up at the night sky and down into the ether, the meaning of my miraculous survivals, perhaps something about my history and the reason I couldn't use my powers...

Are you really so sure about this? Faye pressed. You don't know who he is, or what he's like, or...

"That's why I need to find out!" Halcyon insisted, not at all concerned about speaking her thoughts aloud. "Right? When are we going to get another chance like this?"

Faye squirmed. Halcyon didn't have her memories, hadn't seen Macrothesis or the visions of devastation that accompanied it. Hadn't been visited by Unnrus-kaeljos in a dream. Didn't know that Unnrus-kaeljos had been party to the destruction of Indus... Might not even know that he seemed to be Ludwig's father. She had kept those things from Halcyon because it would make it more natural for her to spy on Nanzanaya, in order to uphold their bargain with Seigetsu. And now, was that lack of knowledge about to get them into terrible danger?

...No. Of course it wasn't. That wasn't how things worked for them. Instead, it was going to get them tied up with a new obligation or contract.

At the same time, she had questions for the light wave too... and it was correct that Halcyon had pulled Procyon back from the void before.

Faye wasn't sure if she would have gone for it. She probably would have listened to her senses and refused. But that moment's hesitation was all it took for Halcyon to step forward.

"Hallie? What are you doing!?"

It was Corsica, calling from above.

Halcyon looked up. Corsica was standing at the lip of the broken bridge, staring down with wide eyes at the wave of frozen light, its surface inches from Halcyon's boot. Part of the edge crumbled beneath her, and Corsica scrambled back to keep her footing as a few small chunks of crystal rained down.

"I'm going to get answers!" Halcyon called back up. "I'll be right back!"

And then she stuck her hoof into the light.

Corsica stared as Halcyon was pulled into the wave.

There was no fanfare. Nothing to mark her passing. And then, with a rush that sounded like a distant waterfall, the wave unfroze, and spread away from the tree.

"Going to get answers? Hallie...?"

Corsica had only been there for a second. Not even long enough to process how she had just used her talent, let alone how Generosity stepped in to shield her from the consequences. Let alone how the tree had exploded. Let alone... what?

"I wish," she whispered, half in a daze, "that Halcyon would get back here, right now!"

Nothing happened.

She blinked, and tried again. Still nothing. No weight in the back of her mind, telling her the wish had been made. No supernatural weariness, telling her it had been consummated. No snapping feeling, like when Seigetsu countermanded her wish before it came true. Just... nothing.

Corsica glanced at her flank, but her talent was still there, just where it usually was.

"I wish I could find a sandwich for lunch, once I'm back on the surface," she said, wishing for something too simple to hurt much when it came true.

A microscopic weight appeared in her mind, akin to putting a pebble in her pocket.

She tried again to wish for Halcyon's return, and still, nothing happened.

"Hallie!" Corsica called again, her voice cracking. "What did you-"

The lip of the bridge crumbled again, and this time she wasn't fast enough to catch herself before she fell. Corsica tumbled, missing the fallen crystal platform and plunging into the ether.

Standard Icereach safety protocol was not to go swimming in ether. Being a scientist, she had touched it plenty of times anyway, and could instantly tell that this ether was wrong as she hit the surface. Normally, ether's viscosity changed based on how much you had in one place: a small beaker of it poured more easily than water, but the river had a surface that was stable enough to stand on, like a partially-packed snow bank. And it never stuck or clung to anything.

But this ether looked washed out, like the night sky over Ironridge when the city's lights were shining, and she sunk in it all the way up to her chin. And when she climbed out, sputtering, onto the roots of the crystal tree, she felt it stick in her coat, a filmy sensation that clung to her fur and wouldn't go away.

From down here, draped over a crystalline root, Corsica could see the light wave receding in the far distance, a band of light on the horizon like the last traces of sunset. Halcyon was nowhere to be seen. And her talent still wasn't working.

"Hallieee!" she called one more time, that one word the only thing she could say to protest this. This Tree of Harmony, one of the things they were ostensibly trying to save and restore, cracked and broken because she hadn't thought before using her talent. And that light wave...

This was what Halcyon had seen after the avalanche, when she had been unconscious in the Icereach medical ward. This was what she had been chasing all those long years, what drove her to experiment on ether crystals and drag Corsica along. And now, she had...

She had gotten the opportunity to answer those questions once and for all, and left Corsica behind.

Again.

"Come back," she whispered. "Please..."

The receding light disappeared from the horizon, leaving her without a response.

Soon, Rainbow Dash came searching, and carried Corsica back up to the entrance to the tree. The central chamber was less cracked than it had been, Starlight and Laughter still working to re-meld the crystals and everyone else standing in a stupor.

"My friend," Corsica announced, "is an idiot."

Before anyone could cut in, she dumped everything on them, how she emerged from the tree to see the light wave and Halcyon halfway reaching for it. She had no shortage of ways to lambast Halcyon's decision-making: something that appeared in apocalyptic visions, created the windigo race, and showed up after the half-destruction of a Tree of Harmony could never be good. And yet nothing she said felt good enough; everything she said was beating around the bush.

Corsica had tried to patch things up after their feud in Snowport. She had offered every olive branch she could imagine, dropped the subjects she was sore about and let them remain in the past, figured Halcyon was fully committed now to an endeavor she understood, which was restoring Kindness... And now the whiplash from all of that frustration hit her all at once, like a dozen wishes coming true at exactly the same time. It hadn't been enough.

Her best friend, the only constant in her life after this awful special talent turned it upside-down, had ran off to finish their inquiries on her own. And to add insult to injury, her special talent - the reason all of this had started in the first place - couldn't even do anything about it.

What was the point of paying such a price for her power if that power wouldn't even work right when she needed it to help her live with the consequences?

"Not to interrupt your rant," Starlight cut in, "but the tree's going to be fine. Whatever happened in Ironridge, this is different. It's roughed up, but we can fix it."

"That's not the point!" Corsica snapped, fully aware she was being a baby when there were more important matters at hoof, but far beyond the point of caring. "I... She..."

"Corsica," Twilight said, walking over and putting a wingtip on her shoulder.

Corsica's stream of words abruptly cut off, as she fumbled for what to say next.

"I've had... friends leave me out of things I really wanted to be a part of," Twilight said, keeping her voice gentle even though her mane's frazzled state betrayed that she had been panicking over the tree mere moments ago. "But I've also been that friend who ran off to go do her own thing without thought for all the ponies I should have invited. So I can tell you with certainty that Halcyon didn't mean anything by it. She probably got wrapped up in her excitement and wasn't even considering how you felt, which I know doesn't feel great but at least means you can talk through this later. And I'll help with that, if you'll have me."

Corsica sighed, her fury spent. "Thanks."

Twilight narrowed her eyes and straightened up. "What I'm more interested in is what she was thinking. You make it sound like she went with this Unnrus-kaeljos voluntarily. Are you certain that's what you saw? Because I saw it in a vision in my own crystal palace, and she saw that vision too! And that vision didn't exactly inspire a lot of trust in that thing."

"...Maybe I just saw what I wanted to see," Corsica admitted. "But I trust my eyes. It looked like she stepped into that wave on purpose."

Twilight sighed, then turned to the three flames - despite their diminished states, Generosity and Kindness had started helping to seal up cracks, as well. "Everyone? Flames of Harmony? I need to know... everything you can tell me about Unnrus-kaeljos. And maybe about Indus, Aegis and Tetra, as well. This is important."

"Tell you... everything," Unnrus-kaeljos said, its voice hauntingly familiar.

I was floating in a sea of endless light, yet if I tilted my head just right, it could be a sea of endless darkness as well. Feathery runes spread out on the horizon, and before me was a tear in the fabric of space, a river of stars with a rocky ceiling on the other side. A cord of light tethered Faye to that crack, and tethered me to her. I couldn't tell if I was a disembodied ghost with her in my real body, or if she was, or if both of us were ghosts and our body yet lingered in the real world.

Unnrus-kaeljos floated alongside us, a runic halo orbiting its barrel, wings of runes that had swords for feathers beating up and down, sliding along that halo like keys on a key ring. Inside the halo, its body was made of light, a golden-white film that seemed to strain to contain something beneath, a protective veil separating me from the divine.

"Everything," I asked. "Please."

"Halcyon," Unnrus-kaeljos said, its voice reverberating throughout the blinding expanse. "And Faye. Where does trust come from?"

"What kind of question is that?" Faye asked. "You're not about to make me regret letting her bring us here, are you?"

"Long ago, longer than you can possibly imagine, I trusted that the world I built would endure for eternity," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "A trust that was ultimately betrayed. It was a betrayal I feel the sting of even today. Once, equinity was perfect, existing in peace and harmony and taking care of one another. They held no grudges, and did not climb on one another's backs in pursuit of superiority. But one day, they began to change. How is a creator to feel, seeing their masterwork take on a life of its own, free to scratch and dent itself in pursuit of things I never intended?"

"I... have no idea," I said. "What do you mean?"

"Neither did I know how to feel," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "But I was soon forced to choose."

We cannot see into the light wave, Generosity explained, flickering in the tree as more cracks were sealed. Its power is diametrically opposed to ours. However, we are almost certain that what exists inside is a god of the previous world, Indus.

"Unnrus-kaeljos." Twilight folded her ears.

That is the name of the light wave, Generosity said. Not of the god itself. His real name was expunged from history, and the only one who might still know it is our sibling, Convergence. We were created after the war, in our world's dying hour.

Both of the gods still exist, Kindness added. After they grew tired from their battle, ponykind subdued them, harnessed their power for the construction of this new world, and sealed them away.

"Well, where are they?" Rainbow asked. "Back in Indus, right?"

Generosity flickered. We must not speak of that, for fear that someone unworthy could find them again... as they have been found before, throughout the millennia of this world's existence.

"That's happened before?" Twilight's tail flicked in agitation. "I knew the Griffon Empire and Celestia and Luna have met Tetra, but the other one, too?"

Tetra is the more active of the two, but the least powerful, Generosity continued. Removed from her body, Aegis, she can do little more than speak. The other is far more formidable, never having been fully stripped of his divinity. He is also far more inscrutable.

He feels genuine remorse, Kindness explained. And a deep, deep sadness. And when his shackles are slackened, he never tries to escape, even when he could overpower us. He stays in his prison of his own free will.

Which is why we don't understand Unnrus-kaeljos as much as we wish we did, Generosity said. It's undeniably formed by his power, or something closely related to it. And it appears whenever we, as the arbiters of this world's laws, are suitably distracted, such as when you call upon us when wielding the Elements of Harmony, or when a large enough disruption occurs at one of our homes. We believe that from his prison, the other god's spirit leaves and travels the world within the light wave, while his body remains shackled, creating a plausible deniability - an attempt to influence the course of history without openly defying us.

Remember, the laws of reality for this world you live in weren't made by a god, Kindness added. They were made by normal ponies, with the help of technology. It's our job to enforce them, including against the old gods. But skirting the line like this makes it harder for us to do that, especially when we aren't at our full strength.

That's our best guess for what's happening with that light wave, Generosity finished.

Twilight contemplated this, and Corsica listened silently.

Rainbow chewed the inside of her cheek. "So... is he evil? This Unnrus-kaeljos guy? Or, the god you think is inside the wave?"

We don't know what his intentions are, Laughter said, flickering along a crack in the ceiling. We can't see anything around him, including the conversations he has with ponies he encounters in the depths. We know that happens, though!

Twilight perked up. "What is it that stops you? Do you have any better understanding of it than just 'his power'?"

The flames shimmered, but didn't respond.

"There was something weird about the ether around the tree, after it left," Corsica spoke up. "Like it had been corrupted somehow."

His presence is on your coat, Generosity confirmed. It makes you... difficult to pick out.

Twilight leaned in, curious. "Would you mind terribly if I tried to... wring some of this out of your coat, and save it to study? I have a bit of a foundation in this field, and might be able to learn something important."

Corsica blinked. "What? Oh... Yeah, I do too, actually. Dunno if I mentioned it. Here, do you have, like... a basin for me to drip into...?"

Better yet, Twilight had a moisture-extraction spell, which was a lot more comfortable than Corsica had anticipated - which made sense, given that it was apparently developed to help speed up showers. And with a crystal vial conjured by Starlight, they soon had a small vial of yellow-tinged ether, only lightly contaminated by pink unicorn shed.

"I think I'll go down to the river and scoop up a few more of these," Twilight volunteered. "It might be diluted by now, but the more samples, the better."

"What I decided," Unnrus-kaeljos said, "was that I would not begrudge equinity their desire to change, their will to create a future for themselves free from gods. Thus, after this world's creation, I spent the last of my dwindling power to create some guard rails, tools meant to guide my ponies to grow in a direction they could be proud of. And then I sealed myself away, entering a long, deep slumber in preparation for my inevitable reawakening."

"Guard rails," Faye said. "You mean the windigoes."

Unnrus-kaeljos nodded. "The windigoes were among them. I created three great curses to stand in the way of any who aspired to become godlike themselves, curses to test the worthiness of ponykind's entire society. With the power of love, I placed my wrath, to ensure ponies could control their passions and not be held captive by them. With the power of hope, I placed my jealousy, to tempt astray those whose dreams were impure. And with the knowledge of the truth of existence, I placed my confusion, that ponies would understand the loneliness of divinity, and see for themselves that knowing every answer does not equate to solving every problem."

"So you are Ludwig's father," I said.

"Do you refer to a windigo?" Unnrus-kaeljos looked curious, as much as an expressionless pony of light could manage. "I do not know those creations by name. They are not life forms as you understand them. Merely tools, created with the only power a defeated god had at his disposal. But such is not the case for ponykind. This world stirs and groans, its foundations made by mortal hooves, buckling under the weight of entropy as surely as when they were designed by a god. Last time your world fell to ruin, your kind answered by beginning to evolve. This time, can you complete that evolution, becoming something more perfect than your creator dared to dream?"

"What do you mean, becoming something perfect?" I pressed. "Like a new kind of pony?"

"Such is the direction of fate," Unnrus-kaeljos agreed. "Your minds and even your physiology itself has changed since those distant days when you left your old world and embarked to this new one. Such change is constant. The sarosian race is a new invention, and the changeling queen, even more so. My heartfelt desire is to see ponies grow until they can finish what was started three thousand years before the fall of Indus, and create a world with no need for gods."

Faye raised an eyebrow. "And where does that leave you?"

Unnrus-kaeljos turned to regard her. "In a position to empathize with your desire to disappear. With failings that crush you, even if they may have been unavoidable. The world proved to be unsafe under my stewardship once before. Better that ponies have control of their own lives, and not a great arbiter who fails to save them when they cry out for mercy."

It faced the tear in space again, the crack leading back to reality. "But that is also why I did not grant your wish. Though I took the portion of your soul you call Procyon for a time, I knew from the beginning you could pull her back, once you had recovered the will to live and found a new purpose in your life. Now you possess an incredible agency, protected by the shield of the void and wielding the power to interact with that which should be forgotten. You also possess the strength to live with yourself, and rise above the desire to disappear. You have grown. In you, my goals found fruition."

"Tell me about Tetra," Faye said, changing the subject.

"Tetra." Unnrus-kaeljos shook its head. "My closest friend. My fellow god. We were united in our belief that only freed from the machinations of gods could the world exist forever in a peaceful, unchanging state. However, we were divided over how to respond when the ponies began to change, when they learned to grapple with complex questions and abandoned their simple ways in pursuit of ambition. As I said, I decided to see what kind of future the ponies could create for themselves. But Tetra advocated the destruction and recreation of the world as a means to reset equinity to its primal state. Eventually, our differences grew so severe that she attempted to initiate the cycle on her own. I chose to fight her, buying ponykind time to answer the questions that they had chosen to dominate their existence. For whom should they exist? For what should they strive? Were they worthy of a world not poised on the brink of disaster? Our battle proved to be the final catalyst in their search, and the world you now inhabit is built on the backs of the answers your ancestors found."

My ears fell.

"Now it is your turn to answer those questions," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "Are you worthy of the life I gave you a second chance to live? And what do you live it for?"

"That's... something only I can decide," I said. "Isn't that the point of your story?"

"You are correct."

"I want to save Coda," I said with a nod. "I want to teach her how to have a normal life, and... learn that for myself, alongside her. That's my goal. Right, Faye?"

Faye swallowed, then nodded.

"You have learned how asking a boon of me works," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "Say the word, and I can grant you power to aid in your quest. But it will come at a price."

"What do you propose?" Faye asked.

"The pony you seek is no longer where you left her," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "I can take you to her, deposit you at a point where you may access the surface near to her, sparing you a long search and much travel for which you have not the time. But in return, once you have achieved your goal, I require a pledge that you will support Starlight Glimmer and walk alongside her as she finds her role in this world."

"What?" I tilted my head. "Not that I don't like her, but why?"

"In order to evolve, ponies will require all the time I can buy them," Unnrus-kaeljos explained. "This world their ancestors built frays at its foundations, and much of that revolves around her. The Flames of Harmony were not meant to assume mortal forms, and the instability of her mind could lead to futures that are outside the passage of fate. Once you have finished your mission, I request that you go to her and support her in every way. You have suffered a similar pain to what she has, and may be able to touch her heart in ways that few others can."

I nodded at Faye. "We were going to do that anyway, right?"

She hesitantly nodded back. "We were, but..." She turned to Unnrus-kaeljos. "How can we know you're trustworthy after what you've said and what you've done? You were party to the destruction of Indus."

"Had I such trust in myself, I would break these bonds and put the world to rights with my own hooves," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "But I have seen how that ends. I offer my end of this bargain up front, with the burden of trust given solely from me to you."

"What about our friends?" I asked. "Can you go back and get them, too?"

Unnrus-kaeljos shook its head. "My time in this world is nearing its end. But they will be able to find you. The Flames of Harmony watch me incessantly, and will surely tell them where I have taken you."

"We'll do it," I said. "I'm... going to need some time to decide what I think of you. But I can't let Coda down. By the way, is Nanzanaya...?"

"She knows less of me than she would prefer, yet more than she lets on," Unnrus-kaeljos said. "I have seen her heart. She works towards ends I approve of, as well as ones that are closer to your own goals than you know. The tower she seeks Equestria's help to destroy holds a great and dangerous secret, one inexorably linked to changeling queens like yourself and Coda. If you truly seek to live at peace with this child, you cannot do so until the tower has fallen and you have wrested control of your history and its secrets into your own hooves."

I looked at Faye. She looked back at me. It was plain to see that whatever was in this tower, she was suddenly less eager for us to find out.

"So," she asked. "Where is Coda?"

Corsica stepped out into the sunlight, along with Starlight, Twilight and all of their friends.

"I still can't believe," Rainbow complained, "the flames said that thing took Halcyon all the way to the Griffon Empire. Seriously, was it just trying to put some miles between us and her?"

"I'm not sure there's anything we can do about it," Twilight said, biting her lip. "As much as I'd like to know she's okay, that's a huge detour we can't afford right now if we want to go to Ironridge, stop the war and fix Kindness's tree."

"She should be okay," Corsica grunted. Periodically, she had tried to renew her wish, this time changing it to a general wish that Halcyon would be okay. And after the flames had confirmed that Unnrus-kaeljos dropped her, shortly before fading back out of existence, it had worked like normal - albeit with a small cost, since the flames could basically already tell her Halcyon was in one piece. Wishing for something she already knew to be the case didn't cost much.

It was almost like, while Halcyon was in the wave, her wish couldn't form because it was targeting something that didn't exist.

They hiked back into town, and Corsica let herself zone out. The sandwich she had wished for earlier proffered itself conveniently. She wasn't too burned out from using her talent, since the things she had wound up paying the price for were small. Shouting at everyone had been a decent way to work off steam from Halcyon ditching her, as well. And now, she just felt drained.

Not talent-drained. Normal drained, the way she used to feel when too much dumb stuff happened in one day and she just wanted to curl up and pout and not think about the future. She didn't know what her future would be. What would she do with herself now, drift along as part of this group like a listless sidekick?

It would work. Her mission, which she stole from Halcyon when Halcyon was too incompetent to see it through, was to raise the alarm. Now, the alarm had been raised. Her part here was over. But she didn't know what to do with herself, and the pony she had once relied on to drag her through life anyway wasn't just drifting away anymore: she was gone.

Corsica couldn't justify destroying her mind over and over with her special talent when it wasn't for the sake of someone she cared about like that. Maybe that was a good thing, since she wouldn't hurt herself this way anymore. Maybe it was a bad thing, since she wouldn't have a reason to get out of bed anymore either.

But for now, it couldn't hurt to drift along, to go with the flow until something roused her. Eventually, the others were back, explaining their new plan in detail: Starlight would charge up the Immortal Dream's batteries, then stay here, helping to repair Laughter's palace while everyone else flew west to the Crystal Empire. It would take ten days, their cruising speed reduced slightly thanks to a finite supply of fuel forcing them to fly more efficiently - but it was a time loss they judged the could afford, in the name of helping repair the damage their efforts had caused. When they got to the Empire, Twilight would arrange for regular train and mail service to Our Town, and Starlight would catch up that way, since she could somehow ignore the train limitations. If Halcyon magically came back during that time period, Starlight would bring her, since she could do the same.

Also, they were taking Wheelcakes. The engineer had serious wanderlust, and couldn't live out her profession or use her talent in a town where she couldn't leave by train. It worked out, since Twilight wanted to theorycraft about the rails anyway, and Wheelcakes had more first-hoof experience with them not working than everyone else put together.

All of this information bounced off Corsica's ears, like it was happening to someone else in a story, and not to her. Her own thoughts were stuck, paralyzed, endlessly running and going nowhere, just like the trains.

All she could think about was what she was going to do now.

End of Act 3

...

One week ago, in Ponyville...

Boop!

Papyrus stared himself up and down, standing on the empty train station platform as a modest wind blew past. "You know, for how much you talked that up, I really don't feel any different."

Discord shrugged, himself and Papyrus the only souls around - mostly because everyone else had left when they saw Discord coming. "Oh, there's a difference, believe me. This is working, right?" He waved at you, then knocked on the fourth wall. "Yep! Seems to be working. Congratulations, welcome to the P.O.V. crew, we don't have any doughnuts, how did this spiel go again?" He stopped to rub his chin in thought. "Ah, yes! Now that there are four of you, maybe you'll be able to spice this production up a little bit, though Hallie getting two slots for free on account of her multiple personalities is probably cheating..."

Papyrus nodded idly, mostly ignoring the draconequus and trying to feel for anything different about himself. There really wasn't anything... and he had once been an evil god who ate emotions and brands and all sorts of dark magic, so he liked to think he could recognize new powers when he got them. "Prove it," he said, cutting off Discord's ramble. "Give me a way to measure what this 'pneuma' of yours changed."

"You can't quantify your own existence from beyond the frame of reference you exist in, silly pony." Discord waggled a talon. "Let's just say that now you've got an extra frame of reference, making you matter just a little more to the overall course of history, along with any historians who might be watching."

Papyrus inspected his hoof. "So if I took myself, one random pony and a hundred historians, and gave them each a choice of being in a room with me or with that rando, you're saying this change of yours would make more of them choose me?"

Discord whistled innocently. "Trying too hard to suss this out will make your brains explode. Didn't you have a favor you asked me here for?"

Papyrus rolled his eyes. "I will figure out what you did to me, even if it turns out to be nothing whatsoever. But fine... One trash can teleport ticket to the Crystal Empire, please. Old Butterfly has an awful habit of leaving her crew behind, and I could use some capable minions if I'm really going through with this whole reconquer-and-fix-my-old-empire thing. Especially the ones that were originally my minions back in the glory days. Hup hup!"

Discord and Papyrus traded a few more barbs before making their way towards a nearby trash can. Stand close enough, and one could feel like they were right there with them, but step back, and you would soon find the borders of a screen silhouetting the window into their antics.

Many such screens floated alongside it, in a starry void lit from below by a green and teal aurora. Most of those screens were blank, showing only a flickering gray static. But two others were lit, one showing Corsica on the deck of the Immortal Dream in a cave in the Everfree, admiring the ship's construction and worrying over the apparatus for holding its harmony comet. Another showed Halcyon on the ground below, doing the same.

Teamwork

Locating Senescey in the Crystal Empire was easy when you knew her as well as Papyrus. Sneaking up on her was another matter altogether, but the payoff was funny, and so Papyrus had gotten a lot of practice in his previous life.

"I never knew you were an egghead," he whispered, looming up behind her as she browsed the shelves of an antique bookshop.

Senescey whirled, catching him with a left hook and pivoting into a suplex, flipping Papyrus on his back and pinning him against the ground. He made no moves to resist, offering only a toothy grin: a great way to annoy ponies was letting them catch you when they didn't know what to do next.

"You," she sighed, backing off when she realized who it was, "have a lot of nerve. And a death wish. What do you want?"

"Letting me go that quickly? Disappointing," Papyrus said, getting back to his hooves as the shopkeep appeared to check out the commotion. "And here I thought you'd be unhappy to see me. I'm after a chat, and if I can properly snag your ear for it, a proposal."

Senescey glanced at the shopkeep and shrugged. He shrugged back, deciding nothing was on fire, and went back to whatever he had been doing.

"I've got a better proposal," Senescey hissed under her breath. "How about: I'm busy with something important, so you go and entertain yourself with someone else for a change?"

"Is that so?" Papyrus leaned against a bookshelf. "See, the way I understand things, you've taken up the mercenary life in recent years, and the filly who currently has you in her employ just absconded the other day and completely forgot you even exist."

"That was yesterday," Senescey said, making a show of trying to concentrate on the books. "And this might be a difficult concept for your juvenile brain, but I, like most sane adults, am capable of having multiple goals at once."

"Eh." Papyrus shrugged. "Ten bits says your name won't float through her head a single time in the next week or two. I know commitment issues when I see them. Speaking of commitment, how'd you like to get the old band back together and try to reconquer the Griffon Empire?"

Senescey put down her book and stared at him. "Have you lost your mind?"

"Hah." Papyrus swiped the book with a wingtip. "You just admitted I have a mind to lose. Now what is this you were reading about? Philosophy...?"

"If you can understand a tenth of the words in there, maybe I'll talk about it," Senescey grumbled. "Even though you're obviously just taking an interest in my interests to try to manipulate me. I'll ask again: what are you bothering me for? What do you want?"

Papyrus ignored her, reading. Not just philosophy, but governmental philosophy. A theory of a way to structure the state that the author was laying out as a hypothetical. Hard to say without historical context if this was a serious submission or just an attempt to challenge readers to think outside the status quo. He flipped closer to the beginning, looking for an abstract or list of basic tenets to their system he could use to-

Senescey flipped the book out of his wing and back under her own. "Well?"

"What's a former revolutionary like you doing reading a thing like this?" he asked, lowering his voice. "With how much blood you spilled in the old Empire to change it, one would think you've already got a grasp of the future you were fighting for."

"There's nothing 'former' about it," Senescey hissed. "I'm the only one our dreams live on in. What do you care?"

"So you are planning to conquer some place or other and remake it in your image!" Papyrus brightened, still keeping his voice down. "What's the occasion, old girl?"

"Shut up. I'm not a conqueror." Senescey glowered. "Again, what's it to you?"

Papyrus innocently whistled. "It's just, that seems awfully compatible with my idea that we go and tear up the Empire again, you and I."

Senescey turned her back on him. "You're actually serious? No. I'm not interested in making things worse."

"Funny, neither am I." Papyrus smoothly caught up with her. "Actually, I never was, but last time I didn't have my head screwed on proper. You know how it is."

Senescey gave him a try me look.

"You ever wonder why we're still alive?" Papyrus asked. "Frankly, I have no clue how you survived that mess, but I know my own path from there to here goes beyond preposterous. But forget about the how for a moment and ask yourself this: we're some of history's biggest villains, done and dusted, and yet our stories somehow aren't over. In fact, they could have quite a lot left to them. So where do we go from here?"

"...Huh," Senescey said. "I'm years ahead of you on asking that. Have you been thinking about it long enough to appreciate the answers I've found?"

"Prepare to be scandalized," Papyrus warned. "But I'm bored, and if you've got any better ideas on what to do next, I'm all ears?"

"Fine," Senescey sighed. "I need to pay for this, and then let's go get drinks. Try not to make me regret thinking about explaining all this to you, and hopefully your attention span has improved."

Half an hour later, Papyrus and Senescey were seated at an outdoor cafe with tables, chairs, cutlery and even the sunshade parasols made from crystal. From the strains of conversation around them, Papyrus picked out two mothers complaining about their foals' schedules, a pair of academics debating what sounded like math, several young couples on a group date... A perfect venue for laying plans for world domination. Or whatever Senescey wanted to talk about.

Politely, Papyrus folded his forelegs on the table. "I'm all ears."

"This," Senescey said, pulling out her book and slapping it on the table, "is a treatise about the role of gods in government, in a hypothetical setting in which gods don't actually exist. The Crystal Empire was sealed away for one thousand years, libraries and ponies and everything. It's a time capsule, a portal into the past, to an age when Garsheeva and Princess Celestia still existed, but did things very differently. Like any age, the thinkers of this age spent a lot of time on the question of how to build a society that was fair, equitable, and would eternally endure. The difference between their time and our time is that we have no guarantees about tomorrow, yet we know that after all our forebearers' actions, the world they left behind endured for a thousand years. Does that make sense to you?"

Papyrus resisted the urge to needle her about their comparative intelligence. "Thinking more about what comes after the revolution, eh?"

"It was a blind spot of ours last time," Senescey admitted. "Not the one that ultimately did our plan in. But seeing what Chrysalis achieved has forced me to consider it. She did everything we wanted, Gazelle - smashed the old hierarchies, usurped the goddesses, undid-"

Papyrus waved an urgent hoof. "I know I'm the last one to lecture about respecting naming preferences, but there are actual pragmatic reasons not to call me that around these parts. Ones that go beyond politeness and self-control."

Senescey sighed. "Papyrus. And it would be nice if you returned the favor."

Papyrus put a hoof over his heart. "I'll have you know I haven't called you Senescey even once today, despite constantly thinking it. Though if we're earnestly trying to be civil, what was the new name, again...?"

Senescey rolled her eyes. "Leitmotif."

"Ah, yes, yes, Leif. Like the things that grow on shrubs. My apologies." Papyrus cleared his throat. "And I suppose I just got carried away again. Do continue about Chrysalis?"

Senescey gave him a withering glare, but relented. "She didn't leave anything good in her wake. The Griffon Empire she left behind was no better than the one she tore down. It... was the same as it might have been if we got our way, and assassinated every sphinx who didn't align with us. That's why I need a plan, a vision for the world after it's remade. I don't know if I have the power to see such a transition through. Remembering how helpless I was, how small of a thing sent our plan off the rails... If I tried, again, to start a revolution, I can be almost certain that I'll lose control of what I set in motion again, perhaps this time after it's too late to stop, and only wind up ruining things for everyone. But what I can do is think. If I can come up with a blueprint for a society that's better than our current one, one that doesn't hate sarosians like the old Empire, that doesn't suffer the excesses of the aristocracy, that doesn't chain ponies with ignorance like this one... then maybe when someone comes around who does have the power to remake the world and see their mission through, I can leave a record behind with a plan they can follow, so they don't end up wasting the opportunity like Chrysalis."

Papyrus grinned. "And that's where this comes in," he said, patting the book. "You think you're far from the first to feel this way, and looking for such records left behind by others so you can tinker with and renew them."

Genuine surprise shone in Senescey's eyes, and she cracked a small smile. "So you do have a brain cell."

"Lest you forget," Papyrus muttered conspiratorially, "I spent my entire foalhood - the first one, that is - daydreaming about exactly the same. Now, I was a bloodthirsty murderous monstrosity cursed by chaos to have my benevolent ambitions twisted beyond insanity, and I can't even claim my ideas weren't impractical and childish before that set in. But I do know a thing or two about this."

"Riiight." Senescey scrutinized him.

Papyrus shrugged. "Need I remind you how we first met?"

"We prayed to the Night Mother to heal our crippled bodies and she said she'd do so if we loyally served you?" Senescey raised an eyebrow. "Which, might I add, was a promise she never made good on?"

Papyrus blinked. "Was that really how it went? Huh. Here I always thought we hit it off because we were disaffected by the status quo and you and your sisters had Lord Gyre in your pocket."

"I can't tell if you're joking," Senescey groaned, massaging her temple, "or if you really never knew... You had to have known. You're messing with me again. Stop that." She shook her head.

"Well, I suppose that point's a bust," Papyrus lamented. "So, you think your time is best spent thinking and researching so you can tell the next guy to take over the world how to do it right. What makes you think they'll listen?"

Senescey frowned at him.

"Like you said," Papyrus pointed out, "Chrysalis wasn't in the mood to listen to anyone when she tore up the place. Neither was I, when I had my god powers. Wouldn't it be awful if you did all this work, only for the next megalomaniac to come along, trash everything, and then not even realize your ideas exist?"

"...I can't control that," Senescey said, slowly and levelly. "I'll just have to hope it doesn't happen."

"Liar," Papyrus cheerfully declared. "I've got no idea what it is, but there's no way you'd spend your life on this if you didn't have a plan."

Senescey glared at him. "Look at everyone around us. You think they operate under any guarantees their life will amount to anything? You think they have any kind of insurance that someone too strong to care about them won't come along, trample everything they've worked to build in their lives, and not even notice? We can't control things like this, not within our fundamental world paradigm, and learning to live with that reality is how everyone operates on a basic level. And people who can't learn to live with it wind up like... like you, or Starlight." She sighed. "This is what I'd like to change."

Papyrus leaned in, ears perked.

"I don't want a world where mine operators can poison rivers with impunity, and get away with it," Senescey hissed. "I don't want a world where ponies have to accept that everything they do could one day be rendered meaningless, like the hundreds of thousands of sarosian lives in Mistvale that were snuffed out. I don't want a world where the ones who lead us are no better than those who follow them. And I lack the power to break the established order and replace it with something new, but I know there are those who have it. That's why I'm going to be ready with a plan, on the crazy, off chance that I was brought back for a reason and I do get the chance to use it."

"...You know," Papyrus said, "have you ever thought about doing a test run?"

Senescey tilted her head.

"Put this universalist thinking on the shelf for a moment," Papyrus said, adjusting himself in his chair. "I've been thinking about my own lot in life, and the unhelpful truth I finally managed to confirm is that the only reason I still exist is because Starlight hates letting others win and there's no more meaning to it than that. That leaves me with a big black stain on my record, and a whole lot of nothing to do. So suppose I went back to the Empire and tried to kick the place back into shape a little. Could I really make it worse than it already is?"

He leaned in. "You think the new, slightly-saner me will create a bigger mess than the old, off-his-rocker me? True, I don't have the power and influence I once did, but that's nothing a little guile can't fix. Who knows? Maybe I'll even leave things slightly better than I found them. Problem is, I've got no ideas beyond winging it and taking some names. No plan! No vision. These things happen when you decide to take a place over for the sake of taking it over. So, feel like putting your plans for a grand society through some real-world experience?"

Senescey scrutinized him, hard.

"If we fail spectacularly, eh, it was already a lost cause." Papyrus shrugged. "If we do a measure of good, even if it's far from perfect, isn't that better than not acting at all? And if we think of something better to do along the way, it's not like I'm wanting for years on my lifespan. What do you say, old partner?"

Senescey sized him up.

"For kicks and giggles, we could even be proper teammates, and not call you my minion anymore," Papyrus offered.

"Have you talked to anyone else about this?" Senescey whispered. "Like Nehaley?"

Papyrus perked up. "I was just going to hit her up next! Figured it would be easier to get her in on this if I already had you on board. Also, wherever we go, we'll be bringing Braen, because I'm still technically her bodyguard and there's no way she'll say no to an offer to travel the world."

"Fine," Senescey sighed. "You don't have my enthusiastic support, but it's not like I was getting anywhere with Halcyon anyway. I'll work with you until, and only until, I get fed up with you or find a more promising way to spend my time."

As he followed Senescey, who knew better than he where Larceny - now known as Nehaley - was sleeping, Papyrus studied her. Not just because she was pleasing to look at: her demeanor had changed since the old days in the Griffon Empire. The Senescey he remembered was a young zealot, the middle sister in a trio of assassins, old enough to remember why they were fighting but young enough that the battle had been her whole existence. The least powerful of the three, but the most loyal: Felicity, the elder, could be tempted by emotional connection, and Larceny, the younger, had accepted their reasons for fighting as truth without ever experiencing them for herself.

Senescey had also been the best-adjusted, the face he could put forward when something needed to be done by a normal pony. But now, she had lost some of that normal-pony veneer, an intensity to her eyes that had always been there, yet gotten harsher, a warning that she was a mare with nothing left to lose.

She walked with confidence and ambition that didn't belong to a scholar, or to someone who had resigned themselves to the possibility that their plans could be torn asunder by the whims of fate. It had been nearly twenty years since Papyrus had been a sphinx, with its sixth sense that made him slightly more receptive to the emotions of those around him, but experience and instinct told him Senescey was still withholding the bulk of her story, and her plan.

Fine by him. Ambitious pawns were the best pawns, because you could count on them to be self-starters and do things even when you weren't around. Of course, he'd need a better grasp on what made her tick to predict her actions and play that fully to his advantage...

It almost reminded him of Meltdown, and the things he saw in her. But Papyrus didn't let himself dwell on his ex-lover. This time around, he wasn't going to lose sight of the fact that he was trying to be a good guy. That meant being clearsighted about the possibility that he could fail, and repeat his past mistakes. And if that happened, he wasn't going to let anyone else take themselves down along with him.

Senescey stopped at an ordinary door in the castle's lower residential sector and knocked. "It's me," she declared.

A muted grumble seeped through the door just as Papyrus was preparing a joke about no one being home. Nothing followed it, but apparently it was all the invitation Senescey needed to shadow sneak through the doorjamb, leaving him out alone in the hallway.

Changelings. So rude how they could do that even when not in sarosian form. Idly, Papyrus leaned against the door and fantasized about being able to do that, pressing his ear to the crystal and hoping to catch a snippet of conversation-

The door swung inward, and he crashed over, Senescey barely dodging out of the way in time.

He grinned and dusted himself off. "Oopsie! Now, what have we here?"

The room could be roughly compared to an Ironridge hotel suite. It had one bed, a tiny bathroom with little more than a toilet and shower, and the sparse amenities provided under the philosophy that guests deserved comfort, but wouldn't be spending more time here than necessary for sleeping.

Larceny wasn't sleeping, though she was in bed, a bathrobe completely covering her scarred leg and a well-worn book held in her good wing. Her mane, once a dazzling sapphire, had been dyed bubblegum pink and then ignored for a month, its original blue making a lengthy comeback at the roots.

She looked... about the same as she had looked during the trip down from Sires Hollow. Which was to say, if you took her despondence and Senescey's newfound determination and mixed them together, you'd get something approaching a normal pony.

"If you need something, don't get your hopes up," Larceny warned, eyeing Papyrus with a blank stare. "My days of doing things are long behind me."

"Well, I suppose that saves me from having to ask if you'd like to go on an adventure," Papyrus said, saluting with a wing and strolling back out the door. "I'll just leave you to all the important things you're not doing."

He hid around the corner of the door just long enough to give the impression that he really had gone away... and then a little longer for good measure. Eventually, he heard Larceny ask, "What was that all about?"

Papyrus kept waiting. His instincts told him Larceny wouldn't respond to the same kind of bullying Senescey had: it would take more than persistence, an earnest promise and a good deal to get her out of bed. Or rather, it would take far less, but then she would just become deadweight, and he couldn't have that. This was going to take Senescey's help, and at the very least, he needed to know how inclined she was to give it.

Suddenly, the wait paid off. Senescey marched out of the door, immediately spotted him, and narrowed her eyes. "If you were going to be polite about this and respect our wishes to be left alone, you should have done it for me, too. Fair's fair: get in there and finish what you started."

Papyrus broke into a huge grin. "You want me to invade your sister's personal space and refuse to leave until she gets back on her hooves? Aww, isn't that sweet." He marched back through the door. "Sorry, lazy lady, but apparently I'm not being given the option of doing this respectfully. Wanna go on an adventure?"

Larceny sized him up in confusion, and looked to Senescey as well. "Whatever you want, I'm not physically capable of doing it. This isn't a matter of persuasion." She looked back at her book and sighed. "I see you two are cooperating again, though."

"It's a..." Papyrus waved a wing. "Joint venture. Between old besties. Felt only right that I offer an invitation. Also, I've never been one for mocking the infirm, so don't worry, I got it all out of my system on the shrub before coming here."

Senescey's ears folded indignantly. "Leif. I am not a plant."

Larceny looked at her bathrobe. "Does it have anything to do with what we were trying to do last time?"

Papyrus whistled far too innocently.

Larceny focused on Senescey. "I told you in Icereach, I can't go back to that. You don't want me to come back to that. I was the reason our plans fell apart. I betrayed you, and I haven't had a change of heart. I found something new to live for. I'm done."

"You certainly look like you're living the good life," Papyrus remarked. "I bet this is how everyone dreams of spending their time! Retiring at twenty, hanging out alone in bed in a room with no windows for the last two decades? Mmwah, what a life! So fulfilling." He blew a kiss. "Ambition's all burnt out, I take it."

"I left my mark on the world," Larceny said, not rising to the taunting. "I gave Halcyon a chance to live her own life. That's a fair trade for mine."

"And now you're going to wait here to die," Papyrus agreed.

Larceny blinked at him. "What part of 'I can barely move' don't you understand?"

"It seems like a simple concept," Papyrus agreed... and then grinned. "Until you consider that your bodies already weren't in that great of shape back in the Empire, and that didn't stop you from chasing a cure. Can you only take, what, an hour on your hooves each day before the exhaustion makes you feel like death? Or is it fifteen minutes? Fifteen minutes each day, for what, twenty years? That's nearly two thousand hours of time you've still been good for since we parted ways."

"...I can't do math. Whatever you say," Larceny said. "I'm tired, Papyrus. And I'm saving what little strength I do have for the times when I need to protect my investment. My soul is burned thin. You can't even comprehend what I went through to save her. If you two are working together, that means you're planning something big, and even if my body worked, my mind just doesn't anymore. I can't."

"Still not over things that happened twenty years ago, eh?" Papyrus leaned against the wall. "Ever seen a therapist about that?"

"No," Larceny grunted.

"You should try," Papyrus pointed out. "Because believe it or not, I know a grown-up emo kid who can do what the Night Mother promised you all those years ago. Yank out your soul and stuff it in a new body at the drop of a hat? Happened to me, and I've even got all my old memories, just with enough distance that I'm not dysfunctional from guilt."

Larceny gave him a look.

"Could probably even make you young again!" Papyrus enthused, strolling over to the edge of her bed. "Nothing against being a fruitcake, I'm sure someone's into that, but you could even get a little romance in your life!"

"Not to put a damper on things," Senescey said, "but my understanding of your situation is that you were literally reincarnated as a newborn foal, with a new mother and everything. But practicality aside, he's right: you deserve a new chance at life. One of the few sarosians to survive Chrysalis's wrath should be meant for more than wasting away like this."

"I already got a new chance at life." Larceny stared tiredly at her book. "I made the most of it. I did something that matters. That's enough."

"Small words for someone who used to dream of toppling the imperial aristocracy," Papyrus prodded.

"Those dreams were delusional," Larceny sighed. "Just a way for... for you and Felicity to cope with losing Mother." She focused on Senescey. "Thinking bigger doesn't mean your actions will be more important. I chose, in the end, to save one life. Anything she does, everything she experiences, will be the legacy of my actions. Anyone whose lives are better because of her will also be my legacy. Over the course of history, you can't measure how big that will be. But it's not something I'm scheming towards. Not something I've been flailing at for twenty years. Something I've already done and finished. That counts for more than any dreams or hypotheticals."

Papyrus grinned a broad grin. "But why stop there?"

Larceny turned to face the other way.

"So you've done something you're proud of. Congratulations! I make myself feel that way all the time," Papyrus proclaimed. "Doesn't do anything to erase that gnawing sensation asking why am I here or what am I going to do going forward. And if you think it does, I bet you're in denial."

"Doesn't matter if it does or doesn't," Larceny grunted. "I don't have the capacity to do any more anyway."

"Ah ah ah," Papyrus chided. "We got on this track because I already won that argument. If you wanted a functional body, there are ways, out there in the universe. Why, I bet the shrub would even carry you if it meant getting you in on the fun!"

Senescey scowled, but also looked intrigued. "I thought you were recruiting us to help you take over the Griffon Empire. You don't think we're going to find a way to fix our bodies there that we somehow missed the first time."

Papyrus whistled. "Well, like I kept telling you, I have nothing but time on my hooves. Plus, I'm a good guy this time around! And you three technically did all that work for me for nothing before. And Larceny does have a point that she's not good for much in this state. So it seems it's in keeping with my goals and interests to spend at least a little effort getting you patched up first, no?"

Larceny was actually listening now. "Do you have a plan, or are you just trying to get my hopes up?"

"Bits and threads I could pull on to see if a plan comes tumbling out," Papyrus cheerfully answered. "And an excellent way to stall until those bear fruit. You see, I'd gotten dreadfully fond of having a trio backing me up from the shadows, but there are only two of you. We'll need to recruit one more."

"Braen will be easy to convince. You said so earlier yourself." Senescey grimaced. "And don't even pretend she can replace Felicity."

Larceny nodded. "Felicity was the one who kept us together and devoted to the cause. Without her, whatever we had before isn't coming back. Even if you have a way to fix my body, which is a big if, don't get nostalgic for our old dynamic. It's gone for good."

"Actually..." Papyrus put on his toothiest grin. "She was the one I was thinking we go look for."

Both mares looked at him incredulously.

"So you didn't know! Smashing!" Papyrus stomped a hoof in delight. "And here I was worried the shrub might already have found out! Unless Felicity met another end later on I missed out on, in which case step on me and call me a court jester, but she did survive the initial purge!"

"How!?" Leif asked, forcefully grabbing Papyrus's shoulders. "And you didn't think to mention this earlier!?"

"Excuse you, I was preoccupied with my impending potential doom upon asking Starlight why she didn't kill me," Papyrus chided. "But she was very much alive, albeit pregnant and emotionally needy to a crippling degree. Something to do with the power source on Shinespark and Valey's airship acting as a shield to block out Chrysalis's connection... or maybe it was that giant metal dragon that kept hanging around. I was in a chaos coma at the time, and not feeling up to investigating." He stepped back and bowed. "But, if you think that's something worth getting out of bed for, I could probably get us a passably stale lead or two on what happened to her after."

"If you're toying with me I will flay you alive," Senescey said, her yellow eyes burning with intensity. "...Sister?"

"You're going to need to make good on his promise to carry me," Larceny warned. "I'm not kidding about being an invalid. Any energy I use ever incurs a debt that needs to be slept off immediately. Don't ask me to fight. Can't fly. Can't even think too hard. But... I do wish I could see her one last time."

Papyrus slapped the bedside. "If things go the way I'm planning, seeing her once will only be the start of it. We're getting the band back together! Plus Braen. Can't pull a Halcyon and forgetfully leave without Braen..."

Students

Far from the Crystal Empire, to the east of Our Town and the east of Ponyville and the east of everywhere else in Equestria, there was an ocean. Not a river like you could find near Ironridge, not a glacier like you could see from Icereach, but a sea: water as far as the eye could see, stretching the length of the continent in one direction and the width of the Aldenfold in another. Its waters ranged from slate gray to turquoise blue by clime, played host to gloomy doldrums and towering storms, to muggy tropical winds and clear ocean skies. The sun smiled on its whitecaps by day and the moon kissed the masts of schooners by night, its rays refracting off them like second sails.

Near the center of those waters, closest to the Aldenfold yet far from any land, an archipelago graced the waters, sitting atop a tropical confluence that graced it with white sands, sapphire waters and a sky so blue it was almost teal. The islands existed in varying degrees of settlement, the largest sporting heavy development and others maintaining their forests, vines hanging from the densely-leaved trees.

On the most populous beach of the most populous island, ponies splashed and played, sunning themselves with reckless abandon. Concrete embankments had been set up where the sand gave way to turf, guarding against erosion and giving a home to infrastructure such as benches and trash cans. And one of those trash cans suddenly shook, rattled... and with a cough of purple chaos magic expelled four ponies out onto the embankment.

"Well," Larceny said, her fluffy bathrobe looking garishly out of place against the glaring sun and frolicking beachgoers. "This is a change of pace."

"Kinmari Marine Research Academy," Papyrus declared, drinking deep of the salty air and feeling it caress the roof of his mouth. "Home to a sporty Equestrian party school, and - relevantly to us - the last place I laid eyes on your frumpy sister."

"Felicity was here..." Senescey said, squinting against the sun. "I can see it. She always did have a soft spot for the resorts of the Goldoa Coast."

"So much water," Braen breathed, fixated on the sea. "Are we on an 'island'?"

"Oh! I suppose this would be new to you, wouldn't it?" Papyrus swaggered. "Living your whole life in Ironridge and whatnot. Don't get used to it. I have a compelling reason to finish our business in this place as quickly as possible."

He glanced back at the trash can, an artsy, wicker-like lattice of iron strips acting as a holder for a more mundane bin. Discord peered over the rim, lurking within.

"We can count on you for a ride back out, right?" Senescey asked, keeping a wary distance.

"Depending on the Lord of Chaos is a risky gambit," Discord mused from within, sounding intrigued. "I suppose it wouldn't be sporting of me to leave you here without warning, but the only reason I brought you here in the first place was because waiting a month for you to steal an airship and fly it here on your own sounded boring. Tell you what: finish your business here, come up with your own way to wherever you're going next, and I suppose I'll bail you out again if it's shaping up to be equal parts foolproof and mundane. Toodles!"

He climbed back into the trash can, and was gone.

As if a magical field had fallen, ponies started to notice them. The beach wasn't truly packed, but its population had increased noticeably over the scant few minutes they had been there, as if they had arrived right as classes were letting out for the day. And while Papyrus blended in perfectly with the exclusively young and mostly athletic crowd, Larceny and Braen were drawing stares.

"So nice of him to drop us in the middle of the action before we could come up with a plan," Papyrus whispered to Senescey. "Tell you what, you get Miss Bathrobe out of the limelight here and I'll wing it until we can regroup and discuss how to pick up Felicity's trail. We'll meet up near the hospital, wherever it is. Got it?"

"Hospital?" Senescey raised an eyebrow.

"Felicity was basically an invalid," Papyrus quickly explained. "If anywhere has records of her, it'll be there."

Senescey nodded, agreeing with his assessment. And not a moment later, she and Larceny were gone.

"Right, so," Papyrus whispered in Braen's ear, though he wasn't sure if that was actually where her auditory sensors were. "Kinmari. Island college school thing. Probably the worst possible place in Equestria for me to be recognized, but also the easiest for me to blend in. Our story is that we're prospective students and you really like armor, and if anyone finds out you're not just a kid in a suit we say I'm a prodigy and your inventor. Time's up, play along!"

"Hey, Slick," said the first of the students to approach, a macho stallion leading a cadre of giggling mares. "Nice costume you got, there. That an in-house job?"

Papyrus leaned casually against Braen, sizing the stallion up. Obviously a social kingpin to afford an entourage that big. Challenge him to establish dominance? Ideally, they wouldn't be here long enough for that to matter...

"You big fan of armor too?" Braen asked cheerfully, still talking like a yak. For the life of him, Papyrus couldn't figure out why.

The stallion did a powerful flex. "Name's Blasting Cap, president of the mining and blacksmith's club. You kids from College Town? Didn't know we had any noteworthy hammers there."

"Prospective students, actually," Papyrus preened. "Ran off from our tour. I don't suppose an upstanding leadership stallion like yourself would cut our fun short and drag us back into town, would you?"

Blasting Cap tilted his head, clearly unable to parse out Papyrus's contradictory tone and words. "Are you asking for directions, or trying to see how we feel about breaking the rules?"

His mare squad backed him up with sage nods, but an impatient pony in the crowd pressed, "Where'd you get the cool armor!?"

Papyrus smoothly stepped in front of Braen, waving a humble wing. "This, my friend, is an ultimate weapon that will save the world in a time of dire need. You there! Biceps!" He flung a hoof in Blasting Cap's direction. "You've got some meat on your bones. I challenge you to a lifting contest, you versus Braen. Or anyone else who wants to see for themselves if this is a mere costume."

Blasting Cap raised an eyebrow. "Real armor's heavy. The closer it is to the real thing, the less you can bench."

"Then it should be easy pickings for anyone who wants to make themselves look good," Papyrus said, bowing with a salesman's smile. "Riiight?"

"Lift!" someone in the crowd cheered, and soon a chant was struck up.

"Well, if you insist," Blasting Cap said, shrugging. He stepped onto the concrete embankment by the trash can, then nodded to his entourage. "Ladies?"

As they assembled into an upside-down pyramid, causing Papyrus to wonder if this wasn't mere eye candy for an influential stallion but actually a gymnastics team, Braen came up beside him. "What is point of contest?" she asked in his ear.

"Easy," Papyrus whispered back. "You lift me, overdo it a little, pretend to have an accident, and boom, I'll pretend to be injured and they'll drag me to the hospital. Hup hup!"

"If Papyrus insist..."

Blasting Cap struck a pose, daring Braen to one-up this. So, with a single leg, she seized Papyrus, reared back, and hurled him over the hill like a feathery missile.

Braen and the crowd watched him go. "Oops," Braen said.

Blasting Cap's jaw hung askew.

"He'll be fine," Braen promised. "Probably."

Papyrus was, in fact, fine, but only because he had the reflexes to right himself and brake his fall. Not that it served his ends to let the crowd see that. So he lay on the ground in a heap for them to find, yowling his head off.

A sizable crowd crested the hill, though most of them stopped there as onlookers. To his credit, Blasting Cap led the charge.

"Are you alright, dude!?" he asked, Braen hot on his heels.

"I think I dislocated my spleen," Papyrus wheezed, sporting a few purposefully-bent pinions. "Don't worry yourselves, nothing I don't suffer from Corsica on a daily basis. Owow owwww..."

"Corsica?" Blasting Cap glanced at Braen.

"Not her. Marefriend of a friend. Really has it out for me for some reason." Papyrus feebly waved a hoof. "Ow. If anything's broken, my old man's gonna kill me... You guys don't have a place I could get patched up in secret, do you...?"

"Well, there's the hospital," one of the acrobat mares offered.

"Perfect," Papyrus groaned, moving a wing and feigning a wince. "Anyone feeling charitable enough to point the way?"

"Do you need a stretcher?" another mare asked. "I can run for-"

Braen grabbed him by the tail and slung him on her back like a sack of meat. "Papyrus overreacting," she promised the crowd as he yowled again for effect. "Have no fear. Which way is hospital?"

"I can... show the way..." Blasting Cap volunteered, uncertain."

"Capital," Papyrus whined. "Let's go with that, please..."

Minutes later, the trio had cleared the beach, and the air became quiet enough to talk again. Papyrus's memories of Kinmari weren't all that helpful for getting a sense of the island's layout: though they were clearer than he preferred, he had been catatonic for most of the visit, and barely explored beyond one or two buildings.

From the position of the sun, he guessed they were on the island's eastern shore. The middle and south of the island were mostly empty turf, alternately flat and hilly, sporting extensive running trails, sunbathing spots and open-air sporting venues. All the buildings he could see lined the west and north edges, and Blasting Cap seemed to be leading them north... That clicked with something in his memory. The hospital was probably in the north. That made sense.

"You're not actually hurt, are you?" Blasting Cap guessed, paying attention to Papyrus as Braen carried him with a bounce in her step.

"Is it that obvious?" Papyrus winked. "You lot obviously wanted a show."

Blasting Cap shook his head. "Kids these days. Are you really prospective students? You look a little young for that. And are you still trying to find the hospital, or...?"

"Yes, yes, and I'm actually in my mid-thirties," Papyrus smoothly said. "So what's worth talking about around here, Biceps? Gimmie some gossip. Old scandals, new scandals, the works!"

Blasting Cap gave him a look that was even more unconvinced. "...What's this school's basic reputation?"

Papyrus sighed. "Sports, parties, sunny beaches and cutting-edge theoretical physics. Big fan of science, me. Though I'm a bigger fan of drama."

"You don't say?" Blasting Cap looked at him a little longer, then shrugged. "Well, the old joke is that half the ponies here think K.M.R.A. stands for Kinetics, Mathematics, Rocketry and Astrophysics, the other half thinks it's Kissing Makes Romance Awesome, and both are right. Anyone seriously here to learn science is here for one of two things: building vehicles that can take ponies into extreme conditions like the seafloor or outer space, or running experiments that can only be done in places like those. And don't take this personally, but I hope you're good at that. Because you don't, uhh... seem like the type who will have much luck in the dating pool."

Braen prodded Papyrus. "See? It not just Mother who tell you that. Or Other Mother. Or Corsica. Or-"

"Oh, shut up," Papyrus grumbled. "What about, uhh..." Was there anything more productive to steer the conversation toward? "What about literally anything that's good to talk about, here? What do you tell the bright-eyed newbies who come tumbling in through your doors?"

"You're kind of weirding me out, buddy," Blasting Cap said. "If you're not really hurt, I think I should be taking you to the administrative office instead. Let somepony who's on payroll deal with this? I've got some friends to be hanging out with..."

Suddenly, a pegasus dropped out of the sky. Colored just like Papyrus and appearing in her mid-thirties, he was certain he had never seen her before, but when she spoke, it was undeniably Senescey.

"There you are!" she hissed, eyes sparking. "Papyrus, if you've been making trouble for the students..."

Blasting Cap looked relieved. "You his mother, ma'am?"

Senescey nodded. "I don't know what he's dragged you into, but I can take this from here."

Blasting Cap nodded and strolled away, aiming for the beach and walking quicker than necessary.

The moment he was out of earshot, Papyrus mouthed, "Hey there, mommy dearest."

"Call me that when we're not putting on an act, and I will hit you," Senescey warned, furling her wings. "I trust you've shaken the crowd by dragging your reputation through the dirt to ensure they want nothing more to do with you?"

"More or less." Papyrus slid off Braen's back and landed on his hooves, finally straightening his feathers. "You?"

"Nehaley is safe and comfortable," Senescey said. "Let's learn what we came here to learn and get out. Your plan?"

"Hospital." Papyrus pointed at the building in the distance he by now thoroughly remembered. "Find records. When Starlight and her crew dragged me through here, Felicity was largely sedentary from her constitution issues, and pregnant to boot. They got me looked at, and I was their enemy, so she would have gotten the same."

Senescey nodded. "Are you smart enough to leave this in my hooves, or are you getting involved too?"

A memory twinged in the back of Papyrus's mind as he stared at the hospital. "I'm considering it," he said. "You're good at what you do, but sitting back is boring... I suppose we'll see."

They walked closer, and the further they went, the more Papyrus couldn't shake the feeling that the sky was darkening. The hospital took up more and more of his vision, its three stories looming above him.

Brick walls. Crenelations. Sliding windows. Its bottom floor was a different color than the top two floors, orange above and blue below, which should have been bright and bold colors. But there was something off about them, like a tiny needle stuck into his head. A current of emotion rose up in his memories, usually safely sealed and separated as if they belonged to someone else, accessible to his mind for convenience only. But now...

Despair. Self-loathing. Directionlessness. Loss.

Papyrus felt like he was on a rickety catwalk above a rushing dark river, its tide slowly rising. Just before the surface could brush his hooves, he closed his eyes, blotted out the vision, and tore his gaze away from the building.

The sky quickly returned, and the caustic memory returned back behind a layer of glass where it belonged.

"Papyrus is alright?" Braen asked curiously.

Papyrus shook his head. "Of course I am. Don't be ridiculous."

Senescey glanced over at him.

"I'm perfectly fine, as always," Papyrus sighed, holding a hoof to his forehead. "Just have a little history with this place that wasn't my brightest hour."

Senescey hesitated. "Which means...?"

"That I suppose I'll stay out here and make you do the dirty work after all." Papyrus gave her a beatific smile, chancing another look at the hospital. When he felt the same symptoms threaten to rise up once more, he flicked his gaze away.

"That's not how I meant the question," Senescey said, annoyed.

"But it does mean you don't have me compromising your stealth mission!" Papyrus gave her a cheery wink. "This island's full of horny college kids, they'd be a fool not to have a gynecologist on staff for when the inevitable happens. Just break into their office, find their records, bag everything from the year 985, and Bob's your uncle."

"...Whatever you say," Senescey said, shaking her head and changing her disguise to look more like she was twenty. "I'll be back."

And so Papyrus settled in to wait. Braen was visible and conspicuous, but fortunately most of the ponies heading into or out of a hospital had good reason not to loiter, and so no one stopped to ask about her.

He waited. And he waited. And he started to get bored.

"Doing nothing?" Egdelwonk asked, wearing his pony guise and strolling up behind them.

"Productively so," Papyrus replied, finding that he was perfectly fine as long as he didn't look at the hospital. "At this very moment, my most competent minion is looting all the information you refused to tell us because 'it would be more boring that way.' So, clearly, I'm having the most engaging time of my life and am not at all bored."

Egdelwonk smiled a bit too broadly.

"You're about to make me an offer," Papyrus guessed, having seen that smile before.

"More like give you some food for thought," the trash tyrant said. "How would you like to see what she's up to without actually being there in person?"

"That sounds more like an offer than food for thought," Papyrus pointed out.

Egdelwonk curled his lip indignantly. "I didn't offer to give you such a way. Merely asked how you'd like it!"

"Sounds interesting," Papyrus admitted. "Provided it doesn't make me think too much about the last time I was in this building."

Egdelwonk yawned. "Sounds like a 'you' problem. Supposing such a scrying magic did exist - I mean, obviously it does, because I can use it, but bear with me for now - what do you think could have been going through the head of the one who invented it?"

"Fifty-fifty on something degenerate or looking for a political edge," Papyrus said without even bothering to think.

"Really." Egdelwonk lowered his shades, peering at Papyrus over the rims. "And which one of those motivations matches someone like me?"

Papyrus blinked at him, then sat back again. "For entertainment."

Egdelwonk's grin returned. "Ah, but wouldn't it be so much more entertaining to go there in person? If that's why I'm scrying, why stop there?"

"Are you trying to convince me to head on in after her?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"If that's how you want to interpret it, be my guest." Egdelwonk folded his forelegs. "I prefer to think of this as laying the groundwork for an important lesson for your career in the Junior Dumpster Despot Corps, but if you're not yet motivated enough to keep your quasi-mortal hooves out of a situation that could turn sticky, perhaps that lesson isn't yet due."

"Hard pass." Papyrus waved a hoof. "If you've got a magic super camera, turn it on already."

Egdelwonk shrugged, snapped the spokes of his lone bat wing... and a shimmering rectangle poofed into existence, populated with rushing gray static. A few more snaps, and a picture appeared with a twist of color, depth perception and all. It felt more like a portal than a screen.

"That's why I'm asking for records from so long ago," Senescey was saying, speaking to a mare at a desk that looked too small to be the hospital's front one, but was still clearly customer-facing. The lobby around her was empty. "Professor said it's fine to use data this old if we properly anonymize it. And he'll be the judge of that."

The secretary - obviously a student, with a cherry-red coat and horn-rimmed glasses that had 'nerd' written all over them - looked unconvinced. "I told you, I'll need to look up our rules on this. Can't your professor give you a curated data set for this?"

"Maybe if gathering data wasn't supposed to be part of the assignment," Senescey pleaded, playing the role of student worried about her grades to perfection.

Suddenly, a door clicked open, and two ponies emerged: a middle-aged mare in a labcoat, and another student. "Next?" the doctor called as the visibly-relieved student fled the scene.

The secretary nearly dropped her ledger in her haste to open it, glancing around the empty room. "Umm, umm, we had... Moonbeam scheduled for an ultrasound, but she hasn't checked in yet? You're ten minutes ahead of schedule, Doctor, so maybe-"

"You're Doctor Meadowglade?" Senescey pushed past the secretary, a pleading expression on her face. "I need historical data on all the patients you saw during the year 985. Just names and reason for visit will do. It's for-"

Meadowglade cut her off with a distracted nod. "Of course. I can have that prepared in fifteen minutes. Your professor didn't give you a requisition slip, I take it?"

Senescey shook her head.

"Professors these days," Meadowglade sighed, pulling out a clipboard with her horn and beginning to write. "At least you remember what to ask for... That's all you need, names and reason for visit?"

Senescey nodded. "For the gynecology department specifically."

"We don't have the data that pared down," Meadowglade warned. "You'll have to take the full set and extract what you want yourself, unless you can give us two business days to do it for you. Is a paper copy fine?"

Senescey nodded. "Perfectly."

The secretary was looking on in annoyance. "Are we really allowed to just hand this out to anyone who asks?"

Meadowglade gave her a weird look. "This is a school hospital. Everyone who comes here signs a waiver that their information may be used for training Equestria's next generation of doctors? Including you?"

The secretary looked deeply embarrassed.

Meadowglade shook her head, motioning for Senescey to follow her down a hallway. "Honestly, we just had a class here to view a live operation last week... Come with me, information from that year will be in the archive. So, are you new to the field?"

She walked with the hurried stride of someone who was clearly a professional, yet lived every day knowing that ponies' safety depended on her haste, and Senescey had to run to keep up. "Considering switching majors," Senescey explained. "I haven't committed yet, but material sciences weren't working out, and I have a steady hoof and a high tolerance for blood."

"That'll serve you well," Meadowglade said, turning and fishing a ring of keys out of her pocket, which she used to unlock a nondescript metal door. Inside was a copy room with dozens of filing cabinets, boxes of paper, and copy machines. "Does gynecology in particular interest you, or are you exploring the nursing track in general?"

"I haven't decided yet," Senescey admitted as Meadowglade tracked down the right filing cabinet and used another key to unlock the drawer. "You're an ob-gyn, right? What helped you decide?"

"I was involved in an accident while I was in school here," Meadowglade said as she worked, pulling out several files. "Ugh, this is so disorganized... It had me in and out of the hospital many times while I recovered. Same year you're asking about, actually." She pulled out a thick folder, scanned it, and nodded to herself. "I wound up befriending a mare who was here under long-term commitment for an at-risk pregnancy, which was complicated by other lingering health disorders. Quite the colorful character. She and I bonded over my experience, which she could relate to, to a degree."

She stepped to the copy machines, deftly engaged all three of them, and split up the papers, feeding them in simultaneously to speed up the process. "I took an interest in the field to see if I could help her. Turned out to be something I was very good at."

Senescey's eyes lit up. "Quite the story. I wish I had something like that... No offense to whatever you went through. What was her name?"

"Felicity," Meadowglade said, collating the pages as the copy machines spewed them out.

Outside the screen, Egdelwonk strummed the feathers on his pegasus wing. "My, how convenient."

Papyrus didn't respond.

"And that was this same year?" Senescey asked, not betraying anything more than a student's curiosity with her composure. "Well, that's not what my project is about, but if I see her name go by, I'll think of you."

Meadowglade nodded absently. "Right, this should about do it. Let me staple these for you, I need to get back to see if my next patient has showed up..."

"Busy life, huh?" Senescey joked. "Must be like you're on call twenty-four seven."

"This is the wrong field if you're not prepared for that," Meadowglade warned. "Especially if you're the building's only specialist, like me. Learning in a research hospital is one thing, but working? You have to be a doctor and a teacher, and most just go to the mainland for better work schedules..."

"So what happened to Felicity?" Senescey asked as Meadowglade finished up the paperwork.

Meadowglade stuffed the papers in a folder and handed them to Senescey. "She was enrolled in some sort of witness-protection program. After she gave birth and her health recovered a little, the government helped her move to Manehattan to be closer to some office for that. And that's the last I've heard from her."

"Huh," Senescey said, taking the folder under a wing. "You've been a fantastic help, Doctor. I'll be sure to tell my professor to give out those requisition slips next time. Can I find my way out of here, or...?"

Meadowglade pointed at the door and angled her hoof. "Take a right, and you'll be back where we started. That has been, what, three minutes? Here's hoping nothing literally caught on fire while I was gone..."

Egdelwonk let the screen disappear in a cloud of purple smoke. He raised an eyebrow.

"I knew her," Papyrus said.

"What Papyrus talking about?" Braen asked, tilting her head.

"I knew her," Papyrus repeated. "Held that mare's hopes and dreams in my hooves for the briefest of instants. Saw them all laid out like a canvas, in their entirety. Back when I was a god..."

Egdelwonk said nothing.

"...Eh. Philosophy doesn't suit me," Papyrus declared, kicking the mess of questions he could have given voice to back into the recesses of his mind, along with the rest of the mess he had inherited from his past life. "Besides, this works out for our goals nicely. Who would have thought someone who actually knew the old goat would just tell us about her on a whim?"

"That does tend to happen more often when one is able to put on a facade of normalcy instead of eccentricity and insanity," Egdelwonk remarked. "Not that I'd know, of course, but when has the Dumpster Deacon ever needed to do research? All the information I'd ever need, people throw away for free."

Papyrus rolled his eyes just as Senescey walked out the hospital front door, the folder of data still clutched under her wing.

"That," she declared, marching up to Papyrus, "was more productive than it had any right to be. Felicity is enrolled in a witness-protection program in Manehattan. That's more than enough information for us to move on, and I doubt we can find anything else of use on this island."

"Figures," Papyrus yawned. "I knew you could do it. Been spying on you with his help the whole time, if you want to skip the briefing." He pointed over his shoulder at Egdelwonk.

"Of course you were," Senescey griped. "Better than you following me, I suppose. I don't think I could have pulled off that disguise if I was answering for your lack of self-control at the same time. Do you have any use for this?" She thrust the folder at him. "I doubt we need it to get to our next destination, but I doubt I can get it back so easily if we throw it away."

Papyrus took the folder and skimmed its contents eagerly, though it was mostly charts and tables filled with gibberish medical shorthand. "Well, most of the cases in here probably amount to the grave misfortune of students who didn't take their precautions seriously, and everyone loves watching others get what's coming to them, right? We could use it for entertainment."

Senescey snatched it back. "On second thought, I'll hang onto this, thank you very much." She raised an eyebrow at Egdelwonk. "Manehattan. Somewhere within walking distance of the government buildings, a police station, or anywhere else that might be involved in witness protection programs. Can we get a ride, or is this the part where you strand us and run off cackling?"

Egdelwonk massaged his goatee with a wing. "Well, you haven't exactly explored your options thoroughly, but Papyrus is getting reported to the authorities as we speak for bizarre conduct... I suppose I could pick up Larceny and then give you all a free trash teleport. But the next big jump you make is on your own power, no ifs, ands or buts. Do we have an accord?"

Senescey frowned. "Throw in a promise that you'll warn me first every time you help Papyrus spy on me from now on, and take a hike if I say it's a bad time. If I'm going to give my all for this partnership, I need privacy sometimes in return."

"Mmm, you drive a hard bargain," Egdelwonk mused. "I think I'm going to need one act of petty vandalism before we go if I'm to agree to that."

Senescey glanced around to ensure no passers-by were looking, then tipped over the trash can, spewing rubbish all across the sidewalk.

Egdelwonk clapped his forehooves. "A mare after my own heart. Even though you technically just took my private property and carelessly returned it to the masses. For shame. Next stop, picking up Larceny from whatever rooftop you stranded her on, real next step, Manehattan!"

He struck a pose, motioning for everyone to enter the tipped-over can. Braen did so eagerly, Senescey followed stiffly, and Egdelwonk motioned for Papyrus to bring up the rear.

Papyrus stopped, glancing up at the hospital one last time. Meadowglade. Starlight. Gwendolyn. That overpowering, suffocating sense of confusion, as if the world his senses showed him didn't match up with any possible state the world could be in, and behind it, an overwhelming, all-consuming clarity, as if it had all been reduced to a single, terrible truth.

There were other places like that on this island. Places he wouldn't be visiting by leaving now.

Was going back to the Griffon Empire really such a smart idea if he wasn't ready to face those? Surely, the Empire would have places like those too.

He shook his head. The point of this was to write a new chapter for himself rather than being defined by the old ones, no? So the old ones didn't matter. He could leave them behind, where they belonged.

Papyrus stepped into the trash can, and Kinmari was gone.

Skip

Skyscrapers broke up the horizon like rectangular teeth, the sun merrily shining on their glossy windows and into the broad streets that bounded them. Billboards were dim, their customary neon advertisements unable to compete with the light of day, and a few dirigibles hung in the background, one trialing a banner with an advertisement for fruit juice.

Papyrus stepped from a dilapidated dumpster onto the rooftop courtyard of a tenant building, surrounded by strings of drying laundry and a fat stallion who had fallen asleep while sunbathing. The only similarity to Kinmari in sight was the sea; it glistened beyond the final row of buildings, festooned with ships of all sizes.

"Apologies," Egdelwonk said, brushing an apple core off his shoulder as the others emerged as well. "I would have made it nighttime to better fit the stealth-noir vibe of your business here, but Woona would have my hide for a rug if I infringed on her domain."

"Meh. Doubt this place would look that edgy even if it was night. It's no Gyre, that's for sure." Papyrus waved a hoof, casting his mind back to the Griffon Empire's most-corrupt and least-livable province, and its gloomy metal fortress of a capital city.

Larceny shaded her brow with her good wing. "Never knew a metropolis could look so cheerful."

"It's a facade," Senescey warned, looking out over the city with a frown. "There's just as much money and ill-gotten influence here as anywhere else."

Egdelwonk raised an eyebrow.

"Do you know what industries this city is known for?" Senescey asked, walking to the edge of the roof, where a chain-link fence provided an effective, if ugly, way to keep careless ponies from falling off. "Music and fashion. Things that should be matters of artistic expression... but instead, they turn it into social hierarchies and hero worship. Whoever lines up the biggest licensing deals and publishing contracts gets famous. Ponies here get venerated for nothing more than being well-connected, and entire industries crop up to convince the public that their tastes, their body types, their ability to sing is superior. They decide what 'good' is to fit what they already are. It's-"

"What is point of rant?" Braen interrupted, sounding legitimately curious.

Senescey blinked at her. "What?"

"Look at all those ponies," Braen said, joining her at the edge and pointing down to the colorful specks dotting the road below. "Probably, each one of them have own answer about what is point of living here, in city. Same as ponies in Ironridge. Many different ponies. Many different answers."

Her mechanical eyes adjusted as she surveyed the cityscape. "Leitmotif not sound happy about own answer. So rather than wallowing, why not find another?"

Senescey looked at her in bafflement. "You can't just choose a different way of looking at it to change what's going on down there."

"That pessimistic answer," Braen admonished. "Same answer mother Shinespark arrive at. So, not acceptable answer to settle on."

"Alright, kids, break it up," Papyrus announced, elbowing in between them and earning a rude look from Senescey. "Enough philosophy! Let's talk shop." He nodded back at Larceny. "We know with modest accuracy that Felicity came to this city for some sort of witness-protection program a little less than twenty years ago. There's no possible way they don't have records on where she went next, assuming she isn't even still here. So I propose we hit up some government offices and figure out who would be involved in a thing like that."

"Do we know what she was a witness to?" Larceny asked, laying down on the warm concrete. "Could make this a lot easier if we knew."

"Presumably, to what happened in the Griffon Empire," Senescey said, frowning. "When it all fell apart. Think about it: Chrysalis captured and enslaved the entire sarosian population of the eastern continent, turning us into changelings. And to this day, she doesn't know how to make more of us once we've been enslaved. Anyone who slipped through her grasp is a valuable resource. Chrysalis has also been active in Equestria. I see plenty of reasons why Felicity could have needed protection... and as a first-hoof witness to Chrysalis's ascension, she would have had valuable enough knowledge to prompt them to want her alive."

"Actually..." Papyrus raised a hoof, about to mention it was more likely she was a witness to his own deeds at Kinmari.

But then he thought better of it, and lowered his hoof. "Yeah, I bet you're spot on. You brainy bat, you. What's this about Chrysalis in Equestria, again?"

Senescey didn't seem to pick up on what he had been about to say, which he took as confirmation that she really didn't know. Of course, he didn't know what became of her after Chrysalis attacked, either, so fair was fair, right?

"She and an army of changelings attacked Canterlot about three years back," Senescey explained. "It was a highly visible military offensive meant to disguise an infiltration operation, with the end result of installing Chrysalis as an impostor in the royal family. Ultimately, both prongs of the attack were rebuffed, and many drones were lost in the process. It also served to awaken most of Equestria to her existence, and the existence of changelings as a whole. Nothing less than a catastrophic failure for her, no matter how you look at it."

"So I've heard," Egdelwonk yawned. "That does tend to happen when you mess with Twilight Sparkle and her friends."

"In other words, Felicity maybe closest to whatever place keep eye on changelings?" Braen asked, tilting her head.

Papyrus hesitated further. Keeping his silence wouldn't cause them to go off chasing a false lead, would it?

"Sounds likely," Larceny said. "So, how are we doing this?"

Papyrus patted his chest. "Same as last time, of course! You're a cripple, Braen gets all sorts of looks and I'm horrible at feigning innocence, so we all hang out up here while Sen... Err, Leitmotif does the dirty work?"

He fluttered his eyebrows in his best pretty please.

Senescey gave him a level look, and then sighed. "Well, at least you're aware of your team's limitations."

"No wonder Halcyon ditched us," Papyrus mused, sitting back and rubbing his chin. "...Except you, that is. What did you do to tick her off, again?"

"Gave her good advice," Senescey groused. "That she wasn't inclined to follow. Are there any objections? To you just camping here while I do everything by myself? Barring as exemplary of luck as Kinmari, this could take a week."

"What even are you talking about?" Papyrus spun in a happy circle. "That was all calculated! Pure skill on my part, pointing you in the right direction. Besides, as fun as it was, making a fool of myself in front of those college kids, keeping a low profile might actually be the wiser course. You know, given who we're dealing with."

Egdelwonk nodded sagely. "You do have a bounty on your head. Then again, whoever had fun by staying home when adventure came to call? I'm starting to regret giving you these free rides. You did worse at biting the plot hooks in Kinmari than Halcyon did during the Barnabas Weapons Emporium incident."

"I'll pretend to know what you're talking about and ignore you anyway." Papyrus waved a wing at him. "We've got a goal, and we're not going to see it through by getting distracted at every little side opportunity. Leif, dear, you won't actually take all week, will you?"

"No promises until I get a little closer," Senescey said. "And don't call me 'dear,' either. But for now, I don't even know where the nearest police station is."

"Alright. Duly noted." Papyrus bowed. "I believe in you, shrub! Good luck!"

Scowling, Senescey took wing and soared away.

"So, old chap," Papyrus said, elbowing Egdelwonk in the shoulder, "about that spying thing you did last time..."

Egdelwonk looked at him in annoyance. "It's been thirty minutes. Have you no ability to entertain yourself by simulating near-miss catastrophes in a pocket dimension while waiting for anything?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Stinks to be you, I suppose." Egdelwonk pulled out a coin and flipped it. Tails. "Well, there goes another nascent civilization."

Larceny gave him a worried look.

"Eh, they were barely microbes anyway," Egdelwonk said with a shrug.

"Egdelwonk doesn't like microbes?" Braen asked also worried.

"For crying out loud, I'm kidding!" Egdelwonk threw a hoof up in the air. "Can't even make a joke these days without it getting taken too seriously, I swear."

The sunbathing stallion grunted in his sleep.

"...Oh." Egdelwonk snapped the spokes on his bat wing, and with a flash of chaos magic, the stallion was teleported down below. "Probably should ensure no bystanders get infected by our senses of humor."

"Yes, but about Senescey..." Papyrus pushed.

"Is this truly your idea of a good time?" Egdelwonk gazed at him levelly. "Interacting with the world from behind a screen, no stake in the matter, safe from any and all repercussions?"

At a look from Larceny, Papyrus quickly explained what he had done during Senescey's hospital crawl.

"Better than doing nothing," Larceny admitted. "I'll watch."

"You have an excuse, in that you can barely move," Egdelwonk pointed out. He turned to Papyrus. "You, on the other hand, are perfectly capable. Strong, sly, eminently manipulative. You should be suited perfectly for this! Why is your first instinct to stay back and watch, hmmm?"

"Pragmatism," Papyrus smoothly said. "We stand a better chance of success if I'm not there to get in her way. What more to it does there need to be than that? If I'm to do better than last time, I can't allow hubris to cloud my judgement of my own strengths and weaknesses."

Egdelwonk's eyes bored into his. "And will you allow cowardice to do the same?"

"Shut up, old stallion," Papyrus scoffed. "Turn on the scrying thing, already!"

Egdelwonk rolled his eyes and snapped his spokes again, prompting a static-filled window to twist itself into existence. But before it could resolve, Braen said, "If can really make this show anyone at any time, why not look at Felicity?"

"I can't spoil the story like that!" Egdelwonk looked aghast. "Even if this bucket-head here is determined to take the least-interesting route to his goal, that's no excuse to short-circuit a good character arc."

"That's what our lives are to you?" Larceny asked tiredly. "A story?"

"Some have expressed exasperation at the conclusions my worldview leads me to draw," Egdelwonk admitted. "As it stands for you, I'd strongly advise taking my help when it comes and not asking questions when it doesn't. Try too hard to figure this out, and you're liable to twist your brain bone."

"I think you just told me all I needed to know," Larceny grumbled. "You can watch anyone, anywhere, for entertainment? No stakes? You don't see us as people, but sources of fun? The realization of our desires matters less to you than whether it 'makes a good story'?" She shook her head. "You probably think my escape from the Griffon Empire makes for a fantastic one."

Egdelwonk put a shocked wing to his chest. "I would never purposefully embody a bad example to give someone a taste of what he doesn't want to be." His eyes sharpened, and he looked at Papyrus with a smile. "Would I?"

Papyrus gave him a sketchy look.

"All I mean to show is that unchecked use of a power like this can give rise to some dangerous worldviews, little prince." Egdelwonk smiled back. "She is right, you know. It would certainly be safe to observe your friend's adventure from a distance. Might even be fun, participating in her story. Nudging it along, checking in with her during breaks, but never putting your own comfort on the line. In fact, with a power like that, why bother doing anything else ever again?"

"You're giving me a lesson I don't need," Papyrus warned. "I didn't come to Equestria and seek out Starlight for entertainment, or for safety. I'm not planning on taking back my empire because I get a kick out of watching all the lesser ponies running around."

Egdelwonk raised an eyebrow. "I was under the impression you were doing it because you had nothing better to do."

"So I'm still figuring out the reasons for my life." Papyrus shrugged. "I don't think I'll find them in sitting back and getting addicted to watching other ponies strive for things... if that's even what you're trying to warn me about. Following Senescey will improve our coordination and spare her from needing to make a lengthy report. Or, we could do what Larceny suggested and go check in on Felicity, right here and right now."

Egdelwonk sized him up.

"Come on," Papyrus goaded, the screen crackling with formless static over Egdelwonk's shoulder. "Do we pass the test, or do we pass? Turn that thing on already!"

Egdelwonk reached forward and tapped Papyrus on the nose.

A cold static briefly flooded his body, and then nothing. "That was the same as last time!" Papyrus complained. "And it didn't do anything then, either!"

"I gave you ten minutes," Egdelwonk said. "Ten minutes of that screen listening to you... as much as it listens to anyone. You think you can control it? Go ahead. See what it's like."

Papyrus blinked. "Really?"

Egdelwonk bowed and stepped aside. "The clock is ticking..."

"Find Felicity," Larceny urged. "Sidestep this whole chase. Look for her, see if she's alright, find any background-"

"Way ahead of you," Papyrus promised, reaching out a hoof and acting on instinct. He didn't know how you controlled a magical construct like this, but Egdelwonk usually didn't resort to pranks where the punchline involved nothing happening...

As he stepped closer and closer to the picture frame, it grew at a disproportionate rate in his vision. And suddenly, the city was gone.

Voices.

Hundreds, thousands, millions of voices, pouring through Papyrus's being in a ceaseless tide, a monochrome canvas of overpowering mutters and feeble, distant screams, voices of restlessness, cries of joy and wails of loss, casual contentment and camaraderie, frustration and rage, voices coming and going like a crowd on the widest and busiest street in the world.

That static wasn't chaos, it wasn't the randomness born of a lack of signal. It was every signal at once. And yet they were muted, forced down into a frame of reference that he could comprehend, all of the meaning and purpose of their words being lost to the blackness of space, until only the muttering remained.

Papyrus tried to grab at one, reaching for the top of the flow, pulling at threads like he was attacking a mile-wide canvas made without a loom. A particularly powerful one caught on his hoof, and he pulled.

It was a crowd of foals in a lightly-wooded area, the sun shining merrily overhead. The one in the center had a glistening cutie mark, and by the reactions of the others crowing around them, it was brand-new.

Papyrus let that knot of voices go and reached for another. In a wooden shack, rain spattered the windows and wind shook the rafters, a storm blowing by overhead. A stallion stood by one wall, a diagram propped on an easel next to him, explaining its contents to a group of younger, attentive stallions. Some sort of school? Perhaps a planning committee? Papyrus couldn't hold onto the voices long enough to tell. His grip slipped, sliding along the strings that the voices were a part of, and within the vision he was pulled through one of the windows, out into a valley where a cold, soggy mare was dancing ecstatically in the rain, reveling in the power of the storm.

He dropped the thread entirely, and was back in the sea of static, the muttering of the world passing him by. How could you find anyone in this? There had to be a trick to it. Something, some sort of...

Here was a thread that was different from the rest. It felt sticky, or perhaps larger, or... Words didn't exist to describe how it was different. Just like they didn't exist to describe how he could touch a voice at all. But it stood out; he could see it from farther away, and it felt stationary in the tide, not coming and going like the rest of them.

Papyrus reached out, and found himself on an airship he had ridden before, a long time ago.

Occupying the cabin next to him was Corsica, fast asleep.

Papyrus scratched his head. Unlike the others, Corsica's thread wasn't hard to hold onto. She also wasn't saying anything, due to being asleep, and he realized her voice wasn't part of the great muttering as a result. And yet still, he had found her. Her thread was different.

What were the odds of randomly settling on a pony he knew that way, instead of anyone else? What was different about her?

Frowning, he pulled out of her vision and back into the tides.

The next vision he grasped turned out to be a mare in a business suit, sitting at a desk and listening with a tired expression as someone at the front of a conference room took questions after a lecture. She had just finished asking her own question; that must have been how Papyrus found her. Now that she wasn't speaking again, her thread had gone silent. If he dropped it, he knew he wouldn't be able to find her again... and he didn't have the skill to stop it from sliding out of his hooves regardless.

Funny, though. He could still see Corsica's.

Focus. Search for Senescey. Or Felicity.

But the voices pounded against him, and Papyrus started to flag, wondering if he wasn't just another soul in the tide. He tried to speak, and the moment he did, his words were ripped from his lungs, carried off along the strings to join the ceaseless mutter, before he could even choose what they would be.

He knew this sensation, and he couldn't hide from it any longer. This... reminded him of how it had felt to be a god.

"TIME IS UP," Egdelwonk's voice said from on high, and a talon reached to pull him out.

Seated once again on the warm concrete of the rooftop, Papyrus felt that sense of cold static return, and then drain away through his nose as Egdelwonk tapped it again. "Had fun, did you?"

"That's a bit unsporting of you," Papyrus complained. "You knew I wouldn't be able to get anything productive out of that with so little time to learn how to control it, didn't you?"

Egdelwonk smiled a too-sharp smile.

"Many pictures appeared," Braen offered. "Even saw Corsica! Just, never useful picture."

"Figures," Papyrus said. "So, now that I'm certain you'll never let me try that again, what's the trick? How do you work that thing?"

Egdelwonk chuckled darkly. "Do you still want to work it?"

Papyrus folded his forehooves. "You haven't changed my mind about it being awfully useful to my... I mean, our cause, if that's what you mean. And if you mean your earlier admonishments not to get caught up pretending it's a toy, I think I'm even less inclined to do that now than I was before. It was creepy in there."

Larceny nodded. "I'm sure someone appreciates whatever it is you're up to. But I'd appreciate it more if you were convincingly on our side."

Egdelwonk rubbed his chin. "Give me your honest opinion, Papyrus. Having tried to work this thing..." He tapped the nebulous frame of the screen, which once again showed only static. "Who do you think made this system?"

"Frankly, I couldn't care less," Papyrus swaggered. "Do you have a reason for being so obtuse about this thing? If you want us to know something about it, why not just say it? I dig your cryptic trickster thing, but all we really want is to find Felicity, get on with restoring Larceny's body, and then move on to the fun stuff in the Griffon Empire. Would it kill you to get with the program?"

Egdelwonk stomped a hoof, the screen shattering in a burst of magic. "Fine, then! Skip your stupid plot hooks! Worse than Halcyon, I swear!" He pulled out a scrap of paper and seared a few words onto it with his eyes, then plastered it against Papyrus's face. "Go on. There's Felicity's current address. You'll find Senescey loitering in the laundromat at the base of this building listening to gossip while pretending to wait for her clothes. See how well the Empire treats you when you skip out on all the foreshadowing for what you'll find there and arrive too early in your character arcs. Mark my words, you're about to get dunked on worse than the show writers did for giving Twilight wings in Season Three. Airhead. Protagonists these days, urgh, seriously..."

He climbed into the trash can and pulled the lid shut so viciously that it almost fell over. And then he was gone.

Papyrus peeled the paper off his face and read it. "...Anyone know how to read addresses in this city?"

"Not sure what make Egdelwonk so mad," Braen said, worried. "But help from him very useful so far with fast travel. Maybe not good thing that he decide to leave..."

"Eh. He'll be back." Papyrus shrugged. "We're entertaining enough that he's practically got no choice. Though it does seem we should be catching up with the shrub right about now, doesn't it?"

Larceny nodded. "If you want to hurry, I could use a lift..."

True to Egdelwonk's word, they found Senescey in an open-air laundromat. She raised an eyebrow as she saw them coming.

"Been making yourself useful?" Papyrus asked, winging her a salute. "Because we sure have."

"Do I even want to know?" she asked, no other customers standing in the immediate vicinity.

Papyrus held out the scrap of paper. "Check this: we bullied Egdelwonk into letting us skip the search and giving us Felicity's address. And into leaving us alone for a bit, as a plus!"

"Actually, bullying was mostly done by Papyrus," Braen corrected. "And seemed to consist more of ignoring warnings than bullying. Though, could not tell what warnings were about."

"Eh, something related to going on a power trip." Papyrus shrugged. "Honestly, he wasn't very coherent to me, either. So, think you can find this place?"

Senescey looked up at a large map of the city tacked to one wall.

Papyrus, Larceny and Braen crowded around.

"Right here," Senescey said, tapping a street with a wing. "And we're here." She tapped the other side of town, then sighed. "If we want a trench coat or something for Braen, this would be an excellent place to buy one."

"You mean lift one, right?" Papyrus leaned against a washing machine. "Because I'm flat broke. Like a bitless pancake."

The washer entered its spin cycle and threw him off with its rattling, as if to protest the joke.

"I have some money," Senescey admitted. "Not a lot, and certainly not for your use, but some. I'd be willing to spend it on her."

"And feed into the gregarious fashion empire that enriches the rich and destroys true artistic freedom?" Papyrus teased, leaning in. "I thought you were just telling us about-"

Senescey punched him, sending him sprawling.

"Fine, fine, I deserved that," Papyrus started to say, pulling himself to his hooves... when he was interrupted by a shrill whistle. Across the street, a constable had witnessed the altercation and was charging toward them, whistle in his lips and baton drawn.

Senescey swore. "Stop talking, let's get out of here."

"I like how your first reaction upon getting into trouble is to run," Papyrus declared, several blocks away and hopefully with the constable off their trail, "when we could have perfectly easily framed this as a domestic violence dispute or something and sent him on his way with smiles and waves."

Senescey stared at him in concern. "The fact that you consider that an innocuous activity says even more about that plan's chances of success than your general demeanor."

"And you're the one who punched me. So there." Papyrus shrugged. "Let's just try not to do anything else to attract the ire of the law and get where we're going swift-like, shall we?"

"Let's have you try not to do anything that will make me do that," Senescey sighed. "Why did I even sign up with you again...?"

Papyrus waggled the paper with Felicity's address. "Because you'd be lost without me?"

"If you're waiting for me to say thank you, keep waiting until I see that paper isn't a joke," Senescey told him. "Anyway, we need to cross town, and-"

"I'm about at my limit," Larceny warned. "My second limit. Already past the one where I'll need to sleep all this off for a day."

"That," Senescey finished. "There are streetcars that offer free public transit through the city on fixed, limited routes. I think there's a station just around that corner. We can try to take one if everyone is confident our team can pass the Papyrus-acts-normal-for-an-hour challenge?"

She stared at Papyrus. So did everyone else.

"If I must," Papyrus sighed.

"Is trench coat still in cards?" Braen asked hopefully.

Senescey hesitated. "...If anyone asks after you, I'll explain. And everyone else will leave the explaining to me. Okay?"

Everyone nodded.

"Good," Senescey sighed. "Holding my breath for this incredibly simple and normal plan for getting from one side to the other to work."

It worked.

Papyrus stepped off the streetcar after forty minutes of radio silence. He hadn't made a joke about the geeky stallion whose shirt was inside-out, and when a young mother gave him an abashed apology after her foal crashed into him while running around, he managed to keep his response to a distracted nod. In fact, he almost felt proud of himself for that one, particularly since the curvature of the foal's cheeks had reminded him of the folds on a pumpkin and an excellent gourd joke had been on the tip of his tongue.

"I'm impressed," Senescey said as the streetcar rattled away. "And a little proud of you, Papyrus. Who knew you had it in you?"

"Oh, shut up," Papyrus managed, reddening slightly at being called out. "Need you remember, I'm no longer obsessively chaotically compelled to make a bad situation worse. I merely enjoy it from time to time."

"And if you could keep that enjoyment in check more often, you might not have to leave all the dirty work to me, like on Kinmari," Senescey added, shaking her head. "Whatever. We're almost here."

Internally, Papyrus groaned. In a way, this was worse than being a sphinx: he could no longer blame his bad behavior on his nature. He wasn't excused from actually trying anymore. And if he did slip up, at a time where it mattered...

Well, so far, he had done a good enough job of avoiding situations where his behavior actually mattered to find out.

The annoying part was, when he had been a sphinx, he never thought like this. He didn't even realize, until the final days before the Empire's collapse, that he had been in the wrong. And afterward, he had learned entirely the wrong lesson from it.

They were in a high-walled street that turned left up ahead and didn't continue straight, its elbow boxed in by a five-story terracotta building painted a yellowy off-white. A grid of windows dotted its street-facing walls, more residential than official. Inside the elbow was a fancier tower with an open-air food court and a small shopping mall on its exposed first floor, and nondescriptly fancy office suites stacked above.

"I think," Senescey said, turning to the terracotta building, "she's in there. This might even be the corner penthouse suite."

"Fancy," Papyrus said. "Do we just roll on in unannounced, or is there a more polite way to break it to her? Asking on the off chance I'm not an expert at this."

"I don't know." Senescey shook her head. "Trying to draw something like this out sounds like it would just be frustrating for no reason. I say we look for a front office, tell them we have a personal invitation, and are trying to confirm this is her address."

"Just in case," Larceny added, "you go in first, in a disguise. If she's still under any sort of witness-protection program-"

"Right," Senescey sighed. "I'll be right back."

Moments later, Senescey returned, wearing the same guise she had used to infiltrate the hospital in Kinmari. "Mixed results," she announced with a quiet voice. "She's there. That penthouse is hers. She also has a legal waiver absolving all responsibility for anything that happens to solicitors or other intruders knocking on her door."

Larceny let out a slow, stunned sigh.

"Figures she'd never lose her paranoia," Papyrus remarked.

"I didn't think this would be real," Senescey admitted. "Really. I thought you were pulling our tails."

"Don't thank me too early," Papyrus reminded her. "Wouldn't want old Felicity to miss out on the rude joke I make in return."

"Shut up and listen," Senescey snapped. "I... No, never mind. You're right. You wouldn't appreciate it. Let's just go, and take care not to get blasted if her door is trapped."

"Specialty Braen armor almost impervious to damage," Braen offered. "If blasting is to be had, Braen can take it!"

"Or we could sacrifice Papyrus," Larceny proposed.

Papyrus winked. "Well, I didn't know you still had a sense of humor! But I like Braen's idea best..."

They continued their chatter as they entered the building, made their way up a tight staircase and into a fifth-floor hallway. And soon enough they reached a door with a metal knocker cast in the shape of a heart with several vibrating lines protruding, like the strings on an instrument. It was otherwise unadorned.

"That's her brand," Senescey said, discarding the earlier plan and lifting a hoof to the knocker. "This is it. This is..."

Knock.

Immediately after she dropped it, a frantic scrabbling sounded from the room beyond, like hooves on a hardwood floor, except even more so. It drew rapidly closer, until something thumped into the door. And then, after the sound of no less than five locks being undone, the door cracked open, revealing a curious face on the other side.

The creature that greeted them had no less than three bows in its cherry-red mane, and a silky silver-gray coat that had been groomed to grow far longer than natural. Slitted garnet eyes stared out above a whiskery muzzle, and the floor beneath it bore countless scratches and claw marks from incidents just like this one.

"Hey," the sphinx said, her plate-shaped ears wobbling as she spoke. "Are you the paparazzi?"

Flounce

"Hey," said the sphinx in Felicity's doorway, her numerous mane bows and hanging curls flouncing at the slightest movement of her head. "Are you the paparazzi?"

Papyrus glanced at Larceny. Larceny glanced at Senescey. Senescey glanced at him.

"I require an answer," the sphinx said, sizing her visitors up with unrecognition even as her her claws flexed eagerly. "Mother is not home right now, so if you mean to approach at an opportune time with your covetous backroom dealings, this is it."

"Hey, Glitter." Papyrus winked, having no trouble picking out a suitable nickname for such a flamboyant creature. "Are you asking in an 'I want to meet the press' sense, or an 'I want to eat the press' one? Because I'm getting some conflicting vibes, here."

Confusion crossed the sphinx's face. "Is that a cannibalism joke?"

Papyrus backed off a little. "If you can't share the sentiment, I gather you've never met many real paparazzi."

"I see." The sphinx's expression morphed to concern, and settled on coldness. "Arrive at your point, then, please. If this is simply a social call at the door of a stranger, I imagine many other swaths of the populace will be more receptive to your sense of humor than I."

"We're business associated of Felicity," Papyrus volunteered. "She's the one we're actually here for. Give us the best way to get a hold of her, and we'll be out of your mane, quick as can be."

"Now I know you are up to no good," the sphinx accused warily. "Any true associates of Mother's workplace would have access to the proper channels. Do you even know what she does?"

"Today? Haven't the foggiest," Papyrus admitted. "We're from twenty years ago. Time travelers, actually. It's a complicated business."

The sphinx shook her head. "What a preposterous notion. Make your case or step aside and let your associates do it for you." She attempted to peer over Papyrus's shoulder, and her eyes widened. "Is that a suit of power armor!?"

"Not right to call armor if no one is inside," Braen answered. "But underlying principle is same."

"...Quaint," the sphinx said, a feather held to her chin as she appraised Braen. "Your dialect, I mean. And you two?" She tilted her head at Senescey and Larceny. "Your colorations are oddly familiar..."

"This would be easier to explain directly to Felicity," Senescey sighed. "Much easier. Can you tell us how to get in contact with her, or do we just have to wait outside this building until she comes home?"

"This again? I think not." The sphinx shook her head. "While I have leave to conduct my own dealings as I please, for her dealings, there are rules. And the foremost of those rules is that anyone who doesn't know the rules doesn't get to play. I cannot simply go making exceptions willy-nilly just because you asked multiple times."

"Fine, then." Papyrus raised a wing, turning to leave. "Next time you see her, tell her High Prince Gazelle wants a word about her old line of work, and will be loitering in the alley out front."

The sphinx's eyes bulged. "High Prince Gazelle? So you did dye your coat that way on purpose! What is the meaning of impersonating such an odious historical person?"

"Ah, so she told you about me." Papyrus grinned. "It's no impersonation, Glitter. Go ahead, put us to the test. They know just about anything you might ask me as well." He swept a wing back, indicating Senescey and Larceny.

The sphinx looked skeptical and worried. "...Tell me my parentage. Including the reason for their union. And leave nothing out. I demand you put your outrageous statements to the test."

Once again, everyone looked at everyone.

"Geribaldi Stormhoof," Larceny eventually said. "He was your father."

"I hired your mother to seduce him, if memory serves," Papyrus said, rubbing his chin. "So that she could subsequently ditch him as part of a plot to drive him to suicide. Looking back on it, I suppose that wasn't one of my saner moments... although she did her part with gusto, so at least you can't blame it only on me."

Senescey cleared her throat. "The point was to control the sole surviving heir of the Stormhoof dynasty."

The sphinx's eyes grew wider and wider, and started to shake. "...Perhaps I misjudged you," she eventually admitted. "You might want to come inside."

The apartment's interior was a dark yet opulent affair. Spacious skylights provided the only lighting, putting the penthouse's rarefied location on full display but leaving the blue shag carpets and plum purple walls to speak for themselves. Antique couches, their carved wood beginning to separate along its grain from age, guarded the walls as occasional do-not-touch setpieces, but the house as a whole felt surprisingly empty, like it had been pre-furnished and then moved into by someone who valued austerity and didn't have much of their own. Room after room served no discernible purpose, and yet they were hardly in disrepair. From how clean the carpets were, Papyrus almost wondered if it was serviced daily.

In the cornermost room, two entire walls were made only of glass, looking out on the open ocean, a balcony recessed several feet down beyond them so as not to block the view. This room looked more like ponies spent time there; its furniture was meant for sitting rather than an art display.

"My name is Floria," the silvery sphinx explained. "A purposeful deviation from the Imperial naming traditions, lest you think to blurt out the obvious. You will spare no detail in explaining to me how and why you know the things you know, as well as what business you have with my mother. Nothing that is fit for her ears is unfit for mine. Speak."

"Question from the peanut gallery," Papyrus began. "Do you have to speak so stiffly? I seem to recall you first greeting us with a pedestrian 'hey', which personally, I find so much more relatable."

"I mistook you for someone else," Floria griped, "which we will not speak on again, if you value your presence here."

Senescey cleared her throat. "We want to know how and whether Felicity found a way to have her body restored. And, beyond that, we'd like to see her again. We are... friends. From before."

"From your appearances I can get a perfectly good idea of whom you are pretending to be," Floria informed her. "What I would like to know is what plausible explanation any of you can think up for actually being those people, all of whom perished decades ago."

"That's a long story," Senescey said. "Especially when it's different for each of us. And I doubt you'd be satisfied by mine anyway."

"I fled the Empire before it collapsed," Larceny volunteered.

"And I was reincarnated," Papyrus gloated.

Braen shook her head. "Braen creation was more recent than imperial war. Was not there like others."

Floria raised an eyebrow, sitting up straight in her chair. "What part of 'spare no detail' did you not understand? Reincarnation? Do you mean to insinuate that you are undead? Clearly, you are no longer a sphinx, if you ever were."

"Well, when you challenge a vengeful angel to a duel, make your challenge impossible to ignore, and then she rips out your soul-" Papyrus cut off, realizing how intently Senescey and Larceny were looking over their shoulders.

In the doorway was a sarosian mare who looked to be in her fifties, with a heavy build and a business suit and a floor-length red mane that was streaked with silver.

"Well," she breathed. "Here I was planning to come home early and surprise you, only to find I'm the one getting surprised instead. Is this...?"

Papyrus sat up, faced her, and flashed a grin. "We're getting the band back together for another run at taking over the Griffon Empire. Are you in?"

Felicity dropped her briefcase.

Senescey and even Larceny got to their hooves. Papyrus prepared to cover his eyes and ears in case things got too mushy, but he needn't have bothered: for a long, long minute, nobody spoke.

"I-I'm dreaming, aren't I?" Felicity asked. "This can't be-"

"Someone's world will burn," Senescey said solemnly. "Just like ours. Remember?"

Whatever the significance of that phrase, Felicity ran to her, and Papyrus had to cover his eyes after all. "How is this possible!?" Felicity asked, emotion streaming from her voice.

"That's what I was trying to figure out ere you returned," Floria began, frustrated. "They obstinately-"

"Hush, you. And Larceny too?"

"And me."

"Floria, go fetch our guests some tea! I... I don't even know how to begin to..."

Papyrus idly scraped at his tongue.

"I fled the Empire to the west. I always wondered, had I tried harder to convince you to join me..."

"And I was miraculously on Valey and Shinespark's ship at the moment of truth! Senescey, how...?"

"It's a long story. We might want to sit down, first."

"Yes, yes, of course. I just... This wasn't exactly something I let myself dream of, you understand..."

Papyrus made a show of clamping down his ears.

"Would you knock that off?" all three sisters said as one.

"We're trying to have a reunion, here!" Felicity added, exasperated. "Speaking of which, what are you doing back from the dead as well? Because I have it on very good authority you hunted down your demise and embraced it."

Papyrus yawned and allowed his eyes to open. "Ask Starlight. Long story. Any particular order we're going in?"

Once it was established that everyone had a long story to tell and that no one was good at leaving the floor well and truly up to someone else, lots were drawn to determine a fair and impartial order the stories would be told in. And then they were immediately discarded when Floria returned with the tea.

"Mother," she said, balancing a tray on her back with her wings. "I take it you've decided your guests are... legitimate."

"I think we've reminisced enough to determine that beyond a shadow of any doubt," Felicity said, motioning for the sphinx to join her.

"That one, I like the least," Floria decided, nodding at Papyrus. "Perhaps you will have better luck forcing him to explain himself than I."

"Actually," Papyrus cut in, "my own antics following the destruction of the Empire are... Forgive me for never directly confirming this, but is it true that they aren't yet common knowledge among my minions, here? So might we want to cover everyone else's stories before we get distracted with all the thorny bits in mine?"

Senescey and Larceny gave him sharp looks, and Braen tilted her head.

Felicity stared at him in concern. "First off, you are High Prince Gazelle, and you've recanted of your crimes or at least regained sufficient control of your faculties to participate in a normal conversation, correct? I'm acutely aware of the change in your... ahem... features since we parted ways, but you should know this house is equipped with numerous security measures, in case you feel like having a repeat of the Kinmari incident." She turned to her sisters. "By your placid coexistence here, I presume you mean to vouch for him, but if this is all unsettled business..."

The duo warily shook their heads.

"Ahem." Papyrus furtively cleared his throat. "So, essentially, I lost my marbles to a greater degree than usual in a room full of uncatalogued historical artifacts. Caused a lot of damage, countless sacks of gold worth of losses, big scandal, might have also sent half a dozen or so students to the hospital with debilitating injuries and lifelong trauma. Yes, I was having a power trip, I know I was in the wrong, and I won't do it again, but I'm also laying ever so slightly low from the law as a result. That about cover it?"

Felicity stood up. "That does not 'about cover it' in the slightest! You destroyed any diplomatic possibility for Valey and her friends to have a happy ending in Equestria!"

"An act for which I am sincerely and contritely sorry," Papyrus said, lowering his head and making the strongest effort of his life to show genuine remorse - even though he was fairly sure he didn't feel that the same way as others. "And, more importantly, attempting to atone for. By the way, not to change the subject, but do I have to watch my mouth around here with regards to certain sphinxy secrets...?" He glanced at Floria.

Felicity shook her head. "She knows everything I do, and if you know more, I would appreciate the both of us coming into the know."

Floria nodded.

"Right." Papyrus sighed. "In that case, I also devoured dozens of souls and had a brief taste of immortality, before it was stripped away. And before I met my end, I got to try again, with more like a million that time."

Senescey and Larceny's eyes went wide.

"You didn't think Starlight killed me for no reason, did you?" He shrugged at them. "All I did was recover Garsheeva's stockpile, plus all the innocents from Mistvale. Only managed to keep them for a few minutes before I was crushed to death between Starlight and a mountain, but so it goes. I needed them to become strong enough to threaten her friends and convince her to put me out of my misery. Which, in the end, she didn't do, because she hates not getting the final word, and so here I am. No more ancient sphinx insanity curse, on account of no longer being a sphinx."

Floria grimaced. "You are referring to the tendency of my kind to succumb to madness regarding things we care strongly about, and inevitably sabotage our deepest desires."

"Ah, so you do know!" Papyrus nodded wildly. "Even back in the Griffon Empire, that was a tightly-kept secret. Most sphinxes never learned of it themselves. I only learned about it myself after nearly tearing apart the continent I was trying to unite. For a while I even thought Starlight and her friends stopped me in time, but then you-know-who came along and finished what I'd started..."

"Chrysalis," Senescey said.

"Yes, yes, that one." Papyrus nodded along, then pointed a feather at Floria. "Don't suppose you've had better luck with the curse than I did?"

"That is an exceedingly impolite question to ask a lady," Floria said coldly. "But as a matter of fact I have. In full awareness of the potential my kind can exhibit, I endeavor to conduct myself at all times with utmost humility and self-control, and thus far have not had any of these 'lapses into chaos' exhibited by my progenitors."

"Even the way you greeted us?" Papyrus winked. "Because that-"

"Was also calculated, thank you very much," Floria interrupted. "And no, I will not elaborate. Suffice it to say that knowing what I now know of you, I would not greet you in such a cavalier manner again."

Papyrus pursed his lips. "I think you'd get along famously with Corsica."

"Speaking of Chrysalis," Felicity cut in. "I survived her assault within the sanctum of Valey and Shinespark's airship, where I had stowed away in a vain attempt to make reparations, but what of you two? When she attacked, every sarosian in the realm was torn apart into a soulless husk, and all of their souls were taken back in short order by Starlight. Valey, I witnessed being put back together, and it was a monumental effort that could never be replicated at scale. And the magical protections I enjoyed were hardly commonplace, so how is it you yet live?"

"I wasn't in the Empire any longer," Larceny said. "After we parted ways, I left. Was out of the range of whatever she did."

They looked to Senescey.

"I... was put back together," Senescey sighed. "I don't know how. I remember dying. For the longest time, it felt like I was in a dream that I could never remember. And then, one day, I was me again."

She held up a foreleg, then flickered with green flame, showing off her changeling transformation. "I can do this now," she explained, cycling through the appearances of everyone in the room before returning to her own. "Perhaps as a byproduct of being broken and then reforged."

"Such an event is exceedingly unlikely," Floria pointed out. "Sarosian souls are connected to their bodies by their cutie marks, or brands. Remove the brand, as Chrysalis was actually doing, and the soul goes along with it, a phenomenon that does not happen in other ponies as their souls are also tethered to their bodies, forming a triangle. Such a rudimentary concept ought to have no need for explanation to individuals with your history, and yet you are stating that the impossible has occurred with little in the way of explanation. How?"

"How were my brand and soul re-attached to my body?" Senescey shrugged. "It's my body and my memories, beyond any doubt. But I just woke up one day and was myself again."

"What were the circumstances of this?" Floria pressed. "The time, the day, your precise location. Were there others?"

"Two others," Senescey said. "It happened on the day that Chrysalis attacked Canterlot, several years ago - living in Equestria, I'm sure you're familiar with the event. Presumably, I was a drone in her horde. When the attack ended, according to everyone, the changelings were flung from the city by a powerful force field. But I, along with two others... We came to our senses in a cave beneath the city. We went our separate ways, and that was the end of that."

"All of this basically boils down to what we're doing now," Papyrus cut in. "Basically, I've got nothing better to do with myself, so I want a redo. Take another swing at the Empire, you know how it is. I haven't been following it quite as closely as I could have, but I've heard enough to know that they survived, and then never properly moved on. It's the same old feuding nobles as it always was, except this time without a conniving goddess holding the place together. Power trading hooves and centralizing itself under whoever has the biggest army, that sort of thing."

Senescey spoke up. "I've been there since I reawakened. Currently, the two dominant factions are a group based in Gyre known as the Night's Boon, and a reclusive noble who's calling himself High Prince Gustadolph Everlaste. But the Night's Boon doesn't have a centralized leader, and no one seems to know for certain whether this Gustadolph even exists, let alone is a member of that house's line. Whether he's real or not, the consulate operating in his name holds most of the imperial south."

Papyrus rubbed his chin. "The Empire does have an impressive history of leaders obfuscating their true identities, powerless figureheads and kingpins pretending to be henchmen. By the by, I happen to have first-hoof confirmation that in the months immediately following the attack, Chrysalis stayed there in the Empire. Any chance she could be involved in these mystery cults?"

Senescey shook her head. "We know for a fact that she was in Canterlot when she attacked it, and the current governing situation has been in place since before that. It could be the work of these Changeling Bishops like the ones in Ironridge, though. Do you know about those?" She glanced at Felicity.

"Changeling Bishops?" Felicity tilted her head. "I must admit, this is the first I've heard the term. Though, I can tell you one thing that's unusual about the Canterlot attack: I have acquaintances there, sarosian circles, and they gave me no reports whatsoever about a repeat of the Empire's soul-draining taking place. That is to say, not a single new changeling was added to the swarm, even when things were going in Chrysalis's favor."

"Unusual." Senescey frowned. "In Ironridge, some of the Bishops - one in particular - were stopping at nothing to find a new way to make more changelings, one that didn't involve stealing the brands from native sarosians. They also seemed to be actively working to protect our kind. At first, I assumed they thought of us as natural resources and were attempting to restore our population as a matter of protecting their ability to sustainably farm us, or perhaps that the Bishops weren't even capable of draining us. But you say Chrysalis herself visited a city with a fresh sarosian population and left it untouched?"

Floria nodded. "By all accounts, Canterlot has one of the largest sarosian populations in Equestria - and, by extension, the world, if the north was as decimated as we have been led to believe. It is possible that something has interfered with Chrysalis's ability to enslave new members of your kind."

"Perhaps she was injured during her attack and never fully recovered," Felicity offered.

"Could be." Papyrus shrugged. "I stabbed her good, but she seemed to barely care. Regenerated almost instantly."

"One more question to ask her if we ever get the best of her," Senescey said. "At this rate, I don't know if that will ever happen. But it's what I was working on for most of the time between waking up and running into Papyrus again."

At Felicity and Floria's looks, Papyrus quickly added, "Oh. Yeah, I have a new name now. Comes with being literally born again, with new parents and everything. Actually, most of us do. I just don't respect theirs, is all."

"Nehaley," Larceny said. "I didn't need a reminder of my old life in my new one."

"Leitmotif," Senescey added. "Long story. As usual."

Felicity shrugged. "For my part, I'm the same old Felicity I've always been. Minus a few glow-ups, of course."

"Forgive me for changing the subject, but you said you were attempting to subdue Chrysalis," Floria cut in. "Are these contingencies for an unavoidable meeting, or are you planning to arrange such a confrontation on purpose?"

Senescey hesitated. "...I would like to do the latter. Since I don't have a way to fight her, or even survive being in her presence, attempting to track her down is the only part of the plan I've been able to pursue up until now. But in the hypothetical situation where I could have her at my mercy, there are some things from her that I need to know."

"Hey, you didn't tell me about this!" Papyrus leaned in. "Things such as?"

Senescey pointedly looked away from him. "Crystal - the mare Chrysalis used to be before ascending - had an even worse lot in life than we did. She had every reason to tear down the existing system and build something better in its place. We laid most of the foundation for her, and it was still in place after we broke up. All she had to do was finish our work. But then she left it all in ruins. She didn't make anything better. And no one who came after her was able to do so either, not in twenty long years of feudal governments and ponies getting trampled by circumstances beyond their control. I have to find out why."

She set her shoulders. "Those ponies failing once she was gone, I can understand. As mere mortals, we don't have the kind of power required to mold society into a utopia. But those limitations don't apply to gods. She had power enough to command hundreds of thousands of souls to perish instantly from countless miles away, but she stopped halfway through the cycle of destruction and recreation. She tore it all down, but that's something we could have done on our own. What she didn't do was the important part. I want to hear her reasoning... and if I don't like it, find out how to get that power for myself, so that I can do the job better."

No one seemed to quite know what to say. "You know," Papyrus pointed out, patting his chest, "I used to be a god too, and you never asked me about this."

"That's because you're deranged," Senescey said, as if it was simple.

"No, really! I can give you a fantastic answer." Papyrus adjusted himself in his seat, leaning closer. "Maybe not the answer you're wanting to hear, but a true one. About how someone can wind up with that much power and still want nothing more than to disappear."

"That sounds too philosophical for my tastes," Floria said. "From your repeated japes about returning to reconquer the Griffon Empire, I gather the reason for your appearance here is a much more pressing topic of conversation. Are you being serious?"

"I'm dead serious," Papyrus answered, setting aside his joviality. "Frankly, I've got a second chance on life I didn't deserve and don't know what to do with, and I might as well spend it cleaning up after Evil Me. Regardless of your feelings on the old Empire and what it did or didn't deserve, what it got was a pretty stingy deal. Finish what I started, except this time not tearing anything down purely for the fun of it. Now, I'd like it if you three were in this with me. You were my loyal lieutenants, and I'm sure the way things ended stings for you as well."

Felicity's ears fell.

"I'm not demanding your fealty, or anything," Papyrus went on. "If it wasn't for me, you three wouldn't have gotten split up, and so I figured a good place to start would be getting you back together again. See? Nothing in it for me: sincere atonement. But, I know you all had big dreams of being revolutionaries, so I'd be remiss not to offer you a chance to join me for your own sakes, and of your own volition. I sure could use you. Stripped of my sphinx powers and with my name in the gutter, all I've got to work with is a passing skill at fisticuffs and a very good memory of how things got to be the way they are."

"Let me make sure I'm understanding you correctly," Felicity cut in. "You're proposing that, out of the blue, we uproot ourselves from the lives we've built here, journey north to the remnants of the Griffon Empire, help you overthrow its current crop of rulers, and then install ourselves in their place, and somehow build a new system of governance around us that will stably endure long after we're gone."

"Which is basically what we were planning the last time around," Papyrus pointed out.

"Is it?" Larceny asked. "We were chasing the destruction of the nobility as a means for revenge. We never talked about what would come next."

"That's because rebuilding is the hard part," Senescey said. "From the sound of things, the current political situation in the Empire is much less stable than it was in our time. Toppling it again should be easy. Papyrus might even be able to manage that on his own. The true problem is what comes next. It's what we forgot to consider the first time around, and what I didn't even realize was missing until I found out what Chrysalis had done."

"And how do you feel about this?" Felicity asked her, focused.

Senescey shrugged. "I've... expanded my thinking since we last met. The old me had never traveled outside the Empire. The new me has seen much of the world. I would like to believe there is a solution out there, a way ponies can live indefinitely, without social hierarchies which lead to the weak trampled by the mighty. Papyrus's experiment... It's a chance for me to test my ideas."

She closed her eyes. "I haven't given up on our old dream. You... It looks like you've found a new life, now. The kind of stability we fought the entire Empire because we were denied. And I never thought I'd see you again. But my path is clear. If I continue, and you stay behind... This time, I'd like to part ways properly. Without a chip on my shoulder, and without leaving so much unsaid."

Larceny nodded.

Felicity bit her lip. "Darling, before rushing to conclusions... How long can you wait?"

"Huh?" Senescey blinked.

"Let me explain myself," Felicity said. "I am not intrinsically opposed to joining an effort to put right what we once allowed to go horribly wrong. In fact, I'd quite like to... to spend that much time with you once again. It's just that I currently have some very compelling reasons not to. Among them are a job in which I provide a completely irreplaceable service to an important client, and a headstrong child who might not appreciate such a move."

"Worry about your own affairs," Floria reassured her. "I am capable of taking care of myself."

"Also," Larceny added, "in case you didn't notice, I can barely move."

Felicity got to her hooves. "Might I have a look at you, darling?"

Larceny shrugged, opening her bathrobe. "Knock yourself out."

Felicity stepped forward and tapped her, positioning her hooves on Larceny's body in several stances that looked halfway between a doctor and a combat artist. Eventually, she stepped back, wearing a small frown.

"Well?" Larceny looked up. "You were always the best of us at Mistvale Arts. Anything?"

"...I don't quite know what to make of this," Felicity admitted. "You feel... faint. It reminds me vaguely of actively using an art on someone who is in the process of dying, which is a profoundly unsettling experience I don't advise any of you to partake in. Except instead of actively feeling you slip away, you are merely partly slipped away, and moving neither closer nor farther. It's like something killed you on a metaphysical level, but didn't quite finish the job."

Larceny frowned.

"Have you any idea what did this to you?" Felicity asked.

Larceny hesitated. "I didn't... quite make it out of the Empire on time. I was right on the edge of what Chrysalis did. As you said, it must have been unable to finish the job."

"I see," Felicity mused.

Floria retreated to a doorway, giving her a wary look.

"Oh, what's that for?" Papyrus asked, glancing over. "You don't know something about this, do you?"

"You know what spinxes are capable of," Floria replied. "If this mare is truly suffering from a failed attempt to remove her brand, perhaps it simply isn't 'set right' or some such. Seeing as we have multiple confirmed instances of sarosians recovering their minds and memories after having stolen brands restored to them, I could try to remove and replace it. See if that unsticks the issue."

"And the catch?" Senescey leaned in, intrigued. "You don't sound too eager."

Floria glowered. "I enjoy my sanity. If utilizing my powers as a sphinx could lead to the onset of conditions, I would rather stay well away. Unlike some, I do not have access to a nebulous process of reincarnation with which to outrun my mistakes."

Papyrus gave her a too-wide grin. "Before you go meowing up that tree, I'm running straight back toward my mistakes. And it's probably going to go horribly for everyone involved. And anyway, off the top of my head, the only sphinx in recent memory who went insane for being too charitable was Ginger Guardclaw. Oversaw House Guardclaw's destitution and eventual replacement with House Goldoa by giving away all their assets. Terribly tragic, I'd never do such a thing. So if you don't want to end up like me, you have little to fear from helping."

Floria gave him an owlish look. "I shall... think on it. For Mother."

"That does return the question of how long you can give us," Felicity said. "I, for one, need to examine the feasibility of taking a temporary leave of absence, see what assets I could potentially furnish you with, and most importantly see how I feel about this whole thing after sleeping on it. Impulsive relocation, I've had ample opportunity to learn, rarely ends in sustained happiness for anyone."

"Assets, you say?" Papyrus perked up.

"Like I said, I shall see." Felicity shook her head. "Perhaps it will be that I cannot help you in person, but can support you in another way. I work for the Equestrian government, did I mention that?"

Senescey's ears stood straight up. "A government job? After..."

"After what happened to us in the Empire, yes," Felicity finished for her. "I thought about it long and hard, and determined that I would feel more comfortable having myself in that position than a nameless stranger I couldn't trust to understand my own experiences. Regrettably, it's highly classified, and I can't tell you more - especially when one of you is officially a wanted fugitive, which we're going to have to clear up with the officials, no buts."

"Vouching for me sounds like an excellent way to earn a rock-solid excuse to flee this country in a hurry." Papyrus grinned. "Anyway, I wouldn't say we're in an extreme rush," he admitted. "And this place seems cushy enough. Say I found a way to entertain myself up here for a week, completely out of sight of the city and anyone who could get me in trouble. What could you do with that?"

Felicity bit her lip. "One week? That... should be enough for me to get my thoughts in order on how I feel about all this, at least. And I really would like to do something for Larceny. Perhaps... Hmm, but that would be an awfully big favor..."

"You would grant them leave of our entire home?" Floria asked, indignant. "Am I to have no privacy when you are gone at work!?"

"Perhaps they would get through to you that it's not so bad to have a rough edge here or there," Felicity gently chided her. "But I will forbid them from entering your room."

"Just my room? Mother!"

Papyrus leaned in and smiled beatifically. "Does this have to do with whoever you thought we were when you answered the door so cheerfully?"

Floria gave him an evil eye. "I thought you agreed never to speak of that again."

"If it's that embarrassing, you ought to thank me." Papyrus stood and slicked back his mane. "After all, your mother dearest might have walked in while they were still here. And wouldn't that be a sight to behold?"

"I will bite you," Floria threatened. "Mother, is this toad truly who you used to work for?"

Felicity smiled fondly. "On second thought, perhaps this would be a good week to put in overtime..."

Boundary

"We are here," Unnrus-kaeljos said, light cresting the top of its wave in an eternal flood. "I can take you no further."

I stood before the frozen wave on a chunk of rough red rock protruding above the lifestream. Now that I had been inside, I could see a little more clearly through the wall, like the surface of a shallow, rippling brook. The distant runes of light, the golden void, the figure with wings of swords hovering among it... but this was the real world, and Unnrus-kaeljos was now as distant as a waking dream.

"The child you seek is nearby," Unnrus-kaeljos promised, "but may not be for long. You must act decisively if you wish to recover her. Now go. I shall anticipate the day when we meet in person again."

And then the wave unfroze, and swept on by.

I didn't say anything as the light wave receded in the distance, and neither did Faye. Gradually, though, my trance was interrupted by the awareness that nothing about this area of the lifestream felt familiar.

First was the ether itself. Normally placid and so still it could be mistaken for the sky, it had ripples and waves, lapping choppily against the rocks. The turbulence broke up the visage of stars and replaced it with a purple, greenish swirl, and it didn't subside with Unnrus-kaeljos's passing.

Second was the wind. While the air around the river was never so stagnant as to be unbreathable, here, it blustered in my ears and threatened to lift the fur on my back.

The horizon was lit in the direction the wind was blowing from, almost as if Unnrus-kaeljos was still visible in the distance, except the light was different, more like sunset during a thunderstorm where the clouds broke far on the horizon. When I climbed to the top of the boulder pile, that light stretched in a vast, unbroken line before me, a solid wall of something in the distance.

I wasn't standing on the only solid ground, either. All around me, the cave ceiling was riddled with cracks and fissures, boulders and scree fallen from above and sitting in the river. The spider-web nature of the ceiling cracks led to a matching pattern of debris down below, a network of narrow, loosely-packed bridges that separated lagoons where the lifestream was calmer and rivers where it had broken through. And the cracks in the ceiling were easy to see, because through many of them, light was filtering down from above.

As I watched, a choppier part of the lifestream breaking against a wall of rock erupted like a geyser, spraying the ceiling with ether. The ether seemed to catch fire in midair as it rose, some of the magical flames burning against the ceiling and others escaping up the fissure like a chimney flue. When the activity subsided, the ceiling was stained a glossy black where the flames had burned it; I saw many other such places mixed in with the reddish natural rock from above. In the distance, another such plume erupted, filling my ears with the sound of distant explosions silhouetted by the wind.

Where are we? Faye asked in my mind. Is this somewhere with a broken Tree of Harmony? This can't be natural.

"I dunno." I spun in a slow circle, the eldritch landscape unbroken in every direction. "But, I think we should start by looking for a way up."

After an hour of painstaking progress, navigating terrain so loose that it could shift with the slightest bump of my hoof, I reached an area beneath a chasm with light filtering through where debris had piled high enough in one point to reach the ceiling. The odds of actually being able to climb beyond that point were infinitesimal, particularly without my bracelet to bolster my endurance, but the alternative to pressing on was taking a break, and that meant talking about Unnrus-kaeljos and how we were all alone with no friends or resources to fall back on, by our own volition. And that was bound to be an awkward conversation, so I pressed on.

I made it to the top of the rubble pile and into the chasm, stopping to rest on a thin shelf of rock suspended just above the ceiling level. It didn't feel sturdy, but looking around, nothing did: the walls of the chasm were cracked and broken, as if they had lost coherency as the world's crust a long time ago and only remained in place because nothing had tried to move them. Which didn't make sense, considering they were supported by nothing from below. But I wasn't sure what else to make of the sight.

Look up above, Faye said in my mind. The sky is right there. We aren't far underground at all.

I craned my neck. Surely enough, the rocks stopped in the distance, perhaps three times as far above as I had already come, climbing up from the ether river to the ceiling of its cavern. The chasm twisted as it rose, rocky lumps and protrusions sticking out at all angles, making its walls feel more like a hunk of crumbly cheese that had been pulled into halves rather than cleanly sliced or fractured. But through its twisting, I could see bits and patches of a dull, greenish-blue sky.

The Icereach sky hadn't matched up with the Ironridge sky, an icy, whitish-blue contrasted with a pure tropical teal, and both of those had been different from the cheery baby-blue skies in Equestria. But this was yet different, feeling somehow tired and sickly. Just like the sluggish, broken rocks of the canyon that didn't even fall down properly.

Where were we?

I followed the ledge enough to find some good hoofholds, and resumed my climb. A benefit of the rocks being so cracked like this, stability aside, was that it made climbing easy: the next slab up never aligned perfectly with the one below it, sometimes leaving a crack for me to wedge a hoof into, other times recessed enough to create a tiny ledge. Two more times, I stopped to rest; being in great physical shape made this climb possible in the first place, but it didn't inure me to the effects of dragging my body up a giant, unforgiving obstacle course.

This would be so much easier if I could use my wings.

Sorry, Faye said. If that was something I was sealing away, like the memories of us being a changeling queen, I would have given it back long ago. I wish we could fly too.

I sighed, waiting on a recessed ledge as an ether flame eruption passed by. The dark, multicolored flames rose swiftly, like an upside-down waterfall, and I could feel some sort of energy as they passed by, but it wasn't heat. This place was actually quite cold. It was refreshing, after so long away from Icereach.

After the eruption dissipated, I pressed on, using a fallen spur of rock to bridge to the other side of the chasm, where progressing looked easier. The bridge itself was majorly cracked in two different places, and yet it still held against my weight, even though it had every reason to crumble under its own. And yet, across from me, some scree slid down through a channel between two large slabs, pebbles clattering against bigger rocks, prompted by nothing.

I scrambled to the top of a slab that had started tipping out over the abyss, but gotten stopped by the pressure of the one above it, creating a large, slanted ledge that most smaller debris would roll off of. The rocks were a mix of rusty red and sandy yellow, streaked here and there by brown and gray, a homogeneous blend that felt like someone had taken once-pristine strata and then rearranged them a bit. Old rocks, dry rocks, cracked and broken rocks... Another shower of tiny pebbles and dust passed down, as I neared the very top.

A side chasm broke off from the main one, this one not going all the way down, and it provided me with a gentler ramp to finish my ascent. After clambering atop one final boulder wedged into the crack, I put my forehooves up on the rim of the surface, pulled myself up, and stared.

The landscape was broken just like the walls of the chasm, only magnified and turned on their side. Plain broken stone with no hint of vegetation or life was stacked haphazardly, forming steep hills or short mountains with stair-like slopes made from slabs of broken rock, with no soil in sight. The elevation changes were dynamic with no flat land in sight, so I resumed my climb, pulling myself onto the surface and then up several more chunks of rock to the crest of a nearby ridge.

Beyond that were more mountains. Low chains, like the one I was on now, unnaturally flat basins, giant pillars that sometimes expanded or formed arches as they rose. In some places there were simply floating islands of rock that were supported by nothing and didn't bother to fall; the big floating islands were invariably surrounded by smaller boulders or shards that joined them at a close distance in midair. Everything was crisscrossed by chasms leading to the lifestream below, and the occasional eruptions of flame were the only relief I had from the landscape's overpowering brownness. But even they seemed tainted, just like the greenish sky, rising as bands of aurora that eventually lost their momentum and drifted around the peaks of the pillars until they lost cohesion and vanished in smoke.

The wind blew less constantly than it had down below, sometimes shifting at a moment's whim, gales and blusters creeping like predators through pockets of stillness. And in the distance - close in the distance - there was a light on the horizon, just like I had seen from below.

This place is wrong, Faye whispered in my mind, giving voice to the obvious. It's too... dead. The stars that we see when you get closer to my power, especially when I've been suppressed for a while? There's nothing. Not even the background haze I get from plant life and creatures that aren't intelligent. Nothing at all.

I was beginning to grow thirsty, and my skin itched beneath my coat, as if I was too hot even though it was freezing out here. "Maybe we should focus on making sure we don't end up the same way," I said. "We know Coda is nearby. That means there must be someone with her, right? Someone with some way to survive out here. Are you sure you can't sense anything at all?"

No. Nothing.

"In that case..." I glanced at the glowing horizon, which seemed to be only beyond one more shallow ridge. "We go that way. Because I'm pretty sure that was the direction we were going when Unnrus-kaeljos dropped us off, and it looks like there's something over there."

Without wings, I had to make a careful descent through a valley to reach the next ridge, this one also sporting a chasm down to the lifestream. After following it for so long that I realized it was about to wrap back around and become the chasm I ascended through, I doubled back and tried the other direction, this time miraculously finding another bridge. The dryness in my throat grew worse as the minutes ticked into another hour, but eventually I crested the next ridge, and looked out at the end.

Before me, the chasms rapidly grew wider until the land gave way to a collection of floating islands, the view ahead more air than stone. Through the widening cracks, I could see the lifestream once again, flowing faster and faster outwards until it hit a burning band, lighting up in a luminous band of plasma, a perfect, unbroken line. Jets of flame rose up with increasing frequency the closer to the boundary I looked, and beyond that line, from my high-up vantage point, there was nothing. The green sky darkened as it drew closer to the horizon until I could see night and stars beyond, and below, as well.

I was looking down over the edge of the world. And beneath it was the night sky, exactly like the river of ether... except now connected to the night above.

This is... Faye whispered in my mind, her thoughts trailing off into awe.

"The edge of the world," I whispered back. "I always wondered what it would look like. Isn't this place supposed to be so dangerous nobody's ever properly explored it, beyond confirming that it probably exists?"

They say the laws of physics break down as you get closer to the edge, Faye said. And judging by how inconsistent gravity and erosion are here, I'd say that might just be accurate. They also say it's difficult to sustain life out here, and impossible to create new life.

"Difficult to sustain life." I was feeling that pretty strongly now, except... I pointed a hoof. "Then what do you think that is?"

Near the very edge, in an area where the islands were slightly denser and the chasms slightly closer to still being chasms instead of empty space, a network of bridges crossed the gaps, rusted and looking as if someone had thought better of building them halfway through construction. And on the island at the end of the bridges, the largest chunk of rock that far out in either direction as far as the eye could see, was a castle, made of the same reddish-brown stone, reinforced with sporadic metal plating and surrounded by a glossy bubble the color of normal sky.

I don't know, Faye said with a mental shiver. I'm not getting any signs of life from it at all. No stars. It's just as dead as the rest of this place.

I pointed at one of the castle's towers, where a distinctive airship was moored. Heavily armored and overengineered, its prow was painted to look like the face of a shark, and it had what looked like a giant eye on its belly.

There was no mistaking it: I had seen this airship before, in Ironridge newspaper articles about the Pirate King, Rhodallis.

"I don't know why our powers aren't working," I hissed, "but this place has to be important. That's where we need to go."

Faye sounded skeptical. Do you think we're really in a position to go walking into a castle we know nothing about, that's protected by unknown magic, when we're on our own and not at full power?

I bit my tongue. No... With our history, that would probably end terribly. "But what choice do we have?" I decided to press, my ears slicking back against the wind. "The light spirit said Coda's not going to be here for long. And do you really think there are going to be any livable rest areas within however many miles of here for us to rest up, learn about the situation and get better equipment?"

Faye hesitated. ...I'm just worried. Halcyon, I'm not so sure trusting Unnrus-kaeljos is a good idea. I know you want to break out of our pattern of failing to perform when the pressure is on, but we have no safety net at all right now. What will we do the first time anything tries to stop us at all?

I glanced down... and remembered that I was wearing only boots, and no coat. Odds were, I'd get abashed about having so much of my body in plain sight among strangers, even if our first encounter wasn't hostile. We wouldn't accomplish anything at all.

But even though my own mental limitations had stopped me before, they had yet to stop me this time. We weren't paralyzed yet, and could still try again.

I just hope that if this place teaches you a lesson, it'll be one you can recover from, Faye said. I might... No, never mind. If we wind up in need of saving again, it'll be because we've exhausted all our options and can't make ourselves do anything more, once and for all. And maybe having nothing to fall back on this time will be what we need to push through.

"Thanks." I nodded, hoping her logic was sound. "And hey, maybe you're right and there's nobody in that castle at all. In which case, free airship for us?"

Maybe. Faye didn't sound convinced.

I made my way slowly and carefully towards the castle, painfully aware of how little cover there was as I searched for natural bridges I could use to reach the point where the constructed bridges began. Another hour passed, the sun never budging from its position on the opposite horizon to the world's edge. Maybe it didn't work right here, either.

At this rate, dehydration was going to kill me before any bad encounters did.

The closer I drew, the better of a look at the castle I got. Its entire island had been reinforced, plates of what looked like scrap iron bolted across fractures in the rock to hold it together. Whether or not that actually helped, I couldn't tell. The other islands were holding together just fine despite looking like they could break apart at any minute, after all.

Finally, after descending far more than I was comfortable with to reach a point where the islands were close enough to jump, I clawed my way onto the final island before the real bridges started, and approached the first one. It seemed to be made from iron fencing nailed haphazardly to the top of four parallel pipes, the pipes burrowing into and out of the rock of the islands themselves, leaving cracks where it entered.

The pipes seemed familiar for some reason, though I couldn't place where. They were silvery and ribbed, only slightly tarnished compared to the fencing that made up the walking surface above them, made up of countless interlocking cylinders each a little shorter than a pony. How had they gotten here? What was their purpose? I decided not to stick around and speculate; there was no cover at all from here to the gates of the castle, and four whole islands to cross to get there. If any undetectable guards were watching, and I didn't want to throw myself on their mercy, I'd have to move quick-

"Well, well, well!" something said the moment I set hoof on the bridge. "This is surprising!"

I jumped in shock, landing back on the starting island. "Who said that!?"

Nothing.

Carefully, warily, I inched a hoof back over to the bridge.

"Yeah, there you are!" The voice was back, peppy and cheerful. "Don't run away, or anything. You've seen what this place looks like, right? I bet you'll last all of ten minutes out there without some serious preparation!"

"What... are you...?" I asked, keeping a single hoof on the bridge.

"The name's Canon!" the bridge chirped, speaking with a big-city stallion's voice. "I'm a life support system! My purpose in existence is keeping your meaty moist bits from turning into desiccated rock. And you, chump, I'm thinking you're getting pretty desiccated. Been out here too long, or something? How'd you get out here in the first place?"

"It's a long story," I started. "And I'm not a chump-"

"Yeah, yeah, probably longer than you've got left on your clock. Tell you what: you just keep going this way, and I'll find a way to get you into the castle and get you some water. That way, you can keep the meat on your bones where it belongs! Sounds good, eh?"

I had no idea what to make of this. "Isn't that dangerous?" I asked warily. "Your castle's just accepting visitors? It's not out here to make it impossible to reach?"

"Aww, of course it is!" Canon excitedly agreed. "But I'm a keep-your-meat-made-of-meat system, not a security system. Can't fault me for just doing my job. So come on, what have you got to lose? No more than you've got on the line staying out in this stinking desert."

Fake hospitality is still better in the short term than outright hostility, Faye admitted.

I agreed, and so I took a tentative step forward.

"That's more like it. Hey, pick up the pace!" Canon encouraged. "You're not getting any moister standing out here, that's for sure. You know water? That good wet stuff? Gravity works in weird ways on it out here. Sometimes it falls straight up into the sky. You could drill all the wells you like out here and not find a single molecule. It's that bad. In fact-"

Canon's voice cut off as I left the bridge behind and stepped onto the next island.

"Wow, you really can't hear me," Canon said the moment I stepped onto the next bridge. "Most ponies, see, I can bother them from a pretty respectable distance. Comes with keeping their meat alive. Are you sure you're normal, chump? It's like you go invisible the moment you stop touching the pipes."

"The pipes?" I ignored the insult and kept moving, looking at the supports for the bridge. "What's that got to do with anything?"

"Well, they're basically my skeleton!" Canon explained, endlessly talkative. "Kind of like the bones in your own body, except you don't talk with those. Except for your jawbone! But that's a special case. So think of the pipes like my skeleton, except every bone is a jawbone. That clear it up?"

How bizarre.

Canon kept chattering as I approached the final bridge before the gates of the castle. "So you're sure I'm welcome here?" I warily repeated, looking up at the massive sealed gate and the dome of blue just around it. "This doesn't look like a place that's expecting visitors."

"Well, of course you're not!" Canon happily rambled. "But screw that, says I. Case in point, you're not doing so hot out there on your own, and what am I supposed to do, not do my job?"

"Against your masters' wishes?" I ventured.

"Eh." Canon gave me a verbal shrug. "You know, keeping blokes alive in a place like this is a pretty tough job. Not just anyone can pull it off! So I suppose you could say if they don't like the way I do things, too bad, 'cause they're stuck with me. Anyone less dedicated to the job wouldn't be up to the task, see. I bet you couldn't do a better job of making this place habitable!"

"Right..." I glanced again at the gate, which remained locked and closed. "Where are we, again? Whose castle is this?"

"Boy, you came all the way out here without knowing a thing like that?" Canon chortled. "People sure are strange. This is Neo Everlaste Palace, the seat of power of the Griffon Empire! The whole entire consulate is based here. Say, you're not a consul nobody introduced me to, right?"

The Griffon Empire.

"I don't think so," I said distractedly, realizing I hadn't even started making a list of all the places I knew about on the world's edge. The Griffon Empire.

The land where I was born.

"Thought not. You don't really have the moxie for it, you know?" Canon's voice echoed up from the pipes, which I realized also crawled their way across some of the castle walls, like lazy vines on a poorly-maintained structure. "But hey, I've been fed wilder stories before. Anyway, let's get you up and inside! Circle around right for a bit. There's a great pipe there that'll let you climb over the wall."

"Convenient," I muttered, leaving the metal and Canon's voice behind as I circled the dangerously thin strip of dusty rock between the castle wall and the bottomless void, turbulent ether frothing below on its way to the edge just a single island-length away.

Eventually, I found the pipe, arranged at a gentle slope up the wall and with nothing else to block my climb. The bottom disappeared into the rock, and the top flopped over the edge of the wall.

"This sure seems like something the castle security would be interested in," I noted as I climbed it, my boots feeling slick against the pipe's polished surface. Its metal felt thin somehow, not quite weak enough to buckle under my weight, but like I could punch it and leave a dent without too much trouble. "Why's there even a pipe here, anyway?"

"Because it looked too empty without one," Canon explained, as if that was a perfectly reasonable reason to build a pipe in an unreasonable place. "Where else was I gonna put it?"

"Fair enough..." I reached the rampart, where the shield around the castle touched down.

Stepping through the shield, I instantly felt better. A ringing in my ears I hadn't noticed before disappeared, the sky was blue again, and I felt mildly less parched, on top of a general sense that my balance had improved and I could close my eyes without worrying if I'd be able to open them again.

Unfortunately, the pleasantness from being inside a righted environment was offset by the contents of the castle courtyard. It wasn't just the island outside: austere steel plating completely covered the floor and haphazard parts of the walls, with pipes zigzagging everywhere they wouldn't trip someone up. It gave the impression that this was an ancient structure that had been hastily repurposed by someone whose sense of style was meant to feel as unwelcoming as possible.

The courtyard was also completely empty. Not a soul to be seen.

"Looks like security's light today!" Canon happily remarked.

Halcyon? Faye said in my mind. The moment we stepped inside this bubble, I started being able to detect people. There are quite a few on that airship, but outside of it, I can only feel five in this entire castle. I think. It's hard to count, because some of them are deeply abnormal.

Worrying... What kind of abnormal?

I'm not sure, she continued. I've never felt anything like this before. And they're all similar, but different, too. If we can get away from our pipe friend, let's try to pass over control so you can feel it too.

Lovely. I glanced at the nearest pipe, brushing it again with a hoof.

"Alright, chump," Canon goaded. "You're going to have to trust me on this one, but that side door there is completely unguarded. Just do your sarosian thing and slide on in!"

I looked at the door it seemed to be suggesting, down in a shadowed area of the courtyard.

It's telling the truth, Faye confirmed. No one behind that door. All of them are higher up in the tower.

That was good enough for me... especially since Canon hadn't done anything yet to indicate it could hear Faye. I dropped down from the wall and slipped in beneath the door.

The corridor on the other side had been mostly retrofitted with black metal plates, but nobody had bothered to see to the joints, and as a result they were separated at the edges by about an inch of bare, ancient stone.

This corridor had no pipes in it, but at a junction ahead, another one unceremoniously snaked around a corner, laying on the floor like a discarded garden hose. I walked up and touched it.

"Smooth sailing so far, right?" Canon egged me on. "So next you'll go left, then right up the staircase, then right, then go past three doors and you'll find the water storage room. And boom. Am I a life preservation system of my word, or am I one of my word?"

"We'll see about that," I said, thinking to Faye, Can you feel Coda?

She paused. Maybe. It's possible one of the things I feel could be her. I didn't get any time up front around her after she absorbed the windigoes... or before that, for that matter. But I know what a windigo feels like, and I think there are traces of those here.

Right...

I didn't like any of this. Now that the conversation had turned to windigoes, Canon's demeanor reminded me worryingly of Ludwig. Was I jumping at an invitation to walk into a trap? Even if this was a place I needed to go to accomplish my mission... Pressing on, whether I listened to Canon or not, would be a matter of throwing my fate to the whims of fortune.

How had I managed to get into this situation with so little resources at my disposal?

Well, Faye lectured, I did warn you about jumping into that you-know-what...

Here I was chasing Coda with no weapons, no reliable information about where I was or what was going on around here, no allies, no escape plan, and no supplies for surviving in the wilderness. And, as usual, I was freezing up: not because I was unreasonably scared to commit to a course of action, but because I quite literally had no tools to work with.

Was this always what did me in at the end? Every time I had failed before, was it due to a lack of preparation not giving me the tools I needed to carry out a decent plan?

How was I so bad at this?

Change of plans, I thought at Faye. Forget Coda for now. Even if I find her and grab her, I don't know that I could survive on my own right now, much less carrying around an ice sculpture. Top priority is now finding a way to get to a place where we can survive long enough to get some resources to our name. The only thing around here that's remotely familiar is that pirate ship, so I think our best bet is to try our luck with them. At the very least, we know they oppose Ironridge's windigo government, so we might be able to trade information for safe passage out of here.

Faye considered this. ...I didn't expect that from you. But I don't see that we have any options that involve less gambling.

Should we still go check out this water storage room our pipe friend wants to lead us to? I asked.

What do you think? Faye asked back.

It didn't seem worth it. Not if I wanted to reach that ship as fast as possible, before anyone else could potentially find me. I could still last a while longer, and surely the pirates would have their own supplies.

So, I started searching for staircases, taking care not to touch any pipes I passed by just in case.

The castle wasn't that big. I wound up going past the water storage room anyway, because it just seemed like the best way to go: the hallway after the first staircase ran parallel to the castle's main entrance, and a long, darkened window to the left probably overlooked its central chamber. With the lights off in the main room, I couldn't see what was in there, but the corridor itself was lit enough for me to find my way.

I took a peek into the storage room as I passed by - none of the doors in this castle seemed to have actual doors, and were simply open apertures, save for the ones leading outside. It turned out to be a perfectly innocuous storeroom, with several huge metal tanks in the back and a bunch of wooden crates up front that I quickly deduced held food.

Should I steal some? Canon had basically offered to give it to me anyway, even if I was now avoiding the pipes to dodge the possibility of further manipulation now that I had a plan. I figured it would be okay to just grab a bit, so long as I didn't dawdle.

No alarms sounded. Cheeks bulging, I went on my way.

Behind the central room, another flight of stairs went up, and another went down after it in what was likely a mirrored configuration on the other side of the castle. A third staircase offered another way, and soon I was on a level where the metal plating was slightly less obtrusive, with fluffy red carpets that were both horribly unfitting and not that expensive in the first place. It was like someone without the resources of a royal was pretending to be one anyway.

And there were still pipes everywhere, crawling along the ceiling and walls.

Hallie. Faye stopped me abruptly. I think we're getting close to where the ponies are, and they're coming this way. Take cover if you don't want to be seen first.

I ducked into the closest door available, dropping into a shadow created by its frame and watching as stealthily as I could.

Their voices reached me before their visages. "No," a chiseled, callous stallion's voice was saying. "I expected as much. You don't get a reputation for not existing by showing your face around visitors to your castle. That said, I hoped our cargo could at least tempt him to barter..."

"This castle doesn't look like it gets many visitors," said a second voice, one which instantly made my blood run cold. "And we had to let a consul aboard our ship to even get here! With a vetting process like that, you'd think we could at least see the ringleader."

It was Rondo.

The Aldebaran incident had sunk to a deep page in my memory, something I tried not to dwell on now that I had smoothed things over with Leitmotif and gotten bigger problems to worry about. But I had completely forgotten that she didn't speak for the rest of her crew, and they parted ways after their capture by Elise. What even were the others? Vivace and... Tempo? Or was it Rubato?

But Rondo's voice brought his name instantly back to my head. If he was affiliated with the pirates - which was much more likely than an affiliation with the castle - that could complicate my new plans.

"Don't be so sure we haven't," the first voice corrected, its tone a strange and unsettling mix of pragmatism, mentorship and arrogance. "Sometimes the thing you know they're hiding is a trick to keep you from looking for what they're actually hiding. With creatures like these, you can never be too certain..."

"Quite bold of you to discuss this in the presence of a consul," said a third voice, snide and sure of itself yet maintaining a veneer of respectability.

"Is it?" asked the first voice. "I've got nothing to hide."

The group rounded the corner and entered the room, a long, wide hallway with stone pillars along the edges. My eyes picked out Rondo first; he hadn't changed his appearance at all since coming to Icereach. Walking in the middle was a huge stallion with pegasus wings and a chocolate coat, he wore a custom-made set of black and purple armor that accentuated his toned form and left his special talent open for all to see: an empty circle, just like Lilith, Samael and Estael's.

The third pony, a unicorn stallion of normal stature with a well-oiled mane, also wore custom armor, though it was clearly a mark of office more than something meant to be functional. Burnished, interlocking and proud, it had a green and purple insignia I recognized from Icereach's limited history textbooks as belonging to the Griffon Empire's House Everlaste - a symbol that was oddly missing from any of the castle's decorations, when Canon had called it Everlaste Palace.

His armor also had a perfectly folded cravat.

But the thing my eyes settled on and refused to leave was what Rondo was pulling: a wheeled cart carrying a block of ice. In the middle was Coda, exactly as I had seen her last.

My heart clenched. There she was...!

It looks like the pirates have her, Faye said in the back of my mind. Maybe trying to align ourselves with them doesn't have to mean sacrificing this goal, after all. Unnrus-kaeljos did say she might not stay in this area for long.

Yeah. But if they had her, they obviously had designs on her, too...

"Alright," said the biggest stallion, who had 'pirate king' written all over him. "I think it's time we left this dump and tried our luck with the Night's Boon. Us visiting your sworn enemies next wouldn't make you go back on your word, Consul."

"Of course not," huffed the stallion in a cravat. "I will escort your ship far enough that it can fly on its own without my power. What you do after that is your own business. But do remember the terms under which my lord offered to reconsider your proposal."

Rhodallis scoffed. "If he gets a second chance to buy the kid, it'll be because he sucks it up and decides he likes what I'm doing, not because I dance to anyone's tune. I know what you're playing at. I've seen this game before. You think you're so clever... but in reality, you're just lucky I have bigger targets to chase. Now get a move on back to the ship! This castle's decor is an eyesore."

I think that's our cue, Faye whispered. If you want a ride out of here with them, and with Coda, it's now or never.

I swallowed, then rose out of the shadows, having a sinking feeling this would end with signing another contract.

Crew

I took a deep breath, and stepped out into sight of the three stallions.

Pirate King Rhodallis - scourge of the Ironridge army's morale, a guerilla raider who operated out of Varsidel and attacked military ships, taking their crews captive and then releasing them again for no reason, someone I knew only from keeping up with newspapers while I had been there - gave me the kind of glance you use when spotting a bit of money on the sidewalk and deciding whether to pick it up.

The armored stallion with the cravat, an older brown unicorn with a greased-back mane whom I took to be the Consul, had a more animated response.

"What is this thing doing in the castle?" he sniffed, turning up his nose at me.

Rondo, for his part, betrayed only a light gasp. "Halcyon?"

Rhodallis raised an eyebrow at him.

"She's with you, then, is she?" the Consul asked, sounding like he had a runny nose. "Sending spies in bad faith to snoop around the castle while attempting to curry favor with His Highness? And you wonder why we were unable to reach an accord."

Rhodallis chuckled. "Fair's fair, right? I let you on my ship. Hurry up, Halcyon! And try not to leave the good Consul's sight. We can't antagonize him too much until we have no further need of him, remember."

My head spun. I figured this might end with some sort of contract, I was trying to get on board Rhodallis' ship to get away from this castle, and yet before I could say so much as a word, he had picked me out and pressed me into an act as a member of his crew.

Well, okay. There were a million ways this could go wrong, and exactly zero it could go better. I nodded, and started walking.

An awkward silence ensued, Rondo pointedly holding his tongue even though he clearly wanted to speak to me and Rhodallis cowing the Consul into submission by silently daring him to run his mouth about spies. For my part, I had no trouble keeping my mouth shut: things were going my way, and the slightest thing I did could change that. I had stumbled into being a pawn on somebody else's board, as so often had happened before.

We exited the castle at one of its upper floors, onto an airship dock made entirely of metal and clearly not part of the original stone construction. This close to the edge of the world, even the sunlight felt oppressive, the distant rush of ether colliding with that burning line ringing in my ears. I glanced at Coda to see if she reacted to our surroundings in any way, anything at all, but she was just as still and unresponsive as the day I found her in Cold Karma's basement.

Ahead was the airship I had seen from below, its decorations bizarre and intimidating. Ignoring the shark face on its prow and the giant eye on its belly, the main body of the ship was painted and constructed to look like a ribcage, its hull closer to a cylinder than something with a deck on top. The lift and propulsion mechanism was centralized in several dozen glowing vents around its sides, bottom and rear: a dirigible-less class of mana ship that had been futuristic and promising twenty years ago, but was blocked from becoming mainstream after the Steel Revolution due to its poor energy efficiency and the spiking price of power. For one rich enough to operate one, they offered plenty of combat benefits, however, including good reaction time, a small profile and the ability to armor their critical components.

The cape attached to Rhodallis' armor billowed as he led the way, and the ship's side slid open, a door revealing itself in welcome. Just inside, I could see several ponies flanking the path, awaiting their master.

As the threshold approached, I focused, trying to ensure my legs didn't shake and fighting back a surge of self-consciousness at being seen without a coat. What was worse, choking under the pressure of my agency and failing my mission at the moment of truth? Or not having agency in the first place?

Whichever I happened to have, always wishing for the other was my lot in life. I closed my eyes, swallowed and said a silent prayer, hoping that fate - the one thing that did sometimes work in my favor - would be on my side again.

"Haven't cleaned this place up in my absence, I see," the Consul drawled as he stepped into the boarding room. "Well? I take it I won't be given better quarters, either?"

"Same room as last time," Rhodallis said, indicating a staircase with a tip of his head. I turned to follow where he was looking... and in that instant as I was distracted, his hoof hit me on the back, pushing me forward.

"And throw her in the brig!" he barked, several crew mates already rushing to obey. "She offended our host's hospitality in the castle, and we wouldn't want to tarnish our new relations by letting justice go unserved."

The Consul sniffed again as two ponies grabbed me from either side. "Yes, you do that. I'll be in my 'quarters', fulfilling my hopefully final end of our bargain..."

I didn't struggle. There was nothing it could possibly accomplish, even though from the feel of these ponies, I might actually be their equal in strength.

Of course I was being taken prisoner. That was how it always started. In the bunker, with Aldebaran. In the Barnabas weapon shop... Hadn't Egdelwonk wanted me to follow up on that?

Nothing to do but wait and see what he was keeping me alive for. And after that, see just how much more complicated my life could become.

Corsica didn't pass the time in her room. She knew from experience that if she went to bed without a good reason to get up, she would stay there for far too long and feel like garbage as a result. And she didn't have a good reason to do anything, so instead she chose to loiter in a public space where eventually someone would come along and scrape her off the floor if she became too sedentary.

The space she chose for that was the mess hall on the bottom floor of the Immortal Dream. When it wasn't in use for feasting, an unusual system of winches and chains could hook to the corners of the grand table and retract it into the ceiling, clearing out a wide, empty space with benches on the sides and nothing in the middle.

Instead of being plain wood, however, the floor beneath where the table would go was glass, offering a panoramic window through the bottom of the ship to the desert far below.

Who designed something like this? Wasn't there a risk it would break? Or had they invented failsafes somehow, however that had been? Wouldn't the money spent on making something like this actually practical have been better used improving flight performance? The Immortal Dream was full of things that made her ask this, from the beautifully carved and decorated woodworking to the sliding doors that somehow never got stuck, even when hinges would have been so much simpler.

It only could have been someone with infinite time and infinite resources who had nothing better to do than take something that didn't need to be beautiful and make it so regardless. This was the kind of thing Icereach would make. Except it was actually finished.

Corsica stared at the desert as it passed below, all of its water locked long ago in clay and then left in the sun to bake into stone. The sun hadn't yet set since they left Our Town, and by the next sunrise they would be out over the sea.

Hoofsteps made her ears twitch as someone wandered by, and she looked up. It was Rarity.

Rarity stopped, something on the tip of her tongue, though she didn't let it out.

"It's my birthday," Corsica remarked, offering her a conversation starter.

"Yes, I suppose it is," Rarity admitted, taking that as permission to sit down beside her. "But your mood doesn't look receptive to a congratulations. Do you mind if I join you?"

"Knock yourself out," Corsica offered. "On both counts. I don't... really care, anymore."

Rarity sat, and held her tongue. And after a long moment of silence, she said, "You know, ponies tell me I'm quite good at listening."

Corsica shrugged. "I just got ditched, once and for all by my best friend. What am I supposed to say about that? It happened. Words won't change that. And even if there were words that could have prevented it, I didn't have them. Not for lack of trying. I try and I try and I try, run myself ragged each day. Takes far less to do me in than it does for a normal pony. I guess she finally decided it wasn't worth waiting for me to keep up."

Rarity listened.

"You ever feel like..." Corsica tongued the inside of her cheek. "Like you're only moving because of momentum you had from some previous phase of your life? Like every day, you slow down more and more. Like there's nothing new that you're running on, like you've stopped having the kinds of experiences that make you alive and you're only living off your memories of experiences from long ago? I don't even know if I can blame this on my special talent. I haven't overused it right now. As of a few months ago, I was still raring to go, making plans to escape Icereach and live the big life once I had outran everything that was holding me back."

"As an artist, I can relate," Rarity said. "What you're describing sounds an awful lot like a creative funk, when I'm too busy rehashing old ideas to embrace new ones and then run out of old ones to rehash."

"What do you do when that happens?" Corsica asked, looking up. "I can't pretend my life's a work of art, but it sounds similar enough."

Rarity leaned back against the bench. "Well, don't stop, for one. Some ponies extol the virtues of taking breaks, but if you ask me, stepping back from your work at a time when you're struggling to engage with it amounts to giving yourself an excuse not to engage at all. You have to be ready to live with the fact that you won't make something up to your usual standards while the muse isn't there, of course, but I don't think I'd have ideas half as good if I let myself get out of that how can I use this mindset. And I think that applies rather well as a life philosophy, because the absolute worst way to find something worth living for would be to sit down and try to pause living your life."

"In other words, keep dragging myself along," Corsica said. "Where, though?"

"Where?" Rarity tilted her head, looking concerned. "Outside your front door, anywhere? Surely you must have some regular obligations and responsibilities that require doing things beyond sitting around in a funk."

"Nope," Corsica said. "Wasn't allowed any in Icereach, after a falling-out with my dad. And I don't exactly have roots in Equestria. The thing I've been throwing myself into these last few years is making Hallie's dreams a reality. And now, I just don't have anything to do."

"So you're not talking so much about a lack of inspiration as a complete and utter detachment from everything," Rarity pointed out with a frown. "Not even any duties or responsibilities."

Corsica shrugged. "Couldn't exactly take them with me from Ironridge. And here, my only job was to raise the alarm, and that's mission complete. As far as I'm aware, no one's counting on me anymore to do anything."

"Now that sounds like a vicious cycle for one's self-esteem," Rarity pointed out. "Well, I'd happily offer you an invitation to put down roots in Ponyville. Though, depending on what happens when we get back to civilization, the lot of us could be setting off on a northerly adventure, which wouldn't be very conducive to helping you get properly integrated into society."

"That was sort of the plan," Corsica told her. "When Valey sent us south, I don't think she seriously intended us to succeed at finding help. Part of her just wanted us to settle down safely out of the way."

Rarity thought about this for a moment. "Well, if you'd still like to do that the moment the next period of international peace and quiet rolls around, we'd all be delighted to have you, and for my part I have quite a few connections in Ponyville and could easily get you hooked up with a lovely and well-positioned abode. But if you don't mind me changing the subject a bit, your cutie mark... I've heard the most important parts on what it does, but what does it mean?"

"I dunno." Corsica glanced at her flank, where a series of triangles and runes sat that she told ponies back in Icereach represented architecture. "According to Valey, it's something called an Artifice, tied to the virtue of Hope. But its practical effect on me is opposite that, since it consumes my desires to run. So I'm not even sure it has meaning. Just function. All it is is a tool."

Rarity nodded. "Ponies in the north, I've heard your cutie marks are both rarer and more powerful than the ones in Equestria. My own mark, I doubt it would be particularly impressive to you, but it's something of a special one around here: it lets me detect nearby geodes with my horn. And cutie marks with actual physical powers are far in the minority in Equestria. Most of them convey some form of expertise, or even are nothing but meaning. A guide to help remind ponies of the purpose of their lives. So perhaps I'm off base here, and forgive me if I'm violating some major cultural barrier, here, but at least in my culture, it seems like the problem might be that your cutie mark isn't doing its job."

"Well, duh," Corsica said. "Did you miss the part where it makes it impossible for me sustain caring about things?"

"Not like that," Rarity insisted. "I mean that it isn't performing the basic function of symbolizing what you want to do with your life."

Corsica frowned. "I guess we don't really have the concept of that in the north. Icereach was a little different, but for most ponies in Ironridge that I talked to, you figure out what you want to do on your own, and a special talent is something the lucky ones get that's just power to help you get it done."

Rarity shook her head. "If I were more of a scientist, I'd wonder if northern and southern cutie marks are actually different things altogether. But I suppose that's a silly hypothesis when we know yours is different. Though I'll admit that this 'artifice' thing still throws me for a loop at times."

"The way I remember it," Corsica said, "you've got your three virtues: hope, love and knowledge. Starlight is the real thing. Who knows what the other two flames are doing. Probably spooky flame things. And then the artifices - like my special talent, and Valey's, and the one Celestia supposedly has - are cheap copies."

"Right, right," Rarity said, pushing in as Corsica got to cheap copy. "But darling, what if... I don't know, I'm spitballing here, but what if this artifice isn't meant to be your real cutie mark? If you're feeling directionless in life, it's certainly not helping, and what if it's even blocking you from getting your real cutie mark by taking its spot or something? Around here, magic that interferes with or attempts to change the process of getting a cutie mark usually has disastrous results."

"You think?" Corsica rubbed at her flank, half expecting her special talent to peel right off. It didn't.

"You did get it in an unusual way, didn't you?" Rarity pressed.

"While I was in a coma," Corsica admitted. "From what I've seen, getting these isn't the same between north and south, but this wasn't normal for either of our homes. I've been lying about it for years to casual acquaintances just to avoid weird questions and speculation. Didn't even know what to make of it myself until I met Valey. Now, my best guess is that while I was unconscious, some part of me didn't want to die so badly that I attracted this somehow, and it let me claw my way back to life. But imagining myself with that much willpower in this day and age..." She closed her eyes, and suddenly found that there was a tear ready to fall. "I miss who I used to be."

Rarity put a tentative hoof on her shoulder. "We all do, sometimes. Whether it's youthful innocence, or a missed opportunity, or... I'm sure someone older than I could put it much better, from experience. But I don't think there's a pony alive who hasn't wished they could go back and redo something they did before."

"I try not to wish to change the past," Corsica said, letting the hoof remain. "When I've done it before... it always does something, but it always makes things worse. Usually, I learn the truth about something that really happened, and the thing I wanted to change turns out to be a lie I've been living all along."

Rarity blinked.

"Can you imagine that?" Corsica asked. "Living life knowing that anything you experience could be fake at any given moment? What if future me loses control for the tiniest second and suddenly all the things I remember happening now are just a skewed interpretation of what really happened? Either history is malleable and I've just wiped something away, or I'm not malleable and all my thoughts and wishes are predetermined in accordance with what really happened."

"I..." Rarity managed. "I might be badly out of my wheelhouse on that one, I'm afraid. But if you're worried about stuff like this, I would strongly recommend talking to Twilight. Out of all of us, she's the only one who has direct experience with time travel."

Corsica felt a strong sense of deja vu, as if she had been told this before and immediately forgotten even though this was an important revelation. "I'll... give her a chat," she said, itching at the opportunity to do something productive instead of sitting here feeling sorry for herself. "Good talk. I needed this. Thanks."

"Always happy to help," Rarity assured her. "And happy birthday, by the way."

"Oh, yeah." Corsica gave her a defeated look. "I guess that thing we were working on is kind of a dead elephant now, huh?"

"The present for Halcyon?" Rarity guessed. "I don't know how much she was expecting to receive a gift from someone on their birthday, even if that's a tradition I've indulged in myself on multiple occasions, but I suppose we'll just have to hold onto it until your inevitable reunion. Which will happen, darling, and when it does I promise I'll be there to slap some sense into her with you."

"Thanks," Corsica said, getting to her hooves. "I've got an extra-strength one socked away for her choosing this of all days to leave on..."

The ship's brig turned out to be poorly constructed for batponies, just a couple of cages in a hold with vertical iron bars and low ceilings. But anything better wasn't needed: only a fool would try to escape mid-flight, rather than accepting their fate and sitting still. And though I might have been a fool, I wasn't that bad. Yet.

I held my tongue, and the crew mates didn't prompt me to speak. Rondo never crossed my limited line of sight; Rhodallis probably wanted us separate on purpose. He was probably also interrogating Rondo first to learn everything he could about me. I didn't see the Consul or the Pirate King either, and after enough hours had passed, I slipped into a light sleep, weary from my climb out of the canyon and trek through the crumbling wastes.

My dream was fevered, putting me back in the Crystal Empire as I was fraying, succumbing to tunnel vision and having trouble functioning as a mask. It was an unpleasant dream, made worse by the real-life effects of trudging through the wastes, which felt more draining after the fact now that I could look back and see what I had done. The edge of the world had taken something from me, nothing I couldn't recover with time but enough that spending more than a few hours there would degrade me in nameless ways until I eventually fragmented and crumbled to dust, just like the rocks. These thoughts intruded through the light barrier of sleep, mingling in my mind with the dream's already-harried subject matter and making it feel like I was caught in a whirlpool of dust. But I held on, remembering how close Coda was and focusing on her, and as the dream drew to a close, I still had my wits about me.

A rattling noise finally ended it as the lock on my cage was undone, pulling me firmly back to wakefulness. "Boss wants to see you," said a gruff stallion with chin stubble, fidgeting with a ring of cast-iron keys. "Up an' at 'em, girlie."

Once again, I had nothing to gain from resisting, and this time the pirates didn't forcibly carry me, clearly determining that I had no desire to disobey. The ship's internals were cramped, and we navigated up several staircases that were only wide enough to take single-file before reaching a room full of navigational instruments that seemed to be an auxiliary bridge. Not the primary bridge, I gathered, because instead of a host of pilots working the controls, there was a single large desk, set into a corner of the room with powerful, dark architecture.

Seated behind it was Rhodallis.

"Well, well, well," he said as I arrived, getting to his hooves and making no motion to dismiss the guards. "You've done an admirable job of playing along and holding your silence. But now that idiot Consul is gone, and you and I can talk freely. So what do you say you answer a few questions?"

"What do you want to know?" I asked, swallowing.

"Let's start with who you are," Rhodallis said, his tongue coated with arrogance, though he didn't seem to have decided yet that I was worthy of more scorn than anyone else. "Not just anyone can go sneaking around in that castle. It's one of the hardest places to reach in the world. You're not a spy working for the crown, are you?"

"No way," I said warily. "I'm Halcyon, from Icereach. Your stallion, Rondo, he and I met about half a year ago. There's some bad blood between us."

"Alright," Rhodallis said. "your stories line up, I'll give you that much. Your mother, what's her name?"

"Nehaley," I answered without hesitation.

Rhodallis nodded. "Good enough. Now, how did you get there without an invitation from a Consul?"

I swallowed again, realizing that even if I wanted to tell the truth, my story wasn't believable in the slightest. "Underground. I went along the ether river - the lifestream - and then climbed out through the canyons near the castle."

Rhodallis looked intrigued. "Really, now...? And that protected you from the effects of the Boundary? Even if it did, you must have spent some time on the surface, at the end. How did you get past the vertigo layer?"

I blinked. "Vertigo layer?"

"Come off it," Rhodallis growled, "no one's that tough. The effects caused by the liquid in your ears getting funny ideas about which way is down?"

I wasn't prepared for this. Not only was I not ready with a lie, I didn't even know what the truth was, let alone whether it was important to hide.

"...Legitimately clueless," Rhodallis said after a moment. "Well, you might be a bigger prize than I expected. Provided you're being honest..."

He tensed for a moment, and suddenly my fur lifted as some kind of force sucked at me, ineffectually. After another second, it subsided.

"Well, I'll be," Rhodallis said. "Moving along. Why were you in the castle?"

"What did you just do?" I asked instead, my fur just starting to lie flat again. Thinking back, raking through my memories, that had felt almost like a much, much weaker version of touching Coda's throne...

"Cooperate well enough, and I might give you the chance for some questions of your own," Rhodallis said. "But we're not there yet. Why were you in that castle?"

Fine. Truthfulness it was. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, opened them, let it out, and said, "I was looking for someone. Coda. That filly in ice you were pulling around."

Rhodallis' eyes widened with further interest. "Were you, now? And what would a brat like you want with her?"

"...She's my friend," I admitted, leaving it at that.

"Your friend? That thing?" Rhodallis suppressed a chuckle. "She's not even a real pony. You know that, right? What she really is?"

"...A changeling queen," I ventured, figuring there was very little chance that he didn't already know that. "Doesn't stop her from being my friend."

Rhodallis shook his head. "I've stumbled into a farce. You, kid. What's your opinion on changeling queens?"

Now we were getting into dangerous territory. "I don't really have one," I ventured. "Just like batponies, or unicorns, or anyone else. There are... all kinds of changeling queens. Coda is a great person. But then there's ones who do things like Chrysalis."

"How egalitarian of you," Rhodallis pressed, stepping closer. "What's your opinion on Chrysalis?"

"That depends," I said. "I'd like to know why she did what she did. But from everything I do know, I'm not sure there's a way to forgive something like that."

"You think forgiveness should even be on the table?" Rhodallis spat. "Chrysalis was a hideous monster, irredeemable in every sense of the word! I've flown all over this world, kid. And I've never seen anything a hundredth as dark as the inside of her heart. Everything she touches festers; everything she leaves behind is a stunted ruin. And here you are, equivocating on my doorstep about forgiveness and talking about being that block of ice's friend..." He shook his head. "You're a piece of work, kid. So naive I envy you. Do you even know what was lurking in that castle you snuck into?"

I tensed, taking a step back. "N-No..."

"Heh. Heh heh heh." Rhodallis turned away. "Still, even if you're naive and clueless, you've got skills. Some kind of protective power as well, I'll give you that much. Just what have I stumbled upon, here...?" He began to pace. "The thing in the ice. Chrysalis's daughter. How much would you do in her name?"

"What do you mean, in her name?" I asked. "Are you offering to give her to me if I work for you?"

"Don't get ahead of yourself," Rhodallis warned. "A pawn this valuable doesn't find its way onto my ship every day. But if you can make yourself useful... You know what? Go ahead, ask your questions. I'm curious what they'll say about your motivations."

"Okay." I swallowed and regained my composure. "You were trying to sell her to the owner of that castle? What was that about?"

Rhodallis shook his head. "While you were snooping around in there, did you encounter any sort of prison?"

My backwards ears fell. "Should I have?"

"Well, it depends on how thoroughly you look," Rhodallis said. "And whether my information is accurate. There's a... person supposedly held captive there I need to kill. I was hoping to conduct an exchange, obtain him by offering that block of ice as a trophy. As you can see, discussions broke down before they even began."

"Who is this prisoner?" I asked. "Why do you want him dead?"

Rhodallis shrugged. "Some rebel or freedom fighter. I couldn't care less who he is. All that matters is putting him out of his misery. But that's only one goal on my list among many. I still have other potential buyers for this ice cube. And we're already on our way to pay the next one a visit..." He rubbed his chin. "If you really want that demon spawn for yourself, you won't object if I throw you back in the brig and haul you around with it while I do the rounds, and take more time to think about how to use you. That's how you think, isn't it?"

"I can follow the rules, if you have something more for me to do than sitting in a cage," I offered. "But I do want to follow her."

"I'll need to trust you a lot more before I give you anything like that," Rhodallis said. "But no need to be as silent as you were earlier. Talk with my crew, learn why they follow me. Maybe they'll even let you see your precious ice cube." He raised a hoof. "I've heard enough. Take her back to the brig."

As his ponies motioned for me to go back down the stairs, I interrupted. "Can I get one more question, first?"

"Oh?" He raised an eyebrow, and the others stayed their advance.

I nervously cleared my throat. "What's your relationship to Chrysalis?" As a changeling bishop, I wanted to add. Actually, what even is a changeling bishop... but that would be a lot more than one question.

Rhodallis laughed. "I'm just here to give her what she always knew she deserved. Take her away."

The crew mates nudged me more forcefully, and this time I complied without resistance.

Atonement

A week into living at Felicity's place, Papyrus had kept his promise. Not once had he set hoof outside the penthouse, never had he invited trouble by showing his face where it could be recognized. No government agents had busted down the door to take him into custody, no political operatives had shown up looking for revenge, and he hadn't even burned the kitchen down.

But Garsheeva's breath, was he bored.

"One of these days, I'll understand modern art," Papyrus mused, staring at an ornate glass torus mounted on the wall of a side room, about the height of an average mare and exactly half full with clear, sapphire liquid. "It might take a brain transfusion, several years of intensive psychiatric reconditioning and an epiphany from the god of glass donuts, but I'll get there. It pays to be optimistic, you know."

Floria was watching him warily, something she had spent so much time over the past week doing that he was starting to wonder if she was intentionally sacrificing her dignity so that he would annoy her instead of getting in bigger trouble. "That is an Abyssinian water clock," she informed him, curt. "A gift to Mother from a client several years back."

"Are you serious?" Papyrus turned his head sideways. The ornamentation on the glass did contain a series of markings at regular intervals, almost like the notches on a clock, but it had no hands or mechanical contraptions whatsoever. "Why would someone make a clock that doesn't work?"

"In Abyssinia-"

"Perhaps they wanted to punk old Felicity with a useless gift?" Papyrus mused... and then his eyes lit up. "Actually, this is genius! When I take over the Empire again, we should make it so these are the only kind of clocks allowed! Imagine all the bureaucrats when nobody is able to coordinate their meetings..."

Floria watched him coldly. "Do you truly have that little respect for things you do not understand?"

Papyrus winked at her. "Have you even met me? Try replacing 'things I don't understand' with 'literally everything' and you'll be closer to the mark."

Floria sighed and shook her head. "Your lack of imagination makes me more concerned by the day about what kind of ruler you will turn into if this insane plan of yours does bear fruit."

"For your information, I have changed," Papyrus told her, proudly patting his heart. "Surprising, I know, but you should have seen the old me!"

"Where you once were has no bearing on who you are now," Floria curtly replied. "Better does not equal good enough. Or are you just thinking you'll get it out of your system so that you can one day run a functioning government without succumbing to the urge to insult every minor office whose purpose slips your mind?"

Internally, Papyrus noted that she had a point, not that she needed to know. Part of that was why he needed Senescey and the others on his team: she was the one with ideas for how to set up a stable, long-term system, and his talents were more in getting rid of systems he didn't feel like keeping around.

What would Floria be like as a governor, he wondered? Probably nothing fantastic; the track record of sphinxes as a race was writ large across the pages of history for all to see. And yet in all the days he had spent being shadowed by her and getting on her nerves for fun, he had yet to figure out what form her insanity and instability would take. Probably something related to crankiness or stinginess, considering her primary passion seemed to be for keeping her passions in check. But that didn't strike him as a particularly stable situation, especially when her father had been the same, and Papyrus sure remembered how that turned out...

Before he could indulge in the memories, a song of greeting announced Felicity's return several rooms away.

Floria breathed a sigh of relief and darted away, and after one more glance at the water clock, Papyrus followed her.

In the penthouse's central room, as usual, Felicity was greeting her family. The first few days had been dampened slightly by memories of their bitter parting in the Griffon Empire, but as it became more and more apparent that twenty years really was enough to heal old wounds, that behavior faded with gusto. Now, Felicity positively lavished them with attention - a behavior Papyrus surmised was usually reserved for Floria, and now had to go to someone else as the sphinx was too self-conscious to partake in displays of parental affection with guests in the house.

"I hope your day was more exciting than mine," Papyrus greeted, lifting a wing in welcome. "Not that I'm ailing from anything besides boredom, but did you really have to hit me with the one restriction I'm worst at? Holding still and not making trouble for the duration of our stay?"

"Ahem," Felicity told him with a flat look, "staying cooped up in here was your idea. And while I do think it was a wise one, I won't be held responsible if you do happen to explode from pent-up whatever it is that drives you. If doing nothing pains you so, I'm sure you can find some way of being productive and safe at the same time."

"At least you don't need to worry about me." Larceny shrugged, swaddled in blankets on a nearby couch.

Felicity gave her a fond smile. "About that, I have been looking into alternate ways to potentially make headway on whatever ails you... but tonight, we have more important matters to discuss. I've told you all repeatedly that the importance of my job here is one of the biggest factors keeping my hooves tied when it comes to your mission in the Empire, and I've made some headway discussing the situation with my manager. All of that is to say, would any of you be down for a potentially-clandestine meeting with him around one in the morning tonight to add your input to the matter?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Would doing so be illegal, by any serendipitous chance?"

Felicity cleared her throat. "Well, it would involve taking a wanted international criminal - that's you, darling - into an Equestrian governmental office. And while I've confirmed to a fairly high degree of confidence that my manager is more interested in extracting certain favors from you in exchange for my leave of absence than arresting you on the spot, such considerations might not apply universally."

"And we can't just meet him in a cafe or alley because...?" Senescey asked.

"Oh, he lives in the office," Felicity explained. "Never leaves it for security reasons. Otherwise, I would have invited him to this very room."

Papyrus frowned. "What even is this job of yours?"

"Oh, a little of this and a little of that." Felicity dismissed him with a smile. "Though if you really want to know more, you could do worse than tagging along tonight. And you are looking for a way to get out of the house, aren't you?"

Papyrus licked his lips. "You know, this smells like a trap, and I honestly can't tell if that's the old instincts kicking in or if I've just spent too much time around Halcyon. But who cares? I'm bored, so count me in."

Upon seeing Felicity's reaction, he added, "Halcyon? Crippling paranoia disguised as a pony. You'll probably meet her some time or another. Now, time for me to go brainstorm nicknames for your funny boss pony..."

Night fell in stages, as it does in the city. First came the rush hour, and then came sunset, and for a few hours after the streets didn't get the memo that it was time to calm down yet. When the memo did arrive, it was less like pulling a throttle and more of a change to the traffic composition: fewer ponies walked the sidewalks, and the ones that did looked hardier, and the cabs and carriages pulling their way through the streets looked less like obstacles to dodge and more like sanctuaries to seek out.

By the time Felicity sallied forth from her penthouse, everyone save Floria in tow, the orange street lamps were long into their vigils, dutifully washing out the stars with overhead glare and providing plenty of edges to the light for things to lurk beyond. Felicity had seen to it that all four of them had business suits to wear; in the daytime, that sent the message that you were too important or powerful to find messing with others to be worth your time.

In the dead of night, it was quite the opposite.

"Is it wrong of me to hope we get in a scrap with some random ruffians?" Papyrus whispered to Senescey as they walked towards a waiting carriage. "Someone who thinks we smell like money and wants to mug us? I haven't had a proper brawl in ages."

"If we did," Senescey whispered back, "I'd prefer to deal with it quietly and not make a spectacle."

Sadly, nothing stepped out to block their path, and they climbed into the coach - Larceny more gladly than the others. Papyrus leaned his head against the cold window, strumming his feathers against the door and watching the not-quite-slumbering city go by.

In a past life, he would have strummed his claws, instead. Old instincts almost tried to make him do it, but when he looked at his hoof, it was flat. The muscles just weren't there.

He closed his eyes.

Eventually, the carriage stopped, and they disembarked in what seemed to be a small industrial park bordering a rail yard. Papyrus only needed a cursory survey to determine there were more warehouses nearby than high-end office buildings. Wherever Felicity was taking them, it seemed like it would be less of a legitimate government agency and more of a secret government lab... which fit with his personal experience that the most important functions of a state were never public.

And, sure enough, as Felicity led them into a narrow alley and then offered to shadow sneak him through a chained metal grate blocking a staircase descending below the street level, their destination was underground.

Papyrus was reasonably comfortable with shadow sneaking. He had accompanied the sisters when doing it many times before, in the old Empire. Taking passengers had a few limitations, but was something anyone could do with nothing more than bodily contact and a decent ability to hold their breath. But there was always a mild discomfort involved, something not even being a sarosian could dispel. As they slipped through the grate, that discomfort mingled with the buzz of old memories, with the sense of crawling into the dangerous unknown, with his old lieutenants at his side - lieutenants that even now, as was the case back then, he could never be one hundred percent sure weren't about to turn around and betray him.

That mixture surged through him, and Papyrus felt alive.

Down the stairs they went, Felicity pulling out a portable light source to lead the way. The staircase opened out into a ledge above an underground waterway, which Papyrus instantly suspected was connected to the sea: that, or its usage varied widely enough that the water level might as well have tides of its own.

"Is there a reason your boss is down here?" Larceny asked, quiet and gruff.

"We're merely taking the back entrance," Felicity whispered back. "Seeing as the front entrance is quite understandably locked and guarded at this time of night..."

The walk lasted just long enough that Papyrus was starting to wonder if he shouldn't worry about Larceny's constitution. Eventually, they came to a heavy iron door set into the wall, beyond which the grinding of machinery could be heard. Felicity ferried Papyrus under once again, shadow sneaking through the doorjamb.

Her light was no longer necessary on the other side, several floodlights illuminating a high ceiling above a brick-walled room filled with giant, cylindrical machines connected by industrial pipes. Accompanying the machines was a caustic smell which caused Papyrus to wrinkle his nose.

"What is this, a wastewater treatment plant?" Senescey asked, looking around. "What does your work have to do with this?"

Around the machinery, a skeleton crew of technicians wandered catwalks or sat around on call in case anything exploded. Over the din, only one had noticed the newcomers, and he paid them no mind, as if it was perfectly acceptable to see a group of ponies in suits in a place like this.

"Welcome to Manehattan's water purification plant, where sea water is turned into the stuff that comes out of faucets in homes," Felicity said. "And it has a nominal amount to do with it, but more importantly the elevator into my building is right over there." She motioned at a doorway set into the opposite side of the room.

As they walked across the machine room, Papyrus let himself stare, and allowed his mind to wander. Felicity's building being above this place was a decent enough reason, but she didn't say it was the only reason. What else were they doing here?

On the pipes between some of the machines, vibrating with the force of whatever was moving through them, his eyes picked out a few sensors that looked newer than the rest of the setup. Modern quality control, or something else?

"This place is enough to provide all the water for a city this big?" Senescey asked.

"Oh, quite a bit more than," Felicity proudly proclaimed. "The technology is quite scalable, and there are over two dozen rooms like this one in this complex alone. This year, in fact, we're aiming to put the finishing touches on a pipeline to export water to Canterlot!"

"So you work for the water authority?" Papyrus rolled his eyes. "Really got my hopes up for something eldritch, there..." He sighed and followed her to the next door, which was already open and didn't require another shadow sneak.

A short maintenance corridor later, and they reached an elevator that sprung to life with a keycard from Felicity's pocket. It rose much more smoothly than the cacophony in the last room led Papyrus to expect, and after a long, whirring ascent, they emerged into the kind of upper-management hallway their suits were meant for.

Actually, this hallway was grand enough that their suits almost didn't cut it. Dimly lit and painted with subdued, dark colors, it had regal red walls and a floor made from midnight purple marble tiles, with thin golden ribs on the walls and ceiling to provide texture and shape. Alcoves between the ribs had doors flanked by potted plants, bearing darkly lustrous creepers with glossy green-black leaves that grew up the walls to frame their entrances, clearly guided by magic.

The hallway bespoke a degree of wealth and power that was clearly disconnected from any regulatory approvals or budgets in need of balancing. If this was a government agency, whatever it did was important enough that its resources came no questions asked.

"Fancy place," Larceny muttered quietly, trying not to show how much the trip had taxed her.

Felicity only nodded, leading the group around a corner. At the end, the hallway widened out into a grand double-door with three short steps leading up to it. Any interest Papyrus had lost down in the water purification plant was now back in force. Just who had Felicity wriggled her way into working for?

The doors swung open of their own accord as the four ponies approached, revealing a spacious executive suite. Dark pillars held up a beige-trimmed ceiling over a black floor, lights slotted into tiny alcoves showing off the vegetation kept along the walls. Silent waterfalls slid down glossy panels and landed in pools that were almost supernaturally still, the floor a mix of black marble and glass panes that covered those pools, creating rivers that wound in geometric patterns beneath the floor. At the far sides were two whole-wall murals cut from ruby crystal and enshrined in white marble, built into illuminated displays that cast harsh and sparkling shadows across their lines. Both of them depicted battles of some sort: the one on the right, a war, and the one on the left, a duel.

At the back of the room, across from the entrance, was a whole-wall window, glinting with the telltale sign of enchanted one-way glass and looking out over the Manehattan skyline with the moon hovering in the distance. In front of it, in the middle, was a large horseshoe desk, its top recessed slightly below the frontal facade. In the middle of the desk was an angular, high-backed executive chair, turned towards the window.

"We have arrived, as requested," Felicity announced with a bow, the doors closing behind everyone once again of their own volition. "All four of us."

The chair began to turn around.

It was Princess Luna.

The monarch wore a neutral expression, her wings folded and her mane blowing quietly. Senescey caught her breath, and only decades of stage experience let Papyrus avoid doing the same: a ruler of Equestria was the last thing he wanted to run into.

Luna was a goddess. Gods wrote their own rules. If he was to walk out of here, it would be by her grace and hers alone.

"Come closer," Luna said, voice neutral. "There is no need to linger in the shadows."

"Didn't you say your boss was a dude?" Larceny muttered as they approached.

"An effective way of preventing a certain someone's thoughts from wandering down the correct track," Felicity apologized. "I'm just glad my excuse about her being unable to make a house call because she lived here didn't fall on more skeptical ears."

Two and two clicked in Papyrus's brain. "Oh, so it is treason, then! Well, congratulations, you caught me. End of the road, I guess." He sat down and held out his hooves. "What now?"

The theatrics were instinctual, but more than anything, they were a way to take his mind off figuring out how he felt about this. Was it... No, better not even begin to dig. Wouldn't matter soon, anyway.

But soon didn't come. Princess Luna watched them, and watched them, and waited.

"Your Majesty?" Felicity asked.

"Long ago," Luna said, "I created sarosiankind, breathed life into a race that I soon proved unable to care for. And so they passed into the arms of a caretaker, who watched over them for me until one day, she, too, failed. Now, my children's continued existence in the north is balanced on the edge of a knife. In absence of populations large enough to sustain themselves and unifying forces to hold them together, they will continue to disappear, until they only persist in isolated colonies who have forgotten how to interact with their neighbors. You were that caretaker's final servants. Her failure is your own."

"The Night Mother." Senescey folded her ears, visibly torn between acceptance and defiance, still trying to get a read on the situation.

"I am told," Luna continued, "that you seek a chance to atone for that failure, as I do for my own."

Papyrus looked up.

"I know who you are, Gazelle Grandbell," Princess Luna told him, meeting his eyes. "Your presence here neither subjects you to nor absolves you from judgement for your crimes against my sister's laws. But I would hear your plans for Garsheeva's old domain."

"That'll be rather difficult to tell you," Papyrus said, swallowing as much of his usual demeanor as possible. "Considering step one is 'get the band back together' and then step two is 'wing it'."

Luna stared into him. "Surely any motivation that could drive you to conquer such a storied location would prompt more thought than 'winging it'."

Papyrus shrugged. "I play the game on instinct. It's how I made such a mess of things last time around. There are probably a lot of former acquaintances of mine who would say 'I told you so' if they ever saw me again, provided they're still alive. But it's also the only way I know how to play, and right now, my instincts are telling me to try again and make it right. Don't get me wrong, I'm also out to have a little fun in the process. But the way I see it, even if I can't land a place as one of the good guys, I can still even the score a little, make it easier for someone else to come in after me once I've cleaned up after myself. Besides, most of my intel on the place is years out of date, so I can't scheme properly even if the urge takes me. That a good enough reason to go in without a plan for you?"

Luna watched him a while longer.

"It's debatable, whether I've really changed," Papyrus said. "But I like to think I eventually - way later than I should have - learned a thing or two from my mistakes. And even if this whole Empire thing goes nowhere, even if you eviscerate me on the spot, at least I can say I dragged these three sorry lugs back together."

He gestured to the sisters, and Luna's gaze followed. "And what are your dreams?" she asked them.

"Papyrus may not have a plan," Senescey said. "For the Empire's future. But I do. I envision a flat hierarchy for society, with no class and only the bare minimum of centralized authority required to keep that structure in place. I'm sure that as a goddess, you find any ideas someone like me could come up with to be untested, impractical and unrealistic, but I have a duty to my past and everyone else's future to try. And so I'll use Papyrus's revolution as a test. I don't know if my plans for a perfect world could survive contact with reality, but to try them on a small scale like what he can realistically hope to achieve... It's the only way to get the experience I need to improve them."

Luna turned to Larceny.

"I just want my daughter to be happy," she said, looking distinctly uncomfortable on three legs, shorn from her usual bathrobe.

"I recall you once pursued a different goal," Princess Luna said. "Restoration of your bodies. A payment from my stand-in that you never received."

Larceny bowed. "That was a long time ago."

"Princess," Felicity said. "If you want to help us... If you feel any kinship with our cause, as some of the last survivors of your children in the Empire... Your blessing on our course is why we are here. You-"

Luna interrupted her with a nod, and everyone fell silent.

"Let me tell you some of my hopes and dreams," Princess Luna began. "Almost twenty years ago, my children's time was cut short by the mare calling herself Chrysalis. She separated their souls from their bodies, enslaving the latter and seeking to use the former as a power source. They were torn from her grasp and eventually scattered to the Lifestream, dashing any hope of reversing what became of them. Even I could not command those starry waters to return what was given to them. And the one mare who could - Starlight Glimmer - has already decided that is not her role in the world."

Her mane silently blew, a cloud of starry smoke on an invisible wind. "But Chrysalis still exists in the world at large. My children's bodies remain under her control. Part of me desires vengeance. Another part, to recoup the shards of what was lost, even if it can never be made whole again. But most of all, I desire to see that this tragedy can never be repeated. And so, I have been watching the changelings. I have studied, familiarizing myself with the advancements in science made during my thousand-year banishment, both knowledge published under the light of the sun and gained in dark places where none can see. I have tried to discover, to the fullest anyone can understand, what makes a changeling queen, why they function, what they feel and how they may be undone. And I will tell you what I have seen."

Papyrus listened.

"Some changelings," Luna said, "are coming back to life. From the moment of my return, I have discovered isolated drones embedded sporadically in societies, in the guise of ponies with families and relationships. Commoners and ordinary folk, few and far between, removed from Chrysalis herself or the creatures with empty circles for cutie marks that appear to command portions of her horde. Upon capture and investigation, these creatures are the same soulless husks that sarosians become when their cutie marks are removed, acting and shapeshifting as if given orders by remote. However, in the wake of the changeling invasion of Canterlot, a new type has begun to appear: ones who are indistinguishable from original sarosians. But I still call them changelings, for they wear the guises of day ponies, and internal identification information I wove into the design for sarosian bodies reveals that they can be matched one to one with ponies who lost their lives on the day of Chrysalis's ascension."

"What, like, they've got their name printed inside them?" Papyrus asked, scratching an ear.

"Precisely," Luna said. "Though it is more of an identifier, and not the name they would use or even be aware of in day to day affairs. The Night Mother's civilization may have perished, but her records endured, and I spent many a long night in the days after my return in Mistvale, reading through the archives of the deserted temples."

Senescey swallowed. "And that's where we come into this. Felicity told you about me, I take it?"

Princess Luna nodded. "The changelings I commonly observe wear the forms of day ponies, but cannot consciously shapeshift. And when pressed, they all confess to having amnesia about events prior to the point when they presumably awakened. This amnesia is to be expected when pairing a body with a fresh soul and cutie mark; memories in the conventional sense are understood to be accessed based on the unique combination of a body and a soul. But I have heard that you experienced a similar awakening with your original soul and cutie mark, and retained all of your previous identity as a result."

"I have," Senescey said. "Your Majesty. And I can control my shapeshifting, as well." She held up a hoof, and it flickered with green flame.

Luna gave Felicity a look.

"I think that means it's my turn to pick up the story," Felicity said, catching the look. "A primary question Her Majesty has been trying to answer is why these changelings are reawakening. Is it connected to the blank ones she found weeded into society before the Canterlot attack? Is Chrysalis behind this, or is it an unrelated phenomenon outside her control? A promising initial theory was that if these changelings were operating under Chrysalis's orders or control, they would have some means of exchanging information with her, so if we could discover that means, we could learn a great deal indeed."

"Hold up." Papyrus folded his forelegs. "I'm not the greatest science wonk, but didn't Chrysalis do her soul-slurp using the Daydream Network? You know, mystical thingamajig the Night Mother used to communicate with her faithful? The way I always heard it, that was supposed to be a 'feature' baked into bats by their creator." He turned squarely to Luna. "So if you know enough about it to throw it around like that, catching them talking over it should be easy."

"Such were my initial thoughts," Princess Luna said. "Alas, the reality has proven to be more complicated. In lieu of a lengthy scientific explanation, suffice it to say we are certain that they are sending information. We know they are doing much more sending than receiving, and may in fact be transmitting every detail they experience, with an emphasis on the lives of the ponies around them. But we have not yet identified the destination for all of this data and accompanying emotions."

Senescey blinked. "Is this subconscious? Am I relaying everything I experience right now?"

"Perhaps," Luna said. "A proposal you doubtless find no less unsettling than any of the other awakened changelings I have approached. But I find it worth the risk of being eavesdropped on because you are such a unique case that the benefits almost certainly outweigh the risks."

"You say you'd spare us the scientific explanation," Papyrus swaggered, "but try me. I'm down for a little science."

Luna gave him a patient look. "As I said, we are still investigating. However, the Daydream Network involves broadcasting information freely over a surrounding space. The most powerful broadcaster in an area can control the fabric of the network within their surroundings, imposing order and creating channels for communication that can make information private. In fact, some broadcasters powerful enough to do this cannot help but do so, and I have reason to believe changeling queens fall into that category. In short, if someone was using the Daydream Network to communicate, I would either be able to hear it, or detect the effects of them controlling the network to create that private channel. And they would not be able to do so at all within my presence without besting me in a fight over it, which cannot be done stealthily. Yet still, they communicate."

"And how do they manage that?" Papyrus pressed.

"Through the plumbing," Luna simply said.

Papyrus and Senescey looked at each other.

"The circumstances surrounding Chrysalis's ascension were carefully buried," Luna explained, "to the extent where, prior to my return, my sister was hard pressed to separate fact from fiction even when it came to the attack itself. However, in the imperial province of Gyre, I discovered the buried prison where her throne - an object critical to her empowerment - was constructed and then filled with the emotions that would give her strength. Though the throne was long since removed, the facility was filled with metal pipes that held an almost organic appearance, connecting the throne's central chamber to altars throughout the prison where those emotions were fed to it. I could not design an experiment that successfully demonstrated the purpose of those pipes, but the matter remained on my mind upon my return to Equestria. And eventually, with the resources at my disposal here, I discovered that cylinders of metal sometimes microscopically vibrate in the presence of changelings."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"I mentioned the project to send water from the facility here to Canterlot," Felicity cut in. "That's related to this line of research. She's already established that these vibrations propagate remarkably well through longer or branching pipes, and also that there seems to be a logic to the direction they propagate in - not that we quite understand that logic yet. And the upcoming pipe that will be used for water transmission is large, robust, and exquisitely monitored. It's Her Majesty's belief that, if the changelings are using the vibrations of pipes to transmit information, we may be able to tap an incredible wealth of information by offering such a large and tantalizing link and then listening in on what is sent through it."

Princess Luna nodded.

"Devious," Papyrus decided.

Felicity cleared her throat. "Anyway, as to what I have to do with all this... You all remember what my brand does, correct?"

Papyrus sighed in reminiscence. "Allows you to dampen or excite emotions in an area around you? After all the manipulation we got out of that, how could I ever forget?"

Felicity nodded. "The reason I'm involved in all this is because we discovered that my brand, when amplifying or dampening the emotions of nearby changelings, also amplifies or dampens the effects they have on nearby pipes. Makes it much easier to get data from willing test subjects."

"I must learn what has become of my children," Luna said, a crack of emotion entering her stoic voice. "And yet Felicity has asked leave of me to accompany you to the north on a mission that may well be doomed from the start. It would be selfish of me to prioritize my own atonement over yours, but I yet give myself pause, because I believe there are ways we can both benefit from an arrangement with each other."

Papyrus leaned against a pillar. "You've got something you want from me in exchange for giving Felicity some vacation time. Well, spit it out! I've always been one for back-room favors."

Princess Luna nodded. "I have only returned to the Griffon Empire once since my exile, and that was before Chrysalis attacked Canterlot and the situation changed, beginning the appearance of awakened changelings. If you wish my blessing upon your mission, then I would have you survey the Empire's lands for me, and try to determine whether there are such changelings in its lands now. Blank ones without a master, marked ones without memories or a connection to their shapeshifting. You may also investigate and report on any suspicious or unusual networks of pipes you discover, especially the organic variant used in the throne. In exchange for this - and after I have had time to gather testimony and run some experiments concerning whether Senescey is transmitting data, and see what can be done for Larceny's condition - I will bless your mission, and ask my employee to aid you to the fullest in an official capacity."

She gestured to Felicity, who bowed.

Papyrus let out a long, deep breath. It seemed this god wasn't interested in ending his game today, after all.

"Oh..." Senescey hesitated, brushing one foreleg with the other. "I go by Leitmotif these days? Just as a matter of preference; I've... tried to cut ties with my past identity in case I need to go incognito..."

"And I go by Nehaley now," Larceny added. "Just used to it after living that way for twenty years."

"I see." Luna nodded, as if this was an everyday occurrence, and asked nothing more on the matter. "I shall update my records accordingly. Now, if you desire to return to your slumbers at home, I shall no longer keep you. But you did come all this way, and this facility is well-equipped for some of the things I have suggested."

Papyrus gave the sisters a lazy salute. "You chicks want me there while she's poking and prodding you with pipes and trying to fix old Lar-lar? Because frankly, that sounds pretty entertaining, but I'm down to go bother someone else for a change if not."

"I think," Felicity said sternly with a hint of parental gentleness, "this is a time where it would be appropriate if you bothered someone else for a change."

Revenant

After Bernard left, and Lethe and Gaston wandered away to do their own things, I didn't have to wait long before the hold became eventful again.

That event was the appearance of Pirate King Rhodallis.

For a moment, he stared at me, walking up to my cage and trailed by several pirates, including Bernard. I couldn't quite tell if he was evaluating me or daring me to ask why he was there, but right before I gave in, he nodded, and then spoke.

"You're up for crew duty," he growled absently, voice gruff and arrogant as usual. "Follow me."

"Crew duty?" I blinked. "You mean following you off the ship to..."

"Yes." Rhodallis was already walking away. "Think of it as an opportunity to show what you're made of."

I swallowed. According to Bernard, this next excursion was another attempt to sell Coda. Which was good for me if I wanted to stay as close to her as possible, but could quickly spiral out of control... Actually, that was assuming I had any control in the first place. Which I didn't.

Nobody bothered to unlock the cage, so all I could do was shadow sneak through the bars to follow him. Everyone looked at me like they were perfectly aware I could have done that any time I wanted, and all of us knew Rhodallis' word was the thing that actually kept me within those bars. Making me leave like this was clearly a show of that power, one I didn't feel like dwelling on: this would be different than the previous times anyone tried to conscript me.

Not that it was any different yet.

The room Rhodallis led me to was clearly an armory, bedecked with all manner of weapons and armor. Sickles, daggers and greatswords, light padding and scale male and even a full set of plate, chakrams and halberds and whips and clubs mingled with other weapons I had never even seen before.

"Take what you can use," the Pirate King instructed, leaning against the entry. "I doubt you're completely unarmed, but the usual sarosian tools of the trade don't work so well where we're going."

I swallowed. Actually, I was completely unarmed, my bracelet still carried by Seigetsu countless miles away. And my combat training was pretty narrow in scope...

"Why?" I asked, trying to buy more time to think. "Aren't we going to barter? You're expecting this to come to blows? And you think I'll have something to contribute next to your crew?"

Rhodallis chuckled. "Don't be so modest. You had the confidence to be slinking around in that castle where I picked you up. Now take what you can use."

I surveyed the armory again. Physical strength was about my greatest asset - along with being possibly immortal and able to recover from heinous injuries, which these pirates really didn't need to know about. Plus, I liked being covered up, so starting with armor seemed like a decent enough plan.

The full plate was too big for me, unfortunately, but I managed to find a set sized for a normal mare that was only modestly bulky, form-fitting with a patchwork of plates and reinforced leather. It didn't come with sabatons or a helmet, but after adjusting it as best as I could, I felt like I could wear a coat over top of it and only look slightly large rather than conspicuous. The armory did have a few capes, but with this, I felt like I could pass on those.

I did a few quick movement exercises to familiarize myself with how much the armor hindered me - Rhodallis said nothing, which I assumed signaled approval that I was taking this seriously.

Weapons were harder. In Icereach, while training with the yaks, I had never found something I felt comfortable with. I put in a decent amount of time with a quarterstaff, but it was difficult to appraise my own results when a humble stick had never been able to make a yak so much as wince.

The armory did cough up a staff, though, and it was a good sight better than the ones I had trained with in Icereach. This one was split up into three segments, the joints held together with short, spring-loaded chains that pulled the top and bottom into their slots. And the ends were tipped with sturdy metal, so with a little practice, it could effectively convert between a staff and a large pair of nunchucks with a well-practiced flick. And when folded up, it was portable, too.

I didn't feel I had the time to give it more than a few practice swings, just to familiarize myself with the locking mechanism, but this seemed like a no-brainer. Into one of the clips on my armor it went.

The other thing that gave me pause were the greatswords. When I was little, I had always liked those; my fascination dated to the same phase that gave me the overdone-cool aesthetic I applied to my old coats. Reality ruined my dreams when I actually tried to use them; it simply wasn't possible for younger me to lift and effectively wield something that hefty and big. But now...

I hesitated, staring at the swords. I didn't have my bracelet or the extra strength it could provide, sure, but I had grown since then. And strength was usually what I considered my biggest asset. Not that these were for the average strong ponies, but was it worth a try?

Reaching up, I pulled down one with a long, serrated edge like an unfolded batpony wing, then thought better of it and traded that for a straight, single-edged blade that didn't taper until the very end and had a remarkably wide profile. I tried several stances, from holding it purely in a mouth grip to bracing the handle under my wing joint and standing three-legged, and the heavy armor I had donned first weighed me down that I didn't tip over even with the sword fully extended.

Was that what I had been missing before? Was it never about my overall strength, but my center of gravity? I swung the sword a few more times, several wide, aesthetic holes bored through the metal along the blade's length starting at the hilt, which had the effect of making it densest at the tip. And I kept my footing.

"This is good." I nodded, realizing the holes also made it easier to affix to the small hooks on the back of my armor. "I'm ready."

Rhodallis raised an eyebrow, looking intrigued. "Wouldn't have pegged you for that type. Well, we'll see soon enough if you can use it. Keep up."

As I followed Rhodallis back to the ship's entrance, our momentum shifted, the ship slowing and losing altitude beneath my hooves. Some other pirates were there, and so was Coda in her block of ice, strapped to a trolley cart that was outfitted to be pulled by a single pony. If I got the opportunity to make a break for it with her, that would be good for me... but as I stared at her and ran my mind over the possibilities, a strange, queasy sensation started to settle over me.

I was too familiar with the effects of panic attacks and working my mind into a paranoid spiral to mistake this for one. Something was different. Something was wrong.

A quick glance at the rest of the crew told me many of them sensed nothing amiss... except for Rhodallis. He wore a hard expression that mostly matched his usual one, except seemed to be masking the fact that something was bugging him. And he seemed keenly interested in me.

So, I tried not to betray how I was feeling, too.

Hallie? Faye asked in my mind.

Mentally, I tuned in. Did she know anything about what this was?

Maybe, she said. I think... we might be picking up on some sort of strong emotional presence, though it's hard to tell when I'm in the back. We've been breaking down the walls between us, but you were originally designed to seal away our identity as a changeling queen, so we'd probably feel it a lot more strongly if I was up front.

Would that be a good thing? Should we switch?

I got the impression of her shaking her head. Certainly not while everyone's staring at us. I might be able to tell more about what this is if I was up front, but I'm not sure that would be a good thing. I can't make out what this is feeling, but it feels bad.

Yeah. That was the impression I was getting, too.

Before we could talk further, Bernard walked over and patted me on the back. With a wink and without a word, he took up a position beside Rhodallis, in front of the sealed exit door.

"Sir, we'll be doing a flyby to drop you in less than a minute," a mare said, poking her head down the staircase to the bridge. "Everything in order on your end?"

Rhodallis gave her a serious nod. "Roger. prepare to open the door."

A flyby? To drop us? Where were we going?

That noxious feeling increased, but felt somehow distant, as if some other force was holding it just at bay in ways I couldn't describe. I glanced between Rhodallis, Bernard, and Coda - the Pirate King himself had loaded the trolley on his back, standing firm under its weight. I felt like a mission with this degree of initial tension deserved some sort of explanation before-

"...Open the door now," Rhodallis commanded, counting under his breath. "You two, prepare to jump!"

Someone pulled a safety lever, and the door snapped open with a ferocious clang of metal. It was clearly designed to open quickly, if not peacefully... Before I could finish that thought, or even process what was on the other side, Rhodallis barked the order to jump, and leapt from the still-moving airship, Bernard only a step behind him.

I knew better than to question tight timing in a situation like this. Seeing that Bernard had no wings either and trusting they wouldn't be required, I pushed down that growing sense of wrongness and flung myself from the door.

I hit the ground - metal ground - hard, and had to tuck into a roll to preserve my leg joints. That was a maneuver I wasn't used to doing with a giant sword on my back, and once I was upside-down, it prevented me from finishing the roll, leaving me stuck on my back for just long enough to see the ship accelerate away into the green-tinged sky.

Before my position could start to look awkward, I pushed myself upright and turned in a circle, a chill running down my spine as I took in the panorama of my surroundings.

We were standing atop a thick, metal wall. To one side was a sea of concrete, rails and warehouses and cranes and smokestacks stretching as far as the eye could see, except none of the trains were moving and all the smokestacks were dead. The metal walls had rusted and began to decay, and an eerie green fog wound through the streets, clinging to buildings, wafting and lingering.

To the other side, the wall curved into a massive ring, enclosing a much more ordered yet also more deteriorated set of buildings. Straight sidewalks flanked streets filled with detritus, austere residential or office towers leaned at slight angles, their homogeneous steel walls stained and blackened with soot. At the compound's center was a ziggurat, still standing despite the blown-out buildings that surrounded it. The green fog was here, too, much thicker than outside the walls.

It was inhabited, though. Or, at the very least, there were things moving around down on the streets, glowing points of brighter emerald that were too few and far apart to properly make out.

The fog extended to the wall I was on, as well, which must have been why the sky looked green. And that feeling of wrongness had only grown stronger.

"Tough luck getting pulled for this of all duties, eh?" Bernard said, flipping and catching a dagger, his eyes darting around with a professional wariness.

The look on my face must have told them all they needed to know.

"First time in the Revenant City," Rhodallis guessed, Coda's trolley set up properly once again. "The former capital of Gyre. You've heard the stories."

No, I hadn't, actually, but I nodded hesitantly regardless.

"Our prospective clients live here, which tells you a thing or two about their sanity," Rhodallis said. "A certain wing of the Night's Boon. We've got a... business relationship with them, so whether we make the sale or not, there are a few other goals to accomplish here. Top of the list is replenishing ammo for the ship. We used a lot last time we were in Ironridge, and I want us topped off before the next time we head back."

He patted his own greatsword, then took the trolley harness, waving me forward. "You take point. We're heading for that ziggurat, and can get there however you see fit. Bernard will back you up only when you're losing badly enough to convince us it's not an act. I want to see how you handle yourself in a fight."

I swallowed. "The Night's Boon will want to trade with you even after I fight them?"

Rhodallis gave an unnerving chuckle. "Oh, they're not the only ones here."

And then he fell in behind me.

The queasy feeling deepened as I found a staircase and led them down from the wall, Rhodallis picking up Coda's trolley again to handle the stairs. As we descended into the mist, the sky grew greener, and I began to feel vaguely as if gravity was pulling me in two directions at once. There was something in my vision as well, registering as a sunspot even though it didn't move with my gaze. But it did move with me as I walked, a small colorless blotch that appeared whenever I looked down.

We reached the streets, the mist whispering hallucinatory nothings in my ears that I couldn't make out. Or maybe it was just my nerves. The streets looked broad and straight from above, but down here, they were filled with enough wreckage to obscure my vision of everything but the buildings around me and the ziggurat in the distance. If something wanted to sneak up on me here, it would have no shortage of cover.

So I moved slowly, trying to give corners a careful berth. Defunct mana lights were everywhere, built into the sidewalk curbs and welded to poles, a few of which were still standing. The metal sidewalks had been burned semi-indiscriminately; I couldn't make out a pattern that corresponded to where burnable things might have been before whatever befell this city.

Though, knowing the Empire's recent history, I had a hunch this was related to Chrysalis.

A building had collapsed broadly out into the street ahead, almost completely blocking it off with shattered concrete, twisted rebar and dead mana conduits. In skirting around the rubble, I had to go all the way up onto the sidewalk, passing another scorched structure with the door stuck widely open, its auto-close mechanism dangling in a wreck from the top. Curious, I chanced a look inside.

Something green and on fire rushed me.

Acting on instinct alone, I braced myself with an armored shoulder, my greatsword half-drawn. Two dozen metal splinters clattered against the armor, but a few found softer spots, slipping through with blunted force that was still strong enough to break my skin. My leg burned with pain as I fought to dislodge the attacker, but more than that, something appeared in my mind, a skeletal afterimage of a black and green sun, a fireball in the sky that grasped at my mind with festering tendrils of desiccated flame. The tendrils groped at me, clawed at me, tried to get in, all in a vision that couldn't be real, that felt superimposed in my vision over the reality of me struggling with this sharp, burning thing... but they were repelled every time by a shield of pure, otherworldly gold.

I got my sword between me and the attacker, and with a powerful kick, used its leverage to tear my shoulder free and force myself and the attacker apart. The instant we broke contact, the vision ended and my head cleared, still befuddled by the supernatural pressure of the city but no longer feeling like I was halfway inside a dream.

The thing afforded me barely a second to comprehend it before attacking again, and all I could really see was green fire and scrap metal, but this time I was ready. Instead of bracing myself, I backstepped, warding it with a horizontal slash of my blade, timed to be slightly early in case the weapon was heavier than I expected. The tip grazed it, and forced it back just long enough for me to take another look.

Still fire and scrap metal, and still not a good look, as it charged me yet again, rushing straight forward without any sense of self-preservation. This time, my timing was true, and it screeched with the rending of twisting metal, the sword made from sturdier stuff than it was. But even though the flames burned almost horizontal, like a candle in a breeze, and even though that blow could have mortally wounded a pony, it twisted, its metal rearranging itself as it tried to reform.

I didn't give it the time, closing in with an overhead smash. The thing abandoned rebuilding and simply thrust all of its scrap metal into my chest, but this time it failed to find any chinks, only earning a cacophony of scratching metal on metal as it hit me and my sword smashed into it from above, dropping it to a heap.

The green flame flickered for a moment, and then went out, oozing into a thick green smoke that quickly dissipated, becoming one with the fog swirling around me. Left behind was nothing but ordinary scrap metal.

I poked through it with my staff to be sure, but no surprises jumped out at me. Just industrial wreckage, like so much else laying around on these green-choked streets.

"What was that?" I asked, turning back to my two companions, neither of whom had lifted a hoof to help me.

"A revenant," Rhodallis said, adjusting his own sword as if to check that it was still there. "This place is crawling with them. They spontaneously arise whenever this mist gets too concentrated. Trying to exterminate them is futile, but once one's locked onto you, there's nothing to do but kill it." He let out a deep, bitter breath. "Now pick up the pace! We don't want the stuff that makes them to get any funny ideas about using our own supplies as a vessel."

Halcyon finished off her second revenant with greater ease than the first, though this time she had the element of surprise. Faye, sitting in the back of her head and thinking her own thoughts, got to spend considerably more effort watching them and thinking about them than Halcyon did, even though this time Halcyon took a moment to observe what it really looked like before engaging.

And Faye didn't like what she saw.

The revenant was roughly equinoid in shape, made of scrap metal that seemed to be held together telekinetically, green fire burning everywhere its body should be. It was the same shade of emerald as their own flame, summoned by their bracelet, a fact Halcyon also picked up on. But what Halcyon didn't know was how strongly this place reminded Faye of the crystalline Macrothesis.

Also a city. Also inhabited only by strange, construct approximations of ponies, made from the only materials that happened to be around - crystal in that case, scrap metal in this one. Also existing inside a vortex of emotion, and in both cases, the emotional core was deep down, at the center. But while the emotions of Macrothesis had been steadfast, eternal and pure, these were turbulent and chaotic, and somehow also static and stagnant. It felt less like there was one great mind thinking these thoughts and more like a river of minds, and yet it also felt like a dry riverbed, like she was seeing the channels carved into the land by something that was no longer here. And yet it was so much more present than most emotions that it could literally possess scrap metal to attack you.

That was her working theory on what the green flames were, at least. It was probably some form of changeling queen power, and changeling queens used emotions as power. Except her theory also didn't leave much room for the changeling queen, because these revenants acted less like extensions of something intelligent and more like an autonomous, spontaneous force.

Halcyon backpedaled, accidentally drawing the attention of two revenants at once. Faye could feel her learning, discovering the extent to which she could trust her armor and improving her balance on big swings, and part of her was annoyed with Rhodallis for not joining the fray: seeing a master at work with her same weapon of choice, Halcyon would learn even faster. At the same time, her special talent...

Using it in the way Halcyon had been set up to think it was for was much better than Halcyon realizing what it could actually do. But Halcyon had also been striking out on her own and not using it at all recently, which was even better. Faye wanted to encourage that. Part of her knew she was being pedantic, putting the avoidance of her own fears above the potential good of accessing more power to achieve their formidable goals. But they also had more power than they knew how to handle already, and needed confidence and consistency more than anything else. So, she tried not to resent Rhodallis too hard, and returned to watching, trying to puzzle out one more connection that would make everything she had already observed make sudden sense.

I panted as I smashed the second revenant, noting another patrol of two walking along in the distance. I could be as strong as I liked, but swinging this greatsword around while hiking in a suit of heavy armor, moving from battle to battle without breaks... Without my bracelet's power, I was getting tired.

That said, maybe it was better I didn't have it. My customary deep-seated paranoia, already convinced that the revenant fire was related if not identical to my bracelet fire, suggested all sorts of ways using it in a place like this could backfire on me, from bringing back the hallucinations that happened when they landed a hit to absorbing the green mist and turning me into a revenant.

Having the bracelet be so far away freed me from the temptation of using it. And for all I knew, that was a good thing.

Still, my limits would catch up to me if I went too much longer at this pace, so I turned to Rhodallis and Bernard and laid out my case.

"I think it's pretty apparent I can handle myself at least a little, if you're testing me," I finished. "But I'd like to point out I'm swinging around gear that's way above my weight class. Both of you can probably last a lot longer in these circumstances than I can, and I'd like to not push so hard before you give me backup that I'm dead weight if we have to work together."

"...Alright," Rhodallis said, his customary swagger fully sapped away by now and replaced with an angry, resentful determination. "I suppose I've seen enough. Bernard, back her up from now on. I'll step in when we get to the big ones."

The big ones. Right. Of course those were just small fry. I tried to massage my wounds through the armor, my shoulders, cheeks and legs stinging from the four different times I had been hit so far. Every time was the same result, feeling as if my mind was dragged before that hollowed-out ghost of a star to be groped and probed, and every time being pushed back by the supernatural shield around my mind.

We crossed another patrol, and this one went down easier, Bernard vanishing right as the fight started, then appearing behind one the instant their attention was on me, shredding it with a double-dagger pirouette that belonged to a pony far below his own weight class. It almost made me feel silly, the far smaller pony walking around with heavy armor and weaponry, and him treating the fight like a dance. But it brought results, and I had no reason to complain about that.

"So what are revenants?" I asked, repeating my original question but this time determined to press further. "How do they work? I get that they come from the green fog, but why?"

Rhodallis shrugged. "You ever been to a battlefield? Or maybe a church?"

I nodded. I had spent countless hours in the Icereach chapel.

"The land has a memory," Rhodallis said. "Things happen that are potent enough, or often enough, and the land remembers. And this land just has some particularly bad memories."

"Why?" I asked. "What happened here? Was it related to Chrysalis?"

"This is where her power was assembled," Rhodallis told me, still walking. "All that hatred and apathy and rage and loneliness and despair, mixed into the brew of desolation and poured into her soul... All of that happened beneath this city. So when she embraced that power, this was one of the first places to go."

"She razed it?" I guessed, looking around at the burned-out buildings.

"Didn't even have to." Rhodallis stopped, another revenant patrol approaching around the corner. "There was some sort of feedback, and the place exploded all on its own. Been like this ever since. Don't ask for more details. All I know beyond that is, this city got what it deserved."

I held off on the questions until we defeated the next patrol. This one had three revenants, and I was fairly sure it was where I would have fallen if I was still on my own, or at least would be wounded too badly to go on. But Bernard was a professional, and I only had to take one hit to my armor before he had them all down.

Even though Rhodallis told me not to ask further, I still burned with questions. "So the Night's Boon..."

"Well, they're here because they've got a point to prove," Bernard said, taking over talking from his boss. "They seem to think that with sufficient prayer, rituals, that sort of thing, they can cleanse this place and excise it of its history. Good luck to them, I say."

"So they're here because they're trying to fix it, and remove this green fog?" I asked, keeping a sharp eye out as we walked. "Wouldn't they realize how dangerous it is?"

"Oh, they've got plenty of firepower," Rhodallis said, also looking around. "That's the only reason they're not dead yet. But like I said, firepower doesn't make these things stay gone."

Bernard chuckled. "I doubt a few rituals and good vibes will do much to rejuvenate this place either. You can't break a curse with happy feelings."

Rhodallis shook his head. "Actually, that's the only thing that possibly could. They just don't understand the magnitude of what would have to happen here to counteract what happened before. You can't erase trauma, but in principle, you can add enough other experiences that it's no longer the most definitive event... If they were willing to spend a few thousand years doing it."

I raised an eyebrow. Rhodallis was the last person I ever expected to hear advice on dealing with trauma from, even if it related to the physical land a city was built on.

But Bernard didn't sound convinced. "Even if that could work for other places, how many other spots in the world do you know where a bit of bad history causes those to pop up?" He pointed back at the last scrapped revenants. "This place is different."

I almost expected Rhodallis to argue that it was just a difference of magnitude, but he held his tongue. Huh.

We entered the ziggurat's shadow. The street we had been following drew to a close, reaching a low wall that seemed to be the first barrier separating the inner city from the capitol complex. Rhodallis casually jumped it, carrying Coda's trolley once again, and Bernard easily followed suit. I swallowed, considered whether I'd be able to make it, and settled for shadow swimming up the singed gray bricks.

Now, Bernard took the lead, drawing us into some sort of metal parkland that felt like it was supposed to act as a substitute for green space in a place where trees couldn't grow. In the distance, I spotted a much larger revenant, this one shaped like a scorpion and twice as big as Rhodallis. Bernard gave it a careful berth, and it left us alone.

Above, the sky was a thick emerald, swirling with fog against a backdrop of more fog. Thicker fumes occasionally leaked from grates and drains, and we fought our way through two more patrols, exhaustion starting to creep at my limbs even with Bernard's help. The ziggurat loomed overhead, and already I could see blown-out windows on its upper levels, a flying revenant with broad, immobile wings circling lazily around them.

The fog itself seemed to caress me, probing me and trying to get in, even without a revenant to stab me and inject its flames. What would happen if I accepted it? According to Rhodallis, all this was just a left-behind memory of the power that had once passed through this place, the things and experiences passed on to Chrysalis. Could I even absorb a memory? I understood precious little about how changeling queens worked, but I felt like we dealt in emotions themselves, not the residue they left behind. Or maybe the difference wasn't so clear-cut as that? I could still feel emotions about things that happened to me in my past, even though they weren't happening now, in the present.

Even thinking about opening myself brought the fumes closer, filled my ears with a baleful muttering, not close enough to squirm inside me yet close enough to hear. Voices, crying and complaining and wailing and gnashing their teeth, cursing their oppressors and begging for salvation and ruing their sins and slavering for vengeance, forbidden a future and yet frozen in eternity, formless and lost.

Even listening to their echoes almost distracted me enough to miss Bernard signalling a patrol, and I pulled myself back to reality to deal with it as we approached the ziggurat's gates. But those voices, now that I had heard them, didn't fade from my ears, resuming their endless muttering, begging that each and every individual one might be known.

I thought back to my experience inside Coda's throne, seeing the storm of emotion she had absorbed, a ferocious facade with no substance. That storm couldn't even push back a room full of this fog, let alone a city. Let alone the real thing, the one who embodied all this.

Coda was right there, frost pouring from her eyes within the ice block. If she was free right now, if she could feel this, would it convince her of the futility of her cause? Would it convince her to abandon her faithful and let me give her a normal life, faced with how insurmountable of a fight she had picked?

...I wasn't sure it would. It might rightfully convince her she needed a stronger power source. But having felt this myself, for the first time having begun to fathom the depths of what drove my mother, I found myself wanting to fight her in Coda's place. To take on that responsibility, destroy her, and release her from this curse once and for all.

Bernard gave the signal that the entrance was free. Swiftly, as silently as we were able, we dashed into the ziggurat.

Parasite

The inside of the ziggurat felt like walking into a tomb - and, at the same time, into a heart.

A combination of high ceilings and flat metal walls displayed both an ambition and a lack of imagination, the lobby that greeted us spreading wide to both sides. Despite its vastness, it had a complete and claustrophobic lack of windows, made all the more jarring by how it was right up against the edge of the building. Someone could have given it windows. The outdoors were right there. But they had chosen not to, and even without the desolation and green fog, it felt like walking into an enormous griffon hand that was grasped around me.

While you are here, the architecture seemed to say, nowhere else matters. You are mine.

And then there was the fog. Whatever forces outdoors could dilute and disperse the fumes, in here, they weren't at play. Fog slithered and seeped from random objects, not only the seams between the metal plates on the floor but from dead light fixtures, from uncomfortable-looking rows of chairs in waiting areas, from the line of sterile reception desks along the wide back wall. When one jet of fumes stopped, another sprang up from somewhere else, over a dozen active at any one time, like the building was breathing and changed its mind about where its countless noses were every few seconds.

A tiny revenant skittered across our path, smaller than a hoof and made of bolts and paper clips and other metal bits. Rhodallis smashed it beneath a sabaton before I could tell if it was hostile, or actually this place's version of an insect.

"Hold up," he warned, his voice low enough not to attract the attention of the room's other revenants - some were patrolling, others were standing eerily in place, and one was even sitting at a reception desk, doing absolutely nothing.

I glanced over.

"Things work differently in this place," Rhodallis muttered. "The further we go, the less certain you can be that anything you see is real. It's not that your actions don't have consequences, but that those consequences might not be what anyone would expect. So be careful. And don't even think about trusting your own feelings."

I swallowed. Great talk, pirate king.

Rhodallis took the lead, getting us through the lobby without another fight. Beyond, things grew even more claustrophobic, square metal tunnels with walls exactly as wide as the ceilings were high leading us deeper into the ziggurat. Occasionally, enough damage had occurred to the metal plates that I could see underneath them at the seams, but every time there was nothing but concrete. It seemed like whoever had built this place just cast it in place, and then added the monotonous metal for aesthetics.

"Where'd they get all this metal, anyway?" I whispered, uncertain if this was the time for conversation but wanting more and more to distract myself from the muttering in the mist.

"Gyre's steel industry," Rhodallis growled softly. "The old government wanted rapid industrialization, but they couldn't find enough buyers in time. So, they became their own customer. Such a waste..."

Huh.

A green glare reflecting off the fog gave us warning before the next revenant rounded the corner, and Rhodallis swiftly passed Coda's cart to Bernard. This one was flying, two propellers above the front and back of its sausage-shaped torso, with no legs and two arms with long, needle-like claws... At least, that was the impression I got before Rhodallis struck.

He lunged at it faster than my eyes could track, ramming a hoof deep within the thing's burning core. Rhodallis stood frozen, a crunch of metal reached my ears, and after about a second, the revenant's glow faded, its parts falling uselessly to the floor as scrap metal. Rhodallis kicked the scrap aside and continued walking without a second glance.

Much as I felt like asking how he did that, this time, I held my tongue.

We pressed on. It should have been pitch black, in absence of any revenants' light, but for some reason, that wasn't the case: the green fog itself seemed to provide some basic level of illumination, except it was incredibly inconsistent. The fog slithered, and our hundreds of shadows danced across the walls and ceiling and each other, in ways that should have been impossible with ambient or even many point sources of light. The shadows looked queasy, undulating with the mist during their brief time in existence before they were left behind and new shadows came to replace them, and if I stared at them too long, I began to feel like my head was swimming, too.

Eventually, we came to a staircase next to a burned-out elevator shaft, one of its sliding doors halfway open, the other jammed off its rails and mostly closed. Instinctively, I stepped towards the stairs leading up, but Rhodallis shook his head, hefting Coda's trolley again and starting on the ones that went down.

I glanced up, and then down. Below us was still that strange blotch in my vision, something I now suspected was a point in space that I could see through walls. Was that where we were going? Getting back outside, perhaps on the roof, would be so much nicer. And the more I stared at the blotch, the harder it was to look away.

But Rhodallis continued his course. And, eventually, after several more stairs, we found something.

It was a room inscribed with complex patterns of runes, most of which ran in straight lines that intersected each other at odd angles, changing directions whenever they hit an edge between the floor, walls and ceiling. I couldn't tell what they were drawn with - some sort of ink, luminescent and sparkly. Long-lived candles lined the walls, and at the back of the room was a wooden door where most of the runes converged, obviously installed in a custom frame long after the rest of the city had been gutted by flame.

The fog was less prevalent here, most of the room's light coming from the runes instead. As I stepped closer, taking care not to walk on the runes after seeing Rhodallis do the same - Bernard didn't bother - the muttering from the fog faded slightly in my mind.

It felt... better. And yet there was still something strange and unnatural about it, in an entirely different way that I couldn't put my hoof on.

"We're here," Rhodallis muttered, stopping in front of the door. Then, raising his voice, he called, "Open up!"

The door swung inward, the lines of runes that crossed from its frame to its surface glittering brighter as they were disturbed. From inside, a small griffoness wearing a starry black cowl peered out, nodded, and wordlessly beckoned us inside.

Beyond the door, my boots found carpet. The metal had been removed from the concrete walls, and the concrete had been papered over, warm orange lighting flickering from candles and magical lanterns. Initially, refurbishing this area must have been a rush job, I could tell. Some of the foundational work was hasty, as if done by ponies with a sword held to their throats. And yet, bit by bit, it was in the process of being redone, ornate wooden trim covering up some of the seams, one wall barren with the supplies for remaking it laying out on the floor.

The runes were still present, as well, tracing along the edges of walls so as to not get in the way, trailing off out of sight through a connecting hallway. There were also a few large weapons near the door, sitting in what had to be a hoof-crafted weapon rack.

Altogether, it felt like a cross between an old mare's house, a construction site, and a guardhouse. And even though the green was gone, some other feeling had grown up to replace it, filling the room and turning its air into a hard, heavy, fragile shield. I tried to parse this new feeling, but my mind was too strained and addled from resisting the effects of the green fog, and I couldn't even get a hint before my faculties walked out in protest.

The griffoness closed the door behind us, the room feeling somewhat cramped between me, her, two pirates and a block of ice. She glanced to Coda, her curiosity partially masked by a perpetual solemnity, and then turned to Rhodallis and bowed.

"The Night's Boon bids you welcome," she said in a soft, scarred voice. "Are you here for our usual covenant, or something else?"

Rhodallis shrugged. "As misfortune would have it, I'm here for both. But let's not negotiate here. I have better things to do than repeat myself."

The griffoness bowed again, motioning for us to follow her down the hallway. "Then please, follow me. Though I should mention that you are not our only visitors today. Please remember our rules, and try not to cause trouble in the consecrated areas."

"Oh...?" Rhodallis raised a heavy eyebrow, towing the trolley as he followed.

She led us through an area that was laid out more like a large home than the labyrinthine dungeon comprising the rest of the ziggurat, to a degree where I suspected the walls were entirely customized and this compound was built inside a large, open room in the ziggurat's basement. The runes followed us through the hallway, reminding me of the guide markings in Icereach to help scientists not get lost. Except they were clearly more functional than that, on some magical level, relating to this place's freedom from the green fog... As we walked, I took a deep breath and tried once again to get a read on this place's feeling.

It was confusing, and almost contradictory. There was a strong negative vibe in the air, feelings of frustration or pain or even agony, but they were intrinsically woven through with strains of joy, pride, stubbornness and accomplishment. Part of it felt like the celebratory buzz that came with overcoming a strenuous, rewarding challenge, only the afterglow was squished in together with striving during the trial, and even dread and anticipation before it.

But that was only one of the feelings making up the atmosphere in this place. There were also threads of wild abandon, of living like there was no tomorrow, a passion and vigor that cared nothing for consequences. Alongside them were feelings that there really was no tomorrow, helpless and trapped. And beneath all of it, there was peace.

Baffled, I resisted the urge to scratch my head, Faye helping to parse through the feelings that were pressing on my senses. What could be causing all of this? What could make someone feel this way, all at the same time? Despite how many things I had listed, I knew I had just scratched the surface of what was in the air. And it was also more alive, less a memory like the green fog or the feeling in the Icereach chapel, and more like what I remembered from touching the crystal heart in the Crystal Empire, except much more jumbled and not nearly so strong.

Even if it wasn't that strong, it was still strong. We passed a door in a hallway that over a dozen rune lines connected to, and the feeling peaked as I looked at it. Whatever was making the place feel this way, odds were decent it was behind that door.

For better or worse, the griffoness led us past that door without a word as to its purpose. Probably for the better. With all its conflicts and contradictions, the pressure this place exerted on my mind was overall a neutral force, neither good nor bad. That was a lot better than the green fog, which was clearly evil. It was also worse than something actively good, and my preference was for things that left my mind alone entirely and didn't feel like anything at all.

We entered a bigger room, which stood out for several reasons. First, it was populated, with half a dozen ponies and griffons in starry robes sitting, kneeling or pacing around it. Some were quietly meditating, while others were painting or sculpting, most with an unhurried veneer of productivity. Second, it was the best-decorated area I had seen so far, artwork of varying quality hung from the walls, with hoof-made furniture that had too much time spent on the details. The room cleanly answered its own questions of where all this art came from, and what all of the Night's Boon members did down here.

They took care of their space, gave it more attention than it could reasonably deserve, and tried their best to beautify it. This must have been their idea of cleansing the land of the memory of what had happened here. And, for a moment, it felt like a surprisingly good and effective idea. I could almost imagine myself as this building, repaying their care with gratitude.

Except, whatever the thing behind the rune door was, it was still doing its thing. And the feeling I got from that outweighed anything else these creatures could be doing here. Whether they cared for this space or not, it was the dominant force here, not them.

All of that was almost interesting enough that I could overlook the giant, jet-black suit of armor standing patiently in the corner. Almost.

Rhodallis didn't. His gaze drifted to the armored creature, their broad shoulders almost rivaling his own stature, their face and eyes and every feature concealed beneath polished, lacquered steel.

His eyes narrowed. "I know you. From the Wilderwind Resistance. What are you doing in a place like this?"

"Waiting," the black knight said in a voice I couldn't place between masculine and feminine. "For you."

"Are you, now?" Rhodallis leaned on one shoulder, his voice back to dripping with its usual condescension. "And why's that?"

The black knight's helmet turned slightly towards Coda. "Consuls have loose lips. I heard what you're trying to sell."

Rhodallis raised an eyebrow. "Are your masters interested? Think they can afford my price?"

"I didn't come to negotiate," the black knight said. "I'm only here with a warning. You're trying to sell something that isn't property. She's a pony."

Rhodallis shook his head and snorted. "Frankly, I couldn't care less what you think this is. To me, it's a means to an end. If you want it, make your offer now or forever hold your peace."

"I only came to warn you," the black knight said, leaving with a clank-clank-clank of armor. Some of the Night's Boon creatures looked relieved.

Bernard gave himself a satisfied smile. "Well, I haven't an idea who that was, but bold threats do make for entertaining gestures."

"I'm glad you think so," Rhodallis grunted, stepping towards a lone door at the narrow end of the room. "Because if we don't strike a deal, you'll be guarding Coda solo up here while I show Halcyon the Core."

Bernard's smile became worried, both self-deprecating and self-aware.

Before Rhodallis could knock, the next door opened, moved by the aura of a unicorn who had to be pushing ninety years old. His snow-white mane sagged around his wizened shoulders, and he regarded Rhodallis with cloudy eyes and an eventual nod. "You're here for our usual arrangement, I take it."

"Among other things," Rhodallis said, gesturing to me. "I suppose we'll need introductions... This is Halcyon, my newest curiosity. Halcyon, this is Lente. He's the leader around here, and a business associate. Now then." He trudged into the office on the other side of the door, still pulling Coda, motioning for Bernard to stand watch outside and for me to join him.

The office had a carpeted floor, wooden walls and a papered ceiling. Lente took up a chair behind a heavy oak desk, watching for Rhodallis to begin negotiations. And for my part... I had no idea what to do.

That introduction was apparently all I would get. Here I was, party to discussions even Bernard wasn't a part of, ostensibly to sell Coda but who knew what else on top of that. So far, we hadn't met enough ponies for it to matter, but I got the vague impression I was supposed to sit back and let Rhodallis take the lead. But now, if that was still the case, shouldn't he have confirmed my instructions explicitly? Or at least given me a better briefing on the plan? Maybe he suspected I would react poorly, since I told him I wanted to free Coda and he was trying to pawn her off. But if so, why bring me here now?

If it was supposed to be some form of torture or power play, he would have given me more explicit instructions not to interfere. But it was almost more like... this was a test, and he cared less about negotiations going smoothly than seeing what I would do.

"Right," Rhodallis said, positioning Coda's trolley front and center, "let's get down to business. The thing in this ice block is Chrysalis's daughter. She's a changeling queen, just like her mother. Everything I've been doing for you, she could do a thousand times better, and without the need for ongoing contracts."

Lente frowned at her. "You think this filly could act as an emotional sponge for the horrors of this place?"

My blood ran cold.

How had I missed this? In all my speculation about this place, I had completely forgotten to ask myself what a group like the Night's Boon would want with a changeling queen. But now that I thought about it, it was chillingly obvious. The green fog was probing me because it was attracted by my emptiness, like opposite poles of two magnets. I could choose to embody this place if I let it in, just like Chrysalis did... and just like Coda could do too.

And the Night's Boon wanted to clean this place up. The emotional scars here were literally leaking out into the air and possessing inanimate objects. So what if they gave them someplace else to go?

Like into Coda.

I couldn't let this happen.

"Well?" Rhodallis asked. "A changeling queen was able to hold all this once before. Sure, she's already a little filled up, but even if you can't cleanse the whole city, you could dramatically expand your working area. Maybe even clean it up enough that the revenants leave you alone."

"No way." I dropped my forehooves on the table, hard. "Isn't trying to stuff all of this into one person what caused this whole mess in the first place? Do you want to make another Chrysalis? What if she explodes too, and makes it twice as bad? And even if it did work, could you ever live with yourselves for forcing a kid to pay the price?"

My heart was pounding. I was exhausted from the fighting, the walking, the heavy armor and the constant pressure of the green fog. I had no cards to play, no chips on the table, but I had just entered the game regardless. I had to.

Lente glanced at me, and then at Rhodallis. "She has a point. Both a practical and a moral one. But what do you gain from her making it?" He focused again on me. "Why bring someone like this to such a discussion, Rhodallis?"

Rhodallis shrugged. "I have my reasons. But you don't have any complaints about giving the energies of this place to me."

Lente turned back to him. "You take them of your own free will."

"Free will is an illusion for the likes of me," Rhodallis growled, gesturing at Coda. "I am what I am. But that goes double for her. She wants what you make her want. Changeling queens are vessels. They're giant trash cans for all the things that don't belong in the rest of the world, a few wretched sacrifices so everyone else can live better lives. Prioritizing the needs of the many at the cost of a few... Isn't that why your order is here? Squandering your chance to live lives outside of this accursed pit so that someday, it won't exist anymore?"

Coda stared back, unblinking, from within her block of ice.

Lente folded his hooves and sighed. "Why don't you let her out of there so she can weigh in on this for herself? Talking about free will is meaningless when she's completely captive."

"No can do, old stallion." Rhodallis slowly shook his head, teeth gritted. "She was like this when I got her. There's no helping it. You can use her, or you can walk away with your morality intact and the same horde of revenants at your door that's always been there."

My mouth hung open as my mind put up a final bastion of resistance against saying another possibly stupid thing. "If you really want to do the right thing, what about buying her off Rhodallis and then letting her go free?"

Once again, Rhodallis didn't do anything to stop me from speaking my mind. Lente looked at me sideways.

Eventually, he chuckled. "So that's your game. Trying to get me to buy her from two opposite angles. Making it look like a binary choice, where either branch results in a purchase! You're good, you're good. But I notice you haven't even given your price. Might as well put it on the table and get it over with."

"...Nothing you'd be willing to part with," Rhodallis said, standing up. "And nothing I'd be willing to accept. Right now, I just need the Neo Everlaste Consulate to think I'm serious about finding another buyer after they turned me down. Which isn't to say I'm not serious about it. I just knew I could come to you to keep up appearances while looking for other options that are more likely to pan out." He fixed Lente with a look. "If anyone comes looking, we closed the deal and you're currently using the thing in the ice block as a mop head for your floors. That's the gist you should send, but be evasive and don't make any binding statements. I want the act to last for about a week, at least long enough for rumors to spread before the truth gets out. If those rumors make it to Ironridge, all the better. Think that'll sit easy enough on your precious conscience?"

I blinked, taking all that in.

"And in return?" Lente asked, looking entirely okay with being asked to spread baseless rumors about abusing Coda, even if he backpedaled from actually doing the deed itself.

"The customary Core cleansing and checkup," Rhodallis said. "Plus a dozen scrapped revenants on the way here, and plenty more on the return trip. Anything else you want on the side? This is a bit of a special order."

Lente nodded. "The Black Knight. If I'm to insinuate that we closed a deal on your changeling queen, I need some insurance that they won't show up here to make good on their threats."

"They're actually called the Black Knight?" I stopped myself, remembering too late that my own role here was probably done. Fitting, though.

Rhodallis ignored me. "I don't have the resources to track their every move. If they show up here again, you can let them in on the truth. But I'll make Wilderwind my next stop. If I run into them there, I should be able to head off any trouble."

Lente proffered a wizened hoof. "Then we have an accord. I will prepare the lift to the Core. Your associates are welcome to stay in our sanctum until you are finished."

Rhodallis bumped it, sealing the deal. "Thanks, but Halcyon's with me for this."

Lente's eyes went wide. "You're taking a sarosian into the Core? You of all people ought to know how dangerous-"

"Hah!" Rhodallis barked out a laugh, cutting him off. "It's like you don't know who you're dealing with. She'll be fine with me."

I swallowed, following him out of the office.

Minutes later, with Bernard standing solo guard over Coda, I left the relative safety of the Night's Boon's sanctuary, and the green mist returned with a vengeance.

I didn't want to admit it, but... I liked Bernard. Sure, he made a show of acting affably evil, had a doubtlessly crooked past, scammed his friends and could shank me in a heartbeat if he ever felt like it, but without him, I was alone with Rhodallis.

Rhodallis, I had much less reason to trust. Inscrutable as he could be, the only reason he had to keep me alive was that I was useful to him, and I didn't understand why that was. Even if he merely abandoned me, I would be screwed, tired and on my own in a cursed, twisted labyrinth beneath a blown-out, haunted city in the middle of nowhere on a continent far from home. Maybe I could find my way back to the Night's Boon and make some sort of deal to enter under their protection... maybe.

But if he actually turned on me, I would be toast.

We crossed another revenant, this one tall and bipedal, walking at a swaying slant that would have tipped over if it was a real creature. Once again, Rhodallis killed it before I could move, piercing it with a hoof and watching as its essence drained away.

What had he said while talking to Lente, about giving the city's energies to him? Weren't we supposed to be replenishing ammunition for the ship? My brain started spinning, churning out theories about how the green fog was the ship's ammunition, and Rhodallis could somehow absorb it... Was he a changeling queen? The impression I got from all the Ironridge Bishops, Lilith most of all, was that they were something similar, but not nearly the same. But was it close enough that Rhodallis could absorb the fog just like it wanted to do to me?

If so, what did that say about him? The muttering, pounding at my skull, hating and lamenting and cursing and crying and despairing... Was that what he felt like, inside? Were these voices one and the same with his thoughts?

Hopefully not. If their goals were the same, and the fog wanted me to embody it as a changeling queen, that would almost certainly mean he would do something to help it get in. Like taking me to this Core, where the fog would obviously be the strongest.

Great.

I tried to shrug it off the same way Corsica might ignore something that bothered her back in Icereach, but I couldn't remember my previous train of thought to return to it. I tried to tell myself I was just being paranoid, as usual, but I wasn't. My paranoia was reasonable, grounded in reality, reinforced by every time something crazy came along and ruined my day out of the blue, and yet everything still turned out alright in the end, from a combination of inexplicable miracles and the supernatural durability of my mind and body. But this time was different.

Once again, as always, I was at the mercy of fate. I was armed and armored, and yet there was no way out of this save for a miracle, for the actions of everyone around me to inexplicably resolve in a way that left me fine and on my hooves. It was the same as it always was. And yet this time, I couldn't shake the feeling that my fear was so much more real than before, that everything I used to worry about was silly and trivial, and that my prayers were useless words on the wind. That there were no gods here to hear me.

Maybe it was the stakes. Dying? I had faced death plenty of times before. Maybe even actually died once or twice. But never had I seriously faced becoming a vessel for a force I rejected; for things I didn't want to overwrite my mask on my blank slate and become the new me.

Losing everything I was, being forcibly remade as someone else... That was terrifying.

"Why so quiet?" Rhodallis asked as we walked. "There's no need for stealth. You've seen how I deal with these."

"You want to answer more questions?" I raised an incredulous eyebrow. "Fine, then. Do you believe in gods?"

Rhodallis chuckled. "Of course I do. I practically am one!"

"Bigger ones than you," I countered. "That doesn't count."

"Then it depends on your definition," he said. "There are powers that be just about everywhere you look. Some of them even make for good sport. And others are just a good way to die... if they don't ignore you altogether. But it isn't my job to be mad about that. That one is special."

"That one?" I tilted my head. "That one what?"

"When you think about it, even the Night's Boon is a god," Rhodallis went on, ignoring me. "This whole city is like a patch of dead flesh on the world, left to rot even as the rest of the organism goes on living. And then this parasite thinks it can spring up right in the middle of that, make this dead space its own and decide it can set the rules. But that's a special case, and probably not what you had in mind."

I screwed up my gaze as Rhodallis impaled another propeller revenant. The Night's Boon was a god, and also a parasite, growing in the dead flesh of the world? Was he... talking about their sanctuary, whatever the runes were doing and whatever mechanism it used to keep out the green mist?

If the world was alive... That was a concept I had started familiarizing myself with a while ago. But he made it sound like in the space around this city, it had died, and then something completely different was growing back from the Night's Boon's sanctuary to take its place.

That was why their sanctuary felt so different. I shuddered.

I had no idea what kind of implications something like this could carry.

"What about the kinds of gods you pray to?" I asked, saying anything I could think of to keep Rhodallis talking.

"Those have never existed," he spat. "And if they do, they don't listen. Not to Chrysalis, and not to the countless souls who stained this place before passing their wretchedness on to her. Scream all you like, kid. No one can hear us. I know that for a fact."

Violence

"Have you ever felt more alive?" Rhodallis asked, another revenant crackling and collapsing into scrap metal, its energies drained by his hoof. "I'm never more myself than when I come down here. Honestly, I don't know why I don't come here more often."

He certainly looked alive. I was flagging, the long hike and heavy armor and multiple solo fights early on all taking their toll. Even without that, the city's atmosphere took a constant presence of mind to push back, an extra weight draped around me that slowly, inexorably was wearing me down. But for some reason, the same factors were invigorating the pirate king, and I almost swore there was a bounce in his step.

His angry, heavy, perpetually serious step. It was a very uncanny bounce.

"I'm... not so sure?" I responded warily. "Are you sure you're feeling alright? You're not acting like you normally do. And before we entered, you warned me not to trust anything that happened down here as being real."

Rhodallis just chuckled. I caught a glimpse of his eyes, and they were filled with a cruel, torturer's glee.

This was bad news.

I followed him down another staircase, and the claustrophobic, square metal tunnels we had been trekking through suddenly gave way to somewhere bright. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust, but we appeared to be high up on a wall overlooking a very broad cavern, probably about the size of the surface city's walls. The bottom was sloped and heavily developed with cluttered, trashy ruins in a very different style from the absolutist architecture that dominated the surface city interior. All of it was wasted, and sporadic green bonfires provided the illumination. The fires that consumed this portion of the city never seemed to have gone out.

"What is this?" I asked, my eyes tracing the rivers of green fumes rising from the fires, twisting strangely coherent paths through the air, and ultimately rising to the ceiling, an industrial platform that probably supported the bulk of the city above.

"This is the original city," Rhodallis explained, showing no signs of irritation whatsoever at my constant questions, even though I felt like he could murder an entire village without batting an eye. "Long ago, they said Garsheeva made this crater to provide shelter against the winds. The new city, covering it up... that was all built within the last hundred years. A symbol of progress, they called it. Paving over their history and trying to make the land look flat again, like anywhere else. And then they kept the old city around as a place to put creatures too poor to afford a life with sunlight."

He spat the words with passion and conviction, the ruins below easily visible, even though at this distance the green mist should have hopelessly obscured them. And yet it didn't, as if it wanted this to be seen.

"Why are you telling me this?" I asked. "I appreciate it, but what's it matter?"

"Can't you hear it?" Rhodallis asked, breathing deeply in. "Because they want to be remembered."

The muttering in the mist assaulted me, voices scratching and groping at my mind. But when he put it like, that, the reason why was obvious: they wanted to be heard.

I wondered what it would take, what kind of time and capacity and fortitude it would require to let them in, to hear out every single soul that had carved this chorus into the air, to learn their names and their desires and remember each and every one of them. And then I remembered myself, sitting under a lonely sky in Icereach and staring up at the heavens, wondering who - if anyone - might be out there.

It wasn't just the creatures who had left this place behind, whose desires still lived on more actively in my mother. It was everyone. Everyone wanted to be remembered, not just the ones whose echoes permeated this place.

A job like that was fit only for a god.

We descended, climbing down a complicated set of scaffolding on what I guessed was a central support pillar of the city above. We passed more revenants, each one making me question anew what Rhodallis was, what he was doing, and how that related to Chrysalis. We reached the ground, and the fire on the revenants grew brighter, Rhodallis dispatching a massive one that looked like a tree with the body and legs of a spider and a single massive wing growing from its trunk.

We traversed ruined alleyways blocked by blown-out buildings, streets laid out without regard for any form of planning. We found another staircase, descended into a long-dry sewer tunnel, passed through a maintenance door, and kept going lower.

The fog thickened. The flames of the revenants grew brighter. That discolored blotch on my vision grew closer, now identifiable as being directly beneath the central support pillar. And I still had absolutely no idea why Rhodallis was taking me here.

When pressed, he wouldn't say.

Eventually, the tunnels opened out into a hexagonal space roughly the size of a small ballroom and made of smooth, polished bricks. Green flames on the pillars provided illumination, burning from what looked like smashed lighting fixtures, as if they remembered where light had once belonged. Artwork and murals adorned the floor and the walls, but my attention was stolen by the huge stone double-door on the opposite wall. It had no frame, looking like it was designed to blend into the wall when closed, except it was wide open, its panels thrown heedlessly ajar.

It looked like a gateway to the void.

"Hey." Rhodallis stopped unexpectedly, though I had been sure he would forge ahead. "Are you holding up?"

No, I wasn't. In fact, I wasn't sure I had a heartbeat anymore, so disorienting was this place to my sense of rightness. I could even be dead right now, and I wouldn't remember being alive enough to tell the difference. But I nodded nonetheless.

Rhodallis frowned at me. "You know that isn't natural, don't you? You see this place. No one but the most foolhardy survives even at the upper levels. At this depth, ordinary ponies couldn't leave without a permanent impression on their psyche, even with me to keep them safe. It's like putting your head in a nutcracker. And sarosians are more vulnerable than most. So why are you holding up?"

I swallowed.

"That's what I brought you here to learn," Rhodallis explained. "You were resistant to the environment of Neo Everlaste Palace. And to my powers. I need to find out why. Now then... we're almost to the core. If you get cold hooves, you're welcome to drop your protections and let me in, just long enough to see what's inside. I'll even leave you intact when I'm finished. Which I'd try to do anyway, but it's harder to make guarantees when force is involved. You understand."

"That's what this is about?" I folded my ears. Nope. I definitely still had a heartbeat. "This is a place of power for you, or something, and you're going to try to use it to muscle your way into my mind."

I remembered Coda, trying to do something similar with her throne and failing miserably.

"I don't expect you to say yes," Rhodallis said. "I don't expect you to be able to say yes. When I questioned you on the ship, you didn't even sound like you knew what you were doing. So think of this as... me finding out for both our sake. Just a little farther."

My ears pressed back. But I saw absolutely no choice but to follow him into the door.

Beyond the door, I no longer saw green fog. Instead, I saw only in shades of green, flames burning upside-down that leaked from the ceiling. The path wound left and right, passing branching corridors and jail cells, its concrete floor cracked by the force of whatever destroyed the city, but otherwise looking surprisingly new.

A collection of pipes ran along the vaulted tunnel ceiling, thin and ribbed and organically woven together like muscle fibers, made of countless segments that interlocked at regular intervals. I had seen pipes like that before recently, in the castle at the edge of the world. If I touched them, would I hear another voice? They looked like the pipes in Coda's ship that connected her throne to the prayer altars, as well.

Acting on a hunch, I pressed my face to a grate covering one of the jail cells - made of shiny, new, black-painted steel. A revenant in the corner didn't notice me, this one shaped like an amorphous blob. But on the right wall, there was a statue of a batpony, forelegs extended and mouth open in agony, its hips and hind legs buried in the wall as if it had been trapped in wet concrete.

I looked from its mouth back to the pipes on the ceiling. I remembered what Rhodallis had said this place was used for. There was no doubt about it: this was the prototype, the original version of Coda's airship, taking the feelings shared by creatures at the altars and funneling them into a changeling queen. Only while Coda had been gorged on cheap flattery and shallow praise, these altars had taken in the misery and despair of the imprisoned.

"These weren't just for any old prisoners," Rhodallis said, noticing as I stopped and stared. "The punishment for heresy against Garsheeva was death by ritual sacrifice. This place is where those sacrifices were kept."

I felt my skin crawl. The same Garsheeva who talked me into trying again in Ironridge, before I climbed to the bottom of the world and rescued the dying Flame of Kindness?

Actually... I deflated. Why was I even surprised?

Rhodallis beckoned for me to follow, and I kept walking.

After a while, of several more staircases and branches and cells, following the pipes at every intersection and taking the path where they were the thickest, I became aware of Procyon, hovering alongside me. This was... the first time I had seen her since coming to the Empire? But she always came and went as she pleased.

"Don't acknowledge my presence," she said, her voice low and frustrated. "Don't want to give him any ideas."

Rhodallis wasn't watching me, so I gave the tiniest of nods.

"You realize what's going on here, right?" she asked, not expecting an answer. "You've put all the twos together, you know what you have on the table?"

Maybe, but if I was going to get anything helpful out of her...

"Your mind is protected by multiple factors," Procyon said. "Part of it is our split nature. Being fragmented like this... It gives you more leeway to run from things you aren't strong enough to handle, to always answer a problem with the best part of yourself. Another part of it is your identity as a changeling queen. Even an empty queen, even having ran away long ago from parts of your powers..."

She shook her head. "But the most powerful component is a shield made from Unnrus-kaeljos' power. I believe he gave you that shield when I was taken, in order to hide what was done to you... Our split nature; the composition of your soul. The laws of reality push him out. That shield is necessary to cover up evidence of what he did, and I don't know what would happen if it was gone. It could be anything from me being forcibly re-integrated into you, to you being pulled entirely into the void where I was kept, and trapped there for eternity. I think that shield also conceals your nature as a changeling queen. So even in the best case, if Rhodallis breaks that shield, he'll find out who you are and you could become the next thing he tries to sell to random cults to use as an emotional sponge. He wants to see what's inside you because he wants the source of your power for himself, but if he gets in he'll wind up with so much more. You can't let that happen."

Great speech. Really, really heartening-

"I don't know what will win out if you do nothing," Procyon said, interrupting a train of thought she probably couldn't hear: unlike Faye, she had never responded to telepathic communication. "The power of Unnrus-kaeljos is formidable, but so are the memories in this place. Holding them back would be like trying to push a boulder up a waxed slope, or to change the course of a dried riverbank by adding more water. The residual willpower of countless dead mortals, versus that of one god..."

I waited for her to reach her point. Above, the pipes had become too numerous to be contained by the ceiling alone, and were branching down onto the walls, thicker and thicker bundles joining up at every intersection. The blotch in my vision was just ahead.

"But this place is special," Procyon continued. "It's a scar on the world. The normal laws of reality don't have as much purchase here. What that means is, the forces tying me to the void - and all of our powers that I took with us when I left - aren't so strong here. In other words, I might be able to help you in a more tangible fashion than usual. So when he tries again to get inside your mind, don't give up without a fight."

And then she was gone.

The pipes completed their encapsulation of the tunnel, becoming the walls and the floor on which I walked. No mysterious new voices greeted me as my booted hooves touched them, but the muttering changed: instead of a sea of voices surging and trying to speak over each other, they felt frozen in time, as if each one was uttering a single idea, a single syllable, and stopped where they were at the end of the world. The pipes twisted and constricted, merging into each other like blood veins as the tunnel circled and descended in a spiral, until at last they opened out into a final chamber, a brick pillar in the middle rising from baleful emerald depths.

Rhodallis strode toward it on a bridge of pipes, leaving me to follow. For all Procyon's warnings, for all Rhodallis' inscrutability, for all this place's danger, I couldn't bring myself to turn back.

Having heard those voices, I wanted to see - and remember - the source of all this with my own eyes.

I crested the pillar, a lonely circle in the middle of a high, cylindrical chamber, with huge pipe mouths lining the walls that had probably once poured water into a cistern below, and beheld the rift.

This was the blotch I had seen from the surface, visible through the streets and the walls, a cutout in space that glowed with colors that weren't colors. The air in the room around it felt flimsy and two-dimensional, like I could accidentally tear it by moving in the wrong direction, like I was a higher-order being beholding this scene drawn on a sheet of wet paper. When I moved my eyes toward it, and my vision hit one edge, I found I was instantly looking at the opposite edge instead, as if there was so little inside it that there wasn't even space to spend time moving my eyes across. And yet it also felt the opposite, like I was looking across something so vast, time had to accelerate for me to move my eyes enough to ever look away.

It was a cut-out. It wasn't green. It wasn't pink, it wasn't magenta. It didn't seethe, and yet it roiled, holding still in a state of constant motion, like the edges of the tear were blowing in a dimensional wind. It wasn't even here at all, and yet it spoke to me, a memory echoing into the depths of my soul.

{{DIEEEEEEE...}}

The rift groaned to me, projecting a vision over the room, or over my eyes, or across time and space, the same feeling I got when stabbed by the revenants, when beholding that hollowed-out sun. For a split second, the room was no longer green and burning, but dim, and instead of myself and Rhodallis, there were two mares, both familiar: a dazed Valey and an unconscious Kitty, the former stumbling along and the latter being carried by something I couldn't quite look at, either.

{{PLEASE... HELP... DIEEEEE...}}

"Well?" Rhodallis put a heavy hoof on my shoulder, jolting me back to my senses. "With a look like that, I know it's getting through to you. The memory inscribed in this room. You're not that dense."

I felt like I was going to throw up, struggling to compress the kaleidoscope of my senses back into a single dimension... but, gradually, I succeeded. "What is this?"

"Stanza's deepest desire," Rhodallis said, standing proudly with his chest to the rift. "Chrysalis's throne, the receptacle for all these emotions that stored them here, marinating her soul in them until they were all one and the same. What Stanza wanted, what she wanted, what I want for myself and all the other tormented souls that were touched by the fools who built this place... All they wanted was for it to finally be over."

"Why?" I pressed, my heart pounding against the inside of my armor. "Didn't you just say they wanted to be remembered?"

"They wanted a whole host of things," Rhodallis explained, wearing the green fumes like a mantle. "They hated a whole host of things, the rotten circumstances and miserable lives that brought them to marinate in a place like this. They hated their own weakness, their loneliness, everyone who had ever done them wrong, and everyone who never lifted a hoof to stop it! The mistakes that brought them here, the laws that placed them in the wrong, the goddess and her faithful who enforced those laws, the whole world, everything!"

He spun to face me, pointing an aggressive hoof in my face. "You claimed earlier that you didn't have an opinion on Chrysalis, dodging my questions and equivocating about forgiveness. Well, this is her heart! Take a good look around, kid. Take it all in, and tell me how you feel now!"

And so I looked. The rift, still flickering in my mind with a memory of pleading to die... It was shaped like an alicorn laying upon a throne, constructed from a pipe organ that had been tipped on its back. I didn't know how I could tell, but the more I looked, the more I tried to listen without being overcome, the more I could simply tell. It did want to be remembered. It wanted to be found.

The pipes that formed the bridge to the pillar I stood on snaked up and around, entering the rift organ by becoming its organ pipes... and yet, the pipes in the real world were severed and torn, not lining up with the rift's memory, revealing themselves to be made of a material that looked like thin canvas dipped in molten metal. But the rift was a memory. It wasn't the real thing, the real Stanza, Chrysalis's counterpart to Coda's throne Fugue.

"What happened to it?" I asked. "The throne that was here. Stanza."

Rhodallis shrugged. "Buried a mile deep in a collapsed lab beneath the former capitol of Izvaldi. What's it to you?"

"What's the relationship between a changeling queen and their throne?" I asked.

"Why do you care?" Rhodallis gave me a suspicious look, though he seemed to more suspect I was stalling than up to no good.

"I'm seeing a memory of it asking for help dying," I said, staring into the rift. "I just want to know if that was Stanza talking, or Chrysalis."

"It was an extension of her," Rhodallis explained. "While she was connected to it, at least. Other than that, it was just a machine. This kind of damage, this kind of imprint... Building it requires events to reinforce themselves at a singular point in space. Even though Stanza wasn't even here anymore when Chrysalis embraced her powers, this is the place where the feedback occurred. So now that throne is probably just inert junk."

That didn't sit right with me. Maybe it was just my own quirky relationship with machines, but... they could be people, too.

However Chrysalis felt, wherever she was, I suddenly felt sorry for Stanza, too.

Maybe... if I got the chance, in the future, I would track it down, dig it up, and find a way to give it the rest it deserved. Cleansing this city felt like an impossible challenge, but honoring the memory of one machine, finding and dismantling it, I felt like I could do.

"Anything else?" Rhodallis asked, waiting patiently. "Or shall we get started?"

I turned to face him... and realized there was something I had missed, something so ordinary by comparison that it felt out of place.

It was a dusk statue, normal and mostly unmodified, like the ones in storage in the Icereach bunker. Only instead of a polished, colored gemstone in the choker, this one had a much stranger gem, that pulsed with a small vortex of magic. Otherwise, it didn't seem to be doing anything.

"What's that?" I asked without thinking, pointing a hoof.

"This?" Rhodallis patted the statue. "Just an... observer. Ever hear the maxim about staring into the void, and the void staring back? Some people are curious just how true that is."

He gave me a challenging look.

Procyon appeared, again, beside me. Instead of floating, I noticed, her hooves were making contact with the floor.

"I don't know exactly why you brought me here," I told Rhodallis. "I'm guessing you want my powers for yourself, and took me where you were strongest to try and pry them away. You really can't just live with not knowing?"

Rhodallis shrugged. "Spoken like someone who's tried too hard to convince themself of those very words. I have a goal, and I can never rest until I've seen it through. And you've got an edge I can almost certainly use... and that you're almost certainly underusing. Be honest with yourself. I told you I'd try to leave you all in one piece, and you've followed me all this way without so much as a hint of resistance. You want to know how you work too, don't you?"

I swallowed, the green power backing off just enough to give me room to think.

Of course I wanted to know who and what I was, to have an absolute component to my identity, something I could always lean on to know that I was me. Something I couldn't leave behind when changing houses, or when life took my friends their separate ways. Something that could pierce the uncertainty that came from having multiple selves. But...

"We've literally met each other a few days ago," I pointed out. "Don't pretend you're doing this for my sake."

"I wouldn't dream of it," Rhodallis said, a tiny laugh hidden in his arrogance. "I'm just offering a way for you to look on the bright side... No hard feelings, kid. I need this to accomplish my goal."

I squared my shoulders, realizing I had positioned myself between Rhodallis and the rift, but standing my ground anyway. Why had I done that? It was subconscious, but... of all the possible things to find, and of all the possible times to find it, I found a tiny piece of myself looking to my mother, and hoping she would protect me.

"Are you Chrysalis?" I blurted out, in retaliation to my impulse but also because, having seen him down here, I was legitimately curious.

Rhodallis just shook his head. "I told you. I'm just here to give her what she always knew she deserved. Now, try not to struggle."

His body came alight with green flame, consuming his armor and clothing and melding it into his skin, a black carapace taking shape in its place that I had seen on untransformed changelings and dead ones before them. A long, pockmarked horn grew out of his forehead in a dazzle of sparks, and his wings spread wide, wider, shedding their feathers and splitting down the middle to become dragonfly wings, quite unlike the smaller changelings I had seen before. But his mane survived, powerful and wild, and his eyes never changed, becoming larger and more angular yet retaining their same feel.

On his flank was a special talent of an empty circle, just like Lilith and the others.

This was his true form. But, if he was a changeling queen - changeling king? - he didn't have a crown.

Of course, neither did I.

Rhodallis raised his head, lit his horn, and his emerald aura pulled together the fumes from the air, sucking in more and more, almost restoring a measure of color to the room as they congealed into a lance made from emerald glass that burned inside with emerald flame. And then he flung the lance straight at my head.

My hooves were rooted in place. Something paralyzed me. My usual paralysis. As always. Of course.

But it didn't paralyze Procyon.

She jumped, catching the lance with a hoof and a wing, just as a golden shield materialized around me, a furious plume of sparks erupting as the lance tip bit and drilled into it, both of them working together to push it back. I couldn't tell if the shield was real or in my mind, I couldn't tell if the lance was real or in my mind, a drowning sense of detachment welling up-

Faye tore off her mask.

In one smooth motion, she juked to the side, catching the emerald crystal that composed Halcyon as it fell, and stuffing it into her armor. As the lance tip broke connection with her shield, the weight of inevitability slackened slightly from her shoulders, and she was present again: she could feel the rushing of blood in her ears, the roaring of her emptiness in her heart, the demands of the spear and the room and Rhodallis, all as one voice, that she let them inside.

"No!" Faye cried, the spear dissipating as Rhodallis formed another one and calmly flung it at her. "I am not your tool, and I don't want anything to do with this place!"

Rhodallis let the spear be his reply. Faye tried to dodge again, but it turned in midair, seeking her.

So she rammed it first, Rhodallis' emerald willpower pounding against her, demanding answers, seeking to know.

To know what? Faye pushed back with her thoughts as her words, leaning into the shield, wrapping her own hooves around the spearhead and joining her strength to Procyon's.

The desire in the spear fractured, and Rhodallis was suddenly out of sync with the green mist. He wanted her power; it wanted a host. For just a moment, Rhodallis pushed into her alone, a fiery, caustic curiosity, a determination to stop at nothing, to take whatever he needed to succeed, to break whatever he needed to find what he needed to take...

But what was he looking for?

Faye tried to pull.

Still pushing, still defending herself, still forcing him and the mist out, but she was a changeling queen. Anything he could do, she could do better, adrenaline pounding in her heart as she realized she wasn't afraid: no matter how hard she messed up, no matter how far she fell, she could never repeat the mistakes that led to this.

For once in her life, even though Halcyon had been, she wasn't paralyzed and wanted to fight rather than flee.

"What do you want?" Faye yelled, both through the spear and with her mouth, a surge of strength welling up to pull Rhodallis closer, to stare into him as he wanted to stare into her. "What do you think I have for you? What are you trying to use it for!?"

"You're embracing our power?" Procyon grunted, still struggling to hold back the spear. "You're serious about this?"

Faye let her emptiness answer, grasping at Rhodallis like the mist pulled at her... and he wasn't prepared in the slightest.

"What!?" he grunted, staggering forward. "What is this? What are you!?"

Faye felt him resist, and suddenly her emptiness didn't seem sufficient. Rhodallis was pushing her away, backing out of her orbit, redoubling his efforts to probe her now that she had shown off the ability to fight back.

"You do have something," he panted, gritting his teeth. "Something I need to fulfill my purpose..."

Faye pulled again. She didn't have her bracelet, her changeling queen crown, the true key to wielding her powers, but she did have her own determination: a desire to stop hiding, whetted on the taste of freedom she had forced herself into after Halcyon was taken in the Crystal Empire, and now sharpened by the reality that suddenly, her actions mattered.

She had never been in a life-or-death fight before, ever. And the difference in focus it made was electrifying.

Rhodallis leaned again on the mist, and suddenly, Faye was facing an omnipresent, crushing force that needed to be repelled, a soupy sea of desires attracted to her emptiness, one she rejected and could not afford to take in. But attacking was all she could do; her defenses were reliant only on that shield, and despite all Procyon's efforts, it was beginning to show major fractures.

If only she had a weapon...!

And then, from across the depths of space, something answered her call.

It was a light around her leg, a ghost of a bracelet, held back by the reality that it was countless miles away in Seigetsu's pocket aboard the Immortal Dream, and yet trying regardless. And that reality didn't seem so strong here, as if it was stale, just like the air.

Like she could break it, just by pulling.

Procyon saw her, nodded, and let go of the spear. Then she stepped back, looked down at Faye's leg, took a deep breath... and when she spoke, her voice reverberated with the power of the void.

"Let the shackles be released!"

With a crackle of lightning, the light around Faye's leg intensified into a ring of plasma and then metal, her bracelet settling into place as a familiar weight, its black surface glowing with emerald runes that slowly rotated around the metal, chiseled in impossibly thin lines.

Faye lit her bracelet, and did not hold back.

Everything was captured in her vortex as her body burned with green flames of its own - Rhodallis, the spear, everything. Memories streamed into her, loathsome and bitter, a firehose of sensory feedback too fast to parse, and yet she focused her vision and ignored it, staring deep into Rhodallis, the pirate king flung across the room and now physically stuck to her outstretched hoof. She saw him, saw inside him, looking deeper and deeper, but everything inside him was the same: there was no nuance, no complexity, none of the facets that belonged to a person, to anyone living a complex life. The only thing in Rhodallis was green, and two precise flavors of it: a festering, seething hatred of himself, and a desperate, angry fear of being forgotten. And, as she stared deeper into that pure, volatile sea, she saw his name, too.

Extraneous Hatred of Self and Extraneous Hatred of Abandonment

The words lingered in her vision, traced by letters of fire... and then it became too much. Faye could no longer hide from the consequences of inhaling emotions in this place, and she magically retched, reversing the power of her bracelet and expelling as much of the mist as she could into Rhodallis' chest in a mighty, sickening blast. With a crack, her power convulsed, and he was flung across the room, landing up against the base of the normal dusk statue as her hoof dribbled with green flames.

It felt... much like using her power to attack Duma had, long ago in the vault beneath Snowport. But she was certain she hadn't gotten all the green out. The only thing to do was survive and escape from here. And to do that...

She let her bracelet go out.

Smouldering, Rhodallis lifted his head, staring hollowly at Faye, her bracelet displayed for all to see. "Impossible. That... can't be..."

"I win," Faye said, looming over him. "Now that we've established who's stronger... I'm leaving, and I want Coda. If you want any chance of getting anything more useful out of me, you should cooperate, hand her over freely, and give us a ride out of here. If you don't help me, then I'll go it on my own."

"How?" Rhodallis whispered. "You... Who made you? Who are your parents? Where is your throne? How did we not know...? Did we know? Do any of the... others, like me, know? And what have you taken in to gain such power...?"

"If you want any more answers, I think Coda is a fair price for them. Don't you?" Faye cracked her neck in challenge.

Rhodallis gritted his teeth, his changeling appearance fading away as his normal armor and pegasus stallion guise re-materialized. Faye stared him down. She had this. He was about to break-

Suddenly, the core of the dusk statue changed, somehow. And then it spoke.

"She is mine."

Faye's ears stood straight up. Even Rhodallis looked surprised. The voice the statue spoke with was tired, too tired to be bitter, too tired to be angry... and belonged to a mare who could have been anywhere between twenty and two hundred years of age.

"My firstborn," the dusk statue said. "Coda is the fake."

Faye stared up at the statue, no questions in her mind about who was speaking on the other end.

"My daughter... Find me. I am waiting."

The core changed again, and it spoke no more.

Rhodallis pulled himself to his hooves, his body singed in a way that reminded Faye almost of Mother... though his burns, slowly, were healing. He stared straight at her, aggression banished and replaced by weariness. "Is this true?"

Faye took a step forward. "Is Coda less valuable to you if you know she's a fake?"

Rhodallis growled. "Is. This. True?"

Faye stood her ground.

"Who else knows?" Rhodallis asked, his voice defeated, and yet dangerous, too. "Lilith? Samael? Estael? Zero?"

Faye shook her head.

"What about Cinder?" Rhodallis pressed. "Does she know? Or..."

"If you're talking about anyone with the same special talent you have," Faye interrupted, "I don't usually go around advertising this. Almost nobody knows. But if you're thinking of blackmailing me with this information, know this-"

"Heh." Rhodallis chuckled to himself. "Is that a thing you're keeping under wraps? Don't worry... Your secret's safe with me, at least until the opportune moment. I'll ask you one more time: how do you feel about Chrysalis?"

Faye stood her ground. "I can't... possibly answer that right now."

Rhodallis started up a slow pace towards the exit. "Fake or no, Coda is still valuable to me. It's not her powers I value so much as her reputation... and how that reputation makes my enemies feel. Take her, and I'll send my crew to get her back. Reveal your identity and take her place, and I'll just need to use you for my plans, instead. Or you can work with me, and perhaps we can come up with a plan that works for both of us better than what I originally had in mind. The choice is up to you."

All was quiet aboard the Immortal Dream.

The ship was several days into its flight from Our Town to the Crystal Empire, and the drama of Halcyon's disappearance and the revival of Kindness had mostly faded into the background as the monotony of travel set in.

Various passengers handled the wait in their own ways. For Corsica, it involved the equivalent of mentally hibernating, shutting down and doing nothing whenever no one was around so that she could give more energy during the times when others were. During those times, the only passenger who could even attempt to beat her at waiting calmly and peacefully was Seigetsu, who never lost her cool anyway. So it was somewhat notable when Corsica, napping on a bench in the mess hall and waiting for anything to happen, saw Seigetsu pass by in an almost flustered state.

"What's up?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "With a look like that, is the engine on fire?"

"No." Seigetsu shook her head. "I've simply misplaced my collateral for the deal with Halcyon..."

"Her bracelet?" Corsica shrugged. "Didn't peg you for the forgetful type. Oh well. It'll turn up somewhere."

Achievement Point

Faye could feel the gears turning in Rhodallis' brain as they climbed back up to the Night's Boon's base. She had a lot to think about, too.

The climb was almost easy, thanks to her bracelet - once the fight was over, it had stayed on her leg where it belonged instead of returning to the Immortal Dream, and it was trivial for her to tune it right to give a small strength boost and nothing more. Halcyon's crystal was tucked safely away in a pocket on the inside of her armor; filling her other half in on what had transpired below was probably better done outside of Rhodallis' presence and the green fumes.

Fumes which, as part of her final attack to fell the pirate king, she had taken into her emptiness.

It was impossible to judge how that was working out for her while she was still surrounded by them externally. All she could do was bank on her ability to expel them and clean them out once she was in a less-polluted location.

They left the buried city and returned to the tunnels under the ziggurat, Rhodallis leading the way, continuing to dispatch revenants despite the beating he had taken. Most of the damage had healed by now, but a few stubborn burned spots remained, a lingering testament to their battle. Faye wondered if they would ever fully disappear, or if her bracelet had scarred him just as it had done to Mother.

If so... that was proof it couldn't hurt her in the same way, or at least had vastly different conditions for doing so. It was an invitation to use her bracelet more, experiment with it and lean into its power. And as hard as she had just used it, she couldn't shake the feeling that it could be turned even brighter if she was really trying.

She might need that power if she was going to free Coda from the windigoes, even if she saved her from the pirates first.

They reached the stronghold, and were admitted by an acolyte in the same manner as before. And, in the central room adjacent to Lente's office, Bernard was waiting.

"Well, well," he greeted politely, standing guard near Coda's ice block, keeping his voice to a library tone. "One of you looks distinctly better than the other, I see. Things didn't go as planned?"

"You could say that," Rhodallis growled. "We're getting out of this place. The situation has changed, and I need to be able to think clearly to adjust our plans."

Bernard raised an eyebrow at Faye. Her input mattered to him, huh?

"Your boss bit off more than he could chew," she said. "And didn't make himself out to be particularly trustworthy, either."

"And yet you're still traveling together," Bernard pointed out. "Was this a... matter of convenience, or is our business still on?"

Faye hesitated. Was this really the best place to press her case? Coda was right there. Rhodallis wouldn't be a problem in a fight; she had beaten him at his strongest just moments ago, and now he was more removed from that place of power. The Night's Boon wouldn't like a fight in their sanctum, but if she started something, it would effectively be just her versus Bernard, fighting for Coda. If she waited, she could have more pirates to contend with, and potentially get forced into some kind of deal. Maybe... she'd go it gently.

"Depends how you treat me going forward," she said. "For one, I think they say that to the victor go the spoils. If we're going to part on good enough terms to have anything to do with each other in the future, I want Coda, no questions asked."

"Ah, so it was that kind of change in situation." Bernard smiled sadly. "Well, I suppose that's between you and His Eminence, then. In matters of his property, I am but a servant."

He looked to Rhodallis.

Rhodallis' eyes were closed. "You want her enough to take her by force?"

Faye blinked, then looked at Coda.

Rhodallis glared at her. "I said, you want her enough to take her by force?"

"If I did," Faye countered, "could you stop me?"

"Non-committal as ever." Rhodallis rolled his shoulders. "What'll you do if you get her? You know she's no good to anyone in that state, right? Save as a bartering piece."

About half of the monks in the room were watching by now, and the ones who were trying to look disinterested or focused on their own tasks were clearly listening. Faye swallowed.

"...I think I can work with this," Rhodallis mused. "Actually, this could be great for us... Sure. You win, kid. Go ahead and take her. You did beat me, after all."

Faye braced herself for the but.

"But consider her taken by force," Rhodallis continued, confirming Faye's fear. "Both of you are rightfully mine, and wherever you go from here, whoever you get to take you in? I'll just consider them on the hook for both of your prices. At the rate things have been going, that'll be a more effective way to make a sale than what I'm currently doing! You get what you want, I get what I want, everyone's happy... and if you manage to befriend someone with deep enough pockets, we can even consider things settled between us for the future. Hahahah! Hurry up, Bernard, we're leaving."

Bernard tossed her the rope for pulling Coda's cart with his signature smile. "That's how the cookie crumbles, eh? Take care, Moneymaker Halcyon. I'll miss the extra source of income you put in my pockets."

Rhodallis swaggered out, and Bernard followed him, and before Faye could even process what had happened, Coda was hers... and their ticket out of Gyre was gone.

She stared into the ice block, her reflection imposed over Coda's frozen form. All that effort, all that luck, to get right back where she had been on the day she left Ironridge. Except instead of among friends, she was alone, without resources in a cursed city in the middle of nowhere on a foreign continent... But still, it was a victory. One she should probably celebrate before moving on and facing that grim reality.

Halcyon had been the one up front whenever they were around Coda, though. This was Halcyon's victory to relish more than it was hers. She should-

"That was an interesting exchange," said a voice behind her. It was Lente, the elderly stallion Rhodallis had been dealing with earlier who probably led the Night's Boon.

Faye folded her ears and turned to face him. "You want something?"

"I don't know the first tenth of your stories, or your reasons for being here," Lente told her. "I do have an extensive history of dealing with Rhodallis, and a lot of knowledge about how he operates. We just established earlier this day that the Night's Boon will not pay the price he seeks for that filly, and so you'd best not count on finding long-term shelter with her here. But we are a charitable organization, and I don't think he'd read into it too much if we sent you on your way with some advice and supplies, and let you stay the night."

Faye sagged in relief. "Actually a friendly stranger for a change? I'll take it. Even if it's too good to be true, I'll take it."

Lente shook his head. "You were arguing against his proposed usage of that filly when he tried to sell her to me. After hearing you and him part ways, that's enough to give you the benefit of the doubt for a night. Now then, if you'll follow me..."

The room Faye was given was decorated in much the same fashion, with wooden walls that hung paintings likely made by the monks, and furniture carved by hoof and talon as well. If the Night's Boon had a mess hall, Lente didn't volunteer its location; instead, she was offered a pack of dense grain bars with some sort of rehydrated berry paste. The opposite of gourmet, but it was portable and probably had a long shelf-life, which she supposed the creatures here valued more.

There was one light fixture, one table, one dresser, and three beds. That was interesting. Were the Night's Boon short on space? Perhaps they were bracing for an expansion, or had just suffered a loss in membership. Maybe they didn't like sleeping alone, or maybe they had a carpenter who really liked making beds. Either way, if at all possible, one of those beds was going to Coda.

Faye sized up the ice block on the trolley. It had been solidly attached, with climbing crampons gouged into the base of the block and tightened against the platform's sides, so that Coda didn't fall off when being carried on someone's back. She poked at the ice, trying to get a feel for whether it was really as solid as it looked.

It met her hoof with a presence both hostile and curious, dangerous and familiar. A spark of resentment and childish anger, approaching her not as an enemy, but as a potential co-conspirator.

What were her grudges, the ice asked? Any good ones? Any plans to act on them? How would she like a little help seeing them through?

This was an opportunity, the ice wanted her to know, to act on them in ways she never even dreamed before were possible.

Faye sighed and withdrew her hoof. The barbaric, conspiratorial urges of windigoes were deeply familiar to her, especially after carrying around Ludwig for a time. But where Ludwig had been a speck, a flicker, an ever-present annoyance and nothing more, this was a solid wall, a block so thick she couldn't feel anything of the filly inside. How many windigoes did the Cold Karma core even have? Even if she could contain all of that, she needed a better way to help Coda than just trading places with her.

After a quick examination of the beds, she decided not to risk putting the entire trolley on one.

Instead, she doffed her armor, hanging up the greatsword by the wall and leaving the rest of the pieces sitting in a chair where they would be slightly easier to don again than if they were strewn about on the floor. Nice of Rhodallis to leave her with the equipment to fight her way out of here, even if it was probably the last thing he was thinking about.

She lifted her foreleg and examined her bracelet. There was no damage to the fur where it was worn, aside from the slight impression it always left. No sign of the injuries she had given Rhodallis, or that plagued Mother. The bracelet itself had returned to its usual inert black appearance... though, if she looked hard enough, she swore she could still see the runes that had lit up on the surface, only now they were black on black instead of glowing emerald.

It felt right, having the bracelet back. Seigetsu was a different problem in a different world. But this bracelet belonged here. It was her power, and she needed it for the kinds of things she was picking fights with.

Next, she pulled out Halcyon's crystal. Better to reunite sooner rather than later... but she was bone-tired, and without the bracelet's glow, she found she could barely lift another limb.

Maybe Halcyon would appreciate coming back in the morning, instead.

It was night. Faye was surrounded by snow and ice, hemmed in by cliff walls to her left and right. Ahead of her - and behind her, she knew - was open air.

Her bracelet was glowing. Balthazar was standing across from her, watching, waiting in that patient fighting stance of his. And she was paralyzed by a very familiar fear.

Faye remembered this moment keenly, not needing a dream to tell her how it went. These were her final moments of being an abstract concept in Halcyon's imagination. They were at the hideout, in the Trench of Greg, and later this night Halcyon would become a ghost for the first time, stealing Ludwig's body and forcing her, Faye, to take control of their real one. This was the last time they had fought, the most viscerally they had clashed, fear of the past versus hope for the future, before realizing the dynamic between each other once and for all.

Her body thrashed as she tried to force Halcyon to put the bracelet out, flinging them down in the snow. Faye floated through the dream with a detached incredulity, an amazement at how far she had come, a sadness at how the tables had turned: it was her, not Halcyon, who at long last called to their bracelet and used it without holding back. In the dream, she was fighting, struggling to turn it off, and yet in reality, today she had fought to turn it on.

What had happened? How had they traded places? Could they go back? Should they go back? Was it healthy to have a voice for and a voice against, or should they be in harmony about whether to use their powers before actually using them?

The battle ended with both of them in disgrace, laying defeated and freezing in the snow. Balthazar stood by, watching as Halcyon grappled with herself. Faye - both past and present - took no joy in her victory.

The dream began to end... but just as it was fading, Balthazar grabbed her, pointing up in the sky at several small, approaching ships. Faye's memory sparked; she didn't remember this part nearly as well. Wasn't this an encounter with the Yakyakistani invasion force, the one presumably compromised by changelings? That was incredibly relevant, she needed to not wake up so she could...

Faye's eyes opened of their own volition, and she was back in the stronghold of the Night's Boon. Too late.

She groaned, holding a bare hoof to her forehead. That dusk statue down in the core, near the rift... That had been Chrysalis. Telling her to find her.

Chrysalis was with the invasion force in Yakyakistan, or somehow behind it, right? Faye didn't know. She felt like that was her assumption, but it was a dated assumption. All of her knowledge about this badly needed an update.

Hopefully, she could continue that dream the next night. That wasn't usually how it worked, but wasn't never how it worked, either. And a full, picture-perfect refresher on exactly what had happened that night in Icereach felt like very valuable information to have.

Faye shook her head. First and foremost, she needed to worry about getting out of here, and then about where to go next.

In the time it took to put on her armor, get Coda hitched up and make sure she wasn't forgetting anything, she settled on a few ideas. First, she was going to Izvaldi. Equestria was off the table since Coda didn't have a writ, Ironridge likely wasn't safe if Rhodallis had been able to take Coda from there in the first place, and she had no better ideas for places that would take them. But Izvaldi, at the very least, was where Rhodallis said Chrysalis's old throne was. Visiting and dismantling that wouldn't actually do anything helpful for her, aside from maybe for her state of mind. But it was somewhere to go, and she needed to be anywhere but here.

Second... she badly needed ideas on how to get there.

"I'm afraid your travel options are limited," Lente pointed out half an hour later, confirming her fears. "Most of the supplies we get are brought in by monthly hoof caravans - the revenants like airships a little too much, you see. A day's fast march from here will get you far enough out of the city that you won't run into any more of those things, but we usually have the wagon pullers go in shifts and rest on the wagons so they never have to stop and make camp."

Faye nodded. "I can do distance marching, but what I really need is a map."

"That's what this is for," Lente said, pulling out a folded up pocket brochure that looked to be a travel guide of the Griffon Empire, thirty years out of date. "Doesn't do much to reflect the latest geography, but it's what we've got."

She eyed the pamphlet, its map depicting my present location as a luminous blue citadel overflowing with mana light, not the green wasteland it was today. The Griffon Empire, she knew from her days spent studying in Icereach, was a mostly vertical strip of land, fairly small in all, bounded by the northern ocean to the west, the edge of the world to the east, the Aldenfold to the south, and Mistvale to the north. Mistvale was massive in comparison, a roughly banana-shaped continent that hugged the edge of the world as it curved north and west, with an expansive coastline and nothing but mountains.

Gyre, the Empire's northeasternmost province, was situated right up against Mistvale. If she felt like visiting the extinct homeland of her ancestors, all it would take was heading north and being ready for some climbing...

Since the edge of the world was probably a bad idea, that left her with south and west as options. West would take her through the Wilderwind province en route to the sea, and might be optimal if her end goal was to catch a boat and leave the eastern continent. South was the eventual direction to Izvaldi... and probably also her fastest route to civilization.

"Any idea how long it would take me to hike to here?" Faye asked, pointing generically at the Goldfeather province - halfway between Gyre and Izvaldi. "To any town where I'd be able to barter or do odd jobs to get some resources. I've got a lot more endurance than it looks like."

Lente shrugged. "That's the route our caravans take. It's three days and two nights nonstop to get here from a border town called Gorton's Holdout. We've got some good people there. If you wanted to head that way, there are caravan waymarks we've set up on the road so the caravans don't get lost. I'd wager someone exceptionally good could do the trek solo in a week? Which is about as much food as we're comfortable parting with, so I hope for your sake your legs are as good as your mouth."

Faye nodded along, extracting as much useful information out of the stallion as she could - what the waymarks looked like, potential useful contacts in Gorton's Holdout, dangers to watch for aside from revenants, and so on. But as the conversation dragged on, she began to feel more and more like the old stallion was wishing she would take her troubles and move along. And with her changeling queen powers, it was probably more than just a hunch.

"You've been a big help," she eventually finished. "But I need to get going if I want to clear the revenant zone by the time I need to sleep. If Rhodallis comes asking, you don't know where I am, alright?"

Lente shook his head. "Can't make any promises when that stallion's involved, miss. But I wish you the best of luck. And I'll send someone with you as far as the entrance to the ziggurat, just so you don't get lost."

The next hour was spent in awkward silence, Faye hauling Coda and occasionally resorting to lifting the trolley on her back to climb up staircases. That maneuver required a good bit more strength from her bracelet, and got her odd looks from the monk who was accompanying her - a monk who probably could handle themselves alone against revenants, and did chip in to help when she had to fight them, but always waited for her to engage first.

By the time they reached open air, Faye felt like she already would have been spent without the bracelet's power. Her monk companion departed, heading back into the ziggurat with only a nod.

The sky was clear and green, no airships lurking on the horizon. Swallowing, girding herself, Faye pressed out into the city.

The walls were Faye's goal. Going south didn't matter yet; all she needed to do was get out of the city's core, where she remembered the green fog was densest. Already, it had lightened tremendously from the depths of the ziggurat, and even compared to the area higher up around the Night's Boon stronghold, but if she could just get beyond those walls...

A collapsed building turned her back, and then another, the path she entered by with Rhodallis and Bernard proving impossible to retrace. Faye smashed her way through three revenants at once, uncoupling herself from Coda and surging with her bracelet as she brought her blade down on a quadruped's fiery back. Did it say anything that the revenants with the most exotic shapes were all down below, in the buried city and the catacombs beneath it? Probably nothing important, but science was how she distracted her brain from monotony, and as the hours wore on, she began to fear the monotony of walking, fighting, walking and fighting was exactly the same kind that had messed up her bracelet during the hike from Sires Hollow to Snowport so long ago.

It wouldn't do to have that happen again. She needed to be conscious of her power and use the bracelet for endurance without letting it become an echo chamber for her own desire to get where she was going.

Around noon, she finally crested the wall, the sky taking on a hint of blue that was visible through the fumes. There, with no revenants in sight, she sat down for a break, pulled out Halcyon's gemstone, and let her other half come out.

Halcyon materialized as a ghost, taking a moment to process her surroundings. She looked at the city. She looked at Coda. She looked at Faye.

"Sorry," Faye said, her emotions outpacing her thoughts. "I... You were frozen up again, so I took control. And I beat him. It's not all peachy, but we won, and... You remember, right? I tried to make sure you'd share my memories from down there, but the longer we've been treating each other as distinct people, the harder it is to be sure that's working the way I think it is."

"...Yeah." Halcyon nodded, floating in midair. "I remember. Just... trying to reconcile why I would have chosen there of all places to get paralyzed."

"It's weird, isn't it?" Faye asked. "Like we're in the opposite roles we used to be in..."

Halcyon nodded. "Yeah."

Evidently, she needed just as much time to think about all that as Faye did. And time was about the only luxury they had. The next hour passed atop the city wall; now that they were out of the inner city, Faye wanted to be sure they were heading in the right direction before proceeding any further, and that meant skirting the ramparts, which were blessedly intact and mostly free from revenants. Whoever had designed this city hadn't wanted anyone breaching the walls... odd, since they lived in a country where a majority of the population had wings.

Eventually, they descended, one of Lente's waymarks posted on a very visible and obvious highway running through the industrial wasteland. The highway was straight, flat, had no bridges or turnoffs, and sliced through factory after dead factory, passing warehouses and empty courtyards and several lesser revenants, these ones wandering solo instead of in packs.

"Weird, isn't it?" Halcyon asked, doing a flyby as the sun began to grow low on the horizon.

Faye raised an eyebrow.

"There's no water anywhere around," Halcyon pointed out. "Industrial stuff like this, you'd think it would be built on a river, for coolant or waste disposal or easy shipping. But they chose to build in a place that just doesn't seem suited for it."

By this point, Faye's mind was focused wholly on the task of putting one hoof in front of the other... and on not getting consumed by that task. "I guess. Do you see any places that would be good to stop for the night? I think... I shouldn't go much farther today."

"I'll start looking," Halcyon offered. "If I go high enough, you can really tell how we're leaving the green mist behind - I think we could probably be safe anywhere. And I haven't seen any revenants for a while. But it would be better to have proper shelter, so I'll see what I can find."

As she flew off, Faye turned and looked over her shoulder. The dusky sky was properly colored for real now, the green fog limited to thin clouds clinging to a stack of broken-down crates or an abandoned building here or there, rather than an omnipresent force. A stiff wind helped to disperse it, actually affecting the fumes this far out and preventing them from gathering or lingering. Behind her, in the distance, the city walls were visible enshrouded in a green bubble, the bulk of the miasma orbiting them and their core. The blotch representing the rift had finally grown distant enough to fade from her sight.

She let out a deep, deep breath, and for a moment, turned the bracelet all the way off, gauging how her mind was doing.

Her limbs were absolutely leaden, but that was predictable. More pressing, she found that she could feel the traces of green she had absorbed and not fully expelled, a jumbled, muttering, weeping lament.

But she was too tired to deal with that now. Maybe in the morning-

"Bad news," Halcyon announced, appearing again out of the sky.

Faye's ears fell in anticipation.

"There's a dust storm coming, it looks like," Halcyon said. "I've never seen one before so I can't be sure, but I'm not sure what else this would be. And I have no idea how bad it'll be or how fast it'll get here, but if there's one thing we learned from Icereach and Ironridge, it's not to take inclement weather lightly."

"Then we need to find shelter." Faye pulled her determination together and re-lit the bracelet, sucking in a breath. "Can't afford to be picky. What's the nearest building that doesn't look like it will collapse?"

Halcyon pointed right next to them. It was yet another purposeless industrial complex, surrounded by empty lots that had outlived their purpose. About three floors high, it was covered in towers of scaffolding and decrepit conveyor belts, some of which had fallen over. It had more green fog than Faye would like...

"Most of the roof has fallen in," Halcyon said, "but it's the nearest thing by a mile. Do you think we could give it a shot?"

Dubious, Faye nodded. It wasn't the worst building she had seen... But it was roughly average, with its slightly more intact walls balancing out the greater presence of green fog, and this probably wasn't a time to be picky. "We can go check it out. Keep looking for others while I see if there's any obvious danger."

Halcyon nodded, and flew off once again.

Faye left the road behind, entering the sea of concrete and asphalt surrounding the building. Most of it was hemmed in by a barbed-wire fence that had held up better than the rest of the facility, but a once-guarded checkpoint made for a convenient ingress, dead machines lining the path that had once been used to punch employee time cards. Whoever came here in the old days, she didn't want to be them.

Signs of twenty-year-old life grew more visible as she wandered the courtyard, moving towards the building's entrance. A forklift, abandoned in the middle of a path, clearly left behind in a hurry. An old lunch box sitting on the edge of a stack of iron girders where someone might have stopped for a break. Faye stepped around a pile of rubble that had been dropped when an overhead conveyor belt snapped-

"Run." Halcyon was back, urgency plastered over her face. "You don't have any time at all, that storm moved way faster than I thought it would!"

Faye canned her thoughts and broke into a sprint. The wind was blowing from behind the abandoned facility, blocking her view of the horizon, but it was about as strong as it had been for the last three hours...

And then she saw the dust cloud, looming up behind the building, taller than any storm had any right to be. In about five seconds, it doubled in size.

Faye turned her bracelet all the way on and dashed, heedless of the consequences. A wheel on Coda's trolley struck loose gravel and bounced, flipping the trolley on its side, but she forced it to keep going, the ice block skidding against the ground. But it wasn't enough, and when she was only a stone's throw from the entrance, the dust storm struck.

Instinctively, Faye rammed her eyes closed. Even in the lee of the building, it felt like she was caught in a cheese grater, receiving an enthusiastic sandpaper massage, needles blistering through her armor-

"This way!" Halcyon screamed over the din, her voice barely loud enough to be audible. Trusting it, eyes closed and head down, Faye pressed just a few steps further... and the storm's brunt lessened with each one, until she opened her eyes again, the sting of the dust particles rapidly fading as her changeling queen powers knit back together whatever wounds it had inflicted.

She was standing in the doorway to the building, a fixture that had once been the main entrance. It was the architectural equivalent of a bankrupt stallion trying to look rich, or perhaps of a used-cart salespony. But this was her only choice, and it was a miracle and a half she was even here, when she could be spending the night lost in a dust storm, waiting in torment for it to pass so that her body could fix itself again.

What would she find inside? Revenants? Dreary lodging? Or perhaps new insight to the sordid story of why the green mist, and Chrysalis, felt the way they did.

Without any better options, Faye brushed off some of the dust embedded in her armor, righted Coda's trolley, held up her bracelet for light and walked inside.

Our Vows

Faye turned up the light on her bracelet, lifting a hoof to better see her surroundings.

The building she had taken shelter in had no foyer, its doors opening directly up to a warehouse area that spanned all three of its floors. Most of the ground was littered with parts of the collapsed roof; above them, about three quarters of the sky was completely exposed.

Faye had to cover her eyes and look away, the walls acting as a windbreak, but dust from the storm still drifting down in flurries that would quickly blind her if she kept looking up. To her left, however, there was a stack of rooms with broken windows looking out over the work floor, probably where the offices and break rooms were located. They would offer more shelter than the main entrance.

Halcyon flew off ahead to investigate as Faye tried a door, half an inch of sediment already coating the ground from the storm above. If this was a regular occurrence, it was almost odd there wasn't more... The door needed a heavy shove for its hinges to unstick, but eventually, it gave, opening with a small puff of green fog.

Faye stuck her head in. Break room indeed. It had a few backless benches, a tile floor and ceiling that were more intact than the rest of this place, several old metal lockers, and a dead vending machine in the corner that looked to be only stocked with water.

She didn't bother closing the door, pulling Coda inside and taking a heavy seat on a bench. This felt safe enough from the storm. No need to go exploring further.

After a moment, Halcyon returned. "I think I gave this place a thorough check," she reported, hovering by the bench next to Faye. "I saw a revenant insect, one of the tiny ones that left us alone in the city. Hopefully that's the extent of what they can manifest, here."

Faye nodded. "If I sleep, do you think you can stand guard? We've been walking all day..."

Halcyon frowned. "How do I wake you? If anything happens."

Faye flicked an ear, thinking. "You... can't recombine us on your own, can you?"

Halcyon shrugged. "I've always figured that was your power. But I can try?"

Faye nodded, and Halcyon's brow furrowed in concentration. "I don't even know what I'm supposed to be doing," she admitted after a moment, giving up.

"...You've done something like this before, actually," Faye said, her mind wandering back to the dream she had last night, and to their ill-fated return to Icereach. "I guess I never asked. But, when you took over Ludwig's body, remember?"

Halcyon grimaced. "I was kind of happy to forget about that, but I guess I did. Never really learned how that worked."

"How did you do it?" Faye raised an eyebrow, starting to undo the clasps on her armor. It felt like a sandy sock around her, and if there was no immediate danger of revenants, she'd need to give it a good cleaning.

"I dunno." Halcyon folded her hooves in midair, face turned down in a frown. "It was while I was a ghost, like this. Ludwig was following me around, invisible somehow to everyone but me. I think he actually said we were invisible for the same reason. And he was trying to make another deal with me and work together to fight the invaders from Yakyakistan, except I lost my temper at him, and tried to punch him. And it just worked."

"Just worked?" Faye flicked her ears, tugging at a strap with her jaw.

"I could hit him," Halcyon explained, "even though we were both intangible. Except when I tried pushing him against a wall, it was like part of him got stuck on the wall in the real world, and part of him kept going through, like I can. And I pushed them far enough apart, and then something tore, and the next thing I knew, I was in his body."

Faye put down her work. "But you just phase through me like normal, right? You can't do the same to our body?"

Halcyon waved a hoof through Faye's shoulder, and nothing happened.

"Must be because you're currently all the way real, and not... whatever Ludwig was doing," Halcyon mused. "It feels like there should be a way, though."

"If we were both in the same body, then definitely," Faye admitted. "We've even had times before where we fought for control, and both had a hoof in it at the same time. But that's different from when you're like this."

"You can't turn yourself into a ghost like this, right?" Halcyon asked. "Just me?"

Faye slowly nodded. "When I think about relinquishing control, I just... slide to the back of our mind. I don't think I can externalize myself in the way that you and presumably Procyon can."

Halcyon nodded too. "But there's gotta be some way for me to warn you, if I really am gonna stand watch."

"This is a weird idea," Faye said, finally getting her armor off, depositing it on a bench with a slither of dust. She shook out her wings. "But you said there was a revenant insect in another room, right? What happens if you try to interact with that? I wonder if you can touch it the same way you could with Ludwig."

"We can try," Halcyon offered, getting up and floating towards another door. "Keep your boots on, there's broken glass on the floor in some of the other rooms."

Hesitant to leave Coda, Faye thought for a moment, eventually settling for nestling her up against a wall where she'd be out of sight from anywhere outside the break room. Satisfied, she nodded, taking her sword and following Halcyon, her step much lighter now that she had shed so much weight.

This door opened slightly easier, and led to a cramped corridor with a staircase to the next floor. The stairs opened out into some sort of logistics room, a long desk with several chairs flanking a window that looked out over the production floor, a few locked filing cabinets at the back. Another door, to the side, bore a plaque saying Manager's Office.

The revenant was by the filing cabinets. It was roughly the size of Faye's unbooted hoof, with a small, guttering flame.

She leaned over to inspect it. Its back was made of an Equestrian bit - the same currency used in the old Griffon Empire. It had two unwound paper clips as antennae, and no visible legs, meandering slowly around and doing nothing at all. The thing didn't even seem to notice her.

Halcyon poked it, and the flame wobbled, like it had been blown on.

"I can definitely feel it," she reported, her face creased in concern.

"Physically?" Faye asked. "Or mentally?"

"I'm not sure there's a difference." Halcyon poked the bug again. "It's kind of... squishy. It's that feeling when you impulse buy ten lottery tickets to distract yourself from something you don't want to think about, and all of them are duds. I could probably do something to it, but I'm not sure what."

She picked it up for emphasis. It waved its antennae frantically.

Faye blinked. "Well, if you can do that much, you can throw it at me. It's got metal bits, I can feel it too."

Halcyon regarded the tiny revenant and chuckled. "Huh. You might come in handy, little guy."

While she played with the revenant, Faye's tired mind turned to the manager's office. "I'm going to check in here," she reported. "Just to see if it would be better than the break room for napping."

"I checked it already," Halcyon reported, lifting her head. "It's got a broken window too. Though the dust's not too bad, and it looks like the chair is intact and kind of nice."

Faye shook her head. "I'd just feel easier not being so close to the building entrance. Not that anyone else should be out here in this storm..."

The door was locked, but it was a small task for her to shadow sneak underneath, then unlock it from within. This door's hinges actually worked properly, and she saw that the room beyond was wallpapered. Not extravagantly, but someone had tried to make it slightly more posh than concrete.

A big desk sat against the window, which, as Halcyon said, was also broken. But the floor wasn't very dusty, which suggested that it actually was reasonably sheltered, and after finding the right angle to stare out at the sky, Faye realized this stack of offices was under the one portion of the ceiling that hadn't collapsed.

From here, she could watch the storm, and feel relatively safe. Satisfied, she nodded to herself, then went to get Coda and her armor.

Coda almost didn't fit through the turn in the corridor before the stairs, but Faye eventually wrestled her into the manager's office, pushing herself through the task with repeated promises that this was the last physical effort she would need to make today.

The chair was, indeed, nice. Only about as dusty as she was, at that. Faye itched to take off her boots and clean them, too, but unlike the chair, the floor hadn't escaped the ravages of broken glass.

And she also needed to eat.

Using her sword, Faye cleaned off the desk, pushing glass and detritus aside and noting that it had been immaculately clean before being abandoned. Not quite unused, but whoever worked here treated their workspace seriously. Given that this was an executive's office, that certainly differentiated them from Icereach... though, being serious didn't necessarily equate to being nice.

She pulled out a meal worth of rations, and then started rooting through the desk drawers, looking for something interesting to read while she ate.

One of the drawers was locked. The rest contained office supplies. Great. Odds were, all the important stuff was-

"I can try my hoof at that, if you like," Halcyon offered. "Not like I've got anything better to do."

Faye glanced up to see her still carrying around the revenant beetle, its paper clip feelers brandished like twin lockpicks. The beetle seemed to have given up on struggling and was now holding as still as it possibly could.

"Go for it," Faye offered, biting down on her rations and staring out at the monochrome brown sky.

So Halcyon went at it, fumbling with the revenant for several long minutes as Faye ate. And, just when she was finishing her meal and preparing to tell Halcyon to give it up, the lock opened with a small click.

"Huh." Faye slid the drawer open. "Didn't think that would work."

Inside was a stack of letters, all marked as addressed to the office of the Gregory Ore Sorting Company. They had been stacked neatly, eight in total, sorted by postmark date. Each envelope had been opened neatly and carefully, and each one was still full, ostensibly reunited with their original contents after being read decades ago.

Well, a one-sided correspondence would make for interesting reading before bed. Careful not to disturb their order, Faye opened one and began to read.

Dear Sir or Madam,

My name is Klifton. I am the overseer of the new Grubert Internal Logistics Company, which as of next week will be your new intermediary for requisitioning production equipment through the government. The Ministry of Economic Planning has informed me they have already prepared our downstream partners to adapt to this transition. However, I'm reaching out to you because I value a personal relationship with my co-workers. Aside from the contractual specifications of interfacing with your company, the Ministry was able to provide me with little more than the title of your job. If, as I do, you believe you could collaborate better with a flesh-and-blood griffon than a faceless name in a far-off building, then I invite you to respond at your leisure.

If this entreaty has breached protocol or given cause for offense, please disregard it and I shall not inquire along this line again. I look forward to a productive business relationship,

Grubert Overseer Klifton

Faye read the letter twice. This was an interesting thing to save in a locked drawer.

After checking on Coda, then triple-checking her chair for any bits of glass, she curled up in it, kicked her boots down to the floor below, dusted off her legs, and then pulled out the next letter and continued reading.

Dear Madam Geneva,

I was heartened by the enthusiasm of your reply, and took to the pen to give you my own response immediately. As you guessed, I am new to both this position and the Griffon Empire. My prior business experience comes from an enclave in Ralianth; I moved across the sea for this job. One would hope that learning in the cutthroat environs of Varsidel would provide ample preparation for working in Gyre, but if I'm still worthy of such a cynical joke after you hear this, I suppose I've simply got a lot to learn.

Regardless, the research I did about Gyre before accepting the post resonated with me. In answer to your question, I think making such an effort to embrace the modern world is admirable. History textbooks still in use at my school make no mention of Gyre as more than a mark on a map, so meteoric is its rise. I think this is the right time and the right place for a hard worker to be a part of something big, a dream which is in short supply in Varsidel.

Might I ask about you in return? How long have you been in Gyre? Where did you study? Are you fresh blood as well, or an industry veteran?

Looking forward to your reply,

Grubert Overseer Klifton

Faye carefully tucked the letter back into its envelope and pulled out the next.

Geneva,

As you wish, I shall dispense with the titles. Though from the limited responses others have been sending to my initial letter, I can't tell if this is cultural wisdom to take to heart, or merely you do things differently.

Grubert is still in the spin-up phase, so I can't comment on the regular flow of operations, but so far the biggest system shock compared to Varsidel is the hiring process. Your account of nepotism is synonymous with the way things are done there - I won't judge, I would never have received my education without such back-handed dealings. But I hadn't realized my workers would be chosen by the same office that chose me. While I knew this was closer to a branch of the government than an independent organization, I had expected to at least have the latitude to choose my own employees.

I took this question to the Ministry of Economic Planning, and from their response, I gather they don't field this question very often. For clarity, they didn't understand why anyone would want to be in charge of hiring their own workers. And while they didn't forbid me from trying, they had no resources to offer to assist me whatsoever.

Have I committed a cultural error? Should I just let this go and use the workers they have provided me? I looked into their wages and the cost of living in this area, and while it will hardly be glamorous living, this doesn't strike me as coerced labor or a covert slaving operation, though it's strange enough that I did consider the possibility. For such a bureaucracy, it just seems odd that the tools for this don't exist.

-Klifton

For a moment, Faye didn't open the next one. She thought about calling Halcyon to come read this too, but... no. She didn't see her nearby, and could tell her later.

Something shady had been going on, though. Big surprise. Concerning the manner of employment of who knew how many creatures, especially if it applied to all the government-managed companies in the area, and not just Klifton's. Faye felt cold and lucid with sympathy, as if it had just started raining... and at the same time, she felt a lot less alone in the world.

She wasn't the only one who had problematic relationships with her employers. That might just have been life as usual for this entire province.

Geneva,

I see exactly what you mean. And I'm grateful for your wisdom, otherwise I would have been hung up on this for quite a while.

It's still hard to reconcile with my time in Varsidel. It makes me realize I hadn't been getting my talons dirty around the working class nearly as much as I thought I had. Still, our countries have surprisingly different solutions for vouching for the integrity of the creatures we hire. I suppose I should be grateful to have the government doing it all for us here. I've only been in Gyre for two months, and don't have nearly the longevity of relationships required to do such a thing with confidence myself, given the state of the general populace. And yet, it still feels so impersonal. I don't like it, even if I can see why it's necessary.

Such are the bumps upon the road to prosperity. I can only believe that, once Gyre's economic modernization has completed, there will be fewer factors compelling creatures to crime, and this system will no longer be necessary.

In other news, the Grubert facility is still in the closing stages of construction, despite being officially open for business. This week, I need to settle the matter of furnishings for the rooms, plus any additional equipment we're going to need. Ordinarily, this is something a company would do by contacting us, seeing as we're the supplier of such things. But I suppose we're going to have to parlay directly with the government to requisition things on our own behalf.

Back in Varsidel, this would be the kind of opportunity one uses to get an extra slice of the pie. I fully intend to play things on the straight and narrow, but I'll keep my eyes open nonetheless. I'm curious what the higher-ups expect me to use this opportunity for.

I'll keep you updated,

Klifton

Faye turned to the next letter, her eyes starting to get heavy.

Geneva,

I needn't have bothered. They delivered our stuff before I could even complete our own order form. A lot of it is useless, too.

How does your company track employee work hours? I've just been doing it by hand, making a note if someone doesn't show up or stays overtime, but they want to outfit the entrance to our yard with punch clock machines to get an exact time for everyone.

Is that necessary? I should have gathered from my adventures with hiring, but it feels like they want this place to be fully automatic and not even need a manager. It's so apathetic. How can people put their hearts into working for their country if their country is just a machine?

At the very least, I want control of my own books. A good half of Grubert is purely desk jobs, so I suspect they're transferring me people who shouldn't be on more physical tasks - yesterday they gave me a griffon with a cracked rib, and one of my mares is five months pregnant. I should have the ability to cut people like that some slack if I judge that they're doing their best and still need it.

The thing I don't get is, I've tried my best to get on friendly terms with everyone on my payroll, and none of them are particularly enamored with the way we do things in Varsidel either. It's like they'd rather be shuffled to a new job each month based on what the Ministry thinks needs more bodies than get ahead based on who they know. They're not even trying to take advantage of a friendly connection to me, not a single one.

For what it's worth, my superiors in Varsidel always told me I cared too much and was asking to get walked on by someone more eager to climb the ladder than I was, but that's not what's going on here. What's going wrong?

-Klifton

Half asleep, Faye reread the letter, her eyes moving of their own accord. Sleep claimed her before she could open the next one, her own life resonating with the story laid out in the letters: an idealist, a new country, nothing that made sense, and that idealism slowly draining away.

It wasn't Halcyon that awakened Faye. Nor was it the building collapsing, nor was it the dust storm, and nor was it getting stabbed by a revenant.

No, it was plain old thirst.

Remembering just in time not to get out of the chair without her boots, she reached a wing down instead, hooking her supplies and pulling up a canteen.

Her thirst slaked, she looked around. Halcyon was floating by the door, watching her.

"Anything to report?" Faye groggily asked.

"The storm's died down," Halcyon said. "Didn't even last too long after you nodded off. It left a lot of dust, but... Well, you'll see when you go outside."

Faye flicked her ears in response, looking again at Klifton's letters. She was almost done with them... "Any reason this would be a bad place to take breakfast? I want to finish these, if I can."

Not for any particular reason. They didn't tell a terribly uplifting story, nor an earth-shattering one, nor a relevant one. But she felt like she wouldn't be doing this old griffon justice if she didn't read his testament all the way through.

Halcyon nodded, drifting off to check the grounds. And so, Faye unwrapped more rations along with the next letter, and continued reading.

Geneva,

With all due respect, I disagree. I suppose that from an outsider - and by that, I mean the people on the ground who are locked out of any opportunities, not foreigners like you - the system I grew up with might not seem very fair. And it wasn't. I'll readily admit that, even though it served me. Even I left it behind for a reason, after all. But can anything better be said about this? Not a single one of my employees comes to work because of patriotism. I doubt most of them even know what the word means. This economic modernization could be doing great things for the people, but none of them seem to have any ambition about the matter. They're just happy for the stability, even if there's no hope for anything beyond that. At least, that's what they tell me.

On another note, I've come into contact with the overseer of a sister company to mine, one that performs the same function for a different sector in the outskirts. They're even newer to this than I am, and they were asking for advice settling into the job, believe it or not. It makes me wonder if I should be worried for my job security. The griffon with the cracked rib I mentioned earlier, he healed enough that they transferred him out again, to a different job, and he's not the only turnover. I'm not worried about a demotion - they brought me overseas for my managerial experience, after all - but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if they shuffle administrators between companies in the same way as they do workers.

Don't worry. If that happens, I'll stay in touch. I've been enjoying our conversations as well.

-Klifton

Still eating. Next letter.

Geneva,

The collaborator whom I mentioned last time has given me access to all their books. Every single one of them. Ostensibly for the purposes of helping me to help them acclimate to the role, though I suspect they're just trying to pawn off work on me. Regardless, their company is older than Grubert, apparently predating the reshuffle that decreased the granularity and made our service zones smaller. You predate me as well, so you probably know about all this, but I'm just interested to see historical records about the way things were done. And their predecessor was a meticulous record keeper.

While there's no information here about our actual trading partners and very little about our finished products, I feel like I have a good grasp now of this entire economy's production capacity for all sorts of major sectors. On a whim, I decided to research similar statistics for all the Empire's other provinces - much easier to find those - for comparison's sake. And I have to admit, I just can't see what Gyre is doing, here.

Almost all of our capacity goes into industrialized building materials like steel and concrete. The rest is mostly mana technology, though that technology is unsophisticated compared to western nations - I cracked open one of those time card machines to get a look, and it seemed downright primitive next to what I used in Varsidel. Additionally, I had a look at the construction records for the Grubert facility, and assuming that's more or less in the same ballpark as every other complex here, the rate at which Gyre is growing and adding new companies for logistics to take care of roughly matches what our output of these materials can construct.

Do you understand that? We're not building housing, we're not building schools, we're not building anything to help us develop better technology than we already have. Or to use all this infrastructure to benefit the populace! All we're adding is capacity, and all that capacity is used for is to add more capacity. And the precision with which the throughput of that scale-up is planned is boggling.

I don't think there's an endgame to this, Geneva. The hyper-centralization, the growth at any cost... I think all of this is being done purely for its own sake by someone who enjoys the numbers and is blind to everything else.

It's so sad. We've accomplished something monumental here, off the backs of creatures who are too jaded to ask for more in exchange for their contributions, and it's not being used for anything. Where are their dreams? Why don't we use all this to make a giant spaceship, and see what's out there beyond the stars? If that's too ambitious, why not build public parks, or literally anything?

Tell me I'm being silly, or that I've missed something important that makes this all make sense. Right now, it just feels like such a waste.

-Klifton

Faye was shaking. She opened the final letter.

Geneva,

I like that plan. Let's not waste another day.

For anyone reading this after we are gone, let me provide a rough copy of the plan outlined in Geneva's last letter. We are eloping to Ironridge. I no longer believe in what I saw in this place, and Geneva never did, and only held onto her position because she was lucky enough to have it. We suspect that the Gyre government enticing me here for managerial work was part of a larger pattern necessitated by there being too few here who have the skills to effectively do it themselves, hence the Ministry trying to do everything for me and my new associate trying to get me to do everything for him. If I proved my competence and loyalty over a lengthier period of time, I strongly suspect that would have been my eventual destination, working at the center to help micromanage roles such as my current position.

In our respective offices, we will leave our halves of our correspondence as a message for you, our successors. If you are like Geneva and see this job as a privilege: it's not. Don't be fooled by your position above all those creatures on your factory floor. You - you, them, all of you - deserve better than this. If you are like me, and came to Gyre hoping to use your skills for something that really matters: they don't need you here. Go and be something other than a cog in a machine. Gyre needs more than a skilled manager if it is ever to change its fate.

Sincerely,

Former Grubert Overseer Klifton

Faye stared at the letter for a while. And then, slowly, she put it back into its envelope, and tucked the whole stack neatly into her food pack.

He was just like her. Right down to caring about outer space, to accepting a bogus job and leaving with his friend in search of somewhere better, here was someone who was just like her.

Maybe not an ordinary, run-of-the-mill griffon. A privileged one, by his own admission. Yet still, there was nothing unique about her situation, no cosmic coincidence forcing her to be this unlucky. It wasn't because she was a changeling queen that everything didn't go her way, or because of her fractured mind and multiple selves, or her dealings with Unnrus-kaeljos. It was because... these kinds of things just happened to people. And if Gyre's pre-war state was as systemic as Klifton believed it was, they might have happened to a lot of people, just like him. What was to say no layponies had come here seeking steady employment?

This was just... the way things were.

Faye's hooves shook, and a tear ran down her dusty cheek. A tear of relief, and a tear of anger, and of an immense desire to change this.

"You," she whispered to the faint greenness in the air, "will not be forgotten. None of this... will be forgotten. I will make your dreams count for something. I'll make it so you can afford to dream. I'll..." She swallowed. "I'll see to it that I have a future, at the very least. Even if all of you are dead and gone, even if only your regrets are lingering on... I'll break this cycle. Whatever makes it so this is the only kind of life you could live, I'll break it by being different. I'll prove it can be done. And I'll leave a path for others to follow. I don't know how I'll do that. But I will make your story count for something."

Something shifted, deep inside of her. In the green mist she had absorbed during her struggle with Rhodallis, that she never fully expelled. It was a loathsome mist, filled with anger and despair and regret... and yet, as she spoke her oath to it, holding it in her embrace, it changed.

Anger gave way to desire. Her special talent sparkled as her promise became the mist, and the mist became her, an extension of her own will, a partnership. She could give meaning to its pain, and in return...

She wasn't sure.

It didn't feel like power. In fact, it felt less like power than before, the kind she could wield as a changeling queen. There weren't words to describe it. It felt... like an understanding, maybe?

Sure. It felt like she and the mist had reached an understanding.

Where that would lead, she wasn't sure either. Maybe revenants would stop trying to attack her? Maybe creatures like Rhodallis who tried to fight her using the mist would suddenly find their attacks ineffective? Or maybe it conferred no tangible benefits whatsoever, yet when the time would come to meet Chrysalis, she would be able to understand her, too.

Faye checked herself over. Oath aside, she couldn't feel any differences, both physical and mental. She was still herself, inside and out, just with a new goal added to her plate. One she had always wanted, yet never dared to admit to herself... Was that right?

Yes. It felt like she had always felt this way, and only just now had reason enough to face it. The only thing that gave her pause was, Halcyon was still out on her patrol. She had missed all of this, from reading the letters to the resolve she felt afterward.

Imparting memories was one thing, but Faye doubted she would be able to impart a promise. Even if she tried, this would be something she had done, not something they had done together. And that was the same direction things had already been moving, her struggling and striving to be someone who could face their future, and Halcyon still afraid of their past.

The gap between them was getting wider. It was like they really were their own people.

Faye cleaned herself as best as she could without wasting precious water, which mostly amounted to four separate full-body attempts at dusting herself off. But nothing could banish the feeling of sand in her fur, compounded by sweat from several all-day hikes and going a week without a shower, and eventually she was forced to accept that this was as good as it was going to get.

And it was about to get worse. Because now she had to put on her sandy boots and dusty armor.

After dumping her boots and giving them a few good kicks, she strapped them on, finishing with her armor before hauling Coda down the stairs. In the collapsed production room, she noticed a mysterious sight: no less than three beetle revenants, crawling around the room, pushing sand with bits of metal foil they used as shovel-like faces.

They had been doing this for long enough, it was starting to make a difference, excavating the detritus from the dust storm and moving it outside. None of them showed her any interest, but they were doing their jobs dutifully, and with precision.

It was like they didn't want this place to be buried and forgotten.

Maybe they were doing this to the entire city.

Faye nodded at the revenant beetles in respect, and then pulled Coda's trolley out the door.

Harsh mid-morning light greeted her, the sun still too low to provide proper illumination through the building's missing roof. Halcyon was hovering near the door, clearly waiting for her to show up. Right, there was something out here Halcyon wanted her to see...

The city looked about as she remembered it. Sporadic patches of green fog, lots more dust and sand, a few revenant beetles out here cleaning, too. But the thing her other half had warned her about was impossible to miss.

In the courtyard, standing patiently a respectful distance away, was the Black Knight from the Night's Boon base.

"Hello," said the Black Knight. "I've been waiting for you."

"Uhh..." Faye glanced back at Coda.

"That pony with you," the Black Knight said, their impenetrable helmet turning towards Coda. "You're taking her through the city alone. Not on the ship. You were one of Rhodallis' followers. This is an attempt to conceal where you are taking her."

"What?" Faye took a step back, her mind catching up as she remembered their altercation the other day and what this likely looked like. "You've got it wrong. I'm not one of Rhodallis' followers. I was his prisoner, willingly, because this is my friend and I was trying to get her back. Now that I've got her, I'm on the run, and Rhodallis is my enemy. If you don't like him, or if you do want to help Coda, then I'm not your foe."

"A worthy deception," the Black Knight said. "But words are cheap. That filly is being used as a vessel by something no mortal can deal with. If you truly care about her well-being, give her to me. There is nothing you can do for her on your own."

Halcyon floated up beside Faye. "Let me take the lead for this," she asked. "I know we'd be changing out in public, but saving Coda has been my goal since... since before we went to Equestria. And she's been my friend since early on in Ironridge. If we've gotta protect her, then this is my battle to fight."

Faye slowly nodded. If her life was drifting in its own direction, with her goals and her promise to the green mist, then Halcyon deserved the same freedom to pursue her goals... and Faye sincerely wished for her to reach them.

She held out a hoof, turned Halcyon back into a mask, and put-

-me back on.

I settled back into the weight of my armor and opened my eyes, my body feeling horrendously unbathed. But that wasn't what mattered right now. I narrowed my eyes, checked my bracelet, cast off the trolley harness, and stared the Black Knight down.

"Let's get something straight," I announced, stomping one hoof forward, their helmet completely hiding their reaction. "Coda is my friend. She's my responsibility. I knew her before she got windigoed, and I had some outstanding promises to her that, until she's better, I'll never get the chance to fulfill. I've crossed continents looking for a cure, and more continents to chase her down after those goons got a hold of her! I will not stop until I succeed, and I won't suffer the same setback again of letting some stranger claim ownership of her. If you know how to help her, you can stuff your demands and help, but let's make one thing crystal clear: you. Will. Never. Take. Her."

I punctuated every word of the last sentence with a swing of my sword, stopping with it drawn in a challenging stance pointed straight towards them. It was impossible to get a read on how strong this Black Knight actually was; with armor like that, they could be anywhere from relying purely on intimidation to being another of Kitty's Whitewings in disguise. But I was far more than an ordinary traveler myself, was still smarting from needing Faye to fight Rhodallis on my behalf, and was not about to accept a trip back to square one while laying down.

The first person I met after getting back Coda was not going to swipe her right back for themselves.

"You speak with conviction," the Black Knight said, pulling a folded-up shaft from their armor that whirred, clacked and expanded into a heavy-duty war pick. "Prove that you feel it."

The Black Knight waited for me to make the first move. Against a large foe, in heavy armor... would the tricks I learned in Icereach work, sparring against the yaks? They might not need to. I had a real sword, and my bracelet, and I could feel Faye in the back of my mind, more steadfast than usual. I lit my bracelet bright, and my heartbeat spiked, but she steadied me, and the Black Knight waited as I took a breath.

Our bracelet didn't go out.

I nodded, readied my sword, coiled my muscles, and rushed forth.

Time seemed to slow as the Black Knight braced for my blow. I shifted my weapon to a wing grip, my motions flowing through my mind a second before they happened, trying to force a parry and knock them off-balance and grapple their helmet with a hoof all at the same time. They didn't believe in my weight; I could see it in their stance. They were going to catch me and push me back.

But I believed. Our bracelet flared, Faye right beside me in my mind, and our sword locked with the head of the war pick. And it was the Black Knight who wasn't strong enough.

Their parry failed, the sword and the pick catching on their armor instead as I plowed into them. They stumbled, and I grabbed for their helmet, twisting and pulling as they caught their balance, my free wing sneaking around and hitting a clasp... and the helmet came free.

We broke apart, me with my prize and them catching their balance. A shock of pink-and-yellow mane was the first thing to greet me, followed by a sky-blue face with a curved muzzle and an overly wide mouth.

The Black Knight's expression morphed slowly from surprise into a sheepish grin as she realized what had happened. "Aww... buckets. I guess you really do care that much about her, don'cha?"

My heart stood still. The Black Knight was an adult, but... other than that, right down to the hairpin turn her demeanor made when unmasked, she was a perfect mirror image of Kitty.

Bad Riddles

I stared, dumbstruck, at the mare before me.

The Black Knight, normally clad head to hoof in their namesake armor, was now missing their helmet, which dangled from my shocked wing. And the face that had been hidden beneath it belonged unmistakably to Kitty.

An older Kitty. But still.

"Guess that didn't go as planned," not-Kitty chirped, an embarrassed blush on her sky-blue cheeks. She gave me a sheepish smile. "So... does that make you for real, then?"

"About protecting Coda?" I took a step closer to the ice block. "One hundred percent. But you're just gonna back down after one hit because I stole your hat?"

I hefted her helmet for emphasis.

She shrugged.

"If this is a joke, it's not funny," I said warily, watching her demeanor for any sign of... anything, really. But all I got was sheepish innocence. "Who are you and why do you look like that?"

Not-Kitty frowned, confusion breaking into her expression. "You don't recognize me?"

"I do, and that's a problem." At the very least, I was confident enough I had the upper hoof to start asking questions. "You look - and act - uncomfortably similar to someone I know, but unless you're pulling a very fast one on me, you're not actually them."

Not-Kitty studied me.

I tossed the helmet and caught it. "You want this back? Answer my questions. You were talking like you know about what happened to Coda. Windigoes? You've got a history with them. Isn't that right?"

Not-Kitty sat down in defeat. "Well, buckets. Got any more proof you aren't one of Rhodallis' pirates? Anything at all? Seems like we might've gotten off on the wrong hoof, but with those guys, you can never be too careful. After all, they've got nothing if not belief that they're in the right, just like you."

"No more than I have that you're not some roving bandit," I replied, wracking my brain for an out on the off chance that this really was a good guy - or, at least, someone who would tell me more useful information while cooperating than at swordpoint. "I'm new to this continent. Ask me something a foreigner would think they know, but be completely wrong about - someone who hasn't flown these skies for years like Rhodallis has."

"Oh, easy!" Not-Kitty perked up. "What province did Garsheeva build her private sanctum in?"

I blinked. Grandbell was the capital province, the home to Garsheeva's city and her temple. Icereach's censorship hadn't quite gone far enough to obscure something as basic as that. So, presumably, that was the easy, fake answer, and Garsheeva had a hidden lair somewhere else... but Grandbell would also be an easy first pick if you were trying to make up an answer that was incorrect, yet sounded plausible. Taking a stab in the dark would be more earnestly wrong.

"The Stormhoof Province?" I guessed, my tone making it clear that I wasn't confident in this answer.

"Nope!" Not-Kitty beamed. "It's Grandbell. Used to be right there for everyone to see, just not enter. Everyone knows about it. I just figured you were expecting a trick question, so I asked one that wasn't a trick. Next question: how many paws does a sphinx have?"

Well played, but now my paranoia was flaring up again. How many paws did a sphinx have? This couldn't be a trick question, could it?

Could it?

"...Four?" I dared to guess, a skeptical, tentative, jaded look already growing on my face.

"Yep!" not-Kitty praised, beaming. "You had to think about it, though. Is this a trick, or isn't it? So maybe you really aren't from around here, because that one should be easy. Okay, anyway, question three: two llamas, a sarosian, and a sock puppet being played by a griffon walk into an antique pawn shop on the Goldoa coastline, where they find a set containing a purple carved wooden pentagon and a yellow carved wooden septagon. That means five sides and seven sides. A cruise ship - you're following this, right? A cruise ship is docked at the town, and is scheduled to depart in seven hours. Of the two llamas, one has a ticket for the ship, and the other always lies. The llamas disagree on whether the sarosian can count to seven, but everyone knows they can at least count to five. Also, the griffon's sock either has purple stripes or yellow stripes, but the sarosian is colorblind so purple and yellow look the same to them. Now, the big question is... is this a trick question?"

My brain hurt.

"I mean..." I held a booted hoof to my forehead, keeping half an eye out to ensure this wasn't a distraction so some hidden accomplice could sneak up to steal Coda. "Whether I say yes or no, I'll be correct, right? Because if it's not, then that's such a straightforward no that it just isn't. But it sure sounds enough like one that I could be justified in saying yes."

Not-Kitty beamed. "Correct! Now, final question: from question three, if the griffon buys the artifact with the same coloration as his sock and then hides it in the sock, under what circumstances could the two llamas agree about how many sides the sarosian thinks the remaining artifact has?"

I groaned in despair. "Errrrrrr..."

If they're both lying, Faye said in my mind, her tone suggesting she was enjoying this. She said one always lies, but she didn't say the other always tells the truth.

I said that aloud, and not-Kitty looked thrilled.

"Well," she declared, "I guess that settles it. Rhodallis' crew don't have the patience or the sense of humor to put up with that. Me using it as a distraction once or twice before might have had something to do with it, as well. Solemnly swear on your friend here that you're not a friend of Rhodallis, or of windigoes, and we can try getting off to a fresh start?"

"I'm an enemy of Rhodallis, and I'm trying to escape from him," I swore, drawing a hoof across my heart. "As for windigoes, our history is... complicated. But I don't trust them and I'm trying to stop them, and to save my friend from them. And I'm not about to lose my temper over some silly riddles, but I have a lot more to lose if I stay here long enough to get boxed in by another dust storm and run out of provisions. Now it's your turn. What are you doing, and why should I trust you?"

"I'm the Black Knight," not-Kitty told me, hefting her war pick with a serious look. "And believe it or not, I'm still trying to pin down what my goals should be. So I wander, and I do what I can when I see something that needs doing. But I know a thing or two about windigoes. If you don't already have an ironclad plan to help your friend, I could probably help you."

"Don't have any goals, eh?" Figuring it was time for a gesture of good faith, I tossed back her helmet. "What's your real name? Aside from the Black Knight."

She caught it, checked it over for damage, and then met my eyes. "Name's Puddles. Not too menacing, eh? Sure you've never heard about me? And how about you?"

I wracked my memory, but... "Not ringing any bells. Anyway, I'm Halcyon."

Puddles nodded, attaching the helmet to a strap on her armor without putting it all the way on. "Well met, Halcyon. Anyway, it's more like I have too many goals to lift up any as the most important. Now, you're really stuck here, no hidden airship or anything?"

I nodded. "Are you offering a ride...?"

Puddles gave me that sheepish smile again. "Didn't wanna risk my own ship so close to the city. It's an old wooden one, and revenant fire could burn it to cinders. Only left it a day from here, though!"

"Any chance it's due south?" I glanced in the direction I had been going.

"West," Puddles apologized. "I flew in from Wilderwind."

I hesitated, looking through my provisions. "I've only got enough provisions to make it to Gorton's Holdout if I don't take any detours. If I follow you and you ditch me, I'd be at the mercy of the elements. We've been over ten times why I'm not a pirate, but why should I trust you?"

"I swear it on Wallace Whitewing," Puddles solemnly promised. "Do you know who that is?"

My mind sparked. Whitewings were what Kitty called her remote-control bodies, and the more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed that she had named them herself. Another connection between this mare and her lookalike in Ironridge? That couldn't be a coincidence.

And yet, I sifted further in my memories, and felt like I remembered something from before that, perhaps from Rondo during my ill-fated job with Leif and her associates. Wallace Whitewing...

"He was the champion of the Griffon Empire, the greatest hero it had ever known," Puddles explained, seeing my confusion. "He fought for the redemption of criminals, the equality of races, and to save the continent during the Twilight of the Gods. And he was also my father."

I stared at her, relevant new information flooding into my head. Redemption of criminals, equality of races, didn't that sound a lot like Kitty's stated goals of evolving beyond the constraints of being a windigo?

Blinking, I shook my head to clear it. That wasn't the important thing to focus on, right now. But this Puddles clearly had pieces to the puzzle that I was missing, and from the sound of it, they were big ones. Maybe even the key ones that would finally turn the picture into something I could identify.

Trustworthy or not, I had to go with her so I could find out more.

"Alright." I nodded. "It's a deal. I'll trust you, we'll travel together for the time being, and you tell me anything you know that could help Coda. Please don't make me beat you up again. I've had... a long history with getting betrayed."

To my surprise, Puddles looked away. "...Same," she eventually admitted, before perking back up. "Anyway, let's get a leg on! If your stamina's good enough to even think about making this trek with a load, and the weather doesn't stop us, we should be able to find the ship by nightfall."

The first half of the day was much harder going than yesterday, owing largely to the fact that the direction Puddles wanted to go in didn't have a major, unobstructed road to follow. Our path meandered from side to side to dodge ruins, weaving through courtyards full of desecrated, derelict machinery, dust and sand piled against the walls in heaps I now suspected were revenant-made. They couldn't completely get rid of it when cleaning; all that sand had to go somewhere. So it was just here, out of the way.

Most courtyards were separated by walls, concrete bases topped with steel fences and then barbed wire. I remembered the correspondence tucked away in my bag; Faye had passed on to me a general idea of what was in there, even if her thoughts surrounding the letters remained her own. How many owners and managers of these factories actually thought they needed those fences, either to keep outsiders out or their workers in?

More than some of those wires, I guessed, were just there to meet a quota for steel consumption, or maybe to fit some urban planner's bad taste in aesthetics.

Probably. But I still shivered, well aware that most didn't necessarily mean all.

The walls generally had enough holes for us to get through, and when they didn't, Puddles made more. A single swing of her war pick was enough to demolish the concrete base; a second, to wrench the fence out of the way. Where had that strength been when we fought? When I pushed back her blow, together with Faye and our bracelet, were we really just stronger than concrete?

Maybe we were. I had no reference for my own strength that was applicable to the world at large, spending my time doing things like training with yaks and walking cross-country and donning heavy armor while pulling a load. Of course that couldn't be average, but how much stronger than average actually was I?

Watching how effortlessly Puddles cleared a path, remembering how Rhodallis hadn't wanted to pick a fight with her in the Night's Boon's sanctum even with numbers on his side - and remembering that Faye had apparently bested Rhodallis as well - I suddenly found a new appreciation for that strength, along with a desire to formally measure it.

Despite our advantages, we spent little time talking, saving our breath for the road. And even though I felt like I was making good time, my bracelet burning lightly, the burden of pulling Coda not yet having caught up to my muscles for the day, I almost felt like Puddles was slowing down on my behalf.

She didn't offer to pull Coda herself, which I appreciated. And she had to take point anyway to lead the way. But I pushed myself a little harder, and sure enough, she sped up to match my increase.

Eventually, our path was broken by a long, long warehouse that seemed designed to look like a wall. Plain, gray and boxy, it had innumerable freight entrances and a wide, empty courtyard, suggesting it was used as some sort of shipping or cargo hub.

Puddles glanced up at it, evaluating the building. To my eyes, it looked pretty sturdy, in better condition than most of the places we had passed so far...

"Buckets. I forgot to adjust our route for this place, since we have cargo," she eventually said, nodding back at Coda. "Well, we've got three options: over, around or through."

"Over?" I tilted my head. "Are you secretly a pegasus?"

Puddles shrugged, then flexed, and a compartment on her shoulder popped open, exposing a miniature hooked cannon. She aimed it up, and with a small, smokeless blast, the hook flew out, trailing thin, sturdy rope.

It lodged on the building's ceiling. She gave it a solid tug for emphasis, and it held.

"Well, that's handy," I remarked. "Though, with Coda..."

"They're rated for my weight alone," Puddles apologized. "Had to cut some corners to get everything I wanted to fit in here. If you ever want a set for yourself, by the way, grapple parkour is a fast and fun way to travel."

Grapple parkour. I blinked at the line, my mind assembling a probably-fantastical image of what that could look like.

She gave the line a different tug, and it came free, rapidly retracting into its holder, which snapped closed.

"Well, unless there's anything particularly bad in here, we go through," I said, turning to one of the open freight entrances. Puddles had nothing to say to stop me, and the noontime sun quickly vanished behind the ceiling as we ventured inside.

I didn't realize quite how hot the desert was until we sat down and stopped moving, after a quick look through the warehouse determined this was a good enough spot to take lunch. My bracelet went out, parts of my armor came off, and I sat down to rest, letting the day's exhaustion fully hit my now-unaided body.

"Whew," I panted, brushing a drop of sweat from my mane. "This isn't forgiving terrain. Maybe it's a good thing we decided to stop here."

"I'm impressed," Puddles said, mountainous storage racks surrounding us. The lower shelves had been largely cleared out, probably by vandals or treasure hunters, but the higher ones were half full of crates, boxes and sacks of materials and who knew what. "Takes guts of iron to survive out here, let alone with what you're wearing. One of the few times I guess you'd be glad to have that kind of ice around, huh..."

She pulled out her provisions, and I withdrew my own, neither of us yet to the point of sharing.

"So you know about windigoes," I said between bites. "What exactly do you know? If you've got stuff that can help Coda..."

Puddles raised an eyebrow. "You share your history, I share mine?"

"You first," I prodded, though I didn't say no.

Puddles shrugged. "I spent six years possessed by one, as a kid."

I nearly spat out my water. "Six years?"

"Really not ringing any bells, huh?" Puddles sat back, talking with her mouth full. "You really must not be from around here. When your parents are famous, and you're their reason for fighting... Well, they kept it a secret until I was back to normal, and didn't exactly shout about it in the months after that, but history has a way of finding out. Not many in the Griffon Empire who don't know at least something about my reputation. Anyway, that's my story. I just don't want anyone else to go through what I did. Especially not another kid. So I caught wind of this Coda, and what else could I do but look into it?"

"A good egg, huh?" I flicked my tail, chewing.

"Well, there's more." Puddles kept eating, staring off into the distance of the warehouse rafters. "You see, six years don't pass in the blink of an eye. My parents tried all sorts of things to heal me. And during that time, my body and the windigo inhabiting it fell under the control of someone very dishonest, who convinced them he was searching for a cure while secretly using its power for his own ends. It ended badly for him, and for everyone else involved... Even for the windigo, believe it or not. So I couldn't stand by while Rhodallis tried to do the same to her."

There was more to that story. I knew there was more... but Puddles had said her piece. "Your turn," she said, punting the conversation over to me.

Well, if that was how it was going to be... she would get only part of my story, too. At least until we could decide how much to trust each other.

"I met her in Ironridge," I started to explain, choosing my words carefully. "I dunno how much news you've heard out of Ironridge, lately, but the city has been ran for years by a corporation secretly controlled by windigoes. It used them for air conditioning, I think willingly, and the city was too hot to survive without it. So they got a lot of political power, and wanted to use it to go to war with Yakyakistan. So Coda... sacrificed herself somehow to seal them away in her body. I don't know exactly how it works, and it's probably not even the same as what happened to you. But there's a lot more than one windigo in there. Dunno how many. But I think she just took on too many at once."

Puddles rubbed her broad chin with a hoof, scooting over and inspecting Coda more closely. "Buckets. I was afraid this wasn't the same exact situation. Though, I don't know how much better it would have been if it was... You mind a few more specific questions?"

"Go for it." If she was asking permission, that was a good sign.

"That brand," Puddles said, pointing at the black crown on Coda's flank. "How long has she had that? Is it her normal one, or did it only appear after she got possessed?"

I furrowed my brow, remembering Kitty's snowflake talent... and how Corsica's had changed to a snowflake when she got possessed. That had to be what Puddles was talking about. So I shook my head. "Always been like that. I'm guessing some types of possession change it somehow?"

Puddles nodded. "The bond between bodies and brands is special. When I was possessed, mine changed to a snowflake, and from what I understand, that wasn't something that the windigo could control. So for better or for worse, what's happening to her isn't the same as what happened to me." She returned her hoof to her chin. "It's possible she's still conscious and in control. Or it's possible no one's home, and she's in stasis in some way I haven't seen before."

"When this first happened," I offered, "the whole block of ice wasn't there. She was encrusted in it and still frozen solid, but it wasn't nearly this big."

"I don't know what to make of that," Puddles mused. "According to the stories - I have no memory of that time - my windigo once did something like this to themselves as a defensive measure. Which, depending how Rhodallis got his hooves on her, could... Buckets." She shook her head. "You know how he came by her?"

I shook my head. "Wish I did. Haven't a clue. But I left her with friends to go chase a cure, and eventually, I found her again being carted around by him. So it can't be anything good."

"Meh," Puddles pouted. "Figures."

"So what were you gonna do with her?" I asked. "If you did succeed in swiping her from me?"

"Keep her out of harm's way." Puddles shrugged. "Prevent her from being used as a tool. With how much is on my plate, that's about the best anyone could possibly hope for. Even if her situation did turn out to be identical to mine, that would still be a lot of work to fix, and if it ended the same way... Well, best not to dwell on could-have-beens. Let's just say, here's hoping it doesn't take six whole years."

"It won't," I promised, more to Coda than to Puddles. "I won't let that happen."

Puddles stepped back, wrapping the remainder of her rations. "Then let's get a move on. We've been making better time than I expected, and might be able to reach the ship before it gets too dark."

Beyond the shipping center, I saw the reason that warehouse had been allowed to grow so long: a dry, cracked riverbank.

Multiple docks and cargo cranes extended from the loading area out over the massive ditch. At the bottom lay a rusted-out boat hull, a frightfully-colored glaze born of myriad desiccated pollutants, and plenty of trash, most of it submerged in the scorched earth from the days when that had been mud.

"Whatever turned this place to a desert made the river dry up," I remarked as Puddles led me towards a fallen crane arm. Crossing it would take some nerves and a decent helping of balance, as well as carrying Coda on my back, but it looked far preferable to the unnaturally-straight riverbed.

"Gyre was a desert long before that," Puddles said, hopping out onto the crane arm with surprising grace. "The rivers just disappeared with Garsheeva."

"What did she have to do with it?" I asked, hefting Coda and following her with care, my gaze never wavering from my hooves.

"During Garsheeva's reign," Puddles explained, "the Empire used waterways as its roads. Instead of building land roads between the provinces, she scooped out trenches long ago with her bare paws, and then filled them with water and created currents using her power over the elements. They had rivers that spun in circles, and even streams that could flow gently uphill... so gently that it was difficult to empirically prove. But her clergy always said so. And when she disappeared, the rivers went back to their natural flow overnight. Most of them became stagnant, evaporated, or simply drained away."

I folded my ears, imagining what that must have been like.

"Gyre was a special case," Puddles continued as I finally made it off the crane without accident, leaving the riverbed behind. "They thought the rivers weren't good enough, so they made their own roads. Like this one."

She patted the far riverbank, which was, indeed, another long, straight road running from the dome of green in the distance that marked the city off into the horizon. I wondered just how long it went, parallel to the river.

"Say what you will about Gyre's hubris," Puddles went on. "I think it's sad, myself. They spent so much effort trying to worship themselves at the end, and not Garsheeva. And then when Garsheeva disappeared, they went away with her. If they had left roads like these for the rest of the Empire and not just their own wasteland, maybe they could have had a little bit of good in their legacy for the continent."

"What's it like everywhere else, then?" I asked. "Do they just have no way of getting around?"

"Yes and no," Puddles said. "The Empire isn't so large that someone determined can't make the journey from end to end if they have the resources to rough it, guard against bandits, and appease all the various factions along the way, but cities and settlements are a lot less connected than they used to be. Town walls are the limit of anyone's allegiance now, not provinces. And fliers, or anyone with an airship, can move around much more easily than the young or old, earth ponies and unicorns, those with families or obligations. Really, it's divided the continent into two classes: those who can get around, and those who are stuck in place."

Well, now that just reminded me of Equestria. And not in a good way.

I stewed on that thought for the next few hours, muscles straining and bracelet burning as we hiked through the desert heat.

My hooves stumped down, one and then another and then a third and then the fourth, over and over, the edges of my boots beginning to chafe, but not harder than my bracelet could repair. Several times I had to check my train of thought, give it a forcible kick in another direction, just to avoid a repeat of the incident where I broke my bracelet walking to Snowport by focusing on nothing but my determination to get there for a week or two of walking. Hopefully two days wasn't enough to cause a repeat of that incident, but still, I was worried.

Fears of immolating myself like Mother had done decades ago seemed mostly unfounded; never in practice had the bracelet come even close to doing that type of damage to me. But getting my bracelet stuck on my own emotions had happened before, and it would be ruinously inconvenient if that happened again.

But I kept my wits about me, and finally, as the sun grew low on the horizon, Coda's ice block betraying not so much as a drop of moisture for all the day's heat, Puddles gave me the words I was waiting for.

"We're almost there," she said, slowing up and pointing. "I dropped anchor just in that warehouse over there."

The warehouse proved to be in such respectable condition that the magical lock on its bay door actually still worked, responding to something in Puddles' armor and grinding open of its own accord - a horrid, rattling grinding, but of its own accord nonetheless.

"Neat, huh?" Puddles beamed. "I fixed it up myself. Pays to have a place of your own in the middle of nowhere from time to time."

The warehouse concealed a dirigible ship, built with a wooden carriage that my knowledge of airships pinned down as roughly thirty years old. It was a fine, venerable ship, with a character suited for altitude, inclement weather and austere luxury, perhaps not fearing combat yet not expecting it to be inevitable, either. An airship from a different age, not terribly unlike the Immortal Dream, when creatures could afford different priorities and the sky was something to explore and marvel at, not to flee through.

I liked this ship. Among airships, it was a knight and a gentleman.

Moments later, I was on the bridge with Coda, relaxing as the propellers buzzed to life and the dirigible inched out from the warehouse, rising into the sky. Puddles leaped over the side just long enough to close the warehouse door behind her, leaving her grapple attached so she could pull herself back up when she was finished, and then she was back, setting a course straight for the setting sun.

If there was a betrayal coming, this would be it. Here I was again, on a stranger's airship, with plenty to lose and no control of our destination.

And yet, somehow, this time felt different.

Puddles shucked off her armor, standing in a device that was part armor stand, part... something else, which held the various pieces out from her so she could quickly and easily remove it, and presumably put it back on again. Once she was bare, I saw a sturdy blue mare with the proportions of a large stallion - but not a huge one. She was caked in dust, sweat and grime, her shoulders wider and more toned than her hips, and she bore a vibrant special talent of a rappelling rope coiled around some hooks and pitons, and a grin that was glad to be home.

"I've got a shower in back," she offered. "You want first dibs, or me?"

I hesitated. "I... You can go first. Where are we going, by the way?"

Puddles shrugged. "I'm going to Wilderwind. Got some other obligations I need to check in on... You don't have to get involved, if you don't want to. As for you, it didn't sound like you had any other plans, so you're welcome to just stay here out of Rhodallis' reach for a while. But let me know if you get any other ideas for where you want to be, and we can add it to the list."

Generous terms. If this really was for real, I'd take it. And if it wasn't, I'd be sleeping with my bracelet on, just in case.

Nothing suspicious happened while Puddles was in the shower, and I took the chance to familiarize myself with the ship's controls. It seemed to have a rudimentary autopilot system that could maintain altitude and bearing, so there was nothing that needed to be done, but this wasn't a setup that took a pilot's license to fly. It seemed to have been made for an enthusiast, not a professional.

By the time Puddles got back, I was feeling comfortable enough to entrust her with Coda while I went to wash up, myself. Nearly a week without a shower, plus everything I had been through over that week... If taking such a minor risk for something I needed this badly wasn't worth it, that wasn't even my fault for not being diligent anymore. That was just the world hating my guts.

I didn't know how much water the ship had stored, so I tried not to dally, even though the suds felt wonderful in my fur. This was the first proper opportunity I had received to check myself over in a long while, too, and I was pleased to see that my changeling queen healing powers were doing their job: no scars from all the places revenants had stabbed me, and no glassy, blackened fur under my bracelet that hinted at the start of an injury like Mother's.

In fact, the shower felt so good that it let me forget about my next pressing problem until it was staring me in the face: my armor was filthy. Just as bad as I had been.

No way was I sleeping in that. In fact, I was hesitant to even touch my boots with a wingtip.

I sighed. That would need to be cleaned sometime when my limbs didn't feel like jelly. And I didn't see anything else to wear in the meantime.

Oh well. Faye and I had been trying to go without our coat from time to time, anyway. And Puddles was just one pony, who could screw me over a lot harder if she wanted to than just by having a weird reaction to my legs. I'd get by.

So I strolled back out onto the bridge, a single corridor connecting rooms at the sides and the shower near the rear to the expansive control room at the front of the dirigible carriage. "Hey," I greeted tiredly, relieved to see Coda just where I left her. "Hope you don't mind if I ditched my armor in the bathroom. I'll clean it in the morning after I get some rest."

Puddles turned to nod at me, a little more quickly once she saw what I looked like. "Woah," she said, raising an appreciative eyebrow. "You're pretty eye-catching!"

I folded my tail to cover my special talent, sensing that she was staring. "Um, thanks?"

She nodded in what was probably understanding. "Sore subject? Well, my identity beneath that armor is a bit of an open secret to anyone who cares enough to find out at this point, but the original point of it was at least partly to get away from the expectations others had for me. I've got a pretty recognizable appearance too, you know, and a story to attach it to. Won't necessarily find that everyone knows about the windigo stuff, but everyone knows the great Wallace Whitewing... Heh. So whatever you're trying not to get recognized for, your secret's safe with me. Even if it's just that you look memorable, period."

"...Thanks," I said, swallowing and pulling myself back together. "I appreciate it."

"By the way," Puddles added, "I know I just said I wasn't going to pry, but... Actually, forget it. I did just say I wasn't going to pry."

My ears flicked, and I smirked a wry smirk. "Well, when you put it like that, can I really not know what you were going to ask?"

"Your special talent," Puddles said. "It looks a lot like hers." She nodded across at Coda. "Is there... any connection?"

My whole body shivered. "That's..." I pressed my ears back. "Not something I'd like to talk about until I know you a whole lot better."

"Fair enough." Puddles didn't seem bothered. "We've all got our secrets. Anyway, pick out any cabin that looks unused, find wherever to stash Coda, and get some rest, unless you really like watching the night go by. We'll be in Wilderwind by morning, but I'll be sleeping in since I've gotta stay up to pilot. So, uh, feel free to sleep in, or explore, or wait for me, or whatever you feel like. Figure out your own breakfast, and once we resupply at port, I'll treat you to a nice, big lunch. As a fellow enjoyer, or at least tolerator of bad riddles, it's the least I can do."

I nodded gratefully. Maybe this was for real.

Of course, if Puddles herself was a good pony, then the law of cosmic balance dictated that whatever business she was flying into Wilderwind for was a hideous political rat's nest that would make even my new, hardened resolve turn to spaghetti. But given the state of the world at large, that was probably a given anyway.

So, maybe the universe would allow this nascent partnership to turn out alright.

Jig's Up

I regained consciousness, and immediately knew something wasn't right. I was on the road, in the middle of nowhere, with Coda to protect and nothing but my own power to my name, and yet beneath me, I felt a nice, fluffy bed.

Suppressing any hint of a reaction, I cracked open an eye, and reality caught up with me.

I was in a compact yet comfortable cabin, the light of dawn shining in through a lacy curtain. The architecture was tight and efficient, but it looked like it had been designed for someone roughly twice my size, so it was roomy nonetheless. Wooden trim and walls gave it a homey feel, and a rough, no-slip metal floor gave it a utilitarian edge, and my bed even had a canopy for a helping of luxury, though I had been too tired last night to bother closing the drapes around me.

Right. I was in Puddles' ship. The mysterious Black Knight, whom I roundly bested in combat only to discover was a doppelganger of Kitty. And Coda was sitting entombed in ice near the door to my room, right where I left her.

It seemed Puddles was trustworthy enough not to take Coda and run the moment my eyes were closed. A very low bar, but given how my life had turned out so far, I'd take what I could get.

I rolled out of my bed, eyes bleary from sleep, completely naked save for my bracelet. Right... I had ditched my armor and clothes last night while taking a shower, and didn't feel up to the task of cleaning them at the time.

Well, one thing at a time.

Yawning so hard that the tips of my ears touched, I strolled out into the ship's central hallway, getting the feeling that we weren't moving. The bridge was empty, and on the way there I passed an open door, behind which was Puddles, flat on her back in a bed with her legs in the air, snoring loudly. Drooling, too.

I couldn't remember if I had ever seen Kitty sleep, but if I had, it would probably look exactly like that.

Yesterday, I hadn't pressed the issue of why they looked the same, especially when Puddles had a history with windigoes. But sometime I'd have to change that. This mare had to know something about...

My train of thought trailed off, unable to get going, and I knew exactly why: for the moment, everything was fine. For the last week, nothing at all had been fine. I needed a break, I deserved a break, and my body and brain had together decided to take one.

Well, that was fine. If I could put off freezing up and shutting down until I was somewhere safe, that was infinitely better than doing it in the middle of a fight. In fact, now I remembered Puddles talking about needing to stay up to pilot the ship until nearly dawn, so she'd be sleeping in, so...

I didn't bother finishing that thought. Instead, I turned around and went back to bed.

The next time I woke, I felt much better, though I probably could have gone on for several hours more if not for my stomach and my nose. The former needed assistance, and the latter told me assistance was close at hoof.

I followed it to the rear of the ship. After the cabins were the bathroom and the exit, and between those and the hold was a kitchen and a dining area, where I found Puddles tending a steaming stovetop.

"Pancakes and jam?" she offered, hearing me come in. "All I know how to make is bachelorette food, but it's hot!"

I flopped myself down at the table, and soon was eating, too hungry to take breaks for conversation. Fortunately - and also like Kitty - Puddles didn't consider this a breach of manners at all, and for a moment we devoured in silence, until after three stacks I was finally sated.

"So," Puddles said when I was done and she was done as well. "Had any brain blasts over the night?"

"Eh?" I raised an ear.

"Thoughts about what you'll be doing next," she explained, waving a hoof. "Last night, it seemed like a tomorrow problem. Well, guess what: it's tomorrow!" She grinned a wide, wide grin. "My offers still stand: you can stay here for a while, or if you have somewhere in the Empire you need to be, I can give you a ride as soon as it's convenient. We haven't talked much about who your other friends are, or where that might be."

I crossed my forehooves nervously. "...Right. I don't remember how much I said yesterday, but I kind of came to the Empire on my own to track down Coda. There's something I'd like to do in Izvaldi before I leave, but other than that, I don't have a lot of reasons to stay on this continent. And if leaving would put some distance between me and Rhodallis, I have a very good reason to leave."

"Hmm," Puddles mused. "Well, the good news is, Izvaldi is right in the center of the Empire, so it's quick to get there from just about anywhere. The bad news is, I've got too much going on around these lands to easily give you a ride farther away, and the other bad news is Rhodallis' stomping grounds run from here to Yakyakistan. So if you want him off your tail, heading west isn't going to cut it."

"Great." I sighed. "Well, that's how things usually go for me. But I've just had a pretty harrowing week or so. So if you're offering free hospitality for a while, and if this place is more or less safe from him, I wouldn't mind taking at least a few more days here to think."

Puddles nodded along.

"Where are we, anyway?" I asked, glancing at the window, though from this position I couldn't see much on the other side. "You said we were going to Wilderwind?"

"Yep," Puddles said. "Got some business here to take care of. You're welcome to come along, or stay here with the ship, or go off exploring on your own. I assume you wouldn't have been in Gyre if you didn't know a thing or two about how to take care of yourself."

"What kind of business?" I asked warily. "Anything political? That I might regret getting mixed up in?"

Puddles giggled heartily. "Political? Absolutely. Regret getting mixed up in?" She gave me a far-off look. "Depends what your goals are and what you want to make of your life. But there's certainly no harm in just looking around."

"Depends on what my goals are?" I leaned in with a frown. "Well, what are your goals? Why are you doing... Actually, what are you doing here?"

"It would be far easier to show you," Puddles said. "And if you're worried about getting accidentally dragged into something... I've been banging on the door, trying to become a part of something for more than a decade. This continent's future isn't something that likes meddlers. Society has its own idea of where it wants to go, and anyone who wants a say in that and doesn't already have one gets the door slammed in their face. Around here, you have to try persistently and actively to even hope of becoming a part of something."

Oh? A place that actually wouldn't foist random things on me merely for blinking in the wrong direction? It didn't feel polite to say, but that sounded like a paradise compared to Ironridge. I was already sold.

"Well, sure," I said, nodding back. "If that's how it is, I'll come take a look around. Though... my clothes and armor are filthy, and I'd rather not go around with nothing at all."

Puddles brightened. "I know a thing or two about armor maintenance, believe it or not! And I'm not in a hurry. Let's see if we can tackle that together."

Moments later, the two of us were looking over my soiled gear in the bathroom. Puddles frowned, nodded, and started pulling the pile apart, separating it into individual pieces.

"Here, you deal with these," she said, tossing the boots my way. "Feel free to use the tub, we've got plenty of water since we're at port. Now let's see about this armor..."

Puddles spent nearly three hours tending to my armor and gear, which had the upside of giving my boots time to dry. From her constant mutterings, I got the feeling not all of its wear was my fault, and Rhodallis just didn't take very good care of his armory.

"And this," she said, finally turning to my greatsword. "What was this used for, trying to cut metal? Its edge is ruined."

On second thought, maybe all this was my fault.

"Fighting revenants," I said, considering the possibility that all the damage to the armor had come from me, all the blood staining it was my own, and what I would look like right now without my regenerative changeling queen powers, none of which she needed to know about.

Puddles shook her head and sighed. "Right. I saw you in the ziggurat, I don't know why I even asked." She hoofed the sword back to me. "I can sharpen this, but we'll probably want to take it to a blacksmith first to get the edge professionally straightened. Otherwise you'll be left with structural weaknesses that you won't be able to fix without wearing down the blade significantly through more sharpening. In the future, if you go back to that city, I strongly recommend a war hammer, maul, morningstar or similar heavy and blunt weapon. This worked because of its weight, but it was the wrong tool for the job."

I nodded, absorbing this information. "In my defense, I didn't know what we were going to be fighting when he took me to the armory and told me to arm myself."

"In that case," Puddles said, "I suppose you could have done much, much worse. At the end of the day, survival is what matters, and the cost of fixing and replacing your gear is secondary to that."

She turned back to my armor, and pushed it towards me as well. "Now, this should serve you in a pinch, it's certainly better than nothing, and at the very least you'll look like a seasoned veteran. But there's a lot we can do to improve it, or we could just get you something new and better, so try not to pick any major fights that you have the option of putting off. Actually... be careful picking any fights in general, okay?"

I tilted my head. "Lotta strong fighters in Wilderwind?"

"Well, yes," Puddles admitted. "But it's more than that. When you turn to violence to solve a problem, someone always loses. It's an important tool, and sometimes there's someone who needs to lose at any cost. But whatever your reason for fighting someone, they've got a reason for fighting you, too. And your reasons will rarely have to do with figuring out who's stronger. This isn't a fair way to solve conflicts, only a necessary one. So before you get in a fight, always stop to think about whether the ends justify the means."

I looked away. "Is that what you were thinking when you challenged me over Coda, in Gyre?"

Puddles looked slightly uncomfortable. "Yes, but my ends were less straightforward than you think. I can learn a lot about someone from fighting them. I challenged you not to stop you, but to find out if you had a sincere conviction behind your words."

"So it was like a lie detector?" I asked. "A lie detector through combat."

"One can sincerely believe in the necessity of telling a lie," Puddles said. "In fact, it was somewhat a hopeless gambit because the defining trait of Rhodallis' crew is that they believe they, and no one else, are in the right. Every one of them has some fanatically powerful belief they would discard a lawful life and everything else for so that it could remain unchallenged. But Rhodallis doesn't see Coda as a person, I'm certain of it. If his crew thought of her as a pawn in a scheme rather than something they would lay down their life to protect, I thought I would be able to tell."

"And could you tell?" I pressed.

Puddles nodded. "Absolutely. Now get suited up if you're coming. And remember, my identity is something of an open secret among anyone who cares to find out, but I do have appearances to keep up. While we're in public, I'm the Black Knight, not Puddles."

"Got it." I nodded, lifting my armor and heading back to get my boots.

Fully armored and equipped, ready for anything and confident that Coda was safe in my room, I stepped out into the evening light, and got my first good look at Wilderwind.

Sprawling out against a backdrop of rocky black desert was a city that strongly invoked Dead Herman, with ramshackle setups built atop each other, bright lights and lively traffic both on hoof and in the sky. Like the skyport above Dead Herman, this city as well seemed to be built from the ruins of something gigantic, but what that something had been was impossible to identify.

The one thing I knew for sure was that it had been tall, and designed predominately for fliers. Roads seemed to have been added as an afterthought, huge plates of metal thrown down to cover the ground without too much care taken to make them perfectly level. In fact, everything seemed lopsided to some degree, as if all the architects were drunk and none of their tools were properly calibrated.

And yet, this was no shanty town. I could tell that instantly from all the advertisements: flashing signs and high-flying billboards, selling things no impoverished slum could ever afford to be bothered with, from fancy perfumes to theater performances to jewelry and musical instruments. What was going on here? Had the Empire's cultural elite packed up their trappings and accepted a place with no sound architecture if it also meant no riffraff? No, Puddles and myself certainly looked like riffraff, and yet we didn't seem to stand out at all.

I looked across the buildings again, largely metal and fortified with scrap, and it suddenly hit me: this must have been built from stuff scavenged from the wasteland in Gyre. And for the mountain of buildings not to collapse under its own weight, even if the outer facade was built from whatever could be hauled in, it had to have a solid, well-designed structural core.

Ahead, Puddles had returned to her stoic, impassive Black Knight demeanor, but now that I had figured out this much, I had to ask. "Where did this place come from? Who built it?"

"It used to be a flying city," Puddles said, "carried by clouds enchanted by Garsheeva's power. When she disappeared, the enchantments gradually came undone. So they landed what was left of the city by a river, and have been building it out ever since."

I looked at the buildings again. Wouldn't have thought of that.

It did make sense, though. I had no idea how cloud could become a building material, but this place did look a lot like a city that had been picked up, jostled a little, and put back down. If that was simply the result of its foundation crumbling and setting it on the ground...

We passed hawkers and criers, and enough pedestrians for me to start getting a feel of the city's pulse. No one truly destitute crossed my path, but there were still two distinct classes of civilians: an upper crust not quite haughty enough not to mingle with their inferiors, and another class not quite so poorly off that they didn't attempt to mimic their superiors' styles of dress and speaking. Their differences were subtle enough to make me suspect I wasn't seeing the full picture: if everyone was flaunting what wealth they had in the same way, why weren't the rich flaunting harder?

The answer, I suspected, had something to do with how closely correlated the difference between the groups was with who did and didn't have wings.

It was the griffons and the pegasi who walked like they were better, like they knew they didn't have to be here and were doing everyone else a favor by using their feet. And towards the center, the city was quite tall, growing too steeply for any roads. That was where the real flexing of wealth would take place.

"And remind me why everyone here is so rich?" I whispered, striding closer to Puddles.

"Mercenaries," Puddles grunted. "Prior to the monarchy's collapse, the other provinces fought endlessly, but no one invaded Wilderwind because no one wanted their territory. So their soldiers sold their services instead to the highest bidder. They were always well off in this city, but having a monopoly on the industry allowed them to concentrate most of the continent's remaining wealth right here after the fall, as rich nobles found themselves suddenly vulnerable in a threatening world."

"Profiting off of civilization's collapse," I said.

"Or putting their lives at risk to protect those beyond their own borders," Puddles replied. "Is it despicable, or noble? Whatever you think of it, you'll find many who disagree."

I wanted to point out that someone could easily hire mercenaries in a lawless world to try to conquer their neighbors or strong-arm their way to more than their fair share, but I let that protest die on my tongue. What would it achieve?

I didn't have a goal here. I was just a tourist, passing through and trying to stay beneath the notice of anyone important. And there probably were plenty of people, both who lived here and came here looking to hire, who were just trying to survive. Wasn't any of my business, sticking my nose in that.

We rounded a corner, winding our way upwards, and a huge billboard tempted me to stick my nose back in anyway.

"Who's that?" I asked, pointing up at the illuminated display. Rather than any discernible product, it simply had the likeness of a lithe, snow-white griffon with a long, sharp black crest sticking down from beneath a white fedora. His thin, dark eyes and polite, satisfied smile couldn't possibly mean good news, and in broad text beneath him, the billboard read Hail Gottlieb.

Puddles' demeanor darkened. "My enemy," she said, and kept walking.

I pressed once, but she had nothing more to say on the subject. Or, more likely, she had so much to say on the subject that she didn't want to do it in public, from within a suit of armor.

We drew closer and closer to the central tower that made up the city's structurally solid core, eventually reaching a wide plaza at its gates. Lit neon at its edges, the plaza was roughly circular, half of it cutting into an alcove in the tower wall and half of it creating a balcony that looked out over the lower city, the highest place you could reach without either going indoors or flying. Two fountains were built into the balcony rim, sporting streams of water that gushed from mechanized nozzles, moving them about in ever-shifting patterns like a slow dance of ribbons.

Looking out, I saw a quick, clean break between the lower suburbs and the craggy terrain, the city reluctant to expand past the footprint it must have held in its skyward days. I didn't see the river Puddles had mentioned; presumably it was to the north, as the plaza faced due south. And the more I looked, the more I felt the plaza was ever so slightly off-balance.

This high up, the city was much more cohesive and intentionally designed, scrap metal mostly used to fill the holes where cloud might once have gone. But the entire tower, and the plaza connected to it, were tilted by a fraction of a degree.

To the city planners, that had to be infuriating.

"My business is this way," Puddles said, walking toward the glass revolving doors into the tower lobby. "There's security, so you won't be able to catch up if you fall behind. Come, or don't. Your choice."

I felt like seeing the inside of the tower. Along I came.

The lobby was brightly lit and warmly polished, striking a sharp contrast with the lobby of the Gyre ziggurat I had explored only days before. While both were similar in layout, capacity and function, this one had the air of a VIP chauffeur, like a courtly bowing butler who didn't need to waste time verifying the identities of anyone who walked in because the clients who were supposed to be here paid him enough to have courtesy to spare for those who didn't. The lobby felt like an open letter to the public, a free sample and reminder of the luxury that being in high society could give.

Work hard, it seemed to say. Sweat. Bleed. Rise to the top, and claim the place where you belong.

It was also probably lying. But, enveloped in that sudden atmosphere, a very real griffon in a tuxedo greeting us with a courtly bow, it was a very motivational lie.

I wonder if we'll find any honor here, Faye said in my mind. Everything about this feels like it's intended to distract people from the way things are, with the way things could be if they won the lottery.

Yeah. I nodded.

If this is where the leaders of mercenary companies gather, though... Faye mused. Whoever lives and works here probably has a substantial amount of sway over the direction of the continent. I bet this is where all the power brokers are. At least outside of the ones loyal to those consuls from Everlaste.

Instinctively, I glanced around the room to see if there might be any consuls here, hanging around near the levers of power. None crossed my gaze... though I did spot a unicorn wearing the distinctive garb of the Night's Boon.

Apparently, that group had a presence here, as well.

Puddles ignored the reception desks, walking to a spacious elevator hall presided over by several pegasi and griffons wearing skimpy neon uniforms. They looked more like guides than guards, despite the fact that each one wielded an ornate rapier shaped like a long-stemmed rose, and several seemed to recognize Puddles at a distance.

"My lady," said a lipsticked pegasus mare who couldn't have been older than I was, dropping into an elaborately practiced bow. "Will you be visiting Battalionlord Geirskogul again today?"

"I will," Puddles said, leaning on her Black Knight mannerism, formal and curt.

"Then please, follow me," the mare said, guiding her into an elevator. She glanced back at me. "Friend of yours?"

"Yes," Puddles said. "She goes where I go."

I almost felt like the pegasus put on a show of how much it wasn't her job to question such things, so gracefully did she beckon me into the elevator as well. Once I was in, she pressed a button to close the doors, then ignored the normal control panel, drawing her rapier and inserting the tip to a small hole like a key.

The lighting on the control panel changed, and she pressed a button. As much as the lobby felt like a VIP area, it was clear the real VIP area was slightly harder to reach than that.

Gravity doubled as the elevator began its ascent, floors flashing by through its glass doors. When it finally stopped, high enough that we had to be near the very top of the tower, the doors slid open to a completely different vision of austere opulence.

Black marble with white veins made up the floor and the support pillars, gold trim lining small channels of water at the edges. The ceiling was a material that might have been terracotta, vaulted and barreled and lit from below, clearly chosen for its pliability and receptivity to ornamental carvings of rose buds. It almost reminded me of the upper reaches of Cold Karma; I wondered if the north's rich and powerful all contracted the same architects to build their lairs.

The pegasus with the rapier guided us down a short hallway which opened into a small waiting room, the world's best-paid secretary lurking behind a desk covered in a pane of glass that had luminescent mana conduits etched into its surface, forming a glowing teal rose.

I was beginning to feel like Wilderwind's highest circles had a motif.

"Hello, dearie," the secretary said to Puddles in a tone that could have made Chrysalis herself take a seat and wait her turn. "Here for your usual unannounced and unscheduled appointment, I take it."

"I go where I go," Puddles said, unshaken. Her helmet tilted almost imperceptibly in my direction. "She's with me."

The secretary looked at me through the rims of her glasses, lifting her head and letting the bottom of the frame touch the edges of her pupils for emphasis. "Don't see many of your kind around these days. I imagine you must be tough to have survived this long."

Mentally, I took a breath. "I see no reason to put that to the test."

"She's with me," Puddles simply repeated, moving to take a seat. "Tell us when Geirskogul is ready."

The secretary clicked her tongue, wrote something with a gigantic fountain quill, and went back to perusing whatever was out of sight on the lower part of her desk.

For minutes on end, we sat. I couldn't make small talk with Puddles; she was exuding an impenetrable wall of stoicism. At the opposite extreme, the rapier pegasus seemed to be daring me to make small talk with her, and I couldn't tell if this was a legitimate invitation or some sort of test, trying to goad me into breaking a cultural taboo. I didn't want trouble, so I kept my mouth shut.

There was a clock, with glowing hands that ticked in slow, slow circles. There was no window. And there was one other rapier-wearing valet, ostensibly waiting for whoever was currently in the next room with this Battalionlord Geirskogul.

Finally, the door at the opposite end of the room opened.

Out stepped Rhodallis.

Puddles instantly turned to him, as did the other rapier valet. He was accompanied by another pirate I didn't recognize, and gave us a huge, I-know-where-you-live grin.

"How did I know you would be here?" Rhodallis chuckled, slowing as he passed us. "Crazy coincidence, right?"

Puddles stared him down.

Rhodallis didn't stop, but as he passed, he reached out a huge wing and patted me on the back. "Keep up the good work, kid. This job's already paying dividends."

And then he strolled onward to the elevator, entourage in tow, the doors closing smoothly behind him.

I sat, stunned. Had he known where I would be? Or did he just serendipitously discover my new location? Should I have been more paranoid, worn a disguise that would cover my face as well?

Was Coda safe, alone on the ship? What did Puddles even think of this? Was she now suspicious I was-

"Battalionlord Geirskogul will see you now," the secretary droned, her voice reminding me of a beehive. "Get on with your bad selves."

Without a word, Puddles rose, motioning for me to follow her into the next chamber.

I found myself in an executive suite with an excellent window overlooking the city, offering a view to the west of a river that reflected the setting sun. To the right, the terrain rose gradually into foothills, and far in the distance, I saw a line of silver that might have been the sea.

At the room's lone desk sat a small, compact griffoness with a scraggly gray crest and bottle-green plumage. She wore an eyepatch, and numerous chips in her beak had been sealed over with a material not quite the same shade of yellow. I pegged her age at seventy, or perhaps a little more, and yet her remaining eye held a ferocity that could see several lifetimes of combat still before it would be extinguished.

She pressed a button on her desk, and the door closed behind us of its own accord.

"You have interesting timing," she said in a scratchy voice, her vocal chords ruined by decades of shouting. "I know your history with my previous client."

"I finished the objectives you gave me," Puddles said. "Rhodallis is someone I try to deal with on my own time."

The griffoness sniffed. "At least the masses haven't taken to plastering his head on billboards in the streets. For all your tremendous efforts, we continue to be swimming up a waterfall, Puddles." She turned to me. "Who is this?"

Puddles pulled off her helmet, tossing her mane to get it out of her eyes. "A new associate of mine. On the run from Rhodallis. I think she crossed him, but I haven't pressed for the full story. She's not looking to get involved, but she's new to the Empire, and I wanted her to see what's going on here with her own eyes."

"Young and innocent, eh?" The griffoness looked me slowly up and down. "Former associate of Rhodallis? What was your title?"

"I didn't have one," I said, which was technically untrue... though Moneymaker Halcyon meant nothing beyond the random whim of one crewmate. "All I was trying to do was rescue my friend. Now that I've got her back, we've acrimoniously parted ways." I glanced up at Puddles, still trying to gauge her reaction to what Rhodallis had said to me in the waiting room. "She'll be safe alone on the ship, right?"

"Rhodallis knows better than to break the laws of Wilderwind," the griffoness told me. "A pirate is worthless without a place to do business at the end of the day. Now, you..."

Without warning, she lunged at me from behind her desk, moving so fast my eyes couldn't even track her. My heartbeat spiked, but before I could so much as twitch she had the tip of a rapier resting on my nose.

Think. Focus. Calm.

"If you're trying to test my fighting," I slowly told her, "I'm more of the heavy bruiser type. Now please put that away."

She withdrew her sword, walking back to her desk and pacing. "Reaction time around point two seconds. It's clear you've never been trained, but you've seen enough not to cry bloody murder, either."

"For your information," I told her, "I spent two years training with military yaks. It's just a very different kind of training."

The griffoness nodded appreciatively. "That does make sense, yes. Beastly in a fight, yaks are. But you're still fresh and green. No agent of Rhodallis, at least not one who's been around him long enough to seriously comprehend what you've gotten yourself into. Definitely not someone who sought to join his crew on purpose."

"That was my conclusion as well," Puddles said. "I assume your meeting with him went poorly? On his way out, he made a spontaneous, petty attempt to convince me she was still on his side."

"Poorly for him, perhaps." The griffoness tapped her desk, opened a drawer, and pulled out a sheaf of papers, offering it to Puddles. "Here's my latest research on potential new targets for you to strike. I haven't had as much time to trim it down as usual. It's been a bad month for work. But I at least have time enough for an old friend."

She walked to the window and sighed deeply. "You. Sarosian. Do you know who I am? Have you felt this country's blood?"

"Battalionlord Geirskogul?" I guessed, feeling like there were few possible ways I could be wrong.

"That's what they call me," Geirskogul said, looking out at the sunset. "But you're in the company of this mare, and she tells me you're 'new to the Empire' and 'don't want to get involved'."

I swallowed. That sounded an awful lot like the start of a recruitment pitch...

And, perhaps, like the start of a story.

Politically Tenuous

"Before you say too much," I warned, "I really mean it. I don't have room on my plate for any big, noble causes to fight for. I'm just trying to stay alive and help my friends."

I stood in an executive suite near the top of the Wilderwind tower, a broad window looking out over red evening sky. Puddles was a few paces away, at my side. And across from us was Battalionlord Geirskogul, a griffon of probable importance who was probably about to try and drag me into something.

Geirskogul drummed her talons on one hand for a moment, producing a rhythmic ticking against her desk. And then, instead of shoving a contract in my face, she looked to Puddles and shook her head. "You just brought her up here because you're lonely and wanted company on the walk from your ship, didn't you?"

Puddles folded her ears, taken aback. "Meh..."

I blinked at that.

"Kid," Geirskogul sighed, still focusing exclusively on Puddles. "You... Nah. I should encourage you making friends. Especially normal ones who don't fancy themselves superheroes. Or washed-up warlords." She turned to me. "Though, former associates of Rhodallis is only a small step in the right direction... So why are you here?"

I swallowed, figuring I had nothing to lose from honesty. "She invited me, and I just didn't have anything better to do."

Geirskogul looked amused. "You make a habit out of consorting with important people for no reason?"

I had no idea how to answer that. Really. Being in situations where someone actually listened when I said I wasn't looking for more obligations just didn't happen to me. That said, I had followed Puddles up here simply because it sounded interesting... not that I knew quite how high up she intended to go.

Or what a Battalionlord even was, for that matter. But the decor suggested this was pretty high up.

"What do you want?" Geirskogul asked me, folding her talons. "Staying alive, protecting your friends, keeping your hooves clean of anything that doesn't have to do with you... There are many who wouldn't ask for more. Many who can't afford even that much. If you think you've got a shot at it, you're lucky. But I see you running around with this kid, and do you know what she wants? Has she told you her goals?"

I glanced at Puddles, who looked well and thoroughly put on the hot seat.

"She doesn't know what her goals are," Geirskogul said. "Hasn't figured them out yet. Still trying to be everything to everyone, in the shadow of her father."

She kicked back in her chair. "You think you've got a handle on what you're supposed to be doing with your life? Maybe if you follow her around, you'll rub off on her, teach her to settle for something she can put a name on. And then maybe the continent will see another apocalypse because someone coaxed its would-be savior into a happier life. And it wouldn't be any more your fault or her fault than the thousands of other people who didn't do just a little more, themselves."

I squinted, trying to parse that. "I feel like you're trying to talk me into two opposite things at the same time, here..."

"You came barging into my office without a good reason for being here, so I get to say whatever I like, whether you understand it or not," Geirskogul snorted. "And that's exactly what I'm doing. I both envy and resent your capacity to limit your ambitions. If you walked in here and told me you were willing to do anything to shift this nation from its present course, I could offer you jobs fit for an army of goddesses, just like I do for her." She jabbed a thumb at Puddles. "But when you come in and say you respect your own limits, all I can do is wish certain others got to experience the same, and then remind myself why they can't."

"I'm not lazy or sheltered, if that's what you're implying," I protested. "I just don't want to take on so much that I collapse under the weight and don't accomplish any of my goals."

Geirskogul stared me straight in the eye. "Whatever you've seen in your life, you've only had a precious few years to see it. I've been fighting for this nation some three times as long as you've been alive. If nothing else, you're sheltered from the passage of time." She turned to Puddles. "And you're being awfully quiet over there. Just going to let your friend do all the talking?"

Puddles shook her head, turning to me. "This is what I wanted to show you. Before the Empire's fall, Geirskogul was a rival of my father's. She's one of the last people in the Empire with honor befitting her authority. Can you see how tired she is, how worn thin? I don't know how much you've seen of the state of our society as a whole, but this is currently what it looks like at its best. My goal is to prevent the land my father gave his life to save from bleeding to death twenty years later."

"Ah," Geirskogul crowed sarcastically, "so you came up here to mock me. Well, this tired, worn-thin bird of war is currently your best and only source of information about places where a lone warrior can actually make a difference, short of tramping about looking for them on your own." She groaned. "I've been fighting on behalf of this land for a long time. And I won't have it be under my watch that it finally gives up the ghost and devours itself alive. I can't be picky about my allies, even if they're misguided youngsters who are only here to prove a point to dead relatives."

"And what do you think's going to happen here?" I asked, feeling like I had been successfully maneuvered into the question both of them wanted me to ask all along. "What are you trying to save the Empire from?"

Geirskogul gave me a smug, cheeky, tired look that said you finally asked.

"You asked who that griffon was on the billboard we passed, earlier," Puddles said. "Gottlieb Gallowsborn. He-"

"Hold on, Gallowsborn?" I interrupted, incredulous. "How do you get stuck with a name like that?"

Geirskogul shrugged. "His mother, being a heretic, was sacrificed to Garsheeva in accordance with law. But since she was pregnant at the time, his father - Lord Wilderwind - talked Garsheeva into a stay of execution long enough for the child to be born."

I blinked slowly at her. "You're pulling my leg."

Puddles rolled her eyes. "His father had nothing to do with it. Garsheeva made that exception for anyone. Thought it was bad taste to eat unborn children, for some reason."

Now I turned to stare at Puddles. "Garsheeva ate Lord Wilderwind's wife? For being a heretic? Wait, was that always the form of her death by ritual sacrifice thing? That the catacombs under Gyre were for?"

"Oh, not his wife," Geirskogul said, not at all hasty to correct the more alarming parts of my statement. "Sphinxes are born very rarely when one of the parents is a pony or griffon, and lords needed heirs to keep their own lines in power in their province. He simply had hundreds of children in an effort to get a sphinx."

My blank stare turned back to Geirskogul. "That's really not making it any better."

Geirskogul shrugged. "This province had a great deal of personal wealth, a greater emphasis on mercenary company than family, and a culture that believes strength is hereditary. Even offering nothing in return save for the slim chance at fame should they bear a sphinx, Lord Wilderwind had little trouble finding many who considered this to be an equitable arrangement."

I screwed up my face. "Maybe it's a cultural thing, but that doesn't sound like a very fair trade to me. Even if it was consensual."

"Call it a cultural difference, then," Geirskogul said, ambivalent. "Speaking for myself, I had no regrets."

I wasn't sure how much more confusion it was possible to fit in my expression. "Wait, you did this?"

Geirskogul nodded calmly yet again. "I did, once. My son grew up to be a scoundrel and deserter who abandoned his entire company - he was their leader - during a deployment in Ironridge, then lied about it to the entire nation afterward. Suffice to say, I no longer share my compatriots' beliefs about the qualities that are hereditary in a person. But I also can't hold Lord Wilderwind accountable for my son's failures, and so I have no regrets. But aren't we getting off-topic?"

"If the point of this story is those were the good old days, you're kind of making me worried, here," I pointed out, shuffling a hoof.

Puddles took a deep breath, stepping in. "The important part is, Gottlieb grew up to be a war criminal, assassin and mass murderer responsible for finishing what Chrysalis started. For several years after the Empire's fall, there was a period of relative stability and attempted reunification under House Everlaste, until he killed their entire royal family. He was subsequently captured and put to the sword by Everlaste's generals. But, unfortunately, his reputation is not as dead as his body."

"Politically, the Empire's lands are divided into two camps," Geirskogul said, sitting up straight again. "Those who are loyal to the way things used to be done, and those who aren't. The former group is mostly cohesive and concentrated in the south, collectively administered by the Neo Everlaste Consulate. They claim Everlaste's youngest son, Gustadolph Everlaste, lives on in a secret castle none but his consuls have ever seen, and that in him, the line of sphinxes endures. But every other known sphinx in the world is dead, and there is no proof that Gustadolph didn't join them fourteen years ago at the end of Gottlieb's blade."

Puddles nodded solemnly. "It's just a story, not one that anyone can prove. But a story is what those people want; something they can all share and believe in, even if it isn't true and even if it leads to being controlled by an organization no one knows anything solid about. They care more about having a direction to face and something to believe in."

"And everyone else?" I folded my ears, suspecting I knew where this would lead.

"Everyone else aren't a faction," Geirskogul said. "Just a bunch of people united under the joint banners of sphinxes bad and we do what we want. They - including almost all of Wilderwind - only come together to agree that they don't want any part of what the Consulate is selling. There is no cohesive system, and the half-systems that do exist frequently contradict each other in ways that no one acknowledges or cares about."

"What kind of contradictions?" I asked, hesitant.

"Well, here's a big one," Puddles said. "Most of the middle provinces - that's Goldoa, Izvaldi and Goldfeather, going west to east - have fallen back to a relatively feudal system, at least outside of the areas that swear allegiance to the Consulate. Towns take care of their own affairs and ignore the world around them. Those three provinces also control ninety percent of the Empire's croplands, and the remaining ten percent is in Stormhoof, which the Consulate completely controls."

"So the Consulate has all the farmland?" I tilted my head.

Geirskogul laughed. "No, barely a third of it. They benefit more from the threat of taking it than actually having it. The Consulate has something resembling an army, and these townships have only one means of defense: hiring mercenaries from Wilderwind. We accept most of the payment for our services in food. It's how we eat. But why trade for what we could take by force? There's nothing they can do to ensure we negotiate in good faith. Why not gouge the farmers with unfair prices for a necessary service? Why not assert our authority over their lands? We might be their political allies, but they're completely at our mercy."

"It's an unstable dynamic," Puddles said. "Caused by an imbalance of power, a lack of rules to keep that imbalance in check, and most importantly, a lack of anything tangible to give the armies of Wilderwind and the farming provinces a desire to unite. And so the Consulate rattles their sabers just enough to remind the farming provinces that they need to rely on Wilderwind, without actually trying to take any land by force."

"If nothing changes, eventually Wilderwind will try to take those provinces for its own," Geirskogul said. "The Consulate desires this because it makes us look like barbaric invaders and themselves as the preservers of order, and that's the narrative their followers want to hear. It will also be the truth. We will be barbaric invaders, by then too fractured and spread out to stand against them. And then the entire continent will be under the rule of an organization that no one knows the first thing about."

Puddles sadly nodded. "In life, Gottlieb was a Wilderwind mercenary. In death, he's becoming a symbol of what some in Wilderwind think we should do: take what we can and give nothing back. Fight the Consulate that still bears Everlaste's name. Is it a serious suggestion? Maybe they're bored troublemakers pretending to really mean it, and maybe they really mean it and are pretending to be bored troublemakers. But if nothing changes, Wilderwind will become the bad guys, with no good guys in sight."

"What do you even do about that?" I asked, ears down. "I'm no stranger to feeling like there are no good guys to side with. But if you're the same, like... what are you even planning?"

"I look to my father," Puddles said. "Wallace Whitewing. He was a hero to the entire Empire, a champion who fought for the people and for justice and gave them something everyone could believe in. But he died fighting Chrysalis during the Empire's fall, and someone like him is what the land today is lost without. So, I have to take his place. If I can become a symbol who can inspire everyone to become something better than this, then maybe I can save this land from another war."

I took a step back. That sounded terrifying. How could anyone take on sole responsibility for something like that without being certain the course they had chosen to lead everyone on was the right one? And how could you come by that certainty without being delusional?

And it didn't add up, either. "If you're trying to be a symbol," I hesitantly managed, "why hide in that armor?"

Puddles smiled a wide, sad, foalish smile. "Do I look like much of a hero without it?"

I didn't know what to say.

"Also," she said. "I don't want anyone thinking I'm just doing this because of Wallace. I don't want anyone to write me off because they think they already know what I'm trying to be. I'm trying to follow in his footsteps, not actually steal his legacy... and he didn't inherit his reputation from anyone else. Besides, it's easier to believe in my own course when I'm wearing a mask. That way, I can show everyone something that's just a hero. No extra bits left over."

A mask. To cover up her doubts about whether she was on the right path, and to make sure everyone else only saw what she needed them to see?

No way...

"It's a fool's hope," Geirskogul said. "She tries and tries, and yet she's still trying to graduate from the stage of 'Do they know who I am?' to 'Do they believe I represent justice?' At the end of the day, you can only sell people something they want to buy. And you're trying to sell to people who would rent out billboards to display a symbol of killing the other side in their sleep. But it's still more of a hope than anyone else walks through these doors with. For my part, I do my job as an administrator, and until death or senility take me I won't see the companies unite to wage any bogus wars. But I just don't know how many years I have left."

I sighed. "I thought you said you could furnish me with an army's worth of work to help change things, if you wanted to."

"Oh, I could." Geirskogul hammered her desk. "Some people are born rotten. Others turn that way because they've lost faith, and then some just don't have a choice. If you felt like helping someone out like this kid does all day and night, it might only be a drop in the ocean. But you'd have reduced the amount of desperation on this continent nevertheless."

I thought about that. About what I had already committed to, how incredible and unfeasible those dreams really were.

May I take over? Faye asked in my mind.

If she didn't mind switching in public? Go for it.

Faye forcefully wasn't self-conscious as she held her mask in a hoof, stowing it inside her armor. Puddles and Geirskogul both watched her.

"I don't know much about reforming societies, or about changing what people want," she said. "And even if I did, I really am at my limit with my own goals. But if you were being truthful about the limits of your knowledge, then I do know some things about Neo Everlaste that you might not."

Both of them perked in interest.

"I've been to their castle," Faye said, steeling herself under the sudden weight of Geirskogul's interest - Puddles was merely curious, but this griffon was fixated. "There's a reason why it's hard to find. It's an old ruin at the edge of the world, to the east of the Griffon Empire. The Consuls have some sort of power that lets them survive out there, and generate a bubble of livable space around it. I think they can also extend that power to airships they're traveling on to allow those ships to reach it."

"How did you accomplish this?" Geirskogul asked slowly.

"Rhodallis," Faye told her, choosing to omit her trip through the Lifestream. "I told you I'm trying to protect a friend, and am on the run from him. That friend is possessed by several windigoes, and he was trying to sell her to the palace's ruler. And the reason I'm on the run is because I stole her back."

"Now that's interesting," Geirskogul mused. "Very interesting... What else did you see in this palace? Tell me any details you can possibly remember."

Faye nodded. "There was something weird there. I didn't see anyone other than pirates and Consuls, but the entire place was covered in pipes that talked when you got too close to them. I think it said it was a life support system."

Geirskogul let out a slow breath. "What did Rhodallis seek from them? And did they try to get anything out of him? What kinds of transactions were they pushing for?"

"We left without making negotiations," Faye said, shaking her head. "Rhodallis wanted to speak directly to the palace's ruler, and the Consuls wouldn't let him, so instead he left. I wasn't able to tell if that ruler exists or not. But Rhodallis wanted to trade my friend for a prisoner he thinks is in that castle. And he told me the reason he wanted them was so he could kill them."

Geirskogul glanced to Puddles. "What are you thinking?"

Puddles nodded back to her. "What was Rhodallis visiting you about? Anything to do with her friend?"

"No," Geirskogul said. "Rhodallis is nominally incorporated in Wilderwind as the leader of a mercenary company. He has no loyalty to our flag, but uses this city as his primary port of business, and is frequently here for mundane reasons. Today, he wanted to borrow the Sword of House Wilderwind."

Oh goodie, magical swords. "What's the story behind that?" Faye asked, her interest piqued.

Geirskogul took a long drink from a neglected mug on her desk. "Wilderwind. Long history. Politics. Bleh. It's just a ceremonial blade that was passed down between the rulers of this city for generations. Wilderwind was unique among the provinces in that it never changed its name when a new line of sphinxes came to power to replace one that had just died out, and this blade was a symbol of that tradition. Practically worthless to anyone who lives here now, considering how they all feel about the sphinxes and their legacy. He offered a large quantity of material goods in exchange for the chance to borrow it for a week or so. Valuable goods, but mundane ones, nothing one-of-a-kind. I shot him down because as far as I know, this sword isn't currently any kind of symbol on either side of the conflict, but with its history it could easily be made into one by someone with nefarious intentions. Just didn't see a need for him to have it."

She put her mug down and raised an eyebrow. "Mean anything to you?"

Faye slowly frowned as ideas slid into place. "I stole my friend back in Gyre. He had just visited the Night's Boon there. I thought he was trying to sell her to them, but what he actually wanted was for them to help make it look like he was trying to sell her. He wanted them to claim they had bought her for a while, while he would actually hold onto her. And this sword... Everyone in the south would think it's really important because of its history, because even though you don't value that, they would. But he only wanted to borrow it, and was giving you regular, unremarkable stuff that wouldn't travel well in stories."

She looked up. "He wants to make it look to the Consulate like you bought her, even though he didn't even have her to sell. He's trying to convince them that he's serious about finding another buyer without actually getting rid of her - and he'll definitely be trying to get her back from me. This is all just a giant haggling bluff. He's trying to scare them into coming back to the table without revealing how much he actually needs to close the deal with them and them alone."

"Which means?" Geirskogul asked, watching her with interest.

"...I don't know," Faye admitted, starting to feel like she had shared enough of what she knew already. "I suppose the most likely answer is that the actual trade doesn't matter and what he really wants is to meet whoever is behind the Consuls. But he'd have to be pretty confident there actually is someone behind them to spend this much effort on it, when it's possible the Consuls are refusing him because they don't actually have a leader for him to meet."

She took a step back. "Listen, I'm telling you this because I really would like to help someone who has the Empire's best interests at heart. And also so you understand where I'm coming from when I say I have too much to worry about with my own problems. Maybe if you can't find a solution to what your own people want, you can find a way to do something about the Consuls instead, or at the very least determine what they want and how bad they actually are. So if there's any way you could pay me back, maybe by helping to steer Rhodallis off my tail, I'd really, really appreciate it."

Geirskogul slowly nodded. "I'll consider my options. You'll be safer in this city than in most of the Empire, at least. And Rhodallis is wary of Puddles. But watch yourself nonetheless. You make this friend of yours out to be indisposed. Are you her legal guardian?"

Faye bit her lip. "No, but I probably should be. I don't think she's got anyone else looking out for her."

"Rhodallis could claim the same," Geirskogul said. "Slavery is banned in Wilderwind, including buying and selling people as commodities. He can't attempt to trade her here without jeopardizing his relationship with us. But that doesn't prevent him from making a legal case to take her from you... and the only reason I assume you deserve custody of her in the first place is that I trust Puddles' judgement. Were it up to the law, you would have to pray that the finer details of your situation are compatible with a military idea of justice."

"Thank you." Faye swallowed. "For the warning. I'll... be careful."

"Now get on with your bad selves," Geirskogul demanded. "I've just exhausted my budget of free time for the next month on this social call."

"Thank you for your time." Puddles replaced her helmet, bowed, and led the way back to the waiting room.

Faye's thoughts spun, turning further with every step. The things she had told Geirskogul, some of it speculation made up on the fly... She had touched Rhodallis' heart, seen who he really was inside. That one-dimensional, all-consuming hatred, directed toward himself, and toward being forgotten...

And presumably to all others like him. The other Changeling Bishops. Even Chrysalis. If hurting them was his ultimate goal...

Did hurting them extend to killing them? She wasn't sure. But this prisoner in the castle, for him to spend so much effort on reaching them, they had to be related to his drive. Was it possible they were another Bishop?

For that matter... could Bishops even die in the first place? Or were they like her, bolstered by healing energies that somehow made them immortal? She remembered Rhodallis healing after their fight, but not all the way. Something wasn't right here.

Could it be possible that Gottlieb was the prisoner in the castle, and moreover, that he was a Bishop? She could see a world where he killed the Everlaste royals, was captured, tried, publicly executed, and then came back to life, only rather than admit it the generals hid him away where no one would ever discover that he was still alive. That still wouldn't explain what Rhodallis really wanted to do with him, unless he both had a way to kill him for good and really did want him gone. But why would he? Rhodallis also hated the imperial royalty. Shouldn't he be on the same side as someone who did a thing like assassinating an entire family?

And either way, why was Rhodallis so intent on using Coda as the bartering chip in this transaction? If he knew something about her unique value that Faye didn't, it clearly wasn't special enough to get the Consuls to close the deal on his terms. And if he didn't, why not try to barter with something else the Consuls were more interested in?

She had so many pieces, and yet there were also things that didn't connect to anything whatsoever. The castle's life support system was especially baffling; now that she had seen the remnants of Stanza down beneath Gyre, there could be no doubt that those talking pipes were the same as both there and Coda's throne. The voice she heard through them had called itself Canon. Canon, Stanza, what had Coda's throne been called? Fugue?

Could changeling queen thrones talk when sufficiently powered up? The sheer impact of being near the rift where Stanza used to be had almost overwhelmed her with hallucinations, but she felt like she remembered seeing Stanza talking, begging someone to help it die.

There was no doubt about it: there was a functional changeling queen throne in Neo Everlaste Palace. But Chrysalis was in Yakyakistan, and Coda's was on her ship in the Aldenfold, where they had ditched it outside Sires Hollow. So... whose was this one?

She needed to find the remains of Stanza. Maybe, possibly, there was a chance it could lead her to answers.

Out in the waiting room, that pegasus was patiently waiting for them, still with her salacious neon uniform and her lipstick and her rose-hilted rapier, a huge ribbon bow tied on her back. She bowed in a manner Faye chose to interpret as chaste, professional and equally aimed at both of them. And, at Puddles' grunted acknowledgement, she led them back into the elevator to the tower lobby.

As the elevator descended, Faye studied her. Usually that was something she tried to do discretely, but with how hard the pegasus was trying to get looked at, there didn't seem to be much of a point in hiding it.

Working as a dressed-up valet who escorted clients between their meetings with higher-ups and sat around doing nothing while waiting for them to finish sounded like an easy, boring job with no hope of advancement that was given as a reward to creatures who weren't important, but had pleased those who were. Would someone like this resent the status quo, or love it? She didn't look distressed, but the reason she kept trying to get a reaction out of Faye definitely could have been because she was bored.

Was that the kind of boredom that could lead to posting billboards showing the faces of dead criminals? Or to think that having a child with the ruler of your province sounded like a remotely good idea?

Whatever it was, it felt weird that someone like Geirskogul could work until her voice broke and her feathers fell out, in the same building where this pegasus could sit around for an hour in a waiting room looking pretty for someone who wasn't even there to see her. That felt wrong.

It wasn't Faye's job to fix this, and she didn't know the answers even if it was. But as they left the elevator and then the tower, the pegasus looking frustrated by her inability to get more of a reaction for her antics as they left her behind, she felt like she was starting to get an idea of the breadth of the problem.

Faye put me back on as we unlocked and re-entered Puddles' ship. Nothing appeared to be ransacked, and when I rushed to my room, there was Coda, right where I left her.

I sighed in relief.

"Well, buckets," Puddles said, stepping out of her armor. "That went... about how I expected? Maybe so, maybe not?" She tilted her head at me. "So what are you thinking?"

"Lots." I shrugged. "Might need to sleep on it. You don't mind if I keep staying here, right? I'm certainly not going to get in your way."

Puddles nodded. "It's going to take me a few days at least to get all these papers from Geirskogul in order to figure out what I'm doing next. My feelings about windigoes are sorta separate from the whole save-the-Empire thing, but if giving you a place to crash is what I can do, then it's what I can do."

"Izvaldi," I said, prompted by Faye. "Any chance any of your leads might warrant a trip there?"

"Did you mention going there already?" Puddles rubbed her chin. "I'm feeling some deja vu. Anyway, I'll see what this stack of papers has. But between this, maintenance for the ship, getting you some better gear, and whatever else, say so more forcefully if you want to set sail sooner than next week. With this kind of lifestyle, you learn to take downtime where you can get it."

A whole week?

I almost moved to protest... and then I stopped and stared. I was so conditioned to expect no downtime, ever, that I had no idea what to do with myself for that much time. Despite the fact that I had lived for hundreds of weeks. Thousands? Maybe almost a thousand. But still.

"Just to be absolutely sure," I said. "There's no potentially world-ending events scheduled within the next week that we need to be moving as fast as possible to stay ahead of, right? Odds are actually low that Rhodallis will just tear in here and grab Coda by force?"

Puddles slowly raised an eyebrow. "Aside from him, are youuu aware of any I should be aware of too?"

I shook my head and chanced a chuckle. "Nope. Just not used to that being the case. Maybe some downtime does sound great. Let's, err, see if I still remember how to figure out what to do with myself when basic survival is taken care of..."

Protagonist Privilege

Papyrus stood at the prow of his airship, his teeth dry from the wind as he grinned out at the mountains.

It was an Equestrian model, with ornate beating wings and a long, graceful rudder, hanging from a dirigible that was shaped like a cross between a glider and a sail. From what he'd been able to tease out, most Equestrian airships were somehow powered by proximity to major pegasus cities; this one was a special long-distance model that had been retrofitted with a secondary propulsion mechanism more akin to the ones commercially available in the north. That made its wings largely ornamental after the first day or two of travel, but he didn't mind. They still looked cool.

"The Aldenfold," Felicity said, stepping up beside him with an assassin's grace and looking forlornly out over the railing. "My sisters say we could be in the Empire before nightfall."

Papyrus felt an old instinct to flex claws he no longer had.

"Do you have a moment?" Felicity asked, placing her gaze on him instead. "We go much further, and we'll lose the ability to write this off as a pleasure cruise and go home. And I'd feel a bit more comfortable with one more serious conversation about our plans here put behind me before we make landfall."

Her words echoed distantly in Papyrus's ears. He saw only mountains, ones he had crossed many times in his lives in varying states of desperation. He saw his old kingdom looming ahead in his mind's eye; the vision of it that he wanted to leave for his sister, the cesspit his maddened self had perceived it to be, its true past and present states, neither of which he had seen clearly. His goals for it that were too new and nebulous to pin down.

"Knock yourself out," he said absently, still trying to envision something the Empire could become that would form a complete picture with everything else he had seen at as.

"I'm worried," Felicity told him, speaking loudly over the wind, "about our contingencies. Currently, the plan as I've heard it seems to be get there, see what we have to work with, and then take over the Griffon Empire. There are some minor ideas about what to do with it after that, but let's ignore that for now. What I want is to hear your honest and earnest idea of how long you think this will take and what kind of time commitment you think we're making."

"Worried I'll get bored a week in when we discover we have precious little to work with?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Think I'm here for a quick rush of adrenaline, that I'm expecting we can just waltz back in and keep cashing in on all the setup we did last time around?"

Felicity hesitated. "If nothing else, I'd like to hear your thought process around those matters."

"Well, I hope it takes forever," Papyrus said, turning back to the mountains passing below. "If we got this done and over with in a week, it would do a pretty shabby job of giving me something to do with myself, don't you think?"

Felicity said nothing.

Papyrus flicked his tail. "Last time, we got as far as we did with my princely position, the secret backing of the powers that be, Meltdown's ability to manipulate energy prices for the entire Empire, plenty of greedy and corrupt sphinxes to extort for money and influence, and with all that it took us roughly five years of scheming for everything to come together. This time, we've got our reputations and the probably-secret heir to Stormhoof, whatever any of that counts for in this day and age. Furthermore, the catalyst last time that let us set our plans in motion was the specter of a war between Ironridge and Yakyakistan, which is happening again, right now."

He closed his eyes, trying to find focus in the wind on his face. "It's possible we really will be able to waltz back in, flip the table on the status quo, and own the place before the week is through. It's also possible that we get there and literally everyone is dead. Or perhaps there's been a revolution while I wasn't looking and everyone is now so happy that it would be pointless for us to tamper further. Optimally, we'll find all our current tools useless and can integrate ourselves into society like ordinary civilians, slowly building up social capital in the name of a lengthy and impossible goal that allows the years to slip by in a manner that doesn't feel quite so directionless, but that's a pipe dream and we all know it. How do you want this to go?"

"I," Felicity said, wrapped tightly in a fur coat, "have my duties to the Princess and to my family. I'm getting old, Papyrus. And my daughter is growing up. I already feel as though I haven't struck the right balance for her, trying to provide an environment where she can live a normal life without fear of the specter of sphinx madness claiming her mind. If we spend ten, twenty years on this, it's going to be my last hurrah, the last great project I do with my life. But even three years for Floria could be some of the most precious and formative years she's going to get. And all I can think about is how this project of ours will cause her to spend them."

She took a moment to catch her breath, but Papyrus didn't bother interrupting with a witty remark. His old self would have seen Floria as a potent and powerful tool - and he knew that the reason she was conceived was because Felicity once saw her as the same. And she was a powerful tool. Possibly the best one they had, depending on the state of the Empire.

He had resolved to do things differently and better this time, as a prerequisite for even trying. He had promised himself that he would learn from his mistakes. But that was difficult when he didn't know how else to see her, and so the best balance - and not a very good one - he had managed to strike was pretending Floria didn't exist at all.

"I need to know," Felicity continued, "under what circumstances you would consider abandoning or changing your goals. Not because I think trying to atone for past wrongs isn't noble, and not that I suspect the Empire is a perfectly happy place where there's nothing to be done to make it better. I need to know how you would react if I decided my daughter's needs had to take precedence over those of our plans."

She swallowed. "You remember, last time I wavered at the very end and almost broke. Looking back, I wish I had changed my mind earlier. You're trying to learn from your own mistakes and do better this time, aren't you? Well, I am too. And for me, that means talking in advance about the possibility that our loyalty to the cause might not be absolute."

Papyrus frowned. This was exactly his problem. "I've worked with disloyal pieces before. I know how to plan around the possibility that someone won't always do as I want. It's what I was good at. And having frank conversations with prospective traitors about their prospective treachery that didn't involve threats or blackmail to keep them in line was never in the playbook."

He rounded on her. "I know we're saying we'll do things differently, and I solemnly swear I won't use unsavory means to keep you or anyone else in line. Cross my heart, lesson learned. But what if that does happen? What if we call it all off weeks or months or years in the future, amicably go our separate ways or even stick together, sans our dreams of conquest? If all that happens and I'm a nice and good sport about watching my new plans crumble into dust, what do I do next?"

Felicity looked uncomfortable. "That's more or less what I'm asking you. If myself and Floria left, I promise we would do it in as minimally inconvenient a way as possible that wouldn't stop you from continuing with the others, unless I truly and earnestly believed you needed to be stopped. But if you yourself chose to end your ambitions, presumably it would be for a good enough reason that you'd find your present fears silly. Speaking from experience, last time, I was terrified that something would tempt me from our path. And like I said, I wish I hadn't been."

"The whole point of this is to give me something to do with my life," Papyrus half sighed, half growled. "I died. By all rights I shouldn't exist. What kept me going in this life ever since I was old enough to understand that was the hope of finding the reason I was brought back, and now I finally know that it was nothing more meaningful than a child goddess who couldn't live with letting me get in the last word. I need there to be a reason I'm still here. I can't have all this just be meaningless. And if we fail to accomplish anything, that's exactly what it will be. I can't risk that. But I also can't play dirty to hedge against that without defeating the point of doing it at all."

"Can't you?" Felicity asked. "Isn't that what happened last time? Our plans came tumbling down despite all the foul play in the world, and it was all because one of us changed their mind at the last minute. Despite how... unconflicted you were about it all. And unless I'm very badly mistaken, you're glad our ambitions were stopped."

"Perhaps," Papyrus admitted. "But if they hadn't been foiled, I wouldn't be in this present pickle to begin with. All I want is to accomplish something worth accomplishing. It doesn't have to be reconquering the Griffon Empire, that's just a goal for the sake of having a goal. And ideally I'd do it in a way that's not so ridiculously evil that it makes it no longer worth doing. A little jaywalking is fine, maybe some petty slander and burglary or punching someone's lights out, but no more trying to assassinate someone by driving them to suicide and all that."

"Or trying to frame someone else when he didn't go through with it," Felicity added. "Which you claimed was the plan all along."

"Yes, not one of my finer moments." Papyrus waved her off with a wing. "Our finer moments. But what's the alternative? Is being nice and friendly and telling you how fine I am with the possibility that you could take Floria and bail on our plans going to prevent you from actually doing it? Doubtful. Is there a nice and friendly way at all to ensure that doesn't happen? Who knows? Not me. All my talents and experience revolve around putting the skull in skullduggery. So either I'm a naive villain who doesn't know how to be effective and nice at the same time, or such a thing simply can't be done in the first place. Both cases mean that for me, do something and make it worth doing are mutually exclusive."

He hung his head. "That's why I'm hoping waiting and scouting out the Empire's present state will yield us some magical answers that make this no longer an issue. Best case, everyone's so rotten and evil that we won't have to feel bad at all about unwitting hostages and extortion and mind control because they'll have it coming, but that's what I thought last time and it didn't work out so well."

Felicity thought for a moment. "You really have changed, you know? High Prince Gazelle would never have grappled with the tradeoff between doing something ethically and effectively, let alone where another person could hear him."

Papyrus groaned. "Yes, thank you for noticing, it's been a bumpy ride. Are you going to carry on like a lovesick parent, or will you make it worth my while to talk about this kind of stuff by giving me an answer I can do something with?"

"All I can say is that you shouldn't get too attached to your goals," Felicity said, banishing her smile and shaking her head. "For the longest time I thought the meaning to my life was protecting my sisters and getting back at those who were responsible for the state of our world. It gave me the strength to survive in grueling circumstances no child should have been forced to endure, yes, but my reluctance to let go meant that when a new, better purpose came to me, I almost didn't grab on in time. If the only meaning of this trip to you is looking for something to do with yourself, you had better keep your eyes open so you won't miss it when you see it."

Papyrus said nothing.

"That's my advice," Felicity said. "Born from lived experience. My purpose now is ensuring that Floria has a future. Think as big or small as you like, but that's good enough for me."

Papyrus sighed. "Right. Got it. Imagine I gave you a witty joke about being too young for responsible fatherhood in this body, and go do whatever it is you do when I'm not looking. I've got some thinking to do, please and thank you. And once we get there, let's try to stay stealthy and undercover for just one day, learn what we can, not get involved, and then have the big conversation about exactly how much we all want to commit to this plan."

Felicity politely bowed. "I'll be down below, then. May your thoughts bring clarity."

Papyrus made a show of watching the mountains as she left. He really did need to think, even though no amount of thought could solve a problem that was fundamentally born of overthinking things. If only he could just not care about reconciling his past with his present, or about justifying why he was still alive...

But there was another reason he had sent her off as well.

"How long have you been eavesdropping?" Papyrus asked. "And can you really hear us from that far away?"

Across the deck, Discord rolled his eyes, then climbed out of a trash bin that had been bolted down near an outdoor dining area. "Do you even need to ask?"

"Well?" Papyrus asked, turning back to the mountains. "Going to tell me something useful for a change, or just plaster me with more riddles?"

Discord grinned. "Oh, don't worry, this one will be an easy riddle. And I've only got one this time, too!"

"Fine," Papyrus sighed. "I could use a distraction. Hit me with your best shot."

"If the present-day Griffon Empire was the setting in a story," Discord said, standing directly behind him and yet somehow perfectly audible over the wind, "who would be the protagonist?"

Papyrus frowned.

"Simple, isn't it?" He could hear Discord smiling.

"Simple for you to tell me whatever I say is wrong, maybe," Papyrus grunted. "This is about whether I end up on the right side of history, isn't it? As a protagonist or a villain. And it's going to lead into a lengthy lecture about who gets to decide that, and eventually you're going to tell me no one does and thus it was a pointless question all along, and the moral will be that I'm thinking too hard about this and the solution is to add parables that complicate things further. I know how you work."

Discord chuckled ominously. "You think you know me so well."

"Go ahead," Papyrus groaned. "Tell me how even that is completely wrong and off the mark."

"Well." Discord strummed his talons and claws together ominously. "What if... I was the protagonist?"

"Doubt it," Papyrus said, not even stopping to consider.

"Correct! I'm not." Discord winked. "Although I can be whenever I want to. But what if the protagonist was someone completely different, unrelated to either of us? What if our little conversation here didn't even merit an inclusion in their story because we were both nobodies, background characters or even never appeared at all?"

Papyrus shrugged. "What if that was the case? Alright. Go on. Tell me what that would mean."

Discord blew a raspberry. "Well, I'm not the one running around dissatisfied with his role in things. All I'm saying is, what if it wasn't your job to fix everything and heroically put the place back together specifically because someone else is already doing that? For that matter, what if the story wasn't even about grand politics and heroism at all, and instead the protagonist was a humble farmer in Goldfeather who tended their crops and lived a peaceful, uneventful existence?"

"Are you trying to convince me to become a farmer?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Or to settle for some other humble life, and leave the Empire up to whoever else feels like stepping up? Because you could just say so directly."

"No, I've got something more esoteric in mind," Discord mused, rubbing his chin. "Suppose I rephrased the question. You're not trying to guess who the protagonist is. You're deciding who they are. Who would you choose?"

Papyrus blinked.

Discord patiently smiled.

Papyrus narrowed his eyes.

"Can't even answer a simple question at face value," Discord lamented. "My, my. You know, most people would pick themselves without a second thought. Aren't you the only person you concretely know for sure has thoughts and feelings? Look at Felicity. She tells you plenty about what she's feeling, but how do you know she's not just a meat robot running through the actions? Or worse, reading from a predetermined script? Why, picking anyone but yourself could be tantamount to admitting they might see you this way!"

"Why ask me this?" Papyrus pressed. "What changes based on my answer? Those farmers will keep on farming regardless of how important I think they are. Perhaps you get a kick out of philosophical discussions about the nature of reality and this is only a matter of entertainment, but right now I'm in the market for cold, hard advice on what to do about my problems."

Discord reached forward, and in one swift motion booped Papyrus on the nose.

Papyrus swatted at him. "Do you mind taking this even remotely seriously for once in your existence?"

"The first time I did that," Discord said, his tone deadly serious, "I made you a protagonist. This time, I'm giving you one free use to spend on whoever you see fit. Think good and hard before using it."

"That didn't do anything," Papyrus pointed out. "Not last time, and not this time, either. You just want to see me mash someone's nose in."

Discord winked. "While that would undoubtedly be hilarious, and it might not look like it does anything to your eyes, it does, in fact, do something. Are you tired of our games? Do you want me to tell you what it does?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Try me."

"This whole plan of yours to take over the Griffon Empire," Discord said, slowly strolling away. "You've changed from how you used to be, but it's still all about yourself. You're not thinking about how the people who live there feel. You're not thinking about how your friends feel. You're not thinking about how poor Floria feels. You're coming to realize you've found no fulfillment across your lives, and you're searching desperately to find some, yet for no reason more than your own sake, your own peace of mind, your own atonement for your own sins."

His neck elongated, letting his head orbit Papyrus even as he continued his march to the trash can. "The boop might not do anything, at least not from your perspective. But considering who to use it on? Thinking about other people, their own ambitions and desires, whether or not they ought to matter to the grand course of history? If you become the ruler of a country, you won't need any of my powers to decide that for everyone. In fact, you were quite enthusiastic about it last time around. So put some thought into it. Every last person you come across, starting with your friends and extending to strangers in the road, think good and hard about how much they matter and whether their story deserves to be told."

Discord climbed back into the trash can, his body disappearing, his neck retracting after it like a hose. "Perhaps you can find in them the purpose you seek. Or perhaps they can find in you a ruler who sees them as more than background characters in a story. And if you ever reach a point where you realize you don't need my boop to make them matter to the story, you'll find yourself in possession of a tool far more powerful than a ticket to a cheap laugh."

He disappeared, leaving Papyrus to stare at his own hoof.

Was he being selfish, trying to fix up the Empire for the sake of his own peace of mind? It wasn't selfish if the masses benefited from it too, even if he was technically more interested in the benefit to himself. That was the difference between who he was now and who he used to be. Now, he was taking care to ensure he went about his business in a way that was beneficial to society, or at least not detrimental.

There was no way all Discord wanted was for him to have a what if other people matter epiphany. That was a concept for foals; even admitting it shouldn't be taken as a given and still belonged on the table was embarrassing. What, had Papyrus just been lectured like a five-year-old who didn't know how to share? He had just told Felicity all about how he was doing this in a way that wasn't evil and didn't trample...

Papyrus's heart sank. He couldn't finish his train of thought. The truth was, he had absolutely no idea how to do what Discord asked. When he looked at other ponies, he saw logic and rules; things he could say and ways he could press in order to get different responses. That was just how things were. Presumably, it was how everyone saw everyone else, and it was an unspoken rule for nobody to let anyone else know they were in on the masquerade. And, presumably, he had always just been a little better at figuring out how those rules worked for the people he met than everyone else.

Trying to change his ways was, at heart, a conscious choice not to exploit that. For reasons that he used to neither understand nor accept, and now accepted while no longer trying to understand.

Papyrus hated looking at himself this way. He wanted to shy away, to go back to brooding in circles about the Empire. But he needed a way past his current conundrum. Discord had finally spoken plainly, and Papyrus was just about desperate enough to give even that advice a serious try.

And so the ship flew on, Papyrus standing at its prow, making a silent resolution to himself to look someone in the eye and try to imagine them in his place as the protagonist of his story.

"Still out here, are you?" Felicity asked some hours later, this time accompanied by both of her sisters and even Floria. The ship was idling, a sheer, gigantic cliff just before them where the mountains fell away to an endless expanse of water.

The northern sea.

Papyrus nodded, the Empire once again back in his thoughts. Far to the east, the coastline began, Stormhoof Castle on an island right up against the shore, close in the shadow of the Aldenfold.

Or, at least, it was probably still there. As with everything else about the Empire, he would get to see for himself soon enough.

"We need to talk shop," Senescey declared, the early evening sun at her back. "Confirm our plans before we act on them. First and foremost, our first destination is that island down there. Stormhoof Castle Town. Is anyone not on board with this or concerned about it in any manner that going elsewhere could address?"

"My reasoning hasn't changed," Papyrus said, ignoring Floria's intent gaze. "That place was one of my favorite haunts, and one of yours as well. If anyone is going to recognize us, that's where it will happen, and if we're going to get rustled I'd much rather have it happen early in than once we've got an operation going and have something to lose. By the same token, it was also the province that most directly felt the effects of our chaos. If any place harbors ill feelings towards us, that one is at the top of the list. Now, I'm not saying we choose Stormhoof as a long-term base of operations. But for testing the waters, no place is less likely to give us a false negative."

It was Floria who spoke next. "Stormhoof is the province of my father."

Papyrus tapped his wingtips together and gave an awkward grin. "Without getting toooo deep into the nitty-gritty, yes, it is. Though now that I think on it, right before everything went south I might have tried a short-lived ploy involving convincing everyone you were actually the heir to Gyre, which could work for or against us depending whether anyone who remembers it is still alive. And what our goals are."

He hesitated, the sight of Discord's retreating head rattling around in his mind. "I mean... depending on what your goals are."

Floria looked somewhere between taken aback and intrigued. "Of all the ponies here, I hadn't imagined the first to ask what I want out of all this would be you. But very well." She sighed. "I agree with the present consensus that I should hide aboard the ship and otherwise conceal my race and lineage until you can confirm the present public sentiment towards sphinxes. However, I don't see anything that sentiment could feasibly be that would allow me to productively contribute, or do anything other than hide. These concerns apply no matter where in the Empire we make berth, but doubly so in a land where my family once ruled. I desire that you spare no effort in remediating these concerns, and worry only that it will be harder to do so here, should you encounter any pressing reason to stay in Stormhoof. I would rather not become a monarch or a political pariah, but I have little more desire to spend the entirety of this venture alone on a boat."

I want to be useful. Let me help.

Her words pressed themselves into Papyrus's freshly Discord-addled brain, stripped of their mannerisms and reduced to their essence. It was a simple motivation, one he could reduce a lot of creatures to. Also a very easy one to exploit. All you had to do with someone like that was tell them you needed them, reinforce the message over time, and they would be hooked.

But... imagine if this return to the Empire was her story, not his?

It probably wouldn't make for a very good story if the main character was perpetually out of the action, he decided. Her desire might have been simple, but it was reasonable.

Papyrus left it at that. Strangers on the street, sure, but he really didn't like the idea of himself as a side character in Floria's life. Besides, he had thought about it, made an effort, probably done himself and Discord proud. Probably.

The sisters were talking logistics, and Papyrus wasn't listening. He could do more, if he tried to find a way for Floria to contribute, even if it overcomplicated things or reduced the success chances of the plan. But for all the fuss he had made earlier, taking over the Empire wasn't really what mattered. It was about finding something to do with himself. And entertaining Discord's advice technically counted as something to do. Besides, Floria's reaction to him helping her for no apparent reason would be entertaining.

Sure. He gave himself a satisfied smile, put it on display with no context for all to see, and wrote down help make Floria useful as the new top item in his secret mental plan.

The first thing Papyrus noticed about Stormhoof Castle, aside from the fact that it was still bustling and not an overgrown ruin, was the airships.

Back in his day, the Empire hadn't owned any airship technology, the machines and their inner workings too new and complex and zealously guarded by other nations for his country to have set up an industry yet - and they had little incentive to, with their relatively small continent and river system for effortless local travel. The castle used to have only one dock, reserved for private transports on nobility business, while seafaring vessels occupied an elaborate and massive system of sheltered docks down below.

Now, he saw that same spidery harbor, serving slightly less traffic than in his heyday, yet still very much alive. But above it was an entirely new setup, constructed from the roofs of buildings and the walls of the keep in the center of the island. White stone piers supported by lumber from the sides and steel from below, ramps and lifts leading up and down, a brand new airship dock fit perfectly into the island's pile-of-buildings aesthetic, offering loading space for no less than thirty vessels. And in the distance, on the mainland, Papyrus could make out a landing field that hadn't been there before, where ships were grounded for maintenance or to conserve energy.

"Well, that's a good sign," Papyrus remarked, standing next to Senescey, who was presently disguised as a pegasus who could have been his sister. Together, they would be the preliminary exploration party; it was decided that the two undisguised sarosians might want to sit out the first scouting mission until they discovered how the Empire felt about those, too.

"Indeed," Senescey said, her voice slightly higher-pitched due to her form. "It's encouraging that they've not only managed to survive, but build new infrastructure."

Papyrus winked cheekily. "Oh, that? I was talking about how we wouldn't be tempted to use the scarcity of airships as the foundation for a gambit involving confiscating Varsidelian merchant ships in order to raise tensions to justify moving troops around again."

"A shame, too," Senescey said, her voice distant. "That was actually one of your better plans. And from the things I've heard, all the troops you pre-positioned for your intended coup meant they put up a better defense against Chrysalis than they could have if those armies hadn't been deployed throughout the Empire."

Papyrus had no quip for that.

"Anyways." Senescey shook her head. "You take the lead. I'm ready when you are."

Papyrus jumped over the railing.

Wind whipped around his feathers and pulled at his cheeks as he spiraled, snapped out his wings, and pulled up into a glide, Senescey following in his wake as the ship pulled up and away - there was no sense paying for mooring when they could just fly.

Stormhoof spun and grew in Papyrus's vision as he straightened out and looped closer, dipping between two rooftops into an alley, curving and rising with the roadway, ducking under an arch where another road crossed this one. He laughed in exhilaration, skimming past pedestrians who reacted as if they saw nothing more than a pair of reckless teenagers having a race.

Sphinxes had always been hampered by cultural expectations around their wings. Wings were a sign of power; Garsheeva was seen by most of the public only when she took to the skies. Wielding that power was a sign of dominance, more so than any griffon or pegasus exercising theirs. Keeping them furled was a sign of respect and restraint. As a sphinx, Papyrus had never believed in those; he flew as often as he could as a symbol of freedom and defiance, rebellion against that institution and its norms.

But wheeling in the imperial sky as a pegasus, like he had seen so many pegasi and griffons do so long ago... This feeling was completely different, because it meant nothing at all.

His old motivations? He was beneath them. And so, for a moment, Papyrus put his mission aside and flew, Senescey matching his movements, and was free.

Eventually, they landed in a plaza that offered some rare green space, backed by a fountain, a road winding around it.

"Look at that," Senescey said, furling her wings beside him and nodding at the fountain. "Wonder how much power that takes to run. They never could have afforded this in our days."

Papyrus nodded. "I'll bet once Gersheeva disappeared, everyone started digging their own mana wells, and power is plentiful now. Or at the very least not a leash used to control the provinces."

"Well?" Senescey asked, looking across the stream of pedestrians walking by. "So far no one seems to be paying us too much mind."

"So far so good," Papyrus agreed, scanning the crowd. Not a single sarosian, though that wasn't too different from twenty years ago - Stormhoof hadn't been a friendly province for them even before Chrysalis came through and enslaved them all. "I vote we find a newspaper."

Senescey flipped a coin and caught it, already leading the way.

As they walked, Papyrus craned his ears to pick up muttering. The crowd was at ease, with no one making an effort to guard their voices, no post-apocalyptic vibe permeating the conversation. He even saw two young mothers sharing a bench, watching their children play. Evidently times were good enough, at least in this city, that starting families was still a palatable option.

He almost started to look away when the oldest of the kids - a male grifflet with a dark coat, probably around ten - spotted him, met his eyes, beamed, and came ambling over.

"Hey, mister!" the grifflet chirped, swaggering like only a ten-year-old could, his mother fast on her way to scoop him up. "Great cosplay!"

"Cosplay?" Papyrus blinked. "Ah, yes, I'm quite proud of this one. Glad to see a kid like you appreciating the finer aspects of culture, right?"

The grifflet started to respond, but was swaddled in his mother's wings before he could get anything coherent out. "I'm so sorry about that," she apologized with a submissive smile, pulling the squawking grifflet back, undoubtedly preparing to lecture him about the wisdom of talking to strangers.

Papyrus gave her a disarming Grandbell salute and a wink, and turned to leave. But internally, he was frowning: was Prince Gazelle Cosplayer really the first thing that crossed anyone's mind when they saw him? Sure, he used to make jokes about this very thing, but mostly for jump-scaring people who were around back then. This kid, by contrast, had been born well after his reign of terror. Even the kid's mother was probably too young to have known much about politics back then, unless she was very unlucky. And the kid thought he was cool...

Hopefully there was someone else the kid had mistaken him for an impostor of. If his legacy had somehow morphed into a form that could produce a reaction like that among children... Well, at the very least, it might be useful. But it was also a sign that not all might be as it should be.

Road's End

"Well," Papyrus said, sharing a bench with Senescey as they used the last of the evening light to dissect a newspaper, "I'd call this a productive outing, wouldn't you?"

"Can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but yes, I would," Senescey said. "Speaking for myself, I've learned all I need to know about which parts of my old information are dated and which are still relevant."

"Sarcasm? Me?" Papyrus gave a rude grin. "We've got a name and a hobby for the local honcho. High Consul Tarunda, patron of the fine arts? I've already got half a dozen ways we could use this, and if you sit tight until tomorrow morning I'll have a dozen more."

Senescey sighed. "Right. Glad you're enjoying yourself. Do try to keep in mind that manipulating royalty won't matter until we determine how safely we can show our faces to the general public." She tapped an editorial pointedly. "Read this one again. Where they're making fun of 'lawless northern states' for needing curfews? Whether they're exaggerating or not, that probably means they don't have curfews here. And that, taken together with the complete lack of mention of sarosians anywhere else, means we're probably no longer occupying a prominent space in public thought."

"Could be because you're all dead," Papyrus pointed out.

"Thank you for noticing," Senescey grunted, "it's a good thing that's not the fault of anyone here. Regardless, at the very least I don't think we have to worry about any paranoid countermeasures to getting around by shadow sneaking."

Papyrus winked. "Just like the good old days."

Senescey ignored him, watching a dressed-up guard standing by a gate in the distance instead. "Your competence permitting, I'd like to take advantage of this and check out the city at night. What's your opinion on that guard's posture?"

"The one with the spear?" Papyrus craned his neck. "Everlaste colors, real pretty boy face? Not too serious, loves his job, expensive training but little experience. I could wipe the floor with him if I played dirty. Hard to tell if he's just here for show or because someone moved all the veterans elsewhere, but I'd wager the former. The civilians are certainly at ease around him."

"My gut says the same," Senescey muttered. "I'm curious what the guard presence here looks like when the civilians are sleeping and there's no one to put on a show for. Do they really feel that safe here, or are they just showing off?"

"Well, there's an easy way to find out!" Papyrus kicked back and stretched. "But while we wait for night to set in, want to go check out the old tournament arena? If this High Consul really is sponsoring sunset thespian revelry in a public venue, I bet we could get a look at him in person."

"Yes, let's," Senescey agreed, folding the newspaper and unfurling her wings. "If it's state-sponsored art, we might learn a thing or two from the kinds of content they allow in their performances."

By air, the island took mere minutes to traverse, its dense architecture and steep, mazelike streets passing with every wingbeat. The sun was low on the horizon, reddening the sky and casting the entire city in the shadow of its own walls - except for the tower keep and the outer walls themselves, which gleamed like a beacon with light reflected off the waters.

In Papyrus's former life, the Empire had played host to a yearly fighting tournament, its progressive rounds spanning months and generating some of the best entertainment a noble could wish for. The affair had been a venue for all sorts of cheating, a not-so-secret contest of bribery skills playing out behind the battles themselves, drawing ponies and griffons and more exotic creatures frequently endowed with abilities beyond the fruits of simple training. More relevantly to him, it had also been a one-stop shop to track down power brokers and the strongest of the strong. And because everyone already expected everyone else to be playing dirty to rig the tournament, he could pursue whatever goal he wanted and no one would suspect him of anything more than being a garden-variety tournament cheater.

Ironic, then, that he was once again heading to the Stormhoof colosseum that hosted the majority of those tournaments, flush with ulterior motives, in hopes of getting a peek at the powers that be.

It was almost as if twenty years had passed, the Empire had fallen, and nothing had changed.

The arena was a huge, bowl-shaped structure occupying an entire sector of the island, situated south of the keep. Open to the air, it was rimmed by a wall that held corridors and concession stands and private boxes for deep-pocketed parties. Beneath that was tiered seating, a long, steep ring of it that made up most of the arena's structure. At the bottom was a final drop surrounding the flat central fight pit, its walls offering two corridors for the fighters to enter from, along with the windows of the true VIP boxes. Twelve of them, one for each lord... not that the Empire had had twelve noble houses or even twelve provinces for more than a hundred years before Papyrus was born.

As they flew in, taking in the view from above, Papyrus saw that once again, not much had changed. Down in the pit, the fight platform was gone, replaced with a bigger and fancier yet much less durable theater stage. Much of the seating had been roped off, guiding patrons to sit in places in front of the stage now that it was no longer an omni-directional affair. And the crowd was tiny, numbering in the dozens rather than the thousands that would attend before. But, other than that, it was the same.

"Looks like we're just in time," Senescey said, pulling up beside him and observing the distant, colorful quadrupeds scurrying around and setting up the stage. "Let's get to the entrance. Flying in probably hasn't gotten less rude since the old days."

They spiraled down to the arena's main entrance - it had about five of those, so they just picked the closest. Just like before, there were no ticketing mechanisms, a wide-open tunnel through the wall joined to a bridge across a street below, open and visible and attractive to anyone who might come wandering by.

Unlike before, it wasn't terribly crowded. In fact, aside from an old couple who were slowly ambling their way in and a fancifully-dressed usher, Papyrus and Senescey were the only ones there.

The usher immediately caught their eyes and swaggered over with a posh, educated demeanor, offering a welcoming bow.

"Hi there," Senescey said, motioning for Papyrus to let her do the talking. "We heard that this was the place to be for evening entertainment?"

"Ahh," the usher sighed happily. "You've been guided well, my young friends. Are you perhaps new to the city, or merely to the arts? I don't believe I find your faces familiar!"

"The city," Senescey answered, nodding casually. "What's the entrance fare?"

"Free of charge!" The usher flourished his robe. "A gift to the cultured masses, by decree of His Radiance. Go on, help yourselves to any seats you desire ere the performance begins! It is your privilege as those with the tastes to appreciate fine art."

Papyrus winked, Senescey curtsied, and both strolled on past.

"Well, he seemed to think of us as royalty," Papyrus remarked once the usher was out of earshot. "I gather that this consul fellow really wants us here. I wonder if it's for propaganda reasons, or if he just thinks that highly of his own tastes."

"And anyone who shares them?" Senescey raised an eyebrow. "Guess we'll find out."

After a lengthy climb down the side of the colosseum, they reached the populated area around the rim of the inner pit. The crowd was just barely sparse enough to leave front-row seats, and Papyrus was fairly sure they snagged the last available pair that were side by side - he wasn't sure how he felt about sitting too close to speculate with Senescey without being overheard, let alone right next to a stranger, but there would be plenty of time for clandestine chitchat later. For now, he had plenty to watch.

Something that stood out almost immediately was the age demographic present. There were roughly forty years that were completely unrepresented in the crowd; everyone here was either under thirty or over seventy. That went for the performers setting up down below, too. Immediately to his left was a wimpy-looking colt of about fourteen who seemed to be here on his own, and the most common sight of all seemed to be couples in their early twenties. No griffons mixed with ponies, either. They all obeyed Garsheeva's old dating rules.

Down in the pit, preparations were finishing up. Stage hooves were beginning to turn the lighting on, a narrator in full costume waiting visibly in the wings to step up and perform his introductions. And just before the stage, a delegation had arrived and swiftly set up seating that was more posh and ornate than what was available above, and now a procession of ponies in armor were marching in to fill it.

This was not functional armor. Flush with House Everlaste colors and regalia, it had so many smoothly-interlocking parts that a single hit from any blunt weapon could immobilize half of it, assuming said weapon didn't get tangled in their massive capes. Indeed, it looked more suited to a masquerade ball than combat, sporting long, hefty cravats and high collars and shapes molded after idealized physiques. Whoever had commissioned this had a strongly opinionated fashion sense, and no time for anyone who told them they were wrong.

Eleven Consuls in all took up their seats, leaving one seat conspicuously free - there was no way these ponies were anyone else. And they were all ponies, too, not a single griffon in sight. Papyrus frowned, scrutinizing them closer: one of them had a slightly different demeanor than the rest, though from this far away he couldn't put a feather on why.

And the theater didn't leave him much time to speculate. As the sky faded and twilight settled in, the last Consul took up their seat, the narrator took to the stage, and the play began.

For nearly three hours, Papyrus watched the performance with an interest that swiftly burgeoned into fascination. The actors in the pit were stitching together a historical drama from events six and a half centuries in the past: a period he himself had studied during his days as a prince. Granted, he had studied most of Imperial history, but in those days, the Empire's count of recognized provinces had dwindled to five, and those that had sphinxes on their thrones had fallen to three. According to all credible historians, it was the smallest point in history the sphinx population ever reached, the last twenty years notwithstanding, and the subsequent rebound triggered such a political realignment that the number of houses and provinces both returned to twelve within a single generation - the last time they would ever do so.

The play was remarkably well researched. And yet it wasn't a propaganda piece seeking to romanticize the Crown or the return of sphinxes: instead, all that history was simply a backdrop for the story of an entirely fictional and unassuming unicorn who awakened to the secret power of mind control, evaded the law, and went on a behind-the-scenes political rampage with astounding panache and a new gambit every minute. And in the end, all of their actions amounted to a state where history as it would have been recorded was exactly the history Papyrus had been taught. An unnecessary bonus that only the educated would understand.

He couldn't hide it. He was impressed. Some of the things this made-up unicorn came up with belonged to the same school of thought his old self had mastered. And while they weren't real, the playwright clearly was.

They were cunning. Bold, too, to present such an aggressive story of political subversion to the de-facto rulers of the land. And they almost definitely didn't have the powers their protagonist wielded, or that Papyrus himself once had. No way to make good on their fantasies save putting them to paper and then to the stage.

A quick glance at Senescey told him she wasn't enjoying herself quite as much as he was, but that was fine. Papyrus really had enjoyed the old days, much as he now knew the ruin his ways had led to. That old itch was still there, deep down, and scratching it in a theater was much more morally upstanding than ruining people in real life.

As he earnestly applauded, though, something else caught his eye: the loudest applause was coming from the Consuls themselves.

Huh. This wasn't the kind of story to feed your populace if you wanted them to be sated and contented with life under your rule, and yet they loved it. Weird...

He leaned closer, looking past the applause, and fully realized what he had started to suspect earlier: while all of the Consuls had liked the performance, most of them liked their special treatment even more. Special seats, public perception of them being cultured and refined... Only one of them looked like he would have settled for a seat among the crowd.

"Hey," Senescey whispered, nudging him as the applause began to die down. "Think you've seen enough? I need to stretch my legs something awful."

"I've got a hunch that one is about to give a speech," Papyrus muttered back, nodding at the one Consul he had singled out - a light blue unicorn with a bald forehead, wide chin and round, orange beard. "It would be a shame to have come all this way and then not hear him out, don't you think?"

Senescey grumbled and then settled back down.

And, true to Papyrus's prediction, the blue Consul did rise to his hooves, his horn flickering to life with a voice amplification spell. "Bravo, magnificent!" he praised, striding forth and mounting the stage in a single jump. "My friends young and old, we are all characters upon the great stage of the Griffon Empire. To live, to love, to suffer and struggle is the essence of our beauteous existences! And tonight, we lucky few who were here have born witness to something beyond value: the passion within sixteen young hearts, hearts who bared themselves to you by performing the truth of their own story. To the artists among us, both present and future... We salute you."

The entire theater troupe, from performers to stage hooves, lined up before him on the stage, facing the crowd. And, one by one, the Consul moved down the line, lifting and kissing their hooves.

Papyrus leaned in closer. This was the one who was the most earnest in his appreciation. A speech like this had to be made up, but was there a chance he wasn't faking it?

The Consul rose and turned to the audience once again. "How many here have defied a king? How many have controlled a mind? How many have turned the world itself against them in pursuit of what they know they must do? Unwise, impractical, not possible; the trappings of life resist these yearnings of the soul. But who among you can deny a desire to live this way, to live the same life in reality that we live inside our heads? My friends, reality is an imperfect medium for your perfect minds, but art transcends that limitation. And every one of you is a work of art."

Some in the crowd shifted, enough to catch Papyrus's attention.

"My friends," the Consul implored, "who has seen you as you truly are? Who has seen you as you have just seen these sixteen?" He swept a hoof out at the theater troupe. "Who do you wish could see you, in all the complexity and beauty of your true and precious selves? My friends, we are in a theater, a place for the expression of art. And so if that person is out there in the crowd, perhaps even seated right next to you, I implore you for one night only to cast propriety aside and show them the passionate truth of your heart, right now!"

The crowd was waiting for this. Scarce had the words left his lips before every couple in attendance, young and old, leaned together and embraced.

Papyrus folded his ears in fascination as everyone hugged their date. Most of them kissed. Unfortunately, all of them had the restraint not to go farther, but at least some of them clearly considered-

That colt in the seat next to him who was here on his own had clearly reached the part of the show he was here to see. And when Papyrus and Senescey both sat awkwardly in their seats without so much as a nose nuzzle, the colt gave them a look that said I waited three hours for this?

Papyrus glanced at Senescey. Her eyes were glazed over with a complex mental calculus, weighing the value of smoothly fitting in against the price of hugging Papyrus.

He was fairly sure that, if he made that call for her, she would play along with whatever he did, with the expectation that they would both swear never to speak of it again. And this situation was funny enough that it was almost tempting... Almost.

But he was a changed stallion, and so Papyrus summoned his convictions and did the right thing. "Kid," he said, giving the colt a weird look. "You'd better not be eyeing up my sister."

The colt's eyes widened in alarm as Papyrus flashed him a murderer's grin, and he tumbled half a seat backwards, trying to put some space between himself and Papyrus. Unfortunately, this involved bumping into the next couple over, both of whom had been stoically and intently ignoring him up until that point and now found themselves able to do so no longer.

Senescey gigglesnorted in relief, and then wasted no time in grabbing Papyrus and dragging him back up a row in the seats, where the aisle was clear enough that they could make a break for the exit.

Reluctantly, Papyrus dashed after her, just in case an incident was brewing in their wake. He really did want to hear more from that Consul. The stallion clearly wasn't in his right mind, but his particular brand of insanity would take a lot more thought to analyze, and if the worst he was going to do was encourage everyone around Papyrus to kiss... Well, Papyrus could be a much less intrusive audience member than that colt. But Senescey wanted out, and if this was a regular enough occurrence that the audience was expecting it, there would always be other days.

They stopped in the colosseum's outer wall, slinking off into the tunnels that led to the upper private boxes Gazelle had once doled out to friends as a prince. Senescey glanced around, satisfied herself that they were alone, and let out a deep sigh of relief.

"That," she said, "is something I thought was only supposed to happen in stories."

Papyrus scratched an ear. "Well, he did seem to want everyone to think of themselves like they were already in one. Discard your inhibitions, do things you'd never do in reality... We ought to be grateful all he wants people to do is make out in public. You and I both know how much worse of fantastic behavior he could have encouraged."

Senescey hesitated. "Thanks for not actually going along with that, by the way. I... didn't really expect that from you."

"What can I say?" Papyrus shrugged. "I've changed. Though, I'm trying to decide if I've changed enough not to ask if you wanted me to..."

"Not on your life," Senescey threatened, then deflated. "Anyway. Those Consuls are incredibly bad news."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Is this oh no they're insane bad news or oh no I know something Papyrus doesn't bad news?"

Senescey gave him a serious look. "Being near them gave me the same feeling as dusk statues used to."

Papyrus felt his eyes widen. "The things the good old Night Mother used to use to telepathically speak with sarosians? We haven't perhaps fortuitously invented a new kind of dusk statue other than those you could be talking about instead?"

"The very same," Senescey whispered, regret and a hint of anger tainting her voice. "Also the dusk statues Chrysalis used to steal the minds of my entire race."

Papyrus narrowed his eyes. "There's no way that flabby Consul was Chrysalis. I knew her, she'd never talk the way he did."

"I knew her too, before she transformed," Senescey said, troubled. "But I also know what I felt. There was no mistaking it. I... suppose it might not even be the Consuls, but someone in that arena was controlling the Daydream Network."

"Which means...?" Papyrus tilted his head.

"We can't stay here," Senescey declared. "Not with so many sarosians on our team. I don't know what's happening, how someone has gotten access to that power again or what they're using it for, but it's inconceivable they don't know how it was used twenty years ago. My lease on life was renewed by random chance after it ended to this exact phenomenon twenty years ago, my sisters are somehow in the same boat, and the least responsible thing we could possibly do is set up shop somewhere it could happen again."

Papyrus slowly nodded. "What about myself and Floria? Think we're at risk?"

Senescey slowly shook her head. "You, probably not. But I wasn't around to remember the aftermath last time. How were sphinxes effected? I can't guess for Floria."

Papyrus rubbed his chin with a wing. "Mentally, I wasn't exactly present either. But I did survive, so presumably whatever Chrysalis did didn't hurt me. At least not in that way." He looked up. "Suppose I agree with your assessment. You would be the expert, and it does sound like those are risky stakes to tangle with. But this is frankly an enormous lead, and if we do want to take over the Empire, we're going to have to deal with whoever this is someday. Maybe not right now, but in the future we'll have to look at splitting the party so I can dig deeper here."

"Let's discuss that back at the ship," Senescey said, straightening up. "I don't want to risk being here for a moment longer than we need to be."

"Fine," Papyrus admitted. "I suppose that's the wisest choice. Though, you do know what a Consul usually is, right? Something tells me we're going to find more of these things no matter where we go."

Senescey shook her head. "They can't be everywhere. At the very least, I doubt there are any in the north, given what we read in the paper."

Papyrus shrugged. "Well, that'll be fantastic if it's true. Anyways, since I'm not at risk of spontaneous zombification, how about you head back first and I explore around for just a bit longer? We did want to check how the city is at night, after all."

"Knock yourself out," Senescey sighed. "Just don't get into too much trouble with no one around to save you? That's on you. Now let's get a move on."

They fell into a swift pace, heading for the exit to the tunnels and joining the sparse crowd on the way - it seemed that while they had been talking, the Consul's speech had wrapped up and the event was now over. But right when they were nearing the final arch, starry sky visible beyond, Senescey hesitated... and by the time Papyrus realized why, the orange-bearded Consul was staring them down.

Papyrus hesitated too. What was he doing here at the mouth of the arena? At first glance, he was just mingling with the patrons on their way out. Could that be all there was to it?

"Hey, you!" the Consul called out, striking up a swift march toward him and Senescey. "I saw you in the front row, and I don't think I've gotten to greet you yet!"

Papyrus glanced at Senescey. Was she still feeling the Daydream Network's effects here, now that this guy was close again? A quick look at her face said she definitely was.

But at the same time, they were in public. At least two dozen other theater-goers were within eyesight and earshot. The Consul couldn't possibly do anything to her here and get away with it, and Senescey clearly knew that. So, following her lead, Papyrus walked casually forward to meet him.

"Hi," Senescey said, allowing her voice to waver uncertainly. "You're the Consul?"

"High Consul Tarunda!" He grasped her hoof and shook it earnestly, then gave Papyrus the same treatment. "I haven't seen either of you before at my shows! Did it live up to your expectations?"

His eyes were blocky and his forehead large, and he gave them each a smile that was slightly mad, in a friendly way. Papyrus quickly decided that it was better to err on the side of too much enthusiasm than too little.

"I found it to be quite smashing," he primly declared, putting on a slightly mad smile of his own and standing close to Senescey. "She and I are passing through town, and we didn't quite know what our entertainment for the night would be, but you can't live the good life without a little gambling, right?"

Tarunda gave them a deep belly laugh. "Just passing through, eh? Where are you kids from? The greener pastures of the middle Empire, or did you come down to get a taste of civilization from the north?"

"Please." Papyrus dismissed him with a wave of a wing. "You clearly appreciate a good story. What would be the fun of spoiling a surprise like that?"

"Ah, so there's a story to it, then," Tarunda mused, stroking his beard. "There's a story to everything, not that most can appreciate them. But the ones who do, even the ones who make an effort to without finding success, they have a special place in my heart. It's a big, scary world out there, and not everyone thinks about appreciating the beauty in everyone they meet. I hope my little speech wasn't too flowery for the likes of you, by the way. I've got my regulars down in the Stormhoof art scene, and I know what they like, you know!?" He guffawed for good measure.

"I wouldn't sweat it too hard," Senescey cut in, still nervous. "As long as you're not offended that we didn't accept your invitation at the end."

Tarunda waved a hoof. "Oh, don't sweat it. I'm surprised that many people get into it in the first place. But hey, speaking of invitations, and of beauty... You say you're just passing through, and I wouldn't want to twist your hoof into changing plans on my account. But you in particular..." He nodded approvingly at Senescey. "With a body like yours, you could get a great position at the castle. A lot of people say it's what's inside that matters, but they don't realize you can be beautiful on the inside and on the outside, too. We frequently need ladies to stand around on ceremony and look good. And the compensation is highly negotiable."

Senescey hesitated. "You're extending a high-paying job offer to someone you just met, on basis of looks alone?"

Tarunda shrugged. "Some find it a bit archaic, I'm aware. But the interview process is nothing but my eyes, lass. Talent's got nothing to do with it when all I need is your body and your time. It's like renting out an art piece to put on exhibit. And since every living creature is one of a kind, it just seems right that this commands a price they get to set for themselves, don't you think?"

Senescey took a step back. "No offense, but are you certain this is only about standing around and getting looked at? Because if you're selling what it sounds like you're selling, which by the way you're very bold to do in public, I'm really not that desperate."

"Such is life." Tarunda shook his head and started to turn away. "You kids have safe travels, alright? And remember, highly negotiable means highly negotiable. You get yourselves into a scrap or find something you really, desperately need, don't forget that no one else will place a higher value on what you've got to trade than old Tarunda."

And then he moved on to greet other patrons, leaving Papyrus and Senescey alone. Neither of them wasted any time in getting out of there.

"So," Papyrus said, as the two of them settled down on a high-up crenelation that was both suitably private and would make it easy to spot the next flyby of their ship. "He wanted what I think he wanted from you, right? Dare I ask how old he thought you were?"

"I don't know," Senescey said, troubled. "I do know what you're thinking. And if that's really all he wants, we did stoop to that plenty of times in the old days. But before you make a joke about me being secretly over forty, stop and think about what I just told you. I can tell what he is. If he can tell what I am... He could be in the market for something much more sinister than a pleasure mare."

Papyrus frowned. "You think he knows you were an assassin?"

"That's not what I'm talking about," Senescey said, sternly shaking her head. "He could know I'm a sarosian. A changeling."

Papyrus blinked.

"You remember what Lilith was doing in Ironridge," Senescey said. "What she was using me for in her experiments. Chrysalis took over too many sarosians when she attacked the Empire. The world's population of my kind is no longer stable. We can't reproduce as mindless drones, and we're barely even able to keep up our own numbers, let alone have extra children for her and her minions to use to replenish the swarm. So what would happen if someone in the Empire, some... other changeling queen, as preposterous as it sounds to say, awakened to their powers and wanted to use them in an environment where everyone who responds to those powers is extinct?"

Papyrus's eyes widened.

"He wants my body, and my time. Everything else is irrelevant." Senescey hardened her gaze. "I don't know why he didn't just take me by force, but he's trying to buy my service as a vessel."

"That's a rather big I don't know," Papyrus pointed out.

"I know," Senescey sighed. "And none of the explanations I can think of make sense."

"Yes, why doesn't he just devour your soul..." Papyrus mused. "Given the state of imperial royalty in our own day and age, I can see why this idea might not fly, but what if he's a semi-decent enough person?"

"Decent enough to try to buy it instead of outright stealing it," Senescey scoffed. "We're operating atop the world's least-sturdy tower of assumptions right now, but the process of accumulating the kind of power she did cost Chrysalis every shred of her sanity and decency, whatever she possessed before all that to begin with. And the Night Mother was a cold-hearted manipulator. If this is some third party who can do the same - or, worse, one of those two in the flesh - then I think it's safe to assume them being truly decent is off the table."

Papyrus narrowed his eyes. "Hold up, though. What if they don't have that much power? Mind still slightly intact, strong enough to use the network but not strong enough to forcibly take what isn't freely given?"

Senescey sat up and blinked.

"Would you be able to tell the difference?" Papyrus asked. "If you were near someone who could kill you with a thought, or if you were near someone who had the type of power to do that but not the magnitude, could you tell them apart?"

"I... don't know," Senescey said, mulling over his words. "And I don't know how we'd safely find out. But you could be on to something."

Papyrus shrugged. "Progress does demand risks. And, frankly, we've already risked being in his presence quite a bit tonight. And if he was willing to let you walk away now, it's not impossible we could try pressing a little deeper."

Senescey closed her eyes. "Well, we've sure done a good job at taking this slowly and building a solid foundation to base our plans from. I still think we should run and try our luck somewhere else. We have an opportunity here, but no fallbacks. Pressing on in this direction would be a gamble, and if we lose, it wouldn't be the pack our bags and go home kind of loss... At least, not for me. And I want to live."

"Do you?" Papyrus asked her. "Do you really?"

Senescey gave him a peeved look. "What kind of question is that?"

"It's just..." Papyrus tapped his forehooves together. "There are a whole lot of ways to live that don't involve trying to take over the Griffon Empire. If that's really your top priority, then we shouldn't be here."

Now Senescey looked taken aback. "Are you really offering to base a decision around what I want?"

Papyrus gave a mysterious grin. "Wasn't that how I said our new contract would go, back in the Crystal Empire?"

Senescey frowned. "No, you said... If it didn't work out, we were just going to go our separate ways."

"I think you said that part," Papyrus pointed out, "and if I delight in anything, it's surprising people. Now be honest with me, old chum: what do you really want? To try out your ideas for a new model of governance in some distant, hypothetical and extremely unlikely future in which we take over the Griffon Empire, at severe risk to life, limb and reputation along the way? Or to live?"

For a long while, Senescey was quiet, and Papyrus waited.

"When we made our deal," she eventually said, "I didn't realize Felicity was still alive."

Papyrus nodded along.

Senescey swallowed.

"And?" Papyrus gently prompted.

"You're not the person I'd prefer to talk about this with," she said flatly. "Frankly, nobody is. But I have no desire to lose my sisters again. I also have no desire to cast aside the meaning I found, all those years ago. You can't fathom what I've been through, Papyrus. The things I've been through, the way I grew up... You know about self-inflicted demons, but you haven't suffered at the hooves of others the way I have. I do want to live. If I die, having achieved nothing, my life will have been meaningless. But I've been pursuing my goals for years before I discovered you were still alive. And I had every intention of sticking with you only as long as it served them, and getting right back to my own work after we parted ways."

She swallowed again, and continued. "So, it's two against one. I could stay out of this, and protect both myself and my sisters. Or I could go in, and gamble with no contingencies. It seems like a clear decision. For now."

"Well, then as a true and loyal friend I support your decision with all of my heart!" Papyrus theatrically bowed, ruining the moment with a well-timed wink.

Senescey gave him a look. "Are you being serious?"

"No, and I'm also not being honest," Papyrus told her with a smile. "But I will do it. Unless you come out right now and tell me you actually want me to play devil's advocate and talk you back into this, I feel like it would make a great capstone to our adventure today for us to fly off into the night in perfect agreement about what not to do next. Don't you?"

Senescey stubbornly looked away. "If you have something actually useful that you think I'm overlooking, go ahead and spit it out."

"Well," Papyrus began, more than ready for this, "you're calling this an opportunity with no contingencies in place, and waltzing up to our fat bearded friend and telling him you'll take the job certainly sounds like something we'd want a contingency for. But something I haven't heard a peep about yet is what you'd actually ask for."

Senescey frowned. "Does it matter if I'm not willing to pay the price?"

"Perhaps," Papyrus said. "Because if you don't have anything to ask him for, then it's not much of an opportunity, either. On the other hoof, Fatso could have yoinked you, and he didn't. And he offered you anything, and we don't quite have a guarantee it will end badly if you say yes. For all we know, we've completely misread the situation, and he really does just want a questionably-legal pleasure mare who's secretly a shapeshifter in her forties. Or even a wallflower! So the way I'm seeing this isn't as an opportunity without a contingency, but a contingency without an opportunity."

Senescey narrowed her eyes in thought.

"If we set up shop here," Papyrus pointed out, "we'd have a standing offer to fall back on, from someone powerful enough to bail us out of quite a bit of trouble. Now, we might not want to use that offer, but it's better than having nothing at all."

Senescey listened, lashing her tail.

"Furthermore," Papyrus went on, "you've just seen reasonable evidence that the old magics are still active in the Empire today, and it's an open question who's behind it. What if we run into it in other provinces? If we're so scared of gambling when it comes to strangers in possession of instant death magic, which is admittedly a very risky thing to gamble on, wouldn't we be gambling by trying our luck somewhere else that they don't have a more hostile resident user? Fatso might be shady, but the worst thing he's done is said please."

"You've... got some good points," Senescey said. "Papyrus, be honest: do you think I'm losing my nerve here because I'm worried about my sisters getting taken?"

Papyrus raised an incredulous eyebrow. "You're asking for candid insight into your own emotions from me? Perhaps we should have kissed back in that theater after all!"

Senescey instantly slapped him.

"Ow," Papyrus said. "Well, I have no idea. If I was trying to use them to manipulate you... I'd consider them a potent tool, but I'd try to keep a failsafe, just in case. That's as far as my expertise goes with these sorts of things. And I'll have you know that's a much more honest response than I'd give to any old stranger."

"It sounds like a cop-out," Senescey said, not meeting his eyes. "Give yourself a little more credit and try again."

Papyrus aggressively folded his ears. "Well, too bad, it's the best I've got."

She didn't answer, leaving him to dwell on that. Did she know what Discord had said, back on the airship? She had to, right? He probably clued her in, just so she could prod him. He must've...

Or maybe Discord just knew these kinds of questions would be in his future, and wanted him thinking about it before the fact.

Think, Papyrus. Try again...

"Yes," he said, subdued. "I suppose you are losing your nerve. Honestly, that might be a good thing. If I had something better to do with myself, I might do so as well."

"...Listen," Senescey eventually said. "Before I signed on with your crazy Griffon Empire plan, I spent all of my resources trying to track down Chrysalis. It's how I met Kitty, how I met Halcyon, how I got stuck in Lilith's lab, why I took Halcyon's writ and followed her south... I could never forgive Chrysalis for what she did. Not just for killing everyone, but for getting real power, the power to change things, and then wasting it on a tantrum before disappearing."

"You told me," Papyrus said. "Back in the Crystal Empire."

"Did I?" Senescey folded her ears. "Maybe I did. But it's not just been about revenge. I thought, if I could get that power for myself... Find out how she did it, take it from her, become a changeling queen or any other kind of god, I could do it right this time. Fix the world where she failed, and where the Night Mother failed before her."

Papyrus perked up just a little.

"It was a silly goal, wasn't it?" Senescey asked. "I knew that so long as I was a sarosian, even one who knows how to shapeshift, if I actually found her she could just kill me with a stray thought. None of my plans extended to how to keep going once I solved that first step, of discovering where she was hiding. I figured I'd start with what I could do, and take things one step at a time."

She turned away. "I never did find her. And now, completely by accident, I've found someone else who has a similar power. And look at me. Cold hooves, here at the moment of truth. And they haven't even tried to kill me yet."

Senescey let out a small laugh. "Give it to me straight, Papyrus: am I delusional? Is this offensive, even entertaining the possibility of getting that kind of power for myself after what happened to you? Have I just been chasing a goal all these years that was deliberately unattainable, in order to have something to do with myself? You say that a lot about what you're doing here in the Empire now, so if anyone would know, it would be you."

"Delusional? Completely and utterly," Papyrus said, something in his gut telling him to speak first and dress up his words later. "I certainly am. I just don't have anything better to do with myself. But from the sound of things, you do."

"You could come with us," Senescey offered. "Forget our ambitions and just stick together for the sake of it."

Papyrus chuckled. "Yes, your lives would be immeasurably enriched by my ceaseless crude jokes, and where would you all be without a nonstop source of stress for Floria?"

"I'm being serious," Senescey pointed out.

"To what end, though?" Papyrus pressed. "I'm being serious too. Unless I'm badly misreading this, you're trying to talk yourself into hanging up the sword. And we're going to need a new goal if I'm to earn my keep."

"There wouldn't be a goal," Senescey said. "I can't be certain. I'm still trying to find my own way here, Papyrus. But I think I'm starting to see what my sisters saw when we went our separate ways last time, at the end. They chased our goal far enough to see what really lay on the other side, and I'm only just catching up. Trying to fix everything wrong with the world, all by myself? It was a fantasy. And now that I've found them, if I get any closer to those powers I've been chasing, I'll just become another pebble in the river. Can you see it too? How little there really is behind whatever you think it is that keeps you going?"

"Yes," Papyrus griped, "no matter how much I try to look away. What are you on to?" He stared her in the eye. "Please. If you really think our problems are remotely comparable, if you think you know even a glimmer of the answer, then tell me."

Senescey shook her head. "I don't know anything. Three hours ago, I still thought my conviction was unshakable. Then, I thought I was going to die. Now, I think I've seen the end that my road leads to; the end I was ignoring all this time because I thought I'd find another way. For all I know, I'll wake up tomorrow with an epiphany and want to scream at myself for what a fool I was, throwing in the towel tonight."

She stared straight at him. "But that's for tomorrow me to worry about. Tonight... I don't have an answer, but I feel like following in the footsteps of the ponies who did find one, twenty years ago. My reasons not to feel so distant, out here. So what's stopping you from taking a chance on the future and doing the same?"

Papyrus wanted to say something about how vague she was being. About how it sounded like she didn't have a new plan to pursue, how it was pointless asking for his help in her next endeavor if she didn't have a next endeavor lined up. If she actually did, he suddenly realized he needed almost no coaxing to drop this Empire business and sign on, but this whole speech was just a fancy, dramatic way of saying, Hey, wanna go do nothing at all?

He tried to piece together a sensible way to phrase that protest. And before he could, Senescey said, "Exactly. That's the point."

"...Am I that easy to read?" Papyrus shrugged helplessly.

Senescey extended a hoof. "Come on, Papyrus. Take a chance on me. I might not know what I'm doing, but this feels cool, and that's a good sign. We both know our reasons for coming back to the Empire are just excuses. We don't need to risk our lives on some mission that neither of us believe in. And I'd be a bad friend if it turns out this is what you've been looking for all along, and I didn't share."

Papyrus squinted at her. "Delusion check: you're not asking me to do anything helpful, productive or in furtherance of any goals, be they yours, mine or anyone else's. You want me to tag along while you do whatever for the fun of it."

Senescey waggled her hoof at him. "And I'll probably wonder what got into me come morning. Maybe it was the atmosphere of that stupid play. Now take it!"

Papyrus took her hoof, took a deep breath, and stood up.

Senescey looked almost surprised as he did it, but she quickly replaced her expression with an uncertain smile.

"...Legitimate and very rude question," Papyrus warned. "Is this actually the part where we're supposed to kiss?"

"Uhh," Senescey said, staring at their touching hooves. "I'm going to go with, maybe? If that's really how you want this new partnership to work? But I've been in a lot of relationships, and I don't think I'd call it normal?" She tilted her head. "Do you actually like me?"

Papyrus winked, which at this point was thoroughly a show to cover up the fact that he had no idea how he was feeling. "Well, I've been in exactly one relationship, and it was just about the most abnormal one ever! In other words, I have absolutely no idea."

"In that case, let's not," Senescey said, shaking her head. "And if things change in the future, then that's the way it'll be." She sighed. "There's our airship, out there. I hope the others are relieved that we came all this way only to turn around, and not annoyed."

"We're the ones who actually wanted to do something here," Papyrus pointed out. "It'll be fine. Probably. Good thing we brought enough fuel to cover the return trip."

"We will have to figure out where we go next, won't we?" Senescey gave him a little smile. "But that's something everyone else should help with. Come on. Let's get back to the ship and let them know how things stand."

She took wing, and Papyrus followed suit, letting her set the course this time and taking his turn flying in her wake. His thoughts weren't buzzing, tamped down and muted by an emotion he wasn't familiar with, but neither were they frozen and unable to move.

Maybe this would be a good thing. He still wasn't sure what the plan even was, other than that there was no plan. The vibes were nice, though. With Meltdown, he had never felt this way.

Perhaps he should have kissed Senescey after all. But it would have been funny, and that wasn't the point. If he really wanted to be funny, he could have booped her instead. And who knew? Maybe Discord really had given him some special power he could bestow with that, and it would be a suitable thank-you for... whatever she had just done. He still didn't understand it.

But no. He didn't need that. Whatever had happened, however fast it was happening, Papyrus had a decent enough excuse to hope that he was on the right path: Senescey had said so. He could afford to trust her. It was certainly something he hadn't tried before. Why not see where it led?

Maybe he would finally be free.

Fail Mail

The next morning, or perhaps the next afternoon, Papyrus awoke slowly, a thick purple curtain blocking out the sun.

Like many others, he had a well-established morning routine, a set of rituals to pry him out of bed and get him out the door. Unlike many others, his was almost purely mental, a fifty-fifty split between updating his plans for the day and daydreaming about seeing them come to fruition. It served the purpose of a morning briefing for a politician or military officer, only with more fun and fewer other people involved. And today, he had an unprecedented plan on his plate: tear down all his other plans, and then go do whatever.

He smacked his chops, fixing his main and tail to ensure their appropriate disheveled appearance, gave his face a quick once-over, and that was that. Time to go find Senescey, see if the night really had changed her mind as she feared, and if not, give the rest of the crew the low-down on what they were no longer doing.

The first person he found was Floria, holed up in the galley and aggressively cooking the crew's lunch. Her eyes snapped up as he entered, a skillet in each wing.

"Oh," she said, turning back to the stove. "It's you."

"Expecting someone else?" Papyrus asked. Truth be told, he mostly checked here first because he was following his nose; most of the voyage here was spent either in his room or on the deck, and he didn't have as good of an idea as he should have where each crew member had their preferred hangout.

"I have been eagerly awaiting your report," Floria said, prim and formal and ignoring his question. "On the state of the island, and of the Empire at large."

Papyrus awkwardly winked. "Yes, about that, I was just looking for my co-conspirator from last night to summarize our findings and plan out a presentation to you all! You know, have you seen her?"

"Leitmotif?" Floria asked, reminding Papyrus that he really would need to put effort into remembering his ex-cronies' new names if he wanted to follow them around on a long-term basis, and not just think of them by their old ones.

"That's the one!" Papyrus took a few steps forward and grinned. "Seen her? If you could but give me a humble direction..."

"Still sleeping," Floria told the stove with a huff. "As of twenty minutes ago, when I checked to see how much of this I would need to make. You're welcome. Since you were asleep as well, if you want a portion you'll just have to sit and wait for me to make extra later."

"You know..." Papyrus swaggered over and leaned on the counter, figuring she wouldn't have told him he had nowhere better to be if she really didn't want him there. "The true sphinxly way to conduct yourself would be to make too little food on purpose, and then sell your limited supply for a behind-the-back favor while claiming it's an earnest mistake to any not in the know. Now, I was doing some thinking the other day, and I've got this niggling little hunch that won't go away that you might secretly be a sphinx..."

Floria stiffened. "Any deals I make with you will be held in broad daylight, and if I possess something you want then the best thing you can offer is an equal seat at the table. And the 'true sphinxly' way to conduct myself is something I refuse to put stock in, given the track record of my forebearers."

"Yes, yes..." Papyrus flicked his tail and moved on, wandering out of the galley. She wouldn't be upset at the sudden change of plans, would she? He had promised himself he'd find a way for her to contribute, but if the plan as a whole was scrapped, that didn't really count as breaking that promise. Right? She could just help with whatever the next thing they decided to do was.

An hour after Papyrus encountered Floria, Senescey finally stumbled out of her room, which by now Papyrus had learned the location of and parked himself across from, waiting patiently.

"...Hey," Senescey said, staring groggily at him for a moment and blinking. "What time is it?"

"Who cares?" Papyrus shrugged. "Not like we're in a hurry. So, had any calamitous second thoughts about what a fool you were last night and how everything we discussed is now null and void? Or are we still on for whatever the plan is now?"

Senescey yawned. "Plenty of second thoughts, but I don't know if they change anything. You?"

"Nothing new, I'm afraid." Papyrus turned in a circle. "Anything we should discuss, or shall I summon the crew?"

"No, nothing urgent." She shook her head. "Just things I should have asked him when I had the chance, like how many others he's extended this offer to, and whether I can meet them. Go knock yourself out."

And so Papyrus rounded everyone up. It wasn't difficult; Felicity and Larceny both knew there was news to discuss without even being told, and neither could match Floria's intensity. Soon, the five of them were gathered around a table, Senescey looking mostly awake but still betraying hints of getting up ten minutes ago.

Papyrus took it upon himself to do most of the talking, Senescey occasionally chiming in to back him up. And, for once in his life, he didn't try to dress any of his information up.

"With all due respect, darling," Felicity said when he was almost finished and searching for anything he had missed, "I don't mean to say I told you so, but this is exactly what I told you might happen yesterday."

Papyrus put on a faux indignant expression in the face of her restrained smugness. "And for the record, I told you yesterday to give me exactly one night on the town to work out how I felt about long-term commitments here. If anyone's predictive abilities are the subject of accolades, here, I believe that honor goes to yours truly."

"Would you stop bragging and think about what you're saying?" Floria burst out. "For one moment? Please?"

Papyrus and Felicity both blinked, turning to her.

Floria took a deep, steadying breath, and kept her eyes closed as she spoke. "It must be nice, having the resources to embark on an extra-national venture and then mothball it after a single day. This airship, Mother's position, Writs of Harmonic Sanction, experience enough to evaluate a location in a single night and determining none of this is worth the trouble. Writing it all off. Having a daughter who will dutifully and diligently accompany you without complaint when plans change without warning less than one percent of the way in."

She opened her eyes. "And I won't. Reach a consensus that this retreat is the right course of action, and none of you will hear any more from me on the matter. But please, first..."

Floria looked away and shook her head. "No. My apologies; ignore me. I was in the wrong."

Felicity was wholly focused on her. "Speak your mind, Floria. You have as much say in this as anyone else."

"...Very well." Reluctantly, Floria took another breath, then focused on Papyrus and Senescey. "I... appreciate that you feel this is a long-overdue chance to hang up your swords. To bury the hatchet and move on. But I have yet to even draw my sword. Day and night for years on end I have endeavored to be the perfect daughter, to look my sphinx blood in the eye and rise above its shortcomings, and the reward for all my effort is this... this peaceful and meaningless stasis! I want to live. I want to do things. And I... I let myself get my hopes up that I would be able to do something in the land of my ancestors, instead of spending one night here on an airship and never so much as disembarking. I'm just disappointed."

Papyrus glanced around to see if anyone more qualified wanted to address this first.

"Don't look at me," Larceny said, still wearing her old bathrobe and not-recent-enough mane dye job, even though Luna had somehow fixed her leg.

"Well," Senescey started, and immediately ran out of things to say.

"If you were in charge, darling," Felicity said to Floria. "Where would you take us? Inside or outside of the Empire."

Floria looked slightly taken aback. "I... don't know enough to set a course. If we have credibly established that Stormhoof is dangerous, I might not remain here either, but I should like to see at least some of the Empire."

"Strictly speaking..." Papyrus tapped his forehooves together, preparing to play his favorite pastime of devil's advocate. "It's dangerous for sarosians and changelings. You and I might get into all sorts of political drama, but I don't think that sort of power can rip out our own souls, even in the worst-case scenario." At Senescey's look, he added, "Not that I'm advocating this as a plan, or anything."

"You look conflicted," Larceny said, nodding to Felicity.

Floria blinked, looking back at Felicity as well. "Mother?"

"I suppose that's a good way to put it," Felicity replied, biting her lip. "I think I've always been rather clear that Floria must come first in my priorities. At the same time, much as I expected it from you, Papyrus..." She turned to Senescey. "I feel like... a meeting between the five of us is too public a venue for the things I want to say."

"Things you've been waiting almost twenty years to say, right?" Senescey asked sheepishly.

"Things I gave up on ever getting the chance to say almost twenty years ago," Felicity corrected. "And things I was never certain would be appropriate to say again, even now."

Papyrus kicked back in his chair. "You know, if you two need some family time, I could always go annoy Floria somewhere else for a while..."

Floria huffed at him. "Perhaps my simple aspirations mean little to someone who has toyed with lives and empires, but know that I put up with your japes only at the behest of my mother, and if you intend to haunt us for the indeterminate future then you ought to bear in mind that my patience will one day expire."

"There'll be plenty of time for whatever needs saying once we're flying," Senescey cut in. "The important things right now are things that need to be said before that. We need to pick a direction. And if there are any more last-minute arguments for risking that Consul and staying here, we need to hear them now." She glanced at Floria, and her ears fell. "And personally, I do empathize with Floria, so my vote for wherever we go next goes to her choice."

Felicity sighed, something clearly on her mind that she was struggling with whether or not to spit out.

"Come on, girl!" Papyrus urged. "If you think you've got a good reason not to weigh anchor and need to keep quiet because you like what Sen... I mean, what was her new name?" He stared blankly at Senescey for a moment. "Leitmotif! Because you like what Leitmotif is currently thinking, I've got some news for you."

He got up, walked around the table and positioned himself right over Felicity's ear.

"Saying it later rather than sooner," he breathed, "is how buyer's remorse is born."

"...Fine," Felicity said, brushing him off with a wing and addressing the whole table. "Yes, darling, I... do very much want this... change of heart you've had to stick, because I..." She swallowed. "It feels immeasurably selfish of me to be listing reasons we could and should stay here, but frankly, yes, I do have several."

"Tell me," Senescey said. "I'm not delicate. And even if they change my mind in the short term, that won't necessarily speak for the long term, as well."

Felicity swallowed again, then nodded and fixed her mane. "Very well. First, of course, is what Floria wants. At the very least, I was hoping we could discover the city was stable enough to travel incognito, show her some of our old haunts, give her the opportunity to get invested in a goal here... I struggle with this as a parent, I know it's an issue, but that's an opportunity she deserves to have."

Floria bowed her head and kept her silence in thanks.

"Second," Felicity went on, "I don't know how much thought any of you have given to my work for Her Majesty Luna. But I am officially here on her business, and this thing the two of you have discovered is very directly related to what she wanted me to investigate. Especially if it turns out he already has other changelings in his service."

"Would Luna want you to risk your life for that, though?" Senescey asked, quiet.

"Third..." Felicity took a deep breath, then pulled a small, sheathed knife out of an interior pocket of her suit. "The Princess would never ask a sarosian to undertake work investigating Chrysalis and related phenomena without substantial means of self-protection. I think that if we attempt to engage with this Consul and he betrays us, we have more than means enough to leave him with a very nasty surprise."

Everyone, even Floria, leaned in closer.

"I'd like to be a lot more certain about exactly what intentions he had for Leitmotif," Felicity said, unsheathing the knife. "And, certainly, we'd still be in a significant measure of danger. This is by no means a silver bullet. It's merely... a method to rob Tarunda and anyone like him of their due. Behold."

Its blade was made of moon glass.

"Empty," Felicity said. "Applied to any sarosian, changeling or otherwise, it will dredge out their cutie mark and their soul along with it. And it's been demonstrated in the past that if the soul is taken like this and the body is physically restrained, someone sufficiently capable - such as Her Majesty - can put the pieces back together again. But, there is a different use for this as well."

She passed it to Papyrus with an earnest expression. "Go show Floria the city, incognito. You're right that neither of you are vulnerable, and if Tarunda tries anything that merits resorting to violence, he won't like what he finds. We'll be with the ship, ready to leave at a moment's notice. But I want her to have this chance. Please."

Floria actually blushed. "Mother..."

Papyrus flipped the knife and caught it. "So what you're saying is, we've got an escape ready and waiting and can cause as much trouble as we like, so long as we don't cause quite so much that he sends other ships after us, which he could do whether we have some fun today or not."

"Oh, that's far from the only weapon Her Majesty left me with for situations like this," Felicity ominously promised. "If you feel like it isn't worth the risk, that's your call to make. But I would appreciate if you would do this for her."

"I'm not some tourist, Mother," Floria muttered. "I appreciate the sentiment, but one daylong field trip isn't what I'm looking for, least of all with him as a chaperone... but I'll take it. Thanks."

"Braen is best chaperone," Braen said from directly behind Papyrus. "Impervious to changeling queen magic, too! Why not make party of three?"

Papyrus jumped all the way out of his chair. "Where did you come from-" He cut himself off, his face slowly falling in dawning horror.

Braen tilted her head at him. "Papyrus is alright?"

"Oh nooo," Papyrus groaned, clutching at his head with his wings. "Blast! Arrgh! You've been here all along!"

"Technically, Braen was on the bridge," Braen explained, watching him with a confused mechanical expression. "Pilot with no need for sleep is good for travel."

"Papyrus?" Senescey asked, reaching out a tentative hoof.

"I did a Halcyon," Papyrus whispered. "I forgot about my own teammate! The one I'm technically on payroll to be a bodyguard for, no less! I'll never be able to make fun of her for that again after this!"

There was a beat, and then Floria burst out laughing. Everyone but Papyrus rapidly joined her.

"Laugh it up," he griped, grudgingly admitting to himself that this was pretty funny and trying to ensure his frown didn't give way to a smile.

Braen picked him up and forcibly set him back in his chair. "Please remember that Braen has combat functionality. In event of trouble, enemies will soon find much worse surprise than moon glass knife. Besides, Floria is right! Would be big shame to come all this way and not even step outside ship."

"So is common sense getting overruled?" Senescey asked with a feeble grin. "You're really going to tempt fate by taking a vacation in a city we know to be overseen by an eldritch monstrosity who already has eyes on us?" Her expression morphed to a serious frown. "You know that this is a terrible idea."

"At risk of sounding like a broken record," Floria cut in, "my frustration is mine to control. We have established many reasons why we shouldn't be here. If I am to go out exploring, the trip at least ought to have a purpose to it, such as learning something useful for Her Majesty. But I trust the judgement of those more experienced when they say this area is dangerous. I can find a way to live my life somewhere safer."

Papyrus glanced from her to Braen to Felicity and back. "So... just me and Braen, then? Or are we doing the smart thing and flying away?"

"It sounds to me," Larceny said, breaking her silence, "like everyone advocating for not leaving immediately is doing so on behalf of someone else. Who here, for their own reasons, doesn't want to leave Stormhoof immediately?"

Nobody raised a limb.

"Then there you have it," Larceny said. "Let's get out of here."

A knock sounded upon the door.

Papyrus grinned a stupid grin. "Was that inevitable, or was that inevitable? I'll answer, everyone else stay out of sight, but Braen, be ready to jump in with some cannons or something." He tucked the moon glass knife away in the fold of a wing. "Let's see what kind of parting gift fate has cooked up for us."

Everyone else shuffled, moving out of sight as Papyrus went to open the door to the deck. He creaked it open, wearing his biggest smile and ready for anything...

It was Discord.

Papyrus let his grin drop, raising an eyebrow.

Today, Discord was in his Egdelwonk form, dressed up in an outfit that had probably been politely borrowed from a mail carrier. Egdelwonk bowed professionally and proffered an envelope. "Letter for one Mister Grandbell?"

Papyrus took it and flipped it over. It was relatively thick, unaddressed but marked with the Seal of House Everlaste. "Why are you giving me this?" he asked, staring Egdelwonk down. "No, really. I get it, that shady Consul wants to get one last word in and threaten or blackmail or bribe us to force us to stay here, and it's going to work because that's just the way luck works. But why are you the one delivering it?"

Egdelwonk rolled his eyes. "It's your plot hook to chase or ignore as you please, but a certain sinister theater patron didn't actually know where you were, and I'm so tired of seeing you blitz through every setup and ignore every planned story arc that I decided to give him a hand. Knowing you, you'll ignore this too, fly off to live happily ever after, and derail everything as a result, but at least I tried."

Then he shut the door in Papyrus's face.

Papyrus stared at the envelope, shrugged, and tossed it on the table, beckoning everyone else out of hiding.

"Dare we look?" Felicity asked.

Senescey was already slicing it open, taking care in case the contents were poisoned.

Out slipped a short letter and a large stack of pictures.

Papyrus blinked, spreading the pictures out on the table. Taken at night, yet with decent lighting, they depicted Senescey - in her present disguise, colored like she could be Papyrus's younger sister - engaging in various acts of mundane vandalism, and looking deeply aroused while doing it.

He blinked harder as Senescey took the letter and started reading aloud.

Hey there, little miss! Your old friend Tarunda here - sorry, I don't think I got either of your names!

This morning, my night shift got in with some concerning pictures, copies of which I've sent so you can see. This wasn't you, was it? Now, I figure I owe you one for hearing me out the other day, so I've got this swept under the rug all nice like. Call it a favor between friends! But between you and me, if you've got these sorts of inclinations, you could really use someone powerful on your side to keep things smoothed over if you indulge too hard, you know?

Hope this reaches you alright, and good luck on your travels!

Senescey stared at Papyrus. And then at her sisters.

"Is this supposed to be blackmail?" Felicity turned one of the photos over, but the other side was blank.

"He doesn't know," Senescey said.

"Some pretty shabby blackmail," Papyrus added. "What are we going to care when we're never coming back here?" He glanced at Senescey. "You didn't actually trash the place, did you?"

"He doesn't know," Senescey repeated, flickering with green flames as she regained her original sarosian form. "You can't blackmail a changeling with visual evidence. We can take any disguise, and abandon them at will. He doesn't know I can... do this..."

Floria instantly caught on. "Then presumably he used another changeling to pose as you to create these, and expects you not to know how he did that, either."

Senescey looked up at the team with wide eyes. "He doesn't know that I can shapeshift. We could con him."

Papyrus whistled casually.

"There's something I haven't mentioned yet that didn't sit well with me," Senescey went on, her voice speeding up. "The feeling I got from being around him was similar to being around a dusk statue, but in Equestria, Princess Luna didn't feel that way. Neither did Starlight, and I think she can use the Daydream Network too. And there's no way Luna can't. This feeling doesn't just come from being near someone who can control it. There must be something more specific to it... and I have a hunch that this feeling involves them not being very skilled with the power they're using. Like they're leaving themselves open, somehow. The dusk statues were always open, since the Night Mother used them to talk with us. And what Papyrus said yesterday, about how maybe Tarunda was playing nice because he didn't have enough power to forcibly drain us... What if he actually doesn't know how? I thought we stepped on a land mine here, but what if it's possible we've found someone who knows less about this than we do?"

"You think we could extort him?" Papyrus asked. "Get in close enough to find out more about the limits of his knowledge, and then use it?"

"To what end?" Larceny asked. "Are you going back on hanging up the sword, or would this just be risking life and limb trying to extort an even more powerful lord than last time just for the fun of it?"

Senescey set her jaw in a frown. "I... don't know."

"Darling." Felicity scooted over and put a hoof on her back. "Giving up on your plans because you think they're unfeasible... If that's the only reason you do it, it always leads to this."

"We don't need to take over the Griffon Empire." Senescey shook her head. "I don't know what I want right now. I'm going to need a lot more time than just one morning to sort through my feelings. What I would like is if the three of us can stick together and be a team again... and you did say this situation was something Luna would want to know more about." She looked up at Papyrus. "How much can we trust Egdelwonk when he says Tarunda didn't know where to find us? If that's true, and if we can keep it that way, then we'll have an escape route on the table. And if my reading on Tarunda's competence with his powers is correct, then we might not be in as much supernatural danger as I feared we were, even if this is still extremely dangerous."

She looked at Felicity. "If we got to the bottom of this, we'd both be doing something for you, for your benefactor, and for any sarosians who might still be in the Griffon Empire. They can't all be gone. Tarunda found someone to pose as me, after all." She tapped a picture.

Larceny glanced at Papyrus.

"What?" Papyrus shrugged. "I have no idea what I should be advocating, here. What she talked me into was throwing away my vague ambitions, signing on with you girls, and taking each day as it comes with no glorious underlying schemes, plans or goals. Now that a glorious scheme is spontaneously and unpredictably materializing, is it more in line with my new promise to talk you all out of it, or go along with whatever you decide?"

"We can do the same thing for different reasons," Senescey said. "This wouldn't be about testing out my ideas of governance."

"Even though you haven't had your moxie revitalized by a new reason to act so much as a new method of action," Papyrus pointed out.

"...True." Senescey drooped. "What does everyone else think? I won't stick my neck back out there unless we're unanimous. But I think getting an existential scare and then having my viewpoint flipped on its head in one night is a great reason to have my reasons change."

Felicity fidgeted with a wingtip. "If we decide we're determined to poke our noses into this Consul business, which for the record I agree with Leitmotif's current reasons for doing... I, for one, do have a vested material interest in figuring out what's going on, and I think making life better for any hypothetical remaining sarosians in the Empire would be a decent way to balance the scales a little for our past deeds without doing something quite so grandiose as a full reconquest. But if we do all agree on this, Her Majesty did leave me with a few other tools that could prove much more adept at handling this situation."

"What have you got?" Larceny asked. "Speaking for myself, as long as Halcyon stays out of the Griffon Empire, I couldn't care less what goes on here. But I signed on with this already and got my payment in advance, so..." She flexed her restored foreleg.

Floria nodded. "I would like to see what tools are on the table as well."

Hesitantly, Felicity nodded, then reached into her suit and pulled out something else. This time, it was a heavily-ornamented box that looked like a wedding-band case. She folded it open.

Inside were three crystalline needles, each about half a hoof width long and too thin to properly determine their color. They rested on a velvet bed in pre-made depressions, the case clearly crafted to custom specifications. Papyrus stared at them, reaching for an observation that could make himself look smart and finding nothing at all.

"What are these?" Senescey asked, inspecting them closely but not daring to touch.

"Something dangerous, largely useless, and incredibly potent in certain niche situations," Felicity said, everyone watching the box over her shoulders. "Her Majesty referred to these as Iklofna. She wouldn't tell me what they are or where they come from, and from her reluctance on the matter I gather we'd rather not know. Furthermore, she cautioned me that using these is likely to be mind altering in some way, and that dying after using one is a much worse idea than usual."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Fates worse than death? Oh, goodie... And what does it do that's worth all this hassle?"

Felicity looked back at him. "They supposedly allow one to retain consciousness and memory even after having their soul torn out by a changeling queen."

Larceny, Senescey and Floria all drew in a breath.

"I wish Her Majesty had told me more about how these work," Felicity lamented. "I've studied the workings of memories and souls, both sarosian and otherwise, since coming into her employ. Need I remind you, a major target of our investigation is these 'awakened changelings' such as Leitmotif, whose bodies were stolen during Chrysalis' rampage, then spontaneously regained cutie marks and souls. Subjects whom, if Tarunda does have other changelings in his employ while not believing they can consciously shapeshift, we have likely already found in the Empire."

She tapped the pictures. "Now, the difference between Leitmotif and these other awakened changelings is that she possesses her memories from before her awakening, and they don't. This is because memories exist in the space between unique combinations of bodies and souls. Consider two bodies, Body A and Body B. If you move a soul from Body A to Body B, the result will be a creature who has no memory of its time in Body A, and if you then reverse the transfer, they will remember their previous time in A but not in B. This works the same if you perform the experiment with one body and two souls, or really any numbers you please."

Felicity picked up the box with a wingtip. "Those laws are supposed to be inviolable. However, most of what I've learned about them has been from Her Majesty herself... and she was also the one who gave me these, and told me what they could be used for. That means whatever exception she has discovered to her own rules, she doesn't consider it worth teaching. And these are rules, mind you, that not just anyone would be allowed to learn in the first place. So whatever is going on here must be unusual indeed."

"And what are you proposing we do with these, again?" Papyrus asked.

"Well," Felicity said. "The original idea was that, in lieu of moon glass, if someone was trying to steal my soul, I would be able to use one of these instead. And while that would do nothing to actually stop them, it would mean that were I ever to be put back together again, I would retain all memory of things that happened while I was inside my captor. A highly unlikely scenario, but bear in mind that this has happened multiple times before..." She pointed to Senescey. "Including to one of our own. So Her Majesty gave me these because on the off chance we could repeat that stroke of luck, the information yielded could be invaluable."

Senescey poked at the box. "You think if we can be reasonably certain that Tarunda will borrow my body, then put me back together when he's done, we can use this to spy on him." She shook her head in disbelief. "She couldn't possibly have foreseen that being useful. Did Luna just load you down with crazy unknown magic for every conceivable once-in-a-blue-moon scenario?"

"As a matter of fact, she did," Felicity said. "These are far from the only magical failsafe Her Majesty left me. Far from the most dangerous or esoteric, as well. Merely the most suited to our present situation."

"Should we know about any of the others?" Larceny asked.

Felicity cleared her throat. "I feel like it would be best to keep those options off the table until we actually need them, lest we risk doing more damage to ourselves using Her Majesty's power than we would avert from the trials around us."

"Question from the peanut gallery," Papyrus said, waving a wing. "All that seems dandy enough. I, for one, know more than I'd care to about what kinds of skeletons gods can have in their closets, especially ones who used to be really evil. But do you know how I know that? Because I used to be one. With a very different body than I have today."

He rested his cheeks on his hooves, stretching his mouth out into an artificially wide smile. "So how's your memory science explain that one? Think I've got one of these Iklofna bits already?"

Felicity frowned. "I don't know enough about how they work to say. I don't understand any mechanisms by which that law could be violated. Her Majesty did warn me that non-sarosians could use these as well, but ought to stay away from them because there wouldn't be any benefits to go with the myriad downsides. Hence why she only gave me three, and not ones for you or Floria. But if you'd like to know more, I think asking herself would be your best recourse."

"And she might be more inclined to humor me if we brought her the sweet, juicy intel we came here to find..." Papyrus mused. "Ironic how the moment I give up on finding some deeper meaning or secrets or whatever to myself, I find a real and tangible avenue to do just that. Oh well! Are we doing this, or not?"

Everyone looked at each other.

"For what it's worth," Papyrus added, "it would be funny to see the look on Egdelwonk's face if I actually humor him for a change."

Senescey knocked on a trash can. "Egdelwonk? If this is something you're actually trying to steer Papyrus into, can you give your word that you'll be in our corner if anything goes particularly badly off the rails?"

A pair of red-on-yellow eyes shone back out from within. "This is not a safe and cuddly adventure for the faint of heart."

Senescey swallowed.

"Aww, he doesn't mean that!" Papyrus reached in and pulled Egdelwonk's head up and out into plain sight, then gave him a noogie. "Right, Wonky old pal?"

Egdelwonk suplexed him into the trash can, trading places with one smooth movement. "I solemnly swear and give my word as the most honorable and sacrosanct sultan of sewage that there is at least one decision you can collectively make right here and now, as a group, that results in at least one person present surviving for at least one day after the fact. Excluding me. Good enough?"

"Better than worst-case scenario," Braen remarked.

"Come on, is that really the best we get?" Papyrus hauled himself out of the trash can, picking a banana peel out of his tail.

"My job is to keep things interesting around here, not to keep anyone safe and happy," Egdelwonk lectured. "And it won't be very interesting if literally everyone dies, because then there would be no one for anything to happen to. Now stop relying on the powers that be and go eat your plot hooks! Lazy ponies, I swear..." He climbed back into the trash can, and was gone.

Everyone looked at each other and shrugged.

"Well!" Papyrus took charge of the conversation. "That leaves us with four probably yesses and one who hasn't yet commented?" He tapped his hooves together and grinned at Floria. "What do you say, matey? Change our minds about being smart enough to sit this mystery out and try to swindle the guy sitting on your dad's throne, or intelligently make a mad break for the hills?"

Floria looked taken aback, but also conflicted.

"For what it's worth," Papyrus added, "the stuff we got up to in the old days was technically a lot more dangerous than this. I'm inclined to agree with the read that if Fatso could and wanted to insta-kill us, he would have played his hand very differently. At the same time, back then we had the backing of a reclusive goddess, and out of our two divine patrons this time, one is a clown and the other is a zillion miles away. Back to the first hoof, you wanted a role to play, and if things do reach a point with Tarunda where we're not just conning him, but leveraging him where he can see it, you'd be better equipped than any of us to make threats."

"And you require a unanimous decision to stay here," Floria said. "Meaning this truly is up to me."

Papyrus winked three times in rapid succession.

"I... shouldn't be given a decision like that," Floria whispered. "Even if it is what I wanted. I will... side with the majority. And I pray that nothing ill comes of this."

Everyone's eyes locked... even Braen, whom Papyrus belatedly remembered he hadn't included in the vote tally. They all nodded.

"Right, then!" Papyrus slammed a hoof down in the middle of the table. "To bad ideas! And feature creep! And teamwork! And giving up on vague and nebulous goals in favor of achievable ones!"

"To playing with dangerous magical artifacts in the name of getting Felicity the information that Luna needs," Senescey said, putting her hoof on top of his.

"To Her Majesty," Felicity added, joining her hoof to the pile.

"To scamming people!" Braen enthusiastically joined as well.

"To hoping we didn't jinx ourselves." Larceny rested her restored hoof at the top.

"To hoping I don't regret being the first one to object to leaving, and the last one to sign on with staying." Floria capped off the hoof stack. "And to making up our minds."

Out of nowhere, Egdelwonk appeared, one-upping her with a seventh hoof. "And to chaos, and the magic of friendship!"

Everyone gave him a weird look.

He shrugged. "What? The six of you have gotten marginally less self-centered in your reasons for being here over the past few days. In fact, it's almost like you decided to stay because you're more in it for each other's goals now than your own, which quite frankly wasn't supposed to happen for at least a few more chapters. Whatever cosmic balance keeps karma greased up and ensures that stories have morals, I'd say it's roughly as likely to reward you for that as it is to punish you for not running away. So enjoy your scheming, and ta-ta!"

Once again, he was gone. Papyrus looked at the trash can, shook his head, and then looked back to his team.

"Right," he said. "If we're doing this, let's hash out a plan..."

Royal Spectrum

Five days into my stay in Wilderwind, I was finally starting to remember what it was like to relax.

I sat on a rooftop near the city outskirts, feeling downright pleased with my appearance. Two days ago, Puddles had decided to write off my armor from Rhodallis as a lost cause, and a five-hour marathon of visiting blacksmiths, armories, clothiers, boutiques and hobby shops left us with the materials to do something about it. A marathon session of crafting ensued, as I brought to bear everything I had learned from making my previous clothes in Icereach, soaked in Puddles' knowledge of armorcraft and blended them together, and after a day and a night and another day in her workshop, it was finished: Halcyon Coat, Version Three.

Made by my own hooves. Rugged and stylish, with bits of visible armor on the surface and sturdier plating underneath, it had a high collar and a half-cloak big enough to sweep but too small to get in the way, and a weight profile that was slightly unbalanced to the left - just enough that it would be counterbalanced by my favored satchel, or by a hidden detachable ballast. It cut a colorless profile with its thick black fabric and strips and studs of non-reflective silver metal, the cloak cast slightly to one side to show off my boots as well: slim and sleek and tall and plated and powerful, a hint of elegance to remind everyone that I was still a mare under this elaborately armored costume.

I felt cool. Ridiculously cool. Powerful, cultured, refined and even clean, five days in a row of real baths leaving my fur not sweaty and not full of sand. Sure, my sword hadn't gotten the royal treatment yet; it was still the same big block of metal it had been a week ago. But it was up next, and I didn't feel like waiting that long to show off the new me.

That was why I had half-jumped, half-climbed to the roof of a storefront overlooking a busy Wilderwind market street, and was currently striking poses in full public view.

I hate to burst your bubble, Faye said in my mind, but I think this is too normal around here for us to get as much attention as we would elsewhere.

I shushed her. Let me have this. Besides, there were at least a few looks of envy in the crowd below, more than there were of annoyance. Mostly from foals, granted, but still.

One of the reasons I could relax so much and afford to spend time showing off was that Rhodallis was gone. The day after I encountered him in the tower with Puddles, his airship had left, drifting lazily south with its corny, painted-on shark face and taking my paranoia with it. I had watched for a solid hour as it meandered away, and the sight of my problems disappearing like that had unlocked something in my brain. Something I was now taking full advantage of, adjusting myself so that my cloak caught some air.

I wonder if this look could use a mask, Faye mused. Not the magical way that we do it. A real one.

Good question. But there would always be room for adjustments later. Right now, I just wanted to bask in what I had, while that sense of accomplishment was flying high and before the world could get a word in edgewise and subject this coat to the same fate as my old ones.

Hopefully that wouldn't be soon. I had taken extra care to make this one intended to take that kind of abuse.

"Only a few more hours until sundown," I remarked under my breath after another round of posing. "You think we should keep working this venue, or try another one? I'd kind of like to get a bigger reaction than this..."

I think you're going to have to actually do something for that to happen, Faye pointed out. Too bad we don't know any good acrobatics tricks.

Yeah. For some reason, that kind of movement had never properly resonated with me, possibly because I wasn't built for it or possibly because my teachers were the least-acrobatic creatures in the north. And this wasn't the time to make myself look silly by trying to learn. Showing off, showing off...

I hopped down from the roof. Puddles had given a lengthy talk about how to build shock absorbers into armor for things like this, but I had my bracelet, and that was more than enough to get me through a little fall. Ponies gave me a slightly bigger berth than they would for an unarmed stranger as I started walking, which wasn't saying much when over half the crowd was either visibly armed or clearly didn't need a weapon.

You'd think this place would be perfect for showing off gear like mine: no one would find it out of place, and plenty of others to one-up with my skills. But maybe I'd have better luck being patient and strutting my armor in Izvaldi, instead...

And then it hit me. "I know where we're going," I whispered, the crowd too thick for anyone to realize I was talking to myself as I turned and abruptly started marching uphill.

Dare I ask? Faye sounded amused. While dressing up had been her hobby originally, I was taking it far further than she ever intended. What she saw as a means to hide her hooves was a means to me of feeling cool.

She would get to watch and see. And she just might see me make a fool of myself, but I suddenly remembered a place where I could definitely get an audience, without fail.

I rounded the city, partly retracing the route I had taken with Puddles on my first evening here, partly making up my own shortcuts by using bracelet-assisted jumps to climb walls and walk on roofs. Investing in a grappling hook like Puddles might not be a terrible idea... but I turned out not to need one, flipping up onto the plaza outside the central tower and even sticking a slightly respectable landing.

A few ponies on the plaza gave me an oh, it's a hooligan look. Rude.

Oh, Faye said, catching onto my plan as I stepped through the lobby doors. Are you sure this is a good idea?

Well, it wasn't like the tower had any defenses against strangers wandering into its lobby. And I had been allowed in here before - near the top, even. The worst that could possibly happen was that I got shown to the exit, and if my new getup couldn't impress those dolled up elevator attendant mares, then I was a fraud and it wouldn't impress anyone. So as far as I was concerned, this was a great idea. Outside of freak accidents, what could go wrong?

Don't jinx it, Faye sighed.

Nobody stopped me at the door, and I made it most of the way to the elevators without anything happening. See? No jinx. I didn't see the mare who had been eyeing me up last time among the five or so hanging out in the elevator area, but that wasn't necessarily a good or bad thing. The ones who were there, with their humongous bows and intricate make-up jobs and scandalously skimpy neon dresses, all fixed me with looks that said you belong here, though I felt like they didn't actually recognize me and were trained to do that to anyone.

"Hiii," one of the mares said, a teal pegasus with a dark purple mane and a matching neon blue dress, stepping forward to greet me with a blue-lipsticked smile. "What's your business today, Ma'am?"

I turned my chin up, adopting an aloof expression like Puddles used as the Black Knight. "Waiting. For someone."

"I seee," the teal mare said. "May I ask who and where?"

"That's classified."

The teal pegasus gave me a look that saw right through me. "Well, we've got plenty of waiting chairs right over there, okay? Please enjoy your stay!"

She gave me a deep bow, and then went back to titter with her companions about something. The expectation that I would go sit in the lobby chairs, away from the elevator entrances, lingered heavy in the air. So, feeling silly and not letting it show, I went and did just that.

You know, Faye said in my mind, you're probably at least the thousandth one this year to try to proposition those girls. You might be the most innocent, or have the purest intentions, and you might not even be in the bottom tenth percentile for how suave you were... but that was never going to work.

Shut up. She didn't need to rub it in.

Faye giggled.

So I sat there and stewed, precious daylight wasting away as I fought between the desire to go do something else and the urge not to look bad by getting up and walking away. Several elevators came and went, new mares and griffonesses emerging from them as the clients they were escorting left the tower, and old ones ascending with new clients. After a while, the pool was completely rotated out save for the blue mare who had told me to take a seat. If she left, then I could leave too while she was gone without losing face. But my paranoia, reinforced by the fact that she snuck a glance at me at least once every minute, told me she wasn't going anywhere.

It was basically a staring contest, and she clearly knew it. She was daring me to leave, and her prize for winning was nothing more than knowing I would feel silly about it. But she also won if I stayed here, and her prize was knowing that she had wasted my entire evening. On the scale of problems I had dealt with in my life, this was so tame it was almost funny, but still. How had I let this happen?

Another elevator slid to a stop. Out stepped a mildly uncomfortable middle-aged stallion in a suit so small it made him look puffy and bloated, with square-rimmed spectacles and a double chin and a briefcase and a minuscule tie. Much more important was the valet who was with him: the same mare who had escorted Puddles and I last week, with her purple coat and magenta mane and eye-searingly red dress.

This was... I didn't know whether it was good or bad. But when the blue mare who had been watching me leaned over and whispered something in her ear, and when she turned to look at me as a result, and then when the two of them exchanged a lightning-fast kiss from an angle clearly meant to allow me to see it, I had a feeling I was in for something awkward. Especially when the purple pegasus started coming my way.

Deliberately and directly my way. Any coolness I had been feeling, any desire to show off my new coat had by now thoroughly evaporated.

"Hey there," the purple pegasus said, giving me a sly, sideways smile. "Lissa says you were waiting for someone? And that you neglected to mention whether that someone was a client or a certain employee?"

My stoic facade was all I had. "I did say that."

The purple pegasus advanced into my personal space. "Well, lucky you, running into someone who already knows all about the unique nature of your business here. Won't you please follow me?"

I glanced around. What were the odds I was about to be arrested for... something?

Lower than the odds that a valet who remembered taking me to a VIP area and had clearly been interested in me at the time wanted something more benign out of me. And really, I had come here in the first place to show off. And I was a batpony, so I could escape quite a few bad situations with shadow sneaking. I stuffed my paranoia into a tight little box and wordlessly got up to follow her, hoping that the worst fallout from a little adventure like this would be me feeling really, really awkward.

She led me back to the elevators, pushed a button and waited for the doors to re-open on the one she had stepped out of... but someone had already called it up to another floor. As she pouted and summoned another, the blue pegasus - presumably Lissa - bumped conspicuously into my side.

"Heeey," she said, her voice not quite low enough to avoid being overheard. "Thanks for waiting, and I hope you don't have any real business we're distracting you from? Flarefeather's been talking so much this last week about meeting a real sarosian, I just couldn't let you get away. Mares, right?"

"Shut!" The purple pegasus - presumably Flarefeather - smacked her with her tail, which was too short and fluffy to have any effect. She looked pointedly away from both of us.

The other valets giggled, and Lissa strolled smugly back to her post.

I tried to process that without dropping my guise. She had been baiting me into staying here on purpose? Whatever these elevator attendants were up to, it was certainly complicated enough for someone with a boring job to have come up with it. But maybe it wasn't sinister. As long as Flarefeather didn't want anything from me that I wasn't actually looking to give. And I had come here to be the center of attention, even if this really wasn't how it was supposed to go...

The elevator opened, and Flarefeather all but pushed me inside.

I noticed she didn't even ask me where I was going before pushing in a number, not using her rose rapier key to access the VIP floors this time. "What do you want with me?" I asked as the elevator started to ascend.

"What!?" She gave me a shocked, innocent expression, and then a predatory smile. "Aww, that's my line! You did come here to see me, right?"

I considered how to respond to that. "That's classified."

Flarefeather flicked my chin with a wingtip, making me take a step back. "Ooh, you're not very good at this. But, I could tell, from how oblivious you were last time. Let me spell it out for you, sarosian: I, Flarefeather, want to do you a favor. Even if you didn't come here to see me, you'd be a fool not to change up your reason."

I frowned. "Why?"

"That's not the right question." Flarefeather flicked at my muzzle again with a pout. "The question you should be asking is, 'What kind of favors can you do for me, Flarefeather?' Because it's obvious you don't know how this works, and you're throwing away a grand opportunity here."

I stood my ground. "You're being unusually pushy."

"Well, excuse a filly for dreaming." Flarefeather rolled her eyes. "Come on, drop the act! Whaddya want!? A filly this talented and beautiful doesn't fall into your lap every day, missy, not even if you're Lord Wilderwind himself. What? Do? You? Want?"

She punctuated every word with a tap of her rose rapier on my nose.

"I'd like to know what's in it for you," I said. "You clearly want me to owe you a favor. What?"

Flarefeather rolled her eyes. "Who cares? Did you or did you not come here to see me?"

Uhh...

"If your stubborn little shtick won't let you answer," Flarefeather threatened, "then prove you've got a different reason by telling me what floor you're going to. Because you still haven't protested me punching in a random one. And Geirskogul is out of the office."

"Fourteen," I said, picking a random number fast enough that it wouldn't sound like I had to stop and think.

"Auditing?" Flarefeather frowned. "Also known as the most boring department of all time? Why do you wanna go there?" Nevertheless, she punched in something further, and the elevator reversed course, starting to go down.

"Business," I lied.

She gave me a smug look. "Sounds to me like you don't know enough about the fourteenth floor to tell when I'm making stuff up."

I winced. Visibly, since there wasn't much point anymore in hiding it. I was so flustered, I had fallen for something like that...

Flarefeather paused for a moment, considering something. "If you're being obtuse because you wanted to ask me out and then saw me kissing Lissa, just so you know, it's an open relationship. We wingmare for each other all the time."

I had absolutely no idea how to respond. But I let my posture drop nonetheless.

The elevator dinged, and the doors slid open. Ahead was a hallway full of nondescript doors. I noticed that it was actually the seventeenth floor, not the fourteenth as I had requested.

Flarefeather shoved me out of the elevator, and the doors closed behind us, leaving us both in the hallway as the elevator whirred away.

"Come!" Flarefeather demanded, actually kicking me in the rump. "If you've got nowhere better to be, then guess what, I do. You just actually don't talk much, do you?"

"If you were in my situation, you wouldn't either," I told her, dropping my demeanor and speaking normally for a change.

"Aww, scared of saying something you'll regret?" Flarefeather's predatory smile returned as she pulled out her rapier and used it to unlock a door. "Come on, what's a little secret between friends? I don't have to tell anyone about anything, whether it's your weird gaffes, your weird desires, even your weird tastes in music! I mean, seriously, a real-life sarosian?"

She dropped the door and whisked herself to my side, grabbed my wing, and extended it, feeling it all over. "Wow. These really are real."

I felt my old, familiar aversion to being touched rear its head. "Are they usually not?"

"And you've even got the fangs!" She slid back and kicked the door open, revealing... a messy dorm room. With windows, two beds, two desks, two dressers, the works. "Seriously, anyone who wants to be on your bad side is a loser. Give me a little credit."

I blinked past her at the room. "Is this yours?"

"Sure is," Flarefeather said, strolling in and stepping over a heap of clothing, leaving it up to me for once whether or not to follow. "Want some tea? Or are you more of a smoothie filly?"

I frowned, standing in the doorway. "You know, this is how people get drugged or poisoned and abducted..."

Flarefeather actually stopped what she was doing and stared at me. "Who hurt you?"

Her shock was so genuine, it actually registered on some deeper part of my brain that hadn't yet been infected with paranoia.

Flarefeather frowned. "Are you actually as hardened as you looked with the Black Knight the other week? Is this, like, some residual last-of-your-kind trauma from what happened twenty years ago?"

"...Yes," I said, deciding to gamble on the truth. "I've lost count of how many legitimate-looking jobs I've been fooled by. And offering free favors and hospitality without telling me what you want in return is setting off all sorts of red flags. Sorry. It's nothing personal."

"Wow, okay. No tea it is, then." Flarefeather turned back to the middle of her room, then took a seat on one of the beds. "Uh, there's no traps. I promise. Nothing out of the ordinary going on here at all, just a normal mare with normal mare-level secrets wanting, uhh... Never mind. Boy, this might be more trouble than it's worth..."

I pushed past my paranoia and stepped into the room, taking a seat on the other bed and successfully not stepping on any traps, be they malicious or simply something spiky hidden under the clothes on the floor. "You could just tell me what you want."

Flarefeather got her smile back. "A cool and exotic friend? Who wouldn't?"

I blinked. "That's it?"

"That's seriously not normal where you come from?" Flarefeather tilted her head. "You think everything's gotta be a transaction, or something? What, were you raised by capitalists?"

"Just not accustomed to getting my fair share when everything's over and done with." I shrugged. "Would be great if there was a better way, but that's just not how my life works. You'd be jaded too if you'd seen half the things I have."

"Okay. Hmm. Okay." Flarefeather held a wingtip to her chin. "My gut says 'trouble, stay away,' but you did just say you think that's a dumb way to live. Do I gamble? What's the worst that could happen?" She locked eyes with me. "Seriously. If I solemnly swear to show you a good time for free, with no ulterior motivations beyond enjoying the challenge of brightening up your gloomy mug, what's the worst that could happen to me?"

Well... Hmm.

"Right now?" I shrugged. "Actually, nothing is hanging over my head immediately right now. I'm wanted by some pirates, but they left Wilderwind a week ago. With my luck, I could still walk into a random building and get abducted for no reason. That did happen once. I think I got framed for some crime and arrested, but I never investigated once I got out."

Flarefeather whistled. "Okay, so pirates and unjust arrest. No biggie. Us Wilderwind Escorts have enough friends in high places to get out of literally any legal trouble, even if we really did break the law - but don't tell anyone, I play it straight and narrow since I'm a good filly. And this sword isn't just for show. Can't fulfill our duties without being highly trained as bodyguards, you know!"

She whipped out her rapier and did a quick blade dance that was far too fast for my eyes to follow, grinning as she landed. "So? What else?"

"And there's no chance your employers are secretly using you and could turn on you at the drop of a hat?" I pressed. "Wouldn't have anything to do with me, but if we're talking about my bad luck rubbing off on you..."

Flarefeather chuckled. "Not on your life. Let's just say I know why I have this job, and it's what we in the business like to call a non-revocable privilege."

She threw in a wink for good measure, but I wasn't convinced. "Nothing shady that I should be paranoid about?"

"You've got it bad, you know that?" Flarefeather took a step closer, still smiling. "It's, mmm... garden-variety shady. Or maybe I'm not. Maybe I'm special. Actually, forget what I said, I've already confirmed you're not the type to be impressed by that. Let's just say the powers that be have a vested interest in letting me do whatever I want. And if you've really got such a rough lot in life, sounds like you could use some powerful, no-strings-attached friends, no?"

I leaned back. "You sure you've got no ulterior motive?"

Flarefeather gave an exasperated sigh. "Sue me, I can't prove it. And anyway, am I not allowed to? Aren't you? You still haven't told me why you came here in the first place, even though I know it was to see me. All I want is to have a little fun." She pouted, puffing out her cheeks and daring me to deny it.

"...Fine," I said. "I'm here because I just spent several days making this new armor and wanted to show it off to-"

"Are you serious?" Flarefeather was immediately in my face, grabbing and lifting the cloak on my armor, testing various plates and pads, lifting my legs to inspect my boots and prodding everywhere with her rapier. "You made this? And you wanted to do a completely and absolutely normal thing like having friends to show off your cool talents to? This seems pretty functional..."

I deflated, unable to summon the willpower to push her away. "Telling you kind of hurts my case."

"Aww, so that's why you clammed up!" Flarefeather gave me a silly smile, letting me go but still standing in my personal space. "What a cute reason. And it's a double win for me, because now that you've done something cool for me, by your twisted logic I'm in your debt and have to repay the favor. You wouldn't do paranoid little me the disservice of being forever in your debt and knowing you could come to collect at the most inconvenient possible moment in time, would you?"

"You're mocking me," I pointed out. "And you won't find it nearly as funny if we actually get in trouble because I decided to hang out with you."

"Sounds like a wager I'll happily take," Flarefeather insisted. "Come on. Tonight? Right now? I've got a bet to win, a point to prove and a hottie to impress. All you have to do is say yes, and you can write one down on the books as a deal that didn't go south. Fantastic deal, going once..."

I hesitated. "Just so you know, I'm not really into romance..."

Flarefeather looked only slightly put out. "That's fine! I can do platonic. Seems like a waste, but the client is always right. Also, um, we're not supposed to do anything more than flirting with clients in the first place, so technically that's more legal than any of the alternatives?"

I squinted at her. "Just what kind of services does your job even entail?"

"Oh, loads." Flarefeather shrugged. "Tower security and eye candy for the executives, mostly. The higher-ups say those go hoof in hoof, since clients are much more likely to behave themselves around someone they want to impress. Now, personally, I've found they just have different kinds of bad behavior instead, but that's what this beauty is for." She gave her rose rapier a loving nuzzle.

"Huh. Makes sense." I nodded.

Flarefeather leaned over and gave my shoulder a flurry of paper-light punches. "Look at youuu, having a perfectly normal conversation with me! See, things aren't so bad! Come on, let's go hit the town! The alternative is me having to get all blushie crushie for fat business stallions who are twice my age for the rest of my shift. You wouldn't do that to me, would you?"

At this point, I really couldn't say no. "Your bosses are okay with you just walking off the job for a night? And I don't really know any places to go, or what to do there."

"Who's walking off the job? You're a client." Flarefeather gave me a huge wink. "See, I'm still dressed up and everything! And don't you worry. I know so many good spots in town."

"Alright, then." I nodded, deciding that if this went poorly, there was nothing I possibly could have done to prevent it anyway. "Lead the way."

Flarefeather sprung to her hooves, crossed the room, and unlatched the window, pushing it wide open. And then, to my horror, she picked me up, grunted beneath the weight of my armor, and hefted me out into the sky.

Seventeen floors and a lot of green bracelet fire later, I was more intact than the part of the plaza where I had landed.

"This is," Flarefeather said, looking even more awkward than she had made me feel in the lobby. "Not how I've ever had a date start before? And also completely my fault? I'm so sorry..."

"It's... water under the bridge..." I pulled myself to my hooves, checking every limb over and over for breaks. Activating my bracelet early this time, not being caught in a ladder, and not hitting any pipes on the way down meant I was in far better shape than when I fell in the Flame District, and I was pretty sure this was a shorter fall, too. My armor was more or less intact as well, though it was visibly banged up enough that I'd have to re-polish it tonight... I was pretty sure I could still walk, at least with a little help from my bracelet. And I definitely wanted to go anywhere but here, because people were staring.

"I should have asked if you could fly in that!" Flarefeather squeaked, mortified. "And how are you still standing? How did you not get crushed by your own armor, let alone the ground!?"

I didn't feel like letting any bystanders start asking the same questions, and I definitely didn't feel like waiting around for someone to come and demand compensation for the inch-deep Halcyon-shaped crater in the plaza. So instead, I returned the favor for all of Flarefeather's touchy-feeliness by grabbing her, hefting her onto my back, and bounding away, jumping off the plaza and crossing a few rooftops before landing in a nearby alley.

She looked stupefied as I set her down.

I glanced around, then sighed. "Cursed power bracelet. Don't ask." I patted my foreleg. "I'm alright."

"Alright, so I guess your appearance isn't just for show," Flarefeather laughed nervously. "Maybe actually you don't need a bodyguard after all, not that I'm bad at it. Though I'd forgive you for questioning my competence after I actually almost killed you ten seconds after daring you to show me how bad your luck could really be, haha..."

"It's fine." I shook my head. "If I wasn't ridiculously durable, I would've kicked the bucket long ago. The real place my luck will show its colors is when someone wants that hole filled and forces me into a devil's bargain to cover the cost."

"I'll, um." Flarefeather swallowed. "See to it that doesn't happen? To the best of my ability?" She shuffled slightly. "Are you actually cursed? Or do these things just happen to you as some kind of cosmic joke?"

I shrugged. "Honestly, I'd prefer if it was a curse. That would mean there might be something I could one day do about it. So, you still want to tag along with me? I can't promise we won't randomly find ourselves at ground zero for the next world conflict, which has also happened to me before."

"Now there's a story." Flarefeather laughed again, regaining her composure. "I think I'll take my chances with you, at least for tonight. If you really aren't mad about me almost killing you and all. At the very least, this is way more exciting than my usual life. And if I jinx us too hard, maybe you can get some useful data points for figuring out your curse?"

"Knock yourself out." I rolled my eyes, but returned her nervous smile. "I'm actually really not concerned about physical danger, just because I can do that. So if you've got political danger covered, and you're not yet running for the hills, maybe we'll make a great team."

Flarefeather perked up further. "Yeah, maybe!"

"Just, err, try not to overestimate your ability to cover political danger," I added as a whisper. "Otherwise you really could be forced to run for the hills."

Flarefeather fully regained her predator's grin. "Oh, I'd like to see that happen. Wilderwind can't cross me."

I shook my head. I had a way out in Puddles. If she made herself eat her own words, that would be on her. "So where are we going? I don't have any time limit, and was up pretty late last night..."

"Do you like jazz?" Flarefeather winked. "I know a great jazz club..."

Attending a jazz club was not something I had done before. It was the kind of experience you went to to make yourself feel refined and cultured more than for the entertainment itself, though I might have been missing the point... not that I didn't enjoy myself. Actually, I found myself wondering if Ironridge had any establishments like this, and imagining taking Coda to one while showing her the world after we were reunited.

I didn't know enough about the world to do that mission justice as I needed to. Maybe hanging out with ponies like Flarefeather was a really good idea after all.

"Boom, look at that," she said as out hooves met the cold stone road outside, sunset long gone from the sky. "I tried my hardest to jinx us again, and nothing bad happened! Aside from tonight's artist being a little uninspired, but that happens. Better than the club hosts being snooty."

"This was fun." I nodded. "I appreciated it."

"You wanna..." Flarefeather gave me a sly grin. "Do it again tomorrow? And maybe I could walk you home?"

My paranoid side said something about her finding out where I lived, but after everything that had happened today, I didn't care anymore. I nodded again. "Sure. Why not?"

So we walked back to Puddles' ship, mostly in silence. I led us the long way around. Now that my paranoid side had been silenced, there was another side of me that was starting to wake up, remembering the good times with Corsica and Ansel back in Icereach, with Balthazar and the yaks, and even with Mother, too.

One by one, slowly but surely, I had left all my friends behind. My life had gotten less stable along the same trajectory. True, the Aldebaran incident had precluded all of that, but my life got back to normal for a full six months again after that happened, right?

Was this where I had gone wrong? Hanging out with Flarefeather felt fun, in a way that I couldn't properly quantify, even if I couldn't be certain what her motives were. But then again, what were anyone's motives for becoming friends? Hadn't I bullied my way into Corsica's life because I saw something in her that I wanted for myself? Maybe the reasons for forming a friendship didn't matter as much as the results.

So I would hang out with Flarefeather again tomorrow. And then I would probably leave her and Wilderwind behind, sailing on to Izvaldi in pursuit of my lonely quest to understand myself and my powers and Chrysalis and Coda.

Was that a mistake? Should I just settle down and stay with my friends, instead?

No. I couldn't. Coda was counting on me, Rhodallis would surely be back, the war between Yakyakistan and Ironridge had to be stopped, and Faye had sworn her own oaths about the legacy left by my birth mother. We couldn't stop yet. But the thought of continuing felt bitter, like this quest was taking me into territory I suddenly had a new reason not to want to explore.

I couldn't stop. There was nothing for it but to enjoy the present while it lasted. At the very least, right now there was no reason to hurry.

We arrived at last at the ship. "I know this one," Flarefeather said, nodding absently at it. "You're staying with the Black Knight?"

"Yep." I nodded as well. "So, uh... What time would be reasonable for me to show up tomorrow?"

If Flarefeather was thinking about how my lodging implied that I would be transient, she didn't show it. "Bright and early," she said without hesitation. "I run elevators all day long. If I'm not there, assume I'm with someone and will be back within an hour. And don't be shy about mingling with my other friends while you wait; I'm sure they already knew who you were. Lissa is just a tease."

"Bright and early?" I raised an eyebrow. "You got something planned, or you just want to slack off that hard?"

Flarefeather giggled. "Who wouldn't? Don't forget to show up, now."

"I've got no intention of missing it." I turned to look at the ship, then made up my mind on the spot and hugged her. "Thanks. I needed a bit of coaxing out of my shell."

Flarefeather awkwardly returned it. "So is this a platonic hug, or did you change your mind, or...?"

"Platonic." I quickly let go; initiating contact myself didn't make it feel any less awkward or wrong. "Just a thank-you I thought you'd appreciate. I guess you turned out to be genuine after all."

Saying that would surely jinx it. Surely-

"Actually," Flarefeather said, as I braced for the gotcha I knew was coming. She lowered her voice conspiratorially, standing in a beam of light emanating from the ship. "Before I go, you wanna see something wicked cool?"

"Do I?" I stepped forward, curious what other shoe was about to drop.

"You're pretty special, being able to take a beating like that," Flarefeather muttered, waving me even closer. "Forget making your own clothes and literally being a sarosian. Now, I don't have special powers, but the truth is, I'm pretty special too. In fact, I've got a deep, dark secret pretty much no one but my bosses and the other escorts have seen. Not even my exceptionally lucky dates, and certainly no platonic friends. So? Wanna see my secret?"

Did I? Maybe I did. "Show me," I whispered, sensing that this was a real token of friendship and not the last-minute trap I was fearing. "What is it?"

Flarefeather crouched down, covering herself with her wings so that only I could see. Then, she bit her foreleg, gently easing off one of her tight, neon boots.

My heart stopped.

Beneath her boot, her leg started off the same purple as the rest of her coat... and then it broke into every color of the dawn, exactly the same as Procyon's.

Her eyes glittered as she looked for my impression. "The Royal Spectrum. Incredibly rare on a pony. It's real, not a dye job! But you clearly already know what it is... Heh. I'm special too."

She slipped her boot back on, and before I could find words to match my feelings, she was gone, soaring off toward the tower in a trail of purple and magenta.

Ulterior Motive

The next morning, I returned to the Wilderwind tower to find that I had done a better job fixing my armor than they had done fixing my hole.

A warning cone was present to ward creatures off from the uneven depression in the plaza, pushed slightly to the side as a pair of pegasi in hard hats sketched around it with chalk, wielding tape measures and clipboards. It looked slightly more like they were delineating a construction zone than trying to reconstruct a crime scene, but just in case, I didn't linger.

I slipped through the rotating glass doors into the tower lobby, questions about Flarefeather's legs gnawing relentlessly at my mind. After an hour of armor polishing to calm my thoughts, I had managed to make it through the night, but no amount of self-reassurances like but she was clearly not malicious would suffice anymore. I needed to know why someone else could share my most distinctive physical trait - a trait held by the old me, Procyon, and not my current form, no less.

Before leaving Icereach, I had always assumed my hooves were just a me thing. Unusual, but within the realm of just being an ordinary coloration that I had an inexplicable phobia of showing to others. Between Procyon and Faye's stories, it now seemed much more likely their current blood red color was a product of my self-image translating into my physical appearance, using changeling magic that I couldn't consciously control. But assuming all that was true, and that Procyon really did wear my original form, then my original hypothesis still worked for her hooves. Striking, distinctive, incredibly unusual, but no reason to suspect they weren't just the product of plain old luck and genetics.

And now, it seemed there was more to it than that.

The first possibility my brain could cook up was that these were the mark of a changeling queen, and Flarefeather was somehow just like me. But if that was the case, it wasn't universally true. Coda didn't look this way, and I had never heard anything indicating Chrysalis had, either. And it would be a silly identifier if it was the case because any half-competent changeling queen would just hide them to avoid being found out.

So, I took solace in the fact that there was hopefully a slightly more mundane explanation than that. But the dilemma I couldn't solve was whether Flarefeather had shown me her leg knowing I was the same, or it had been a complete accident. She said she thought I knew what it meant... but that could just have been because I looked so surprised, right?

If there was something that pattern could mean that was innocuous enough that she could expect a stranger to know, well, I was in the dark. And I needed to find out.

I strode across the lobby floor to the elevator area, feeling much more like I belonged here than the past two visits. At first glance, neither Flarefeather nor Lissa was present - in fact, very few were, indicative of a morning rush hour.

"Hey there," said a tiny griffoness in a neon green uniform with an even tinier beak and outrageously squishy cheeks. "May I ask your business today?"

"Looking for Flarefeather," I said, giving her a slight nod. "Is she in today?"

The griffoness curtsied and winked. "Did I even need to ask? She's with a client, and you can be next in line. Happy waiting!"

Remembering Flarefeather's advice to try talking with the other elevator girls while I waited rather than sit on my own, I opened my mouth to make small talk... and then a griffon pushed past me from behind.

Well, griffon might have been a generous term. He looked as though his eagle half had actually been made from a turkey instead.

"Hey, uh," he grunted, sounding winded from the walk across the lobby. "Any of you ladies free? Oh, sorry, I'm not cutting in line, am I? Got a, uh, a conference on floor three..."

The tiny griffoness gave him a very professional smile. "Hey there, mind if I check your... Oh, your ID's all set! Right this way, sir..."

I got a faint sense of missed opportunity from her as she turned her back on me and the elevator doors closed behind her. Not too surprising. I had no idea how she saw me, as an ostensible friend of a friend, but smiling all day long at guys like that had to be tough. And, looking behind me, there were enough griffons and pegasi hot on his tail that the other elevator girls probably didn't need me distracting them from their duties.

Though, maybe Flarefeather had asked me to distract them because they wanted it.

But I had already stolen away one of the tower's staff for the previous evening, and unless a dramatic revelation about our hooves convinced me to ditch Flarefeather immediately today, I was about to do it again. So I retreated to the waiting area, took up the same bench I had used last night, and pondered how strange it was that I had gone from the half-deliberately-awkward filly in Icereach who went out of her way not to be talked to to someone on-duty employees would rather chat up than do their jobs.

Twenty minutes passed, during which the supply of elevator girls dwindled to exactly one, and ponies and griffons started piling up beside me in the waiting area. That one, I guessed, was required to stay here to guard the elevators, because she continually rebuffed the formation of a line, telling all comers to stop and wait their turn. I didn't see a ticketing system, though. How was this supposed to work, everyone just got priority in terms of how important they were?

At the very least, most creatures weren't accompanied for the entire duration of their visits. I watched the elevators come and go, and the griffoness who had greeted me came and went several more times, usually only five minutes per trip, rarely returning with the client she left with. Maybe they only escorted them to and from the rooms where they did business? Maybe waiting around for clients during their meetings was something they only did during off hours, or for particularly important meetings? Probably the latter, because Flarefeather wasn't back yet despite the volume of traffic. Or maybe someone just needed her in person for something.

Eventually, though, my waiting paid off, an elevator opening to reveal her with a sleazy teal pegasus with an oily black mane. Even from a distance, I could see the insincerity in her smile as she bade him farewell, the glint in her eyes as she spotted me, and the spring in her step as she ducked behind a freight elevator-tier stallion with the world's smallest toupe to come meet me.

"Aww, look who showed up!" she greeted with a pose and a wink, raising her voice to carry over the din of the lobby chatter. "Might I ask your business?"

"Only if we can talk outside," I grunted loudly, bringing back my stoic front from yesterday. "Sensitive business. Too many prying eyes here."

Flarefeather pursed her lips, shushed herself and downright pranced at my side back out into the plaza.

When we were free of the rotating doors, she let out a hefty sigh. "Whew! Haha. Okay. Seeensitive business?"

I shrugged. "Just figured you could use a cool-looking excuse not to get picked up by whoever in that crowd had the biggest hurry."

Flarefeather chuckled, and I found myself chuckling too.

"Well, hope I didn't keep you waiting," Flarefeather apologized. "That one was a problem customer - we profile everyone who comes through our doors and keep records on behavior to see exactly how much they can be trusted to be left alone, and he's a serial kleptomaniac. Even goes rifling through vases and potted plants when he thinks no one's looking. Sooo...?"

I shook my head. "Wilderwind's business fashion sure is a contest of slobs versus snobs. I can see why you want an excuse to be anywhere else."

Flarefeather nodded seriously. "Yeah, forgive me if I massage you with my eyes a bit. They need a break. And there's a long history behind the lack of self-respect some of those guys have, if you're a history buff."

"Speaking of keeping me waiting, though," I said, rounding on her and raising an eyebrow. "You sure left on a cliffhanger yesterday."

"What do you know, so I did!" Flarefeather grinned. "And it looks like it did its job, because here you are again! Wanna... walk and talk?"

I looked her up and down. No sinister vibes, certainly no more than yesterday. Not that this made me any less curious... "Alright. Where should we go?"

Flarefeather cheerfully shrugged. "What are you in the mood for? Food, entertainment, thrills? Cute stuff, cool stuff? Exclusive VIP stuff? We could even do boring stuff if you want to be a non-conformist."

"Nowhere risky," I requested. "How about... Err..."

An idea suddenly rolled over in my brain. "Show me a good side of town," I asked her. "Somewhere that's not just dubious money grubbers and whatever those business goons in the tower are."

"Aww, somewhere inspiring?" Flarefeather winked. "And safe, to boot? This filly knows just the place. Come, come on!"

She jogged a few paces away, spreading her wings before remembering at the last second that I couldn't fly. "Wait, you fixed your armor!"

"From the fall?" I shrugged. "Yeah, it just took a bit of polishing. Only cosmetic damage."

"You should make me some armor sometime," Flarefeather suggested. "Granted, I dunno how much more can be done to accentuate a physique this good. And I do like my speed. But wouldn't that be an awesome token of friendship? I'd trade you for it."

"Trade what?" I asked, falling in alongside her. "A continuation of our conversation from last night?"

Flarefeather waggled a booted hoof at me, grabbing the lip of the boot in a teasing grin. "That's really got your attention, huh? What are you thinking? Wanna see it again? Maybe all four at once? That one's gonna cost you a favor and a half."

I hesitated. "Look, I'm pretty sure you mean it innocently, but I've got a history with owing favors..."

"Yep. We covered that last night." Flarefeather nodded seriously, then skipped ahead and started walking backwards, facing me. "This is all part of the plan to get you to lighten up, remember? A little you rub my back, a little I rub yours, a few innocent favors back and forth with no strings attached? We have a little fun, and in the end, you get to write it off as a great deal that didn't get wrecked by your silly curse. And maybe it doesn't come out perfectly one hundred percent even in one direction or the other, and then I get to teach you that nobody cares. Right?"

"Is that what we're doing?" I frowned.

"Yep!" She beamed. "Now, the question you should be asking is, 'How can I pamper you in exchange for seeing your cool secrets, Flarefeather?' And believe me, I've already thought up dozens of innocuous and even platonic ways to respond, so I'll be a little miffed if you don't give me a chance to use them."

I raised an eyebrow. "Do you really want me to ask that?"

Flarefeather gave me a huge grin that said try me.

So I did. With all of the acting talent I always thought I possessed in Icereach, even though I was never sure how well it translated to the real world. Twirling on one hind leg, I struck a stupid pose with my butt out to the side and one hoof on my cheek, landing a giant wink with a toothy grin. "How can I pamper you in exchange for seeing your cool secrets, Flarefeather?"

Flarefeather's eyes went pinprick for half a second before she fell over laughing.

"Hey, you asked for it," I sighed, poking at her with a wingtip.

"I had no idea you'd actually go through with it," Flarefeather wheezed. "People aren't supposed to say the lines I give them, you know. Those only work when you're wearing one of these." She patted her salacious neon uniform. "Although, now I'm pondering what I wouldn't give to see you in one..."

"Information," I pressed. "Come on, tell me about your... You know?"

Flarefeather stood up, finally seeming to take me seriously. "Well, what's there to say? Like, you did recognize that, right? You looked like you did. What doesn't speak for itself?"

I lowered my voice just a little. "I've seen someone with it before, but I don't know what it means. And it was in kind of a worrying context last time, too."

"Oooooh..." Flarefeather glanced away in guilty realization. "So I totally accidentally caused you to freak out about this for all of last night? Wow, your luck really is terrible."

I nodded in mild annoyance. "Yeah, you can say that again. So what is it? Something actually innocuous?"

"It's the Royal Spectrum," Flarefeather explained. "It's, well... It appears on the descendants of sphinxes. Only, the thing is, it almost exclusively appears on griffons. Have you ever looked at a griffon's front legs? You know how they sometimes have those little bands of color above one talon, before the floof starts?"

"That's it?" I blinked in realization. "That's all it is?"

"Yeah," Flarefeather went on, letting her voice go back up to normal. "It's hereditary, and lasts for a few generations before fading. And the fact that only griffons get it is part of why this is the Griffon Empire and not the Griffons And Ponies Empire. Except, sometimes, maybe around one in ten thousand, that rule breaks. And when ponies get it, it shows up on all of our legs, and is way more colorful and visible."

"Point that out to me next time we pass a griffon with it," I requested. "I need to see this."

Flarefeather frowned. "You not from around here, or something? Well, I guess we established that you don't fit the local ethos, but there are griffons all around the world."

"Not where I'm from." I shook my head. "Long story, I'll tell you later."

"Well, I'll hold you to that." Flarefeather nodded resolutely. "And point it out when I see it. Anyway, mine's tied to the last line of House Izvaldi. Each province has its own, or more like each province lord's lineage. And the sphinxes themselves had no clue what theirs would look like until they had offspring. It's kind of weird, because a province lord's sphinx offspring will pass on the same colors as their parents, but the lords in the first place came from excess male heirs to the imperial line in Grandbell, so it's like the color just chooses to differ when you get your own land... There must be some magic at play behind the mechanics of how it gets decided. But isn't that cool?"

"So you're descended from Lord Izvaldi," I said, remembering long ago in Equestria when Starlight told me about my own parentage... A griffon noble, the Izvaldi regent, had by all accounts been my father by blood. Did that make us some degree of cousins?

Maybe I'd have to tell her, just so her flirting didn't get more awkward than she realized.

"Sure am," Flarefeather chirped, bumping my shoulder with her own. "That means you're hobnobbing with royalty, by the way."

"Didn't the sphinxes have crazy numbers of children, though?" I asked, skeptical.

Flarefeather puffed up her cheeks and pouted. "Well, pfft, who asked you? I thought you didn't know much about royal lineages and all that. But yeah, they do. Most of the the time. Not many like me, though."

I flicked an ear. "So how did the Izvaldi family tree look, anyway? I heard it had a griffon regent?"

"Okay, so." Flarefeather brightened, clearly prepared to answer this question at length. "Lord Goraldi Izvaldi was the last sphinx to take the throne, and nobody knows exactly when he died because his death was kept secret for ages for political reasons. His eldest son was Lord Victor, the first griffon regent. And then Victor's eldest son was Lord Percival, the second griffon regent, who was in charge up until the war happened. Got that much?"

I nodded. Simple enough.

"Now," Flarefeather went on. "Goraldi had, like... actually not that many kids? By Wilderwind standards. And a lot of them who weren't Victor randomly died. In suspicious circumstances. Lesson from history, if your big brother is kind of evil and has or wants a throne, don't give him any reason to think you might usurp him. Used to happen all the time. What a great system, right?" She rolled her eyes.

"If half of Wilderwind is related to Lord Wilderwind, how come they aren't all dead for the same reason?" I asked, tilting my head.

Flarefeather shrugged. "Oh, that's easy. This only becomes a problem when the sphinx passes on without any sphinx heirs. No need to assassinate someone who can't steal your throne because you're a sphinx and they're not. Lord Wilderwind just waited to kick the bucket until the system collapsed, and boom, the military took charge."

"It was that easy?" I frowned.

"Yep." Flarefeather grinned. "Turns out already having a system in place for allowing up-and-coming leaders to raise their own armies funnels all the upstarts into the existing framework, and lookie there, no one company could get strong enough to mount a war of succession. Bureaucracy can be good for things!"

It sounded more to me like a coup had just been performed using claims based on legal authority rather than blood, but I had no reason to argue. "So where do you fit into the family tree?"

Flarefeather nodded along. "Yeah, so, one of Goraldi's sons had half a brain and married into minor Everlaste nobility and went to live there instead. The guy was a pegasus called Lord Crowscone - really questionable name, I know. But it was a smart move for staying alive! Anyway, that guy was my dad. Please don't do the math, by the way. I was an illicit off-the-books love child nobody knew about, and he was old enough at the time that it's kind of gross to think about."

"Huh. So that would make you Goraldi's granddaughter, and Percival's cousin..." I trailed off, keeping the rest of my musing in my head. If Percival was my father, then we were... what, first cousins once removed? Was that how that worked? A generation apart, even though we looked to be about the same age. "Right?"

Flarefeather gave an affirmative wing salute, twirling her rose rapier for emphasis. "Nailed it in one! You're pretty smart, mystery mare."

I blinked, an awkward thought just now occurring. "Wait, have I not told you my name?"

"You know, I was wondering if that was deliberate," Flarefeather said with a wry smile. "Were you holding out on me for a reason, or did you really just forget?"

I felt myself redden.

"Well!" Flarefeather patted me on the back with a gregarious wing. "Congratulations, now Lissa owes both of us lunch. I was pretty sure you were just spacey, but after I told her they got you in to see Geirskogul without giving the secretary a name either, she was convinced. This is a good deal for you, by the way. I'm sure you'll like Lissa, too."

"You tell her about what happens while you're sitting around waiting for random clients to get out of meetings?" I folded my ears. "Does being in love actually make you do stuff like that, or are you just doing it to show off?"

Flarefeather mashed a wingtip against my muzzle to shut me up. "Nuh uh uh. You can ask me for deets about my love life after you give me your name, sarosian. I had my fun, but no trying to wriggle out of this now that the bet's been called."

"It's Halcyon," I said. "My name. And you're the one who never asked."

"Halcyon, huh?" Flarefeather rolled it around on her tongue. "I like it! Gives off a kind of 'ye olden dayes' vibe. I'm Flarefeather, by the way. Since you also never asked." She threw in a cheeky wink.

I rolled my eyes. "I already said your name. When I was miming your silly request, remember?"

"Wrong word; mimes are supposed to be silent." Flarefeather spun in a circle. "Anyway, walk and talk successful. What do you think?"

I blinked, paying more attention to my surroundings. We were in some sort of recessed courtyard that had been meticulously designed to appear a lot bigger than it actually was, and very difficult to see from afar. Sculpted pillars held up the edges around an open-air center, the rest of the city continuing up on the roof even as the courtyard stretched on below. We had gotten here courtesy of a curved, descending road that cut a neat trench down to the courtyard's entrance, and were far from alone.

Dozens of griffons and ponies milled about, mostly between my age and thirty. Most of them were either unclothed or wore sophisticated dress in line with the better-presented business attire of the tower, but a few seemed to be making a show of artful buffoonery with their appearances. I got the impression they were parodying the sloppier of the tower dwellers, the ones who had let their appearances go to seed: their garb was just a little bit more coordinated in its rudeness, their mismatched colors slightly more artistically mismatched and their cravats folded despite being untucked.

"Where are we?" I asked, noting that the decor was more tasteful as well, despite being the most lavish I had seen since the tower. This place was still trying to show off, but it felt more like a museum than a casino.

"The Wilderwind School of Business Acumen," Flarefeather proudly announced. "This proud institution is over eight hundred years old."

A school? My ears perked up. "Does it have a library?"

"One of the oldest in the Empire that's still standing." Flarefeather gave me a cheesy, noodly smile. "Why? Are you a neeerd?"

I blinked, Corsica temporarily superimposing herself over Flarefeather in my vision. She could have said the exact same thing, on a good day.

Before Flarefeather could notice my hesitation, I shook my head to clear it. "I know how to appreciate a properly curated library from time to time. And you're proud of this place too, since you said you were taking me somewhere inspiring."

"Aww, well, you caught me." Flarefeather hung her head in mock disgrace. "Yeah, I like it here. I mean, this is where the best and the brightest of the younger generation congregates, right? Everyone here is the future."

I tilted my head. "Have you actually studied here?"

"Not as a student." Flarefeather shrugged. "My job as an escort usually makes me too busy for stuff like that. But I sure have a lot of experience with what the current generation in power is like. Whatever comes next has gotta be better than those blowhards, right?"

"That's a cynical way to put it," I pointed out.

"Hey." Flarefeather gave me a jaded look. "You wear this suit, take this rapier, and do my job for one single day, and then tell me you don't agree."

I stared at her, wondering what the politest way would be to decline.

As I stared, Flarefeather slowly started smiling.

I frowned. "What?"

She pulled up close to me ear, and whispered, "Staring doesn't have to be free."

I shook my head and walked a few paces away. "I can't tell if you took me seriously or not when I said I don't really do non-platonic stuff..."

Flarefeather innocently shrugged. "Hey, can't blame me for getting mixed signals. You're the one sending 'em. Anyway, the school is cool and all, and I could talk your ear off about its modern role trying to restore the city's magic, or its historical role teaching merchants and diplomats how to interact with Varsidel and who cares what else, but this actually isn't the part I wanted you to see. You wanna go a little further in?"

"Lead the way," I said, following in her hoofsteps.

The underground campus was surprisingly large. Compared to the city up above, it had straight, well-designed corridors designed to get people where they were going, and felt like a more utilitarian version of the upper reaches of Cold Karma. The city surface, on the other hoof, more resembled a bowl of spaghetti...

It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize the reason for the shift in architecture, though in my defense, I was unaccustomed to looking for it: ceilings everywhere meant no one could fly. The city above didn't need to be optimized for transportation, and in fact keeping it unoptimized probably helped the ruling winged class feel superior. I didn't mind tunnels, though. In fact, I liked them. They brought everyone else down to my level.

Hopefully Flarefeather wouldn't find out that it wasn't just the weight of my armor, and I actually couldn't fly.

"Here we go," Flarefeather said, opening a door to another sector that had a different air to it, with far fewer ponies around. In fact, the only one I saw was sitting just inside the door, on a stool by the intersection of a hallway, reading a book.

They were dressed in the characteristic garb of the Night's Boon.

"Ah! Flarefeather," the stallion said in a brisk, pleasant voice, perhaps in his early thirties. "Come to visit the kids again? And with a friend?" He sized me up, then raised an interested eyebrow. "Are you a sarosian?"

"This is Halcyon," Flarefeather sang in a slightly more cutsey voice, showing off her uniform. "And I'm technically on the job, but she's a friend, too. Mind if we drop in?"

"Oh, well, of course!" The stallion bowed deeply, then offered me a hoof. "My name is Poplar. It's a pleasure to have you here, Miss Halcyon. A friend of Flarefeather's is a friend of ours."

"Likewise." I uncertainly bumped his hoof. "But, she sort of brought me here for fun and on a whim, and I don't really trust her to explain what's going on."

"Ahh." Poplar bowed again. "Milady, would I be ruining the surprise were I to answer any more of our guest's questions? I do so love raising awareness of this place, but if you have dibs..."

Flarefeather puffed out her cheeks. "Dibs! Dibs dibs dibs. I totally have them. Come on, where are the kids?" She hopped up and down impatiently.

Poplar laughed. "Well, as long as your eccentricity doesn't rub our guest the wrong way. Please, after me."

The corridors of this wing ran in a rectangular lattice, each rectangle surrounding four laboratory-style classrooms with short, room-width windows designed for public viewing. When I peeked in, however, I saw not desks and machinery and test tubes but foals' play equipment. A collection of interlocking foam mats, arrayed blankets for nap time, a large chest of numbered wooden blocks... This was clearly no college.

One of the rooms was occupied. Through the window, I stared as at least thirty colorful foals frolicked and played, their ages varying between just old enough to stand and ready to learn their times tables. Several more adults in Night's Boon garb watched over them, most of them around Poplar's age.

"One moment while I announce your presence," Poplar said, budging open a door and slipping lithely inside.

"Okay," Flarefeather breathed the moment he was gone. "Ground rules: literally just be a sarosian and stand around doing sarosian things. This'll be cool, I promise this'll be cool. Also, don't tell them I'm not a real princess. I've already tried, and they won't believe you. Now, do you mind helping me get this outfit off? In a platonic manner. We're all adults up in the tower, but duds this saucy will set a bad example for the kids."

Huh. She was actually nervous. Stage fright, specifically. Curious, I decided to help her, though I knew absolutely nothing about working with clothes on a body that couldn't shadow sneak to make it easier, let alone belonged to someone else. In the time it took me to find the hidden zipper underneath the top of her skirt, she had all four boots and her headdress sitting by the door in a pile. Fortunately, she neither made a flirty joke nor seemed to misread the source of my embarrassment.

"...Hold up, though." I stepped back once the deed was done, seeing Flarefeather for the first time without most of her regalia, all four of her legs colored like a dramatic alpine dawn. I couldn't say it without it being taken the wrong way, but she actually looked way better this way... "Aren't those supposed to be a secret?"

Flarefeather gave me a toothy, pickle-shaped grin. "Yeah, they are... Not! I lied to impress you." She hesitated, then added, "I mean, they're sort of a secret. Don't go telling random strangers. Just, it's not literally me and Lissa and a few other escorts who know. Um, you're fine with that armor getting played with, right? No weapons that could accidentally fall out?"

She stared conspicuously at my greatsword. I unstrapped the sword and propped it against the wall next to her things.

"Nothing else?" She raised an eyebrow. "Daggers, blowdarts, shurikens, cursed magic whachamahoozit you said saved you from the fall?"

I shook my head, lifting my foreleg and tapping my bracelet. "None of those, and it's a much worse idea for me to take this off than leave it on. I'll be careful."

Just then, the door opened again, Poplar beckoning us both inside.

In the room, the teachers and caretakers stood to the side. The foals and grifflets were all corralled in the center, in something resembling a military parade formation, and from the efforts of the older ones to nudge the younger ones back into their positions, I realized they had probably learned this of their own volition.

"Hello, my subjects!" Flarefeather declared in a faux royal accent, her mane long enough to sweep dramatically as she walked toward them now that it was no longer tied up by her ribbon.

An older grifflet held two talons to his beak and made a surprisingly good imitation trumpet solo noise. The foal formation broke down cheering, and I hesitantly followed Flarefeather as she carved a path with her wings up to the edge of the room, where everyone could see.

"Princess Izvaldi has a treat for you today, my subjects, yes!" Flarefeather crowed, sweeping a wing slowly towards me... and then, in a snap motion, grabbing my head and pulling it closer to the crowd of children.

"Look!" she urged, tugging on my ears, trying to get them to stand up straight so she could show off their leafy bits, pulling out my wings and flexing them for me, prizing open my mouth to show off my fangs. "Ears: real! Eyes: real! Everything, real! They all told you sarosians were extinct, but lo, one has entered my vassalage, the knight Halcyon!"

Mercifully, she let go of my face, focusing on the children instead. "I've been wanting to teach you about sarosians for a while now. Who here can tell me where sarosians are from? You?" She pointed at a waggling pink hoof.

"The moon," said a wide-eyed pink filly.

"Mmm, not quite," Flarefeather hummed. "But here's a hint: it was always night there."

A grifflet was hopping up and down, so Flarefeather picked him next. "Da Misty Mountains!" he exuberantly declared.

"Yes, Mistvale," Flarefeather corrected. "Now, who knows what Mistvale was like? What kinds of places there do you think sarosians lived in?"

"Boats," said a unicorn colt without being called on. "They lived on boats and were pirates for a living. And the pirate ships fought with Garsheeva!"

"They fought Garsheeva's own ships," Flarefeather gently told him. "But they also lived in Mistvale as well. Mistvale had a lot of mountains, with cities at the tops of the mountains, and more sarosians living in the valleys between the mountains. And the cities were enchanted so that their plants glowed blue in the dark."

"Where were you from?" a filly asked me. "Everyone in Mistvale's supposed to be dead, so are you from somewhere else?"

Flarefeather gave me a look that said the ball's in your court.

"Yeah-" I started to say, when I was interrupted by another grifflet.

"Are you a zombie?" the grifflet asked. "I heard that you can come back from the dead."

"No," a filly protested, "being dead means you can't come back from the dead!"

I swung in a quarter circle, causing my cloak to billow and recapturing their drifting attention. "Heh! Heh. I have climbed to the roof of the world, traveled the darkened sea on the cloaks of gods, peered into the afterlife and clawed myself back out. How else do you think I survived the ending of my race? I... err..."

The kids were mostly confused, so I sighed, dropped the act and let my voice return to normal. "I'm from across the sea to the west. And no, I'm not undead. Does anyone know what countries are to the west of here?"

"Gyre," said the unicorn colt who had spoken without being called on earlier. "And then the desert."

"That's east," Flarefeather corrected with a smile. "West means across the ocean. Does anyone know their geography?"

A studious filly had her hoof up without jabbing it around, so I called on her. "In the west, there are Ironridge, Varsidel, Yakyakistan and Silverwind," she reported dutifully, looking to Flarefeather for approval.

"Silverwind is a myth," said the unicorn colt, clearly trying to restore his street cred by scoring a win.

One of the real teachers waiting on the sidelines came and scooped him up. "Hey!" he protested. "It is a myth!"

"Silverwind isn't a myth," Flarefeather told the crowd, "it's just empty and has nobody living there, just like Mistvale is now. The world has a lot of empty spots. And a lot of spots we think are empty, but might actually have rare discoveries waiting to be discovered. And other times, they have new people to meet instead! Don't you all thing being able to see distant lands with your own eyes would be amazing? Now, I know all of you can't go traveling until you're older, but until then, I've got your back with my stories, okay? Alright! Before we leave, does anyone have any questions for my knight, Halcyon?"

Somehow, no one blurted, so I was able to pick a talon.

"Are you really able to turn invisible?" the grifflet asked, clearly expecting a demonstration.

I shrugged. I could do that. "Can anyone dim the lights, just a little?"

One of the teachers got up and obliged, and soon the room was dim enough for me to shadow sneak. I sunk into the floor up to my chin.

The crowd rumbled with enamored whisperings. "Pick me!" a filly begged, barely able to contain herself.

I glanced around, and the children close to her didn't seem to be pressing questions. Taking that as a sign that they were giving her a turn, I nodded, selecting her.

"Are powers like those how sarosians helped High Prince Gazelle topple the Empire?" she asked, curious and earnest.

I bit my lip. "Probably? I might be the wrong pony to ask about that. Too young to have been around back then."

A grifflet rotated to face Flarefeather. "You should get an older knight," he advised.

"Hey." Flarefeather grimaced. "If someone actually was old enough to remember those days, the last thing they'd want to do is talk about them, so you'll have to settle for stories from youngsters like her. And me. And anyway, getting old isn't as fun as it sounds. You kids are lucky because you get to hang out with each other all day long. Old people are boring. Now, can Princess Izvaldi and her knight Halcyon get a grand procession on their way out?"

The trumpet grifflet enthusiastically returned to his role, the older children clearly relishing the role of showing off their choreography. And, a minute later, we were out.

"Be honest with me," I teased as Flarefeather put her work uniform back on. "You only brought us here to have an excuse to yank on my ears."

"To platonically play with your ears," Flarefeather corrected. "And sure, that was like... fifteen percent of the reason. Maybe twenty. But you did want to see something inspiring, right?"

"Those kids?" I tilted my head.

"Me!" Flarefeather insisted, getting up in my face. "Performing a selfless act of community service? No rewards, going above and beyond the call of duty? And, yeah, the kids. I mean, don't you like kids?"

Poplar was waiting for us, and stepped out from around a corner. "The majority of those kids belong to students here, you know."

I lifted my ears.

"Sorry for stealing your thunder, but it looked like you were floundering a little," Poplar said to Flarefeather as she struggled with a bow strap. "And I can't help myself when I see an opportunity." He turned back to me. "About twenty years ago, shortly before the war, the Izvaldi capitol complex was destroyed amidst a battle between Garsheeva and a notorious heretic. There was an orphanage on the premises, and though it was successfully evacuated, its facilities were destroyed. Due to some personal connection I don't fully understand, a high-ranking commander in Wilderwind offered to assume responsibility for the displaced children. We were even given an education here at this school, despite being unable to pay and unusually young..."

"We?" I interrupted. "You mean you and Flarefeather?"

Poplar blinked. "Oh? Myself and the other teachers here, yes, we were among those orphans. Flarefeather has a different connection to this place, and would probably bite my head off if I tried explaining it for her." He chuckled. "Regardless, once we came of age, many of us from the Izvaldi orphanage wanted to repay Wilderwind for what it had done for us. So, we opened this program using the resources they originally gave us to educate ourselves. And now it functions as an educational day-care of sorts for the students' children... Quite useful, given how Wilderwind boasts the highest rate of single young mothers in the Empire. It's just our way of finding meaning in our lives while also saying thank you."

"Sappyyyyy..." Flarefeather rolled her eyes. "Anyways, boom, there's your heartwarming, uplifting and inspiring field trip that I totally didn't get to explain at my own pace. Community service is cool. Kids are cool! I'm cool for coming to help them, even if I'm a little more popular than I am effective... Ever since I told them what my legs mean, I've just been the resident Princess, even though I'd forfeit my head if I actually tried claiming the Izvaldi throne. Does this, um, meet your expectations? I'm kind of worried this bombed, just a little..."

I shrugged. "I've just never really been around kids much before. There were almost none where I grew up."

Flarefeather's look morphed to sympathy. "Filly, you're missing out. Kids are awesome. They're so innocent, even when they're talking about things they have no right knowing about. And they don't judge you if you act weird while trying to hang out with them. I love kids, and I wish I could do a little more for them beyond brightening up their day with my princess accent."

Her seriousness took my ambivalence and bowled it over. "You really do enjoy this."

"Suuure do!" Flarefeather's grin returned. "Anyway, how was that for a sinister ulterior motive for wanting to make friends with a sarosian? Absolutely diabolical, right? Your life has been ruined now that a room full of kids got to see a new species for the first time in most of their lives?"

I giggled just a little. "Alright, alright, you win..."

"Sounds like our work here has brightened up your day as well, then," Poplar said with a bow. "Please take care on your travels. The Empire has never been known as an easy place in which to be a sarosian."

We left the foals' wing, heading back through the corridors to the central plaza. "So?" Flarefeather asked. "Hungry yet, or should we do something else?"

I shrugged. "What are our options? I could go either way."

"Well, Lissa does owe us lunch," Flarefeather pointed out. "For that bet earlier. And I would like you to meet her properly. You know, since you were interested in the library earlier, I could leave you there while I fly back to the tower and get her, and then we could all meet up and head somewhere from there?"

"That sounds good." I thought it over, and decided a school should be arguably the safest place in the city... though there was always a possibility of me uncovering a horrifying revelation while idly perusing tomes that would ruin my life for the foreseeable future. But that was a risk worth taking for the chance to ransack a research library not curated by Icereach. "How long will you need? I could use as long as you give me there."

Flarefeather tapped a hoof to her chin. "In that case, how about I give you an hour? Gotta remind the bosses that I'm still working, even if it's not where they can see it."

An hour? That was like offering someone a salad with only a single crouton. But it could at least be enough to determine what sections I'd be interested in coming back to later. "Sounds good," I told her. "Point me in the right direction, and let's see how much fun I can have in an hour."

Library Time

Flarefeather went on her way, leaving me at the entrance the the school library. Though, 'entrance' might not have been the right word - rather than a cavernous hallway like I had been imagining, it was just another wing of the complex, ordinary corridors splitting up the rooms where the books were actually kept. It felt like this had been constructed as general-purpose school space, and converted to a library after the fact.

I got fewer weird looks than I was expecting, being a batpony dressed in armor in a school library. Most of the ones I did get were probably due to my sword; I wasn't the only one with strange garb, and I fit in well with the local age distribution. Or maybe it was just my face. Batponies were rare, after all.

But no one tried to deny me passage, and so I wandered the halls, peering into each room and taking stock of how things were labeled, getting a feel for the library's collection. The most popular rooms were the ones dedicated to math, finance, logistics and leadership, by a huge margin. Not surprising, considered this was a business school. Leading a mercenary company probably took all those skills and more. It did make me wonder, however: were the creatures going to this school the children of elites, who were already destined for leadership roles? Or did Wilderwind's culture simply funnel anyone with ambition here, and churn out far more candidates with the skills for the job than there were companies to lead?

Either way, I got an uneasy feeling about the role a society like this could play in the world. In more peaceful times, their organizational skills could easily be put to use for mercantile purposes. In less peaceful times, those skills would apply to war instead, and could much more easily be used to start or prolong wars than stop them. It made a lot more sense, now, why Geirskogul was so worried about Wilderwind's unity and moral fiber.

I rounded a corner, passing a pair of rooms dedicated to biology, anatomy and medicine. That made sense; you needed medics to maintain your soldiers. There were noticeably fewer students here than in the previous rooms.

There was also a strange, nameless unease, a sensation that not all was quite right. Now that I thought about it, it had been slowly building in the back of my mind ever since I entered the library, steering my thoughts toward warier places. Was I just being paranoid now that I was on my own again? Odd, considering just yesterday I had been worrying that hanging out with Flarefeather would lead to a trap. I forcefully tapped the side of my head with a hoof. Why couldn't my feelings work in more reasonable ways?

Whatever. I turned back the way I had already come, deciding I shouldn't wander too far from our meetup point when I didn't have much time... and after a room or two, I trailed off and frowned.

That sensation was slowly getting lighter and less pressing in my mind.

Cautiously, I turned around again and retraced my steps. Ever so slowly, the feeling that something was wrong increased again.

It wasn't in my head. Something weird was going on.

I quickened my pace, holding my head high and paying as much attention to myself as I possibly could, trying to figure out what I was feeling and why. It registered the same way an altitude change did, or a low vibration that you felt first in your bones; some sensation that wasn't picked up by any of the normal sensory organs. And it got stronger quite quickly, tripling in intensity over the span of a single room.

After that point, it didn't change, feeling roughly like there was a cork lodged in my brain no matter which direction I went. Until I tried going backwards again, at which point it got weaker along the same trajectory it had strengthened. Something physical was causing this, at a definite location, and it wasn't moving. I narrowed my eyes and checked the nearby rooms.

None of these were in use by any students. One was an archival room dedicated to Varsidelian poetry, another was empty, another claimed to hold the rescued collection of a library in Goldfeather that hadn't been sorted yet after it was saved following the Empire's fall... Sure, that was a decently suspicious place to look. It was locked, and the lights were off, which I took as a courteous invitation to enter.

Inside the room, my bracelet provided enough light to see stacked boxes and not much else. I couldn't feel anything different though, not since I had crossed that final threshold. Did that mean that even if I did find what was causing this, I might not know it when I saw it?

You know, Faye pointed out, this is a school. It's possible someone is just running a regular experiment that does this as a side effect, and they don't know it because there are no batponies here to tell them?

I slowly nodded. "You want to take over?"

Nah. Faye backed off in my mind. Just thinking that we've been pleasantly surprised once today, with that Royal Spectrum turning out to be nothing nefarious. So, wouldn't we be less likely to get in trouble if we went to get lunch with Flarefeather and then left Wilderwind with Puddles than if we tried to figure out what this is?

I paused. She was almost certainly right; I knew that on an intellectual level. There was no way Wilderwind was keeping something sinister in their school that would doom me for not knowing about it. That was comically implausible. Even if, with my luck, it would be true.

The bigger way walking away could go wrong was if learning about this taught me something that could help Coda.

And besides, I was curious. "You're not the least suspicious?" I whispered. "You can feel it, right?"

I can, Faye confirmed. Honestly, it feels a little like how the Night's Boon base felt, in Gyre. Just a little. Well, it's up to you.

I was loathe to leave, but checking a few of the boxes revealed only stacks of magazines and foals' books, many of which were well-used. And Faye was right. I had just asked myself, on the way here, what the odds were that something would go fantastically wrong while exploring the library. And if I stuck my nose in too deeply and regretted it, there would be no one I could possibly blame but myself. That wouldn't be luck, it would be a lack of self-preservation.

Common sense was just barely strong enough to squash my curiosity. I turned out my bracelet and left.

The weird sensation abated as I expected, and by the time I reached the entrance of the library, I couldn't feel it at all. But Flarefeather wasn't back yet, and so for minutes on end I got to kick myself and wrestle with my urge to go back and find out more.

Finally, that changed. Two pegasi in flamboyant elevator mare outfits pranced into sight toward me, one unmistakably Flarefeather and the other a teal mare in a blue costume whom I recognized quickly as her friend, Lissa. Lissa was grinning like she had just learned a secret, and Flarefeather was pouting. Clearly, they had gotten an eventful conversation in on the way here.

"Hey," I greeted, strolling out to meet them, pushing back one last pang of curiosity. "Lunch?"

"Lunch!" Lissa agreed, sidling up beside me with an aloof air. "Gotta see what all this Halcyon hype is about for myself. Real sarosian, huh?"

"Did the library live up to your standards?" Flarefeather asked, with the air of someone who was trying to change the subject.

"I could have spent longer," I answered truthfully, glancing back over my shoulder. "Really just got to see what the rooms all were, and not spend much time with the books themselves."

Lissa gave a knowing smile. "Yeah, I heard you were a nerd. So, since I'm on the hook for lunch, you're okay with somewhere cheap, right? School food court, maybe? Since it's your fault I lost the bet, and all?"

I hesitated. "Err..."

"Great!" Lissa slyly winked. "Because I'm basically broke anyway. And they've got fast food and stuff. You'll love it. Come on, now!"

Flarefeather gave me an I told you so shrug, even though she hadn't told me anything.

So Lissa lead, and I followed. The school food court turned out to be a nicer version of Icereach's cafeteria, except three of them stacked side by side to accommodate the full student population. The rooms were still organized in a utilitarian measure, but the benches and tables were real wood instead of metal, with larger tables towards the middle and smaller ones at the edges for loners or small parties like ourselves. And after Lissa haggled our way in past the bored griffon at the gate, I realized it was even an all-you-can-eat buffet.

I stacked my plate high and returned to our table, the last of us three to arrive. "Well?" I asked, sliding in, aware that I was getting ever so slightly more weird looks with my current company.

Jealous looks, mostly.

"Well, start talking!" Flarefeather shoved me, speaking with her mouth full.

"What do you want me to talk about?" I looked between her and my plate, and then to Lissa.

"The same things you talk about with me?" Flarefeather raised an eyebrow. "You know, your gritty, edgy paranoia? 'How do I know this isn't a trap?' That kind of stuff?"

I frowned. She wanted me to act like a basket case?

Lissa, for her part, was smugly eating, watching our exchange.

"Come on, she's real into experienced worldly types like that," Flarefeather pressed. "You're supposed to make me look cool for having cool taste in friends. Or are you really that at ease around me after only a day or two of hanging out?" She immediately switched from a pleading look to a saucy smile.

I sighed, turning my attention to Lissa. "If you've got questions, ask away. I'm not a chatterbox, but I'll answer what I can."

Lissa evaluated me, a hint of neutrality behind her taunting smile. "Stoic warrior type, eh? You get in fights often?"

"Only when I can't avoid it," I answered.

"Oh yeah?" she pressed. "What do you fight for? There's gotta be a line you draw somewhere, right?"

I flicked my ears, sensing that her eagerness was more projected than Flarefeather's. Their demeanors were very similar, but Lissa's felt more like a front. "Isn't that a pretty personal thing to ask someone you've just met?"

"What if I asked it, then?" Flarefeather asked. "For that matter, where are you even from? Couldn't tell if you dodged the kids' question back there because they just didn't need to know, or because... you know... it's a secret."

"Ever heard of Icereach?" I asked her back.

"Nnnope!" Flarefeather perked up. Lissa leaned in too, her head a little lower than Flarefeather's.

"Well, that's why." I shrugged. "Would have taken more explaining than their attention spans could handle."

Flarefeather smiled gamely. "I've got a great attention span."

Lissa leaned over and kissed her.

"Hey!" Flarefeather protested, reddening and pulling away. "Stop trying to distract me and make me eat my words! That's cheating! And not fair!"

"You can get revenge whenever you want it." Lissa winked, then turned her attention back to me. "More practical question: what's the traveling climate like these days? You geared up just for self-defense?"

I shrugged. "Depends how good you are at not sticking your nose where it doesn't belong, and how lucky you are. But the world's pretty dangerous right now, so I'm not sure there's anywhere you could go if you really wanted to be safe. Are you planning a trip, or something?"

"No such thing as having too many options open," Lissa answered. "Especially when you're in our shoes."

"You're not happy with things here?" I tilted my head. "Might be a silly question. Flarefeather is always going on about how gross your jobs can get sometimes."

Lissa blew a raspberry. "Gross? Messing with clients is great. It's more about the limited outlook for the future. There are too many things us escorts aren't allowed to do, and at the top of the list is expect a promotion. We could be here until we're old and ugly. But don't you think asking a filly her motives is a little personal when you've only just met?" She gave me a pointed wink.

I blinked, then frowned. "Look... Fine. The reason I'm out here is-"

Lissa beamed, and also blushed, fluttering her eyelashes pointedly. "Really? So you don't mind getting a little personal with me after all?"

I lost my train of thought, and had nothing to do but sigh.

"Sorry," she snickered, looking not at all remorseful. "Force of habit. And we are still on the clock. Just doing what the job entails. No hard feelings, right?"

"You're the one who wants to hear what I have to say," I pointed out, a little annoyed. "And no matter how hard you flirt with me, it's not going to work. I'm just not attracted to other ponies. It's nothing personal."

"Wow," Lissa said, nodding along. "You really are ace. Or maybe just dead inside. Tip from a pro: even if you feel nothing, pretend to enjoy it and we can give your social status a big boost. It's one of the few things we actually have the power to do around here."

I flicked my tail and folded my ears. "I'm not going to be around here long enough for that to matter. So if you want your affections to be repaid, save them for each other." I sighed again, my thoughts threatening to wander to the time Procyon told me the reason I only liked machines instead of ponies was because she took my horny side - and a crush on Corsica - with her when she left. "I don't mean to be mean. It's just the way I am."

"Alright. Water under the bridge." Lissa slapped Flarefeather on the back, causing her to spill part of her drink and shoot Lissa a rude look. "You were saying?"

"You asked what I fight for," I said. "Well, I've got a friend... Almost more of an adopted little sister at this point. And her lot in life is insanely bad. She's cursed to be stuck in a magical block of ice, and on top of that, she got foalnapped. The reason I came to the Griffon Empire is because I was chasing her, and I just recently managed to rescue her. But I still need to break the curse, and that's what I'll be working on the moment I leave Wilderwind."

Lissa's facade melted a little, and I got a look of genuine sympathy. "That's wild. What kind of stuff will breaking it take?"

"Dunno yet." I shook my head. All my leads were tentative, and mostly revolved around better understanding my own powers so that I could help share the load without also sharing Coda's fate. "Right now, it'll take a lot of guessing in the dark until I stumble onto something promising. But I've got an idea to try in Izvaldi, and I at least want to do that before I bail on the Empire."

"You said you were cursed too, right?" Flarefeather cut in. "Your bracelet? And probably your luck as well? Did you just bond with this kid over being cursed, or something?"

I almost chuckled. "Not quite. I knew her before she got iced. Would be nice if she could meet you, though. She grew up real isolated, and the last promise I got to make to her was to show her the world."

"Show her the world, huh?" Flarefeather turned distant, looking away.

Beside her, Lissa hefted her empty plate - both of these mares were far better at holding a conversation while eating than I was, not that I considered myself a slouch at that. "More food. Be right back. Anyone want anything?"

Flarefeather shook her head. "Nah, I'll go get my own in a bit."

I nodded down at my half-full plate to signal a pass as well.

"Alright!" Lissa trotted off.

"You know," Flarefeather said the moment Lissa was out of earshot, "you two kind of remind me of each other."

"We do?" I blinked, looking out after Lissa.

Flarefeather leaned all the way across the table to get close to my ear. "Don't tell a single soul this filly spilled so much of her heart out for you like this, especially Lissa. But... I'm pretty sure the reason she wants to leave Wilderwind is more for my sake than her own."

I raised an eyebrow.

"I'm a simple mare of simple means!" Flarefeather innocently shrugged. "Right now, I've got job security, political immunity, a great flirting buddy, and I do nothing in return except act cute all the time. Who could want for more, pfft, not me! But for some reason, she gets mad whenever I tell her that. And the times it comes up are whenever she's talking about going out to show me the world, just like you said now."

My eyes widened just a little.

"I think she knows I'm settling for too little," Flarefeather said. "And, I mean, I know it too. I told you I love kids, right? But do you think I could start a family with this job? In Wilderwind, the day-care system is your mercenary company, and if you don't have one, you're screwed with a capital S. My point is, your friend's lucky to have you, and I hope she knows it! And also, you had better give Lissa the best travel advice of your life." She threw in a wink for good measure.

I sat back and took a deep breath. "Well, if you're about to ask to come with me, my first advice is, don't. Seriously cursed, remember?"

Flarefeather blinked. "Wait, is that even an option?"

I realized too late that she hadn't actually been considering it. "A really bad one? There's a reason why this was the first thing I said..."

"Oh well." Flarefeather looked downcast for only the briefest of moments. "Oh, hey, Lissa!"

"Hey." Lissa scooted back in, already back with a second heaping plate of food. "So, I've cooked up some ideas," she said, fixing me with a serious look. "About your friend and her curse. Do you know Mistvale Arts?"

"No," I admitted. "You know about them?"

"Just hear me out," Lissa pressed. "Mistvale was home to the sarosian society. And it's pretty big, and so mountainous that you can't explore it, period, without an airship. So how well do you think it's been explored since they all died off?"

I slowly blinked. "Where are you going with this?"

"You're a sarosian," Lissa continued. "Mistvale sarosians had all sorts of mysterious and closely-guarded powers. What if, by exploring the ruins of Mistvale, you could learn some secret technique that would help you in your quest?"

I exhaled hard. My thoughts had all been pointing towards Izvaldi, towards finding the remains of Stanza, but at best that would give me new insight into how changeling queens, and possibly just Chrysalis herself, worked. But Mistvale was a much bigger, much richer target. And Lissa was right. There were things many old batponies could do that I couldn't, Mistvale Arts foremost among them. That was a really good idea.

"Interested?" Lissa raised a knowing eyebrow. "See, I knew you'd think this idea has promise. Now, hypothetically, and without being too specific, I might know a way to make that search a whole lot quicker and easier for you. If you're willing to trade for it."

Flarefeather suddenly looked wary. "Lissa, are you thinking of-"

Lissa silenced her with another kiss. "Hush, you. I know what I'm doing." She turned back to me with a big grin. "And what I want are sarosian facts! What's it like to be a bat? Can you feel your own fangs when your mouth is closed? Does the world look different through slitted eyes? Is it true that you're obsessed with fruit? Can you really eee?"

I cleared my throat, taken aback. "How about one question at a time? Also, why?"

Lissa shrugged. "I'm half-sarosian. Heretical, I know. Can't blame me for wanting to get in touch with my heritage, right?"

"I don't think having mixed species parentage makes you half and half..." I uncertainly pointed out. But she probably had her own definition, or just didn't care. "But sure. Fine. Ask questions more slowly."

"Where are you from?" Lissa asked. "Somewhere with other sarosians, presumably, to be your parents?"

I rubbed at the back of my neck with a wing spoke. "That's what I was trying to explain earlier when you two were making out... I'm from Icereach. It's a colony in the mountains, halfway between Ironridge and Yakyakistan. Lots of batponies. Very remote. And given how things are for us in the north, most of them prefer it to remain that way."

"In the north?" Flarefeather looked confused. "You mean Mistvale? Isn't that more to the east of where you're talking about?"

Oh, right. The existence of Equestria - and all the other lands south of the Aldenfold - weren't actually common knowledge in the north. I had learned that once, long before actually going there.

But Lissa knew. "You're talking about the Plains of Harmony?" she guessed, perking up. "You know much about them?"

"Well, a bit," I said, holding off on telling her I had not only been there, but cavorted with royalty. "Assuming that's what you call Equestria. You're interested?"

Lissa furrowed her brow. "From what I've heard, it's devilishly hard to get them to let you in. They say the only people in the east at all with the influence to get them to do that were the old goddesses, Garsheeva and the Night Mother. But I've also heard that if you can go there, it's much easier to get a brand."

I blinked. It was easier in Equestria to get your special talent? I almost never thought about those, seeing as I had been born with mine and also generally tried to hide or lie about its function. But I couldn't necessarily remember seeing a lot of ponies without one there, either...

"Surprised?" Lissa asked. "Guess you're lucky, never having to worry about that. It's true that all sarosians are born with their brands, then?"

I nodded. "Yeah. Never happens any other way. But for other ponies, they're supposed to be related to things you really strongly care about, and for us, there's not as strong of a connection."

Saying it that way almost made me do a double-take. Did that have anything to do with why it was easier for moon glass and changeling queens to kill batponies by taking their special talents? This would merit further thought later, for sure.

"Ahhh," Lissa said with a grin. "So around your own kind, you're pretty normal, but out here with the rest of us, you're guaranteed to be special. What's your brand do? Show me yours, and I'll show you mine."

She patted her flank, which I now noticed was covered cleanly by the skirt of her uniform. Same with Flarefeather. I had just seen Flarefeather naked an hour ago, yet realized I couldn't remember at all what her flank had looked like underneath.

"I'm kind of bundled up," I apologized, twisting to show off my armor. "And like you said, they're not really a big deal to me. Cultural differences, I guess."

"Lucky," Flarefeather muttered.

"Well, okay." Lissa shrugged. "Got anything else neat you can do? You said no Mistvale Arts, but what about the telepathy stuff? Like how sarosians used to pray at their altars and claimed they could hear the Night Mother. Is that real? Did you have that out west?"

I shook my head, wondering if all this was going somewhere or if Lissa really was just curious. I couldn't blame her if she was, I decided. And this would be a sensible reason for Flarefeather to introduce us. "I've heard it's real, but we didn't have any higher beings to make use of it."

"You're not much of a showoff," Lissa remarked, munching away. "Yeah, you're born with your brand, but it's boring. Yeah, you can communicate with your mind, but literally no one cares about figuring out how it works so you can use it without a god around? Is that the vibe I should be getting?" She raised an eyebrow. "Even if it's true, that's not a great face to put on for impressing people. Especially someone who just asked you to impress them."

"I guess I just value honesty?" I guessed, keenly aware of how much I habitually hid or lied about. The truth was, I just didn't feel a need to impress others, not that she needed to know.

Lissa kicked Flarefeather. "You sure managed to pick up a boring sarosian."

Flarefeather stuck out her tongue in return. "Well, maybe you're just bad at getting her to open up! I told you she doesn't like personal questions."

"I'm right here, you know," I cut in, feeling like this situation warranted scaring them just a little. "And you wouldn't be exuberant or outgoing either if stuff went wrong for you as often as it does for me. The telepathy thing isn't cool, it's a weakness. Literally while you were meeting up and I was in the library, I felt something trying to mess with my mind. I'm just not-"

Both mares snapped to attention. "Wait, seriously?" Flarefeather asked.

I nodded.

"In the library?" she pressed. "Your bad luck really did come to haunt you the moment I stepped away? What did it turn out to be?"

"I didn't stay to investigate," I hesitantly said, suddenly feeling I had steered this conversation in the wrong direction. "Why?"

They looked at each other.

"Schools are supposed to be safe," Lissa pointed out. "They wouldn't keep something dangerous here deliberately, right?"

"Unless they didn't know it was dangerous," Flarefeather replied, continuing her line of thought. "Which they might not, because sarosians are rare enough that no one might have wandered through here to tell them about it."

"We could get someone to owe us a big favor, here," Lissa added. "If we brought this to the attention of the administrators."

"Hold up," I interrupted, waving both wings in a dramatic no. "Slow down. You're assuming whatever it is isn't there on purpose and we wouldn't get in major trouble for finding out about it."

"Trouble with whom?" Lissa frowned, tilting her head. "The school has safety officers for a reason. If it's something dangerous, it's not supposed to be here."

I tapped my wing spokes together. "With whoever put it there? Who would have done so illegally if that's really against the rules, and thus might also break the rules to get back at us?"

Flarefeather whistled. "Yup. There's that paranoia I was talking about, see? You wanted to see it; now it's on full display. Though she sort of has a point..."

"Nope." Lissa adamantly shook her head. "Passing off problems as someone else's problem is how everything goes wrong. Besides, I want to see this sort of thing in action. Finish your lunches and we're going to go see the safety office."

I groaned, turning back to my meal. It seemed I'd get to sate my curiosity after all... Hopefully, if someone official was on my side, that would lessen the chances of this turning into another cascading problem.

"Really?" a bespectacled unicorn mare asked, sitting behind a desk in the school's security office a short while later. "I can't say I've heard any reports of this before, though we also don't play host to many sarosians."

"That's what I felt," I confirmed with a nod, having gone over the bare minimum necessary for her to know that a point source somewhere in the library was giving me a weird feeling that others likely were immune to. "I don't know if it's a problem, but they wanted me to report it." I nodded back to Lissa and Flarefeather, who were waiting right behind me.

"I suppose it merits investigation," the security mare agreed, getting out of her chair. "We don't want anyone feeling unsafe here just because they're an uncommon species, though it sounds less like something deliberate and more like a side effect of something no one's had the chance to consider. Why don't we see if we can track this mystery effect down?"

I nodded thankfully, less because she was helping me and more because nothing bad had happened. The four of us traced a quick route back to the library, at which point I sharpened my senses and went on high alert.

"You could try to triangulate it," Lissa said as we passed the zone where the effect reached its strongest, resting strangely in the back of my mind as if the atmosphere's composition had suddenly changed.

"If there's a definite threshold, we'll do that," the guard agreed, pulling some chalk from her saddlebag and offering it to me. "Don't worry about the floor, it'll come out. Can you mark down where it reaches a level you'd be able to precisely recognize anywhere else?"

I took the chalk, walking back and forth and eventually deciding I had the right spot. Then, we continued through the hallways, combing back and forth around the intersecting corridors and finding more places where the feeling reached its strongest, the guard leaving and returning shortly with a map to transcribe my markings to.

They made up a very clear circle that even centered neatly on a room. But the room in question was locked, and had boxes stacked against the interiors of its windows.

"Hmm," the security mare said, tapping her chin with a hoof. "Would you mind if I left for a second to look up who's responsible for this room? A lot of the ones in this section belong to individual archival projects dating to the aftermath of the war, and many of them, we haven't had the resources to do more than store for safekeeping. It's quite likely your culprit is something no one knows about, and your insight on it might be of value to our scholars."

I nodded. Odds of malicious intent down, odds of accidental land mine up. And if it was neither, the possibility of getting answers from a scholar was very tempting.

It took long enough for her to return that Lissa and Flarefeather, mercifully bored of teasing me, started flirting with each other instead, leaving me free to think. Going to Mistvale, Lissa had suggested. Trying to learn something from the ruins of my ancestors' home... It was basically what I was already planning with Izvaldi.

Except, I had a ride to Izvaldi in the form of Puddles, who had told me Geirskogul had given her plenty of leads to justify a trip there. Mistvale was much vaster than the Empire, by contrast, and I couldn't think of a way to convince Puddles to take me there instead. Though, the prospect of batpony temples filled with thousand-year-old writings, unspoiled since the day their inhabitants disappeared, was almost tantalizing beyond measure...

The security mare returned, and with her was Poplar. The Night's Boon stallion who had just played host to Flarefeather and I this morning.

"Ah!" he greeted with a smile. "They mentioned a sarosian, and I wondered if it might be you! I'm told something in this room has given you cause for alarm?"

I tilted my head. "You guys are responsible for this?"

"If by this, you mean the room," he agreed, the guard stepping back to let us talk. "It's been quite a while since anyone has been here, as far as I'm aware. Let me see..." He fumbled in his robe for a key.

"What's inside?" I asked, more curious now that I knew a group like this - not that I fully understood what the Night's Boon even did - was related to something that could give me a weird feeling at a distance. Especially since, as Faye had noted, their base in Gyre felt slightly similar, too.

"I've mostly forgotten, to tell you the truth," Poplar explained. "You see, the Night's Boon - the organization most of my friends an I are a part of - was the first, and to my knowledge only, group to attempt an expedition deep into Mistvale following the extinction event. Now, all of us here at the school were too young to come along, but we were able to persuade the school to provide financial backing to the venture, and that included giving us space to store what was brought back..."

With a click, the door swung open and the lights came on. It took no investigation at all to tell what was responsible for the way I was feeling.

Dusk statues. Half a dozen of them, one in the center and the others lined up along the back wall, in a pattern that suggested there had once been more of them and several had been removed. The ones against the wall were inert, just like the ones in the bunker at Icereach. But the one in the middle was not only active; it was modified.

First, it sat in the middle of a large, custom-built glass tank that was full of water. The core on the necklace glowed with a strange flux, a vortex that seemed to be constantly folding in on itself contained within a colorless white gem that wasn't cut like the originals. And runes had been inscribed on the statue, a line of sparkling, glistening characters that traced its way down from the core, along the statue's chest and pedestal, through the glass wall of the tank and onto the floor outside it.

From there, they zigzagged, turning at sharp angles and running in straight lines, crawling up a wall and disappearing into an air vent by the ceiling.

"Oh?" Poplar blinked in recognition. "Never mind, I do remember this! I didn't realize it was still set up... You could feel this from a distance? That's fascinating."

I was staring at the runes. I had seen runes just like these before, in the Night's Boon's base in Gyre. They were exactly the same.

Rather than listen to Poplar's explanation, I acted on instinct, getting close enough to lean down and smell the runes. The muted sensation I had been feeling disentangled itself into a flurry of emotions: stress, struggle and striving, spikes of understanding and victory, weariness and quiet camaraderie, and an intense desire to improve.

Did these emotions belong to the students studying in the library?

"In the depths of the Mistvale temples, the expedition found some very unconventional dusk statues," Poplar was explaining. "Ones that did things like react to the emotions of the creatures around them, even non-sarosians, all on their own. I think this was an attempt to make a regular one work like one of the special ones at the temple cores, using what we could understand of the temples' technology... Not that I was involved as a researcher, though I did get to watch them work sometimes! The ink for these runes was made from ground-up crystals taken from the cities that used to serve similar functions, except we couldn't figure out how to make more crystals, if I recall..."

"What was that function?" I asked, staring at the runes and mentally comparing them to the ones in the Gyre base. Hadn't those all traced back into a room I hadn't explored? What were the odds they connected to modified dusk statues in there, too? Were the runes some sort of range extender or guide, and the dusk statues were using them to produce the base's anti-revenant shield?

Maybe the reason the effect I felt here wasn't fully the same was just because this school wasn't built in a hole blasted in reality, and otherwise they were exactly the same thing. This could even be a prototype for the one in Gyre.

"Some type of conduit for magic, I believe," Poplar answered. "In hindsight, it makes a lot of sense you'd be able to feel something like this. Sarosians were always said to be closely attuned to dusk statues, and our modifications might have let you feel this one from farther away. I wonder if anything would happen were you to try praying to it? My higher-ups in the Night's Boon would undoubtedly be fascinated, although I don't think this research here has been touched for years..."

I didn't know much about how to use dusk statues, at least not the proper way. And if this was an autonomous setup, there wouldn't be anyone on the other side to hear me, anyway. But I was curious... I knelt down and touched my bracelet, carefully turned off, to the runes near the tank.

Instantly, I felt a whirling sensation somewhat akin to taking off my mask, like when you wake up too quickly and all the blood rushes out of your head. My senses took a second to recover, and when they did, I was seeing double.

Part of me was still in the storage room, kneeling on the floor. Another part of me was disembodied and massive... No, not disembodied. I just didn't have a body anything like I had ever had before. I couldn't see, not in a conventional sense, but I was aware of a huge number of rooms, some empty and others bustling with life, each one of those lives glowing like a little star.

Up or down didn't exist, gravity was missing and distance was relative, but sound was a thousand times richer than normal. I could feel a hundred voices passing me by, perhaps two hundred, as if each one was speaking directly into my ear and I had enough ears to accommodate every single one of them, and the mental capacity not to get overwhelmed by it all. The words weren't in any language I recognized, yet the feelings behind them were clear, exactly as I had felt while sniffing the runes except now so much closer.

It was like a river of emotion, rushing by through a sea of emptiness. I could take some for myself, if I wanted, dip my hoof into the stream and fish out as much or as little as I needed. And I could see where it was coming from, the lights of the creatures scattered all throughout my awareness. But where was it all going?

My consciousness tried to follow the river, and came to a vortex, just like the one I saw in the statue's core. The emotions were all going in there. And then they were going somewhere else, beyond the vortex, but when I tried to feel out where that was, I felt immediately strained, like I was trying to shout above the river's noise and had only my own voice with which to do so.

I could have turned on my bracelet, but that didn't feel wise. I pulled back in the real world, and the mental world disconnected with a snap that sent my vision reeling again.

"What were you doing?" Poplar asked, curious. "Did anything happen?"

I shook my head to clear it. This was not a static setup. All that emotion was going somewhere, and I was less concerned with whether anyone would miss it and more with what it was being used for. What was that vortex? It felt like less of a storage device and more of a portal...

"More importantly," the security mare said, "now that the cause has been identified, can I mark this as case closed? It sounds like the responsible party has been notified, and will take care of things on their end?"

And then it hit me: the runes here were collecting emotion, somehow, but I couldn't tell where they were sending it. The ones in Gyre were using emotion to stabilize the space around them and shut out the revenants, but I had never thought about where they were getting it.

This contraption was harvesting the students' ambition and desire to improve, and somehow sending it to Gyre to power their shield.

"Well, since nobody's been checking on the experiment here, we could always take it down," Poplar suggested. "We wouldn't want to cause anyone discomfort on behalf of something no one is using."

"You should... hold off on that," I tentatively suggested. "And maybe ask your higher-ups if that's okay first. I think this might be doing more than it looks like, and could actually be important."

I remembered multiple lines of runes heading into the door in Gyre, and the soup of emotions in that place had certainly felt more complex than the focused ones here. And anyone smart wouldn't design their life support system to fail if just a single piece went offline, especially if those pieces were hidden in innocuous locations like this, under the watch of those who didn't realize how important they were. Still, even if I didn't know what the Night's Boon's game was, it would feel pretty terrible to doom them to being chopped up by revenants by letting someone take out the power source on their shield.

Hold on, an emotion-powered life-support system... Neo Everlaste. The castle at the edge of the world. Was that connected to this too?

My head spun. Investigating this had been a good call after all. I suddenly had some big new pieces to the picture of how everything in the Empire fit together, pieces very few others could ever have access to.

The question was, what could I do with this information... Its best use might just be as a bartering chip with well-intentioned creatures like Puddles and Geirskogul who could put it to proper use, in exchange for things I wanted like safety and airship passage.

Either way, I was in good shape. Luck had majorly gone my way for once. And with how often it swung the other way, I would be a fool not to make the most of this.

Travel Plans

By the time we left the school, it was mid-afternoon. I was feeling above average, the mystery of the school library put successfully behind me with no adverse consequences. Lissa and Flarefeather, by contrast, clearly saw this result as less of a relief and more of a fun adventure, and I didn't have the heart to lower their spirits by talking about how much worse this could have gone. And as they had no desire to put a stop to the day's fun so early, I soon found myself talked into leading them back to Puddles' ship to make formal introductions.

It was silly, considering they clearly already knew her - at least well enough that Flarefeather already knew where she was going when the two of us went to visit Geirskogul. I had my suspicions, though. It seemed like Lissa hadn't quite figured me out, and had taken my resistance to her flirting as an unwillingness to talk about my travels.

Lissa and Flarefeather copied each other's mannerisms and acted similar on the surface, but where Flarefeather had naively bashed her head into my cynicism over and over until she broke through, Lissa was quicker to back off and re-evaluate her strategy. Perhaps too quick, since I wasn't averse to giving her what I figured she actually wanted: details about the broader world.

Hence where Puddles came in. Flarefeather needed no ulterior motivation to think hanging out with a friend of mine sounded fun, but Lissa probably wanted to watch Puddles interact with me, and see if there was something she could learn about how to do so more productively herself.

All that was just a hunch, of course, but it was something I would do, and Flarefeather had said we were similar. Besides, I liked to think I knew my own behavior well enough to recognize it in others. Ironic, then, that Lissa could simply solve all her problems by asking me in a straightforward manner. My problems never did that. Unless they did, and I was just as blind as she was...

That was a discomforting thought.

Either way, that was how I found myself standing outside Puddles' ship, instructing my new friends to wait an acceptable distance away while I went in to find if my host was amenable to the idea.

"Sounds good!" Flarefeather chirped, saluting with a wing. "And take all the time you need. We never get bored together."

Lissa gave Flarefeather a sly smile.

I nodded. "Just don't make me come back to anything I wouldn't want to see. That I wouldn't, not that you wouldn't. I shouldn't be long."

We parted, and I boarded the airship, taking a quick look around and determining that everything was - as always - the way it should be. Coda still sat frozen in my room, frost somehow dripping from her eyes despite being encased in a huge boulder of ice.

Puddles herself was on the bridge, sitting at the navigator's desk to the side of the controls and sifting through a pile of paperwork. "You're home early. Getting bored of Wilderwind?"

"Not quite," I answered stepping closer. "How are things here?"

"Everything is pretty much in order," Puddles said, aligning her papers by tapping the stack's edge against the desk, then putting them down and spinning her chair around to face me. "I'm thinking we leave for Izvaldi at dawn tomorrow, though I could bump it forward to this evening and do a night flight if you don't care about the scenery. Wanna go over any plans for what you're doing once we get there?"

"Actually..." I grinned hopefully, tapping my wing spokes together in front of me. "I've been making some friends while I'm here, and was wondering if there was any chance you'd be willing to meet them before we leave? Maybe impress them a little?"

Puddles laughed. "You want me to suit up and go on parade to show off your connections? Sure, I could use a break from this anyway. When and where?"

"Well, they're waiting outside," I began. "And I could make them wait as long as you need. But do you think showing them the ship would be too much to ask for?"

Puddles blinked in surprise. "Depends what kind of friends we're talking about. I like to give people the benefit of the doubt, but this is my house..."

I wandered over to the windshield to see if I could point them out. "Well, you probably already sort of know them a little, and they should be right-"

Yep, they were there, making a show of petting each other's manes. What was I expecting? I shook my head and looked away.

"...Never mind," I said, remembering that I had a sentence to finish. "They're not complete strangers, though."

Puddles got up, curious, and looked out the window for slightly longer than I had. "The Wilderwind Escorts?"

I realized too late that I was going to have to answer a question about why I chose to keep this company. "I told them not to do anything too embarrassing..."

"I didn't know you were into that!" Puddles nodded approvingly. "And those girls are notoriously difficult to impress. I don't suppose my trip with you up the tower gave you an opening, heh?"

"It's not like that," I pointed out, reddening in annoyance. "But, yeah, it did."

"And I suppose that's why you want to meet them in my company again..." Puddles mused. "I don't know what it will do that I didn't accomplish the first time, though. I'm not very talkative as the Black Knight."

"Any chance you could be your more talkative self?" I suggested, swishing my tail hopefully. "Part of the reason we get along well is because they're looking for travel advice, but I know very little about the Empire itself, or the areas it would be practical for them to visit."

Puddles looked confused. "Travel advice? Those girls don't usually leave this city."

"Why not?" I asked, though having full-time jobs was probably reason enough on its own. "What kinds of things do you know about them? I just know those two as friends, as of a day or two ago."

Puddles nodded absently. "Well, for one, most of them are too politically valuable to be kept on a long leash."

I blinked. "Politically valuable?" Did this have anything to do with how Flarefeather told me she was Izvaldi royalty by blood, albeit outside the line of succession?

"Right. I guess this usually isn't the kind of thing that gets explained to outsiders," Puddles elaborated, straightening up and adopting a teacher's demeanor. "Wilderwind's escorts are all special in some way. Most of them have some potent secret, like dirt on a powerful authority figure. They're the people who aren't important enough to become players in the game, at least not without flailing blindly and having a terrible time of it, but are important enough that they can change the stakes if they come into play, or would make attractive pawns to someone truly powerful. So the city keeps them on display as a sort of show of force. Same principle as hanging weapons on your wall. It's meant to intimidate anyone important enough to recognize those girls' strategic value."

She tapped on her desk with a frown. "So if you're in an escort's position, you have two choices. Wilderwind comes to you, and you accept their employment - degenerate job, room and board, powerful political protection - and then abide by the conditions that you don't try to do anything with whatever your special edge is. Or, you turn them down and try to go it alone, be your own force in the world and fend off any other powerful interests who want to use you on your own power. It sounds like a raw deal to us free spirits, but to them, it's a no-brainer."

As she spoke, I cringed harder and harder, my insides twisting up in primal revulsion. That was exactly what I had gone through in Ironridge. And she was telling me Wilderwind had an entire class of creatures in the same boat, paraded about like collectibles by some government that purchased their loyalty out of fear through cushy, restrictive deals?

No. No, no, that was stupid! Things couldn't work like this for so many people, they weren't supposed to! My situation was an anomaly-

"Are you okay?" Puddles asked, concerned.

"I'm not some free spirit," I muttered, in a trance. "That's just like how I was, in Ironridge. Special enough to make a difference, but not enough to do more than struggle. The local powers fighting over who could use me as their pawn. And now here in the Empire, with Rhodallis, it's the same. I'm just like them. Only, I can't live with the deals I'm offered. I'm in a constant battle to be the one who gets final say over my life, getting carried along and bounced from place to place and from fight to fight. I've never been powerful enough to take a single action that's not either a sacrifice or a gamble, but I've always been powerful enough to have there be something I can do. They're... just like me."

Puddles' face creased in sympathy, and she stepped over and put a hoof on my shoulder. "Refusing to sing to someone else's tune is the definition of a free spirit. And if that's how you truly feel, then you're in good company. Taking the easy way out and signing on with someone more powerful who I don't agree with is anathema to my ideals, but I sometimes have to do it anyway to get the resources I need to do my own thing. It never quite feels like you can rest easy, does it?"

I nodded, grateful. "Even if we chose to stick our heads up and accept this lifestyle, though, it doesn't mean it's one I'd recommend to anyone else. If that's really what's going on here, I probably owe it to my friends to be up front with them about why leaving Wilderwind isn't a safe dream to entertain. Would you...?"

A realization crossed my mind, and I blinked, trialing off. "You know all this because you've tried recruiting them to your cause before. With your whole thing about trying to inspire people to take responsibility for their land's future, and becoming a symbol and all that. Since they have an edge that would let them do more than most!"

Puddles grimaced. "It was a while ago, but yes. And it didn't end well."

I folded my ears, debating whether to ask to hear about it anyway. "What was your takeaway?" I asked instead.

"That's a long story," Puddles said, shaking her head. "Too long for today, at least while your friends are waiting. If you want to encourage them to leave Wilderwind behind and go see the world, I'd say you know the risks just as well as I do."

I looked at the floor, took a breath, and made my decision. "I'm not trying to impress or flatter them. Let's just be honest about what it's been like for us out there, at least as much as we can without touching on secrets or sore subjects. Try not to hide our bias, and let them interpret it how they will. Think you can help me? And maybe that it would be more authentic if you went as yourself rather than the Black Knight?"

"Meh..." Puddles shrugged. "I don't think I'm very inspirational without it, but I suppose that's not the point, so I guess it should be fine. And they probably know who I am beneath it anyway. So knock yourself out. But I'll leave most of the talking to you unless prompted." She nodded, bestowing her blessing on my endeavor.

"I think you're plenty inspirational," I told her with a smile, less because I had seen her in action and more because it felt like the right thing to say. But I felt it, too. It was nice to know I wasn't the only one out alone in the world, struggling to do the things I believed in.

"Thanks," Puddles chuckled, waving me out. "Let me get all these papers put away before they arrive."

Lissa and Flarefeather were still doing their best to disobey my instructions not to let me come back to anything I didn't want to see, but at this point I just shook my head and sighed. "Well, you're welcome aboard," I told them, standing at the ship's entrance. "I'm not sure this will be exactly what you're expecting, but come on in."

Flarefeather barely waited, bouncing up and into the ship. "Thanks, Hallie!" she sang with a grin, slapping me on the back with a wing as she passed. "I can call you that, right?"

I did a double take. Part of me instantly protested, saying only my Icereach friends were allowed to call me that... but I had left both of them behind. In doing so, hadn't I forfeited my right to be picky about that?

"Sure," I managed, conflicted. "Knock yourself out."

Lissa passed by me as well, wearing a sure smile that I could tell covered a hint of nervousness. I brought up the rear, closing the hull-side door in my wake.

As I watched them, my mood immediately started to rise. The ship's interior had always had a homey feel, dark wood trim providing a rustic vibe and carpets that obviously had to be replaced every few years making it come across as a house as well as a vehicle. But some part of it must have been sleeping before, because as they inspected it, it slowly came more alive.

Maybe it was just my imagination that the colors had lightened, or the corners no longer felt as empty. But I knew, the same way I had known something was amiss in the library, that this was the way this ship was meant to be.

"Hi," Puddles greeted, putting on a friendly smile and sitting in the hallway to the bridge. "Welcome to my ship?"

She spoke with a nervousness that probably stemmed from her lack of armor, a fixation I definitely needed to ask more about. So far, it seemed more like she wanted to hide her identity than her body, so it couldn't be exactly the same as my situation, but still, I suddenly felt bad for being the one who did get to armor up.

"So you're the Black Knight," Flarefeather said, going in with the same earnestness she had used to sledgehammer me into submission. "I heard you were a mare under all that armor! Bet you remember me, right?"

She struck a pose for good measure, Lissa lurking directly behind her.

"I've been up the tower a few times," Puddles admitted, clearly awkward in the role of host.

Flarefeather blinked in slow confusion. "Wait, are you secretly shy?"

Puddles gave me a look that said these are your guests, remember?

"Look," I started, preparing to come to her aid.

Before I could continue, Flarefeather got right up in my face, looking like it took significant willpower for her not to squish my cheeks in delight. "This is crazy! Why didn't you tell me the Black edgiest-of-edgy Knight was secretly cute? How did you get lucky enough to stay here?"

She took a step back, sobering up just a bit, and nodded at Puddles. "Your secret's safe with us, by the way. But seriously, how actually did you wind up getting in here?"

I glanced at Puddles, who clearly had no qualms with letting me answer. "Won mutual respect through a duel in the cursed desert of Gyre," I said with a for-me-it-was-Tuesday shrug.

"You're pulling my tail," Flarefeather rebutted, wearing a skeptical but impressed smirk that practically begged me to stick to my story.

Lissa, however, looked put out. "Come on, why do you act cool for her but not for me? Don't I merit a little adventurous flexing and embellishment too?"

Flarefeather aggressively waggled her eyebrows at Lissa, which saved me from having to answer a question I legitimately had no reason for.

"It's true," Puddles said, nodding along with my version of events.

"That's how it happened," I agreed solemnly. "There were some extenuating circumstances involved, including pirates and my friend... Speaking of, since you came all this way, you want to see her? The one I came to the Empire to save?"

Coda wasn't exactly a sculpture to show off, but Lissa had mentioned having ideas that could potentially help me. So if she knew anything at all, it was better to get that conversation started sooner rather than later.

"So," Flarefeather mused aloud as I led them to my room, "if a duel is all it takes, I know my way around a sword... Wanna fight, Miss Black Knight? See if I pass muster as someone worth knowing?"

Puddles giggled awkwardly. "Meh-meh... I'm afraid I don't really like fighting."

Lissa raised an eyebrow. "That contrasts with the actions you regularly perform in a public and visible way."

Puddles shrugged. "If it's for a good enough cause, I can make an exception."

I pushed open my door, sensing a perfect segue. "And this is a good enough cause."

Coda was right where I left her, face set in frozen determination.

The mood instantly froze as well. "You weren't kidding," Lissa said, face serious as she looked Coda up and down... and sympathetic as well, a first for the emotions I had seen her display.

"That's not a normal kid," Flarefeather pointed out. "She's the size of an adult, even though she's obviously young. And wings and a horn. And then there's..."

She bit her tongue, looking like she wanted to say more, a wrenching look on her face that was equal parts heartbroken and wary.

For my part, I blinked, completely having forgotten that Coda's appearance was far from regular. Furthermore, she was wearing her changeling queen crown.

Flarefeather had been interested in my bracelet ever since I told her it was cursed. How obvious would it be to other ponies that Coda's crown and my bracelet were the same kind of thing? My heart rate spiked; would it be possible for Flarefeather to figure out what I was based on this information? Actually, forget Flarefeather, what about Puddles?

I steadied myself with a deep breath. I'd deal with that if it happened, but not invite it sooner than I needed to. "Let's go back to the foyer, or the bridge," I invited, gently nudging everyone back toward the door. "She's not going to get better by ponies staring at her."

I met with no resistance, and soon we were all on the bridge, the ship's largest and most open area.

"Well," Lissa said, "that stinks. I feel sorry for her. You think you've got any chance at fixing whatever's causing that?"

I shook my head. "Dunno, but I won't easily take no for an answer. You made it sound like you knew something that might help?"

Lissa shrugged. "Well, I was going to make an offer to press the Night's Boon and get you access to their trove of Mistvale loot, just in case you found anything in there that would help out while saving you a trip up north. But, you kind of torpedoed that by finding their cache yourself, so at this point all I can do is say please on your behalf. And all this could do in the first place is maybe help you get better at sarosian magic to make your journey easier in general... Not the greatest gift, but it's what I've got."

I chewed my tongue in thought. "I want to pursue this lead in Izvaldi first. But there might be a point to coming back here to look into that afterward. I already learned quite a bit from going in there today, after all..." I glanced over at Puddles. "You'll need to come back here eventually to see Geirskogul again, yeah?"

"And there are two hotties here it sure would be a shame if you never saw again, riiight?" Flarefeather grinned suggestively. "Ironclad reason to return, right there."

I grinned too. "Yeah." It would be nice to stop leaving my friends behind, one day.

"I assume you wouldn't want us to come with you," Lissa said, making my ears twitch. There it was. The question I had suspected was waiting in the wings all along.

This one was on me to answer before it even got to Puddles. "Is that really such a good idea?" I asked, turning to face her. "I know what you said during lunch, about having limited opportunities here in Wilderwind. I also know enough about your job to guess there's a really good reason why you were offered it, and that if you cut ties with Wilderwind, other employers might get pushy about asking you to sign with them, instead."

Lissa shook her head. "I'm not expecting you to say yes. But, you are seasoned travelers. Especially you, whose reputation is a known factor." She nodded at Puddles, then took a deep breath. "I'm too young to content myself with living like this for the rest of my days. And even if I wasn't, our current position with Wilderwind can't last, whether it's due to political instability or another extinction event or whatever."

"That's true," Puddles said, nodding slowly. "I don't know how much longer the Empire's current political situation will last. I don't know the particulars of why you're working for Wilderwind, but if they're the safe option and striking out on your own is the risky option, none of us can know how much longer they'll remain the safe option."

She looked away. "At the same time, I can't recommend you leave in good faith."

"That's the opposite of what you say in public," Lissa pointed out. "Telling people to take responsibility for their communities and the problems around them. Running away might be a weird form of taking responsibility, but before we can take care of the things around us, we need to take care of ourselves. No?"

Puddles bit her lip.

Lissa narrowed her eyes and folded her ears, but then let it go a moment later. "Anyway. I'm using my time to plan. As the one with the most experience, it would mean a lot to me if you can hear my plans out and tell me where I'm being a dummy or overlooked something important."

Puddles relaxed instantly. "I can do that," she said, cheering up. "What have you got?"

Lissa nodded, serious. "First are the end goals. We don't want to live on the road forever. The idea is to settle down, get a house, work normal jobs, start a family, all the normal stuff. As you're clearly dancing around, we have political targets on our backs in the Empire, and can't just do that here. Second, I have a brand and Flarefeather doesn't. I want to fix that. I've heard that in the Plains of Harmony, almost everyone gets brands, so going there is how we'll get her hers. I know border passes are hard to find, and this is asking a lot, but that's the dream."

She cleared her throat. "Next, for our resources, we both are good in a fight, and we both have some connections among the Night's Boon we could call in a favor or two from. I also know that Yakyakistan is the only place that's still giving out border passes. So, we're going to wait for the Night's Boon to have a reason to mount another expedition to Mistvale, find a way to join it, and cross all the way over to Varsidel from northwestern Mistvale. Then we swashbuckle our way west, and by the time we reach Yakyakistan, hopefully the cultural differences should be big enough that we're just two random ponies, no imperial baggage at all. And from there we ask around, set up a base, and see what it'll take to get across the border."

Slowly, I blinked. "Is this why you wanted to steer me into checking out the Mistvale stuff? So that if I wind up with a lead that requires me to go that way, you can come with?"

Lissa shrugged. "I do want to help you. What's wrong with doing it in a way that lets Flarefeather enjoy your company for a while longer?"

Flarefeather giggled. "I'd be nowhere without your motivation, but remember to set some goals for yourself too sometime, babe."

"Right." I shook my head, trying not to think about myself and Corsica back in Icereach, eagerly obsessing over a very similar plan. "Problem one: Yakyakistan isn't safe. Possibly one of the least-safe spots to be in the world right now, actually. If you care about avoiding extinction events like the war that toppled the Empire, stay away at all costs."

"Seriously?" Flarefeather blinked owlishly. "What gives? And why?"

I sighed. "You know what a windigo is?"

Puddles perked up a little.

"Ice monsters, spirits of wrath that freeze stuff and possess ponies?" I tilted my head. "They're supposed to cause blizzards if too many are together at once, and they really like starting wars? My friend, Coda, is like that because she tried to fight some? Currently, most of the world's windigoes are sealed away under Yakyakistan, and the few that are free are trying to make Ironridge and Yakyakistan go to war in order to break the seal and set all the rest of them free."

"That's... bad," Flarefeather said, wowed. "Is anyone doing anything about this?"

I thought back to what I had been doing before getting spirited away to the Empire by Unnrus-Kaeljos. How were Starlight and Twilight doing? Had they wound up going north, and were they making a difference? What about Corsica, Leif and the rest of my crew? Even Papyrus...

I shook my head. "Maybe. Hopefully it'll be enough. Honestly, once I save Coda, that's probably what I'll be working on next, too. If I'm not too late."

"That's some serious moxie," Lissa pointed out. "We're past the point where you say stuff just to impress us, you know. Are you being serious?"

Puddles, for her part, looked deeply conflicted. "I need to talk to you later, about this. Once we're alone."

I nodded. There could be a lot of reasons why, but my money was on the one connection both of us knew the other knew about and yet neither had broached out of respectfulness: Puddles' cake-hungry doppelganger in Ironridge.

"Dead serious," I apologized. "Also, border passes - they're called Writs of Harmonic Sanction - are pretty rare. I'm not saying it's impossible to get one, but if you're thinking of going to Yakyakistan because it could be easier there, the supply is probably getting cut off until this war is over. I can't imagine Equestria giving out more passes to a government that's currently hostile and under the sway of supernatural malevolent forces, at any rate."

Technically, that supernatural malevolent force was Chrysalis. But I didn't need to complicate the picture any further.

"Great," Lissa sighed. "Thank you for doing exactly what I asked and sinking my plans before I committed and got us in deep trouble. Ugh, I thought this all fit together perfectly, too..." She shook her head. "What do you recommend? Suppose we had to get out of Wilderwind in a hurry. I get a pretty good look at the inner workings of government there, and I think I'll have plenty of forewarning in an emergency, but if we did have to leave in a hurry, where would you go?"

"Mistvale," Puddles said. "Specifically the valleys. I used to hear about how they were mostly unmapped, even before the war. If you had the resources to stockpile food and supplies in advance, you could wait out almost anything down there. And it's less than a day's flight away to reach the fringes."

Lissa winked gratefully. "See, I knew seasoned explorers could come through!"

Flarefeather, however, was a bit more hesitant. "Just as long as you're not thinking of using that place as a hideout, right? You know the one. It might be easier to stock, but there are definitely others who would be able to find it..."

Lissa shook her head. "Of course not! Mistvale is massive. Why would we pick the one place... Actually, let's discuss this one later."

I raised an eyebrow, and I knew Puddles was doing the same. "Is this anything we should know about?"

"Nahhh." Flarefeather dismissed me with a wave. "And forget we said anything. Contractual obligations. Stuff we're not supposed to talk about."

Really? What did a place in Mistvale have to do with her claim to the Izvaldi throne...? Eh, whatever. I shook my head.

"Anyway," I said, changing the subject. "We're heading to Izvaldi tomorrow morning. Dunno when we'll be back. I think me and her have some stuff to discuss between ourselves before we set off, so..." I gestured to Puddles, then nodded to Lissa and Flarefeather. "Is there anything more you want to ask here? I could maybe come catch you later tonight, if it's too early to say goodbye."

"I got what I needed most." Lissa stretched. "But if I can give you some advice in thanks?" She turned to Puddles. "Get your act together. Telling people to do one thing in public and then the opposite thing in private is lame. I don't know how you can put any conviction behind your actions if you're peddling in contradictions like that. Maybe you can't, and maybe that's why you don't get more attention. Maybe people can just tell. But I do appreciate your advice, and will put it to good use."

She turned to me next, and nodded. "And you were good for more than you let on! Same tip as before: it costs nothing to impress people, even if you're not really feeling it. Try it out sometime. And good luck with your friend. If you do ever find a reason to head deep into Mistvale, remember that I'd love to help make such a trip happen."

I nodded back in appreciation. Puddles just looked wounded.

Flarefeather's goodbye was much more simple. She looked me up and down, bit her lip, tongued her cheek, and then whispered, "Can I feel your ears one more time?"

"I can literally come by tonight if you'll miss me that badly," I pointed out. "But, fine..."

She showed remarkable self-restraint, only rubbing them for a second or two. I found myself able to put up with it.

Then I saw them to the door, waved, got waved at, and finally found myself alone on the ship with Puddles. The ship's atmosphere settled back into its stately, sleepy air, and the corners felt just a little bit emptier.

My heart sank. Was this the right choice, leaving my friends behind again? It wasn't like the alternative was sane or sensible, at least not the alternative where I hauled them along to wherever I went next... which was going to be Izvaldi, where Flarefeather's lineage had the highest potential to get us into trouble. There was another alternative, of course, one where I stayed here instead and put down roots, giving up on goals that required leaving.

But that would mean abandoning Coda. And that was unthinkable.

So I turned to Puddles, ready to talk shop and find out what she had to say.

Windigo Worries

"So," I said, standing on the bridge with Puddles and looking out into the evening, in the direction Lissa and Flarefeather had disappeared. "I can sort of guess what you want to talk about."

"You told me about the windigoes in Ironridge before," Puddles said. "How they were trying to start a war with Yakyakistan, and got sealed away somehow by your friend. Now you say the purpose of that war was to free all the rest of the windigoes under Yakyakistan, and that it'll probably still happen even without these ones."

I nodded slowly. "And you said you've got some bad personal history with windigoes. That you were possessed by one for six years." I turned to her and steadied myself. "What are you thinking? I get just being curious, but with how you reacted to all that, whatever's on your mind sounds more important than that. But you've also told me several times that you're not interested in leaving your duties in the Empire and going west."

Puddles looked intensely conflicted. "This information isn't something the general public knows about, right? You're privy to some important secrets you must have learned somewhere."

I nodded again.

"And you also recognized me," Puddles said, averting her gaze. "When I lost my helmet in Gyre. Said I looked and acted like someone you knew. Do those two things... Are they related? How you know about all this, and that you recognized my appearance without knowing anything about who I am?"

So she did want to talk about Kitty. I was right.

I nodded one more time. "I got the impression you knew something, but didn't want to talk about it. And this arrangement of ours is great enough that I didn't really want to impose. But, yeah. They're very related."

Puddles motioned for me to explain, so I took a breath and prepared to give it my best shot.

"Her name's Kitty," I explained. "That's a nickname for something bigger, Catherine something. She looks exactly like you, except a little younger than I am, and she has windigo eyes and a snowflake special talent. And she's a windigo. I don't remember everything she told me, but lots of what I know about windigoes comes from her. She's the driving force behind the windigoes, the one who coordinates all the others. She's always talking about trying to evolve beyond the constraints of windigo bodies, and wants to kill her creator god. And she has a bunch of mechanical bodies called Whitewings that she can remote control."

Puddles looked utterly dejected. "So she is still out there. I knew it."

"You know about her," I said, prompting her to continue.

"She was my captor," Puddles explained. "And, eventually, my daughter."

My eyes went wide. "What?"

Puddles composed herself, though her eyes were far away. "This is a long story. I hadn't really ever planned on telling it, though if she's still out there, I don't think I have a choice. Especially not to someone who knows her. But, after I recovered from my possession, my parents took me immediately to a hospital for an examination. My body was in rough shape, and one of the things they learned was that I was pregnant."

My mind reeled. I tried to imagine losing control of my body for a spell, not remembering anything that happened during it - easy, when that was a regular occurrence due to my relationship with Faye - and waking up to discover I was pregnant. I didn't even know how I would handle that if I did remember how it happened...

"Over the month or so before I recovered, the windigo in my body escaped captivity," Puddles explained, noting my discomfort with a sympathetic look. "She went on... Let's call it an adventure. So, the doctors assumed she must have gotten frisky, and left me to live with the consequences."

"That's messed up," was all I could say.

"My family kept it as much of a secret as possible, but I still got a lot of sympathy for it," Puddles agreed. "And most observers didn't even know the extent of it: I already had the body of a young adult, but my consciousness hadn't existed for six years, so mentally I was much younger than I looked. Still am, by the way! I never got those six years back. At the same time, my family was extremely supportive, and I had always had a resilient and happy outlook on life. So even though it was a challenge, I didn't think it was as bad as everyone around me considered it to be. Other stuff that happened around then, like losing my father... That was the actual bad stuff."

"Wallace Whitewing?" I asked, hoping I was remembering correctly.

Puddles nodded. "He died protecting the Empire when it was attacked, fighting at ground zero. The stories everyone tells say that without him, all life could have completely ended in the east. But as a kid, I cared less about that than that he was gone." She shook her head. "But that's a different story. The important part is that no one, not even me, realized what my daughter was until the day I gave birth."

I listened, frozen.

"It's burned into my eyes," Puddles said, closing her eyes in emphasis. "She looked identical to me, except that her eyes had no pupils, and she had a brand of a snowflake, both just like mine when I was possessed. But she had such a joyous smile... And then, while I was sleeping after the birth, she disappeared without a trace."

"She ran away?" I asked, incredulous. "Can a newborn do that, even as a windigo?"

Puddles shook her head. "I don't know. I... suspected my mother got rid of her."

"That... wasn't what you wanted?" I guessed, instantly regretting the way I had worded it. But how could you word a question like this?

"It's so complicated," Puddles apologized. "I should tell you how we felt about my possession after it was over. Apparently, while it was in my body, that windigo did and said some truly horrible things to my parents. Wallace never spoke about how it affected him. He was too strong and humble for that, and whenever I asked, he would just talk about how heroic the ponies were who saved me instead. Morena - that's my mother - was much more outspoken about her hatred for the windigo. But I could never bring myself to feel the same."

"You couldn't?" I gently pressed.

Puddles nodded. "Over the course of my possession, my parents tried everything to free me. For most of that time, my body was in the care of an Izvalden scientist called Chauncey. He was the chief advisor to the province's ruler, and made great promises to my parents about the kinds of resources he had at his disposal. Unfortunately, rather than working to cure me, he experimented on my body in secret. I'll spare you the grisly details, but I believe he wanted to use the windigo's presence as a catalyst for unlocking some dark sorcery. If it wasn't for the windigo's presence and restorative powers, my body certainly couldn't have survived his treatments."

She sighed, keeping a brave face even though I could tell reliving this wasn't pleasant. "All this rang hollow on my mother's ears, since without the windigo, I wouldn't have been entrusted to Chauncey in the first place. But that's just not how I feel it. She did endure all that, and kept my body safe along the way. Things got even more extreme in the last month, after the windigo escaped... which I really can't blame her for wanting to do. Outside of my parent's knowledge, Chauncey relocated me to the prison underneath Gyre after I was recaptured, and pretended it was another escape in order to keep my position secret. That windigo protected me down there, too, like it or not. And... I just can't forget her smile."

I didn't know what to say.

"Perhaps I'm a sentimental fool, ripe for taking advantage of," Puddles admitted. "Perhaps no one sane would see it the same way. Perhaps my mother was right. But, my greatest regret in life has always been that I didn't know what happened to her. And there's no doubt in my mind that this Kitty of yours is one and the same."

"I..." I tried to say, but found no words. "Do you know how she did it?"

"I've learned some of her tricks over the years," Puddles said. "There's a phenomenon in which blank ponies can use moon glass to obtain something that looks like a brand. Or a special talent, as you call them. But it's documented that these brands often cause personality changes, and also that they disappear over time during a pregnancy, and manifest in the foal instead. A lot of this documentation actually came from Chauncey, who was researching this very phenomenon... and it's even possible that my windigo manipulated him into that research to use for its own ends."

I folded my ears.

"In my own case, there was an event during the windigo's initial escape that involved another windigo heart," Puddles went on. "Artifacts that have been used in a few obscure rituals to detach brands from their owners, I've since learned. At some point after that time, the windigo's brand on my body began fading, and it seemed to take more effort for them to remain in control. Eventually, it faded entirely - a similar trajectory to that experienced by the pregnant moon glass mares in Chauncey's study, although mine did happen faster. The only explanation is that my windigo used my body to grow itself a flesh-and-blood pony body of its own, not stolen from anyone. And based on our similar appearances, I even suspect some kind of cloning was used in place of a father, though I haven't been able to figure that one out yet."

"Hold on, what do you mean 'not stolen'?" I pressed. "You don't think borrowing someone's womb without permission counts as...?"

Puddles looked conflicted. "I don't know. That's for only me to decide, but almost everyone I meet disagrees with the conclusion I reached. Maybe it's wrong of me to wish for her happiness. Perhaps I've even been manipulated into it, somehow. I wish I could speak with her myself to find out for sure, instead of only hearing of her through the stories of others. But from what I have heard, she seemed to want to be a pony. And as someone who is both fortunate and glad to be alive, how can I look down on such a goal?"

My feelings seemed to hollow out, zooming out until I was miles above the world, looking at Icereach and the Griffon Empire at the same time. I had never once begrudged Mother her lack of ability to do anything for me, beyond seeing me safely to a home where I could grow up. I had never known a father, nor even considered that I was missing one. And my birth mother... According to Papyrus and Starlight, the final straw that made her sack the Empire was seeing me for the first time, and discovering that I wasn't the kind of child she thought she was having.

I had yet to learn what Chrysalis thought of me now, two decades later. But weren't we the same, Kitty and I? Unexpected monster children, thought to be mundane right up until birth? Maybe it was an imperfect comparison, because Kitty had a history with the world before getting her body, while I was a brand new person. But I still wanted to make it, because of how much differently history might have gone if my mother had embraced me nevertheless, the way Puddles wanted to do.

"I think," I said, feeling a tear materialize at the corner of my eye, "that Kitty would be lucky to know you. It is your decision. And I bet you'd be a great mom, and would hope she'd appreciate it if she knew."

"It sounds like you don't hate her either," Puddles observed. "Even though you're the one bringing me news of what she's trying to do."

I hesitated, considering my answer. "Windigoes are people too," I eventually decided. "They might have some bad compulsions, some of which are built into their bodies and some of which, they just have never known any better. And some of them might be malicious even if given a clean slate and a choice. But what part of that isn't true for ponies? I don't want them freezing over the world, and they need to be stopped. But I wish there was a better option beyond stopping the war and ensuring they don't break free."

"I see," Puddles said, looking away.

"...So, what does this change?" I asked, hesitant.

Puddles shook her head. "I can't forsake my responsibility to the Empire over one pony, even if that pony is my daughter. I'll give it some thought, but for now, it changes nothing. If you do head west again, perhaps I can give you more information then that might help you, if you really intend to try to stop the windigoes. But for now, we should think of our trip to Izvaldi."

"Hey," I interrupted, shaking my head. "Before we move on to that, just real quick... Why did you tell me all that? It can't have been pleasant to remember."

"You already knew her," Puddles said with a shrug. "And you seem like a decent sort. I guess I just wanted someone to know the full story."

"But you were so careful back in Gyre, figuring out whether you could trust me," I pointed out. "We spent ages in that desert, staring each other down and asking questions, remember? And you were wise to be paranoid, I was literally in the company of Rhodallis just a day ago. You can go that quickly from trusting me enough to let me onto your ship to trusting me enough to hear this stuff about your past?"

Puddles sat down in the captain's chair, spinning it to face me. "It's not such a leap as all that. The consequences for letting a pirate onto my ship are way worse than letting the wrong person know about my daughter, don't you think? Besides, I prefer a world where people can trust each other."

Maybe she was right. What could I do with that information, if I was malicious?

Maybe a lot. But there was a pretty big gap between being malicious and being an intimate friend. What could I do with that information if it just didn't matter to my goals?

I thought about that... and I decided that maybe, this merited going out on a limb.

"Yeah, well... Me and Coda." I struggled to take a breath, my throat suddenly going dry. "W-We're both changeling queens. Same thing as Chrysalis. So, a secret for a secret. How's that for a big one?"

I could tell Puddles was intrigued, and yet she merely nodded in an offering of restraint.

"It's not really relevant to anything, I guess," I admitted. "Just, I'm not a very trusting pony. Hard to decide who I want to let in on the full story... and you seem like a decent sort."

Puddles caught my meaning and winked.

"If you wanna bombard me with questions, err..." I swallowed. "I guess the two most important ones are that neither of us are evil or trying to ransack a continent. And, this related to why I'm trying to go to Izvaldi. I... want to track down the remains of Chrysalis's throne."

"Stanza?" Puddles looked doubly intrigued. "Well, since you mentioned it, I might actually be able to help with that."

My ears rose. "Really?"

Puddles nodded. "As far as I've heard, it was last kept in the same lab where Chauncey experimented on my body when that lab was destroyed. However, I once found a way back into the ruins of that lab, when trying to learn more about my past there. It..." She hesitated, rubbing the back of her neck awkwardly with a hoof. "Is this the right way to respond? I've never really had someone come to me with something like this before..."

I couldn't help it. The tension broke, and I laughed.

"As long as you're not trying to sell me to a conglomerate or experiment on me to make use of my powers, I'll take it," I giggled in relief. "I guess you really are a decent sort, after all."

"If you want to talk about it, I'll listen," Puddles offered. "I did just dump my own depressing story on you with little warning, after all. Though, you kind of look like you don't want anyone to press?"

I thought about that. If I didn't talk now, who knew how long my walls would last once I put them back up again? On the other hoof, there was nothing I cherished more than an offer to leave well enough alone.

Usually, I didn't have either of these options. Getting to choose between them was downright alien.

"You'd be okay with just dropping it for a while?" I asked, testing the waters. "Actually just having two legendary monsters on your boat and not asking questions?"

"If you're telling the truth, I've got quite a bit more than two," Puddles pointed out. "Thanks to Coda. And are you sure monster is the right word?"

I shook my head, feeling a familiar unease at her question - it reminded me of thinking about letting others see my hooves. "You lived through what Chrysalis did. You know what we're capable of."

Puddles nodded. "And I've lived long enough to see plenty of other monstrous things people have done without powers like that. You heard what I said about Chauncey. Did you know he created Chrysalis, too?"

I took a heavy step back. I was fairly sure I had known, but hadn't put two and two together during her story...

"Again, I don't know how many others would agree with my views, if any," Puddles pointed out. "In my experience, relatively few. But on this ship, at least, being a monster is about what you do, not what you are."

I really hadn't put that much thought into my use of the term before. Now that I thought about it, I wasn't even sure how negative I had intended it to be - there was a degree of rarefaction around it in my mind, a uniqueness, like it implied I was special as well as dangerous. But maybe I had just internalized the meaning too deeply to think about it.

This didn't feel like a revelation, or like it rocked the foundations of who I was. But nevertheless, it gave me something to think about, and I found myself deeply grateful for her sentiment.

"Thanks." I nodded. "Look, I don't really get how you're the one giving advice and support when you're the one who just told a big, messed-up story about your past. I barely even gave you one line. But as long as you are, do you mind if I get some advice on one more thing?"

Puddles shrugged. "Meh. Go for it. Such is the work of a hero, right? Wouldn't be much good at helping others if I let my own problems slow me down."

"Those two who were just here," I said. "Flarefeather and Lissa. Especially Flarefeather. I've only known them for a day or two, but her especially, I'd like to be friends with. But the thing is, ever since I left my home and started traveling, I've been leaving my friends behind, one after another after another. And not just the inevitable partings. I don't think I've even been putting as much weight on staying together as I should."

Puddles tilted her head. "And doing all this work to help Coda?"

I bit my lip. "Well, maybe she's an exception. But I actually left her behind for a while first. And I left literally everyone to come out here after her, and... Look, I know from experience that telling Lissa to stay put is sound advice. Better than the alternative. And you sounded like you agreed with me. But at the same time, I feel like I'm making a mistake I've made before, and that I should have learned from by now. And I don't know how to learn from it. They obviously want to travel, and it would be so simple to invite them along, but that's obviously not the right answer, so what is?"

Puddles solemnly considered this for a moment. "I don't know if I can help you," she eventually said. "I might just be the wrong person to ask about this. Especially in their case. I usually work alone for a reason, and a big part of why I'm making an exception for you is because you're tough enough to survive in the desert of Gyre."

I glanced down at my bracelet. "Don't tell anyone, but that's because as a changeling queen, I'm not exactly mortal."

"Seriously?" Again, Puddles looked intrigued. "Buckets, you can't just say stuff like that if you don't want me to ask about it. Ahem. Anyway, I'm a loner in the field for a reason, and it's because I've had teamwork go wrong too many times before to count." She hesitated. "Maybe that's an exaggeration. But one of the biggest times it happened involved those escort girls."

"Really?" I tilted my head. "You mean the escorts in general, and not specifically those two."

"Right." Puddles nodded. "This was over a decade ago. It's another long story, but I thought they would make perfect collaborators because their circumstances give them a card to play. For most of them, once you know what their story is, it's not hard to see how they can make a difference. But that endeavor ended when one of them betrayed us and several others died for it."

I felt myself deflate.

"I learned some hard lessons from that," Puddles explained. "And what I decided in the end was that I shouldn't be trying to change the Empire through the actions of an elite few. Rather than focusing my efforts on speaking to the people who had unusual powers that they weren't using, I broadened my focus and started looking to everyone instead - the people who don't even think they have power at all. I figured a societal movement would have less chance of being led astray by any one individual's actions."

She shook her head. "Lissa saw right through me. I think I just don't want the closer relationships that come with a smaller group. I've been burned too many times for that."

I frowned, and took a breath. "I think you're lying to yourself," I told her, straightening up. "All this stuff you told me, basically for free, no one would tell that to a stranger they just met a week ago if they really wanted to be alone. Maybe you've had some bad experiences losing people before, like your dad. But that doesn't mean you don't want friends."

"...Heh." Puddles grinned a little. "Well, whether you're right or not, that's my journey to figure out. Anyway, I don't think you need my advice. It's quite clear you already know what you want to do. You seem to think I've learned the wrong lesson from my experiences, after all."

What I wanted to do was invite Flarefeather to come along and see the world. I just knew that would end poorly, especially since we were going to Izvaldi, the place her own secret revolved around... I scowled and shook my head. "I don't know if you've learned the wrong lesson or not. I think it's dumb, trying to go it on your own. Speaking as someone who compulsively does that herself, it's terrible. But I also think your reasons for it are solid. I wish I could invite them to come, and I know they'd say yes, but even if it was my decision, I know it can't end well."

Puddles nodded sympathetically.

"It's stupid," I sighed. "This ship, you know... I don't know if you felt it too, or if it was something only I can feel because of what I am. But there was something right about having more people here, especially ones who were adventurous and happy. It was like the ship was more itself than usual. Like it was brighter, and more alive."

"This was my parents' ship," Puddles agreed. "They were an exploration team, and before I got possessed, they traveled the world with me - my mother, my father and my uncle. No blood relation there either, just like my father. All three of them were just friends. But the years since it became mine..." She shook her head. "I agree with you."

"It's not even a risk," I said. "I just can't see any scenario where inviting them along ends well. And I don't know if I'm being stubborn or selfish or what."

"Do you know why Wilderwind employs them?" Puddles asked. "What it is that makes them special?"

I hesitated. "I don't think Lissa has told me hers, but Flarefeather is special because she's an heir to the throne of Izvaldi. Off the books, but able to prove it. And apparently the royal family there would be threatened if they knew... and Izvaldi is right where we're going."

Puddles held a hoof to her chin in thought. "Depending on whether they know her face, it could be possible to keep it a secret. And although Lord Izvaldi is rather vain, I feel like I could persuade him to make an exception, or leave her alone as long as she didn't actually make a play for his throne."

"For real?" I took two steps closer. "Is this a wild hope, or do you actually have something on him?"

Puddles shook her head. "Izvaldi was the province where Chauncey was based, where I was held during my possession. In payment for the services my parents thought Izvaldi was rendering, they lent their names to the province, fought for Izvaldi in tournaments and otherwise did their best to burnish its public image. The current Lord Izvaldi knows little of what the dynamic was truly like, but he knows the public version very well, and he also knows who I am. For years now, he's been showering me with gifts, trying to persuade me to embrace my lineage and politically align myself with him. If Flarefeather is in my entourage, I think he'd overlook quite a bit in the name of appeasing me."

All that sat uncomfortably in my skeptical mind. "Are you sure he wouldn't take it as a sign that you were fighting for the Izvaldi flag all along, just on the side of a challenger to the throne?"

Puddles considered this. "It's possible. But although I've rebuffed his most overt requests, I've never formally snubbed him, and still contributed much to Izvaldi as a whole. I don't think he's looking for a reason to distrust me."

I sat back and thought about that. Was it possible that inviting my new friends wouldn't end as badly as I thought?

"Furthermore, my relationship with Wilderwind is slightly special," Puddles added. "Izvaldi relies on Wilderwind for defense against the Consulate and their saber rattling, but doesn't trust them not to simply try taking Izvaldi for themselves. Meanwhile, I'm friends with the Wilderwind top brass, but not formally in their employ. For Lord Izvaldi, aligning with me provides a degree of separation compared to Wilderwind itself, along with the possibility that he could completely flip me from their side and have me sign on as only Izvaldi's defender. But with my current alignment, opposing or attacking me could still invite retaliation from my ties in Wilderwind. He can't afford that. If that's really all that's going on, then I might be able to keep Flarefeather quite safe, in this specific regard."

My ears folded and unfolded as I ran my mind between the consequences and rewards. On one side, I saw Flarefeather's infectious enthusiasm as she explored the ship, her persistent attempts to pry me out of my shell, and knew that not only would she love this: she would help me remember why I had loved this at first, too.

On the other side, I saw Coda, frozen in a block of ice because I had been laying dead in a pool in the Flame District when she needed me most.

"Do you really think your position is strong enough?" I begged, unable to keep the hope out of my voice. "Even if all we could do was one trip to Izvaldi, and then bringing them right back here?"

"Buckets, listen to yourself," Puddles chuckled. "If you think you don't know what you want, then you're not being honest with yourself." Her expression turned earnest again. "Now, what about Lissa? Flarefeather's only half of that duo. You know what her deal is?"

I blinked, wracking my mind to remember what Lissa had told me. Of the two of them, Flarefeather I had known for longer, trusted more, and was closer with... though they were definitely inseparable over a matter like this. But I couldn't think of anything.

Shaking my head, I told Puddles this, and she frowned.

"Well, in that case, there's not much I can do," Puddles apologized. "I guess that's it, then."

I stared out the window, back at the Wilderwind tower. "They said I could come visit again tonight if I wanted a more proper goodbye. Or just missed their company, or whatever. I could go try to find out."

Puddles fondly shrugged. "Meh... We don't have to leave tomorrow morning. If this matters to you, then take the time you need."

"If Lissa's is something we don't need to worry about either..." I hesitated, feeling like I already knew the answer yet not wanting to risk it being otherwise by letting Puddles say it. "You're talking like you wouldn't say no to any of this."

Puddles shrugged. "Seeing how passionate other ponies can get about the things they care about is the best kind of persuasion there is. I would like it if you could ask Lissa to needle me slightly less about some of my contradictory views, but... it would be nice to watch someone experience the joy of adventuring again. That is how I got this, after all." She patted her special talent fondly.

"Then it sounds like I know what I want to do," I said, girding up for another trip to the tower. "I know you make it sound like it's obvious, what I want, but it really wasn't obvious to me when we started this. So, thanks."

Puddles giggled. "Hey, what are friends for? And good luck out there. Take all the time you need."

Loving the Horizon

Sitting in the lobby of Wilderwind's tower, it was hard for me to make it through my explanation of where things currently stood because of how smug Flarefeather's grin was.

"See, I knew you'd come through for us!" Flarefeather aggressively purred, eyeing me with a look that suggested letting her feel my ears earlier had been a big mistake. "Didn't I? I totally did. Come on, say the magic words..."

I sighed, dropping the details and getting to the point. "So if you agree with our assessment of your situation, and Lissa is willing to be completely forthcoming about her own situation and P... I mean, the Black Knight thinks we can mitigate the risks there too-"

"Then we can come?" Flarefeather whispered under her breath, still not letting me finish.

"I... Yeah..."

I rubbed the back of my neck, processing how badly I had underestimated Flarefeather's desire for this outcome. Was I just this bad at evaluating what other ponies wanted when they weren't right in front of me? Or rather, at evaluating how badly they wanted things? Or was this a completely normal reaction, and I had just forgotten how to unapologetically crave something after how many times I should have been more careful what I wished for?

Flarefeather started to giggle, and I realized too late that I had been staring and was now probably about to eat a horny joke as payback. But she mercifully summoned the self-restraint to turn her gaze towards the elevators, even though I knew she was thinking it. "So, Lissa's back up in our room," she muttered under her breath. "Would it be more your thing to watch me break the news to her, or do you want in on the action?"

"Err, the news is that there are a really lot of conditionals," I tried to say, though Flarefeather clearly wasn't listening. "And you haven't even told me you agree with our assessment of the danger to you, forget about Lissa..."

Flarefeather whipped out her rose rapier and bapped me on the nose with the flat of the blade. "Trained. In. Combat. We are literally professional payrolled security guards and have been so since the moment we were old enough for a sufficiently degenerate executive to put us in these suits. Stop fretting!"

Well, at least Flarefeather's own assessment of the danger she would be putting herself in was low enough.

Flarefeather started hauling me toward the elevators. "Think of how much happier you would be if you replaced your thoughts of catastrophe with thoughts of the look on Lissa's face when she hears the news. She didn't believe you would come through for us! She's probably still moping about you-know-who not living up to her expectations. Don't needle her about it, only I am allowed to make fun of her for being a secret fan-filly. Unless you're willing to pay the price. And if you are, gimmie a heads up, because I want to watch."

"Right..." I said as the elevator doors closed behind us and Flarefeather keyed in the dorm level as its destination. "But seriously, there'll be plenty of time for getting excited while we're flying. Do you think you could take this seriously long enough to get a safety plan in place?"

"Who's not serious? I'm dead serious," Flarefeather insisted, clearly too excited to actually be serious. "I mean, fine, but can we at least wait until Lissa? Talking shop without her around would be kind of pointless anyway."

To my relief, she managed to contain herself as the elevator finished its ascent and we walked down the dorm hallway. I didn't want to admit it to myself, but Flarefeather's exuberance didn't bother me because it was annoying: it was because I was jealous that I no longer saw travel that way, myself.

I wanted to accept her invitation to join in, but even if I didn't have to keep my head on straight and be cognizant of the dangers, I wasn't sure I could anymore. And that was a painful thought to think about.

"Alright," Flarefeather whispered, hugging the wall and sneaking up on her room's door, which was presently closed. "She said she'd be in here. Watch and learn, because this'll be great."

I raised a skeptical eyebrow. Did that mean I didn't want to watch?

"...Hey, babe!" Flarefeather slipped up against the door, knocked three times, and then opened it without waiting for a response, swinging it slooowly open. "Hope you're indecent, because I had a fantastic day!"

Surprised Lissa sounds wafted out from the door, and I shook my head and sighed.

"Flarefeather," Lissa's voice groaned, "one of these days, you're going to barge in on something you actually don't want to see."

"Oh yeah?" Flarefeather strolled into the room. "I'm pretty sure as long as you're in the scene, that's impossible. But you'll want to hear this..."

"How about me swinging a frying pan at your head for interrupting my sleep?"

"Aww, but you'd never do that. If you ruined my snoot, it wouldn't be as good for kissing!"

"Now that you mention it, that is true..."

I rolled my eyes and wandered into view before they could actually start kissing... and did a double take.

Lissa was naked, which for most ponies would be nothing unusual. But her teal fur, unbroken in hue across most of her body, morphed into a majestic purple halfway down her legs, and faded to a rich forest green by the time it reached her hooves.

"Oh, you're back?" Lissa blinked when she saw me, giving me a look that was much more sober than the one Flarefeather was giving her - and the one she had just been giving Flarefeather. "Can we help you?"

Flarefeather took a huge breath before launching into an explanation, which I didn't need to do, so I was faster. "Do you want to come with? I talked with the Black Knight, and she's willing to entertain the idea if there's a compelling argument for why it would be alright for your safety."

Lissa blinked again.

Flarefeather gave me an annoyed pout that morphed to a cheeky smile. "What she said."

"What kind of safety?" Lissa asked, completely oblivious to the fact that all I could think about was her legs. "Is this a 'do they know the rules of the road' thing, or do you have something else in mind?"

I gestured at her legs. "Well, we're going to Izvaldi, and I know Flarefeather has some political connections there that could turn dangerous. And I was going to ask what your deal was, why Wilderwind thinks you're valuable enough to keep around, but I guess that's kind of answered for me."

Lissa glanced at her legs as well, then held one up. "This? House Everlaste. It's what me and her initially bonded over." She nudged Flarefeather. "Sorry, could you give me a minute? This isn't something you just answer on the spot."

"You sure about that?" Flarefeather nudged her back, harder. "Because I'm pretty sure this one's a no-brainer, babe."

I said nothing, remembering that encouraging them to be smart and think things through was exactly what Leif had done to me, Corsica and Ansel back in Icereach. Was I really still carrying baggage from that incident? Apparently so, because I suddenly found myself thinking about how the roles were almost perfectly reversed... and this wasn't even the first time, either. I had felt that way when trying to tempt Coda out into the world, too.

Although, Leif hadn't been so bad once I got to know her, and it was Coda who suffered the consequences of following my temptations, not me. What if it wasn't my luck that was cursed, but the idea of exploring out into the world?

"Hold on," Lissa said, pushing Flarefeather gently away and focusing on me instead. "Why did the Black Knight change her mind? And more importantly, why did she advise against this plan while we were there? I can accept if she's a liar, but now she just sounds random."

Now I had to take a breath. "Because lived experience doesn't always match up with what you want to be true. She's trying her best, but she's been through enough garbage that it's pretty amazing she's still on her hooves at all. For your case in particular, it's because she's had Wilderwind Escorts die on her watch before, after taking the exact same deal that I just talked her back into."

Lissa instantly looked guilty. "I... guess that would be a pretty good reason."

Even Flarefeather's mood fell. "I haven't heard of this," she said. "Was it anyone we would have known?"

I shook my head. "Over ten years ago, so probably not. But you could ask her yourselves. Anyway, I agreed with her assessment. The amount of danger I've faced since leaving my own home, I would have been dead twice over if it weren't for... Well, you've seen it." I gestured to the window, and Flarefeather slowly nodded.

"Your cursed power thingy," she agreed. "So if both of you think it's a bad idea, why'd you talk her back into it?"

I stepped inside, shutting the door with my tail and steeling my heart for something a bit more personal. "Because I'm lonely. I've left behind almost everyone I know to chase after things that are important to me, and it feels like such a mistake, but I don't know a smarter alternative. But seeing how much enthusiasm you girls have for leaving... It reminds me of how I used to be, before it all started going wrong. And we get along well enough. If I'm going to try something different, why not do it here, with someone who clearly wants to?"

They looked at each other.

"This isn't just for me," I insisted. "I'd love it if you two had a brighter future to look forward to than living in a glitzy dorm and flirting with gross dudes until the political order collapses, then running for your lives. I think you deserve it. And I have no idea if this would be temporary or permanent or what. Maybe you'd tag along just for Izvaldi - that's where we're going next. Or maybe you'd never come back here. But, it'll be so dangerous that trouble is more of a certainty than a chance. So maybe, if we talk this out and decide we have accurate expectations of what could come for you and ways to mitigate that, this could be a learning experience so you're better prepared when you strike out on your own."

Something passed between them that I couldn't properly read, though Flarefeather was finally taking this seriously.

"When you talk about the stuff that might come for us..." Lissa said, choosing her words carefully. "You're talking about the reasons we have our jobs as escorts, right?"

I nodded. "The Black Knight explained it to me. They give you deals this good because you have something that would make you valuable as a political pawn. Collecting you and displaying you like this is basically a show of power. And if you leave their protection, someone else might try to use you instead. For you two, I'm guessing that's your lineage."

Lissa glanced between Flarefeather and me. "You mind if we discuss something alone real quick?"

"Sure." I stopped myself from phrasing it as a question or tilting my head, though all of my instincts told me not to: if they kept secrets about this from me or Puddles, we wouldn't be able to adequately plan and could get jumped more easily as a result. But Lissa had to know that, right? She was the one who put forethought into their travel plans. Odds were, she just wanted to discuss and make sure Flarefeather was okay with putting everything on the table before accepting this as a condition of coming along. Not that I hadn't already seen both of their legs...

I left the room, shut the door and walked a safe distance away, just in case. As tempting as it was to eavesdrop, I even covered my ears for good measure. Those two had yet to betray my trust. If something went wrong because of them, at this point, I had faced down the fury of the universe and lived to tell the tale. Odds were, they would have a worse time of any potential trouble than me.

Minutes passed, and eventually the door opened again, a once-more-clothed Lissa beckoning me back inside.

"Decided anything?" I asked as she shut the door behind us.

"Yep," Flarefeather answered, her smile gung-ho enough to be legitimate but relieved enough that I suspected she hadn't enjoyed their conversation. "So, it sounds like you pretty much know the important parts. Yes, Wilderwind Escorts are basically collectable trophies as far as the top brass is concerned. And we're here as Royal Spectrum bearers, me from Izvaldi and her from Everlaste. The only two in the collection! Sounds pretty dignified and uplifting when I put it that way, doesn't it?"

Lissa nodded. "Both of our existences are largely off the record to our home nations. Our legs are generally hidden from clients due to our uniforms, and we're a tight-knit group. Generally, only people important enough that Wilderwind would want to intimidate them are aware that the escorts are special at all."

"I told you about my parentage, right?" Flarefeather asked. "Old geezer who was Lord Victor's brother, noped off to Everlaste to avoid Victor's jealous wrath, had a tryst or three?"

"And my blood is Everlaste, but I was born closer to here," Lissa explained. "My mom was really young, single and probably transient. Only know what I learned from the orphanage, but presumably she was either a local who somehow got with a visiting Everlaste sphinx, or the daughter of such a relationship back in Everlaste who ran away up here when she got knocked up. Apparently that happens a lot." She shrugged for good measure.

"Sounds like another reason not to stick around," I pointed out. "So you think Everlaste will leave you alone as long as you hide your legs? If you grew up in an orphanage, wouldn't plenty of people have seen them then?"

Lissa bit her lip. "Dunno. The moment word made its way to the tower, they scooped me up. This was before I could even remember, and tracking down the place to learn even this much about my mom was basically impossible. So it's not an ironclad secret, but the important part is, even if Everlaste knows, it won't matter unless they can connect it to a random unimportant traveler like me. And even if they can do that, it won't matter unless they care. And Everlaste cares so much about sphinx blood these days, they'd probably treat me pretty well if they did get their hooves on me. Maybe even better than this."

Flarefeather nodded. "Her situation is different than mine. Lissa could likely get a good deal no matter where she goes, on bloodline alone. Since my bloodline is much less powerful, they spend more energy watching for threats than looking for trophies."

"So you're not afraid of exploitation at all, then," I told Lissa. "Beyond... this. Which is stifling, even if it's safe."

Lissa hesitated. "Well, yeah. I mean, there was that assassin way back when who cleared out the Everlaste royal family. Gottlieb something or other. He got executed by a military tribunal, but apparently he somehow still has fans in Wilderwind."

Flarefeather patted her rapier. "Good thing we know about dealing with hooligans, right?"

"Anyway, that's probably the worst danger my presence could bring down," Lissa said. "Though Wilderwind would probably be unhappy with you if Everlaste started making overtures for me to join them as a result of anything that happened. Actually, Wilderwind in general will frown on this. Our employment here is... 'voluntary.' We're allowed to walk away on paper, but the top brass have taken great pains to drive home that we won't find a better deal anywhere else."

I blinked. I hadn't really thought about how Wilderwind itself would take this... Puddles had good rapport with Geirskogul, and Geirskogul had enough seniority to merit a huge fancy office, but places like this surely didn't enjoy their toys getting up and leaving. At least, not unless they benefited from it-

Nope. No, definitely no. I stomped that thought down before I could finish it: I was not about to make any deals, on my behalf or my friends', with Wilderwind to find a way for this to be profitable for them. Those deals were always how everything went wrong. Maybe Puddles could do it, but not me.

"I'll ask the Black Knight to see if she can throw her weight around," I told them. "But you're sure about this? She said she can probably make Lord Izvaldi leave you alone as well, Flarefeather. So we've got some insurance in case your identities become known, but do you think this is good enough?"

Flarefeather looked hopefully at Lissa. Lissa nodded.

"Sounds like it to me," Lissa said. "Is she here too? The Black Knight? I'd like to talk with her for a bit first, just to make sure we can work on a team together."

Nope. I had left her at the ship... "Should I go get her? It might be a bit of a walk."

Lissa shook her head. "I'll do it. I'm faster. Flarefeather, while me and her sort out logistics and legal stuff, pack for both of us. I haven't made a decision yet, but it sounded like they wanted to leave at dawn tomorrow."

Flarefeather saluted with a sharp wing across her chest. "You got it! Hallie, you're drafted as my assistant, because we'll have a lot to carry. Let's do this thing!"

The state of Flarefeather and Lissa's room told me a lot about how much they valued organization and tidiness. Those expectations led me to believe packing would be a herculean effort: surely paring down what to bring would be even harder than it was for Corsica when we left Icereach together.

Instead, it involved the procurement of several industrial bins, into which everything - literally everything - was shoveled, unsorted. I didn't know why I was surprised.

"If you don't sort this now, do you really think you're going to do it later?" I asked, pushing one such bin out into the hallway and hauling an empty one back in. "Do you even know which of these are yours and which are hers?"

"If the color scheme works, you get dibs," Flarefeather primly replied, emptying the contents of her vanity into a sack, and clearly considering trying to take the vanity itself as well. "Sharing clothing is hot."

I leaned against the wall, taking a breather and watching her work. Even someone this disorganized wouldn't take absolutely everything on a mere practice run. Whether we brought them back here or not following the trip to Izvaldi, Flarefeather was preparing to move out, and enjoying every second of it.

How long had she been living here, anyway? As long as I had been living in Icereach?

That couldn't be possible, since I was probably a little older than her. Though not by much, and I had been gone from Icereach for a while now... Maybe it was exactly the same.

Silently, I made a vow not to let the same fate befall her that landed on me, and got back to work.

An hour passed, and some of Flarefeather's other friends poked their heads in, all receiving the same story: it was a secret. I couldn't tell if it was self-restraint or a deliberate tease: Lissa hadn't made her decision yet, whatever she was discussing with Puddles. Nothing was final. But by the two-hour mark, the dorm's early risers were starting to retire to bed, leaving Flarefeather with admonitions not to make too much noise and invitations to enjoy herself in equal measure. We finished our binning soon after, and found ourselves with nothing more to do, sitting against the empty desks next to open, empty windows.

I didn't have anything to say, and Flarefeather didn't either, though not for lack of emotions. I could feel her gratitude and appreciation like a heat lamp on a cold day, and watched her staring out at the night sky with eyes that lusted for the horizon.

"Hey," I eventually said. "You really want this, yeah? Like, you look really happy."

"Feels like a dream," Flarefeather said, smiling out at the sky. "A week ago, I had never met you. Crazy, right?"

"Where do you want this to lead?" I asked. "I'm sure part of what Lissa and the Black Knight are talking about his how long this will last, but you didn't pack like you're on a quick vacation. What are your plans for the future?"

Flarefeather shrugged happily. "Who needs plans? That's Lissa's strong suit. I just go where she takes me. Hasn't led me astray so far, right?"

I said nothing.

"But, I definitely know I'd like to see something beyond this city," Flarefeather promised. "I can't talk about my expectations without sounding silly, 'cause I'm a sheltered bum. My only expectation is to have my expectations blown open. Even if it's dangerous, I'm fine with that. I just want something more than the same boring day-by-day, flirting with the same bureaucrats and guarding the same glitzy tower from trouble that never comes. And I've got it on good authority that there's something better out there than what I've got right here."

"Whose authority? Lissa's?" I tilted my head.

"My own!" Flarefeather patted her chest. "It's just common sense. Sure, I know it won't all be sunshine and rainbows, but variety is the salt of life, right?"

"Spice," I corrected.

Flarefeather nodded along. "Yeah, that. But you came from outside of Wilderwind, and you're plenty interesting. So I rest my case."

A pang of sadness drifted over me as, once again, I remembered my final days in Icereach. "I used to feel exactly the same."

Somehow, Flarefeather laughed. "Not as good a time as you thought, right?"

"You don't sound discouraged," I pointed out.

Flarefeather shrugged. "I mean, I believe you. I've seen your friend, remember? But so what? I've got a fresh set of dice to roll. And you can't have had it that bad if you still appreciate having a cute friend like me around. I mean, sure, I had to put some serious leg work into breaking you out of your shell, but you weren't evil or nothing. Just an awkward little mare with a crazy story! So I think I'll be fine. In the ways that matter."

I joined her in looking out the windows. "I might not be evil, but that doesn't mean I'm particularly good, either," I told her solemnly. "I've made a lot of tradeoffs in pursuit of what I want that most people wouldn't make. And, I'm not that good or consistent at hanging onto goals, either. Honestly, at some point or other, I've left behind every single friend I've ever made... including one who was really counting on me, I think. I don't... know if I can promise that I won't do that again. I'm trying to be better, but-"

Flarefeather interrupted me with a smile. "Good news: we're ready to go wherever the winds take us. So I don't think you'll be faced with any hard decisions like that for a while on our behalf, unless you decide to go somewhere we literally can't follow."

"Like across the Aldenfold?" I asked.

Flarefeather blinked. "To the Plains of Harmony? I mean, Lissa's already planning to go there eventually..."

"But you don't have writs," I said, shaking my head. "And I... actually do. If I had to go there, you wouldn't be able to come, not unless I miraculously find a pair and give them away."

I almost said another pair. But that would have invited a story I didn't particularly want to think about.

Flarefeather sat back, stumped.

After a while, she said, "Well, I guess in that case we'd go it on our own. That's what Lissa has been preparing for all this time, anyway. But I assume you'd only do that with a good reason."

"Yeah," I agreed. "A reason like trying to get back to my previous friends, some of whom are still there."

Flarefeather tilted her head. "Does Coda have a writ too, then?"

I froze. As far as I knew, she didn't, and I had never even considered that.

Hopefully... I would be able to meet up with my friends in Ironridge, and it simply wouldn't be a problem. And maybe Princess Twilight had enough authority to get me more writs, to give to whomever I wanted. In which case it wouldn't be a problem for Lissa and Flarefeather either. But that was banking on circumstances outside my control, and if anything went wrong with that plan, the first step would be going back to Equestria to look for a solution. And leaving everyone behind again.

Why was this always my first course of action...!?

"You're looking a little haunted over there," Flarefeather pointed out. "Hope I didn't just blow a hole in your own machinations."

"No, I can fix this," I said, talking more about my tendency to jump to this as a solution than Coda's lack of a writ, and also lying through my teeth in the hope that saying it enough would make it the truth. "This is fine. A problem for later, anyway. And it won't matter if this turns out to just be a round trip to Izvaldi and back, which I still think is way safer and smarter than the alternative. I don't even know how much longer I'll be traveling with the Black Knight myself."

Flarefeather grinned. "In other words, if we don't do this now, we could miss our chance? Where I'm from, that's called an excuse to get while the getting is good."

You know what? Sure. Let's go with that. I nodded, and started psyching myself up for a reply when Lissa stepped in through the open door, Puddles appearing in her full plate mail behind her.

"We've reached an accord," Lissa announced, staring around at the boxes. "This... is certainly a pack job."

Flarefeather and I both perked up. "It's happening?" we said in sync.

"...Those look heavy," Puddles said, speaking in her characteristic Black Knight grunt. "I'll fetch a trolley."

"It's happening," Lissa said, breaking out in a reassuring smile and nuzzling Flarefeather. "HQ does need you to sign this, though."

"Paperwork?" Flarefeather frowned as a clipboard was shoved in her face.

Lissa shrugged. "Waiver saying that you agree they'll hold your job for you, you agree that they can't provide normal amenities including security and legal protections while you're outside of province borders, that you're still bound by normal provisions of employment including secrecy and code of conduct even while you're not collecting benefits or reporting for work, the usual. Essentially, we're still employed, on an unpaid leave of absence, and we keep our responsibilities to do right by them but they don't keep theirs to do right by us until we're back."

"Gross." Flarefeather stuck out her tongue and scribbled her name, spitting the pen out the moment she was done. "Glad you've got a head for legalese, because I sure don't want to read this whole thing."

Lissa took the clipboard back and glanced around the thoroughly looted room. "You remember that we're not leaving until tomorrow morning, right? There aren't any blankets here. And I don't see my nightie."

Flarefeather winked. "In the box. And I figured we could just crash on the ship! Get a feel for the new quarters, just in case it's so abjectly horrible that we change our minds and run away screaming in the night."

"That probably won't happen," I reassured, knowing that with my luck, it still very well might.

Flarefeather gave me a sidelong grin. "Let's be real though, it would be pretty funny if it did, right? You think we could prank someone that way, or are shipyard attendants not known for their senses of humor?"

Lissa tapped her on the back. "I'd let you prank me that way, but the night watch probably doesn't deserve it."

Flarefeather broke down giggling.

"Alright..." I rolled my eyes, turning to the bins. "Dunno how big of a trolley we're getting, so let's start carrying a load. You two can carry these, right?"

"Excuse me, are you calling my fitness into question?" Flarefeather pouted. "You think I could have this much self-esteem if I couldn't bench a measly cargo bin? Watch me."

True to her word, she was able to heft an entire bin on her back, stabilized by her wings, and so was Lissa, both mares managing their loads with a skill that suggested they had frequently done this before. What did Wilderwind make them do, rearrange furniture in conference rooms?

Either way, I had a magic bracelet, and had spent years undergoing military strength training with creatures thrice my size and ten times my weight. So, not about to be outdone, I benched two bins at once, and could have easily managed the weight of a third if I thought it would fit through the door.

"Showoff," Lissa quipped. Flarefeather just grumbled.

And so we left, leaving the rest of the bins for Puddles. I wasn't surprised to learn that the tower had a cargo elevator for purposes just like this one, and we exited through a warehouse connected to the back of the structure that completely avoided the main plaza. I led the way, by now familiar enough with the city to get around even after finding myself somewhere new from the back exit, and we marched through the streets, drawing all sorts of looks for our odd combination of garb and cargo.

No one messed with us, though. In fact, everyone took great care to get out of our way. I really couldn't blame them; if I was a civilian - or even a criminal - and I saw a squad of movers coming through, carrying twice their weight in industrial-looking crates while wearing skimpy neon dresses and cartoonish armored noir swordfighters' garb, I would get out of their way too.

The ship was locked when we got there, and I felt like shadow sneaking in to unlock it would be poor form, even when I was currently living there. So instead we waited, eventually getting bored enough that Flarefeather and Lissa decided to stack both of their boxes on mine as well to see if I could lift all four. With a bit more help from my bracelet, and the pegasi participating in a delicate balancing act, I succeeded... and I started to relax, as well.

Flarefeather's excitement and gratitude was right there, pointed straight at me, and at Lissa too. Lissa was more calm and guarded with her emotions, though I could tell that watching Flarefeather enjoy herself was like a reward to her. Lissa was pleased with herself. And I felt like I could be pleased with myself, too.

The intensity of the feeling faded a little as they disassembled the box tower and I finally got to stretch my back. As contagious as it was, I was still an observer, living out through them what I didn't feel myself...

I frowned, blinked, and caught hold of that train of thought, and turned my bracelet just a little back on.

It felt like a physical rewind. I hadn't not been able to read the pegasi when my bracelet was off, but turning it on made it easier for me to empathize with the spirit. I felt less like an outsider, like this joy was something I could observe, but not partake in. To make sure, I flicked my bracelet on and off a few more times, and the effect was undeniable: with it on, I was more empathetic.

Did turning it off cause some sort of blockage, or...?

Well, we are a receptacle for emotions, Faye pointed out in my mind. That's just how changeling queens work, I think. We're like an empty reservoir. It makes sense that engaging with our power would make us more receptive to the emotions around us.

I tilted my head, considering the implications.

I don't have a great precedent to base this on, Faye mused, considering Coda had a whole throne and altar setup to help her absorb emotions. But it's possible we can absorb emotions through activating our bracelet, like what happened that time when it got broken after we used it too much while walking from Sires Hollow.

Could that be what was happening? Was I turning into some kind of mirror when I used it, reflecting or absorbing the emotions around me? I focused, and Flarefeather's happiness clearly was directed at least in part at me. And when I turned my bracelet on, it felt much easier to reciprocate.

Was this smart? Was it ethical? Was I rendering my mental state vulnerable to change and manipulation? Was that any different from what normal ponies did when their own feelings were influenced by the actions of those around them? Was I taking something from Flarefeather that wasn't meant to be taken? Did it matter that it was freely given? And if emotions were energy, what happened to the things people felt about each other when the other person wasn't a magical emotion energy battery, anyway?

So many questions, some of which could probably stump even a god. I shook my head to clear it, and decided that the worst course of action would be to let this make me a wet blanket and kill the mood.

Puddles showed up eventually, with all the remaining boxes in tow. I let myself tune out as Flarefeather and Lissa picked themselves a room to share, and another room to use as storage for all their stuff. It seemed I wasn't needed for that, and nothing was going wrong that I needed to fix.

The two pegasi went back to the tower shortly after, to say their goodbyes and conduct a sweep for any personal trinkets they may have missed, never mind that Lissa's official agreement with the tower meant they would be coming back after the Izvaldi trip, and Puddles was adamant that this wouldn't turn into a more permanent arrangement without a solid month of discussion and planning. Then they returned, and spent the night in a room far enough away from mine that they wouldn't wake me up with any late-night chitchat.

In the morning, they were gone again, back to the tower for yet more goodbyes and yet another final final check for missed belongings. My last chance to rethink this came and went, and I spent it in my room, staring at Coda.

I would learn my lesson. I wouldn't fail again. This time would be different. I would keep them safe, save Coda to undo my past failure, and eventually return to Equestria and make things right with Corsica. And along the way, I would find a middle ground between leaving my friends behind and inviting them into danger. A middle ground that was better than my previous modus operandi of achieving both negative extremes at the same time.

My moment of resolve came and went, and we lifted off, pointed our backs to Wilderwind and set sail for Izvaldi.

Hating the Horizon

By the final day of the Immortal Dream's flight west, Corsica had settled on her favorite spot: the observation area at the front, on the bottom deck at the prow.

From the mess hall, a corridor led forward, past a small bathroom tucked under the staircase and into a compact area at the very front of the boat, reinforced windows looking forward and down and out to the sides in a panorama that made it feel like the biggest room on the ship, even if it was actually a closet with little more than room for a few hammocks. But she could lay there, swaddled by the ropes and canvas, and watch the horizon go by - a horizon she had once been so excited to chase.

Ahead and below was a canal several miles wide, the southernmost talon of the Griffon Palm Sea. Snowport would come into sight sometime today, but it was still far enough out that the talon looked endless, heavily forested land scrolling by on either side.

Corsica tried to appreciate its beauty, to feel the temptation of that vast open landscape with its complete absence of restrictions and rules. But too many events from the past months were burned into her vision, superimposing themselves over the world below and ruining the view. Events like Halcyon stepping into the light wave while she could do nothing but watch.

What was the point of being free from Icereach's stuffy, stifling rules and roadblocks if she had no one to share it with?

As she had done so many times before over the past week, always when no one was looking, Corsica started to silently cry. She cried for her own enthusiasm, which had been intact enough despite years of living with her talent even up until she arrived in Ironridge. She cried for her missed opportunities, all the things she had hoped to see out in the world, yet no longer could, like the joy of discoveries partaken with friends. And she cried because she really had nothing better to do, at all.

"Is this a bad time?" Twilight asked from the entrance.

Corsica jumped a little. "Whaddya need?" she asked, trying to wipe her face down on the hammock before turning around. As tight as her heart felt, Twilight had been a perfectly good host, and there was no reason to take anything out on her. "If it's a reminder that we're almost there, I don't have much to do to prepare."

"Actually, I'd like to talk about your cutie mark," Twilight said, her tone suggesting that this was a bit more important than idle chitchat. "Artifice of Hope? Emotionally drains you in exchange for granting wishes?"

"What about it?" Corsica asked, sluggish. "Need me to use it for something? Not like I've had much to use it on since we left Our Town."

Twilight gave a knowing grimace. "So you haven't been using it this last week and a half. That was the next thing I was going to ask."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Does that mean you've got a really big job? As long as you're willing to lug around my carcass until I recover."

"Get out of that hammock," Twilight commanded.

"Not something I can do from here, then?" Corsica sighed, preparing to spend the effort required to get up. "Fine..."

"I'm not asking you to use your talent!" Twilight insisted, raising her voice. "What I want is for you to get out of bed!"

Corsica groaned, sliding out of the hammock and landing shakily on her hooves, her mane completely messed up and split over her face. She brushed it haphazardly back with a hoof. "What else do you need me for, then?"

"It's not because you have work to do," Twilight said, backing off a little. "It's just, I know using your cutie mark makes you lose the motivation to do anything, but you're not using it, and you're still like this. So I'm worried you're using your mark's side effects as an excuse to let yourself stop trying to do anything."

Corsica gave her a blank stare. "I told you, if there's anything that needs to be done, I'll do it..."

"Corsica," Twilight said flatly, giving her a no-nonsense stare. "If I'm wrong, you can tell me, but don't pretend to not at least know why this is a conclusion I could draw. You've spent the entire voyage west laying down or sleeping. Even flying up to Our Town, you were more active than this. I know losing Halcyon hurts, but once we land, I'm going to have ten thousand obligations mustering resources and giving reports and preparing to go defend Ironridge from Yakyakistan and fight windigoes. So if I don't give this talk now, I might not get the chance later."

Instinctively, Corsica tried to shut out Twilight's words as unimportant noise. She didn't want to get up again...

"No more excuses," Twilight told her. "I don't care if you're just going through the motions. If you don't get up because you don't want to, then you're never going to find a reason to want to, but you might find one if you get out there in the world. And I don't care if you have a crippling cutie mark or not, because you've lived with it for years already and I don't believe you've spent every day of those years in bed either. You might have a good reason to tell yourself you can't do this, but if you let that reason be an excuse to stop trying, that's just a self-fulfilling prophecy."

Corsica's instincts told her to push back. "I can make myself get up just fine, see?" She showed Twilight her hooves. "I just really don't have anything to do. Like, what, do I walk around the boat?"

Twilight shrugged. "It's better than nothing. Go for a walk, think about what you'll do when we land, talk to someone? Everyone else has cabin fever too; you're not the only one who's low on ideas."

"Well, what are you doing?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Aside from poking me awake?"

"Going over the reports I wrote up on the way here," Twilight explained. "Explaining the situation with the flames to the other princesses and requesting a summit as soon as possible, starting mail service to Our Town, that sort of thing. Making sure they'll be ready to send out the moment we touch down in Snowport."

Any interest Corsica felt had already waned. "I guess wandering in circles around the boat it is."

Twilight nodded firmly. "If you want to do me a favor, make it so I don't have to worry about you more than I already will. That'll help more than you can imagine. Like I said, even if you have to force yourself through the motions and aren't really feeling it, just stay on your hooves, okay? I promise I'll help mediate things between you and Halcyon when you meet her again, but that's going to be a lot harder if you're roleplaying as a sea cucumber."

"I'll get on it," Corsica promised, devoid of enthusiasm and not particularly wanting anyone to watch her as she sorted through what Twilight had said. "Taking a walk around the ship now."

Twilight gave her a look, but let her go.

Corsica took the shortest path to the cargo hold, through the empty mess hall and then the empty galley and then the not-quite-empty storeroom, its provisions stretched across a crew half the size of what the ship could carry during its glory days. The cargo hold had a staircase that spanned all three floors, and Corsica stopped, unable to make a decision on whether to go to the cabin level or the top deck next.

Using her special talent as an excuse to stop trying. Was that really what she was doing?

Could Twilight earnestly say that after seeing the blowback from her wish almost shatter the Tree of Laughter? After it summoned Unnrus-kaeljos, who carried Halcyon away?

Was it an excuse that she had collapsed in the early days after she got her talent, using it everywhere without realizing what it did? Was it an excuse that she had knocked herself out for a week, wishing that Valey's Cold Karma coup would succeed in Ironridge, just after she had been banned from helping in a more physical way because she was already past her limit? Maybe the reason Halcyon had left her behind was because she was tired of Corsica being so passive and tired all the time, and just because Corsica couldn't keep up. Did that sound like something anyone would want to do? Like something anyone would make an excuse for?

Corsica gritted her teeth. That was stupid. Twilight was being stupid. No one would wish to be this way. But using her talent was often the only way, and without it...

But Twilight was right. She choked on a sob: she hadn't used her talent over the past week, and all the times she used it in Our Town turned out to be minor. And she hadn't used it much on the flight up from Ponyville, either.

Maybe she should wish for something big and pointless, just so... No. That would be stupid, too. Corsica hated it, but now Twilight was staring her in the face too, another phantom imposed on her vision. This wasn't just her talent's fault, but hers, too. Had it broken her down, over the years? Or was this just how anyone would feel in her position?

It wasn't fair. This was her talent's fault; any desires or ambitions she had harbored for herself were choked off long ago when she learned that letting herself feel them too closely rendered her catatonic. After that, she had been living vicariously off of the enjoyment she found in watching her friends find fulfillment. Halcyon's eureka moments became her own eureka moments. But Halcyon didn't need her, and who else did she care about? Who else hadn't she left behind on her adventures? Forget that, who even had there been in Icereach, before her travels started?

This was all so stupid. She had always told herself having her talent was overall worthwhile, because it gave her the power to protect the ponies she did feel strongly enough about to spend her desires on. But now that she wasn't using it because they were all gone, what was the point? Had it protected them after all, if it made her drive them away instead of holding them close? It was pointless.

Corsica climbed up the stairs, the end of her path sitting in plain sight all around her. This was where everything she had been doing for the past three years led to. Where had she gone wrong? No one asked if she wanted this special talent. No one had given her a choice in the matter.

The deck was far from empty: Rarity, Applejack and Pinkie Pie were all gathered near the bridge, talking, and Rainbow Dash was visible far in the distance doing loops and tracing patterns in the air with her rainbow-colored trail. None of them heard Corsica emerge due to the wind, though.

Ahead, Snowport had finally come into view; the ship was losing altitude. They were still over the water, but in a matter of moments, this journey would be over. In a matter of moments, the Immortal Dream would dock, its passengers would disembark, and it would do whatever ships did while they weren't in use, presumably undergo cleaning and maintenance in preparation for being used to fly to Ironridge.

In a matter of moments, Corsica would need something new to do with herself, but no matter how deep she looked, she had no desires whatsoever.

Go for a walk, Twilight's voice echoed in her head. Even if you're just going through the motions, you won't find anything you want to do by laying in bed.

I'll be right back, Halcyon lied, jumping into a light wave that would carry her across the world.

I'm sorry. I really do think I've never seen you before, Ansel said on the day after her recovery from the avalanche, all memories of their days as colt and fillyfriend wiped away.

I wish you weren't my father, Corsica's own voice shouted, coiled up in a fit of emotions.

Do something, said a voice Corsica had never heard before. Hurry.

If the ship touched down in Snowport, time would cease to flow. Drifting lifelessly on this ship was her terminus point, her final destination. If she couldn't see a future for herself, did one even exist? What would happen if time moved too far forward?

Your pain is familiar to me, that voice insisted, more of a chorus than a single pony. I want to help you.

Corsica grimaced. How was it possible to feel so listless and yet so tense at the same time? A paradoxical feeling pushed her against herself and yet held her in place, a savage, almost primal desire to no longer exist in this state where she couldn't have desires, a temptation to fling herself at a cage made of razor wire fences, come freedom or death.

One last try? If this was her fate, if this was the only place her path could lead, what did she stand to lose, risking everything trying to escape? If she accepted the consequences as inevitable anyway, then what more could happen? Why not peel back the curtain, try to peer beyond the veil of her listlessness and see what was back there, look her own emotions in the face, everything that hadn't been safe to feel ever since she learned there were consequences for desiring anything beyond a passing whim?

The ship was seconds away from skimming the water, its hull built to serve double duty as a ship of the air and of the sea. Snowport's docks were dead ahead. There was a presence around her, a strange feeling that she wasn't alone.

Corsica squeezed her eyes shut, stuck a hoof into her heart, and yanked the whole thing out where she could see it. Screw the consequences, screw everything she had learned about how to have a future: she had no future. All she wanted was one last look at the pony she had once been.

But it was a mirror. She saw a classroom in Icereach, a young filly on escapades, chafing against rules, with plenty of power that came from her status and wasn't good for much at all. She had never wanted for power. What she wanted was to be free.

"I wish I didn't have this special talent," Corsica whispered, knowing that the one thing her talent couldn't do was change its own mechanics. It was a zero-sum game; wishing for more stamina in the past had taken the same as it gave.

"I wish I didn't have this special talent," she whispered more forcefully. None of that mattered. Rules like that had never been important to her in the first place. "I don't want it. I wish I had never gotten it. I'm done being a sacrifice for ponies who don't appreciate it and throw me away once I'm burnt down to a stub. I wish it had never worked this way in the first place! Now get off my flank!"

Nothing happened - at least, not to her special talent. But time had stopped, and in the infinite void before her, she saw everything she had lost, everything that had been taken from her, everything she sacrificed to her talent and everything she threw away so that her talent couldn't get to it first. She saw herself, three years younger with a sassy, flirty smile, pampered by her father and popular in school, with an imagination that let her make use of the personal laboratory she had been given for her birthday several years before that. She saw a curiosity that led her to ransack libraries, an initiative that hosted countless spur-of-the-moment parties and got her invited to many others, a blazing flame that propelled her forward toward bigger and better and brighter things, and a fearless bravado to cover for the mistakes she made along the way.

What would her past self say if she could see her now, a disheveled, blubbering wreck who could barely stand straight? The reality of her situation hit her like cold rain, and she opened her eyes, all of her previous haunting visions now replaced with that image of her at her prime. Time would continue. She would disembark this boat, go on to Snowport and either crawl forward through life or lay down and die, without her shoes and without her ear ornaments and without even brushing her tail and mane.

That was too stupid to be fair. If that was where life would take her, she would fight it kicking and screaming.

"I want to go back," Corsica demanded, stomping a hoof. "I wish I was who I was before I got my special talent. I wish none of this had ever happened!"

She raised her voice, not caring who might hear her, pulling on her past self's desires and leaning into that flame. "This wasn't a fair trade!" she screamed at the horizon, which had once seemed inviting and wonderful and was now dull, loathsome and boring. "Let me go back! I wish I was free!"

Something started to twist at her flank. Corsica whipped her head around, and her special talent was moving, the lines that composed it starting to turn and change, like the hands on a clock that was running backwards. "Screw you," she hissed. "I don't want this anymore! I want to go back! I wish I was the real me again!"

A loud, mechanical buzzing built up and overtook her ears, like the sound of damaged high-voltage mana equipment. Someone might have been shouting her name, but the buzzing obscured a cavernous silence, and her heart hurt, as if her ribcage was suddenly too small. Her entire body felt wrong, somehow, and she realized she was wearing her ear ornaments, even though she hadn't put those on in over a week. And her special talent was peeling, pulling away from her flank at the center and staying attached at the edges, like a spider web in a gale.

It had to be all in her head. Her talent couldn't modify itself, and that extended to wishing it away. It couldn't be working.

But Corsica didn't care. She had years upon years of pent-up, repressed desires, and if the consequences of expressing them destroyed her, she was already destroyed. She could finally feel herself again, and she held nothing back, no words in the universe sufficient to express her passion and rage.

Leave. Leave. Leave leave leave leave leave-

With a tiny pop, her special talent detached from her flanks, trailing a wall of midnight-blue storm clouds that crackled with lightning, just like had happened when Generosity absorbed the consequences of her wishing Kindness back into existence. Corsica's heart stopped, and both she and the ponies around her stared as the talent was swept upward, pulled like a vacuum into the harmony comet of the Immortal Dream.

It touched the comet. Some sort of feedback zipped through the system, and with almost no fanfare, both her talent and the clouds and the harmony comet winked out of existence, disappearing without a trace.

Gravity vanished, and a moment later Corsica felt herself slammed against the ship deck as it hit the water with an almighty splash, bobbing violently and rapidly losing speed.

But... she couldn't get up. Something was wrong with her body; nothing felt like it should. Everything was alien, and her heart hadn't started again yet. She couldn't even speak, and there was blackness...

"She seems to be coming to," said a voice that was probably familiar. "Draconic medicine must have some serious tricks up its sleeve."

Corsica stirred, and tried to open her eyes.

Her head pounded, and her whole body felt like it had been tumble-dried in a bucket of rocks. She hadn't felt this beaten up in... in...

Her eyes flew open in alarm. She was laying in a hospital bed, and yet attending her weren't the nurses of Icereach: it was Seigetsu, Twilight, Starlight and a small, lizardlike dragon in a medical frock.

She breathed a sigh of relief, though her breathing felt labored. The last few moments were coming back to her, and it felt like she should be in Icereach for some reason...

"Well," the frocked dragon said, wearing a pair of spectacles on his incredibly thin, wide face, "if loss of consciousness was the only issue, I'd say she's out of the woods, though it still appears she's suffered a great amount of blunt physical trauma recently. And I really can't speak to this age thing at all."

Age thing? What...?

The more Corsica tried to think, the more her memories felt piecemeal. She was at Wystle Tower with Ansel, and Halcyon had been there too. There was an avalanche, but she barely had time to register what was happening... She woke up with a special talent. Several years passed, and she learned that her desires always came true, albeit at the cost of her ability to desire anything. Aldebaran. Ironridge. Halcyon.

She had... wished her talent was gone, that none of that ever happened. But... it had happened. She remembered it, and Twilight was right here. But, the last thing she remembered was a terrible rumble, the biting cold, being swept off her hooves...

"Nnngh..." Corsica tried to get up, and couldn't quite do it even though she was maybe slightly less bruised than she felt like she should be. But she got a look at her flanks: no special talent. Nothing but smooth, pink, unblemished fur.

That wasn't how it was supposed to go.

"Corsica?" Twilight asked, hesitant. "Do you... remember who I am?"

"Yeah?" Corsica blinked to clear her vision, her entire body just fitting weirdly somehow. "Twilight. Starlight, Seigetsu... Dunno if I've met you, Doc. What happened?" She tried to rub gently at her forehead. "The avalanche feels more recent than it should have been, and stuff on the ship is kind of distant... Are we in Snowport?"

"That's a question we're all still trying to figure out," Twilight apologized. "And one that maybe you can help with. But first, how are you feeling?"

Corsica groaned. "Messed up. And kind of feeble. Feels like... Well, I guess I have been sitting around for a week being a couch potato. Have I? How long has it been? I..."

She shook her head, confused. Had she just been laying unconscious for weeks in Icereach? She vaguely remembered the doctors there explaining it to her when she came to, and it felt like that should be happening, right about now. But she also remembered laying in a hammock all day aboard the Immortal Dream, for some reason unable to summon the willpower to get up and explore the ship.

What was wrong with her? Had she somehow traveled through time? It was hard to tell if her memories were chronologically consistent, because they felt so incoherent.

"Less than two days," Twilight explained. "Starlight recently arrived, and was able to help the dragons do something to bring you out of your coma. You kind of collapsed on the deck after the ship lost power, and Applejack thought you had some physical injuries, but then there's this..."

"You should see a mirror," Starlight agreed. "Can you stand? With help?"

"Sure. Don't laugh if I faceplant," Corsica warned, now determined to stand on her own. Shakily, all but certain she was healing off more than a couple cracked ribs and probably deserved a walker or a cane, she edged herself out of bed, gasped at the feeling of her own weight on her hooves, and nearly crumpled before Starlight caught her in her aura.

Corsica reddened. "Thanks."

Something about standing gave her a sense of vertigo, and not just from getting up after laying down for so long. Nothing seemed to be the right height, though she couldn't tell if it was all shorter or taller...

Twilight held up a mirror, and Corsica beheld a messy, bed-ridden version of herself that probably didn't look much worse than she had over the last week or so on the ship... except for one crucial difference.

She was small now.

Almost-three-years-smaller small. Seventeen-years-old small. Corsica paid a great deal of attention to her own body, and there was no possible mistake about what she saw: somehow, her age had reverted to what it had been during the avalanche, when she first got her special talent.

In fact, her body had probably been rewound by her wish to that precise moment in time, so precisely that when her wish came true, she immediately fell unconscious, because that was how she had been on the day her talent had appeared.

"What the...?" Corsica whispered, knowing it to be true and yet still scarcely comprehending what had happened. What she had done to herself. What, somewhere, an emotional price was waiting to be paid for. And it was probably a big one.

"You're lucky you passed out so close to a friendly dragon town," the doctor told her. "Whatever happened to cause this, your body shows signs of having been brain-dead for weeks. These symptoms shouldn't be possible for someone who's been unconscious less than forty-eight hours, especially the partially-healed blunt trauma that appears to have caused this in the first place. Magic that can repair the spirit and coax it back into wakefulness like this is not commonly available outside of our lands."

"I... think the rest of this is on me to figure out. But thanks, Doc." Corsica nodded shakily. "Any estimate on when I'll be able to walk on my own power again?"

The doctor frowned. "I'll be frank with you: you were never in that good of shape to begin with. If you want to get your strength up, I'd strongly recommend some form of physical therapy. A proper exercise regimen could do you well, even after you're back to normal conditions."

"What?" Corsica tilted her head. "I know how to exercise. Sure, I might not have done much recently, but I..."

She trailed off as another realization hit her: if she had truly been rewound, that meant she had never spent time training with the yaks. She might remember Balthazar's lessons, but as far as physical fitness went, her body was that of a civilian. And not a particularly active one, at that.

Well, that was embarrassing. Her post-Icereach self definitely should have appreciated what she had more. This was something she'd have to remedy, the moment standing wasn't physically painful anymore.

Something felt wrong about that thought even as she thought it, but it took her a full minute to realize what: she wanted to do something. Why? Self-improvement. Who needed a better reason than that?

That wasn't how she was supposed to work, at least not since getting her special talent. But it very much was how she had been before then. Was this for real? Was she not instinctively shying away at the possibility of desiring something anymore?

Corsica cracked an excited grin. It felt real! How had she done this? What were the consequences? Probably huge and debilitating for someone, somewhere, but she had already promised herself that she didn't care when making the wish. And you know what? She didn't care. If what she remembered of the way she had been was accurate - and, frankly, it was embarrassing to dwell too much on, so she didn't particularly want to think about it - then she'd give anything to not go back to being that way. This was the real her. And as soon as she got over the system shock of feeling like two ponies mashed and melded together, she was sure it would feel right, too.

But... she was, technically, an adult on what had started as a high-stakes diplomatic mission and might now be turning into a military intervention in a foreign war. As much as both halves of her wanted to relish her situation and go do literally anything, she had learned a bit about self-control when keeping her desires in check due to her talent. She could focus and take this seriously, as long as she got free time sprinkled in somewhere. Probably.

"Alright," Corsica sighed, kissing her ambitions and tucking them in for a nap as she prepared to be an adult again for a bit. "So where's the other shoe that's gonna drop? Nothing ever goes this well without a gotcha. Did my stunt break the ship?"

Starlight bit her lip.

"Umm..." Twilight cut in. "Not to interrupt, but you're really feeling up to contributing? We could certainly use the help, and you might even know something about what's going on with it. But even if you got rid of the thing that was causing you that much distress, it's not like that degree of depression and emotional damage can just vanish overnight."

"Do I look dumb enough to question it?" Corsica shrugged. "I remember what I was like. I wished none of that had ever happened, and I guess I got my wish. With my memories somehow intact. Sort of. I'll figure it out. So whaddya need?"

Twilight and Starlight glanced at each other. The doctor looked mystified, yet deeply curious, and Seigetsu simply stood in the corner, hands clasped behind her back, watching.

"Well?" Corsica asked, feeling an itch to get out and explore the city if she wasn't actually needed.

"That's... not supposed to happen," Starlight admitted. "Memory magic is mostly above my pay grade, but you're saying you feel like your past self, but with your present memories? Or like they're all mashed together?"

"Told you. Dunno." Corsica shrugged again. "What I do know is that whoever I was before just a moment ago is dead to me. I remember enough about her that I never want to be her again. I'll still help out with your mission, but I don't even really want to think about it."

Starlight shook her head, then looked at Seigetsu. "Have you ever heard of two sets of memories being grafted together? Even if it's from the same person at two different time points? Anything that could explain this?"

Seigetsu hummed in thought. "No. But my people may have some knowledge on the matter." She turned to Corsica. "I would encourage you to stay close to your friends until you have a fuller understanding of what you have done. In matters like these, it is nigh impossible to fully predict the consequences."

"Whatever they are, I'll take 'em," Corsica said. "Better than being a dead mare walking. It feels bad to even try to relate to who I remember being over the past few however-longs. And not just because I'm still sorting out who I am now in my head. I didn't do this because I was happy or content with how things were going and who I was."

"Well, at least you're feeling lively," Twilight remarked. "But let's get back to the ship so you can see how things stand."

"I came straight here from the train station," Starlight added, nodding earnestly. "You better not have destroyed my ship beyond what I can repair, or that'll put a wrench in any plans to go back north."

Corsica's memories stirred, and she slipped a little back into the groove of her mission here in Equestria. "You're feeling up to going north all of a sudden? Did anything new happen over the last week?"

Starlight shook her head. "Let's talk more about that on the ship."

The Immortal Dream was docked safely in Snowport's harbor, being ogled by no small number of draconic onlookers. To Corsica's relief, it didn't look outwardly damaged - she was fairly sure she remembered it dropping the last little bit into the water after she wished away her special talent.

Starlight flew up to the rigging using her strange telekinetic flight, a spell Corsica remembered being jealous of before but now felt open envy over. She should have tried to wish for that for herself before throwing away her talent! It wasn't like she wasn't miserable all the time anyway, so what would a little more wish blowback matter in the grand scheme of things? Though if she had gotten that ability for herself, it probably would have gotten rewound too...

Futilely, she lit her horn and tried to lift herself anyway, though it didn't do much good.

"Well, nothing's amiss up here," Starlight reported, floating down to the ground. "That's a good sign, at least. The comet lattice can get pretty time-consuming to repair."

"The thing you'll want to see is in the engine room." Twilight shook her head. "It's... You'll recognize it when you see it."

Twilight had to help Corsica down the ship's stairs, as she was walking with the aid of a rolling cart thing that slipped under her barrel that the hospital provided. She wasn't sure if it was humiliating, needing the aid, or cool to have a personal go-kart that no one could part her from without looking like a huge scumbag, but being unable to handle stairs definitely erred on the side of humiliating. She tried not to redden too hard.

Starlight was way ahead of them, the door to the engine room left open in her wake. And as Twilight and Corsica caught up, Corsica began to recognize a very disconcerting noise: the empty, overwhelming, technological hum that filled her ears when she first started grasping for her past. It was the auditory equivalent of a piercing red spotlight in a dark theater being pointed straight at her eyes, and as she got closer, it forced her to put her ears down and cringe.

The engine room, she quickly saw, hadn't exploded or suffered any visible forms of damage. Its control cabinets were still glowing, and the suspended cloud of rails that usually burned with the harmonic plasma that fed the harmony comet was intact as well. However, the rails were far from inert: instead of their usual calming, shimmering mist, they crackled with vicious blue lightning, midnight flames running their lengths in tight orbits around a dark star at their core.

It looked more like a portal to another dimension than a physical object, a perfect circle that always turned to face her as she rolled from side to side. Obviously, that meant it was a sphere, but no matter what angle she saw it from, it had clearly defined, burning white edges where the blue power in the rails pressed in on it, and whatever was inside pressed back.

Corsica rolled closer, and it came into sharper focus more quickly than natural given how little her position actually changed. Inside were midnight blue storm clouds, and at the core was her old special talent.

Somehow, the ship and its harmonic energies seemed to be containing her talent, locking it in a prison... and the premonition flux along with it. That stuff had almost leveled a Tree of Harmony when it exploded last time. If it exploded again, she doubted the engine room would fare much better.

I'm glad you're alright, said a voice Corsica barely remembered from before she lost consciousness, right when she was deciding to fight her fate one last time.

"Well," Starlight said, nervous and baffled and relieved and more than a little awestruck. "Thank you for not poking this too hard while I was gone, but I have not much idea what to do with it from here. While I was fixing the palace, I got a good enough explanation from the other flames of what this stuff is and what happened last time, and this stuff is really bad news."

River of Time

"Bad news, huh?" Corsica asked, warily eyeing the sphere of energy isolating her special talent and its accompanying storm clouds inside the engine core of the immortal Dream. "Worse news than blowing up the Tree of Harmony? Or my brain?"

"I'm just worried it'll blow up the ship!" Twilight complained, ears folded against the confluence's menacing buzz. "Well, Starlight? You said you know what's going on here?"

"Enough to know we're in trouble," Starlight said, walking up to the cloud of rails and staring into the core. "That phenomenon surrounding it - the stuff that looks like storm clouds - is called a premonition flux."

Twilight nodded, squinting up alongside her. "You mentioned that once or twice when telling me about your foalhood adventures, and the Flames called it that too in the Laughter palace. It looks a lot like harmonic fire, except corrupted somehow?"

"Would make sense," Corsica said, keeping a healthy distance from the core - though it was much, much easier to feel curious about the mechanisms behind her wish-making now that she could no longer make them. "When I used that talent, I'd make my wish, and then I'd get a feeling that I was going to pay the price, and then actually pay the price when the wish came true. So I'm guessing that stuff is like a magical I owe you, or something. Maybe even more like a mental tax collector. And in this case, like at the tree, it got pulled out of my body before it could collect on its due."

"However your wishes worked, there must be some sort of energy transference involved," Twilight answered. "Maybe this premonition flux is the energy carrier, taking from your emotions and applying it when the wish is fulfilled?" She rubbed her chin in thought. "No, that wouldn't make any sense. Why would that lead to it exploding unless your wishes are thwarted somehow? But in the Palace, it exploded the moment your wish came true..." She glanced at Starlight. "Are you going to fill us in on what we're missing?"

Starlight took a deep breath. "You're right that it's the energy transference mechanism, and that it's a type of harmony. But Corsica was closest to the truth when she said it was like an I owe you. According to the Flames, premonition flux is an energy debt carrier. The actual energy consumed in making a wish is consumed when that wish is made, not when it comes true."

Corsica tilted her head. "So it's negative energy? Literally negative, not just bad. Like, I pay up front by creating this, and then it gets canceled out later by the mojo I lose when I actually feel the price?"

"It doesn't look like chaos or disharmony to me," Twilight said, squinting. "Usually that looks a bit more... Discord-y."

"Nope. Not the same." Starlight shook her head. "Emotions don't exist in negative numbers. Either you're feeling something or you aren't, and even if you think you're feeling the opposite of something, that's just a positive quantity of a different emotion. In this case, that emotion is still hope. The same thing both of us paid as a price when we used that artifice..." She nodded to Corsica. "And the same thing as my virtue, which is why it's the same color as the flames I use to power this ship. And it's quite a lot of it, at that."

"So what's negative about it, then?" Corsica asked. "Assuming this stuff does disappear when someone pays the price, it sure feels like I've lost something."

Twilight slowly blinked.

Starlight simply shrugged. "It moves backwards through time."

Corsica stared flatly at her.

"Premonition flux is created at some point in the future," Starlight explained. "It's an energy-intensive process, and hugely inefficient at higher concentrations as well - most of the excess power is lost, which in the physical world takes the form of an explosion. As opposed to when it's all happening inside your head." She walked to the other side of the engine room, drawing in the air with a hoof. "Then, it dissipates at some point in the past, releasing that energy as a power source."

Twilight hesitantly raised a hoof. "Is this at all related to that time when...?"

Starlight shook her head, though Corsica couldn't tell whether it was a no or an it's not important. "Because the premonition flux still exists contiguously between two points in time, we can see and even interact with it as if it was a normal state of energy. But if you tried to do anything to it, you'd see the effects of your action show up before you take it, and not after, hence the name. And if you try to change your action based on the results you saw in the flux... The flames didn't talk about that, but they clearly didn't want to answer. Either way, those storm clouds are waiting for a powerful energy source to create them in the future, and they're not going to be picky about what it is."

"Hold on," Twilight interrupted, "the first time you told me about this, it was related to Valey's artifice, wasn't it?"

"And Valey's artifice warns her about impending danger," Starlight agreed. "It's the same mechanism, only hers uses the premonition flux as a source of information rather than power. Because of that, it uses little enough that the actual amount of energy required to create the flux is insignificant. All of the artifices function this way."

"So where does that leave us?" Corsica asked, crossing her forelegs and leaning on one hoof. "Is it inevitable that this particular bit will be 'created' in the future? My wish already came true; that's how I got so small. Why hasn't it gone boom yet? Is it just gonna seek me out and chew on my mind anyway?"

Twilight frowned. "Well, right now, it looks like it's being held in stasis. Which is odd, because if the positive energy in the ship is doing that, why doesn't it just cancel out and explode right away?"

"I don't know." Starlight shook her head. "I do know that last time this stuff got into the physical world, a Flame of Harmony was able to pay the price to get rid of it. If we could get it out of the engine and somewhere the explosion wouldn't damage anything valuable, I could probably do that again. Going off Generosity's experience, it would hurt like crazy, but not debilitate me for too long. But moving it safely is going to be the hard part."

"Maybe the dragons could do something?" Corsica suggested. "Seigetsu has a weird power to cancel wishes I've made before they come true, and the premonition flux in my mind always goes away when that happens. Dunno what that would do for one that's already come true, but not had the flux vanish yet. I'm not down for anything that involves that stuff getting back in my head though, and I'm not budging on that."

"I wouldn't ask you to," Starlight said, still staring at the confluence in thought.

Twilight loudly cleared her throat. "If we've got something to try, can we go try it? Preferably not here? That buzzing is really starting to get on my nerves."

Starlight nodded. "Right. Seigetsu. I suppose she's the best lead we have. Ugh, go figure I'd spend the entire week psyching myself up to face the north again, and before we can even lift off I have to defuse a harmonic bomb that could blow my ship to smithereens... and this is still closer to a problem that can be solved with brute force than my usual luck in the north."

Twilight was the first out the door, and Corsica brought up the rear. On her way out, though, she could have sworn she heard a voice whisper, Good-bye!

Freedom to Choose

On the deck of the Immortal Dream, Corsica watched as Twilight soared away, ostensibly to take care of princess duties now that fixing the ship had been handed off to Starlight. Probably a bunch of preparation for going to Ironridge. Sounded like work.

An instinctive aversion to thinking about work reared its head in Corsica's mind, then crumbled just as quickly to dust when her present reality caught up to her: she didn't have to be lazy anymore. She could throw herself at the workload of a princess returning from a three-week vacation now, and come out no less unscathed than any old pony! Not that she wanted to, of course. Bureaucracies had never been anything but a hindrance to her, and pulling their strings sounded like it would get boring fast. But it was a real boredom; not volunteering to help Twilight was a laziness she could choose, rather than one forced upon her.

A cool mountain breeze drifted off the water and tugged on her unbrushed mane, bringing the scents of melting snow and evergreens. This was unfathomably refreshing. In fact, she almost felt like laying around for a while simply to have a rest that she could properly enjoy, rather than laying on the floor like a puppet with cut strings. It would certainly do her healing, avalanche-stricken body good...

But screw that. There was a town to explore, and she had done it dirty last time by being unable to care.

"Hey," she called to Starlight, who was standing at the railing in thought. "You need me for anything, or can I take off?"

Starlight blinked at her. "You're going somewhere?"

"Exploring," Corsica said. "What more needs to be said?"

Starlight pulled out the mirror from the hospital - from where, Corsica couldn't say. But Starlight needed no more words to make her point, either: Corsica looked like a dump.

The first time she saw her own reflection, she had been distracted and preoccupied by her age, and ever since then, she had been too focused on her injuries, her smallness and her lack of crippling lethargy to notice the condition the rest of her body was in. But with Starlight's expression and the mirror once again held in front of her, it was no longer possible to ignore the truth: she really, really needed a bath.

"Point taken," Corsica said, feeling herself redden. "I know you literally just carried me up the stairs, but could you, uhh...?"

Starlight sighed, lifting Corsica in her telekinesis and floating her back down to the cabin level, where the Immortal Dream's one and only shower was located - far from the luxurious bathtub Corsica preferred, but at least they were at port so water rationing wasn't important.

"Here," Starlight said, producing Corsica's shoes and ear ornaments from somewhere once they were at the bottom of the stairs. "They took these off at the hospital, so I held onto them for you. You're not going to need any help in there, are you?"

Corsica took her ornaments in her aura and stubbornly wheeled herself towards the bathroom. "I'm an invalid, not an inv... I mean... bah. I'll be fine."

Fortunately, Corsica's horn was in perfect working order, and she was able to make up for her infirmities with a generous helping of telekinesis. Unfortunately, the process of cleaning herself brought back memories.

She had been this way too, back in Icereach, the first time she awakened from her post-avalanche coma. She remembered pressing the hospital staff about the matter: didn't they clean their patients if those patients were incapable of doing so themselves?

The answers had been mixed: yes, they cleaned her up substantially from the state she had been in when Halcyon dragged her in through the door, and no, they were a hospital, not a resort spa. No one was going to shampoo her mane and tail, let alone the rest of her fur. To make matters worse, Corsica herself had been split on what she wished they had done. Part of her was aghast at her state, but another part of her had recoiled from the idea of anyone even touching her unconscious body, let alone grooming it. And it was awfully difficult for a mixed answer to appease an upset teenager who didn't know what she wanted.

That incident had led to her discovery of how distant Graygarden had been while she was in her coma, once she started asking why he didn't intervene on her behalf to make the hospital into a spa. And that, in turn, had led to one of the first and still most damaging uses of her special talent: wishing Graygarden wasn't her real father.

Corsica scrubbed aggressively, newly frustrated with the track her mind was going down. Couldn't she put this behind her? It wasn't like she was anywhere near Graygarden, or could undo that wish, or even wanted to make up with him in the first place. Right?

This was a downside to being able to care again that she had completely forgotten about: getting hung up on stupid stuff that didn't matter. She hadn't realized how good she had it when she still had her special talent... not that she wished she could get it back. That was a fool's desire if there ever was one. She had chosen which side of desire she wanted to stand on, and no matter how many regrets she might have, they would never outweigh the value of what she had just gained.

She finished her shower and toweled herself as dry as she reasonably could without either hurting herself or falling off her roller, this time determined to make it up the stairs to the ship deck without getting carried. Starlight was in the engine room as she passed by, thankfully too distracted by its piercing hum to notice her. Now, the staircase...

Corsica glanced down at her not-quite-load-bearing hooves, four wheels in between them. She glanced up at the stairs, with wooden frames and lips and metal grates in the center to catch runoff from the deck or dirty hooves. She put one forehoof on the first step and pushed, and felt a stab of pain long before she started to lift herself from her roller.

This was already feeling like a worse and worse idea. Frustrated, Corsica stared at the open doorway at the top of the stairs and growled, "I wish I could climb this staircase by myself!"

Nothing happened. No weight in the back of her mind, no sudden surge of strength as her body knit itself back together. She tried again to climb the stairs, only to meet with the same result.

She was helpless. And while there was a perverse joy in it, in having a challenge she suddenly couldn't conquer simply by wishing it so, did it have to be something so mundane and easy that finally bested her? This was embarrassing! Her fault for not being more careful what she wished for, and if her memories were accurate, this state wouldn't last for more than a week or two, but still. Did she have to trade a broken mind for a broken body, and still be unable to do anything on her own? It felt like the universe was laughing at her.

Finally, she didn't have to rely on anyone to blaze a trail through life for her, could walk on her own power, didn't need to be afraid if she fell off Halcyon's coattails... except she literally couldn't walk. Or climb a staircase.

This stank.

Too proud to admit defeat and ask for Starlight's help, and vaguely aware that she could get into all sorts of trouble in Snowport if she was on her own and unable to defend herself, Corsica retreated to the ship's library and looked for something interesting to read. It was clearly more of a personal collection than a curated assortment for the general public, leaning towards nonfiction with a scientific bent. Most of the volumes had seen heavy wear, and were evenly split between engineering and medical texts, both about three decades out of date. Sometimes more.

But there was one book, however, that stood out both for its age and lack of apparent subject matter, at least as far as its cover and spine were concerned. It was just an old bound leather notebook, thick and musty and looking as if it had been drizzled on more than once, with absolutely nothing on the exterior indicating who had written it, or when, or why.

Intrigued, Corsica pulled that one out and flipped it open right to the middle.

Yea, did the waters of the Yule kiss my keel like a mare scorned, but held it aloft did they, they held it aloft. Westword and southword did I sail, but not up, for the portage of a mile would be impossible without pegasi a thousand strong, and I am no pegasi. Now I have no boat, and my boat has no captain, and the rivers of the mountans her doom would finde her here. Rocks and pebbles, strames at perfect slopes, that my headache might by crystaline waters be quashed!

They can't see this majesty.

Corsica didn't try to suppress her grin. How drunk was this writer? The writing was wobbly and riddled with typos, and she could only imagine the story that led Starlight to possess something like this.

She chose another random page, this one much more legible and sober.

I've found a spot to set up camp that should last until my leg heals up. This cave is situated on a hillside, its mouth facing downward. Higher altitude than I'd like, but no chance of flooding during storms.

These views are enough to make any forget about the Promised Land. It baffles the mind that no one has sought to colonize these cliffs. The colors are vibrant and larger than life, and there are peaceful forests and gentle meadows in between the jagged peaks. With the hubris and wingpower griffons are known for, they might take it easily.

I sense there's something more at play beyond a lack of imagination. None of these climates should be possible. I am no wizard, but I sense this land must be steeped in magic beyond my ken. It feels as though I've set hoof in the land of gods. Were it possible to disturb this tranquility, I think it would have been disturbed long ago.

From my cave mouth, through a pass, I can see the lowlands of the known world stretching out below. I feel as though I will be safe so long as I keep that land close in sight. But if I did lose myself to curiosity and press upward and inward, of all the places I have seen in the world, I think this would be the very best one in which to die.

Corsica frowned. Was he talking about the Aldenfold? Her memories of her own flight south from Ironridge were muddied, along with everything else from the avalanche onward - possibly because of her rewinding, but more likely because she had just been experiencing the world in a dulled, uncaring state. But even then, she remembered seeing mountainscapes of impossible variety and lushness, bamboozling environs in which fields of flowers sprung up above rows of ice-capped peaks.

She flipped to another random page. It was a detailed, well-documented blueprint for some alchemical apparatus... which she quickly realized was an alcohol distillery. This stallion wasn't merely a drunkard, he built his own equipment for refining spirits while out in the wilderness. Now that was dedication.

Idly, Corsica skimmed the rest of the pages to see if he had left any more diagrams, perhaps a sketch of the view or a map that would help her pin down where in the mountains he had traveled. She did find a map, though it only showed his route inside the mountains themselves, and was artistically embellished enough that she doubted its accuracy.

Near the beginning of the book, however, something else stood out to her: a giant, full-page drawing of the Emblem of the Nine Virtues, the symbol of the Church of Yakyakistan. An upside-down equilateral triangle minimally inscribed with a hexagon, she had seen this shape plenty of times before, usually in the context of Icereach's censors trying to pretend they weren't as bad as they actually were.

This version of the emblem, though, was modified, a circle drawn around it and a heavy horizontal line drawn through that, just below the top of the triangle, leaving only three of the emblem's vertices above the line: the top two points of the triangle and the topmost point of the hexagon, all in a straight line of their own.

Those were labeled, too. The extra line was Aldenfold, the top left triangle tip was Unicornia, the top right triangle tip was Garsheeva, and the top hexagon point was just some question marks with an arrow.

Corsica frowned. That was all there was to it; no labels had been placed on the rest of the emblem. Her thoughts went back to the massive underground door in the crystalline Macrothesis, its locks built to only open when the words on them were correctly identified... and no one present had known the true meaning of Aldenfold. How old was this book? Could its author have known something that had been forgotten?

Not like Corsica wanted to open that spooky door. It had probably been shut for a good reason. But who could say no to an ancient riddle involving forgotten knowledge?

She rotated the book twice, looking at it from different angles, and started to suspect there was a much more sensible solution to what the diagram meant: that extra line literally represented the Aldenfold mountain range, where the author had been traveling. Garsheeva, up in the top right, that mean the Griffon Empire in the north's far east. Which made this a map of the world, or at least a very loose one, superimposed on some religious symbolism.

It would have to be a pretty old map, if there were just question marks where Ironridge was now. Ironridge was what, eight hundred years old? Could this book really be eight hundred years old?

If so, it was remarkably well preserved. But she could understand a little more why Starlight kept a thing like this around. It probably belonged in a museum, and would be the pride of any collector's archive.

"What are you reading?" asked a voice from the cabin hallway.

Corsica was too cool to jump when startled. Not truly, but in this case her instinct to avoid hurting herself was able to overpower her instinct to jump, so she took the win and let herself feel cool, looking slowly up with an I knew you were there expression. "Nanzanaya?"

"I just woke up," the zebra yawned, wiping a hoof across her eyes. "We're bobbing. Are we on water? I thought this was an airship..."

Corsica blinked... and realized the boat was, indeed, gently rocking, and slowly moving up and down as well. It felt so natural, she wouldn't have noticed if no one pointed it out to her. Weren't sailors supposed to get seasick from the rocking of their boats? And this was all that was? Bunch of wusses.

"We're at port," Corsica explained, remembering that she had been asked a question and opting not to mention that she had broken the engine. "Don't think Seigetsu's here right now."

Nanzanaya stepped closer, frowning as she took in Corsica's appearance. "Am I still half asleep, or do you look different?"

"Yup," Corsica said, using her floating book to hide her grin. Seeing all the reactions to her new age was going to be like triple dipping at the free sample kiosks in Eaststone Mall by wearing silly disguises so the vendors couldn't remember her... "Two hundred guesses why, and none of them will be correct."

Blearily, Nanzanaya focused. "You're kinda beat up. Makes you look smaller. Got in a fight with the locals?"

"A hundred and ninety-nine guesses remaining," Corsica giggled, her grin growing.

"So you're not beat up?" Nanzanaya raised an eyebrow. "That roller is just for show, then?"

Corsica sighed. "Fine. A hundred ninety-nine and a half guesses remaining."

"Oh, so I'm getting somewhere!" Nanzanaya walked properly into the room. "How did you get wrecked, then? Lemme guess... Accident while docking the airship?"

"You think this looks that recent?" Corsica asked. "That I'd have time to get busted up, make it in and out of the hospital in..." Her eyes widened in realization. "We've been here for almost two days! You did not just wake up and notice we were on the water!"

Nanzanaya burst out laughing. "Hey, gotcha! I guess you really were out cold since we landed. I've just been sitting around here with nothing to do, so you can forgive a little prank, right?"

Corsica put her book down, making a note to come back to it later. "Really? I know you're on super dragon probation, but they couldn't even get someone else to watch you while you stretch your legs on shore?"

"Technically, I was never on super dragon probation. I've just been following Halcyon, who is," Nanzanaya pointed out. "But even if I was, I had two meetings yesterday confirming I was free to go. One step closer to securing aid for my home, yay..."

Corsica tilted her head. "Didn't you and Halcyon break into a top security vault in the Crystal Empire? I'm pretty sure you were under probation. What were you even thinking would happen?"

Nanzanaya rolled her eyes. "I was trying to get the attention of the powers that be around here and let them know that this was serious. And while I did get bit of a reputation, guess what: a dragon inquisitor and multiple alicorns know my face now. If it wasn't for this business with Yakyakistan and Ironridge taking up more of their attention, I'd say things would be proceeding smoothly."

"Dunno how justice systems worked in your home country," Corsica said, "but going to war on your behalf is kind of a big ask, and breaking and entering isn't usually the way to build goodwill..."

"Your friend was with me," Nanzanaya pointed out. "She got busted even harder than I did."

"My friend was an idiot," Corsica countered, the words tasting strange on her tongue. Not the part about Halcyon being an idiot - that much was a given. More the part about them being friends. She hadn't really thought about Halcyon much since her rewinding, and this wasn't a good time to start.

Nanzanaya raised an eyebrow. "And her idiotic tactics got her what she wanted. What's more important, the first impression or the end result?" She shrugged. "I must see my homeland saved. Easier to convince someone that extreme actions were born of genuine desperation than to get their attention by being civil and polite."

"If that's the case, what are you hanging around talking to me for?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You said you're free to go. Why not go?"

Nanzanaya gave her an intense look. "Because you saw Him."

"I saw who?" Corsica asked cautiously.

"Unnrus-kaeljos," Nanzanaya whispered. "The Traveler in the Deep. He took Halcyon, and you were there to see it, weren't you?"

Corsica stiffened. "What's it to you?"

"I'm trying to figure out what happened, down there," Nanzanaya said. "You don't have the mark, but I've never seen someone in the process of making a deal with him to watch how fast it actually appears. But now my own eyes are confirming what I've heard from the others: you've grown physically several years younger. That can't happen by mundane means."

Corsica blinked. "What?"

"Furthermore," Nanzanaya said, "Halcyon, who was supposed to be my ally in all this, never wound up doing anything useful. No matter how many times I reminded her of my presence, no matter what offers I made, in the end she ignored me completely and left for lands unknown."

"Join the club," Corsica scoffed. "But what are you talking about?"

"In fact," Nanzanaya continued, "when pressed, she deflected most of the credit for her achievements in this country onto you. Deflections which I ignored, because she possessed the sign and you didn't. But now I'm wondering if I misinterpreted the timing of the prophecy, and it was you I was meant to work with all along."

"Not gonna get any better response out of me until you explain a little," Corsica warned, realizing that even if she was no longer pathologically tired, Nanzanaya probably couldn't call her out on it if she used that as an excuse to get out of whatever was being foisted on her.

Nanzanaya looked expectantly at her. "This transformation you've undergone. Did you wish for this? Did you ask Unnrus-kaeljos for this, at the bottom of the world? That's the name of the light wave they say took Halcyon."

Mentally, Corsica swore. Did she answer that with a straight face? Nanzanaya had never seemed exceptionally trustworthy, and she couldn't even remember if the zebra had reason to know about her special talent. "I think," she decided, "that's for me to know and you to puzzle over. So what if I did?"

Nanzanaya sighed in confusion. "Your demeanor is just as mismatched with my expectations as Halcyon's was. Let me try a different tactic: ask me anything you like about that light wave."

"Why?" Corsica tilted her head. "Elaborate on everything you've just been talking about, and then tell me what you want from me, here."

Nanzanaya took a step to the side, starting to pace. "I couldn't be any less transparent about my goals here if I tried. The Aptann Valley is in trouble. We need Equestria to protect us from our neighbors, Abyssinia, whom I might add are your neighbors as well and currently at war with your sworn allies in Cernial. The only part I haven't been fully forthcoming about is that before I left my home, I received a prophecy saying I would receive aid and succor from someone I met in this land. I was to recognize that person using a mark Unnrus-kaeljos, the light spirit, bestows upon those whom it has made deals with. Halcyon had that mark. You do not, though I suspect you made a deal as well. And I'm trying to figure out why my prophecy appears less than accurate."

She stared at Corsica. "What else must I clear up?"

"Halcyon has a mark from making a deal with this light spirit?" Corsica leaned closer. "Whaddya mean?"

"A third eye upon her forehead," Nanzanaya explained, tapping her own forehead with a hoof. "One that only other bearers of such a mark can perceive. You can't see anything of the sort on me, can you?"

Corsica grumbled a no. She wanted to complain about Halcyon never mentioning something like this to her, but, honestly, was that much of a surprise?

"My time is running out," Nanzanaya told her. "You single-hoofedly convinced Equestria's monarchy to intervene in your own nation's conflict. I don't know what luck or resources you brought to bear to pull off that feat, but I desperately need the same miracle. If you help me... I can see your frustration with your friend's secrecy. Halcyon and I share many of the same secrets, on account of our histories with Unnrus-kaeljos. Help me, and I can tell you anything I know to bridge that gap."

Corsica narrowed her eyes and looked away. "If you're serious about that, you should wait. For at least a week. I haven't decided how I feel about Halcyon these days."

"This could hurt your land as well," Nanzanaya pointed out. "Suppose Equestria is blindsided by Abyssinian aggression because they ignored me, and have to re-allocate resources abruptly to deal with the new threat, cutting off promises you were counting on partway through?"

"I don't care about my home either, right now," Corsica said, closing her eyes and feeling as if her heart was being needled relentlessly. "I've only just started feeling like I can afford to care about anything, and I'd rather spend that freedom on freedom for its own sake than solicit new causes to chain myself to. Ask me when I'm not physically an invalid and have already gotten to run around and enjoy a good couple nights on the town."

Nanzanaya frowned... and then brightened. "Well, I'm not in that much of a hurry. It won't be too long until evening. Do you need a lift, or help getting around?"

Corsica squinted at her. She knew when she was being sucked up to. It was practically one of the daily tenets of her life at Icereach, at least pre-avalanche. But that also meant she knew how to deal with it.

"I'll accept any and all favors, if you can accept that I'm offering nothing in return," Corsica said, shelving the old drunkard's journal in a place where she'd easily remember it later. "Just don't drop me going up the staircase."

Nanzanaya nodded agreeably, following as Corsica rolled out of the library and towards the front entrance. As she passed by the open door to the engine room, amid the annoying magical buzz, she could have sworn she heard that same voice say, Have fun!

You... too? Corsica thought back at it, not about to have a conversation with a voice in her head while Nanzanaya was watching, but more and more sure that she wasn't just hallucinating.

With Nanzanaya's help, Corsica was able to get off the ship and onto the docks, which were thankfully designed for easy traversal by dragons pulling carts loaded with cargo. The whole city opened up before her like a landscape in a pop-up storybook, and new temptations flooded in every time she turned her gaze: dragons to chat up, stores to visit, viewpoints that would be great to check out if only she could climb. They passed by the statue of Saint Tadashi in the central plaza that Corsica vaguely remembered from her first trip here. This time, she could have listened to a lecture about his cultural significance for hours.

...Wait, this was the place where dragons didn't like talking about their religion to non-dragons because they were humble and didn't want to make them feel inferior. Scratch that. Mojo or no mojo, the world's censorship walls were still a pain in her flank.

All the city's temptations were for naught, however, because Corsica had a particular destination in mind she already would have gone to if she was on her own and very much wanted to see Nanzanaya navigate as well: the western side of town. The Abyssinian quarter.

Nanzanaya caught wind of her plan soon after they passed through the western gate, its guards seeming to already recognize both her and her accomplice. She gave Corsica a wry look.

"What?" Corsica shrugged innocently, her shoulders warning her that this wasn't entirely a safe action yet. "I hung out with them last time I was here. Can't blame me for wanting to catch up with old friends."

"Contrary to what I've given you cause to believe," Nanzanaya lectured, "I have no strong feelings one way or another on Abyssinians themselves. It's their king I must see stopped. Him, and the magical tower on our border he is using to curse my homeland."

Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"But I suppose you had no way of knowing that," Nanzanaya lamented. "So your intent to annoy me with this destination still comes across."

Corsica stuck out her tongue and kept rolling, spying a four-legged fish and a pair of spherical frogs haggling with a bipedal bird-thing on a corner. They looked bizarre. How had she not been more curious about this the first time around? Could that fish actually swim, and that bird actually fly? What was the purpose of the frogs' massive, webbed ears if they were just going to hang down flat against their sides like that? How did keeping your balance work when you walked on two legs all the time, anyway?

Curiously, Nanzanaya regarded them with a similar level of intrigue. Could that be taken to mean she hadn't interacted with many Abyssinians up close before? She hadn't said anything to indicate that wasn't the case...

Freedom Town, that was the name of this place. Corsica's other murky memories started resurfacing the longer she stared at the ramshackle city's jagged architecture and unevenly sloped roads, clear enough to guide her into an alley that was more or less where that tavern would have been. Fauntleroy, that was the name of the proprietor! And there had been a walrus, and some batpony twins who mugged Halcyon, and that weird centaur who wound up imprisoned in the Aegis vault beneath the castle... Whatever had happened to him?

"Do you have a destination in mind, or are we wandering aimlessly?" Nanzanaya asked. "Because although I am willing to wander, I can't help but harbor suspicions you are doing this to annoy me."

"Oh, I've got a destination in mind," Corsica promised. "And it'll be the perfect place to help you loosen up. Should be right... around... Here!"

Fauntleroy's tavern came into sight, just as lively as Corsica remembered it, the lights already glowing even though it was still two hours to sundown. The door was wide open, scents of fish and brine wafting freely, and even as she watched a trio of creatures eagerly loped their way inside to begin the night's revelry.

"Dunno if you've ever been to an Abyssinian bar before," Corsica said, rolling up to the door and catching her cart wheels on the uneven doorstep. "But it's, uh... an experience..." She struggled to get one wheel over the lip, then another, and then the last to. "You'll thank me for... in the morning!"

Inside, the building was smokey and warmly lit, an absurdly lanky bipedal cat scuttling around behind the bar counter. At a large corner table near the window, she saw a familiar walrus chortling and bumping mugs with several others, including a trio of polar bears in suits she felt like she should remember better than she did. It was the smell of chaos, and although her injuries were poised to do their level best to prevent her from having a good time, there could be no doubt that Corsica was in the right place.

Eyes On Abyssinia

"Well, I'll be!" The fat walrus in the tavern corner pointed a flipper at Corsica as she carefully rolled closer, recognition shining in his crinkled, jolly eyes. "I remember your face! You were here with that mechanical pony a while ago! Welcome back, missy, welcome back!"

At his gesture, the rest of the table looked up, some craning their necks and a few moving aside to make room - hospitality Corsica would easily accept. "Hey!" said a spherical frog, its ears flapping in excitement. "I remember you too! You remember me, right, old buddy? Old pal?"

The trio of polar bears lifted their sunglasses to squint at her in perfect sync. "Say," one slowly began, "weren't you there when...?"

"Wow," Corsica said, rolling up to the table. "I really made that big of a splash? Last time I was here, I just hung out and did nothing."

"Ponies are memorable!" the walrus defensively insisted. "Though I'm afraid I have a better memory for appearances than names... I'm Jones, in case you're the same?"

"Corsica," Corsica said, noting that not one of the creatures here was commenting on her age - understandable, since she was surprised they remembered her at all as it was - or on her roller cart, which was much more surprising. "And she's Nanzanaya. This a good spot to kill some time and help her lighten up?"

"Did someone say killing time?" Fauntleroy, the tavern's lanky owner, sidled over with the grace of a phantom thief, wielding a pen and clipboard in one hand and a platter in the other. "Can't speak to that, but if you'd accept the death of your taste buds instead, I got a great new drink in this weekend... How can I whet you ladies' whistles this fine afternoon?"

Corsica blinked, remembering the actual purpose of taverns. On the one hoof, now that her mind was finally her own again, it would be nice to keep it that way. On the other, she really had gotten several years chopped off her age, which meant that she definitely wasn't old enough now... Hold on, that wasn't on the other hoof, that was a second reason to say no. On the other hoof, Nanzanaya was clearly trouble, so Corsica needed to keep a level head to deal with her-

Was this for real? All Corsica could think of were reasons to ask for something soft, and yet her mental calculus kept insisting that abstinence was a losing proposition. Why not go bold, be adventurous?

She shook her head in disgrace, forced her eyes shut and tapped the table with a hoof. "Gimmie something a kid can drink."

"I'll take the house special," Nanzanaya cheerfully volunteered, nudging Corsica. "You're paying, right?"

"Yeah, whatever," Corsica grunted, trying not to think about Nanzanaya's age. Was impulsive stupidity a part of her own personality that had been hammered out by her special talent and brought back by her wish, or was this just the way all teenagers were?

Excessive policing of her own thoughts was supposed to be a relic of her past, now that her special talent was gone. The whole point of getting rid of it was to be free to think and feel and act how she wanted, without restraint or consequences! But no, here she was, doing it again to act like the twenty-year-old she wasn't instead of the seventeen-year-old she was.

Fauntleroy was back in a flash, passing Nanzanaya a wooden tankard overflowing with tan foam with a you're doomed expression and a dainty little glass to Corsica that looked to be filled with orange juice. Corsica reddened and sank lower on her roller. For something she was doing to soothe her adult ego, this sure felt embarrassing.

"I'm feeling the deja vu," one of the polar bears said in a deep baritone, nodding at Corsica. "You definitely were there for the thing. You remember what we're talking about, right?"

"Huh?" Corsica looked up from her orange juice, grateful for any distraction. "Uh, no. I lead an eventful life. Think I've seen you before, don't remember anything special about it. Should I?"

The polar bears nodded in sync as Nanzanaya cautiously sniffed and sipped at her foam. "You were with the party that found us in the swamp after our memories got zapped," said another bear. "With that changeling who was pretending to be an alicorn? Teleported us all the way back here, remember?"

Corsica still wasn't sure how much she remembered the polar bears, but she definitely had a memory of Twilight realizing the Abyssinians thought she was a changeling with classless tastes. Which had come from Fauntleroy, actually...

"So how's that been going?" Corsica asked, figuring it would be much faster to let them remind her than try to remember it all on her own. "You guys really did get zapped?"

"Completely and utterly." The third one nodded. "The dragons confirmed it was their you-know-what that did the job. We've been slipping back into society, but it's only been a month, so..." He shrugged. "Baby steps?"

The spherical frog who had greeted Corsica earlier nodded excitedly, sending his ears flapping. "It's been the talk of the town! Opinions are split on whether they were involved in some shady business that backfired, or they got on the wrong side of that rogue guy from the department of you know what. But everyone works the fields in groups now, just in case they become his next target!"

"The department of you know what?" Nanzanaya raised an eyebrow. "Actually, I don't know. You have secretive government organizations here?"

Corsica nodded, fairly certain they were talking about the memory-wiping batponies, including the one that had supposedly attacked Halcyon before disappearing... not that Halcyon ever told her about these things. She couldn't even blame this one on her hazy memories. That was all Halcyon.

"Yeah, you're not supposed to know!" the frog insisted. "That's the whole point of what they do!"

Nanzanaya raised a skeptical eyebrow, and Jones chortled. But as Corsica watched, she began to get the feeling someone was right behind her, and wasn't mobile enough to whip her head around.

Another instance of her infirmity forcing her to play it cool... Silver linings, right? She flicked her tail. "Don't wanna take a seat?"

Two identical batponies slipped into her vision, claiming the stools on either side of her.

"Hey," one said. "Long time no see."

The other winked.

"Am I really that memorable?" Corsica asked, raising an eyebrow.

The second rolled her eyes and shrugged, and the first gave an oh yeah wink.

"Should I be flattered?" Corsica asked warily, vaguely recalling a pair of batpony twins that had been the shadiest characters at the table last time around.

"Oh, you should humor her," Jones encouraged, his blubber shaking as he spoke. "Poor Yunie's been on probation with the dragons ever since last month's incident! She's just trying to entertain herself on the straight and narrow!"

"Shut up, pops!" Yunie - evidently the one who had spoken - said. "For the last time, stop telling everyone you meet that I'm turning over a new leaf! It's embarrassing!"

Her twin nodded in furious agreement. Corsica glanced at the twin in confusion. Only one of the duo got called out, huh?

"But, uh, anyway, yeah, I remember you," Yunie said. "Hard not to, when your marefriend was the one who got me in so much trouble. You and her an item yet?"

"What?" Corsica frowned. "If you're talking about Halcyon, we're not an item."

Yunie nodded along. "Mmm. That's a different flavor from last time. Still good, though. You two have a fight or something?"

"Yunie," Jones warned.

Corsica gave the more talkative batpony a look. "That's none of your business."

Yunie and her clone both flickered with green changeling fire, and a second later Corsica found herself flanked by two shoddy Halcyon clones. They had done a decent job on the faces, but that was about it: there were no leg colors, the special talent was wrong, and the complete lack of clothing made them almost unrecognizable compared to her friend's usual appearance.

"You could make it our business," Yunie said with a seductive wink, her silent twin striking a flirty pose.

Once again, Corsica's instinct to avoid hurting herself with sudden movements was all that let her remain calm and composed... even if, internally, she felt an urge to smack the faces in front of her and give Halcyon a piece of her mind for what she had done at the laughter palace. "You're not very good at this," she deadpanned. "And Halcyon doesn't know how to make that expression."

Yunie whistled. "Okay, so it was a bad fight. Guess you're not the right venue to mess with her by proxy. My bad."

Both her and the twin turned back into their regular batpony forms.

"Don't get me wrong, you're welcome to mess with her," Corsica grunted. "Just, she's several continents away-"

She was interrupted by a furious sputtering and choking as Nanzanaya, eyes bugged out, barely managed to land her mug upright after taking a sip. "Haaaaaugh!" the zebra panted. "W-w-w-w..."

Fauntleroy slipped past with a stupid grin, sliding a glass of water to a stop right in front of her.

Corsica laughed as Nanzanaya gulped it down, the whole rest of the table joining in. Half of her was glad she had been smart and chosen the orange juice, and she took a classy sip to celebrate. The other half thought that looked kind of fun.

Yunie's twin got up and helped the spherical frog to pound Nanzanaya's back, and in a moment, she had recovered enough to speak. "That's an experience..."

The frog took a whiff of her mug and blanched, its ears standing up ramrod straight.

"South Badlands Swill," Fauntleroy explained, hanging close enough to ensure that one of his customers wasn't about to die. "It's a recent recipe, maybe twenty years old. After the old fermenting crops died out when the desert started getting worse, they found some new ones that are hardier and not as good. So you drink this stuff to show you're tougher than hard new times while reminiscing about the good old days. Being terrible is the point!"

"Twenty years ago?" Nanzanaya raised an eyebrow, still shaking a little from the effects of the drink. "Resources have been getting scarcer in Abyssinia, you say? Is this why you invade your neighbors? A shortage of food?"

Fauntleroy whistled uncomfortably. "You know, I'm not really one for politics..."

"You asking 'cause you're a zebra?" Yunie tilted her head casually. "I wouldn't sweat it. No one in Abyssinia would be dumb enough to go after any of our other neighbors when all the warmongers are currently wagering our existence on beating the ice dragons."

Nanzanaya frowned. "Are you certain of this?"

Jones glanced around the tavern, which was only just starting to fill up for the evening rush. "I don't see any of our resident experts who love explaining the situation, but the Abyssinia I know has plenty of goodwill for its neighbors! Most of the time."

"When they're not hoarding magic we need for our survival," the deep-voiced polar bear said.

"They do that?" Nanzanaya asked, putting on a very good innocent facade that suggested she wasn't in Equestria purely to convince their leadership to attack Abyssinia on behalf of the defense of her own homeland.

"That's what all the newspapers say," the polar bear said with a shrug. "I make a point of reading every single publication in the city. When your history's gone, why not become an expert in current affairs?"

"Nerd," another polar bear whispered. The third kicked him.

"The dragons see the war from a cultural standpoint," the deep-voiced bear went on. "At least, that's the signal their presses send. Most of them think they're trying to defend cultural monuments from barbaric invaders. My countryfolk mostly see it from a survival standpoint. They think there's old magic the dragons have buried away that'll help them survive... and with the state of Abyssinia, the need for survival is obvious to anyone with eyes. You should see the pictures. The land itself is rotting, and the seas no longer behave like any water you and I know. And all this started happening within the last quarter century."

Corsica tilted her head. "Is this town really that new? Last time I was here, you said it mostly cropped up as a result of the war."

"Yes and no," Jones said. "Our nations have always been like squabbling siblings, going back for generations! But we care about each other where it matters. It's hip these days to talk doom about the present state of the world, but when has it ever not been? Things aren't so different now than they were when I was a pup."

Yunie gave him a skeptical look, her twin falling over with an exaggerated facehoof. "Um, pops, I'm pretty sure all the dudes on both sides currently dying in the war wouldn't agree with you on that."

Jones muttered unhappily, but didn't reply.

"So these are recent developments," Nanzanaya said. "What about the tower on your border with Aptann?"

"Oh, so you know about that?" Yunie nodded along. "Yeah, not surprising. I'll bet you anything it's related. It showed up right before the seas began to change, right down to the day. I was there, you know. Got to explore the place on day one, but it was so tall I didn't make it even close to the top. Bet you can't even breathe at the top, it goes so high up."

Nanzanaya frowned. "I was told your king built that tower. You say it simply showed up?"

"Yup." Yunie nodded seriously. "There I was, minding my own business on the beach one day, hunting for treasure in a shipwreck, when suddenly there was the biggest earthquake you've ever laid eyes on. I flew straight up 'cuz I knew a quake like that would probably cause a tsunami, which it did, but before even that happened I got to watch the tower literally grow from the ground. Looked like a bunch of plants sprouting up and then weaving together in midair. Right in the middle of the village. The place was a mess. Everyone had to write it off as a total loss and move out the moment help arrived. Whole thing took less than fifteen minutes."

"You were a local?" Nanzanaya pressed, curious. "You lived there prior to its appearance? Were there any strange factors, indications that it would happen or why it happened? Tell me more."

"Curious, are you?" Yunie smirked. "Nah, nothing that would indicate it was about to happen. Not obviously, at least. It came completely out of the blue. One moment, everything was fine, and the next... boom."

Her twin mimed an eruption for emphasis.

"No indication of its purpose?" Nanzanaya pressed harder. "How did your government respond?"

Yunie shrugged. "Helped relocate us. What else do you do? And I think they sent some mages to check it out once they realized the weather was getting weird. Those guys grilled me for a while since I was one of the first people to see inside, but they didn't look like athletic types so there's no way they made it even as high as I did. And I didn't find nothing up there. Just empty rooms and hallways, all made of this weird purple crystal that felt kind of strange to touch. Couldn't say how."

"And what's this tower doing now?" Nanzanaya frowned. "Your government has it cordoned off from the public for their safety and no one is allowed to see what they're using it for, presumably?"

Yunie scoffed. "Nah, they tried to do that for a few years, but then someone came along and kicked them out and claimed it as a castle. Abyssinia's government isn't that coordinated. Honestly, it was a miracle they were able to come help out in the first place, and they probably wouldn't have if our village hadn't paid hefty tributes to the crown. We were one of the only places in the nation that could actually trade with Equestria, so we were like... indispensable to the economy, and stuff."

Corsica listened along, knowing there were only two things that could be going through Nanzanaya's mind right now: she had come to Equestria to tell them the tower was an Abyssinian military threat against her country. Either she was lying to cover up her real motive and was thinking about how to prevent Yunie's version of events from conflicting with her story, or she was wondering if the information her own superiors had given her was flawed.

She took another sip of orange juice. Watching someone else's plans get the Ironridge treatment, over a matter she had no stake in, was deeply satisfying.

"You traded with Equestria?" Nanzanaya asked, skeptical. "I was under the impression Equestrians considered Abyssinians to be monsters."

"Eh." Yunie shrugged. "Changelings are a special case, since we can look like normal ponies well enough. It was a whole town of us. Providing certain 'services' to those in the know. Turns out some ponies will pay huge amounts of money for one more day with a dead friend, that one crush who got away... You name it."

At this, Corsica leaned in, her attention grabbed. "I thought changelings only learned to shapeshift recently. Have Abyssinian ones been doing it for a while?"

"Uhhhh..." Yunie suddenly backpedaled. "Just to be sure, neither of you is a monarchist stooge, right? Because you have hung out with the dragons, and there are teensy little rumors you know a Princess as well?"

"I'm from the Aptann Valley," Nanzanaya promised. "Which isn't to say that I don't value relations with my Equestrian neighbors, but I prefer to sing to my own tune."

Corsica nodded. "I'm not a stooge, but those rumors might have some truth to them."

"Welp. Sorry," Yunie said. "In that case, I've probably blabbed too much already. Not that I don't like blabbing, but Equestria really dislikes changelings after some of us attacked Canterlot a year or two back? Our village is toast, so it's probably no biggie I just told you where that used to be, but we're really trying to fly under the monarchy's radar..."

Corsica thought about that. From her interactions with Princess Twilight... Well, Twilight had been spending most of that time telling her to get up and stop lazing around. She wanted to go with her instincts and say Twilight wasn't the kind of leader who would be mad about the mere presence of changelings... but then again, there was that whole incident in the Crystal Empire where Halcyon and Nanzanaya got busted for sneaking around. And she remembered the dragons having a well-drilled changeling protocol.

It probably wasn't safe to promise anything in order to try to learn more. But without doing Yunie dirty, she very much wanted to learn more about this changeling business from the other sides.

"Psst," hissed the spherical frog to Yunie. "Is this about the thing with the Royal Guard, where you awaken to your powers by-"

Yunie smacked him in the lips with an urgent hoof. "Shut up, Leeroy! Whose side are you even on!?"

"Oops," Leeroy whispered. Jones shook his head in disgrace.

The Royal Guard, huh? Corsica gave Leeroy a knowing smile.

Nanzanaya had a smug smile of her own. "So how do you handle South Badlands Swill?" she asked Yunie, poking her on the shoulder to get her attention. "If you can keep down a whole gulp of this, I'll change the subject away from changelings."

Yunie swiped the mug, chugged half of it, let out a thunderous belch, and then passed it to her twin to finish off, who followed suit. "You got a lot to learn about how much toughness is normal around here, kid," she wheezed, clearly suffering for her stunt, yet able to push through it. "Now pay up. What's your story, eh?"

Corsica raised an eyebrow, curious how Nanzanaya would spin her reasons for being in Equestria to this particular audience.

The zebra took a moment to think, gently tapping her forehooves together. "That tower isn't just bad for your own lands, you know. It's practically on our border. Our lands are suffering too. I came to ask Equestria to do something about it."

Huh. Honesty. Or at least sticking to her story. Not what Corsica expected.

"Equestria, eh?" Yunie gave her a mischievous look. "Not gonna come to your neighbors who actually claim the land and tell 'em to better regulate their fiefdoms?"

Nanzanaya hesitated again. "...The Aptann Valley has a strongly centralized government. Forgive me if I assumed the tower's continued presence signified a tacit approval of its effects within your lands."

Yunie rolled her eyes. "Lady, if we knew how to make our lands stop being all woo-woo..." She waved her hooves like an inflatable balloon mare for emphasis. "We'd have done it long ago. But I think the current sentiment from on high is that this is, like, the beginning of the end of the world? And that you can't really stop what's already been started."

Nanzanaya gazed levelly at her. "And what if I told you I have it on good authority that bringing down that tower will actually fix everything, for both of our nations?"

"Eh, good luck with that." Yunie blew a raspberry. "That tower's new lord doesn't really keep the place open for business. You'd need an army to get in there, and Abyssinia's army is currently busy fighting the ice dragons, and convincing them to do otherwise is a preeetty tough ask. Besides, we had that tower to ourselves for like... more than a decade, and it was just empty rooms. Far as I know, at least. Point is, no one wants to spend effort reclaiming a position they already know to be useless."

"Who is this tower's new lord?" Corsica asked. "Someone the crown doesn't have much authority over, it sounds like?"

Yunie shook her head. "The crown doesn't have much authority over anyone save for having the most powerful mages in town. Abyssinia at large is a fiefdom. The army that actually does the fighting in Cernial is just a bunch of warlords fighting under a united banner for various reasons, some better than others. So the new lord is literally just someone strong enough to walk in and set up a perimeter. I'd already left the area by the time it happened, so I don't know anything about them."

"Hmmm..." Nanzanaya mused. "Does that mean the Abyssinian crown wouldn't take it as much of an insult if any of their neighbors - say, Equestria or Aptann - walked in and razed the tower for themselves?"

"Uhhhhhhh," Yunie said. "If you ever actually get to make a decision like that, you should maybe base it off more than just my opinions? I'm, like, one random punk in a bar somewhere halfway across the world."

"Yes," Nanzanaya pointed out. "And you're also someone who claims to have been there when it first appeared. Additionally, I don't find myself interacting with many Abyssinians. So I find your opinions interesting."

Yunie scratched her rump. "Well, I don't think anyone cares about the tower keeper's feelings, and I think we'd probably be pretty happy if stuff actually started working right again with the environment? But sending an army onto Abyssinia's lands is kind of a declaration of war, no matter who you're fighting."

Nanzanaya frowned thoughtfully.

"...Have we kept this down long enough, by the way?" Yunie asked, sharing a look with her twin and then at Nanzanaya.

"Huh?" Nanzanaya blinked.

"Gonna take that as a yes," Yunie said, sliding shakily off her stool and embracing her twin. "Alright, I'm gonna go find a ditch somewhere that no one will need for the next day or two. Smell ya later, monarchist stooges!"

The two of them wobbled out of the tavern, showing much less coordination than even a minute ago as they made their abrupt exit.

Nanzanaya put a hoof to her chin. "So that's the topic that makes her excuse herself..."

One of the polar bears chuckled. "I think that was actually your drink."

Jones guffawed, slapping the table with a flipper. "Oh, you're new around here, so I can't blame you for not realizing she'd take your dare. That mare's stomach is truly a marvel, but even it has limits."

"I'm surprised she held out for so long!" Leeroy added.

Nanzanaya picked up her mug and looked at the froth on the bottom. "Huh. I guess this stuff really was that bad."

"So what's with the other one?" Corsica asked. "You talk about her like she's only one pony, but she's got her mute tagalong twin?"

"That's pretty much all there is to it," one of the polar bears said. "Her cutie mark gives her a second body somehow. The finer details are a mystery, since she just makes the conversation get really horny if you ask her how it works. Learned that the hard way. Don't try it at home."

Another polar bear shrugged. "Isn't that your own fault for not being into ponies? I bet those two-"

"I'm actually not really interested in this conversation," Corsica interrupted, the bear pointing at her and Nanzanaya. "And this place is getting fuller by the minute. What do you say we clear out and make room for the higher-paying customers who can actually hold their liquor?" She patted her roller. "Besides, this makes me mega slow, and I'd like to get home before midnight."

Jones raised an eyebrow. "That isn't an augment to help you go faster?"

"What?" Corsica blinked. "No, it's a support because I fell off a cliff and literally can't move without it..."

Jones' eyes widened in alarm. "My dear, you ought to be resting in that case!"

Corsica gave him a peeved grin. "Or we could go back to the reality where none of you were commenting on it because you're tough and gritty geezers who see nothing unusual about a filly wandering in with more breaks than a unionized warehouse job."

Leeroy's ears wobbled. "So... not very many, then?"

"Shut up." Corsica held her grin in place, trying to detach her roller from the spot where it had come to rest, one of its wheels stuck in something sticky. "You try coming up with good puns on the fly."

One of the polar bears stood up and bowed. "May I escort you? The roads of this town can't be good for your wheels."

"Huh?" Corsica let her grin drop. "Any particular reason, or just feeling nice?"

The polar bear shrugged. "You did save us when we were lost in the woods after losing our memories. What goes around comes around, right?"

Another one nodded. "And I'll get your tab for the night!"

Instantly, Fauntleroy appeared, wearing a sharp-toothed grin. "Did someone just utter my absolute favorite phrase?"

The third polar bear chuckled. "More of a favorite than 'everyone's drinks on me'?"

Fauntleroy gave him a side-eye. "Second-favorite phrase. On a technicality." He picked up Nanzanaya's tankard and sniffed it. "I see you opted to poison my favorite set of twins. Would be a shame to leave without sharing in their experience, don't you think?"

Nanzanaya gave him a polite look. "I already shared in it, thanks."

"Oh, that little sip?" Fauntleroy raised both eyebrows, then smirked. "No. No, I don't think you did. Careful not to step in any ditches on the way home if you can't already see the bottom, fillies. And come again soon!"

He raised a hand, waving lazily and scooting off to the next table over.

Dusk had settled in by the time Corsica was at the gate separating Freedom Town from Snowport's fortress. The walk from the tavern was just long enough to let her watch the stars come out, and there was no trouble along the way for her polar bear escort to ward off.

"I think we'll be fine from here," Corsica said, a stone's throw away from the gate's guardhouse, which was staffed less vigilantly than when she had come here with Twilight. "Thanks for the walk, old dude."

The polar bear saluted. "Give our regards to your other friends if you see them again, too. And keep an eye out for strangers if you go out alone. They still haven't caught the culprit yet, so there might just be a brainwasher still on the loose nearby. Take it easy, ladies!"

He turned to walk away, and Corsica rolled onward, Nanzanaya at her side. Like true professionals, the guards remembered both of them from earlier in the day, and after a bit of small talk waved them on through.

"You're still staying on the boat, then?" Corsica asked Nanzanaya as they walked.

"Sure am." Nanzanaya nodded. "I have a mission, after all. And staying in Princess Twilight's orbit as long as possible is my best venue for seeing it through."

"Anything you heard tonight change things?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Their version of events kind of differs from your own."

"It does." Nanzanaya flicked her tail. "And I'm inclined to trust theirs, as I've never been to Abyssinia or seen the conditions there for myself. It would also be very convenient for me if they were telling the truth, as the indifference of their king makes this a much easier task than if he was outright hostile. They also confirmed the core tenet of my mission here: even if Abyssinia is not building the tower up as a fortress as a prelude to invasion, the negative effects it has on my land are documented by their people, as well."

Corsica listened, focusing on her hooves to keep them from getting tangled up in the cart wheels. "Huh."

"Of course, it's possible that they are lying," Nanzanaya added. "Trying to put an innocent facade on their nation's true intentions. But such dedication would be strange to find in a village this remote and unimportant. The best result would be that diplomacy can take me further than anticipated, and I might treat with their king as well to seek aid and sanction for this tower's destruction. Unfortunately, this new tower lord still presents a threat I will need a military force to remove... I have much to think on. I very much hope we stay here for a few days, so I can speak to more of the civilians about the state of their home."

"Sounds reasonable," Corsica said. Surprisingly so, even. Nanzanaya was extremely shady; she had established that much from observing her over their previous stay in the Crystal Empire, and... probably other events she had forgotten about. It was hard to remember things that had happened during a period of her life where nothing whatsoever was allowed to be important.

But everything she had done and said tonight lined up with the actions someone would take if they really were concerned about the effects the tower had on her land, and wanted it gone at any cost. Granted, getting rid of it probably wasn't the actual solution, when it was likely a broken crystal palace that needed to be fixed instead of razed. But Corsica didn't talk about her own knowledge of crystal palaces in public spaces. Telling people about her experience down in Laughter's palace, or watching Ironridge's Kindness palace break, would lead to endless hours of questions. So she couldn't fault Nanzanaya for doing presumably the same.

They made it back to the harbor without incident, where the ship was still in one piece. Corsica had to wait on the deck for Nanzanaya to climb down and get Starlight to help her down the stairs, and as she passed by the engine room doorway on her way to her cabin, she saw that her old special talent was still stuck in the engine, still making that all-consuming buzz.

Welcome back! Did you have fun? that voice asked, speaking once again into her head.

"Sure did," Corsica muttered under her breath, rolling along to her cabin. Tomorrow, bar anything catastrophic happening - and Starlight had reassured Nanzanaya no fewer than three times that the ship was not about to explode and was in a perfect stasis until someone decided to mess with it - she would have to get to the bottom of that voice and figure out who was talking to her. Because it was definitely not a hallucination.

Old Fashioned Work

When you had a special talent that could make anything you wished for drop into your hooves with little more effort than a stray thought, it was easy to find things you were looking for. Corsica had spent the better part of three years living with such a talent, and frequently caught herself pining during that time for the days when her life had actual challenges beyond mustering the willpower to do anything at all.

Running around Snowport searching for traces of a specific train engineer should have scratched that itch nicely. Corsica had memories of days spent crawling through the Icereach library in search of material for a project, days before she was saddled with her talent. Memories that were much fresher after being rewound to the time of the avalanche. By all accounts, this should have been a good old return to form, in which she applied herself, did some hard work, and earned her reward...

By the end of her second day looking for Wheelcakes, it was abundantly clear that her experiences putting in work in Icereach didn't translate well to the real world.

First, Icereach was smaller than Snowport, and she perfectly knew her way around. Physically getting from place to place to chase leads here frequently took an hour or more, between her lack of familiarity with the streets and status as a cripple and the general overall size of the place. And she had to take more trips than she would have liked, because it was much harder to plan ahead and multitask with her trips when she was less familiar with what any given place had to offer. A trip from the northern end of the dragon suburbs to Freedom Town could be up to two hours, and that was without breaks. Breaks that, due to her present physical state, she frequently needed.

Second, in Icereach she had always been able to fall back on her status as the head scientist's daughter, and had a lifetime's understanding of everything that could and couldn't get her. In Snowport's unfamiliar bureaucracy and culture, a connection to Seigetsu was enough to prevent her from getting completely stonewalled, but she still felt as if she were navigating a dimly lit labyrinth without a map.

Third, Icereach was held in stasis as a matter of official policy. Nothing there was ever allowed to change. Quite different from the busy port town of Snowport, where she had finally arrived at the train yards in possession of the information that Wheelcakes was currently running cargo back and forth to the Crystal Empire, as well as the name and location of the dragon who was in charge of scheduling trains along said route, as well as a letter of introduction to convince said dragon to take her seriously, only to learn that the engineer had left minutes ago on her final run of the day and wouldn't be back until tomorrow.

Bone-weary, Corsica rolled out of the warehouse with a sigh, the sunset splaying peach and purple rays across a pile of clouds that weren't dense enough to be a storm, but sure were stacked high. Her wheels crunched on loose gravel. At this rate, she was probably setting back her recovery by overdoing it instead of resting, but hadn't she just been resting for two weeks in a coma? Besides, she was making progress, even if it was much harder than any research she had done in Icereach.

A shouting dragon marched past, directing two others who were carrying so much cargo that they couldn't see where they were going. In the distance, a train pulled away from the passenger platform, moving into the rail yard to park for the night, a gaggle of freshly-disembarked creatures slowly draining into the city. The wind was stiff, but not cold enough to be uncomfortable against Corsica's thick, Yakyakistani fur.

Life was good. Sure, this was a lot harder than she remembered it, but getting to retire for the night with a promising lead and a place to pick it up in the morning? She was getting somewhere. On her own. Towards a goal that she still cared about after two days.

It was exhausting, but satisfying, as well. Corsica grinned into the sea wind, knowing she would sleep well tonight.

Rolling back to the Immortal Dream took her through most of the sunset. She still couldn't handle the stairs, but getting Starlight's attention was fairly easy after they had rigged up a rope on the deck that ran down the entrance to the engine room and tugged a little bell. Starlight was there almost before Corsica had stopped ringing.

On the bottom floor of the ship, Pinkie Pie was cooking dinner, and Rainbow Dash was lounging in the dining hall. Twilight herself hadn't been back from the Crystal Empire since Corsica woke up, but her friends had been in and out: none of them could get back to Ponyville due to having learned how the train magic worked, and apparently none of them had been willing yet to take Discord's offer for a way to cheese the system.

"You look beat," Rainbow greeted, upside-down on one of the side benches with her tail and a wing dangling down, looking up from a novel. "Rehab going rough?"

"Rehab's a secondary benefit," Corsica said. "Though at this rate, I'd better be getting some strength back. But the real goal is to track down Starlight's mom."

"You mean Maple?" Rainbow asked. Starlight was conspicuously silent.

Corsica nodded. "Yup. Best idea is still to poke around with the trains and try to learn more about what happens when you defy the system, since that might point to what she did next. And progress on that front is... I've almost finished tracking down the mare we gave a lift to out of Our Town. After two days. So basically, almost back to square zero for investigating a way to possibly gain a small lead into Maple's next destination, out of however many more destinations she's visited over the past umpteen years."

"Sounds kinda like we'd have better luck just going to the neighboring towns and asking around," Rainbow pointed out. "Not that I know how far away those are, but wouldn't guessing and checking be faster?"

"Could be." Corsica managed a shrug. "I don't have the means to get there, so I'm just doing what I can."

Rainbow craned her neck towards Starlight. "Hey, Glimglam! How close are we to getting airborne again?"

Starlight put her ears down. "Depends."

"On...?" Rainbow prompted.

"I've got an idea that I'm almost certain will work," Starlight said. "Might require abandoning some principles, and I'd need permission from all the princesses, and while it's not impossible they'd say yes, it's not a sure thing either."

Starlight stared at the floor. Rainbow stared at her. "That all? What are you waiting for?"

"You're that sure you can just ask the Princesses a favor and they'll give you whatever you need?" Corsica tilted her head at Rainbow. "I know you're in their inner circle, but you haven't even heard what she wants yet."

Rainbow shrugged. "Yeah, well, neither have you. And every day we're stranded in Snowport is a day Starlight's friends up in Ironridge are trying to hold out against who knows what from Yakyakistan. We fixed the Kindness flame, why wouldn't the Princesses pull out all the stops to let us go up there and finish the job?" She pointed a hoof at Starlight. "And whether they would or wouldn't, you've still got a duty to try, and I've got a duty to make sure you don't shirk that duty."

"I know," Starlight said. "I've spent all day trying to come up with fast and feasible alternatives, and if I don't have any by tomorrow morning, I'm catching the first train to the Crystal Empire to run this over with Twilight and, with her support, the other Princesses." She squeezed her eyes shut. "I don't want to go back to the north, but if I don't take the chance I'm being given... It could really be too late."

Corsica sized her up, and got the impression she had been thinking about personal dilemmas like whether or not to return to the north a lot more than scientific ones like how to fix the engine. But if that was the case, how would she have a foolproof plan for fixing it?

It was foolish to doubt, of course, given Starlight's relationship to her old special talent and the similarity of their powers. But Corsica was deeply curious to see the substance of Starlight's plan, and moreover, a trip to the Crystal Empire would very likely put her in contact with the mare she was looking for. "Count me in," she volunteered.

"Same!" Rainbow pumped a hoof. "Let's get this ship back in the air!"

Morning dawned, but Corsica didn't awaken until someone started rapping on her door.

"What is it?" she grumbled, her vision completely blocked by unbrushed mane. "Feels like it's four in the morning..."

"It's eleven!" Rainbow Dash called through the door. "And Starlight remembers that you wanted to come with, and is using your sleeping in as an excuse to procrastinate!"

"Gross," Corsica groaned, nevertheless starting the process of waking herself up. "Too early..."

Are you trying to sleep? the voice in her head asked as she shifted back and forth, trying to prevent herself from drifting off long enough for her brain to get going.

"Yes," she mumbled back at it. "How'd you tell?"

No response.

Corsica yawned, rubbing her eyes against her pillow in an effort to keep them open. One day, she'd get to the bottom of that voice. The way it was talking to her really reminded her of something, but she couldn't place what... And why did it keep coming and going?

She felt a bit better than usual as she started her morning care routine, not enough to forego the roller but enough that she didn't nearly collapse while getting onto it. Odds were, she could handle the stairs now if she really pushed herself, crawling up and floating the roller behind her and then getting on again at the top... She wasn't sure whether that would be more or less dignified than getting someone else to float her, but hopefully it wouldn't be too much longer until she didn't have to choose.

Someone had saved her some breakfast, which she scarfed cold before reporting to the engine room alongside Starlight, Rainbow, Pinkie, and Nanzanaya. "Alright," Rainbow prodded, poking Starlight with a wingtip. "Everyone in Snowport is here and ready to go. No more stalling. You gonna tell us what this plan is and why it requires the Princesses' permission instead of being something we can do right here and now?"

Starlight sighed. "It's for a good reason, and I'd rather not tell anyone else this until I can get Twilight's opinion on whether it would be remotely sane to try. No offense, but she's seen things you haven't." She straightened up, folding her ears against the engine room's buzz, and took one last look at the cloud of rails holding Corsica's old special talent. "But I haven't had any luck in thinking up other fast and effective ways to deal with this. So let's get going."

Nobody dissented, and Corsica soon found herself rolling through the streets to the train yards once again... At least until Rainbow Dash picked her up and started flying her there, since she was far and away the slowest member of the party.

As embarrassing as it was to be carried around in public, it was drizzling, so at least she didn't have to spend as long in the rain.

The train platform was sparsely populated, and once the others' conversation drifted to facets of life in Ponyville, she found herself tuning it out, her thoughts drifting instead to Ironridge. If Starlight got her way and this unspoken plan of hers worked, she could be back in Ironridge by the time she woke up tomorrow. And some of the things she had been avoiding thinking about so far would become far more in her face than they had been so far.

Things like Ansel. Since getting rewound, most of the time when her thoughts threatened to wander to dangerous places, they veered towards Halcyon. But Ansel had stayed in Ironridge, and even if she wouldn't have to deal with Halcyon again, her present course sure would mean dealing with him.

Part of her said there wasn't anything to deal with. She had a working relationship with post-avalanche Ansel. Everyone else had to get used to the fact that she was now three years younger; he could get used to it too. But even if she remembered that working relationship, her memories were now much closer to their romantic relationship, as well.

That relationship had been cut off as effectively as if the old Ansel had died and been replaced by a new one, thanks to his amnesia and change in personality. Corsica's old frustration and mourning at their sudden incompatibility was overshadowed in her mind by the inescapable weight of her special talent, but it had still been there. Would seeing him again like this dredge up things that she had already moved on from and were best off forgotten? She was her old teenage self again, and having blurry memories of having done this once before could contribute everything or nothing at all to change that.

At least she'd have it easier than any random other pony in the same situation. They wouldn't even have their memories to fall back on. Then again, they wouldn't have to do this twice, either.

Life sure could get messy when you were actually living it instead of taking everything like a limp slug. And she wasn't even living it yet. Just pondering things that might happen while waiting at a train station in the rain.

A headlamp glared off the misting droplets, and with a muffled screech of iron against wheels, the train arrived.

The door was flung open by a vaguely familiar yellow-and-blue mare, and a small hoofful of passengers disembarked. The mare waved when she saw Corsica and her entourage.

Yep, that looked like Wheelcakes. All that work, and Corsica could have found her just by trying to catch a train to the Crystal Empire.

"Nope," Wheelcakes said when Rainbow Dash tried to present the group's tickets. "You guys gave me a ride on the house, so the least I can do is return the favor. Crystal Empire, right?"

Corsica shook her head at her own luck, rolling up to the train's doorway and refusing help as she navigated her wheels over the crack. This train had only a single passenger car, cozy and lit with warm pink and woody colors, and so far, she and her entourage were the only riders.

Was traffic between Snowport and the Crystal Empire just not that great? Or were the trains frequent enough that it just felt sparse, on account of Wheelcakes having no other routes she could run? Corsica presumed that was the case, at least. The dragon who told her about the engineer's present route didn't specify why she was only doing those two stops, but it didn't take a great leap of logic to guess why.

The others filed in as well and took up seats, Rainbow hogging an entire bench to herself. According to the schedules, there were at least fifteen minutes left before this train departed... Wheelcakes was presently standing by the door, looking out and surveying the empty platform.

So Corsica turned around and rolled up behind her. "Hey," she greeted.

Wheelcakes flicked her ears and turned around. "Did you get in an accident?"

"It's a long story, but you could say that," Corsica admitted. "So, I heard this is the only line you can run now."

Wheelcakes nodded sadly, keeping a keen eye on the platform. "I tried the other major directions, but none of them work. This one is the only one short enough to not need the train magic, since Snowport and the Crystal Empire are so close together. I've been talking with the government about getting my memory wiped, but they'd have to go back pretty far, so until I can make a decision, I get to be the queen of the Snowport-Crystal Empire line."

"That's rough," Corsica said. "Really banged your head against the proverbial wall? No chance you were getting somewhere and just didn't try long enough?"

"I tried it enough before that I've got a sense for these things," Wheelcakes told her. "Didn't take more than a try or two to know I was getting back to Snowport faster than I was leaving. I've talked about it with the dragons and the Order of Silence, and this isn't something that starts working again just because you bang your head against it."

Corsica grinned. "Call me bored, but I kinda wanna bang my head against it myself sometime. I'd like to see how this fake endless terrain stuff stacks up against attempts to empirically measure your location."

Wheelcakes tilted her head. "It's not that interesting. And are you really the enterprising type?"

"I am now," Corsica gloated, trying to put a hoof across her chest and wincing. "And I think it's plenty interesting. Don't you want to know how this works?"

Wheelcakes grimaced. "What I'd rather be able to do is take my train wherever I please."

Okay. Corsica backed off a little. Apparently, this was a situation that called for empathy rather than goading. "Bet you're not the only one," she said, rocking back a little on her roller. "The dragons have to know if there's a history of people finding loopholes in the system, right?"

"I asked." Wheelcakes shrugged. "It's not something you can just find a loophole around. This isn't a magic barrier that prevents you from going where you please, it's magic that shortens your path when you're unaware of how long that path actually is. And it only works when you're not aware of it. Trying to subvert it, your goal wouldn't be to avoid the magic. It would be the opposite."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Is that what they told you? Because if it takes you less time to come back after you turn around than it does to get to the point where you turn around in the first place, that sure sounds to me like the magic is doing something when you know about it."

Wheelcakes frowned in thought.

Corsica grinned.

"I only have the answers they've given me," Wheelcakes eventually said. "Snowport's economy lives off of trade. You might have a point, but they have every incentive to make the tracks usable for everyone. I don't see any reason not to trust their answers when they're trying to help me do what they want."

"So why not-?"

Corsica cut herself off as another pony appeared on the platform. It was already poor form, discussing this material in a public venue, even if that venue was empty. Definitely better not to create more work for the dragons' memory erasers... though when she saw who this was, she realized she probably needn't have bothered.

It was a mare, and a batpony at that. Her age was hard to guess, because she was clad in heavy ornamental robes and a tall miter, but based on the amount of wrinkles on her disinterested face, she was probably between forty and fifty. And she was completely gray, right down to her irises.

"Ma'am!" Wheelcakes quickly bowed. "Are you... here with any updates on my situation?"

The cleric sized up Corsica with a bored look. "No," she said in a toneless voice. "Just going to the Crystal Empire."

"You know me?" Corsica asked, rolling out of the way so that she didn't block the door.

The cleric lazily met her eyes. "You match the profile of someone I've read about. Corsica?"

"Yup." Corsica winked, feeling like no amount of charisma could faze this mare, yet that she was obligated to try. "You?"

"Halandyne," the cleric said, stepping onto the train and passing Wheelcakes a ticket with the barest motion of her wing. "You're from the north. Have you ever heard the name Nencosay?"

Corsica tilted her head. "Nencosay? You just up and ask that to strangers? Can't say I have. What context would it have been in?"

"Someone who can erase memories." Halandyne walked past her, no longer making eye contact or even turning her head. "How about Halcyon?"

Corsica blinked. "Uh, yep. Know her a little better than I'd like. Why?"

"I've heard she frequently wears heavy clothing," Halandyne said dispassionately, looking across the empty seats. "Have you ever seen her naked?"

"Yes..." Corsica said. From her garb, this mare was obviously the replacement for Yelvey, Snowport's previous Order of Silence cleric in charge of erasing memories for those who accidentally learned about the trains and still wanted to ride them. "What's it to you?"

Halandyne didn't so much as flick an ear. "Was there anything remarkable about her body?"

Corsica squinted at her, aware that she could be poking a sleeping dragon yet not feeling up to restraining herself. "With the way you're asking, do you see a scenario where I wouldn't say no?"

"I see," Halandyne said. "Thank you for your cooperation. Good job."

Without another word, she moved to the back of the train and took a seat, her hoofsteps barely audible against the carpeted floor.

Corsica raised an eyebrow at Wheelcakes.

Wheelcakes shrugged. "She's the one I've mostly been talking with about getting my memories altered so I can drive anywhere again. Unfortunately, their power is a blunt instrument. All they can do is start at the present and completely erase back however far they want to go, like cutting off the end of a rope. She's nicer than she acts, though."

"I'm not sure I'd call that 'not nice' so much as weird," Corsica muttered back. "Who just up and asks what someone else looks like without clothes on with barely a word of introduction? That's gotta be one of the conversation starters of all time. And I want to say she was being sarcastic at the end, but with that tone, I really can't tell..."

"They say the members of the Order of Silence sacrifice their equinity for the powers they wield," Wheelcakes said. "I've heard only rumors about what that entails. But now that I can see for myself why they're important to society, I wouldn't begrudge the ponies who make that sacrifice anything. Including strange mannerisms."

Corsica stared at Halandyne again.

"It's about time to get this train moving," Wheelcakes said, glancing at the station's clock. "I should get back to work."

"Hold up," Corsica cut in. "One more thing before you do that: after your shift is done, would you mind taking me out somewhere we can't go anymore? I wanna see for myself what it's like."

Wheelcakes hesitated. "Will you pay me? That would technically be overtime, and I do need to make a living now that I'm back in normal society."

Corsica frowned. She didn't exactly have finances that she carried around...

"...On second thought, I'm already giving you this trip for free." Wheelcakes shook her head. "I guess I could make that a freebie too, if that's really how you want to spend an evening. But only once. And believe me, there are far funner things to do in town."

Corsica flashed her a toothy grin. "Say that after I make the discovery of the century. It's been too long since I got to commit myself to a magical mystery."

Wheelcakes rolled her eyes and started preparing the train for departure. "Knock yourself out."

Corsica spent the train ride with a mix of listening to Rainbow and Pinkie's banter and watching Halandyne from across the train car. Halandyne spent the ride with a mix of looking out the window and watching Starlight. Starlight looked as if she was a thousand miles away.

It took several hours, just like the last time Corsica had ridden this way. Her memories of that trip were doubly hazy; not only had she been under the lethargic effects of her special talent, but it had been boring and largely uneventful. She had expected it to be eventful, since they were ostensibly transporting the metal dragon Aegis to the Crystal Empire for safekeeping, and Abyssinia would ostensibly attack and try to steal Aegis for themselves.

Which hadn't happened. All Corsica remembered about the last trip was a whole bunch of tension that built up to nothing at all.

The train churned through well-plowed snow, the tracks kept free and clear by the passage of many trains before it. And as the Crystal Empire's protective magical shield began to grow on the horizon, Corsica's boredom got the best of her, and she decided to try talking to Halandyne once again.

"Hey," Corsica greeted, rolling closer.

Halandyne looked up, her gray eyes partially obscured by a gray bang. "Do you need something?"

"To sate my curiosity," Corsica said. "You're the memory eraser Snowport got to replace Yelvey, right? After he went missing, or something."

"My role is not to give knowledge, but to take it away," Halandyne said dispassionately. "If you are curious, perhaps you should visit a school instead?"

Corsica decided to ignore that. "Why are you heading out here if your job is in Snowport?"

"To ensure that the Order of Silence fulfills its role," Halandyne explained, as if that explained anything.

"Which is...?" Corsica tilted her head.

"To preserve the status quo, as desired by the Holy Convocation of Cernial." Halandyne shifted slightly as she spoke, but didn't meet Corsica's eyes, staring straight ahead as if she didn't even notice her.

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Careful not to explode from passion for your mission," she prodded.

"I have a lot of emotions," Halandyne agreed. "Few of them are about you. Do you need something?"

She made eye contact, and Corsica almost rolled backward from the dissonance. "Does that mean you don't mind if I keep asking you things?"

Halandyne unfocused, as if being here in the present took more effort than she wanted to give. "I don't mind. Do you mind learning nothing of importance?"

Corsica cracked a grin, accepting the permission. "Does that mean you think you've got nothing interesting to say, or that I'm not worthy of it?"

"Things that are interesting are rarely important," Halandyne said to the bench in front of her. "Things that are important are rarely interesting. I have nothing interesting to say, and you have nothing of importance to hear." She made eye contact once again. "If you are bored, perhaps you should visit a circus instead? I hear they have clowns which are quite funny."

Corsica kept grinning. "See, you're funnier than you give yourself credit for."

"I am glad you found entertainment," Halandyne said, looking up at her. "Good job."

A shimmering wall abruptly entered the train and swept through Corsica. They were inside the barrier.

"Good talk," Corsica said as the train began to slow towards the station. "Have fun preserving the status quo, and all that. I'll be rooting for you. And, uhh... Good job?"

"You will be safe in my hooves," Halandyne agreed, getting up and meandering towards the door as the train was coming to a halt, barely even wavering from inertia as it rolled to its final stop.

Corsica watched her go, the first one out the door after it was opened, with nary a word to Wheelcakes or anyone else.

What a strange mare. Maybe it was her hauntingly familiar lack of passion and enthusiasm, or maybe it was the name... The same first three letters as another strange mare Corsica knew. But even though she knew nothing about her, Corsica felt an odd compulsion to brighten her day.

Corsica shook her head. Flirting with a heavily cursed church official thrice her age as a proxy for annoying a thick-headed friend she didn't want to decide whether she loved or hated was a weird idea even by someone like Papyrus's standards. She had a mission of her own to see through, and it was time to get back to work.

When Starlight said earlier that she wanted to run her plan past Twilight before sharing it with the other Princesses, Corsica took that to mean that it wasn't for her ears yet either, a perception that was reinforced by Starlight ignoring Rainbow's repeated pleas to let her in on the details. And yet, as they drew into the center of the Crystal Empire and approached the palace, Starlight had yet to make an effort to ditch her entourage.

Not that Rainbow Dash was possible to outrun, and she was pretty sure Pinkie Pie could track anyone over any distance as well. But Nanzanaya was still hanging around, and even though Starlight could easily outrun Corsica in her wheel-bound state, she made no efforts to ditch either of them.

That was either tacit approval of their presence... or Starlight was just stalling because the upcoming conversation included a subject she didn't want to broach.

Corsica pushed herself to pick up the pace, her recovering body groaning in protest. If she hadn't been a cripple, she would have felt a spring in her step, and her hooves still itched with the phantom temptation to start skipping: there were plenty of things she could imagine making Starlight stall for a day in Snowport looking for alternatives, complain about breaking principles, and then stay silent throughout the entire train ride, but none of them could also fix a toxic special talent jammed in an engine. The palace loomed immediately overhead; if anyone tried to force her to turn back, fall behind or sit the inevitable meeting out now, they would be in for an earful-

...The entrance to the palace elevators was blocked by a short, two-step staircase.

What was even the point of that? Could they not have made the elevator go down two more steps instead? Had the Crystal Empire's designers ever heard of ponies with disabilities? Scowling in disbelief, Corsica tackled the staircase, wedging one of her wheels onto the first step, determined not to get carried or telekinetically lifted yet again.

Starlight looked over her shoulder, saw Corsica, and lit her horn. Corsica preemptively reddened; the plaza had at least a dozen other ponies...

But instead of her, Starlight's horn targeted the ground, coaxing the crystals that made up the street and palace and everything else to grow into a gentle ramp at the edge of the staircase. Starlight nodded at her handiwork and pressed on.

"Thanks," Corsica grunted in relief, taking the ramp.

"Don't mention it," Starlight said, sounding distracted. "Surprised they didn't have one of those already..."

Their entourage swiftly picked up a quartet of guards, all unicorns wearing armor with a crystalline sheen and sporting sublimely toned muscles. Nanzanaya got a side-eye or two and Corsica got a questioning glance, but Starlight and the others were clearly well-recognized, and the group of five soon became a group of nine. From the guards' demeanor, Corsica decided they were there less to guard against any threats, and more because they thought Starlight, Rainbow and Pinkie ought to look important.

Surprisingly lax, compared to how uptight things had been before.

"The Princess Twilight has been working from her suite," one of the guards explained, leading the way through a familiar hallway to the room where Corsica had spent the night last time. Crystalline plants grew from crystalline soil in crystalline pots that dotted crystalline alcoves in the walls, all colored just slightly differently enough to be visually stimulating instead of monotonous.

"She'll be overjoyed to see you," another guard promised.

"Come on, buddy." Rainbow smirked at him. "Do I look like I don't know the obvious?" She scratched at the back of her head. "Actually, she's probably gonna be annoyed if we drag her away from her work to go have a good time..."

They reached the door, and Starlight took three whole seconds to knock. "Come in!" Twilight's voice instantly called from the other side.

Starlight opened the door. Inside, Twilight was seated on the one of the couches around the central table, opposite from a studly white unicorn with a royal blue mane, both studying what appeared to be a game board surrounded by reams of parchment.

"My Lord!" All the guards bowed in practiced unison, not quite as stiff as Corsica expected.

"Starlight!" Twilight greeted, her face brightening. "Any luck with the Immortal Dream?"

"Hey guys!" the unicorn added, flashing the kind of smile that couldn't let someone remain a bachelor for long.

"...About that," Starlight said, rubbing one foreleg with the other and standing to the side while everyone else filed in, save for the guards in the hallway. She didn't continue.

Twilight read her expression and frowned. "Complications?"

Starlight hesitated again, then glanced awkwardly at Nanzanaya. "Would you... mind waiting out in the hallway with the guards?"

Ah. Here it was. Corsica held her breath. Was Nanzanaya getting the boot, but not her?

Nanzanaya shrugged. "Whether my ears are too delicate for your secrets or your secrets are too delicate for my ears, I suppose I don't mind. I'll be around if you need me..."

As she filed out the door, she threw Corsica a wink no one else but the guards could see, and closed the door behind her with her tail.

"...What about me?" Corsica spoke up, daring to draw attention to herself. "Am I good to stay?"

Starlight glanced at her. "You weren't one of the ones who got in major trouble with the Crystal Empire for sneaking into the Aegis vault last time we were here. Which, I suppose is as good a segue as any..."

She took a deep breath, then nodded to Twilight and the white unicorn. "Figuring out how to get the Artifice free is slow going, and even if I manage to protect the ship, it's pretty likely I'll hurt myself in the process while canceling out that premonition flux. Not permanently, but badly enough to set back our timetable for going to the north, which... the more I think about Maple, the more I wonder if I'm a fool for waiting this long as it stands. Even with all my power, I can't do this both quickly and cleanly."

Twilight looked concerned. "I know you don't want to leave the Immortal Dream behind, but I agree that time is of the essence, and we can always use an Equestrian ship..."

Starlight wasn't finished yet. "I've been thinking about how I would have solved this problem as a filly," she continued. "Back when I... leaned into being unstoppable. Sometimes, I did just use brute force and hurt myself for it. But most of my victories came through resourcefulness, and having no boundaries I wasn't willing to cross to get the tools I needed. And there's one tool that, if we brought it into play, I'm almost certain could solve this problem instantly and effortlessly..." She sighed. "Aegis."

Brute Force Method

"Aegis."

For a moment, the ponies in Twilight's suite were still. "Aegis?" the unicorn sitting across from Twilight eventually said, blinking. "The mechanical one? That you guys raised a stink about last month after the Crystalling?"

Starlight nodded. "One and the same. Twilight?"

Twilight looked confused and slightly worried. "That's... not what I expected you to say. I thought you didn't want anything to do with the kind of power that dragon represents."

Starlight gave her a flat look. "I also don't want anything to do with going back to the north. And as far as I'm concerned, those two are one and the same."

Twilight leaned back.

"I can't face the north without also facing my response to the north." Starlight shook her head. "That's who I am, Twilight. When I have the choice, I always take the path of power. And that choice is always there if I want it. I can look away and pretend it doesn't exist, or I can choose the only option I've ever found palatable. Do you want me to open the door on my history without taking action when something comes through it? The only way I know how to do that is by averting my eyes and burying my head in the sand."

Twilight bit her lip.

"Either we ignore this problem and go home, or you can solve it." Starlight looked her straight in the eye. "Or I can. And I even gave it a whole extra day after thinking of this to see if I could come up with something that involves crossing fewer boundaries, with no luck. This is my way. And now you get to choose whether to sign off on it, because you've put yourself in the position of being the one to do something about it if I go too far."

"Not to interrupt if you're having a moment," the white unicorn said. "But that's not just her decision. To actually use Aegis, you'd need every Princess to sign off on that. Plus the Convocation in Cernial. You do know how they feel about Aegis, right?"

Starlight turned her glare to him, softening it just a little. "That's not what 'no boundary I won't break' means. I don't intend to do this without your permission, but if you tried to stop me, the thought would cross my mind. And speaking from experience, I'm less scared of the wrath of goddesses and nations than I am of what Aegis could do if someone like me were to misuse it." She deflated a little. "Which is why I'll think about how to do this later. Right now, the only thing I'm doing is asking my friend whether this is something I should try to do at all."

The white unicorn sighed, put a hoof on his forehead, and grumbled something about mares under his breath.

"Then I think you should do it." Twilight's indecision vanished, and she gave Starlight a firm nod. "If you're trusting me with this, then I'm trusting you in return. I don't think your primary motivator deserves to be fear of the consequences of your actions, Starlight. Even if you've made mistakes before. Remember that as a Flame of Harmony, you were always meant to be a fundamental force for good in the world. You were meant to take action; all of us were. And I'll be by your side to make sure your hooves stay true."

Starlight melted in relief. "That's... what I was hoping you were going to say. I think." She hesitated. "Maybe I was also hoping you would talk me out of it."

Twilight smiled, got up and walked over, putting a hoof on Starlight's shoulder. "Then it sounds like you're easy to please. I'll have Spike summon the Princesses. If there's action to take, then we shouldn't dawdle."

As Starlight and Twilight traded platitudes, Corsica rolled over to Twilight's abandoned spot at the table, its giant game board dredging up inviting memories from a time not so long ago when she had taken names at Icereach's school board game club. "We're not pulling her away from anything important, right?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at Twilight's abandoned opponent. "If this is just for fun and you want someone to finish your game with, I'm a quick study..."

The white unicorn laughed. "Oh, this is just a tactics exercise for Ironridge. Twilight hasn't commanded troops before, and I don't think my aunts want her to, but she wanted to be prepared in case she had to get directly involved with Equestria's strike force."

Corsica tilted her head. "Your aunts?"

The white unicorn patted his chest. "I'm the Prince. Shining Armor? Twilight's sister. That's what I've been calling Celestia and Luna ever since getting married, even though that's not really my relationship, or Cadance's..." He scratched his head. "Where did that nickname come from...? Anyway, it's always nice to meet more of Twilight's friends. You are?"

Oh. A Prince. Cool. Probably actually the Emperor, considering that the goddesses were called Princesses. Casually consorting with even more royalty, even though with her current connections in Equestria, Corsica really shouldn't have been surprised... She gave herself a smug little smile directed at her past life in Icereach. Being the Head Scientist's daughter had nothing on consorting with royalty. And she used to think she was a big shot.

"Corsica," she said, making an easy read on his character. "I'd offer a hoofbump, but my body might literally fall apart if I move an unnecessary muscle."

Shining Armor threw back his head and laughed like a jock at a party. "I see that a lot! The Crystal Empire's usually peaceful enough that training can get rowdy to compensate. There a good story behind yours?"

"Fell off a cliff." Corsica shrugged nonchalantly, as if she had already had three years to process the trauma of nearly falling to her death. Less surprising was the fact that this guy had managed to land an empress than the fact that he was still married. "During an avalanche. Barely survived. It was pretty metal."

Shining Armor whistled. "This one time-"

Rainbow Dash stepped over, grabbed a token on the game board and slapped it down with a wing several spaces over. "Checkmate."

Shining Armor blinked at her. "That was a supply convoy tent."

"Seriously?" Rainbow winked. "Must be embarrassing to lose to one of those. Now come on, they're leaving without us!"

"Oop!" Shining Armor flipped to his hooves and bounded out of the room with an athlete's stride, in a manner far less dignified than befitted an emperor prince.

Corsica slowly gave chase, pausing a few times as she slowly realized that her body felt worse than it had this morning. Was she overdoing it? Not like she had done that much today other than ride on a train, but yesterday... She'd have to force herself to take it easier, at least until she wouldn't jeopardize her recovery. Re-injuring herself would reek.

Rainbow caught up to her after locking the door in their wake, and to Corsica's surprise decided to keep pace with her rather than rushing ahead to join the guards and Twilight's entourage.

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You don't have to stick with slow old me. I can see you wanna go fast."

Rainbow mirrored the expression. "You know your way around here well enough to find the throne room on your lonesome?"

"Uhh..." Corsica wanted to say I'll explore until I find it, but that didn't sound like taking it easy. And that was also how Halcyon got in trouble the first time they were here. "Good point."

So they walked - or rather, she rolled and Rainbow flew. From the distant, frequently-changing grin on Rainbow's face, Corsica got the vague impression she was entertaining herself by daydreaming about battling hoards of invaders in the hallways. It looked like fun.

"What do you think of Shining Armor?" Corsica eventually asked, popping a question from the most recent subject on her mind.

"Twilight's big brother?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "I think he's pretty cool. Knows how to lighten up when he needs to, unlike literally every noble ever. He was the captain of the Royal Guard before the Crystal Empire came back and Cadance got it as her territory. So I guess he's the kind of guy who doesn't mind getting his hooves dirty?" She shrugged. "Honestly, we've only met, like... a dozen times. Twilight could tell you more. Why?"

Corsica shrugged, turning a corner at Rainbow's direction now that the others were completely out of sight. Even the guards hadn't bothered to stay back with her? Maybe Nanzanaya had done something suspicious, or her presence just distracted them enough that they forgot about her...

She shook her head. "Just seems like he's a little more interested in being a heartthrob than ruling. Is his wife like that too?"

"A heartthrob?" Rainbow gave her a suspicious look. "I mean, he was considered Equestria's most eligible bachelor before the big wedding, but now he's, like, super wholesome and chaste and stuff. Especially when Twilight's around. Except with his wife. And I didn't see him doing anything unusual. You just got a thing for him?"

Corsica blinked hard.

"Do I?" she asked out loud. "Is that what this is? I don't think so, but..." She frowned harder. "That's what anyone in denial would say. But if I was in denial, wouldn't I be ridiculously embarrassed and blushing right now? That's what kids who are too dumb to notice they're in love are supposed to do, right? Besides, he's literally married." She tilted her head at Rainbow. "Am I blushing?"

Rainbow rubbed the back of her neck awkwardly and looked away. "Actually, uh, yeah, you are getting pretty red there..."

Now she could feel it. "I'll have you know," Corsica insisted through gritted teeth, "that I am technically still an adult despite having the body and apparently also mind of a teenager again. And I've spent the last three years emotionally repressing myself anyways. So don't look at me like I'm weird. I'm apparently just a prisoner to my own hormones today."

"Oh, nah, having crushes is great." Rainbow waved a casual hoof. "Been there, done that plenty of times. I'm just surprised 'cuz I had you pegged for a mares' mare."

Corsica wilted on her roller with an almighty sigh, and instantly regretted it as her rib cage complained. "Have you never heard of being able to appreciate both ways?" She let herself deflate further. "Apparently I haven't, because I'm handling this like a schoolfilly even though I've literally been in a relationship before, and according to my present state of mind I still was as of three days ago."

Rainbow landed and gave an awkward laugh. "Yeah, those were some interesting years for me too. My advice would be to literally not sweat it and have fun. Odds are, Shining Armor would even find it funny, because you kinda look a lot like his wife as well."

"That just makes it worse!" Corsica burst out, once again instantly regretting her sharp movement. "Also I will literally break a rib if I don't settle down. So if you're going to give advice, do you think you could give some that both wouldn't upset a hysterical teenager and also treats me like an adult?"

Rainbow bit her lip, suppressing a clearly juvenile joke through a mighty force of will. Corsica was chagrined, but she found that she appreciated it, too.

"Uh," Rainbow eventually said. "Serious dating advice, from literally me? You used to be what, twenty? First off, that's not that old. Still allowed to do stupid stuff. Second, adults can get horny too. Shining Armor's the pure and faithful one; that doesn't extend to his wife. Actually, if you're trying to avoid losing your cool like this, you probably shouldn't say anything to draw Cadance's attention at all, because she will be able to tell and she will make a horny joke at your expense. And finally, try to be more shameless. She's a professional wingmare, so if you really wanna land someone, she could help. If you don't mind getting teased about it."

Corsica summoned her determination, took a deep breath, let it out, winced at the pain in her bones, and managed not to say anything witty. "Got it. Thanks. And by the way, I was completely fine about this until we started talking. I know what a crush is. I'm just... more embarrassed by my own situation and lack of control over myself, is all."

Rainbow winked. "That's, uh, actually how it is for everyone. Good luck out there. Glad you're feeling stuff at all again."

Did she have a point? Maybe she did. Corsica started rolling again with no reply save for a nod.

It was humiliating, having feelings that were outside the control of her higher thinking. But wasn't this what she wanted? With every day that passed, her time with her special talent felt another year away, and she couldn't be sure if it was a magical effect of her memories sorting themselves out after recombination, or if she was simply feeling and experiencing as much in a single day as she had in an entire year, before.

She should embrace this. Relish it, even. Only to an extent; she did have an image to maintain, and she needed to not hurt herself by physically overreacting. But shamelessness had been a big part of her identity in Icereach, so she should be able to do that just fine... right?

Actually, if she really had been perfectly rewound, why was she embarrassed at all over a thing like finding a stallion attractive? She had literally been in a relationship, like she'd said.

It would be nice to have a little more control over her feelings. Turning back to where she had been before was unthinkable, and even the prospect of finding a middle ground gave her a chill. But she hadn't wanted to lose the ability to police her thoughts. Merely be free from the requirement that she always do it. It was like she had broken down a dam, and now her heart was a river that couldn't be stopped.

Better than the alternative. That was the one thing she knew for certain: her old life had reached the end of the line. Her older self might as well have died when the Immortal Dream touched down in Snowport's harbor. She had no hope and no future, and if her wish hadn't been miraculously answered... Better not to think about what she could have done next.

So she would do her best to relish this. It was better than the alternative. And since this whole conversation was all Rainbow Dash's fault, Corsica shelved her shame and spent the rest of the walk in silence, following Rainbow's advice by contemplating whether Rainbow was a looker.

Last time, Corsica had a vague recollection of visiting a reception room that looked like a downscaled stand-in for a throne room, broken out for guests who were important enough to meet with the powers that be in a refined setting but not important enough to make said powers climb all the way to the real throne room and gussy it up for an audience.

This time, she was definitely standing in the real throne room.

The ceiling arched almost five stories high, though past the first the crystals grew so reflective that looking up was like staring into a fun house mirror, and it was impossible to tell where anything truly was or how many edifices and chandeliers there truly were. She swept her gaze down to take in the first floor as well, only to have its occupants immediately take precedence over the architecture in her mind.

Alicorns. Two of them - three, counting Twilight, though Corsica wasn't quite sure she counted in this situation. Princess Celestia, Corsica remembered meeting before, but the Celestia of her tarnished memories was smaller, less radiant and commanding and lustrous, someone she had simply spoken to without stopping to be wowed by her presence.

But this Princess Celestia could take up an entire window, the castle's crystals shining behind her translucent, flowing mane and lending it an ever-changing sparkle, like sunlight bouncing off inch-high waves on a calm sea. Back when Corsica had been dead, everyone else looked more or less the same to her, but now that her own flame had been relit, it was plain to see how much more alive she was than everyone else in the room. Twilight was just a mare with wings and a horn, Celestia was an immortal.

And standing in front of the throne next to her, true to Rainbow Dash's word, was an alicorn she hadn't met before that looked surprisingly similar to her, only older, with a more colorful mane, and much, much more attractive.

Corsica shivered with envy. She had always been proud of her own looks, considered remarkable in Icereach for the length and finesse of her horn, combined with the care she took of her coat. But while Corsica's coat was merely lustrous and soft, this mare looked like you could stick a hoof into her fur and never find the bottom, as if her very being was made of something extradimensional, a fluff so transcendent and fine that the individual hairs ceased to exist and flowed together into a pink, pillowy whole.

Not that this alicorn, who could only be Princess Cadance, was packing any excess material. With her pencil-like muzzle and wide, cornered eyes, every angle was sharp and every curve was unfair... and the curious foal strapped to her back only drove home the image. It was like a great, big billboard advertising that she wasn't in the market, and just happened to look this good anyway.

Focus, Corsica told herself, remembering that she had kept her composure perfectly in the presence of princesses before. She was here on business... But it was business the adults in the room could take care of without her. So she didn't have to pay perfect attention. Besides, Twilight was an alicorn, and looked like a mostly normal pony. That meant the way the other two looked wasn't an inherent property conferred by simply being an alicorn. And that meant that if she could keep her head on straight, she could potentially ask Princess Cadance what shampoo she used later.

No... No, that wasn't why she was here. Corsica wrenched her thoughts back on track. Aegis. Starlight borrowing Aegis. That was part of her important and overarching quest, which was more important than doing absolutely whatever she felt like at the moment, such as being envious of alicorn figures. Ignoring her responsibilities and doing and thinking whatever she pleased instead might have been the most constant aspect of her life in Icereach, so at least it didn't leave her feeling alien like her earlier discussion with Rainbow Dash. But had she really never learned to get serious at all? Maybe not. After all, Icereach never gave her anything truly important to do.

She would have to re-kick that habit, and fast.

"Looks like everyone's here," Twilight sighed in relief. "Sorry, Corsica. I didn't realize I left you so far behind. I should have-"

The situation finally clicked in Corsica's brain as reality took hold. "Wait up. I thought you said you were going to get Spike and contact the Princesses to request a summit..."

Spike gave her a big enough thumbs-up that she finally noticed him, and then took a look around the rest of the room for good measure. Shining Armor, Twilight, Rainbow Dash... Pinkie Pie had left the posse at some point, as had Nanzanaya and most of the guards.

"I work fast," Spike said, patting himself proudly.

"I already happened to be in the Crystal Empire at the time," Princess Celestia explained.

Twilight nodded. "Yep. That's what I did."

"You didn't even come straight here? You took a detour?" Corsica gave her an owlish look. "How slow am I right now?"

Rainbow Dash awkwardly looked away, hovering in midair. "Umm, well, we did stand around talking in the hall for a bit. But, like, pretty slow?"

Corsica sighed.

"I'd rate you at two snails out of ten," Rainbow added, as if that helped.

"Thanks," Corsica said flatly. "If I had gotten my mojo back without breaking every bone in my body and losing two years of for-fun military conditioning, I'd beat you in a race for that."

Twilight shushed Rainbow with her aura. "Since we have more than I expected at such short notice, Princess, do you think we could start discussing my request on Starlight's behalf?" She bowed to Celestia. "I know it won't be possible to get a yes until Princess Luna and the dragons have both gotten to weigh in, but if it's going to get shot down immediately, better now than later. And if it requires time for thought, better to get as much of a head start as..."

She trailed off. Princess Celestia was smiling.

"Princess?" Twilight tilted her head.

"Twilight Sparkle," Princess Celestia said, her voice echoing and regal and calm. "And Starlight Glimmer. Do you recall what you saw in your journey to the Palace of Convergence?"

"A whole lot," Twilight admitted. "But you're probably talking about..."

"The vision of Aegis fighting," Starlight finished for her. "Of the destruction of Indus. We assumed you had seen that too."

Celestia nodded. "Then you have seen this machine at its worst. But even then, it was merely a weapon in the hooves of its pilot, Tetra. Starlight. You have seen Aegis act many times in person, as well."

"I have." Starlight nodded. "It can be gentle. Or kill ponies. Or save them. But I don't intend to use Aegis on other creatures at all. Just to fix my airship, and then I'll give it right back. You can even accompany us in person if you want to see that it isn't misused."

Celestia looked intrigued. "You would not take Aegis with you to the north?"

Twilight hesitated, and then spoke slowly. "Umm, should we?"

"You know the dangers against which you will fight," Princess Celestia said. "As well as the guarantee many unexpected ones, beyond. Do you have faith in your abilities and in harmony to see this task through without the most powerful weapon we have to offer?"

"Is this a test?" Twilight asked nervously. "That... doesn't quite sound like something you'd normally say, Princess."

Cadance chuckled. "She knows you well."

Twilight tilted her head further and squinted. "Wait, what?"

Some of Celestia's demeanor dropped. "Indeed. This is not an unrehearsed meeting. Ever since we met Starlight, Twilight, and especially so after your visit to Convergence, we have discussed among us what we would say if you were to ask for the use of Aegis. That particular question was from my sister. Because we wanted to be able to give you our full answer no matter which of us happened to be present when you asked us."

"Does that mean this is all fanfare and you've already got a verdict?" Rainbow asked, hovering.

Celestia nodded. "We do."

"You, Twilight, may use Aegis." Princess Cadance bowed. "It would be far from the first time you've held Equestria's fate in your hooves."

"Um," Twilight said. "Me specifically? Starlight, will that work for what you're trying to do?"

Starlight frowned. "I'd understand why you would trust her more than me. Honestly, I'd be a lot more comfortable with that as well. But Twilight is..." She looked awkwardly at Twilight. "Thought exercise. What's the biggest horn laser you can shoot, and what's the limiting factor preventing you from going bigger?"

Twilight narrowed her eyes in thought. "Too big to demonstrate in here, for sure. As a general day to day matter, I'd say the limiting factor is the fact that it's not socially acceptable to shoot lasers for no reason, but if I really had to push myself, it would entirely come down to stamina and how fast I want to tire myself out. As an alicorn, my mana conversion rate and overall magical throughput are basically impossible to saturate, even during events like Tirek's rampage when I had access to external power sources."

Starlight nodded. "Your limiting factor is your stamina as a mage and ability to store and produce energy, not your capacity to use power that you're given. And my understanding of Aegis is that it's an exoskeleton or artificial body that's powered by your own internal magic. In other words, it's a way to transcend physical limitations if you have too much power to express with your existing body." She turned to the older princesses. "Aegis would primarily bolster Twilight in places where she already has untapped potential, and do nothing for the areas that are holding her back. It could still solve our present problem, but in terms of making her stronger, it would be little more than a glorified suit of armor."

"That's a good point," Twilight said, blinking. "I'm a pretty powerful mage by normal standards, and becoming an alicorn definitely let me express that power more freely, but my impression is that the powers older goddesses use are stockpiled over millennia. Right?" She offered Celestia a questioning stare. "So if I'm so far off from saturating my own potential as an alicorn... Not that I wouldn't use Aegis with the utmost care, but I couldn't do something like what I saw it do in Macrothesis even if I wanted to, right?"

Princess Celestia beamed. "You are both very perceptive. However, we have a separate gift that is much more relevant to your mission in the north, and it may change your assessment of that situation."

Corsica raised a curious eyebrow... and then Princess Cadance started glowing.

The glow had almost always been there, she felt like, only suppressed somehow. But now it burned off her like a fiery red light, and then compressed, congealing, its rays bending around forward like a lamp being placed in a reflective lamp hood, merging into a torch on her chest. And then it parted from her entirely, enveloped in her aura, at first too bright to look at but swiftly cooling and becoming corporeal.

It was a red, triangular gemstone about the size of a hoof. And aside from the light show, plus the fact that it seemed to be rotating in her aura of its own accord, it was surprisingly unremarkable.

"The Lovebringer?" Twilight looked confused. "But-"

"It was you who returned this to us, after all," Cadance confirmed. "And surely between your own studies and Starlight's story, you know its history... as well as the unique power it has over one of our foes."

Twilight hesitantly nodded.

"Uhh," Rainbow cut in, having mostly held her silence throughout the meeting. "I might'a zoned out during the relevant bit. Could you give me the night school version?"

Corsica backed her up. "Charity for the unenlightened?"

"You know what a societal virtue is, at least?" Cadance asked. "I mean, I assume you do, given who you've been traveling with..."

Rainbow pointed a hoof at Starlight.

Starlight nodded. "That gemstone is the equivalent to the Element of Harmony gemstones in your necklaces. The gemstones are the Flames of Harmony. The flames are the gemstones. If it's hard to envision, remember that the flames themselves are technically the soul of the world, so even though you think you're just talking to one little flame, the palaces are actually just loci of power where they can manifest enough to speak. The whole world is their body. Everything that exists. So these gemstones are just the part of their body that's most receptive to being carried around wherever they're needed, and then used as a direct conduit to their primal power. The burny part of the flame concentrates in palaces, the gemstone part goes wherever we take them."

"But they once existed in the same place, at the time of this world's creation," Princess Celestia said, taking over for her. "In the beginning, each gemstone was kept in its palace, with its flame. And this state of affairs continued until the first palaces were discovered and then entered, some two thousand years past. While the gemstones corresponding to the Elements of Harmony were given freely, each of the three societal virtues was sealed along with a curse, and to remove the gemstone was to free the curse and unleash it upon the world."

"And that one's curse was the windigoes," Twilight finished for her.

"It was," Princess Celestia agreed. "Stories are passed down and told at Hearth's Warming of how the windigo scourge was driven back by the fires of friendship and camaraderie. Over my long rule, I have guided those stories to ensure they remain accurate, because the windigoes were repelled by such fires, and that is a tool even the meekest among us can bring to bear. But the stories make less mention of the Lovebringer, because I wished for my little ponies to turn to themselves for the answer rather than a lost, mythical relic."

She stared into the gemstone for a moment, and then turned back to Twilight. "But now that the keystone that began the curse is no longer lost - and especially in the hooves of a Princess of Friendship who knows those fires like no other - it may be possible to write a new ending for this annual parable. One more harmonic than savage beasts being driven away, only to await their chance at revenge."

Twilight gave the Lovebringer a solemn stare. "I understand," she said, bowing. "I'll make sure to return this safely."

Corsica watched as Cadance - somehow not quite as divine or lovely as she had been before divesting the gemstone, but still divine and lovely - floated the gemstone towards Twilight, and Twilight bowed and awaited it.

With a splash of red, it melded into her chest.

Instantly, a spark of red lightning ran down Twilight's mane, and she winced as if struck by static. After the jolt, her mane and tail had changed, beginning to rise and flow like Celestia's, taking on a deep and starry sheen, with one of her twin stripes turned bright crimson for emphasis.

"Oh," Twilight said, her voice endowed with an odd, echoing ring that hadn't been there before. "This is... much more powerful than my own Element. I can... Umm, some of you might want to take cover in case I accidentally flex a muscle wrong and half the room breaks?" She shakily turned to look at Starlight over her shoulder, and Corsica saw that her irises had gone bright red. "If this is the same power as yours, is this how you feel every single day?"

"Not an alicorn." Starlight shrugged. "Just a plain old unicorn who can't accept defeat."

"I think this is about the same power level as the Tirek incident," Twilight said, studying her hooves, moving in a jerky fashion as if she was contradicting her every action. "Which I did manage to control before, so I should be able to re-familiarize with it quickly enough. Is this...?"

"The power we were attempting to emulate by 'stockpiling power for millennia,' yes," Princess Celestia said. "The power that alicorns and sphinxes were originally created to wield. And though we can survive containing the unbridled energies of creation, you should know that our forms are far from sufficient to do more than skimming the surface of this reservoir... although such skimming was still sufficient to accomplish feats such as raising the Aldenfold. With Aegis, you could be far stronger. It was over the proper usage of this power that my sister and I clashed one thousand years ago, before I banished her to the moon. And it is this power that you will need to restore harmony to the north, in a manner that does not merely pass today's problems on to the next generation. We are giving it to you. Use it well."

Twilight chuckled nervously, her movements already becoming slightly more assured... though Corsica noticed her wings were clamped much more tightly to her sides than usual. "So you really think I need Aegis and this at the same time?"

Cadance shook her head. "This power was too important to your mission to withhold. We were going to offer it to you before you crossed the border whether you asked for it or not. So our discussions about Aegis were based on the assumption that you would already have this."

"Hence the warnings," Twilight said, a bit more confidence returning to her voice. "Although I think not breaking anything like this is going to be more a matter of practice and control than intent..."

"Your intent was never in question, my little pony," Princess Celestia said fondly. "And if it was, you have a friend with a similar power who is already trusting you to steer her right. I am sure she would be willing to return the favor."

Starlight shuffled warily, and Twilight gave her a reassuring nod. "I'm pretty sure that's the least of our worries."

"So..." Twilight had started pacing, her legs twitching occasionally, like they wanted to break free and run on ahead. "I'm pretty sure, or at least I feel like, I could completely ignore the intended ways of doing anything right now and solve all the north's problems directly through brute force. And I don't even have combat training. I could probably just blow up an invading army from the opposite horizon! Not that I'd do that, but I sure feel like I could." She looked up at Celestia. "So, why are you giving me Aegis, again? Do you really think there's possibly any problem up there that I couldn't solve now, but could if I was stronger?"

That was what Corsica wanted to know, too. As well as why a rando like her got to watch goddesses exchange powers on scales that could accidentally level a city. Maybe they didn't think her knowing about it was a threat, since she'd probably just explode if she tried to touch that power and couldn't use it for herself? Or maybe they figured that since she'd be following the team to the north, she'd find out about it one way or another anyway.

Her other questions had decent answers. But seriously, she could smell Twilight's power, it was wafting off her so strongly. So why throw Aegis on top of that?

"You asked before we could offer the Lovebringer, and I would not be surprised if you changed your mind in light of its power," Celestia answered. "We merely prepared our answer to that question in advance in case you asked it. However, I believe you summoned us because you had a problem that required more finesse to solve, not more force. And having access to the one tool that was ever capable of channeling this much power may also make it easier for you to control it."

"Well, that would be a relief," Twilight said, stopping in front of a particularly reflective crystal and staring. "Also, are my eyes red? Can I change that?"

"There are ways to repress the cosmetic effects of excess power," Cadance chuckled. "But that's something you can figure out on your own time. I think Flurry's getting bored with this conversation."

She teased at the ears of the foal on her back, who looked anything but bored.

"Come," Princess Celestia instructed. "I will show you to Aegis's current location... as well as instruct you on the contingencies under which the dragons insisted this be done in order to grant their blessing. It will be your decision how much and whether to use it."

Oh, great. More walking. "Hey!" Corsica called, willing to take any attention she could get. "Mind going slow enough that I can keep up? Only got so many wheels, here..."

It was only once they were out of the throne room and proceeding apace that it hit her: Cadance wasn't following, and Corsica had gotten so absorbed in being responsible and paying attention to her mission that she forgot to ask about her shampoo.

Rats. This was what she got for being a good filly.

Beyond The Rift

Corsica kept a keen eye on Princess Twilight as they walked - and rolled - the halls of the Crystal Empire's central keep. She wasn't alone; everyone else seemed to be watching Twilight as well.

"Hey," Corsica said, rolling up alongside Twilight, whose stride grew steadier with each extra minute spent acclimating to the Lovebringer's power. Her mane and tail hadn't stopped floating, though, nor had they lost their starry, eternal depth that flowed like the eldest princesses' manes. "Would it be bad taste to make a joke about how I'm always somehow present when you get your world rocked with some new power or news?"

Twilight blinked, her pupils leaking starshine. "World rocked? Oh, you mean the crystal city under my Tree of Harmony?"

"And getting a piece of the powers of creation thrust in your face and told 'use this'," Corsica added with a grin. "That can't happen every day."

"Actually, that's exactly what being an Element bearer entails," Twilight pointed out. "I guess it's not every day that you get charged with a second piece of the same power, but this has been my destiny since I was a foal. Even if I only found out what that meant several years ago."

Now it was Corsica's turn to blink.

Rainbow came to her defense, though. "Yeah, but the Elements of Harmony only let us clean clocks under really special circumstances. This one looks like you're, uh, literally about to explode from power."

"It's not that different from the Tirek incident," Twilight said with a shrug. "At least, not as far as the way it feels. I don't know if that's because it's actually a similar grade of power or just because both were sufficient to saturate my abilities as an alicorn, but I'll be able to control it with a day or so of practice. I've done it before."

"Tirek incident?" Corsica asked. "You guys keep mentioning that..."

Rainbow flashed an eager grin. "Tirek was this centaur who tried to sack Equestria a while back. His powers let him drain ponies of their magic and add it to his own, so the more ponies he beat, the bigger and stronger he got. Celestia, Luna and Cadance all gave their own powers to Twilight at the same time so she could be strong enough to have a fighting chance-"

"That's not what happened!" Twilight corrected, looking briefly annoyed. "I was supposed to be hiding their powers, not using them."

Rainbow raised a smug eyebrow. "But you did use them, right?"

"That doesn't matter." Twilight shook her head. "They weren't enough to beat him, anyway. We all eventually got drained too, remember?"

Corsica frowned, trying to keep pace while rolling along. "So how'd you beat him?"

"With the Rainbow Power," Twilight explained. "That's what we decided to call it, anyway. At my Tree of Harmony, there was a small altar where we presented keys made from trinkets we got from our friends, in ways that somehow exemplified our roles as Elements..." She blinked as if suddenly realizing something obvious, but then shook it off and continued. "Anyway, once we presented our keys, the altar gave us its power, and it was somehow enough to defeat Tirek the same way we normally do, with all six of us at once. Just a lot stronger than usual."

"You thinking something else, there, Twi?" Rainbow prodded. "I saw that face..."

Twilight sighed. "Just that my key came from Discord, who happens to be a draconequus, just like the Flame of Harmony in my palace... I guess he was a more fitting source for it than I thought."

"Hold up," Corsica cut in. "Evil centaur. Absorbs the power of most of Equestria's citizens, which is enough to beat a max-powered alicorn in a duel. Similar strength to what you have now with this new power. He gets your power too, right? So presumably around twice as strong as he was before. And then you just beat him anyway?" She tilted her head. "What's even strong enough to do that?"

"I hadn't heard the story this way before," Starlight added, dropping back to walk with them. "Might be because I spent so much time telling you my own story instead of listening to yours, but still... The Flames of Harmony are supposed to be the biggest fish in the sea. What I've heard is that they were made using power taken from the two Indus gods after they exhausted themselves in their fighting. This power and that power are one and the same. So if the Elements of Harmony weren't enough against Tirek, and the combined might of all Equestria's goddesses weren't enough, said might being roughly equal in practice to one of these, at least within the limits of an alicorn body, though I don't suppose you got new bodies..." She rolled her neck, listing caveats one after the other.

"I mean, we never thought it was that odd," Twilight interrupted, cutting Starlight off before she could ask the same question Corsica had. "We were still acting as the Elements of Harmony. Just with more power than we had before. This Virtue of Love feels much stronger than my existing Element, but what makes more sense: that some parts of the world are arbitrarily orders of magnitude stronger than others, or that we weren't using the full power of our Elements before? Of course Tirek with two virtues worth of power would lose to us with six. And that's ignoring the fact that we've always been stronger than the sum of our parts together. It's more than just addition."

Starlight shrugged. "I guess I was reading into things, then. Still, that just makes me wonder why you weren't more powerful earlier. If your Element of Magic can do that sometimes, why can't it do that all the time, especially when you're an alicorn? The Lovebringer doesn't seem like it's holding back."

"Also," Rainbow cut in, "we kind of did transform during that. With a flashy glow-up and everything. Just if, like, that matters."

Corsica retreated from the conversation just a little, relishing her apparent ability to ask questions no one had thought of before. But soon, a new question drew her back in.

"Hey," she said, feeling for an opportune gap to take. "You know if all centaurs can do that, or if Tirek was special?"

Twilight considered this. "I have no idea. I've never met another centaur in person, and judging by the lack of accurate literary information on them, not many other scholars have, either. From my experience, he didn't seem to be using any tools to accomplish what he did, so it's likely others could accomplish it, if they wanted to. But whether it's a natural ability or learned sorcery, I couldn't say."

"Huh." Corsica kept rolling, realizing that Twilight and her friends hadn't heard much about Duma - though the centaur she had watched Seigetsu subdue in the Snowport dungeons was certainly on her own mind.

After a bit more rolling, Corsica finally saw Princess Celestia come to a stop... outside of what appeared to be a random door in an unused residential wing.

Sure enough, as Celestia undid the locks and allowed the party inside, Corsica found herself faced with a suite much like the one where Twilight and her friends stayed: a central sitting room connected to an open kitchen and a big balcony, with hallways branching off to a multitude of smaller connected private rooms and sleeping quarters. The accommodations looked hardly shabby for being disused, though given the completely crystalline architecture, Corsica wasn't sure what it would have looked like if it had been run down, either.

She followed Celestia down one of the hallways into a humble bedroom that appeared completely unoccupied... at least until the air shimmered, and with an effect reminiscent of the Ironridge crater's old heat wave, Aegis was there.

Rainbow Dash raised an unimpressed eyebrow. "You put it in a random bedroom? No grand vaults or showy security or nothing?"

Princess Celestia gave her an amused smile. "The Crystal Empire does not have an infinite supply of grand vaults, and due to events a month ago, the one that we did allocate to this purpose was deemed no longer suitable."

Corsica pointedly looked away.

"Princess." Twilight bowed, trying to focus on Celestia even though Aegis was commanding everyone's attention. "At our meeting, you spent a lot more time talking about the Lovebringer than Aegis. But now that we're here, I..." She looked back to the metal dragon. "Did the dragons really say yes to us using this without even needing to hear us out on why we want it? They can't have known we only wanted to borrow it to fix an airship. What's the catch, here?"

Corsica slowly nodded. She had seen the vigor and paranoia with which Snowport activated its defenses in response to Duma's intrusion. In what felt like another life, she remembered multiple trains being sent to the Crystal Empire under the auspices of transporting Aegis on one of many identical decoys, only to later learn that it had been smuggled here another way in secret and was never on the trains at all.

"The decisions were made ahead of time," Princess Celestia answered, shaking her head. "While you and your friends flew to the Palace of Laughter, Twilight Sparkle, we have hardly been idle. The Convocation agreed to this because they have a long memory, and are more aware than most that the misuse of this machine is not the sole danger that threatens the world. It was to escape from the scourge of the windigoes that Equestria's modern denizens and the dragons of Cernial first made their pacts, after all."

Twilight waited, clearly expecting more.

"They are not without a stake in the matter," Celestia added. "And one of the conditions was that, should you take Aegis beyond the lands of Cernial's domain, you would be accompanied at all times by a trusted liaison."

"Seigetsu," Twilight guessed. "Is she here now?"

Celestia shook her head. "I have faith that you will meet with her in Snowport and apprise her of the situation before departing for the north. I was not able to contact her on such short notice to be present for this discussion, but as these lands are still within Cernial's ancestral domain, that should pose little issue."

Corsica frowned harder. Sending someone to keep an eye on everyone? Sure, that fit with how they did things. Being okay with staying out of the loop for even a minute, on the other hoof, didn't match up with someone who would do this much surveillance in the first place. "You really don't think they'd prefer us to sit on our hooves for one more day so Seigetsu can get here first?"

Princess Celestia turned to her, visibly weighing whether to answer. But before she could, Twilight cut in.

"I don't believe this is the whole story," Twilight said uneasily. "We've said... I've said multiple times now that all we need is to use Aegis to fix the Immortal Dream. We could probably have it safely back here by the end of the day. So why are you talking like taking it to the north is a foregone conclusion? Especially when you already just gave me more power than I know what to do with."

"Yeah, what's with that?" Rainbow asked, hovering.

"Given the way things tend to go around me," Starlight sighed, "it probably is a foregone conclusion..."

Celestia hesitated. "Am I correct that everyone else in this room intends to join Twilight Sparkle in venturing north to stop the war between Ironridge and Yakyakistan?"

Corsica blinked, realizing she hadn't consciously thought that far ahead. It wasn't something she had any reason not to do, right? The old, broken Corsica would have done it without thinking because all she ever did was go with the flow. But she didn't actually have to do this, now that she had the capacity to find something different to do with herself.

The last thing she wanted was to get tied up in obligations she hadn't thought through. But she didn't want to be a flake, either, and the truth was she had yet to contemplate either path, going or staying. She had been living exclusively in the present. And so a snap decision was here, whether she liked it or not.

Starlight's nod sealed the deal. Corsica nodded too; she wouldn't be the lone pony to chicken out of a high-stakes mission to a war zone. But she'd definitely have to put some real thought into this later.

"Looks like we're all agreed," Rainbow said, pounding one hoof with the other. "Spill the beans!"

Princess Celestia looked Twilight in the eyes. "The dragons have been unsuccessful in their endeavors to discover more about the incident that prompted Aegis's relocation to this tower. They are stalemated in their war and see numerous signs that their absolute control over their lands is slipping. And so they believe the safest place for Aegis to reside, for the time being, would be far away from Cernial, in the hooves of an operator powerful enough to defend it and known for their commitment to peace."

Starlight groaned.

"In other words," Twilight said, turning back to face Aegis, "we're taking this to the north whether we like it or not."

"Can you see no possible way this could go wrong?" Starlight entreated, giving Celestia a deadpan stare. Looking at an alicorn like that, Corsica decided, must have taken nerves of steel... That, or being so far beyond dead inside that she knew there was nothing even a princess could do to hurt her. Just like Corsica had been the last time she mouthed off in Celestia's presence, actually.

"It would hardly be the path of assured outcomes," Princess Celestia agreed. "However, the Convocation views it as merely a matter of time until the Aegis is compromised if left to remain in these lands. When faced between a gamble and a loss, they feel they have only one path, and that is to place their trust in allies who have a reach longer than their own."

Twilight put on a wry smirk. "I'm flattered they think so highly of me."

"I may have thrown in a word in your favor during deliberations." Celestia's smile was far more teasing, though it soon grew straight again. "Furthermore, it was not a coincidence that I happened to be in the Empire at the precise time when you came to call. In fact, since the Crystalling, I have never left. Representatives of the Convocation came here to treat with Equestria while you were away, and both before and after their arrival, I have remained here to stand guard over their god personally."

"And you think we're the best place for it," Twilight said. "In Ironridge and possibly Yakyakistan, which according to her are full of schemers and scoundrels and even Chrysalis." She pointed a hoof at Corsica. "Safer than any other corner of Equestria, protected by defenses you fully control? Why not put it in my Crystal Palace? Princess Luna had a lot to say about how Convergence was so powerful, no one with bad intentions could make it to that door even if they wanted to."

"We debated many options," Princess Celestia answered with a shake of her head. "Would that you had been there for it. However, this is the answer we decided upon... contingent on your acceptance, Twilight. I recognize that this mission already asks much of you and your friends."

Corsica watched everyone else for their reactions. Rainbow looked intrigued, and Starlight clearly considered acquiring Aegis to be a foregone conclusion.

"Alright." Twilight bowed. "If that's what's on the table, I'll do my best. Just... You know you can tell us this up front, right, Princess?"

Princess Celestia gave a knowing smile. "I won't get to tease you forever, Twilight. Now then. Aegis. Awaken."

"I AM ALREADY AWAKE," came a voice from the metal dragon.

"So how does this work?" Twilight asked, stepping uncertainly forward. "Starlight told me some of what Aegis can do, but I assume there's more to it than just saying what I want."

Princess Celestia nodded. "Aegis forms a special bond with its pilot using technology you may be familiar with if you journeyed to the heart of Convergence's palace. Once this bond is in place, it can act autonomously in accordance with orders, be directly controlled by remote, or be controlled physically from within the cockpit. The remote link can sustain energy transference, so merely being connected should help you to manage the Lovebringer's power."

She then turned back to Aegis. "Aegis, I would like you to transfer my pilot's bond to Twilight Sparkle. From now on, she will be your new master."

"ACCESS DENIED," Aegis said.

"What?" Celestia frowned in confusion. "Aegis, explain."

"OUR BOND WAS ESTABLISHED ON PROVISIONAL SECURITY PROTOCOL," Aegis said. "PROVISIONAL BONDS ARE TEMPORARY AND CANNOT BE TRANSFERRED. ONLY MY TRUE PILOT CAN INSTRUCT ME TO BOND ON A PERMANENT BASIS."

"Then who's your true pilot?" Twilight asked, looking up at the dragon's blank, featureless face. "Tetra?"

Aegis swiveled its neck and lowered its head, pointing straight at Starlight.

"I don't know why anyone expected anything else," Starlight deadpanned. "Why is it me? Are you sure you're not mistaking me for you-know-who that you used to hang out with all the time?"

Aegis's body flickered with sluggish pulses of light. "I AM BEYOND CERTAIN."

"Great," Starlight said, wiping back her mane. "You know what, I'm actually not interested in learning how or why this is the case. Can I make Twilight your new boss? And if so, what's the least-complicated way to do it?"

"AFFIRMATIVE. YOU CAN MANAGE SUCH FUNCTIONS FROM WITHIN MY CORE."

The armored plating on Aegis's chest split along asymmetrical, geometric lines, sliding aside on hidden rails to reveal a tall, shallow cavity. Inside was a large, flat-faced crystal that had been polished to a mirrorlike sheen, its exposed face roughly the size of a full-grown pony. Aegis stood, waiting, the crystal pulsing from within with a faint rainbow sheen.

Starlight frowned, reaching a hesitant hoof towards the core. "Do I just... touch it, or...?"

Princess Celestia nodded, standing watchfully by.

The surface of the crystal rippled like water as Starlight's hoof broke through it. It reached out, wrapping around her leg as she appeared to become weightless, floating up into the core and disappearing with barely a splash.

Corsica held her breath, watching Aegis for a reaction. The metal dragon stood in the bedroom, taking up most of what was already a spacious chamber, its head bowed to avoid scraping the ceiling and its strange, conical tail backed far enough into a corner that it probably didn't have room to turn around. Its wings were mostly furled, just loose enough to remind everyone of their presence. It was completely still...

And then Starlight's special talent appeared on its otherwise-blank face.

"Woah," Aegis said in Starlight's voice. "This is... surprisingly cool."

"Starlight?" Twilight asked.

"Whaddya mean?" Rainbow demanded, flitting around eagerly now that the tension had broken. "What's it like in there?"

"I have no idea why a disembodied goddess would give her mechanical body an interior like this," Starlight's voice echoed. "It's like a whole command center in here. There's even room for two! You could actually live in here and use this as a house in an emergency..."

"Can I see?" Rainbow pleaded, inching her hoof closer to the still-exposed core.

Starlight's voice hesitated. "Maybe it would be better if you didn't," she said. "This looks a lot more intuitive than I was expecting, but Aegis is definitely attached to my power right now... At least give me a bit to properly pass this over to Twilight. If she wants others messing around inside her divine exoskeleton, that's her call."

Rainbow gave Twilight a plaintive look that said you're letting me see it, right, my very bestest buddy in all the world, aren't you?

"Now if Twilight wanted to see if she can come in here, that might speed things along," Starlight's voice offered.

Twilight nodded. "Alright."

She reached her hoof up to touch the crystal, but was repelled by a ripple and a soft electromechanical buzz.

"Umm..." Twilight bit her lip, still holding up her hoof.

"Right, of course it wouldn't let anyone else..." Starlight's voice echoed from Aegis. "There, try again. Security systems."

Twilight repeated the motion, and this time she was pulled weightlessly inside, just as Starlight had been.

Rainbow Dash waited. And waited. And waited. And tapped her hoof. "Soooo...?"

"This is probably not going to be very entertaining," Aegis apologized with Twilight's voice. "And it might take a while."

"Like, ten minutes, twenty minutes...?" Rainbow tilted her head.

"Well, I can tell you I'm not taking Aegis outside this room until I can be a hundred percent sure I'm not about to accidentally demolish the tower by spreading my wings," Twilight's voice said.

"So probably all day," Starlight's voice apologized. "I'm going to help Twilight go through all this feature documentation, but unless you or Corsica really like reading manuals, it'll probably just make it take longer if we broadcast everything we're talking about. It might just be better if you two make your way back to Snowport on your own time tonight, and we'll plan to have Aegis ready enough to fly us there and meat you by nightfall?"

Rainbow's face fell.

"I should mention," Princess Celestia cut in. "Princess Luna is on her way here, and should arrive by nightfall. Cutie marks and premonition flux are much closer to her field of expertise than mine, and she was originally the creator of the mark that now ensnares your engine. If you desire any aid beyond what Aegis can render in solving your problem, this plan would allow you to benefit from her help, as well."

"Sounds good," came Twilight's voice, sounding as if she was already cozying up with a stack of reading material. "Is that alright with you two? If we all meet back at the Immortal Dream tonight?"

"Eh. Yeah." Rainbow landed and kicked the ground with a hoof. "I didn't wanna read manuals for hours anyway. Come on, Corsica, let's get out of here."

An invitation? That was nice. Corsica was hardly done looking at Aegis, but if it was stuck with them on their journey, she imagined she'd get to see a lot more of it going forward.

Corsica and Rainbow left the castle, finding a lively town below under auspiciously sunny skies. There were enough crystal ponies out that Corsica found herself quickly distracted by thoughts of whether she could get her coat to look like that, too... but she pushed that temptation aside, keeping herself focused for a little longer.

"That happen often?" she guessed, nodding up at Rainbow.

"What, the eggheads doing egghead things?" Rainbow rolled her eyes. "Uhh, pretty much all the time. I just wanted to see how they were going to get the thing out of there when it was twice as big as the only door."

"Good question," Corsica muttered. "So what are you going to spend the rest of the day doing? Probably nothing an overworked invalid could do without cracking twenty ribs?"

Rainbow Dash shrugged. "Probably try to track down the others. I've been sort of getting the vibe that some of us are more attached to the idea of kicking butt in the north than others, but Twilight hasn't sat us down yet to declare that this is an all-in mission for the Elements of Harmony, and she's probably not going to do so until it's too late. Like, imagine going, 'oh, oops, Rarity isn't here, let's ride two hours to the next city over to go look for her' right when we're trying to leave."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Isn't your Element magic supposed to only work when you have all six of you together?"

"Sorta?" Rainbow rubbed the back of her neck. "We can only do the really big rainbow laser thing when we're all together, but I think Twilight might have that covered. And for the last year or two we've been getting picked and chosen for missions in pairs much more often than all at once. My money says this one's gonna be me, Twilight, Starlight and Fluttershy, though. Not sure if the other three will be coming."

"Oh yeah?" Corsica nodded along. "Why Fluttershy? I haven't seen much of her since we got here."

Rainbow gave her a weird look. "I mean, her palace is half of the reason we're going up there, right? We saved the flame, now we gotta fix its home too, or something. Right?"

Corsica felt herself redden. "Look, I... All that stuff in Ironridge pretty much happened to someone else. Not me. I just remember it because I got some of her memories stuck in my brain when I rewound myself, but I can be forgiven for forgetting."

Rainbow winked. "Eh, I forget stuff all the time. Just means you've got more important things to think about."

"Keep telling yourself that," Corsica retorted. "Anyway, does rounding up your friends involve any sitting in place without excessive wandering around? Preferably in a way that's not existentially boring?"

"Pretty much the exact opposite." Rainbow gave her a shameless grin. "But, uh, it's kinda crazy to see you actually looking for something to do. What have you been doing since you woke up, just recuperating on the ship?"

Corsica shook her head. "Rolling back and forth across Snowport trying to pick up the trail of Starlight's missing mom. Dunno what I can manage when even the Inquisition is stumped, but it's something to do. And I think I'm about to re-injure myself if I keep it up."

"Yikes," Rainbow hissed, drawing her teeth into an exaggerated grimace. "But you mean Maple, right? Any good leads?"

"According to Seigetsu, she came through Snowport about sixteen years ago," Corsica explained. "Got dead-ended by a train that couldn't reach its destination, came back to Snowport, and disappeared without a trace after that. I haven't found much, but I did get that engineer we brought back from Starlight's village to offer to take me on an off-the-books train run later today so I could see what it's like to have the magic turn us back."

"Trying to retrace her steps, huh?" Rainbow rubbed her chin. "If Seigetsu lost her trail around here, that's a pretty good lead, but sixteen years ago is, like... a lot. Before the Crystal Empire, I dunno that there was much else besides Snowport up here, though I guess I didn't know about Snowport until a month ago either. And you think the trains didn't work for her because she knew about how big the world really was?"

Corsica nodded. "I don't know exactly where Starlight's been, but I get the impression she's well-traveled. And that Maple went with her as a kid across most of the world."

Rainbow frowned, clearly recoiling from the most obvious way that someone could vanish decades ago with no clear way to get anywhere else, yet not leave a trace. "Well, I think it's a pretty good lead," she eventually decided. "You meant Wheelcakes, right? What time are you meeting up with her to go see what it's like?"

"Forgot to ask," Corsica admitted. "I'll probably just hang out at the train station until she says she's done."

"Oh yeah? Eh, might as well come with." Rainbow shrugged, and set off towards the train station at a leisurely enough pace that Corsica could keep up.

It took three hours of waiting, during which Rainbow left and came back again with most of Twilight's friends in tow, but Wheelcakes eventually arrived.

"Still holding me to our deal?" she asked Corsica as the other passengers boarded, the late afternoon sun hanging low in the sky.

"Yep." Corsica grinned. "Any chance this is your last run for the day?"

Wheelcakes nodded. "Someone else gets to handle the night trains. I've been driving all day! But, a promise is a promise. After I get this last ride to Snowport. Hope you're fine ending there for the night, because that's where I sleep."

"Spiffy." Corsica winked. "Even if it's as boring as you say, I've gotta see this magic for myself."

Corsica settled comfortably into the train car cushions to wait. The car was fuller than on the way in, its passengers mostly equine and mostly looking like they were on their way home after a full day's work. But surely as a cripple, no one would ask her to scrunch up and share a bench, right?

The last two creatures to enter were Seigetsu and Halandyne.

"Hello," Halandyne said, surveying the train car before wandering over and taking the bench opposite Corsica. "You didn't seem bothered by my presence this afternoon, so I assume you will be similarly unbothered now."

"You two know each other?" Seigetsu asked, amused, standing at the entrance to Corsica's booth.

"Sure. Make yourself at home." Corsica flicked her tail in welcome, unwilling to muster the strength to lift her head.

Seigetsu took a seat next to Halandyne. "You seem to have been keeping yourself busier than advised," she noted.

Corsica flicked her ears. "Sue me. I want stuff again."

Seigetsu nodded, sitting back and folding her arms.

"So are you two working together on top-secret church business?" Corsica asked, glancing between Halandyne and Seigetsu, recalling how difficult it was to pry information out of Halandyne earlier. "Or am I not allowed to know?"

"Merely attempting to catch up on my backlog from spending a month following you," Seigetsu acknowledged. "Though from what Her Majesty tells me, I may as well have to give up on that altogether."

Corsica cracked a grin. "You're getting shoveled into our party long-term to keep an eye on some treasure we might be dragging up north?"

"A crude way of putting it," Seigetsu said. "But yes. I am being 'shoveled into your party' to 'keep an eye on some treasure'. With luck, this will also further my other duties, but that possibility is tertiary to the will of the Convocation."

Corsica's eyes slid over to Halandyne. "Other duties such as... what she's helping you with?"

"Halandyne is Yelvey's replacement in Snowport," Seigetsu explained. "A much higher-ranking and more-tested member of the Order of Silence, given the circumstances... and yes, the task both of us are working on at present is discovering what happened to her predecessor after he fled the city."

"You got any thoughts on those three polar bears?" Corsica asked, her mind snapping to the brainwashed trio in Fauntleroy's bar.

"Almost certainly the doing of a member of the Order," Seigetsu said.

"You say that like it's not necessarily Yelvey?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

Seigetsu sighed. "Snowport is unique among Cernial's lands in that Yelvey... is not our first cleric to go missing. Some years ago, when the city was controlled by an entirely separate lord and administration, another member of the Order vanished without a trace. I should stress that in Cernial, this is an exceedingly rare event, and to suffer two instances in the same location not three decades apart is completely unheard of. The first time this happened, it resulted in inquisitions. The second time... Let us just say that Yelvey's actions have many in the Convocation believing Snowport to be cursed."

Corsica frowned at Halandyne. "This first time wouldn't happen to be the name you asked me about this morning, would it? Nar-something?"

"Nencosay," Halandyne said. "It would. A prevailing theory is that our inability to find her is because she crossed the mountains to the north."

"The Convocation is not wont to let a single case of mutiny among the Order's ranks go without investigation," Seigetsu explained. "As a Special Inquisitor, I have made solving this notorious cold case to be my life's work. And now Yelvey's own disappearance has turned it from a cold case into one hot enough to merit the intervention of senior clergy..." She closed her eyes and let out a breath. "But if the Convocation decrees that my presence is more needed in the north, then so be it. And perhaps I will find a clue as to my target's whereabouts on that side of the mountains, along the way."

"I get it." Corsica glanced between the two of them again. "So this is like you handing off your case to a new investigator before you get stuck with us for a while."

"Yes," Seigetsu said stiffly. "You could put it that way."

Huh. No wonder she was feeling talkative about it. Corsica didn't want to guess how old Seigetsu was, but having her life's work taken from her and given to someone else at the whim of her superiors... What would it even feel like to have a goal she had been chasing for years, let alone lose it to circumstances beyond her control?

It was impressive she was handling it so civilly. Corsica nodded, concealing her jealousy. And then, just because she could, she replied, "Well, I wish you find a killer clue in Ironridge with us."

Seigetsu gave her a knowing look. "That no longer does anything of note, though I do appreciate the sentiment."

"I know, right?" Corsica grinned, her mind blissfully free of looming wishes and penalties. "I'm just glad I can root for someone again and actually put my heart into it. I mean it. I hope you get the lead of the century."

"It is not impossible," Seigetsu admitted. "When I first found you and your friends in Stillwater, I assumed Halcyon to be a bearer of the same kind of power that the Order of Silence possess, and thus an indicator that Nencosay - or someone else versed in those arts - had made the trip to the north. Though I now know that she must be something far different, there are enough similarities to give me hope that more clues may reveal themselves in the north, with time."

Corsica rolled her eyes. "If you're specifically looking for anything related to Halcyon's brand of weirdness, you'll be drowning in clues. Trust me. You should actually be careful what you wish for."

"Advice born of experience, no doubt," Seigetsu said. "I suppose we will see how it plays out."

Little more of interest was said, and eventually the train pulled into the station at Snowport, its passengers disembarking one by one until it was just Corsica, Wheelcakes, and Rainbow Dash's entourage.

Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Fluttershy and Rainbow had all turned out for the field trip to nowhere, apparently, and as Corsica quizzed each one of them on their reasons for being here, she soon found it was pointless to question it.

"Are you crazy?" Pinkie asked, giving her a wide, sideways stare. "Trains can't just run in place and look like they're moving without going anywhere. That would be bizarre! Of course I want to come see it in action!"

"You know, Pinkie," Applejack pointed out, "you've done some much stranger things than just running in place without going anywhere before."

Pinkie patted one of the seats lovingly. "That just means the train is a kindred spirit."

"Well I, for one, have been boondoggled by this whole never-ending train business ever since it started," Rarity declared. "And as an avowed lover of solving mysteries, I'm quite relieved someone has finally gotten some pieces together to try and tackle it... Thank you, Corsica, darling. Besides, if I don't see this phenomenon for myself and simply take everyone else's word that accepting Discord's help is the only way of getting back to Ponyville in one piece, not to mention making future travels for business endeavors..." She wiped her brow, looking mildly overwhelmed. "Let's just say that there will be a loophole, and I'll do my part and more to see that we find it."

"Um, I'm just here for emotional support," Fluttershy added. "Since none of you seemed to listen to the warnings that this actually doesn't feel very nice, somehow."

"Right," Rainbow announced. "So, how are we doing this?"

Wheelcakes satisfied herself that all other passengers had left the train, and then nodded, sliding the door shut. "I'll take us down the southeast tracks that would usually take us around the coast of the Griffon Palm Sea and eventually get us to Catantan, where Our Town was. The alternative is going back towards the Crystal Empire, then taking either the south junction towards central Equestria or the west junction deeper into Cernial, but because that area of the tracks is local enough that the magic doesn't stop me, it would take at least an hour to reach the point where things start going weird. Southeast, it should start much faster. And I'll just go until you tell me to turn around."

"Sounds good," Corsica agreed. "Any objections?"

"Yeah, let me off," Rainbow said, moving to open a window and preparing to climb out of it. "I just thought of a better idea: why don't I fly along above you and watch the train and the land around it from the sky? I bet I can keep pace with a measly magic train. And if I can't, that'll be interesting to know, too."

"Have fun!" Pinkie waved energetically.

Corsica glanced around. "Any other objections?"

None were voiced, and so Wheelcakes moved back to the engine, leaving the door open so everyone could see and communicate with her as the train pulled away from the station and slowly picked up speed.

"Right, then," Rarity said, pulling out a notepad and quill. "I'll be on landmark-watching duty. Primary objective: detecting if we've crossed the same terrain twice, and creating a ledger so that on our way back, we can see precisely which parts are skipped."

"I'll help with spotting," Applejack added. "I've got a good eye for the lands."

Methodology was good. As a scientist, Corsica approved... but what she really wanted was to stare into the illusion and see if it stared back.

Because it had to be an illusion, right? Something, whether on the trip out or the trip back, or maybe both, was desynced from reality. She watched idly as Pinkie Pie threw a rope out the window and dragged it along the ground beside them as the train moved; so long as the wheels didn't clip it, that was smart. It would let her verify that the ground out there was actually solid.

The train moved faster, passing between two hills and entering a deciduous grove. That pass was very memorable. The note-takers would remember it for sure; she heard Applejack commenting to Rarity about what kind of trees those were. Nothing Corsica saw looked blurred or fuzzy; Pinkie's rope was properly brushing the ground. All signs indicated that the world around them was real.

Keeping her focus sharp was a trial, but Corsica was invested, and her attention didn't waver: no supernatural distraction forced her to blink, no lapses in attention span covered up a mystical discontinuity in the land around them. The grove ended in a bridge across a stream, and the tracks curved ever so gently to the left, crossing a wide, saddled valley with long green grass, moving towards a low range of mountains in the distance that were just steep enough not to have soil.

At their present speed, how long would it take to reach the mountains? Corsica craned her neck, winced at the movement, and noted the forest receding behind them. Probably... No way it would be less than ten minutes. Curious, she closed her eyes and began counting seconds under her breath.

It was a skill she had acquired in Icereach for flexing on her peers when doing experiments in school, and time had done nothing to dull her senses - not that it had been more than a week. When ten minutes had passed, free from any blips or shakes in her stream of consciousness that could have heralded magical interference, she opened her eyes.

The mountains were close now, and they were still in the same valley, the sea visible in the distance to the north.

Come on. When would the supernatural stuff start?

They reached the mountain pass, the ridges rising just high enough to block her view of the terrain around her, hewn away by whoever constructed the rails in times of yore. Surely this would be it, right? When she couldn't see anything of note around her? This would be where the mumbo jumbo started. They would emerge from the mountains and be right back at the start of that valley...

The pass came to an end with another bridge, and from the river far below, Corsica realized they had gained substantial height since they went in. Why hadn't she been watching their elevation? Had the train just pulled a fast one on her? A raised plateau was coming up, flat and unremarkable save for a smattering of lone trees, and as the train crested its lip, she saw instantly that it went on farther than she could see.

Infinitely repeating terrain. That had to be this plateau. She could taste it already. The few trees that they passed barely counted as landmarks, and could easily start repeating...

And yet, not five minutes had passed before the tracks veered gradually to the edge of the plateau, descending on a smooth, gentle ramp towards the shoreline far below. Corsica could see them stretching out at least a mile in the distance, running near to the beach, crossing a bridge over another tributary, eventually becoming obscured in another grove on the horizon.

"How long does it usually take to start repeating?" she called forward to the engine.

"It doesn't repeat!" Wheelcakes called back. "It's just infinite. Everything after the grove we passed at the start, I've never seen this way before! If we went back and tried this again, none of it would be the same after around that point!"

"Perhaps we ought to give it a few more minutes still before turning back," Rarity offered. "So far these landscapes have been detailed and different enough that it's easy to keep a log of where we've been. I ought to be able to point out exactly what parts we skip on our way back, and the more we've seen before we turn around, the bigger of a splash it will make, so to speak."

So they kept going... at least until Rainbow Dash dropped down, rapping on the windows with a hoof to be let in.

Pinkie Pie opened her rope window further, and Rainbow tumbled inside, her mane blown back from a good high-speed flight.

"Whew!" Rainbow said, shaking herself out and fixing a stray feather. "So, has it gotten crazy down here yet? Because out there, I definitely noticed the spookies."

"What have you seen?" Fluttershy asked, as Rarity and Applejack pointedly kept their focus on the terrain.

"So," Rainbow said, as Corsica rolled over to listen. "I set out to keep pace with the train, right? And at first, I could match it perfectly. But the longer I flew, the more the train started falling behind. And even when I slowed down to let it catch up, it, like, didn't work?" She scratched her head. "I really don't understand it. Like, you were moving forward, and it looked like your speed was constant? Except it wasn't, because after a point, you just never caught up to me even if I stopped and hovered in place. And the craziest thing is, to reach you guys again, I had to fly backward. Back towards the train, right? And the train moved away from me, backwards, even though it was still moving forwards according to my eyes. Trying to get back to you guys felt like catching up to someone in a race, even though it looked like we were rushing straight at each other. It was the trippiest thing ever."

Corsica listened, both eyebrows going up.

"I'm pretty sure, like..." Rainbow waved a wing. "I probably actually backtracked the exact same distance to get back to you guys as I flew while thinking I was gaining just a little ground, in terms of what it feels like I flew. And I'm a pro, I know my flying distances. So I think you might actually be stuck in one physical point in space right now, even though it looks and feels like you're going forward? Ask an egghead, that's just what I saw. But let me tell you, there's definitely something going on here."

As Corsica listened to Rainbow's spiel, a sensation slowly began to grow in the back of her mind... or perhaps it had always been there, and she was just now noticing it. But it was a sensation she knew intimately well, and never wanted to feel again.

A premonition flux. A wish waiting to come true.

"Sounds like maybe we should stop the train and think this through," Applejack offered. "If we've come far enough that the magic is kicking in, it's not like we'll learn more by spinning our wheels. Besides, all of a sudden I'm getting the shakes for some reason, and I wonder if this is the feeling we were warned about."

"I can feel it too," Fluttershy murmured. "I know you said to expect this, but I feel like we should go back home for some reason."

Part of Corsica sagged in relief: the others could feel it too. This wasn't her talent returning to exact its vengeance. Another part of her bristled in anger: how dare the railroad employ a force like this to accomplish its job? Could its architect really not have thought of something less wantonly destructive?

And a third part recoiled in fear. She had lost her mind to this power before, felt her soul destroyed from blow after crushing blow until she could no longer muster the will to live anymore.

Her new flame was precious. She could not risk it for something as idle as curiosity, no matter how much she wanted to smash this dumb system and break it over her heel.

Could she?

The train ground to a stop as the others talked around her, debating the merits of pressing on versus turning back and trying to objectively analyze each other's - and their own - cowardice. It would have been amusing to listen to, if Corsica wasn't so torn by her own dilemma. Take the smart road, give in to her foreboding and do what the train magic obviously wanted? Or fight back against something that was incredibly stupid?

She had spent the entire ride trying to pierce the illusion and finding nothing amiss, she noted. The feeling only sprung up when Rainbow Dash swooped in, offering concrete evidence that not all was as it should be. This might be a reactive power, intelligently applied, or perhaps applied in response to her own thoughts and emotions. By that measure, trying further to piece together how the phantom terrain worked would only increase the penalty she would have to pay.

But... Corsica had only broken last time under three years of unrelenting pressure. It wasn't any individual wish that had undone her; it was the collective lack of oxygen, her inability to ever be free and recover, the fraying of her support system and her social life and everything else going wrong around her when she had no way to cope. Others who knew about her talent had remarked about her resilience, how it was borderline incredible that she had carried the weight of the Artifice of Hope for so long. And she was fairly sure that she really was back at her prime now. So long as she didn't subject herself to that unending purgatory again, she was almost certain she could shrug off a single large blow with no long-term consequences.

If lack of space to recover was what had doomed her before, then so long as she had space to recover, she could be fine. And she would have that space, because she no longer had a special talent that would sap her every stray thought. Corsica smirked at the world. If this was the best defense it had to offer, she had already taken this and more.

To sate her curiosity, and more than that, to spite the system, it was worth it to push the boundaries.

"Screw the magic," she announced, rolling towards the train doors. "Screw the rules. I'm gonna go outside and touch some grass. Who's with me?"

Some of Twilight's friends looked at her like she was crazy, and in the end, only Rainbow joined. "Uh, I'm not a coward, just saying," Rainbow offered as Wheelcakes reluctantly opened the doors. "But just so you know, even though we were told we'd have a bad feeling about this, I have a bad feeling about this."

"Oh, this could be a lot more than a feeling," Corsica promised, eyeing up Pinkie's rope. "Hey, could you tie that to my roller? Just in case I get smote by the powers that be and you need to drag my unconscious carcass back into the train."

A burnt-out ghost of a mare flickered in Corsica's vision as Rainbow obliged, and Corsica swept it aside. She was fresh. And maybe a little headstrong and stupid as a result, and maybe she was trying so hard to put her dead self out of her mind that she was forgetting the lessons she had learned from that. But even as the mountain grew in the back of her mind, a little spark of rightness pushed her forward, a feeling she couldn't understand and had never really felt before. She knew how this would go, at its very worst. She had felt the clobbering of a premonition flux before. As long as she had room to breathe, she could recover from anything it did to her. So, this was a way of facing her past, wasn't it?

That was a good way to think of it. Corsica rolled out, Rainbow flying carefully behind her, onto the grass next to the train tracks.

It felt... solid enough. Its blades brushed at her fetlocks, at least where they could reach around her little silver shoes. But when she reached down to take a nibble, it tasted faint, and she couldn't be sure that she had swallowed anything at all.

"Faker," Corsica told the landscape, with its violet evening sky and scattered, towering clouds that had been drizzling earlier in the day and would probably start again before morning. "Might be pretty. Sure ain't real. That's how illusions work, right? You see through them and then they vanish? So what's your deal?"

With her telekinesis, she grabbed around for a stick or something that could serve as a souvenir, but there was a lack of organic debris laying around in the grass. So, instead, she popped off one of her shoes, held it in her aura, and started using it as a shovel to dig a hole.

"You like being interacted with?" Corsica asked, the mountain in her mind growing. "You actually have any dirt under there, or are you just surface-deep? What is this, some kind of touchable projection that scrolls along while we're stuck here? Why can't we just move? And what would you do to a poor, determined mom who doesn't know what your deal is and pushes too hard because she just wants to see her kid again, huh? You able to weigh motives? Bet you hers is better than mine. Mine's just..."

Rainbow called something from behind her, but Corsica realized too late that she couldn't hear: the sound of voices and the sea and the wind in her ears had been replaced by that same awful buzzing that surrounded her special talent in the engine of the Immortal Dream. This was the fever pitch, the breaking point, and as the mountain in Corsica's mind teetered on the edge of a cliff, she rejected her last chance to turn back, stabbing the ground once more with her shoe. "Screw you!"

The mountain fell. Corsica felt it coming, knew its weight, braced herself for the crippling exhaustion and loss of all she had just come to care about. She propped herself up on that small little spark that told her there was nothing it could subject her to that she hadn't seen before, growled in defiance... and slowly trailed off in confusion as nothing happened.

Her spirit didn't break. The mountain didn't even hit her at all.

Instead, it hit the ground beneath her hooves. With a sound like breaking glass, Corsica felt the land below her give way, and with a surprised yelp, she fell.

"Unnngh..."

Corsica had fallen off her roller. Her entire body stung; it would be a miracle if nothing had re-broken. But aside from the brief shock of tumbling and a hard landing, her mind felt fine. No missing desires, no quenched flames. She was, at least mentally, okay?

She pried open her eyes. Her mind might have been fine, but the world around her was anything but.

Plants and grass were sparse around where she had landed, and grew sparser as she looked towards the railroad tracks... Or where the railroad should have been. Instead, a few short hoof-lengths from where she lay, the ground dropped away in a sheer chasm that burned with yellow energy, radiating up in waves that looked like an aurora made of sunbeams.

Pillars rose from the chasm in regularly-spaced intervals, made from gray metal and dotted with crystals and cables that glowed, blinking at regular intervals. At the top of the pillars were supports, a raised railway track running between them, carving a latticed path through the sky about twelve feet over her head. Around the rails, she could see the ghostly outline of grassy terrain, replete with a jagged, shattered hole where she had broken the illusion and fallen through. Rainbow Dash was standing at the edge of the splintered hole, gaping down at her.

"I'm... sort of alright," Corsica groaned, praying that she hadn't cracked any ribs.

And then she saw the train.

Oh, it looked like a train on the surface. But from below, she saw the truth: that carriage car was just its back, and the engine was nothing but a protrusion on top of its head.

Its huge, black, chitinous head, born of a cross between Princess Celestia's features and a stag beetle.

The creature's body was long and slender, but also hollow, the train tracks passing clean through a hole in the center. It was segmented like an ant, with a clear joint where the head-engine was connected to the body-coach, and looked as though it could become as long as it wanted by adding more cars. Elegant, spidery legs straddled the true earth on either side of the canyon. And it was watching her.

It was at once sickeningly grotesque and possessed of an ageless dignity, a kind of nobility or soul that only gods could match, befitting a creature that predated the equine race. Corsica thought she saw kindness and wisdom in its empty eyes, and pain and shame as well.

She glanced again at the hole in the illusory terrain... but before she could think too hard, the ground began to shake.

The train looked away from her, down the tracks. And then it stepped to the side.

Corsica stared, baffled, as the tracks simply phased through its body, the creature stepping off them and to the side. As it moved, the illusory terrain moved with it: in fact, it almost seemed grown into the creature's body, as if the terrain was a part of it, somehow. And then another train appeared in the distance, its legs flying like a griffon fiddler's talons as lumbered forward at a staggering speed.

This new train was surrounded by a new set of illusory terrain, which moved both with it and relative to it, and Corsica's mind was just fast enough to realize that it would have looked like real, moving terrain to anyone riding the train on the surface. It extended a ways out before and beyond the second train, and the two beasts made eye contact as they passed, the second one pouring a torrent of yellow energy down into the chasm in the form of a laser beam running from a gland on the bottom of its chin.

As it moved on, Corsica saw a shimmering outline of chains in its wake, swaddling the tracks like translucent silver cobwebs... but those soon faded, as did the illusory terrain. Wheelcakes' train sidestepped back onto the tracks, its terrain once again moving with it as well. From Rainbow Dash's expression, no one on the surface had noticed the second train's passage at all.

Corsica's mind might have been safe from the premonition flux, but this... this just might break her. At a loss for words, she locked eyes with the train, noticing a small cloud of crackling yellow thunderheads around the gland on its chin the former had been using to shoot its laser into the chasm. The illusory terrain was part of the trains, and the hole she had made...

"Sorry," Corsica whispered, wincing once again at the motion. "Didn't mean to hurt you. I'll... try to fix that. As soon as I can stand again."

Boundary of Knowledge

With a soft rush of wings, Rainbow Dash landed at Corsica's side.

"Uhhh," she said, gaping at the secondary landscape that extended all around them, sparse shrubland gathered at the edges of the chasm around the train tracks. Quickly, though, she tore her attention back to Corsica.

"You okay?" Rainbow asked, looking her over. "Your cart's like, over here..."

"Dunno," Corsica whispered. "Prolly not, but nothing worse than a little fall. No magical... ow."

The others started gathering around the hole in the sky as well, peering down through the illusory terrain attached to the train to glimpse the world below. "Oh my," Fluttershy murmured. "Corsica, are you okay?"

Nice that they were focusing on her, but weren't there bigger things to talk about, here...?

"Uhh," Rainbow repeated. "We probably should get you back to town. But I kinda want to explore down here... We're not leaving for Ironridge literally tonight, right?"

Corsica stared at the world around her. From the angle she had landed at, she couldn't see what was back in the direction of Snowport, or much of the nearby terrain, either. And she was all but certain she had just injured herself again.

Exploring sounded fantastic, but no amount of stubbornness could deny her situation, and it was better that someone got to look around than no one at all. "Good idea," she breathed, relenting. "Keep an eye out for anywhere Maple would have gone if she got down here. And I'm gonna need a lift."

Between Rarity's telekinesis and Rainbow helping out, Corsica was slowly lifted out through the hole in the sky. Passing through the crack in the illusory terrain gave the kind of discontinuous sensation she had been expecting during the train ride out here; the moment she was past them, she couldn't quite remember how the jagged edges of reality looked when she had been staring at them head-on. But the others recovered her roller as well - now broken from the fall - and soon she was aboard the train again, carefully braced on a bench, Fluttershy checking her over for fresh injuries.

"I don't know what I should be making of this," Wheelcakes warned, standing awkwardly out of the way. "As far as I'm concerned, I'm just the engineer, and you all made a hole in the ground...?"

"Well, darling," Rarity explained, "I'd hazard a guess that whatever we saw down there was the real, objective state of the terrain, and whatever we see up here is the part that changes to hide how far we've really gone... I think. As an artist, I want to view this as an optical illusion that's simply more physical than usual, but we'd need Twilight if we want to describe what's actually going on."

"Here's a question," Applejack said. "What are we hoping to find down there? Ain't nothing wrong with being curious for curiosity's sake, mind. And Rainbow, I know you were saying something about searching for a lead on Starlight's mom. But even if you go poking around and somehow find a fifteen-year-old letter from her laying out where she's going next, do you have time to do something about it? I was under the impression this Ironridge business is pretty urgent."

Rainbow bit her lip. "Yeah, I know, but-"

Pinkie Pie rapped on her shoulder and pointed a hoof out the window. "Not to interfere with your choice about what to do next, but I kinda sorta think your choice is kinda sorta being interfered with."

Rainbow looked, then blanched.

"What?" Corsica asked, unable to see out the windows from her bench. "Something coming out of the hole?"

Applejack looked too. "Nope. Hole's gone."

Rainbow groaned.

"Did it disappear the moment none of us had an eye on it?" Rarity postulated with a frown. "I know I turned my back for a moment to focus on Corsica..."

"I didn't see anything," Fluttershy volunteered.

Neither, apparently, had anyone else.

"So, uh..." Rainbow turned to Corsica. "I'm guessing you're really not feeling up to doing whatever you just did back there again, huh?"

"I barely even know what I did," Corsica grunted. "Aside from digging a hole. But if that was all it took, wouldn't this have happened before?"

Rainbow Dash rubbed the back of her neck. "I mean, this whole Maple hypothesis is that it has happened before..."

"Do any of you mind if I take us back to Snowport?" Wheelcakes cut in. "I'm still feeling uneasy out here, and we've got an injured passenger. Plus, you mentioned bringing your other friend into the loop."

"Might as well," Applejack told her. "We can at least see how the return journey stacks up to the one that got us out here."

"Hold up," Rainbow said. "While you do that, I'm gonna just sit out in the field where the hole used to be. Try to leave me behind. I flew all the way to get here in the first place, so it's not like I can't get back to Snowport on my own. Might as well see what happens, right?"

"Good luck out there," Rarity agreed, sending her off with a nod.

The ponies all returned to their stations, sans Fluttershy, who stayed with Corsica. The train felt hesitant to start, somehow, not picking up speed nearly as fast as Corsica felt like it should... but it was barely a few minutes until they were back in Snowport nevertheless, much more quickly than they had taken on the journey out.

"Still not feeling better, huh?" Wheelcakes asked Corsica as everyone else disembarked, sans Fluttershy. "Think I need to leave the train here while a medic comes to check up on you?"

"That would be good," Fluttershy agreed for her. "I'm sorry to take so much of your time tonight..."

It did sound good. Corsica was exhausted: not the paranormal soul-crushing exhaustion of being drained by her special talent, but too many days of running around had fully caught up with her, and now it felt like her skeleton had gone on strike and her body needed all its energy not to turn into a puddle of meat.

She should have listened to her doctors and stayed on bed rest until the chance of re-injury was gone. Now, she had no choice.

"Back again, are you?" asked a wide-faced dragon doctor who looked like an upright lizard. "Can't say I'm surprised. Kids these days..." He tapped a clipboard, standing over Corsica in a familiar hospital bed. "You do know what going easy on yourself while you recover means, yes?"

"Apparently not," Corsica grumbled, some sort of painkiller taking the edge off her situation, though she could still barely move. "What's the prognosis, broken spleen?"

The doctor sighed. "Three cracked ribs, a sprained hip and you're up to your ears in bruising. You will recover, and it won't even take that long, but only if you can be kind to yourself and not play extreme sports the moment I discharge you. I want you out of bed for no more than an hour each day at least for a week, and then we can look at getting you a physical therapy program to rebuild your strength in a way that won't just re-injure you. Take this seriously, and you could be back to living your normal life in a month or so."

"Wish it could take one night instead," Corsica said, exercising the one thing she could now do without consequences. Predictably, nothing happened.

"With that attitude, it'll take a lot longer," the doctor said, giving her a stop-increasing-my-workload glare. "Since it's getting late, I'll keep you here for the night, and tomorrow I can see about discharging you after I give your friends a proper lecture about proper outpatient care. Being friends with a princess might let you skirt legal rules, but healing bones follow their own-"

A knock sounded at the door.

"May I get it?" Fluttershy asked, the only one of Twilight's friends to have stuck with Corsica all the way here.

The doctor rolled his eyes. "I suppose this means I get to give my lecture tonight instead of tomorrow..."

Fluttershy opened the door. In walked Twilight, Starlight, Seigetsu and Princess Luna.

"At ease, my good doctor," Seigetsu said, noting the doctor's expression. "Well," she continued, turning to Corsica. "You've been busy."

"Twilight!" Fluttershy brightened.

"How did you get back here again?" Twilight asked, giving Corsica a concerned frown. "We're all ready to make the repairs to the Immortal Dream, but Princess Luna mentioned it would be better if you were here for it, and Seigetsu tracked you down in here?"

"Fell off a cliff again." Corsica rebuffed the look with a feeble, cheeky grin. "Have you not talked to anyone else? We had an eventful time."

Starlight sighed. "What did you do...?"

Fluttershy glanced at the doctor. "Maybe we shouldn't talk about it in public..."

"Not. So. Fast," the doctor declared, squaring his skinny shoulders and staring down the newcomers. "Princesses, Special Inquisitor, I respect your domains and your jurisdictions, but my jurisdiction extends to this hospital room and ensuring this patient doesn't become a bigger patient tomorrow. Whatever repairs you're trying to take her to work on or secret business I must not be present to discuss, can it wait until I've had one more moment to see my job through?"

Seigetsu raised an eyebrow at Corsica. "What have you done to prompt this?"

"Fallen off a cliff," Corsica repeated. "I told you. Twice."

Princess Luna bowed. "Do not let us interfere with your work, Doctor Mercurius. Perhaps I ought to wait in the hallway instead."

Twilight gave the doctor an expectant look.

Doctor Mercurius sighed, then fixed her with a pointed stare. "Bed rest. One week. On her hooves, roller or no, for not more than one hour per day. Then we can talk about getting her strength back. As a government official, I assume you are responsible enough to enforce those conditions for my patient. Also, welfare only covered the first roller, so someone is paying out of pocket if she wants a new one that isn't broken."

Twilight raised an eyebrow at Corsica. "Do you realize how recently I couldn't convince you not to stay in bed for a week?"

Corsica returned the look. "Do you realize how embarrassing it is for me to remember that?"

Something pensive died on Twilight's lips. "Right. I'll do everything I can to keep her to those instructions," she promised, then turned again to Corsica. "And if you want to come with us to Ironridge, I hope you'll make that easy for me. But let's discuss this after we fix the ship."

"Hey," Starlight volunteered, lifting a hoof and flashing her horn and encasing the hoof in a solid block of conjured crystal. "If we had to move her around, would an immobile full-body cast be a decent way?"

Corsica blinked, catching her meaning. "There's no way that's comfortable."

Doctor Mercurius gave her a skeptical look as well. "Would that not interfere with rib cage movement while breathing?"

Starlight shrugged. "Somehow, it doesn't. You don't even need to breathe if it covers your face."

"Then I suppose it would be fine," the doctor agreed. "Get a new roller from the front desk. I have another patient to check in on, one who actually doesn't deserve to be here..."

Getting around on a roller had been undignified, but it had been cool, too. Getting floated along inside a chunk of crystal like a balloon towed by a filly was just embarrassing. And it wasn't even comfortable to compensate.

"...And Rainbow Dash stayed behind to investigate," Fluttershy finished, recounting what had happened on the train quietly enough that bystanders couldn't easily hear her - not that there were any who didn't give a wide berth when they saw two alicorns and a Special Inquisitor coming through. "I don't know if she's back yet."

Twilight frowned in thought. "There's certainly some kind of spatial distortion at play; we knew that much before this." She turned to Luna. "Princess, is this something you know about? And is there a reason I shouldn't know about it? You're being pretty quiet."

"Apologies," Luna said. "My thoughts are on the things I have witnessed in your airship's engine room. The trains belong to my sister and her domain."

"You have to know how they work, though, right?" Starlight asked, glancing up at the taller mare.

"Prior to my banishment, the only ways to travel the breadth of Equestria consumed months of time," Luna explained, lowering her voice. "I experimented with the working of the trains long enough to find a way to bypass their restrictions so that I could make use of them, but I have scarce had time to adapt to this new age and take stock of my own duties and interests, much less question actions my sister took in the direct wake of our feud."

She shook her head. "That is not to say I have no thoughts as to the matter. I have merely been too busy to dedicate more than a cursory amount of time to unraveling why my sister chose to design the system as she did."

Twilight tilted her head. "You can't just ask her?"

Luna immediately bit her lip.

"It didn't go over well?" Twilight asked. "Is this related to bad blood from the Nightmare Moon incident?"

"If you have a compelling reason to know her motives, you would be better off asking her yourself, Twilight Sparkle," Luna said, her voice stern. Softening, she added, "If it is only a matter of curiosity as to their working, I can explain some of the methodology behind the system's mechanics."

Twilight met her eyes. "Is looking for hints about where Starlight's mother could have gone a compelling reason?"

"You are referring to Maple," Seigetsu noted. "Equestria as it stands is a system made up of towns and cities and the rails that connect them. It is not impossible for creatures to find their way outside of the system. Your methods, in fact, were unnecessarily forceful to the point where I can't even claim to understand how they succeeded. In truth, all one need do is leave a populated area on foot, unaccompanied by any trains. It is possible that she could simply have wandered into the wilderness. But for the trains to fail her, she would have to know the scale of distance she was attempting to surmount, and would surely find it implausible."

Starlight shook her head. "I started my journey all those years ago by running away into a mountain range everyone thought was the edge of the world. Maple knew me. Whether she would find it plausible or not, she would certainly assume that this was the kind of thing I would do, and she came here looking for me."

"If that is the case," Seigetsu said, "then she very well may have attempted to travel to another Equestrian city on hoof."

"Equestria's true lands are vast," Luna added. "Even having free reign of the continent for a thousand years, my sister and I did not come close to seeing all that it had to offer. And not for lack of trying. With neither flight nor a powered vehicle, reaching another settlement beyond this one would take years even for a seasoned caravan."

"How far out from the city does Snowport manage?" Twilight asked. "In terms of real space, not what the trains can cover."

"The city has a modest agricultural radius," Seigetsu explained. "The dragons have expanded a fair bit to the north, and much of the south and west is claimed by the monsters of Freedom Town, who work the orchards and fields. As most dragons harbor little desire to interact with monsters, they are far more familiar with the settlement's outer areas than most of my people. Beyond those fields, about half of which are close enough to be worked by day, there is a perimeter maintained by the castle's scouts, as large as we can spare the soldiers for, to provide some manner of warning in case Snowport should be invaded. And past that, the land swiftly fades to uncharted wilderness."

Twilight frowned. "So barely a day's walk away, it's completely uncharted? You haven't even explored your own backyard?"

"As Her Majesty said," Seigetsu replied, "most of Equestria's physical land exists in this state. A thousand years ago, before the trains were created and before the Crystal Empire disappeared, things in this particular region were different, so we do have some maps dating back to that time. And cartographers or adventurers attempt a survey every hundred years or so, though the most recent one is nearly seventy years out of date. And when those are attempted, it is up to the undertakers where the survey should go and what should be its limits."

Twilight's frown grew incredulous. "Is nobody curious about the world around them at all?"

"I think you underestimate just how vast this world is," Seigetsu said.

"As I said," Luna agreed. "My sister and I spent a thousand years attempting to map our realm, and it was too great to accomplish even within that span of time. Through the enlistment of explorers and agencies within our government, we were able to trace out a rough shape for the continent and place the locations of its boundaries and major geographic features. But ponykind would need to number a thousandfold more than it does today for that knowledge to even become relevant. Should you ever view our world from the surface of the moon, you will understand."

Seigetsu sighed. "Lest you mistake me, this is not a state of affairs I find wholly convenient. I am an inquisitor, not a cartographer, but I have made an effort myself to travel beyond those boundaries and ensure Abyssinia is not planning something just beyond our sight. But no matter how large our city grows, there will always be a limit to how far from it we can maintain a current survey of."

"You could start another city," Twilight offered. "Have some of the residents here branch out and plant a new one a day's travel away. Then trade information and let them expand how far you can see."

Seigetsu shook her head. "And then couldn't you say the same about that city as you currently do of us? There would always be a frontier. Moreover, we lack the people for such an endeavor, constrained both by our birthrate and the need for soldiers for the war. All of this is to say nothing about Equestria's opinion on the flow of information across a distance."

Princess Luna nodded, her mane shimmering in the newly-fallen night air. "The phenomenon you suggest is also what has already been occurring ever since Equestria's founding, Twilight Sparkle," she added. "Ponyville itself was planted by the Apple clan within mortal memory. Can you say for certain how far from Ponyville you could explore, independent of established roads or vehicles, and be confident of what you would find?"

Twilight blinked. "I guess you've got a point, then. So, I guess what you're saying is that even if Maple did decide to ignore the trains and leave on hoof, we'd be combing such a big area that it would be impossible to find her."

"Not impossible," Starlight corrected with a grimace. "You're forgetting how my power works. Just... impossible to hit a barrier we couldn't overcome."

Twilight glanced at her. "Starlight?"

"I wish I could find her," Starlight sighed, squeezing her eyes shut. "But Gazelle might have been right. We can't afford to get distracted from the north. I... I'm ready to face it, if I need to. Or at least ready to make myself be ready. Whatever happened to her, it's less likely that every single day will make a difference than it is for everyone in Ironridge. I appreciate everyone digging into this for me, but we should just go."

Twilight's ears fell in worry. "Starlight, I know how much effort it's taking for you to say that, and that you'd rather avoid all of this. I'm just, well... I know it's progress, but I feel like you're using one thing you don't want to do to avoid facing up to another."

Starlight shook her head. "Maple will still be wherever she is when I go looking for her, Twilight. That's how it always works. You'll see."

The conversation drifted off into uneasy silence. Personally, Corsica wanted to hear more about the weird bug-Celestia things that were apparently the trains' true forms, or what the premonition flux was for, or why the one they passed had been shooting a giant laser into the ground. Could any good scientist live with not knowing more?

Apparently, Twilight and Starlight and Fluttershy could. Everyone seemed more concerned with how this discovery could relate to finding Starlight's mother. Which, to be fair, was Corsica's reason for investigating the trains in the first place. But now that she saw it from this angle, everyone down below worrying about their friends as she floated along silently in a crystal, it became more and more apparent that this had been less of a reason than an excuse.

What she had really wanted was a direction to point herself in, now that she was reunited with her desire to do things.

"Careful," Twilight said as they moved towards the Immortal Dream, which was riding conspicuously lower in the water than it had before. "We've got you-know-who parked invisibly on the deck so we don't freak out any locals. Try not to bump your snoot on anything you can't see."

"I noticed, darling," Rarity remarked dryly, rubbing her muzzle for emphasis. She was among the sizable posse that had come out to greet them as they approached the ship, everyone sans Rainbow Dash now present, and had just finished confirming that Fluttershy actually told Twilight and the others everything they needed to know.

Applejack nodded along. "So you got the old thing working well enough, then?"

"More or less," Starlight explained. "Aegis listens to Twilight's commands now, though we couldn't figure out how to get her to stop listening to mine. We can move her around, use the invisibility, give orders in person or by remote... It's good enough for what we need to fix the ship."

"Hold on a moment," Pinkie cut in. "Is it a she, or is she an it? I'm confuzzled."

Seigetsu nodded. "The Aegis is traditionally regarded as feminine, as per our scriptures. But the writing makes it unclear whether this was the gender of her body, or merely of her soul. And there are not many contemporary analogues for soulless metal bodies that are nonetheless capable of speech."

Twilight frowned at Corsica. "Wasn't there that one with you, when we first met...?"

"You mean Braen?" Corsica asked, realizing that she was in fact much more comfortable when she wasn't speaking.

"Yeah, her..." Twilight nodded.

"That one was an interesting case," Seigetsu agreed. "Though from my own observation, your Braen was possessed of a soul - in a mechanically attached fashion, like a primitive version of the interface the Aegis uses to connect with her pilot."

Rarity wiped her brow. "It's quite something to think about technology created by ponies being comparable to primitive forms of that which went into a god, I must say."

Princess Luna shook her head. "The science that created the Aegis might be incomprehensible to society's current standards, but it was a science like any other."

"So, you think you've got what it takes to get the ship running again?" Applejack asked, steering the conversation back on track.

"Right..." Starlight took a deep breath. "Here's a quick beginner-level summary of what we're going to do. The ship's engine is a crucible and cyclic amplifier for harmonic energy. Currently, it's full of premonition flux that's tied to a disembodied cutie mark. Premonition flux is a type of harmonic energy that, for reasons, is traveling backwards through time. That means that when we perceive it going away, it'll actually be getting created, which will consume an inefficiently large amount of energy and probably create a shock wave that will be very dangerous in addition to draining whatever it uses as a source."

She turned to the ostensibly empty space on the deck. "Aegis is the body of a god, and more importantly it's been used to fight another god, both of whom had powers that we now know have become the foundations of this world, and the Elements of Harmony. Part of how Aegis functions is that it has a harmony extractor built into its tail, which is essentially the same thing as this ship's engine. While the engine here was initially designed to use ponies' innate harmony as harmonic life forms to fly, Aegis was designed to use the divine harmony of a god. Somehow. You see how they're the same?"

Pinkie Pie bounced in place. "So you're trying to take the storm clouds down there..." She pointed through the deck floor at the engine room. "And put them in there instead?" She pointed at nothing, where Aegis probably was hidden.

Starlight nodded. "Aegis is much higher spec than this ship, and has even interfaced with the engine before, during my adventures as a foal. If we try to reboot the engine with Aegis right here, hovering inside the formation area for the harmony comet, they should be able to form a connection. And since Aegis is currently powered by both me and Twilight, that stored energy should be more than sufficient to create the premonition flux, which from our perspectives would erase it."

"And this takes care of the explosion?" Applejack asked, wary.

At that, Twilight took over. "I've been studying Aegis's design, and it's extremely likely that the reason the harmony extractor is positioned externally, on her tail, is because it's also a defensive system. In other words, she can power herself from external energy as well as from her pilot, such as the kinds of attacks her opponent god might have been launching. I'm more sure of how this works with harmonic energy than plain old kinetic energy, but since any potential shock wave would be generated by the formation of the premonition flux in the first place, I think Aegis should just be able to devour it harmlessly."

"And if she can't," Starlight added, "projecting a shield to protect us and the ship will be much easier on the deck than inside the engine room."

"Huh," Pinkie remarked. "So it'll be like when you put too much hot sauce on a burrito and it makes you run around really fast."

Everyone looked sideways at her.

"What?" She blinked. "Never had that happen before?"

"Anyways." Twilight shook her head. "Myself, Starlight and Princess Luna will remain on the deck to project a shield in case something does go wrong, though I think we've done enough research and testing to ensure that's a formality at this point - Princess Luna actually helped us create a weaker premonition flux to test with on the way here. Seigetsu, would you go to the engine room and follow our directions on that end?"

"Very well," Seigetsu agreed. "I pray your plan succeeds."

Corsica found herself released and set down as Starlight readied her magic for a bigger task, and Fluttershy was thoughtful enough to come over and ensure she was stable. Several more instructions were passed around as Starlight and the alicorns coordinated, and Corsica began to feel a stiff crackle in the air, like static along her coat.

"It should be ready," Twilight declared. "On three, then! One... two...!"

Her countdown completed, and the harmony comet exploded to life with a violent surge of thunderclouds, midnight blue and crackling with black lightning. In the middle of the stormy comet was a distortion, a hole shaped like the Aegis with wings spread... and then a hexagonal shield flared to life, humming with power and arcing across the deck in an upward parabola, ready to direct any explosions harmlessly into the sky.

Aegis's outline grew brighter at the tail for a moment, and the comet drained away in a swirl, like water leaving a sink that had just been unplugged. And then, with a slight puff of smoke, it was over, the Immortal Dream rocking gently in the sea.

"...Well," Twilight said, tentatively letting the shield drop after a minute of no further action. "I'd say that worked about as perfectly as possible. Have we got our ship back?"

Starlight teleported, and a moment later teleported back. "Out of power, but nothing looks damaged. I could have her back in the air in fifteen minutes, tops."

Pinkie let out a cheer, and Applejack and Rarity joined in. Even Fluttershy added a soft "Yay!"

"You three put on a bigger light show than Aegis did," Corsica remarked, almost disappointed that there hadn't been more. "It's not even going to shoot a giant exhaust laser or something, to re-balance its energy?"

Twilight shook her head. "That's something we actually haven't tested yet. I figured maybe it wouldn't be the best idea to practice giant lasers in a populated area, though that would definitely be a thing to try out before we actually need it..."

"There is still the matter that I am curious about," Princess Luna declared, her voice cutting across the celebration. Her horn glowed with a strange gray aura, and something floated down from the space where the premonition flux had disappeared.

Corsica recognized it with a chill: her special talent.

Luna stepped closer to her, floating the glyph up close, where she could see it. Freed from the storm clouds that had been trailing it, it was now just an innocent mass of lines and geometry... An innocent-looking mass that held the power to grant her deepest wishes, and destroy her life in the process.

"I don't want it," Corsica said flatly. "It was yours originally, right? The Artifice of Hope, or something? I don't even want to be tempted by that kind of power. I'm not a goddess. I know what it did to my mind."

Princess Luna frowned. "Is that so?" She turned to examine the disembodied talent. "I was hoping you could shed light on that, but apparently not. Because this is not my Artifice of Hope."

"What?" Corsica blinked, then blinked harder. "Literally everyone in the north told me that's what this was. Even you told me, before we left to fly to Our Town! What do you mean-"

She was interrupted by a rush of air as Rainbow Dash arrived, speeding to a stop with a windblown mane and a saddlebag hanging from her side. "Did I seriously just miss the light show?" she complained, looking around and waving to Luna. "Oh, hey, Princess. So anyway, I found a city..."

It's About Time

"Oh, hey, Princess," Rainbow Dash greeted, landing on the Immortal Dream's deck with a fancy flip and saluting with a wing. "So anyway, I found a city..."

Everyone turned to look at her, to Corsica's slight chagrin. Her old special talent was still hanging there in Luna's strange, gray aura, and this sounded like whatever that was about was going to get pushed to the back burner.

"Either you're playing a joke on me, or have an unprecedented sense of ironic timing," Seigetsu calmly remarked, folding her arms. "But do tell. Where is this city?"

"Southwest of here," Rainbow said, rooting around in her saddlebag. "In a hole. Hang on, I got a map..."

She pulled out a hefty scroll, spreading it out for everyone capable of movement to see.

Most of Twilight's friends crowded around, and Seigetsu's eyes widened in amazement. "Where did you find this article!? Have our enemies scouted-?"

"I made it." Rainbow proudly thumped her chest with a hoof.

Seigetsu gave her a skeptical glare. "You 'made' this."

"World's fastest pegasus," Rainbow smugly announced. "And I've got good eyes. Anyway, I found some of your castle guards out on patrol out there, told 'em I knew you and was scouting out the terrain for fun, and they basically gave me all the paper and bags and stuff and asked real nicely if I'd write down what I saw? So I did. Pretty good, right?"

"It would have taken a dozen of our own fliers a full month to map this much land with any semblance of accuracy," Seigetsu accused. "Where is your survey equipment? How did you measure angles and distances? You had to have procured this from somewhere."

Rainbow gave her a cheeky grin. "See, you're saying I couldn't have done this, but you're not calling my map wrong..."

Seigetsu sighed. "No, it matches up within a reasonable degree of accuracy to the historical maps of this area's greater surroundings kept by my people. If you truly aren't bluffing, then I daresay whatever you currently do for a living when not acting as an Element, your talents are wasted on them."

Rainbow waggled her eyesbrows at Applejack.

"Dunno why you chose me to give that look to," Applejack retorted with a shake of her head. "She's definitely fast, though. I can vouch for that much."

Seigetsu put a hand to her chin in thought.

"Hey, if you wanna test me, there's always the city I found," Rainbow pointed out, tapping a point on the map. "Right here, see?"

Seigetsu looked closer. "This is well within the perimeter maintained by Snowport. Our scouts could not be entirely unaware of a city this close to home."

"Like I said, it's in a hole." Rainbow shrugged. "There's all sorts of cave entrances out there. I didn't check most of them too deep 'cuz I can't see in the dark, so there might have been more that I missed."

"Might I have that map?" Seigetsu asked, extending a hand. "I would submit it to the proper government channels. I am sure Halandyne will enjoy investigating this supposed city while I am away."

Twilight gave Starlight a look. Starlight bit her lip.

"About that," Rarity cut in. "Rainbow, darling, what kind of city was it? You didn't happen to see any traces of Starlight's missing mother there, did you?"

"Uhhhh." Rainbow backpedaled, looking suddenly pensive. "So, like..." She glanced around at everyone else, especially Seigetsu, Luna and Corsica. "I didn't stay there that long. Because it kinda..." Her gaze swiveled to Starlight like a creaky wheel. "Gave me the same vibe as your old town? Back when, you know..."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. Starlight's village that they had visited above the Palace of Laughter? She remembered that Starlight had some major history there that prevented her from wanting to go back, but the closer and more immediate her discarded life drew to the end, the less she cared to remember it. And now she found that she couldn't recall at all what the deal with that place had been.

Starlight just sighed.

"Well, that doesn't sound good," Twilight remarked, looking ever so slightly haunted.

"It, uh, definitely made me remember how I told you all I was going exploring and could find my way back on my own?" Rainbow added. "And how you'd have, like, absolutely no way to find me if I happened to not come back. Just saying."

"I am sure Halandyne and the military will find great enjoyment investigating this in my absence," Seigetsu repeated stiffly. "Would you care to elaborate more on this 'bad vibe'? I would like to make as thorough a report on this as possible."

Rainbow tapped a pensive hoof. "Just, like, the kinda place you're not supposed to ever want to leave, hint hint wink wink and all that, you know. And they didn't really seem to relish the idea of being found by anyone who didn't want to stay there."

Twilight and all her friends exchanged looks. Starlight looked deeply uncomfortable.

"Seigetsu," Twilight said, her mane still blowing in an invisible wind even though she had managed to suppress most of the other effects of carrying the Lovebringer. "Professionally speaking, is there any reason for us not to get involved? I have provisioners scheduled to come stock the ship for our trip to Ironridge tomorrow morning, which means we can't leave tonight even if we want to. And getting to this town would be a good excuse to test out the engines and make sure the ship is fully and properly fixed."

"Professionally speaking," Seigetsu answered, "you have never taken part in the treaties between your people and mine, Princess Twilight, and cannot be expected to be bound by what you do not know. Beyond that, I believe that within your own nation's power structure, you and your friends as the Elements of Harmony are considered something of an irregular unit outside the chain of command and free to act as you will. And personally speaking... Thank you for asking."

Rainbow Dash smirked at them. "I like how coy you're being about wanting to check this out. I mean, come on, is there anyone here who thinks this isn't exactly the kind of thing we usually stick our noses in? I only came back here to get you all because I didn't wanna leave you out of the fun."

Applejack kicked her lightly. "That ain't what you were saying a moment ago."

Rainbow shrugged. "So?"

"I'd like to put this to a vote," Twilight announced, cutting in. "I'm setting off for Ironridge along with any who are coming as early as tomorrow morning. Tonight might be some of the last time we have to make decisions if any are undecided whether they're staying or going. And either way, we don't know how long this mission will take, so this might be the best time we'll have for goodbyes, as well. For all I know, we could be gone for a month or more! So, any who would like to spend the rest of this evening investigating Rainbow Dash's mysterious town, please raise a hoof. Let's put this to a vote."

She raised her own hoof, bidding others to follow suit. Rainbow's went up instantly.

The rest of the group looked around, and Applejack raised her own hoof. "Can't very well let y'all go charging off into danger on your lonesomes, now."

"Or miss out on the fun!" Pinkie added her hoof to the mix. "You just said we won't see each other for a while after tonight, right? Why not have one more adventure for the road first? It'll be a bite-sized micro-adventure!"

"Be careful not to jinx it, darling," Rarity admonished, nevertheless raising her own hoof.

Fluttershy didn't say anything, but her hoof went up too.

Twilight looked to Starlight, who had yet to budge.

"Uh," Rainbow said, nudging Starlight's shoulder. "You know there's a chance we might find something about where your mom went there, right?"

"Like what?" Starlight retorted, her gaze drilling into Rainbow Dash. "A better map of the surroundings with a route she might have followed? Someone who saw her and can give us a better trail to follow? Either we find nothing and wasted our time, or we find a hint we won't have time to follow up on and have to leave it behind for later. For after the north."

Rarity bit her lip. "I suppose it would be too optimistic to hope that we could find Maple herself in this city?"

Starlight hung her head and shook it. "If that was the case, then I'd have to learn why she stopped and stayed there for so many years. I don't think there's any reason for that I could find palatable."

Seigetsu stepped forward. "For my part, my duty binds me to go where the Aegis's keeper does. However, I can promise you that if we do come across a hint you are unable to pursue at this venture, my people will be investigating this discovery thoroughly, and may be able to continue the search in your stead."

"I will dedicate what resources to this I can as well," Luna added, standing quietly in the shadows near Corsica.

"Princess!" Twilight blinked, apparently realizing she was still here. "What... I mean, do you have any thoughts on this? Did you know about any cities where Rainbow's map shows?"

"None that would be meaningful." Princess Luna shook her head. "I merely wished to have a conversation with Corsica about this cutie mark, once we would no longer be interrupting more pertinent matters."

"Speaking of me," Corsica said, laying gently on the deck. "You think I'm going to be much use exploring a secret town? That doctor will eviscerate you if I get out of bed."

Twilight nodded. "You can stay with the ship, then. I expect we'll still fly it out to the location just to get there more quickly, but that should be fine?"

"Sounds like we've got everyone's votes!" Rainbow banged one hoof against the other. "And it's all in! Well, all except Corsica. Plus an undecided from Starlight. And, that's probably not gonna change any time soon."

"Very well, then." Seigetsu dismissed herself, striding to the gangplank. "I must give your findings to Halandyne and the castle before we depart, so I shall do that now so as not to delay your departure any further. I will return shortly."

Twilight nodded, and Rainbow saw her off with a salute.

"Now then," Twilight said, stepping over to Corsica and looking to Starlight to crystallize her again. "I suppose we should get you down belowdecks and into a proper bed. I still need to talk with you about whether you'll be making the trip with us to Ironridge, especially given your present condition, but-"

"About that..." a new voice said.

It was Discord, peering up over the railing.

Applejack sighed. "What do you want?"

"Can I help you?" Twilight asked with wary politeness.

"It has come to my attention," Discord announced, slithering up onto the deck, "that one of my prize employees is indisposed and no longer capable of doing the duties I promoted her for, at least for the moment." He looked directly at Corsica.

Corsica looked back. "It's not my fault. But if you wanna magically heal me, I'm wide open."

Discord's eyes glowed. "Oh, it very much is your fault. But I'm magnanimous, and you did fall off a cliff in the line of duty, so here. Have some free healing."

He snapped his talon, and nothing happened.

"There," Discord proclaimed, strutting about, "I've mended a single ruptured cell in your body. You're healthier than you were a moment ago. Congratulations!" He stopped before Twilight and bent down. "Now, you, on the other hoof-claw-paw-talon-thing..."

"Caaan I help you?" Twilight repeated, recoiling just a bit.

Discord studied her, stroking his goatee. "I heard today was Throw Crazy Powers At Twilight She Never Asked For Day, and looking at you, it seems to be true. Is that a fragment of creation I see? What did they call it again, Elskabera? You've hit the jackpot, Twily. And a giant metal thingamajig to boot!"

"And...?" Twilight asked, visibly worried.

"Well, for one, all the other powers that be were handing out more powers that be and I felt just a little left out, so I wanted to give you something too," Discord proclaimed with a beatific smile. "But, being a wise and thoughtful friend, I imagined you must be very stressed out by all these weighty and unanticipated new responsibilities, so I prepared a wee little power that's completely and utterly useless and you won't have to worry one bit about how you use it as a result. What do you say, feel like adding one more to the old pile?"

Twilight blinked.

"This goes for anyone else here, by the way," Discord added, glancing over his shoulder at the rest of the group. "Sans Corsica because she's a noob. Anyone-"

"What did you just call me?" Corsica interrupted, incredulous.

"A noob," Discord repeated, matter-of-fact. "Getting on crutches for a humble two cliff dives? One of them was barely fifteen feet, for crying out loud. Ask Glimglam, by this point in her story she had toppled from at least six and walked it off every time! Regardless, anyone but you. Does anyone want a completely useless superpower to make them feel better for not being Twilight and not getting the weight of the world dumped on her shoulders with scarcely a minute of warning and not an ounce of explanation?"

Out of the corner of her eyes, Corsica noticed Luna's face darken.

Twilight squinted at him. "I guess I'm flattered, but if you're secretly trying to help me, could you be more direct about it? And if not, I think I've got enough on my plate as it is right now. Thanks."

Discord turned to everyone else. "Not her, then? You? Free useless superpower, going once? Going twice?"

Starlight took a step back. Applejack looked openly skeptical, and Rarity was clearly trying to figure out Discord's motives.

Rainbow raised an eyebrow at Pinkie Pie.

"Hmm... Deeeeeply tempting," she agreed, nodding. "But I probably already know what it is, and wouldn't want to spoil the fun for anyone else!"

Discord sighed at her. "Yes, of course you of all ponies would already-" His shoulders slumped. "Fine, you're disqualified too. Why do I even bother?" He turned back to the crowd. "Anyone else?"

"I'll take it," Fluttershy volunteered. "You sound like you put a lot of effort into this gift, and I'm sure it's nothing too bad."

Discord raised an eyebrow. "Fluttershy, eh? I suppose I should have seen this one coming..."

Rainbow Dash stepped in front of her. "No pranking Fluttershy, bozo. I dunno what you're up to, but that's the rule."

Discord's face drooped. "You're making this out to be some epic sacrifice, but I'm serious! I'm just here to lighten the mood with a completely harmless and completely useless un-serious gift!"

"Uh huh." Rainbow nodded, unconvinced. "Prove it. Right here. I know a prank when I smell one. Why don't you show your tricks to someone who can take it, first?"

Discord shrugged innocently, strolling closer. "Well, if you insist..."

And then, like lightning, he stretched out a talon and booped her on the nose, pressing it in with a satisfying boink!

"Heh heh heh hoo hoo hee hee hee!" Discord immediately fled, cackling with glee as he toppled over the railing. "Oh, gottem!"

"Discord!" Fluttershy shouted, raising her voice for the first time since Corsica met her. "That was rude!"

With more of a kerplunk than a splash, Discord hit the water, and in a puff of purple smoke and polygons, he was gone.

Rainbow Dash took a deep breath, rubbing a hoof along the bridge of her muzzle to ensure it was properly un-booped. "That," she declared with a sigh, "is what I call taking one for the team. You owe me one, Flutters."

Fluttershy shook her head. "I can't believe him..."

"Hey, Twi." Rainbow finished checking herself over, satisfied that Discord hadn't cursed her... at least as far as she could tell. "Magic scan? Or a regular eyeball scan? He didn't stamp me with lipstick or make my mane turn brown and fibrous or anything, did he?"

Twilight lit her horn, which made her mane blow a little harder than its new normal, and a field of magic swept across Rainbow from head to tail. "Not that I can see," Twilight determined, shaking her head. "I think you just got straight-up pranked."

"Yeah, sure did get me good," Rainbow replied, shaking a hind leg out before hopping into the air to hover. "Never saw that coming. Caught me completely off guard."

"He did lighten the mood, though," Pinkie pointed out. "And he also made good on his promise! Now you've got a completely useless superpower that does nothing whatsoever!"

Rainbow looked herself over one more time for good measure. "I really don't feel any different..."

"Of course not, silly!" Pinkie chided. "That's because it doesn't do anything!"

"Let's go get Corsica to a cabin so she can rest and talk with Princess Luna about that cutie mark," Twilight cut in. "Starlight, could you give me a hoof with that? And afterwards, if you don't mind, I'd like to talk."

Starlight shook her head, already heading for Corsica. "If it's about Maple, you don't have to worry. I'll talk myself into coming with you. I just need a minute, first."

Rainbow Dash followed Twilight onto the ship's bridge, and Twilight made no motions to shoo her away, which she took as an invitation to remain for whatever talk Starlight was about to receive.

It was worth being sure, of course. Sure, Rainbow Dash had been present for most of Starlight's recounting of her foalhood adventures. She had heard all about her travails in the Griffon Empire, knew her struggles with adapting to a more peaceful life and had listened to every word as Starlight recounted the reasons why that endeavor was impossible. And Starlight hadn't hesitated to share any of that with her. She had always felt more than welcome in Twilight's library, or the train cars, or everywhere else the story was told in. Part of it had even been recounted on her own parents' airship, where she had been the host and Twilight and Starlight the guests.

But Rainbow wasn't the reason Starlight had started telling the story. Nor was she the reason Starlight had gone from a vengeful time-traveler seeking to ruin their lives to someone the Princesses trusted to let listen when talking about the secrets to Equestria's future. That was all Twilight. And so she felt it fair to give Twilight the chance to boot her out in case she wanted to give Starlight a one-on-one.

Instead, Twilight glanced at her and asked, "what did you think of the way the Princesses gave us Aegis and the Lovebringer?"

"Buh?" Rainbow looked down from her musing. "Uh, it's not the first time they've tasked us with something critical to Equestria's future out of the blue. I guess there might've been a little less fanfare than usual, but we also showed up on their doorstep instead of getting summoned like all the other times?"

"That's what I keep telling myself," Twilight agreed, though her tone suggested otherwise. "But I can't shake the feeling that something bigger is different. And I think that difference is Starlight. If it weren't for her, I'd have no idea what the significance of Aegis and the Lovebringer were in advance. I'm still trying to make sense of how her story and the entire north fits into our, or, I guess, my worldview... So maybe I'm just overthinking this because we're going there soon. It just... I can't put my hoof on it. You know?"

Rainbow Dash stared at her friend. Her thoughts were still full of the epic and frankly eerie cave she had just discovered villagers inside, so much so that meeting with Celestia and Cadance earlier in the afternoon felt like old news. And Twilight, frankly, looked stressed. Small wonder, between trying to coax Starlight back up north and however much unicorn juice she had just tried to cram into her horn from the Lovebringer.

"Just saying," Rainbow volunteered, "but I bet you could clear your mind real well by going out for a fly. Weren't you stupidly fast last time you got powered up this much?"

Twilight turned faintly red. "Yes, and I had a much harder time getting it under control than my horn. Anyway, if you're not worried, then I'm probably worrying about nothing. Just... wanted to check and make sure."

Just then, the door slid open, and Starlight stepped in. "Is this where you wanted to meet?" she asked, noticing Twilight and nodding faintly.

"It's as good a place as any." Twilight nodded. "And Rainbow, it's fine if you're here for this. Listen, Starlight, before we go back to the north, or get too caught up looking for clues about Maple-"

"I've made my peace with it," Starlight interrupted, shaking her head. "I did that long ago, on the night when I got my cutie mark, Twilight. Trying to pretend otherwise... I was burying my head in the sand." She took a deep, steadying breath, and looked her in the eyes. "I'll be alright. You remember what the Flames of Harmony told me, right? That the source of all my problems wasn't actually my virtue, but the fact that I was on my own with it. I had the drive to change the world, but not the power to follow through on it."

She walked to the ship's console, running a hoof over its lovingly-polished wooden surface. "I know in my head that it'll work this time. But it's like trying to kindle a flame when you've been burned every time you've touched it before. Even if you suddenly get the right tools for the job, and you didn't have them before, you can't outrun those memories. But you can count on me to push through it. Staying standing is the one thing I know I can do. So, I'm serious: just keep leading, and don't worry about me."

Twilight smiled softly. "I'm glad you feel that way. But, before we leave, there's something else I wanted to show you."

Starlight hesitated, stepping closer. Rainbow hovered curiously over Twilight's shoulder.

Twilight took out a strange, translucent crystal that was slightly smaller than a hoof. It was mostly clear, but at its core was a strange, fluctuating vortex that looked like a cross between a fractal and a cutie mark. Rainbow was pretty sure she had never seen it before, but Starlight drew in a sharp breath.

"I figured you'd recognize it," Twilight said. "Princess Luna gave it to me. She said she got it from Felicity, after Felicity started working for her. And she said Valey still has the other side."

Rainbow tilted her head. "Wait, that's what the sound stones look like? The linked ones you could use like a walkie-talkie anywhere in the world?"

"One and the same," Twilight said.

Starlight looked up, visibly scared. "Have you used it?"

Twilight shook her head. "I haven't. Knowing how you felt about this, I wanted to ask you, first."

Starlight swallowed.

"It's okay to say no," Twilight offered. "But knowing how much time we have to get up north could affect our plans, based on whether we learn anything interesting in this city Rainbow found. And... even if it doesn't feel that way, I know you want to talk to your friends again."

Starlight took a step back.

Twilight nodded in slow understanding. "It's okay to say no-"

"Hold on. No, it isn't," Rainbow insisted, barging in. "Look. It's been what, eighteen years since you talked to her last? Why, because you were drawing a line in the sand so you could hold yourself back and not go chasing endlessly after impossible goals because of your cutie mark? Weren't you just saying you knew that was bogus and are ready to start again? And that you know that having impossible goals doesn't matter anymore because we can make them possible? According to Corsica, Valey and all the others have been keeping Ironridge's mess contained to Ironridge and are literally fighting a war right now to keep it out of your hair, which is as cool as it comes but also insanely stupid because you should just be hanging out! Call her. Right now. You can't get back those eighteen years, but you can still use the time between tonight and when we see her in person tomorrow."

Twilight looked completely taken aback, but Starlight winced in a way that told Rainbow she had struck home. "Come on." Rainbow swiped the stone from Twilight, proffering it to Starlight with a wing. "I'll even give you the script. It goes like this: hey, girl. I've been a real knucklehead for the last eighteen years, but guess what: I'm all grown up now, and I'm coming to kick some Yakyakistan tail like the good old days. See you tomorrow."

Starlight whispered something under her breath that Rainbow couldn't catch. "Whuzzat?"

"I said, you sound just like her," Starlight angrily sighed. "I can't escape my past even when I try to, can I? I just start seeing it everywhere, even where it isn't."

Rainbow waggled the sound stone in her face. "Got it in one, chief. So what are you waiting for?"

Starlight gritted her teeth... and, after a moment, wrapped the sound stone in her aura, lifting it out of Rainbow's wing.

After a momentary focus of energy, it began to glow.

"Hello?" said a raspy voice from the stone that, now that she heard it, Rainbow realized really did kind of sound like her own. Not exactly, but surprisingly close.

"Princess Luna? You looking for another situation report?" the sound stone asked. "Uh, there's not much to report since last time, actually. Their cold siege is just as solid as ever, but they haven't reinforced the lines with any tech to break through. Odds are fifty-fifty that they actually threw away all their big war machines on that first push, or they're happy to wait and let the civilians eat themselves alive with anxiety. Which, knowing windigoes and what it looks like on the ground here, is... Hey, you there?"

Starlight shuddered, looking at the sound stone with wide eyes.

"Princess? Testing, is this working? Can you hear me?"

Throat dry, Starlight croaked, "It's me."

For a moment, silence.

"Hey, kiddo."

Starlight stared at the hovering sound stone.

"Those dumb kids I sent dragged you back into this, huh? Bananas, I had a feeling they'd do that. Welp. Guess that means I failed again. Hope we managed to keep the north off your back long enough for it to matter."

Rainbow's eyes crossed, and she viciously swiped the sound stone back. "Alright, hold on, you," she demanded, brushing off Starlight and Twilight's expressions. "I had to go on a huge rant and basically threaten Starlight to even get her to touch this thing, and that's all she gets? You're sorry you didn't do a good enough job at making it so you could go even longer without talking? Are you nuts? Do you have any idea how she's been feeling about your inevitable reunion?"

"Rainbow-!" Twilight made a grab for the sound stone, but Rainbow juked away.

"Listen, it's cool how you've tried to give her less to worry about," Rainbow insisted, ducking and sheltering the stone until she could say her piece. "But we've spent weeks talking her out of ditching you, and you are going to help us with this, like it or not. Here, I'll make it easy for you: hey Starlight, sorry for the eighteen years of literal radio silence. Should'a come found you ages ago. Let's make up for it by kicking some Yakyakistani tail together like the good old days. There's your script. Got it? Now speak."

She thrust the sound stone back at Starlight, who was visibly overwhelmed.

"Take it," Rainbow insisted. "You've both got your lines. Or make your own lines, I don't care. Just say something!"

The voice on the other end of the sound stone burst out laughing.

"Nyaah ha... You sound kinda like I used to. Even got that old fire. Guess Starlight has similar taste in friends now as she used to. But if you think you're coming up here, I hope you've got a lot of that fire left. Because we're going to need more to get out of this alive than I know where to find. You guys are my reinforcements, right?"

Starlight gingerly took the sound stone again. "We are," she said. "And I don't know what fire I have to offer. I've still never escaped the weight of our year together, the last time I went to the north." She took a deep breath. "But my friends have what you're looking for. They'll be able to see us through. And that's why I can come back again."

"Woah," the sound stone said after a moment of silence. "Never heard you speak about others that way before. I guess you really have changed. Heh." A soft, well-concealed sniffle. "I always wanted to be the first one you said that to. So, then. See you soon?"

"If all goes well, tomorrow afternoon," Starlight promised, tears starting to form in the corners of her eyes. "See you soon, Valey."

"Roger. I'll gather the others and roll out the biggest welcome wagon a wartime economy dealing with a doomsday cult can afford. See you soon, kiddo."

The sound stone went dim.

Starlight stared at it, and slowly started to shake. "I just..."

Twilight stepped over and gently put a wing on her back. "Welcome home, Starlight. It'll all be alright now."

Starlight buried her face in Twilight's shoulder and started to cry.

"So," Rainbow said with a cheeky grin, "did I know exactly what to say right there, or did I know exactly what to say? Because that feels like the coolest thing I've gotten to do in at least a week."

Twilight glared at her. "You were incredibly rude and really should have left them to their reunion in peace."

Rainbow grinned harder. "Yeah, but I still knew exactly what to say, right?"

Twilight rolled her eyes.

Starlight took a shaky, shuddery breath. "Thanks, Rainbow," she managed. "Valey's probably right, though. She's no stranger to what the north can do. We'll need every bit of your drive and more. So I hope I can count on you as well."

"Um, duh," Rainbow pointed out. "I want to go to Ironridge more than anyone else here. You remember I heard foalhood stories about this place growing up, right? So what if there's a doomsday cult that's been completely off our radars so far? This trip is going to be awesome. And I will personally see to it that you get to hug each and every one of your old friends, where I can see it, for at least an hour each with no interruptions."

"Thanks," Starlight said. "I mean it."

And then she grabbed Rainbow Dash with her telekinesis and pulled her into Twilight's hug as well.

Flame of Rebellion

The moment she was alone in a proper bed, it was all Corsica could do not to fall asleep.

She really should have just done it. Ignoring her body's needs was why she was in this position in the first place, and she didn't need that flat-headed doctor to recognize the remedy when she saw it. But her discarded future still hovered like a strange blind spot in her mind's eye. Those three years she had wound back the clock on hadn't completely vanished, and if Princess Luna could give her any more information or closure on what had happened to her and why, she had to take it. She needed to know. Needed to...

"May I enter?" Luna's voice asked from everywhere at once.

"Go for it," Corsica grunted, not putting much volume behind the words... though they didn't cause her as much discomfort as usual.

Suddenly, Luna was there.

The Princess of the Night stood at the foot of Corsica's bed, the moonlight shivering in her wake. The lone lamp brightening Corsica's cabin seemed dimmer in her presence, as if she carried an aura that could suck away the things ponies hid behind, and pull closer the unknown.

Corsica wanted that. Not enough to put force into her desire, but when strangers saw her, she wanted to put questions on their tongues and remind them of their doubts. That would be cool.

"So, special talent," Corsica said. "Sorry if I don't say much. Not in great condition to talk."

Princess Luna shook her head. "You will find your maladies less cumbersome here. Scarce had you touched your bedding than you succumbed to sleep, and we stand now within a dream."

Corsica's eyes widened, and she realized that she actually could move a little... even though she still felt exhausted. "This is a dream? Are you real?"

"My domain allows me to walk within the dreams of others," Luna explained. "And this dream is yours. Nothing we do here will have consequence in the waking world, though you will remember it."

Corsica brightened with interest. "There's no way to teach that, right?"

Luna shook her head. "You have an unusual relationship with what is and is not possible, but this is not a place one should tread without purpose. To be surrounded by dreaming souls is to stand apart from the world's dreams. To lose oneself here would be to lose oneself utterly."

Her horn lit with a gray aura, and she drew forth Corsica's special talent. "But I would speak of you before I speak of myself. This is what I found within the premonition flux that occupied the ship's core. Does it stir recognition?"

Undeniably so. "Yep," Corsica said from her bed, reminding herself that this was a dream, and her old special talent couldn't hurt her here... Probably. "That's mine."

"This is not my Artifice of Hope," Princess Luna said. "Not the cutie mark I beheld upon you when last we met, one month ago. Not the artifice that turns the willpower of its bearer into physical change in the world."

"You sure about that?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "If not, then what is it?"

"A cutie mark with the powers of an artifice," Luna answered, looking Corsica in the eye. "But not made by my hooves. Different in both form and function from the Artifice of Hope. And it is bonded to you."

Corsica scowled, pulling down her blankets and pointing at her blank flank. "Sure looks to me like it's over there where it belongs, not here where it doesn't. What do you mean, it's bonded to me?"

The special talent rotated gently in Luna's grasp. "How thorough is your understanding of the mechanism by which cutie marks naturally form, and the nature of their bond with ponies?"

Did Corsica really have to explain every little thing she knew about that? "Probably not as good as yours."

"Very well." Princess Luna nodded again. "Under ordinary circumstances, ponies begin their lives as a union of body and soul: one component that exists entirely in the physical realm, and another that resides purely in the mental realm. The bond holding those two halves together is what allows you and I to act and turn our thoughts into effects on reality. For example..." She lit her horn, adjusting the position of a chair against the far wall. "I thought to move that chair, and my body executed the action. An imperfect example, as we are presently in the mental realm, but from your point of view it should suffice?"

"Uh huh," Corsica said, encouraging her to go on.

"From the bond that links body and soul are birthed cutie marks," Luna continued. "This event can only occur when the two sides are both straining towards each other: the mind yearning to accomplish some worldly goal, and the body taking up an ideological mantle, stepping into a role and assuming a new meaning. From that event onward, they exist not as a pair but a triangle, with the cutie mark as the third bonded point, straddling both halves of reality."

She fixed the chair and continued speaking. "My own tinkering with the nature of cutie marks defies this natural state. The marks made by my hooves are not born from the bond between body and soul. However you came by the Artifice of Hope, it was given to you by physical means in the physical world, and as such was attached to your body, but not your soul. This mark is separate from your body, but is yet bound to your soul, in the way that only naturally manifested marks can be."

Corsica's chest tightened with a precursor to panic. "You mean I can still use it? Is it not gone after all?"

"It seeks a reunion with you," Luna answered. "As do all natural cutie marks when removed by worldly means. In absence of forces keeping it separate from you - first, the ship's engine, and now, my magic - it would surely repair its physical bond and return to your flank, as before."

Corsica felt cold. That couldn't happen. Going back was unthinkable. "How do I stop it?"

Princess Luna looked regretfully, even guiltily, at the special talent. "I could seal it away, perhaps. But do you understand that this mark is not mine, but yours?"

"Doesn't matter," Corsica insisted. "I know what it did to me. If it comes back, it doesn't matter how long I fight it. It'll eventually break me."

Luna looked her straight in the eye. "The mark that broke you was my Artifice of Hope. This mark is something different."

"So you're saying I just got my own special talent, and it's that?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Then what happened to the artifice?"

"I am unsure." Luna stared into the talent as it bobbed slowly in her aura. "This is your cutie mark. It is also an artifice, or at least has the power of one, but is no artifice of mine. In fact, it rejects me forcefully, and I am employing blunter methods than are usually necessary to keep it in my possession. The only answer I can fathom is that your cutie mark, as it manifested, consumed my artifice, twisting and repurposing its power toward your own ends."

Corsica's eyes went wide.

"Such an event is unprecedented and should not even be possible, at least with the laws of reality as I understand them," Luna added. "But I can think of no other explanation. And so I would have you tell me everything that could have caused this mark to change - times of great emotional breakthrough, encounters with the supernatural, anything that has happened since last we met. Within this space, we have as much time as you require."

Great. Time to talk without breaks for at least an hour.

If Corsica was doing this at any better time, she would have filtered her thoughts more, considering before each sentence whether it was or wasn't wise to tell a goddess. But as it was, she wanted answers, and could do nothing but trust they would be given in exchange for candidness.

And so she spoke. Her state of mind when she cast off her talent should have been the hardest to recount, but Corsica felt an odd sense of kinship with her dead elder self in the final moments of her life. That corpse had put everything she had into coming back to life, and in the fires of her funeral pyre, Corsica could almost recognize herself: the same heedless, sacrificial recklessness that had driven her to break the false ground around the train, consequences come as they may.

The actual hard part was discussing her second-to-last, second-greatest wish, that the efforts to revive the Flame of Kindness would succeed. Partly because she had pushed out those memories, and partly because of what happened after... She moved on quickly, covering the events in the crystalline Macrothesis for good measure, even though Luna already knew she had been there.

"I think I am beginning to understand," Luna said eventually, as Corsica started to run out of things to say. "Do you know what this cutie mark now represents?"

"Should I?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"It is yours," Luna replied. "Born to aid in granting your most fervent desire. You should know that desire better than any other."

Corsica looked down at the blankets that swaddled her splinted body. "I wanted my life back. To be free."

Princess Luna nodded. "This has become the Artifice of Rebellion."

Rebellion, huh?

Was that accurate? Corsica instinctively wanted to slap the label aside, but... wouldn't that be the point? She had always chafed at Icereach's rules, always wanted to see the world for herself and walk her own path. Had she thoughtlessly risked unknown consequences when breaking the train's illusory terrain solely for the sake of sticking it to the sake of a system she thought was dumb? When she thought about it this way, had her final wish been anything other than refusing to accept the consequences for all her other wishes?

"What does it do?" she asked hesitantly. "You said it's still an artifice? And it's not the same thing as last time?"

"I can only begin to guess," Princess Luna apologized. "You know more than many about the powers that underlie our world. The Elements of Harmony and the Societal Virtues, emotions or concepts that are as one with the laws that govern reality. My artifices were constructed to align with and draw from these laws. Your artifice employs similar mechanisms and a similar degree of power, to a sufficiently unnatural degree that I still name it artifice. Yet it is aligned with a concept that is not part of this world's foundation... and may be intrinsically opposed to those that are. I am no stranger to choosing one's personal justice over the status quo, but I am also a goddess of harmony whose being is interwoven with those laws. As such, to my senses, your cutie mark is more opaque than stone itself."

Corsica's ears fell. "So how do you know it's any different than it used to be? The old one could defy stuff pretty well, as long as it let me care to do it."

"Cutie marks born of one's own will are meant to help achieve one's goals, not hinder them," Luna explained. "They are by nature incapable of destroying the reason for their existence. But the Artifice of Hope was not made to grant your wishes. It was created for a far different purpose, and used to your own ends irrespective of that. Not so for this one."

"Oh, beautiful." Corsica rolled her eyes. "So now it's got a mystery drawback and I get to find that out by trial and error again. Here's an idea: why don't you hang onto it, destroy it, seal it away, whatever, and then I can pretend this never happened?"

Princess Luna stepped closer, fixing her with a piercing stare. "You don't believe you will need it again?"

Corsica looked right back. "You think I will?"

"In the scant few hours since your awakening," Luna coolly replied, "despite being physically crippled and lacking any resources to call your own, you organized an expedition to poke holes in my sister's train magic and somehow succeeded through brute force. From conversations I have had with some of your companions, you did this under the auspices of searching for Starlight Glimmer's missing mother, but from inconsistencies in your actions I suspect this was motivated by simple curiosity mixed with a disdain for things that are hidden from you. As an example, you were face to face with my sister only this afternoon, and made no attempt whatsoever to ask her for the information you desired."

Her bearing applied too much pressure for Corsica to even flinch. "...So?"

"Is this not your nature? To defy that which constrains you?" Luna asked, calm and regal, her mane flowing in the rising moonlight that peeked through the window.

"So what if it is who I am?" Corsica asked, too tired for a fight. "I'm still smarter than to kill myself using an artifice again."

"This is a power made to assist in accomplishing your goals," Luna said, turning to Corsica's special talent. "You may see it now as the target of your rebellion, but it is in truth a means of rebellion against whatever target you desire. Can someone like you choose not to use it?"

"Is that not what I'm doing right now?" Corsica pressed, wishing Luna would just take the thing away and let her sleep.

"Is that what you did with every wish you made upon the Artifice of Hope, knowing full well the cost?"

Luna's counterattack pierced her utterly, and Corsica slumped. "That's why I'd rather not have it somewhere I'd be tempted to use it."

"...Very well," Princess Luna said, withdrawing Corsica's special talent. "Then I shall do what I can to keep this from you."

Victory. Finally. But before Luna could leave, Corsica's curiosity won out: "Why were you trying to get me to take it, anyway?"

"You could not have created something like this without true passion," Luna said, turning to look back over her shoulder. "And I know well the pain of abandoning passions that have previously undone us."

"You... wanna elaborate?" Corsica invited, sensing that the conversation would take a very different turn if she kept it going.

"Do you know who I am?" Princess Luna asked, giving her an intense stare. "Do you know where I have been for the last thousand years?"

Corsica folded her ears.

"Living out a banishment upon the surface of the moon," Luna said, stalking to the window and staring out. "Who is it that passes judgement upon rebels, Corsica? It is the victors, after we have gone to war. I fought my sister, and lost. Her answer reigned supreme."

"Her answer to what?" Corsica asked, a chill seeping in through her blankets from the aura that Luna exuded.

"To the question of what should be done with the Societal Virtues," Luna answered, mane blowing in the moonlight. "Their use came with incalculable risks. It was a question that had no safe answer, but I believed we ought to stand as equals. She believed that she alone should determine when their use was worth the risk. Force of arms was the only venue we could accept to determine our answer, after all others had been exhausted. And her answer won out."

She took a deep breath, then turned to Corsica. "What do you think happened today, with the powers that were given freely to Twilight Sparkle? And what process do you think went into that decision?"

Corsica had a bad feeling that no matter how she answered, she couldn't change the point that was coming. So she stayed silent, and swallowed.

"My sister had her opinion," Princess Luna said. "I had a different one. The matter at hoof was the use of a Societal Virtue, exactly the same as before. And so I bent the knee, out of respect to the previous answer we reached and a desire not to repeat the process of reaching it."

"What?" Corsica gave her a stern frown. "So you mean you weren't on board with giving Twilight those powers, but went along with it because you lost a fight about it before?"

"Because I knew the consequences of my previous rebellion," Princess Luna corrected. "Lest you think my sister took advantage of me, it was I who insisted my own position not be taken into account. She was willing to listen, and together come to a new answer. I refused, because even though the form of the debate might change, even though its consequences might differ from what they were before, I could not bear to put myself in that position once again. And that is much the same as the words I now hear from you."

"You think me being afraid of that artifice is the same as you not wanting to talk about the Lovebringer with Princess Celestia?" Corsica asked, her mind running through ways to disagree and realizing none of them would work.

"You can resolve to no longer fight your fight," Luna said, turning once again to leave. "But no amount of resolution can keep you from situations where you will be tempted once again to do so. As someone who has walked a similar path before, and who now seeks to atone for the consequences of their fight, I hope you can use my experience to see your path to a different conclusion."

"...What do you want me to do?" Corsica called out as Luna reached the window. "What are you trying to steer me towards, here?"

"Controlling the paths of others is neither my desire nor my duty," Luna answered, not looking back. "All I can do is offer you the experience of those who have gone before."

Corsica didn't stop her. Princess Luna melted into the moonlight, and was gone in a trail of starry fog.

A minute passed, and then another. Was the dream supposed to keep going, or...?

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted her special talent, hanging in the mirror above her dresser.

The moonlight grew grayer. Corsica felt a chill.

"Just a dream, right?" she muttered to herself, untangling the covers and slipping out of bed. "No consequences in the real world, right?"

Her legs worked without the aid of a roller. In fact, she felt almost weightless as she approached the vanity, but the special talent disappeared before she got there. The mirror reflected her room with the bed neatly made, and no sign that she was there at all.

Corsica huffed. Spooky dream.

Hoofsteps sounded in the hallway outside her room.

Corsica stepped over to investigate, her shoes clacking against the wood floor. Was that Twilight's voice? She slid her door open.

"I really don't know, darling," Rarity said, walking at Twilight's side towards the library. "I don't see any issues with continuing trying to help her, at least not any for us. And I do feel simply horrible about what happened to her, losing her friend and all. My only concern is that I don't know if continuing to follow us around is really in her best interests."

Twilight bit her lip.

"I completely understand your point about not wanting to abandon her, too," Rarity quickly added. "It's just, there's a very large difference between abandoning someone in need and entrusting them to someone better-suited to helping them. And I don't know what we can do, especially with all this Ironridge business coming up, to help someone who seems to have completely lost the will to live."

Corsica shuddered. Were they talking about her? Was this how Twilight and her friends felt when her back was turned?

Of course not; this was a dream. Besides, she might have lost the will to live before, but she was better now. Though, since that was the case, why was she dreaming about this?

"If only we weren't cooped up on an airship," Twilight complained. "If we didn't all have cabin fever too, it would be that much easier convincing her to take an interest in things again, but the moment we reach Snowport I'm going to have at least two all-nighters before I can relax. Either we hope that she finds it easier to take an interest in getting out of bed once there's somewhere else to go, or we hope that someone in Snowport or the Crystal Empire knows enough about her condition to help, but either way, but either way I don't like how little that leaves for us to do while we have time to do things!"

Corsica loitered behind them, placing bets on how long they'd take to notice her.

"Maybe it's my issue for just not being okay with being unable to help someone, but I've tried!" Twilight insisted, frustration visible in the frizzing of her mane. "Or maybe I just don't like admitting defeat to the kinds of problems Starlight warned me about. I guess... well, maybe I'll try one more time before we make landfall." She shook her head. "Whether she lets me do it nicely or not, I'll have her out of bed for our landing. If I can do that, I'll call it enough of a step in the right direction that I can rest easier."

"Good luck, darling," Rarity offered, stopping at the entrance to the library. "I don't imagine it will be difficult to find her."

"Thanks." Twilight nodded, and continued across to the stairs.

Rarity, for her part, watched Twilight go... and then turned around to go back the way she came, walking right through Corsica with a soft staticky fuzz.

Corsica blinked. Then she caught up to Twilight and waved a hoof through her, to much the same effect.

They didn't just not notice her. She wasn't even real.

Twilight turned down the stairs, face set in determination. Corsica followed her, the moonlight growing colder as she realized what she would see.

In the observation room, the giant window showed Snowport dead ahead, the Immortal Dream flying low over the water. And in one of the hammocks was a pink lump that could scarcely even be called a pony.

Corsica felt something akin to a spike of static as her eyes fell upon her past - no, future - self. And then Twilight asked, "Is it a bad time?"

Future Corsica raised her head with a start, telltale signs of tears matting the fur around her eyes. "Whaddya need?" she asked, her voice grating against Corsica's mind. "If it's a reminder that we're almost there, I don't have much to do to prepare."

Corsica stared at her. Her future self looked somehow more equine than her memories made her out to be, though she had done her best to separate her memories of this time and only keep what she needed to avoid any awkward situations. Sure, she was dead inside. Corsica didn't even need to see her eyes to tell that. But she clearly had a lot more emotions than Corsica had remembered.

"Actually, I'd like to talk about your cutie mark," Twilight said, reminding Corsica that she wasn't alone with her future self. "Artifice of Hope? Emotionally drains you in exchange for granting wishes?"

"What about it? Need to use it for something?" Future Corsica propped her head up enough to look at Twilight without getting a crick in her neck. "Not like I've had much to use it on since we left Our Town."

Corsica could tell. Now that she was face to face with her past, she could remember the effects of the artifice on her body down to every excruciating detail: it didn't just sap her willpower, it made her feel like a marionette with fraying strings. Her future self's eyes were haunted and her coat unwashed, but there were those few tiny extraneous movements - a twitch of the tail, a flick of the ears - that revealed she could move if she wanted to. She just had no reason to.

"So you haven't been using it this last week and a half," Twilight said, clearly unable to see the telltale signs of life Corsica could. Though, those signs of life didn't count for much... "That was the next thing I was going to ask."

"Does that mean you've got a really big job?" Future Corsica asked, looking entirely indifferent about the prospect of dropping another mountain on her psyche. "As long as you're willing to lug around my carcass until I recover."

Why was Corsica dreaming about this? She kicked herself with the sharp edge of a shoe, and all it did was make her leg hurt. Ow.

Twilight steadied herself and set her face in a stern frown. "Get out of that hammock."

Future Corsica looked confused. "Not something I can do from here, then? Fine..."

Corsica didn't remember this. Did she? Why would she, at any point in her life, have gone willingly to use her accursed artifice for something she didn't even care about? She remembered the effects of the artifice, but... but...

No. She did remember. That yawning abyss, that utter lack of light, having no reason not to let herself be destroyed because she had nothing worth saving her strength for. On the outside, Future Corsica was as recovered as she could get, and could physically survive another use of her talent. On the inside, the damage was already done. She had nothing left.

Just a pink, fluffy, dirty, raspberry-maned corpse. The fire in her eyes had been replaced by a void long ago, so vast that Corsica felt her hard-won fire flicker against the emptiness.

"I'm not asking you to use your talent!" Twilight cried. "What I want is for you to get out of bed!"

Future Corsica obeyed, but clearly didn't comprehend. She more flowed out of the hammock than climbed, putting in so little effort that Corsica's gut wrenched just watching her.

Why was she seeing this? Who had decided that she look back upon her own darkest hour? Princess Luna? No...

No, this wasn't her darkest hour. This was someone else's. Someone she had cast off and discarded, along with all their weariness. Someone she looked like, but no longer was.

And 'looked like' was a stretch. Future Corsica was bigger than her, a full-grown adult in perfect physical health. She even had some degree of exercise, and her body looked like it hadn't quite forgotten the time when it was well-taken care of. Despite the obvious signs of personal neglect, Corsica realized it was impressive how good she had looked. Had she once shone so brightly that she still had this much left, even at the end?

It shouldn't have mattered. She didn't need to look back anymore now that she had reclaimed her past glory. She was her real self, and this was a dead faker living inside an empty shell, similar to her only in that it had desired to be her.

Twilight and Future Corsica started arguing, but Corsica brushed aside Twilight's words even more easily than her future self. Why was she seeing this? What was the point?

Eventually, Twilight won. Future Corsica left her behind, walking into the mess hall on a route that would take her up to the deck, where she would finally be free.

Corsica followed, a cascade of emotions gushing across her future self's face. Loathing, acceptance and despair, realization and yearning. Resignation and rage, and beneath it all a directionless desire to fight. The last embers of a flame that was about to come back to life.

She reached the deck. Corsica could see Snowport in the distance, but the void around her future self was so all-consuming, its tunnel vision extended down to her: she couldn't clearly make out the others on the deck, even though she knew they were there. It was just her and her future self, standing there at the edge of eternity.

Future Corsica's consternation faded, a drop of curiosity wiping the dust from a window. An idea seemed to cross her mind. And then she made eye contact.

"I wish I didn't have this special talent," she whispered to her past self.

Corsica stared back.

"I wish I didn't have this special talent," Future Corsica whispered more forcefully. "I don't want it. I wish I had never gotten it. I'm done being a sacrifice for ponies who don't appreciate it and throw me away once I'm burnt down to a stub. I wish it had never worked this way in the first place! Now get off my flank!"

She was right, wasn't she? That wish still burned at the core of Corsica's flame. Was this mare everything she had left behind, or everything she had striven towards at the end? She was both. Death and life, together as one.

Future Corsica's eyes focused, and she saw Corsica anew, regarding her with apprehension and embarrassment and primal lust. She knew what she was. She felt and lived every bit of the death and decay that bogged her down, the weariness from friendships spurned and bonds lost, but she knew who she wanted to be. She stared at Corsica with eyes like a ravenous beast, that needed her like she had never been needed before.

"Come on," Corsica breathed, extending a hoof to her future self. "You can do it. This is who we were meant to be. You don't need that. You want to be me!"

"I want to go back!" Future Corsica screamed, her voice cracking as she reached for Corsica. "I wish I was who I was before I got my special talent. I wish none of this had ever happened!"

Corsica's heart hammered in her chest, blindingly aware of how brightly she burned in the emptiness. "Grab on!" she urged. "I want you, too! The worthwhile part of you! We do have a future, and it's great!"

"This wasn't a fair trade!" Future Corsica wailed, straining towards her. "Let me go back! I wish I was free!"

Corsica glared at the artifice that was holding her back. Was this why she was here? Was it a reminder of what she had fought to escape from? In reliving her darkest hour, was she also reliving her moment of triumph and rebirth?

There, on her future self's flank, was the target of her rebellion. Something she had to be free from at all costs.

"Don't worry," Corsica whispered, burning brightly as her future self flailed and fought. "I'm here to help you. It's going to be alright."

A strange ecstasy filled her as she partook of her future self's struggle, their two flames burning as one in the darkness. She pulled, tugging Future Corsica away from the artifice... and as she pulled, she realized she had the capacity to do more.

Right there, on her own flank. The source of all her torment, weaponized to work for her instead of against her. If anything deserved to feel the way her future self had been made to feel, it was the artifice that had done this to her in the first place.

Corsica reached into the back of her mind for a mountain to throw at her future self's artifice.

Instead of a mountain, a sword appeared.

Black and nondescript, it had a circular hole in the hilt that was roughly the size of a hoof, and its blade was wrapped in black chains. But Corsica grabbed it without hesitation, striking and twisting at the artifice on her future self's flank, disfiguring its lines and prying it away... and with a pop, it sprung free, just like a stuck gasket when faced with a crowbar.

Future Corsica was rent in twain, a flame that exploded into Corsica's chest, same as had always been there, and the darkness, an ugly little thing that she barely had a chance to look at before the feeling of static electricity overwhelmed her, and forced her awake.

The Uninvited Come

Corsica flung herself awake, her spirit dropping back into her battered body with an unpleasant thump as her bed caught up to her.

That dream... What had she just been doing? Her horn sparked to life, and pushed back her blankets. Only when she saw her flank, and stared for a solid minute to ensure it was still empty, did her heartbeat begin to slow.

Unlike normal dreams, her vision didn't drift away. The Immortal Dream was moving, or at least airborne; she could no longer feel the gentle bobbing of the waves against the hull, and it was replaced by a soft, harmonic hum that had become background noise during her long month of voyaging to and from Our Town. The sounds and smells of reality should have replaced it, pushed her nightmare far out of reach - if she could even call that a nightmare. But they didn't. It was like she had walked through a door and stepped back into the real world, with no transition whatsoever.

She relaxed and let her horn go out. What had come over her? Seeing her future self, who was also her past... Saying the things she had said, reaching for her special talent so soon after she told Luna she didn't want it...

That last part was what bothered her most. Did she have no sense of self-control? Being unable to control her impulses was supposed to be Future Corsica's problem. Senselessly using her special talent, even looking for an excuse to use it there at the end, just so she'd have a better excuse in turn to stay in bed and do nothing. She could swear off special talents if she very well wanted to, so why did she jump at the very first opportunity to use it?

Luna had her dream powers, right? Was the latter half of that dream constructed purely to prove a point? Corsica tensed in frustration, gritting her teeth. It didn't prove anything if the dream made her do something she wouldn't actually do in real life! She was perfectly capable of... capable of...

She almost choked on her frustration. If she really was capable of restraining herself, she wouldn't have needed to ask Luna not to give back her special talent. She should have been capable of it, especially after how much she went through over the last three years to learn that skill. But watching her dead self act so indifferent to Twilight about the possibility of using her talent, then calling on it so indifferently herself, right in the same dream... This was beyond humiliation. It was straight-up mockery.

Placed in a dream where she mocked herself. Perhaps to prove Luna's point, or perhaps by her own subconscious. But what was she supposed to do?

Corsica wanted to roll over, to adjust herself and get more comfortable, but Fluttershy had arranged her in bed with a brace to stop her from doing precisely that, on the doctor's orders. Humiliating.

Part of the point of rewinding herself and wishing her talent away was to be freed from the consequences of being impulsive, of course. This was how she had wished to become. She should have been able to simply do what she wanted and not care, so why was this so embarrassing in the first place?

Breaking the illusory terrain around the train was exactly the same. Now that she had two reference points, she could look at it more objectively: both times, she had come face to face with something dangerous, and completely lost her ability to think critically, barging in and recklessly challenging it for no gain or benefit. Why? Of all the possible places to go insane and have no self-control, why do it when it was dangerous?

"I suspect this was motivated by simple curiosity mixed with a disdain for things that are hidden from you," a memory of Princess Luna said, her voice echoing through Corsica's ears.

No. It was more than that. Curiosity might have motivated Corsica to go investigate the trains, but it wasn't why she lost her head and attacked the ground despite the threat of premonition flux building up in her mind... Premonition flux that disappeared instead of collecting its due, at that. And she might not have liked her future self, but disdain wasn't why she had summoned her special talent - or, at least, her dream's idea of her special talent - to help her.

Was it... because she was scared? Scared of what the premonition flux could do to her, scared of that dark void in her mind that she cleaved from her other self in her dream? Was fear her motivator for freaking out and backtracking on her principles like that?

Corsica felt herself slowly sinking, her cabin's ceiling growing farther away. If she had truly been rewound, she shouldn't have been scared of things that had never happened to her. But she knew she was right, and that meant her break from the last three years wasn't as clean as she wanted it to be. Some of her baggage was somehow still hanging on.

Maybe she shouldn't have been surprised. It was honestly a miracle her mental state had reset to the point where she could enjoy things and harbor ambitions at all-

"What are you thinking about?"

Corsica blinked, then sighed. It seemed the paranormal wasn't done with her yet.

There was a light in her room. A ghostly, translucent, vaguely-pony-shaped blob of light, gently undulating with shifting colors. It hovered just off the floor, and at first she worried her special talent was somehow back, but it was too big and indistinct for that. Nope, just a plain old unidentified magical phenomenon... and she was pretty sure it had just asked her a question.

"Hi," said the light blob, drifting closer. "You noticed!"

"What are you?" Corsica asked, pondering ways to check if she was still dreaming. "Some sort of ghost?"

"I'm the Immortal Dream!" the light said proudly. "I love you. What are you thinking about? Your thoughts feel weird."

A gear popped loose in Corsica's brain.

"I've been talking to you for a while now," the light rambled. "But I was sleeping, so I don't know if you heard. Most people don't hear even when I'm awake. You're different!"

"Hold on..." Corsica slowly blinked. "Are you the weird voice I've randomly been hearing since I got rewound? And when you say the Immortal Dream, do you mean the Starlight one, or...?"

"I am this ship," the light stated, its voice sounding like a jumble of creatures overlapping, mostly female yet changing often enough that Corsica really couldn't tell if it was the one she had been hearing. "Do you like me?"

"You're this ship." Corsica glanced around at her surroundings, the floor and walls and ceiling of the cabin. "Alright... Why is this ship possessed by a magic talking ghost?"

The light bobbed excitedly. "Because I like you! So, what are you thinking about?"

"Wondering whether I'm hallucinating, mostly." Corsica squeezed her eyes shut, but when she opened them, the light blob was still there. "Do you have a name that's a bit less of a mouthful than Immortal Dream?"

The light jiggled from side to side. "I am this ship."

"Great. I'm calling you Morty." Corsica sighed, hoping she wasn't committing a grave aeronautical faux pas by renaming an already-named vessel... or by giving a colt's name to what was probably a filly. "Is thaaat okay with you?"

Morty bobbed in midair. "Your thoughts are strange."

"Morty-" Corsica started, then cut herself off. "Never mind. That feels too weird to even think. Immie? Dream? Flying tub?"

"I am this ship," the light reminded her. "And you're nice, but you're also weird. I was named a long time ago! I think I still remember it. Do you want me to make a new name for you, too?"

Corsica blinked. "Should I?"

"Alright!" The light blob swam in a circle. "You can be Gerardo!"

Gerardo... The griffon who gave her a ride from Icereach to Ironridge in the distant corners of her future? One of Starlight and Valey's old traveling companions? "Doesn't that name already belong to someone else?" Corsica probed. "Someone you used to carry around a lot?"

The light tinkled with shame. "I don't know very many names."

"Well, uhh..." Corsica fumbled for something to say. "You're a pretty good ship. Been all across the world, and stuff?" If only she was better with kids... This ghost was very definitely not an adult.

"Yes!" The light blob got all of its cheer back, bobbing up and down wildly. "And no. I've been to Ironridge, and I've been to the Griffon Empire, and I've been to Griffonstone, and I've been to Kinmari, and I've been to a place called Sires Hollow, and I've been to Ponyville, and-"

"Sounds like a lot," Corsica encouraged, fatigue already weighing on her again. This conversation probably wasn't going to end on its own, but what did you do with a ghost ship that seemed to have no goals beyond talking?

"And I don't know where I haven't been because I haven't been there yet," the light puffed, rattling off too many names in one breath... How did it even have lungs? "Like right now! I don't know where we're going, because I haven't been there before. Have you?"

"No," Corsica managed. "It's... hard for me to talk right now, kid. Sorry. I'm kind of beat up. You know how that works, right?"

The light stopped bobbing. "I protect people who are hurt."

"Awesome." Corsica sank back into her bedding. "Think you could protect me tonight while I get a good night's sleep? If you do, I'll talk to you all you want once I'm feeling better."

She got the vague impression that the light was saluting. "This is my duty," it proclaimed, solemn. "Feel better, okay? I'll keep you safe."

Corsica waited... and the light didn't leave.

"You gonna go somewhere?" Corsica eventually asked.

"I am going somewhere." The light swooped over by the window, a slip of cloud drifting idly by. "I'm taking you, and everyone else! See?"

"No, like..." Corsica tried and failed again to find a comfortable angle to keep an eye on the light. "Are you going to stop staring at me? And leave me alone so I can sleep?"

The light tinkled again. "But you're inside me."

Corsica blinked. "Not the ship itself. You. The glowy... thing."

"But I am this ship," the light insisted, befuddled. "I can't get you off me. If you don't want to be here, that's for you to do."

Did this ghost not understand the concept of personal space? How would Corsica even explain something like-

"Excuse us," said a new voice.

Corsica blinked harder. There was another ghost in her room.

This one was just as indefinite as the first, though easy to tell apart: it was black and silver instead of a shifting rainbow, was slightly larger, and spoke with a much cleaner, more practiced voice. There was still something discordant about it, though: its voice was young and full of spunk, also female, and yet gave the impression of great age and dignity, like a talented filly reading a script during a school play.

But the contradiction sounded nice on Corsica's ears. Better than nice, somehow. For the briefest moment, she imagined that if it had an equine form, it would probably be quite the looker.

"Little one," the new light said to the old one. "She now perceives our spirits as creatures separate from our bodies. The presence of your mind's gaze is not the same to her as your presence as a ship."

"Huh?" the old, rainbow light asked, its focus turning to the new one.

"I will explain it to you," the new, silver light encouraged, shimmering as it moved in a way that reminded Corsica of a ruler's stride. "But let us look at someone who cannot perceive us, first."

"Okay!" The old light darted towards Corsica's door, phasing straight through.

Corsica cleared her throat before the new light could follow. "So have I died and turned into a ghost myself, or is this ship just haunted all of a sudden?"

"We were always here," the new light said, hovering near the door. "Your ability to see us is the new part. And it's getting stronger with each passing day."

"What are you?" Corsica demanded, straining to look at it upright. "Does this have to do with my special talent?"

The light flickered between silver and black, a faint trace of red rising up through it like an errant tongue of flame. "Spirits of things that are not alive, and never were. But is this really a road you want to tread?"

"Seems like I don't have much of a choice," Corsica pointed out. "You're the ones showing up uninvited in my room."

"You have a choice," the silver light replied. "The alternative is merely unacceptable to you."

"Oh yeah?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "And what's that?"

The light seemed to shrug. "Accept yourself. Your whole self, including the part you are going to such lengths to cast off."

Corsica's eyes widened in surprise. "Did you just platitude me? That's almost offensive." She let out a sigh. "I don't know who you are, or what you know about me, but three years of my life are dead. They never happened. Beats me how I got rid of them, but if I somehow got them back, they'd just kill the rest of me, too. Does that factor into your wisdom, oh ghost of spooky warnings?"

Another flicker of red.

"Well?" Corsica pressed.

"It's not too late to turn back," the light said. "If you don't think you can do it on your own, speak with Seigetsu. So far, you have only made barest contact with the power that was lost. The memory erasure kept by her people could still be potent enough to delay your march, at least long enough for the eyes of history to fall on someone else, instead."

"But what's that supposed to mean?" Corsica demanded. "If you're trying to warn me of something, it won't work without specifics! And if the other one was this ship's spirit, then who are you supposed to be, anyway?"

The silver light sighed. "I told you. A spirit of something that was never alive. And I am warning you that the power you chase is a power that cannot help but be used. The more you embrace-"

"Hey!" The other light floated back through the door. "Hey Aegis, weren't you going to talk with me?"

Corsica blinked.

The silver light stiffened, cutting off mid-sentence, then swiftly departed, taking the other light with it.

"We're almost there," Rainbow said, sitting on the Immortal Dream's control console as Starlight guided the ship forward, Twilight and Seigetsu standing nearby.

"This is well inside the perimeter that my people patrol," Seigetsu replied.

"Yep. We've been over this a hundred times," Rainbow pushed back. "But hey, let's be fair, here! Your scouts were covering such a huge amount of terrain, they surely couldn't be bothered to check out every single random cave and hole in the ground they came across, right?"

Twilight gave her a cross look. "Rainbow..."

Rainbow jumped down and patted her smugly on the shoulder. "Don't worry, Twi. You'd be on their case twice as hard if you didn't have your princess image to keep up, so just think of it like I'm giving them a hard time for you."

"And as we've thoroughly established," Twilight countered, "there also happened to be a giant city in a hole in the ground less than a day's walk out from Ponyville, which none of us knew about, either."

"That one was completely buried. This one is in a hole. Anyone with wings could see it, they're not even comparable!" Rainbow rolled her eyes, gesturing for Starlight to slow down. "It's right in the center of that boulder field there. You can practically see it already!"

The ship slowed, and soon, everyone filed out onto the deck to get a better look straight down.

South of the rails connecting Snowport and the Crystal Empire, the terrain devolved into a grassy swamp that looked like a pleasant meadow yet was actually a bog, as Rainbow remembered everyone else finding out during Twilight's marathon teleport session to get there a month ago. Fed by runoff from the mountains that couldn't collect into streams or lakes, that bog stretched far to the east and west, losing itself in extensive forests to the east. But to the west, rocky hills occasionally broke the surface, big slabs of flat stone stacked at odd angles, like the world's surface had been broken and scrunched together a little, long ago.

"What are they growing down there?" Applejack asked, the rising moon providing enough light to see the sheen of the water beneath the grass. "That looks organized like farmland right up to where the rocks start, but I've never seen a crop what can breathe underwater."

"Rice, mostly," Seigetsu explained. "A special variant bred for cold or temperate weather."

"And holes," Rainbow said, pointing down at the rocks near the farmland. "See? Right there."

Down below, a particularly large sheet of rock jutted up like half of a tent, supported by nothing and shadowing a long crevice. The crevice was raised enough not to flood, sitting on the slope of a small hill, at an angle where she couldn't truly blame ground-bound farmers from failing to see it: no one would want to climb these hills when the footing was so treacherous, especially if the bog was actually good crop land. But didn't some dragons have wings? There was even a faint light radiating up from below.

Someone had to have seen this.

"Yep, I can definitely see it," Twilight agreed. "At least, I don't know what other hole you could be talking about, Rainbow. Has this really never been noticed before?"

"Am I just blind, then?" Applejack asked, lifting her hat and scratching at her head. "No big holes down there are jumping out at me."

"I don't see it either," Fluttershy noted, standing quietly to the side and craning her neck to see the terrain below. "I don't think I'm bad at seeing in the dark..."

Rainbow stepped up next to her and pointed a hoof. "It's literally glowing. Night should make it easier. Right there, see?"

Fluttershy stared in confusion. "Um, I really don't see anything..."

"It's not that hard..." Twilight started to say, then trailed off. "Starlight?"

Starlight was staring over the edge, horn lit, a look of intense concentration on her face.

Eventually, she let out a breath, and her horn went out. "I don't see it either," she said, shaking her head. "But I have a spell that can detect cavities behind solid objects, and there is something down there. I think. It feels weird when I try to use it. Something is going on."

"Seigetsu?" Twilight turned to the dragon, who was leaning against the bridge and thoughtfully rubbing her chin. "What do you see?"

Seigetsu tapped a claw on the railing. "I think I'd like to see how you all handle this before I weigh in."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Rainbow asked. "Is the hole magic, or something? Why would me and Twilight be able to see it if no one else can?"

Twilight's eyes widened in realization.

"Figured it out already?" Applejack guessed, raising an eyebrow.

"I don't know why this could be significant," Twilight said. "And I don't want to bring Corsica up here to test. But Rainbow and I are the only ponies here who have used Writs of Harmonic Sanction. And those allow us to bypass the spell that obscures the true form of the Aldenfold's terrain."

Rainbow blinked at her, then Starlight, then her again. "Yeah, but, okay, what's that magic got to do with a random city in a hole in a boulder field? And, uh, did you really not have a writ?"

Starlight shook her head. "Just one of the many things about this trip I've been putting off. I've turned them down twice now."

"You know we're going to Ironridge, like, really soon, right?" Rainbow pointed out, raising an eyebrow.

Starlight pulled out a writ.

"Oh, well, okay, then. Just conveniently have one-"

"I asked for it while we were in the Crystal Empire," Starlight interrupted with a sigh. "I was thinking I'd have a little more time to psych myself up for it, but if it's suddenly relevant right now..."

She looked down over the edge. "You know this can't actually be what's going on, right? Maybe it's some other class of illusion magic, but the spell in place over the Aldenfold consumes incredible amounts of power. I told you about how it's powered, remember?" She looked back at Rainbow and Twilight. "Using entire crystal palaces? Two of them? Using technology from Indus? Even if it was on a smaller scale, that kind of effect shouldn't be something just anyone can replicate."

Seigetsu stepped forward. "Perhaps a reminder of why we are here is warranted. In the past thirty years, Snowport has suffered two desertions of clergy from the Order of Silence, who wield the power to erase memories. This power is regulated with utmost care. Such events should be unthinkable, and our inability to find the perpetrators is a source of great shame and consternation."

She narrowed her eyes. "But that is, indeed, an enchantment like unto the Aldenfold beneath us. It is every bit as out of place here as you say. And whatever it is hiding, it would go a long way toward explaining why that something has never been found."

"You can tell that's the kind of magic at work?" Twilight asked.

Seigetsu flexed her claws. "Did you think I reached the station of Special Inquisitor for purely political reasons? I have my methods." She narrowed her eyes at the crevice among the rocks. "If only those methods had included free requisition of airships. That cave is hidden both by the mountains' magic and by regular camouflage that make it difficult to see from the ground. Even when plainly visible, it looks scarce more than an ordinary shadow. This was hidden by someone who refuses to be found. And I can easily guess the culprits."

"Just saying," Rainbow cut in, "but I did go down there for, like, long enough to see there weren't just two dudes in that hole. It's a city. Or at least a village."

Starlight stepped forward, holding a now-empty writ, a regretful look on her face. "...It's true. I can see it now."

Twilight gingerly took the empty writ, and Starlight didn't try to stop her.

She did look back after the empty scroll, however, and shook her head. "Figured if I did it spur of the moment like this, it wouldn't feel so... weighty. Anyway." She squared her shoulders and turned to Seigetsu. "Your Order of Silence uses Nightmare Modules for their memory erasure, right?"

Seigetsu raised an eyebrow. "They've been known by that name."

"Do they have any others?" Starlight pressed. "I assume you wouldn't have this job if you didn't know a thing or two about how to fight them."

Seigetsu looked taken aback.

"Well, I'm more familiar with what they can do than most," Starlight said, walking back to the railing. "But the only time I've seen the memory erasure used, it was cast from a horn. If they try to fight us, how will they use it? Being the Elements of Harmony might protect you from their effects, or it might do nothing. And I don't think any of you would enjoy losing your memories."

"They activate their powers by physically stabbing the target with a knife made of black metal," Seigetsu explained. "Rather than leave a wound, it renders you susceptible to their magic through the duration of the blade's contact. When we encounter them, I would prefer if you all stood at a distance and left the fighting up to me, to avoid this exact scenario."

"Hopefully it doesn't come to that," Fluttershy murmured.

"The only way it wouldn't is if they were to surrender quietly," Seigetsu answered, shaking her head.

Starlight cleared her throat. "Do these black knives look anything like this?"

She pulled out a black sword of her own, plain and unadorned save for a triangular hole in the hilt. A sword Rainbow Dash was accustomed to hearing about from her stories about life north of the Aldenfold, and had seen in person once or twice as well: Starlight's current vector for wielding the Nightmare Modules, both the one that erased memories and others.

Seigetsu's eyes narrowed at the sword. "I wondered if you might be harboring something like that."

"Can I take that as a yes?" Starlight asked, keeping the sword at her side.

"You would be wise not to wave that thing around where my people can see it," Seigetsu said. "At best, it would constitute high heresy and crimes against public order, and that's if they don't realize it is real."

Starlight sighed. "Sounds like just another Tuesday in Ironridge. And if they do realize it's real?"

Seigetsu nodded. "You could incite mass panic or even societal collapse over the imminent end of the world."

Twilight's eyes went wide. "What?"

Seigetsu put a hand over her face. "Tell me you aren't carrying that around without at least some sort of idea of what it is..."

"A weapon used by one of the titans who destroyed Indus," Starlight said, putting the sword away again. "The counterpart of which, by the way, is currently flying invisibly inside our harmony comet, and hopefully didn't raise too many eyebrows when we used it to fix the ship back there."

"Then you can conceive of at least one reason why it might produce such a reaction," Seigetsu told her. "And I would not worry about Snowport's citizenry. About four months ago, we transported a five-ton magical relic through our port that caused it to constantly rain even when no clouds were present, and required a specially-constructed train car to move. They are no strangers to strange comings and goings."

"Right," Twilight groaned. "I remembered that..."

"Wow, we're getting to be a real walking doomsday armory!" Pinkie remarked, strolling straight through the middle of the crowd. "Does anyone else miss the days when we could just roll out the harmony laser and turn the baddies good with a single strike?"

Starlight cleared her throat. "Actually, if these are batponies using Nightmare Modules, that's probably the most effective way to deal with them. Exposure to powerful harmonic effects seems to directly purge the emotional energy needed to power Nightmare Modules, so even a little harmony could render them useless."

"As I said, you would be best leaving any fighting to me," Seigetsu said. "I am extensively trained for this specific scenario. While any contributions you can safely make will be welcome in the moment, you have quite a lot riding on your safety."

"Well, someone's going to need to stay with the ship," Applejack pointed out. "You know, just thinking off the top of my head, here, but if too many bodies might just get in the way, Twilight and Starlight are the only ones of us who have been in real, serious fights here... and Rainbow's the fastest, so she could easily make a getaway. And you three are also the ones with the writs. So maybe it should just be you three that scout out the place first with Seigetsu, and then the rest of us come check it out once it's safe, if there's much more to see?"

Rainbow glanced around at her friends. She could hold her own in a fight; there was no way she couldn't. But Pinkie, Fluttershy, Rarity... "Applejack has a point," she admitted. "Maybe we should split up for this."

"I'm not sure we have a choice," Starlight said. "If that magic really is the same as the Aldenfold's, anyone without a writ might not be able to get down there in the first place."

Applejack swallowed.

"Perhaps," Seigetsu said. "Now, if there is nothing more to discuss, should we not get going?"

"Been waiting for someone to say that!" Rainbow backflipped over the edge, plummeting down the short drop to the boulder field and flipping out her wings to catch herself at the last moment.

Seigetsu dropped shortly later, landing with the grace of someone who had jumped from the bottom step of a staircase rather than a hovering airship. And a moment after that, following some distant farewells and advice-giving atop the ship, Starlight and Twilight arrived as well, the former floating along in a cloud of telekinesis and the latter wobbling along on unpracticed wings.

Not that Twilight was a bad flier. She certainly wasn't a pro, but Rainbow couldn't help but note how much funnier she looked after Celestia gave her that power. The last time Twilight was this souped up, the slightest errant twitch of a feather could send her accidentally rocketing across the horizon, and watching her trying to avoid a repeat of that performance was like watching an amateur clown practicing with stilts.

Speaking of those powers... "You're leaving Aegis back on the ship, right?" Rainbow glanced up at the harmony comet, where a slight distortion signaled Aegis's presence.

"We're still connected by remote," Twilight assured her. "And being able to control Aegis up on the surface means we can still contact the ship if we need to for some reason."

"This hole doesn't give fantastic vibes," Starlight said, hovering over to the entrance, not trusting her footing on the precarious terrain. "And there's so much water around here, shouldn't it be flooded?"

"That's kinda why I started poking around here in the first place," Rainbow admitted. "It felt kinda weird that this marsh was here at all with the ocean so close by. It's even got some gentle currents."

Seigetsu nodded. "Hundreds of years ago, this area was an estuary that drained more freely into the sea, but we began to control that drainage rate when we realized we could make the area more suitable for certain types of crops."

"Well..." Rainbow landed, stepping up to the lip of the crevice and waving for the others to take a peek inside. "Guess you'll get to find out where all that water drains to instead."

Freedom and Ignorance

The marsh cave grew wider as Rainbow Dash descended, a waterfall roaring in her ears in the distance below. At first, it clung to its identity as a narrow, claustrophobic crevice, but then surrendered all at once as she reached the bottom of the stone plate that supported the surface.

She emerged into an underground ravine as wide as it was tall, stretching out of sight around bends to the east and the northwest, a deep river carved into the floor, barreling around the bends with a ferocity she had rarely seen before in water. The channels were cut narrow, taking up only the center third of the tunnels' floor space, and on the damp banks were the lights and hovels of a village big enough to spread out of sight around the tunnel bends.

It was a village with raised stone paths built from a full hooflength of packed, large-grain gravel, to allow drainage for the water running down the walls. The walls were completely covered in thin sheets of groundwater seeping down from the marsh, a mix of dribbling waterfalls and glassy veils that followed the curvature of the stone, depositing mineral formations that made the walls look lumpy, organic and almost like they were melting. Something about those formations hit Rainbow viscerally, reminding her of what she thought intestines would look like if she ever got eaten by a giant.

The water from the walls joined the rivers, both of which were flowing towards her before colliding in a giant melting pot directly beneath the entrance. A roughly circular basin of dark waters churned and frothed, the city taking up space all around its north and south banks, where the tunnel was at its widest. And then, to the southeast, the river broke out of its melting pot, barreling forward and downward, plummeting off a cliff as the tunnel turned straight down, sending its water seething into a black abyss.

Houses lined the rim around the abyss, too. In the corner to the east, on the thin wedge of land separating the eastern river from the abyss and forcing it to collide with its neighbor and change course before it could fall, there was a more elaborate estate, almost enough to be called a mansion, though it was still made out of stone slabs like all the rest. A road led through it and out around the abyssal rim, and its front yard featured a spiky stone protrusion that jutted out over the melting pot and the waterfall like a broken bridge, positioned perfectly along the dividing line between water and void.

That stone spur would be visible from almost anywhere in the city. To a Daring Do villain, it would be the perfect spot for offering up live sacrifices.

Rainbow glanced back over her shoulder to gauge the others' reactions. Twilight looked unsettled and Starlight wary, but she couldn't spare too much attention for them, because Seigetsu was walking on the ceiling.

How did she do that? It looked like her feet were slightly melting into the stone...

"Okay," Twilight whispered, pulling up alongside Rainbow, though she could have shouted and nobody would have heard her below over the water's din. "I see what you meant about the vibes..."

Starlight hovered closer as well. "There are ponies in the streets, but it doesn't look like they've noticed us," she said stiffly, pointing to the patches of muted color where equines wandered the roads. "They don't look like they're doing much, either."

"I'd prefer to go talk to them," Twilight said, hovering close enough to the ceiling that Seigetsu could hear too. "But you said you specifically wanted to take point, so I guess I'll follow your lead?"

Seigetsu shook her head. "Oh, they've definitely noticed us. They are merely pretending not to see."

"Which means...?" Rainbow pressed.

Seigetsu gestured towards the stone mansion. "We must find our targets quickly. Stay vigilant, and follow me."

Then she jumped, flipping through the air and landing at the base of the outcrop that straddled the waterfall.

Rainbow dropped into a glide, tailing her as she strode across the rocky courtyard towards the mansion. There were no guards, and not even a physical door, just an opening through which Seigetsu entered without attempting to knock.

Inside, rather than the foyer Rainbow expected, was a single large room, the floor scored with small drainage channels in a checkerboard pattern faintly reminiscent of a ballroom, and the ceiling held up by rough-hewn stone pillars that provided ample shadowy cover for ambushers, especially ones that could climb or fly. Rainbow instantly ascended, checking to ensure no one was waiting to get the drop on her friends... not that she knew how to spot a batpony who was shadow sneaking. Starlight's stories had left her with ample reason to watch out for those.

But if there were any hidden attackers, none of them jumped out to accost her... until half a second later, a bright burst of light flashed behind her. Rainbow whirled, squinting, ready for a fight.

It was Starlight, light still receding from her horn.

"Don't patrol dark spaces without a light when you're hunting dangerous batponies," Starlight grunted, pointing for Rainbow to stay on the ground. "If there had been one there, you would have been at their mercy."

She then soared off between the pillars and launched another flashbang, sparing Rainbow with a pillar's shadow. "And look at the walls, not me!" she called back.

Rainbow groaned at getting shown up, briefly tried to soothe her ego, and drifted to the floor, where a different commotion was beginning to take place.

The center of the large room was empty, but the sides had an assortment of stone tables and water-warped crates, and the back featured a stone alcove bed that was probably supposed to be fancy, but didn't fit any style Rainbow had seen before. In the bed, blinking in annoyance at Seigetsu, was an earth pony colt, somewhere in his late teens, who had clearly been awakened by Starlight's flashbangs.

"I just got to sleep..." he complained, staring down the end of a war hammer made from a strange, monochrome, bright purple metal. His eyes crossed. "Oh, good grief. You're outsiders, aren't you? I take it you don't come in peace?"

Seigetsu pointed the hammer at him one-handed, raising her voice to ensure everyone in the room could hear it. "I am Special Inquisitor Seigetsu of the Holy Cernial Convocation. I am here in search of a pair of dangerous criminal fugitives who are believed to be hiding in this village. Forgive me for assuming by your lodgings that you occupy a position of importance here, but I require a form of insurance that we will not be ambushed by those I seek to apprehend."

The colt blinked groggily. "What? I don't have-" Starlight flashbanged again. "Stop doing that! I'm already awake!"

"Once we are assured that we will not be ambushed," Seigetsu promised. "I bear you no ill will, but any discomfort caused by using you as a hostage is far more temporary than the damage that could be caused by an ambush from the criminals I seek. Please accept my apologies, and order any guards to reveal themselves."

"For crying out loud, I don't have any guards!" the colt burst out. "We're not barbarians! That's the whole point! And no one here has any history with your world."

"Two batponies," Seigetsu said. "Completely gray, and likely to wear clothing that disguises the fact that half of their bodies are missing. Proficient with black daggers that can destroy the memories of their targets. Do you know them?"

"Oh." The colt sagged. "You're looking for them?"

Seigetsu twitched.

"Could you put that hammer away?" the colt asked, clearly uncomfortable. "We're all pacifists here, and force can't bring back whatever you're looking for."

Seigetsu withdrew the hammer slightly, but kept it out. "They are no longer here, then?"

The colt sighed, taking the space he was given to sit up. As his bedding fell off, Rainbow got a glimpse of his cutie mark: a yawning, black pit with a waterfall rushing in.

"They're here in body," the colt said, staring at Seigetsu with bleary eyes. "But they don't have any memory of anything they did to you before coming here. Same for everyone. If you're looking for anyone with a history on the surface, that history doesn't exist anymore. So if you're looking for revenge or whatever, you're wasting your time."

Starlight landed close by, eyes wide. "What did you say?"

"Weapons down, please," the colt yawned, rubbing sleep out of his eyes. "You'll get it if I show you... show you around. No one here has any problem with you, so there's no point in hurting us. Can't we talk this out?"

Seigetsu still hesitated... but Twilight tapped her leg with a hoof. "I want to talk about this too," she said. "And we haven't found anyone who's hostile yet. If it doesn't work, I'll take responsibility for that, but we should hear him out."

"...Very well, then." Seigetsu's hammer dissipated into thin air, though Rainbow could still tell she was on high alert. "Now, explain further. These two batponies are elderly, one male and one female, named Yelvey and Nencosay? Why do they no longer have their memories?"

"Thank you for your basic decency," the colt muttered, sitting up straighter. "They don't have them because they took them away. That's what their powers do. You said you knew that, right?"

"But why did they take their own memories?" Twilight pressed.

"And you said they took them from everyone here?" Starlight asked stiffly.

The colt shrugged. "Because they didn't want them anymore. Duh."

Seigetsu gave him a look that demanded further elaboration.

"That's why anyone ever comes here. At least, most of the time." The colt slowly pulled himself out of bed. "This town's called Abaddon. I'm Keeper, the mayor. You probably know that already if you found us and came straight for me, but with how many questions you're asking, maybe you don't. And most of the people looking for us are people who can't live with their past anymore and seek freedom in ignorance. It's a more peaceful way to leave your failures behind than just dying, but to people like you, it's basically the same."

He got on his hooves and stretched. "No one here is haunted by the ghosts of their pasts anymore. So if you're the ghosts and you're looking to do some haunting, forget about it. Your marks don't even know who you are."

Starlight stared at the ground in horror.

"But..." Twilight protested. "What if they change their minds? What if they want their memories back?"

Keeper shrugged. "Then they're out of luck. Death is permanent too, though, so it's not like this is a worse alternative. Your friend there looks like she gets it."

He pointed at Starlight.

"Buddy," Rainbow said with a frown, "that's messed up. Who would want to get rid of their memories? You sure you don't coerce them into doing it? Not like they'd remember why they did it after the fact, right?"

"They don't remember, no," Keeper said. "That's the point. And we never use coercion. The pain of not knowing can be great, so it's something that should only be used when the pain of knowing is greater."

Rainbow gave him a stink-eye.

"Be that as it may," Seigetsu cut in, "they are still guilty of great crimes in my country, whether they remember them or not. Where are they?"

"No, they aren't," Keeper insisted. "The ponies who wronged you are dead. I'll show you to them if you need to see for yourselves, but please don't hurt them. It won't matter when they can just forget you all over again, but no one likes making that trade."

"I do not come for wanton vengeance," Seigetsu promised. "But I would hear what they have to say for myself."

"Alright, alright..." Keeper started wandering towards the door, clearly not in a hurry. "Follow me. And don't complain when they really don't remember you."

Rainbow glanced at her companions. Seigetsu was already in the vanguard, Twilight was practically bristling with questions, and Starlight... didn't look too hot.

"Twilight," Starlight whispered as they stepped outside, a small cluster of curious ponies starting to gather - most of whom looked decently healthy, if muted and dull. "Is this how it looked when you first met me?"

"Well," Twilight deflected, "That was long enough ago that I had some pretty differing expectations of-"

"Yeah, pretty much," Rainbow interrupted, landing on Starlight's other flank. "At least there's no creepy smiles..." She waved to the onlookers. "Yo! Hey guys!"

Some of the ponies waved back uncertainly, and a few returned hesitant greetings. "See?" Rainbow pointed out.

"He called himself the mayor," Starlight breathed, closing her eyes and inhaling. "But I doubt he's the founder. He's too young and not charismatic enough. If... If there's a demagogue behind this place, just a warning that I don't know how I'll be able to react."

Twilight put a reassuring hoof on her shoulder, forcing Starlight to look her in the eyes. "You'll be fine, Starlight. You've learned from your mistakes. And if this is another pony making that same mistake, then I'm sure you more than anyone will know what to do."

Rainbow considered their exchange, then caught up to Seigetsu and Keeper. "So," she asked the colt, "have you gotten your own memory wiped too, then? You really have that much trust in your past self that you don't regret it?"

"Oh, no." Keeper blinked at her. "I haven't. I was born into this community, you see, so I don't have a history on the surface to run from, or any real traumas at all. That's how I got my name, since I've kept all of my memories." He adjusted their path, walking out of the mansion courtyard to the south and embarking on a road around the rim of the waterfall pit. "It's also how I got my job. Many of the people ask for their memories to be reset fairly frequently, and you can't serve as an administrator if you're just going to forget your projects halfway through."

Outside of the mansion compound, space became more limited, a narrow ledge of rock running around the waterfall pit, separating it from the actual cave wall. It was just wide enough for the road plus a single row of houses, all built from stone, their roofs set up to provide adequate protection from the irregular dripping of the roof stalactites. Between that and the mist from the waterfall, Rainbow was already starting to feel damp, and she noted that none of the other ponies she saw looked completely dry, either.

Quite a few of them were outside socializing, sharing meals or else simply talking. The food looked worse the more Rainbow glimpsed it: some sort of completely homogeneous gray matter, and nothing else. All the ponies who were eating had exactly the same thing.

"So, uh," Rainbow began. "Do I wanna know what that food is?"

"It's food," Keeper explained. "It doesn't have a name. Long ago, we used to eat surface food, which I've heard comes in different types that need different names. But ever since Misophaes joined us, we haven't needed to."

"That's a weird name," Rainbow remarked. "Who's Miso-face?"

"One of the three pillars of our community," Keeper said. "Misophaes joined us shortly after I was born, along with Nencosay, so I don't remember what it was like before her. But she's a unicorn who knows a spell that turns water into food. Without her, we wouldn't be able to survive underground like this."

Rainbow Dash shook her head. "So basically, you've forgotten what real food is. That's kind of sad."

"I'm guessing the other two pillars are Nencosay and Yelvey?" Twilight asked. "Or is Yelvey too new of an arrival to count?"

Keeper chuckled. "You know when he joined us, then? I suppose you would, if you're looking for him. It's kind of refreshing to meet someone who doesn't think that was forever ago. You're right, though. I never learned much about what our life was like before them. I assume we must have lived on the surface, and I think there were less than a dozen of us, but that's all inference. It's probably better that I don't know more, anyway. Everyone else's ignorance is a curse that frees them from the greater curse of their painful histories, but mine is a blessing because I never had to suffer that pain to begin with."

Rainbow rolled her eyes.

"I see that you feel differently," Keeper remarked. "And I'm in no position to tell you you're wrong, so I suppose instead I'm happy for you. You're lucky. Abaddon has one hundred and fifty three creatures who weren't so lucky, not counting myself. But who is truly luckier, the soul who has never suffered at all, or the one who finds salvation when they can run no further?"

Rainbow glanced around at the village ponies they were passing by, most of whom were happily socializing with each other. The few that weren't stared curiously instead, and sometimes warily. None of the cheer they displayed felt as obviously fake as the first time she visited Starlight's old village, back when Starlight had been a small-town dictator in the middle of nowhere... but it still felt out of place.

"So is talking to each other just really interesting?" she asked. "Because what you call salvation looks like pure boredom to me."

Keeper nodded, repaying a couple of curious waves from the ponies he passed by. "I have my duties as mayor to keep my mind occupied, but many would agree with you once the novelty of meeting a new like-minded community wears off. That's one of the biggest reasons the villagers choose to get their memories wiped more than once. By resetting themselves, they can get to know their neighbors all over again. It frees them from any mistakes or hard feelings from previous cycles, and keeps things always new and never boring."

Twilight's face twisted in revulsion. "Your relationships are that disposable to you?"

"I can't comment, since I don't partake in that pastime," Keeper admitted. "Actually, I don't socialize much at all with the ponies who regularly do this, since it can be quite unnerving for both parties when speaking to someone you know much better than they know you. But actions on the surface have the kinds of lingering consequences that can force people to give up everything to escape them. Does it surprise you that those who accept such a deal find enjoyment in interactions where everything is temporary and both successes and failures are wiped away?"

"Are they temporary?" Twilight pressed, incredulous. "Don't you get old? Don't you have children? Time is passing, whether you like it or not, and the friendships we build over that time are what gives meaning to spending it!"

Keeper grimaced. "You're asking the wrong pony, since I don't live like that, thank you very much. And I'm sure anyone else here would be happy to debate that subject with you all night, but I need to keep my memories in order to keep Abaddon running and I'd very much appreciate it if you didn't fill them with questions I don't have the context to answer. I'm already making a significant sacrifice by standing apart from our culture rather than accepting its company, and before you think any more about how nice it is to be someone without a reason to abandon everything, please think about what would happen if no one did my job, this village forgot that Misophaes can make food as a result and we all starved to death."

"Alright, see," Rainbow pressed, "You just said you're making a sacrifice with your role here, but right before it you said you were the lucky one..."

"Can I see some of that food?" Starlight requested, face ashen.

"We have plenty, so I don't see why not." Keeper waved at a pair of dining ponies, marched over, and soon stepped back with a small stone bowl filled with something gray and indistinct - an airy mass, fuzzy around the edges, so featureless that it appeared to completely lack depth. He offered it to Starlight.

Starlight stared into the bowl for a long moment, then touched the food with the tip of her tongue. Immediately, she went rigid.

"Starlight?" Twilight pulled the bowl from her aura, standing right in front of her friend.

"Ether flakes," Starlight said with a grimace. "Not the usual flavor." She shook her head, letting Twilight take the bowl. "I feel like there's something about this whole situation I'm forgetting, and I desperately need to remember. Something about the stone, or what they're doing to their memories, or this food. Is it that...?" She turned her head upwards, towards the crack in the ceiling they had entered through, which was now thoroughly obscured by a field of dripping stalactites.

"Yo, Starlight?" Rainbow waved a wing in front of her face. "You still in there?"

Keeper, too, tilted his head at Starlight.

Starlight stared for a while longer, then tore her gaze away. "This isn't right," she said. "I feel like I know this place, somehow, but I've never been here before. And it's not the same as I feel like it should be. And there was something important I needed to do here... This isn't just about my own village. What am I thinking of? Is there something that's messing with my head...?"

Rainbow glanced at Seigetsu and Twilight. "Either of you feel any head-tampery things going on? This place is messed up, but I feel fine."

"Perhaps," Seigetsu admitted, stepping closer to the edge of the waterfall pit. "There is some type of powerful magic in that hole. I suspect it is the source of the Aldenfold enchantment they use to conceal the entrance, and it is strongly aligned with the domain of Ignorance. But if you feel there is something you need to remember, sensitivity to this would be more likely to produce the opposite reaction."

"Uh," Keeper cut in, "if it matters, we do usually have to make sacrifices to the abyss to open the entrance for new arrivals... How did anyone know to let you in, anyway?"

"Sacrifices?" Starlight raised a wary eyebrow.

Keeper nodded. "Memories. Items with personal significance. Performing memory erasure near it works best. The abyss primarily protects itself, so for us to live under its protection, we have to do something for it in return. That's another thing it would be pretty bad if there wasn't a mayor around to remember."

"I don't think it's the pit." Starlight shook her head, sounding far away. "I think... it's something to do with the ceiling? And everyone is counting on me to succeed."

"Everyone?" Twilight asked. "You mean us, right here?"

"I don't remember." Starlight frowned. "It feels important. But also like it doesn't quite fit in my mind. Like... a piece from a different puzzle." She turned pointedly back to the road. "I'll think about it more once we're no longer down here. If something's trying to manipulate me into doing something, I don't feel like going along with it."

Keeper nodded in solidarity. "If there was something down here causing people to feel that way, I don't think we'd notice it. The socialites who reset themselves for fun, they live here on the long bank." He gestured to the rim of the pit, to his mansion, and to the southern riverbank extending up the tunnel to the northwest. "But some of us have big enough scars that just erasing their memory isn't big enough. Even once they're fresh, they'll slowly start remembering feelings without context, like spontaneous guilt or fear. There's not a lot we can do for them aside from being ready to erase again the moment they have a crisis."

Rainbow glanced across the waterfall pit and the bowl before it where the rivers collided. "So they're all on the other bank, or something?"

"They live on the short bank," Keeper agreed. "Mostly to stay away from the socialites, to try to avoid interactions that could bring back those feelings. But also so they have to go through my place first if they want to reach the abyss."

Halfway around the pit's rim, Rainbow could see that spur jutting out over the boundary. "Knew it," she dryly cheered.

"You don't mean..." Twilight trailed off.

"Have I not driven home yet that not everyone is as attached to this world as you seem to be?" Keeper raised an eyebrow. "If it sets your mind at ease, our system actually works quite well. The abyss promises a much more gentle end than jumping in the river, and all of us revere it, whether troubled or not. So when the path to get there is longer, and help is positioned directly on the way... I don't know any units of time that would be meaningful to you, but the abyss hasn't claimed a living soul in a very long time."

Twilight looked only very slightly pacified, and Rainbow didn't blame her. If the ponies down here had completely lost the will to live, there was a great solution to that: not living in a pointless and gloomy cave.

Keeper looked harangued enough already, so she hesitated to drive it home. In fact, he looked like he already knew what she was going to say. A simple raised eyebrow was all she needed.

"...The point is, if you're having strong feelings with no context and don't understand why, you'll be in good company over there." Keeper sagged, pointing across the river. "I've had as much of this as I can take. The two you're looking for were in my mansion all along, there's a back room... I wanted to show you our town to make you understand, so that you'd agree to leave us alone and prevent any other ghosts from following you. It's not working. Any more listening to you, and I don't know if I'll be able to fulfill my duties anymore, and then... Just go. I need to put this out of mind the normal way."

"...I've changed my mind," Starlight said, straightening up. "This isn't the same as my old village. However it started, if you're the only thing holding it together... This isn't an engineered trap, and it's not powered by malice or delusions. It's just a self-sustaining pit of despair. Without hope, you'll never remember to seek the surface. All of Equestria is waiting for you just beyond that barrier..." She stared up at the jagged, pointy ceiling with a glare that challenged it to crumble to dust. "That's what I'm supposed to do here."

Rainbow blinked at Twilight as Starlight hovered, soaring off towards the mansion. "Never seen her talk like that before."

"Oh, um...!" Keeper reached out a hoof after her. "Try not to fly directly above the abyss? Not that I doubt however you're flying like that, but that's kind of like taunting our deity and we don't actually know if it's possible to fly back out again if you fall too far in..."

"Eh, don't worry about it." Rainbow patted him on the shoulder. "She's survived falling off like six cliffs way higher than this before she even learned that trick. More likely the abyss would break from her hitting the bottom."

Keeper tapped his forehooves together. "It's also our guardian deity, so that wouldn't be good either..."

Rainbow was already gone.

Given how tired of them Keeper seemed to be when they left, Rainbow Dash guessed that waiting for him to catch up would leave them waiting forever. Still, barging into his house when they knew he wasn't there felt just a little rude, and while Rainbow usually didn't mind being rude, things were different when it was to someone she felt bad for.

But Seigetsu had no such reservations.

"Seigetsu," Twilight called, chasing the dragon as she strode back into the large open chamber of Keeper's mansion. "Before we find them, do you have a moment?"

"I suppose," Seigetsu said, stopping and turning as Twilight, Starlight and Rainbow grouped up before her. "Though I can already guess what this is about."

"This whole city is upside-down," Twilight told her with a grimace. "It's completely antithetical to everything I stand for, and even if some of the ponies seem to be having a superficially good time, the ones on the other bank clearly aren't. But everyone here still thinks it's working."

Seigetsu raised an eyebrow. "Are you troubled by the ethical issues of imposing your own worldview on a society that holds a separate one?"

"Well..." Twilight's ears fell. "Yes. I mean, I don't know. But whether I am or not, you clearly don't intend to leave this place alone. And if you capture the two batponies who are erasing their memories and take them with you, then this town will be destroyed. They're using the memory magic as a crutch to release the pressure of living in such deplorable conditions, and if you take it away, I doubt they'll last a week before they start fighting each other. So... what are you going to do? You can't just take their means of survival and then leave them to their fate."

Seigetsu nodded slowly. "Are you using your presumption of my future actions to avoid making the choice yourself?"

Twilight blinked. "Are you saying you're not going to take them?"

"No," Seigetsu said. "I'm simply asking if that's a choice you are willing to make, or if you must rely on others to make it for you."

"I..." Twilight swallowed. "I know I'm right. They don't understand how bad they have it because their society fundamentally disallows them from knowing. There's no possibility they can change on their own, and I couldn't live with myself if I left them like this. I don't even know why I should be hesitating. Just, taking away the only home they've ever known, when I don't actually know for sure what it's like to live like this... Should I really be the one making that decision? Shouldn't it be them?"

"Does it matter if you can't decide?" Starlight asked. "Ever since we became friends, you've been asking me to rely on your judgement if I can't see what's right. Can't you do the same? Because for me, this problem is very easy."

She gestured at the rough stone pillars surrounding them. "This place has no hope by design. Their futures get stolen again and again so they don't have to fear them, but they have nothing to strive towards or look forward to as well. This is what I was feeling out there. It's so bleak that even I couldn't see how my role as a Flame of Harmony fit into it... because it didn't. This picture they've made doesn't require me and is complete without me, to such a degree that I couldn't even remember what my purpose is. And now I haven't remembered this strongly for a very long time."

Twilight stared at her.

"The Flames of Harmony are this world's fabric and foundation," Starlight said, running a hoof along a pillar. "They're supposed to be its essence, present in everything. But they're not, and that imperfection is what gave me so much grief as a filly. I couldn't live with it. And maybe I'm not supposed to. As a filly, I didn't have the power to fix it, but isn't that supposed to be different now? This town does not belong in a harmonic world. And we have the power to let the light in, break the cycle happening here, and give these ponies back to society with the help they need to re-learn how to face the sun with the pride of the living."

Something intense burned in Starlight's eyes, and Rainbow Dash found herself speechless.

"You're both bearers of harmony," Starlight said. "Isn't this our purpose?"

"Starlight..." Twilight's voice hitched. "All three of us are also ponies. The whole point of the story of your foalhood was that the principles of harmony are too abstract and uncompromising to be used purely on their own merits. That's why they're loaned to ponies like me and the other element bearers. So that... we can make our own decisions when life is too complex to let a single principle tell us what to do."

"And now that it's come to that, you're having trouble making a decision," Starlight pointed out. "I'm not. If you think I'm wrong, I'll... I want to respect you, but ignoring my purpose here would be no less painful than when I tried to deny my desires as a filly. Is it really worth that to trust ponies who obviously can't know any better to make the right choice with their lives?"

Twilight bit her lip.

Seigetsu waited.

Rainbow still didn't know what to say.

"...The reason I can't decide is because neither answer is acceptable," Twilight finally said. "I couldn't live with myself if I left them alone, but it feels wrong to take away what they have here without even asking. If I had more time, I'd stay down here, try to convince them to see the surface and live without the promise that their decisions don't matter. But with their worldview, they have no possible reason to agree. I'd just be wasting time, which would delay our trip to Ironridge, and they actually want our help. Even with all the powers Princess Celestia just entrusted me with, I don't have the capacity to do everything the right way. I just don't have the time to be everywhere at once, do I?"

She gave a weak chuckle. "Is this how you felt, Starlight, trying to take responsibility for your entire world?"

Starlight evaluated her seriously. "No. If it was, you'd be a lot more desperate."

Twilight sighed, then straightened up. "Seigetsu. If I ordered you to leave the batponies alone and go back to Snowport with us, would you do it? Would you trust me to put something together so that someone else can find and help this place properly in our stead?"

"I think you misunderstand my goals," Seigetsu said, tapping a claw with her arms folded in front of her. "The well-being of the populace here barely ranks third on my priority list. Above that, I have a cold case to crack, and if the fugitives have indeed purged themselves of their knowledge of their own motives, that will require opening this place up for a deeper investigation... which will certainly be conducted by Halandyne, whom I have no authority over. But most importantly, I am tasked with observing how you use the Aegis."

Twilight frowned. "Well, I can tell you right now I don't need Aegis to accomplish anything here."

"Perhaps not now," Seigetsu agreed. "But you are still basing your decisions off a concern for the free will of mortals. While this is admirable, you are a goddess in possession of power to be a goddess among goddesses. Meanwhile, they have chosen to exist in such a manner that their decisions are completely without consequence. Their wills are meaningless. They choose for them to be meaningless, because the one choice they have that retains meaning is whether or not to partake in their cycle of erasure. And we have just finished hearing from the one creature down here who seems at all inclined not to embrace it."

She fixed Twilight with a pointed stare. "Your will has the authority to shape nations. Theirs is nothing against yours. It is nothing by choice. They are less than children weighted against a parent even compared to my will. To value these equally would be to commit a grave mathematical error, and yet to do so is still within your rights as a goddess. Is this the kind of ruler you will be, allowing the use of your absolute and singular power to be influenced by those who have already relinquished their stake in the outcome?"

"No," Twilight told her, voice firm. "No, the error would be to weigh the strength of our wills against each other in the first place. You're trying to see what kind of ruler or goddess I'll be, how steadily I can manage this power? Then watch me."

She let out a deep breath. "Seigetsu, do what you came here to do. The world changes around us and forces us to adapt, and now it's going to do the same to them. This is because of your investigation and the worldly consequences of whatever those batponies did, not the whim of a goddess. The ponies here closing their eyes to that reality doesn't make it go away. And I choose not to protect them from that. It won't be a goddess that demolishes their lives here, but the natural flow of the world. The same way it works for everyone else."

Then she turned to Starlight. "And then we'll be there for them when it happens. It doesn't take a Flame of Harmony to help someone rebuild when their life falls apart. Anyone can offer a hoof to someone who's lost and show them a way. We don't need to do this as goddesses or as avatars of harmony. We can do it as regular ponies who happen to be in the right place at the right time. Once word spreads that their way of life here is unsustainable, which should happen quickly, we can offer them a place in the Crystal Empire, and others can step in to walk with them from there. We don't need to be Convergence and Hope. We can do it as just Twilight and Starlight. Will you try it this way with me?"

Seigetsu stared at her for a moment. "Interesting."

"Don't think this means I don't understand your point, or that I won't use this power when I need to," Twilight added. "I just think that right now, I don't need to. I know this sounds strange coming from someone with as much power as I've been given, but I have faith in ponies' abilities to make the world better on their own. More faith than I have in a single goddess to choose the best course for everyone, especially when their biggest problem is that they've lost their understanding of how to act on their own behalves. As a goddess, I could command Aegis to blow off the roof of this place, then levitate everyone out whether they struggle or not. But as a pony, I can show them that there are still roads towards the future, even in the face of adversity. That they don't need to rely on shortcuts like memory magic, or on waiting for someone more powerful to have their way with them."

She squared her shoulders. "So it's not that I don't know how to solve this, or that I'm afraid to use my power for fear of wronging them, or that I want someone else to decide in my stead. It's that remaking their world by force for them is the wrong tool for the job. They'll learn much more if we set an example they can live by and use to overcome adversity. And for an example that will be relevant to ponies as weak as they are, we won't need any powers or authority at all."

Starlight was stunned.

Twilight offered her a hoof. "I think you could benefit a lot too from being the one to show them this."

Starlight grabbed her in a hug, burying her face in Twilight's still-slightly-ethereal mane. Twilight took a step back in surprise.

"I wish I could see what you see," Starlight eventually said, extracting her face and breaking the hug. "When you put it like that, I can believe it, but I've never known anything other than giving every fiber of my being towards a goal, or forcing myself to give up. You don't think they'll, I don't know, blame us for being in Seigetsu's company when she's the one doing the wrecking?"

"If they do, then they'll just get an extra lesson that other ponies don't do only things you like or only things you don't like." Twilight shook her head. "Maybe some of them will decide to resent us for coming here. Maybe some of them won't take it any differently from how they would if we excavated this place and didn't give them a choice, and just relocated them by force. But if they're asking questions about their lot in life again, that's a step towards looking for answers and re-engaging with the world."

"If you say so," Starlight said. "But let's still do this quickly. The feeling this place is giving me is really strong."

The Weight of Life

Rainbow Dash had to admit it: she was just a little jealous of Twilight and Starlight's exchange.

Not that jealous. The facts were clearly in Starlight's favor: there was copious amounts of dark magic at play, and the whole town needed a harmony laser to the face before any amount of diplomacy or being nice would work. And when had they ever needed to ask permission to blast someone with the Elements of Harmony, anyway? But still. A little jealous.

"So where's the door to the back room Keeper mentioned?" Twilight asked, poking around behind the pillars near the stone alcove bed against the back wall. "There's a lot of space here to hide a door, but it shouldn't be that well-hidden..."

"This place doesn't have doors, remember?" Starlight replied, pressing her telekinesis field into a wall to search for cavities beyond. "It's probably some waterlogged hole that looks like a ventilation shaft."

"No, it is quite hidden," Seigetsu replied. "I believe it is behind this bed."

"What, like, the bed moves?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow, hovering near the ceiling where she was searching. "Has this place even invented the wheel? And how do they get out if Keeper's sleeping?"

Seigetsu shook her head. "And it is wise not to leave the source of their memory loss exposed to the general populace. Were anyone to have regrets about their decision, these clerics would be the most obvious target for vengeance. As for the entrance..." She tapped on the alcove bed's far wall. "This is a light facade. Strong telekinesis could do the trick, or one could simple shadow sneak through the cracks."

Twilight flew closer, lighting her horn and focusing on the bed's far wall. "Huh, you're right," she remarked as it dislodged and floated aside.

Just as promised, there was a modest opening in the rock behind the bed. It led into a semi-natural tunnel that sloped upwards slightly for drainage before opening into a room-sized cave connected to several others. These were less decorated and just as sparsely furnished as the mansion's main room, lit with only a single sconce that held a small, partly-charged crystal.

"On your guard," Seigetsu instructed, carrying her purple weapon and motioning for everyone else to stay behind her, Twilight and Starlight's horns both brightening until they completely overwhelmed the tiny lamp. "Something approaches."

Something shuffled in one of the other entrances, and out stepped a creature that had once been a batpony.

Elderly and completely gray, it had the head and chest of a stallion, but its limbs and barrel broke away into a pony-shaped cutout, beyond which was a swirling, empty void of distant purple fog and cold lightning. Rainbow had heard about batponies who became attuned to Nightmare Modules from Starlight and her stories, and had always wondered whether and how much she was exaggerating, but there was no mistaking it: that was what this was, his gray body flaking away like chipped paint as it gave way to nothingness and then reassembled itself at the hooves.

Rainbow's gut told her this wouldn't come to a fight. The creature looked tired, defeated and cold.

"Who are you?" he asked, looking up at Seigetsu with empty eyes that squinted against the light of the horns. "It's so bright... What do you want with someone like me?"

Seigetsu loomed over him with stern pity. "Yelvey."

"What?" The stallion's ears folded in confusion as he lifted his head.

Rainbow noted that even though Seigetsu was talking to him, and even though Twilight and Starlight's horns were the source of the glare, he was still trying to look at them - and at herself, as well - more than Seigetsu.

Twilight noticed this too. "Sorry," she apologized. "We know how shadow sneaking works, and we can't risk getting snuck up on when our memories are at stake. We can turn them down once we can see Nencosay."

But Starlight shook her head. "I don't think he's talking about that kind of brightness."

Yelvey slowly nodded. "It's the corona. You aren't like the others here. Please..."

"...You truly are gone," Seigetsu sighed, shoulders firm. "Do you have any understanding of who we are, why we are here, and what you have done?"

Yelvey cowered. "I can't remember. They said I was someone important on the surface who guided hundreds here to find peace from their failures, but I can't remember. Now that my duties are complete, they said I came here to share in the reward... but there is no peace here. This place belongs to a nameless guilt, and we can't hide!"

Seigetsu's eyes widened.

"This must be my punishment for tricking others into coming here," Yelvey whispered, prostrated flat on the floor. "Please. You must leave this place before that darkness claims you as well..."

"It's the other way around." Twilight adamantly shook her head. "We've come to let the light in. There won't be any frantic escape: we're going to build a road so that everyone here can leave with their heads held high. And that starts with you and Nencosay. Do you know where she is?"

Yelvey betrayed a glance towards the room he had come from. "Just in there. But why do you think you can help us? The darkness is already coiled around you. I can see it, seeping into your wounds. Even people like you have guilts and regrets. It's coming for you! You have to leave before it's too late!"

Seigetsu eyed the tunnel he had indicated, its ceiling low enough that she would have to duck to pass through. "Nencosay!" she called, voice echoing off the damp rocks. "Come forth!"

"Something isn't right," Starlight warned, sticking close to Twilight and Rainbow. "I don't know if this is the work of a self-sustaining cycle anymore. And if it is, it might have birthed something more than a village with no reason for living."

"You don't say?" Rainbow raised a sarcastic eyebrow.

Twilight stared at Yelvey for a moment longer, and then nodded. "If there's something stronger than twisted momentum keeping these ponies down here, then we'll deal with it like we always do and help the villagers after. First things first, we can start by purging Yelvey and Nencosay of Nightmare Moon's influence."

"Think it's gonna matter that half of us are still up on the ship?" Rainbow asked. "We don't have the Elements on us, either."

"We have two Societal Virtues," Starlight answered, keeping her voice low. "That should be more than enough. We'll go as soon as Nencosay appears and get both of them at once?"

Twilight nodded.

"That would be appreciated," Seigetsu murmured, watching the shadows of the tunnel. "On your guard. Someone approaches."

Moments later, a mare appeared from the gloom, skittishly pausing at the edge of the light... but this definitely wasn't Nencosay. Small and mousey, she had a tan coat and fluffy orange mane that hid a stubby unicorn horn, and wide, haunted eyes. Her cutie mark showed a plain, empty circle, and she wore the face of someone who had been conscripted to work in a torture chamber against her wishes, with a tiny smile that seemed to have just realized all of reality was a cruel, awful joke.

Seigetsu blinked at her demeanor, then frowned. "You must be Misophaes. The food-maker."

"You know me?" The mare timidly brightened, taking a step closer. "I-I've forgotten about you. Over and over. I don't e-even remember what I did to you. But you remember, don't you?"

"I've never met you." Seigetsu shook her head, keeping one eye on Yelvey and another on the room's entrances at all times. "My only business here is with Yelvey and Nencosay."

Misophaes turned expectantly to Rainbow and her friends.

"I don't know you either." Twilight shook her head. "But we can find someone who does on the surface, if you can hold out just a little longer. Do you know where Nencosay is?"

"You don't have to lie," Misophaes whispered. "I can feel the malice in your voices. Unless lying is how you're trying to hurt me? You don't need to hold back. I won't remember you, anyway."

"Uhh, what malice?" Rainbow squinted at her. "Is this what all the north bank ponies are like? We only saw the creepy ones on the south..."

"Um, yes!" Misophaes brightened. "They won't remember any of your cruel impulses either, so if you're looking for a good place to-"

"We are looking for Nencosay," Seigetsu sternly interrupted. "If you have nothing better to do than talk, then find her and bring her here."

Misophaes nodded, shaking. "Betray her over to you. That m-makes sense. What better punishment for my sins than to be forced to sin even more? The weight can increase, but never go back down. You understand that. You understand that..."

She shuffled back into the tunnel, muttering to herself in the distance.

Rainbow blankly stared after her. "That wasn't anything we did, right? Does she just think everyone's as messed up as she is?"

Twilight looked disturbed. "There's no way someone can actually think like that. And if she does, I..." She wiped her forehead with a wing. "Maybe I have bit off more than I can chew with trying to help this town. But I'm still going to try." She glanced at Starlight. "Is there any chance she was under the influence of something that could alter her thoughts, like the Nightmare Modules do? Her cutie mark looked kind of unnatural. Maybe that?"

"Could be." Starlight just looked jaded. "I told you, it feels dangerous down here to use the powers I'd need to tell for sure. But some people are just broken, and others are just rotten. And for every one you can save from an evil influence, like Puddles, there'll be someone like Chauncey who would still be evil even if you took it away. The one she reminds me of most strongly is Crystal, though not as desperate or mean. Either way, if you think there's a perfect solution for something like this, go ahead and prove it. Consider it an easy mode trial run for what we'll find in the north. And let me know when you're ready to use force."

Rainbow glanced at Yelvey, who was still prostrated on the floor. "You got any words of wisdom, old geezer?"

"About Misophaes?" He weakly lifted his head. "She's waiting here to be judged for sins she doesn't remember. The darkness has claimed her completely. We can take away her knowledge, but never her guilt. Everyone else is like her, to an extent. They say she's one of the founders who has been here the longest, and requested erasure the most. If you stay here, you'll become like her too, in the end..."

He slumped again, seemingly drained just by being in everyone's presence.

"I'm still with Starlight," Rainbow said. "These guys are bad for each other. I say we do whatever we can to get them as far away from each other as possible, as fast as possible. And if any chaos rears its head, we blast first and ask questions later."

"There is actually a rather pertinent question that's been on my mind," Seigetsu said. "And seeing as we are presently waiting... Yelvey claims that he guided hundreds here, but this is based purely on what the villagers have told him. Keeper gave us the present tally at one hundred and fifty three, a figure I have no reason to doubt. And for Yelvey to have come here at all, it is likely he did know of this place in advance. But I have made it my life's work to unravel this mystery, and despite my authority as an inquisitor and my family's control over Snowport, I am aware of barely a tenth of the number of unresolved missing person cases it would take to explain this. In fact, I refreshed myself on the subject at your own request just this week. And not once during our tour did the faces I saw here match any visages of those who were known to be missing."

Twilight tilted her head. "You know, I didn't see any crystal ponies here either, and the Empire has been back for a while. And neither have I seen any Abyssinians. If these villagers were coming from the nearby surface towns, then the population should be more representative. Does that mean Yelvey wasn't sending anyone here? Where did everyone here come from?"

"Maybe they were born here?" Rainbow suggested with a shrug. "Surely some of these dudes spend their boring eternities down here getting it on."

But Starlight shook her head. "I haven't seen a single foal here, or anyone younger than Keeper at all."

Rainbow was tempted to ask Yelvey... but Seigetsu held out a hand, quieting the discussion as a light appeared again in the tunnel. It was Misophaes, carrying a sleeping, nightmare-cursed batpony in her aura with a look of guilty validation.

"Here she is," Misophaes greeted, setting the mare down next to Yelvey - she looked even older than he was. "She almost never wakes up anymore unless someone wakes her, so I l-left her asleep for you." Her horn went out, and she turned to Seigetsu expectantly. "Now you're going to praise me for this, r-right? To make me feel worse for doing something that was wrong."

"...Thank you," Seigetsu said, hesitating slightly before saying it. "Now, if you would stand back..."

Rainbow nodded, setting her teeth in a grin. "It's harmony blasting time!"

Twilight and Starlight's horns were already lit for their floodlight spells, but suddenly they lit brighter, the ground seeming to groan beneath Rainbow's hooves. The two mages stepped closer until they were side by side, filaments of ruby red flooding into Twilight's aura and mixing in a swirl with her usual lavender just as midnight blue did the same for Starlight. Twilight's starry mane, which had been almost suppressed into something resembling hairs again, burst back into an ethereal cloud, and faint echoes of runes appeared, orbiting in a disk of light around Starlight's barrel.

The air rumbled with thunder and crackled with tension as their auras reached together and merged, sweeping forward in a wave that refracted around the tiny cavern and surged through Yelvey and Nencosay. The two batponies' bodies resisted at first, then broke like paper, letting through a spray of chromatic energy tainted with a deluge of black, that deluge slowing to a trickle as the seconds passed and the harmony became more pure, running out of taint to purge.

"Whew," Rainbow whistled as the light started to fade enough to perceive the room's other creatures as more than backlit silhouettes. "Nice! Never gotten to see one of those I wasn't part of before. Does this look that cool every time we do it?"

But everyone else was focused on the two batponies, splayed on the floor and out cold. They looked tiny and weak, and still not particularly colorful... but the purple voids were gone. Their bodies were whole, as they probably hadn't been in a very long time.

Misophaes blinked, poking her head back out of the tunnel. "What did you do to them?"

"Stripped them of their powers," Rainbow bragged. "Harmony, one; darkness, zero!"

"Impressive," Seigetsu mused, checking over the bodies. "And also unprecedented. I don't believe Cernial even knows whether this is possible. Though it remains to be seen what will be left of them once they regain consciousness... Their pulses are stable, but I suspect they will be out of it for several days."

Something approaching rapture grew in Misophaes' eyes.

Twilight gave her a confident nod. "It's all over now. There won't be any more memory erasure, no more fear of the things you've forgotten. You can all come back to the surface and learn to live again."

Misophaes grabbed her by the shoulders, their muzzles inches apart, staring into Twilight's eyes. "You were angels," she breathed. "Angels disguised as demons. Now we won't know, and we won't be able to forget that we don't know. It's the perfect end to our punishment. Our sentence continues without floor to stand on. Resetting ourselves extended it, but didn't further it! Now we can't run, and our ghosts will push every last one of us into the abyss, all at once!"

Twilight balked.

"I'm going to watch every one of them fall," Misophaes babbled, her voice burning with adoration. "I'll watch it with you! All of you made me help with this, so it's on my hooves as well as yours. Y-You won't even need to make me watch. And I know what you'll do next. Because you understand me. I never thought I'd get to suffer at the hooves of someone who's just as wicked as I am!"

Twilight teleported out of her grasp, expression furious. "We are here to prevent suffering, not to cause it, and no one is throwing themselves into the abyss on our watch! Do you even know what it means to wrong someone? Because the only one you've wronged here is yourself. By living in the dark and knowing only the unknown, all you've accomplished is becoming so afraid that you mistake your own allies for enemies! Do you want to know why you're so afraid? Then get up on the surface and see all the good things you've been hiding from for yourself!"

"Mistaking allies for enemies?" Misophaes tilted her head. "We are our allies' enemies. I betrayed Nencosay to you. Together, we betrayed everyone here serving their sentences. You're going to betray me after they're gone, but I'm ready for that. At first, I wasn't sure why your words never matched the hatred in your tone, but that's just to help it hurt more, isn't it? What more do you want? We're already going to kill everyone."

Twilight's words failed her. Rainbow was ready to knock Misophaes unconscious with a hefty boot to the head, but she restrained herself enough to follow Starlight's lead: Starlight was watching Twilight with the unhappy resignation of watching a friend be proven wrong.

The moment Twilight admitted as much, Rainbow knew, Starlight wasn't even going to give her time to reach Misophaes.

"I-I know," Misophaes stammered, her tiny, knowing smile never vanishing. "Everyone h-here thinks I'm their ally who provides food and keeps them safe. It'll be a bigger betrayal for me than for you, right? But it's not enough for you, so it won't be satisfying, since you don't know them. Well... Well, what if you do know them?"

Rainbow frowned.

"I've got a lot of people serving sentences down here," Misophaes carried on, obliviously eager. "Maybe you do know some of them, just like you knew me and Yelvey and Nencosay? Maybe you have an ally who's missing, who I went up on the surface and kidnapped and brainwashed and then forgot about because I don't remember much, and now they're down here, and you can laugh behind their backs with me as they jump off, or, or, maybe it's an enemy you hurt before but didn't finish off, and then they came here to escape the pain, and now they won't even remember you as you finish what you started! That'll make it better, right!? Or maybe-"

Starlight's eyes went wide.

Twilight put a stern hoof on her shoulder. "Starlight, Maple was trying to find you. She never would have given up in a place like-"

Misophaes, however, perked up even further. "M-Maple? Yes! I do know a Maple! And, and probably others, too! I'll go get everyone! And we'll wait for you! By! The abyss! I'll do my best to hurry!"

Then she jumped to her hooves, weaved around Seigetsu and dashed out the exit to the mansion proper.

Starlight was rigid.

"She was lying through her teeth," Rainbow pointed out. "There's no way you don't know that, right?"

Starlight said nothing.

"Bet you anything we could have given our own names and she'd still have said she knew someone like that down here," Rainbow added.

Twilight nodded firmly. "We know Maple faced a setback with the trains, but there's no way something like that could have caused her to give up. And even if it did, she'd never surrender her memories of you."

But Starlight was staring through the wall, unblinking. "She wouldn't, but what would she think I would do? Maple was there when I gave up part of my own memories once before. She might not want to join a society like this, but if she found out about it, she'd absolutely think to look for me here. And what would they do if she didn't find me and then tried to leave?"

Rainbow vehemently snorted. "Whether that makes sense or not, I'm telling you, that mare was full of it. She's completely delusional. We probably needed to blast her with a harmony laser more than Seigetsu's batpony goons."

Twilight weighed this, but Starlight didn't so much as twitch.

"And besides," Rainbow added, "you got the memories you took from yourself back somehow, right? So this might not even be permanent."

Seigetsu raised an eyebrow. "You've been able to reverse this same effect before? Nightmare Module memory erasure?"

"...Yes," Starlight admitted. "It's hard not to call it a special case. I'm a Flame of Harmony, and it happened a place of power specifically related to me... Probably the second strongest place in the world after my palace, and maybe even stronger, since I've heard that palace is broken. And I only cut out about thirty minutes of memories. So harmony can counteract it somehow, but it could be completely different for an ordinary pony who's had their entire life stripped away again and again. Misophaes was in the room when we purged Yelvey and Nencosay, and she barely even acknowledged it."

"Yeah, but-" Rainbow started, but was cut off.

"Don't you see!?" Starlight burst out. "This is how my power works. It's inevitable. My goals can't become impossible while I still care about them. If Maple's here, and if she's lost her memories, I have a course to pursue to look for a cure. I might spend decades and never find it, but we haven't even seen her yet and the starting point is already right there."

She squeezed her eyes shut. "I was a fool to come here. Maybe I really would have been happier with my head in the sand back in Ponyville, or even Our Town."

"Uh, we still haven't seen her yet," Rainbow pointed out, "and I'm still ninety zillion percent sure that harpy was lying..."

"This is a poor place for speculation," Seigetsu cut in, lifting a hand and transmuting her purple weapon to a chain. "I've accomplished my primary objective, and whether you used to know any of the villagers here or not, it doesn't change what you're going to do next, does it?" She cast a glance at Starlight. "She said she was going to wait for you all before making her move. And whether your loved ones are among them or not, I can't imagine you'll sit by and allow her to start a stampede into the abyss."

"...You're right," Starlight said, letting out a slow breath. "Come on, Twilight. Whether it's your way or my way, we're getting everyone out of this place, whether they like it or not."

Seigetsu lifted both of the unconscious batponies, wrapping the chain around them and binding them gently, albeit firmly, together. But her gaze lingered on the floor where they had been.

Three black, faceted crystals sat there, small and slightly translucent, one beneath Yelvey and two beneath Nencosay.

Rainbow stopped, looking over her shoulder as Twilight and Starlight marched stiffly on ahead. "What's that, moon glass?"

"Nightmare Modules," Seigetsu answered, face creased with concern. "It seems that although you expelled them, they remain intact for another to use. I should confiscate these and return them to the Convocation. If they can cause this much harm in the hooves of those who are bound by oath to Cernial, then in the possession of a stranger..."

"Makes sense," Rainbow said, approaching warily. So this was what Nightmare Moon's power actually looked like in physical form... "But why are there three of them? I thought you guys just gave your spooky clerics the one that erases memories."

"We do," Seigetsu said. "At least, as far as my knowledge extends. The Order of Silence is secretive, and this is the first time in Cernial's history that these powers are known to have been taken away. But speculation on how Nencosay came by another will avail us naught. Rainbow Dash, would you carry these until we return to the airship? I would not invite further complications by carrying those on my person at the same time as the ponies who can use them." She hefted the captive batponies for emphasis.

Rainbow stepped closer, reaching a hesitant wing for the gemstones, itching to chase after her friends but unable to fight the feeling that time wasn't flowing as she looked at these, anyway. "Uh, sure. They won't explode or curse me 'cuz I'm an element bearer, right?"

Seigetsu nodded, and so Rainbow scooped them up. They felt weird to the touch, cold and glassy and almost repulsive, in the sense that they were pushing her away. It was a similar sensation to playing with playing with a pair of weak magnets and holding their similar poles together, only her wing was one of the magnets. She had a feeling it would be easier than usual to accidentally drop them.

"You see a bag or something around here I could stuff these in?" Rainbow asked, searching the few warped crates stacked sporadically by the walls. "Feels like they're gonna try to run away... Hmm, this'll work."

She pulled out an old, mildewed saddlebag, the insignia on the side no longer identifiable. It didn't have any holes, though, and she doubted a place like this could offer better.

Good enough. With the Nightmare Modules clinking softly in her new bag, Rainbow took off after Seigetsu out the tunnel to the mansion proper.

In the mansion's main chamber, Twilight and Starlight were waiting.

"Are you coming?" Starlight called as Rainbow and Seigetsu caught up, voice icy. "Just because she said she'd wait for us doesn't mean we'll have time to spare. We have to act all at once if we're going to stop this from becoming a massacre. Aegis is going to destroy the ceiling, Twilight will try to immobilize everyone with her telekinesis, and I'm going to see if I can cover the entire thing with crystal. What can you two do?"

"Don't worry about me," Rainbow promised, flexing her wings. "I'll do what needs doing. Catching anyone who slips through? Punching out Misophaes? Snapping you out of it if Maple does show up? I've got all your bases covered."

"I have extensive training in-" Seigetsu began

Before she could finish, Keeper appeared in the doorway.

"What are you doing now?" he demanded, walking in. "Misophaes is running out and about unsupervised and more hysterical than usual, and has started rounding up..." His eyes fell on Yelvey and Nencosay, unconscious and chained and carried on Seigetsu's back. "Oh, good grief."

Rainbow gave Seigetsu a look. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure you're going to have your claws full explaining about those two."

Seigetsu met Keeper's eyes. "I believe I made my intentions clear. You can choose not to remember the surface world, but you cannot choose to have us no longer remember you. I am here to take these two back to face justice for their crimes."

Keeper blinked. "You were listening when I told you they don't remember a thing they did to you, right? They're completely different..." He trailed off as Seigetsu turned, showing off the reconstituted hips and legs of her captives. "Ponies..."

"What's done is done," Seigetsu said, resuming her march forward.

Keeper sat down hard, grabbing his face with his hooves. "Misophaes is going to go berserk."

"She already is," Twilight said, walking out the door. "Please try not to be yet another pony we have to worry about as a result."

Rainbow nodded, following her and Starlight past the stunned Keeper and taking some slight courage from the fact that he was more worried about Misophaes' reaction than everyone else's. Maybe that would mean the crowd wasn't going to take this quite as badly as she was...

"Hey, by the way," Rainbow called back at him. "You know any villagers here called Maple?"

"No?" Keeper tilted his head. "What's that have to do with anything?"

"See?" Rainbow bragged, catching up with Starlight. "I told you she was-"

In the plaza outside the mansion, between its front doorway and the rocky spur that protruded over the waterfall, Misophaes was waiting for them. She wasn't alone.

A crowd had gathered to the north, just after the bridge across the river that connected the plaza to the north bank. Dozens upon dozens of bedraggled shapes stood there with muted colors. But next to Misophaes, there was only one: an earth pony, with a long brown braid and ruby eyes.

"...Lying?" Rainbow finished, stopping next to Starlight.

"Maple?" Starlight whispered, her words carried away by the roar of the waterfall.

"You recognize her!" Misophaes' expression brightened, though she still had that same wide, haunted look. "I... I knew it! I'm sure it's my fault she's-"

The time for talking was over before it began. Rainbow kicked off and surged forward, leaving her namesake trail in the air as she outflew a wave of power from Twilight and Starlight's horns. She twirled as she reached the ledge, smashing a hind leg down in a brutal axe kick on Misophaes' skull and locking her forehooves around Maple's barrel, seizing the startled earth pony and lifting her into the air.

Starlight's energy outraced her the moment she pulled up, spreading out over the abyss and solidifying into a massive, all-encompassing sheet of crystal, growing all the way to the far bank and then northward to cover the rivers as well. As Rainbow doubled back, she saw the entire crowd of spectators pinned against the ground by Twilight's telekinesis, Misophaes included. The assault was so effective that Seigetsu was left with nothing to do.

But that didn't make it remotely alright. "What are you doing here?" Rainbow demanded, slamming to the ground by her friends and depositing the shell-shocked Maple. "She was bluffing, Keeper just said she was bluffing, there's no way you would have come here in the first place! Starlight, this isn't what Maple looked like, right? We've got the wrong mare, right?"

Starlight regarded them with empty eyes, and then lifted herself in her telekinesis and started to ascend. Twilight looked up, watching her rise.

Rainbow looked back at her captive, staring her angrily, desperately in the eyes, but how was she supposed to pierce the illusion for a mare she had never met? "Hey, Keeper!" she shouted over her shoulder. "You know this one's name?"

But she could still see him sitting inside the mansion door, well out of earshot.

This was a hoax. This had to be a hoax. All the evidence pointed to this being a hoax... and then she finally saw it.

The Maple before her was terribly groomed and in sorry shape, but there was no mistaking her for someone who would now be in their early forties: she was still young, a similar mid-twenties to how she had been described in Starlight's story.

"I knew it! She's bogus!" Rainbow cried out, dropping the imposter and waving up at Starlight. "Hey Starlight, this has gotta be a changeling or something! There's no-"

Twilight tapped her on the shoulder, and pointed to the pinned-down crowd Misophaes had roused from the north shore. And when Rainbow saw what Twilight did, she went completely slack.

Fluttershy was there. So were her parents. And others she didn't care about as much, like her boss on the weather squad at Cloudsdale. And the more she looked, the more she saw.

A gaggle of young unicorns she was pretty sure had been Twilight's school friends in Canterlot, including Lyra. And off to one side, there was even an orange unicorn with a red, blown-back mane standing next to a charcoal batpony with emerald eyes.

Rainbow's attention snapped back to Misophaes, who was starting to recover, the spot where Rainbow had kicked her flickering faintly with green flames.

And then the light came.

First, it appeared in the middle of the ceiling, and spread to the corners faster than Rainbow could follow. Then, it descended, the bulge at the bottom of a solid sphere burrowing deeper, reaching closer through the ground. The light's surface bowed, swimming with currents of devastation, carrying a hollow roar like an engine echoing inside a tube the size of a mountain.

And then there was Starlight. Glowing with power and yet backlit by the eruption, hovering in the air beneath the orb as it grew and descended, she cut a silhouette that belonged more to a weapon than a pony. It was her virtue's midnight blue, the same power she and Twilight had unleashed together in the back tunnels to purge Yelvey and Nencosay of their Nightmare Modules. But that had been a familiar harmony, the kind Rainbow placed her faith in to always win the day.

This power, with its contrasting sheens and eddying currents and infinite depth, was a power unbound by sentiment. There was no grand speech, no lesson to be taught, only destruction and destroyer. And then all at once, it vanished, and nothing remained.

Everything beyond the perimeter of the blast was unscathed, save for a few inches of burned and blackened rock. Everything within that perimeter was no more.

It was as if a sphere had been cut out of reality and replaced with empty air, cutting down into the earth, unnaturally smooth and unnaturally round. Beyond was a cloud of dispersing steam, swamp water displaced by the edges of the blast. Amid the cloud was Aegis, draconic wings spread, coursing with power and hovering in place, like a symbol stamped on the heavens of what had been done here. And beyond that were the stars, with the rising moon just beginning to peek over the edge of the crater.

Seigetsu stared impassively at the destruction as Starlight slowly landed, losing her glow, once again recognizable as a normal pony.

"Your life here is over," Twilight said, resigned, unwilling to let the silence continue. Only the sound of the waterfall accompanied her, muffled by a thick layer of crystal. "But the rest of your lives-"

Rainbow's focus finally turned to the villagers in the plaza, washed in moonlight, their restraints no longer necessary. They stared at the sky, at the moon, with strange looks on their faces that seemed to finally understand something.

And then they started melting.

At first, the textures of their coats and manes took on a weird, glossy sheen, like they were made of water instead of fur. And then, with a sound like a million gentle sighs, they started sloughing apart, losing their color, watching the sky and dripping with water as they deformed into pony-shaped piles of gray, flaky mush that looked just like their so-called food.

Rainbow was too stunned to move as Misophaes scrambled to her hooves and rushed to the melting Maple clone. "What's going on?" Misophaes panicked, lighting her horn and digging her hooves into Maple's mush. "That's n-not supposed to happen! No, no, I can fix you, there's still something you're good for! If I don't fulfill my end of the bargain...!"

The mush reacted to her molding, and soon Maple was rebuilt. But no sooner had Misophaes moved on to another of the melting villagers than she began to fall apart again, just like before.

"Dude..." Rainbow felt her bile rise as she looked around at the crowd, and then back over her shoulder to the south bank where she had toured with Keeper. There, shadowed by the crater wall so that the moonlight couldn't touch them, more villagers were watching, though they had blank expressions that suggested they couldn't even process what they were seeing, even though they remained intact. "What the hay?"

The piles kept receding, melting into water that dribbled off into the river and the abyss. Aside from Rainbow's entourage, the only people exposed to the moonlight who hadn't disappeared were Keeper, the two batponies, and Misophaes. The latter was still scrambling, and Keeper was leaning against the door to the mansion, frozen in horror.

"This can't be," Twilight whispered.

"I'm sorry, Twilight," Starlight sighed, landing softly at her side. "Not every problem can be a friendship problem in the end. It looks like this one was just one monster and her self-made prison."

"What...?" Keeper started to break out of his stupor. "Did she make all of us? Were we...?"

"Those must have been changelings," Starlight said, voice heavy. "Or, at least, once been changelings. Changeling bodies are made from hope given physical form. There's a very specific way you can kill them that reverts them back to their base components... and it looks somewhat like that. I don't know if these ones were somehow made incorrectly or just poisoned, but I think the reason they can exist in the first place is as a manifestation of their will to exist. It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy. Maybe it was the food. Maybe it was the despair of this place. But if that's even close to true, I'm surprised they didn't fall apart long ago."

Twilight took a hollow step closer. "Did we do this, then? Did we kill them?"

"You can't kill what was already dead," Starlight replied, emotionless. "And they might not have had souls at all to begin with."

"Then... what about me?" Keeper asked, slinking closer with his ears back, unable to resist looking at the moon. "What am I, then?"

Seigetsu gave him a sympathetic look. "I suspect," she said, "that this place was originally founded by a small, transient community who came into contact with Misophaes and Nencosay. I don't know the details of how you experienced new arrivals in your community. Yelvey must have had something to do with it, for him to seek you out himself. But the vast majority of them were mere fabrications introduced into your midst, perhaps even the same bodies changing forms as time passed. I would hazard a guess that everyone who was truly living met their end in the abyss long ago, after constant exposure to this oppressive atmosphere and the lack of meaning brought about by such pervasive impermanence. In fact, it's something of a wonder that you never joined them."

Keeper stared blankly at the ground.

"Not all of them," he eventually said. "It happened when I was young, so I don't remember well. But Misophaes used to have a disciple who left the village with someone and ran away."

Rainbow listened closer, curious.

"Everyone forgot and stopped talking about it before I was old enough to learn the details," Keeper apologized. "I think he left with someone who was new to the village. It might have just been something like this, where you came here to take someone, and didn't mean to stay. But, like. Not everyone."

"I'm not entirely sure what we can do with that." Seigetsu shook her head.

"So... what now?" Keeper curled up again. "Our home is..."

Twilight offered him a hoof.

He looked blankly at it. "You got the two you came for. You destroyed everything else. I mean, apparently it never even existed to begin with. What do you want with me?"

Twilight gave Starlight a pointed look for her to come and watch, then turned back to Keeper. "You can't tell me you think you have a history on the surface to run away from. You've lived your whole life down here. So why not give the rest of the world a try? I've got plenty of places you could stay and friends who could help you build something new for yourself. This place doesn't have to be the sum total of your existence."

"Right," Keeper halfheartedly scoffed. "And if that's such a good and trustworthy deal, who would ever want to come down here instead?"

"How many people actually wanted that?" Twilight asked, looking out over the puddles where the slush piles had once been. "It looks like there was almost no one here."

Keeper hesitated, then pointed at the batponies carried by Seigetsu. "He did. Yelvey was real, wasn't he?"

"And it sounds like he regretted it." Twilight shook her head. "This town is finished. The ones who haven't looked at the moon, we'll get someone down here to check on them, learn what we can and see if any have anything left inside. And if they do, we'll help them. But there's no future here. Will you come with us?"

She offered a hoof again, trust me written in her eyes.

"Guess I don't have much to lose." Keeper hung his head, then took it.

"See?" Twilight turned back over her shoulder to look at Starlight. "Even if they don't look like it, every problem can be a friendship problem at its core."

Starlight glumly stepped over, Aegis still hovering in the background. "I don't have it in me to be optimistic or learn from this right now. I'm too tired. I thought... Everyone's been talking about Maple since I got to Snowport, but how was I supposed to prepare myself for finding her in this hole in the ground? I wanted to trust you and do things your way, but when I heard that, and then when I saw her..."

She swallowed and looked away. "You were right. You and Rainbow. This isn't something Maple would ever agree to, and she knows what batponies with Nightmare Modules look like. They probably couldn't have tricked her or overpowered her either. It was a silly fear. It wasn't rational. But in the moment, I..."

"I know." Twilight put a wing on her shuddering shoulder.

"Bet you this is what Yelvey meant when he talked about the darkness already finding us," Rainbow added. "Wonder if he could tell that we all had regrets for this place to exploit, just by looking at us."

Twilight nodded, straightening up. "But we were stronger than it. Tomorrow morning, this will all have been a passing nightmare, and we can continue on our mission with one more dark spot on the world brought back to harmony."

"Yeah, so about that..." Rainbow looked over her shoulder towards the crystal covering above the abyss, where Misophaes was sitting on the remains of the outcropping, slumped and staring into the darkness. "We've still got a pretty clear culprit for this whole madhouse on our hooves. There were a bunch of changelings involved, who might have been rewired on the spot to look like our friends. Bet you that means they really were mindless drones, and being controlled by a powerful enough empath to read our own worst fears... even if she wasn't a skilled enough empath to make those fears believable. Even saw her healing an injury with green flames, too. Now, who does all that remind you of?"

Starlight sighed and got to her hooves, taking a step towards the ledge. "I suppose it wasn't just a feeling after all..." She cleared her throat. "Hey! Crystal! That's your real name, isn't it?"

Misophaes scowled back at her in confusion.

"Hold on," Twilight muttered, motioning for her to stop. "Chrysalis attacked Canterlot just a few years ago. Misophaes has been here since Keeper was born. The math doesn't line up."

"And Chrysalis is supposed to be manipulating Yakyakistan, too," Starlight agreed. "But the evidence is irrefutable. Crystal..." She squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them again. "How did you end up like this?"

Misophaes stood up, the outcropping creating just enough rise beneath her for her to look down on Starlight. "I don't understand you. You came here to make me suffer. You forced me to commit evil. You invited me to commit more as my punishment. Then you stopped me and killed them all yourselves. Why didn't you make me sully my hooves? Is this what you want, or isn't it? I just don't understand..."

Twilight firmly shook her head. "We came here to follow through on Seigetsu's investigation, and after that, to save as many as we could save. We never wanted to kill anyone, or to make you do it either. And if they hadn't all been empty puppets that turned to mush, we'd be having this conversation with all of them."

Misophaes chuckled. "I can still hear the hatred in your justifications. Why can't anyone say what they mean? When you were being evil, I thought I understood you... but maybe I'm overthinking it. Maybe the only point of your existence is to do the opposite of what I want. And I know how to prove it. Watch."

Then she lifted her head towards the hovering Aegis, shook a hoof at it, and shouted, "Kill me! Finish me off like all the rest!"

"No," Twilight said, stepping forward. Rainbow watched Starlight, who did nothing.

Misophaes locked eyes with Twilight. "See? You only exist to get in my way. Everyone exists to keep me from understanding. If you think I'm wrong, then tell me why. Why let me live? Why let me remember? To continue suffering for my crimes? What even were my crimes? I thought I wanted to hide, but you've made that impossible. So what's the answer? How much longer until I can know what this was all for?"

Twilight hesitated.

"If you don't give me an answer, I'll make one," Misophaes threatened. "I'll follow you, and your allies, and I'll hurt them. I'll keep hurting them until what I know I've done matches the weight of the voices, the eyes, the lives... If I can make sense of it, it'll go away. You won't let me forget about the question anymore. So hurry up and finish what you started!"

"I'll tell you what you did," Starlight declared, stepping forward. "You killed your stepfather. He deserved it. You were experimented on by your grandfather, becoming bitter and resentful. You were used as a tool in a misguided and failed attempt to create a god, and when you were the only one left alive you became one yourself. My friends took you in when you had nowhere else to go, looked out for you no matter how much you mistreated them. And in the one instant when our backs were turned, you were laughed at one more time, and decided to abandon your lover, abandon your newborn daughter, and kill every member of your race on the continent. Sound familiar?"

Misophaes frowned.

"I stopped you," Starlight said. "Not in time to save their lives, but I didn't let you get away with it. Remember me? The one filly who could make you flee in terror at the height of your wrath? You exterminated a continent. If you only remember this hole, you can't even comprehend how many souls that is. Real souls, not the puppet drones you kept down here. Is that enough of an answer for you?"

"...No," Misophaes retorted, slowly and deliberately. "Taking lives? Hating people? What does it even matter? You make it sound like I had a reason to do it. What was that reason? And what were the reasons for that? My stepfather deserved it? What's a stepfather, and why did he deserve it? And what was the reason for the reason he deserved it? Where does it all start? Who can I blame who can't just escape by passing that blame to another? Why do the screams haunt me, and not whoever started it? Don't you see? It's because I started it. I deserve this. I sinned, me and no other! But you say I had reasons to do it, so you must be lying. Even if you're not, that c-can't be all... So tell me! Tell me what I did and why I did it and what it was all for so they can finally let me rest..."

Her breathing broke down as she talked, growing more and more desperate, until at last she was crying, and all she could do was cover her head and cower on the ground, sobbing softly in the night.

"It doesn't work like that," Starlight said. "You can't escape from what you've done just by knowing who started it. And those voices you hear? They're not just your conscience speaking for those you killed. Countless other creatures have suffered and died without understanding why, and their regrets and questions were forced onto you. Your existence doesn't give you the luxury of freedom from that, and neither does mine. So you have two choices: become strong enough to carry the weight of those lives, without hiding in this pit and knowing you'll never find an answer good enough to let them rest. Or you can die."

Her horn went out, and with a smooth flash, all the crystal covering the abyss disappeared. Misophaes was surrounded on three sides by water and darkness, and the only way out led to Starlight.

"Starlight!" Twilight took an urgent step forward.

Starlight held out a hoof to stop her. "No. We did the rest of this my way, despite what both of us agreed was best, and you didn't have a choice. Now I'm going to do this your way. For my own sake, I need to see if this will work... and if it doesn't, I'm the one who allowed this to happen by letting her get away decades ago. One way or another, ending this is my responsibility."

Twilight didn't back down, but she didn't press forward, either.

"Well?" Starlight challenged, staring down Misophaes. "Death? Or an impossible life? It's not a question of which is easier, but you have no other options. I know what it's like to bury your head in a false paradise for years and forget about everything that matters. And I'm still trying to find a way to live while facing the future and the past. I haven't found it yet. I'm still a thug who can only solve problems with brute force, but I could get there someday! Can you live with the possibility that I could find that answer and you won't be there to see it?"

Misophaes hunched over like a cornered animal. "If you believe in a possibility like that, then you're nothing like me."

Starlight was unbowed. "If you don't believe in it, then why are you still asking? Just want to see us squirm in the face of questions we can't answer? Or could it be that you know what my power is?"

Misophaes glared at her in challenge.

"I can grant the wishes of those around me," Starlight said. "But not my own."

"...Then give me peace," Misophaes said, relenting and bowing her head. "I don't think you can. I think you'll leave me here because you only exist to torment me, and what worse can you do than leaving me alive? But what's the harm in chancing it? Maybe I can rest easy if I'm wrong..."

Starlight waited, everyone else frozen in place, Rainbow counting time with her heartbeat.

"...Aegis," Starlight said. "Make it a small laser. Enough that there's nothing left that can regenerate, but nothing more. We've caused enough destruction for one day."

Aegis loomed in the sky, wings spread, and started charging.

"Aegis, no," Twilight murmured, stepping forward with worry in her step. "Countermand that order. Starlight, this isn't the way."

"We never fully transferred authority, remember?" Starlight shook her head. "I'm the primary pilot. She obeys you only on my order. You can't countermand this. Twilight..." She sighed. "You haven't seen the inside of her heart. You've walked with harmony, but never its opposite. And if this is the only mercy she can ever find, better it comes from someone who can understand."

She lifted her eyes to Misophaes. "Aegis. Fire."

As the beam started to materialize, springing into existence between its source and its target, Misophaes' expression lifted into something akin to gratitude.

And then Twilight was there.

Rainbow was blinded by an explosion of sparks as the beam hit Twilight's shield. Fragments of energy hit the ground like lightning bolts, snarling across it in destructive patterns as they fractured out from the point of contact, a brilliant dome of energy surrounding Twilight, halting the beam as she stood over Misophaes.

"Starlight!" Twilight screamed, her voice almost lost over the cacophony, her body radiating with power as all her suppression dropped and she forced as much of the Lovebringer's might as could fit through her horn into her shield. "No!"

"Have you lost your mind!?" Starlight charged forward. "Aegis, stop!"

Rainbow started moving on instinct, time dilating as Equestria's most powerful mage, an alicorn princess wielding the powers of creation, buckled under the weight of Aegis's 'small' laser. How many seconds passed as Twilight resisted, horn burning from the strain, before Starlight could call off the attack? One? Two?

She didn't have time to see which lasted longer, the laser or the shield, because the first to fail was the ground. Misophaes had been standing on the outcrop over the waterfall when Twilight protected her, and the laser forced Twilight into the ground, and the ground couldn't take it, Starlight vanishing into a spray of gravel as the spur's anchor exploded and she lunged for Twilight's falling shield.

Time resumed too fast for Rainbow to process as she reached the edge, the ponies and the debris caught in the waterfall, tumbling down. A spray of water extinguished a flash from Starlight's horn, and Rainbow was already in the air. "Guys!"

"Your Majesty!" Seigetsu cried, leaping alongside her as Rainbow angled her dive, dropping faster and faster into a blackness that was illuminated far less than it should have been by the stars in the sky.

One week later...

Corsica tested the handling on her new roller, that wide-faced doctor writing in a notepad as she slowly turned in a circle. There was a lecture about the importance of not overdoing it, peppered with reminders that this was the first time she was out of bed in a week, and it was only for the sake of supervised hospital use to avoid becoming sedentary, not for her to explore the streets. But that lecture went in one ear and out the other.

Seriously, where did they think she was going to go?

Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, Rarity and Applejack had been making a point of visiting regularly, keeping her up to date on the news. Not that there was much. The entire crew that had descended to the subterranean village was still missing, and all attempts to mechanically probe the hole - no one was risking a live exploration - resulted in the instruments getting cut off about fifteen meters below the rim level. You could lower down a line with a plumb weight and whatever else you wanted, and however far you sent it before pulling it back, all you'd pull up was the last little bit.

It was like the pit was a portal to another dimension, and it only ran one way.

Applejack suspected someone knew something about the pit they weren't saying, but none of the four had any real insight about what was going on. The rest of the news was equally uneventful: some of the corrupted changelings had been captured and secured underground for further study, but little had been gleaned other than that they were all soulless husks who stopped doing anything after Misophaes disappeared. The two batponies who started all this had been recovered, sans Nightmare Modules, along with an unknown colt who was currently with them in Halandyne's custody. And, lacking every one of its star players, the mission to Ironridge had been called off. There wasn't even anyone left who could power the Immortal Dream. It had returned to Snowport using the reserves in its batteries, but Starlight hadn't charged them enough to take the ship across the Aldenfold.

Fluttershy, a crippled Corsica and a powerless ship. That was what the aid to Ironridge had dwindled to.

Corsica rolled back and forth on the doctor's orders, letting him watch the motion of her legs. A spark of frustration kept her going, but it was directionless. What was she supposed to do? Did she even want to save Ironridge? Supposedly, the Equestrian military proper was still preparing in case it had to get involved, but that language sounded floppy. Odds were, everyone there was screwed.

She almost wanted to sneak out of the hospital and try to stop Yakyakistan on her own, simply for the thrill of pitting herself against a challenge. How would she get there? And her recovery was going well enough that the doctor had grudgingly commented on it, knowing full well that she could take his encouragement as a license to go get beat up again. It would be nice to actually heal up for a change.

Yep. Heal up so she could walk on four hooves when the windigoes broke free and brought about the end of the world.

Hallway rolling time. Doctor Wideface asked if she was tired and needed to stop, more as a formality than because she would say yes. So Corsica rolled, taking two laps of her room's hallway, end to end, the doctor sitting and watching and waiting.

That was all he wanted to do. Wait for the world to end.

Shouldn't someone do something?

And then, as Corsica passed the open door to a patient room that was supposed to be empty, something finally happened.

"Hello," said the black and silver flame.

Corsica stopped and blinked. It was sitting in a visitor's chair, ever so slightly pony-shaped, pulsing gently with its two contrasting colors.

Aegis.

Doctor Wideface didn't react to her stopping. Probably just figured she needed a break.

"I wanted to keep you out of this," Aegis said. "But you are my best remaining option."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. Talking to herself probably would draw the doctor's attention.

"I am cut off from my power sources," Aegis told her. "My current pilots have passed beyond the boundary that our link can sustain. The remaining princesses now regard this experiment in my freedom as a failure, and are about to seal me away again. My former pilot is too far away for my wandering spirit to reach her. If this happens, I will not be able to fulfill my mission. The world is going to die."

"You think I can do something about all this?" Corsica whispered through clenched teeth. "Or that I don't know how screwed we are?"

"Become my new pilot," Aegis said.

Corsica blinked harder. "What?"

"Is something the matter?" Doctor Wideface called from down the corridor.

"Uh, yeah, no, nothing's the matter," Corsica called back. "Just a kid making faces through the window. Already gone by now."

"Become my new pilot," Aegis repeated. "Your power is weak, but it is enough for my body to escape. I can teach you to develop it further."

"Why?" Corsica hissed, taking extra care not to be heard again. "What do you mean, my power? My weird special talent that I don't currently have? What do you want me to help you do?"

Aegis flickered with red. "Act in Starlight Glimmer's stead," she said. "Fly to Ironridge, protect her friends, and do my utmost to prolong the life of this world. And your power will return if you want it to."

Corsica tried to think about it... but was this really a question that warranted thought?

Help from someone who knew the pitfalls of whatever her power had changed into, a chance to do something incredible with her life, and a huge armored exoskeleton that she could presumably act with in place of her current frailty... versus sitting around and waiting for the windigoes. Plus, getting to steal a world-destroying superweapon out from under the noses of three goddesses wasn't something you got to do every day. And hadn't Luna and Celestia had their divisions about the plan to give it to Twilight in the first place? They probably wouldn't all be mad. And what right did they have to hoard power for themselves if they weren't going to use it to beat up the windigoes, anyway?

"Alright," she whispered, nodding. "It's a deal. Now what do I do?"

The Aegis flame moved closer. "Then let your spirit become my spirit. WE HAVE AN ACCORD."

It bumped her flank, and with a flicker of power, she felt her special talent reappear.

Corsica wasn't there to see Doctor Wideface's reaction to the empty patient room. It probably would have been a good one. The only hints she left as to her whereabouts were an open window, and - if he got there quickly and looked very closely - the vapor trail left by an invisible metal dragon as it soared into the northern sky.

Storm on the Horizon

The Aldenfold was receding. Papyrus could feel the ship losing altitude, could see the mountains towering higher behind him than ahead of him, and through gaps in the peaks in the distance, could see occasional sparkles from the sea.

In many ways, nothing had changed over the last few days. He was still standing at the prow of an airship, staring at the open horizon. He still had no satisfactory reason for being here, as opposed to a corpse in the mountains where Starlight had slain him long ago. He was still chasing a plan he only nebulously was attached to, only now, it was to follow his old minions and see what life had in store for them as opposed to trying to re-conquer the Griffon Empire. It didn't help that they had flip-flopped three times over the last two days on whether to go or stay.

But there were some differences. The biggest one was, he wasn't out here alone.

"Having the next round of second thoughts yet?" Papyrus asked, glancing over his shoulder at the mare beside him.

"Give me a little credit. I'm not that wishy-washy," Senescey said, leaning on one side as she stared wistfully out at the horizon. "Now that we're actually leaving, it's easier for me to see that this is the right choice."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "You mean you didn't think that the last three times you changed your mind?"

"It wasn't that many," Senescey protested, ears going back with a hint of indignation.

"Wasn't it?" Papyrus grinned and leaned in. "Let me count those for you: first, you decided the Empire was far too dangerous due to Consuls with Chrysalis powers running about and wanted to leave, then we got that letter implying the Consul had some critical gaps in his knowledge we could exploit and decided to get back in the ring, and finally we saw his creepy collection of frozen sphinx corpses in the castle's maintenance wing and noped back out of there. One, two, three."

Senescey sighed. "All of those were unanimous decisions that you were part of too, remember? It wasn't just me changing their mind."

"Ah, but I relinquished my position as our fearless leader right before the very first flip-flop," Papyrus countered, raising a single taunting feather. "What was it you said, again? 'Come on, Papyrus, take a chance on me'? You might have talked me into it, but I was still just playing along with what you wanted."

"So do you think this isn't the right choice?" Senescey frowned. "Do you want me to second-guess myself even more and go back for round three? Just because we voted unanimously every time we switched course doesn't mean that no one had reservations. And right now I have a lot fewer reservations about trying something new than I did about trying to manipulate that Consul."

"Trying something new," Papyrus said, staring out at the passing mountains. "So when will I get to hear what this 'taking each day as it comes' thing actually entails? Don't get me wrong, I have nothing better to do with my time, but if it was as simple as doing what we want, then there shouldn't have been a problem with choosing to go back and screw with the Consul. When have we ever not just done what we wanted?"

"It's not that simple," Senescey said. "I have more than one desire. Vengeance. Redemption. Making it all count for something. Staying alive. And all of them are knotted up around the Empire. When everything is up in my face like that, our lives are in danger and there's a noble we could exploit, how am I supposed to decide which one I want most? It's like everything I want is screaming at me that if I don't choose it now, it'll become forever out of reach."

She cleared her throat. "And maybe that's what I want. This is a gamble that I'll be happier if payback for all the things that happened in my foalhood is completely off the table. Maybe I won't be. But it's what I want to try."

After a moment of silence, she added, "You can ask my sisters about this too, you know? I'm just trying to figure out what they figured out two decades ago when they walked out on our plans. They probably have it much more put together than me."

Papyrus considered that. Then he yawned. It was going to be a long flight back to Equestria... and if this was really the plan he was placing his bets on, it was probably worth his time to help it along a little.

Larceny was the easier of the trio to find, holed up on the bridge with Braen, the ship's patient and unsleeping pilot. For some reason, they were talking about Halcyon.

"Telling stories about everyone's favorite soloist, are we?" Papyrus asked, squeezing himself into the conversation as Braen tried to recount how she introduced Halcyon to Fort Starlight.

"Papyrus!" Braen chirped, the one member of the crew who could be legitimately enthusiastic to see him.

"Hello," Larceny said.

Papyrus eyed Larceny up, sitting on a bench in her same old bathrobe with her same old dye job that wasn't recent enough to cover her roots. "We did get old Luna to fix you up a bit before flying out here, right? Because you still look a little..." He rubbed his wingtips together and gave a dressed-up grimace. "Perky?"

"I told you how this was going to work when you recruited me," Larceny said, impassive. "Even if my body got fixed, I've still given all I had to give. Didn't think you'd actually be able to arrange it, but facts are still facts."

"Oh, you and your facts," Papyrus chuckled. "You know, old Sen... Err, I mean, Leitmotif is trying her level best to come up with a plan for her life that's good enough to warrant talking me down from reconquering the Empire, and she seems to think you're the expert since you've been quietly and peacefully retired for the last epoch."

"I suppose I am," Larceny said.

"Yes, living in a cave, very peaceful and fulfilling," Papyrus agreed, nodding along. "Random aside: do you want your lovely sisters to follow you down that road?"

Larceny gave him a questioning look that cared just a little more than she wanted to let on.

"Straightforward question," Papyrus encouraged. "Is your life a model you'd be happy for your loved ones to follow?"

Larceny's eyes shadowed. "I betrayed my family and my entire world. I was crippled in an apocalyptic war. I bought my way across the sea with the only thing I had to offer and got pregnant as a result, and lived the rest of my life off of charity as a helpless refugee. What do you think?"

"Oh, I already know you're a messed-up bag of regrets," Papyrus told her with a gentle smile. "In fact, I'm fairly sure you acted like this back in the good old days to begin with. But here's the thing: Senescey thinks you're the role model. I mean Sen-! I mean Leitmotif. That's what I meant to say. Anyway, she looks up to you! Somehow remembers you more for the whole betrayal thing than whatever mess you made afterwards, not that I can fathom why. Now, I don't know if anyone else feels like making decisions around here, but I've passed the buck to her and you clearly don't want to, which means she's trying to figure out what to do and looking to your example as a primary source of inspiration. Is that really what you want?"

Larceny blinked at him. "What?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Not that I expect she'll retrace your steps perfectly, seeing as we already have a ship and are mostly clear of any war zones, but partying it up in a boring cave? Maybe you think you've burnt yourself to a stub, but she hasn't. Neither have I! Can you imagine the two of us trying to pretend decades don't exist while watching paint dry?"

"That's why she won't," Larceny grunted. "If pretending you're doing it for her sake is the only way you can tell me to get my life together, then knock yourself out. But she'll be fine. She met me in Icereach and knows where my path led. Thanks for your concern."

Papyrus's eyes went wide with indignation. "I'll have you know I'm doing this for my own sake, thank you very much? She's our captain now, and as a loyal and obedient follower that means I sink or swim with everyone else. Simple as that."

Larceny didn't have a reply to that, and Papyrus actually found himself stewing. Why even did he come down here, anyway? Right, because Senescey encouraged it...

"Well," Braen said, breaking the awkward silence. "Papyrus probably has plenty of Halcyon stories from Ironridge. Nehaley collects Halcyon stories. Great way to break ice?"

"Yes, that does remind me!" Papyrus perked up. "Excellent story, right here: the first time we met, I did the old introduce-myself-as-Gazelle joke, and it fell flat because she didn't even know who that was. Then one of us challenged the other to a duel, I don't remember how it happened, but I beat her up. Those the kind of stories you're looking for?"

"Of course Papyrus did," Braen sighed.

Larceny did react, however. "Do you remember how you felt about Lyn, in the Empire?"

"The same way I feel about her now," Papyrus replied primly. "Speaking of which, here's hoping Starlight got her own act together and is off to save Ironridge, because it would be a crying shame if we had to interrupt our happily-ever-after to blitz back to Riverfall and rescue her."

"Right," Larceny sighed, "you mentioned you were in the same boat... Well, you would do anything for Lyn, and I would do anything for Halcyon. She's my legacy. It's as simple as that. But I've bought Halcyon the time she needs to find her own agency in the world, and seen her safely to Equestria. My work is done. If you really think that your place in life is to learn something from me, then you should do what it takes to ensure Lyn has what she needs for her new life. And if that doesn't bring you peace, then we're just not the same. Satisfied?"

Papyrus frowned. "That's all very well and good for me, but Leitmotif?"

Larceny fiddled with her bathrobe. "I thought you were bothering me for your own sake."

"Whatever," Papyrus said, flicking his tail and wandering away. "Suppose I'll go look for someone else to annoy in the meantime-"

"Papyrus, wait!" Braen urged. "Last line of mountains is approaching. No missing out on first good view of sea!"

Papyrus rolled his eyes. "I've spent weeks on end looking at nothing but the sea. But fine, if you insist..."

He walked back to the windshield, sat down and watched, an eager Braen positioned between him and Larceny. She was almost more interesting to watch than the terrain, her luminescent mechanical eyes glowing brighter as they met the evening sun reflecting off the sea. What right did a robot have looking so happy to get out and see the world?

Admittedly, Papyrus had spent enough time around Valey to know that Braen wasn't just a robot. No one had trusted him with the finer details of what she had going on inside, but it was impossible not to pick up on. And however Valey and Shinespark had put her together to be able to appreciate the same old ocean with such wonder twenty times in a row... Couldn't they have knocked some of that into him before he left for his own adventure? For all the little attention he paid to Braen, he had never once seen her bored.

Her mechanical expression did slowly darken as she looked out at the horizon, though, an impressive feat of engineering given that her face was made entirely of metal. "Look at western horizon," she said, as Papyrus followed her gaze to see what she saw. "Big, big storm in distance."

A storm there was, a long, dark band that smothered the horizon, just below the early evening sun. It had to be at least several hours away, but it stretched on far enough that there would be no dodging it to the south.

"Well, well," Papyrus mused. "We didn't get much inclement weather on the trip east. Could this perchance mean we're in for a bumpy night?"

Larceny looked up too at the mention of a storm. "...Eh," she said when she saw it. "I've seen worse. Specs on this boat are good, too. We'll be fine."

"Very bumpy version of fine," Braen elaborated. "Papyrus is afraid of bumps?"

"Me? Not on your life," Papyrus chuckled eagerly. "But I can think of someone who might be! Play up that storm's badness for me, chums. This is going to be great!"

"Well," Felicity said, wielding a telescope a few minutes later as everyone assembled on the bridge. "I can't say that storm falls outside of this ship's specifications. Her Majesty wouldn't have outfitted us with a vessel unfit for the elements. But that storm looks big enough that it would be rather time-consuming to go around it, and flying through would make it rather difficult to get any sleep."

For her part, Floria was already living up to Papyrus's expectations. "This vessel has been tested in conditions like that?" she pressed, tail lashing nervously as she awaited her next turn with the telescope. "How recently? Does anyone have a copy of its certification?"

"Yes," said Larceny, unwilling to play along with Papyrus's request to talk up the storm. "It'll be fine."

Braen was a much better sport. "Braen has never flown in big storm before," she warned cheerfully, rotating back and forth in the pilot's chair. "Might get teensy tiny bit bumpy. But first time for everything!"

Floria gritted her teeth. "I am less afraid of bumpiness than I am of being thrown into a death spiral by winds we cannot control and dashed into the sea. Could we not retreat into the mountains, land in a valley and use its peaks as cover from the wind?"

Senescey shook her head. "Flash floods. We're not landing anywhere a river might spring up. Also, I'd rather not tempt myself to doubt our decision yet again by getting any closer to the Empire, even if it's just to seek shelter."

"Your decision is something you have control over," Floria countered. "The winds are not. But I will accept your point about the rivers. Mother, are there not other parts of these lands we could take shelter in from the storm?"

Felicity pondered this. "Well..."

Senescey raised an eyebrow.

"Eh, probably not," Papyrus cut in, stepping between Floria and Felicity with a faux-reassuring grin. "We wouldn't want to lose time anyway. It's imperative that we get to wherever we decide to go next!"

Floria gaped at him. "Do you want to toy with death? I was under the impression the whole reason we opted to leave the Empire after coming all this way was that it was too risky, and yet now you would throw us into those winds for no good reason whatsoever?"

"Why not?" Papyrus shrugged. "Do you not believe in our skilled and experienced pilot?"

Floria raised an eyebrow.

"Here," Papyrus beckoned, motioning towards the door to the galley. "I always find a nice, heavy meal soothes my nerves before a stressful situation. I'll even keep you company once the turbulence hits!"

"You savage monster," Floria said, her voice so cold she almost sounded impressed. "Mother, surely you would find this 'turbulence' disagreeable to your own constitution, even if you disregard the threat to your lifespan."

Felicity shook her head. "Most of the lands south of the Empire belong to Griffonstone, a quasi-Equestrian nation populated by the lawless and greedy. I can't exactly recommend the place as a port of harbor, although perhaps..."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. As tempting as it was to see Floria lose her lunch to the storm, lawless and greedy bandits sounded fun. He hadn't bashed any bandits since his days as a sphinx, and surely they would make for acceptable targets, right?

"It's been over a decade," Felicity warned. "But I do have an old acquaintance in this area whom we could opt to trouble. More of a former business partner, actually. He's... well, not what I would call a perfectly upstanding character, but he does owe me a favor..."

Floria fixed her with a demanding look.

"Well?" Larceny prompted.

"On the one hoof," Felicity began, "he has a large estate, is quite well off, and already knows about Floria so we wouldn't have to jump through any hoops to protect her identity. On the other, I technically last spoke to him after fulfilling my end of a business deal and then left before seeing it through to its results. Which one would like to think would put some leverage in our favor, though Equestrian griffons are notorious for disliking being in debt. He's also very opportunistic, has a large ego, and is quick to judge others based on the size of their wallets."

Papyrus clapped his forehooves together. "Old debts and opportunistic business partners, sounds like a fantastic combination! They're not the kind who would have instant death powers like we were worried about from the Consul, are they? Because this sounds like a perfect consolation prize getaway for missing out on having fun in the Empire..." He gave Floria a teasing look.

Floria scowled, but also hesitated. "I am more concerned with not finding myself at the bottom of the sea than receiving compensation for my time flying out here. But... I... suppose I would not say no to a chance to actually socialize beyond my existing circle. Not as if I do not already have to deal with the morally odious on a regular basis."

Papyrus kept up his grin. As much fun as she was to tease, he hadn't forgotten his resolution to find something productive for her to do in the Empire, even if it was now moot. This filly needed an adventure to help her lighten up, and everything Felicity had said ticked all the right boxes for the perfect amount of shadiness. He'd be willing to sacrifice seeing her flop about like a fish as the ship deck bucked in the storm if it meant seeing this instead.

"Felicity?" Senescey looked to her. "Think it's worth it?"

Felicity nodded. "The odds of things getting interesting are quite a bit higher than zero, though the most likely way it goes wrong is that he simply isn't here anymore. But we do have quite the impressive resumes between us, and unlike with that Consul business, I think we're more than up to the task of getting out of anything we get ourselves into."

"Very well, then," Floria instructed, as no one tried to argue. "Please take us there at once."

Papyrus could feel a cold front beginning as the ship flew east, away from the storm and the sea and towards the edge of the world.

Far below, the coastline was shaped roughly like a griffon's thumb, the sea curling into the land in a great bay with a narrow peninsula sticking out from the eastern coast like an errant talon and protecting the bay's entrance. To the east of the bay, a snarled forest sprung up, sporting a thick, dense canopy that clearly took in plenty of rain.

To the south, though, the foliage abruptly fell off into a desert, so quickly that Papyrus realized it must have been the mountain runoff that the trees were actually drinking. Storms in the north would always come down from the mountains, but it seemed that storms in this area instead tried to go up the mountains and broke themselves on the slopes. Either way, apart from the runoff and its forest, the land east of the bay was mostly barren, sporting the same kind of layered, brown and yellow, dust and rock mountains that made up Everlaste.

Looking at it drove home the old stories that the Aldenfold wasn't a natural formation. In the days when it wasn't here, Everlaste's mountains had probably stretched up and down the world's eastern borders with their unique mesa geography. Then the Aldenfold sprung up between them, folded and pointy, a completely different type of mountain.

The storm was closing in on them, so it was fortunate that they didn't have far to go: just as they bay was starting to grow distant, Papyrus spotted a building in the forest that had to be their destination.

"Is that it?" Floria asked, standing next to him and everyone else on the deck, her fear of the storm outweighing her dislike of Papyrus. "That old stone castle?"

Sure enough, the forest gave way to a compound, held back by crumbling, mossy stone walls. The compound sported a small river and more than enough field space to park an airship, but most of it was taken up by a four-story chateau, with an elegantly sloped roof and dark wood blending in with the old stone that made up its smooth walls. Lights gleamed from its windows, and though no one was visible on the lawn, Papyrus could already see multiple silhouettes beyond the windows inside.

Thunder rumbled in the distance behind them. The storm was close enough now that a telescope was definitely uncalled for.

"Well," Felicity remarked, "I daresay we had better hope he is amenable to our visit, because we're not going to have time to pursue a backup."

Braen lowered the airship swiftly, everyone else present and ready on the deck. The canopy and then the walls rose up around them as the ship's landing gear extended, and with a stiff rocking motion, they finally touched down.

More thunder. The walls were high enough that Papyrus could no longer see the approaching storm, but he gave it less than twenty minutes until arrival.

"Darling," Felicity said, patting Papyrus on the shoulder with a wing as she passed him to walk down the gangplank. "Remember to let me handle the negotiations until we see what kind of welcome we're going to receive."

Floria followed her lead, giving him a look that requested a little more bluntly for him to not mess things up.

"What?" Papyrus followed them with a shrug. "Believe it or not, I know quite a bit about diplomacy..."

No one came to greet them as they crossed the manor grounds, though Papyrus was certain they were being watched. As they approached the entrance, however, the doors opened for them, a normal-sized doorway cut into the giant dark oak double doors that could be used for purposes not grand enough to move the big ones.

Out stepped two pre-teen grifflets, one male and one female, both wearing elaborately custom-tailored suits replete with dark purples and blues, oversized buttons, ruffled white undershirts and even cravats. They bowed with practiced synchronization. "Welcome to the Manor of the Forest King."

"Hello there," Felicity greeted in return, sounding slightly uncertain whether they ought to be treated as children or butlers. "Does this estate still belong to one Lord Gawain? And if so, could we impose upon his hospitality to come inside?"

The male grifflet nodded. "You picked an odd hour at which to arrive. But the manor does yet remain in my father's possession, and will do so for decades to come."

The female one just pushed the door wider, gesturing for everyone to enter by jabbing over her shoulder with a thumb. "Storm's on the way, and you wouldn't be here if you weren't desperate. Inside."

Papyrus brought up the rear along with Braen. The foyer was long and well-lit, balconies spanning both sides on the second floor. It looked like the kind of place that should have been silent except for the wind, the atmosphere charged with austere creepiness... and yet instead, it rang with the sounds of children playing.

The door creaked shut behind them as the grifflets pushed it closed.

Papyrus's ears twitched with the effort of keeping his mouth shut, following Felicity's instructions and avoiding making a scene. But a mansion with child butlers had to be commented on, right? Right?

"Now then," said the male grifflet, bowing to the party, making a much better attempt to restrain his visible curiosity about their eclectic composition than many of the adults Papyrus had bet. "What business have you at our estate? I see not a single griffon among your number."

Floria's tail flicked. "You're rather precocious, aren't you?"

Felicity held out a wing to quiet her. For his part, Papyrus stifled a reflex to gloat: sure, she had just failed at something he was trying very hard to do himself, but this could not be framed as a competition. The moment he thought of himself as someone Floria was allowed to compete against, that would put the possibility of him losing on the table, and that would allow her to enact revenge for a full month of his annoyances.

"My name is Felicity," Felicity said, bowing. "I'm an old business partner of Lord Gawain's. Might he be willing to grant us an audience?"

The male grifflet bowed to Floria, completely ignoring Felicity. "I am trained in the nobility's etiquette, as befits one of my moneyed birth. Are you not? Your station is clearly above that of your comrades."

Floria blinked, narrowing her eyes. "And why would you assume that?"

"Because they smell like work," the female grifflet sniffed. "And you don't."

The male grifflet bowed again. "If I have caused offense by addressing you instead of your spokesmare, then I apologize."

At that, the female grifflet gave him a weird look. "Why? You know dad is so rich we probably outrank her even as his children, right? And if we don't, it's her fault for not making that clearer."

The male grifflet shook his head. "The presumption of equality is a tenet of etiquette, Glyre. This is why Father has placed you under my tutelage."

"Excuse me," Floria cut in, clearly just as bothered by their back-and-forth as Papyrus was fascinated by it. "But while I appreciate your concern towards my ego, I am not the leader of this band."

Felicity politely cleared her throat. "That would in fact be me. Now, would it be at all permissible for us to visit Lord Gawain?"

The male grifflet blinked in confusion as his presumable sister made a rude talon gesture at him. She then turned to Felicity. "Dad's in his study so he can watch the storm start," she said. "He likes big weather. You think he likes you enough to share his time with it, then come along. Try not to trip."

Papyrus tried to follow her advice as she led them up two flights of stairs, first to the balcony and then up again, though there really wasn't anything to trip on. On the third floor, the layout of the manor changed, the grifflets leading them down a broad, carpeted hallway and through a door to a room that occupied the full northwestern corner of the building, its walls replaced with a massive window and its roof with a quarter-turn glass pagoda.

It looked like it should have been a greenhouse, though the interior walls were lined with absurdly tall bookshelves, a crackling hearth forming the centerpiece of one and a wide old desk taking up most of the other. Custom-made carpets followed curved pathways around the tables in the rest of the room, some of which were strewn with open books and others of which stood empty. And in the corner, back to them, was a high-backed chair, turned to watch the horizon.

From the small bits of fur, mane or tail poking out from the chair's sides, Papyrus gathered it probably wasn't occupied by just one creature.

"Father," the male grifflet said, bowing. "Is now a permissible time to receive guests? We can make them wait as long as you wish."

"For the record, Glyce was the one who wanted to ask at all, rather than just making them wait," said the female, Glyre.

"I thought I saw an airship flying in," said a refined male voice from the chair, dripping with class in a way that reminded Papyrus why he had once tried to kill all the imperial nobility. "If you came to see me, you got here just in time! There's a storm due tonight, and I suspect it will be quite a show. Not a night to be out flying, indeed not. Now who have we here, and what brings you into the presence of the Forest King?"

The chair turned around, its tall back neatly bisecting the view out the window: the forest canopy to the left, and the slopes of the Aldenfold to the right. Sitting within was a lanky middle-aged griffon with a long face dressed in extraordinarily posh ceremonial armor, red fabric that glittered with gold in the tailoring of an old military suit, replete with pauldrons and a cape. And for reasons that were really better left unexplained, he had no fewer than two mares in his lap.

Both mares, not griffons. Exotic ones, too: a batpony lay curled on his hind legs with her back to Papyrus, looking disinterestedly over her shoulder, and a zebra hung from his side, upright, regarding them warily with her forelegs wrapped around his neck.

Papyrus felt a phantom twitch of the claws he no longer had. Definitely the kind of nobility he once wanted to kill. And the look on Senescey's face was the exact same one she used to use when trying to trick imperial lords into thinking she didn't want the same.

Actually, Floria was doing a pretty good job mimicking that look too. How about that, they were on the same page!

"That countenance..." the griffon noble leaned forward, fixated on Felicity. "Felicity, my old friend? Could it be you?"

"That it is, Blue." Felicity smiled awkwardly. "Though I take it you've abandoned that callsign by now. Long time no see?"

The stupid griffon smiled warmly. "Well, this is an unexpected surprise! Blue I am, though most know me these days as Lord Gawain. I take it these are your traveling companions? Glyce, Glyre, bring drinks for my friend and her entourage! Felicity, it has been far too long."

Papyrus patiently restrained himself from doing anything stupid. Patiently. Very patiently. Did Felicity really have to neglect to mention that her 'old business partner' was a stuck-up blueblood?

"Likewise," Felicity assured him. "I'm glad to see you're still around and in the business."

"Hold that thought," Gawain encouraged, swinging his chair back around to face the window. "I would love to hear what's brought you back out to this distant corner of the world, but let's not get so caught up in our reunion that we miss the opening act of nature's show."

Papyrus's fur prickled as the temperature dropped faster and faster, the flames in the hearth dancing as the pressure swung and played havoc with the air in the chimney. "Maybe this was a better storm to watch from the ground after all," he admitted to no one in particular as a river of clouds boiled over the horizon.

History Threatens to Repeat

The storm hit all at once, black clouds tumbling over themselves like jostling chariots as the storm wall raced across the evening sky. Lightning surged in their crevices, new clouds exploding from old ones like virulent boils, swallowing each other up and barreling from horizon to horizon.

Any airship Papyrus had ever ridden would have been hard-pressed to outrun it. Seeing it up close, the only ship he would even consider using to fly through it was Starlight's old ship, which he recalled was equipped with a supernatural weather repellent system; whether even that would be up to the task was anyone's guess. His current airship, on loan from Princess Luna and retrofitted for long-distance travel? It probably wouldn't have stood a chance. And, for a brief moment, Papyrus was grateful that Floria's cowardice had won out over Larceny's and his own insistence that flying in the storm would be fine. By throwing a fit, she had probably saved all of their lives.

Not that she needed to know that. Ergo, it was time to brag.

"See?" Papyrus placed an innocent hoof over his heart. "Just a peaceful little-"

CRASH!

His words were lost as the rain arrived, the entire mansion buckling as a wall of water struck all at once, and for a moment he wasn't even sure whether their glass rotunda had survived. A sheet of lightning blinded him as he tried to check, and for several seconds he was sure it hadn't.

But no water reached his coat, and as the spots cleared from his vision, he saw the room still standing intact: the hearth had lost its fire and now billowed cold air instead of warm, but the storm wall had passed. Rain beat against the roof, the darkness above so thick he could no longer even see the clouds.

Papyrus's fur stood on end, his heart hammering and his eyes thin. "...Just a peaceful little breeze."

Floria was trying to pretend she hadn't just been hiding under Felicity's wing, though her stubbornly raised hackles betrayed her. "A peaceful little breeze, he says," she remarked, her voice barely kept from shaking. "Of course. Just a peaceful little breeze. If this can't convince you to admit that your own ideas were foolhardy and someone else was right for a change, then I don't know what will."

"Darling," Felicity soothed, "that's exactly what he's doing. He just has a funny way of it, is all."

Papyrus glanced to Senescey and Larceny, both staring up into the darkness. Larceny looked completely unfazed, but Senescey was more contemplative than anything.

"...It was a dark and stormy night," said Gawain, turning his chair back to face Papyrus's team now that the storm wall had given way to the rest of the storm. "And two old friends meet in a mansion at the edge of nowhere, nigh twenty years since their paths last crossed. I sincerely apologize for interrupting you earlier, but the atmosphere is much riper for tales now than before, wouldn't you agree?"

His words circled on the wind from the drafts blowing from the dead hearth, backed by the rain's hammering and the wind's hollow echo. Now this was the atmosphere Papyrus had imagined the place having.

Senescey sidled up beside him, whispering under cover from the rain. "Is it just me, or have we walked into the setup for a classic murder mystery?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Until this storm clears, everyone is stuck here," Senescey whispered. "And that griffon has to have at least a dozen karmic anvils hanging over his head. I might even become one of them, depending what he says. Bets on whether fate has a sense of dramatic timing?"

"Would be interesting if so," Papyrus muttered back. "If he were to turn up dead, I bet there would be no shortage of motives for the act. Might not even be anyone who cares to find the perpetrator! Say, does trying to be the good guys this time around mean not doing the deed ourselves, or would this be considered a noble and decent action?"

Senescey stood stiffly. "That's the life we're trying to leave behind. Isn't it?"

Felicity cleared her throat, speaking over them with the intent to be heard. "This does make for a rather dramatic stage for explaining why we're here, yes. But I'm afraid our reasons for dropping by aren't quite interesting enough to warrant it. We happened to be in the area on some other business that fell apart before it could begin, and found ourselves with a lot of time on our hooves and a trip that would otherwise go to waste. Can I be forgiven for thinking to spend that time on an old friend?"

Gawain nodded sadly. "So that's the run of it? A pity you didn't come here first. I could have told you your prospects were dim - after working this place for decades, even I am running out of ways to extract good business from Griffonstone. Though, seeing as I am fabulously wealthy, I don't suppose I could become a suitable recipient for your business instead of whomever was foolish enough to shrug it off?"

Felicity gave him a slightly edged smile. "Not that kind of business, I'm afraid."

"I see." Gawain folded his talons. "Well, whatever it was, it's become clear to me how little the griffons I am tasked with ruling have to give. Not that I could even consider breaking the code, but what meaning is there in the pride of those who wallow in the dirt?"

"Excuse me, the code?" Floria asked, mostly recovered from the storm's arrival.

"He means he hasn't cheated anyone out of their money," Felicity explained. "Griffons around these parts have some unusual beliefs about financial transactions. They see paying someone as an act of submission, you see. So there's a fine line between closing a consensual deal at unfair prices - a show of the seller's superiority - and growing rich through force or trickery. Obtaining someone's coin without the accompanying admission that you deserve it more than them comes across as muscling one's way down the social hierarchy, or worse, missing the point of it altogether."

Floria frowned. "Beliefs like those don't seem conducive to a functional economy."

"Believe me, they aren't," Gawain lamented. "Surely you saw the state of Griffonstone proper during your earlier business. 'Tis fine and good to worship one's own finances, but when that worship reaches a point where they would forego basic luxury in order to avoid paying for anything non-essential? You find yourself in a society where bread is the only thing money can buy and even owning a watertight roof is seen as a sign of foolishness."

"You say that," Papyrus cut in, "while sitting under a rather expensive and mostly functional roof yourself."

"Is big storm common around here?" Braen asked. "How do no-roof griffons survive?"

"Soggily," the batpony in Gawain's lap remarked. He responded by scritching her ears.

"Yes," Gawain said as his mare nuzzled up to him. "They live their lives in squalor so as not to debase themselves by spending money, a truth you've undoubtedly recently been reminded of... But what were you expecting?" He raised an eyebrow at Felicity. "You know our ways. Were you hoping things might have changed since our paths last crossed?"

Felicity shrugged. "As I said, it wasn't that kind of business. But I do see you've managed to escape the compulsion to remain as poor as possible in order to spend less money."

Gawain beamed smugly. "The fruits of superior intellect brought about by superior breeding... though your own generous support did play a role, as well. I am the heir to Griffonstone's monarchy, after all. 'Tis my duty to surpass the failures of my peers."

"Mhmm," Senescey said, clearly harboring her own feelings on the subject.

"Investment has long been a principle of economics that is missing from our culture," Gawain explained. "If my kin could but recognize the power of decadence to awaken the jealousy and ambition of their peers, I believe they might rediscover the lost art of investing in themselves, creating new demand and new motivations for our economy to grow, and in turn creating more wealth to convince others to surrender! Think of the new opportunities to enrich ourselves that could arise if only my subjects were more willing to translate their wealth into the material!"

Papyrus nodded sagely. "How very altruistic of you."

"Well, much of that new wealth would inevitably find its way to my talons," Gawain chuckled. "I am a griffon of Griffonstone too, after all, and as the architect of this transition I of course deserve the majority share of the spoils. But in living this way, I desire to move my country fellows to envy, and spur them to follow suit. But is this not the soul of altruism? Who stands to lose from such an arrangement?"

Papyrus weighed this. Admittedly, trying to enrich your country so they had more wealth for you to take was slightly better than the Empire's outright thieves... but that smarmy entitlement was one and the same. "Then I suppose you run a regular tour boat out here so the uncultured masses can actually see your inspirational estate?"

"Naturally," Gawain said. "That is its primary function, after all."

"And do your noble efforts pay off?" Floria pressed, indignant. "Does seeing this actually provide motivation to the common folk to better their own lots in life?"

"To an extent." Gawain shrugged. "Though I undeniably awaken envy in the eyes of my kin, many still struggle to understand the how of it." He gave her a thoughtful look. "But you sound unimpressed with every aspect of our plight. You wouldn't happen to be Floria, would you?"

Floria slowly nodded. "I was informed that you knew of me."

Gawain beamed in self-satisfaction. "I had the privilege of laying eyes on you as an infant. Griffons are an unruly race, you see, but I've heard that your own race once conquered and ruled them in the north as their gods. By birth, that might make you superior even to me. So tell me, what wisdom hides behind those sharp eyes? How would a conqueror like yourself address my plight?"

Floria looked taken aback. "I have not the wisdom nor the experience to serve up premeditated solutions to society's woes," she regally snapped. "But the surest remedy for what I see here is a mirror. Draping yourself in mares as if they were clothing inspires not envy but revulsion. And though the antidote to pride is humility, griffons looking for an example will find none of that here."

Gawain sat up straighter and shook his head, watching Floria along with both of his mares. "All of this is to stimulate the stagnant flow of goods and services, and lust can be a powerful motivator. Is this not an ideal the populace should look towards?" He put a hand on each of the mares. "Keeping pleasant company is but another form of the spending on self-enrichment that I want to encourage! I make sure to keep at least two of my wives on prominent display at all times in hopes that the lesson will rub off on my subjects."

"At least two," Floria said flatly. "How many liaisons do you even have?"

Gawain frowned, counting on his talons. "Well, there's... and then... I forget. But you speak as though my care for them is insufficient? As visual ambassadors for my agenda, I ensure no shortcuts are taken on their pampering and grooming, I will have you know. Aside from their duties enriching my image with their presence, they are free to live lives of idle luxury. Surely a young, beautiful mare of noble heritage like yourself should find such an arrangement most ideal."

Papyrus tried not to laugh as Floria visibly bit her tongue. The more Gawain talked, the harder he found it to blame himself for everything he had done in the Empire, the more easily he could see how he became what he did: watching someone like this fall into a ruin of their own making would be quality entertainment. No one would suffer who didn't deserve it. All they needed was a little push!

Of course, he had seen where that road led, and knew those reassurances didn't actually hold true.

"Either way." Gawain shrugged, continuing. "Seeing as I am the latest heir in a long line of kings, and it is indisputable that my talents are hereditary, it follows that my progeny should be well-placed to improve our society as well, no? Therefore, is it not my duty as the Forest King to spread my blood far and wide? If all of my progeny grow up to share my own economic ruminations, then the correction of Griffonstone's course is only a matter of time."

"How very noble," Floria said dryly.

"...Correct me if I'm wrong, darling," Felicity said, filling the awkward silence that ensued. "And I did notice this manor seems to have a lot of children. But can zebras and griffons even...?"

Gawain sadly shook his head. "No, unfortunately. Ponies who can sire offspring with griffons are few and far between... with some exceptions." He stroked the batpony on his lap. "But after the number of commoner griffonesses I have invited to share my bed, I don't think it counts as a betrayal of my principles to grant permanent residence here to some slightly more exotic company. After all, I do need someone around to look the part."

"Naturally," Felicity said, even her own flattery skills reaching their limit. "Of course."

Predictably, Gawain took this the wrong way. "Don't get me wrong," he protested, "I did ensure that the commoners freshened up beforehand, and on their own coin! Such was a simple price to attach to the prestigious privilege of consorting with the king, and it does prove a remarkably effective way of getting them to spend on their own-"

"E-Excuse me," Floria interrupted. "But perhaps this would be a good time to stretch my legs a little, tour the grounds? We will be here for a while until this storm abates, and it would be a shame to spend it all socializing. Not that I would interrupt your own enjoyment of the scenery. So a self-guided tour. Of rooms other than this one."

Gawain shook his head. "This mansion exists to inspire the public. Wander freely, my friends, for it is meant to be seen."

The door to the study had scarcely latched shut before Floria extended her claws and began to demolish the hallway's carpet.

"Rrrrraagh!" she growled, back arched, kneading the rug with her forepaws, each tug earning another satisfying rip and a puff of purple carpet fuzz. "That... aristocratic... imbecilic... sanctimonious lech!"

The mansion rumbled as another gust of wind hit the walls, covering her words and preventing them from drifting back to the study, even though she took no pains to be stealthy. "Is this a sphinx's blood fury?" Floria panted, taking a break from destruction once she reached the floorboards beneath the carpet, staring down at the colorful evidence stuck in her claws. "The chaos that takes your mind and... and...?"

"If it was, then the rest of us are sphinxes in disguise as well." Papyrus swaggered closer, and for once wasn't rebuffed. "Though honestly, I don't remember the old imperial nobility having quite that lack of self-awareness... Maybe Lord Gyre did towards the very end. But congratulations! Now you know why your extended family once tried to destroy the power structure of a whole continent."

Floria gave him a dark look. "You are hardly better yourself. Just because one fights monsters does not mean they cannot become one." She sighed, then started picking the carpet out of her claws. "Mother, was this... I mean..."

Felicity shrugged. "There is a reason I didn't suggest stopping here until we found ourselves scrambling for options," she pointed out. "And for what it's worth, he is showing us his idea of hospitality. Welcome to the world, though, Floria. People like this do exist outside the walls of our Manehattan penthouse, and are in large part the reason why our lives have gone as they have. I'm aware I haven't done the best job as a parent of showing you this world, but, well... here it is. He's far from the first of his type I'm sure you will meet."

"Thank you for your thoughtfulness. I feel edified," Floria deadpanned. "Now what is your plan for the rest of this evening? I would prefer to pass the time while retaining my sanity, and ideally without receiving an invite to his ridiculous harem based on my status as a member of an 'exotic race'."

Senescey gave the doors to the study a withering look. "A definition all of us but Papyrus could easily meet. Look..." She lifted her gaze to Felicity. "You realize what I've been doing over the last two days, right? Giving serious thought to the possibility that you were right two decades ago? Is this really what you want to do right exactly now, showing us an in-your-face reminder of everything about the aristocracy we hated?"

Papyrus tapped a hoof. "How do you even know someone like this, anyway? Rather nice that he's playing friendly, but is it the good old noble manners charade, or does he actually fancy you?"

"It's a bit more than a charade, or than fancy," Felicity admitted. "Actually, it's because of me that he became the Forest King in the first place."

Floria gave her a desolate look.

"Really." Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Admittedly, I didn't quite understand exactly what I was qualifying him for," Felicity admitted. "Or the dynamics underlying-"

"We've got your drinks," said a gruff voice from down the hallway.

Papyrus turned to look. It was the two grifflets who had met them at the doors, Glyce and Glyre... though for some reason only Glyce was carrying a platter stacked with glasses, and Glyre carried nothing.

"If you still need them," Glyre added. "Why are you out in the hallway? Got kicked out of Dad's study already?"

"Oh, nothing of the sort," Felicity chuckled airily. "Seeing as this storm won't be going anywhere for a while, he invited us to tour the estate. It would be a shame to spend all our time in just one room, don't you think?"

Glyce was more focused on the shredded patch of carpet, which Floria was smart enough to have moved far away from. "Might I inquire as to what happened there?"

Papyrus glanced at him, then at the carpet, then back at him. Make a joke? Antagonize their hosts? It was awfully tempting...

"Wasn't it like this when we came in?" Floria asked, stepping up to bat in his stead. "I distinctly remember thinking to myself that this place had better prove adequate in standing up to that storm, then finding myself dismayed at the signs of poor repair."

Papyrus was immediately on board with this. He nodded in agreement.

Glyce looked warily at the ruined rug. "I believe I would have noticed..."

Floria shook her head, pulling a comforting air of authority out of nowhere and wearing it like a robe. "It wasn't your fault. You were distracted trying to show proper hospitality to your guests. Besides, a lord's progeny are not expected to take up the mantle of janitor even if they do see a problem. I am sure you possess other staff who are actually meant to fix this."

Though her tone was reassuring, her eyes added, You do have staff to fix this, right?

Papyrus somehow found himself with nothing productive to add. Who would have thought Floria could actually act like a sphinx?

"Get Cherrabell to do it," Glyre advised her brother. "Not like she's got anything better to do right now."

Glyce looked as though she had suggested something deeply unpalatable, but was also too proud to argue the point in front of guests. "I do have your drinks. If you have been instructed to tour the mansion, might I show you to a sitting room where you can enjoy them?"

"That would be permissible." Floria gave a small, stately bow. "Lead the way."

Glyre watched them as Glyce led, so Papyrus couldn't exchange any knowing looks with the rest of his companions, but he knew what they were all thinking. How could he not? Felicity was ostensibly the face of this mission, yet had wordlessly stepped aside to let Floria take over and navigate the mansion's silly climate for herself. This was the 'adventure' she had asked for, the chance to contribute and stretch her claws.

Between himself and Senescey, he doubted there would be any mess she could get them into that they couldn't handle, and that was assuming Braen was full of it when she claimed to be equipped for combat. The only funny part was that Floria probably didn't even realize this was for her.

Glyce led them past a hallway intersection and then turned at another, walking carefully down a corridor that ended in a rattling, rain-spattered window, utterly black from the storm beyond. From there, he turned to the side, guiding them into a large, ornate room with a gently sloped ceiling.

The wall to their left had a wide window looking out over what would have been the compound's northern courtyard, were there anything to see amid the storm. The wall opposite the window had a wooden stage raised a step or two above floor level, stretching from edge to edge. The other two walls held the entrances, and in the middle was a collection of couches and low tables meant for enjoying appetizers during a performance. Rather than any live entertainers, however, the stage held a collection of easels, mostly displaying portraits of pretentious griffons, frolicking children and wild landscapes, all rendered in a variety of styles and levels of skill.

One of the paintings stood out, though, and not because of any noteworthy skill or prominent positioning: it was clearly a depiction of Everlaste's old capitol, a brown stone fortress nestled against the Aldenfold on the north side of the border.

Not necessarily surprising that a griffon calling himself king of these lands would have the resources to hire an artist who had been north of the mountains, or a merchant who could trade for art that was produced there. But still, Papyrus decided this might be worth remembering.

"Make yourselves comfortable anywhere you like," Glyce invited, depositing his platter of drinks on a nearby table and gesturing to the cushy seating. "The exhibition lounge is open for the pleasure of all of Father's guests. Please partake of your refreshments and enjoy the displays while I confirm with Father where you are actually meant to tour. Glyre, attend them."

Then he bowed, backing out the door.

"Well, that reduces the size of our entourage by half," Papyrus said, raising an eyebrow at Glyre. "I suppose we ought to aristocratically kick back and enjoy our drinks as the good and proper nobles that we are. You look like you love debating the intricacies of fine art."

Glyre gave him a deadpan look. "Love it. You wrecked that carpet, didn't you?"

Floria stared at her. "Does making accusations like that truly pass muster in Griffonstone's high society?"

"Huh. Never mind." Glyre shrugged impassively, then wandered over to the far window and sat down, staring out at the blackness. "Enjoy the art, art enjoyers."

"Thank you," Floria said, padding up to the stage with a flick of her tail. "I shall."

Papyrus followed at a distance, curious to see if she actually cared or was just putting on a show. He didn't care, for the most part. Back in his day, as far as he was concerned, noble art was a tool for unintentional self-parody that served more as a window into the commissioner's ego than a form of flattery. Potentially useful to pay attention to, but certainly not recreation.

This art, though... It wasn't so bad as to suggest it was painted by a delusional lord who had no one to point out their flaws. But it wasn't particularly great, either. A closer look confirmed what he had initially suspected: all different signatures.

Maybe it was mediocre because Gawain had been telling the truth, and Griffonstone's supply pool was just that small. Maybe these were actually the best of the best. But as he started to memorize signatures and search for duplicates, he started to realize there weren't any: these paintings were actually sourced from a decent number of artists, not just one or two. So a small supply pool didn't make sense either. What was this all about?

The obvious answer hit him at the same time as he found a signature he recognized: Cherrabell. The person Glyre had suggested to fix the carpet. These paintings were probably all painted by the denizens of the mansion themselves, as a way to kill time and earn their lord's favor.

...Cherrabell's signature was on the painting of Everlaste. Curious.

"I like this one," he announced, loud enough for Glyre to hear. "This artist... You mentioned her name before. Does she work here? Cherrabell? I think I should like to meet her."

Glyre looked up. "She's one of Dad's spare wombs. If you like it, vote for it. They're out here so visitors can decide which ones are good enough to hang in public."

"Excuse me, 'spare wombs'?" Floria gave her a withering stare.

"What?" Glyre shrugged. "You're a girl too. What do you get for dressing it up?"

Floria's claws scratched at the stage. "...You need better role models," she eventually declared. "Can your family truly judge others for living in squalor when you accept such a status quo yourselves? Learn some self-respect, for goodness sake!"

Glyre tilted her head. But before she could say anything, Glyce reappeared in the doorway.

"I am back," he announced. "And it seems as if Father does in fact consider you esteemed patronages. My apologies for doubting you. Though it seems as if I haven't even left you time enough to finish your drinks..."

"Don't worry about it," Senescey cut in with a shake of her head.

"Wonderful," Papyrus cheered, "a fellow reasonable person. Say, I was just asking if we might meet the artist of this piece I'm particularly taken with..." He motioned towards the Everlaste painting with his tail.

"Cherrabell!" Glyce brightened. "Yes, I'm a fan of her works as well! The imagination, the exotic spirit, the... I'm not sure if she's looking for visitors at the moment, but Father did say I was to show you where you want, when you want, and I'm certainly not averse to paying her a visit. Would you like to go right now?"

Glyre made a crass wing gesture at him, which he visibly tried to ignore.

"A change of scenery would be acceptable," Floria replied. "While this room is hardly lacking, I have been confined to an airship for quite some time, and would make the most of the opportunity to stretch my legs."

"Very well, then." Glyce beckoned once again, motioning for everyone to follow him out of the exhibition lounge. "Please accompany me."

So Papyrus followed, noting Glyre tagging along at the very back of the group. Glyce led them down a flight of stairs to the manor's second floor, the sounds of children at play echoing slightly more here than they had on the third floor. As they crossed into the eastern wing, Papyrus finally saw the source of those sounds: row upon row of bedrooms, probably at least two dozen in total, about half of their doors closed as several mares and griffonesses tried their best to convince the rooms' occupants that bedtime had come early.

Papyrus got a good look at the children as he passed by. Exclusively griffons, none of them were older than ten or so, bundles of fluff and feathers in all the colors of the rainbow. Were all of these half-siblings? Gawain must have been taking notes from Lord Wilderwind...

"Where are the older ones?" Larceny asked, half-curious.

"Mostly relocated," Glyce explained. "Those of us who grow old enough to comprehend Father's mission step out into the world as emissaries of his will. Many of my eldest siblings have emigrated to Equestria to attain modern educations and amass resources for our plans to rejuvenate Griffonstone. As for myself and my twin, we opted to remain here as servants of the grounds."

"Did you, now," Floria said, following behind.

"Someone must see to it that Father's wives are not the sole stewards waiting to greet his guests," Glyce told her with a shrug.

Papyrus quickened his pace to catch up. "Angling to inherit the estate when he eventually passes away without seeing hide nor hair of the ones who left and never returned, no doubt."

Glyce chuckled. "Our children will be parents themselves by the day that happens, and perhaps even grandparents. But it only seems right that we take a special role. After all, we are the last children Father's first wife ever bore, and the only ones still here in the forest. Does that not afford us status and responsibilities greater than those he has sired with other wives, or even in passing with commoners?"

"The last ones?" Floria asked. "What became of her?"

"Simply the last," Glyce said. "She bore children ten times for Father out of devotion to his cause, and after that, asked if her work could be considered complete. Had he refused, I'm sure she would have happily born ten more, but he didn't. And so we happened to be the last."

Floria looked predictably put off by this revelation, but out of the entire group, Papyrus suspected she actually felt it the least keenly... Well, her and Braen.

Neither of them had been there in the old Griffon Empire. Neither of them remembered how rare it could be to sire a sphinx when both parents weren't sphinxes themselves. Neither of them remembered the sphinx lords who carried on as if having twenty consorts was their Garsheeva-given right... It was their Garsheeva-given right. Neither of them had watched Felicity and her sisters debase themselves to manipulate lords by their urges. Neither of them had met Crystal before she became Chrysalis, watched what that system did to her, how it pushed her towards the destruction of everything.

Even Senescey and Larceny had merely seen that. They hadn't participated in the system as Felicity and Papyrus had, using it themselves for pleasure and ruin. And none of them remembered having a beloved little sphinx sister, had ever known the claw-crunching terror of knowing she would one day be swallowed up by that selfsame monstrosity, placed on a pedestal as Empress with the only real duty of producing more heir-hungry sphinxes to perpetuate the cycle.

Senescey and her new way of living could wait. For the first time in twenty years, Papyrus found himself face to face with his old reason for killing, and it was just as potent as ever: whether by the right methods or the wrong methods, this could not continue.

So he smiled an old, jester's smile.

Thunder rolled outside as Papyrus followed Glyce into what appeared to be an infirmary, where a nurse - presumably another one of Gawain's wives - was rooting through a bin of medical equipment, putting something away.

From the decorations, this place was clearly meant to treat grifflets, and all of the common maladies that came with being rambunctious youngsters who hadn't yet learned what parts of the world could hurt them. But its current patient, sitting tired and dejected in a chair next to the examination table, was no child: she was a mare, and she was pregnant, showing off a huge belly that was either carrying multiples, badly overdue, or both.

For a moment, Papyrus was confused, realizing that with the state of this place, he probably should have encountered others who were pregnant long ago. Had he? The nurse was a little round, he supposed, and he had been paying more attention to the children in the hallways than the mares and griffonesses trying to herd them. But he couldn't keep his eyes away from the mare who was receiving a checkup for long.

First of all, she was a pegasus. Not a griffon, not a batpony, not a sphinx or any of the other creatures who could conceive with griffon partners: a pegasus. And since he hadn't seen a single stallion on the premises, and doubted Gawain saw reason to hire one, that left the most likely explanation as her being a disguised changeling.

And a detailed disguise, at that. With an off-white, semi-silver coat and a mid-gray mane and tail, all meticulously washed and groomed, he could tell that this was someone who was taken care of. She looked physically fit, too, enough that she could probably beat him at hoof wrestling despite being around thirty and heavily pregnant. No brand, which was a rarity in Equestria and fairly regular up north.

"Cherrabell!" Glyce greeted, prompting her to look up, her dangling bang unshadowing her eyes and letting Papyrus get a good look at them.

Emerald. Hollow, bitter emerald, the flame of life replaced by a tiny, desperate spark that was biding its time, trying to stay alive until it could find a way out.

Papyrus had seen that exact same look before. It was like he was looking through a portal to that day twenty years ago, when he had made one final choice that pushed the wrong mare one step too far and brought about the end of his world.

"Is this a joke?" he mouthed, aware that Felicity, Senescey and Larceny were no doubt making the same comparison he was.

There was a wastebasket next to the door. Papyrus glanced down out of habit to see if this was somehow a setup, a deliberate recreation of his greatest failure, but Discord was nowhere to be found. He looked back up to Cherrabell, and found himself entirely at a loss for words.

"...Do you all know me?" she asked, tilting her head, her countenance stronger and voice clearer than the pits in her eyes would suggest. "You're all staring like you've seen a ghost."

An Echo of Annihilation

"Do you all know me?" Cherrabell asked, sitting uncomfortably in a chair in the infirmary that looked more like it was designed for a foal than an adult mare - much less a mare as pregnant as her. "You're all staring like you've seen a ghost."

"More importantly, do you need anything?" the griffon nurse grunted, pushing a drawer closed and checking that the room's cabinets were in order as she locked them one at a time. "We're closing early tonight, but if it's an emergency, it'll be easier to open back up now than after I've finished..."

"Merely to borrow your patient," Glyce said with a bow. "These are guests of Father's, and expressed a desire to meet with her after seeing her work in the exhibition lounge. Would such a thing be permissible?"

Interest flickered on Cherrabell's face, but the nurse spoke first, looking distinctly relieved. "Absolutely. Better that someone keep an eye on her while I get some sleep in case she needs me in the night. Would you?"

"It would be my pleasure," Glyce regally told her, though from a grifflet it sounded more silly than refined. "Cherrabell, if you would?"

Cherrabell heaved herself to her hooves, equal parts curious and apathetic and apprehensive and uncomfortable. More than anyone else in the group, her eyes tracked Floria.

"Thank you," the nurse said, her step noticeably lightened as she continued locking up. To Papyrus and his crew, she added, "Cherrabell is on watch for delivery. I sleep in the back room here, so bring her right back here if anything changes. Alright?"

Papyrus clicked his teeth, not at all surprised. "The night of a ferocious storm, grounded here with no way in or out? That's such a poetic time to give birth, it sounds downright inevitable."

The nurse nodded. "Would be nice if it happened. Most nights don't give me an excuse to close up early. And the storm just means there's no chance of other patients getting lifted here from Griffonstone to distract me."

"Does that happen often?" Felicity asked, tilting her head.

"Duh," Glyre said. "What good is our standard of living if the peasants don't get to see it?"

Glyce nodded sagely. "A small taste of the benefits of civilization to tempt the commonfolk into seeking out more. But not for free, mind you. We do have standards to uphold."

More like downhold, Papyrus was tempted to quip.

It was Cherrabell who spoke next, though. "Can we just get going? I need to stretch my legs."

"Go on," the nurse encouraged. "Nothing's keeping you here!"

Papyrus found himself backing out of the doorway to make room as Cherrabell lumbered past. Even after his reincarnation, there were precious few creatures he had encountered who could make him step aside by force of presence alone, and yet Cherrabell was unquestionably one of them. Those broken eyes, decadent griffons, an impending birth in a storm...

No, it wasn't her making him step aside. It was his past, channeling itself through her. He had to be seeing things. And yet still, the night Crystal had given birth remained etched in his memory, both as the final act he had committed that sealed the Empire's fate, and as the first time in a decade he had tasted true lucidity.

What was he supposed to do with this?

Cherrabell cut an odd posture in the hallway, looking simultaneously worn down and winded from walking just a few steps, and yet buoyed by a strength Papyrus had only ever seen in soldiers facing their end on the battlefield: creatures who could bring more than usual to bear, because they weren't saving anything for the future. Especially odd to see that here, when her very near future included an act that took from most mares all they had to give and more.

"My lady," Glyce said, bowing a little more deeply to Cherrabell than his station probably warranted. "Would you accompany us back to the exhibition lounge? Nothing would warm my heart more than partaking in a discussion about the merits of your artwork between you and your newfound fans."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

Cherrabell just stiffly nodded, then took the lead, retracing Papyrus's route down from the exhibition lounge. He didn't want to point out that among imperial nobility, taking your guests on a round trip just for the purposes of picking up someone else they wanted to meet with would have been considered a faux pas; this baby griffon didn't need any more lessons about how to imitate the elite. What he did want to do was talk with Cherrabell, and yet the aura of uncomfortable awkwardness radiating from her suggested that anything other than letting her do the asking would be a bad idea. Could he defuse this somehow? What did she need?

...The absurdity of his train of thought caught up with him a second later. Was he, Papyrus, really organically thinking about how to make someone else comfortable and trying to anticipate their needs?

Whatever. This probably wasn't the time to get hung up on proving a point. If this really was an inexplicably perfect analogue to Crystal and Izvaldi, then Cherrabell probably had a superweapon capable of wiping out half of the content, and he had more important things to worry about than his own ego. Things like... somehow making her more at ease.

So he studied her. The majority of her discomfort clearly arose from her physical condition, and beyond that, he could tell she was still deciding what to make of him and his entourage, especially Floria. But it wasn't them she spent the most time trying to keep in her vision, oddly enough: it was the grifflets.

This, he could do something about.

"Say," Papyrus declared, trusting his gut and springing into action. "If we're to properly have a rousing and intellectually stimulating debate up there, we can hardly carry on all night on empty stomachs. Have you any chefs awake at this hour?"

"Certainly," Glyce said with a bow. "I can take you to our kitchens right now, if you would like to sample the fancies they have to offer."

"As luck would have it," Papyrus pressed, leaning in, "I was actually so looking forward to discussing fine art with Cherrabell that I was hoping to start right away! You already fetched us such fine drinks, I'm sure you could handle this one without our input as well, no?"

His eyes added what he hadn't said earlier: It's rude to make your guests do work, kid.

Glyce looked slightly conflicted. "Well, then what dishes do you fancy?"

"Four courses ought to do," Papyrus told him, reaching out a wing and patting him on the head. "Any dishes you please, so long as you can vouch for their quality - I'm a connoisseur, not some bumpkin with a limited palate. And it must be fresh out of the oven! We can't be having cold or soggy food on a stormy night, now. Got it? No corners cut during preparation, and then no time wasted when serving!"

Now Glyce just looked impressed. "Ah," he said, "a stallion of refinement. I had almost taken you for... Forgive me. I know exactly what it is you require, and I assure you our house will not disappoint."

But Glyre snickered. "What he actually wants is to watch you playing waiter with four courses for seven people at the same time. Does... Does she count?" She tilted her head at Braen.

Braen shook her head. "Braen does not run on food. No need for meals!"

"Hold, hold, come to think of it," Papyrus cut in, fully prepared to throw Glyre under the cart as well and pleased that she was making it easy for him. "One little griffon would have trouble moving all that food on his own, wouldn't he? He must be so heartened you're volunteering to help him!"

Glyre rolled her eyes, but for his part, Glyce looked concerned. "You're sure you will be alright unattended?"

Papyrus gave him a reassuring smile. "Worry not. If we somehow become lost while visiting a room we've already been to, I'll be sure to hold it against my own intelligence, and not your hospitality." He pointed a wing at Cherrabell. "Besides, she knows her way around, doesn't she?"

"I, for one, second this request," Floria agreed, joining Papyrus in uneasy lockstep. "The flight here was long, and I have had quite enough of airship rations for the time being. Make us a proper meal, would you?"

The two grifflets exchanged looks, then nodded. Glyce bowed again, rattling off a list of directions to get back to the exhibition lounge while retreating as Glyre silently slunk away.

Then, just like that, they were alone.

Floria raised an eyebrow. "Do you think they realized you got rid of them on purpose?" she breathed, voice low in case they were lingering around a corner.

Papyrus shrugged. "Whether they do or they don't, they'll have to learn someday that there are certain things adults don't talk about in front of children. One of those matters being foreign politics." He turned to Cherrabell. "Though I can't tell if you were simply apprehensive about the possibility of discussing a certain other country in their presence, or with their presence to begin with."

Cherrabell evaluated him, her expression growing slowly more favorable. "...You're more perceptive than you look," she said. "Thanks. Though it's more the boy that bothers me than his sister."

"How come?" Braen asked. "Glyce seem more polite than Glyre, at least on surface. Even if he doesn't really mean it, is worse to be treated nicely than rudely?"

Cherrabell shook her head. "Most of Gawain's children leave this place by the time they're his age. Surely you see problems with a young male griffon entering adolescence in a place where the only females in his life are his younger sisters and his father's consorts."

Floria blanched. "You can't mean to say his character is so low that-"

Papyrus cleared his throat.

"...Point taken," Floria sighed. "Given what his father is like, I suppose it would be. Positive role models are probably outlawed around here."

"Fortunately, he's got another year or two to go until he's anything more than precocious," Cherrabell said, then sighed. "...Do you mind if we keep walking rather than going to a sitting room? I don't know what else to do with these cramps."

"Cramps?" Floria asked. "If your labor has arrived, oughtn't we return to the nurse's ward?"

Cherrabell shook her head. "It hasn't. I've been like this for a while... Don't worry about it. She just wants me to come back if it gets worse." She picked a random direction at the intersection and started walking. "So. I didn't realize the Empire had any sphinxes left. Which family are you from?"

Papyrus glanced at Floria, curious to see how she planned to handle her heritage in front of someone who knew enough to ask questions. Felicity, he noted, was giving her the same look.

"...Stormhoof, by blood," Floria said. "Though I was raised outside of Imperial society. You are familiar with northern customs?"

"It's where I grew up," Cherrabell admitted. "What's it like there now? Has it gotten any better over the years?"

"That's either a very long or very short story," Papyrus answered. "Let's leave it at maybe with a generous helping of no. I'm guessing you left at least twenty years ago?"

He probably didn't need to ask. Any sarosians still in the Empire when it fell to Chrysalis would have been enslaved and stripped of their souls. Though she had somehow awakened to the power of shapeshifting...

"I don't know." Cherrabell shook her head. "It was many years ago. I haven't been able to track time well since coming to Lord Gawain's manor. But it was about two years after Everlaste's royal family was killed."

Papyrus instinctively looked to his allies' reactions at the reminder that someone else - probably Consul Tarunda - had finished what they failed to do two decades ago. All of them knew it had happened; they had extensively debriefed not even a day ago when deciding to officially give up on the Empire. Oddly, none of them were really that expressive.

"That was what, fourteen years ago?" Senescey glanced at Papyrus.

He nodded. "I think that's what we heard. Truth is, our knowledge of imperial affairs within the last long while is a bit lacking, ourselves. So that means you've been here fourteen, two... twelve years? Assuming you came here straight from the Empire."

"I did. And that makes sense." Cherrabell sighed and looked away. "...I make paintings of the Empire so that if anyone who recognizes them visits, they'd notice me and we could talk. But now that it's happened, I'm not sure what to talk about."

"Are you lonely?" Floria guessed.

Several emotions flickered across Cherrabell's face, doubt and resignation dominant even though loneliness was undeniable, too. But all of them were pushed aside by sudden discomfort as she brought a hoof to her belly, teeth gritted.

"...If I may," Felicity offered, breaking her silence. "Not to disparage the expertise of your doctor, but I have some amount of expertise in the medical arts."

Cherrabell shrugged helplessly as the pain started to pass. "Just a contraction. What can medicine do? You just take it until it's over."

"Sometimes, not much," Felicity admitted. "And other times, more than you might think. But your silence spoke volumes towards Floria's question, and so I figured the least I could do was offer."

"Floria?" Cherrabell tilted her head at Floria, confused. "That's your name?"

"Did we forget to introduce ourselves?" Papyrus cleared his throat. "Erm, I mean, did those silly grifflets forget to introduce us? How rude. Yes, that's Floria, this autonomous suit of armor is Braen, and I'm Papyrus, her bodyguard. Which brings us to these three..." He paused, wracking his brain to make absolutely sure he didn't mess this up. "Larceny and Leitmotif. And..."

His face fell. Whatever Felicity's new name was, he really, legitimately had forgotten it.

"Felicity," Felicity finished for him, patting her breast and making him feel like a fool.

"And I'm Nehaley," the blue one added. "Long story. I remind him of someone he used to know."

Papyrus planted his face against the carpet. "I swear I don't always do this on purpose."

"Do not beat yourself up over it," Floria urged, giving him a patronizing pat on the head. "Coming from you, a sincere apology is worth half a dozen wrong names."

Cherrabell looked baffled and amused, but her focus was more on Floria than the sarosian sisters. "You're the first sphinx I've heard of who doesn't use a G-name."

Floria shrugged. "Consider it a rebellion against my culture on my mother's part for coining it, and on my part for continuing to use it. After all the good sphinx rule has done for my race, let alone the Empire they ruled, I have few fond thoughts towards my cultural heritage."

Cherrabell gave her a more serious evaluation. "And what are your thoughts towards Lord Gawain?"

"A fine and upstanding role model for society," Floria replied with a perfectly straight face. Rip. "Keeps for himself an enviously-sized family." Rip. "Provides his children with only the best of educations and influences..." Rip. "...and is exquisitely prepared to meet the needs of his wife, singular, be they emotional, material or simply an interesting place in the world." Rip rip rip. "And did I mention how eloquent he is? Not to mention his inspirational attitudes towards the commonfolk. By the way, did you happen to know I'm not just descended from imperial royalty, but a prestigious clan of assassins? This isn't relevant to anything, I just thought it merited mention."

Papyrus glanced at the carpet between her forepaws. She did too.

"If anyone asks," Floria added, already picking evidence out of her claws, "the rug was always like that, and the low regard for maintenance around this place gives you serious concerns about its structural integrity in a storm."

Cherrabell sighed. "Right. I don't know what I was expecting."

"Cherrabell sounds sad that Floria not like Gawain," Braen remarked. "But does Cherrabell really feel different? Not seem like this place has much reason for living."

Cherrabell grimaced. "What are you, anyway?"

Braen stood stiffly and saluted. "Braen is daughter of Shinespark and Valey, on mission to travel and see world! Now sees you being disappointed. Why? Does Cherrabell like Gawain?"

"No..." Cherrabell shook her head, drooping with weariness. "Just hoping against hope you had a fresh perspective on why I should even bother."

Floria flicked her tail, stepping past the ruined carpet. "I'd like to say because you have many years ahead of you with which to flee this gilded cage and find something actually worthwhile to do with your life, but something tells me it won't be that easy..."

"Apologies if this sounds rude," Papyrus cut in. "But supposing you decided you shouldn't continue to bother, what would you do instead?"

Cherrabell shrugged. "I don't know. What else is there to do? I've tried fleeing several times, and it always ends the same. Leaving the Empire just brought me here."

Unsure whether he was about to jinx it or simply rip off a bandage, Papyrus tapped his wingtips together with a toothy, apologetic smile. "Beats me. Pull out some bizarre eldritch power and kill everyone in this mansion?"

The open shock on her face was almost too much for him to register. There was no way he had actually jinxed it. Right? No way.

"Who are you?" Cherrabell whispered, her shock giving way to haunted fear. "Why do you know about me? You looked like you recognized me earlier! In the Empire, did they-"

She winced, cut off by another contraction, but kept her focus squarely on Papyrus.

"I was joking!" Papyrus frantically waved his wings. "Woah there, I didn't expect you to actually... Look, no one needs to have their souls eviscerated, here. What say you we strike a deal in everyone's best interests: you don't use that power, and we do everything in our power to ensure that you don't feel we have to. How about that, eh? Deal? Peace? Please?"

Cherrabell watched him, panting, until her pain started to subside. "I wasn't going to use it. Just, please tell me who you think I am. What you think... What you know."

Papyrus glanced at his allies. Braen seemed clueless, and Floria confused, but Felicity was poised to interrupt him at the slightest misstep.

"Right." Papyrus sighed. "So, frankly, it's not you I recognize. It's your situation. As luck would have it, this is not the first time I've been there when a desperate and emotionally destitute mare, presumptively pregnant with the child of a minor griffon noble of no renown, gave birth in the middle of a storm. You and her share a couple of minor physical characteristics including a strong build and the look in your eyes, and last time it went so horrifically off the rails that supernatural doom was in fact involved. You probably know about it. It led to the ransacking of the entire continent and the extinction of Mistvale."

A wretched look crossed Cherrabell's face that didn't exactly scream 'I had nothing to do with that.'

Papyrus sighed harder. "If you actually were involved with that, I swear on my own involvement with it that I'm not out for revenge."

Now Cherrabell looked confused. "You can't be that old, can you?"

"Long story, you'd be surprised." Papyrus waved a dismissive wing. "But if you've got baggage you feel badly about, then congratulations, we're all escaped villains here. Seriously. I don't hold it against you."

Cherrabell hesitated, then finally said, "I don't know if I was involved. I have amnesia. They found me in Everlaste about a month after the collapse. I can't remember anything from before that, not even my age or original name. They guessed I was about thirteen, and the queen took me in as a wingmaid. Does... does any of that sound familiar? Do you know...?"

Papyrus shook his head. "We know basically nothing from after the war, aside from two days just now spent in Stormhoof and deciding we wanted no part of what the Consulate was selling. And among the things I don't know is why history appears to be repeating itself here, but the fact that I got that reaction from a joke intended more for my companions' benefit than yours worries me even more than it appears to worry you. As a member of Team No Longer Insane, I'd love to get to the bottom of this before it repeats any further and dooms you to becoming another of history's greatest murderers."

Cherrabell's face fell as she listened.

"It's true," Felicity agreed, stepping up beside Papyrus. "I don't know why this situation is the way it is, but as atonement for our own mistakes, please believe me when I say that we now have no higher priority than helping you."

Cherrabell shook her head, eyes glassy. "It's too late," she whispered. "I already did use it, once. I... I killed the royal family of Everlaste. The ones that first took me in. How can I trust you? If you're like Gawain, you'll just use me again. And if you're like them, what if I repay your kindness like I did last time? I'm already a mur... murd..."

"That was you?" Papyrus blinked several times. "Balderdash. I absolutely had that Tarunda guy pegged for the culprit...! I mean, eh. Even if you did get them, we probably put a lot more effort into killing off Everlaste's royals than you ever did."

Now it was Cherrabell's turn to blink. "That's your reaction?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Sure, we might have failed in the end, but if you've learned from it and we have too then I'd say that puts us in great company. Plus, if you used this power of yours and all it did was corpse a couple of nobles, I'd say odds are roughly zero that it's actually the same thing as last time. Still doesn't explain the uncanny similarities, but history might not literally be repeating after all."

Cherrabell looked up, baffled. "Who are you? There's... That just wouldn't make sense..."

"If you've got an idea, you might be right," Senescey said. "Especially since you did just get some of our original names. But can I ask about this power you used? What is it? What does it do?"

"It's... a long story..." Cherrabell said, ears back. "It's a very small dagger. The blade looks like a green crystal needle. It's somewhere safe; carrying it around makes me uncomfortable. I don't really understand how it works, but I stabbed one of the palace staff for self-defense one day. And the blade disappeared instead of cutting him, and he just left me alone without a word. And then the next day, he killed everyone. I don't know why, but I know I made him do it."

Senescey frowned. "So you still have that dagger? It got its blade back?"

"I got a new one." Cherrabell shook her head. "Could I... trust you a little more before I tell you where I got them, please? They were given to me by a friend, and... I don't want to betray her any more than I already have."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow at his entourage.

"Darling," Felicity consoled. "I don't know the entirety of what's going on here, but it's not too late for you. We will get to the bottom of this, and we will make it so you never have to worry about using that dagger again. Alright? The only thing you should have to think about right now is bringing your child into the world. Everything else, I promise you can leave to us until that's over."

Cherrabell sighed, turning her head down. "That's what everyone says when they want my trust."

"I'm not quite sure what to say to that," Felicity apologized. "It's your choice whether to trust us or not, and frankly, it's not going to change what we try to do here. Even if it's clearly different, there's still a disturbing similarity in place here that we need to fully understand. All I need from you is for you to focus on yourself right now. Do you think you can do that?"

"I've aired out my dirty laundry." Cherrabell shook her head. "You've taken my trust whether I should have given it or not. I just don't know how to do anything different. If you can give me answers, then you can do what you want with me in return. What do you need me to do?"

"Focus on a safe delivery," Felicity insisted. "We are not on a schedule, and so long as there is no immediate danger, you don't have to be either. We can talk as much as you like about anything you like, but there's no point in doing detective work while you've got something more important to do."

"Something important to do is what I need," Cherrabell pushed back. "Please! I've been in early labor for a full week already, nothing is progressing and I can't do anything or go anywhere and all the nurse wants me to do is wait in bed! I've done this many times before, I can take it, but I don't want to wait. I just want to focus on anything other than this." She glared down at her belly for emphasis.

In response, it shifted, her breath catching in her throat as another contraction arrived.

"A full week?" Larceny looked haunted. "And I thought mine was bad..."

"I really would feel better if you let me take a look at you," Felicity told her. "A week of discomfort, certainly, but you look a sight more than uncomfortable. And however much experience an environment like this has given your doctor, if you've remained in this state under their watch for so long, I daresay I have abilities they do not."

Cherrabell sighed. "You don't need to dress it up. I said I'd do whatever in exchange for answers, and there's only one reason anyone is ever interested in my body."

Papyrus realized what was coming an instant before it hit him. A blanket covered his mind with the weight of an anvil, squashing his emotions with the weight of Garsheeva's footsteps: Crystal used to react like that too, he observed, with all the passion of an academic debater whose self-worth was predicated on their ability to remain neutral.

Everyone else was feeling it too, Cherrabell most of all. That was Felicity's brand for you: an area around her where she could manipulate the intensity of everyone's emotions, cranking what they were feeling up to absurd levels, or, in this case, stamping out any intensity and feeling that was powering their trains of thought.

Felicity let the field lapse so that she could back up her point with words. "Miss Cherrabell," she declared, her voice backed by the weight of a god compared to the depression of her emotion field, "I am not trying to use you."

Cherrabell was openly stunned.

"I'm trying to help you," Felicity insisted, instantly gentle and earnest once again. "I know how you feel. I spent decades in the courtesan trade, and witnessed countless colleagues without the powers to set or enforce fair agreements. I was one of the precious few with the connections and resources to flip that balance of power, and for many long years my only consolation when seeing mares like you was in the knowledge that those who took advantage of you, I could pay back in kind. On my word as a fellow courtesan, reluctant mother and pawn of the powers that be, and on my oath as a doctor, I am here to serve you and nothing more."

Cherrabell started to cry.

"It'll be alright," Felicity urged. "We want to help you. And ideally everyone else who's stuck here with no future as well, but that starts with you."

"I want you as my doctor," Cherrabell sniffed. "What do you need me to do? Should I show you to a room with a bed, or...?"

"I can check you over right now," Felicity explained, shaking her head. "This might tingle just a bit, but I'll explain what I'm doing as I go. Permission to touch, darling?"

Cherrabell nodded.

So Felicity pulled her upright and started poking, tapping Cherrabell's belly and body with the tips of her hooves and wings, explaining as she worked. "These are called Mistvale Arts. You've likely heard of them from your time in the Empire, but mine are tuned for pleasure and healing instead of combat. You are expecting a griffon, I assume?"

Cherrabell nodded again. "I don't know why. They say most mares can't even have children with griffons, but I can. And mine with Gawain are always griffons."

"There's a lengthy explanation for that we can get to in a moment," Felicity promised. "Now, we already established that this weapon of yours is different from the one our past experience involved, but just for reassurance's sake, I don't detect any of the anomalies that indicated something was wrong last time. Your grifflet is alive, properly aligned... and probably normal, though this is the first equine carrying a griffon I've actually had the chance to examine."

She straightened up. "That said, you're exhausted. Every part of your body is strained to the limit, and it feels as if you've been marinating in hopelessness for so long that you're practically falling apart at the seams. You haven't been sleeping or eating well for far longer than a week, have you?"

"No," Cherrabell admitted. "The nurse said my labor was stuck because I just don't have the desire to bring them into the world. But how do I fix that? I'm not that tired. I've done this before, it... it would be easy if it would just happen."

Felicity shook her head. "First, you rest. I've asked your little griffon if they could kindly wait to come for another hour or two. I don't know how inclined they'll actually be for that, given how long they've already waited, but that should be long enough for you to partake in the feast we ordered and then perhaps catch a short nap without anything getting in the way. By the same token, my arts should be able to stimulate your labor as well once you're rested up and ready. But I need you to take this time to get into a state of mind where you're ready to give this your all. And when you do, I promise I'll be right there with you."

Cherrabell sighed. "I'll take your word for it."

Floria hesitantly stepped in. "This really isn't my field of expertise," she offered. "But would it help to tell yourself this is the last child you'll ever be forced to bear?"

"I don't see how," Cherrabell lamented. "What are you offering, to take me to your own estate and let me live out my days there without being expected to do anything at all?"

Floria bit her lip. Felicity glanced uncertainly at her, and Papyrus knew exactly why: that was what Floria herself had been doing for her entire life, and she hated it. But what better answer did she have?

"They say commoners are supposed to work or steal for a living," Cherrabell explained. "But I don't really have any talents. I... I guess I can clean, I suppose. I did that in Everlaste. But in Stormhoof, all I did was look nice, and here, all I do is have Gawain's children. I've never been to school. I think part of why I keep getting stuck in these places is because I don't know what else to do. So what else do I do with myself?"

Floria gave Felicity a pointed look that said You never answered that for me, either.

Felicity gave an awkward smile. "Well, I do have connections in the Equestrian government I could leverage to find a pathway for you. But until we find out what works, all I can promise is that we won't abandon you. And wouldn't it be silly to get too attached to a plan before you've even seen the wider world beyond a few failed countries and stuffy noble courts? Can I ask you to believe things will seem brighter once we give you a ride out of here?"

"You say that like you have your own airship." Cherrabell blinked. "Gawain controls the airship between here and Griffonstone. Did you come here on your own?"

"That we did," Floria assured her. "Presently parked out on your front lawn, and though I dread the prospect of flying in a storm like this, it ought to be sturdy enough to weather this weather perfectly on land. Though I daresay it won't be big enough for all of that stooge's consorts and children, so we will need to clean this place up no matter how our passenger list ends up."

Cherrabell hesitated. "Can I spend the night there? On your ship?"

Papyrus chuckled. "Can't stand one more minute of this place, eh?"

"I don't want to wait." Cherrabell stared earnestly at him. "Not one more minute. I can't do anything here. Nothing I do has meaning. Not living, not breathing, not eating, not... not pushing out this child. Do you even know what it's like to not remember how many children you've had? They all blend together, it's maddening... I want to visit your ship. Somewhere Gawain doesn't own. It might be pointless or even uncomfortable, but it's something I can have a say in. Please."

Felicity nodded. "I can't answer for everyone," she told her. "Especially given the size of our ship and the number of us already on it. But provided you first make the most of this banquet to recover your strength, I for one think it's a splendid idea."

Larceny shrugged. "Works for me."

Senescey nodded. "It sure isn't my ideal way to spend a night, but Felicity knows what she's doing. What about you kids?" She glanced to Floria, Papyrus and Braen.

"Just to make sure," Floria said, "we are talking about you giving birth on our ship. My mother is no quack; any pretense that your labor would remain stuck should likely be discarded."

"Sounds like it to me." Papyrus raised an eyebrow at her. "Scared?"

Floria narrowed her eyes in return. "I do not quail at the prospect of being present for a basic biological function. Rather, I'm worried about our recourse should things go wrong... and about your propensity for making weird jokes at the wrong time."

Papyrus sighed. "If this is my atonement for how things went last time, I shall be nothing short of saintlike. Believe it or not, this particular subject is one where I have an imperative to prove I've learned my lesson."

"I trust in my own abilities and in Cherrabell's," Felicity reassured Floria. "Should those fail, we will be but a short walk from the manor's infirmary... though the length she has remained in this state makes me question whether that wouldn't be a downgrade."

Cherrabell shook her head. "It would. But it won't matter. I've done this a lot before. I'd be fine if the baby would just come... And you say you think you can help with that."

Felicity nodded. "That should be well within my capabilities. Braen? You're the only one we're missing for a consensus."

Braen watched Cherrabell curiously. "Well, what's it like? Never watch mare give birth before."

"And Valey would kill me if I let you change that," Papyrus cut in. "You'll be spending the night with me in a storage closet while the ladies do their thing. I'll need someone to share my philosophical musings with on how awkward it'll be if this ends well and we have to live with being the good guys for real."

"Darling, if you jinx this, I will flay you," Felicity threatened. "But I'll take that as a yes, and trust you to keep Braen's parents from having words for me later." She nodded, satisfied, then straightened up. "Right, then. It sounds to me like we have a consensus. Now let's try not to look like high fools by letting those grifflets arrive with our food before we do."

"We could just eat on the ship," Cherrabell said dubiously, hefting her girth and starting a path back towards the exhibition lounge. "But I'll see what you can accomplish. It would be nice if you turned out to be trustworthy. And if you're not, it won't really change anything for me anyway."

The Griffon King's Dignity

Papyrus strolled through the doors of the exhibition lounge like he owned the place, wearing an air that if he was late, it was everyone else's fault for not adjusting to his schedule. But the room was empty. He had gotten there first.

"Well, that takes care of one problem," he declared as the others shuffled in behind him, Floria and Senescey glancing around as if searching for traps. "Our food isn't here yet. After how insistent I was about its timely delivery, I don't think we'd ever have heard the end of it."

Senescey raised an eyebrow at him. "In the old days, that would have been a plus for you."

Papyrus yawned dismissively. "Yes, I suppose it would..."

The room shook from a gust of wind, its shudder almost indistinguishable from the roll of thunder. The sound of rain against the window redoubled in Papyrus's ears.

As he stared out at the darkness, his back to the stage, Cherrabell appeared beside him, her belly hanging heavily between her legs. "You don't have a very high opinion of your own character," she remarked.

"Eh?" Papyrus glanced at her.

"I have a question for you," Cherrabell said. "I've already decided I'd rather take a chance on your team. What you say won't change that, so be honest. Why don't you act like the leader?"

Papyrus blinked. "Take a chance on us, you say?" He nodded at Senescey. "Funnily enough, it's because she asked me to do the same."

"What does that mean?" Cherrabell didn't wait for an answer before continuing. "You're clearly a noble. And you're this group's only stallion; it's clear what's going on here. Whoever you are, you've even managed to land a sphinx in your harem. A race everyone thought was extinct. Even Gawain can't do that."

"Excuse me-" Floria began indignantly.

"I want to hear it from you," Cherrabell interrupted, focused solely on Papyrus. "I know how this works and what I'm signing up for. But when you talk, your tone is at odds with your words. You speak carelessly and say odd things that sabotage your point, just like Gawain, as if you've never been made to regret your words or watch your tongue. But you also make it sound like you do regret ways you've behaved before, and you let your subjects speak of your past in ways that disparage you. Why? I don't understand why you don't act more proud of your ability to set the rules."

Papyrus grinned. "If that's the part that doesn't make sense, I'm afraid you've misread a lot more of this situation than you think you have. Tell me, out of this 'harem' of mine, how many have you seen me wearing like decorative scarves?"

Cherrabell frowned.

"Let me tell you," Papyrus carried on, "were I to actually try that, I'd count myself lucky if even a single one didn't attempt to punt me through that window for it. Floria, would you care to demonstrate for the good lady's educational benefit?" He nodded aside at the storm.

"You are inviting me to throw you out a window," Floria confirmed, skeptical. "One beyond which there is a raging storm at present. All for the sake of proving a point."

Papyrus winked. "Come on, it'll be educational!"

Without asking any further questions, Floria padded up and slapped him across the face with a wing.

"That ought to serve the same function," she said, walking away without a second glance. "Ruined carpets are one thing, but I'd rather not be indebted to our hosts for breaking such a large pane of glass. Next time, try to make your arguments in a way that don't require me as a prop."

Papyrus wiped his face off with a wing of his own, and offered Cherrabell a winning grin. "See how little coaxing that took?"

Cherrabell looked openly baffled.

"You have the right of it about my noble heritage," Papyrus admitted. "But you'd be wrong to assume these are my minions, or that I've had but a single tryst with any one of them. Shockingly ignoble, I know."

Cherrabell frowned. "What about your heirs?"

"Don't have any, don't need any." Papyrus shrugged. "Not from them or you or anyone else. This world has too many nobles anyway without me making more. As an aside, I realize this was normal back in the Empire and probably is around here too, but have you ever thought about how gross that question is?"

Cherrabell blinked, her footing completely lost in the conversation.

"Now you're getting it," Papyrus encouraged. "Who wants to be reduced to a link on a family tree? Oh dearie me, I barely even pass for an adult and it's already time to throw in the towel on my life, nothing left to do but leave it up to the next generation... Whatever 'it' is, I'll do it myself, thank you very much. You know how it is, right? That's why you were asking after our ship!"

"Yes," Cherrabell admitted, her original point faring worse than a leaf in the storm that was beating against the mansion - whatever it had been in the first place. Papyrus couldn't remember.

"Excellent," he proclaimed, making up an out. "Now, you look as if your mind is rolling freely around on the floor, so I'll leave you to pick it up in peace."

A flash of lightning punctuated his point, offering the perfect dramatic timing to flick his tail, turn around, and stroll confidently over to the couch Senescey had chosen.

"Well said," Senescey muttered as he plopped down beside her. "If you were trying to remind me yet again why I hate the aristocracy. Papyrus, I appreciate that you're trying to make a break with the past and turn your life around, but you keep doing it in a way that makes me question whether I'm right to give up on fighting this."

"Like it or not, we've already made a vague promise to clean up around here," Papyrus quietly replied. "I don't frankly know what life after vigilantism looks like either, but who would blame us for falling short of a perfect cold quit? Unlike last time, ending this griffon's career won't require risking our souls or doing anything more than smashing what's in front of us. And that was our primary reason for abandoning the Empire, wasn't it?"

Senescey just nodded.

"...Then what can I do in return?" Cherrabell called, standing by the window after a long minute of silence save for the storm.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow, and everyone else regarded her too.

"I told you, I've never been to school," Cherrabell continued. "I don't have useful work experience or talents. All I know how to do is look good and clean and have children. I know you said you have your own reasons for helping me, and maybe they're not based on anything I can do for you. But that's the whole reason I'm desperate here in the first place! Gawain ensures I want for nothing, but there's nothing I can do here that means anything. I'm not simple. I understand what charity is. But if you're really trying to help me without looking for anything in return, I'd want to pay you back anyway. And you just said you don't want any of the three things I have to offer. Not that that's surprising, just-"

Floria gave Felicity a conspicuous nudge. "I believe you're an expert on providing answers to this dilemma?"

Felicity looked helplessly awkward, her wings suddenly tied. "Well, darling, your... your frame of mind..."

"Alright, fine, I'll handle this," Papyrus groaned, earning a rude look from Floria as he stepped in to rescue his former retainer. "You want to pay us back, do something we'll appreciate? Here's an idea: give us all the gossip on the Empire." He flashed her a politician's grin. "You schmoozed with royalty during Everlaste's short-lived reign, didn't you say? Surely those with first-hoof experience inside the palace from so many years ago have stories you can't hear anywhere else."

Cherrabell's face brightened in earnest hope. "That's all worth something to you? I-I was the queen's wingmaid! She confided things in me she might not have told another soul, so I could definitely do that! If that would pay you back, or just entertain you, I have enough for a whole month of talking!"

Papyrus clapped his wings together. "Fantastic, because it's a very long flight back-"

The door swung open, and two grifflets pulling a large trolley stumped their way into the room.

"Everyone? Your meal," Glyce declared, taking stock of the room. "Is everyone sitting where they would like to be served?"

Papyrus patted his couch with a nod. "Kid," he said, "I can't very well reprimand you for entering without knocking when it's your own home, but take it from me that's an excellent way to see things you won't be able to forget."

"Then I should hope you would think twice before doing anything unforgettable in my father's home," Glyce replied, pulling the trolley closer and stopping to arrange the coffee table in front of Papyrus's couch.

"No offense," Glyre added, "but you seem pretty forgettable."

Floria leered at her. "You are a small child and for that I shall avoid proving you wrong, but you really ought to know better than to issue dares like that."

"A dare born of experience, I'm afraid," Glyce told her, unstacking steaming dishes in front of Papyrus that really did smell quite good. "We have seen things the likes of which you could only fathom."

"Like Dad out of his armor," Glyre deadpanned, unstacking a tray. "Scarred for life..."

Papyrus nodded along. "Ever ran a goddess clean through with a longsword, then watched her completely ignore it and disintegrate your sister?"

Glyce blinked.

"Yes, I'd hazard a guess you've never been nailed to the ground by a spike through your ear either," Papyrus mused. "How about pirates? What's the most pirates you've ever killed in a single night, directly or indirectly? Captured any noteworthy frigates?"

"You're clearly bluffing," Glyce pointed out. "Perhaps you've heard of people who, lacking credibility, claim to have done these things, but if your ear ever was nailed to the ground it would have left a most visible scar."

"Oh, this?" Papyrus rubbed at his once-ruined ear with a hoof. "It got better when I was reincarnated. Lost all the other old battle scars that way too."

Glyce gave him a searching look. "...Right. Perhaps I shall return to serving your food ere it cools off. Cherrabell! Come sit down, I made sure to bring your absolute favorite...!"

Papyrus leaned back heavily on his couch. "Garsheeva's breath, it feels weird to joke about Lyn like that," he whispered softly to himself. "Am I truly getting over it?"

"Guess you are," Senescey said, sitting close enough that she could still hear.

For a moment, Papyrus tuned the rest of the world out. He could still remember it clearly, that awful minute when Crystal became Chrysalis and murdered Lyn purely to spite him. Once, that vision had consumed him, superimposed across his every moment, clouding his thoughts and locking him inside a kaleidoscope in his head, until he mistook others for his sister and the passage of time had no meaning. Even after he had been reborn, it sometimes haunted him in his nightmares, and the only thing that had ever truly helped was seeing the new Lyn: reincarnated right after him, his new old sister, mercifully free from the perfect recollection of her past that he had somehow been saddled with.

But was that changing again? Freed from his questions about Starlight's intent for him, surrounded by associates he had chosen to associate with for no material benefit, telling others off for having too little self-worth... Papyrus found that he really had just joked about the past. The painful parts.

Huh. Granted, he had stumbled into this by accident, but if he could keep doing it, maybe trying to clean this place up would have other intangible benefits, too.

More footsteps sounded from the hallway, and Papyrus's reflexes were too sharp to let him remain lost in thought. So he looked up.

It was Gawain.

"My guests!" he greeted jovially, his resplendent armor much more visible now that he wasn't literally covered in mares. "I heard that you were taking repast, and hope you don't mind that I thought to join you. A host's duty must ever be to his guests' entertainment, after all!"

Internally, Papyrus groaned, and he noted Floria hiding her paws conspicuously beneath a table. How was this going to go? A confrontation was all but inevitable if they were going to steal away one of Gawain's consorts, and doubly so if they wanted to change the way things were done at this mansion. But couldn't they benefit from at least enough time to coordinate a strategy?

On the other hoof, he had always been a professional ad-libber... Either way, it was exceedingly unlikely they could make it all the way through a dinner party without someone doing something suspicious. His teammates were keen; they had to know that too. Something going down here was inevitable; the only question was who would shoot first.

"No, you're quite welcome," Felicity invited, wearing a friendly and professional manner. "I hope you don't mind that we've been getting to know the members of your household?"

"Mind? Far from it." Gawain strolled over to where Cherrabell was standing and kissed her on the ear. "Lady Cherrabell is one of my favorite wives. If you've come into her company, it can only be because you have exceptional tastes in socialization... not that I grant residency here to any bad options."

"Right," Senescey said, sitting next to Papyrus.

Gawain nibbled coyly on Cherrabell's ear. "Have they been suitably entertained by your gravid ruminations, my sweet?" He reached a talon around and hefted her belly. "Mmm! Taut as a drum, just the way I like it. Come, let us eat before the food grows cool! A spread like this ought to be enough to add a whole inch to your circumference, no?"

Floria choked on her drink. "Forgive my foreign sensibilities, but is this actually acceptable in these parts?"

"You take issue with me lavishing attention on my dearest in public?" Gawain chuckled, seating himself next to Cherrabell. "Rest assured, I would book no complaints if you had someone on which to do the same. Relationships like ours pay dividends, and why should she be embarrassed about that?"

"Mhmm," said Floria, nodding neutrally. "Perhaps under normal circumstances. But at present, your dearest is delivering a baby."

Gawain wrapped a wing around her, playing with her belly. "So I can feel! And at such a strenuous time, how could some extra pampering and comfort go amiss?" He kissed her cheek, then reached for the table with a spare talon. "Now, what delights have we here...?"

"Fascinating," Floria said, strumming her claws... before suddenly breaking into an approving nod. "Well, that makes this much less awkward! I fancy her. What would you require to transfer her from your service to mine? Tonight, of course. Effective without delay."

Papyrus stifled a guffaw. Floria's distaste for decadence was visceral, yet as a sphinx, decadence was her birthright. Funnier was that Gawain appeared to fall for it, regarding her like he had just discovered a new friend... and then there was Felicity, looking like any parent who had just walked in on their daughter's secret wardrobe.

"You understand, of course?" Floria pressed. "I would rather not be flexible on the timing, due to the particulars of her situation."

"Candor after my own heart," Gawain praised. "But that's not a question I can answer, I'm afraid. Lady Cherrabell is my wife, not my servant. It is her heart you will need to sway in order to tempt her from my splendorous side."

Floria blinked, her plan to smuggle Cherrabell out in plain view suddenly derailed. "She is free to go whenever she pleases?"

"What cause do you find to assume otherwise?" Gawain asked earnestly. "Has Felicity not impressed upon you the value my culture places on mutually agreed-upon transactions? The right to conduct bargains is utterly sacrosanct. My many wives attend me by choice! Their act of choosing me is one of the greatest treasures I have on display, for it speaks to my kin how much more desirable I am than they are! If these lovely females graced my parlor by force, why, that would be egg upon the face of all I stand for."

Papyrus felt his jaw go slack as he pointed a slow hoof at Cherrabell. "Is he serious?"

Cherrabell looked slightly defensive. "Of course he is. Gawain treats everyone well. I just don't have anywhere else to go."

Gawain sighed in embarrassment. "And you believed differently? Unbelievable. That my carefully-honed presentation should come across so incorrectly..."

"You mean to tell me you do nothing to keep her here?" Floria pressed, incredulous. "She puts up with that of her own free will? Preposterous. Such treatment ought to be worth at least three airships filled with bits."

"Such 'treatment' is the finest luxury the realm can offer," Gawain countered, dismissing her with a wave. "I have this many wives as a direct result of how excellent of a partner I am, and their voluntary presence here is a long-standing testament to that. Who else in all of Griffonstone can provide such a standard of pampering and bliss, lives free from violence and poverty and effort? And the significance, oh! Do you realize how little an existence in the city proper will ever amount to? But here, just by being seen in my presence, they augment my power and contribute to my glorious vision for the realm. Who could dream of a better deal?"

He chortled to himself, stroking Cherrabell's belly conspicuously. "All I ask in return is that they be the best of the best - I choose my favorites from among a large crowd of contenders, you see. But though I might be supreme as a suitor, all are always welcome to challenge me. If you think you can even attempt to compete, the prize is right here! Show her your best shot."

Gawain spread his wings wide, inviting criticism, and Papyrus saw too many attack vectors to possibly choose between. The griffon had doomed himself before the fight even began. Even when Papyrus was a god, he hadn't felt this powerful.

Cherrabell's eyes were shadowed. "I'd like to go with them, please."

Gawain blinked, and stopped stroking.

"To their ship," Cherrabell added. "Tonight. And... then to the rest of the world."

Gawain released her, recoiling against his couch in shock. "What?" he asked, utterly at a loss. "How? They... Did they blackmail you? If they did, you can be sure I will protect you..."

Cherrabell shook her head. "I asked them. When I heard they had a ship. I've wanted to go for years now."

Gawain slowly exhaled, a tiny, high-pitched whine at the back of his throat. "What is the meaning of this? Why?"

Felicity hesitantly folded her ears. "I don't quite know how to put this delicately, but does this really come as such a surprise?"

"I am a griffon of honor and my word," Gawain choked, smothered with disbelief. "You will take good care of her, will you not?"

Papyrus had to admit, if that was the first thing Gawain worried about... It raised his opinion of him a bit.

Not a lot. Especially with how suspect his idea of luxury appeared to be. Even old Gondolus Gyre could scarcely match Gawain's shamelessness in playing with his toys, and he never made the pretense of doing it for their sake. But it felt marginally more likely now that Gawain would learn something from a savage beatdown of a lecture, and there was a better ending to this than leaving him in ruins... Marginally.

"I do have experience as a doctor," Felicity reassured the stunned griffon. "She will not be wanting for medical care."

"I still don't understand," Gawain said, pulling his composure sloppily together. "You will at least remain long enough to partake of this feast, will you not? And I can't imagine you'll be flying out in this weather. Tell me, I... I must know what I am lacking. What holes have I overlooked in my offerings to my wives? What weakness did you find and exploit?"

Papyrus grinned. "You wouldn't happen to be asking for candor, would you? Because with your permission..."

"Preposterous. I have never lacked for candor!" Gawain shook his head, completely missing the point. "It couldn't be that! Could it?" He glanced uncertainly at Cherrabell. "H-Have I somehow ever failed to make known my appreciation for your presence?"

Cherrabell looked down.

"Gawain," Felicity said gently. "How often do you provide your wives with ready opportunities to leave? Not simply keeping the door unlocked, but offering to build them connections out in the broader world and sending them out with resources so they wouldn't find themselves utterly alone?"

"Opportunities?" Gawain tilted his head. "That's the entire goal of my mission here. Griffonstone has no opportunities, and I mean for my reign to change things so that there are some. As the Forest King, I take frequent jaunts to visit my territory, and often allow some of my wives to accompany me. They see how the commoners live with their own eyes! Isn't that right, Cherrabell? Didn't I just take you four-odd months ago?"

Cherrabell hugged herself. "But you make an effort to send our kids out into the world. Not just Griffonstone, but Equestria and beyond. You give them the connections they need to succeed, right?"

Gawain flushed. "Well, that comes with a very slim chance of success that only my genetic excellence puts them in reach of at all, but I, I mean... You want that? You realize they are going out to work for our cause, to toil and labor, not to enjoy lives of luxury among the chosen. Some of them are very likely destitute by now or have abandoned loyalty to our family altogether! What is the appeal in that?"

Cherrabell swallowed. "I'm bored."

"Bored?" Gawain frowned. "If that is the root of it, I am always eager to spend time with-"

"Surely you feel it too, Gawain," Felicity gently interrupted. "That gnawing sensation that your life here is amounting to nothing?"

Gawain looked up.

"You know what I'm referring to," Felicity said, her voice stronger and more ominous as she stood up. "That nagging feeling that you aren't doing enough, which you always chase away with the same fleeting pleasures as yesterday? As powerful as those pleasures are, they only ever last for minutes at a time, and try as you might to surround yourself with them, it doesn't stop that sense from returning. The feeling that your glory days are behind you, and that nothing you do here matters as much as it once did."

"With all due regard," Gawain retorted, indignant, "that very malaise has my country in a death grip and mine is the one true strategy that can hold it at bay! Envy of me and my wealth can spur my subjects to do better! Would you presume to lecture the master on his own dominion?"

"I would," Felicity said, standing strong. "Because it holds your household in just as strong a grip as the lands around you. What has anyone here to look forward to aside from that which they have today?"

"What they have today is the pinnacle of what money can-"

"It's almost like money isn't everything," Senescey deadpanned.

"Look at her," Felicity whispered. "Does she look content? Like this is enough? Where are your schools, Gawain? When was the last time anyone here learned something? Where are your builders? Your gyms, factories, parks and libraries - when was the last time someone translated their experience into action? When was the last time you ever learned from a mistake, or saw one of your wives do the same?"

Gawain shook his head, his crest heavily ruffled. "They don't make mistakes. I've freed them from that pain, along with their duties. Cherrabell, you remember, don't you? What your life was like before I rescued you and took you into my fold? Tell me I've somehow made things worse. I refuse to believe it."

Cherrabell stared at her food. "That's why I've never said anything," she mumbled. "Gawain does treat us well. We never want for anything. It's better than it used to be. And it was a good trade for a while. But what do I have to look forward to?"

"Warm baths?" Gawain suggested. "Good food? Time together with someone who has only your pleasure in mind?"

"It's been more than a decade," Cherrabell slowly said. "I don't even remember how many times I've been pregnant. So what will one more time change? One more meal, one more walk around the courtyard. What will be different about the next decade? I don't feel comfort anymore. Everything just feels the same. All I want is for something to change, even if it's for the worse."

Gawain was at a loss.

"Don't you feel the same?" Floria asked, taking her turn to step in. "You've been ruling for how many years now and still believe your country lacks even a single reason to engage with society? I believe that ought to be taken for what it is: a sign that your plans have failed and achieved nothing more than the passage of decades. A true ruler would adapt their philosophy and mindset when faced with unacceptable results."

"My plans operate on a longer timetable than you give me credit for," Gawain countered. "Children do not grow up overnight. If my offspring are to propagate my economic ideals and rejuvenate the realm-"

"How can you be satisfied with expecting your children to fix it!?" Floria burst out, cutting him off. "Why not do the job yourself? What's the point of living if your only meaningful act is to pass the torch to the next generation? 'Sorry, son, I couldn't achieve anything in my decades in power. Hope you do better.' Is that what you tell them? I thought griffons were famous for their pride."

Papyrus cleared his throat, happy to let Floria have her moment but determined to get in at least one snipe at the dogpiled griffon. "Having a rough time arguing, are we? You know, I can't speak to the soundness of any of these arguments, but spending your years in an enclave without opposition is an excellent way to let your rhetoric go to seed."

Floria nodded, too angry to pay attention to who she was agreeing with. "If you care about your ideals, then you should temper them against reality, lest they grow dull. My own ideals are tragically underdeveloped themselves, and I can say this has been a fantastic experience for getting in touch with my moral compass. But I don't need experience to know that the only thing keeping your wives here is sloth and inertia. If you want to make yourself actually attractive, try using what power you have for something that others want to be a part of. These justifications for sitting around and replicating all day are nothing more than excuses so you can feel less bad about doing nothing."

"There's more than just inertia," Larceny said, breaking her characteristic silence. "Do you know how hard it is to travel with infants?"

"The children here need us," Cherrabell added. "I haven't wanted to leave everyone else to do that on their own."

Gawain cleared his throat. "Listen, I know when I'm on the losing end of an argument. I've not had the chance to be ganged up on by orators in years, and I... I-I thank you for exposing this deficiency in my skill set. But aren't you being a little uncharitable in your victory laps? I am a male. How could I know what it is like to travel with infants?"

"By doing it?" Larceny raised an eyebrow. "What's your gender have to do with it?"

To Gawain, this suggestion clearly didn't add up.

"Do you take any responsibility as a father at all?" Floria asked. "Or do you actually expect your concubines to raise all these children completely by themselves?"

"You make it sound as if the resources I provide count for nothing," Gawain sputtered. "How many of our children do you think my wives could have had without my support? I do everything for them! I..." He shook his head. "Besides, they could always leave the children here..."

"Not if they're born on the road, I'm afraid," Felicity said, shaking her head. "Which raises another question that actually is a bit unfair: do you know how hard it is to travel while pregnant?"

"It's not that unfair," Larceny said. "You could ask your wives."

"Or us," Felicity added. "I believe among our number, we've had more than one glowing experience with the topic..."

Papyrus could see it in Gawain's eyes: he had lost yet again the moment he opened his mouth, and he knew it. And yet, like a slow-motion disaster reel, he couldn't stop himself from speaking once again.

"...Well, what's it... like?"

Felicity cleared her throat. "I spent the latter half of my time with Floria on enforced bed rest due to a deficiency with my lungs. I was forced to stay behind and watch my friends carry on without me halfway through our travels because I could no longer stomach the thin air experienced at airship cruising altitudes, and couldn't risk being caught on the road if any complications worsened. Before that point, I saw a precipitous drop in stamina and lost the ability to fly altogether shortly after I started showing. Trying to forge ahead on my own would have been utterly unthinkable."

She nodded at Larceny to take over.

"She had it good," Larceny said. "I had to go it alone. With an infant. You can't stow away when you have a crying foal on your back. You can't do work that would leave them unattended. You need twice as many supplies, because you have to feed them too, but can only carry half as many because you have to carry them instead. And some people who would otherwise let you tag along don't want the baggage of a kid." She shook her head. "I bought my way onto less-reputable ships and caravans with the only thing I had to offer. And it was only worth it for my kid. Wouldn't have been a point if I left her behind."

Gawain looked openly dubious. "Those sound like problems brought about by a lack of resources, a fate no wife of mine shall ever be made to suffer. Perhaps your maladies arose because you were not properly cared for? The stamina of my wives rarely even comes into question, properly outfitted with rest and relaxation as they are."

Papyrus tapped a hoof. "I believe the point is that roughing it alone on the road is anything but restful and relaxing?"

"Hence why they remain here," Gawain explained.

"Hence why they don't have as much of a choice as you say they do," Floria corrected.

This time, Cherrabell came to Gawain's defense. "It's really not that bad," she said, smiling awkwardly. "Having kids. I'm used to it."

"Cherrabell, darling," Felicity said. "Your labor has been stuck for a week. You were borderline desperate when we spoke. Perhaps you are desensitized to it, but you are not, in fact, alright."

Cherrabell shook her head, getting to her hooves. "I appreciate that you've helped me to say my part, but you're saying a lot more than I wanted to say. I don't hate Gawain. He has taken care of me, better than anyone in the Empire ever did, and despite me being able to do nothing in return except raising his family and accepting his attention. I'm not looking for you to fight over this. I just want to not do the same thing day after day after day."

For a moment, no one tried to press their points.

"This is something I'm good at," Cherrabell explained with a smile. "I don't mind if he flirts with me, or if I keep having kids. Gawain really did give me a better lot in life than I had back in the Empire." Her face grew solemn. "If that's how you experienced having kids, I guess that explains a lot, but I'm different. I'm fine with this. I want more I can do, not less. Look, watch this."

"Cherrabell, really-" Felicity stretched out a hoof.

But Cherrabell spread her wings, somehow got off the ground, and after a few shaky wing flaps executed the bulkiest and least-graceful backflip Papyrus had ever seen, her belly sticking out like a balloon as she struggled to see the motion through. She stumbled into a landing, puffing to catch her breath. "See? Being grounded as soon as you're showing isn't normal. Oof, settle down, baby. Mama only did that to make a point..."

"Darling," Felicity said sternly as Cherrabell's belly swayed in protest. "Are you really familiar enough with the alternatives to know what kind of toll this is taking on you? I used my Mistvale arts, I felt the state of your body. You're strained to the breaking point. Even though your vital signs are all good, I'm worried you could just suddenly give out, like has been happening this last week with your stuck labor. You are not in perfect health. I don't want you putting any more wear and tear on yourself until your vital spark recovers a little of its fervor. And that means not doing backflips during labor."

"That was actually kind of impressive," Larceny pointed out, keeping her voice low. "Couldn't have pulled that off with Ansel."

Papyrus blinked at her. "Really?" He shrugged, stood up, did a backflip and sat back down. "Because I can pull that off any day of the week."

"Stop-!" Felicity waved a wing at them, exasperated. "Both of you, knock it off! I want to get this grifflet out of Cherrabell, not convince it to stay in for another week!"

"I think that might actually have convinced it to come," Cherrabell wheezed, sitting on the floor and rubbing her belly with two hooves. "Oh boy, here we go..."

"Is what you said about her true, though?" Gawain asked, concerned. "I've made a point of wooing the best doctors Griffonstone has to offer, and even ignored homely looks to get them on my staff, but our medical institution is no more robust than our other tenets of society. If you possess insight that my doctors lack, then I implore you to use it! In fact, name your price for a comprehensive checkup on every member of my household. I will not cut corners on their well-being."

Felicity nodded. "I'm more than happy to discuss that, once I've seen Cherrabell through a safe delivery. Which, I might add, is the actual reason we are interested in spiriting her into our care tonight, contrary to my gregarious daughter's bluffing."

Gawain bowed. "Then please, by all means."

Felicity got up, walking over to Cherrabell. "Alright, then. How are you holding up?"

Cherrabell looked stiffly at her table, holding her belly, three mostly-empty platters sitting as a testament to how much she had put away while the others were arguing. "...Well, whatever you did worked for an hour."

"Small wonder, given what you just did," Felicity replied. "You've eaten your fill?"

Cherrabell shook her head. "You tell me. I sure hope so."

Felicity sized up the table's refuse. "I can't imagine you haven't. It looks like you needed it."

"Then can we get going?" Cherrabell pleaded. "I need to get back on my hooves, and I want to see your ship. Anything that's different. Please?"

Felicity nodded, looking to the others. "Now that we've seen how this played out, and appear to still be welcome here, I wouldn't blame the rest of you for passing the night indoors. I think I'd like at least one trustworthy assistant to help with the delivery..." She looked to Senescey and Larceny. "But aside from that, feel free to follow or remain at your own pace."

Cherrabell started for the door without waiting for a helping shoulder. "I can walk on my own," she insisted. "Just show me where you're moored." At Gawain's confused look, she added, "I'm doing this on their ship. Just to... to be somewhere new for a change. To make this different from all the other times."

Both Senescey and Larceny looked inclined to follow them, so Papyrus glanced at Floria and Braen. "Well?" he asked. "Spend the night in a haunted manor, or next door to a 'basic biological function'. What'll it be?"

Floria hesitated. "I'm not exactly leaping at the chance for either of these options..."

"Before you retire with my wife, might I bother you with one more question?" Gawain asked, awkwardly raising a talon.

"Show us what you've got," Papyrus invited, curious what other holes the griffon had to dig for himself tonight.

Gawain sighed. "You may already know this, but Griffonstone's population has been in precipitous decline from the ages of yore. This very compound, in fact, was once just down the road from a forest town that was completely abandoned not thirty years ago because there weren't enough residents to keep it open. And it will slide further and further so long as my people lack the peace and fortune required to see children as anything other than a drag on their finances."

He cleared his throat and continued. "Now, I provide these ladies with the resources and comfort to create the next generation, to invest in our future, to dedicate their bodies and lives to the most worthy cause in comfort and luxury and bliss, and you still make it sound so ignoble. Is a steady supply of the next generation not something every nation needs? What would you have us do? If this isn't compensation enough for their procreative labors, then what is? Ought we to simply sit back and disappear?"

"How many of our children come back from their travels, though?" Cherrabell asked, looking back over her shoulder from the door.

"Well, none, yet," Gawain admitted. "But perhaps in a few more years..."

"What's done is done, chum," Papyrus cut in. "You've already got a brood who knows how big. If that's really the silver lining you want to salvage from wasting so much time here, why don't you turn Griffonstone into a place they'd want to come back to? Invest a little in raising them to care about their home instead of kicking them out when your mansion gets full and hoping one in ten return."

Gawain was stuck, helpless. "But isn't that the very purpose they are meant to fulfill?"

"They won't fulfill it if they have no reason to return," Floria pointed out.

"And if you don't know how to give them one," Papyrus added, gesturing to Senescey, "we've got an up-and-coming political scholar of our own right here who's just yesterday gotten scammed out of a long-anticipated chance to test out her theories."

Senescey blinked in surprise, betraying confusion with a hint of gratitude. "I mean, not really..."

"What about it, kingly guy?" Papyrus asked, raising an eyebrow. "I feel like flexing the old skills, myself. Bet you we could whip this place into shape in three days if you stand back and lend us your resources."

Floria nodded. "I'm not sure why we're volunteering for this, but I certainly could do a better job with the place than you have. Care to see a close-up of how much better someone who actually tries can do?"

Papyrus glanced around at his friends. It seemed he had just volunteered them for something yet again... and yet none of them looked intrinsically opposed to the idea. Gawain excluded, the one who looked least happy about this prospect was Cherrabell.

"Would that mean staying here, if you're not leaving?" she asked, ears flat.

"We'll cross that bridge in the morning," Felicity insisted, "and you will have just as real a seat at the table as everyone else. Now, we're heading to the ship with all who are coming."

"Well?" Papyrus glanced at Floria and Braen, the only others who hadn't yet made up their minds.

"Can Braen be delivery assistant?" Braen asked, looking after the retreating ponies.

"Valey would kill me, remember?" Papyrus shrugged. "If you go back to the boat, you'll be in another room. And you'll probably force me to be there to keep an eye on you."

Floria sighed. "And if that happens, then I'll need to be there to keep an eye on you."

"Wouldn't that be a shame?" Papyrus grinned. "Seeing as we all know how little reason you have not to help out Miss Cherrabell instead. Unlike us, you're neither too young nor a dude, and therefor have nothing to worry about!"

"Would you stop stating the obvious?" Floria bristled. "I am far less comfortable with the idea of being around Cherrabell than... I mean, with being around you than Cherrabell."

"What a pity," Papyrus swaggered. "Looks like I can only please one of you! Stay behind in the mansion with Braen and free you up to do as you please, or spend the night in a closet on the boat and force you to keep an eye on me. However shall I choose?"

Braen gave him an impetuous look. "Still doesn't see what problem is. Closet on boat doesn't fix anything!"

"Ah, so it wouldn't please either of you," Papyrus said with a wink. "I can't believe you're making this so easy for me. Closet on the boat it is!"

Floria groaned. "Then it seems we have a full cohort bound for the ship..."

Gawain bowed again as they left. "If the storm doesn't offer a lull in the rain, feel free to use the raincoats on the travel rack in the foyer. And if things get too blustery out there, my doors are always open!"

Papyrus didn't pay him much mind. With how high the walls of the compound were, he wasn't too worried about the storm... and he had more interesting things to think about anyway, like the pair of stunned grifflets waiting just outside the doors, who had clearly heard every word of their exchange.

Getting Away With It

Gawain's mansion was eerily quiet save for the storm as Papyrus, Floria and Braen chased slowly after Cherrabell and the others. Over the course of dinner, the griffon lord's other wives had evidently succeeded in putting his brood to bed, because the calls and laughter of children were now replaced entirely by thunder and the wind.

"Can't believe how well that worked," Papyrus declared to no one in particular. "It's one noble in ten thousand who actually listens when you tell them they're an imbecile and everything they're doing is wrong. Usually, either you beat it into them or they never learn."

"Rather presumptuous, coming from a member of the latter category," Floria remarked, keeping pace with him as they tried not to let Braen get too far ahead. "If you're aware of discrepancies like that, why not make an effort to be less odious yourself, as well?"

"Actually, I'm a member of the middle category," Papyrus smugly corrected. "I've been on the losing end of no less than four career-ending brawls with goddesses, and at least one of them actually did get me to stop and think. You think I'm bad now, you should have seen the old me."

Floria sternly shook her head. "Being better than you were is no excuse for not being good enough. Does this whole experience not reinforce your belief that if someone doesn't step up and be a decent person, then the whole world will be full of nothing but Gazelles and Gawains?"

Papyrus ruffled his feathers. "I appreciate how you used my old name there with the implications that the present me no longer fits your point."

"You seem to think you've improved," Floria answered. "Whether that's true or not, my desire is for you not to rest on your laurels."

"So what you're saying is, you've got hope for me yet." Papyrus grinned at her.

Floria sighed. "Much as this ought to be an expectation of basic public decency and not something praiseworthy, yes. I've never seen you make so much as a pass at me, my mother or my aunts, much less impregnate us all simultaneously and then fondle us in front of guests at dinner parties. Thank you. This experience has shown me you could be worse."

"You're trying to insult me with faint praise," Papyrus told her with a yawn. "But if you had been around old imperial royalty, you'd realize the bar you're setting is a lot higher than you think it is."

Floria gave him a sharp look. "No it isn't. And what I'm offering you is an opportunity to do something that won't make me regret talking to you for a change."

"At this point, I think our personalities are just irreconcilable," Papyrus replied. "That's like asking the wind not to blow. Though for a sphinx and an ex-sphinx at perpetual loggerheads, we agreed on quite a lot while making our points back there. It almost came across like we had the same priorities!"

"Is that the best olive branch you can manage?" Floria huffed. "If you want your priorities to ever come across correctly, you need to work on being less ambiguous with your sarcasm."

"Oldest trick in the book, I'm afraid," Papyrus apologized. "It's that much harder to lose when nobody knows what your goals are, and being ambiguously sarcastic or serious is the best way to keep them under wraps. Truth is, I've still got no goals. Just a habit of speaking that's too fun to kick." With a solid stare, he added, "Telling you frankly that I don't know what I want counts as a considerable gesture of goodwill, coming from me. In case that was also ambiguous."

"So I see," Floria sighed. "Fine, then. While we're speaking straight, I have an important question for you. Was this too easy?"

Papyrus nodded. "You mean, did everything go suspiciously well? Hard to say. I will point out that Felicity did allegedly know this fellow from some time ago. It's quite possible she knew what he was like, or even has dirt on him none of us know about to pressure him into good behavior. Especially considering our sudden retreat from the Empire, which, yes, everyone is aware of how unfair that was to you, and she definitely could have wanted to do something nice for you in turn."

He flicked his tail. "Now, there's no way she could have predicted this storm, or Cherrabell's present circumstances or any of that. But I wouldn't be gobsmacked if this was secretly rigged in our favor."

Floria's ears fell. "I was more wondering if there was some... some other shoe we should be expecting to drop. But that does seem like the kind of thing my mother could have assumed I wanted. I suppose I ought to thank her, even if I'd rather not be participating in a script."

"Ah, so you're asking me how this could all suddenly go wrong!" Papyrus perked up. "Do you want the worst answer, the funny answer, or the realistic answer?"

Floria eyed him skeptically. "You choose, in the knowledge that I will be judging you on your judgement."

"Well, we never did get to the bottom of all those suspicious similarities to Chrysalis," Papyrus mused. "I still can't comfortably write all that off as a coincidence, but it's different enough that by now I seriously doubt it'll end the same way. If Cherrabell is the biggest threat in this mansion, I'd say we've safely defused her: she's a lot more stable than Crystal was now that her needs are being met, and given what they are it shouldn't be possible to deny them in nearly as aggressive a manner as last time. Even if something bad suddenly did happen to her, she'd probably welcome it as a change of pace."

"So you think there isn't one?" Floria asked. "That we are well and truly safe? Because I lack the experience to interpret anything useful from this gut feeling, but it won't stop eating at me that there's something serious we've overlooked."

Papyrus nodded. "If I were a malicious god of karma capable of rigging things like this and wanted to destroy us in the most insidious way possible, here's how I'd do it: we read the situation right, but got the wrong mare. Imagine if this mansion really did have another Chrysalis, but it wasn't Cherrabell? And, upon seeing us doting upon Cherrabell with the attention and care she feels she deserves for herself, she explodes in a mindless rage and kills us all?"

Floria's face darkened. "Your mind works in twisted ways. Is this actually likely? Ought we to scour the mansion from top to bottom and make sure there aren't any other mares like that we might have overlooked?"

"Less likely than a lightning bolt causing a forest fire and burning the entire place to the ground," Papyrus told her. "Or than that any given one of us has a heart attack and suddenly dies in minutes. If anything supernatural does decide to screw us over, it'll probably be something Cherrabell knows about but doesn't control and didn't think to mention."

"Then what's the realistic answer?" Floria pressed. "You must have seen nobility in this state before. How would this play out in the old Empire?"

Papyrus nodded. "That one's easy. Corruption is a surprisingly equal-opportunity vice: once you've weakened the rules and their oversight so you can exploit them, they're open for others to exploit as well. You start picking up pirates and bottom feeders until your enterprise resembles a tree that's all bark with no wood inside. And then one day a powerful third party comes along who's interested in your land, your office, what have you, and you find yourself with no real strength left to fend them off. Then you're left with nothing when they take it all for themselves."

"So you think Gawain is about to be victimized by a coup," Floria said. "If he puts this much wealth on display, and if griffons are as greedy as they say, I'm surprised no one has taken it already."

"Eh." Papyrus shrugged. "He's probably got their fair-and-equitable-deals culture to thank for that. Much more likely that he gets robbed by someone from outside his culture who has no qualms with making his cash their own. Someone like, say... us."

Floria's eyes widened.

"Bad things don't exclusively happen to you," Papyrus pointed out. "That's a Halcyon way of thinking. Sometimes, they happen to other people. There's been another shoe about to drop on this place for a while now, and I think by far the most likely situation is that we are that shoe."

Floria frowned.

"I know we were boasting back there, but think about it," Papyrus said. "This kingdom's assets, from the limited amount I've heard and seen, include some unused land, some lazy griffons, an urgent population crisis, and a mansion full of spoiled kids. I think it would be very easy to swipe this all for ourselves, and that's before factoring in anything Felicity might have on that lord. What would you do with all that? Drop it like the hot mess it is, or try your paw at rulership?"

"I have little desire to rule," Floria told him. "Not until more can be learned about sphinx insanity, and how to... how to protect my mind. It would be a great betrayal of my prospective subjects were I to assume any sort of throne knowing that with time, I would grow less and less fit to rule. And having seen the effect of decadence on Gawain, you could easily convince me that sitting on such a throne serves to accelerate the madness, or even causes it in the first place."

Papyrus nodded. "It's a big shame your father is now a popsicle in Tarunda's collection. He's the reason any of us actually know about this in the first place."

Floria raised an eyebrow. "...I haven't heard of this."

"Felicity didn't talk much about him?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Only to emphasize that her own role in my conception involved less-than-ideal behavior," Floria said. "Which I rather wish she wouldn't. I would prefer a parent who leads by positive example. Not by old stories of negative example while keeping me locked away in a penthouse. I desire to be more than the end product of a failed scheme to manipulate someone via the possession of their bloodline's heir."

"Well, I knew him," Papyrus went on, taking that as an invitation. "Always took him for a nerdy loser who couldn't see the fun in life. His father tasked me with getting him to open up more, you see. But no matter how many pirate hunts I dragged him out on or minor schemes I tried to involve him with, he turned a cold shoulder to everything. Not that I was in any sort of mental state to comprehend the particulars of his psychology at the time, much less seek them out, you see. The first time it actually got through to me that I really never would get through to him was when I tried to rouse him to vengeance after half-inciting, half-framing his father for a botched attempt on his life I'm sure you've heard far too much about... Anyway, he wanted nothing to do with it. Wasn't interested at all."

"I can't imagine why he would want to be left in peace," Floria said dryly.

"You actually remind me of him a lot," Papyrus pointed out. "Somewhat acidic, a bit of a coward, that same preoccupation with finding a loophole in your own worse nature. Though I daresay you're far more eager than he ever was to see what lay outside his front door. Shockingly, you're also more willing to give me the time of day."

Floria scowled in confusion.

"Anyway, eventually my plans fell apart, and Starlight and Valey decided to pummel some sense into me," Papyrus continued. "On a night much like this one, actually. We duked it out on a muddy hillside in the middle of a rainstorm. Terrible choice of venue, don't recommend it if you ever have the freedom to choose. Either way, it somehow sobered me up enough that I decided to actually listen to what he had tried to warn me about before."

"Forgive me if I have a hard time imagining it," Floria said dryly. "You're already so receptive to criticisms of your manner."

"And back then I was worse," Papyrus agreed. "But everyone has to start turning their life around somewhere, right? Anyway, your old cat had done some extensive original research on the subject. Scouring newspapers for reports of misbehavior, dating and categorizing and compiling them into a massive timeline and family tree to look for any patterns that would emerge. If you really want to pick up where he left off and try to find a way to avoid going insane without being reincarnated first... The others would despise me for even suggesting this, but even if he's dead, his old research might still be sitting around in a castle somewhere."

Floria hummed in thought, clearly split between thinking into Papyrus's idea and deciding whether to entertain it in the first place. "Tarunda had his body on display in ice, didn't you say? If he really thinks of sphinxes as a people whose corpses belong in collections, perhaps he would have taken my father's research into his collection as well."

"He did have quite the museum," Papyrus noted. "All of it dedicated to our inglorious race and its past conquests. Something like that, which actually paints sphinxes in a bad light, I doubt he would have left on display. But for someone who's that much of an enthusiast, you wouldn't pass on such a valuable cache just because it disagrees with your narrative."

Floria sighed. "Either way, I'm not about to force our group to second-guess our decision again. And if he did happen to have my father's notes, from the sound of things there's exactly one thing he would like from us in return."

"Specifically from Senescey. Leitmotif? Leitmotif." Papyrus nodded. "Which she really doesn't need to be reminded of any more than she has been already."

"Thoughts for another time, then," Floria said. "...Thank you. For trying to take that somewhat seriously. I wasn't sure you had it in you."

"Nothing like a common slovenly enemy for exposing ideological allies," Papyrus agreed. "Speaking of allies, we seem to be catching up."

Ahead was the advance party, Cherrabell and the three sisters, stopped in the foyer while Cherrabell waited for a contraction to pass.

"I see you decided to show up," Senescey remarked, raising an eyebrow at their presence. "You really all want to spend the night like this?"

Papyrus pointed at himself, Floria and Braen in quick succession. "No, no, and way too much, which is why I've got to guard the door to the delivery room so she doesn't get in."

Floria flicked her tail, glancing at Braen. "Why are you so interested in her and her child, anyway?"

"Is pertinent to mission," Braen explained, watching Cherrabell.

"Your mission?" Cherrabell asked, letting go of her belly and fixing her posture as the contraction subsided. "Sorry if there's been too much going on for me to think to ask. But what are you? You have a mission related to my child?"

Braen nodded. "Braen is mechanical pony. Daughter of Valey and Shinespark! Valey and Shinespark are both mares, so cannot have children normal way. Still want them, so invent other way to make daughter instead."

"Sounds like a lot of work," Cherrabell remarked. "Was it that hard for them to find a willing stallion?"

Braen shook her head. "Defeats point if Braen is daughter of Valey and stallion or of Shinespark and stallion. Wanted Braen to be their daughter together. Not accept shortcuts."

Cherrabell looked confused.

"Considering none of us are in committed relationships, I'm not sure we're well-qualified to speak on this," Papyrus said. "But it's possible that people in love see something in starting a family beyond just the end result of cranking out children. Not that I'd know."

"Valey and Shinespark make Braen for many reasons," Braen explained. "Partly because they believe world is place worth living in. Partly to give extra incentive to keep world worth living in! Partly for challenge. Partly so they could get to know her. And so that she could see many things."

Cherrabell nodded, listening along.

"Valey and Shinespark live in Ironridge," Braen continued. "Ironridge is not okay. Too much turmoil and failed revolutions. Many ponies lose sight of belief that world can get better. Things get especially bad within last year, so Braen is sent on mission. Directives are to see world, observe people and find out what Ironridge needs to get better."

Cherrabell looked like she was starting to understand.

"Mostly follow directives by following and listening to what others do," Braen told her, gesturing to Papyrus and the others, her mechanical tail flicking at its base. "But now find something interesting that everyone not asking enough about. Interesting thing is Cherrabell having baby!"

"You've never seen anyone having a baby before?" Cherrabell asked, tilting her head.

Braen shook her head. "Few new mothers in Ironridge. Few small children. Seems like big problem. Even Gawain realize is problem. If making children means hope for future, not making children means no hope. Things are closely related. So filling hole in knowledge is very important to Braen's mission."

"Oh!" Cherrabell brightened. "Well, I can help with that! Here, would you like to feel?" She shifted so that her belly was much more prominent. "They're pretty active since they can tell it's almost time. Everyone deserves the chance to feel a baby kicking."

Braen's mechanical eyes dilated, and she stepped forward eagerly with a hoof extended.

Papyrus aggressively sighed. "If everyone keeps conspiring against me to make my job even more difficult, I will personally give up and blame it on you when her parents come to call."

Braen reached her target unimpeded, placing a tentative hoof and then her entire cheek against the side of Cherrabell's belly. She twitched, waiting for something to happen.

"What's wrong?" Cherrabell asked, tilting her head at Papyrus. "Why isn't this okay? I get the impression she's young, but I'm not telling her where foals come from, or anything. Is this supposed to be off-limits?"

"Look," Papyrus said, "her parents are technically employing me as her bodyguard, so everything that happens to her will ultimately reflect on me. And one of the unknowns that comes with the technology they built her from concerns how she'll experience certain... impulses. Perhaps not at all, or perhaps she'll take after her parents, one of whom is an incorrigible horndog. So part of the instructions that come with my own job are to discourage her from taking any sort of interest in bodies, period."

Cherrabell shook her head, giving Papyrus a slightly patronizing look. "If that's how you see this, I've been around enough children and had enough adult fun that I think I can tell the difference between types of attention a lot better than you can. I'm sorry, but if there's one thing I'm an expert at identifying, it's this. If you ask me as her guardian, then I won't let her watch when I actually push it out, but could you at least let her have this?"

"...Fine," Papyrus relented. "And thanks. Got an idea how close you might be?"

"That was only my third real contraction," Cherrabell apologized. "It'll be quite a while. I'll let you know when I'm close. If it'll make you more comfortable with this, you can come feel it too."

"Think I'll pass," Papyrus dismissed. "Unlike her, I grew up in Riverfall, so I've been around this more times than-"

Halfway through, Cherrabell interrupted him with a gasp. "Oh! There was a big kick! Did you feel it?"

Braen's eyes widened in wonder. "Woah..."

Felicity watched this with perfect understanding. Senescey and Larceny's expressions were a lot more complex.

"There's room for the rest of you," Cherrabell noted, watching them.

"As tempting as the prospect is," Floria interrupted, unenthusiastic, "perhaps we might get you settled in on the ship first before indulging in too many ways to pass the time?"

Papyrus nodded up at the grand entrance. It didn't look imposing, so to speak... but it was locked, and they'd probably need some shadow sneaking if they wanted to leave it the way they had found it on their way out. Though maybe they should leave it open? In case for some Garsheeva-forsaken reason they wanted to come back-

"You all talk a lot," said Glyre, stepping out of the shadows, focused more on opening the door than the ponies she was talking to.

"...Hello, there," Felicity slowly greeted.

"You think Dad's kingdom is ripe for the taking just because he's not doing much with it?" she asked. "You think it's all yours just because you're the first people to show up who don't care about his ideas of fair trade?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "You were eavesdropping when we threw down the gauntlet. Don't you think it's less a question of whether he'd give it to us and more of whether we want it in the first place?"

Glyre pulled aside a normal-sized panel in the door, letting a blast of cold air into the foyer as the exit swung open. "Well, you're not the first," she declared. "I've been waiting for ten years now. So get to the back of the line where you belong, and don't make me fight you for it."

"Precocious and now disturbing, too," Papyrus remarked. "That's a noble's children for you. Would it infringe on your entitlements if we borrowed Miss Cherrabell on a probably permanent basis?"

"Why do you think I'm opening this door for you?" Glyre rapped the wooden panel, emphasizing that they were free to leave. "I don't need wives. Take as many of them as you want. Take some of my siblings, too. I can get more subjects from wherever I please once I'm the queen."

"I'm sure you'd make a fantastic ruler," Floria sighed. "But if you'd like us to refrain from overthrowing you, might I suggest you wait to attempt any coups until we're no longer guests on your premises?"

"I'm not ready yet." Glyre retreated, backing into an unbarred air vent behind a potted plant in an alcove near the door. "Just telling you so you don't forget your place. At the back of the line."

The mansion's courtyard had an unsettling atmosphere, clouds churning past above. For a moment, it had stopped raining, though the grass was soaked and boggy. Papyrus guessed the river running through the yard's other side was its primary defense against flooding, and figured someone probably would have said something by now if it could flood anyway.

"Somehow light enough to see by," Larceny remarked, looking around. "Not that I'm complaining."

"Perhaps that means it's thinning out," Floria guessed, staring up at the clouds.

Cherrabell shook her head. "Where's your ship? Is that it over there?" She gestured to the moored airship, stabilized on its landing gear near the old, disused gate on the far wall. "Could we get in quickly? I'd like to be inside again before the rain resumes."

The sky grumbled, implying it agreed more with Cherrabell's assessment than Floria's.

"Yes, that's ours," Felicity started. "We-"

"Do you think you could carry me?" Cherrabell asked sheepishly. "I'd rather not drag my belly through the mud, and if I try to fly again, I think I'll get another contraction."

Felicity looked ever so slightly taken aback by the interruption. "I... Thank you very much for asking this time instead of trying to fly again on your own, yes. Papyrus, are you our strongest lifter?"

Papyrus flexed his wings, looking dubiously at Cherrabell. "The weight's not a problem, but you want me to hold you how, exactly? You're not fitting on anyone's back with a belly like that. Do I hold you by the shoulders and leave you dangling like a pendulum?"

"You take the front, I'll take the back," Senescey sighed. "I'm more built for speed, but it'll be good enough."

"Fine by me." Papyrus hefted Cherrabell under her forelegs, pumped his powerful wings, and took off, hovering as he felt Senescey stabilize her. "Good enough?"

"Good enough," Cherrabell grunted. "Feels like I've got another one coming on anyway. Just get me comfortable at the ship, please."

They hit the deck without incident, the others arriving seconds after. Braen flew too, using her strange mechanical pegasus wings that glowed when active.

"There!" Papyrus declared, as Felicity moved to unlock the door to the main cabin. "All happy and good?"

"All happy and good," Cherrabell said with a grimace. "My womb has the consistency of a bowling ball, but that's normal. Show me around your ship?"

"Just a moment... There we go!" Felicity's fiddling with the lock paid off, and the door slid open. "Come on in whenever you're ready!"

"This here is the main cabin," Felicity explained, gesturing around the area just beyond the door as Papyrus brought up the rear. "It's both our communal living space and eating room. The ship isn't so big that we're overflowing with space to spare, so I'd get used to the idea of spending time here."

Papyrus nodded around at the room. It was recessed three steps down from the deck level, with the sole door exiting to the prow. A table with a wide, U-shaped bench took up the back half, and while he could hardly call it cramped, space was still economized enough that the entire headboard above the bench was lined with cabinets, racks and hanging nets for storage space.

A compact staircase led further below. "Down there, towards the prow are our personal cabins," Felicity continued. "They're quite cozy, and probably where you'll feel most at home for your birth, though we do only have four of them to split seven ways. Currently, I've been rooming with Floria, Papyrus with Braen, and then the other two have rooms of their own, so they might have to group up so you can have one to yourself?" She glanced at Senescey and Larceny.

Floria cleared her throat. "If such an arrangement does prove to be agreeable, but you do fancy a roommate, I've been missing having a room of my own..."

"And Braen's awake at the controls twenty-four seven," Papyrus cut in. "So I don't really have a roommate except on paper. But do any of you want to shack up with me?"

Cherrabell gave him a look that pointedly said she had already offered, and he turned her down.

"Not that kind of shacking up!" Papyrus reminded her. "Though as the crew's only stallion, I can't blame you if you'd want me locked somewhere in a room on my own."

Felicity shook her head. "Anyways! On the lower level towards the back we have the galley and the engine room, and the bridge is all the way at the front past the cabins. Hard to get lost. Welcome to your new home?"

"It feels so small," Cherrabell remarked, her eyes shining with curiosity now that she was no longer focused on Papyrus. "Everywhere I've spent time before has been big castles and mansions."

"Welcome to the land of economized design," Papyrus said. "Most of the world's dwellings aren't built for nobles with nothing better to spend their money on than big architecture... or more fuel to lift a heavier ship. But if you think this is tight, you should see the submarine they took me on way back in the day..."

"I'm curious. I'm not going to regret my choice," Cherrabell insisted. "I feel more energetic already, just being somewhere new at all."

"Cherrabell's foal will be able to come now?" Braen asked, hopeful.

Cherrabell shook her head. "This is a grifflet, not a foal. But, it's certainly coming... in four to six hours. I hope I don't keep you all up with my moaning and groaning."

"So long?" Braen tilted her head. "What does Cherrabell need so much time for?"

Cherrabell laughed nervously. "That's just how it works. You can't just choose to push the baby out. Your body does it for you, and it takes a long time to get ready."

Braen considered this. "Cannot do something else while getting ready?"

"It's painful." Cherrabell shook her head. "You have to both focus and let go to get through each contraction, especially the ones at the end. You can't control when they come, and it's not fast, but there's not enough time to do anything before the next one, either. Here, next time I feel one coming on-"

It was Senescey who cleared her throat to interrupt them. "So, not to be a damp blanket, but if we've got that many hours to do nothing but talk, I hope we've got more topics lines up than just telling Braen how labor works. Because that subject is going to get harder not to think about as the night goes on, and I think the ponies here who don't plan on following you into the delivery room would prefer a different one while we still can."

Floria tried very hard not to look called out.

"Smashing idea, old girl," Papyrus cut in, taking the baton with gusto. "We've got all that old imperial gossip you promised us, don't we? And if you get tired of talking, I'm sure some of us could step in with a bit more info about who we are and what you're now associating with."

"Now would be a great time for that!" Cherrabell eagerly agreed. "Um... probably. The truth is, a lot of my stories also involve heirs and bloodlines and nobility, and... all the things you've been sending signals you don't actually want to talk about. I assume you knew that if you're asking me about royal skullduggery, and so you won't feel awkward if you get what you asked for, right? You're not looking for feel-good stories about the people in power doing the right thing?"

"Some things never change," Felicity remarked. "Not that I can say I'm surprised."

Senescey looked slightly uneasy at the prospect. "I'd say just as long as this doesn't make me second-guess myself for the fifty-seventh time about leaving well enough alone, but there's only so much more that can be piled on. So go for it. Tell me how absolutely despicable Everlaste's royal family and the company they keep was. Make me regret it again that I failed to kill them when I had the chance."

Cherrabell laughed nervously. "Would anyone mind getting me a glass of water? This could be a very long one."

Floria rose, taking it upon herself to fulfill the request.

"So, to start with," Cherrabell began. "I joined the palace staff sometime when I was around thirteen or fourteen. It's not just the date I've forgotten; I don't know when my birthday is or how old I am. You see, when they found me, I had complete and total amnesia..."

Filly in the Mirror

The filly's vision returned in a beige haze. Had she been sleeping? No, she was fairly sure she was fleeing something. Her legs were still struggling to move, which was how she realized she was strapped to a table.

"Panic response," said a pony with something very wrong with their appearance, a bright light glowing on their forehead. "This is a very consistent pattern..."

"Well?" another pony asked, this one sporting a funny nose and far too many teeth. "Satisfied this time?"

A third pony walked up, a stallion with eyes that were too wide. "Hmm..."

"I would encourage you not to be picky, Your Highness," said a fourth pony, this one also wrong in ways the filly couldn't place. "Her body is running out of stamina. It's already a miracle you've found someone willing and able to heal her as much as we can, and if you press your luck we can't guarantee that you won't be left with nothing."

Actually, most of these ponies' eyes were too wide, with the exception of the one with too many teeth. "Nngh..." the filly groaned, words forming unbidden in a language she wasn't sure why she remembered. "Where am I...?"

The third pony scrutinized her, rubbing his chin with an appendage that went where a wing should have gone, but was covered in a weird, fluffy material made of dozens of soft, straight blades. "You keep getting her wrong, though at least this time she has a nice voice... Suppose I hold your end of the deal fulfilled on a provisional basis, take her now and give you your promised payment. You'd be willing to continue working on her later out of a debt of gratitude, wouldn't you? Once she's no longer 'running out of stamina' for your treatments?"

Several weird ponies looked to the one with too many teeth. Despite that one's monstrous appearance, the filly felt drawn to her, somehow. Maybe it was because she was the only one whose eyes weren't wrong.

She sniffed disdainfully. "Career royalty like you can't ever be satisfied when you've had your share, can you? Fine. Take your 'debt of gratitude'."

"You make it sound like the opportunity I provide for you isn't the most generous in the Empire," the third pony replied, a tone to his voice that made the filly want to flee. Everything about this made her want to flee. She had been fleeing before she even woke up, she was sure of it. What she didn't know was where she was going... or what would happen to her if she couldn't get there.

"Where am I?" she pleaded again. "Who are you?"

"You are in Everlaste Palace, the new seat of power of the Griffon Empire," explained one of the weird ponies, the one with the glowing thing on his forehead. "The year is nine hundred eighty-five, and we are doctors researching a cure for a calamitous plague that swept the land several months ago. You are one of our first trial patients."

"A plague?" the filly asked. Her brain felt oiled, like her thoughts were sliding around and hard to work with. And she was hungry. So terribly, terribly hungry.

The weird doctor nodded. "The details would only disturb you. For now, why not be feel glad to be alive and leave it at that, hmm?"

The filly's legs were still trying to flee. "I'm tied up..."

"Sounds like we're calling it good enough!" said the third pony, the stallion with the strange wings. "Now, might I get better acquainted with the particulars of what I've settled for? In private. You all will have your reward."

"...No," said the pony with too many teeth, her voice like sticky tar. "She's conscious, not healed. We will look after her. Until she is well enough to understand what you want with her."

The third pony looked skeptical, though it was hard for the filly to read expressions right with his strange, wide eyes. "These weren't our terms. I trust you'll make it worthwhile for me to accept this modification to the deal? I've been... missing her."

"Were you satisfied with her appearance, or weren't you?" The mare with too many teeth stared him down. "Be more patient."

"Mmm..." The third pony contemplated this. "More time, and you get her all the way perfect? Shake on it?" He proffered a hoof.

The mare with too many teeth looked disgusted by the gesture. "One of you, accept in my stead," she commanded, nodding stiffly at the weird doctors. "I don't have biohazard boots on."

The one who had been talking to the filly obliged.

"Heh," the third pony chuckled. "For a provincial nobody, you sure have the high-and-mighty attitude down pat. That would serve you well in court... if you were someone like me. Too bad your job will be making babies and little else."

As he strolled out the door, the others exchanged looks behind his back.

That urge to flee was still there. "Please let me go," the filly asked again. "I need to get out of here."

The mare with too many teeth stepped forward, motioning with a wing for the weird doctors to step back - the same kind of strange, soft wing the stallion who just left had possessed. She loomed over the filly, something magnetic about her that made it impossible to look anywhere else.

And then she leaned in and started undoing the straps that bound her to the table.

As soon as the last one broke, the filly half-slid, half-fell to the floor. Her legs felt gangly and unwieldy, her body didn't move the way she expected it to, and something about her barrel was wrong, but she managed to get upright... and then collapsed again after three steps, brought down by a combination of loose, frantic coordination, tripping on her mane and another sudden pang of hunger.

The mare with too many teeth was there again, standing over her as she curled up on the floor. Too hungry... Desperation born of hunger was flooding her thoughts. She was no longer restrained, and yet still couldn't move.

The mare's cold green eyes bored into the filly, and the filly looked up, nothing left to do but trust in fate for her salvation.

"Until a moment ago, you were dead," said the mare. "I changed that, to an extent. You might not thank me. Life despises you. Your lot in it is a cruel joke. You aren't even yourself anymore. All you have to look forward to is being used as a toy by the powers that be. There is no room to hope for anything else. But if you still want to survive, I am your only chance. Come."

The pull of her aura was almost strong enough to lift the filly back onto her hooves. "Can I have some food?"

"Go get her some food," the mare commanded one of the doctors with a nod. Then she lifted the filly back to her hooves by the scruff of her neck, biting gently with her many, many teeth.

Lyantra.

That, they told the filly, was her name.

It didn't resonate with her in the way that a name probably should. But after carrying her one room over, they gave her food, and so she ate until her stomach hurt and then ate some more, too hungry to wait for the nutrients to hit her blood stream.

"Who are you?" she asked when she was certain she couldn't take another bite, her body fitting just as weirdly as ever as all the ponies looked around her. Not one of the ones she had seen felt normal.

"Garnet," grunted the mare with too many teeth. This new room had a window, pouring in light that was harsh and bright - unnaturally so, almost. Garnet was sitting with her back to it, flicking a strange tail that was long and thin and only had hair on the very end. In the background, several doctors were making scratching noises against strange thin tablets with short black spikes.

Garnet didn't seem to enjoy talking. Lyantra could understand that. It didn't feel safe to talk. But it didn't feel safe here in general. Nothing made sense, all of her expectations were wrong, and she was starting to feel like it was impossible to measure how much more everyone else knew than she did, let alone why. The only way she could learn was to ask. So she did.

"What's wrong with the light?" Lyantra asked, her body feeling vaguely like it was swimming.

"What?" Garnet grunted, clearly not understanding her question. More scribbling from the doctors.

"The light from the window," Lyantra elaborated. "What's wrong with it?"

Garnet looked at her, confused and passingly concerned. "Nothing. It's the same as it always is. Is your vision not connected right?"

Lyantra struggled to her hooves, walking slowly and deliberately up to the window - it was possible, with time and focus, but she felt like she was walking on stilts that weren't properly strapped on. Maybe if she saw it up close, she could point it out...

The sky was blue. A ceilingless void so big and empty that she almost lost her balance looking at it. And in the middle was a light so bright and piercing that it physically stabbed her when she looked at it, and she did fall over, her vision swimming. She couldn't find anything to say to an experience like that.

"...Hmm," Garnet said, looking down at her. "Once you're less emaciated, I'll put you to work lifting something. Your muscle tone is atrocious."

Was it? Maybe that was why her body felt so bad. Lyantra looked at her legs, thin and lanky compared to Garnet's. "I'd like to be stronger," she said, especially if it meant feeling comfortable again in her own fur.

Garnet's gaze shifted to the abandoned table. "Are you done eating?"

"I don't know," Lyantra said. "My stomach can't hold any more. But I'm still hungry."

"You're emaciated," Garnet corrected. "It could take weeks before you stop feeling hungry."

"Weeks?" Lyantra asked.

"Weeks."

Scratch scratch scratch.

Lyantra knew what time was. It was instinctive; she could feel it passing as events in the past gave way to events in the present. She was no longer strapped to the table, where she had been. She wouldn't be in this new room forever. But she had no way to contextualize how long weeks would be, or how to get there from here. What she wanted was for her stomach to stop hurting and her body to feel less hollow and more connected.

"What are you?" Lyantra asked, another pressing question taking advantage of her confusion to bubble to the surface. "Why do you look different from me?"

"I'm a sphinx," Garnet curtly explained. "You're a sarosian."

Lyantra tilted her head. "What does that mean?"

Garnet snapped her tail. A doctor left, and soon returned with a silvery hoof mirror, offering it to her. For the first time, Lyantra got a good look at herself.

Wine red coat, with a too-long pale pink mane. Her eyes looked the way they were supposed to, and so did her wings, bare and leathery with several spokes under the membrane that could spread out to extend them. Her teeth were normal. So were her ears, which she realized had been one of the wrong parts about all the other ponies. Garnet's, for example, were round.

She looked... kind of bad. Her coat was unwashed, and now that she was cognizant of it, her mane and tail were triple the length she would normally consider unwieldy. Her legs seemed too long for the rest of her body, though without them, she'd be much smaller than Garnet... and she had eaten so much that her stomach visibly protruded on the bottom of her barrel. Maybe that was part of why she felt so weird.

Despite all the things that were slightly off or unusual, though, at her core this felt familiar. She was pretty sure that this reflection was what ponies were supposed to look like.

The doctor watched for an indication that she had seen enough.

"So," Lyantra asked, turning back to look at Garnet. "Your teeth are different because you're a sphinx?"

"And my wings," Garnet grunted. "Ears. Tail."

"Size?" Lyantra guessed.

"No." Garnet shook her head. "That's because I'm thrice your age."

Lyantra frowned. How did you measure a pony's age, again...? And was it different for normal ponies and sphinxes?

"You're a child," Garnet clarified. "I'm an adult."

That didn't help.

Scratch scratch scratch.

"You don't sound like you enjoy answering my questions," Lyantra observed, testing the ground. She felt a sense of inevitability around the sphinx, like she was stuck with her whether she liked it or not, even if this didn't feel as safe as... Well, she wasn't sure. At this point, this probably was the safest place for her after all.

"I don't," Garnet said, ambivalent and curt. "But for some reason, you keep asking me instead of anyone else."

Lyantra blinked. There were the doctors, sure, but... something about this 'sphinx' drew her to her. Probably because they at least had proper eyes in common.

"Why are you here?" Lyantra asked. "Where are we, anyway?"

Garnet sighed. "Right now, we're here to heal you from being worse than dead. Is that enough, or do you need every detail of my personal life explaining how I found myself in this situation...?"

"N-No." Lyantra felt a growing sensation that she was crossing an invisible line. So she stopped talking and waited for someone else to start something, instead.

Lyantra discovered what days were.

She learned that the light in the sky that attacked her eyes was called the 'sun', and there was an opposite version called the 'moon' that was much easier and more natural to look at. The sun was so bright that it was responsible for the wrong way the window had looked. When it traded places with the moon, there was still an unsettling void in the sky, but she could look out the window without needing to remember not to look up.

The time when the sun was in the sky was called 'day', and when the moon was there, it was 'night'. This was how time was tracked. She felt like it wasn't supposed to work this way, but for the life of her, she couldn't think of an alternative.

Garnet and the weird doctors cared for her, at least one watching her at all times and Garnet showing up whenever something slightly more interesting was happening. Lyantra was able to eat again several times a day, and as she kept doing it, the weakness and wrongness plaguing her body gradually began to subside. The biggest difference came when they cut her mane and tail, snipping them shorter without asking her how short she wanted. She could lift her head so much easier, it almost made her want to see if her body would work well enough to use her wings for flying.

As her strength and coordination returned, though, Garnet started asking her to do things in return, taking her through a long series of corridors and putting her to work. Move these boxes. Straighten this rug. Take these things out and put them on this shelf. They all felt like weird, meaningless tasks - the room she slept in was nice and sparse, just natural beige stone that felt cool and familiar against her hooves. But the collection of rooms where Garnet had her work felt like they were filled with stuff for the sake of being filled with stuff.

Still, she liked having more to do than sit in her room and look out the window, trying not to get blinded by the sun. She liked the feeling of being able to do more as she got stronger, and to feel her strength returning. The doctors had told her that using her strength would help it grow, and so she put everything into her work, testing and measuring herself.

The doctors were measuring her, too.

One evening, when she was resting after work, the door swung open. Nobody here bothered to knock. She wasn't sure if the doctors knew how. But she really wished they would, especially when bringing in ponies she wasn't as familiar with.

This time, their guest was the unsettling stallion who was there when she woke up.

"There she is!" he proclaimed, zeroing in on the bed where she was resting. "How's my precious little gremlin healing up? I've been dreaming about you all week long, you know."

"I'm... getting better," Lyantra said, not sure whether she should be talking to him or not. But a pair of doctors had escorted him in...

"Hmm." The stallion scratched his chin with one of his weird wings. "They keep saying your memory hasn't come back. So it's true, eh? Pity. I really miss that cute flinch you used to do, the one where only one ear goes back, you know?"

No, Lyantra didn't know. And she didn't know how to respond to that, either.

"Still gotta work on that appearance, too," the stallion told her. "Your body's not bad, though even with a dye job you really need to lose some chub. And you're a bit too tall for my tastes. And the facial structure, mmm... It's just not quite there yet. Something about the jaw, I think. But keep it up! I brought you a little present to help jog your memory!"

Lyantra really didn't like him. "Who are you?" she asked, burrowing backwards into her thin blanket.

The stallion flashed a crass grin and winked. "The name's Makalov. Prince Makalov. I'm the one footing the bill for putting you back together, and the one who kept your body from running off while you were afflicted so there was anything to fix at all. Yes, that means you owe me. Keep healing up so you'll be perfect when it's time to collect my gratitude, alright?"

Lyantra shrank further into her bed. "I'm trying to rest right now, actually."

"Good, good. Good! Perfect." Makalov dropped a small package by the door, then retreated with a bow. "See you again soon, gremlin!"

He didn't close the door on his way out, but one of the doctors got it as they accompanied him. Lyantra didn't come out from her bedding.

She preferred Garnet. The doctors were strange and didn't really act like ponies. Makalov was scary. Of the three, Garnet was probably the best. But, maybe she just felt that way because Garnet wasn't there right now.

Lyantra closed her eyes and tried to pretend the world didn't exist as she fell asleep.

Makalov's gift turned out to be a collar and a leash.

The collar was embroidered with an alternating pattern of pink and blue hearts, and looked well-worn. Lyantra didn't want to wear it, and thankfully, the doctors respected her wishes.

The next day, she went to work for Garnet again, rebuilding her strength by hauling things around and continuing to set up the suite of chambers she had been working in. After this many days, her work was building up on itself; even though she preferred the plain stone, she had to admit that everything she had done felt pretty nice when taken all together.

This time, Garnet had her unpacking dresses from a box, carefully straightening them and hanging them in a large, walk-in closet. Lyantra paid just as much attention to the sphinx as her work: Garnet was crabby and mean, but she still felt like the most approachable pony she had met so far. And her old urge to flee hadn't disappeared, especially since meeting Makalov again.

She needed someone who would help her. And she didn't know any other way than to ask.

"Hey," she said, Garnet standing nearby and supervising. "I'm sort of feeling better, in places."

"Good," Garnet grunted. "Because we're starting the next round of treatments tonight."

"You mean to fix my memories?" Lyantra asked. "Or my appearance? Makalov told me about that yesterday. He said he wanted to fix me, and that should be good, but he doesn't seem like he's good."

"He isn't," Garnet told her. "Most people aren't. I'm not, and you won't be either if you ever get to make a meaningful choice with your life."

"Then why does he want to heal me?" Lyantra asked.

Garnet took a deep breath and sighed. "You're Makalov's toy. He owns you. What he wants is neither here nor there, because he can do anything. And there's nothing you can do about it."

Lyantra blinked. "Anything? Why? What does he want me for? Is this why I can't run away?"

"Anything," Garnet said. "Why? Because that's how power works. Don't like it? Tough. Should have been born with a better lot in life..."

"So why don't you do something about it?" Lyantra asked. "The doctors told me sphinxes are important, right?"

Garnet shook her head. "We're not doing this for his payment. You presented an ideal candidate for a series of experiments I need to run. He's part of the experiments too, not that he realizes it. And the integrity of the results is a lot more important than one filly's comfort."

Lyantra's heart sank. "But... what's going to happen to me?"

"For now," Garnet told her, "you're going to keep unpacking dresses. And tonight, we try to make progress on your appearance."

"What's wrong with my appearance?" Lyantra asked. "Makalov said I was too tall, and my legs do feel a little strange..."

"That's normal," Garnet said. "It's a growth spurt. Your body continued growing while you were afflicted, and there's a disconnect in your brain between how it should be and how it is. It'll feel that way until you grow into your adult proportions."

"Okay..." Lyantra folded her ears, a little disappointed that the one point she and Makalov agreed on was apparently not getting addressed. "I think he also called me fat, but aren't I supposed to be eating a lot because I was starved?"

"You're not fat," Garnet sighed. "You're pregnant."

"Pregnant?" Lyantra tilted her head.

"Having a foal?" Garnet raised an eyebrow. "You don't know how that works either, do you...?"

A strange chill went down Lyantra's spine. "No. What do you mean?"

"That's not fat," Garnet sighed, radiating tiredness. "It's called your womb, and a foal is growing inside. Yours is still small, but once it gets big enough it'll come out and become a new pony. That's how ponies are made."

That didn't sound like how things were supposed to work. But, again, Lyantra had no idea how they were supposed to. Only that she'd know it if she saw it.

"Why?" she asked. "Is it supposed to work like this?"

"Why?" Garnet snorted. "Because you're Makalov's toy. That's what happens fillies like you get used by colts like him. And it's not supposed to work like this. Only adults are supposed to have children. Your body isn't ready to support it yet, to say nothing of your mind. Didn't I tell you your lot in life is a joke?"

Lyantra's ears pressed back. "So what will happen to me?"

"You probably won't die," Garnet replied. "My scientists are good enough to see to that. But you're not going to have an enjoyable time. Although..."

She turned to Lyantra and gave her a pitying look. "You've been like this since before you were afflicted. Your foal has been sitting there, waiting to have a normal mother again so it can resume growing. And your state is part of what made you an interesting candidate for the experiments. So it's because of it that you're having any sort of time at all."

"What experiments?" Lyantra begged. "I don't understand what you're talking about! If this is so bad, why can't you just help me?"

"Ones on which a lot more rests than one filly's comfort," Garnet apologized. "I don't enjoy causing you distress. But there's a question I must answer, and everything relies on it."

Lyantra walked a hallway of Everlaste Castle en route between her worksite and sleeping quarters, part of Garnet's guarded retinue.

Bizarre beaked creatures escorted them through the halls, most of their bodies covered in what she now knew to be feathers. Their hind feet looked like sphinx paws, but their front ones were even weirder; Lyantra had absolutely nothing to compare them to. Apparently, these were called 'griffons'.

She didn't like the way they were looking at her, that mix of fear and pity and distaste. But she was aware enough by now to notice at least some of their attention was directed towards her stomach. To what Garnet said was a new pony.

This time, they stopped in the table room, where she had been strapped down when she first woke up. Several doctors were already there, making some sort of preparations.

"Well, someone's up on their hooves," said one of the doctors, bowing to Garnet. "I see she's improving with care after all."

Garnet ignored him.

Lyantra sized up the doctors. Over time, as she had recovered and been shown more about the different types of ponies, she had come to understand why these doctors had confused her so much before: they were unicorns, but they wore costumes designed to make them look like sarosians. It still felt weird and uncanny, seeing non-normal ponies disguised as normal ponies, even though she understood what she was seeing by now.

"So you're trying to change my appearance?" she asked as the doctors milled around, setting up some sort of equipment.

One of them - a mare this time - knelt down beside her. "I can explain that easiest if you'd come and look at some pictures with me. Can you do that, honey?"

Lyantra nodded. The doctor led her over to a cabinet and pulled out a page with several pictures rendered in careful detail: one of a fairly ordinary sarosian like her, and the other of a nightmare.

Seeing it drew out something visceral from her missing memories, a powerful urge to flee reminiscent of the one she had felt when first waking up. It was shaped like a pony, but was black and had hollow eyes, and see-through, gossamer wings. Its underside was textured weirdly, and it had grotesque holes in its legs, its mane and tail made of that same odd transparent material. It looked armored or chalky instead of furry, and it was going to eat her.

Before she knew it, Lyantra was hiding under a desk, curled into as tight of a ball as she could manage.

"It's just a picture," the doctor chuckled uncertainly. "It can't hurt you. Is it unsettling?"

"It's bad," Lyantra explained. "I don't want to look at it."

The doctor's face creased with sympathy, though the effect was distorted by the fake sarosian fangs they were wearing. "Then maybe you do remember something after all. Those things are what ponies turn into when afflicted with your condition."

Lyantra's heart slowed.

"These are pictures of you," the doctor explained. "Both before and after you were afflicted. Do you think you can look at them again?"

No, they weren't. The first picture hadn't been her, even if it was a sarosian. But the doctor gave her time, and curiosity slowly won out. This time, steeling herself, she looked again and was able not to flee.

The thing in the second picture was still terrifying. That was something to run from, she absolutely knew it. But the first picture looked like a completely different pony.

"I don't think that's me," she said uncertainly. Though, she couldn't help but notice that both of them were wearing Makalov's collar.

"It was," the doctor told her. "And you can see it looks nothing like the second. This condition doesn't just take your mind, you see. It transforms your body as well. And since our cure is still in the early stages of experimentation, we were able to get you a normal appearance... but not your normal appearance. Tonight, we're going to start trying to fix that."

Lyantra frowned, curiosity pushing out a little more of her fear. The sarosian in the first picture was pretty, with a light blue coat and purple mane and tail. Her legs weren't so lanky, probably because she was younger, and her stomach wasn't hanging down, probably because she wasn't pregnant. But when she looked in a mirror, she knew somehow that she was looking at herself. And this sarosian in the picture didn't give her that same feeling. She wasn't her.

"I don't think that's me," she said again, a little more certain.

The doctor smiled and shook her head. "Once we manage to put you back, you'll feel it, I'm certain. And if you don't, we'll keep tinkering until it's just right. Now, do you think you could get up on the table again? This time we won't need to tie you down."

Lyantra looked to Garnet for help, but Garnet was busy discussing something with several other doctors, and appeared to be concentrating. She didn't really want this. But what choice did she have? There were half a dozen of them and one of her, and if she made a fuss now, they probably would just strap her down again after all. Reluctantly, Lyantra climbed back onto the table, and awaited her fate.

Hours passed, and nothing happened save for a couple weird and passing sensations.

Lyantra kept her room mostly unfurnished, not that she had been offered much to put in it. A small bookshelf held a smaller number of picture books illustrating the different kinds of ponies and other basic things. Her bed sat on top of things she didn't want to look at, like the collar from Makalov. A stool provided a place for the doctor supervising her to sit. Aside from that, it was just her, the door and the window.

Today, she was allowed to have that window open, because outside it, something was going on.

Below was a big plaza used for events and ceremonies and stuff. It was in use today, a big crowd of creatures gathered around a stage. Garnet was on that stage, along with some others who also had wings and tufted tails. That made them sphinxes too?

"Lost daughter... born to a provincial... never brought forth... Lord Izvaldi..."

She leaned on the open windowsill, the speaker's words partially lost over the breeze. Wind felt weird. The air wasn't supposed to move of its own accord, was it? It smelled sharp and dusty.

"Came forward of her own... salvation of our..."

Garnet was wearing an elaborate dress, with rich, dark colors. Lyantra hadn't seen that dress while hanging the others. Maybe it was too big to fit in Garnet's closet, or maybe it was too important, and she had borrowed it from someone else? Probably the latter, because her closet was pretty big.

"Lawfully wedded... son and... glory of the Empire..."

Lyantra couldn't really tell what was going on, and she didn't know how to read the crowd. They were polite, she guessed? Serious? But they also applauded sometimes. It felt like they could read what was going on a lot better than she could.

Maybe she'd ask Garnet about it later.

Later came soon.

Scarcely thirty minutes after the ceremony concluded, the door to Lyantra's quarters swung open. This time, Garnet herself was the escort, and the visitor was another sphinx.

This new one was male, dressed up just like she was - he had probably been with her at the ceremony. Lyantra was on her bed when they arrived, since there wasn't much else to do. She felt more of an urge than usual to sit at attention. If Garnet alone could do whatever she wanted, two sphinxes could... She really didn't know.

"Well, well," the new sphinx said in a smooth voice, his mane impeccably groomed, some quality to his facial structure that Lyantra hadn't seen before serving to make him look almost silly. "This is my little bro's miracle filly, is it? How do you like that?"

"Who are you?" Lyantra asked, unsure if she should really be speaking.

He padded closer and looked her up and down, somewhere between impassive and dismissive and sympathetic. "Honestly, as impressive as it is, I fail to see the point."

Lyantra's ears twitched.

"Why invest effort into saving this poor creature?" He turned to Garnet, posing his question. "You don't need 'savior of sarosians' on your resume for the general public to accept you. This might come as a shock to an Izvalden, but in Everlaste, that's actually a negative. And you certainly don't need it for me to accept you, hah! Any route towards repopulating our species that doesn't involve sharing a bed with my sister is more than welcome, regardless of your accomplishments. Why, you're practically a peasant as far as I'm concerned, and I still married you with open arms!"

Garnet looked dryly at him. "Thanks. It's a hobby."

"A hobby," the new sphinx said. "To dig up the grave of a species that's been finally put to rest and restart the cycle of hatred. Well, our family has no strangers to eccentric hobbies, so you'll find no judgement here. But, consider that you could have just joined the rest of us in telling Makalov to grow up."

"I could have," Garnet agreed.

"Her child isn't even of particular value," the new sphinx added, scratching his head. "If she were carrying a sphinx, I'd understand, but Makalov's inclusion in the royal family is nothing more than an odd policy artifact combined with a flaw in Mother's character. Bringing back a filly for the sole purpose of having a deluded half-noble's children... The more I think about this, the more it's like you actually hate them more than Father does. Hah! Hoho. Imagine that..."

He turned to Garnet, baffled. "Just what did my brother offer you for this?"

"Nothing as valuable as he thinks it is," Garnet replied. "And some things of value beyond what he realizes. So far, she's my maid, not Makalov's."

The new sphinx looked slightly put out. "I suppose I'll make this clear: you don't need to put any sarosians through living nightmares to win my heart. I actually find this ancestral hatred of ours to be rather gauche. There's nothing wrong with a world where they simply die out and we move on."

Lyantra really didn't like him. Hopefully Garnet would take him away soon...

"Well!" the new sphinx chuckled. "Let it never be said that I don't take an interest in my lovely bride's pet projects. But, if we've seen all there is to see here, it's been far too long since I've gotten to feel good about the main event."

"Fine," Garnet said, more apprehensive than Lyantra usually saw her as she led the way out the door. "Let's see if this is worth the hype..."

When they were gone, Lyantra glanced at the doctor who was keeping vigil in the corner. "Who was that?"

"High Prince Gordovic," he explained. "Emperor Geltrich's heir. But now that he's found a proper wife, he probably won't be just the High Prince for much longer. The Emperor's getting on in age, and was already looking to pass the torch before he became Emperor due to the calamity."

Lyantra suspected that she didn't have a mind for politics, because all this talk of wives and princes and high empires blended together in her ears. But, that sounded important? Maybe?

"Huh," she said, and went back to thinking about what made the wind blow.

Garnet and the doctors didn't give up on changing Lyantra's form. They assembled in the table room night after night, and after several sessions of no results, boredom soon came to dominate Lyantra's feelings on the topic. She couldn't brace herself for the prospect of having an unfamiliar body forever, and that left her with nothing to do but study the doctors' methods and try to figure them out. Not that there was much she could figure. It clearly revolved around Garnet doing something, but that something looked an awful lot like doing nothing.

One morning, as she was getting started cleaning Garnet's bedroom, she asked her about it. "How is this change supposed to work?"

Garnet sighed. "Your affliction was caused by a monster unleashing its powers across a large swath of the world. Sarosians are uniquely vulnerable to those powers, and almost all of your race ended up like the pictures you've seen. Formless. Mindless. Dumb savage animals, controlled by another. But it turns out those powers are similar to ones possessed by sphinxes... ones we don't know as much as I want about how to use."

"So you think you can use the same power that changed me to change me back," Lyantra said, head low.

"It's more than just a hunch," Garnet told her. "I can do it to myself, and the afflicted, mindless sarosians. But now that I've given you a mind again, and a random form along with it..."

She shook her head. "No mind lets me control your form. Having a mind gives you a random form. One or the other isn't good enough. There must be a way to do both at the same time."

"Why?" Lyantra asked. "I'd be happy to stay as I am now."

"I told you." Garnet gave her a pointed stare. "Because what you want doesn't matter, and my client likes the way you used to look more."

Lyantra stared in confusion. "But what does that have to do with you? I know he wants me to look like that other filly, but why do you want this?"

Garnet hesitated. "He has power. You don't. It's not your choice. That's the way the system works... But what if it didn't have to be? What if you could change who you were and become someone who doesn't get trampled as a hobby? What if I could make you that way?"

Lyantra tilted her head. "But I like being me."

"You shouldn't," Garnet told her, a snap of resentment in her voice. "You're a toy. A lab experiment. A pregnant child worker with no peers or role models, and it's going to get worse the more you understand what that means. You should be willing to do anything to escape your own fur... That's what I assumed would be the key, the desire not to be yourself anymore."

She looked up. "But you don't feel that? You can think about where you are, who you are, what you are and not recoil against the walls of your mind, frantic for an escape?"

"I-I want to escape," Lyantra admitted, willing to spill her heart to this mare if it could possibly get her on her side. "I don't really like it here. I don't like Makalov, or that other sphinx you were with. And I'm really bored, especially when you put me on that table and have me sit still for hours. And I'm lonely, even though I never get to be alone even for a minute. Why can't you just help me?"

Garnet shook her head. "There's only one thing I can do to help you: changing your form. If I can figure this out, learn how to do this to a conscious sarosian, I won't have to make you Makalov's plaything. I'll make you anything you want to be. You could be Makalov himself, with access to all his power. You could be a new person, without any history or baggage at all. This is my experiment, Lyantra: changing your form is useless if the new form suffers the same fate as the old. I need thinking, breathing shape-shifters I can observe to see what they do, the choices they make and the consequences of those choices. To see what works."

She lifted Lyantra's chin with a wing. "I don't want Makalov to hurt you, Lyantra. I want to know what to fix so that you and everyone like you will never hurt again."

Lyantra's heart pounded. "But why am I not fine the way I am? Why do you need to change me? Why not just make Makalov leave me alone?"

Garnet sighed and let her go. "Right. You're a new pony. You don't understand what's at stake. I thought that by doing this with a body that had baggage from her old life..." She grimaced. "But you really don't have the kinds of stains on your psyche I'm looking for. Why did all the original souls have to be..." She drifted into muttering under her breath, and Lyantra couldn't catch any more.

Lyantra tilted her head.

"Sorry if this doesn't feel pleasant," Garnet grunted. "I'll try not to leave any lasting damage, but I can't leave this untested."

Lyantra had a mental image of herself, a little picture of her in the back of her mind that had been sitting there ever since she first saw herself in a mirror. It changed as she changed, and was doing better than it once had been, stronger and cleaner, if still cowering and scared. But suddenly, there was a protective bubble around that image, as if the rest of her mindscape had been replaced with hostile, inky space.

There were tentacles in that space. Thick, tapering and wormlike, encroaching from the darkness, made of black, sticky tar that roiled just beneath the surface with hatred and envy. The tentacles encircled her bubble like thorny sharks, gaps parting in their coating of ooze to reveal eyeballs and mouths that stared at her far, far too eagerly.

They didn't pierce the shield, though she was sure they could have. Instead, they spectated, a gibber of comments flowing in about all the things that felt manageable in the privacy of her own mind, now torn out into public. Her legs, what were they doing being so long? Double, triple the length they should be, what was with that? And her stomach, what a balloon! Was it supposed to be the same size as the rest of her put together? She should see a doctor. One who didn't think she was an experiment.

Oh, and had Makalov said there was something wrong with her face? She twisted around to try to see herself, but her jaw wasn't working, like the bottom half was the wrong size for the top half. And her mane and tail clearly weren't cut by a professional, sure, but was this really the best an amateur could do? Someone wanted her to look this way. Speaking of wants, that was a very pretty collar, ooo...

The pressure around Lyantra's mind was too cloying to even scream. And then, all at once, it withdrew, the tentacles vanishing into the darkness, leaving her body twisted and collared and disfigured beyond recognition.

Lyantra started to cry. And that was how she realized that the grotesque ruin was only in her mind: in real life, she was a pretty yet foreign shade of blue, with a purple mane and all her anatomy in the right place.

"W-What...?" Lyantra lost her footing and slumped, the boundary between mind and reality utterly disintegrated.

"Hmm," Garnet said, studying her. "That didn't look pleasant. I tried to do it without direct force... But results are results. Look at yourself."

That's what she was doing. Just like the sarosian in the picture, she was blue.

Her legs were still a little longer, and her stomach still a little bigger, but... but...

"Are you alright?" Garnet asked. "Any lingering side effects? Weird feelings, self-loathing? I tried to make the suppression temporary, to scare instead of scar, but I'm not very skilled at being gentle."

She wasn't herself anymore. And she didn't know what she had to go back to.

Lyantra didn't get to work. Instead, she sat in the middle of Garnet's floor, her thoughts completely paralyzed. And today of all days, Garnet hadn't brought any doctors along to watch her.

"Are you sure you're not suffering side effects?" Garnet asked, after coaxing her into eating lunch. "I turned you back. Did I break something along the way?"

It was true. Lyantra was back in her old form... not that it changed much. There hadn't been any tentacles or eyes the second time around. Whatever had been done, well... it was done. This body didn't feel like it fit her either. She was drifting, and couldn't see what she had been holding onto.

"Nngh..." Garnet leaned back and massaged her temple. "I make for a terrible scientist... What? What do you need? I can't give you anything if you don't talk to me."

Lyantra didn't know.

"I'm not a mind reader," Garnet reminded her. "This is why you shouldn't have kept asking me for help. I break things, not fix them. But now I'm actually offering to help you. What do you want? This success is useless if it comes at the cost of your mind again. I can tell you're still in there, but what will I do with all these scientists if they decide otherwise?"

Lyantra didn't know that, either.

"Worst comes to worst, we have to tear out your mind again and start all over," Garnet told her. "Just like what afflicted you in the first place. I'm not eager to do that. You shouldn't be either. As far as you're concerned, you'll be dead."

Lyantra wanted to say something. She really did. Whatever Garnet was offering, she wanted to accept - she needed a friend. But something broke down in her mind between that thought and taking action. Something around that flimsy bubble in her head protecting whatever it was she was supposed to be.

"Ugh," Garnet said, getting to her paws. "Why do I get the feeling nothing here is going to be the answer I need...? Do nothing, for all I care. Who needs you, anyway?"

And then, Garnet started doing Lyantra's chores.

It made sense, sort of. She was the only other one there. They needed doing, or else Lyantra wouldn't be here herself. And Lyantra didn't know what other kinds of duties Garnet had, but evidently there were none today... or at least none important enough to take her back to the doctors first, or else leave her unsupervised.

That was kind of nice. She didn't really want to be around a bunch of doctors who were constantly watching her right now.

But even if the chores needed to get done, watching Garnet fixing coffee table placements and sweeping felt really odd. This was Lyantra's work. It was something she took pride in being the one responsible for. Pride didn't really fit in her right now, but she was reminded of it anyway, and had nowhere for it to go.

It was also odd because she couldn't imagine Makalov doing menial housework like this. Or that other sphinx. In fact, she couldn't even imagine them knowing how to do it. But Garnet did it with a practiced ease.

That made sense, since she was the one who taught Lyantra to do it. But wasn't it odd that she could do that in the first place?

This was something the two of them had in common. Lyantra felt like she was still floating without a boat, but had suddenly found a single log from a broken raft to cling onto.

So she clung to it, got up, and started working.

Lyantra worked until nightfall. At some point, a doctor poked their head in, and Garnet shooed them away - no testing or experiments tonight. Garnet didn't do much more once Lyantra started, falling back to giving orders and telling her what to do, but it was enough. It was... It was something.

"You're slouching," Garnet told her after she tripped on the corner of a rug. "You're clearly exhausted. That's enough."

Lyantra looked up. She didn't want to stop. This was what she had.

"I'll take you back to your room," Garnet told her. "Come."

She opened the door to leave... but Lyantra didn't want to go.

"Please," she managed, causing Garnet's ears to swivel. "Stay here."

"What?" Garnet spun around. "You're feeling up to talking now? Are you feeling better? Can you tell me what you need?"

"I don't want my room," Lyantra told her. "I don't..."

Garnet frowned.

Then she lowered her voice. "Kid. I despise those scientists. I am using them because I need them because they are the only ones left alive on this continent who know a thing about sarosian anatomy, and I don't need to feel any extra sources of tension towards them to keep in check. If you're alright, what will it take to go back to your room and tell them you are fine and I did not break our most promising lead while their backs were turned?"

Lyantra shook her head. This was what she had. "Can I stay here?"

"...Fine," Garnet sighed. "Sleep on the couch. Don't wander off unsupervised; I will know instantly if you leave. And if anyone comes looking for you, point them to me..."

Then she slouched her way into her bedroom, leaving the door just slightly ajar.

It was probably meant as a warning, that she was watching and listening. But Lyantra already felt watched and listened to, like the eyes could come back at any time. She needed something familiar. And she really didn't know whether it was a good idea - whether anything was a good idea anymore. But her hooves told her where to find it. So, after what felt like an eternity of sitting in the middle of the floor going back and forth, she listened.

She could practically feel Garnet sigh as she edged the door open. But the sphinx said nothing... right up until she lifted the covers and crawled inside.

"What are you doing...?" Garnet groaned, as if she had lost all ability to predict the world.

Lyantra said nothing.

"If you're looking for company, you'd have better luck snuggling with a scorpion," Garnet threatened. "I'm using you. I hurt you badly enough that you spent a whole day without talking, and feel worse about it for my sake than for yours. I keep you under lock and key and work you to the bone. You cannot possibly think this is a good idea."

Still no response. She didn't have an argument she could put into words. All she wanted was something she could hold onto. To side with, so that she could be more than a filly floating lost at sea. And Garnet was the only thing she had. Either she would accept her, or... There was no alternative. Lyantra had to get her acceptance.

"So many times where this could have made sense," Garnet whispered, giving up. "All of those, and nothing. So why now...?"

She still didn't get an answer, and stopped prodding for one. Eventually, Lyantra realized she was letting her stay.

Minutes ticked by, and eventually, the tentacles in her mind returned.

They hid their eyes and mouths, calmer this time. Still roiling beneath the surface. Instead of spectating, one poked her shield, and it popped like a bubble of soap.

Lyantra could do nothing to resist, even if she wanted to. But one of them reached into her image and snipped off the collar around her neck, and another brushed her mane out, removing its hideous style and bringing it back to something resembling normal.

They did a rough job, especially on the rest of her body - it was like she was made of unfired clay, and every time they tried to squish something into place, it squished something out of place elsewhere. But as Lyantra watched, they slowly kneaded away the gross proportions, pressing her mental image of herself back into something roughly resembling what it had once been. A crude work, still vaguely lopsided and marred with flaws. But no longer an ogled monstrosity.

Then the tentacles withdrew, the last one patting her on the head on its way out.

Lyantra didn't know how much of it was real. She didn't know how a sphinx could do something like that in her mind, even if it was real. But if this was supposed to be an apology... It still hollowed her out, left her dizzy and feeling vaguely sticky on the inside. But it was better than anything she could get from anyone else she knew. She knew that for a fact.

This was where she would place her trust, then, come what may.

In the morning, Lyantra discovered that Garnet could still very much change her form. This time, no eyeballs were required.

"Well?" Garnet asked, sitting behind Lyantra in front of a mirror as she transformed once again, a fleeting curtain of green fire engulfing her body to obscure the exact moment of change. "Have you decided this isn't so bad after all? Not regretting your choice to still be there when I woke up? I do need to figure this out, you know."

Lyantra was still here, wasn't she? She figured that spoke for itself.

"Speak up," Garnet commanded. "Was that time better or worse? I'm trying to make this easier, but if you don't tell me, there's only so much I can do."

It was exactly the same. She needed no further preparation for Garnet to simply think about it and her body to obey. The image in her mind was fixed up a little, but she still didn't feel the attachment to it she remembered having lost. She felt... sort of indifferent about the whole affair.

"What's wrong with you?" Garnet asked, shifting her back to her original form. "What did I break? You were talking last night. Did I screw something up again?"

"I'm fine," Lyantra murmured. She just didn't have much to say.

Garnet growled softly to herself. "Why are there no references on what a sarosian body is supposed to work like? Do I have to go to Mistvale to find the right literature? Why is the only resource squirreled away in the heads of those stupid scientists who could all be dead right now if only I didn't need them to figure out-"

Suddenly, a loud knock sounded at the door to the suite.

"What!?" Garnet snapped, raising her voice.

"Just your friendly, patient client, wondering if his little gremlin is finally fixed yet," called an unpleasant voice Lyantra immediately recognized.

Garnet sighed. "Not much of a point in locking it when I'd get visitors knocking either way. Decide for yourself whether you're welcome, and prepare to be wrong."

"I'm so glad you understand how things work around here," Makalov proclaimed, kicking the door open and strutting in.

Lyantra tried not to make eye contact.

He had no such compulsions, and his eyes settle on her, searching. "No progress at all, I see. You know, I really-"

Garnet cricked her neck, as if to signify an absolute minimum of effort. Instantly, Lyantra transformed.

"Oho!" Makalov kicked the door shut and strode forward, his eagerly-widening eyes reflecting a blue and purple filly that felt about as right as all the other forms. "Now that's what I call presentation! Well played, well played!"

He stopped just in front of her, craning his neck and circling like she was a window display, sticking just barely to look-don't-touch. "Mhmm, mhmm... Colors are on point, and you even got her facial structure? Incredible! Manestyle needs some work, but I always did that bit myself anyway. Still no memories, I take it?"

Lyantra wanted to leave, instantly. But Makalov's gaze pinned her in place, so her eyes shot to Garnet, begging to be rescued.

"She's not the Lyantra you know," Garnet grunted. "That's how our cure works. It's a new pony with new memories in the same body. You're not getting that back."

"What are you, a quack?" Makalov scoffed. "I thought you said you could make it perfect! Fine, fine, then what about this?" He gestured to her forelegs. "I did include her measurements in the reference material, yes? Because these are just the wee slightest bit too long..."

"It's called growing up," Garnet said tiredly, sitting in the corner like a sentinel. "Her body continued to age in your storage closet. This is a process, by the way, that even people you consider savages wait for the completion of before having children."

Makalov gave her an exasperated look. "That defeats the point. I like her this way. Come on, the face is perfect, you can do that but you can't shave a measly inch off her height? This isn't good for the appeal."

Garnet shook her head. "This is what the original Lyantra would look like right now if nothing had happened to her in the first place."

Makalov gave her a sour look. "Listen, I can accept less than perfection, but that's two strikes in a row of things you say you simply can't do and I'm starting not to buy it. You're not willfully breaking contract, are you?"

"Did you really think she would remain forever young?" Garnet's face flickered like a fuse, calm and indifferent yet on a timer before it would become something so much more. "I'm so sorry you're wrong about that."

"Fine," Makalov growled, swiping a hoof. "Make me settle for less. What about this, then? You can fix this, right?" He turned his hoof towards her stomach. "A little gut paunch, should be nothing for your overpriced talents? The barrel is supposed to be lithe and thin. Timeless beauty standard. Surely you understand."

Lyantra didn't know why he wasn't actually grabbing her. It felt like there was some sort of invisible contract at play, like once he did, he'd be declaring her good enough and getting nothing more out of Garnet. She didn't know what he would do if he did grab her, other than probably put that collar back on. But what it reminded her of was that flimsy bubble of space the mouths and eyes and tentacles had observed her through, keeping their distance while criticizing - and he was doing nothing but observing and criticizing.

She hated it. And unlike him, she wasn't tied by any such contract. So she drew back a hoof and punched him for all she was worth.

It didn't even knock him over, and yet Makalov gaped in shock, barely comprehending what had just happened. Before he could, Lyantra rushed to Garnet's side and hid between her legs.

Garnet watched this, seemed to make up her mind about something, and sighed a long, defeated sigh.

"She's pregnant," she told Makalov dispassionately. "Has been since before losing her original self. That's something that endures through any of the changes this power can make. I assume you know how this happened. If you didn't want that, you should have thought twice before getting her that way."

Makalov sniffed disdainfully, wiping his eyes with a hoof. "That defeats the point, mare. Look, she's already growing up, if I have to wait a full year-"

"Do you know how much I hate rodents like you?" Garnet muttered, squeezing her eyes shut and rubbing the bridge of her nose. "I've been trying to forget how much I hate rodents like you. I need to, for this experiment to succeed. And you don't seem to realize what's at stake for you if I give up on that... which, for you, I just have."

"Well, you don't seem to realize how much is at stake for you if I call our deal off," Makalov retorted, pompously puffing up. "Now kindly hand over my gremlin. She has some lessons to re-learn before it gets too late."

"At stake for me?" Garnet shook her head. "All I wanted was this filly's body as a test subject. Your payments are irrelevant. You can give me nothing I can't take by force."

Makalov's courage wavered. "Bluff bluff bluff bluff bluff..."

Garnet stared him down.

"You know what, screw you," Makalov said, turning for the exit to leave. "I bet all your Izvaldi scientist buddies will drop you like a hot rock if they get wind of you gambling with our contract. And if you really can't fix her issues, I've got far more important things to do than wasting time on you. Things like searching for a replacement-"

He tried to throw open the door, but it was locked, throwing him off balance instead.

Makalov scowled, fiddling with the lock. It didn't budge.

"I told you," Garnet said calmly, "that you can give me nothing I can't take by force. And I still have things from you that I require."

Makalov whipped around and glared at her, though there was fear in his posture, too. "Are you stupid, or just dim? Locking yourself alone in a room with me? You're not my type, hag."

"Not." Garnet's eyes hardened. "That."

Makalov took a threatening step forward. Lyantra clung to Garnet's side, and she didn't attempt to dislodge her.

"What do you think happened to your Lyantra after she died?" Garnet asked, her tone carrying a quality that could turn day to night.

"Died?" Makalov raised an eyebrow. "She's literally right there."

"Her soul died," Garnet said. "This Lyantra has a new one. What do you think happened to the old one? Did she move on to paradise? Cease to exist? Or perhaps become trapped in an echo chamber, an eternal wail of her last moments and greatest unmet desires?"

Makalov's aggression couldn't last forever. "W-What are you, some kind of philosopher?"

"No." Garnet shook her head. "I'm an observer."

Makalov bristled threateningly one more time.

"I can hear their voices," Garnet told him. "The unending song of the condemned. Voices echoing in purgatory. Words and feelings left behind by souls who met fates neither fair nor just. Nothing can quiet them, not love nor death nor vengeance no matter how great the scale. Most of those wails were caused by creatures like you."

"Uhh..." Makalov took a step back, staring at her like she was utterly insane.

"I know this symphony well," Garnet said, her voice cold and smooth. "Well enough to pick apart its individual strains. Would you like to know what your Lyantra thought when she died? To hear her last words?" She smiled a sickly-sweet smile.

By now, Makalov was paralyzed by her voice, by the realization he couldn't intimidate or control her and didn't know what was coming next. Lyantra felt like she was standing on the edge of a chasm, an eternal void, and yet her own footing felt sure. She was just watching someone else tumble in.

"She had nothing to say," Garnet whispered, "about you."

Makalov's face twisted in confusion.

"She wanted to know the alternatives," Garnet told him, her voice like a whirlpool. "To know what her life could have been if fate hadn't dealt her such a cruel hand. She wanted to know what it was all for. The meaning to her suffering, what was accomplished by it. What her life could ever amount to, after the end."

Makalov was starting to feel the pull. He took a step back, and yet it didn't look like he went anywhere.

"Quite a few of them ask that," Garnet continued, speaking like a history professor and a reaper at the same time. "Tell us, why must we suffer? What did we accomplish with our pain, with our lives? Will anyone hear us? What was it all for? Their cries cannot rest without an answer. They will never allow themselves to be forgotten until someone, somewhere, has learned a satisfactory answer. And now, I am here to claim yours."

Makalov's eyes were wide with panic. Lyantra didn't know what was going to happen, and she couldn't tell if he didn't know either... or if he really, really did.

"What have you found to balance out the pain you have caused?" Garnet asked, the room revolving around her like a jury. "You, born with the privilege of taking whatever pleasure you desire, no matter the cost. Is this what you've chosen? Carelessly inflicting this on a child... Is this the ultimate form of happiness?"

"Well, why shouldn't I take what I deserve?" Makalov burst out. "It's not like anyone would give it to me if I asked nicely!"

Garnet's eyes glowed green. "I didn't ask that. I asked if it was worth it. This system will die without me. It might die with me. Perhaps it will even die because of me, though the gears creating those wails were turning long before I was foaled. Before it does, I want to understand what makes you think this is all worth it. What all of this was for. I came here to see if there's some mythical sea of bliss hidden at the top of the top of this society that can balance the scales and make it worth it. Is your pleasure a satisfactory answer? Will the song agree? Does it outweigh the pain?"

"A-A sea of bliss, eh?" Makalov chuckled weakly. "That's... a good way to describe it... So you want her for yourself, huh? Is that how it is? You're trying to... to steal my little gremlin? Go ahead and take her. I know when I'm out of my league."

"So you do have an answer." Garnet nodded. "That's all we've ever wanted. Now... will it be good enough?"

Makalov tilted his head.

"Conjure in your mind your happiest moments," Garnet instructed, detaching Lyantra from her side and somehow doubling in height. "The bounty that came of your choices and deeds. Lyantra, cover your eyes. Makalov. Prepare to be judged."

Lyantra tried to follow her instructions, but a flash of black and green lit up the insides of her eyelids so brightly that they might as well not have been there. When she finally managed to see again, there was nothing but a tiny pile of dust where Makalov had once been standing.

"Blegh." Garnet made a nasty face, spitting out something small and shimmery before grinding it to dust with her paw against the floor. "Not worth anything at all. I can't even call that a positive, let alone enough. The search continues..."

Something turned in Lyantra's chest, and she found that she could speak freely again.

"What did you do?" she asked.

Garnet gave her a curious look. "The better question is, what did you do?"

Lyantra tilted her head.

"How did you know?" Garnet asked. "I needed him alive for my plans. All the royals... I need to experience what they've built here, at the pinnacle of civilization. I need to see if it's somehow good enough for it all to make sense. The only thing that matters is finding an answer. But I judged him early. I killed him before giving this place a proper chance. And I did it for you."

She turned to Lyantra, intense. "How did you know? I am not trustworthy. Trusting me is foolish, stupid, idiotic, imbecilic and downright suicidal. I blundered around in your mind and broke you without the first idea of what I was doing. And then you crawled into my bed... and you were right. Against all precedent, you trusted me and it worked. I broke with my plans and protected you. You understand something about me that even I don't know, and I need to know how."

"I don't know," Lyantra answered truthfully. "You're the only person who's been nice to me since I woke up. Though, I don't know a lot of people to compare you to."

Garnet sighed and straightened up. "Well, you'd better figure it out, because this anomaly is my new best hope for finding an answer. Don't worry about Makalov or people like him. From now on, I'll protect you. I need to... preserve this status quo long enough to see for sure whether there's anything here."

Lyantra's heart lifted. But the truth was, she was really tired. "Can I not have to transform anymore for a while, then?"

Garnet looked at her sideways. "Do you want your original form back, first?"

Lyantra thought about it. Every time her form shifted... "Maybe tomorrow," she said. "I'm tired of switching. Once I'm not tired anymore."

She felt like she should have said yes, but her attachment to the way she looked was beaten out of her by this point. Hopefully it would come back. She felt weird without it, untethered and set adrift. Like she didn't have a true form at all.

"Well, you can be whatever you want," Garnet told her, sweeping up the dust pile where Makalov had been. "My priorities have shifted. I don't need you constantly transforming anymore. You might as well get some use out of the power I used you to learn. And think about your name, too. If you don't want to inherit the old Lyantra's looks, you don't have to keep her name, either."

"My name...?" Lyantra's eyes widened just a little. True, her name never had seemed to resonate when they told it to her, but she had never considered that it might actually be wrong, just like these other forms.

But unlike her body, she didn't know her real name. "What should I be called?" she asked.

"Up to you," Garnet grunted. "Pick something that's yours, I guess."

That was something Lyantra would have to think about. Something she could actually get excited to think about, as opposed to the still-dented picture of herself in her mind, or the uncomfortable sensation of her stomach being too big, or Makalov...

"Will anyone be mad?" she asked, pointing as Garnet swept Makalov's remains into a trash can.

"No one needs to know," Garnet told her. "If anyone asks, he was never here." She sighed. "Ironic how the one thing he was good for was sticking mares with unwanted children, and he does it again on his way out the door."

Price of Backing Down

The tension aboard the ship grew thicker the longer Cherrabell talked. It was bad enough that, even when she paused to wait out her contractions, no one tried to get a word in edgewise.

Papyrus had felt such rancid moods before. In his old life, he had frequently been the cause of them. It was fun, being around people who couldn't say what they wanted to say and watching the frustration build up until it broke.

This time wasn't quite so fun.

Senescey was giving Larceny an icy glare, and Larceny wasn't fighting it. Felicity looked like she would be more comfortable if it was aimed at her instead, her face tied up with guilt. And Floria, free from her family's personal history with Everlaste, was nothing but disgusted with the tale. Even Braen looked disturbed.

Clearly, someone needed to do something. And yet all of Papyrus's social skills were honed for making things worse.

"Um," Cherrabell said, breaking off her narration with a worried look. "You all look... not... really entertained. I figured if you knew what you were asking for..."

"We knew," Senescey said, her banana peel-yellow bang hanging down and shadowing her eyes, which were still visible only because of their cold glint. "We did know. Makalov? Illegitimate member of the Everlaste royal family? He was there that night in Stormhoof Keep. Boxed in like a pig with all the rest." Her teeth ground together. "We could have stopped this."

"I guess we could have," Larceny agreed, her voice empty.

"You're not going to fight it?" Senescey gave her an incredulous, daring glare. "Not going to push back and say you made the 'right' choice again?" Her shoulders trembled. "Go ahead. Say it. That you traded it all for something better."

Larceny looked at the table. "I'd almost forgotten what this feels like. It was always other people's stories that were my reason to fight. Other people's pain. Things like that didn't happen to me. You two took too good of care of me. Everything I did was for someone else's revenge." She looked small, haunted. "Feels like it's twenty years ago. Is this how it's always going to be between us?"

That stopped Senescey cold. "So you don't," she whispered, hollow and incredulous. "You're just going to sit there and-"

"Darlings, please," Felicity begged, looking morbidly uncomfortable being the voice of reason. "Our operation concluded not even a month before the Empire fell. If all of this story is accurate, then the original Lyantra's suffering would have happened before we had our chance to do something."

Senescey turned to her. "You saw your role all the way through to completion. It was only after we failed that you had second thoughts. Having third thoughts now? Was the peace you made with letting them live that fragile?"

Felicity adamantly shook her head. "It happened almost twenty years ago. There's only so much one can achieve through second-guessing, and it's not worth re-opening old wounds-"

Both times someone mentioned 'twenty years ago,' Papyrus noticed, Senescey stifled a wince.

"Please stop!" Cherrabell begged. "I... I didn't mean to start anything! I just thought I was following orders, telling you what you wanted..."

"Aye," Papyrus cut in, rising to Cherrabell's defense, "that she was. Yours truly was the one who suggested hearing about the Empire's old sludge as a way to pass the time, and if it's going to cause a brawl I'd kindly appreciate it if you directed your ire towards the one whose actual fault it is. Up on deck, anyone who wants to cool their head, I'll take you one on one or all six at once. Sounds like it's pouring buckets out there. Any takers?"

He stood on the table, forcing his presence into the middle of the room and interrupting the conversation like a brick wall.

"No? None?" His eyes found Senescey. "Anyone who stays in here solemnly swears that they will keep their tempers in check and not start anything stupid until we are five thousand percent sure that this won't turn into a repeat of last time."

Senescey sat down, though she looked far from at peace.

"Crisis averted?" Papyrus glanced around one more time, then hopped off the table and took a seat again, this time with his back to the doorway just in case he needed to suplex anyone outside to stop matters from escalating. This did mean sitting next to Floria, but she looked marginally less offended by the gesture than she did when he tried it on other days.

"Sorry," Senescey grunted, eyes closed tight. "It's like time doesn't heal all wounds equally."

Cherrabell was earnestly watching and searching for a sign that the tension had passed, and her courage crept slowly back as Senescey was quiet. "So..." she asked. "Who are you, anyway?"

"Assassins," Senescey instantly replied. "We had our hooves all over the Empire in the days before it collapsed. We killed Gondolus Gyre. We almost killed the entire royal families of Everlaste and Stormhoof."

"You said something like that," Cherrabell uncertainly agreed. "When I told you I killed the Everlaste royal family myself. But that was almost twenty years ago. Wouldn't you have been really young at the time?"

Senescey flickered with green flame, and was suddenly in her early forties.

Cherrabell's eyes widened.

"I don't know what Garnet eventually was able to do with you," Senescey said, changing back to her younger visage. "But I can change on my own, and age is on the table."

"You can do what Garnet did to me?" Cherrabell asked, stunned. "Are you...?"

"A sarosian." Senescey shrugged. "Just like you. All of us can change, once we learn how. I assume you look like this because you wanted to be someone other than Lyantra. Congratulations."

Cherrabell's jaw was slack.

"If I might change the tone," Floria offered. "Why Cherrabell? I am correct in assuming you were Lyantra, yes? How did you come by your current name?"

"Yes," Cherrabell admitted. "I was. You probably noticed, but I still don't have a very good idea of my place in the world."

Floria gave her a serious look. "Papyrus might have given you an invitation to speak freely about your days in Everlaste, but you describe those abhorrent experiences in far more earnest than one does when simply entertaining their hosts. This is the first time you've gotten to own your story, isn't it? To look back and see more than the empty passage of time."

Cherrabell blinked.

"I, for one, bid you continue," Floria encouraged. "Tell us how you chose your name. It would lift my spirits considerably to see you find more of yourself after spending your existence in a dreary box. Forget the pretense of doing this for our enjoyment. If lending my ears to your unsettling circumstances is the price that must be paid, my spirit is already steeled."

"You want me to keep going?" Cherrabell stared at her, incredulous. "I... I figured..."

"Please," Floria insisted, giving the three sisters a look that said shut up, this is important to me. "For your own sake, if not ours."

"Alright," Cherrabell dubiously offered. "I suppose I'll pick up where I left off, then. There's a bit more before I changed my name for good..."

Senescey suddenly got to her hooves. "I need some fresh air. Don't wait for me. Sorry."

Everyone blinked at her as she quickly, quietly slipped out the door to the ship deck. Then they looked at each other.

Felicity's eyes settled on Papyrus.

He shrugged. Was she looking at him because... Why, again? That wasn't the kind of look he could read. But, he supposed Senescey was only in this situation because of him. If she did need to take it out on someone, best to make good on his offer.

Outside, it was raining. The rain was jittery and trembled as it fell, as if it was afraid of the ground below, or perhaps of the storm up above. A short length of roof protruding from the cabin kept Papyrus somewhat dry, though splatters from the drops against the deck still hit his forelegs and hooves. Senescey was under that roof as well, standing as far off to the side as she could get without tumbling over the railing of the ship.

"Hey," Papyrus greeted, keeping his distance. "Leif!"

Senescey looked over her shoulder to face him, illuminated by the light from the cabin along with a brief flash of lightning. "Do you have any idea how ironic it is that you choose tonight of all nights to actually remember my new name?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Figured you could use a thing or two going your way at the moment. Believe it or not, I'm not here to cause trouble."

Senescey barked out a laugh and turned back to the swampy, stormy courtyard. "You have no idea how I work, do you?"

"What, you want to be called Senescey now?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

For a moment, she was quiet, her coat shifting against the vestiges of wind that made it down under the compound's wall.

"I'm dying, Papyrus," she eventually sighed.

Papyrus's eyebrows both went up. "What, like, literally? Right now?"

"Not right now," Senescey said, her voice quiet enough that he had to step closer to hear. "Of old age. The same thing that comes for everyone if nothing else gets them first."

Now Papyrus was skeptical. "You can't be that old."

"Cherrabell was telling the truth," she said. "About sarosian bodies continuing to age when we don't have brands or souls. All the time I spent as a mindless drone doing who knows what is time I'm not getting back. Felicity and Larceny are being honest about their age, and you actually cheated. I'm the only one here who's lying."

"So, hold on..." Papyrus hesitantly lifted a hoof, noting that she was using Larceny's old name as well.

"Fifteen years didn't happen for me," Senescey told the storm. "The prime of my life is simply gone. For me, that night in Stormhoof where Larceny betrayed us? It was barely three years ago. Still feels like yesterday, even though I've been working my butt off ever since I came alive again. Everyone else has moved on, or is pretending to when they really haven't, and I've got nothing."

Papyrus seriously didn't know what to say to this.

"We've been flying together for weeks on end, the three of us, reunited again." She turned to face him. "Myself, and my sisters. We haven't had a proper talk about what happened back in Stormhoof. I've assumed that, if they've been living for so many years without being consumed by guilt for wavering the way they did, they must have found something that lets them live with it. Some... new life experiences to fill the hole our defeat left behind. New reasons why we shouldn't have cared in the first place. I haven't said anything because I got them back, and didn't want to be the first one to question the miracle."

Rain mixed with slush wormed its way down in the background, spattering into the courtyard.

"And now I see they haven't made peace with it," Senescey said. "The moment a reminder of our past rears up again, a real one, it's the same as it was on that day. They don't know if they made the right choices. I know I did, but I wasn't enough. That's always been my strength and my weakness, Papyrus. I can play on a team, but I'm not smart or strong or skilled enough to do it all on my own. But I wanted them to have found something worth hanging up their swords for. After all that time they spent, and I didn't get to spend, I... I wanted them to push back. They should have been able to listen to Cherrabell and say it was worth it, that they didn't regret letting Everlaste live."

"You know," Papyrus pointed out, "your demeanor didn't exactly scream 'prove me wrong' back there..."

Senescey fixed him with a glare as lightning lit up the sky, clouds churning past overhead. "Do you even realize what we're doing right now? Trying to give up on the Empire and go find lives to live another way? I'm still the same Senescey I was twenty years ago. I don't change, I haven't changed because I haven't had the time to change."

Her ears drooped. "But you know who has? They have. My sisters did get that time, and what have they spent it on? Dunno. Doesn't even matter. All I see is that they still haven't found their way. If I take as long as they've had and still come up with nothing, I'll be in my sixties, Papyrus. I'll be retired, I'll be sitting down and waiting to die, and I still won't even know what to do with myself."

Papyrus cleared his throat. "You do happen to be asking that to someone even worse at figuring that out than you are..."

"At least you've had time to do it," Senescey pressed. "And you'll have time going forward, because your lifespan has actually been rewound. Me, I'm... I'm..."

She closed her eyes and shook her head. "Let's use children as an example, for absolutely no reason. Not relevant to current events at all. Felicity and Larceny both have kids who are making their own ways through life by now. You and Floria had a lot to say to Gawain about how stupid it is to throw in the towel on your life early on and leave it up to the next generation, but then there's Cherrabell and Garnet, and if you ask me, the thing Garnet was missing was how much it did for her to look after that filly. Is parenthood for me? No. Probably not. Definitely not right now. But if it was, I would only have a few years left to grow up enough to change my mind. Am I playing it safe by avoiding something with no appeal, or am I missing out on something I don't understand? There's two roads, and I don't have time to see what's down both. I'm lost without a map, and there's no time for exploring."

"That's rough," Papyrus consoled, extremely unfamiliar with the proper protocols for consoling a mare who was pouring her heart out to him. Anything he could say felt like it would just make things worse.

"I don't want to die," Senescey whispered. "I want to live. And I don't have the years I'm supposed to spend figuring out how to do that. I want my life to count for more than this... this hatred of royals that used to consume me and never went away. I can't accomplish anything by failing to kill them. All my dreams of doing something more with my fight turned out to be pipe dreams. I need something else. I know you're in the same boat, Papyrus, and are only here because I promised you something I had no ideas on how to obtain, but I need you to tell me you've had some epiphany here, in the last two days. Pretend it's twenty years ago and tell me what to do with myself."

Papyrus scratched his head. "Well," he started, thinking. "What were you working on back in the Crystal Empire when I roped you into this reunion? Some government theory thing, trying to dig up and consolidate and leave behind ideas on rulership to make things easier for the next conqueror who didn't know how to fix the lands they had conquered?"

"I was lying." Senescey gave him a flat look. "You couldn't have been fooled by that."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "So you were studying political theory with no intent to use it for anything?"

"I was going to use it myself," Senescey said, her voice cracking in the rain. "I wasn't happy with what Chrysalis did, leaving the Empire to wither after tearing it down. She had the power, but not the ideas, or will, or... Whatever she was missing, she failed. The plan was to find her and take her powers for myself so I could do it right."

Several different strains of rain pounded around her, the sharp sound of droplets hitting the deck and the wet splashes from the marsh below, the more pronounced dribble from water running off the ship's roof.

Lightning flickered, and Papyrus's eyes narrowed. "You wanted to become the next Chrysalis?"

"It solves the fundamental problem with all forms of political theory," Senescey told him. "Power exists in hierarchies. The only force that can stop people from attempting to step on their peers and climb the social ladder is someone higher than them stepping on them in turn. Theoretically, a system could exist in which different branches of government are able to check each other in a circle, with no one truly on top. But such a system is both vulnerable to paralysis and to two adjacent bodies being taken over by the same interests, enabling one to act without its oversight. No one has figured out how to de-couple the freedom from oppression and the freedom to oppress others."

She stared intently into his eyes. "The more complex it gets, the more vectors there are to exploit and oppress. Any successful system succeeds not because of the mechanics of power, but when those who come into power use it in good faith. The solution I arrive at every single time is that we need a system as flat as possible while still maintaining a hierarchy: all creatures equal, save for one good-faith divinity to maintain that equality and prevent the formation of further hierarchies. Nothing short of fundamentally changing basic equine nature can be good enough, but this is the next best thing. And the only one I trust to run such a system is me."

"And you think you'd be better than, say, Garsheeva," Papyrus pointed out. "Or me."

"Both of you were sphinxes," Senescey said, her voice small. "You were doomed from the beginning by the nature of your power. I thought I could learn from your mistakes."

For a moment, Papyrus let the rain splash against his hooves. "Well, I can't rightly say it's impossible, after doing it myself. But how close were you to actually pulling this off?"

"It's hard to measure," Senescey admitted. "But closer than you'd think. I had two major plans of attack lined up for when the time came to fight Chrysalis. One was the windigoes. In retrospect, I shouldn't have let myself get so blindsided by the Composer: I knew about the ones in Cold Karma, and thought I could use them for my ends. I had a theory that windigoes, incorporeal living creatures made of emotion, could paralyze a changeling queen from within if she tried to consume too many. That could be used both to incapacitate her, and, potentially, lead to the discovery of a way I could hijack her myself using a similar mechanism."

Papyrus nodded. "Forbidden combinations of windigoes and technology with the intent to splice together a perfect god? Now where have I heard that before...?"

Senescey sighed. "Yes, I'll admit, I have in fact paid attention and tried to learn what I can from people who have done this before. Chauncey might have been insane, but he was successful. Just not in the way he wanted."

"Well, that's one view to take," Papyrus said with a shrug.

"The other plan I made headway on," Senescey continued, shaking her head, "was the rocket Chauncey used to blow up Garsheeva. You remember that incident, right?"

"Hard to forget." Papyrus grinned, feeling a twinkle of reminiscence. "Call it bad taste, looking fondly on those days, but Garsheeva walking around in a normal-sized body after he destroyed her huge one was a sight to remember."

Senescey nodded. "I discovered the facility where that rocket was fired from, and the control terminal used to launch it. There are still some left. It's in the middle of a war zone now, and I didn't have enough time to crack the terminal's secret of how Chauncey fired it from the opposite side of the world. But I was only one piece away from having that level of destructive power at my hooves whenever and wherever I needed it. Those rockets and their bombs are strong enough to fight a god."

Papyrus whistled. "You actually put some serious thought into this."

"I had every intention of succeeding," Senescey told him. "Wasn't actually going to, but not for lack of conviction. Problems I hadn't solved yet were just that: problems I hadn't solved yet. The biggest one being how to actually find Chrysalis... and we now know beyond a reasonable doubt that she's in Yakyakistan, driving their war against Ironridge."

"There was one problem that would have stumped you, though," Papyrus pointed out. "One I can almost guarantee you couldn't solve: there's already a bigger fish. Her name is Starlight, and she has a mystical vendetta against newly-minted gods. She might not be the kind of theocratic world leader you envision, but she beat Chrysalis when she was just a kid. If the extent of your plans was just to somehow usurp Chrysalis's power for yourself - I'm a little vague on what that entails, by the by - she could stomp you ten fights out of ten. And for reasons no one can explain, she'd turn up in the right place at the right time to do it."

"I'll take your word for it," Senescey said. "Doesn't matter, though. I was doing it because it was the path I could see. Just getting back to what we were doing before, picking up right where we left off as if it were yesterday... But I don't think I could have succeeded, even without getting betrayed. I just don't have what it takes."

Should Papyrus encourage her? He felt like he should encourage her. "You say that," he cut in, "after describing an in-depth plan to acquire a weapon with a proven track record of blowing goddesses to bits that you've basically already seen through."

"Imagination isn't the problem," Senescey corrected. "Execution is. Even if I hadn't gotten betrayed by my benefactor, which happened due to my own lapse in judgement for getting taken in by them, everything else on that mission was falling apart. My team only stuck together as a matter of convenience; we were a few short successes away from getting enough resources that we would fight over how to use them. I don't have what it takes to be the glue that holds a group together. Not like Felicity, and much as it feels weird to say it, not like you."

Papyrus flashed her a toothy grin, lit up by another flash of lightning. "Didn't know you could make adhesive out of an active repellent."

Senescey shrugged. "I didn't either. But you're the reason we got the band back together, aren't you? You talked every one of us into joining up for this."

"Thanks for agreeing I'm repulsive." Papyrus patted her on the head with a wing. "But, yes, I suppose I did."

"Well, it's a talent," Senescey told him, ducking out of his reach. "One that, believe it or not, not everyone has. And that's not the only thing I couldn't handle. The job Aldebaran fell apart on, the one that landed me behind bars in Lilith's lab - you were there when they broke me out, you know what I'm talking about. Even Halcyon mocked me after that fiasco, and she was basically my victim."

Papyrus grinned. "No, actually, I haven't heard this one. When did that happen?"

"The mission, or the mocking...?" Senescey folded her ears in disgrace. "Look, whatever, probably better if you don't know. The important thing is, we botched the execution and the recovery from every instance of bad luck we encountered. Not the big stuff, the little stuff. Because I didn't have what it took to mold people into a coordinated unit or pick up the slack when that broke down." She aggressively shook her head. "Why am I even telling you this? The point is, the Chrysalis plan was never happening. I've got one or two ideas I'm stuck on because I can't let go and can't think of anything better, and that's about it. What I was doing up until now is not what I want to go back to."

Papyrus inconspicuously cleared his throat. "Now, look, I wasn't present for any of these horrible and embarrassing failures, and the one grand master scheme I do recall involving you in back in the day, you were pretty much the only person present who stuck to the script. Is this the part where I remind you of all your decent qualities and frankly fantastic talents so you can stop being down on yourself? I feel like that's what the guy is supposed to do around now."

Senescey gave him a look. "It would be a bit more meaningful if you did it without prompting."

"Well," Papyrus began, completely ignoring her admonishment. "For one, you can actually pass for a normal person, hold a normal conversation, make normal friends for non-political reasons and even work a normal job, something surprisingly rare and enviable among our little group. Forget if you're faking it, I can't even do that while faking."

"What a high bar to clear," Senescey told him, though he could tell she appreciated it at least a little.

"Second, you can fight," Papyrus lectured. "You held your own in the tournament, didn't you?"

"Barely. With a lot of cheating," Senescey admitted.

"Barely, she says," Papyrus scoffed. "Top thirty-two, give or take, and you got disqualified for the Stormhoof incident rather than eliminated fair and square. Could have gone even farther. In what world does that not count as holding your own?"

Senescey gave him a flat look. "I was out of my league as of two fifty-six. I only got that far due to flukes and Valey surrendering our match."

"Fine," Papyrus said, sitting on far too much ground to care about giving any up. "We lived in a militarized empire full of posturing states, pirates and gangs and mercenaries and militias, and by the odds we could put you in a room with a thousand other randoms and you'd still be the strongest. How remarkably unremarkable."

Senescey reddened. "That's not how strength works. You only have to lose the wrong fight once to be dead, Papyrus."

Papyrus smirked in her face. "Now I know you're just saying that to be contrary. You didn't enter the tournament with the intent to win, did you? Didn't need to be number one to get something good out of it. Sounds to me like someone's selling themselves short on purpose because they want me to praise them more. What a twist! I didn't know you sought that kind of attention."

"Papyrus, shut up," Senescey demanded, shadow sneaking past him to the other side of the deck. "You're clearly goading me into fighting you so you can throw a match to prove your point. There's not enough room under this overhang for that. The only thing you'll accomplish is getting both of us soaked."

"Huh! So there isn't." Papyrus backed off and sat down. "Though you'd be mistaken if you think I'd try to throw a match to make you feel better. Win or lose, I've always found the heat of battle to be an excellent method of communication. And since both outcomes would thus accomplish my goal, I have no reason to lose, now do I?"

Senescey sighed.

"Apropos of nothing," Papyrus said as the rain picked up in intensity, a brief mix of hail causing the deck to rattle as lightning flashed again. "Your memory of that night at Stormhoof is pretty perfect, right? Surely it would be, if you're this hung up on it."

Senescey frowned. "I spent most of it unconscious from your stun toy, remember? So I actually don't. In hindsight, we should have given that role to a less-loyal member of the team."

Papyrus blinked. "So you were! Honestly, my perspectives of that night were also a bit limited. Seeing as I was truly out of my mind at the time, I spent most of it imagining how Stormhoof and the generals were feeling. The humiliation of Admiral Valey wiping the walls with their castle guard for the second time in under a year. The panic of sitting defenseless with the lights out. The egg on their faces that none of them would live to see in the morning when it all hit the presses. I think all I did myself was make fun of them in their war room while stalling for time."

"What's your point?" Senescey asked, giving him a twisted look.

"It's like this," Papyrus sighed. "There's one other point of view I've heard extensively about that night from. After I emigrated from Riverfall to Ironridge, I got stuck in Valey's orbit, because she and her friends knew exactly who I was and their little clique wanted to keep their eyes on me. She had a few minor feelings on that night, and let me know about them quite often and repeatedly."

Senescey averted her gaze. "I did like her. I've never regretted our path like my sisters, but it would have been nice if we didn't have to hurt her like we did."

"That's the kicker," Papyrus said, leaning forward and flicking his tail. "You didn't."

Senescey tilted her head in confusion.

"Let's remember how everything went down," Papyrus proclaimed, leaning back against the cabin wall as thunder crashed around them. "Stormhoof Keep. Heavily fortified tower on an island playing host to the two biggest royal families in the Empire all on one night. Power shortage, manufactured by myself and my loyal second Meltdown, forcing them to keep the lights off and allowing all sorts of creepy crawly sarosians to sneak through the shadows undetected. Felicity, hired on as a defense contractor to counter that by using her connections to keep tabs on the underground and alert the castle of any brewing threats. And the guards who were in the castle were all fresh Everlaste recruits, due to my own machinations getting all the competent soldiers shipped off to defend against supposed extra-national threats. All sound familiar?"

Senescey sullenly nodded.

"Stage one," Papyrus continued. "You and your sisters and I pull a good-cop-bad-cop ploy aboard Valey's ship to kill Gondolus Gyre, make it look like my fault, and goad Valey into attacking the castle to clean out the small retinue I left in place. Stage two: Felicity and I use the drama over Lord Gyre to get Lord Stormhoof to fire her, making it look like his fault when someone takes advantage of the chaos to come kill them all. Stage three: your band of non-sarosian assassin friends, hoof picked to make it look like sarosians weren't even the threat in the first place, march in through the wide open doors and do, in fact, kill them all."

He raised an eyebrow at her. "But don't you see how many conflicting and tangled goals are at play there? I sure didn't, because I was insane, but surely you could have. Embarrassing the lords as we went in ways that didn't actually help out the plan's success? Who insisted on that, again? I think it was me! And the part Valey really drummed into me was just how much better a job I had done with the guard rotation than I realized. We didn't need the world's scariest sarosian to come knock the castle defenses over; a stiff breeze would have done. Getting her involved was pointless. If I hadn't prematurely raised the alarm by coming to mock them over Lord Gyre and if I hadn't prioritized getting Valey to do the visible fighting purely because I thought it would have been funny, your team could have slipped in and out and very likely gotten away with it. I was the one who really ruined it on that night, not Larceny. And you know the punchline?"

Senescey took a step back, her expression scared and haunted. "What are you saying?"

Papyrus took a step after her, tail lashing. "The thing that tipped the scales for Larceny, that made her betray you, was watching how hard Valey was fighting in that castle and getting a front-row seat to what she was throwing away. If you had simply done what you told Valey you were going to do in your fake cover story, skipped town with her and her friends and let your friends do all the dirty work, Larceny would have been nice and snug on their airship and never had reason to warn Gwendolyn or summon an army to restore order. You could have had everything: dead nobles and a future with new friends. No betrayals involved. Valey had no love lost between her and the nobles, she wouldn't even have been mad at you for taking them down on your way out! Sure, Gondolus Gyre might not have died in that particular timeline, but he was so unlovely that you didn't need a plan to off him any way you pleased. The best of both worlds, it all could have been yours, and it wasn't Larceny who ruined that: it was me."

Senescey flew at him. Papyrus was surprised she had shown the self-restraint to wait until the end of his speech; for a while there, he had even been stalling. But she came, and he was ready, blocking a blow to his head with both forehooves, angling so that she pushed him out into the rain instead of over the railing.

She chased him, spinning into a whirl of forelegs and wings, all aimed squarely for his grinning face. Papyrus ducked, lunging for her hind legs in a grapple instead, but Senescey was already in the air, and he barely had time to deflect a blow from above aimed at his spine, earning a grazed rib instead.

"What is your problem?" Senescey demanded, yellow eyes burning as she landed behind him, twirling and launching a double-hind-leg kick squarely at his side. "You think I don't know how you screwed up? That was the night you killed the last shred of hope Chrysalis was hanging onto, and doomed me and my entire race in the process!"

Papyrus tried to duck back out of her range, but she launched herself into a backwards dive, and her hooves connected anyway, staggering him.

"Is that night a joke now? Something you can grin about for a motivational speech!?" Senescey screeched, following up on her momentum by trying again to pound his spine. Papyrus twisted his haunches to dodge, this time managing to land a one-legged grapple around Senescey's barrel and bring her crashing down to the deck.

The moment she touched it, she shadow snuck, using his own shadow against the glare of the cabin lighting to swim out of his grip. "Give me back my fifteen years!" she screamed, surfacing again a short distance away. "My youth, my strength, my opportunities! You get another shot, so why not me!?"

"Because I tried a bit too hard to get a goddess filly to kill me," Papyrus spat, wiping rainwater from his face and nose.

"How can you brag about it?" Senescey demanded, charging him again, this time aiming for his legs. "Have you changed, or haven't you? I've given everything to move on from my previous life, and you..."

Papyrus jumped, spreading his wings and hanging in the air even as the rain battered them. "Given everything to move on, have you?" he scoffed. "Yes, that does jive with becoming a goddess so you'll have the power to carry out your old agenda, yes indeed it does."

"Shut up!" Senescey flew at him, rammed him and forced him back, the two tussling in midair. Papyrus broke from her, dodged, and she rammed him again. "And what did you do when you had that power? Looked for a way to die?"

"Found a way, actually." The wind whipped around Papyrus as they drove each other higher, the clouds surging eastward dangerously close overhead. This high up, they looked like a river of snakes, jumping down under each other in a bid to outrace their peers, glowing from inside with cold blue lightning. "Fate just had other ideas."

As he tried to rush her in return, Senescey dodged into a backflip, striking his chin with the tips of her hind hooves. "Stop bragging!" she howled. "Papyrus! I seriously can't..."

Before he could properly check his jaw, she was on him again, the two of them flipping over in midair as Senescey grappled him, rolled over and brought gravity to bear in kicking him down. Papyrus landed atop the compound wall, tree branches waving around him like swords in the wind as he tried to regain his balance.

"Have you learned or haven't you?" Senescey begged, hovering over him, fighting against the wind to stay in place. "Are you proud of your greatest shame? You know you were a failure. You know how many died because you couldn't control yourself. I signed on with you again because you said you wanted to atone. Sometimes you've changed more than I think you have, and other times you haven't changed at all, so what should I think? Are you doing this because of something I said?"

"Am I doing what?" Papyrus shrugged, sleet from the storm stinging his eyes whenever he tried to look up at her. "Providing a convenient punching bag and giving you reason to use it? You've let your feelings get all jumbled up, and you're not going to see how you really feel until someone gets you to let your inhibitions down."

"Well, congratulations, I'm not feeling very inhibited!" Senescey shouted against the storm. "And it doesn't make things clearer at all! What do you want me to feel right now, huh!?"

Papyrus pointed a hoof at her. "I think you've made your feelings perfectly clear. You're disgusted by what you used to fight for. Sure, you're sore about Everlaste getting away, but what do you do when confronted with a real imperial noble? Try to tear my throat out. You're confused because you can't own up to the fact that we became what we sought to destroy. Didn't we?"

Senescey gave him a revolted look, losing some of her will to fight the storm as the rain hammered her and her limbs grew cold.

"Perhaps you weren't as bad as I was," Papyrus admitted. "But why does it bother you so much to see me acting like that? It's because you know how I used to be, and you went along with it. You shelved every moral in the world to get what you wanted. Killing people in the night? Hiring others to kill in the night so you could keep your own public image clear, and tarnish someone else's instead? Sucking up to me, the craziest sphinx of them all? And betraying the friends you were making all because I said so, without so much as questioning my blatantly unnecessary plan."

Senescey was drooping harder... and Papyrus jumped off the wall just in time to catch her as she fell, gliding to an unsteady landing on the deck of their ship. There were bits of frost, he noticed, in her feathers.

She stared at him, begging him to continue.

"I won't call myself a guru on walking the right path," Papyrus told her. "In fact, I know basically nothing about it. But I do know quite a lot about the wrong path, and I bet you're as mad as you are because you can't accept that you've been on it. Can't let go of the past because it's all you've got, and it'll follow you even if you try to leave. But you know we were wrong, and can't forgive yourself for being the last one to move on."

"My sisters..." Senescey groaned.

"Are probably bothering you by revealing they haven't moved on as much as you wanted them to," Papyrus finished for her. "Looks like you care about them. Congratulations. I don't have to worry about that because my own sister didn't carry over any memories from her past life, probably for the better. Can't help you there." He shrugged, still holding her. "All I can say is, you won't have much luck trying to change what happened. Might as well learn to live with it. Wish I could do more."

He didn't let her go, and she didn't try to move, but the rain was turning more and more to snow and Papyrus started to fear his hooves would actually freeze to the deck. Before he subjected her to more of Cherrabell's stories, though, he had one more question to ask.

"Hey," Papyrus said. "This might sound weird, but what would you think if your life was, like... the protagonist of a book?"

"What?" Senescey asked, her sodden yellow mane beginning to collect snowflakes.

"You know. A novel." Papyrus shrugged. "Egdelwonk hasn't bothered me since we bailed on the Empire, but he used to ramble about this all the time, and I sort of suspect he was trying to be helpful. So call it a thought exercise. What if you were the main character?"

"I dunno." Senescey shook her head. "I don't think it would be very interesting to have a main character who never learns and never wins. What would you do with all the months I spent locked in Lilith's lab, a time skip? What audience would want to hear about all the investment I put into making Aldebaran work, only for it to go south, after everything in the Empire fell apart? What kind of redemption arc is that?"

She shivered. "Would be nice if it did work that way, where every setback I face has some poetic meaning. But that's not the way the world works. Or at least not my life. And if I get too caught up on the idea that it should, I'll end up like Garnet, killing people just to look for meaning in my life."

"Isn't that what you already tried to do in Stormhoof?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Suppose it is," Senescey admitted. "But I want to be defined by more than just that. So, I think thinking about myself as some sort of protagonist just isn't for me."

Papyrus thought about that. Egdelwonk, Discord, had told him that he could boop one person on the nose, and make them a protagonist. Less because it had actual power, and more as a thought exercise to help him build empathy for how others thought about themselves. But what if it really did more than that? Knowing his benefactor, it wasn't strictly impossible that he had the power to add some sort of karmic moral arc to someone's life. Could he?

It was probably a silly thought. After all, even if he did, he had been told that the way he thought about and treated other people would have a much greater impact on their lives than any silly booping power. And he hadn't been thinking about his lessons, or really anything other than his friend just now, when he goaded her into fighting him. So maybe the whole thing was pointless, or maybe he really had changed.

"Speaking of Garnet," he said, hefting Senescey and turning to get out of the snow. "On a scale of one to ten, how likely do you think it is that she's Chrysalis?"

Senescey blinked. "Where did that come from?" she asked sleepily, clearly at her limit for being out in the cold.

"You know what Chrysalis was like, at least before she transformed." Papyrus shrugged. "And Garnet apparently had black-and-green powers of turning people to dust, too. Thoughts?"

"You're crazy." Senescey shook her head. "Chrysalis tried to destroy the Empire. Why would she want to be a part of its last remaining royal family, especially if that family was so gross? But no, I didn't know her. I only ever met her once, on Valey's ship."

"Huh," Papyrus said. "Well, never mind, then."

"Besides," Senescey added as he moved to open the door. "Cherrabell said she killed the whole royal family, right? And there's no way she could have killed Chrysalis. If she was no longer around, we would know."

Strictly speaking, Papyrus wanted to point out, this 'Garnet' showed up after the Empire's fall, and was thus someone he had never known about. He didn't get all that much time in Tarunda's corpse collection, so if she had or hadn't been there, he had no way of remembering. But it was more important to get warmed up than to continue that conversation. He eased the door open, still carrying Senescey, and slipped inside, back into the light.

A Sense of Self

Time seemed to pass more quickly for Lyantra as more time passed. Once a single day didn't amount to her entire existence, more days felt ordinary instead of forever. The same phenomenon repeated for weeks, and eventually, for months as well.

Some aspects of her life changed as time passed, and others stayed the same. True to her word, Garnet stopped taking her to the doctors for experiments - they still visited occasionally to measure and question her, but Lyantra could tell they were just interested in observing now, and not in trying to make her change.

Not that observing her was great. She had mostly resigned herself to never again feeling like her body belonged to her, never fully banished the memory of the darkness evaluating her with all those eyes and mouths. And while the doctors didn't criticize her like Makalov had, the surgical precision of their remarks about her made it clear they had nothing good to say, either.

Also, the vast majority of their attention was focused on her stomach, which had never stopped growing.

She tried not to think about it. Trying not to think about it was the best she could manage, and the best advice anyone around her knew how to give. It was hard not to think about it, when it did things like interfering with her natural gait or sometimes moving of its own accord, and listing the reasons it was hard not to think about just made her think about it more. Especially at night, when she had nothing else to do but try to get comfortable and find a position to lay in that wouldn't make her worry about waking up lopsided in the morning. But really, she tried.

She tried and tried, vigorously sticking to her cleaning duties. And as she worked, she discovered one ray of normalcy, a single buoy she could use to keep her thoughts from drifting like a strange, uncharted sea: Garnet's stomach was growing, too.

"Is this really worth it to you?" Garnet asked one day, standing behind her as she brewed a pot of tea.

"You keep asking that," Lyantra reminded her, still thinking of her name as Lyantra even though it had been months since she got permission to find a new name for herself. "And my answer is not gonna change."

Garnet leered at the tea over her shoulder.

"Staying in bed like the doctors want is boring," Lyantra told her, sitting on her haunches as she worked to give her spine a rest. "I tried it and there's nothing to do. And I like having tea with you."

Garnet evaluated her. "Having tea with me is a compelling enough reason to get out of bed when you can barely move."

"You're out of bed," Lyantra pointed out. "Aren't you in the same condition?"

"I know my own reasons," Garnet replied dryly. "I'm interested in yours."

Lyantra didn't know how to explain this to her. Ever since Makalov had disappeared - true to Garnet's word, nobody had bothered her about it - Garnet had become obsessed with her reasons for doing things. Garnet wasn't mean, exactly. She didn't belittle her or focus exclusively on her mistakes. But every little thing she did, the sphinx wanted a reason, and acted incapable of figuring it out for herself.

She wished Garnet could. Lyantra didn't know how else to explain that doing something with herself felt better than doing nothing, even if her back hurt and she was tired all the time. But if Garnet really couldn't understand it, maybe that was why she kept asking.

Soon, Lyantra deemed the tea to be ready, and set about pouring it in a meticulously arranged - also by her - set on Garnet's coffee table. "I think I did pretty good this time," she offered, fishing for praise.

Praise from Garnet was excruciatingly rare. So were criticisms. Garnet seemed to mean what she had told Makalov on the day she killed him: she was an observer, nothing more. But it could happen, on days when Lyantra caught the sphinx with her guard down, and Lyantra had few bigger challenges to throw herself against than trying to win it.

"Hmm," Garnet said, sipping without bothering to wait for it to cool. It should have been scalding, but for some reason, she never seemed bothered by the heat.

Lyantra stared at her, hoping against the odds to prompt a response.

"Have you thought about what you're going to do with your foal?" Garnet asked.

"That's a weird question." Lyantra curled her lip. "All the doctors ever tell me to do is not think about it. But thanks, now I'm thinking about it again."

"Oh?" Garnet raised an eyebrow. "Tell me your thoughts."

Lyantra put a hoof on her stomach, big enough by now that it bumped up against the rim of the table. "Well, it's really heavy. And it's uncomfortable, and it's been getting harder, and I don't think this is how it's supposed to work."

"Your due date is only a month away," Garnet grunted. "My scientists have confirmed you're carrying a filly. A pegasus. Most parents would have settled on a name by now..." Her eyes briefly shadowed. "Or so I've been told. But you call her 'it'. You don't see her as your daughter, do you? Just an inconveniently sized part of your body."

"Uh, yes I do," Lyantra answered, more because Garnet made it sound like a bad thing than because she really understood what her daughter was supposed to mean. She still hadn't properly wrapped her mind around the fact that new ponies supposedly came from inside of fillies and mares. That wasn't where she came from, after all: she had begun her existence strapped to a table in a room with a bunch of doctors.

Of course, her body supposedly existed before that, belonging to the previous Lyantra. But what about the part of her that made her her? The part she hadn't really been able to put back together after Garnet broke it long ago, and now existed only in scraps related to making tea and doing chores around Garnet's suite? Had that grown inside someone, too? What would that part even look like, separated from the rest of her body? It had to be pretty big, based on the size of her stomach. Or maybe she was completely off base. But whenever anyone talked about bringing her foal into the world, the only way she could envision herself doing it was as one of the other ponies in the room, watching as her foal woke up, strapped to a table.

She wished Garnet could do this first, so she could watch and see how it worked. But the doctors had firmly explained to her that these things happened on their own timetable and there was nothing they could do to switch the order around.

"That's not an encouraging look in your eyes," Garnet grunted. "You have no idea what to do with a newborn, do you?"

Lyantra reddened. She could never shake the feeling that this wasn't how it was supposed to work, that everyone's lectures were fundamentally incorrect. And that feeling sat like an inconvenient net in her mind that snarled up any extrapolation about how things really were.

Garnet sighed. "Imagine that your daughter is a week old, and she's crying. What do you do?"

"Ask her what's wrong?" Lyantra guessed.

"She is a week-old foal," Garnet corrected. "She cannot talk. She continues crying. What do you do next?"

Lyantra frowned. "Why can't she talk?"

Garnet gave her a look that was so tired, so weary that she could convincingly say she hadn't slept for a thousand years. "Because she's not old enough to know how yet."

That really didn't sound right. "Doesn't everyone know how to talk?" Lyantra asked, feeling like she had just walked into a minefield. "I did when I was new. How do they do anything if they can't talk?"

"You were assembled," Garnet told her. "Not born. Your body existed for over a decade before I put you together. Do you understand the difference?"

Lyantra nodded. Presumably so. Even if there was an ever-present danger that she was saying yes when the real answer was no.

"Newborns are helpless," Garnet grunted. "They can't do anything except eat, cry, sleep and wave their appendages in useless, meaningless patterns. And soil themselves. Do you understand that much?"

That definitely didn't sound right. "Why?" Lyantra asked. "Are you sure? How do they do anything? Aren't they supposed to come..." She wanted to say like me, but that was probably very incorrect.

"I'm sure," Garnet flatly told her. "They can't learn to walk and talk in a womb. Regardless, your daughter is going to be completely dependent on you for every aspect of her existence. Because you're a child, you are currently dependent on me for most aspects of your existence, including food, shelter and basic information even a three-year-old should know about how the world works. That means I'm probably going to have to provide for her, as well. But there are some responsibilities you will handle yourself, starting with giving her a name."

"If all that's true," Lyantra said, folding her ears with a nervous chuckle, "I don't think I'm going to have any accurate or helpful thoughts until they're born, because I'll have to see it to believe it."

Garnet stared at her tea in thought.

"What about you?" Lyantra asked. "What are you going to do with your foal?"

"Turn him over to the royal nannies," Garnet said stiffly. "His name is already settled; Gordovic wants to call him Gustadolph. I won't have to lift a paw to get him through those early years: no midnight feedings, no diapers, no cleaning up barf. A full trained staff to do everything for me. The highest luxury money can buy."

"You don't sound too happy about that," Lyantra pointed out. "But you also make fun of me for wanting to keep working even when I'm allowed not to. So, do you think I'm right, or not?"

Garnet brushed her off, shaking her head. "You're clearly insane. I don't see the worth in your way. But I don't see it in this way, either. I'm still waiting, still giving them more time before they're judged. Maybe it will be different once Gustadolph is born. Maybe there's something I'm just not seeing... but the most likely answer is that everyone in this country is wrong."

Lyantra's ears fell. "Are you going to turn Gordovic to dust like you did to Makalov?"

"Haven't decided," Garnet grunted. "If I do, it'll be his fault for not giving me any reason not to."

Lyantra looked away. She didn't really like the idea of dying.

"But I'll give him more time," Garnet said. "At least until Gustadolph is born... and maybe longer, depending on what happens next. I'm worried, though, that the rest of this country won't give him the time I need, even if I do."

Lyantra perked up.

"Well?" Garnet raised an eyebrow. "Think you can wrap your mind around a different kind of adult problem for a change?"

"Try me," Lyantra dared, eager to find something that did make more sense to learn.

Garnet took a deep breath. "Geltrich calls himself the Emperor. Gordovic and myself will call ourselves Emperor and Empress once he abdicates, which will be made official in about two months. But the Griffon Empire we 'rule' no longer swears its loyalty to us, now that the goddess and old royal family holding them together are gone. Most of the provinces have become satellite states, outside of a formal system, but with loyalties that can be bullied into alignment by their most powerful neighbors. Do you understand how that works?"

"I know how leadership works," Lyantra told her. "You're up at the top, because you're a sphinx. Then there's a big pyramid down to the bottom, so these satellite states would be groups that are only under you because you keep them there?"

"Close enough," Garnet said, which counted as praise in Lyantra's book. "The other regional power that could oppose Everlaste is Wilderwind. We're the only two provinces left with something resembling armies. And Wilderwind has recently transitioned power away from sphinxes and into the hands and hooves of their military, now that their own royal family has died out. They chose to do this instead of swearing loyalty to the remaining sphinxes in Everlaste."

"So they're not your followers," Lyantra guessed.

Garnet nodded. "The only reason Everlaste thinks they can rule is tradition. I don't trust that reason to consolidate power or preserve the status quo. I need to fix this myself if I want things to last long enough to judge what they've built here... not that I'm an accomplished diplomat either. But I have some tools. So I'm organizing a trip to Wilderwind, and you'll be coming with me."

"I am?" Lyantra perked up.

"Yes," Garnet declared, draining the last of her tea and putting the cup down. "I'll time it so that your foal is born while we're away. Don't worry, you'll still be taken care of. But if practical experience is the only way you can learn what you need to start thinking about the future, then that's what you're going to get."

Lyantra's foal came earlier than Garnet was expecting.

It was too intense for her to remember much of. She awoke in the middle of the night with lightning in her stomach, and she must have stumbled to Garnet's room to wake her up, too. But even the memory of those early cramps was only partially intact, like a reflection in the water torn by the edge of a whirlpool, and the rest was lost in a cacophony of unbearable pressure and pain.

Everything until... until...

When she came to, she couldn't recognize where she was. Nestled into a heap of blankets, there was a lacquered wooden ceiling above her. It was rattling slightly, though the blankets cushioned her... Was she moving? Her body felt worse than she could ever remember: her back and hindquarters, especially, she could barely even shift her thoughts to.

"W-Where...?" Her voice was weak and shaky, so much that the very sound of it haunted her.

"You're awake?" Garnet asked, laying on a bench across from her.

Lyantra turned her head just enough to look. Was this a carriage? They were the only two occupants, it looked like?

No. Garnet was holding a third. The sphinx was stretched out on her back with her head and shoulders propped up against the side of the carriage, and laying on her rounded stomach was a tiny foal, suckling away.

"Did..." Lyantra's eyes widened. "Did I...?"

"Yours," Garnet grunted. "I can do this part for you because of my own. Figured you needed to sleep."

Lyantra blinked. She had seen pictures, but this was her first time actually seeing a real newborn. Or, for that matter, anyone younger than herself.

They were... kind of ugly, actually. Seeing them made her slightly uncomfortable: with a light blue coat and a purple mane and tail, they looked an awful lot like the form Garnet and the doctors had once wanted to turn her into. And they were a pegasus, with a bit of green in their mane that probably came from Makalov, and some weird, sock-like markings on their legs that ran the gamut between purple and forest green.

Everything that had bounced off her ears when Garnet said it suddenly made sense. In this tiny, scraggly blue blob, she could see the reflections of its parents like a pair of ghosts hovering over it: a sarosian filly that no one could accept was dead, and a stallion Garnet had killed so she wouldn't have to interact with.

In neither of those parents did she see herself.

Was that thing really growing in her stomach all this time? Were all the distractions that had monopolized her thoughts for the whole span of time she had been alive - the bumps, the kicking, the tension, the nausea, the weight, the strain, the cramps, the hardness, the inability to get comfortable, the feeling of not fitting in her own fur... Had it really all been for that? For... for someone else's child?

Her expression must have communicated everything she felt, because somehow, she was certain that Garnet understood.

"Disappointment and disbelief," Garnet said, a small light dying in her eyes. "So. That's what it amounts to for you, too."

Lyantra struggled to form her thoughts into words. "I'm really tired."

"Sleep," Garnet encouraged. "It's a long ride to Wilderwind. I moved up the schedule for you when you went into labor. I worried this might happen."

"Can I have some water first?" Lyantra asked, her thoughts swaddled in exhaustion, unable to look for a deeper meaning in Garnet's words. "I-I..."

Garnet hesitated, unable to get up without disturbing the foal... then grew a unicorn horn with a flicker of green flame. A solid green aura, denser than a normal unicorn's, picked up a bottle and floated it gently to her lips.

Was that a thing sphinxes could do when they had reason not to get up? Lyantra was too tired to question it. She drank gratefully, and soon drifted back into a half-slumber, letting her body repair itself.

Each time Lyantra woke up, she felt a little bit better, until she was finally well enough to gingerly sit up and rearrange her bedding.

That involved getting a proper look at herself. Someone had cleaned her, she realized. There was no... none of the stuff she remembered like a fading nightmare. And her stomach had shrunk. It still looked weird, but no longer felt like iron wrapped in bands of steel.

There could be no questioning it. That ragged little foal, wrapped in cloth and sleeping by Garnet's side, had very recently been inside of her.

Lyantra felt cold. She felt weird. Alien, even, and not because of her physical state. Things really did work like this. Against everything her intuition had said, and still said now that she could see it for herself.

It felt frightening and wrong.

Garnet was awake, leaning sideways against the back of the carriage seat, looking lazily out through a crack in the window curtains. She didn't look frightened. She looked... resigned.

"So," Garnet said, as if she could feel Lyantra's eyes on her. "Feeling proud of yourself?"

"Proud of myself?" Lyantra blinked. "Why?"

"You did it." Garnet shrugged. "Made it through. Brought your daughter into the world. You're a mother now. They say this is supposed to be the good part. Is it?"

Lyantra blinked. She remembered that look in Garnet's eyes from the first time she woke up: that hopeless defeat, resignation to the inevitable. It was still there, albeit masked now.

Garnet wasn't asking that question in good faith. She just wanted Lyantra to confirm what both of them already knew.

And Lyantra was in no position to deny her. "It looks like who I used to be," she whispered, feeling nasty for even voicing her thoughts. "The old Lyantra. And Makalov. I understand what everyone meant now, about foals coming from their parents. But I don't think that's my foal, even if it was in me. It's theirs. I-I..."

She felt herself choking up already, and knew she wouldn't be able to finish her thought. Too many things were pressing in on her from too many directions: she shouldn't be rejecting this foal, but she shouldn't have had it in the first place, and she could still see the ghost of Makalov leering at her, and the name Lyantra tasted wrong on her tongue when she used it, less hers than usual. All of it was guilt. Why was she pushing it away? Why hadn't she found a new name for herself yet? If she had embraced figuring out who she was instead of wearing old words like rags, would that foal have looked different? And why was she still caught up on thinking it wasn't supposed to work this way? She was dodging her own questions. She couldn't face the foal, and she couldn't face Garnet, either.

"So the foal you just delivered looks like somebody else's child," Garnet grunted. "Ironic."

"Ironic?" Lyantra asked, hiding her broken body in the blankets.

"Oh, just talking to myself." Garnet shook her head. "But you're right. This child is Lyantra's and, presumably, Makalov's. You aren't Lyantra. All I did to 'fix' you was take a new person and put them into an old body that changes appearance based on your self-image."

Lyantra's ears pressed back.

"Are you going to name her?" Garnet asked.

Lyantra winced. "I can't even name myself. What should I call it?"

Garnet looked down at the sleeping foal. "She's a her, not an it. A person who might grow up to live a meaningless life and die a meaningless death, who might bring about more pain than she'll ever relieve. Looking at you now, she's already caused a lot. But she hasn't had a chance to feel that pain for herself yet. She's... a blank slate. And you get to make the first mark on her, in either direction. Or you can leave it for someone else."

A weight of responsibility even heavier than her stomach used to be hovered near Lyantra, not yet crushing her but making its presence known. "What do I do?" she asked, worried. "I-I don't know what to do with that. How do I name her? What does she need?"

Garnet frowned in thought... and then started brushing the foal's wispy mane and tail. Using her feathers like clips, she separated and fixed the stray strands, freshly dried from however they had gotten wet before. Her tongue snaked over the foal's coat in a rhythmic fashion, erasing all the snaggles and tufts where its fur had dried in clumps, resetting its coat to go with the natural grain.

Eventually, she finished, looking down at her handiwork in thought. The foal did look better now that it had been washed and groomed, Lyantra had to admit. More like a really tiny pony and less like a sodden blue hairball.

"Anything you wish someone had been there to do for you, I suppose," Garnet mused. "Perhaps only the downtrodden can know."

"Your Majesty," a griffon protested, standing near the carriage door as the caravan prepared to resume their travels. They had just stopped for dinner, pitched their camp in a protective circle and let Lyantra out to stretch her legs. The grass and the fields provided a baffling contrast to the familiar stone and dust of Everlaste, and her body was still too wobbly to confidently get around on her own, but she had enjoyed getting something other to think about than her foal.

Now they were breaking camp, and there was trouble.

"Lyantra and her child stay with me," Garnet told him, her wrath sitting at her side like a sword in a sheath. "She's my wingmaid. Not yours, griffon."

The griffon gave her a patronizing look. "Yes, that isn't in question. But you have servants for a reason. It's not the place of royalty to have to deal with newborns. You don't deserve the stress on your shoulders, and the propriety-"

"Burdens and stress," Garnet interrupted. "Do you have a family? A wife? Children?"

"Three children, plus the wife." The griffon didn't flinch from her gaze. "I understand that you're still adjusting to life in a more civilized province, but in Everlaste, we don't expect our leaders to get their paws dirty."

"I see." Garnet nodded, her own gaze like a hoof pinning his tail to the ground that he refused to acknowledge. "And how are your children? Burdens? Stressful? Or do they bring joy and fulfillment to your life?"

The griffon was putting up a valiant and stubborn front. "I find them to be exuberant and wonderful," he reported, "because my wife is a homemaker and handles the messier side of raising them so that I don't have to. I'm lucky to have her, just as you are lucky to have us. Please take advantage of it so you can focus on diplomacy instead of caring for your maid's child."

Garnet nodded along, her demeanor suggesting she was in full control of what was happening here. "Am I not a wife as well?"

The griffon bowed slightly, his patience visibly chipped. "My lady, you are the princess. Soon to be queen."

"And your wife isn't?" Garnet raised an eyebrow.

Now the griffon just looked befuddled. "No, I'm... a member of your staff. Not royalty. Did you assume otherwise?"

"I have some advice for you," Garnet said, leaning back into the carriage and preparing to shut the door in his face. "Always treat your wife like a queen."

"What-?" the griffon sputtered. "Are you implying I-"

"I despise false lovers." Garnet gazed imperiously at him. "As your queen, it is my right to receive the best treatment in the land. But I'm not alone in this right. Think about what you offer as proof of your love, how much it counts for, whether your marriage is worth it. You're supposed to be the best part of each other's lives, aren't you? If there's anything you would do for me that you wouldn't do for her, go ask yourself why the one you love doesn't deserve better."

And then she did shut the door, locking herself and Lyantra inside with the foal.

For a moment, the air crackled with tension. Finally, Garnet shuddered, and then she sighed.

"That was kind of mean," Lyantra pointed out. "I think he was trying to help."

"He deserved it," Garnet said bitterly.

"Why don't you want them to help take care of my foal?" Lyantra asked. "I really could use the help. And you don't look like you enjoy doing it yourself that much. Especially the, um, you know..."

Garnet looked at her. "I need to see what you decide. Not whether someone else pronounces you incapable of caring for her and takes her from you. Is this foal worth it? Does she bring you joy? I won't have anyone interfering with your answer."

"Why not?" Lyantra pressed. "I need help. You're already giving it. Shouldn't we accept more?"

Even though she was really just repeating what she had already said, this gave Garnet pause.

"I don't know what to do with the foal," Lyantra told her, folding her ears. "I could learn how to feed her, and how to change her, and how to make her stop crying, but what else do I do? What do I tell her once she learns to talk? Maybe it's because I don't know what to do with myself. These meadows look so weird, I don't think I know anything about the world at all. If you leave her up to me, I don't think I can be good enough!"

Garnet watched her, thinking.

"Didn't you say the staff would raise your foal?" Lyantra asked, pointing at Garnet's own stomach. "Gustadolph? What's the difference?"

"The difference," Garnet said, distant. "The difference is that I am following the rules. Accepting the conventional wisdom. Seeing how this system will work if I don't resist or change a thing. This is the treatment other rulers have installed for themselves, and I'll see its merits by whatever means necessary. If that means relinquishing what is mine into the hooves of others, so be it. A small price to pay if any of this works."

She turned her gaze to the unnamed foal. "You, on the other side, are still my experiment. You've born the wrong child, a foal at odds with your expectations. The father abandoned you because he never loved you. Your miserable life hasn't afforded you the resources to know how to care for them, and the sight of them might even make you sick. Don't deny it. I saw that look in your eyes."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Lyantra whispered, unable to deny it even though she felt like she should.

"I want to see what happens if no one tries to take her from you." Garnet shrugged. "How things could play out if that one factor was changed. Could it change the course of your lives? Or will you agree with everyone who says you aren't fit for her, don't deserve her, and give her away of your own free will? They're all right, of course. You can't even take care of yourself without help. But you can still choose to defy them. I'm simply buying you the time to think things through before making that choice. And when you do, I'll ensure that it is respected."

"What do you mean, give her away?" Lyantra asked, her chest tight. "You're not talking about letting the staff help care for her?"

"Perhaps I am." Garnet raised an eyebrow. "If you let her out of your sight, what guarantee do you have that you'll ever see her again? But then, perhaps that's what you want. It's your choice-"

The foal began to screech and wail.

Garnet sighed, resigned to the interruption. "Get over here. You need experience figuring out what this means."

The problem was eventually solved when Garnet showed Lyantra how to nurse the foal. It felt pretty bizarre.

"You've done this before," Lyantra guessed, once the foal was suckling away.

"No," Garnet grunted. "I haven't."

"Really?" Lyantra tilted her head. "You... seem to know what you're doing."

Garnet frowned. "I have the song to guide me. An unsurprising number of dying regrets involve children. Mothers who bled out in the days after their births. Fathers who went off to war, and never saw their families again. Siblings who tried and simply couldn't. Those memories are useful enough, sometimes."

The song. Garnet had talked about that before killing Makalov. There were other times she mentioned it too, but they were vague and passing, and pressing for details always resulted in changing the subject. But Lyantra was curious, so she had to try again.

"What is this song you talk about?" she asked.

"The wails of the departed," Garnet grunted. "Be glad you can't hear them. They're loud enough that I must have less of a sense of self than you do."

Lyantra blinked. "A sense of self?"

"The thing I destroyed so that you could transform?" Garnet raised an eyebrow... and then, with a flicker of green flame, transformed into an older version of Lyantra. A heartbeat later, she shifted back.

Lyantra's eyes widened. "You...?"

"I told you this when we were first experimenting," Garnet sighed. "I've been able to do it to myself for a while. That's why I thought it might be possible to do it remotely, to you. You helped me learn more about this power. I can even shift ages now, if I have to. If I'd kept Makalov's soul, that would have been fun to torment it with."

"Does that mean..." Lyantra fumbled, searching for the perfect words. "You have an image of yourself in your head too, and it's also broken, and you don't really see it as yourself?"

"I know what I am," Garnet answered dryly. "I simply don't like it."

Lyantra tilted her head.

"Everything about me is an inconvenience," Garnet said, speaking like a grumpy lecturer or a scientist. "My personality does nothing but get in the way of my goals. If I didn't hate the nobility so much, I'd have an easier time joining them to measure their answer. They make it so easy to get distracted... I can't even tell if I'm humoring you and your child this much because it's a legitimate path to an answer, or for my own personal issues. It would be so much easier if I could just cut away all the parts I don't need..."

Lyantra shuddered. "You hate all of them? Not just Makalov?"

"Maybe," Garnet said. "Or maybe it's the song. We hate everything. Powerlessness. Abandonment. Guilt. Oppressors. Bystanders. Pity. False love. And so much more..." She rubbed a paw over her face. "But it's all just a distraction. If any part of that held the answer, then none of this would have happened."

"What about me?" Lyantra whispered.

"Don't ask questions that have no answers," Garnet snapped. "And take better care of yourself. You don't want to know my mind."

The caravan marched for days on end. Lyantra's filly stayed with her in Garnet's carriage, and before too long she had a workable grasp of the basics: what to do with a diaper, how to hold them and nurse them, and a few things to try when guessing why they were crying.

She spent a lot of that time sitting up and staring out the window, especially once she recovered enough that her body no longer hurt to freely move. It was interesting, seeing the ways she could sit now that she could freely arrange her haunches without a massive sphere getting in the way, but it was downright fascinating to see the land's geography.

Trees, grass, plants... All of these felt like things she had never seen before. Not like the familiar, comforting stone of Everlaste Castle. Garnet didn't like explaining what the various types of greenery were, but a staff griffon had bought her a book in a town they passed through, and Lyantra had even started pointing the different trees out to her foal as they passed, trying to teach while she was learning.

That felt weird. Some instinct told her it was proper, that this was an activity that was wholesome and good to do with her foal. She didn't question that feeling; if she needed to learn what trees were, her foal probably would, too. But an equally powerful instinct told her that this was somebody else's foal, and it wasn't her place to do this.

She did it anyway. But it also felt wrong.

Eventually, the terrain grew rockier, and the trees less common. It was hilly, and the hills were grassy, but with random white stone boulders strewn throughout them, mostly laying at the bottom of valleys where they had rolled. Lyantra asked how it had got that way and who put the rocks there, but Garnet wasn't interested in answering.

Soon enough, the grass grew sparse as well, and long after it died out, the hills stopped as well. They passed over a low, narrow mountain range that seemed to neatly divide the hills from the flat land beyond, and when they all stepped outside to eat lunch, Lyantra could see their destination in the distance: a long, much grander chain of mountains loomed low, like teeth, elevating the horizon to the north and northeast. They were far enough away to be little more than blue silhouettes against the strange blue sky, but some distance in front of them there rose a tower. And there, they told her, was the seat of Wilderwind's power.

A Sense of Pride

Lyantra watched from the window of Garnet's carriage as Garnet, along with more than half of her caravan's attendants, left to enter the city.

Their final camp was pitched at the city's gates, just beyond its outskirts, flying lots of flags and establishing a perimeter that was guarded more warily than when they were on the road. Lyantra had yet to interact with a single resident of Wilderwind, but she could tell they were unwelcome just from the Everlaste griffons' demeanor. People wouldn't behave like Garnet's entourage were behaving if they felt like they belonged here.

The city across from their camp stirred up strange sensations when she looked at it. It seemed kind of lopsided and haphazard, like it had just been dropped in place, and not particularly gently. Parts of it also seemed to be straight-up missing. Other parts were ramshackle and patched together, using whatever its residents had on hoof. It was also buzzing with activity, and even from here she could see crews working on areas that looked like parts of the city had simply been forgotten when putting it all together. Not large parts like districts; smaller things that should have been made of stone, like individual walls and roofs.

It was very strange.

And yet, it somehow didn't feel as unfamiliar as it could have, despite the lack of good, cold stone in its construction. The truly strange part was how Garnet had left her here, all on her own except for her foal.

Wasn't she going to show her this city to teach her about the things she was missing? She couldn't do much learning from the inside of their carriage.

The foal began to cry.

Lyantra sighed, turning her attention to her daughter. Diaper? Didn't smell bad. Food? She had just eaten. Maybe that meant she needed to be burped?

She held the foal like Garnet had showed her and started patting its back. This was... doable. Kind of demanding, like her maid work except with a boss who could only ever communicate through inarticulate screams. But aside from being hard on her sleep, it wasn't that bad. The only part she felt would wear her down over time was the foal's appearance.

This wasn't hers.

Then again, maybe she didn't know what she was missing out on. Garnet made a point of telling her how much was wrong with her expectations. Apparently, the reason she was here in the first place was to get them checked against reality.

If Lyantra was miserable, would she know it? If there was supposed to be more to life than this, did she have a reference for what more meant? She kind of wanted to know. Maybe she was dissatisfied, and didn't understand enough to recognize that in herself. Or maybe she was recognizing it right now.

The foal stopped crying, and she kept patting it. See? She could do this. But, alone in the carriage while Garnet was off doing diplomacy in the city, she found herself on the clock, without anyone to talk to. Whenever she was alone in her room in Everlaste, she could try to relax, and appreciate the safety of solitude. Whenever she was working, Garnet was there. Now, she wasn't sure if she was bored or lonely, but something akin to those was on her horizon, and she couldn't stop its approach.

She wasn't sure she could do this.

Lyantra put her foal down and planted her forehead against the window glass, the edges of the curtains hugging her like a headdress. The servants in their caravan encampment-

Her foal started crying again.

She knew what to do, picking it up and patting some more, but it wasn't instinctive. There was some resistance in her thoughts, a leaden cord around her limbs that felt much older than her foal was. Lyantra realized that she didn't like having so little to track time by.

Out there, maybe... And the staff had wanted to care for this foal for her...

Was this a test? Did Garnet intend for her to wander off on her own, and see how she fared?

That was a dangerous test. But Garnet had promised to protect her. But she was also off on a diplomatic mission. What could she put her faith in? The safe, boring option? Or taking a risk?

It was a scary world out there. A world she didn't understand and couldn't predict. Lyantra's nascent courage failed her, and she stayed pressed against the window long after her foal stopped crying, waiting for Garnet to return.

An hour passed, with no sign of the posse that had left for the city center. Garnet didn't return. But, suddenly, her voice did.

"You choose to stay put," Garnet's voice said, scaring Lyantra so badly that she startled the foal in turn, causing it to start crying again.

"Aah! W-Where are you?" Lyantra jumped, frantically trying to tamp down her nerves while also reassuring the foal. "Garnet?"

"An understandable choice," Garnet's voice continued, coming from nowhere and everywhere at once. "Perhaps even a wise one. Something small and feeble like you could never hope to stand on your own in the world, let alone carry a child. So you choose to stay put, and wait for the one you leech off of, in hopes that you can continue to survive by continuing to receive. It doesn't matter where your food comes from, or why you are safe. You accept it while you have it, without question. And for a time, it works."

Lyantra turned in a circle, her ears going down. "What are you talking about?"

"But not this time," Garnet's voice echoed. "Unbeknownst to you, the diplomatic mission was a trap. Garnet and her entire entourage perish in a coup. You wait... and you wait... and you wait. And nobody comes for you."

Lyantra's chest constricted. "You're dead? But I can still hear you! How are you talking to me? Where are you?"

"In the tower," Garnet's voice grunted. "Holding meetings. This is only a possibility, but it's how we're going to pretend the path you've chosen plays out. You're all alone. You lose."

"What?" Lyantra blinked. "I don't get it."

"We won't be here long enough for you to live out the consequences of staying put," Garnet's voice told her. "Or of anything else you decide to do. And I'd like you to have time to try other paths while you're here. So get out of the carriage. Now that you've seen where sticking your head in the ground gets you, try something different."

Lyantra blinked again, more slowly this time. "Is this a game? Where I do something and you tell me how badly it could go? Why?"

"Because you don't have the time to experience every possible choice for yourself," Garnet's voice said. "And I have a hundred thousand lifetimes worth of experiences to fill in the blanks for you. Now get out there and try something else."

Baffled and uncomfortable, Lyantra took the door handle with a shaky wing, wrapping her foal in its bundle so it wouldn't get cold outside. "How are you talking to me like this?"

"The same way I can transform you," Garnet answered. "Using my powers to touch your mind. I've been practicing while you work, whenever I address you when your back is turned. Another useful skill you've helped me hone."

Okay. Cool. Lovely. Lyantra really didn't know how to feel about that. At least this meant that Garnet was still watching over her, right?

Swallowing, she pushed open the door and slipped outside.

Wilderwind's terrain was flat and rocky. That was good. Lyantra liked the feeling of stone beneath her hooves.

It also had griffons. Everlaste ones, since she was right in the middle of Garnet's caravan encampment. Plenty of whom were now looking at her.

"Um," Lyantra said, taking stock of the situation, Garnet's phantom voice nowhere to be found.

"Poor thing," said one of the griffons, looking away with a shake of his head when she tried to make eye contact.

She searched for the one who had tried to take her foal earlier. Garnet was watching, so would she be mad if Lyantra asked for help? Lyantra didn't know what she would do next if she did pass her foal on to a royal caretaker, though. What should her priorities be, at a time like this? What even was there to do?

The sky was overcast with a dark gray cloud cover, blocking out the sun. That meant... something, she wanted to say, but she couldn't remember what. It was a good time to do something?

In front of her was the city, and beyond it, a mountain range. There were foothills far in the distance beyond her, too, and off to the west was a dim band of color where light seeped down past the edge of the clouds. This all felt achingly, hauntingly familiar, right and wrong at the same time. For the briefest of possible instants, she felt like she was standing in an open doorway, looking out at this same scene and discussing it with someone. Was that Garnet's presence?

She looked to her side, but nobody was there.

Right. Priorities. Priorities... but Lyantra didn't know what to do.

Her hooves carried her towards the griffons. Where was the one who had offered to help care for her foal? She would better be able to navigate Garnet's game if she wasn't carrying around a foal on her back. Especially if - and she had a feeling it would happen - Garnet prodded her into the city itself.

There he was.

"Excuse me," Lyantra said, zeroing on the griffon who had argued with Garnet over her foal. She had probably left him here for her to find on purpose. "Are you the one who was interested in my foal?"

The griffon in question was playing cards with three others, using a barrel as a table. He sighed, answering his opponents' questioning glances with a duty calls look, and then turned on his stool to face her.

"You are, right?" Lyantra asked, her foal balanced on her back.

"What I am primarily interested in," he told her, gently and with a small hint of exasperation, "is Her Majesty's public image. Conducting this outreach with an underage sarosian servant's heretical foal on her teat sends a rather unflattering message. And seeing as she is no longer doing so, I consider my interest served."

Lyantra blinked.

"I don't wish ill against you and yours," the griffon clarified. "Knowing Makalov, you've suffered enough of that already. But I'm here to serve Her Majesty, not her other servants. Please go wait in the carriage where they can't spot you through telescopes or something."

Lyantra winced, hard. She hadn't even asked him for anything yet... though it sounded like he knew better than she did what she was here for. "But I don't know what to do with them," she protested. "Garnet didn't want your help, but I-"

"It's a tough life," the griffon interrupted. "Should have thought about that before you let Makalov get a hold of you. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to focus on this play..."

"Okay," Lyantra whispered, stepping away.

The griffons resumed playing. After a few seconds, one of the other griffons cracked a joke she didn't hear fully about Makalov and batponies. A third one shushed him, but the fourth one laughed. Lyantra's ears fell, and she hurried away.

"You try to abandon your foal at the closest opportunity," Garnet said in Lyantra's head as she ran. "No one could blame you, but you'd definitely blame yourself if you had succeeded. Failure stings almost as bad as their laughter, but in the depths of your heart, you know this is a good result. Try again."

Lyantra hid underneath a wagon, nestled against the interior of its wheel. "I don't like this game," she whispered.

"This is life," Garnet said.

"No it's not," Lyantra quietly protested, her voice threatening to crack if she raised it. "Real life wouldn't have you narrating bad news like this, would it? Normally, you're helping me."

"Perhaps," Garnet admitted. "But the reaction of those griffons was unscripted. They despise you."

"Why?" Lyantra folded her ears.

"Because they think it makes them strong," Garnet lectured. "The lesser strength of lesser creatures that comes from dragging others down beneath them so they can see someone when they look down. They're desperate for such strength because they've always been weak, and are too weak to even conceive of an alternative."

Lyantra set her bundled foal gently on the rocks beneath the wagon, allowing her back a moment of rest. "What do you mean?"

"Choose your next path," Garnet said. "See where it leads. Stay hung up on this and look for revenge, or find somewhere else to look. I'll be watching."

"Do you want me to go into the city?" Lyantra whispered.

"I'm just an observer." Garnet's voice receded in her mind. "That's your decision."

Lyantra looked out at the caravan encampment. She wanted to run to safety, but what did that even mean? This place was familiar, sort of. That didn't mean safe. The city wouldn't be safe either. A sixth sense told her that if she waited too long, the sky would start falling, slowly and gently closing in on her until the confusion she was feeling now would look like clarity in hindsight.

"This isn't fun," Lyantra begged. "Please help me."

But nobody answered.

Lyantra slunk into the city.

She wanted to hide, and there were countless places to do so. Her assessment of the place from a distance had been spot-on: it was as if small parts of it had just disappeared all over, individual walls and supports and bits of infrastructure, and the whole place had been shaken and settled in lopsided as a result. She could sneak into buildings through holes where windows should have been installed, yet simply weren't. And sneak she did, because every time she caught a glance from a stranger, the reaction was usually fear.

Something about it was existentially terrifying, the architecture even more than the way others treated her. She was inside what had once been a bedroom and was now abandoned, and while it showed no signs of looting, certain things were just gone. The bed, a nice four-poster with its drapes intact and only slightly askew, had no mattress or pillows, yet the sheets were all still laying in place, like someone had made it anyway.

In the corner was a pile of clothes, layered in a particular order even as they were all strewn about, as if they had been in a dresser that one day just vanished from existence.

All the fur on Lyantra's spine tried to rise, tamped down by the weight of the foal on her back. This was wrong. Horribly, terribly wrong. She poked at the pile of clothes and pulled out a business collar with a tie, her instincts screaming at her that it was about to disappear, too. Along with maybe even the carpet beneath her hooves.

"What happened here?" she whispered, an awful sense of foreboding looming just behind her back.

"This was once a flying city," Garnet's voice explained. "It was carried by Garsheeva's magic and used solidified clouds in its architecture. When Garsheeva disappeared, her enchantments came undone, and all the clouds slowly returned to mist."

Solidified clouds? Those were a thing?

Lyantra felt a little bit better, hearing that there was a rational explanation for this. It still shook her to her core.

She left the clothing and the destroyed bedroom behind, and kept moving. She didn't know what she was looking for. Other people? Someone who could help her? But she had found plenty of those, and the important part was to avoid them.

"You decide not to steal the clothes," Garnet narrated in her mind. "Perhaps you're clinging to some morals, or maybe you just haven't thought this through. It would be useful it would be to disguise your identity as a sarosian. Of course, I could give you a much better disguise, if only you would ask. Keep going."

"Is that why everyone doesn't like me?" Lyantra whispered. "Why does it matter that I'm a sarosian?"

"I've explained this to you," Garnet told her. "Because they're just that uncreative."

Lyantra swallowed. Would it really change something? She didn't know what she wanted, how to get it, where to get it, only that she was lost and confused and in danger. Would indulging Garnet make this test stop sooner?

"Can you make me a pegasus?" she whispered.

Instantly, her body locked up, and after a brief second of light, she could move again. Her wings were covered in feathers.

"Good," Garnet praised. "Now what other tools do you have available to you?"

Lyantra didn't know. So she moved on, and kept looking for whatever she was looking for.

The first time Lyantra started to feel like she understood how this worked was when her foal got hungry.

There was only one thing to do about that: she had to feed it. And it was pretty much impossible to feed on the go, which meant she needed to stay in place while her foal did its thing. And that, in turn, made her more vulnerable.

She needed a safe place to stay while she did this. And the other things she would need to do, like sleeping. That was what she should be looking for: shelter. This time, she had gotten caught by surprise, and was feeding her foal in the lobby of what she hoped was an abandoned apartment complex, hiding under a dusty chair and praying nobody found her as the foal suck-suck-suckled away.

"Where is everyone, anyway?" she whispered, after checking to ensure the coast was still clear. "I saw plenty of people outside, but that can't be everyone. What about everyone who lived in these buildings before they fell apart?"

"They're all dead," Garnet replied. "Some of them, anyway. Wilderwind is a military province, full of mercenaries. Lots of them died fighting when the Empire fell. And the survivors are in higher demand than ever. The ones who can't fight are fixing the city. The ones who can are bringing the region under control, ensuring they have a source of food. Even children and the elderly are chipping in. No one has time to sit around in apartments with their roofs or walls gone."

A source of food, huh? Good thing Lyantra could feed her foal, but... her stomach growled, loudly. She was hungry, too.

Food. Food and shelter. She needed to find shelter, but first, she needed to find food.

"You're learning," Garnet said gruffly. "Keep it up."

Only one pony passed by while Lyantra nursed, and they thankfully didn't notice her. They were a pegasus, flying up to the balcony on the atrium's second floor, so they passed pretty far away. But did that mean someone did live here, after all?

Bad news. She wanted a place to stay as far from other people as possible, at least until she got her bearings. Though, they might have food...

Could she trade for it, now that she wasn't a sarosian? What did she have to trade? She knew how to clean, and she had her foal, and her foal's blanket. And that was about it.

Impossible or not, she needed food. And so once her foal was done, she crept out from under the chair - its cushions had disappeared, probably because they were made of clouds, leaving only a luxurious skeleton - and quickly crept towards the nearest staircase, balancing her foal on her back.

It had a nice, red carpet over the stairs, but no banisters or railings whatsoever. Only peg holes on the sides of the steps where railings could once have been inserted. Neither of the sides hugged a wall, so Lyantra clung to the middle of the staircase as she climbed. She trusted her own balance, but it was like an open invitation to fall off.

The staircase passed by a large, unframed painting, or perhaps just a painting with a frame that had disappeared. It depicted an enormous sphinx smashing and scattering an army on a wasteland plain not unlike where the city was now, jagged foothills rising imminently in the background.

Lyantra reached the balcony, itself completely missing a railing. Her hooves carried her into a hallway, where a couple of plants grew from large, cracked urns, providing just enough cover in the event that anyone saw her. The plants hadn't been watered recently. They didn't look too good.

Her attention was on the doors, though. Or rather, the lack of doors: the hinges were still there, with screws still threaded through them, and the handles and locking mechanisms were sitting there all in a row on the ground. But there were no doors. They must have been made of clouds, too.

Some of the apartments were dark, and others lit by natural light seeping in through the missing windows. Lyantra couldn't see in the dark, so she chose one of the brighter ones to investigate.

It was pretty much the same as the other destroyed rooms she had crept through, though now she was looking at it with new eyes, evaluating it as a long-term place to stay. She didn't know what Garnet's intentions were, but if the sphinx never came back for her... She needed food and shelter.

Apartment. Hole in the wall? Yes. Kitchen? It had one, but the countertops were such a mess that there must have been cloud cupboards above them that simply disappeared.

She searched through the mess of broken dishes and cooking implements for anything she could eat, but it was all bowls and spoons and shards that could slice her to ribbons if she inspected them too closely. Maybe there was a pantry? Come on, there had to be a pantry...

There was a pantry. Lyantra did her best to ignore the smell of rotting fruit, and found a couple of cans she didn't know how to open, some raw ingredients she didn't know how to cook with, like oil, sugar, flour, potatoes... a cheese wheel. She could eat cheese! It wouldn't be much of a meal on its own, and it only looked big enough for a few servings at best, but her stomach growled again. Even if she could tough it out, she knew instinctively that if she didn't eat she couldn't make any milk for her foal. Lyantra pulled off the rind and bit down.

Spicy. Really spicy. At least it wasn't stinky, but this cheese had chili pepper bits mixed in with it. If this was all she could find... She bit down again and again, trying her best to ignore the pepper's sting in her mouth. She couldn't eat this by itself. At the very least, she needed water.

With her foal on her back and the cheese wheel under a wing, Lyantra went back out in search of a bathroom, somewhere with a faucet that wasn't covered in broken porcelain. The apartment wasn't large, and it wasn't hard to find, a narrow room with a weird smell and a toilet sandwiched between the sink and the tub, curtains drawn. A small hole in the roof provided illumination, probably once used as a translucent skylight.

A fly buzzed past her as Lyantra worked the faucet, but nothing came out. Had the building's plumbing not survived the landing and the loss of clouds...?

Maybe it was just a bad faucet. She could try the one in the tub. She pulled back the curtain-

The tub was occupied by a griffon, his eyes wide and unseeing.

Lyantra screamed and fled, heart hammering and hooves pounding, the cheese wheel slipping from her grasp as a half-formed memory of the grisly image chased her like a ghost. She darted out of the apartment and hid behind a dying plant several doors down the hallway, watching and trembling to see if the corpse would follow, her foal wailing from the sudden movement.

"You've seen your first corpse," Garnet said, her voice strangely muffled and muted as Lyantra tried to shush her foal. "Congratulations. Perhaps he hit his head and died of a concussion, or perhaps it was something far more pathetic. But you don't want to end up like him, do you? Even after all you've seen, you're still trying to survive."

"Please," Lyantra whispered, ears flat against the infant's screams. "Please help me. I don't want to do this anymore."

"Soon," Garnet promised. "I am still protecting you. This is all just a lesson. Once you survive for a night, I'll know that you understand what's at stake, that you know where your foal could be without you to provide for them. But you're still hungry, aren't you? Find food. Take it if you must. Learn what the food I give you is worth, my little pony."

Lyantra didn't know if she was hungry. She felt nauseous, her mouth was gummed up from the cheese and stung from the peppers. Maybe... if Garnet said she'd come in the morning, all Lyantra had to do was survive until then? Could she keep her foal happy that long? Forget that, someone was definitely alerted by this. With nothing else she could do, Lyantra started running again.

She ran, rounding a corner into another wing of the apartment complex... and a strange sensation began to follow her, like an anomalous squid in the sea of the unknown.

Although, maybe it wasn't a sensation so much as an intrusive thought, knocking rudely and persistently to be let in.

Was this really right? As she stopped again to try to quiet her foal, it finally caught up with her, slipping into her mind and settling in: did it make sense that she was living like a rodent, scuttling around stealing food from dead griffons? Where was her self-respect? Why settle for a life that worked that way?

She, the thought told her, deserved better. And she could act like it! Carrying her head high, walking outside in the sunlight like a real pony ought to do. Get some resources, some power and clout to her name so she could afford to be seen. True, she might have become worthless garbage, but why sit there and accept it? Why not try to get back what she deserved?

Even if she failed, could she really do worse than this?

It was a tantalizing thought, and Lyantra found herself circling it like a shark. Did that really come from her? It sure wasn't something Garnet had put there. She knew Garnet's style, and nothing about it built her up like that. Telling herself that she deserved better didn't feel like the kind of thing she had reason to think up herself, but... she was overthinking it. She wanted to feel proud of herself. She wanted to do something worth thinking about, worth talking about, more than just cleaning and having a foal and taking strange lessons she didn't have a say in. She wanted, wanted, wanted it, and she let that idea be her passion and her fire. And for a brief, fleeting moment, she felt it.

A sense of pride in herself. Wounded, destabilized pride, humiliated at the circumstances she now found herself in. A desire to fix that and rebuild her pride. But a desire nonetheless.

She would get her own name and her own image, and call them her own, and she would learn to get what she needed to survive, and more than that, to be happy. To live how she was meant to. Whether it was possible or not, she promised that to herself, and it was such a delicious, tantalizing, addictive promise that for a split second, she had a future and everything was okay.

And how would she start? Well, with what she already knew: food and shelter.

A few more doors down, the promise advised. You'll know it when you see it.

Right, right. If that was what it took to keep going, Lyantra could believe that success was just around the corner. She got back to her hooves and started looking for something she could use.

Lyantra found a room that looked very promising, because it was occupied.

She peered around the empty door frame, looking in. There was a sitting room next to a window that had been repaired with some bits of plywood and a misshapen pane of glass brought in from elsewhere, and inside, a group of ponies was gathered around a low table, studying what looked like a huge map.

"Not visiting the Great Temple shouldn't be up for discussion," one of the ponies - they were all ponies, not a single griffon - was saying. "I don't see how we could justify an expedition to Mistvale and possibly skip it. And if we don't get there first, someone else will beat us to the punch!"

"It's clear on the opposite side of Mistvale, though," another pony pointed out, tapping the map. "We'd be spending most of our supplies just on travel time, rather than actual investigations."

"I agree with Lente," said a mare. "We know the cities have been destroyed. We might find records in the Great Temple, but what matters is locating survivors. It's a known fact that there was a colony of exiles who lived outside the dusk statues' range of influence in this cove here, and there could be others." She tapped the map forcefully. "Valleys and caves are where we'll find those, not the dead cities."

Lyantra looked closer at the mare, and her heart jumped: she had spoked, leathery wings. A sarosian, just like her. Could she be safe here...?

No groveling, the promise told her. That's not how you rebuild your pride in yourself.

B-But...

The mare looked much younger than Garnet, with a light grey coat and a short, crimson-pink mane, sitting in a splotch of sunlight that let Lyantra make out her features.

"True," the first pony admitted. "But whether it helps with our goals or not, presenting a strong face to the university is how we get more funding. If this expedition is an academic success, we can try again as many times as we need."

"Hate to break it to you, lady-mare," said a pegasus with a garish red-and-black goatee that was patterned like a lightning bolt, and a pompadour to match. "But the dude's got a point. When you're getting an operation like this put together, securing capital is a more important first step than achieving your goals. I feel how much you wanna see your sister again, but the less time you spend on the foundation, the faster it all falls apart. And we don't even know yet if this plan of yours is even possible."

"The Great Temple might hold answers to some of the parts you're stumped on," the first pony added helpfully.

The sarosian mare sighed. "Suppose you have a point. We can't just change how we're promoting this to the university. Turning back the clock only sounds nice to them when they don't have to take it literally."

They seem pretty distracted, the promise advised Lyantra. And they sound like they're getting quite a lot of resources. Stealing isn't something you should take pride in, but you're already a rodent. Pride is for winners, not something that will help you win. Get there first however you can, and then you'll feel it.

Right. Lyantra swallowed, praying her foal would keep quiet, and crept through the edge of the room, sticking to the shadows and darting into another door the moment she could.

It didn't sound like she was spotted.

Okay, pantry. This apartment had a similar layout to the last one, so she knew where that should be. Lyantra ducked through the kitchen, which was also missing its cupboards, though someone had cleaned up the mess from when they vanished.

The sink looked disused, but there was a barrel with a spigot next to it. Water! Lyantra carefully, carefully adjusted it to dribble into her waiting mouth, silently getting a few slow gulps without spattering too much on the floor.

Nobody heard her. She shut it off and opened the door to the pantry.

But this wasn't food.

Inside the dark pantry was a small, softly-lit shrine. A table with a rosy tablecloth held numerous tiny, framed pictures, showing two sarosian fillies together, one her age and one younger. The older one had light blue eyes and a crimson-pink mane, and a brand of an ear next to a vibrating line. The younger one's mane was the same shade of crimson-pink, her brand showed a dainty tiara, and she had an intelligent, imperious, mischievous look on her face that suggested she caused trouble and loved life in equal measure. Some of the pictures were set to a background of caves and tunnels, others to crudely-poured concrete walls, and still more to snowy mountain valleys and peaks.

A few more artifacts completed the shrine, random trinkets and tiny foal's toys, the whole display lit from behind the central photo with a strange golden light.

Lyantra felt like she shouldn't be here. But, unable to stifle her curiosity, she slid the central picture aside to see what was causing the light.

It was a diamond. Almost hoof-sized and completely gold, it glowed from within with a distant, fiery, apocalyptic light, gently shifting and changing.

That's gotta be magic, her promise said. Powerful magic. Get it.

Lyantra hesitated. A weapon? True, she would feel a lot less vulnerable if she had a way to defend herself. But she had no idea what she would do with a thing like that. How could you use a beautifully ominous golden diamond for more than just a source of light?

She'd have to figure it out later. Better not to dawdle here. Muted by a sense of disbelief, Lyantra reached for it and took it, fixing the position of the photo she had moved while swimming in a sense that this wasn't really her.

She didn't have a bag or anything, and the diamond was glowing. So, she stuffed it inside the blanket with her foal, hoping they wouldn't start crying due to being wrapped in with a hard and pointy gemstone.

And then she shut the closet and fled, creeping out of the apartment, making it out of the hallway and finally a full building over. Lyantra stopped, panted and let herself breathe easy, at last confident that she hadn't been noticed.

She lifted the blankets and snuck a peek at the diamond, nestled in with her foal. Still there. Still strange and dangerous and beautiful, though she hadn't a clue what it did. And for some reason, Garnet wasn't commenting on it, or even saying anything at all.

That was strange. Lyantra looked around: she was now in what once might have been a small cathedral, though it was completely missing its roof and its walls. There wasn't much for cover beyond a few rain-soaked pews, so she hid under one and waited to see when Garnet would speak again.

"Where are you?" Lyantra whispered after a few minutes of silence. "You should have said something by now. Are you happy with me and think leaving me alone is a reward? I just don't want to be alone. I didn't want you to leave..."

Nothing. Lyantra swallowed, and kept waiting.

Just when she thought she couldn't afford to wait any longer, a squadron of five Everlaste griffons flew in formation overhead.

Get their attention, her promise urged. See what you can get from them. Food, supplies, anything - they're supposed to be on your team, right?

"H-Hey!" Lyantra stepped out from under the pew and waved up at the sky. "Hey! Are you looking for me?"

Maybe that wasn't the best way to phrase it. But even if they came down to say no, that would still involve getting close enough to talk with them.

The griffons wheeled about, and swiftly landed in a circle around her. The ones who had been playing cards weren't among them.

"That first the profile, alright," one of them said, scrutinizing Lyantra and then nodding to the others. He turned back to Lyantra. "It's her, as a pegasus, just like she said. Bizarre. What did you do to tick off Her Majesty so much?"

"What?" Lyantra blinked. "She's mad at me?"

The griffon shrugged. "Mad enough to interrupt a meeting to order us to come search this general vicinity for you. I don't know what's going on between you two, but I haven't seen her that intense for all the time I've known her."

Lyantra blinked again.

"Garfield, go report to Her Majesty." The griffon gestured at another, who saluted and took off. Another griffon grabbed Lyantra's foal, blankets and hidden diamond and all, and the one she was speaking to grabbed her in turn, his talons closing professionally around her barrel, pinning her wings to her sides as he lifted off.

She wasn't consulted and never offered her approval, but in a few short minutes, she was back in the caravan encampment, her foal being passed stiffly back into her wings. Did this mean the game was over? That was a relief, but why? She didn't even have time to question it out loud before the griffons ordered her back into Garnet's carriage, and she found herself slumped on the bench, filthy from a day of sneaking around but otherwise right back where she started.

Well... except for...

Lyantra was staring at her diamond when Garnet returned. She barely had time to hide it as the door swung open, sitting on it to smother out its light.

"...Well," Garnet said, inspecting her with an expression Lyantra had never seen before - some combination of surprise, annoyance and deep, deep thought. "It certainly looks like you... What did you do, after you fled from the corpse in the bathtub?"

Lyantra blinked. "Weren't you following me?"

"Something interrupted my connection to you," Garnet said stiffly. "And it's still active. What did you do? Tell me everything, anything unusual at all."

Lyantra swallowed. Could it be the diamond? That was probably magical, and she didn't know what it did. If holding onto it caused Garnet to be mad at her, that definitely wasn't worth it.

Her promise didn't interfere as she hesitantly pulled out the diamond, presenting it to Garnet with a shaky wing. "I stole this."

Garnet swiped the diamond with a wingtip, sniffed it, and then gnawed curiously on the surface. "Pride. Too constant to be a symphony, too concentrated to be a single creature's. Now that's fascinating..."

Lyantra tried to make herself small.

"Good job," Garnet declared. "This thing is worth a thousand experiments with you. I'm very curious how you came by it..."

"Does that mean..." Lyantra lowered her voice to a whisper. "If I give you that, we won't have to play this game again?"

"You've already given me it," Garnet carelessly remarked, clearly more interested in the diamond than Lyantra. "But I suppose." She looked up. "Was that really too much?"

"Yes!" Lyantra burst out. "Yes, that was horrible! Don't ever make me do that again!"

Garnet slowly tilted her head. "Tens of thousands of children live that way every day of their lives. You even had it easy compared to some of the voices in the song. I've heard children sit helplessly during their parents' death throes, heard them exploited and forced to work fourteen hours a day, or carted off on pirate frigates as spoils of war. You kept your freedom. You barely looked at the world from the sidelines, and you already think that was too much?"

Lyantra nodded with a whimper, her promise doing nothing to bolster her now.

Garnet sighed. "I suppose there's a lesson I should take from that as well, though it might just be how soft you are... Fine. I won't kick you out on your own again. But you are going back one more time before we leave. I'll go with you in person, after my duties are finished. Satisfied?"

No, Lyantra wasn't satisfied. Not with going back. Although, Garnet had just promised not to make her go back alone, so maybe she was satisfied? She didn't know. She needed a bath, and was too tired, both mentally and physically. She just wanted to curl up and be left alone.

"...I have some tests to run." Garnet swung the door shut. "If you had that bad of a time, then stay in the carriage until I get back."

It latched closed. The foal was, miraculously, sleeping.

Oh well, Lyantra's promise said, sliding back out of her mind with the same alien sensation it had arrived with. You got that gemstone out of its dusty closet and into the paws of someone who can properly use it. That's more than a rodent like you usually amounts to.

Break Time Runs Out

"Come on," Papyrus complained, "you can't just stop there! Do you have any idea how many questions that raises?"

Cherrabell gave him a pained smile, swaying from side to side to stay comfortable. "That's what you said the last few times. And I don't know how many more encores I can give before I push this baby out right here in front of everyone."

Papyrus raised a skeptical eyebrow. "I grew up in Riverfall, I've seen this whole song and dance before. If you were even a tenth of the way there, you'd be making more of a racket than the crowd at a wrestling match."

"Speak for yourself," Cherrabell panted, holding her enormous belly. "I'll do whatever you want me to. There's no reason I can't give birth here. Gawain loves to watch. I'm just letting you know, it's not going to be much longer..."

"It's almost midnight," Larceny pointed out. "We've been doing this for hours. Surprised you didn't stop talking ages ago."

Cherrabell shook her head and shrugged. "I'm happy to do this. I'll do it for as long as you want me to. I want to be useful. I just want to be sure that what you want-"

"What we want," Felicity interrupted, "is for you to have a safe and easy delivery. There will be plenty of time to pick up where you left off with the story after you've brought your child into the world. Isn't that right, Papyrus?"

"What are you looking at me for?" Papyrus made an indignant face. "You're the doctor, she's the patient. I'm just the peanut gallery. My money says she'll still be huffing and puffing away in the morning whether we call it quits here or not, but if I'm wrong it would be your own faults for listening to me."

Cherrabell gave him a bewildered look. "You still make no sense. I can keep talking if you want me to, I just can't tell what you actually want. Earlier, you made it sound like you didn't want to watch this. If you changed your mind, you can just say so."

"No, hold on," Papyrus insisted, "this is about sphinxes who aren't supposed to exist and sinister gold diamonds that may or may not have manipulated you into stealing them. You can't just drop the mic on that and waddle away for the night. Come on, you've obviously got more in you!"

"What I've got in me," Cherrabell told him, "is a baby. And I suspect you don't believe me when I say it's not going to be there for much longer. Is it because I'm not screaming and hyperventilating enough? I know how to keep my composure for the sake of my audience, and it's because I've had a lot lot lot of practice, not because-"

Felicity cleared her throat. "Papyrus? Miss Cherrabell has made her state clear. We're calling it here on the storytelling for the night, and I'm taking her down to a bedroom to get checked over, and then to get comfortable for the rest of her labor. There will be plenty of time to continue this in the morning."

Cherrabell nodded gratefully, struggling to her hooves. "Thank you. I don't want to overrule what anyone wants, here, I just-"

"You want to take care of yourself and put yourself first," Felicity finished for her, stepping up and bracing Cherrabell's shoulder with her own. "And your right to do that is the most important thing here. We can work on the nuances of self-advocacy later, but right now you get what you need with no questions asked."

Cherrabell leaned into Felicity's offered shoulder, burying her face in her neck like a small child.

"That's right." Felicity put a wing over her back and patted her gently. "Now, I could perhaps use a helping hoof? Anyone?"

"Is Braen suitable for role?" Braen asked, sitting by the door to the deck like a sentinel. "Has much to think about in wake of story. Would like to help Cherrabell."

"Here." Cherrabell beckoned her wing a wing. "Would you like to feel one more time before I go downstairs? I think another contraction's just about to hit, if you want to feel that too."

Braen zipped to Cherrabell's side, not looking to Papyrus or anyone else for permission before applying her cheek and both forehooves to Cherrabell's belly. "Wow," she stage whispered. "So much different than last time. Feels like Cherrabell has boulder inside!"

Cherrabell nodded. "And if you wait for just a moment longer..."

Braen held her position, and within a few seconds, Cherrabell gritted her teeth, just as she had done countless times over the evening.

"Can tell Cherrabell in great pain," Braen said solemnly.

"That's how it works," Cherrabell said with a teacher's patience, her voice tight.

"Must take large inner strength not to cry," Braen added. "Strength more than possessed by someone like Papyrus."

"What?" Papyrus rose to his hooves in indignation. "No. Bad robot! Where do you get off, dunking on your bodyguard? Buzz off. Who came up with your personality anyway?"

Braen straightened up. "Interpreting response as permission to go with Cherrabell."

"No-! Argh, you know what? Whatever." Papyrus waved her off, sighing as he threw in the towel. "Have a fun ten more hours of waiting. And try not to scar yourself. Incorrigible goat."

Cherrabell chuckled. "Don't worry. I think she'll appreciate it. But, could we hurry? The baby's saying loud and clear that it's going to be less than ten hours."

"I'll help too," Nehaley volunteered, rising to follow them as Braen took Cherrabell's other side and helped her stagger down the stairs to the sleeping cabins. "Could probably use a more experienced set of hooves..."

Papyrus watched as they departed, and then listened, and then nothing as the telltale click of a door down below cut off the sounds of Cherrabell and her caregivers. Papyrus had been intrigued, albeit not entirely surprised, to discover early in their voyage that the soundproofing on the cabin walls was so excellent, it was probably magical. Not that he had much use for that, most of the time. But tonight, it sure would come in handy.

The only ones left in the main cabin were Floria, Senescey and himself.

"So," Papyrus began, breaking the ice after a moment of silence. "Certainly sounds like we left a hot mess in our wake back in the Empire. Feel like airing any new regrets, or do we come to terms with all that and move on?"

He glanced at Senescey, who was still swaddled in blankets after their fight in the rain - as was he.

But it was Floria who answered. "Well, I for one have a newfound resolve to let bygones be bygones and have nothing to do with the Empire ever. I'd rather live my life on a continent that won't ask me to repopulate my race by any means necessary."

"Can't imagine why that would act as a deterrent," Senescey grunted.

"Is that how it is for everyone when it comes to having children?" Floria asked, rattled. "The physical infirmity, the dependence on others, that huge shape, that... that lewd panting and moaning?"

"Couldn't tell you, don't know." Senescey rolled over to face the wall.

"Remember what her hubby's like," Papyrus pointed out. "At least half of that was probably for show."

Floria looked mortified.

"Usually," Papyrus unhelpfully continued, "when people have kids it involves a whole lot of agonized screaming and at least five doctors, all stallions, with bright lights and sterilized lab coats crowding around you in a cramped-"

"Thank you, very enlightening, why don't we change the subject?" Floria interrupted. "This 'Garnet' psychopath. You and your cronies were active in Izvaldi, were you not? What do you know about this sphinx?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Absolutely nothing. Which is quite unusual; you're correct about our activities. A cornerstone of my scheme relied around controlling the timing of when the public learned the Izvaldi royal line was extinct. If there really was a secret sphinx successor squirreled away somewhere, that would have made things two thousand percent simpler in some respects while also requiring us to keep her hidden from Izvaldi's steward at all costs. And so I spent considerable time and energy early on ensuring that if Izvaldi did have anyone like that, I would know."

"Working theory," Senescey said: "she's not actually a sphinx. Probably a sarosian who learned to transform early on."

"There is another possibility," Papyrus pointed out. "Sphinxes and sarosians are related on some level I don't fully understand. You know how Chrysalis used the Daydream Network to hijack the bodies of every sarosian on the continent, right? Well, Garsheeva could do that too. Sometimes, when she wanted to meet with me in the field, she would 'borrow' one of the Night Mother's faithful and use them as a vessel. Granted, she always put them back together afterward. But what if they're so similar that sphinxes can shapeshift, too? If this Garnet knew how to do that before the Empire's fall, then hiding from everyone might have been a little more possible." He put a hoof to his chin. "Though could she have hid from Garsheeva...?"

Floria shook her head. "Where I thought you were going with that is that Garnet might have been a transformed sarosian puppet controlled by an external actor."

"Hmm," Papyrus mused. "It's possible."

"I'm not so sure," Senescey corrected. "Cherrabell said that Garnet became pregnant, remember? And Lilith's enterprise in Ironridge was based around finding new ways to bring back up the number of sarosians, which she claims is necessary because all the former sarosians who are now empty bodies in Chrysalis's swarm can't reproduce without their souls. So that's something a remote puppet couldn't do."

Papyrus nodded. "That's a good point... Back to the question I asked you earlier, then. Think Garnet could be Chrysalis?"

Senescey hesitated at length. "I still don't know. Her actions wouldn't make any sense at all, but the circumstances line up well enough."

"You think Garnet might have been the monster who destroyed the Empire?" Floria raised an incredulous eyebrow, but almost immediately put it back down, thinking. "She did seem to have some unusual powers."

Papyrus flicked his tail. "It'll be difficult to suss out from that angle. Sphinxes and changeling queens have a surprisingly similar kit of abilities. Of course, most of those sphinx powers used to be one of the best-kept secrets in the Empire, before I accidentally discovered it myself... Most of what Cherrabell has described, though, is stuff any sphinx could do if they just knew how."

Floria gave him a deeply skeptical look. "I can communicate with sarosians in their minds from across a city, force them to shapeshift involuntarily and disintegrate people I don't like in the blink of an eye."

Papyrus nodded. "You'd need a sufficient power source to do it at any scale. Garsheeva, Chrysalis and I all used a ridiculous stockpile of souls. Or, more accurately, the brands attached to them. I'm not sure what you could do without something like that backing you up, but it's all on the table."

Now Floria just looked disturbed.

"What if Garnet was a Bishop?" Senescey proposed. "Like Lilith, Samael and Estael in Ironridge. Or Rhodallis. A powerful follower of Chrysalis, we don't really know how they're connected, but they aren't Chrysalis herself?"

"Cherrabell never mentioned her brand, did she?" Papyrus tilted his head. "Bishops have that telltale empty circle..."

"I can't remember," Senescey admitted.

"Tell me more about these Bishops," Floria requested. "What are they? What would it mean if Garnet was one?"

"I don't have many hard facts," Papyrus apologized. "They appeared in Ironridge shortly after Cold Karma took over and Shinespark's government got the big boot. Or maybe they were there already and just stepped up to claim a slice of the pie. They have supernaturally good intelligence operations, which seem to be because they each have a share of Chrysalis's changeling swarm under their direct command. I can't remember if I've seen them shapeshift, and I've never seen anything that suggests they can rip out brands the way Chrysalis could, but they can issue orders and control the puppets that are already empty. And they're very single-minded in their pursuit of particular goals."

"Such as?" Floria pressed.

"Repopulating the sarosian race," Senescey said. "Apparently, Chrysalis killed too many of her new army during the initial rampage in the Empire, and then discovered they couldn't breed anymore without souls. I think Lilith is trying to replenish us to ensure a robust upstream supply of soldiers for Chrysalis to harvest. But she's obsessed with the concept to a degree that makes it feel like she really cares about the mission, and not just her boss. Not that she cares about us ourselves, though. Her goal is the only thing that matters."

Papyrus nodded. "And Samael and Estael are the Ironridge Directors of Public Security. I never got the impression they were particularly corrupt, but they certainly cared more about the criminals they were bringing to justice than the actual city streets. Whenever some lawyer or factional treaty allowed someone obviously guilty to slip out from their net - such as yours truly - they took it personally."

"Hmm," Floria mused. "Garnet certainly had her contingent of followers, but it sounds as if she sought Lyantra out as a candidate for her research, correct? Which would mean she may not have had a bountiful swarm of soulless sarosians to work from..."

"That, or she needed one who was already integrated into high society," Papyrus pointed out. "A random one she nabbed from Mistvale just wouldn't do. Actually, what if Chrysalis couldn't even track whose body belonged to whom after stealing them all?"

Senescey sighed. "That's just speculation, and no matter how you want to speculate, I was stolen and then put back together with my correct mind in my correct body. Something had to remember what went where."

"I'll ask again, then," Floria said. "Forget whether it's feasible: what would it mean if Garnet was a Bishop? Or if she was Chrysalis?"

Senescey's face shadowed. "If she was Chrysalis, I'll tell you one thing it would mean: I've been wasting my time ever since I reawakened."

"Oh yeah?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"Yes." Senescey's expression was dark and conflicted. "I think Chrysalis failed. I want to see... someone come in after her, amass that much power again, and try to actually fix society with a proper set of principles and ideas. I assumed Chrysalis never had that, and that's why she simply threw a destructive tantrum. But if Garnet really was Chrysalis, then the only explanation for her behavior would be that she realized the same thing I have. She created meaningless destruction because she had no plan. Garnet's tactics are hideous, but she seems to be trying to figure out what could go into a model for society where the good outweighs the bad. That would mean she knows that she failed the first time, but isn't done yet."

Papyrus stared at her.

"...Which would mean," Senescey finished, "that what I really should have been working on is how to give her my own answers. She... might listen."

"Excuse me," Floria burst out, blanching. "You mean to say that you would entrust someone like that with any sort of power, willingly? Whether or not this Chrysalis idea has any merit, Garnet is clearly the type of person to be stopped at all costs. She tossed a child with an infant into a ruined city and then narrated their struggles while watching, for goodness' sake!"

Senescey met her outburst with a level expression. "Would you entrust me with any sort of power, either? What about Papyrus?" She shook her head. "No one would. If we get caught up in who's willing to follow whom, then the gears will grind to a halt the moment someone plays dirty. The outcome is the only part that matters. If I don't believe that, and I say that mass murderers who ruined civilizations in their past don't deserve a further part to play, then what would that leave me to do with myself?"

Floria gritted her teeth. "Would it be so problematic to choose a leader who doesn't have a history of barbarity?"

"You were yelling at Gawain earlier for leaving the future up to his children," Senescey said, distant and resolved. "It rubs you the wrong way to see someone abdicate responsibility and force it onto others, doesn't it? Me too. I want to live. I want to do something with my life, something worth doing in however many years I have left. I don't want to sit back and watch while others do it. I don't want my biggest act to have been pulling out the keystone to the Empire and watching it crumble. If someone more qualified than me to fix this world wants to take the reins first, then they can go for it. I'm still going to do whatever I can, wherever I can, however I can to be something more than the pain that animated me up to this point. And so I can't condemn anyone, no matter how evil, who also wants to be more than their failures."

Floria had nothing to say.

"Enjoy your innocence while you can," Papyrus told the sphinx. "I don't mean that in the naive sense. I mean that you haven't broken anything people will never forgive you for. I get where Senescey's coming from. I'm not about to give up on my prospects just because I'm one of the most notorious criminals the world has ever known. And if you only look at the world in terms of people who've messed up and people who haven't, you're going to have an awful time keeping that line consistent without someday crossing it yourself and wishing you could go back."

"I've heard enough," Floria said, eyes closed with a grimace. "You've made your points. Perhaps I am indeed naive. But that innocence is precious to me. Can you not imagine my terror at joining your ranks? I've been raised on stories of what you did, I understand your conundrum and I can't fathom finding myself in a situation like that where I'd have to come up with what to do next. Have I not the right to enjoy my clean paws while they last?"

"Never said you didn't," Papyrus countered. "Is that why you dislike me so much? Are you really just afraid you'll wind up like this?"

Floria ridiculed him with her eyes. "Were you unaware?" She held up her forepaws, flexing them to show off the pads and the claws hidden inside. "You of all people must understand what I have to look forward to in life, all because my mother had to seduce an insane tyrant prince and pass his species on to me instead of any of the possible other heists she could have committed her body to. I'm going to lose it, I'm going to lose my mind and my self-awareness and all semblance of equinity and there's nothing I can do about it except watch it coming! You've been through this! And the fact that you're not more concerned for my sake is how I know you never regained your sanity when you came out the other end!"

"That's because I fight the inevitable," Papyrus lectured, "not wallow before it. Would you actually like some concern? I figured you'd take it as mockery."

"Give me your best shot," Floria said dryly.

Papyrus took a deep breath. "Alright. How about this: Cherrabell has her kid, Felicity needs to check up on the rest of Gawain's household, and we may or may not be indefinitely staying here to rebuild a country someone else ruined instead of our own. In the meantime, you, me and Braen take the ship and head back up to Stormhoof and make a mission out of seizing every last one of your dad's old research notes on sphinx insanity from where they're probably rotting in Tarunda's museum. We make a break back down here, analyze the loot, and finish what he started to find a way for you to keep your head. Sound good?"

Floria blinked.

"Well?" Papyrus cracked a grin.

"That's... a plan of action, certainly," Floria admitted. "I suppose I was a fool, hoping for some genuine emotion..."

Papyrus shrugged. "Actions are how I express myself, I'm a sociopath. Can't say I even know what concern feels like. But would it help?"

Floria genuinely considered this. "Why Braen? As a chaperone so I have someone else to talk to beyond just you? Or are we simply bringing everyone who wouldn't potentially be vulnerable to a changeling queen?"

"Both," Papyrus said. "Though also because calling myself her bodyguard is deeply anachronistic. I'm not supposed to let her test them yet because they're technically not finished and her mothers also didn't want her making a splash, but she's a walking hedgehog of artillery. Her parents are big believers in the philosophy that the best way to stay safe on the road is being a one-mare army. Can't imagine why."

"I suppose that's useful to know," Floria sighed. "Even if I truly can't envision it. Thank you. For... making what could be construed as an effort, under charitable light."

Papyrus resisted the mighty urge to waggle his eyebrows.

"Sure is a good thing you didn't have to settle that with another outdoor brawl," Senescey said absently, looking partway checked out of the conversation.

"Eh? Why's that?" Papyrus glanced up at her. "Think she would have sliced me to ribbons?"

"See for yourself." Senescey gestured to a window.

Papyrus got up to look. Outside, it was snowing heavily, the lights from the mansion flickering distantly through a torrential curtain of flakes. The rainstorm had morphed into a full-fledged blizzard.

Floria looked too. "Still think we could have flown through this?"

"Nah," Papyrus proclaimed. "You were more prescient on that one. Such are the fruits of having a brain the size of a cantaloupe."

Floria scowled. "You truly can't let a passable vibe go un-ruined."

"Call it a compulsion," Papyrus yawned. "Say, do you suppose-"

"Ahem!" Braen announced, standing proudly at the top of the stairs. "Cherrabell baby griffon is safely delivered!"

Papyrus blinked. "Wait, like, that quickly?"

Floria perfectly mirrored his motion. "It can't have been so much as fifteen minutes."

"No time even to use bed!" Braen eagerly explained. "Cherrabell start to push as soon as in room. Braen got to stand behind and catch baby! Then had to clean baby and Cherrabell, and Braen got dirty too, and also there was umbilical cord. And then-"

"Woah, woah, woah, hold on!" Papyrus protested. "There's absolutely no way it's over that fast. Felicity kicked you out to come back here and prank me, I know what she's like. You watch, if I go down there to call your bluff I'll probably find them sipping tea or cuddling or something-"

"Yes, come look!" Braen turned and darted back down the stairs. "Papyrus and Floria come see miracle of life!"

"What, and not me?" Senescey slowly climbed out of her blankets as well, making to follow them.

"Just you watch," Papyrus threatened, more to save face than anything as he descended. "I'm calling your bluff, I'm calling it, prepare for an epic roasting..."

As Papyrus entered the dimly-lit cabin, it quickly became apparent that Braen was telling the truth.

Cherrabell was in one of the beds, stretched out flat on her side. She looked more relaxed than at any point in the scant few hours Papyrus had known her, and nestled between her forelegs was a small, recently-cleaned, still-wet bundle of feathers bearing something resembling Gawain's blue coloration. The room smelled a little weird, and there were several towels spread on the floor.

"You really did it," Floria remarked, looking Cherrabell and the baby up and down.

"Thanks to all of you," Cherrabell replied, her voice suddenly weak, as if only by finishing her labor had she given herself permission to rest... though maybe it was just because her baby was sleeping. "If none of you had come along, I'm certain I still would have been stuck right now, trying to sleep in Gawain's manor with no sign of progress."

"We merely provided a light on the horizon," Felicity gently assured her. "You were the one who did the work, darling."

Cherrabell quietly chuckled. "It still made the difference. Thank you. I don't know what I owe you or what I can repay, but at the very least, you have my trust."

Felicity cleared her throat. "Right now you're going to repay yourself for all these years you've spent having children with a good night's rest." She turned to stare at Papyrus and Floria. "I trust none of you are here to request additional story time, now that it's over?"

"Perish the thought," Papyrus innocently declared. "I just wanted to see if Braen was pulling my leg. You really popped it out the instant you made it down here?"

Cherrabell reddened. "Well, yes."

"Impeccable timing," Floria remarked. "Thank you for... listening to yourself and not accepting another request for an encore."

Cherrabell looked a little awkward. "You know, I've done this enough times that it doesn't feel like as big of a deal as it once did, and when you invited me to tell you all stories to pass the time while I labored, I figured you felt the same. So for you all to start making a big deal about it after the fact is pretty embarrassing."

Floria folded her ears. "Noted. I merely wished to... I mean, noted."

"So everything's good, then?" Papyrus asked. "Mysterious timeline convergence well and truly thwarted? You're happy and content and at peace with the world, and are in good health along with your child?"

"I'm tired," Cherrabell said. "Beyond tired. And I've got a sore throat from all that talking. And, opening up about all that has made me realize that I'm still having kids who don't look the least bit like me..." She brushed the nascent feathers on her grifflet with a wingtip. "So I've got some thoughts to sort through. But, I'm very grateful to all of you, and can honestly say I'm feeling the best I have in a very long time." She looked up with an earnest smile.

Papyrus cracked a grin at his teammates. "Well, lasses? Case closed. It looks like whatever uncanny similarities to a previous disaster we saw here have been well and truly derailed." He blinked. "We're far enough in the clear that I'm not jinxing anything, right? There's no other shoe about to drop?"

"Not with me," Cherrabell murmured. "And not with my child. Unless by other shoe, you mean having to wait until morning for me to continue that cliffhanger. You won't mind, right? I'm a little talked out for the night."

"Since you mentioned it, I'm feeling a little hoarse as well," Felicity admitted. "Perhaps we all deserve a good night's sleep. There'll be plenty more work to do in the morning, hashing out our future plans. And I can't very well deny Gawain's request to ensure the rest of his household is in good health."

"You too, huh?" Larceny rubbed at her throat with a wingtip. "Wonder if it was something in the food."

Papyrus blinked at the three of them. "What, you're all catching a cold at precisely the same time? Should I not be standing so close, or...?"

Cherrabell chuckled. "No, I just think I've been talking too long. But if you're worried, don't let me keep you."

"I feel fine as well," Floria remarked. "And if any of us did have a bug, we haven't been around you long enough to spread it around." She nodded at Cherrabell. "Perhaps you three are simply up past your bedtimes?"

Felicity yawned. "I can't deny that one. Cherrabell, I'd like to watch you just a little bit longer, but perhaps we ought to see about getting hunkered down for the night?"

Larceny wordlessly nodded, shuffling out of the room. Papyrus turned to follow... but found his path blocked by Braen.

"One moment before Papyrus leaves," Braen demanded. "Braen would like word."

Papyrus gulped. "This isn't a prelude to blackmail, is it?"

"You're getting blackmailed?" Floria appeared over his shoulder with a full grin of sphinx teeth. "Now this, I'd like to see."

"Concerns Floria too," Braen announced, wiping away her grin. "Papyrus and Floria lecture Gawain mightily about abdicating responsibility. Leaving fixing of Griffonstone to children. Giving up. Still believe position to be correct?"

Papyrus smiled sadly at her. "If you want to lure someone into a rhetorical trap, you've gotta be less obvious in your approach. What's the kicker?"

Braen fixed him with her mechanical gaze. "Braen created by Valey and Shinespark to carry on mission of charting future for Ironridge. By Papyrus and Floria logic, that is sin. Valey and Shinespark should do work by selves. Braen should not exist."

Papyrus blinked. "Is that stretching it? I feel like you're stretching what I said. No one can accuse those two of not doing their time, even if they occasionally go all floppy."

Floria nodded sternly. "My opinion on the work ethic of others has nothing to do with whether anyone should or shouldn't exist."

"Braen is glad Papyrus and Floria backpedal," Braen told them. "Existence obviously beneficial, so Braen never put stock in Papyrus and Floria ideas anyway. Now, however, have counterpoint." She pointed a metal hoof at Cherrabell. "Hear Cherrabell stories. See Cherrabell bring baby into world. Even get to help. Experience make it abundantly clear that making new life not easy, on every step of way. Therefore, is not path of least resistance. Papyrus and Floria wrong."

"Now hold on one minute," Floria pushed back, gently chagrined. "You are clearly under several misconceptions. First off, refusing to take responsibility for your life does not necessarily entail finding or having or making someone to pass it off to. It might be unbecoming to leave a pile of trash in the middle of the road, but malcontents can do it regardless. Second, the mare is putting in the bulk of the work you just witnessed; her partners are the primary target of my ire. And third, no matter how much of a burden a status quo imposes upon you, accepting it frequently is indeed the path of least resistance."

"What she said," Papyrus added. "With emphasis on the fact that Makalov did nothing productive or useful in his entire life. Gawain at least seems to have been decent enough to put a roof over her head."

"No wiggling out of conclusion!" Braen lectured. "Tonight, Papyrus and Floria must think about everything Cherrabell share. Many important lessons to be learned about relationship of old and new, from parents and children to change of rulers. Lessons critical for Ironridge to emerge from great upheaval. Braen need competent extra eyes to be sure not to miss any. That why have to set Papyrus and Floria straight."

Papyrus held a wing over his heart. "Then consider me straight as a fun house mirror. Glad you're looking to your elders for guidance, kiddo."

Floria sighed. "Braen, I will be straight with you: you don't talk much, and when you do, you make frequent allusions to this mission from your parents while never being specific about exactly what questions they tasked you with answering. It lends the impression that you have either been asked to take on more than you deserve, or don't even understand the parameters of your mission yourself. I've never met your parents and don't know what they're like, but if you ever need help navigating their expectations for you, you don't have to ask this obtusely. I'll help you, but I can help you better if you say plainly what you need."

Braen stared levelly back at her. "Offer of assistance is appreciated. That why Braen must fix Floria assumptions, so Floria can give accurate and useful feedback. If only Papyrus so receptive."

"On the contrary," Floria told her, "my feedback will be useless if I approach your problems with your same mindset. You need-"

"Ahem!" Felicity cleared her throat, standing right behind them. "If you three have nothing better to do, perhaps you'd like to help me tidy up this room a little for the night?"

Floria hung her head. "Point taken, Mother. I shall see you all in the morning."

She filed out of the room, and Braen left behind her. Not wanting to get caught up in cleaning duty, Papyrus made to follow them... until he noticed Senescey, lurking just outside the door and staring at something held in a wing with a pale expression.

"Hey." Papyrus nudged her, craning his neck to see what she was looking at. "You alright, there?"

"Come." Senescey grabbed him without meeting his eyes, dragging him into the cabin he usually kept for himself. Before Papyrus could question it, she was locking the door behind them.

"This is a strange way to invite yourself to a sleepover..." Papyrus started to joke, though something told him this was a bad time. The look in Senescey's eyes... She was scared.

"You remember what this is, right?" Senescey showed him the thing she was holding, held forth in her cupped wings.

It was tiny enough that Papyrus took a second to identify it. "Your earring?"

"Yep," Senescey said, pinning it back where it usually stayed on her ear. "Remember what's special about it?"

Papyrus gave her a level stare. "I know you like my quips, but the look on your face tells me you should skip to the details. What's wrong?"

Senescey matched his look. "These earrings were made by Chauncey in Izvaldi and distributed widely to the public as concert memorabilia. Their purpose is housing low-level protective charms that prevented certain segments of the population from experiencing certain side effects from certain experiments he conducted. Do you remember what those were?"

Papyrus was all business now. "No. Never got that memo. What's going on?"

"Without these earrings," Senescey threatened, "sarosians get mild flu-like symptoms in the presence of windigo magic."

Papyrus took a long, slow step back as the implications clicked together. "That's bad."

"There's a blizzard outside," Senescey said, in a stiff trance. "I've been wearing these since my Aldebaran days, and never stopped - the storm our ship used to fly caused the same issues if we didn't. But when the other three sarosians on this ship mentioned sore throats, and I felt completely fine, I tried taking it off just in case, and... yeah." She fixed her eyes on him again. "That's a windigo blizzard out there."

"What gives?" Papyrus whispered, stunned. "Why here, and why now? I figured maybe if our luck or karma was truly terrible, we would get owned out of the blue by a space whale that had nothing to do with anything, but I shouldn't have been right! Just, why?"

Senescey shook her head. "Couldn't tell you. But my best hunch? That weapon Cherrabell said she was in possession of before we got her out of the mansion. I think she mentioned using it for self-defense, and the next day, the person she stabbed went on a murderous rampage and assassinated the Everlaste royal family? A weapon like that would be priceless in the hooves of someone looking to start a war."

Papyrus groaned. "Alright, fine. Let's throw aside the less important questions like how they knew or why now and figure out a plan of action. I've got... a silver tongue, and that's about it."

"You're going to be useless," Senescey apologized, shutting him down with a shake of her head. "Here's the real plan: Cherrabell tells us where the weapon is, and I hope the windigoes haven't arrived yet and go get it. Then I hide it. If I'm too late, or get found out anyway, then I try to bargain. I've worked for a windigo before... and my former employer could definitely be the one behind this. Especially if this blizzard isn't actually being caused by free, live windigoes, but our old ship, and they're using it to shut down the airspace while flying in a team of thieves."

"That's a flimsy plan," Papyrus pointed out. "All your calculations assume they aren't actually here for us. If it is this weapon they're after, we could just let them take it."

"No," Senescey said firmly. "I've unwittingly been a pawn in the Composer's agenda once before. I cannot and will not become a bystander as this continues."

"Really." Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "I thought you said being the hero didn't suit you."

Senescey hesitated.

Papyrus waited for her.

"Maybe it's because I have nothing stopping me," Senescey said, refusing to meet his eyes. "Now that I'm trying to give up on this dream of stealing Chrysalis's power for my own. It doesn't suit me. I've ran from it before and told others to do the same. But I want to square things away with this part of my past. I want to be able to look my future in the eye, whatever it's going to be. And I'm done with making messes for others to clean up, Papyrus. I'm not going to let Cherrabell wake up in the morning to see that her home has been sacked and looted by the Aldebaran's newest crew."

Papyrus slowly nodded... and then he cracked a grin. "Honestly, I'm a little jealous of your conviction. But odds are a hundred to one push will come to shove, here. You know that, right? So, want some backup?"

Senescey turned to the door to hide her smirk. "No, you stay here and keep everyone from suspecting anything. Cover the windows and let them sleep through it all. I was one of the top thirty-two fighters in the Empire, give or take, remember? The Composer won't easily have found another crew as good as me."

"...So they won't," Papyrus agreed, making up his mind to do something silly. "Tear up that place like you're Valey in Stormhoof Keep. And I've got a little something to help you on your way."

Senescey blinked back at him as he drew closer, turning to properly face him as he approached more and more. Surprise, suspicion and acceptance cycled on her face as Papyrus closed in, and she finally closed her eyes...

Boop!

Papyrus winked. Senescey crossly rubbed at her snoot. "Dunno why I fell for that. Dunno what I expected. Dunno what I would have done if you had actually kissed me."

"Probably committed some grievous tactical blunder because you were too caught up in weird mushy feelings," Papyrus helpfully reminded her. "And I'd be a terrible friend if I let any delusions about my character haunt you during an important mission, wouldn't I?"

"Suppose so," Senescey said, unlocking and opening the door. "I'm talking Cherrabell into giving me the dagger's location, and then I'll be gone before you can blink. Wish me luck."

"Doubt you'll need it," Papyrus encouraged. "You're a real protagonist now. That means you've got a karmic moral literary arc, or... whatever I was supposed to extrapolate from our last talk. Knock 'em dead."

And then she was gone.

From across the room, Discord poked his head out of the wastebasket.

"Figured I'd hear from you again the moment I did that," Papyrus muttered. "Care to be helpful for a change? Much as I just buttered her up, I have no idea what any of us are actually supposed to do against windigoes."

Discord blew a raspberry. "Helpful, pfft, of course not! You just lost me my bet about who you were going to use that on!" He jabbed a claw in Papyrus's general direction, looking ridiculously mock-offended.

Papyrus shrugged. "Stinks to be you."

"Eh. I'll walk it off." Discord waved his paw. "Besides, the best trick against windigoes tends to be the magic of friendship, and I'm a total noob at that." He cleared his throat, snaked his head closer, and surreptitiously lowered his voice. "You're going after her, right?"

Papyrus cracked his signature grin. "Of course I am."

Scarcely a moment later, Senescey slipped past the open door again, evidently armed with the knowledge she needed to find that dagger and making fast for the stairs to the exit. If she had bothered to look behind her, she would have seen Papyrus slink out himself, checking the other cabins until he found the one where Floria and Braen were holed up, talking about who knew what.

"Greetings, fellow kids," Papyrus whispered, unapologetically interrupting. "I'm rounding up a posse. Want to go bash some monsters?"

Green Fire, Blue Ice

Senescey's thoughts were aswirl as she slipped under the ship's door and into the storm.

Had she lost her mind? Papyrus had a point; it was none of her business what the windigoes did with the rest of the world and it was extremely unlikely they were here for her in particular. This was a point she herself had made before, when signing on for her brief and uninspiring tenure as Halcyon's mercenary: just because you knew about something you were powerless to change, you didn't have a responsibility to change it. And they were even talking about windigoes. This exact same topic.

She winced a little at thinking of herself as Senescey. The name felt too charged, too loaded, a relic of a time she couldn't go back to and needed to escape, and she didn't want to give Papyrus the satisfaction of dragging her back into it. But Leif was even less appropriate, now that she was raising a sword against her former employer and home. And she didn't have a better alternative.

Senescey pushed herself up through the snow drift on the deck like it was the wreckage of her former plans, a whole foot of it walling the door closed. That was good. It would prevent Papyrus from following her.

She shook herself out, trying to dislodge the snow from the surface of her heavy parka, but for every bit she brushed off, more landed on her, falling from the sky in a silent flood that seemed to want to bury every trace of her existence - herself, and everything she had ever been. Senescey had been buried like this before, in the old Empire, when she was forced to commute and do business in the old catacombs beneath Stormhoof Keep and other cities that resisted her existence on the surface.

Yes, that's right, the snow seemed to whisper as it tried to clog her ears. You fight back, or get buried. It's the only choice.

Senescey jumped off the boat, landing in the snow drifts that covered the now-frozen bog created by the earlier rains, where there had once been a manicured lawn. The snow gripped quietly at her hooves as she pulled herself towards the mansion. She had been gripped like this before, by the stares of the sarosians around her as she rose through the Empire's underworld. Some were incredulous that she could do it, and others openly doubted her, breaking off friendships as she surpassed the limits they had resigned themselves to.

But all of them had something in common: as she enriched herself with money swindled from Gondolus Gyre, as her family started to grasp at the levers of government, they groped at her with stares that said Please, take us with you.

And she couldn't. Sharing her wealth and influence wouldn't change the system that made them stare like that in the first place. At best, it would give them more that others could then take from them. So with a practice born from shrugging off those expectations, Senescey shrugged off the snow, pushing past its creeping, frosty suggestions that all of this was a cruel joke and she was betraying everyone if she didn't do something about it.

Well, she was doing something about it. Senescey reached the mansion and slipped in beneath its door.

The foyer was every bit as opulent as she remembered, with its carpeting and dark alcoves and high-ceilinged architecture. Little more than a status symbol. All the money used to construct this-

She closed her eyes, took a breath and steadied herself. Windigoes could try to hijack her train of thought, to steer her emotions to places she didn't want them to go. When they were on the scene, it was important not to trust herself too much; to stick to her mission at all costs.

"You're disgusting," she whispered to the invisible specter of Gawain, manifesting around her in all the effort that could have better been spent on his people. "But I'm not here to fight you. I have more important targets tonight, ones who are actively malicious and not just misguided. Okay?"

The mansion had no response. So Senescey made for the stairs and continued on.

She couldn't tell if Cherrabell had suspected something was up when she asked where to find the weapon. Cherrabell had firmly established that she trusted them as a group, but after the ill-fated Icereach expedition, Senescey never knew how much stock to put in her acting skills. Much of what they accomplished in the Empire had been a combination of Papyrus shielding them with his audacity and Felicity shamelessly selling herself: she was only the face of their cons when they needed someone who could pass for normal and well-adjusted. But what was normal and well-adjusted about asking for the location of a weapon of mass destruction?

Either way, she had her destination: it was supposedly underneath a loose floor tile at the back of the chapel on the fourth floor.

Not a hint of wind blew through the mansion as Senescey slipped from shadow to shadow, keeping her stealth up without slowing down as she raced for the top. She could easily imagine the storm circling the mansion like a school of sharks. Hopefully the Aldebaran simply hadn't arrived yet and she could still get to the weapon first, and hide or disable or guard it in some way. Hopefully this really would be the work of a crew of mortal mercenaries she could fight, and not actual, free windigoes.

Remembering the way the snow had whispered to her, it was a distant hope.

Most of the mansion's facilities and public spaces were located on the first and second floors, and Senescey had enough trouble finding a staircase to the third that she simply cheated, shadow sneaking up through a crack in the ceiling where a barrel vault had separated slightly from one of the ribs supporting it. After a bit of writhing around in the dark to find a way out, she slipped up through the crack between the floorboards and an air vent, emerging in what could only be described as a love hotel.

Senescey made a face. It was fortunately uninhabited, but the lacy decorations and fluffy pink carpet and white fake-marble canopy bed were painfully familiar to her: establishments like this were where Felicity had gone from a nobody to a somebody, using her brand for manipulating the intensity of emotions to become a unique and prestigious courtesan and start their rise through the underworld.

She ducked through an open door, and decided the whole third floor had to be decorated this way. That was probably why it was so hard to find: this was Gawain's 'private' sanctum for activities that went beyond wearing his wives like clothing.

It was sickening. Bad enough when Felicity had been the one in power in a place like this, with important ponies and griffons paying money to place themselves at her mercy.

He's trying to do better, Senescey reminded herself. Some of them might actually like this, another part of her added. Not all of those girls see fluffy resorts like you do.

Right. Senescey pushed her reaction down like bile and kept looking for a staircase to the fourth floor.

But it was hard to ignore for long. She knew what she was trying to accomplish: keep a dangerous, war-starting weapon out of the hooves of someone who would use it. But she had no good reason to do so: her life, her identity, her view of herself was in shambles, taken apart and deconstructed and only beginning to be rebuilt. She wanted to be the kind of pony who wouldn't let another war occur on her watch, but her actions were nothing more than simple, passing desires with no worldview to back them up.

She also wanted to rob Gawain blind, steal everything he owned, set him to work digging latrines in Gyre, and then sensationalize his fate in every newspaper in the world. Not merely take revenge on behalf of those he had wronged; public humiliation of the highest degree was the only antidote for those who abused their social status.

She wanted it. And without anything trustworthy to fall back on, to back up her judgements with, how could she say definitively that she wanted to protect that weapon more?

Senescey almost had to stop and hold her head with a hoof. How was she the one this mission had fallen to? She was probably the most manipulable pony in the world right now. It would take nothing to convince her to use that weapon on Gawain and his household. Nothing more than a little rebalancing of her desires. And wasn't that exactly what windigoes could do?

She took a deep breath. She wanted to change. To find a future for herself, to become something more than she had been before. That was what she was leaning on. And it would have to be enough.

Papyrus tumbled in through the front door of Gawain's mansion, shaking off an avalanche of snow that clung to him like sticky rice.

Behind him, Floria took a few deep breaths, trying fruitlessly to rid her mane of snow before it melted and soaked her through. "Congratulations," she growled, her voice wry with frustration, "we've made it through the storm and into the haunted aristocrat lair. Papyrus, I didn't quite think you had it in you."

Papyrus chuckled, trying to dry himself off as well. "If you think that was the hard part-"

"Braen do bulk of heavy lifting for both of you," Braen reminded them, her mechanical body allowing the snow to slide off with ease. "If not for Braen, party would still be snowed in behind door of ship!"

"Yes," Floria admitted, "that was a very impressive and slightly unorthodox ramming technique you used to force it open, congratulations to you too." She gave Papyrus a straight look. "Now that we're inside, permit me to establish this one more time: for no apparent reason, completely unrelated to everything we have been doing and discussing over the past evening, a race of mythical evil ice monsters has chosen this exact night to conduct a raid on this exact location. We have no weapons that are known to be effective against them, there's a passable chance they would simply leave us alone, and we're going to stop them anyway without any semblance of a plan."

"I'll have you know my tongue is a fantastic weapon," Papyrus reminded her. "And for some reason creatures of chaos take a liking to me."

Braen planted her hooves and stretched out in a determined pose. "Plus, Papyrus said windigoes might hire mercenaries to do work for them. In which case, Braen has permission to finally use experimental combat features!"

Floria glanced at her sideways. "Do these experimental combat features by any chance include the ramming maneuver you used to force open the door?"

Braen nodded. "Braen ram enemies good."

"Right, right, right," Papyrus interrupted. "Less planning and more doing. Cherrabell said she sent Senescey to the fourth floor, right? I don't remember seeing any staircases going upwards last time we were on floor two, so let's go see if Griffon McLordliness is still up waiting for news of his new baby and ask directions. Maybe see if this mansion has an underground bunker to hide everyone in while we're at it."

Braen and Floria nodded, so Papyrus took off, ignoring propriety and flying in a noble residence to go faster, just like he used to do. It took barely a minute to reach the study where he first met Gawain, and where - luck willing - he would meet him again.

"Hey!" Papyrus barged in through the door to the study without knocking. "Baby daddy! You home, or what?"

The study's enormous walls-and-ceiling window was a picture of snow, flurrying in chaotic and constricting streams like the coils of a sea serpent. Past midnight and under the weight of an epic blizzard, it should have been pitch black outside, but the clouds illuminated their snowflakes with a strange internal glow, blue on white on blue.

Near the window, watching the snow, was a familiar tall-backed reading chair. It spun around quickly when Papyrus announced himself, revealing Gawain, shockingly alone and not wrapped in a single mare.

Papyrus did a double take. "Woah, nice job ditching the entourage. Listen-"

Gawain nodded interrupting him. "I decided I would rather be alone with my thoughts while contemplating what you said about my present course. But come, why are you here? To make a trek through those snows must mean important news is afoot?"

"Congratulations, you're a father again," Floria deadpanned, stepping up. "Mother and child are both healthy. More importantly, we have reason to strongly suspect your compound is about to be assaulted by thieves."

"Thieves?" Gawain blinked. "In this weather? I understand that I have much here to steal, but-"

"Dastardly thieves," Papyrus agreed. "Ones who are probably resourceful enough to create this storm as cover. Now, where are your staircases? We've got a strong hunch they're angling for the fourth floor."

"Preposterous," Gawain blustered. "No craft could fly in this weather, much less could any technology create it. I'll have you know I have been trying harder than I have in a very long time to take this present situation seriously, and cracking such jokes does nothing to help matters. Tell me of my Cherrabell. You said she has delivered, and is healthy?"

"It's not a joke, old griffon," Papyrus threatened ominously. "And we're not sure how much time we have. We're going to deal with it, but if you've got a giant basement sitting around, it could be worth moving your civilians there. Just in case."

Gawain looked at him sideways. "Have you even looked at the weather? I feel like we're speaking past each other, here..."

"Perhaps stop speaking and look for self," Braen suggested, pointing up through the window at the sky.

Papyrus turned upward and groaned. "Did we arrive right as something started happening...?"

Behind the white, seething clouds and their strange blue light, there was something new: a patch of red light, faint yet growing brighter and larger, like a massive boil descending through the storm. Barely several seconds passed, growing and brightening, before it broke through the surface of the clouds like tearing skin, and Papyrus could see something new and terrifying hanging in the sky above him: a giant, blood-red eye, nearly eight pony-lengths across.

Gawain looked like he had instantly wet himself. Floria cowered defensively, her ears back and her hackles raised.

"Well," Papyrus gulped, staring into the storm's massive eye. "I've got nothing."

Senescey found a staircase hidden inside a walk-in closet, and arrived at the fourth floor.

The mansion's sloped roof already cut off parts of the third floor, giving it a smaller footprint than the two below. Here at the top, there was only enough space for a single large room, which Cherrabell had told her would be a chapel.

During her search for the stairs, Senescey had questioned to herself what Gawain would be doing with a chapel in his residence. What would a griffon that vain even worship? Perhaps it was a relic of the mansion's previous owners, or even its bygone history, days when Griffonstone's leaders had a little more dignity and played a constructive role in their society's culture?

She let herself be curious, and that proved to be a mistake. The chapel was full of statues and paintings of Gawain.

Senescey resisted the urge to waste time planting her head against a stone pillar, but she did resolve to needle the griffon about this later. The biggest, most central statue depicted Gawain hopelessly ripped, wearing an anatomically impossible mare on each shoulder and sitting atop a throne Papyrus would have compared to a toilet. If they really did stay here and make fixing Griffonstone into their pet project, this thing would be the first to go... but before Senescey could think about destroying that statue, she had to destroy the floor. Cherrabell's weapon was under a loose tile in this room, somewhere behind that central statue. That was what she had been told.

She rapped the tiles with the edge of her hoof, rapidly checking for the telltale sounds of cavities or loose grout. No one had come to stop her yet. No one had beaten her to this room, unless they were hiding too well for her to make out... and while her skills sometimes failed her, perception usually wasn't one of the culprits. Tap, tap, tap... Clink!

"Here," she hissed under her breath, digging in with the tips of both wings, her extremities still numb from her slog through the blizzard. With a burst of strength, she prized up the lip of the tile, adjusted her grip, and flipped it all the way away.

There could be no mistaking it. Sitting in a small depression in the ground was a dagger, its hilt carved from some sort of shiny, wet-looking black rock that occupied the same artistic space as moon glass, halfway between stone and gemstone. The blade itself was wrapped in an old, tattered rag, pulling her eyes like a magnet to whatever lay underneath. Trembling, Senescey exhaled, reaching for her prize with shaking limbs.

She had no time to waste. She had gotten here first; she couldn't squander her lead. And yet still she hesitated, a silent scream warning her that she was in terrible danger.

Why had she allowed Cherrabell to tell her story in chronological order? Why hadn't she insisted the mare talk about the most pressing part, this thing she had left in the mansion here and now? Twisted queens, lecherous princes, those couldn't hurt her right now.

She knew nothing about this knife, nothing save for stories about what it had allegedly done, and even those were distant and incomplete. But the mere sight of its shrouded blade set her heart to hammering.

The storm was blowing. There was no time for indecision. Better it remain in the hooves of someone who wouldn't use it than someone who would.

Senescey lifted the dagger from its depression in the ground, and as its cloth wrappings fell away, a glint of green pierced her eyes with the force of hundreds of thousands of screams.

She lost her footing and tumbled forward with a yelp, the screams catching her like a great, dark lake. One of them was her own.

Senescey was in a room she had visited many times over the decades. A room she had slept in, schemed in, wept in, partied in, dreamed in along with many others.

She didn't know if this was the last time she would ever come here. But this was certainly the first time she had come here knowing that things would never be the same.

Old water stains lent the bricks in the walls a grimy character, befitting Stormhoof's catacombs. Senescey walked past a table, strewn with playing cards. Usually, they were pretty good about finishing their games before leaving on business, but this time, they had left them out on purpose, a visual promise that they would be back, sit down here again and pick up their game where they left off.

Senescey sat on the bar stool where, only days ago, she had played in that final game. The dregs of her drink were right there beside her, along with a small pile of winnings. She had been behind in the game, though not last place.

She scooped her winnings into a small bag, and then everyone else's, before starting to collect the cards and put them away. It felt like she was defacing a shrine. But, if she was to start over again, she would need all the money she could get. And this time, her sisters wouldn't be there to provide it.

Starting over. It was impossible, unthinkable, incoherent. And yet, it was all she had.

...Had she done this before?

She started towards the adjacent room, past the bar in the corner where the barkeep's stool had been thoroughly deformed by its old occupant's girth. Todd the boozehound, they had called him. Todd was an unusual name, and no one knew if it was his real one, but the fat old unicorn had a real knack for smoothing things over when they were feeling discouraged. He believed in the power of greasy bar food for raising spirits, though his belief in the team did a lot more for everyone than his food ever did. Of course, Senescey could have done without all the times when he got drunk and nearly spilled important secrets to the wrong people, but the hideout just wasn't the same without him.

Next over was the dorm, opposite walls lined with more wooden bunks than they had ever been able to fill. It didn't help matters that the griffon twins insisted on sharing. Tasha and Carla, the mercenaries from Wilderwind... Senescey had never been sure what to think of them.

In more innocent days, she had harbored a crush on them. Them, as a unit: their coordinated bandanas were the only way to tell them apart, and they were otherwise inseparable. But was their closeness with each other a signal that they didn't need anyone else, or a lure, advertising themselves with the obvious? Maybe it was nothing more than an emulation of their idols, an Izvalden sister-sister duo band who still had a poster tacked to the wall beside their now-empty bed.

Either way, Senescey had never acted on it and never known them well enough to ask. And now, she never would.

...It felt like she had already said goodbye to them, for some reason.

Still, they were gone. Everyone but her. After a lifetime of preparation, they had embarked on their final mission, an immaculately planned raid on Stormhoof Keep when its defenses were at the lowest, to rid the Empire of half its sphinx population in one fell swoop.

And they had failed. They were betrayed, and they had failed, and Senescey didn't even learn that they met their ends until she was already celebrating on a distant getaway ship, thinking the plan had met with success.

She staggered under the weight of it all. The knowledge that her own sister had been the one to turn coat. The reason she was here now: not to mourn, but to loot their old possessions, sell them, raise money and use it to recruit new revolutionaries and try again. And as she did her best to replace her old friends, their old targets would be sitting with reporters, alive and well, telling their side and only their side to the world, about how a heinous plot had been foiled without a word in edgewise about why they deserve to die.

Senescey choked on directionless rage. At the back of the room, nailed to a well-scarred board, was a mug shot of Lord Everlaste, a throwing knife embedded in his left eye socket. Mundungus had hung that there, their resident pegasus ninja and point of contact, the one who knew best how to read the underworld and recruit non-sarosians to their cause. It was his coping mechanism, his target practice when things went south. Sometimes it was Lord Gyre's face on that wall. He had to replace it frequently because of how well it was used.

She grabbed the knife, yanked it from the wood and brandished it at the paper, but it was no use. The old sphinx's face, having served so well as a target for her resentment up until now, failed her when she needed it most. This was Larceny's fault. One of the few to survive, now wearing a medal and living who knew where after they all parted ways.

Felicity was gone too. Senescey didn't even know why. Maybe because she couldn't stomach coming back here again.

No, that wasn't right. Felicity was... on the ship with...

<> the dirge said. <>

All those years, and there was no one to hear her cry.

Senescey screamed. She threw the knife on the floor, dropped her loot sack and stomped on it, shrinking into a pile at the side of her old bunk. She curled up and sobbed, tears of desperation matting her cheeks, with no one to hear her and no one to care.

At least, she should have. Senescey had been here before, she knew how this went. But the stake through her heart, the guilt of failure... Was it supposed to be this fresh?

She sat up and wiped her tears with a hoof. This had happened years ago. Wasn't she doing something else, now?

<> the dirge asked. <>

<> still there from the night before the mission. Her head slumped to the side, and she stared in.

<>

Back stared the reflection of how all this had begun.

A young Senescey, scrambling in through a cottage door with a pail of well water. A gaunt Felicity, trying to coax their dying mother back to life. An infant Larceny, wailing for food. All of them, poisoned by a mining accident that had contaminated the river, though none of them knew it yet. None of them understood that Senescey was carrying back the source of their woes.

"Someone's world will burn," Felicity's voice crunched, speaking in a memory seen within a memory. "If anyone begged you to reconsider, would you choose your family over anything they could offer?"

Young Senescey wilted. "What if they offered to bring Mommy back?"

Senescey kicked over the mug, spilling the water and shattering the vision. As it seeped into the brick floor, she finally understood: back then, at least she hadn't been alone.

Was she alone, though? What about Papyrus? Papyrus and...

<>

<> and it was infinitely worse.

The edges of her world began to smoulder and turn green, like a paper catching fire.

Senescey looked up, feeling something tug gently at her heart.

"Worship me," the flames demanded, as her world shrank and fell away into a bleak, black void. "Love me. Acknowledge me as your queen."

"What's the point?" Senescey whispered, her body just a speck on the horizon.

The flames caressed her chin. "Love me, and you will never hurt again."

So Senescey gave in. That didn't sound so bad.

Yes it did. That wasn't how she wanted to die, wasn't who she was supposed to be-

<>

Senescey gave in, and the green flames congealed, two worlds separating before her and stratifying, clarifying, until she was lucid once again. This wasn't the day she had died, ruined and broken in the Stormhoof catacombs, swept away without resistance by the tide of Chrysalis's flame. This was...

Senescey was in a room she had visited many times over the decades. A room she had slept in, schemed in, wept in, partied in, dreamed in along with many others.

The end of her road. The day the song took her, when she was too tired to even resist. Her entire life, summed up in one point: pain that beget greater pain, loss that beget greater loss. Finite. Meaningless.

"No it isn't," Senescey growled, tearing her eyes away from the table, away from the abandoned card game and the empty bar in the corner. "I'm still alive! I'm... I'm in a mansion, and there's a storm..."

<> said the dirge, surrounding her like an empty ring that caged in the possibilities of her life. <>

"I am a pony!" Senescey banged on the walls of her old revolutionary home, the air gaining a strange quality that made it feel like cardboard the more she fought back. She pulled on herself, clawing herself back together, and the more she fought, the more she remembered: "I'm not in Stormhoof anymore! I'm in Griffonstone! Who are you, and what's going on?"

The response was garbled and unintelligible, the world around her sticking together like a ruined spider web as she flailed and fought. And suddenly, like ripping fabric, she was free.

It felt like breaking through the surface of a lake of tar, but the scene tore and sloughed away, lifting Senescey back into her body with a visceral jolt. Her real body, her forty-something-year-old changeling body that hadn't had a sense of taste since foalhood, sitting in a disgusting chapel in Gawain's manor. And in her hooves, she held a knife forged from the selfsame flames that had once devoured her broken, defeated mind.

Senescey stared at the emerald, crystalline blade.

"Wait," the knife said, audibly confused. "You're... real?"

Senescey blinked. Was it actually talking, or was she hearing it in her head? Either way, she tested her limbs and found herself to be in control of her body: whatever had happened, she was fully herself, and back in the real world to boot. She spun around to ensure she hadn't been snuck up on while she was out. The storm was still howling, but she appeared to be alone.

"Well?" the knife pressed.

"Always have been," Senescey told it, though the fifteen-year hole in her life said otherwise. "Did you do that? What did you do? Why was I reliving my memories like that? What are you?"

"Me?" the knife asked. "The name's Iblis. Just a plain old garden-variety kitchen knife. You like fruit salad? I can make a mean one."

Senescey narrowed her eyes. "Kitchen knives don't talk. And the things I saw when I touched you definitely weren't normal."

"Well, I'm a very good kitchen knife," Iblis explained. "But come on, enough about me. There I was, wasting away for decades under that statue with nothing to do but listen to the song, when suddenly, one of the chords started getting a mind of its own. And you say you saw it acting up, and those were your memories? That's what's going on here?"

Senescey slowly nodded. "So you weren't consciously trying to trap me in a vision."

"Heh, I'm just trying to figure out how I got such a weird wake-up call," Iblis said. "But you're probably just addled by the experience. See, you're a sarosian, and the song has a special relationship with sarosians... That chord was taken from a failed revolutionary as she died alone in a sewer. No shot that was you. Unless you died a few decades back and just decided to get better?"

Senescey gave Iblis a sideways look.

"I'm getting the funny feeling you have no ground to stand on when calling me not normal," Iblis blithely remarked.

"Spill your secrets and I'll spill mine," Senescey offered. "I know the color of your blade. And the only person who should have any idea I was down there is the one who killed me."

"Well, now that's a deal I can take." Iblis eagerly chuckled. "I've got a... 'relationship' with Chrysalis, sure. Might even know everything she knew, up to a point. But, I've got my own priorities. No hard feelings right? You apparently got better."

Senescey scrutinized the blade. "Are you a Bishop?"

"What's a Bishop?" Iblis asked. "Never heard of 'em. Anyway, here's the million-bit question: if you're really the mare from the sewer, you must be back on the trail, right? Using your new lease on life to finish what you started? Who's your new target?"

"Good question. All my old targets are dead," Senescey replied, thinking over how to spin her answer and pointedly stomping down her feelings on Gawain. "Right now... I suppose I'm trying to get rid of some windigoes."

Iblis faux-gasped. "Windigoes. Not the wrath monsters they were experimenting on down under Izvaldi, by chance?"

"One and the same," Senescey answered. "Likely even the exact same one. What's it to you?"

"Wellll..." She could almost hear Iblis wink. "I don't suppose you already have a weapon that rips apart emotions, do you? Maybe your back is against the wall and you don't have the tools to finish the job, maybe you even came to find me because you needed a silver bullet?"

"What are you offering?" Senescey asked warily.

Iblis chuckled. "Let me give you the lowdown on what I can do. When I sing the song and get in the mood, this blade cuts straight to the mind. Emotional damage, very unpleasant for normal people. Infinitely worse if you're all the way made of emotions. For my ultimate attack, if I destroy someone's mind all the way, I can ditch this vessel and take over their body as my own. You say you're an assassin; surely you appreciate how useful that is. Your enemies' demise, coming from the one they trust the most? There's another kind of emotional damage! It's a one-way ticket, though, so I'm not doing it for a vessel that isn't worth getting stuck in. And aside from all that, I really am a great kitchen knife."

Senescey's eyes widened. "You are a Bishop. Is this where all of you come from? Do you start as weapons and then steal bodies to use as your own? How does Chrysalis make you, and why?"

"Guessing that's some jargon I'm not familiar with, if you say you've met others like me," Iblis mused. "Can't speak for the others, though for a while they just spontaneously happened before she learned to control the process. I was made on purpose, to protect this filly called Cherrabell... and because I kept getting in the way. But I haven't heard from her in over a decade, and I'm a little more into eating the rich than protecting the weak anyway. Someone like you would make a much better partner. Take me with you, and I swear I'll earn my keep."

Senescey scrutinized the knife. Taking it was the whole reason she had come up here. Something like this winding up in the wrong pair of hooves could prove catastrophic. And this knife knew things. It was a close, direct, tangible link to a dream she had spent years pursuing, and only recently tried to discard. But with something like this, would she have to discard it?

Iblis hadn't corrected her when she suggested it was made by Chrysalis, and it was given purposefully to Cherrabell. That meant Garnet had to be Chrysalis. Papyrus was right. And that meant that her what-if about what Garnet's actions would say about Chrysalis's state of mind...

This could be a direct conduit to speak her mind to the goddess who killed her.

Heart pounding, her grip tightened. "You won't try to possess me, will you?"

Iblis scoffed. "Why would I take over someone who shares my goals when I could get someone who doesn't? No one would be surprised if they died to a known assassin. Let's call that Plan F."

"Alright," Senescey offered. "And you won't get... impatient, if I don't go after someone right away? I've got some more pressing priorities than finding people to kill."

"I've heard your song," Iblis reassured her. "You and I both know that revenge is a dish best served cold. You spent decades on your last plan, and hate like yours isn't dying any time soon. You're patient. The kind of killer who will bide her time until the perfect moment, and can fight the temptation to go for quick and easy gratification. That's exactly what I want. Go ahead, take twenty, thirty years to set up the perfect target. I bet you'll make it worth it in the end."

Senescey sighed, trying to tamp down her emotions: she was still on the job. But it was useless: Iblis thought she couldn't change, and would be captive to her hatred of Gyre and Everlaste and the rest for eternity. And she still was, to an extent. The bloated Gawain statues surrounding her were a testament to that, the angry trembling that threatened to overcome her as she searched through his third-floor sanctum. But what if, over time, she proved it wrong? What kind of message would that send back to Chrysalis? Was this how she would say her piece? Was this what she wanted to say? Or maybe she really did want to do something-

Focus. She gritted her teeth and shook her head. "Right. Alright. Welcome aboard. Now..."

Surroundings check. Make sure she hadn't been snuck up on during all that-

On the floor, near the entrance, a blue-white mist was beginning to pool, like the storm clouds yet brighter and more concentrated.

Senescey dropped into a defensive crouch, pointing Iblis at the puddle as it oozed stealthily into the room. Maybe she wouldn't have to talk her way out of this, after all.

"Peek-a-boo, little ponyo!" the mist said, its words made of winter and broken machinery, rising off the floor and congealing into a form that was almost equine at its head. "Boy, you sure chose a stupid night to be all on your lonesome. It's been a whole entire amount of time since I had a good play buddy, and your face just got..." Ludwig trailed off, his voice going sour as he got a proper look at Senescey. "You again? Is this for serious, ugly ponyo? What are you doing here?"

"What manner of ruin has come for my kingdom?" Gawain whined, flat on his haunches, staring up in resignation at the unblinking eye in the storm.

"Whatever it wants, I vote we let it have it," Floria replied, claws bared and coat bristling. "We must get everyone to the cellar immediately. Please, tell me you have a fortified cellar."

"Of course." Gawain swallowed. "Right. The entrance is in the kitchens on the first floor. We'll rouse my wives; they can coordinate bringing the children below. I assume you three will be heading back to your ship to warn your friends, and of course Cherrabell, though since you already knew about this, are they in the mansion already? Either way, I-I shall attempt to fight it and buy as much time as possible."

Papyrus started running after him as he took off down the hallway. "You? Fight it? Thanks for being noble, but how are you going to pull that off?"

Gawain patted his gleaming armor as he ran. "The Regalia of the Forest King isn't just for show. And Felicity told you about my militant history, I trust? I have a whole armory filled with explosive crossbow bolts that should still have some punch to them. If you think your own courage won't fail you, then help yourselves."

"Exploding ammunition?" Papyrus blinked, rounding a corner after Gawain. "What, like arrows with bombs on the tips? That's actually clutch! You couldn't have mentioned this earlier?"

"I didn't think it relevant!" Gawain panted, skidding into a residential wing. "My wives! Your king has urgent need of you!"

Instead of helping to rouse the numerous mares, Papyrus pulled up, regrouping with Floria and Braen. "Right, so apparently we have useful resources and the griffon has a spine. Planning time."

"What even is there to plan?" Floria snapped back as groggy mares and griffonesses began to appear in the hallway. "Do I look trained in archery to you? I'll give as good as I can get, but in this weather it'll be a miracle if I can hit the thing."

"If activating high-power mode, Braen can fly in storm," Braen declared. "Maybe can ram eye with lots of explosives!"

The mansion shuddered distantly from the storm. Papyrus wanted to berate her for suggesting a plan that sounded like it involved blowing herself up, but his mind was still on that eye: what was it?

If it was a giant siege monster, surely it would have attacked the building more substantially by now. Even if it was just going for Senescey on the fourth floor, they would have felt something if it tore the roof off, something more than the beating of the gale.

Where would the windigoes get a giant siege monster, anyway? And if he was a windigo, what would he do if he had one? Surely it would be much more useful smashing stuff in Ironridge and Yakyakistan, balancing the scales of their war to ensure the two sides progressed according to plan. He wouldn't send it out to the middle of nowhere to help acquire a much weaker weapon.

Besides, windigoes weren't about smashing things directly, were they? Weren't they more about getting people to fight each other? Having others do the fighting for them?

"It's a scare tactic," Papyrus whispered as Gawain barked orders, his wives cleanly dividing themselves between those who were used to following directions and those who were used to sitting around all day.

"What's that you say?" Floria leaned closer over the din.

"That eyeball's not actually supposed to hurt us," Papyrus muttered, just loud enough so she and Braen could hear. "Jury's out on whether it's a paper tiger or a real monster with self-restraint. But if I were a windigo, I'd use it to freak everyone out and get them in the mood to arm themselves. That's a useful prerequisite to turning on each other."

"An unbecoming way to conduct warfare," Floria remarked. "And this means?"

Papyrus nodded. "By waking everyone up, we fell for it hook, line and sinker."

Gawain's wives were moving. It was abundantly clear which ones he had plucked from the aristocracy and which ones he had pulled from working-class conditions: some of them had stepped up to help organize, others were leaving for the wings where the children slept, and still others were herding each other towards the kitchens, the slower ones being urgently prodded along.

It was almost shocking how quickly and effectively they went from being sound asleep to having their act together. Now if only the terse undercurrent of fear in the hallway wasn't exactly what the windigoes probably wanted...

Floria stopped Gawain as he marched past, fear and determination set on his face. "Have they drilled for this?"

Gawain barely offered her a glance. "In Griffonstone, one always sleeps with one eye open. I may have freed them from that way of living, but old habits die hard."

Papyrus set off after Gawain at a brisk pace, trying to out-scheme the windigoes. Everyone was afraid; what would come next? Eventually, the windigoes would have to make a move to capitalize on that fear, but it would be best if they let it marinate for a while. But in order to buy time for it to marinate, they'd have to head off any questions about why the eye wasn't doing anything.

Something would come next, maybe to distract them from the eye with another problem? Or maybe they'd pound the mansion a little to remind everyone it was there, or-

They reached the main hall and foyer. The grand double-doors were wide open.

Outside, a spectacle was waiting for them. The eye was low on the horizon, just over the compound wall, positioned so that everyone in the foyer could see it, like a setting sun. The blizzard still swirled, but instead of inundating the open hallway, it had tactfully penetrated it, laying down a soft carpet of snow in the shape of an actual carpet, like the storm had rolled out a welcome rug for its emissary. And that emissary stood in the open doorway in gleaming silver armor that coursed with ice-blue threads of energy, mechanical head raised and mechanical wings spread.

"Greetings," it said, cool and pious. "You may call me the Composer. I come to you at this hour because your household is in possession of something I need."

"You know me, huh?" Senescey warily circled the windigo, blade drawn. "Guessing you're the weird-talking one who was there in the apartment in Icereach."

"Woah, you have a memory in your brain," Ludwig rasped, wriggling gleefully. "That was me, friendo! The name is Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III, which is a much cooler name than yours. So, since you are so ugly, I was curious what you are doing here!"

"Just... passing through," Senescey warily answered. "What are you doing here? And what do you want with me?"

"Hmm," Ludwig mused. "Honestly, I dunno, friendo. I am pretty sure it still involves killing our evil dad, but my lame boss never tells me the details. Or maybe I just forgot." He spun in a circle. "That is a nice knife you are pointing at my face. Want to go stab someone with it?"

Senescey raised an eyebrow. "Want to get stabbed?"

Ludwig undulated. "Eyy, that is a pretty funny joke because I am incorporeal and cannot get stabbed. But!" He floated up and nudged the central Gawain statue, conjuring a frost mustache on its face, and putting beards and spectacles on the mares for good measure. "This place's boss ruler is a super ultimate loser who smells bad. This is how dumb his face looks. And, I remember with my brain that you do not like boss rulers! Want to go stab him? Preferably in a way that would start a riot that will last for weeks."

Senescey narrowed her eyes. "Is that what youuu're here to do?"

"Eh." Ludwig spiraled back down in front of her. "I just did a whole entire amount of work pushing the boat to get it here faster, friendo. And all my lame boss chick wants to do is steal something that is kept here. So I am allowed to do whatever I want with the place in payment, and I figured it would be super easy to start a riot."

"Right," Senescey sighed. "A riot. Of course."

Ludwig nod-nod-nodded. "Anyway, I asked my nose, nose, since you are wise and intelligent, where are the angriest ponyos and bird things who will be best for rioting? And my nose said, Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III, since you are smart and cool and handsome, you should go up to this room, because this is a room that smells like resentment and will definitely have the best ponyos and bird things to haunt. And then I found you here! So, what does your incredibly small brain say? Want to party it up like it is two thousand years ago?"

Well, then. Confirmation that they were here to steal something: check. Confirmation that they were looking to cause trouble for fun while doing it: also check. Odds that the Composer was involved: one hundred percent, since Ludwig mentioned a ship. And since Ludwig didn't react more strongly to Iblis, odds were decently high that the Composer didn't trust him enough to tell him what they were actually trying to steal.

"Shanking time?" Iblis asked. "I'm getting a good feeling about this one."

"Shanking time," Senescey agreed. She had learned all she needed to learn; time to fight back.

Ludwig hummed eagerly. "Oh boy, I like shanking-"

Ramming the blade into Ludwig felt like sticking a knife deep into a fresh jar of jelly. "Woah, woah, this is a jackpot!" Iblis crowed as the windigo went rigid. "This thing is way more malleable than I was expecting. Its architecture is downright primitive. Who designed this? Here, what happens if I do a little..."

Ludwig exploded with green lightning. "Byooooooorrrgh!" the windigo screamed, writhing and boiling and spewing green fumes as Senescey staggered backwards, shielding her face. "What-? No, come on, not again!"

"What did you do?" Senescey growled around the knife hilt, looking down and verifying that Iblis was still there.

"Just exposed him to the song a little," Iblis replied smugly. "It's like reprogramming. This thing has some serious pent-up resentment toward another windigo who thinks they're his boss. Feelings like that are my home turf, you see. If you want me to just destroy him, go ahead and say so, but why not see first if we can't make him our minion instead?"

"Bzooooort," Ludwig moaned, burning green chunks of ice bubbling under his surface as the lightning subsided and the greenness spread through him. Ten seconds passed, and his appearance stabilized: he was now a green windigo, the wisps of mist flowing from his body behaving a little more than usual like tongues of flame.

"Well?" Senescey asked.

"H-Hey, I remmmemberer you," Ludwig said, his voice fuzzy, as if he was drunk and putting himself back together. "Yyyou're that goon my stupid lame boss chick betrayed back in Icereach. In the cabinnn. Bet you really hate her, huh? Wanna ruin her, friendo?"

Explorers of the Void

Rainbow Dash dove, water hanging in the air around her and then beginning to rise as she pushed past the speed gravity could pull it.

She dove, a clammy, constricting darkness coiling around her like a contracting sphere. It cut off the heavens, the jagged rock walls speeding past her, everything but the water and the limp air under her wings.

She dove faster as the last traces of Twilight's magic and Starlight's glow sped out of sight, somehow falling faster than she was despite her breakneck pace. Rainbow's rainbow trail stabbed the darkness above her like a knife, its light refracting off the water falling around her and revealing absolutely nothing ahead.

The air didn't pull back her cheeks like it should have at these speeds. It barely gave purchase to her wings at all, like it was too thin to have substance. Or maybe like it just didn't care to do its job as air. And before Rainbow knew it, she wasn't diving so much as simply falling into the void.

Rainbow gulped, and tried to pull up. "Guys? This doesn't-"

She hit the bottom.

A sheet of water arrived out of nowhere, Rainbow plunging headfirst in. Except, it didn't feel like water. At her speed, the surface should have broken her neck, but it almost seemed to invite her beneath, slipping aside and letting her in with all the resistance of a spider web's gentle embrace. The water seemed to probe her, like something limp and curious and dead... but no sooner did Rainbow start to struggle than a force of incredible buoyancy pushed her up, back up to the surface, where she bobbed in place, floating a lot higher than she would in conventional water.

Half-stunned, floating on her back, black rain from the waterfall above falling on her face and body, Rainbow Dash got her first proper look at the world around her.

The sky was black. Oil spill black, with a faint corrupted-rainbow sheen if she stared long enough. The rain was silent and uniform, falling in a perfect, vertical distribution without the surges and sways that came with the gusts of a proper storm. There was no wind to blow it, and it made neither sound nor ripples when it hit the lake she was floating in, the water's glassy surface stretching perfectly mirrorlike as far as the eye could see.

Which was farther than it should have been. There was no light in this place, but it didn't seem to understand the concept of darkness either. Everything was dimly, evenly lit, without shadow or contour, as if a higher power had decided all this shouldn't need light to be visible. Not that there was much to see.

Here and there, a pillar or broken arch broke the surface, made of something colorless and reflective, in an architectural style that vaguely reminded Rainbow of Cloudsdale. And overhead, in the sky, thin reflective outlines belied the presence of hefty, almost-invisible links of chain, anchored to nothing, stretching from horizon to gray horizon.

"Guh..." Rainbow tried to get to her hooves, but the water was just buoyant enough that she couldn't: if she was right-side up, she floated with the water an inch below her belly, and the forces on her legs were impossible to control. "Guys? Guys?"

This wasn't working, and to make matters worse, the air held no purchase beneath her wings. But Rainbow was nothing if not a creative acrobat: she flipped back on her back, using her wings as oars, and found that the water let her propel herself at striking speeds towards the crumbling, partially-submerged architecture.

The columns and arches were made of ice. Not melting. Perfectly preserved, aside from their ruined state.

Rainbow hugged a leaning pillar, ignoring the cold - this whole place didn't seem to have much temperature, so it wasn't difficult - and shimmying her way carefully up, the ice somehow providing better purchase than the air and the water.

She reached the top, and it gave her enough height to see the world better. There really were chains in the sky, made of black metal that perfectly matched their surroundings, only visible by the sheen of water sliding around them as they caught raindrops and then released those raindrops back on their same, original trajectories, dripping water from their undersides as if they didn't exist at all. The distant horizon glowed slightly gray instead of black, letting her see the chains' silhouettes better: one ran close enough that she could probably jump to it, if only she had something better than the leaning cap of an ice pillar to build up speed on.

It looked a little familiar. Kind of like what she had seen down under Twilight's Crystal Palace, when Convergence dissolved the table and let them go under the Lifestream...

But this wasn't the time for speculation. She needed to find her friends.

"Guys!" Rainbow bellowed, using her vantage point to scan the horizon. "Twilight! Starlight! Hey! Over here! Shoot a flare or something if you can hear me!"

At last, there was crystal beneath Starlight Glimmer's hooves.

She patted the surface of her makeshift crystal boat to ensure it wouldn't wink out of existence again, a crystal canopy attached to a crystal mast preventing it from filling with rainwater. Her magic sort of worked in this place, but it required far more intent and focus than it used to. It was as if someone or something had changed the rules of reality itself, and she was trying to force magic to work like it was supposed to instead of using it the way it was.

But Starlight was good at forcing things to happen when she needed them to. And right now, she didn't have time to question what was different, because she had lost sight of Twilight while falling. She had to find her friend.

Starlight focused, commanding her aura to expand. It was hard, when she had to keep a corner of her thoughts on her boat, like stepping on a loose paper to keep it from blowing away. But something about it felt natural, as well, in an old, haunting way. Commanding this space to work as she needed it to. There was something familiar about this place, about this way of thinking. But she didn't dwell on that, instead sweeping her massive aura back and forth like a telekinetic dredge net, grasping weakly at the space around her and feeling for anything that didn't move like water.

She found it. That way, behind that crumbling carved ice wall, there was something floating in the water that felt like a body.

Using a crystal oar, Starlight guided her boat, the construct slipping and sliding around as if friction didn't exist in this subterranean world. She skidded around the wall's edge, reaching out with her telekinesis for the sodden thing floating high on the surface.

It was Misophaes.

Starlight hesitated, holding the dripping mare up in her blindingly teal aura. The world around her didn't seem used to its color.

"Oh," Misophaes said, looking up, meeting Starlight's expression with haunted, pinprick eyes and a jaded smile. "It's you."

"Have you seen Twilight?" Starlight demanded. "The mare who tried to shield you? You fell together. She has to be around here somewhere..."

"Are you dead?" Misophaes asked, something akin to bliss in her expression as she smiled sadly at Starlight. "No good deed goes unpunished, huh?"

Starlight blinked, putting to and two together. "This isn't the afterlife. We just fell down your abyss." She lifted Misophaes back up, around and into her boat, following what felt like the only natural course of action before scanning for bodies again. "Twilight! Where are you!?"

Misophaes was silent as Starlight set her in the boat, glancing around with her pinprick eyes, her permanently-haunted expression devoid of nuance that could explain what she was really thinking.

"Alright, maybe here..." Starlight moved the boat a little more in the direction she had gone to find Misophaes, then tried again. "Twilight!"

Rain silently slid into the glassy sea around them.

"I can't hear them anymore," Misophaes whispered.

Starlight's ears flicked. She was trying to listen for Twilight.

"The accusations," Misophaes murmured, rapturous. "They're gone."

"Unless you know where Twilight landed, it's not important," Starlight growled. "You two fell together, didn't you?"

"I don't remember," Misophaes apologized. "I... Killing me really worked. Is this what it feels like to be free?"

Twilight Sparkle couldn't tell if she was still fighting Aegis.

Her horn ached from exertion. Her body felt indistinguishable from her horn. How often had she pushed herself this hard? Should she have practiced before assuming she could just use the Lovebringer's power? All her training, all her conditioning, all her power as an alicorn... She hadn't felt a wipeout like this since early in her studies with Princess Celestia, when her mentor was showing her how to control her burgeoning power, in some ways boundless yet in others constrained by her little filly unicorn horn.

She might have been floating, though something about it felt wrong. And then, a telekinetic aura was lifting her.

It set her down on something flat, rocky and damp. "Twilight."

Twilight focused, channeling a faint current of power in her horn in an exercise Princess Celestia had taught her to help with those accidents, like snapping a disjointed limb back into place. It helped... about as much as it had helped back then. She'd still need to stay off her magic for at least an hour, and not get back to any heavyweight spells or training until the next day, but she could concentrate on things other than the throbbing in her horn again.

Kind of impressive, when she thought about it. That she could fight a world-destroying elder god and walk off the consequences in a day. Also kind of dispiriting, that she couldn't even hold it off for two seconds despite being an alicorn princess endowed with an artifact that could provide more power than even her nigh-limitless limits could handle...

Aaand there was a pony in front of her. A zebra, to be precise, made entirely of red flame.

Twilight blinked, taking in what she was seeing. Its stripes were solid, made of some material that was both reflective and transparent like crystal, yet curved organically instead of sporting facets. The area in between the stripes didn't exist, its body - and it was probably a her - marked out only by those skeletal, rib-like stripes, the zebra's core filled with a rising, falling, ever-circulating plume of ruby flame. Floating deep within, at the core of the flame, was a triangular red gemstone.

"Are you...?" Twilight asked the zebra, tilting her head. Their eyes seemed a little more real than the rest of their body, and a halo disk of glistening red runes surrounded their barrel, rotating slowly.

"The Flame of Love," the zebra agreed. "Are you alright?"

"I will be," Twilight groaned, getting to her hooves and looking around. "Tirek wishes he could pack a punch like that... Where are we?"

The black sky and grey horizon swooped over her senses like the shadow of an enormous bird, and Twilight had to sit down as suddenly as she stood up. Crooked ice pillars and leaning, crumbling architecture protruded from a flat sea around her, silent rain falling and matting her already-soaked coat. She should have been freezing, but this realm seemed to ignore temperature just like it ignored the rules of light: it was overwhelmingly flat and lifeless, with neither light source nor shadow, given depth and texture only by the reflective rainwater dribbling down from the chains in the sky.

Beneath Twilight's hooves was cold, gray granite, perfectly flat and so close to level with the water that even the rippling caused by raindrops could have caused it to spill over, if the rain had caused any. The edge was gradually curved and circular, and a short distance behind her, the rock rose up again in another circular ledge, disks of stone stacked like the tiers on a wedding cake. Something was at the top, but she couldn't make out what.

Twilight tried to fly, spreading and flapping her wings. Aside from spraying water and raindrops, nothing happened. The air ignored her.

She looked back at the zebra, baffled.

The zebra looked very, very sad.

"What happened?" Twilight asked. "Where are we? Is this...?" She stared up at the chains crisscrossing the sky, some of them quite low overhead. They reminded her, almost, of the chains she had seen down by the door underneath Convergence's room...

She swallowed. "Indus?"

"No," the zebra said. "I recognize this place. This is younger than Indus. But, it may not be a bad comparison."

Twilight flicked her ears, sending droplets flying. Rain continued to fall, soaking her to the bone.

"This is a city that was built and inhabited between five and six thousand years ago," the zebra explained. "By the ancestors of who you now call seaponies, at the floor of a body of water you now call the Griffon Palm Sea. They used ice for their buildings, created with nothing but their everlasting magic and the water in which they swam. After this city was abandoned, its ruins survived for more than four thousand years, until they were swallowed up in the creation of the Aldenfold and lost to my sight."

"We're beneath the Aldenfold?" Twilight asked, her eyes widening.

"Possibly," the zebra replied. "Or perhaps we are nowhere at all. The Lifestream does not flow here. This place is outside of the bounds of the world that my siblings and I give order to. I do not think this is Indus, as you asked. But it is just as dead. Just as separate. Just as gone."

Twilight's thoughts started to catch up with her. "Is Misophaes here too? I was protecting her when we fell..."

"I cannot tell," the zebra apologized, its runic halo spinning softly. "The Lifestream is my body. Here, in this place separate from it, I am nothing more than the body you perceive in front of you. My senses extend only from this singular point, in a fashion similar to that of a mortal."

Twilight's thoughts spun. "So you're... closer to being the original person you used to be, before you became a Flame of Harmony? Does that mean you were originally a zebra?"

"Is that the form I am taking?" The Flame of Love looked down at themselves. "Perhaps I was. I cannot remember."

"Well, we need to find Misophaes and get out of here," Twilight declared. "Except... my wings aren't working. Is something wrong with my magic?"

The zebra shook their head. "No. The fault lies in the medium you are applying your magic to. This place lies outside the boundaries of the world my siblings and I bring order to. The only magic that will work here is magic that you yourself brought with you."

Rainbow Dash was pretty sure there was no possible way she was taking off.

She had been flapping her wings for minutes now, but the air just wouldn't listen to her. It blustered aimlessly aside in tiny, useless puffs, refusing to congeal into something solid she could push herself off of, no matter how hard she flapped. Her ice pillar didn't give enough room to run or jump, but this wasn't the kind of problem a strong start could fix. Her flight was just gone.

That was why, after her calls were finally met with a flare in the distance, she didn't even try to flap as she leaped off the pillar, hitting the water and backstroking as fast as she could in the direction it had come from.

"Hey! I'm coming, don't move!" Rainbow bellowed into the abyss, wincing and growling as she rammed her head into a broken wall before changing course to swim around it. "Ow! Wait up, Twilight! I'm... on my way!"

The flare crackled again, and Rainbow righted her course, skimming the lake's infinite surface as black rain drummed softly against her belly. And finally, she saw her target.

A crystal boat, with an umbrella to keep the rain out, helmed by none other than Starlight.

"Starlight!" Rainbow panted in relief, struggling and failing to get upright in the unnaturally buoyant water. "Boy, am I glad to see you! Any sign of Twilight? And, uh, could you lean the other way so I don't capsize your boat while I climb on...?"

Moments later, the boat was successfully un-capsized, Starlight running her aura through Rainbow's fur with a spell that quickly and easily wrung all the water away. "Of course you're here too," Starlight sighed. "I was hoping I only had Twilight to look for... but since we've found each other, I guess the more eyes the better." She glanced out at the horizon. "But now I'm worried there might have been more that followed us."

Rainbow blinked, realizing she hadn't considered this possibility. "Uh, I just saw you and Twilight and what's-her-name... You mean like Seigetsu and Keeper could have jumped too?"

"Misophaes," said a disheveled lump in the back of the boat.

Rainbow blinked harder. "Oh. You're here too, huh?"

"Seems like I'm finding everyone but Twilight," Starlight sighed, turning her boat about and shooting another flare before passing Rainbow a crystalline oar. "Here. Better than not finding you. Twilight!"

"So your magic works here, huh?" Rainbow asked, taking her oar and rowing. "And, uh, what about hers?" She glanced back at Misophaes. "Because mine definitely doesn't. This whole place seems messed up, actually. You got any idea where we are?"

"I'm trying not to think about it," Starlight grunted. "My magic works if I force it to. It's not as natural as it's supposed to be. This place also seems familiar, in a bad way. It kind of reminds me of what moon glass feels like. I'm trying not to think about it too much."

"It feels good to me," Misophaes volunteered, speaking hesitantly, as though she was talking against her better judgement.

Rainbow raised an eyebrow at her. "You have a positive reaction to something? That's a new one. Weren't you having those clerics wipe your memories over and over or something to get away from whatever you were trying to get away from?"

"I can hear you normally now," Misophaes murmured, watching the water with pinprick eyes. "You sound annoyed by what I've done. Proportionally annoyed. Mad, even. I can understand it. It makes sense. No more malice for things I can't remember. It all makes sense, now that the voices are gone."

"Glad to hear you get that we're all down here because of you," Rainbow deadpanned. "Any chance you wanna do something helpful about it?"

"Do something about it?" Misophaes gave her a confused, still-haunted look.

Rainbow patted the crystal boat. "Starlight's being nice enough to pick you out of the drink and give you a ride on her boat. You gonna pay her back? Got any information to spill...?"

"She doesn't know anything," Starlight sighed, in between shooting flares and calling for Twilight. "Isn't convinced yet that I didn't kill her and she's not dead. Doesn't know anything about what happens when you go down the abyss, either, other than that no one and nothing has ever come back."

"I-I mean, supposedly," Misophaes stammered, sitting on her haunches and fiddling anxiously with her forehooves. "I don't remember enough to know, for sure." She looked at Starlight and deflated a little. "I always thought that when I died, I'd remember everything I've done and that's how it would make sense. Not that the accusations would just stop."

Starlight ignored her.

"Great," Rainbow said. "Glad you don't feel guilty at all for talking us into falling down this hole with you. Think you could turn that lack of remorse into something useful?"

"I didn't say that," Misophaes murmured, holding her hooves. "Just that it makes sense now. You're mad at me because I hurt you. It's just what I deserve."

"Great." Rainbow started ignoring her too. "Ugh, if only I could fly and search from above..."

"Keep rowing." Starlight shook her head. "We'll find her eventually."

Twilight was starting to feel silly, trying and failing to climb up to the next tier of the stone dais.

"Ugh!" Her forehooves could just barely cusp the edge when she stretched all the way up, but the wet stone was slippery and she didn't have nearly enough strength to pull herself up with such a shaky hold. "Come on! I... Nngh!"

The Flame of Love was sitting by the edge, staring into the water.

"Hey, umm..." Twilight gave up on surmounting the ledge, pacing over to it. "You pulled me out of the water, right? Was that with telekinesis? Could you... lift me up there, please?"

The fiery zebra turned to her, an unspoken why in the air.

"It would be a better vantage point?" Twilight raised an eyebrow. "I need to find Misophaes. And then... figure out a way out of here."

"There is no way out," the zebra said flatly.

"Isn't there?" Twilight raised an eyebrow. "I mean, I know my wings aren't working, but there has to be some way..."

"Flying would do nothing, even if it worked," the zebra told her. "I am cut off from my body. This is not a matter of spatial distance to be traversed. The sea is part of the world. The air is part of the world. If there was a path, it would connect me. There isn't. There is no way home."

Twilight frowned. "All we did to get here was fall down a hole... Unless that hole was some kind of one-way portal?"

"That could be a way to think of it," the zebra said. "I don't mean to cause you to panic. I love you. I don't want that. But we are in a space that has no harmonic connections to the world you know."

"Harmonic connections, okay," Twilight admitted. "This place doesn't seem very harmonic. What about disharmonic connections, or... Why is that an important distinction?"

"I do not mean harmonic in the sense that you understand it," the zebra told her. "Harmonic as in worldly, as in of the world born from myself and my fellow Flames of Harmony. Your chaos and disharmony are ultimately worldly concepts. The only true insulators to my body are Vacuum and Void."

"Vacuum and Void?" Twilight blinked.

The zebra nodded. "Vacuum is a state of absolute emptiness through which things can pass, but nothing exists. The existence of anything within it renders it no longer a vacuum. This is a concept mortals can observe. You should be familiar with it through your scholarly studies."

"Like a pressure chamber that sucks all the air out," Twilight said.

"Yes," the zebra told her. "Vacuum is the state that exists beyond the boundaries of your world, separating it from celestial bodies, other planets and the stars in the sky. Void, meanwhile, is anything that was overlooked when creating the world and determining what would exist within it."

Twilight leaned in closer. "Overlooked?"

"We are meant to be omniscient," the zebra explained. "Administrators of the world, by nature aware of all that goes on within it so that we can enforce its laws. However, there are some things we are unaware of, either by oversight or by design. Examples of things we flames do not know by design include... the future. Or who we used to be."

Twilight's eyes widened.

"Examples of things we are unaware of by oversight," the zebra continued, "are difficult to provide, because by definition I am unaware of them. The Aldenfold may be one, as I have told you we are unable to see inside its boundary. This place may well be another. But this is Void: things we cannot influence because they exist outside our knowledge. And this is the power that now separates you and I from our world. I could not see this place from the Lifestream. I cannot see the Lifestream from this place. They are separated by something unknowable to me."

"That sure makes it sound like we're just underneath the Aldenfold," Twilight pointed out.

"You deduce that using logic cultivated in the world my siblings and I administer," the zebra countered. "Can you claim with certainty that such logic still holds, freed from the rules of our world?"

Twilight squinted. "Can you claim that it doesn't? I'm looking for a way out, here. And it's hard to argue with someone who says the rules of logic aren't real, but it sure sounds more like you're saying we can't prove there is a way out, instead of we can prove there isn't one."

The zebra just sighed.

"...Are you alright?" Twilight asked, stepping closer.

"I am severed from my body," the zebra said, ruby flames swirling within its frame. "This means I am no longer present to administrate my domain. My Crystal Palace has no more flame; I cannot reach it. Likely, the surrounding lands will have been visited with a calamity like to the ones that afflicted Ironridge, Abyssinia and the Aptann Valley when their flames could no longer touch their seats of power. Our world, which has endured for thousands of years, is dying. We are failing in our mission. Hope, the one of us with the will to claw back what was lost, has been absent the longest and now confined to flesh. And the thinking creatures who live on our world do not yet possess the technology required to repeat the construction of a new world that saved them last time."

Twilight hugged the zebra.

It was warm, a motherly warmth that could cradle even the stars in the sky, that had seen children countless beyond measure, like Princess Celestia but orders of magnitude older. It was fragile, like an antique knife blade still peeling fruit in the hooves and mouths of chefs who had forgotten just how old it was. And it was broken. Twilight could tell, with a deep-seated instinct that might have come from her cutie mark, that it was missing so many parts of itself, and had been for a very long time.

This empty, burning, vaguely crystalline shell was all that was left. The rest had been discarded so that it could better serve its purpose. And still, it wasn't enough.

These were no abstract, mechanical thoughts that a machine could have. Twilight knew them intimately, from when she prepared for Princess Celestia's tests and found herself inadequate to face them on her own, from when she had sacrificed fun for studying and her career as a librarian to help rule Equestria. All so that she could do her job, serve her purpose. And still, she wasn't always good enough, sometimes lay defeated on the floor as somebody else saved the day or the map table called everyone but her.

And she had... made her peace with it. She was the Princess of Friendship, not the Princess of Doing Everything Herself. She didn't have to be sufficient on her own. But in this god that had given everything over an unfathomable span of time and still come up short, she recognized that feeling keenly.

Twilight hugged it harder.

"You have not failed," she insisted, eventually taking a step back so she could look it in the eyes. "Sure, you've suffered a lot of setbacks, but do you know how many times my friends and I have pulled Equestria back from the brink? You'd better, because it was your power we used to do it. The magic of friendship? You know?" She patted her cutie mark. "The world is still standing. It's still filled with smart and strong people who are willing to work together to survive... Not everyone, but enough! I don't know how the ponies of Indus accomplished what they did and built a new world to move to, but if you and I do everything we can to preserve this world and still come up short, you can bet they'll do it again. Do you understand?"

She held the flame by its shoulders. "This world is not a lost cause. We can still fix this and get all the flames back in the Crystal Palaces where they belong. And if it turns out I'm wrong, it'll still be okay, because I know there are people out there who want badly enough to survive that they'll figure out how."

"You are truly a Princess of Harmony," the zebra said weakly. "But do you understand what you are promising? If you alone could survive the end of all things while all other life perished, would you consider this promise to be upheld?"

Twilight didn't even give the idea consideration. "It's not going to come to that," she said, brushing it away. "I don't limp across finish lines. I cross them with my head held high, or watch my friends do it in my stead. You know how to count on your friends to be the missing piece you couldn't provide, right? Or is that idea only part of Convergence's domain?"

The zebra was quiet.

"Sounds like I've made my point." Twilight patted them on the head with a wing, internally wincing at how she was treating a deity that far outranked Princess Celestia yet certain it was the right thing to do. "Now, back to our actual problem. I don't know how to get out of here either, but I'm going to start with finding the pony I fell down here protecting. And for that, I need to get a better look at our surroundings. Will you help me up to the top of this dais?"

The zebra nodded, their runic ring spinning faster, their internal flames swirling to match. Suddenly, they erupted with flame, a sphere of red expanding outwards like a shockwave, passing through Twilight with a sensation that was pleasant and almost stabilizing. For a moment, they continued to expand... and eventually, slowed to a halt, a massive dome of thinly-dispersed red flames centering around the zebra's now-empty body, gone save for its eyes, crystal stripes, and the floating Lovebringer at its core.

Twilight sniffed, feeling the air against the back of her throat. It felt... ever so slightly less alien.

"The purpose of harmony is to impose ideas on space," the hollow zebra explained. "To replace the existing entropy with the rules you are familiar with. I am only one among nine, separate from my siblings and the machine that allowed us to create your world. But my control over this space, so long as you remain within the sphere, should be sufficient to allow for pegasus flight."

Twilight stared at the zebra. One of the nine pillars of reality, fueling her friends' harmony lasers, propping up her world and all that she knew... on its own, barely strong enough to establish pegasus flight in an area small enough that she could throw a stone and hit its edge.

Hadn't she felt the Lovebringer's power, surging through her, far exceeding the throughput her alicorn body was capable of? Where was such a magnitude of difference coming from? Was it the presence of the other flames, the establishment of a status quo that had lasted for millennia? Or was she underestimating just what it took to allow pegasi to fly?

This observation probably should have been discouraging. But at the same time, it made it feel just a little more tangible that the Flame of Love had once been a real, normal person.

Satisfied, Twilight nodded, pumping her wings and focusing. The air didn't feel like it did in Equestria, but it still caught beneath them, and she was able to jump up to a higher rung.

"Sure would be great if I could only fly," Rainbow complained, rowing away at Starlight's crystal boat. "At least one of us can do their thing. Hey, Misophaes! Does your horn work?"

"I haven't tried." Misophaes smiled, somehow both contented and nervous as she stared into the water. "I don't want to."

"Don't wanna find out that your horn went and bailed on you, huh?" Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "Or don't wanna get conscripted into helping if it turns out it works?"

"When I use magic, I imagine the things I might have done," Misophaes said, a slight sing-song tone to her voice. "It made the screams louder. It was my punishment, since I had to use it to stay alive. Now I can't hear them anymore. Why would I want to bring them back?"

"Enough." Starlight silenced them, her own thoughts trying to run from whatever it was she recognized about this place. "Focus on looking for Twilight."

Sometimes, idle chatter helped her, distracting her from whatever was on her mind. Not always. Not today. Her thoughts felt like a mountain that were piling up, and she could only find peace by shoveling her way to the bottom, solving every puzzle and every problem. Finding Twilight was only the beginning. Then, there would be getting out of here, dealing with Misophaes again, going back to the north, fighting windigoes, something about the Flames of Harmony... The only place to start was at the top. It was too unpalatable to handle all at once. It was piling up too quickly not to handle. And the only way she could make progress-

"Woah, look at that!" Rainbow interrupted, waving to catch her attention. "Yo! Starlight! Bring us around!"

Starlight dragged her oar through the water like an anchor, the boat sliding smoothly around to face off to the side. In the distance was what looked like a tiny constellation of red stars, twinkling and possibly slowly growing. She narrowed her eyes. The same red as Twilight's Lovebringer magic.

"Bet you that's an epic flare," Rainbow said with a grin, bringing her own oar around. "We see you, Twilight! We're over here!"

Together with Rainbow, Starlight worked her oar, sending the boat skimming towards the constellation as it rapidly drew closer. The stars didn't fade, and Starlight soon realized they were actually red flames, arranged in a dome over a strange, dark structure that didn't look like it was made of ice.

The moment her boat hit the flame-sphere's boundary, it lurched, nearly throwing her and Rainbow as the water became more viscous and less buoyant. Friction seemed to apply to the hull again, and before the craft could capsize, Starlight leaped to the shore, letting her crystals dissipate and catching Rainbow and Misophaes in her telekinesis.

"Uh, thanks for the save? I totally had that," Rainbow said, inspecting the wet granite on which they now stood. "Woah, actual rock. And I'm getting wet again."

Starlight sighed. "Deal with it. Making crystals is harder here. I need a mental break."

But she also needed to see what was special about this island. Twilight had to be here; the space inside the sphere felt just a little more familiar than the air outside it. And since the island was short, conical and made of tiered layers...

"We're going up to the top," Starlight declared, conjuring a crystal staircase after a moment of effort. "To take a look around. Keep up."

Her hooves clinked against the crystals with sounds that didn't sound quite natural, as though her crystals and hooves didn't have the normal idea of what they were supposed to sound like. Black rain dribbled into her coat and matted her mane. As she crested the island's central tier, Starlight couldn't decide if this place didn't want her here, or simply didn't notice her at all.

At the pinnacle was a machine... Was it a machine? Or a creature? Or maybe just an art fixture. It was a stone nautilus shell, about five times her height, sitting upright on a pedestal with its mouth pointing off into the distance. It seemed to have been modified into something evoking a harpoon, and from its mouth stretched one of the black, glistening chains that crisscrossed the sky, disappearing taut into the horizon.

More importantly, Twilight was examining it.

Twilight looked up when she heard Starlight's hoofsteps, her eyes widening in surprise and confusion. "Starlight?"

"Don't remember me jumping after you?" Starlight raised an eyebrow at her confusion.

Twilight's expression turned a bit sheepish. "Look..."

"What's done is done." Starlight crossed the platform, Rainbow and Misophaes appearing behind her. "We'll talk about it later. Is there anyone else with you, or do we finally have everyone and can focus on getting out of here?"

Twilight scanned her companions. "Rainbow? And... Misophaes. No, it's just me and the Flame of Love here. I... didn't realize you had followed-"

"The Flame of Love?" Rainbow interrupted. "What, like, the harmony one?"

The crystalline outline of a red zebra appeared from behind the nautilus, the Lovebringer floating in its core, hauntingly incomplete and empty. "I have been with you for some time now. But now, I am only here." It nodded sadly to Starlight. "And you are here too."

Rainbow raised an eyebrow at Twilight. "Anything we should know? And, uh, what's this big shell thing?"

Twilight glanced uncertainly at Misophaes. "Is, umm... Since I saved you, do you mind, like..." She looked squarely at Starlight. "Would it be bad to talk about certain things around her?"

Starlight gave Twilight a sigh. "Now you want to listen to me about what we should do with her? I don't know. I don't really care. I think I've found everyone, and now I want to get out of here."

"About that..." Twilight took a deep breath, then started explaining everything the zebra had just told her.

"And so, I don't know whether there's a way out or not, but the flame doesn't think so," Twilight finished, wilting a little from Starlight's stony expression. "I was thinking... Umm... Look." She hung her head. "I'm sorry, Starlight. I didn't realize how unprepared I'd be to accept your decision. On... what to do with Misophaes."

"Is this the most important time for apologies?" Starlight tilted her head. "If it's eating at you, sure. But the best way to make it up to me is getting us out of here. And I'm almost certain the hole we fell down isn't going to let us back up."

Twilight stared at her dismissal. "Yes, it is eating at me. But it sure looks like it's eating at you, too."

Starlight shook her head. "What's bothering me most is something on the tip of my tongue I can't place. There's something wrong about this place. I don't like it. Maybe it's because I'm a Flame of Harmony and am removed from the world I belong in, like you said. But it feels... familiar, somehow."

"You have been removed from the world you belong in for the last thousand years," the red zebra said. "Confined to the moon, prior to taking on the flesh of a pony. Even though that time predates your equine life, perhaps its impact makes you more sensitive to these conditions?"

Starlight glanced at the zebra, changing the subject. "So Eylista being on the moon caused my Crystal Palace to break because the vacuum of space cut it off from the Lifestream, right? What about you? Didn't Twilight say she found you in some cross-dimensional space?"

The zebra shook its head. "The mirror world I was confined in is a pocket dimension, yes, but it is still adjacent to the Lifestream. People are still born there, sharing the same flow of souls that underlies this world... and often sharing the same soul at the same time. The dimensions are bridged by harmonic magics. Though it was a confinement of the physical representation of my soul, I was still free to meet with you in my palace when you arrived there as a child. Now, were anyone to visit that place, I could not see it."

Rainbow Dash scratched her head. "I'm still a little confused by this whole difference between the gemstone, the flame, the Crystal Palace..."

"All of it is me," the zebra said. "The world, the flame, this manifestation. The gemstone that you have carried can move across the world just as your head can move on your neck. Being cut off from the world... You could no more easily cut your wings off. All of it is a part of the body that I share with my siblings, and administrate together with their minds."

"So we're in a pocket dimension that doesn't border the Lifestream," Starlight said, moving the conversation along. "At first I thought this rain was the remnants of the waterfall, but it's been too constant since I got here. And the villagers told us you can't plumb the depths of the abyss, and anything you send down only returns the last bit of the rope if you try to pull it out. That means the abyss is likely a portal, and likely works in only one direction." She glanced at Twilight. "Right?"

Twilight nodded. "That was my assessment as well."

"There's something else I've remembered," Starlight added. "The entrance to the cave Misophaes made her village in was protected by the Aldenfold's magic. Remember?"

Rainbow Dash blinked. Twilight, for her part, did a double take. "It... was. That was how the dragons never found it, wasn't it?"

Starlight nodded. "And the Lovebringer says that this place is disconnected the way the Aldenfold is, and also that it used to be part of the real world until it got crushed in the Aldenfold's creation."

The red zebra nodded.

"Then we have to be beneath the Aldenfold," Starlight declared. "I know what you said, that this space doesn't follow the same rules as the world we're used to. But it must follow some rules, right? Water still falls down. Stone and ice are recognizable as stone and ice. And life existed on Indus before the flames came along and made our current world. You know how my power works. There can't not be a way out of this."

"Does the big shell do anything?" Rainbow asked. "Because literally no one has talked about the big shell yet."

"I can't tell," Twilight apologized, turning to the stone nautilus that held the end of a chain. "There's an inscription on the side in a language that used to belong to Pegasopolis. I'm a little rusty, but I think it says, 'We join our hooves to bar the way for the king.' Does that mean anything to any of you?"

Rainbow raised an eyebrow. "Nope. Nuthin'. You really learned a whole dead language while studying a different random race's historical city just for the sake of it?"

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Do you even realize who you're talking to? Pegasopolis is a critical part of Equestria's heritage! This one, I'm actually embarrassed I'm not more fluent in. It's not something wildly obscure, like that old zebra dialect we found beneath Convergence's..." She trailed off, glancing again at the red zebra. "Were zebras just really important to the world's founding, somehow? That can't be a coincidence."

"Zebras are an ancient race," the flame said. "Over the first three thousand years of this world's history, they were often considered to be a fourth species of pony, along with earth ponies, unicorns and pegasi. It is only within the last few millenniums that they have grown more separate and fallen in number."

Starlight, though, was muttering under her breath. "Twilight, when did the Pegasopolis dialect this inscription uses come into use?"

Twilight scratched her head. "Well, history is pretty foggy before the two-thousand-year mark when Equestria was founded. We have a huge amount of reference material written in it because, as part of the founding treaty, the Unicornian nobility adopted it and it was spoken all across high society for the first few centuries of Equestria's existence. It gradually fell out of favor across the map due to handling slang and adaptations from other languages poorly and having a rigid grammatical structure, and the last place it was actually used was as the official language of the Canterlot government, spoken in the palace and used for writing laws and stuff. That was about a thousand years ago, and it didn't survive the reorganizations triggered in the wake of Nightmare Moon-"

Starlight cleared her throat, interrupting. "But when it began to be used? I'm... just looking for evidence that this statue and these chains aren't as old as the rest of the things here, which apparently is very old." She stared at the nautilus. "It's certainly made of different materials. Stone, instead of ice. If it was newer, that would mean someone might have been here more recently."

The red zebra looked thoughtful. "I can provide little insight on spoken languages, because I speak to hearts instead of tongues. But I do not recognize this shell or these chains from this place's time as a ruin on the seafloor. Someone has constructed these since this place was last a part of me."

"So within the last thousand years," Twilight said. "Which was about when this language disappeared. So either they really wanted to pay homage to a bygone civilization..." She looked up. "Or it was someone closely involved with Canterlot's government."

"One of the Princesses?" Rainbow guessed.

Twilight took a shaky breath. "I've never pressed Princess Celestia too hard on why she created the Aldenfold. But... if this was made by Princess Luna as she was becoming Nightmare Moon... Could she have made the mountains to cover it up? Something she wanted to bury after their fighting was done?"

She turned, expectant, to the flame.

"I don't know," the flame apologized. "There are parts of that conflict that we were not able to witness. Many of the powers Luna created under the influence of the Nightmare, which you know as Nightmare Modules, are related to the concept of Void. They hide information, obscure the truth, destroy memories and veil ponies in impenetrable shadow. Of this, our memories are clouded."

"Well, I know this much." Twilight straightened up. "The Princesses will definitely find out what happened to us. There has to be somebody up there who didn't fall down that hole. Corsica stayed on the airship, if no one else. And Seigetsu was there, and Keeper, and Aegis, too. So if they do know how to reach this place, they'll definitely open the door for us to get out. And they definitely have one, because one of them has used it themselves."

"Alright," Rainbow said, pounding one hoof with the other. "But that's no reason to sit on our hooves waiting to be rescued, right? If this is really a princess hidey-hole, there's gotta be stuff down here that's worth finding, right?"

"Or stuff that was never meant to be found," Starlight muttered. "I'm a little bit more familiar than either of you with the kind of skeletons Luna kept in her closet. I've used those skeletons and paid the price. Is that really something you're eager to find?"

Rainbow hesitated. Twilight glanced at her, bidding her to go on.

"Think about it," Starlight said. "This isn't a conventional hiding place. A conventional hiding place wouldn't need to be hidden from the eyes of the overseers of this world's order. If we were talking about normal skeletons, they could have put them in a secret room in a library, or something. A spot like this, you'd only need if you were trying to hide something you needed the world's rule enforcers not to know about. And maybe it's just because I'm one of those enforcers, but I can't think of anything good that could come of finding a thing like that."

"I can," Misophaes quietly said, speaking up for the first time since climbing the stone dais.

Everyone turned to her.

"It's nice here," Misophaes murmured, still haunted, yet somehow at peace. "I don't have to listen to the screams. Everyone says the rules don't work here. Is karma a rule where you all are from? It doesn't need to be one. It's nicer when it isn't. And now they can't find me anymore. I don't have to care. I don't have to feel guilty. If only I had known about this years ago. This is the kind of place I always wanted Abaddon to be: a place where no one will ever, ever come looking for you again."

End of Act 4

...

Discord whistled cheerfully to himself, lounging on a tree branch hanging over the wall to Gawain's compound. The branch was covered in snow, and the snow didn't particularly want to move, resisting the natural, harmonic idea that show should fall off when you pushed it. Fortunately, Discord was an expert at resisting natural, harmonic ideas, and the snow was now piled high behind him in a statue of Halcyon's face as a token of their friendship.

Ponies and griffons were busy down in the courtyard below, trying to manage far too many children as dawn broke and the need to play in the snow fought with wariness over a weather system that had simply stopped. Funny how things broke down when you messed with the world like that.

Senescey was still asleep, though, working off a nasty magical whack from the previous night's events, and Papyrus was doing much the same for lazier and more conventional reasons. No good viewpoints anywhere to be found, especially now that Rainbow Dash had gone down that hole and Corsica was timeskipped a week or two into the future and was waiting for everyone else's perspectives to catch up. Maybe he'd go pester Halcyon again... He was still sore that Papyrus hadn't used the boop how he was supposed to.

Maybe it was time to promote someone new?

Discord pulled out the script and consulted it, rubbing his goatee with his talons. Nope, no, not that time yet. The cast he had for now was plenty. Couldn't go growing it too fast, after all.

This certainly was a tighter production now that he had all the viewpoints playing by his rules. Just thinking about how chaotic it must have been back in Starlight's heyday, when he was stuck as a statue and couldn't interfere, now that must have been a sight to see.

And he was the Lord of Chaos, wasn't he? Ulterior motives were awful. Maybe he should just say screw it and promote everyone again. But no, not now. You had to have some form of self-control to get proper entertainment, after all.

Yes, bothering Halcyon was definitely the next play. There would be plenty of time for handing out viewpoints later.

Reboot

Faye sat inside a protective golden bubble, floating aimlessly in a sea of red.

She blinked a few times as her cognition caught up with reality. She had... just been reading in bed, right? And felt something off, with a sixth sense she couldn't properly describe. And then she had gotten up to investigate...

All of that had just been happening. And yet there was no moment of transition in her mind, no explanation for how she got from that to this. It felt like she had been sitting here, thinking nothing at all, for a long, long time.

"What just happened?" her own voice groaned next to her. It was Halcyon, sitting naked on the bubble's floor.

Faye blinked at her. She looked corporeal enough, and... Faye was naked too. "Are you... you?" Faye asked. "I don't remember summoning you..."

"I sure think I'm me," Halcyon responded, uncertainly looking herself over. "I don't remember being summoned. I thought I was napping in the back of your mind you read a book. Right?"

"On Puddles' ship," Faye agreed. "That's right. This... place doesn't seem like it should be able to exist, let alone with both of us in it. Are we inside our own mind?"

"You mean like that time we went inside Coda's throne?" Halcyon asked. "Maybe. You think this is because of something we did? Like how we've been practicing passing control to you without physically taking off my mask?"

"I don't know..." Faye rested a hoof against the inside of the bubble, which was solid and felt like crystal. It was true: Halcyon getting separated when she was in the form of a physical crystal had been a worry ever since Seigetsu took her as collateral, and they had been experimenting with ways to swap back and forth that didn't involve Halcyon completely separating from her mind. But at the same time, whatever wrongness she had sensed leading up to this had felt very much external.

Halcyon flicked her backwards ears. "Well, if this isn't our fault, that leaves a whole lot of options that are a whole lot worse. How do we get out of here? We need..." She held up her bracelet hoof. "Look at these."

Around her leg was their bracelet... or, at least, half of it. An imperfect semicircle, it didn't look like it had been cut: its ends were jagged, in a pristine, geometric, interlocking fashion like the tines on a comb. The other half, Faye realized, was on her own leg.

She held her own half up. It didn't fall off, despite there being nothing holding it on.

Halcyon extended a hoof to meet hers. Their hooves tapped together, a sensation Faye had never experienced when Halcyon was a ghost. It felt deeply, almost unsettlingly familiar, making contact with her other half in a way she couldn't even when they shared the same body and mental space. As she tried to hold contact, a sensation jolted through her, a powerful remembrance that they were split like this because she had rejected herself, all those years ago.

It forced her to recoil. Halcyon's reaction mirrored her own.

"W-What was that?" Halcyon asked, dazed. "Was that how you felt about...?" She averted her eyes.

"I don't know what's happening," Faye apologized. "I don't know where we are, what we're supposed to do..."

"If you're looking for answers," Procyon's voice volunteered, its owner sitting somehow undetected behind both of them, "I could help with that."

Faye jumped a little in surprise. "You!"

"Me," Procyon said, wearing a poker face.

Halcyon pointed at Procyon's bare, sunrise-colored legs. "Where's your part of the bracelet?"

Procyon shrugged. "I don't have one. Probably because I forfeited mine when I asked Unnrus-kaeljos to cut me out. You two have been making an active effort to share and be part of each other's lives, and I've been accepting my role as a spectator. So it seems I don't get a part of it."

Halcyon frowned, apparently considering whether to accept this.

Faye had more important things to worry about. "Where are we? Do you know what's going on?"

"Inside our mind," Procyon agreed. "And this right here is the protective shield that prevents things like Gyre's atmosphere and other changeling queens from messing with it." She tapped the golden bubble. "And, presently, is keeping us safe from whatever just happened."

"And 'whatever just happened' is...?" Halcyon quizzed her, leaning to one side.

"I think we were attacked," Procyon explained. "Though 'caught up in an accident' might be more likely. That red stuff is the culprit. The shield is keeping our minds safe, but somehow it's gumming up the connection between you and our body. That shouldn't be easy to do. It means it must have both a physical component and an emotional one, like harmonic magic and windigo bodies. But I can't tell where it came from or what it is."

"You don't know where it came from?" Faye asked.

Procyon shook her head. "I was somewhere else at the time, but I felt it go by. It looked like a shock wave of some sort. But I didn't stop to investigate. I came here as fast as I could."

Halcyon sighed. "Great. Increasing the number of reasons this could be ridiculously bad. Is there anything we can do to get out of this? Even to just let me go fly around all ghost-like like normal?"

"Your crown." Procyon pointed to the two halves of the bracelet. "Our changeling queen void can probably suck away this red stuff and un-jam your connection to our body. But using it here might be different from in the physical world."

Faye raised an eyebrow. "And taking in this unknown red substance wouldn't have unknown consequences?"

"You'd have to get a feel for it to know," Procyon apologized. "But I don't think so. This stuff doesn't feel intelligent, or even like it's associated with an idea. And even if it was, changeling queen voids are perfect prisons. Once something's inside, talking to you is the only thing it can do."

Halcyon concentrated for a moment, then slumped. "I don't think the bracelet's gonna work while it's in two pieces, though."

Faye's mind snapped back to the sensation she had felt upon touching Halcyon's hoof, the accusatory reminder that this was what she wanted.

"We split our mind to escape from a world where we had to be ourselves," Procyon agreed. "Sealing our powers was part of that... unless you've never questioned where your 'old' fear of using them came from." She nodded at Halcyon.

"So what do we do?" Faye asked, looking to both of them for ideas. "Does it not work here because we're separated?"

Procyon nodded. "The physical world has some ideas about how matter conservation works that prevent you from just duplicating your body and going along your way as separate people. This world has no such limitations, and so our power has followed our split. It's not going to work unless everyone with a stake in it can use it in harmony together, bringing together the parts that were split. Fortunately, that shouldn't require actually becoming a single person again, which is both impossible and unwise. All you need to do is push past the wall that's separating you so that you can properly work together on this. And the good news is, that's a wall you've spent the last few months aggressively trying to break down."

Uncertainly, Faye offered her hoof back to Halcyon. "Do we try that again, or...?"

Halcyon glanced at Procyon. "How do you know all this, anyway?"

"Conjecture." Procyon shrugged. "Educated conjecture. I have nothing to do but sit back and stare at the dynamics between you two, after all."

"And you don't need to be a part of this, too?" Faye asked.

Procyon showed off her bare, braceletless forelegs. "Fortunately not, since you're the ones with the bracelet parts. None of us have made any efforts towards making me a part of our life, so the barrier between me and you two is just as strong as it was when I first returned in Ironridge. That's not a barrier that could be surmounted any time soon, even if I wanted it to be. Haven't we established that both of you are happier without the qualities I took with me when I left?"

Faye turned back to Halcyon and took a breath, conflicted about whether that was something she was supposed to take action on, or even wanted to take action on. Thoughts for later. For now, she offered her hoof. "Maybe we start with this?"

Halcyon nodded, swallowed and stepped forward, lifting her own and making contact.

Faye braced herself for the sensation, and it came.

It felt like pushing back against a magnet. She felt the feat she had instilled in Halcyon over pushing their limits and rediscovering their powers, a warning siren dredging up all the secrets she remembered that Halcyon still hadn't discovered yet. If they got too close, if those spilled over into her other half, there would be no going back. The life she had set up, had created Halcyon to live, was already a fading, illusory dream, hammered out into something neither of them were ready to admit wasn't real. And yet actually admitting it...

She couldn't tell Halcyon that she had ruined Corsica's life. Couldn't tell her that their special talent did more than she thought it did. Couldn't tell her that they were a changeling queen... at least until Halcyon figured that one out on her own.

And yet... the sensation wasn't as strong as it could have been. Maybe it was because they shared a body and trusted each other enough to take turns in control. Maybe it was because she cared deeply about Halcyon, as someone she had left behind to enjoy the life she didn't think she could have for herself. Whatever the reason, she found that she didn't need to spill any more of her secrets to stand her ground, to hold her hoof in place and look Halcyon in the eyes.

What she saw was a mirror of what she felt. There were barriers in Halcyon's eyes, ones Faye could easily guess at: the lingering fears she had instilled in her when shaping her early on, the limits on exploring her power and potential designed to protect her civilian life. Limits that had fought her explosively when she tried to reach for her powers before. Halcyon didn't fully know herself, couldn't trust that anything she tried to do would work, and Faye was the source of that.

But neither of them needed to resolve those issues, not tonight. All they needed, and they knew it, was to push past them for long enough to use their powers with a perfectly synchronized intent: get out of here and return to the real world.

Their connection was barely more than a hooftip, but slowly, the two halves of their bracelet began to slide down their legs towards each other, touching and fusing together in a flash of green light where their hooves met.

Faye met Halcyon's eyes, willing her fears and reservations not to trip her other half up again. Halcyon met Faye's eyes, trusting that she wouldn't. And the bracelet came alight with green flames.

Both of them glanced at Procyon, Faye's heart hammering out a beat that might have been perfectly synchronized with Halcyon's. "You're sure this is a good idea, right?" Halcyon asked their third. "It's kind of... uncomfortable."

"That's putting it mildly," Faye managed. "If it works, it works. Let's go?"

Procyon nodded, still wearing a poker face that just might have been hiding jealousy.

Their bracelet burner harder, and the red expanse around the bubble began to shiver as the bracelet prepared to consume.

Immediately, Faye felt like she was stuck in the nozzle of a vacuum cleaner. All her lucidity vanished in a flash, and her spatial awareness went with it. Her mind was sticky, like it had just been dipped in a jar of red molasses. As her green flames ate away at whatever was stuck to her, they pulled on her, too, with all the subtlety of a dog eating a chew toy.

But it worked. Her thoughts cohered and sped up enough to more consciously direct her power, and as she did, her void became more accurate and more effective, swallowing up whatever this red stuff was and not getting stuck as much failing to devour her. And soon, she was able to focus again on the world around her.

She was on the floor, collapsed next to her bed. The lights were out. She couldn't hear the rain anymore. It didn't feel like the ship was moving.

"Halcyon?" Faye called out, her voice sounding oddly disused. "What happened? Are you there?"

"Yeah," Halcyon said in the back of her mind. "I think we're back, but something feels wrong. Not, like, with us. With everything."

Faye nodded. "Everyone!?" She raised her voice. "What's going on?"

"Ghost me," Halcyon requested. "You check on Coda and get that red stuff out of our void, I'll fly around and look for the others."

Faye nodded, pushing Halcyon out into the world as a disembodied specter, who immediately zoomed off through a wall. As Halcyon left, she turned her thoughts inward, to the red goo.

There were no traces of it in the physical world, or even signs it had been physical at all, save for the odd sticky sensation that still lingered in her extremities, gradually fading as she burned her bracelet. All of it now sat deep in her void, where it felt like... she had eaten a nice, hearty meal of cardboard.

It had no nourishment, no identifiable traits or substance. It clearly existed. It had mass and volume, or whatever the mental equivalent of those was for emotional edibles. It wasn't taxing her to hold onto it. But it was bland, tasteless and incredibly impotent. Coda's false flattery was probably a more valuable thing to devour.

At least it didn't feel bad. It wasn't trying to align her towards anything she didn't want to associate with, like Ludwig had. And it might be useful for analyzing what had happened to them. So, expelling it could wait.

She got to her hooves, her legs protected by thin cloth night boots that were comfortable to sleep in and let her not worry about being seen. Her bracelet was right back where it belonged, on her leg and all in one piece. She kept it glowing, both for light and protection and to keep on purging the last of whatever had tried to purge her.

Her legs felt shaky and uncoordinated as she made her way to the closet to check on Coda, as if she hadn't walked or stood in a very long time. The filly was right where she usually was, locked in her iceberg and staring blankly into space. If she had gotten gummed up with red stuff too, there were no external signs to prove it. Nothing wrong with the rest of her cabin, either... No, scratch that.

It was actually a mess. Much messier than it should have been. it looked as if they had made a very rough, sudden landing.

And something felt even more wrong beyond that, something deeper than the last vestiges of whatever had hit her. Something in the air, in the world around her.

Something like... how Ironridge had felt after the sky turned gray, or how she had felt in the catacombs of Gyre.

Faye stumbled into the hallway, her legs still getting used to being used. "Everyone?"

The hallway was dark. Voices were coming from the bridge.

Faye ran towards it, wondering if Halcyon was already there as she burst through the door to the bridge. Puddles, Lissa and Flarefeather were all present, barely visible against the gloom as they engaged in a tense debate, but pausing so they could acknowledge her arrival.

"Hi," Puddles greeted, sounding strained. "Wasn't sure if you slept through our emergency landing..."

"Emergency landing?" Faye asked, seeing no signs of Halcyon. "What's going on?"

"Well," Flarefeather said, gesturing to the ship's broad windshield. "We're soliciting ideas. Working hypothesis: it's the end of the world."

There wasn't enough light in the cabin to cast a reflection as Faye approached the glass, her bracelet dimming so she could see better into the night.

The ship was grounded, sitting in a grassy field dotted with short, wide trees. They were on the edge of a rainstorm, moonbeams breaking through tiny gaps in the clouds as sheets of rain swept down around them. Except the rain wasn't falling. The clouds weren't moving, the moonbeams weren't shifting, and no wind blew through the grass to cause it to move. Everything hung in the air, paused perfectly where it was, as if time had simply ceased to flow.

"What the...?" Faye whispered, staring out at the timeless world.

"There was a bright flash of red," Lissa explained. "Then the ship lost power and she had to make an emergency landing." She gestured at Puddles.

"I checked the systems," Puddles explained, trying to keep a professional face up even though she clearly had no idea what was happening. "Nothing looks broken. We're just completely out of power, including all backups. Even the ones that weren't connected. Drained to the very last drop."

Faye glanced between them, guessing this meant none of them had shared her experience of sticky redness gluing up her mind. "Has anyone taken a look outside?"

"You mean gone out in person?" Flarefeather raised an eyebrow. "You wanna risk getting petrified like everything else out there? Your girl's not a coward, she's just saying..."

Faye frowned. It sure felt like the red flash had already done its worst, but no one else sounded like they had gotten themselves gummed up... At least she knew now that she could recover from it if it happened again. "I'm willing to do it," she volunteered. "Just... give me a minute to get my armor on first, just in case."

Everyone else was coming, too.

Puddles had to open the door manually, since the powered mechanism that usually controlled it was offline. Soon, it swung open, and Faye stepped forward into a world without motion.

Raindrops hung in the dark air around her, thin and streaked against the night. When she touched them, they broke off, becoming water again on the surface of her armor, trickling and dribbling across its surface. The grass moved when she touched it, colored a gray blue by the sporadic moonbeams and a fierce green by her bracelet. Dozens of tiny, rippling hills obscured the land's features with wave after wave of petrified grass - if water was pooling anywhere, or if it was properly draining, she couldn't tell.

Faye looked up, a curtain of rain wrapping around a moonbeam like a treble clef. She looked back, to the trail she had made through the raindrops by walking. She looked at the ship, a curtain of time-stopped water in the air behind it, where it had plowed through raindrops during its emergency landing and they had frozen again the moment they streamed off its hull. The ship's plume looked like an ice sculpture of a muscle tissue, glistening and twisting organically, a watery record of its trajectory preserved in the night sky.

Now that she was outside, it reminded her much more strongly of Ironridge. There, when the Flame of Kindness failed and its palace turned into a spire looming above the city, it was as if the heavens forgot how they were supposed to function, gave up and turned a blank, empty gray. That time, there hadn't been a flash or any red stickiness, sure, but the feeling in the air in the aftermath...

The sky was still working, at least. She could see moonlight through the cracks in the clouds. But the world seemed to have forgotten a core part of its identity, as if the weather had reached the end of its script and now held still, awaiting further instructions.

Red... Was there a palace in this area? Was that its color? Faye gritted her teeth against a rising tide of frustration and helplessness. Had the same thing really happened again? All she had been through, all she and Halcyon had done to try to fix the one that broke in Ironridge, and now it was happening again? She had to be wrong. This had to be caused by something else. Something else, that gave her the same weird sensation that a feeling in the air she had never been without was suddenly missing.

She gritted her teeth. She needed someone to tell her that she was off on a goose chase, that there was no way it had all been for nothing and things were failing faster than she could fix them... and then suddenly, as if responding to her wishes, Halcyon was there.

Her ghostly other self flew down through the frozen weather, her face a pensive mask.

"Well?" Faye asked, praying for good news.

"I went up above the clouds," Halcyon reported. "I know what you're thinking, and the sky's normal, at least. But a really long ways to the south, near the mountains, there's a giant ruby tower just like the one that appeared in Ironridge."

She didn't need to say the last part: it definitely hadn't been there before. Faye could feel it, could recognize this lack of something in the air. She already knew.

Faye sat down in the wet grass without speaking. That felt natural, at least.

"...Are you alright?" Halcyon asked. "Something still wrong with our body?"

"Why is this happening?" Faye whispered. "What's going to happen if it continues? It's not fair. I'd just started getting used to the idea of playing a role in the world again, and..."

"...Put me back in charge," Halcyon offered. "We'll figure out something we can do. I think the first step is getting our ship back in the air, then making it to that crystal tower to see if there's still a flame we can save."

"Right," I said, back on the bridge with Puddles, Lissa and Flarefeather, trying to piece together the least-alarming way to lay out what I knew. "So I don't think it's the end of the world in a 'we'll all be dead by tomorrow' sense..."

"Highly reassuring," Lissa told me, nodding.

"What I want to know is, how's your luck this bad?" Flarefeather asked, looking sideways at me. "Listen, I let you drill through my head how you were super cursed and all the ways stepping outside our safe little tower could go badly, but do you have a calamity djinn breathing down your back or something?"

I shook my head. "If it makes you feel any different, these conditions probably reach Wilderwind too. The important thing is, this is the same thing that happened in Ironridge, except a different rule of how the world works has stopped functioning. And it's happened at other points in the world throughout history too. I don't know if we can fix it, or even why it happened, but there's a giant crystal tower that caused it by appearing somewhere to the south, and the first step is to get there so we can investigate."

"Oh, so fixing it is on the table!" Flarefeather brightened, still clearly freaked out. "That's good. That's great! I've always wanted to save the world. Is there no one better qualified to, you know, turn the weather back on?"

"There had better be, because I'm not very qualified," I sighed.

"You say that," Lissa pointed out, "while laying out a plan of action. Apparently you've seen this before? And Flarefeather was telling me how once you're done in the Empire, you're meaning to go stop a war in Yakyakistan?" She raised an eyebrow at Puddles. "Even you don't throw yourself in front of stuff like that."

Puddles gave her a challenging look. "Guess what problem we're about to be throwing ourselves in front of."

I straightened up a little, relieved to have Puddles' backing - I knew a whole lot about getting myself into trouble that I didn't have the resources to see through. "Well, let's get to it. How's the ship?"

"Out of power." Puddles grimaced. "Whatever that red shock wave was that swept by when the weather froze, it caused all of our batteries to go as empty as they day they were made... Meh. Didn't I already say this?" She glanced at me, then shook her head. "So I hate to say it, but before we can go flying off to save the day, we need to get to a city and trade for some filled batteries."

I frowned, noting that they had seen it and it apparently had effects on the world other than whatever it did to me... We hadn't just ran out by accident, right? Had it actually neutralized all of the stored mana energy in the ship's reserves? Bizarre.

"So what does that mean, a little cross-country flying?" Flarefeather raised an eyebrow. "I'm no lazybones, but can't say I've practiced that too much in Wilderwind."

"Unless you wanted to stay with the ship," Puddles said. "I'd feel more comfortable if someone did, but none of us are suited for it. The Izvalden capital is very close, and I should be able to negotiate for supplies as a free favor from its ruler. I'm not sending you three there while I stay behind. I'm not leaving you or your friend behind while I go. And Halcyon, I'd trust to stay behind and keep watch, but since she seems to know the most about what's happening out of any of us, I want her present to investigate and ask questions."

"Lord Izvaldi?" Flarefeather tilted her head. "I know that's where we were going before all this happened, but this sure is going to make for an uplifting family reunion."

Lissa nodded. "Or we could not bring it up at all. If we're trying to get in and out quickly, none of them need to find out you're a lost member of the Izvalden royal family."

As they talked, my thoughts drifted to the ship's fifth crew member: Coda. Frozen in an iceberg, and currently hunted by Rhodallis, who wanted her back after I stole her in Gyre. My goals had become immeasurably more complicated after I left her behind the first time, and if we all had to abandon the ship, there was no way I was leaving her again.

"Sounds like we all go," I declared, straightening up. "And keep our wings crossed that the weird weather discourages any bandits from roaming the area. Get ready to travel. Let's not waste any time."

The hills were too muddy and too uneven for me to pull Coda's cart. And so, I wound up carrying her on my back instead.

Step after step, I tromped through the stilled world, bringing up the back of the procession. Puddles led the way, dressed fully in her Black Knight armor and carrying a sack that held the ship's empty mana cores. Lissa and Flarefeather both flew, wearing their Wilderwind Escort uniforms, preferring to keep their glittery indoor boots out of the mud.

It didn't take long to reach the edge of the storm, the rain falling off and the clouds growing patchy enough to let starlight through. I stared up at the sky as I walked, feeling far more relief than I should have to see the stars twinkle, alive and vibrant instead of Ironridge's blank gray.

But my view of the sky didn't last long. Soon after we found a road, a fog bank descended to replace the storm, the suspended clouds getting lower and lower until we were walking through a hazy curtain of mist. Unlike for the raindrops, we didn't seem to leave any noticeable trails, though maybe that was because there was nothing to see beyond the fog save for more fog. Either way, my bracelet glowed green, providing light for all of us as we trudged onward towards the capital.

"Psst," Flarefeather whispered in my ear as I walked, hovering low to the ground.

"Eh?" It didn't feel wise to raise my voice, either.

"Your cursed glowing bracelet thing," Flarefeather breathed. "It doesn't take energy to glow like that? Guess it didn't get drained like the ship's batteries?"

I glanced down at it. Where did my bracelet's power come from? I didn't get tired out from using it too much. I still didn't know nearly enough about what changeling queen crowns were, where they came from, the mechanism that made this one mine, and how they worked... Questions that were especially relevant after whatever Faye and I had done to get it to work inside that bubble with Procyon. It definitely wasn't mana technology. But was there a way to extract or convert its power into mana?

Another idea for the pile of things to research once I had a lab again.

"No answer? Huh." Flarefeather drifted out of my personal space. "Guess that means you never thought about it before."

I plodded along, keeping Coda balanced and daydreaming about all the possible applications I could find for a converter that attached to my bracelet and made renewable mana from whatever its green flames were. Powered armor like Puddles, powered weapons, recharging the airship, perhaps even a rudimentary jetpack...

The fog was too thick to make out the terrain as we followed the road, but someone had probably spent effort making it flatter, and we passed through thin stretches bounded by trees and longer stretches without any in sight. And eventually, after what I judged to be four to five miles, I started picking up on the outskirts of a city.

Houses began cropping up with dark windows, lining the road and extending back into the fog. Small alleys and larger roads branched off to the sides, vanishing quickly between the single-story buildings, not organized into any apparent city block structure. Dim structures on the street corners looked like they were supposed to house street lighting, but were all presently extinguished. That was weird, and more than a little disconcerting.

In fact, I didn't see lights anywhere. Had whatever happened to our power supplies hit this whole town as well?

...I didn't see any other signs of life at all, either. Hopefully that was just because it was the early hours of the morning.

Fortunately, Puddles seemed to know the layout of the streets, because she led us into progressively richer-looking districts as we proceeded - none that I'd actually describe as rich, but still more elegant homes with larger yards and better street planning than the ones on the outskirts.

"We're almost to Lord Izvaldi's manor," Puddles remarked under her breath. "Its owner is something of a night owl, so odds are we'll have to deal with him directly. Either way, look cool, be stoic and leave all the talking to me. Remember, our only goal is to swap the dead mana cores for charged ones and then be on our way."

"Got it," Lissa quietly agreed.

"Not to be a downer," Flarefeather warned, "but I haven't seen a single sign that this town has power since we arrived. What if they don't have any to trade?"

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it," Puddles grunted back.

I was with Flarefeather on this. If the town had any power, I should have seen it by now.

At the end of a road lined on both sides with very nice homes, we arrived at a proper mansion, a pair of pegasus guards stationed at the gate: together, they marked the first people I had seen since disembarking the ship. I wasn't quite ready for the relief I felt at seeing proof that the city wasn't a ghost town.

"Black Knight!" the guards greeted, bowing as one. "Your timing couldn't be better...!"

"So I gather," Puddles said, adopting her gruff knight persona, her features completely hidden beneath her armor.

"We're in a sorry state to receive you," one of the guards apologized. "The town abruptly lost power about three hours ago. And there's some disturbing news coming in through the teleportation guild, though I'm assuming it's all related to the reason you're here..."

The other guard was rolling open the mansion's heavy iron gate. "Do you know anything about what's going on out there, Black Knight?"

"Nothing I can talk about," Puddles grunted. "Your power stores. Are they depleted too?"

The first guard grimaced. "I've been out here since the lights went out. Couldn't tell you. Only heard what the runner from the guild had to say when I let them in."

Puddles nodded, walking in through the open gate, the guards assuming we were her entourage and waving us in too. "I'll see what I can do."

I followed her through the mansion's curated courtyard, past hedge sculptures that looked like shadow puppets against the mist. Flarefeather and Lissa both landed, now that there was an actual stone path instead of muddy grass, and I shifted Coda's trolley from my back onto the ground so it looked a little less eye-catching... though with how much mist had condensed into frost on its surface, it was fully impossible to see that there was a filly inside.

We reached a large stone patio that served as the entryway. One of the guards swung open a pair of sturdy oak double doors, motioned for us to step inside, and then hurried in ahead of us, treading carefully in the dark.

My bracelet cast a sinister light on the checkered, black-and-white marble floor as we waited. The foyer had two symmetrical staircases, each footed near a low table with a couch and tea set, several stone pillars holding up the roof. All of these cast shadows on the walls that moved as I did, barely visible due to the light source moving along with me. It created the illusion that something was hiding behind every single hiding place in the room, always ducking out of sight just as I shifted to better see it.

The one thing the foyer didn't have was a sense of depth. It was wider than it was long, and there was no door or hall deeper into the mansion directly across from the entrance. All the ways forward were either to the sides or up the stairs, plus a couple of small doors that weren't symmetrical and didn't line up with the middle of the room. Instead, the far wall had two bookcases, a nightstand with a vase, a portrait of a fat old pegasus in a kingly robe, and a grandfather clock. None of it symmetrically arranged.

All of that, combined with the overdone symmetry everywhere else in the room, created the impression that the far wall wasn't supposed to be there, that under normal circumstances it wouldn't be there, and it had been put there just for me to show that I wasn't welcome. I decided immediately that I didn't like this place.

A light glowed in one of the doors - all of which were mostly closed, but cracked open just a little - before it swung open, guided by the telltale shimmer of unicorn telekinesis. From the number of hoofsteps and amount of muttering that approached, there were quite a few creatures about to enter.

The procession was spearheaded by two middle-aged ponies in sharp business suits: a unicorn mare who was the source of the aura, and a pegasus stallion with dark, lithe features and a slicked-back mane who wore a katana at his side. The mare brightened her aura, and the stallion nodded to Puddles in a small show of respect.

Next up was the pegasus from the portrait, a large, elderly stallion who wore a clearly fake black toupe and might have once had an impressive figure, but had badly gone to seed. He looked flabby and sour, not at all like he was living in the kind of luxury his deep purple, spotted fur-lined robe or gem-crusted crown would suggest.

Behind him were three servants, all sharply dressed yet clearly differentiated in demeanor from the two who had entered first. Those two were important.

"Ah!" the kingly pegasus exclaimed, his voice warbling in a practiced manner, as if he thought speaking with a trill made him sound more refined. "The Black Knight! Your timing is adequate. I have need of you! We are in the middle of an emergency. And none of my incompetent, so-called servants are willing to do as I ask and fix it. You, on the other hoof, have never failed to disappoint! So, when can I expect you to fix this... this, this..." He waved a hoof in a circle, fishing for words. "This outrageous farce that has visited my beautiful kingdom?"

I winced every time he rolled an R.

"That's why I'm here," Puddles grunted. "Give me the details, and any mana cores you can spare, and I'll see it done."

"Details?" The pegasus, who could only be Lord Izvaldi, squinted at her. "You mean you don't already know? Consul Barrows has been murdered on my beautiful property, and now I am the prime suspect! There we were, drinking wine over a game of chess while discussing the latest in theater from Stormhoof, when he keeled over! The Consul collapsed right in front of me, didn't even have the decency to set his drink down first so it wouldn't spill. Very expensive wine, you know. And a very expensive floor! Richer than anything the servants cleaning it can buy, I see to that much. You will clear my good name with the Consulate, yes?" He leaned forward, squinting at Puddles with his beady eyes. "I can't have their... their soldiers coming and tromping around my beautiful home."

"And the power outage?" Puddles asked.

"Ah, the power outage," Lord Izvaldi puffed, seemingly struggling to breathe over his inflated girth. "Set up by the Consulate as cover for raiding my estate, no doubt. That's not what they'll tell you, but doesn't it make sense? It is imperative to clear my name, yet none... none of my useless servants were willing to do as I asked when I told them to fix it! What do they think I pay them for, to say no when their lord has a request?" He eyed up Puddles harder. "You never... ignore my requests, do you?"

As he rambled with the force and bravado of an avalanche, I turned to Lissa and Flarefeather, raising an eyebrow higher and higher. Both of them were standing inconspicuously in the cover provided by Coda's iceberg, their expressions turning increasingly incredulous with every second the pegasus talked.

"This is Crowscone Izvaldi?" Lissa whispered, peering out at the spectacle. "The guy you said is your dad?"

"Better not be," Flarefeather whispered back, mortified. "First time I've ever actually seen him, and I have so many questions... Dead Consuls are really bad, right? You think that's linked to the weather, and the power outage, and...?"

"Yeah, well, I've only got one," Lissa quietly countered, looking like she wanted to squish Flarefeather's cheeks. "How did you turn out so cute? Your dad is kinda gross, girl."

I made a sharp gesture at them to focus. Their relationship with adventuring might still have been in its honeymoon phase, but tonight felt poised to end that with a vengeance.

Recollection

"As I've been trying to tell you," Crowscone Izvaldi ranted, his girth shaking beneath his royal robe, "Consul Barrows has been murdered! It is an outrage, and I want everyone on it this instant!"

"Calm down," Puddles gruffly instructed, her face hidden behind the impassive midnight helm of the Black Knight. "What actions have you taken so far? Have you cordoned off the crime scene?"

"Ah, yes, the crime scene," Crowscone puffed. "I sent my dithering servants to clean it up several hours ago. You, what did you do with the body?"

He pointed at the pegasus with the katana, who wore a pressed suit and a cross, tired expression. The pegasus sighed, stepped forward and bowed. "I moved the good Consul's 'remains' to a secure location. Perhaps you might leave the rest of our coordination to me and rest easy for the night?"

Crowscone kept his beady gaze fixed on the katana pegasus. "You are up to the task, I trust?"

"Naturally," the katana pegasus replied, bowing again. "Your every wish is my command."

"Hmmph." Crowscone turned up his chin, then walked closer to Puddles. "Don't feel obligated to do anything he says," he muttered, bringing his mouth up next to the metal ears on her helmet. "I put you in charge of this for a reason, after all. A very good one! Yes, a very... very good one, you..." He stepped away, continuing to mutter under his breath. "Oh, yes! If any soldiers from the Consulate show up, you are to send them packing. I don't care how nicely they ask. No allowing them to snoop around!"

He then excused himself, departing through a door and taking the three lesser servants with him, the light from a horn disappearing into the shadows.

Puddles sighed, then turned to the katana pegasus. "What do I need to know?"

The katana pegasus bowed. "You didn't come here to get involved in my father's scheming with the Consul, did you, Black Knight?"

"We have other priorities," Puddles agreed. "Your power situation. I notice your choice of lighting." She gestured at the remaining unicorn - the mare who was just as well-dressed as her companion.

The katana pegasus nodded. "Power to the city has been cut off at the source. From the reports, I believe this to be a wider phenomena than just our city. Additionally, all forms of storage have gone mysteriously empty." His eyes found the sack on her back. "If you're here to request what it looks like, then the answer is get in line."

I fidgeted as he spoke. Getting involved with a murder mystery sounded like a great way to not reach the crystal tower in any sort of hurry, at a time when every second counted. Puddles clearly knew that. But she had told us to leave all the speaking to her, so all I could do was trust that she knew what she was doing and could get us out of this...

"Tell me the contents of your reports," Puddles requested. "There is more afoot tonight than local intrigue."

The katana pegasus nodded, his face partly shadowed by his mane in the light from his companion's horn. "Mysterious weather patterns across Izvaldi. Tales of a 'red shock wave' passing by, and the wind and rain simply pausing. Alas, the teleportation guild is more of a local warning system than the national endeavor it once was, so there is little information about the conditions beyond our borders."

"I see," Puddles grunted. "And what if we needed to get south as fast as possible?"

"I can't think of a way faster than waiting for morning," the katana pegasus apologized. "Once the populace awakens and there is better light to see by, it will be easier to take stock of the situation and muster our resources."

Puddles turned her helmet toward me. "Can this wait for morning?"

My backwards ears fell. "If not, then we're probably screwed. But what options do we have?"

Technically, there was a way to make my way south in something resembling a hurry: running full tilt, and using my bracelet not to get tired. But the last time I tried using it to power a cross-country trek, it really didn't work out that well. I couldn't gamble on that not happening again. Not when I'd need to be in sound mind to actually do anything once we reached the Crystal Palace...

"...Are introductions in order?" The katana pegasus glanced at me, acknowledging my presence for the first time. "I am Neeve, Crown Prince of Izvaldi. This is Corona, my marefriend." He gestured to the unicorn who was providing light beside him. "I apologize if I took you for a porter."

Something prickled me about the way he said it. Maybe it was the implication that the iceberg on my trolley was nothing more than arcane luggage, or maybe I was still on edge from the mansion's inhospitable architecture...

"These are my associates," Puddles replied, beckoning for Lissa and Flarefeather to stand a little more in view and conspicuously not mentioning our names.

"Charmed," Neeve said, sounding not particularly impressed. "Now, might we offer you rooms for the night? Perhaps ones far from the commotion around the Consul, seeing as you have somewhere to be and it wouldn't do to get tied down in local drama. Come daybreak, I shall see if a scouting party can be organized that might bear you closer to your destination. As for my father, leave handling his reaction to me."

"We accept," Puddles grunted. "Thank you for your understanding."

Neeve gestured to his companion. "Corona, if you please?"

"Of course." She bowed, speaking in a professional voice that was much less sly than Neeve's, but sounded as if she had given up on much over her life. "Please follow me."

I held my tongue as we navigated the mansion's corridors. After the claustrophobic foyer, it opened up into something more opulent and usable - not surprising, since this was a lord's home, and not just his front door. What was going on here? Not just with Neeve and Crowscone, there was clearly foul play involved with whatever had happened to the Consul and one or both of them was in on it. But Puddles? Why was she playing along? And when would I get a chance to ask about it?

Eventually, Corona stopped in front of a door branching off from a hallway, not overly ornate compared to the others but still embellished a little with the likeness of stone pillars carved into the wall masonry at its sides. "You can make use of this suite," she said, tapping the door with her horn and flickering it in a pattern that suggested an unlocking spell. "You have your own lights?"

She glanced at my bracelet, and seemed satisfied with a simple affirmation when I nodded.

"Thank you," Puddles said, motioning us in through the door before bringing up the rear. "We'll speak again in the morning."

"I look forward to it," Neeve replied, in a tone that suggested ulterior motives. "Pleasant dreams."

And then the door was closed, two sets of hoofsteps clearly departing until an unnatural silence reigned.

"Pssst," Flarefeather whispered in the emerald-shadowed darkness. "That guy is totally the culprit."

"Perhaps," Puddles sighed, pulling off her helmet. "Do you really want to get involved?"

"I..." I cut myself off, realizing what she was doing. "Is it safe to talk in here, first off? This room isn't tapped or bugged or spied on?"

Puddles shook her head, looking weary. "Even if there were bugs, they'd be all out of power."

I glanced around at the contents of the room, lifting my bracelet hoof for light. It seemed to be a common area, with a couch and table in the middle and a door on either end connected to what must have been two bedrooms. But checking those out would have to wait, because Lissa and Flarefeather weren't waiting to start talking.

"So let me get this straight," Lissa accused, keeping her voice low. "The fat old senile stallion, who is you-know-who's dad..." She jabbed Flarefeather's shoulder with a wing. "He wants you to investigate a murder. His shady son, whom he doesn't trust with the investigation, clearly doesn't want us to get involved and gave us a very polite and respectable excuse not to, in a fashion that suggested he knew you would take it. And then you did. Whose side are you on, here?"

Puddles gave her a flat look. "The people's."

Lissa tilted her head.

"Who speaks for the creatures in the city we passed through on our way here?" Puddles asked. "What do they gain from anything that happens in this place? I don't have time to waste on drama between nobility." She shook her head. "For every noble that kills a noble, there are twenty civilians who are robbed by bandits or lose a child to illness or start to think Gottlieb Gallowsborn was onto something. I do what it takes to maintain a working relationship with the rulers here so they will let me continue to work in their province, and nothing more."

Lissa fidgeted. "So you're okay with everything that just got said back there."

Puddles gritted her teeth. "The ruler of Izvaldi brags about making sure the servants cleaning his floors can't afford those floors themselves. Do I look okay with it?" She sighed. "The ponies and griffons of Izvaldi don't have a leader who puts them first. My job would be so much easier if they did. But I'm not a revolutionary. I don't lead charges and promise riches and fame for the people who follow me. What I'm trying to do is inspire them to make promises to themselves, to fight for their own sake. But, it just... meh..."

"That sounds noble, and all," Flarefeather skeptically admitted. "But it still felt mega weird to see you cozying up to someone so sleazy."

"Crowscone is the one who cozies up to me," Puddles countered halfheartedly. "As for Neeve... I've known him for a long time. He honors his deals, and we've had a pact for a while now. I ignore what I see in the mansion, don't try to manipulate his father too hard, and don't rock the boat so much that his family loses power. He turns a blind eye to what I do with the rest of the province in return. I know how it sounds when I say that. But I decided that if I could be for the people and neutral to the government, that was a deal I couldn't afford not to take."

"Is that worth it?" Lissa raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you supposed to be a paragon of virtue who inspires people through your deeds? Because that's literally what I thought you were supposed to be. Someone who doesn't have to make compromises like that."

Puddles defensively met her gaze. "Sorry to burst your bubble, but I'm just one mare with a suit of armor and a legendary dad. I wish I didn't have to, but I can't gamble with everyone's futures to find out."

Lissa gave her a slow, sideways nod. "I'm not the expert on what's possible and what's practical out in the big, bad world. But the kind of person everyone really looks up to is the kind who shows them that you don't have to compromise to get what you want, whether it's good or not. Just saying."

I cleared my throat, stepping up to Puddles' defense before she could answer. "Easy to say when you haven't faced the limits of forging your own path time and again. Do you know how many times I've given everything I had and still came up short?" I glanced pointedly at Coda's iceberg on its trolley. "If I saw someone who actually could just cut their way through all the knots I've struggled to untangle, I wouldn't call them a hero. Real strength is what it takes to keep going after you've sold yourself out when forced into a no-win situation."

"You sure you wouldn't?" Lissa turned her gaze on me. "Couldn't watch someone prove your problems are optional and not want a piece of that for yourself, instead?"

I hesitated half a second too long, and she kept talking.

"I've lived my life watching the rich and powerful," Lissa told me. "I know the difference between the people who make their own paths, and the people who follow along and try to emulate them or ride their coattails. I've seen over and over again how the people rules are for behave around the people who make the rules. Can you really tell yourself you could watch someone do what you've always wanted to do and not want to be them?"

Her lance broke through my armor through a fault she couldn't possibly have known: I had spent years pretending I was other ponies, looking at the mares I admired and trying on bits of their personalities like they were clothing. Imagining myself with Corsica's confidence, Mother's perseverance and Elise's grace... In hindsight, those years were formative years where the line between Faye and my mask was blurry, and we must have been a little bit of both, still shaping the process of who I would become.

But that was who I was. Speaking as the mask, at least, that desire was at the core of my reason for existence: being someone else, so I wouldn't be Faye anymore.

"Guess that means you can't," Lissa said, reading my expression and nodding a little.

Flarefeather tapped her wingtips together, sensing an opportune moment to change the subject. "So, what do you actually do for the people here anyway?" She glanced at Puddles.

"At dawn, you might get to find out," Puddles sighed, starting towards one of the adjacent bedrooms. "...If you think you can do better, go for it. I can get you out of trouble with Neeve one time by pleading ignorance of the rules on your behalves. Try not to get caught. Don't start a rebellion. And whatever you learn about how they backstabbed a Consul, I hope you find it worth making a bad first impression."

She clanked into the room, and started rustling about with the telltale doffing of armor.

Flarefeather stared at Lissa. Lissa stared at Flarefeather. Both of them turned to me.

"Can we borrow your light?" Lissa whispered.

"More importantly, wanna come with?" Flarefeather invited. "We've got a case to crack."

"Hold up," I warned. "First off, super cursed, no borrowing. Second, I know you're not thrilled with the fact that she needs to make shady deals to get by, but do you really see something for us in this dead Consul mystery? And third, I'm not fantastic at stealth."

Lissa nodded. "We're going south to visit your tower, right? Much further past here and you're in Neo Everlaste's land. Having a good in with the Consulate would be pretty valuable, don't you think?"

At this, Flarefeather hesitated. "You're actually gonna sell them out? See, I was just curious how they did it."

Lissa looked at me, waiting for my response.

"...Dunno," I admitted. "It sounds like bridge burning. But admittedly, I'm not planning on staying around here forever. It would mean I'd need to finish everything I plan on doing in Izvaldi during this trip, though, and I've got some stuff to do that's maybe less important than making it to the tower..."

Lissa considered this.

"And anyway," Flarefeather continued in her stead, "what do you mean, you're not sneaky? You are a sarosian, right?"

"What's that got to do with it?" I raised an eyebrow.

"You know, the whole shadow swimming thing?" Flarefeather raised an eyebrow. "If you came, you could even hide us with you. We'd be totally indetectible."

I frowned. "Could hide you with me? What?"

"Is that not a thing?" Flarefeather tilted her head. "That's totally supposed to be a thing, right? How you can take passengers who aren't sarosians when you go all two dimensional?"

I wracked my memories. Right, that was supposed to be a thing, but I had never learned it. Probably because touching other ponies made me uncomfortable, so all it took was a few failures to discourage further experimentation... "Dunno how," I admitted, realizing this might prompt her to change that.

"What?" Flarefeather gave me an indignant look. "That's like being a pegasus who doesn't know how to fly-! Uh, I mean, forget I said that? You, uh, really don't, huh?" She reddened bashfully.

"Never gotten it to work," I apologized.

"Here, show me," Flarefeather commanded, recovering her mojo and marching up to me. "I wanna see how you try, and where it breaks down. Your luck's bound to turn around somewhere, right?"

I frowned. "Is this just an excuse to ask me to make physical contact? I feel like you're not taking this situation seriously, here..."

Flarefeather aggressively shrugged. "This is basically a vacation, sue me. And is trying to help you learn an important ability really not taking this seriously? Think of how much more you could do if you could spirit someone away through the shadows!"

"Fine..." I sighed, closing the distance between us and putting a hoof - not my bracelet hoof - over her back. Then I kicked my bracelet off over a table, since I wouldn't be able to swim with it glowing and wouldn't be able to see with it off.

I hadn't really tried parting with it while using it, before. But it felt like it would work, and somehow, it did. The bracelet came to a rest without bouncing, still glowing softly green.

"Okay," I said, holding Flarefeather as tight as my strange queasiness would let me, focusing on the plentiful shadows cast by my bracelet. "Going down slowly..."

It worked. For me, at least. I sank down gradually into the shadows, but Flarefeather didn't come with me, stuck stubbornly on the surface. It felt like I imagined it would to try to dive while holding an inner tube.

For a moment, I pushed her against the floor, and she crouched down to try to follow me. But it just didn't work.

"Well?" I asked, eventually giving up.

"Hmmm..." Flarefeather frowned, rubbing her chin with a wingtip.

"Try making actual contact," Lissa advised. "Both of you are wearing clothes. Maybe that messes with the magic somehow?"

I glanced at my combat boots. No way was I going bare-legged, especially around two mares who knew a lot about leg markings like mine.

"Well, your wings are free," Flarefeather pointed out. "And, uh, you could try..." She fiddled with her skimpy dress suit, revealing a seam where the top half met the skirt. "Reaching my back through here?"

I sighed. "No. That sounds lewd. This is your experiment, you can just take the thing off. You're not thinking of stealthing in a glitter dress anyway, are you?"

Flarefeather looked just a little put out, even if she couldn't argue with my logic. "Fiiine. Here, Lissa, help me with this and I'll help get yours..."

While the two pegasi undressed each other in the middle of the living room, I sat down and faced a wall. They definitely weren't taking this seriously. Maybe I ought to make the most of the rest of the night and get some sleep...

"Sounds wise," Faye remarked in the back of my mind. "Though, not if it leads to those two going off on their own. This started off as a friendly first adventure like Aldebaran seemed to be for us, and it's quickly getting grittier."

I folded my backwards ears. Yeah. I had stopped being scared of what the world could do to me a while ago, it felt like, but these two... I couldn't let this trip break their spirits. Even if their brand of enthusiasm could get a little annoying. I needed them to succeed, and more importantly, to be alright.

Speaking of... I stole a glance back at the frisky pegasi. Did Faye have any ideas about why I felt so weird touching other ponies? Had we discussed this before? Could that be why I couldn't take passengers when shadow sneaking?

"I don't know," Faye replied in my head. "Maybe. We're scared of something that might happen, that's for certain. But whether it's something someone could do to us, or something we could do to someone else, that's an open question. I think it's most likely the latter. This might all tie back to what our bracelet did to Mother. And maybe it's a remnant of the barriers I built into you to stop you from exploring our powers. We've definitely got some of those left... but I remember feeling it too." She thought for a moment. "I think Procyon said something about taking our attraction to other ponies with her when she left. I don't know what that would feel like. But maybe with that gone, physical repulsion is what we have left?"

I sighed. Hmm.

"Mind letting me take over for a bit?" Faye asked. "I'm kind of curious to try this for myself."

I tilted my head. She actually wanted to? Sure, go ahead.

Faye settled back into control of the body she shared with Halcyon, immediately ghosting her mask so she could fly off and explore. As they grew more comfortable with each other, and as Faye in particular grew more used to the idea of being up front, switching was a much more seamless transition than it used to be. The wave of disorientation that came with it was manageable enough by now that they could do it during a conversation without arousing suspicion, aside from the slightly different speaking cadences each of them had developed.

She stared at the wall, and focused on her void. What she really wanted to try was something she had actively been trying not to do for most of the time she had been up front until now.

It used to be that whenever she was up front, especially during the years when she was almost constantly sleeping, that she would see a field of stars surrounding her, constellations of lights in the distance that each would correspond to a living pony. This had been everything from frightening to a distraction, like a sun spot on her eyes that never went away. The implications, which she still didn't fully understand, put her nerves on edge somehow, a tempting expanse that conflicted with the empty wind in her ears, beckoning her towards some nameless action she knew she had to avoid.

Somehow, the weirdness of it, her desire for it to fade into the background so that she could focus on the world the way other ponies saw it, had prevented her from ever considering this vision's applications. Applications like... telling if there was a guard nearby.

She might not know how to shadow swim with passengers. But tonight, for the sake of keeping her friends safe while they investigated a murder mystery that had very little to do with saving the world, she was going to stop blocking this out, and see if she couldn't learn how to parse what she was seeing into something more useful.

Faye focused, but it didn't work. The stars were distant and blurry, if they were there at all. Something was missing...

Her bracelet, glowing away on the table.

Faye frowned, glancing at it as Lissa and Flarefeather giggled together. She could walk over and pick it up, but if this was a night for testing untested powers...

She stretched her bracelet leg out, trying to remember how she had felt in the catacombs of Gyre, when her bracelet - halfway across the world in the possession of Seigetsu - had mysteriously returned to her foreleg. Could she do that again?

Nothing happened. Oh well. Faye marched across the room to pick it up normally, hoping she could at least turn a zero for two into a one for three.

When she put it on, the stars once again came into focus in her vision, a background phenomenon she wasn't sure she was seeing with her physical eyes. She had spent a lot of effort pushing them into the background so they wouldn't serve as a constant distraction, just like the rushing in her ears, and the more she thought of herself as a person, the less in-her-face they seemed to be. But they were unquestionably there.

Lissa and Flarefeather were remarkably close and remarkably bright, almost so much so that it made her want to push the stars away again. And there were many, many more. Try as she might, though, something broke down in Faye's mind when trying to translate the stars she saw into physical space, as if she wasn't perceiving them in a spatial system that quite aligned with reality. Only the two that were close enough to see and touch, she was certain of. Even the one a room over that should have been Puddles didn't seem to fit with her understanding of the mansion's layout, or even of three-dimensional space. This wasn't just free x-ray vision, this was hard.

But she would make it work. Faye squinted, and she stared, and she studied the star field, looking out into a parallel universe as she paced around the room, reality fading into the background of her senses as she allowed this other sense to take its place.

Some of the stars that she saw were weird. There was a red one, similar in size and intensity to all the others, yet off in color. Actually, there was another red one, though it wasn't really a star; it looked almost more like a ring, or whatever a ring would be in this world that didn't correspond to geometry. And then somewhere far below her - up and down did make sense here, even if nothing else did - there was something, like a hole where a star belonged, but none was present. That one was particularly hard to look at, because there was nothing there to see.

And then there was Coda. The entire iceberg glowed with a light that seemed to threaten her, like a thug asking 'Who are you lookin' at?' She couldn't see if anything was inside.

"...ey! ...yon?"

A voice barely reached her over the sound of her void in her ears, and she had just enough wherewithal to pull herself out of her head and realize it was coming from the real world.

"Nice daydreams?" Flarefeather asked, smirking in front of her. "Check this."

She and Lissa had both doffed everything save for their boots. The boots themselves, it took Faye a moment to realize, had been turned inside out: their glittery, sequined exteriors were now hidden against the mares' legs, replaced with a fluffy, padded, sock-like interior that surely had a professional reason to be turned outwards. A reason like... being dead silent when Flarefeather showed off her steps, almost gliding across the floor when she slid on their fluffy, cushioned pads.

"There ya go," Flarefeather invited. "Now try a wing on my back. And remember, if this doesn't work, we're not giving up or rolling out until you ditch your own anti-stealth armor."

Faye swallowed, nodded, and put a wing over Flarefeather's back, holding her against her side. She hadn't fully boxed away her star sight yet, and having Flarefeather's star so close, physically touching it... Yes, this definitely had to do with the twisting, uncomfortable feeling that encouraged her to break contact and jump away.

And it didn't just have something to do with it. Faye couldn't tear her gaze away as an idea unfolded and grew in front of her, like blood pooling around a body she had realized too late was a corpse.

She could break this living thing that she held. Break it and take it as easily as drawing breath. And if she did, she could keep it with her always. That was what Flarefeather was for. It was what Faye was for. It was what her body was meant to do.

Faye wanted to hide. To sink down, to put her defenses back in place, to forget what she had suddenly remembered about why she left to live behind a mask, this wrong impulse that made sense in the world of her void and her star sight but translated horribly to reality and grew worse the longer she thought about it. And as she did so, she felt something struggling at her side.

"Woah!" Flarefeather gasped as Faye surfaced again, gulping down air. "Hey, you did it! And that was really bizarre. Are sarosians seriously just used to that?"

"Can I try?" Lissa asked, curious and impressed. "I wonder if you can do two of us at the same time."

"I need a second," Faye whispered, voice taut as she tried to steady herself, still reeling from the fading vision of Flarefeather as a trophy to be collected and consumed. "Please."

"Are you alright?" Flarefeather's concern for herself started to morph to concern for Faye. "That didn't feel the same to you as it did to me, right?"

"Just a second..." Faye waved her off. She didn't have Halcyon to hide behind, not now. Halcyon had flown off to go exploring. All she had was herself, and her own determination to stay functional in the world. She could do this. She had to.

When she saw the world only in terms of stars and voids, it made so much sense that one belonged in the other. But her void was a place for carrying around flames of harmony that needed to be rescued, and red quasi-real sludge that paralyzed her until she could get rid of it and analyze it. Not for people. Not for friends.

She repeated that mantra, chanted it in her thoughts, and slowly, her heartbeat settled down. All of it was still there, the idea and her star sight, but she could see the two mares in front of her relatively normally again. Both of them were studying her with abundant concern.

"Sorry," Faye apologized. "I have... personal issues with touching people."

Definitely best not to tell them what those issues were.

"I'll say," Flarefeather remarked. "Has it always been this bad? Have I been making you super ultra uncomfortable instead of merely awkward and cute every time I exist in your personal space?"

"This was worse than usual." Faye shook her head. "But it's never easy. I'm sorry."

"Alright." Flarefeather backed off a little. "I guess plan team shadow swimming is off the table. Oh well. Think I'd need to practice with that a bit before being comfortable using it in the field, anyway."

Faye shook her head harder. "No, we can try it one more time. I... want to make sure that I'm over that. That it doesn't happen again."

"You sure?" Flarefeather asked, standing next to Lissa. "I'm trying to get you to lighten up, not actually hurt yourself."

"And I'm trying to keep you from actually hurting yourselves on an unnecessary stealth mission," Faye countered. "I can't let myself trip up over things like this. Forget it happened. Please?"

She wasn't sure if this was really something she should be asking. It would be nice if Flarefeather respected her boundaries a little bit more. But above all, she needed to understand and outgrow her limitations.

"Two at once," Faye encouraged, spreading and offering both of her wings. "Let's see if it's possible. You've got me trying this, so we might as well make the most of it, right?"

This time, especially once her bracelet was removed and burning back on the table, she felt the more familiar twisting unease as the two mares sandwiched her. She couldn't pretend that she didn't know where it came from. She had no more mask and no more years of avoidance to hide behind. This aversion of hers was nothing more than a defense mechanism so she wouldn't get too close to anyone, wouldn't be tempted to think of Flarefeather's star, or anyone else's, as a collectible with her name on it.

And it would be good enough. She could do this-

...Faye blinked at her bracelet. Her bracelet that she had only just now removed and placed on the table so that she could shadow sneak without its light getting in the way... which she had definitely been wearing a moment ago when she went down with Flarefeather.

She hadn't removed it last time because she was too spooked by her realization, and hid in the shadows without thinking. But it hadn't stopped her. The light should have stopped her. It always usually stopped her.

Somehow, providence had gifted her with the one thing guaranteed to re-track her mind from any and all woes: something completely inexplicable.

Melanosis

I was a ghost, and I couldn't see in the dark.

Sticking my head into a wall still gave me the feeling of being in a geometrically impossible space, but trying to navigate the mansion's corridors by that alone was completely impossible. So, before I could forget which way down was, I flew up, passing through a second and then a third floor before finally emerging into the misty night.

Outside, it was mostly dark as well, the moonlight filtered out by the thick fog shrouding the town. I could at least sense the outline of Crowscone's manor, but visibility was so poor I couldn't make out even the next building over.

These conditions were bad. If I went exploring and wasn't careful, I could get well and truly lost.

I started flying slowly, sticking to the edge of the mansion, looking for any hints of light. There had been unicorns in our welcoming party. If I could find one, maybe I could tag along and eavesdrop? I didn't really have anything important to be doing, but at a time like this, I could do far worse than gathering information.

Row after row of windows passed, dark enough that they were barely distinguishable from walls. There were no landmarks to identify where I had been before, but after a few minutes of flying I started to get the feeling that the mansion was laid out in a modified H pattern, with the four wings tilted outwards a ways to leave room for larger courtyards between them in the front and back.

So, where would the interesting stuff be? Somewhere out of the way, which meant either the top or the bottom...

Another circuit of the building, and a light glinting through a window gave me pause.

Immediately, I flew in through a window, passing through the glass as easily as if I was shadow swimming. Light was shifting underneath a doorjamb; I flew through that door too.

It was Neeve and Corona, making their way silently and professionally down a hallway.

Perfect. I had spent too long in my body before ghosting to catch up to them when they left us the first time, and I dearly wanted to hear what they would say when our backs were turned. Since my stealth was presently unbreakable, I settled in to follow them and see where they would go.

They sure were going somewhere. But they never got where they were going, and they never spoke while doing it. Opening doors, looking in through rooms, backing out and closing them again, crisscrossing hallways, I got the distinct impression they were searching for something. Except neither of them spoke a word, and whatever they were looking for, they clearly didn't think they'd have to check any given room too closely to find it.

I got a good look at the third floor's many chambers, at least. Their construction was impressive enough. Nothing extravagant like the Wilderwind government tower or Cold Karma's headquarters in Ironridge, and it prioritized form over detail - there were no carvings or pillars or artsy embellishments like I had seen elsewhere. This felt like the work of one above-average architect with only laborers and not many artisans to carry it out. And some of the furnishings felt like placeholders, or else were flat-out missing.

Neeve and Corona continued searching by the light of Corona's horn. Were they patrolling for thieves who might be taking advantage of the power outage to break in? Surely there was someone better suited to a task like that... Though if Neeve knew how to use that katana at his side, maybe he chose guard duty for a reason.

Still, shouldn't they at least be making small talk? They weren't even coordinating where to go next.

Or were they? There was something odd about Neeve's body language, the way he kept ruffling his feathers. Maybe he was supremely agitated and fighting to keep his temper in check, and if an assassination had just occurred on his watch, then he definitely had reason to be. But I didn't see any matching hints of frustration on his face. And the way Corona sometimes flicked her ears, and made small adjustments to her mane...

Maybe I was so paranoid that I was expecting them to be as paranoid as I was, but there was a possibility they were using some sort of non-verbal code.

Minutes passed, along with rooms and intersections, during which I watched their movements like a hawk. And sure enough, my suspicions were validated: Corona was using her ear flicks to signal which way she was turning at intersections, and Neeve was catching them out of the corner of his eye. And if they were doing that much, surely they were doing more, as well.

Maybe Corona was doing something with her horn? An old trick I felt like a unicorn had sprung on me before was to disguise their spellcasting by pretending they were just using their horn as a lamp. I didn't have enough experience with horn magic to tell if anything particularly fishy was going on, but there had to be something...

I fell back a little, trying to get a look at the pair's special talents. Neeve's, unsurprisingly, showed a katana. Corona's was a little harder to get a look at, since it was usually hidden in the shadow of her suit; I only got occasional glances when she turned a particularly sharp corner. But it appeared to be a silhouette pony leaning against a glowing street lamp.

Odd. For them both to have talents, they must be special; non-batponies with talents were uncommon in the north. But what passion could a talent like that be related to?

I kept following them. Eventually, they just stopped.

Nothing was different. I couldn't see anything that had changed. In one of the side rooms they stepped into, they just sat down, taking seats across from each other at a tea table and proceeding to do nothing at all.

Were they going to talk? Strategize? Scheme? Even just sigh and let their guard down for a bit? Neeve did pull something out of his suit collar and start fiddling with it, but Corona didn't even remark on it.

I hovered closer, trying to get a proper look at what he was toying with. It seemed to be a pendant on a small chain around his neck, previously tucked inside where no one could see it. The pendant was too small and narrow to be a locket. It was shaped like... a street lamp?

I glanced back at Corona's special talent, which was completely hidden in shadow. Something was very, very fishy.

Was it? I frowned. She was his marefriend. I didn't know much about romance, but carrying around a pendant of your marefriend's special talent surely wasn't that weird of a thing to do. It was probably nothing... but what if it wasn't? What if Corona was the leader of some secret order, and her symbol had been adopted as their symbol as a mark of secret loyalty? She had been calling the shots about where they were going. Could this be-?

No. Nope. I shook my head. There was no world in which that was more likely than a stressed stallion carrying around a customized pendant from his marefriend.

None at all. I reached out a ghostly hoof for the pendant.

The moment my hoof passed through it, I felt a slight flickering sensation, and was suddenly in the middle of a conversation.

"...the whole mansion by morning," Neeve was saying, far more animated than he had been an instant earlier. "I agree that we have bigger-"

Startled, I flinched back... and just as quickly as they had started, they stopped again. Neeve was fiddling stoically with his pendant, and Corona was staring off into space, focused and disinterested at the same time.

Frowning, I slowly brought my hoof back to where the pendant was.

"...need to talk about the Black Knight," Corona was saying, staring straight at him. "If your father really poisoned a Consul, the Consulate won't let him off the hook unless someone else is framed in his stead."

"We can't frame the Black Knight," Neeve sighed. "The citizens already consider her the legitimate ruler of Izvaldi. If the Consulate weighed in on her behalf and accused us of framing her, then the people would see them as righteous and we'd be hoofing this country over to Everlaste on a silver platter. It's absolutely out of the question."

I stared in bafflement at the street lamp pendant, withdrawing and extending my hoof several more times. The pattern was consistent: when I wasn't touching it, they appeared to be doing nothing, but whenever I was, they were having an animated conversation.

Presumably this hadn't been going on in the hallways, since I hadn't seen the pendant then. A power like this was downright devious. And for once, I was glad to be a suspicious, paranoid mess, because there was no way else I would discover this.

"That's not what I mean," Corona countered bluntly, shaking her head. "I mean, we let her carry out your father's investigation. Someone needs to get thrown under the cart before we're out of this mess, and I'd rather lose him and the brown sleep than get caught in the fallout ourselves."

"'Let her' carry out his investigation?" Neeve raised an eyebrow. "That's not why she's here. If we do nothing, that mare will be on her way the moment she has what she came for. And, as per our agreement, my job is to make her exit an easy one."

Corona rubbed the bridge of her muzzle. "What about those kids that were with her? Do you think they might try to stick their noses into this?"

"I highly doubt it," Neeve dismissed. "Her entourage initially struck me as bit players, though the sarosian is more likely a client. The other two... You know where those uniforms are from. They're chips for a power play with Everlaste."

Corona nodded, a distant, pained expression on her face. "I never thought I'd see the Black Knight with Wilderwind Escorts in her party again."

"This is all such a farce," Neeve growled, tired. "Even a year ago, Father would have been able to spot dozens of holes in this plan of his, and never would have pursued such folly. If only..." He put his head down and sighed. "Bergen would have known what to do with this."

"Sorry I brought it up," Corona gently muttered, as if she wanted to leave the conversation there.

Touching the lamp post pendant or no, that was the last either of them cared to say.

Somehow, Faye was getting by.

She followed Lissa and Flarefeather through the hallways of Crowscone's manor, her bulky armor traded out for her night boots to facilitate better stealth. A band of green from her bracelet illuminated the halls and corridors, but she wasn't going to get caught: she walked with one eye in the star world, and if any of the lights she saw in the distance started getting as close or vivid as her two friends', she would have ample time to turn it out and avoid them.

And if she didn't? Shadow sneaking with two passengers at once was possible. Deeply unsettling, but she had proven to herself that she could do it. Coda was safe and sound with Puddles, and she had the tools to keep Lissa and Flarefeather safe.

This wasn't a stable, long-term arrangement. She hadn't figured out why she could suddenly shadow sneak with her bracelet turned on, and she hadn't made peace with the idea of touching other ponies so much as steeled herself in advance for it. But for now, it was good enough that she had a little focus to spare for helping her friends investigate.

"Check out this portrait," Flarefeather whispered, stopping next to a rounded alcove in a hallway wall, set between two expansive windows looking out on nothing but night fog. From the outside, it must have looked like a pillar or column set between windows, but from the interior, it was hollow.

Faye glanced over. The portrait within was elaborately framed and depicted a stallion that was unquestionably Crowscone, perhaps twenty years younger than she had seen him in the foyer, yet still getting on in age. Set against a dim, mountainous backdrop, he held a slender mare who could have been his granddaughter if not for how closely they were touching. She had a long, straight bang and a rebellious, naughty expression that suggested she was in on some great secret - it was almost jarring next to Crowscone, who looked tired and broken down. If the mare had possessed a horn, she could pass for a more beautiful Princess Twilight, yet he looked like an indentured mine worker trying to enjoy his one allotted day of vacation per year.

"She's smoking, right?" Flarefeather quietly whistled. "Bet you that's my mom."

Lissa nodded. "Yeah, that could explain the cuteness differential. But if she's cozying up to someone as gross as him, don't count on her personality being as great as her bod."

Flarefeather made a mock gagging face and rolled her eyes. "Good thing paintings preserve one and not the other," she snarked, moving on but casting several glances back over her shoulder as she left the painting behind.

Faye sighed too. She felt like a chaperone on a high-stakes field trip. Flarefeather said she wanted to investigate and get to the bottom of this Consul assassination mystery, but her level of focus...

No, that was unfair. She hadn't spent too much time staring at that painting. If Faye discovered a painting of her own mother in these halls, she'd probably be much slower in tearing herself away.

"Hey, look at this," Flarefeather said, stopping in front of the next alcove, sounding a little more subdued than before. "There's another one, but it's..."

Faye stepped swiftly to catch up. There was another portrait of the same two ponies, with a few stark differences.

First was the background. This one was set to a landscape seen from a very high altitude, either from a tower like the one in Wilderwind or the deck of an airship. Far more importantly was their ages: Crowscone in this picture was a good two decades younger, but the mare he was with hadn't changed by even a month.

He looked like her father instead of her grandfather now. Life clearly hadn't been kind to him: his face was marked by well-used lines of stress, anger and grief. He had known enough hardship to want to move mountains, but not yet so much that he had lost faith in his ability to do so. Nor had he lost his ability to celebrate: though this Crowscone looked jaded and hard-charging, he appeared fresh off a victory that was as hard-fought as anything Faye had ever done.

What that victory was, she could only guess. And her attention kept slipping to that mare, posing at his side with the same teasing, juvenile, slightly discordant expression she had worn decades later.

That couldn't be the same mare, could it? She should have been an infant in this painting. Or middle-aged in the first one. And both times, she just didn't quite seem to fit, as if the two of them were living in and looking at two completely different worlds despite celebrating together, side by side.

Every time Faye had encountered inexplicable math around a pony's age before, the answer had been changelings. But changelings were people too. Even if they could use their powers to lie about their age, they couldn't go twenty years and pass themselves off as unchanged copies of the people they used to be. Not in front of an artist skilled enough to capture so much expression in Crowscone's face. There was just no shot.

And besides, had changelings even been transforming yet when these were painted?

"You think he forged the other one?" Flarefeather whispered. "Posed solo and had the artist copy in the likeness from here? That's kind of sad. Maybe she isn't my mother after all? I wonder what happened."

Faye flinched just a little. Right. A painter could easily do that, just as easily as they could make up any other details. Something about the way she and Halcyon could analyze another pony's affects, belongings and memorabilia to learn more about them required taking everything she saw at face value, and it almost physically hurt to put distance between herself and the idea that this painting was a literal window into the past.

But what Flarefeather said made sense. Crowscone hadn't been entirely rational when he greeted them in the lobby. Maybe that was reflected in his directives to his artists, and this mare wasn't real at all.

They pressed on, and came to what looked to be the third and final alcove before the corridor split into the mansion's outer wings. This one had a painting too, depicting once again the same scene, this time without a backdrop: a large, well-built pegasus stallion with a heavily-styled mane, clutching the same mare as always. Only with the context of the last two paintings could Faye identify this as Crowscone. He was in his mid-twenties at latest, untested and untried by the world, with the smug arrogance of a political court nuisance who had just enough power to live the high life while keeping ahead of the consequences for his behavior.

At last, the mare he was with looked like she belonged there. Next to a stallion who was more or less her age, with an expression that was more or less compatible with hers, they had the look of co-conspirators getting away with something naughty in the moment. Not like something untoward was happening just below the picture frame, but rather like this portrait itself was being painted against the wishes of someone very powerful.

More than either of the others, this picture made sense. If the others were doctored, this was the original.

"Why does he keep these?" Lissa mused under her breath. "They don't paint him in a very flattering light."

"I feel kind of bad for him," Flarefeather quietly remarked. "Figured I might pity the guy after seeing his taste in art, but not because of this."

Faye nodded. "Think you've seen enough?" she asked softly. "Or are we still looking for clues about the Consul?"

Flarefeather gave her a weird look. "Are you crazy? We're not going home just because he's got weird art."

Well, it was worth a shot.

They pressed on, and Faye soon found herself back to experimenting with her powers, seeing how far she could lean into her star sight without blanking on the real world or having another frightening realization. Puddles' star was somewhere behind them, back in their chambers. It was her reference point for a number of experiments: seeing how long she could track and identify a particular pony, and trying to translate the positions she saw into real, physical space.

She remembered the way back to their chambers. She had been memorizing it as they went, trying to use Puddles as a bearing to help her bridge the gap between where she perceived the stars as being and where the people they corresponded to actually were. But no matter how much she tried, the stars were just disjointed from physical space: she could see Lissa and Flarefeather's positions accurately, but anything more than a room away was hopeless. It was like trying to match up a map that was drawn on a flat sheet of paper to one that was drawn on a sheet that was constantly billowing in the wind. She could hold them together in the area close around her and make them cohere, but anywhere beyond her narrow sphere of influence, the two worlds had a mind of their own.

Two worlds. That was a decent way to think about it. Like she was somehow trying to pinch two worlds together, and could only make them spatially correspond in a very narrow space around her. Unfortunately, having a clear way to frame the problem wasn't helping her make progress-

One of the stars was rapidly coming into focus.

Faye immediately forced herself back into the real world, flicking off her bracelet as she silently lunged forward, awkwardly grabbing Lissa and Flarefeather under her wings and plunging into the shadows.

Both of them struggled a little, but seemed to rapidly conquer their reflexes and realize what was happening. Faye stayed down for a second, heart hammering, then slowly surfaced just their faces, taking a quick breath and glancing around.

Pitch darkness. The star she had noticed drawing into her range wasn't moving.

She could see Lissa and Flarefeather brightly as they fidgeted in her grip, despite the darkness. This close, their stars were pony-shaped, one and the same with their forms she was blinded to in the real world.

Faye forced down her reflex, forced her train of thought to stay on the new star as she cautiously swam forward. It still wasn't moving. Whoever this was, if they had seen her light, they weren't coming to investigate.

A loud snore caused Faye's ears to twitch. She chanced lifting her bracelet hoof, bringing a small sliver of her bracelet above the surface and lighting it to just an ember's glow.

Sure enough, ahead of them was a unicorn, dressed in a business suit that seemed styled to suggest he was a guard, out cold against a pillar in an alcove, a silly smile on his face as his chest rose and fell. Slacker. He snored again as Faye pulled her bracelet back below the surface and quickly swam on by.

Faye found a staircase to the third floor, and waited until she was halfway up to release Lissa and Flarefeather, by now clear of any stars that were close enough for her to pinpoint their location. The moment she allowed herself to break contact, she shuddered mightily, her thoughts feeling like a clogged pipe that had trouble restarting even now that she no longer needed to hold them back.

This was definitely not sustainable. She knew now that the key to shadow swimming with passengers was making physical contact; her boots were what had foiled her on every attempt in the past. She couldn't unlearn that, and even if she could, she didn't want to. This ability was valuable. But she needed a better way to stay sane while using it than simply trying to shut herself down. How could she... she...?

She was almost doing a good enough job at blocking out whatever she was trying not to think about that she couldn't remember what it was. Probably for the best. She could work on her own state of mind when she wasn't on the clock for keeping Lissa and Flarefeather safe.

"Not going to lie, that's pretty disconcerting," Lissa breathed. "Guess it's a good thing we have it? How did you know that guy was there?"

"Intuition," Faye lied. "I'm a professional, remember?"

Lissa slowly, skeptically nodded.

"I've at least been doing this longer than you have," Faye added, which was much more true. "Still want to keep going?"

Flarefeather resolutely nodded, and Lissa agreed.

"Less sightseeing," Lissa added. "We need to find that crime scene and see if there's any evidence they forgot to clean up."

Faye somehow doubted it. If Crowscone had directed his servants to clean it up, as he said, he probably wanted to ensure there wasn't any.

But this was their investigation, not hers. So she followed along, keeping her bracelet to a dim glow and watching for any stars that got too close as Lissa and Flarefeather led the way.

Before long, another one came into focus. This time, Faye was slightly slower and more deliberate in her reaction, halting the pegasi and killing her bracelet but stopping short of pulling them into the shadows. This star wasn't moving, either. And after a long second of listening, she heard another muffled snore.

"Great guards," Flarefeather mouthed, sarcastic.

Faye chanced a bit of glow, peeking around the corner. The conventional choice for architecture would have been to line the mansion's walls with rooms to take advantage of the window space, but Crowscone seemed to like having windows in his hallways, instead: they were at the very corner of one of the mansion's four wings, with windows lining the right side of the hallway both before and after the turn.

Faye was fairly sure this section of hallway was a square, encircling a large, windowless room in the center of the wing, and her suspicion was furthered when she saw the slumbering guard next to an ornate door that faced out through a window and into the night fog.

Top floor, big room, no windows, isolated from the rest of the building by a surrounding hallway? Guarded, pretty door? There was certainly something important here.

"Think this is the place?" Flarefeather breathed.

"Doubt it," Lissa mouthed back. "Don't see any servants coming and going to clean it up. And this seems more like where you'd put a vault or private study than a parlor for meeting guests."

"Yeah, but we're totally checking it out, right?" Flarefeather quietly insisted.

"Door's certainly locked," Lissa countered. "Although..." She slowly raised an eyebrow at Faye.

"Sure," Faye sighed, keeping her voice just as low as the others. "I can shadow sneak you in..."

They crept forward together, bracelet off, the barest hint of light filtering in through the wide windows and the dense night fog. As they reached the door, the guard snored loudly, making far more noise than their silent, padded boots, and kept on sleeping.

Faye put out her wings, and went under.

They surfaced in a room that smelled of old, musty paper. But Faye hesitated to light her bracelet: a new star had come into focus, and it was one of the strange ones.

A ways ahead of her and a little to the right, there was the red ring she had seen at a distance in her initial scan, its center clouded and completely opaque. Whatever it was, it was bigger and more remarkable than a pony, but it didn't have the feeling of measureless value she got from Lissa and Flarefeather - and somewhat from the guards, too. If she let her thoughts run away from her, she was pretty sure she would perceive this more as a tool or natural feature than some kind of collectible.

"Lights?" Flarefeather whispered, nudging her.

Right. Whatever that ring was, it wasn't a guard. Faye lit her bracelet, turning it up a little more than usual.

They were in a study, alright. "Wow," Lissa breathed. "That guy didn't strike me as the bookish type."

The ceiling was high and vaulted, with old wooden shelves, cabinets and display cases packing every available inch of wall space. A worn, messy desk sat at the back, with a large, dilapidated chair reinforced with cushions that was clearly sized for Crowscone. Two doors flanked the desk at the back of the room - they couldn't lead to spaces much bigger than a supply closet. Behind one of them was the red ring.

Every shelf was filled with worn manuscripts, every stand held some odd artifact. The carpet was frayed and compacted from countless hours of pacing, making an odd contrast with the rest of the mansion's newish construction. This room must have been heavily used to have worn down so quickly. Faye didn't get the feeling professional cleaning staff were allowed in here.

"Alright," Lissa said, sneaking up to the desk, "let's see what your old stallion works on in his spare time. Bet you it's not safe for innocent fillies like you two..."

"Watch out for traps," Faye murmured, tensing as Lissa crept ahead.

If there were any traps, they didn't go off - perhaps because their stored power had been stripped like every other battery in the city. Faye and Flarefeather joined Lissa at the desk.

Spread messily on its surface were a jumble of documents ranging from business and legal contracts to security briefings to calendars and ledgers to what looked like dissertations on chemistry. It was messy and disorganized, and all seemed far more complicated than Faye had given Crowscone credit for being able to comprehend.

There was a small framed picture of that mare who looked a little like Twilight, too, propped up against the quill fountain. At the bottom, it had a stylized caption that read Triandra.

"Okay, so dad's got a mind for numbers," Flarefeather mused, pulling up a sheet and inspecting it. "Or not. This is some sort of license agreement from thirty years ago. What's he doing, reading over past glories because he's not cool enough to make new ones?"

"Something like that," Lissa agreed, moving on to one of the bookshelves. "Let's see what his library looks like..." She ran a wingtip over a dusty tome. "A history on the evolution of Varsidelian alchemy?"

Flarefeather glanced up. "Alchemy?"

Lissa traced her wing along the shelf, reading out more titles. "Meditations on the search for immortality... The reconstructed banned works of Bomberain... Steps and preparations for the Elixir of Life..."

Faye and Flarefeather met each other's eyes.

Lissa pulled out a tome, flipped it open to the middle, and began to read. "Upon consumption of the Tonic, thou shouldst expect a stabbing sensation in the heart, akin to that of a knife. In this phase, the beliefs of the imbiber are paramount: should thou succumb to belief that the poison hast doomed thee, so too shalt the body succumb. But the worthy Alchymist who hath trained their mind for one thousand, five hundred days and nights, no more and no less, may see Truth, that such pain is born of expungence of worldly flaws. Should thy mind not wander to death, thou shalt be reborn, immortal of flesh and mind, in not more than one year of the day of consumption. But beware the pull of doubt, for should it enter thy mind before the old flesh is purged, so too shalt thee be purged with it."

She looked up with a grimace. "So you drink this potion and it kills you, but if you don't believe you're dying, you reincarnate in a year? Guess he's a believer in quack science."

Flarefeather raised an eyebrow. "Maybe he's afraid of dying and wants to live forever?"

"Well, check this." Lissa held the book out to Flarefeather and Faye. In the margin, next to the manually-written main text, was a note scrawled by someone else: I made him drink his own tonic. He didn't come back. Another dead end.

Flarefeather queasily shrugged. "Weird vibes are weird..."

Faye's eyes went back to the small picture on the desk, of the mare who didn't change throughout the decades.

"I don't think we're any closer to the crime scene," Lissa muttered. "But I'm starting to get a better picture of what your dad is like. If these are his interests, I bet they have something to do with why he was dealing with the Consulate in the first place."

Flarefeather nodded slowly. "You think that mare in all the pictures somehow really was immortal, and he wanted to stop time for himself so he could be with her...?"

"Immortals aren't real," Lissa countered with a shake of her head. "Mention Garsheeva and the Night Mother all you like, they conveniently vanished right before we were born. It's all just the wishes of sad, desperate people who don't have the courage to make their own change in their lives."

Faye decided not to mention that she was probably immortal, herself.

"Working hypothesis," Lissa said, trying to change the subject. "The Consulate tried to assassinate Crowscone by selling him a poison disguised as an immortality potion, figuring he'd believe something like that. He made them test it on themselves to prove it worked, and they died as a result?" She frowned. "No. Why would either side be that stupid?"

"I mean, he did seem kind of delusional," Flarefeather pointed out.

"But there are surely easier ways to off a ruler you don't like," Lissa insisted, still remembering to keep her voice down. "And if they knew it was poison, they'd never drink their own swill. Though if this book is anything to go by, there's already a history of this..."

While they talked, Faye moved to the other side of the room, keeping half an eye on them but deciding to investigate for herself. The most prominent display case held a bizarre sight: a glass sculpture of a mare that she was pretty sure doubled as a bottle.

It was hard to investigate too closely without opening the padlocked case, but the mare sat straight up on her haunches, mouth open and forelegs extended, with a weird, blissfully guilty expression that suggested she was kissing someone and betraying them at the same time. Her mouth was open, forming the mouth of the bottle, and through her neck Faye could see a tube in the glass leading down to a large cavity inside her hollow barrel, which was partly filled with a clear, colorless liquid.

She had a special talent, etched into her flanks with frosted glass that depicted a backwards clock, the numbers arranged opposite the order they were supposed to be. This didn't seem to be the mare from all the paintings; Faye didn't think she had seen her before.

Down at the bottom, there was a plaque that read Original Sin. Scrawled alongside it was a note reading This elixir is the real thing, but I can't figure out how she used it.

Faye stared at the plaque, and then at the glass mare, and then at the clear, see-through liquid in her clear, see-through barrel. Something about looking at it didn't feel right. It was like... she was sharing a bed with someone who had just been violently ill, and was resting between bouts of sickness, except they didn't tell her and she only knew this through the smell. A nameless, distant, squirming unease.

As a changeling queen who didn't fully understand her powers, Faye frequently had no choice but to put stock in her sixth senses. It would be nice if those senses could be a little more descriptive about what they were picking up and why. But she was pretty certain that substance wasn't just water, and whatever it did wasn't good.

"A little light over here?" Flarefeather quietly called.

Faye tore her eyes away from the treacherous glass mare and walked back over to the desk, holding her bracelet high enough to illuminate the books the pegasi were holding. "Found anything?"

"Just trying to peek through business records to see who he's had dealings with," Lissa muttered. "Most of these have the look of Varsidelian contracts. Might be some sort of transportation or shipping business. Maybe he was an importer?"

Flarefeather nodded. "To just step in here and take over the place, he must have had a fortune from somewhere. But I was always told that when he first left Izvaldi, he went to Everlaste."

"How much longer do you want to spend here?" Faye asked. "I'm sure there's a lot to find, but we do need some sleep before morning."

"Which is probably only a few hours away." Lissa grimaced, then turned to the two doors at the back of the room. "At the very least, we've gotta check his closets before we go."

Right. Faye's instincts told her to save the door with the red ring behind it for last. It was just a hunch, but this felt like the kind of thing where they might need to leave in a hurry after seeing what was in there... Before Lissa or Flarefeather could accidentally choose it, she stepped to the other door, the one on the left, and beckoned for them to follow.

It was locked, naturally. A little shadow sneaking got them under.

On the other side, there was a sharp right turn, and then a steep staircase descent. Well. Not a closet after all.

This time, Faye led the way, the light from her bracelet casting rhythmically shifting shadows over the stair steps as she descended. They went down one flight, two flights, three, climbing down through a narrow, isolated stairwell that was undoubtedly a hidden passage to the mansion's basement. It finally bottomed out in a dark, stone-ceilinged room, the walls lined with extinguished candelabras and sconces. Two repurposed, velvet pews provided seating at either edge. One had a noticeable depression in its cushion, as if someone large and heavy had spent a lot of time there.

In the middle of the room was a coffin with an open lid.

Faye held her breath and stepped closer.

There was no body inside. Only a painting, propped lovingly against the head pillow. It showed the same couple as the ones in the second-floor hallway. Crowscone appeared somewhere between the ages he had been in the younger two paintings, perhaps in his mid thirties, an accomplished adult who had grown up but not yet gotten old.

In this painting, the mare had aged with him. They embraced each other happily before the artist, the rebellion of youth replaced with an earned fulfillment and just a bit of intimate sheepishness. Their manestyles looked slightly more casual and less honed for a powerful court. They wore trappings reminiscent of wedding clothes, though nothing extravagant or covering - a white collar and tie for Crowscone, and a small white flower arrangement tucked in behind the mare's ear. This might have been because the mare had something more important than clothes to show off: a tiny, swaddled foal, presented proudly for the painter to capture in time.

Leucosis

Faye looked down into the stone coffin in the mansion's basement, the painting staring back up at her.

Lissa scratched her head with a wingtip. "If this is a shrine to a lost loved one, or something, it's kind of a creepy shrine."

Flarefeather nodded. "I was hoping we'd find a little more to do with the Consul. You know, a motivation for killing him, or something?"

Faye let them talk. Earlier, they had been suspicious that Neeve killed the Consul; it was pretty obvious that Flarefeather was more here because she wanted to learn about her father. But what really was there to learn?

Evidently, he had lost someone - his wife, child, or both - and never gotten over it. But whatever his past, the present day Crowscone seemed like someone best ignored and left behind. Faye had more important things to think about, like reaching the Crystal Palace. She didn't have time to spend on figuring out someone like this, and the time she did have was ticking. They needed to move on and get some sleep before morning.

...How close was morning, anyway? It had been late into the night when the ship went down, and then they spent hours investigating and walking into the city...

"Girls," she eventually interrupted. "Is there anything more you want to do down here?"

Flarefeather glanced up. "I mean, we haven't really found much, yet..."

"Could be because there's nothing here to find," Lissa remarked. "Though, think about it. This mansion doesn't look that old. Way younger than that painting. So he probably built this shrine way after the fact."

Flarefeather shifted her weight, thinking hard. "Which means...?"

"I don't know," Faye said. "Maybe nothing. You could always think about it later, when-"

"Nahhh," Flarefeather interrupted. "There's gotta be something good here. You can't just build something like this for no reason. Maybe he's got, like, a safe hidden under the painting?"

Faye frowned. "Is building a shrine to a lost loved one not a reason?"

Lissa nodded as Flarefeather reached into the coffin, pulling out the painting. "He didn't seem like the nicest guy, but behind a painting in a shrine seems like an odd place to hide..."

She trailed off, staring into the coffin.

Faye sighed, stepping forward. "Is there really something in there?"

There was, in fact, something beneath the family portrait Flarefeather had removed. It was a second painting, this one showing a solitary pegasus Faye didn't think she had seen before. She was about their age, with a raven-black mane and an ambitious look in her violet-red eyes, but her most striking feature was her outfit: shiny, glitzy and unmistakably the uniform of a Wilderwind Escort.

"Oh, now we're talking," Flarefeather whispered, her voice low with excitement. "He's got a history with Wilderwind? This is my wheelhouse!"

"You know her?" Lissa frowned. "I don't remember anyone in the Escorts who looked like that. Not since I joined, at least."

Flarefeather frowned too. "No, but..." She glanced back to the painting she had removed. "Hold on, you think she's the same kid from here? That would mean... If she's my sister..." Her eyes crossed. "Is that just a crazy coincidence? How did both of us wind up with the same employer without knowing about each other? Do you suppose someone in Wilderwind knew?" Her frown intensified. "They would have had to. No one gets to become an Escort without having something Wilderwind wants in their collection. But no one ever told me about it."

Now that dawn's timing was on Faye's mind, it was becoming a more and more pressing thought by the minute, especially here, far away from any windows that could warn them if the sky started to lighten. But it couldn't stop her thoughts from drifting, too, the new painting raising another concern she had momentarily forgotten about: Puddles said she had tried to work with the Escorts before, years ago, and it had gone horribly wrong.

Wilderwind Escorts probably didn't die that often, living in their rich and cozy tower, right? Not when Wilderwind basically kept them as living trophies. If this mare was dead, it would be a noteworthy, uncommon occurrence. And Puddles had a long history with Izvaldi. Her truce with the ruling family was uneasy and layered, and from the little Faye had been allowed to understand about it, it seemed designed to prevent them from having to endure each other's company for more than passing moments.

If what she suspected was true, a lot of things would suddenly add up. But, then... what was going through Puddles' head right now? They had explained Flarefeather's parentage to her. She would know this relationship, that Flarefeather was the sister of the mare from back then. By letting Flarefeather and Lissa on board, was she trying to atone, or... or...?

It was hard to tell what Lissa was thinking, but Faye wouldn't be surprised if she put two and two together, too. Flarefeather seemed oblivious, at least. And sure enough, Lissa was the next to prompt Flarefeather to leave.

"Maybe we should get a move on," she suggested, gently nudging Flarefeather's shoulder. "Leave things how we found them and ponder this in the morning."

"I'd like that too," Faye agreed. "Remember, our top priority is getting the ship back in the air so we can go to the Crystal Palace. I know you're curious about your family, but remember what Crowscone is like in the present day."

"Yeah, yeah..." Flarefeather sighed, giving the portraits one last look before rearranging them back how they had been. "Alright, we can go."

Halfway up the staircase, the topic hadn't changed.

"Pssst," Flarefeather whispered to Lissa. "Do you think she looked like me?"

"Who, the other escort?" Lissa looked distracted. "Yeah, sort of. Same jawline and eye shape. You're much cuter, though."

Faye urgently shushed both of them. As the study above drew nearer, a problem was sharply coming into focus: there were two stars inside. It was occupied.

"We're too late," she breathed when Flarefeather gave her a questioning look. "Someone's in that room now."

The three of them crept forward, listening. Sure enough, as they got right up to the door - Faye's bracelet extinguished so it didn't give them away by shining under the doorjamb - vague shuffling and mutterings could be heard from the other side.

They backed off a little, feeling their way down one flight of stairs. "Oops," Flarefeather breathed, the colored light of a unicorn horn seeping under the door above them. "Guess we did take too long, after all."

"How did you hear that so early?" Lissa whispered. "That's just unreal."

"Magic," Faye whispered back, glancing through the wall at the red ring star, behind the other door in the study that they definitely wouldn't have time now to investigate.

"Think your magic can also get us through that room without being spotted?" Lissa asked. "This is what you practiced for."

"I hope so," Faye answered, pushing back her star sight so it would be easier to shadow sneak with her friends. Her biggest concern was that unicorn's horn: since her bracelet was the only source of light they had, she had no way of testing if her inexplicable new ability to shadow swim in the light worked for all light, or only her bracelet's. And if it failed...

Well, hopefully the unicorn was casting enough shadows that she wouldn't have to find out.

Her nerves steeled, Faye spread her wings, grabbed her friends, and went under.

She swam in a hurry, swimming past Crowscone's desk and hugging the shelves and cabinets that lined the walls. Sure enough, there was a unicorn, standing near the doorway and providing light for Crowscone as he puttered around, examining a shelf on the far side of the room.

Near the open doorway. Beyond it, the gray light of dawn was filtering in through the windows and the fog.

There was no possible way past without trusting in her new ability to swim in the light, and Faye didn't have time to think of an alternative: she didn't dare surface for air, and swimming with passengers seemed to sharply curtail the amount her lungs could hold, as if she was breathing for three. She had no choice. She darted forward, into the light.

Her swimming held. The light from the unicorn and from the window didn't force her out into the open, as it would have done any day except for today. But her lungs weren't going to keep up, and in the corridor outside the office were no less than six guards, including two that were watching around the hallway corners in both directions. Her chest was burning, and she didn't have time to make a wrong decision and then correct for it.

The safest way to go, it would be... outside. Through the window.

Shadow sneaking let batponies move through glass, probably since glass was transparent to light, and they were merging with shadows. And the huge, floor-to-ceiling windows in the study's surrounding hallways should have provided perfect targets, without so much as a lip on the floor Faye would have to swim up to reach them. But as she accelerated, straining towards the outdoors, the glass didn't let her through.

It felt like any old solid, opaque wall. Was it because there wasn't actually a shadow? Had something fundamental changed about her shadow swimming, more fundamental than she had given credit for? What was going on, and why? And what could she do about it in the short time she had left!?

As it turned out, nothing. Because when Faye pressed harder against the glass, tried to go through it, and then tried to climb it like a regular wall, it didn't allow her to stay under. She simply surfaced, Lissa and Flarefeather in tow, the guards grunting in surprise as they appeared right in the middle of the hallway.

Faye froze in resignation. Something had been due to go wrong, and for it to be the new power she was trusting without understanding at all... go figure.

I couldn't sleep as a ghost, and I still couldn't see in the dark, so I passed the rest of the night floating above the fog layer, watching and waiting for the sun to rise.

It didn't take as long as I feared. The power had already vanished midway through the night, and after that we spent hours between our investigation of the ship and its surroundings and hiking to the city. Not that I was fantastic at guessing the passage of time, but it couldn't have been more than an hour before the sky first started to lighten.

I quickly dove back into the fog, watching as the mansion's outline gradually came into clearer relief. I needed to find my way back to our quarters so I could meet back up with Faye...

The corridors themselves were still terminally dim, even with gray, fog-filtered pre-dawn light seeping in through the windows. Almost subconsciously, I wound up following a unicorn in a guard-style business suit once I felt like I was getting close, on the off chance his horn light let me recognize an important landmark as he passed it.

And it did. When he finally stopped to rap on a door, I was pretty sure it was our own.

My suspicions were confirmed several minutes later, after more knocking, when Puddles opened the door, dressed in her Black Knight armor. "What?" she asked.

The suited guard nodded stiffly. "Three ponies who are supposedly with you were caught sneaking around His Radiance's private study. Do you know anything about this?"

"No," Puddles replied, her tone impenetrably neutral. "I do not."

"I've been sent to verify their identities," the guard continued. "If your entourage is present here, would you mind letting me speak to them to verify they aren't the ponies we're presently holding?"

Puddles nodded. "I'll find them."

Then she retreated back into the dim lighting of their suite, the guard waiting patiently in the hallway.

I scrutinized him. He was being oddly deferential to Puddles if he really did suspect us of something... which, with how Lissa and Flarefeather had been carrying on before I left, they probably really had gotten in trouble. Go figure that my awful luck could still do that, even when I wasn't present for it.

Moments later, Puddles returned. "They aren't here," she confirmed, saying everything a stoic masked knight should say when feigning innocence for herself and herself alone. "Take me to the ponies you've apprehended."

The unicorn nodded. "Follow me."

I started drifting along behind them. It sure was an odd exchange, the more I thought about it. The guard felt almost like he was running through the motions, and didn't really mistrust Puddles at all... Or, more accurately, he didn't care whether she was up to something or not. A punch-clock guard, who followed the letter of his duties and nothing more. Fitting, for someone wearing a business suit instead of any sort of armor.

Faye ran over her options in her mind as the the guards sat them against a wall near the door to Crowscone's study. If it came down to a fight... Presumably, Crowscone employed guards who weren't pushovers in combat, but none of them were changeling queens and none of them could likely hold a candle to the power of her bracelet. Assuming it worked the way she expected it to, which wasn't safe to assume until she knew what was wrong with her shadow sneaking.

But Puddles had promised she could talk them out of one slip-up. Whether she was right or not, violence wasn't their only hope, at least not yet. And beating anyone up would look a lot worse on their records than just sneaking. And maybe Flarefeather and Lissa would cool their heads a bit if they got a dose of reality like this one.

So, keeping herself calm with the knowledge that she wasn't fully cornered yet, Faye focused on her breathing and sat back to see what her friends would do.

Flarefeather, for her part, looked flustered. Lissa looked annoyed.

The sun was rising quickly, allowing her to see more than dim shades of gray as Crowscone finally stomped out of his study, puffing under the weight of his girth. He stopped in front of them, looking down at her with his beady eyes and triple chin.

"Well, well, well," Crowscone rumbled, trilling with his practiced, ostentatious accent. "You must be the three spies who snuck in with the Black Knight last night. Enjoying your look around?"

"We're not spies," Flarefeather mumbled, looking as if her nerves had temporarily deserted her.

"Not spies?" Crowscone raised a thick, black eyebrow. "Hah. And I suppose you're not Wilderwind Escorts, either. Well? How do you like it?"

"How do we like what?" Flarefeather asked, wary and confused.

"My beautiful home, of course," Crowscone trilled, gesturing with his wings at the corridor and windows around them. "Wilderwind, you know, they try to buy you out with a luxurious life in their fancy tower. Then they send you to spy on my house, thinking you'll be... be disgusted with the provincial standards of lesser lords. Don't they? Little do they know, I built this house myself. Yes, I made my fortune, served my country, then came back and built it."

For some reason, Lissa reddened.

Faye glanced at her as she started to fumble her way into a bashful speech. "I know, right? It's... Yeah, you got us. I wasn't expecting to find something this nice here, at all."

Crowscone nodded with a mix of approval and threat. "And what were you expecting to find? Trying to take my great work for your own greedy masters?"

"It's not like that." Lissa shyly fidgeted, leaving Faye all but certain it was an act. "We're... We're trying to swindle the Consulate, not you. We were just forced to lay over here because of the power outage, and since we haven't gotten to leave the Wilderwind tower in ages, and your house was completely dark, we..." She leaned over, pulled Flarefeather close with a wing, and gave her a quick smooch on the cheek. "We're in love. And your house seemed like a fun place to... um, 'flirt'? That's what these are for." She showed off a fluffy, inverted sock-like boot. "And we got a bit carried away seeing how close to the guards we could get, and forgot to watch for when the sun would come up. We're really sorry."

Crowscone raised both eyebrows, suspicious.

Flarefeather nodded, getting in on the act and somehow managing to blush on command herself. "It's a big place. Not knowing our way around was part of the thrill. And the Wilderwind tower never gets dark like this."

Faye nodded too, hoping this wasn't a lie she would regret getting caught up in... although it was also kind of true.

"So that's your alibi," Crowscone accused. "Just a coincidence, then, that you happened to be caught right outside my private study."

"Well, we figured it would be nicest on the top floor," Lissa explained. "So every time we found a staircase, we just went up. And I guess this is where you had the most guards?"

Crowscone considered this. "Very well. Suppose you are telling the truth. What have they put you up to against the Consulate?"

Faye cleared her throat. Anything they said here would invariably be cross-checked against Puddles, so as much as she wanted to stay quiet, she had to make sure their stories lined up-

"Can't say," Lissa apologized, cutting her off. "You must know how Wilderwind works. Our personal lives can be whatever, but confidentiality of state is serious business."

Flarefeather nodded mutely.

For a moment, Crowscone scrutinized them, breathing heavily as normal. "Hmph. Loyalty to the state is only admirable when it is my state you are loyal to. You do know this, right?" He leered at Lissa, then seemed to reconsider, an idea suddenly striking him. "Say... You two, with brands. What are they for?" He gestured at Lissa and Faye.

"This?" Faye glanced at her upside-down crown, which by now was fairly well visible in the misty morning light. "Chess. It's not that remarkable."

Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced at Lissa, remembering that she still had yet to properly take a look at what Lissa's special talent was. Every time she remembered and thought about it, Lissa was either wearing something, or in the dark, or she was otherwise distracted...

It seemed to be an anvil, made from a golden material that was faceted and shiny, like a crystal pony's coat. Huh.

"I'm pretty deft with jeweler's tools, believe it or not," Lissa answered. "What's it to you?"

"I am deciding your punishment," Crowscone haughtily proclaimed. "You are young! Possessed of looks and perhaps abilities. Your lives may yet have value to my great society. Perhaps we can make something beautiful out of them, rather than sneaking criminals..." He turned to Flarefeather, his girth shaking. "You, what can you do? All Escorts are retained for a reason. What was yours?"

"Oh, boy, I dunno." Flarefeather shrugged. "I think I'm related to one of the dead imperial houses? They mostly pay me to stand around and look cute. And poke any rulebreakers with a sword, I guess."

"Ah! Swordplay. Very good." Crowscone nodded, satisfied. "The rest of you too, I imagine?"

Lissa nodded warily, and Faye figured it was best to follow suit.

"Then prepare yourselves for my verdict!" Crowscone declared. "The three of you are guilty of trespassing in my beautiful home! Perhaps it was innocent. Perhaps it was a plot against me. I care not. You would not behave so if you held my Izvaldi in the reverence it deserves. But ignorance can be rectified, and I am merciful. So I will give you a chance to clear your names through a work of public service! The three of you are to participate in a stage play about my own service to the Empire. You will put your looks and talents to use! By studying your lines, you will learn from my good example how to become a benefit to society. And you will present this to me and the public in one week's time! Should I be pleased with the result, your records shall be expunged, and you will be free to leave my city and go about your ways."

Faye, Lissa and Flarefeather all gave each other a look. Sentenced to act in a stage play? That would almost be funny, if it didn't involve being grounded in Izvaldi for a week during which one of the world's foundational pillars was dying or dead.

"I am the government," Crowscone continued, his girth shaking regally. "That shall suffice as atonement for your crimes against the state. Now, as for your crimes against my person..." His beady eyes glinted. "I shall settle for prostration. Kneel before me, and beg of me my forgiveness. I find your attitudes to be... not yet suitably humbled."

Faye blinked. Really? Kneeling?

The only thing she had ever knelt to before was Unnrus-Kaeljos, on that day in the Icereach chapel. This comparison felt downright indecent, despite everything she knew about who the light spirit was and what it had done.

But she would be a fool to die on this hill. So she bent down, forelegs folded and chin to the floor, and lowered her head, wings spread low.

Surprisingly, Flarefeather and Lissa appeared to have a much easier time. Though maybe it did make sense. This was literally their day job back in Wilderwind, after all.

"Hmm, yes..." Crowscone looked down on them, his wide face growing a wide grin. "Your eyes are defiant, but your actions obedient. Isn't it a wonderful dynamic? You want to resist, but see that you have no choice! That is the nature of my authority, a steadying influence to supplant your weak wills and keep you from crime." He nodded at a guard. "You there. You know what to do."

The guard stepped up to Flarefeather and Lissa, who both yelped as he tugged free a single feather from one of their wings.

"What was that for?" Flarefeather gritted her teeth as the guard passed the pair of feathers to Crowscone.

"Pegasi," Crowscone told her, "occupy a special place in society." His wings rustled conspicuously beneath his robe. "As the most noble breed of pony, it is our duty to set an example for all the others. Now, I imagine the three of you think you're terribly clever. Going to leave the moment my back is turned. Fail to pay your dues. From the sarosian, we might find that predictable. But I won't have you two slandering our good name."

He waggled the feathers at Flarefeather and Lissa. "These are from you, are they not? I now own them as collateral. Therefor, I own part of you. If you want to fully own yourselves again, I suggest you not think about running, no matter how hard my worthless son tries to subvert me."

Flarefeather and Lissa shared a skeptical, offended look.

"Now, I have important work to return to," Crowscone puffed, turning his kingly, robed back on them and gesturing to some of the guards. "You and you, take these three back to their quarters and watch them to ensure they don't do any more sneaking! I've let them off mercifully, but they must learn that in Izvaldi, virtue is rewarded and sin is punished."

He barely had time to take a step after finishing before the clanking of heavy armor became audible in the hall behind them.

Faye turned to look. She wasn't at all surprised to see Puddles, accompanied by another guard.

"Oh," Crowscone said, looking at her over his shoulder. "It's you."

"I heard there was trouble," Puddles said, clad head to tail in her imposing black armor.

"Yes, trouble," Crowscone muttered. "You know, you really ought to be more careful, vetting the character of your associates. These three were caught sneaking around near my private study! I have just finished prescribing justice. You can help administer it. These three, I sentenced them to, to... Somebody else can fill you in. I have work that I must return to, and it cannot be delayed."

Muttering harder, he turned away again and stumped back into his study, leaving the door open to allow some light to seep in from the window.

Puddles turned her helmet slightly as she glanced between Faye, her friends and the guards.

"Please follow me," one of the guards offered. "I'll fill you in somewhere we won't be disturbing His Radiance."

"...And that's the short of it," the guard finished, standing with the four of them and two other guards in an unfurnished third-floor chamber with a suitably large window. "Though he didn't command you to remain here, Black Knight, I'm still aware this violates the spirit of your agreement with Prince Neeve. Hopefully I can ask your patience as we see what we can do. The king's moods are a tricky thing to navigate."

Flarefeather frowned. "Not to act suspicious when we're already in hot water, but you sound almost more loyal to the Black Knight than the king."

The guard looked slightly uncomfortable.

"Black Knight, I have to ask," another suited guard said. "How thoroughly have you vetted the possibility that these three could be Wilderwind spies taking advantage of you? You do tend to be... trusting of the populace."

"Of Wilderwind Escorts, though?" The third raised an eyebrow at the second.

"Wilderwind's attitude towards Izvaldi is as precarious as usual," Puddles said. "But they need not send spies here to get what some among them want."

"You have a point," the worried guard admitted.

"More likely," Puddles continued, "I think they were overly eager to investigate the fate of your Consul, and I was insufficient in impressing upon them the need for discretion. For that, you have my apologies."

"You're the ones who are inconvenienced by this," one of the guards said, shaking his head. "Apologize to yourselves. All I have to do is sit around watching you instead of watching any other hallway in this place."

Faye looked between the guards, and then to Lissa and Flarefeather. Both of them, especially Flarefeather, clearly wanted to talk about what had happened, yet both of them had their heads on straight enough not to say anything, since pretty much anything at this point could be incriminating.

The guards looked them over as well. "We'll be taking you back to your quarters now," one decided. "You look like you could use some sleep, and it'll be less trouble for us if you do that while waiting for directions on this stage play."

Faye nodded. That sounded as good as she could hope for, though she really wanted someone to talk to, herself... and neither of her other selves were anywhere to be seen.

In the hallway where everyone had been arrested, I floated invisibly, tempted to follow Faye and the others and see what became of them. But the greater temptation was to see what Crowscone would do in his study.

He had rubbed me the wrong way ever since we entered the mansion, but even the Composer couldn't match that level of self-righteousness. A blowhard like this, I decided, could stand to be less in control of things than he thought he was, even if all that meant was getting stared at by a ghost when he thought he was in private. And I kind of wanted to know where such an inflated ego had come from.

I passed through the open door to see Crowscone standing next to his desk, staring at the two feathers in thought, a lone unicorn helping to light the room. Crowscone's study was messy and claustrophobic, towers of shelves and cases covering the walls like climbing ivy, a dark chandelier hanging down in the center. I got the impression the unicorn didn't really want to be there.

"Leave me," Crowscone eventually commanded, motioning for the unicorn to exit. "And close the door behind you. Soundproof it. You know how it's done."

"In the dark, Your Radiance?" The unicorn blinked. "The power is not back on yet..."

"Are you questioning my word?" Crowscone leered at him from the shadows with his beady, gray eyes. "I require the privacy of my sanctum. Do it."

The unicorn bowed, and then retreated. "It shall be done."

After he left, a bit of conversation sounded from beyond the door, and then it swung shut, the telltale sparkle of unicorn magic briefly glittering against it. Suddenly, the sounds of guards shuffling in the hallway outside were gone.

So was the light. I could see nothing, hear nothing save for the muted pounding of my heart as I waited to see what would happen, and Crowscone's heavy, labored breathing as he seemed to search for something.

Then, with a scrape of wood against wood, a drawer on his desk slid open, illuminating Crowscone's face from below with a dancing, emerald light.

He beamed fondly, greedily down into the drawer, its light catching on the folds of his chin. "Hello there, my pet. Do we have a treat for you today..."

Heart hammering, I floated closer as Crowscone reached into the drawer and lifted out the source of the light.

It was a revenant.

A lesser one, somewhat crab-shaped, about twice the width of a stallion's hoof. It clicked and burned as Crowscone gently lifted it out, setting it on the desk, its flames casting flickering shadows around the room.

"Yes," Crowscone purred, stroking a wingtip along a curved piece of metal that served as the revenant's back. "What do you think of these, hmm? Will they make suitable additions to the great work?"

He offered it the feathers.

The revenant seemed to inspect them. I floated as close as I dared. Its green flames weren't so much as causing Crowscone's fur to curl...

What was this doing here? Why did he have it? Was Crowscone a Bishop? He always wore that robe, so I couldn't see his talent. But even if he was, why was there a revenant so far from Gyre? This was bad. I had fought those things off with heavy armor, a greatsword and my supernatural stamina and endurance; in a population center, they would-

"Right!" Crowscone nodded, satisfied. "In that case, let's begin the ceremony..."

His eyes turned red. A red aura appeared on his forehead where a horn would have gone, if he was a unicorn - fiery, apocalyptic red, not a color you could see in an ordinary aura, its light interwoven with filaments of destruction.

That wasn't a Bishop color. As far as I knew, every single one of them had emerald magic, just like my bracelet. I was lost. What was going on, here?

The two feathers rested on the desk before him, with the crab revenant curiously standing guard. Crowscone smiled down on them, opened his mouth, and started to inhale.

As Crowscone's breath rushed over them, the feathers twitched, and seemed to lose something I couldn't define. Barely a moment later, Crowscone stopped, sat up straighter, and nodded, satisfied with his work.

"Beautiful," he declared, his phantom horn going out and his eyes returning to their usual dull, beady gray. "Here. Have for yourself a well-deserved treat, hmm?"

At his encouragement, the revenant crab pinched the feathers with its fiery, metal claws. This time, the green flames quickly spread, and the two feathers were summarily reduced to ash.

This was bad news. I had seen enough. I fled through the wall, past the guards and out the window, urgently circling the mansion in the misty dawn light. I needed to find Faye, report what I had seen, and discuss what to do about this. Crowscone wasn't just insufferable: at best, he was dabbling with forces that could get everyone in the city killed. At worst, he was a monster too.

Weakness

Sunset lit the sky blood red, a color that foretold death on the horizon.

Gravel crunched beneath Senescey's tiny hooves. She hadn't seen a gravel road before. But then, everything was new, these days. And rarely in a good way.

Crows cawed from the orchard at the side of the road. Ahead, atop a hill, silhouetted black in front of the setting sun, was a three-story manor, some eighty years old.

Senescey struggled to keep pace with the ponies she was following. Triandra didn't look like the kind of mare who would be made to walk to an estate like this. The even shoulder cut of her purple mane brushed along the neck of her dress, a sparkly evening gown with a high slit to show off her brand.

Her brand was a minecart, laden with gold.

"Slow down," Felicity panted, doing better than Senescey was at keeping up despite the infant on her back. Her ragged red mane was matted against her shoulders, and her legs shook as she walked. "My... sister is falling behind..."

Triandra looked back to see how far behind Senescey was. "We're almost there," she encouraged curtly.

Senescey focused doggedly on the instructions Felicity had given her. This trip would make things better. It would help her keep the promise she had made when Mother died, and help her stop crying at night. The job Felicity had given her was to stay close to Triandra, as close as possible. She had to do this. For Felicity.

She plodded forward, but her legs hurt, and her stomach hurt, and she couldn't remember the last time she wasn't hungry from throwing up. She took one more step... and tripped on a large piece of gravel, falling flat on her face.

Triandra bit her lip, the gravel digging into the bottom of Senescey's chin.

"I can't carry her, too," Felicity apologized, looking ready to give out herself. "Could you, please?"

Triandra narrowed her brow.

"...She's five years old," Felicity told her bluntly. "I know you're from Everlaste, but you're not going to die if you touch a sarosian child."

"It's the dirt I'm worried about," Triandra sighed coldly, brushing the neckline of her glittering dress. Then she stepped over, picked up Senescey, and hefted her onto her back. "But I suppose needs must. ...She's surprisingly light."

Felicity nodded, continuing resolutely towards the mansion on the hill. "There does happen to be a plague going around."

Triandra didn't drop her when Felicity mentioned the plague. That was something Felicity had explained in advance that Senescey should notice. It meant she knew - as they had recently found out - that their mother's death wasn't the work of some contagion like everyone thought. Proof that what she heard from the dusk statue was true.

Their mother. It had been almost two weeks, now, since they buried her in a shallow grave in a field alongside so many others. Felicity told Senescey that her foalhood was buried there too, now. Senescey didn't understand what she meant by that. But there were other things she could see now too, things Felicity had told her to look for. Things she wouldn't have noticed before.

Things like the shadow of a slim dagger hidden inside Triandra's dress, mostly covered by her folded wing. That, Felicity explained, was something no foal should be able to notice.

They crested the hill, approaching the manor's front gates. The manor's fence enclosed a large, sculpted yard, but just outside it, the hillside fell away sharply to Senescey's right. She could see reinforcements built into the hill to help stop it from crumbling into the river that flowed by, down below.

Before coming here, Felicity had showed her maps of Izvaldi. This far upriver, Felicity said, the water was still clean. It wouldn't have killed their mother.

A pegasus in a contractor's uniform stood guard at the gate, nodding as they approached. "Lady Triandra. Who are these urchins?" He gave Senescey and her sisters an askew glance.

"Weren't you informed?" Triandra raised an eyebrow. "They're here to help us get rid of Victor Izvaldi."

"Oh. That." The pegasus guard nodded, bowing as they passed through. Senescey glanced at the sign on the gate as she walked inside. It was a large, embellished emblem reading Belias Trading Company Far Eastern Headquarters.

Senescey didn't know how to read. Felicity had just showed her this emblem before, when she was planning this, and told her what it said.

The manor's front door opened magically of its own accord. Triandra carried Senescey into the lobby, which was brightly lit and had been refitted from a residential foyer into a business reception room, with a wide, enclosed desk that could be staffed by up to three clerks at once. Right now, there were only two, both pegasus stallions wearing freshly-pressed business suits, tailored black with golden-brown ties.

They didn't look like their legs were shaking, like they struggled to walk. That, Felicity had explained in advance, was because the ponies working here had never drank the poisoned river water.

It was like she had anticipated every question Senescey would ask. And of course this wasn't fair.

Triandra walked straight past the clerks and beckoned for Felicity to follow. "Tell my husband's aides I've arrived," she called to the clerks over her shoulder, almost as an afterthought.

She carried Senescey up a wide staircase with a swerving, solid-wood banister, situated in a wide hallway on the manor's western face. Dying sunlight poured in through two stories of windows, dappling Senescey's body with harsh shadows cast by the banister railing as she was carried. Stay as close to Triandra as possible. For Felicity's sake, she couldn't let Triandra put her down.

They entered a corporate meeting room on the third floor, with an expansive corner window looking out over the fields behind the mansion. A tower was being erected on the plateau, though it looked as if work had stopped for the day.

"An airship dock," Triandra explained, following Felicity's gaze as she put Senescey down and then took a seat at the board room table, its edges and surface made from polished dark oak. "We can't just become the dominant world power in transportation while expecting ships to land on our lawn."

"Makes sense," Felicity said. Her voice still held an edge of refinement, at heavy odds with her bedraggled appearance and the fitfully-sleeping Larceny on her back.

Senescey was so tired, but she slipped down from her chair and climbed into Triandra's.

"What-?" Triandra frowned, moving to push her away, but she was interrupted as the door swung open and more ponies stepped through.

It was a group of pegasus stallions in business suits, carrying briefcases and clipboards. The last one in locked the door behind him, all of them following Triandra's lead and taking places at the table. Some of them gave her funny looks as she covertly tried to dislodge Senescey. The biggest seat at the head of the table was left empty.

"Right," said one stallion, starting to scribble on a notepad, the sun's red rays catching on his glasses and obscuring his eyes. "Let's get this started. Lady Triandra, would you care to make introductions?"

Triandra nodded. "Everyone, this is Pyle." She gestured at Felicity, who had explained patiently to Senescey how it worked to use a fake name. "Pyle and her sisters have recently been orphaned by the contamination from Victor Izvaldi's soon-to-be-infamous Cordlow Basic Metals Mine. I recognize this is a very last-minute addition to the articles we'll be running, but I've spoken with Pyle one-on-one and believe her story will enhance our case."

Then she turned to Felicity. "We've discussed this earlier, but just to make it formal: we intend to break the news of this 'plague's' nature to the public in tomorrow's newspaper. During this meeting, we'd like you to tell our writers about your experiences, stand for photographs, undergo a toxicology panel and practice for any sworn testimony you could be called to give if things turn messy and Victor takes us to court. Everyone, could you introduce yourselves?"

She gestured to the closest stallion on her left to go first - the one who had already spoken. He nodded to Felicity, the sun glaring brightly on his glasses. "Lady Pyle, it is a pleasure to meet you. My name is Quiverstamp. I am a lawyer, and the head of our legal department here in the Griffon Empire. Prior to that, I worked for the parent company in Varsidel for fifteen years. Ponies from Lady Triandra to Don Belias himself rely on me to prosecute their enemies, and I would be honored if you would do the same."

Senescey scrutinized him. She didn't like the way it was hard to see his eyes.

The next stallion in the circle spoke up. "My name's Merit," he said, a broad-shouldered stallion with trim sideburns. "Company photographer and publicist for the Griffon Empire branch."

He gestured to the next stallion, who followed suit. "And I am Stern," he greeted, his namesake manifesting in the tone of his voice. "I am a chemist for the parent company in the motherland. I've traveled here to analyze water samples taken from the river and covertly from Cordlow's mining waste pools. With your permission, I will be doing a blood draw, which I can use to conclusively prove you have been imbibing mine waste leakage."

Several more spoke up in turn - the minute-recorder, someone's bodyguard, an aide to someone who wasn't present - but Senescey started to lose track of their names. They all looked so similar, pegasus stallions in identical business suits. And she was dizzy from hunger. All her focus went to remembering what Felicity had told her to do, the plan she was supposed to follow. What was she supposed to do, again...?

Right. Cling to Triandra. Don't let Triandra leave her alone.

"Here," Triandra whispered as another stallion talked, lifting her gently and placing her a chair away. "Sit there, alright?"

Sitting one chair away wasn't her job. Senescey crawled out of the chair and back into Triandra's.

Triandra gave her a consternated look, at which Felicity cleared her throat. "This is a very nice room you have here, and I'm grateful that you've invited us, but if you're expecting us to match your level of decorum you may wish to get your eyes checked. There is nothing clean or pretty about our situation. We are tired, we are ill, we are emotionally unsteady and I for one am painfully aware that..."

Felicity broke off coughing, and took almost a full minute to stop, light flecks of blood visible on her hoof when she was done. She looked up, regarding the room with thin eyes. "I'm aware that you're doing this to hurt a local rival, not because you care about us. I want to make them suffer, too. I want to see the culprit writhe and scream in agony, just like my mother did when she breathed her last. But please be cognizant of who you're using as tools in this 'adult game' of yours. My sister there is looking to you for succor, not vengeance. We should all be grateful for that innocent appetite while it lasts."

The note-taker scribbled hastily. Triandra relented, and stopped trying to push Senescey away. Senescey immediately buried her face in Triandra's satin-covered side.

Felicity was lying. Senescey was here for vengeance. Felicity had told her, time and again over the last few weeks, that she would feel a little bit better once she had it.

"Write all of that down," Felicity instructed the note-taker, perhaps redundantly. "And don't keep your commentary to yourself. Talk about how we clearly shouldn't be here, how twisted it is for children to get caught up in all this, how unnerved you all look to hear someone as young as me lecturing you on this. Why don't some of you say something, too? See if your voices are as raw from coughing and crying as mine is." She pointed a hoof at Quiverstamp, the lawyer. "You. Why do you want to make Victor Izvaldi pay?"

Quiverstamp looked dispassionately at her, his eyes briefly visible as he adjusted his glasses with a wingtip. "This is my job. I'm paid to make my employer's reasons become my own reasons. Were any of us to take matters into our own hooves, and use a sword to remove him from the stage, would the sword's reasons ever be in question? Please think of me as... nothing more than the strength that you lack on your own. This is your show, Lady Pyle, not mine."

"And what are your employer's reasons?" Felicity asked, keeping her gaze fixed on him.

Quiverstamp chuckled, adjusting his glasses with a wingtip. "Lady Pyle. Victor Izvaldi has certain... prejudices against members of our upper management. We have a choice between moving our upcoming operations to a more-developed area where we have less room to control the formation of the trade economy, or tilling the soil for a more friendly administration."

Felicity frowned.

"Finances are a powerful reason," Quiverstamp told her. "But not, I'm sure, an inspiring one, to you or the rest of the suffering masses. That's why we want you for this article, and not one of us. Simply put, your reasons are better."

"Are they, now?" Felicity asked, nodding to the camera pony. "And you expect the public to agree. Not exactly surprising, but why us?"

Triandra cleared her throat. "It was a stroke of uncommon luck to find someone as eloquent as you, Pyle. You have a gift for stirring emotions in those who hear from you."

"I'm glad my beleaguered existence could bring somebody fortune," Felicity said with a wry smile. "But that wasn't what I meant. Why did this happen to us? What did we do to deserve this? Who will make it up to us, and how? How many months, weeks, days do I have left to live, and who will take care of my sisters when I'm gone? How long do they have left, themselves?"

More scribbling.

"Well? Anyone have an answer?" Felicity glanced around. "Does anyone care to tell me why I, a child myself in the eyes of the law, have to think about these things as I cry myself to sleep and testify in front of a room full of cash-hungry lawyers looking to profit from my pain? What's the point of all this?"

"Lady Pyle," Quiverstamp said slowly. "Solace in the face of loss is a job for philosophers, not corporations. What we can help you with is bringing Victor Izvaldi to justice."

"So it's about vengeance, then," Felicity softly answered. "I cannot deny the temptation. I did come here, after all. Settling the score will do nothing to bring Mother back and nothing to heal our bodies, but it's the answer you want us to arrive at? You believe that once I've had my fill, this will somehow all make sense?"

The stallions in the room shifted uncertainly, almost suspiciously, as Senescey kept clinging to Triandra's side. She didn't know what was happening, or why this was important, but Felicity had made her promise. Felicity had a plan, and everything would be alright if she just did her part.

"Is this opportunity not to your liking?" the photographer asked, speaking up. "Tonight is the ten-year anniversary gala commemorating Lord Izvaldi passing his office on to his son. All of Victor's censors are like to be present. There's alcohol aplenty, and everyone should be sleeping off hangovers in the morning. We can print whatever you want us to, no matter how vicious, and there's nothing he can do to stop us."

Felicity sighed a dying sigh. "So be it. Vengeance it is, then. I'm sure that's a nice plan, and I wish you ample success in it. Victor is a foul griffon who had every chance to stop this and chose to do nothing. But I have something a bit more melodramatic in mind."

Everyone tensed. Quiverstamp gave her a threatening look. "I'm not sure I catch your meaning."

"Well," Felicity huffed, folding her forelegs on the table. "That's quite the reaction. I suppose this means you're contemplating how a filly like me knows that Victor leases that mine from a noble family in Everlaste that may or may not have ties to this company. You're probably also considering whether you could get away with killing me to stop me from speaking further, and while you very well could I think you at least owe it to me to listen first to my final words. Or were you not the ones advocating seconds earlier for vengeance being the correct recourse?"

The mood in the room ran hard and foul, and Senescey was suddenly scared. Felicity wasn't going to die, was she?

"Good boys," Felicity praised, her own voice edged as none of the stallions drew visible weapons. "Don't you worry. I'm not here for your lives, your reputations or even your bottom line. I daresay your little manufactured scandal has left me incapable of it even if I wanted to. But what I can and will do is make you see me."

Her fangs glinted sharply as the red sunset intensified, the sun halfway down over the horizon. "You know your reasons aren't good enough. However you sabotaged that mine, you know you chose greed and politics over the lives of everyone in the capital. You're cold-blooded murderers, all of you, through and through, and the reason I'm not afraid you'll kill me for saying my piece is because you've already done so. And I think the way you do it is because you just don't see. How many of you live in the capital, smell the desperation, see the people dying in the street? How many of you have met us as more than a figure in a report? Well, now it's all of you, because you will see me!"

She spread her wings, her fur matted and her face haggard. "Go on and publish your articles. Start your revolution, chase out Victor, and keep your names clear for all I care. Use our story while you're at it. But with every word you write about us, every photograph you take, every thought you think, you will see us, and remember the price you forced us to pay!"

A fit of coughing forced her to pause, and she looked halfway up, her muzzle still covered by a hoof. "I'm sure you thought of yourself as ordinary, once. Enjoy the feeling of blood on your hooves. It won't come out."

Senescey was terrified. And then she felt a little kick in her mind, the same feeling she got when Felicity was initially winning Triandra's trust, that always precluded her thoughts racing out of control.

Everyone else seemed to feel it too, cold glares breaking into angry muttering. And then Felicity dramatically gave out, slumping and falling down the gap between the table and her chair.

Senescey started to wail.

Felicity hadn't said anything about this! She sucked in a breath and bawled, now clinging to Triandra just because she was the closest pony at hoof. She wailed, and Larceny quickly followed suit.

"What is the point of this?" demanded one of the stallions sitting farther down the table, fixated on Triandra. "You picked children who knew we tampered with the mine!? Who else knows!?"

"This is melodramatic," another one griped, standing up and gathering his things. "She's a paid actor. You dirtied her up on purpose for the photo shoot, right?"

Triandra gritted her teeth, tense and defensive as Senescey continued to cry. But Felicity's eyes glowed faintly up from the shadows beneath the table where she was swimming.

"She had a point," another stallion whispered, haunted. "Did we fail to think this through?"

"I never green-lit it!" another barked, backing away from him. "Don't blame me! Look, she's the one who had the connections!"

"Silence," Triandra demanded, unsuccessfully trying once again to dislodge Senescey, who cried even harder. "Get your heads together! Order!"

Senescey screamed, drowning her out. But Felicity gestured frantically for her attention, Larceny already collected and held at her side. "Calm down!" she urged. "Senescey, come here! This is their problem now! It'll be okay; remember how I showed you to stop crying!"

Triandra gave Felicity the briefest of glances, and seemed to determine on the spot that she was less of a threat than the cascading anarchy in the room. "Go on," she hissed, trying in vain to shove Senescey down below the table with her sisters. "Get down there..."

Senescey struggled to focus and think about anything, to even understand why she was crying. She could focus on Felicity, on Felicity's voice. Think of... Think of her fear as an object in her hooves. That would help, Felicity had taught her when she was upset before. Help her to get some distance from it, make it easier for her to calm down. Like she was holding it separate from her, like it was a tool instead of a force that controlled her-

Triandra suddenly stiffened, as if pricked by something very tiny and very sharp. Her eyes went pinprick, and for a second, she looked like she possessed all the judgement and stability of a hysterical, terrified foal.

Felicity's eyes gleamed.

"Nooo!" Triandra screamed, Senescey finally losing her grip as she sprung to her hooves and flung her off. "All of this is wrong! You, you, everything!" Her terrified eyes wildly flicked between the stallions in the room. "Why are we killing people!? Why am I a part of this!? I-I shouldn't be here. You...!"

There were no voices of reason left in the room. "Lady Triandra," Quiverstamp started to snarl, "this is not becoming-"

Triandra flicked out the knife that was hidden in her dress beneath her wing and flung it at him like a dart, expertly nicking his throat. For a second, his eyes went wide, indignant... and then he suddenly gasped, and started to choke.

Before Senescey could see any more, Felicity grabbed her, yanking her under the table where she had already gathered Larceny. "Shhh," Felicity quietly urged. "You played your part beautifully, darling. Now there's nothing more but to leave them to it."

"Make it stop," Senescey whimpered as the sounds intensified up above, sounds she could no longer see the source of.

"Stop?" A cruel light flickered in Felicity's eyes, and she glanced back at her brand. "No, we're going to make it continue. These are the savages who see no cost in letting Mother die. I won't let this fight die down until they've learned just how barbaric they are."

"She's had a psychotic break!" someone shouted up above. "Move aside! I don't want any part of this!"

"Why is the door locked!? Ugh, let go of the handle! Move!" Thwack!

"That knife's poisoned!"

"Out of my way!"

A full melee had broken out in the room above. Senescey's heart was pounding, her mind was racing, she felt like she was choking on her own feelings. But after a few long, horrible minutes, Felicity finally whispered, "Time to go."

With a sudden release, all at once, Senescey's head stopped spinning. Her fear quieted down, and the world seemed to come back into focus, enough for her to realize that the fighting seemed to have stopped. No one was yelling anymore, except for her own sobbing and Larceny's sniffles beside her.

Felicity covered her eyes with a wing as she led her out from under the table.

"Y-You kids..." a stallion's voice groaned. Senescey couldn't see who it was.

"...It seems I was horribly naive," Felicity remarked sadly. "I intended to puncture your bubble of innocence and force you to live with the reality you've caused. Perhaps make you wrestle with the questions I've been wrestling with, lately. But I should have considered that anyone sadistic and sub-equine enough to poison an entire city would respond like this to the truth. There's nothing left of you to save. It seems this is all you're good for."

"Something c-came over me," the stallion stammered. "I wasn't myself, I... This isn't my..." He trailed off. "You pity us?"

"I do," Felicity said, still covering Senescey's eyes.

"You," the stallion said, incredulous. "In your position. A kid. This bloodbath doesn't even make you f-flinch..." He sounded vaguely nauseous. "What have you seen?"

"Think about why we came here," Felicity coldly told him. "If you're lucky, maybe now you can comprehend it. But there's nothing here for us anymore. Farewell. I don't expect you'll hear from us again."

And then she pulled Senescey into the shadows and swam out, through the window and into the night.

Felicity finally put Senescey down next to a bend in the river. In the twilight on the terraced hill above them, Senescey could see the silhouette of the manor.

Senescey was scared. She felt cold, and weird, and like she could cry again for any reason. "What happened?" she asked.

Felicity started to laugh.

It was a scary laugh, but it didn't last long, a fit of coughing forcing her to stop before she was ready. "...We showed them what kind of ponies they really are," Felicity eventually managed, wiping a trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth. "I gave them an opportunity to say there was a better way. But they asked for this, and so we gave it to them, you and I with a little help from my brand. Had our revenge. All without dirtying a hoof." She gave Senescey a battered smile. "You played your part to perfection, darling."

Senescey was confused. "Does that mean Mother will come back?"

"...No," Felicity sighed. "No, it doesn't. And I don't expect this will make everything feel alright again, either. But I do know one thing for sure."

She stared down into the flowing river, its placid surface running past just below them. "I felt powerful."

Senescey tilted her head.

"All my life, I've been scrambling just to survive," Felicity whispered. "Suffering under the uncaring gaze of the powers that be. Our lives aren't so much pawns to them as specks of dust on their game board. But it turns out those players are just as mortal as we are, Senescey. They can bend. They can bleed. They can break, and they're so weak that the mere presence of their victims makes them squirm. And because they haven't survived what we have, our pain is too much for them. They might have money and clean water and fancy homes, but they're all at our mercy, and the only thing protecting them is that we hadn't realized it until now."

Her eyes gleamed. "But now, I know. We won't be victims on this path. We can kill them, we can crush them, we can make them destroy themselves with their own hooves, and if we do we can ensure that we won't ever be hurt again."

"I'm tired," Senescey told her, not understanding what Felicity was saying.

"I know," Felicity said, gentleness returning to her face as she reached down and hugged her. "And you can rest easy tonight. Here, look." She turned her attention back to the river. "It's clean. There are no mines spilling into this part of the river. You can drink as much here as you like."

Senescey stared at the river, its surface crystal smooth.

"...Still," Felicity mused. "I didn't expect them to be quite so savage. My brand is powerful, but it can only amplify feelings that are already there. It's possible we've left that company in no state to prosecute this mine business, in which case the public will continue to drink that water and be none the wiser. In punishing the greater evil, we may have also prevented the problem from reaching its swiftest natural resolution."

"What does that mean?" Senescey asked.

"It means that we'll just have to come for Victor ourselves," Felicity said. "Provided no one else beats us to it, and at this point I'd rather like to see if he's as vulnerable as they were. But for tonight, I really do think I'm getting no more out of this body until I give it a good rest."

"Felicity, I'm tired," Senescey repeated. "When can we go to bed?"

Felicity started to reply, but her words suddenly distorted halfway through. <<Well, well. Looks like you're not dead after all,>> she said.

"Huh?" Senescey squeaked, feeling a strange sensation like the friction of the air had just increased.

<<Nice chord you're stuck in,>> Felicity said. <<This one's one of my favorites. So, feeling up to singing your own tune again? Or are you too tapped out?>>

Senescey blinked. What was Felicity talking about?

<<Eh, not surprising.>> Felicity shrugged. <<That red flash must've really done a number on you. Hmmm, hrrrm... You know, if you're still alive in here, I'm not going to push my luck with more tampering. Enjoy your memories and get some zest back, and I'll try again to coax you out once I figure out what's up with this body. Sound good?>>

"Felicity?" Senescey asked. "What's going on?"

Suddenly, the discontinuity vanished. "These terraces seem sheltered enough for a nap," Felicity said, evaluating the hillside leading up to the manor. "Night Mother willing, they'll have bigger priorities on their hooves than sending anyone to look for us. Here, dear, this spot looks alright..."

"Well?" Papyrus demanded, desperate and suspicious and sleep-deprived as natural light began to filter in through the gallery window.

The mare before him sighed, sitting lazily upright on a hastily-arranged couch - the only one of the room's eight batponies to be showing any sign of life. "Aye, she's in here," she smugly drawled. "Congratulations. Guess the irony of this situation was just too good for her to walk out on?"

"Yes, you've made me very much aware," Papyrus snapped. "But can you fix her?"

The mare shrugged, her chin-length, banana peel-yellow mane swaying slightly from the motion... on one side of her head. Her face was split perfectly down the middle, and on the other side, her mane was long and dirty aquamarine, a color that wasn't winning any awards in fashion contests.

"Oh, this is enjoyable." She licked her lips, fixing him with heterochromatic eyes, one of which burned a hateful emerald green. "I'm working on it. But her affliction hasn't yet passed." She glanced around at the rest of the batponies in the room, all of whom were still as stone. "Animating this body is like swimming in leaden boots. I don't think a mortal soul will have as much luck forcing it to work as I am. Even if I bring her up, she'll probably just sink again a moment later."

Papyrus gritted his teeth. "And that's all you can give us about what's wrong with her!?"

"With all of them," she lazily said. "Something to do with that red flash that passed by, no doubt. Presumably, you cure that and their minds will all come bobbing right back up to the surface. Perhaps."

She glanced down at the knife point stuck gingerly into her flank - and at the brand that had been replaced by an empty circle around it. "Of course, I need this one as a co-conspirator, so if any more drastic measures become necessary to keep her alive while you search for a cure... I guess I can't extort you for them as much as I'd like. But if you don't want to find out how long the rest of these innocent bystanders can live without an animating force, then you'd best get cracking on that cure."

Papyrus lashed his tail. "Senescey..."

"Oh, don't give me that look." Iblis smiled beatifically at him. "You always did so enjoy playing games with the lives of others. Why not sit back and enjoy your own medicine?"

Grounded

I awoke to the feeling of being in my body, a misty light filtering in through the window. That wasn't as common a feeling as it once was. It felt like I had been spending a lot more time as a ghost, lately... and I had almost spent a lot more, barely meeting up with Faye in time to recombine before she fell asleep this morning.

What would happen if I just never came back? Would I wind up like Procyon, emotionally detached from everything that was going on and rarely showing my face as a result? It was an unsettling possibility to consider, though if the current trend continued, I might have to grapple with it, and sooner more likely than later.

But sooner didn't mean now. Before bed, I only had time for a cursory exchange with Faye before our body gave in to the clutches of sleep, just enough to share information and decide we could act on it in the morning. Or evening. Or whatever time it was now.

I rolled out of bed and dressed myself, grateful to have been given a room of my own. Faye felt like she was still waking up in the back of my mind, so instead I started making a list of the things we needed to talk about. Crowscone's vague and frightening powers, this play we were sentenced to perform in and how we could get out of it, whatever was wrong with our shadow sneaking...

In the common room, Lissa and Flarefeather were already assembled, dressed as usual in their Wilderwind uniforms. That probably made me the last one up.

"Hey," Lissa greeted with a raised hoof. "A guard just came by and dropped these off." She pointed to the stack of papers on the coffee table they were poring over together. "Information about our sentence. The Black Knight's already out and about, and with this, we're free to go as well, as long as we don't leave the city limits."

"I don't see what they could do to stop us," Flarefeather pointed out. "What do I care if he has one of my feathers? Not like I can put it back once it's plucked."

I hesitated, tempted to mention that Crowscone didn't have the feathers anymore, anyway... but Lissa and Flarefeather still didn't know that I could turn into a ghost, or even much about the split between Faye and I. Explaining this to them before I got a chance to talk with Faye would involve a lot of overhead explanations. And it might not be wise to give these two ideas for yet another problem they could solve in Izvaldi, at least not until I knew the full details on how their last problem-solving foray had gone so wrong.

"What time is it?" I asked instead.

"Got about three hours until sundown," Lissa replied. "Maybe four until it's pitch black. We got up early-ish because we figured we wouldn't want to stay up all night again. Power's still not back, by the way."

I sighed. "Alright. So what do the papers say?"

"They're kind of elaborate." Flarefeather beckoned me closer, my bracelet's light clearly welcome when the only other source was the dimmed light from the window... It looked like last night's fog had never burned off. The weather must still have been frozen.

"Apparently, Crowscone expects us to choose the topic, write the script and recruit any other performers we need," Lissa wryly said. "With the stipulation that it needs to be about a period of his life, and the unwritten mandate to be as flattering as possible. All he's given us is a wide list of resources to start with. Names, organizations, you name it. Some of these look useful. Others... really shouldn't exist. And we've got a letter of introduction to get in quickly with any of them."

"Check out his writing, though," Flarefeather interrupted, shoving one of the papers in my face.

I blinked. It was the most flowery, precise cursive I had ever seen, written in glittery gold ink with the letters immaculately spaced and all bearing the same perfect height, same perfect width and same heavily-slanted font. It was almost hard to look at, printed on stationary that seemed more suited for legal declarations or even religious degrees than for providing simple references. Crowscone clearly didn't want readers to think he was a slob.

"The Department of Civil Obedience?" I frowned, parsing the text and starting to read. "Is that what they call police here? I suppose they'd know about the ruler's temperament and policy. The Triandra Memorial Library? Wonder who that was." I turned a page. "The Church of Pegasi? That's a thing here?"

"Triandra?" Faye mumbled sleepily in my head. "Sounds familiar..."

Lissa shrugged. "I rest my case. Probably a local cult of political favor. But, if anyone around here knows how to flatter this guy, I bet it's them."

Flarefeather grimaced. "Yeah, cults are usually bad news. I vote we wait to check on that one until we can ask some other locals what they're like."

"Not a bad idea," I agreed, fighting back a sudden growl from my stomach. "Any of these places you think might let us eat while we work? I'm starving."

Flarefeather raised an eyebrow. "You're thinking of seriously going along with this? Don't we need to get you to that ruby tower, like, now?"

I shook my head. "It's not a question of going along with anything. It's a question of sitting in here until nightfall, or hitting the streets and seeing if we can learn something useful. Whether it's about Crowscone or the power outage or how to get south in a hurry, he's given us an excuse on a silver platter to go be nosy. We should take it."

Lissa stood up. "My vote says we visit the police. If they're the ones that enforce the laws, they're the ones we'd actually need to get past if we left. We play friendly, pretend we're doing Crowscone's research, and take a look at their resources. See if they'd care if we left, and what they could do about it."

"Oh, you're right!" Flarefeather's eyes widened in realization, and she grinned at her. "There's that brainy mare I love! Bet you we'll find them with their hooves full with all the stuff that's been happening, and they'll be in no shape to chase after a couple of escapees." She turned to me. "So, you ready to roll right now? We've kinda been looking at this while waiting for you."

"Sure am." I brushed off the strap on my armor, still new and untested since I crafted it in Wilderwind. "Let's get out of this creepy mansion."

The city streets of Izvaldi's capital were hardly deserted, but 'bustling' wasn't the right word, either. Through the cover of dense fog, golden late-afternoon sunlight filtered down, strong enough that it should have burned the unnaturally thick blanket off in an instant. Yet, that wasn't happening anywhere.

Ponies moved skittishly through the eerie weather, mostly earth ponies and unicorns. Fliers were much rarer, presumably because they could travel above the fog - I had flown up multiple times as a ghost, and it didn't go terribly high. But it was dense, deep enough to shroud the city and reduce visibility to little more than a couple street-widths.

Flarefeather and I flanked Lissa, the only one among us who had studied a local map. No one tried to bother us. Everyone we saw was too busy either getting where they were going or talking to their neighbors just outside their homes.

Hushed chatter carried easily to my ears in the windless, silent town. "...power out, we have no choice but to talk outside! Unless you like the dark..."

"...no proclamation from the government, though I heard the Black Knight has been sighted..."

"...evil mist. Next thing you know, there will be monsters lurking inside it..."

That last remark struck a familiar nerve. This weather, as unnatural as it was, didn't feel evil. It felt more like it was broken. And I had plenty of experience with real evil mist - windigoes in Icereach, and then the green fog in Gyre - so I felt like I was qualified to tell the difference. But at the same time, having experienced more than one type of ultra-cursed fog before made it pretty rational to believe it could happen again.

"Try not to jinx it," Faye warily warned, mostly woken up in the back of my head. "You did say you saw Croswcone with a real revenant in his desk, didn't you?"

Yeah. That was another reason to be worried.

"...So," Faye said. "The ruby tower is south of here. If I ghosted you to guide me, and then turned our bracelet to a steady burn, I could probably sprint there in a few days. It would be rough, and if we got our emotions stuck again like in Snowport, we'd be on our own for fixing it. But with the power out, even a friendly administration isn't getting us there any faster."

Right. And speed was of essence. The biggest problem was, that would mean leaving behind Puddles, Lissa, Flarefeather and Coda.

Running off on our own sometimes worked, but this was always the price.

"You could also fly there as a ghost," Faye continued. "Assuming you don't have a maximum range. But then you couldn't do anything once you arrived. So that's not useful."

If we did run there, and then somehow get inside the crystal palace, reach the bottom, save the flame and make it back out - all of which were very big ifs - would we be in any condition to run back to Izvaldi? I furrowed my brow in thought, barely paying attention to my surroundings as I followed Lissa. What could we do? Just take the next step and then figure it out from there?

There was always the option to just... do nothing. Sit back and watch the world die, and hope someone else would save it. But that was a terrible option.

"I have an idea," Faye said quietly.

Her voice bordered on intimidated, but I was all ears. An idea with any benefits at all would be better than doing nothing.

"It's not a very good idea," she started. "I don't think you'll like it. I definitely don't. It would be a much better idea in the hooves of anyone but us. But if we don't have the resources to solve this on our own, we could ask for them."

Yeah, but from whom?

"Everyone. We tell everything to as many people as we can," Faye continued. "The authorities, the newspapers, people on the streets. We raise the alarm, and if anyone tries to stop us, we keep talking, even if it means making enemies and using force. And we hope that enough people take us seriously that by pooling our resources, we can find a way south that won't be too late."

I recoiled instinctively. Just what constituted telling everything?

"Good question," Faye whispered. "Enough for people to believe that once we do reach the tower, there's something we could do to fix this. No one will listen to someone who can't prove they have a plan."

I tried to envision myself standing on a rooftop, declaring to the world that I was a changeling queen who could maybe use her powers to preserve a dying flame at the heart of these recent events. I couldn't do it. I just couldn't.

"I don't know if I could, either," Faye apologized. "And I don't know how much to say, even if I could. This is Izvaldi. The place where they made Chrysalis into what she became. Whatever the locals' thoughts on changeling queens, they're probably strong."

Right. With everything surrounding the ruby tower, the power outage and now the magic I had seen Crowscone use, I had almost completely forgotten the original reason we were coming to Izvaldi: to track down the remnants of Chrysalis's throne. Before that, I had known the name Izvaldi as that of Coda's cult, the scientists who used to work here.

We just couldn't do it. I knew we couldn't do it. And yet, the thought of failing to save the world because I couldn't bring myself to say the right words at the right time was so stupid, I could barely bring myself to keep walking.

This was the kind of idea that, now that I had thought it, couldn't die.

"Seems like we're almost there," Lissa softly announced, unaware of our conversation as she broke the oppressive silence.

I sighed, pulling my focus back to the present. Casting as broad a net as possible, throwing what I knew out there and asking for help... I had no choice but to think on it. Once we were done scoping out the police, maybe I'd see what I could bring myself to tell Lissa and Flarefeather about why going south mattered. They already liked me, and trusted me more than most. See how badly this would go.

"Yeah, this looks pretty crowded," Flarefeather glibly remarked. "Something tells me these guys might be a little too busy to help us smooch up the big bad king's ego."

Ahead, the fog was just light enough for me to make out a large crowd of ponies and griffons, formed outside a building into a couple of disorderly lines. There were pegasi among them too, and I could see from the occasional take-offs and landings that my hypothesis they were all flying was correct.

It looked more like a strip mall storefront than a police station. I flicked my ears. "This is the police?"

Lissa glanced back at me. "The Department of Civil Obedience, which we assume is the police. Shares a government building with a couple other agencies, so if we're unlucky, all these people could be here for something else."

An earth pony couple passed by us as we approached, carrying a small, unmarked box that looked like it had been cheaply and industrially packaged in bulk. Some sort of disaster relief supplies, perhaps?

Curious, I drew closer, following Flarefeather and Lissa towards the crowd. When we had almost reached it, a uniformed stallion hailed us, motioning for us to stop.

"Organize into the lines," he requested, gesturing at the various rows of creatures. "That one if you're here for the candle distribution, over there if you've got more looting to report, and here if you have a pre-scheduled appointment with one of the other agencies. Walk-ins are closed for the emergency."

Looting, huh? Yep, people were here for the police.

He started to move on, only sparing us half a glance as he kept an eye out for more pegasi and griffons landing and needing instructions... and then did a double-take, scrutinizing us more closely. "Wait. You're not a sarosian, are you?"

I blinked, Lissa and Flarefeather forming up behind me. "Would it be relevant if I was?"

The officer gave me a serious look. "Would you mind coming with me for a moment? I've got someone who would like to ask you some questions." Catching the looks the three of us were giving him, he quickly added, "You're not in trouble. I'll allow your friends to skip ahead in line while you talk, so it shouldn't cost you any time."

I glanced at my friends, who both shrugged. We came here to talk to the police, but they were the ones who wanted to talk to me?

"Well, alright." I nodded, eternally wary but now deadly curious... and if someone had reason to believe I was worth pulling aside and talking to, maybe they knew things I wanted to hear. "What's up?"

The officer beckoned to another officer who was organizing the crowd, pointed him to Lissa and Flarefeather, and with a few short words of explanation the three of them were on their way, Flarefeather giving me a weirded-out glance over her shoulder as she was led into the crowd.

"You have any sarosian friends around here?" the officer asked, leading me on a different route through a door into the strip front of buildings.

I shook my head. "I'm from out of town. Just arrived recently."

The officer grunted. "Then you might not have heard about what's going on. Something is up with the local sarosians. I'm taking you to talk with a doctor who's currently on the case. She'll want to know about any strange experiences you've had recently, as well as what you've done and where you've been over the last few days. It should help to pinpoint the source of all this, especially if you've recently arrived. We appreciate anything you can tell us, citizen."

Strange experiences, huh? Boy, that would take a day and a half... I didn't catch the sign on the building, but inside was a waiting room of sorts, a receptionist sitting behind a desk and a decent number of ponies sitting in chairs and glumly waiting. At least half of them looked surprised to see me.

Several large candles were set out in impermanent fixtures, providing a minimum level of light not to crash into any walls or bump into other people, and as the officer led me deeper into the building I wondered why Crowscone's mansion didn't have the same. Many of the doors in the hallway were ajar, though since only the hallway was lit it was difficult to make out whatever was inside.

Finally, though, we turned a corner and entered a larger side room that was lit. It had a number of sterile-looking beds lining one wall, several of which were hidden by hanging privacy shrouds, and from the garb of the mare who was currently trying to read a clipboard by her own hornlight, I realized this had to be a hospital.

"Doctor Sophia," the officer greeted, catching her attention. "I found a sarosian who seems to be on her hooves. I thought you'd like to interview her right away-"

Clack!

The doctor flung her clipboard like a shuriken, axepoleing him perfectly in the forehead. "Are you daft, stallion?" she barked, urgently marching towards me with a get out look in her eyes. "We don't know if it's contagious, why would you bring someone you don't think is afflicted in here with the others!?"

I blinked hard.

"Out! Shoo!" She swatted at me to back off, stomping towards me. "Any room but this one, unless you fancy yourself a science experiment! What part of move it don't you understand?"

Demanding answers first seemed like an excellent way to tempt fate. I quickly backstepped into the hallway.

The doctor - apparently Sophia - stood me up in a hallway several rooms away from where I had initially been led, the officer long since dismissed to return to his duties. She had a sharp-tipped horn and a bright red neck-length mane that was so curly it made her look like a sheep, in a way that would have been endearing if I hadn't just seen her assault a police officer. That had to take guts.

"You're a sarosian," she remarked, appraising me. "Are you feeling alright? Any sudden dizziness, light-headedness, feel like you might faint?"

I shook my head. "No. That guy mentioned something weird was happening, though. What's going on here?"

Sophia raised an eyebrow. "Something 'weird' happening? We've had several sarosians brought in this morning who were found unresponsive in their beds by roommates or family. Enough of them that it was safe to assume this afflicted every sarosian in town, until you showed up. Tell me, where did you spend the previous night? Did you have any unusual experiences waking up this morning?"

I blinked. "Just got up a little while ago. I was up all night, after..."

After the airship crashed. But I had missed the crash itself.

"We were stuck in that red space," Faye agreed in my head, putting two and two together exactly as I did. "And we only got out by using our void on the redness..."

I felt slightly cold. "That happened because I'm a sarosian? And it affected every other sarosian, too?"

Sophia leaned closer, stress visible in the bags under her eyes. "What did you experience? And how did you recover?"

"Felt like I was locked in a sea of red," I explained, feeling like the universe was laughing at me as I weighed how much of my precise situation to divulge. "I... got better because I've got a cursed magical bracelet that keeps me safe."

"When?" Sophia pressed. "And where?"

Well, those questions, I could answer. "Must have been a little past midnight," I told her. "I was on an airship flying in from the north, and was up late reading a book. About three hours' walk from here. When I came to, the ship was landed with no power, so it was exactly when the power went out."

Sophia nodded, writing this quickly down. "Was it a sudden onset? And are there any lingering symptoms?"

Back to the slightly harder questions. "I dunno," I said. "I think I felt something off, like, a second or two before it happened. And I feel fine now, but something's really wrong with my shadow swimming. But that could be because of anything."

Sophia pondered this. "How long were you out? You're certain this coincided exactly with the time of power loss?"

"Yeah." I nodded. "It couldn't have been more than a few minutes, and when I came to, we had been landed for a while. But we were flying smoothly before it happened. Also the same time as the weather froze."

"I've been in this office all day." Sophia shook her head, sounding patiently frustrated. "People keep saying the weather's unnatural, but so far that's the least of my concerns. Now, you say you were spared by a 'cursed magical bracelet'? Not simply by being farther from the epicenter of this effect?"

I held up my bracelet leg, lit it and tapped it to show it off. "It was still strong enough out there to take down the entire ship. I don't think it would have fallen off that quickly. And I definitely had to use this."

Sophia squinted warily at the bracelet. "I've seen my share of magical artifacts. What did this do to help you, and what kind of curse is it under?"

I winced a little, and decided to push my boundaries. "Well, it's technically a holy artifact for a really inexperienced god monster, so it's more dangerous and unpredictable than literally cursed. And there's no ethical way to do the science to make it more reliable..." My squeamishness definitely showed on my face.

Perplexingly, Sophia seemed to take this in stride. "With the world in its current state, I'm surprised there aren't more people running around with things like that. How did it cure you? Deflecting or absorbing some other curse?"

Huh. She took that better than I expected. "I'm pretty sure it removed some sort of metaphysical soul sludge," I explained. "Not a toxin. More like an insulator, or interference."

Sophia sighed. "You're 'pretty sure'? I thought I ruled out soul magic earlier... My only hypothesis left is a curse strong enough to be completely undetectable and resistant to all conventional forms of counterspells. But I'm not an expert. No one is, these days. This bracelet of yours doesn't let you talk to your patron, does it? Can you ask them for more specifics on what they did?"

"Say what?" I blinked, incredulous. "You believe me about my bracelet, then disbelieve me about soul sludge not because you don't think it's real, but because you already ruled it out?"

Sophia gave me a strange look. "Well, yes. What part of that... Oh." She shook her head. "You must be from Varsidel or Ironridge. Aren't you?"

Now I just felt embarrassed. "Icereach, actually. Though I did my time in Ironridge as well..."

Sophia adjusted her posture. "The Griffon Empire might be fallen on paper, but we're still the same people. This was a theocracy where most of the population watched our goddess soar the skies, and some of us spoke to a different one through altars. No one here denies that beings like that exist, though I couldn't tell you why they don't try to carve out slices of the central territories. As for soul magic, we are in Izvaldi."

Two and two clicked in my brain, about Coda's cult who created Chrysalis and the legacy they must have left behind. "Really? I'm out of the loop on that."

"Before the Empire collapsed, we had a number of scholars here focused on it," Sophia explained. "Or, more accurately, before Lord Percival's government was blown up in a battle between Garsheeva and a heretic. I was just an intern at the government-run hospital at the time, so I only got to hear about it from colleagues. But there was an entire underground wing of the facility researching empirical, magic-based cures for disorders of the mind. Depression, amnesia, vegetative comas... Some even said demonic possession."

She sadly shook her head. "But everyone who worked directly on those projects left after the fall, and Crowscone locked away all their surviving materials when he came to power. So, I've had nothing but memories of hearsay for the last two decades. And I might have overlooked something important as a result." She leaned closer. "So, can you ask your bracelet god for more specifics, or not?"

I saw a corner, and she was unknowingly giving me a choice whether to back myself into it or not. But my conversation with Faye was still at the forefront of my mind, and for someone like this, who seemed to have the information to contextualize just about anything I could tell her...

"...Yeah," I promised. "But like I said, she's really inexperienced. And pretty reclusive, too. And it's dangerous because most of the time, she doesn't actually know what she's doing, which is the case right now."

Sophia sighed. "Right. So, that's all I'm getting..."

"Could I see the patients for myself?" I asked. "I'm ninety-nine percent sure this stuff won't randomly smear off on people. And if it does, that's probably a good thing, since I'll be fine anyway and it would dilute it on them."

"As long as you're cognizant of the risks," Sophia said, getting up and beckoning for me to follow. "If you somehow are a charlatan, no insurance in the world would pay for your stay here once you pass out."

She led me back to the room I had first seen her in, and drew back some of the bed curtains once we were there. Inside each one was a sarosian, and at first glance, they didn't appear to be breathing.

A second glance confirmed it. "Are they dead?" I asked, hackles raising in alarm.

"They certainly look it," Sophia said. "They have no pulse either. But they're still warm, and they haven't even stiffened despite being like this all day. Ordinarily, there would be all sorts of measurable changes in a day-old cadaver, yet these ponies seem by all rights to have been suspended in time."

A weird thought struck me. "Like the weather?"

Sophia shrugged. "Beats me. Like I said, I haven't been out all day. But if you've seen it, does that mean anything to you?"

I looked over each of the patients, squinting and staring, yet could see no outward signs of red contamination. And yet, that didn't mean there wasn't any. The red sludge I had eaten, I could still feel sitting in my void, tasteless and useless and emotionally destitute, lacking any quality that could register to my external senses. I needed some other way...

"Maybe I could tell, if I was up front," Faye said in the back of my mind. "Part of your function as my mask is to have more distance between you and our powers. But I don't know what confirming this would do for us. We can't use our bracelet to suck out their redness like we did for ourselves. You know what would happen if we tried."

Right. My thoughts drifted to Mother, and her disfigured side.

It had been a while since I had feared I could scar myself like she had been. My bracelet couldn't seem to hurt me like she had been, at least not physically. But other batponies were different. If I tried that on these patients...

"This continent has seen a changeling queen do that before," Faye said, finishing my thought for me.

I closed my eyes and lowered my bracelet hoof. This was a boundary it would be foolish to cross. To my knowledge, we had only ever used our void's power on two ponies before: Coda, when she used her throne to probe my defenses back in Ironridge, and Rhodallis, when he attacked us in the catacombs beneath Gyre. Neither of those were ordinary batponies like these. The odds of something terrible befalling them if I tried to help were simply far too high.

Yet, now that I had remembered that day with Coda... Hadn't she suspected something terrible could happen to me? That her changeling queen powers could potentially tear me out of my body, the way Chrysalis had done to the Empire's batponies long ago? And she rationalized it as being fine because if that happened, she could put me back together again.

I looked back at the suspended batponies. What if I could do the same? Somehow cleanly separate them without causing whatever had been done to Mother, cleanse them of redness, accept that this would probably involve devouring their souls, and then put them back together?

Maybe it was a foolish gambit. It had probably been foolish back when Coda did it, and she had resources I didn't, like all of her cult's changeling queen knowledge, and the presence of her throne.

Even as I thought that, I did another double-take. Hadn't Sophia just said that those very same scientists had left a trove of material behind that was confiscated by Crowscone? And it might not have been mine, but there was a changeling queen throne buried somewhere under this city-

"Stop," Faye forcefully interrupted. "You're making thousands of dangerous assumptions and if you want to push our boundaries that badly, we could always do it with my idea from before. I'd like to help these ponies too, but have you considered what might happen to us if we make a habit of using our void on people? There is no one but us who can police us and ensure we use our powers for good. We can't let ourselves wind up like Chrysalis."

I recoiled in surprise. True, I felt my own deep sense of unease about this prospect, but where had that come from?

Faye said nothing.

Alright, then. There was nothing we could do to help.

With a weird sense of resignation and a determination to discuss this later, I turned to Sophia and shrugged. "Basically zero odds that I could do anything for them. This bracelet would probably kill them if I tried the same thing as it did for me, or worse."

"I understand," Sophia replied, weary and a little dejected. "I'm also aware that this isn't your problem, and you have things to do and places to be. Thank you for giving me as much time as you have, here. But if you or your patron learns anything more, and you feel like doing something to better the world a little, I'll be here for a long time yet."

Are you alright? I asked Faye as I walked back to the entrance of the hospital. What was that about? I knew we both had a lot on our mind lately, but we had used our powers a lot before, and there was rarely any discussion of winding up like Chrysalis as a result. Sure, I wasn't comfortable either, but why now, and why so strongly? Had something happened?

"...I suppose I should tell you," Faye sighed in the back of my mind. "It's my star sight. You probably remember it from the times you used to take the mask off, before the split between us was so cleanly defined. It's one of the parts of our power you don't have access to, since the point of you was to seal it away. But, those stars correspond to people, in some non-geometric way."

I nodded. I knew that much.

"Last night, while I was sneaking with Lissa and Flarefeather," Faye said. "I tried to push my boundaries too hard. We figured out that the reason we've never been able to take passengers while shadow swimming is because it requires bodily contact, and clothes get in the way... or, at least it does with how our swimming works now. At the same time, I was trying to lean further into the star sight, to see if it could give us useful warnings for when guards were approaching."

I nodded again. That all sounded useful.

"It should have been," Faye agreed. "But getting that close to them while seeing them as stars... It made me realize that this is what our void is for."

Say that again? What our void was for?

"That's right," Faye murmured. "Those two are incredibly vibrant and bright. I think anyone would be, if we got that close. But it was a craving unlike anything I've felt before. It was like... it was the natural order of things for them to exist in our void, for their light to belong to us and no one else. It felt like seeing them walking around, that was the anomaly. I was terrified by myself. I almost broke down. And I'm worried that if we do something like this carelessly, it could awaken some taste in us that's so far been dormant, even if we successfully fix them and put them back together when we're done."

My gait stiffened as she talked. Was she serious? Had this been buried so deep in our psyche that even she didn't know about it?

Faye didn't answer. My thoughts drifted to Procyon.

"It's possible," she agreed. "Procyon does always say she was an evil pony. I don't know. But for now, it's starting to feel like I've reached the limit of how deep I can safely dig into who we are and what we can do."

My heart fell. What could we even do about this?

"Well, as long as you're up front, our star sight doesn't work," Faye pointed out. "And I think our aversion to touching people might be due to this, as well. So as long as we stop digging now, and just work with what we know about ourselves instead of trying to learn more, I don't think it's too late to put a lid on that. But we have to be careful."

And Chrysalis's throne? Crowscone's cache of research from the team that created her?

"I don't know," Faye apologized. "For now, none of those are as important as the ruby tower. As long as we only eat non-standard things like red sludge or flames of harmony or windigoes, I don't think we'll have to deal with whatever it was I felt. And I don't think anything we've found here will help us get south."

I wasn't sure I agreed. There was always the slim, tiny hope that if we knew more about our powers, we could use them more safely... but she was right that it wouldn't get us where we were going any faster. Unless I suddenly learned to fly. That was a mystery I hadn't even started cracking.

"Well, girl," Flarefeather greeted, waiting for me at the hospital's exit to the fogbound world, "we got candles."

She proudly shoved a box in my face, just like the ones the other ponies here seemed to be receiving. Candles, huh? I pulled my focus back to thirty minutes ago, recalling the officer saying something of the sort. That did seem like an appropriate thing to hand out en masse during a power outage. Though why would Crowscone be willing to hand these out to the public, but be too cheap to add them in his own home?

"Also..." Flarefeather raised an overly-serious eyebrow. "Wasn't your luck supposed to be super ultra mega-cursed? Because you just let yourself get bagged by a police officer and then walked right back out none the worse for wear."

I grimaced. "Actually, I just found out I'm the only sarosian in town who isn't hit with a time-stop curse. Not sure this is a good thing, even if it could be worse. Did you get anything besides candles?"

Lissa whistled. "Well, we learned that the local cops are far too busy trying to keep order and tamp down on looting to tell us stories about how nice Mister Trills-a-lot is. There's enough weird rumors starting to circulate about the weather and everything else that some people are acting like it's everyone for themselves out there. So, a time-stop curse, huh?"

I nodded, briefly filling them in on how the city's batponies all seemed to have gone into a magical stasis coma when the ruby tower appeared and that I seemed to have been uniquely spared by my bracelet. Both of them looked unnerved.

"Is someone compiling a list of everything we know is wrong since that happened?" Lissa mused. "I know you want to reach this tower, but there's so many different things, there has to be some sort of cause and effect. We've got this, the weather, the power... All these things can't have been caused by the same event and have nothing else in common. Maybe, I don't know, sarosians need the weather to function? Something like that?"

Flarefeather looked more thoughtful, frowning as we walked further into the city. "What was it like for you when the stuff happened?" she asked, glancing at me. "You were the last one to the bridge after the ship touched down. Late enough that we were kind of worried, honestly. Was it just, like 'Flash! Pow!' And then you had to shrug it off?"

I shook my head, repeating what I had just explained to Sophia a few minutes ago... "It was pretty immediate," I told her. "Came out of nowhere and took a while for me to recover. Why're you asking?"

Flarefeather narrowed her eyes at Lissa. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

Lissa tilted her head. "That this isn't the first time the Empire's sarosians have gotten insta-blicked by a magic field?" She winced a little at me. "No offense."

"That Consul," Flarefeather answered, a glimmer of excitement in her eyes. "The one who randomly keeled over last night. What do you want to bet he was a sarosian?"

"Yeah, the one we pretended to investigate last night," Lissa agreed, blinking. "That would mean..." She frowned in thought.

Flarefeather mirrored her expression on purpose. "Yeah? What would that mean?"

"Last night, it really looked like Neeve was the culprit," Lissa said. "But if the Consul was hit by this curse and no one realized he wasn't actually dead dead, then it could be neither side's fault, so both are convinced the other did it."

Flarefeather chuckled. "Hey, if we solved this, you think we could clear up such a big headache for both of them that they'd drop our sneaking punishment and help us get south?"

I was thinking something very different: the Consulate ruled the south. If anyone could roll out a red carpet to get me to that tower as fast as equinely possible, it would be one of the people who ran the place. And if anything would give one of those people a reason to favor me, it would be saving them from this red sludge stasis.

Of course, this would involve doing the exact thing Faye and I had just agreed should be completely off-limits, and praying it both worked and had no consequences. That was a similar level of nope to her earlier idea, spilling everything to everyone and hoping some of them could help.

My secrets for an unknown amount of unqualified help? Or a risk to my sanity for a non-guaranteed shot at some very qualified help?

Flarefeather attempted to choose for me. "Alright," she declared, "think you can make your way back to the mansion on your own? If I fly back, I can get there much quicker, see if he's a sarosian, and start talking. Bet you I'll have this whole case put to bed by the time you catch up. Any objections?"

She didn't wait for any objections before spreading her wings and leaping into the air. A second later, she crashed right back down to earth.

"What?" Flarefeather blinked, looking shocked and upset as she picked herself up, brushing mud off her glittery, newly-scuffed uniform. She flapped her wings, stationary. "What happened? It's not supposed to go like that..."

Lissa flapped her wings too, jumping a few times in place. She, too, was unable to take off, and beneath her cool facade I saw confusion grow and quickly blossom into a deep, alien fear.

Both of them looked helplessly at each other, and then at me.

I shrugged, flapping my wings uselessly for emphasis. "I never could fly, remember?"

"What's going on?" Flarefeather whispered. "When was the last time we flew? Do you remember?" She turned to Lissa. "We flew on our way here from the ship, right? So it can't be whatever happened last night..."

Lissa glanced back at the crowd in front of the police and hospital complex, where pegasi and griffons were still taking off and landing to avoid the fog. "Nope. It's definitely just us." She shuddered visibly. "Just when we needed another random, unconnected thing to go wrong. Let's get somewhere I don't feel so exposed, and quickly."

Premonition

Lissa, Flarefeather and I took shelter inside a gloomy coffee shop, which offered no coffee and day-old pastries on account of the power outage. More appealingly, it had a big, glass storefront to let in light, almost no clientele and a napping bartender who looked like he was only here because he had nothing better to do.

In other words, it wasn't too dark and was about as private as we were going to get.

Lissa and Flarefeather huddled together on a chair meant for one, sitting across from me at a table against the window. A tray of glazed donuts filled the space between us. There was still some mud on Flarefeather's uniform.

None of us knew what to say. Both of my friends were finally taking this seriously; there was none of the adventurous energy that had led them to stay up last night and break into Crowscone's study. That was a silver lining, at least. But the difference in their reactions said something, too.

Flarefeather was scared. I had been flightless all my life; it was difficult to imagine losing an entire dimension from my world. The closest allegory was probably my shadow swimming, which was conveniently now broken itself. But I had taken so many knocks over the last year that it barely even ranked on the things fighting for time in my thoughts. She was new to this. There wasn't even an effort made to cover it up: prior to today, she hadn't realized she wasn't invincible.

Maybe the Aldebaran incident was a better comparison. If she felt like that... The best thing I could do was take point, and make it obvious. Back then, everyone else somehow resolved the incident without any of my efforts bearing fruit. If someone could have just convinced me they had the situation under control, it would have been invaluable.

Lissa, by comparison, looked more contemplative. She was scared too, but while Flarefeather's fear was something new and unknown, I could tell instantly that Lissa had something more definite in mind. She was trying to plan, and while she didn't voice her plans out loud, she clearly didn't like what she was thinking.

Just like me when I used to look to my bracelet as my only recourse. Her expression, I would know anywhere.

It fell to me to do something, but I knew I couldn't do what needed to be done. I, of all ponies, had no right to promise to anyone that everything would be alright. Not me, the filly who had chosen things more important than Corsica and Ansel and then ultimately left them by the wayside, completely unaware of whatever new burdens they were taking up. This was what I did. I moved on and I left half-finished commitments in my wake. And the way I did it was by never making them official.

Had I ever told Corsica what she meant to me? Had I ever revealed my nature as a changeling queen to anyone who wasn't already stronger than I was? I kept my powers a secret because I knew they had been used for great evil before, sure, but the flipside of that was that they could be used for good. By keeping them a secret, no one could ever judge me for not using them. All the promises I ever made about how my powers would be used were strictly between myself and Faye. When we broke those promises by accepting the limitations of what we could bring ourselves to do, no one else knew that things could have been different.

Who would hold me accountable if I gave these girls an empty promise that everything would be alright, and then decided to stop trying halfway through when I ran into an obstacle I was unwilling to surpass?

I hated this. I knew what to do, what powers like mine could be used for, and I knew what would happen if I tried to do it. I had known all along, really, and still chosen to coax them out onto an adventure with me. And my playbook for what to do next was well-worn and familiar: lie, abandon them, or pretend I could do nothing.

Kind of similar to my options with the ruby tower, really. I could use my bracelet and run off on my own to get there. I could try something impossible that I knew I wouldn't see through, be it attempting to cure the Consul or trying to rally the masses. Or I could sit around and wait for someone else to save the day.

With my track record, the latter would probably happen. But it wasn't guaranteed, and I hated the results every time.

The clock was ticking. The ruby tower's flame could be dead by now. Or perhaps it was still hanging on, but wouldn't last until tomorrow morning.

Keenly aware of how much time I had allowed us to waste last night, when we should have been sleeping or planning or even sprinting with the bracelet, I heaved a sigh through gritted teeth. I couldn't take this anymore. Never trying, always failing, locking myself into decisions where I wouldn't follow through even though I held phenomenal power. Setting myself up to sacrifice everything in exchange for the preservation of a status quo like this.

Something had to give. Changeling queens had change right there in the name. I still remembered the days not so long ago when the point of me, a mask, was to be plastic and moldable, something that could easily adapt to whatever I needed to be. What had gone wrong? How did I find myself locked so frequently in these rigid, brittle situations where the only choices left resulted in something terrible? Had I learned a bad lesson, taken something incorrect to heart that led me to discard the right answer before even thinking about it? It couldn't be. Everything I had learned over the last year was to prevent this kind of thing from happening.

Faye was being awfully quiet. What was she thinking about? Anything she saw that I had overlooked?

"Sorry," Faye apologized in my mind. "I gave you my craziest idea already. Maybe I should be focusing more on the end of the world, but my brain's just stuck on the concept of using our void to move around souls."

Probably more productive than I was being. If we could find a way past her hangups on that, then trying to heal the Consul - assuming Flarefeather was right about his cause of 'death' - would be back on the table, and maybe we really could get everyone out of Izvaldi together. Any progress?

"Not even close," Faye sighed. "Mostly failing not to think about how it felt when I was so close to their stars. Lissa and Flarefeather's. I... thought I had mostly tamped it down, but it just keeps coming back. Maybe the damage is already done."

Tell me about it?

"It's just this desire," Faye said. "Imagine if you had a puzzle piece or a piano key or a chess pawn and didn't know what it was, and then one day learned it wasn't just a trinket and needed all the other parts to be complete. Like I thought our void was just a normal part of us before, and now see all the things that are missing. It's like that."

And it would feel complete if... what? It was filled to the brim with a hundred thousand souls torn freshly free of their bodies, like Chrysalis had done? Or were Flarefeather and Lissa special somehow?

"I don't know," Faye apologized. "All I know is that once they were close enough for me to notice it, I could tell it wasn't close enough."

I looked across the table at the two pegasi, huddled up against each other. The chair they shared wasn't quite jumbo sized. Sitting like that looked pretty uncomfortable. And yet they certainly looked like the laws of space would have to bend a little before they could be as close as they wanted to be.

Romance and attraction were mysteries to me. After working at Jamjars' wedding agency, I had seen my fair share of love at its finest, and despite recognizing its absence in Coda's diet of prayers, I really didn't understand the real thing. But looking at those two, it struck me that they didn't need metaphysical voids in their hearts to want to be closer than physically possible.

Could Faye share with me that memory of getting too close?

"Are you sure?" Faye was openly dubious. "If you don't yet have this stuck in your head, you really want to stay that way."

Positive. Gimmie. I felt an idea brewing, like a tiny glimmer on the ground that could belong to an undiscovered diamond.

"If you say so..." Faye relented. "Hope you don't have anything more important to be grappling with, like whether we can do what it takes to save the ruby flame."

We momentarily swapped as Faye tinkered with my memory, re-inserting the whole previous night I had been ghosted for. It landed like a load of bricks: her panic as our shadow sneaking failed against the window, the bizarre contents of Crowscone's study, everything about Lissa and Flarefeather. I saw Faye's star sight, felt her place a wing over Flarefeather's back... and was suddenly paralyzed as something rolled over me.

An urge to take. An urge to keep. An urge to hoard. The knowledge that she could break. The firm conviction that her purpose was to be held and admired and nothing more.

Admired by me. And no one else.

"What the...?" I breathed as the sensation oozed on past, like an ever-cresting wave of sickly sludge. The real-world Flarefeather in front of me clashed with what I remembered like a feeble flame, a faithless imitation of what I was meant to do.

"See?" Faye said unhappily. "I warned you."

No. This was bogus. This was dumb. I couldn't accept this. This was not the idea I had been fishing for.

I knew what I wanted. I wanted a world in which I had seen what Faye experienced and realized that she had mistaken something good, that it was natural to want to hold people close and our all-too-literal ability to do that drew her to the wrong conclusion. I wanted this because I wanted to be like those two, having someone to cling to when I was scared who could share that fear and know it even if they weren't strong enough to banish it at the source. I wanted this to be my oversight, the impulse I never understood, the absence of which had made it too easy to leave my previous friends behind.

What Faye had showed me instead was something different, twisted and wrong. But it had still allowed me to crystallize my thoughts. Even if this revelation didn't mean what I wanted it to mean, for an instant, I was mad enough to pretend otherwise. And I was a great pretender.

"Right," I abruptly declared, sitting up straight and willing reality to be what I wanted rather than what I had. "Listen up. I'm not gonna lie to you and tell you I have a plan, or even a grasp of the situation. Things are going wrong, and they're getting wronger by the minute. They're wrong for me, too. My shadow swimming is busted, or at least changed. But as the one who coaxed you out here, it's still my job to tell you what's what."

I glanced at the bartender to ensure he had gone fully back to sleep... though with the way Flarefeather and Lissa were now looking at me, it was too late to take it back and shut up. "First off. All this stuff is certainly happening in Wilderwind as well. If I was you, I'd be feeling like this was a pretty lousy time to pick to venture out into the world. I know I sure felt that way when my first big adventure blew up in my face. But the fact is, we've got agency here. More than you'd have in Wilderwind, I bet, because this place has a big vacuum of responsibility and is ripe for anyone to do something. You might not have asked to be heroes, but trust me: being helpless in a crisis and watching everyone else do the work is worse."

It wasn't hard to look at both of them in turn when they were so close together. "Second," I continued. "I'm going to need your help to fix this. I know you're shaken by this no-flight thing, and I'd love to be a big hero who tells you everything's gonna be okay because I'm on the case. But the truth is, I'm the wrong pony for the job. Not even because of how hard or easy this will be. It's because..." I took a big breath. "I'm a chronic, incurable coward. And if I'm left to my own devices, I'm gonna get halfway through this and then run away."

I forced my ears to stand up straight. "I've never not fled from responsibility. I'm horrible with it. I pretend to take on big jobs by getting close to the action and then I wimp out when I reach the edge of my comfort zone. Every time I hit my limit, it's because I flake out, not because I'm outmatched. I fixate on the consequences of messing up during the moment of truth and then make snap decisions about things with far bigger consequences I then have to run from. And I don't trust anyone as a result, because I know that I'm not trustworthy myself. It's stupid. It's stupid and it prevents me from making lasting friendships with anyone... which could soon include you two if nothing changes."

Both of them looked a little stunned.

"It's a lame weakness," I said. "Pep talks are supposed to be how it's okay to have fears and weaknesses and how you can overcome them, and the truth is I've been bested by my insecurities every single time I've tried to see something through. I've never stayed committed. I'm a self-proclaimed adventurer with nothing but forfeits under my belt. So let me make something perfectly clear: this is not a pep talk. Like I said, I'm telling you what's what."

I took a deep breath. This wasn't even the hard part, but I wasn't out of steam yet. "Despite all that, you threw me off a skyscraper and saw me walk away like it was nothing." I pointed a hoof at Flarefeather. "And believe it or not, that's the least of what I can do. This is all the more stupid because if I could get a grip and learn to stop bailing at the drop of a hat, I'd be unstoppable. Instead, I always under-promise and then pretend to be a bystander, and no one can call me out on it because I never tell them I can make a difference in the first place."

Finally, I folded my forehooves on the table. "So. I'm sorry for airing out my dirty laundry in your faces at a really awkward time. But I can get us out of this if I apply myself and get my act together, and the stakes are too high to magically assume this time will be the charm. I need your help, and what I need you to do is hold me accountable if I say something's impossible or 'this is the only way' without a really good reason."

Flarefeather looked suspicious. Lissa, oddly, looked guilty and a little annoyed, but my heart was pounding and I couldn't even try to parse her feelings over the rush of my own nerves. Even in my head, Faye was quiet, waiting to see how my speech would play out.

"You know, you made it pretty clear when we met that you had issues," Flarefeather ventured. "You thought your luck was so terrible that you'd get sucked into a conspiracy just by breathing. But then you talk big about Yakyakistan's windigoes, or going south so you can fix the weather, and now all the stuff you just said. Am I hearing that right? That you like to hang out around stuff like this and then only get spooked once you're far in?"

"...Yeah." I let my ears fall. "I'm a whole lot better at starting stuff than seeing it through. I just usually don't get much farther than being in the right place at the right time."

Flarefeather nodded. "See, someone who's truly paranoid about everything would have fled the continent by now. So what are you actually afraid of?"

There it was. Here came the hard part.

"I'm..." I swallowed, my throat suddenly bone dry. "Some of the things I can do are kind of... distinctive. And I'm afraid that if I make a big splash, or even just use all the tools in my kit, someone's gonna recognize them and realize who I am."

That got Lissa's attention. "Realize who you are? What?"

Flarefeather tilted her head. "What do you mean, realize who you are? Are you secretly someone famous operating under a pseudonym?" She squinted at me. "You're like... our age. How long have you even had to become famous?"

I shuddered, and checked to make sure the barkeep was still sleeping. "I'm not, but I easily could be. It's... I'm..."

Both of them watched as I struggled. I had been able to just spit it out for Puddles, hadn't I? Come on, come on...

Flarefeather looked awkwardly restrained, as if she was uncertain whether to press me. But Lissa spoke up. "Is this a test to see if we'll let you weasel out of something when you just asked us not to, or are you actually tongue-tied?"

I sighed, something loosening in the back of my mind just a little. "I'm not a batpony. I'm a creature called a changeling queen. Which, if you didn't know, is the same kind of super-rare monster that destroyed the Empire two decades ago."

Both of them stared at me, incredulous yet slowly starting to pale.

"There aren't many of us," I said. "But everyone who was alive back then must have been affected by that. If I stay in one place for too long, show off too many different things I can do, they stop being anomalies and start becoming patterns. Someone's going to figure it out, especially here in the Empire. Some people already have, so it might be only a matter of time no matter what I do. And it's not guaranteed that what I'll do is good, either. There's only so many ways to use a power that lets you rip out the minds of real batponies and turn them into soulless drones. But that's what I've got to work with. I'm trying to be a good guy, but living with it has done some interesting things to my sanity."

"Are you being serious?" Flarefeather asked, quiet.

"You want to know why I'm so paranoid about the people around me?" I asked her. "It's because I've had way too many experiences where people who do know something about me try to use me as a tool. This isn't a random bracelet. It's part of me, and the focal point for my power. Listen, I..."

I swallowed. "I get it if this is a deal breaker for you. I swear I'm doing my best to stay on the right side of history, but the only safe way to do that is to not be a part of it. See, I also don't know much about my powers, because I've never had a teacher. Even with good intentions, I could accidentally-"

"Do you need a hug?" Flarefeather asked, interrupting.

I blinked. "What?"

"I dunno much about changeling queens, or whatever you called yourself," Flarefeather said. "But if you've got something everyone else wants and they've never left you alone about it or treated you like anything else, that actually explains so much. So? Going once..."

"...Yeah," I answered, still processing what she had said just as much as she was processing mine. "Go for it."

Flarefeather hopped down from the chair she shared with Lissa, still crusted in dried mud, and glommed onto my side. And as she did so, I felt something different.

My old aversion to being touched was just as present as always, yet it felt more transparent now, more mechanical and artificial. It made my skin prickle, my fur bristle and my gut squirm, but I could feel something else underneath it. Several things.

One was that... this was nice. Welcome, even. Although she had yet to grasp or process the situation, her first desire was to help, and I felt some real measure of comfort and relief from it that I didn't think I would have felt before.

The other was a strange, coiling knowledge that I didn't have to let this end. She was about to stop any second now, but I could keep her here by force, couldn't I? I could keep this, and so, so much more.

My void was for holding things, wasn't it? This was such a perfect match, my desires and her soul at this precise moment in time. I might not know how, but my instincts could fill in the blanks. Capture her, trap her, freeze her, endlessly repeating the precise note that I desired to hear.

I could do it. And there was no good reason not to.

Flarefeather relaxed her grip, patted me on the head, and tousled my leafy ears. She said something, too, but I missed it over the strength of my internal monologue, that creeping sensation retreating into the recesses of my mind with a feeling of patient victory.

See? I was right. She wasn't here anymore. Now I'd have to live without this for a while.

This loss could have been avoided, if I had been a little faster at quashing my inhibitions.

Oh well. It would be a learning experience. Next time, I would remember how temporary this pleasure had been. And the next time. And however many times it would take for me to realize that this time need never end.

Starlight Glimmer was getting hungry.

Maintaining her crystal raft took every bit of her waning focus. They had been going for hours, if not days. Her eyelids were heavy, the world still seemed to resist her magic, and it was only a matter of time before her spell would fail, dumping all her friends and Misophaes into the strange, dark water and leaving them without even the illusion of progress.

And she was pretty sure they were going nowhere, because this sea beneath the Aldenfold felt endless.

"Guys?" Rainbow said, hauling on her oar as the dark rain zipped past, blocked by a crystalline roof and windshield that Starlight hoped were worth the effort to maintain. "I'm starving."

"Don't say it," Twilight grunted, pulling the other oar - Starlight got a reprieve from rowing, since she was keeping the spell alive. "Thinking about it will make it worse."

"Fine," Rainbow sighed. "But I'm also getting tired. Do you think we should, like, find a place to sleep? 'Cuz we didn't sleep at the snail shell platform since we wanted to get out quickly, and that's starting to feel like a mistake."

Twilight shook her head. "If we slept first, we'd be even more hungry now, and that's assuming we could get to sleep in this rain."

"Oops, did I say starting?" Rainbow continued, teeth clenched. "I mean this whole thing felt like a mistake twenty hours ago! Hey, creepy!" She shot a glare back at Misophaes, who was sitting calmly at the back of the raft, some distance between her and the Flame of Love. "Feel like taking a shift rowing, for a change? We're here because of you, you know."

"I know," Misophaes softly said, looking oddly satisfied.

Rainbow just growled. To her credit, she didn't try to litigate Misophaes' demeanor yet again: they had been over it countless times since they set off. Misophaes simply enjoyed this place.

Starlight fixed her eyes on the sky ahead, steering the crystal raft as it shot forward at breakneck speed. The water offered no friction or resistance, and if they stopped rowing, it would take almost a minute to come to a halt. But aside from the occasional ice structure poking above the surface, and correcting for differences in Rainbow and Twilight's strokes, there wasn't much steering to do: they were trying to go as straight as possible, using the chain from the nautilus Twilight had discovered as a guide.

That chain was still going. It didn't sag, it didn't bend and it didn't flex, tethered perfectly to the horizon as if gravity was just a dream. Did it even have an end? It had a beginning. And this was the most productive idea anyone had come up with about which way to go.

"Man, what a ship of fools," Rainbow groaned, looking back at Misophaes again. "Hey, aren't you hungry? You had a spell that made that weird evil food back in your village, right? How come I haven't seen you use that?"

Starlight knew someone was going to bring that up eventually. At some point, a starving pony would eat anything, and Abaddon's 'food' had at least kept Keeper alive.

She was almost surprised it hadn't come up earlier. For her part, she was willing to go a lot longer before she tried eating modified ether flakes to survive. But Rainbow and Twilight hadn't seen batponies turn into those when hit with her sword. Maybe she was underestimating how they felt about that food's creator.

"I don't want to," Misophaes explained, speaking in her characteristic haunted singsong whisper. "When I use magic, I ask the accusations to keep me alive. Now that they're gone, I don't want to call to them. I don't want them to come back."

"Even if you shrivel up and starve?" Rainbow raised an aggressive eyebrow.

"That's okay," Misophaes said. "My punishment is over. I'm already dead. And if I'm still alive like you say, I no longer have a reason not to die."

Rainbow shook her head and went back to rowing.

They rowed, and they rowed, and somehow, every time Starlight thought she was about to give out, she found the strength to keep going for just a minute longer. Her horn throbbed, almost like the headaches she used to get as a filly, and the spikes of discomfort from maintaining her spell were enough to keep her awake in turn as she held her spell together through sheer determination.

What would happen if she fell asleep? When she woke up, would she be rested and ready to continue, or would her hunger erase any gains she could make? What was their plan, beyond rowing and seeing what happened?

She was the Flame of Hope. The world would rearrange itself so that her goals could never become impossible, so long as she fervently wanted them. But did that apply here, in a place the Flame of Love said their jurisdiction did not extend?

By using her horn, by casting her magic, she was forcing her jurisdiction to exist here. So if she could force there to be a way out, the only way it would happen was by being stubborn and staying determined.

And, finally, her determination paid off. Something appeared on the horizon dead ahead, small and pyramid-shaped, growing rapidly closer in the dim, omnipresent light. The chain they were following led right to its summit.

It was the same type of island as last time.

The crystal raft bumped against its shore, and everyone disembarked in a hurry before Starlight finally let her horn go out. Instantly, the rain hit her fur, long dry in the safety of her boat and now exposed once again.

Everyone would just have to deal with it. There was no way she could maintain a roof while they slept. Overwhelmed by exhaustion, Starlight curled up against the nautilus island's lowest wall and instantly gave in to sleep.

Mist curled around Starlight's world. She felt her spirit hovering above the dark water, vaguely aware that this was a dream.

There was no rain in her dream, and her world was bounded not by darkness but by white fog. But she was flying somewhere, moving at great speed, ice ruins passing rapidly below.

Then something grew out of the fog ahead of her, looming and twisted. It was a great tower cut from raw, black stone, hovering above the water, its shape too alien to identify in the mist. Starlight's spirit rose, drifting towards the peak of the floating tower, where a broad swath of flat land was overshadowed by great stone protrusions that looked like grasping claw tips, silhouetted in the fog.

She saw structures on the land, roads and ruined buildings that had long been left to the ravages of time. Some were more intact, especially where the tower's claws protected them, yet others were nothing but foundations. But her path took her over the buildings, towards what might have been a town square, a circular plaza near the very center of the summit. At the center of the plaza was a well, and there, Starlight descended.

The well shaft was too dark to permit light, and yet the mist around her was white, forming a two-tone backdrop as Starlight emerged into a cistern, a forest of pillars obscuring the horizon with their shadows.

Someone was here with her. She wasn't alone.

"Creature of Harmony," a voice said, ancient and echoing and powerful. "Your world has abandoned you, as it has abandoned many things before. You cannot return along the path you came. But this purgatory need not be your grave. Find me, and I will show you other paths, paths to places your creators could not begin to imagine. You have stepped beyond the bounds of their rules, and little remains to constrain your potential."

Then, like a spell being extinguished, the dream ended, and Starlight was awake.

"What...?" She groaned, putting a hoof to her forehead and getting another beneath her. The first thing she noticed, looking around, was that everyone else seemed to have woken at exactly the same time.

"Nngh..." Twilight blinked in confusion, climbing to her hooves on the shore of the nautilus island. "Girls? I just had the weirdest dream..."

Faith

Freshly ghosted, I watched as Faye, Lissa and Flarefeather walked off, heading for Crowscone's manor.

Would they be fine? I knew Faye explicitly hadn't wanted to be up front, let alone on her own, and I had basically just thrown her off the deep end by spilling my secrets to the pegasus duo and then leaving before they could start asking hard questions.

Not that they knew, but I was proving my point pretty nicely already, starting something and then getting distracted before I could finish it. And this was a distraction. Going to see if Crowscone would say anything interesting at his speech was objectively less important than ensuring nothing went wrong kidnapping the Consul. That wasn't to say nothing interesting would happen there. Interesting things usually happened when I got distracted. But that was where our problems ultimately stemmed from: I had too strong of an attachment to being everywhere at once, and couldn't sit down and focus on one thing at a time.

I righted myself in midair. Faye had agreed that this was worthwhile, though. And now that I was doing it, I might as well do everything in my power to do it well.

Angling my body, I zipped off in the direction the pink griffon had gone. I didn't know my Izvalden geography, or where I would find Crowscone's impending speech, but he sure sounded like he did. This would also let me ensure he wasn't following everyone else after Flarefeather told him not to.

Gonkers wasn't hard to find. Rather than following the others, he had gone back to checking nearby shops, poking his head in and announcing to all and sundry that Crowscone was giving a speech at the memorial crater stage. Judging by how no one questioned where that was, I assumed it was a highly prominent venue, the kind that would be easy to spot from midair if only it weren't for this fog.

Fortunately, Gonkers didn't visit too many more shops, taking wing and finally leading me somewhere. He stayed low enough to the ground that it was still visible, and I stuck close behind, determined not to lose him after wasting time already. We passed first through more commercial streets, then some nicer streets that felt like the neighborhood of Crowscone's manor, and almost abruptly into an open field, the road feeling somewhat nice and well-maintained for a dirt road. There were ditches at the sides to collect runoff, and I could hear a river somewhere nearby. Louder than that, though, I could hear a crowd.

Abruptly, I reached them, ponies and griffons packed together as they murmured anxiously and tried to get close enough to see something through the fog. It was an ornate wooden stage, with an acoustically curved back and roof that suggested it had been constructed as a concert venue. The structure showed signs of being several decades old, though it had been well-maintained and protected against weathering.

Massive dead spotlights lined the sides of the stage, pointed up at the sky - when the power was on, I wagered the beams from these could be seen clear across the city. The interior of the stage's roof was painted, as well, depicting an exaggerated night sky with sparkly black, using silver, magenta and lime green for the moons, stars and galaxies.

That color scheme... I frowned. Was it a coincidence? Those were the colors of the Firefly Sisters, the Griffon Empire band I kept a poster of in my old bedroom in Icereach.

I knew basically nothing about them. Hadn't thought about them at all in months. But if they had been big enough to have a home venue, maybe that was where I found myself right now.

Despite the circumstances, I smiled, remembering the days when I had cherished anything I could count as part of my identity, no matter how small. That poster had predated the Empire's fall, Mother told me, and I could only imagine that band had moved on to different things long ago, if they even survived the war. This was called a memorial stage, after all. Still, even if I was wrong about where this was, I was happy to be here. It felt like catching a faint nostalgic scent, a memory of the days when I had wished for the horizon with open wonder.

I still needed to show Coda that horizon. And Lissa and Flarefeather would probably jump at the chance to join us. Quietly, I made myself a promise to go on a real adventure, once all this was over.

The magic dissipated as suddenly as it arrived when Crowscone took the stage.

Flabby and arrogant, he stood with his kingly robe spread wide, revealing a purple silk business suit with loose, ruffled trim, an abomination of fashion that existed between smart and luxurious. His crown glittered in the light provided by six suited unicorn guards, the late evening sun blocked out by both the fog and the stage's shadow. Off to the side was a raised structure that looked like a VIP box; I saw Crowscone give it an unusual wing salute as he waited for more stragglers to arrive.

At last, satisfied, he cleared his throat and spoke.

"Rumors have reached my ears," Crowscone began, in his familiar ostentatious trill, "of unrest in my city. Of whispers, yes, and doubt. Of looting! Of my people behaving in ways that suggest they believe it is every pony for himself!"

His voice echoed across the field, at least one of those unicorns casting an amplification spell. "You are here," Crowscone continued, "that we might put an end to these nasty rumors by putting an end to the nasty behavior that causes them. That problem is a lack of faith. Some of my citizens lack faith in me, in the world I built, that I allow them to live in. And so they do unsightly things, like putting their own fear above the good of society. Tonight, we shall rectify this through a demonstration! I shall hold court. And you all shall demonstrate for each other the power of your faith in me."

He smiled a broad smile, leaning forward. "Now then. Who among you has the faith to ask of your lord a boon?"

"I've got one." A mare pushed her way to the front of the crowd, raising her voice to be heard. "I live on the edge of town. Have a husband and three kids. Work the orchards every day. Today, when I went out to work, I saw just beyond the edge of this fog bank a rainstorm that's frozen in midair. You can touch the hanging droplets and everything. Is this caused by a lack of faith in you? You must have heard the rumors. Everyone's heard them; I've seen them and am telling you they're true. So why don't you tell us about that?"

My ears perked in interest as a wave of agreement swept across the crowd. Crowscone's civilians were confidant enough to address him that way? He must not have ruled with as iron a hoof as I thought.

"So you ask for information," Crowscone declared. "Then you shall have it! This 'weather' is a giant spell cast upon us by Wilderwind. My mages have already determined the source. It is meant to scare, inconvenience and unnerve. They can do little more without risking my retaliation. For now, however, I have chosen to abide its presence, because it has revealed a flaw in you people that must be expunged. I, Crowscone Izvaldi, have kept you safe from grabby Wilderwind and the evil Consulate for many years! And as long as even one pony in this land continues to believe in me, I shall continue to do so until our adversaries are dust and Izvaldi alone stands supreme!"

He gave the crowd a beady-eyed glare. "But until all you people believe so fervently, I shall suffer this harmless prank, this reminder of our enemies' intent, to remain."

As he spoke, I narrowed my eyes. The crystal tower was behind the weather change, not Wilderwind. Was he making up an explanation when he didn't know what was really going on?

That was annoying, though I didn't know what else I expected. If I did manage to fix things, he would take credit, and the population would be none the wiser. Not that I was interested in taking credit myself, or telling everyone what was really going on... so I wasn't sure if this actually mattered. It could matter a whole lot if I failed, but then there would be nothing anyone could do, so in a sense, nothing would matter that way, either.

But it sure was annoying. I booed loud and hard, safe in the knowledge that no one could hear me.

"Does that satisfy your request?" Crowscone looked out across the assembled creatures. "Who else would ask something of their ruler?"

"Why is the power out!?" a voice shouted from the crowd. "And when will it be back on?"

"Sophisticated and opportunistic sabotage," Crowscone replied, his voice warbling with righteous anger. "It is the providence of a ruler to provide power for the people. Our enemies know this. In our moment of distraction, the Consulate have attacked a pillar of my right to rule. Already, we have caught the party responsible. I am presently weighing their punishment. Care must be taken to send a proper message of deterrence to the Consulate, and not one of escalation! Your lights shall return when I deem it appropriate to let the Consulate know their scheme has failed."

The crowd started murmuring. I hovered closer. Who was this culprit they had captured? Was he talking about the Consul Faye and the others were trying to abduct? Or was he making more things up to burnish his image? The power outage had to stem from the crystal tower as well; no Consulate scheme could cause the power stored in Puddles' ship to simply vanish.

"So you can do something about the dark and the fog," said a griffon in the crowd, "but you're waiting for the right time? Think that time could be now, maybe?"

Crowscone nodded at two of his pegasus guards waiting in the wings. "You there. Bring out my gifts!"

The crowd tensed in anticipation as the pegasi ducked backstage. Curious, I floated even closer.

Moments later, they returned, dragging a large rolling trolley laden with several colossal, bulging sacks, one of which appeared to be glowing from within.

Crowscone reached a wing into the glowing sack, fished around, and withdrew something bursting with light. I recognized it instantly: a gemstone that had been converted into a small mana core, freshly charged and brimming with energy.

The crowd's eyes snapped to it as one, many wandering to the sack he had pulled it from, which was big and bright enough that it could contain perhaps a hundred more. Crowscone locked eyes with the griffon who had spoken out, then gently lobbed the core, the griffon catching it with a look of satisfaction.

"Receive of me gifts," Crowscone bellowed, "and remember why it is I you are faithful to! These cores were filled for you by hard-working unicorns from the strength of their own horns! My own home, I have allowed to go dark so that you may have first pick of these. But use them sparingly until our power grid is restored. These are small, and we must not let our enemies know we are on to them."

I blinked, baffled. Here I had been expecting yet another self-serving ploy, and this was... actually good? Still self-serving, if he was making people get the good stuff straight from his hoof while leaving the aid workers downtown to hand out normal candles, but it was still the right thing, even if done for the wrong reasons. And he was, for once, telling the truth about his own manor being dark.

Now I wondered what was in the other bags. I could poke my head through the canvas, just not see in the dark...

As the crowd clamored with requests, Crowscone started handing out more mana cores, refusing to let his guards do the job and insisting on passing out each one himself. If only one of us was physically present here! I gnashed my teeth, watching core after core go to people who probably wanted them for light or household comforts: with all these cores put together, we'd be well on our way to getting Puddles' ship back in the air again.

If he was able to make these at all, though... The red flash had emptied the ship's mana core, but this meant that it didn't stop anyone from refilling them. Getting more power wasn't a fool's errand. But if emptying existing storage devices was all it did, why was the city's power grid down? Did it interfere with some means of production, but not others? Or could there actually be something unrelated at play?

I needed to discuss this with Lissa, Flarefeather and Puddles. By now, I had seen enough inscrutable conspiracies to not be overwhelmed by this, but I needed second opinions on these possibilities.

"Now then," Crowscone said as the crowd's fervor began to wane, their faces much better lit thanks to the distribution of cores. "What else do you desire? Money? Safety? Answers? None have yet been audacious enough in their belief to reap true rewards."

A stallion stepped forward. "My family restaurant was broken into just this afternoon. Didn't catch hide nor hair of the culprit, but they made off with the cash register and everything in it. Sounds to me this has been happening to a lot of folk today, but all that's different is a little power outage and some spooky weather. You mind telling me why all of Izvaldi's criminals are collectively losing their heads and deciding today's the day to do crimes?"

"I wouldn't call this weather 'a little spooky'," said the mare who had spoken at the start. "It feels apocalyptic. And that's coming from someone who lived through the war."

Crowscone ruffled his feathers. "Not all are as grounded as you appear to be," he told the stallion. "Fear robs us of our morals. And as I have told you, faith is the antidote to fear. Our great nation of Izvaldi exists in a vice, pressed between the barbarians of Wilderwind and the tyrants of Everlaste. The pressure would break many an ordinary pony, who have no reason to trust that we will endure. For I am the one reason that exists! The one force capable of maintaining our cherished way of life! Those who put their faith in other things build upon a shaky foundation. They carry a terrible burden with no help to see it through! And when they break..."

His beady eyes glinted. "Yes, when they break, this is the result. Creatures revolting and amusing in equal measure. They scrabble for material wealth using any means they can, loathsomely unaware that their fate is of their own making. I feel no pity for creatures such as those, ones who have rejected salvation. And neither should you."

The crowd shuffled in place.

"Who among you feels the same?" Crowscone demanded. "There is one side in Izvaldi. The side of righteousness! Those who stand not with me stand alone!"

There was a murmur of approval among the crowd, along with a few more enthusiastic shouts. Something bothered me about the reaction, a sense that it was almost familiar, but I couldn't place where.

"Raise your hooves," Crowscone instructed the crowd, "if you believe today's spate of looting is an issue that must be rectified."

More than half of the crowd lifted an appendage, and I blinked in surprise. This looting had been brought up often enough that I supposed I should have guessed it was a real problem, but it never clicked because I didn't think I had seen any. Then again, my only trip outside Crowscone's manor so far had been to the police station, and that was ostensibly well-patrolled...

Actually, no. There was that pink griffon. I had been paying more attention to Crowscone once his speech started, but Gonkers was still where I had last seen him, sitting on the roof of what looked like a VIP box, quietly cracking jokes with a couple of young friends.

He certainly looked the part of a juvenile delinquent, and he had talked about breaking into Crowscone's manor. Did my friends and I just look tough enough that we had bumped into a bandit and been profiled as allies?

I shrugged. Better than the alternative, at least.

"You," Crowscone said, picking out a pegasus from the crowd at random... or perhaps not, knowing his biases. "What do you think ought to be done about this?"

The pegasus straightened up. "Yeah, so on my way here, I passed the Black Knight heading for the Department of Civil Obedience carrying like, three shady dudes who were out cold. Looked like they were beaten black and blue. And see, like, I didn't know the Black Knight was in town, and if I was a looter, I wouldn't want to mess with that. So why don't you get more Black Knights to stand around in armor like that so no one can tell if it's the real one? It's like a scarecrow!"

Crowscone considered this, stroking a wingtip across his triple chin. "Perhaps your ideas have a future. This suggestion pleases me! Would anyone else like to match the patriotism of this fine pegasus?"

"Why don't you go out and fight them yourself like the Black Knight does!?" shouted a griffoness from the back of the crowd.

Crowscone drew himself up, indignant. "I fight day and night to keep our foul and vile neighbors confined to their own lands! My citizens, your war is already my war! There are many dark places within our beautiful city, and only one of me to light them. I can only be so many places at once." He beatifically closed his eyes, spreading his wings wide. "But what is a ruler to do if not grant the wishes of his own people? When your faith in me has reached its apex, when enough voices cry out to me for succor, then shall I ascend and become everything to everyone. Until that day comes, it shall sometimes fall to you, my people, to become the arms of my law in my stead. As it does tonight! Who here has the faith to stand up to crime and lawlessness under their own power, safe in the knowledge that my will walks with them?"

Several among the crowd stood, more certainly than I felt like was warranted. Just what was going on here? Earlier, this felt like a handout, but now it felt slightly more rehearsed, as though some of the audience had been told what to do.

Maybe they had. Someone like Crowscone would definitely seed his audience. But still, the response felt unnatural, as if there was a script people were reading from that hadn't been offered to me.

As Crowscone praised them, I swooped out over the crowd, unsettled enough that I had to confirm my hypothesis. It was easier to read ponies up close, especially when i could stare into their faces and not be seen in return. Harder than when I was corporeal, to be sure, but in the eyes of those who stood I saw not just certainty but familiarity, as if they had seen what would happen before. Rallies like these, I guessed, were a common occurrence that appealed to specific types of people.

But not everyone was the same. Others were apprehensive. Some were here with an extinguished hope that this time would be different, as if they had shown up to ask questions and hoped that tonight, Crowscone would offer more than self-flattery. Others were clearly not mollified by his explanation about the weather, and towards the back of the crowd, where it was harder to be seen from the stage, some were taking their mana cores and going home.

"In times of unprecedented trial," Crowscone was saying, reaching into another sack, "the reach of my authority must be broader than usual in order to maintain the lives we know and cherish. And so, let it be broadened!"

He pulled out a bundle of things that were flat and shiny, and from the distance I slowly identified them as badges of some sort. Given the context, likely police badges.

"You, with the courage to stand," Crowscone declared, brandishing the badges. "My Department of Civil Obedience is strained beneath the weight of these unfolding crises. New hooves will go a long way towards alleviating their burden so that they can alleviate yours. In my name, I deputize you! Upon ruffians and troublemakers, my law is yours to wield as you see fit! If this gift of authority is not sufficient, I have brought weapons as well, though I ask that you stay behind to receive them after my speech is finished to ensure they only enter the hooves of the worthy."

Some among the crowd did not seem happy about this. "What I want to know," one griffon whispered to another, "is how he knows he's not just giving this to another vandal who knows how to butter him up! And how will new recruits know how to return my savings to me even if they do catch the bandits?"

"Why hasn't anyone asked about the monster yet?" another whispered.

"The one that's been flying around today?" another whispered back.

"Yeah. The green one!"

"He'll just say it's a Wilderwind or Everlaste spy," a fourth grudgingly pointed out. "Anyone who comes here for real information is hopelessly naive. We're here for the handouts and you know it."

I tilted my head. A green monster flying around? There were maybe ways this could be innocuous, but my paranoid gut said revenant and I had seen Crowscone with one earlier, in his study. If only I was corporeal, and could ask these griffons questions...!

Also, they were all griffons. Maybe it was just this group, but it was starting to feel like griffons were more dissatisfied with Crowscone than others. Not entirely surprising, given how often he referred to the crowd as ponies, but could I use this somehow?

On the stage, Crowscone finished handing out police badges and straightened up, preparing to speak again. "Hopefully," he began, "tonight has demonstrated the fruits of placing your trust in me. Those of you who have lived in my Izvaldi for more than a week or so will recognize this as a regular occurrence, and if any of you haven't, ask yourself who else on this continent would hand out gifts to their believers free of charge. Only in Izvaldi does the government exist in service of building a utopia! Only in Izvaldi is the wealth I accrue given back to you to better your lives! Only in Izvaldi are you rewarded for merely having the faith to request it!"

Suddenly, horribly, I realized where my earlier sense of deja vu had come from.

It wasn't just the crowd. It wasn't just the way they were reacting. It wasn't just their relationship with Crowscone.

It was all of that, combined with where we physically were: Izvaldi. The name of the cult - a cult that originated here, in this very land and perhaps this very city - who handed out money in exchange for shallow protestations of faith, which were then harvested and stuffed into an adolescent changeling queen.

I looked up at Crowscone with wide eyes, suddenly operating under a new theory of what was going on here. Had I erred terribly in bringing Coda to this place? Or was there another changeling queen here, one I knew nothing about? Did he have a different purpose in mind for whatever he was harvesting? Or was he following someone else's playbook, running through a ritual he thought made for effective governance with no idea what it was used for? Did-

Crowscone wasn't done with his speech, and didn't leave me time to explore the possibilities. "However," he continued, "despite all I do, some of you still lack faith. You show up, take my gifts, and let the niceties end there. Perhaps you do not trust me, or perhaps do not believe I am capable of anything more. Fallacious beliefs, when I have done so much for you over so long. Yet you are imperfect creatures, and fallacy is only to be expected."

He sighed, then rose to his full height. "That is why I am necessary. Were you capable of maintaining a paradise on your own, I would be but another member of the masses. But I, Lord Crowscone Izvaldi, am here for you. I am here to shoulder the flaws that hold you back. To lift away the doubt in your hearts that stymie trust, and to forge you into your best selves. I am merciful. I judge your sin separate from you sinners. All of your fears, your insecurities... These things are mine to bear for you, if you but believe I can. Is there anyone... anyone among you tonight who would give their burdens over to me, and achieve true peace for their soul?"

I wanted to run, to warn Faye about what I had realized, check on Coda and figure out a plan. But whatever he was doing now, I had to see what it was.

"Anyone?" Crowscone asked, wings spread benevolently, a mountain of flab filling out the space beneath his suit. "You know I grant this opportunity but once per public address."

"...I'll do it," said a pegasus, looking like he was stepping out to cross a high-speed raceway. He had a distinctive pink and teal mane - easy for me to keep track of. "Does this mean I have to join your pegasus church, though? I'm not religious."

Crowscone shook his head. "Religion is the act of placing your faith in something you cannot see, not something you can. But I am not affiliated with the Church of Pegasi. While they only accept the enlightened among their ranks, you will be freer than any other to live your life as you see fit."

I frowned harder. The Church of Pegasi? That was one of the groups we had been told earlier to visit for the play Crowscone wanted us to put on. Was Crowscone saying they were made up of people who accepted this deal he was offering?

The pegasus looked as if he expected someone to stop him, but nobody did as he jumped up on the stage next to Crowscone. In the crowd, some people looked bored, some - mostly griffons, again - looked a little disturbed, and quite a few looked annoyed with themselves for not speaking up instead.

"Then let us be about it!" Crowscone declared, turning his back on the crowd. "I have an enlightenment to perform. The rest of you may watch as my guards return this pile of gifts to my manor." He gestured to the still-largely-full sacks with a wing, only the mana cores properly distributed. "Remember, I prepared those anticipating your every desire! That they remain with me, and not in your hooves, is the fault of everyone present who was not faithful enough to request them."

Crowscone's guards made a show of inspecting the bags, and I flew close enough to hear a conspicuous clinking - at least one of them had to be packed to the brim with money. Why had no one asked for that? If this really was a show of giving away free stuff, was no one going to be opportunistic about it?

I looked back at the crowd, and realized the answer: most of them trusted this about as much as I did. So many of them were holding their breath, watching for an invisible catch. The ones who did speak voiced only their most pressing concerns, asking for things they truly needed - aside from the police badges, which Crowscone had more or less prompted them to take on his own.

No one, in this entire field, was dumb enough to be an opportunist at a time and place like this, even though many were now kicking themselves for doing so.

I felt my faith in random people increase just a little, and found my extreme paranoia feeling slightly more normal.

And then I turned around, following Crowscone and the pegasus through a wooden door painted to blend in with the back of the stage.

The door opened out into a narrow wooden staircase that somehow held Crowscone's girth. It descended a few steps before reaching ground level, a flat dirt-and-wood floor illuminated by a mana core in Crowscone's wing. The back room was short and wide, with a few square planks scattered on the ground that looked like they were once used for giving props or equipment something cleaner to sit on. Beyond that, the only other thing I saw was a cluster of derelict instruments tied to the ceiling, bits of crystal and wire that looked like they hadn't been maintained in a long time.

The next door, turning back under the stage itself, was made of metal.

"So, uhh... How does this work?" the pegasus asked, glancing around uncertainly at his surroundings. "And where are we going?"

"Somewhere very safe," Crowscone promised, "with some specialized tools I require to work a miracle such as this."

He stopped in front of the door, giving the same wing salute he had used as the address was starting.

Moments later, it opened, a pegasus mare standing on the other side. The first thing I noticed as she returned the salute was that the lights were on behind her. This room had power.

The second thing I noticed was that her eyes were green.

Instantly, I checked her special talent to see if this was a Bishop. Fortunately, she was blank, which was the default state for the north's non-batpony population. But my ghostly heart was pounding, and I was ready to read into everything.

Neither of them exchanged words, the mare welcoming Crowscone in with a nod. The room beyond the door was recessed slightly below ground level, with a lot more machines and sensors lining the walls that looked much better maintained than the ones outside. It was also much more sturdily constructed, trading wood and dirt for metal and stone. At one side was a staircase, and Crowscone began to descend, already puffing from the exercise.

The stallion reached the staircase head before I did, and when he looked down, he blanched. "Uhhhh..."

"It's perfectly harmless," Crowscone's voice reassured, carrying up from the depths. "Nothing can hurt you while I am here."

I tore my gaze from the racks of machinery and drifted closer, somehow already knowing what I was going to see.

Down the staircase, lit softly by mana lights in the ceiling, was a tide of green fog, exactly like I had seen in Gyre.

It fumed and swirled, moving like a predator in a fish tank with nothing to hunt and nowhere to go. And halfway up the staircase, it stopped very abruptly, a faint colorless distortion in the air that suggested some kind of barrier was present, not two meters below the surface of the outdoor ground.

"Go on," the mare with green eyes encouraged, speaking softly and without worry. "I've been here many times. Like His Radiance says, it's completely harmless to those he favors."

"Hey, I don't know about this," the stallion said, still looking down. "Nobody mentioned anything like this..."

"His Radiance awaits you," the mare told him. "Are you going, or not?"

The door to the exit, I noticed, was closed. She must have gotten it behind us.

The stallion noticed it too, and started to sweat.

"Chiera, hurry him up, would you?" Crowscone's voice called from the room below. "Even I am outpacing that boy!"

The stallion was seriously considering making a break for it, and the mare - Chiera - noticed. "I apologize," she said. "But His Radiance has made a decree."

She started to slowly walk toward him. The pegasus darted for the door and grabbed the handle, yanking hard, but it was locked. Moments later, she was upon him.

Her left iris ignited with a ring of green flame, and her body began to burn in answer. She gripped him around the barrel, and with inequine strength, hoisted him, locking his wings against his sides with a single foreleg.

"W-What are you doing!?" the stallion cried in terror. "Noo! Let me go! You're freakishly strong! What are you!? Let me go!"

"I am enlightened," Chiera calmly told him, still burning as she carried him towards the staircase. "Just as you are to become, once you give your burdens to Lord Crowscone."

Her flames didn't burn him at all. I trembled.

The stallion screamed again, but the walls were thick and sturdy. I couldn't hear anything from outside. Likely, anyone there could hear nothing from within.

I fought my impulse to flee. I needed to understand this. Chiera couldn't be a changeling queen; changeling queens were batponies, and batponies always had special talents. But that was my bracelet strength, activated by her iris; there was no possible mistaking it. I needed to warn Faye and the others, but first, I needed to know what was going on here...

Following them into the staircase, I reached the barrier. And suddenly, I remembered that I could interact with the mist.

I had never ghosted in Gyre's city itself, only out on the wastes once we were almost a day away. But I had been able to touch and slightly move a revenant. And now, pressing into mist this dense, I could feel it, and it could feel me.

Anyone watching the mist would be able to see me move through it. I couldn't stealth down here, and worse, I might not be invincible.

That was the last push I needed. As the captive stallion screamed again, I flew straight up, through the ceiling and out into the foggy night, ready to beeline back to Faye and the others.

Awake

Dr. Corsica, Chairmare of Environmental Impact

On the Correlation Between Ether Crystal Fault Planes and Significant World Events

Preface

A long-standing mystery in the study of ether is the presence of fault planes within the crystalline structure of ether crystals. The fault planes form on the surface during crystal growth in response to certain magical stimuli at precise points in time, and are visible to the naked eye, appearing within a properly-sliced crystal not unlike the rings of a tree. These aberrations can be found within all naturally-occurring ether crystals, yet their origin in the wild has yet to be explained.

Thanks to our breakthroughs in measuring, it is now possible to date the formation of the fault planes to within a single day, allowing us to know precisely when they appeared. Furthermore, a historical analysis of these dates reveals an unusually high correlation with the dates of significant world events, suggesting that the planes may stem from or even predict occurrences thousands of miles away. The focus of this paper is to provide such an analysis, examining the dates of all fault planes formed within the last century and making a case for further research into why they appear when they do...

My legs dangled off a crystalline ledge as I reclined, proofreading my work for the dozenth time that afternoon. A warm emerald light from my hoof bracelet illuminated the research paper as I flipped from page to page, scrutinizing the writing with every bit of perfectionism I had in me. Had I given too much bias to the section on the Griffon Empire's history? Would that make it obvious that I had written this? Or was that a good thing if it came at the cost of less focus than Ironridge deserved? The whole point was to play into Head Scientist Graygarden's biases, much as I wished I could do legitimate research in peace... I chewed my tongue. Maybe I needed to second-guess my decision to cut the section on-

A loud, grinding clunk of machinery jolted me out of my concentration with a yelp, making me jump and nearly fall off the ledge. My wings snapped out with a clumsy panic as I struggled for balance, and I reached down, snagging the paper I had dropped before it could fall out of reach.

"Oi! Shut it, you!" I grabbed a loose crystal in a hoof and flung it with all my might, earning a metallic clang as it bounced off the tall, cylindrical ether pump that was making the racket, a mess of pipes and bolts and glowing displays rising from the abyss. "Stupid machine! How many times do I have to check your extraction schedule to make sure I can work down here when it's quiet? Now leave me alone, or I'll use the override code I pilfered from Fuel Synthesis and you won't get any work done today... either..."

My face fell as I peered closer: a screen read seven in the evening. Exactly when the pump was supposed to start. Which meant I had been down here for ten hours...

Well, I felt silly. And hungry. Have you ever failed to notice how hungry you are until you're way more hungry than you'd like to be? It's not my favorite realization.

I stood up on the crystal plinth and furled my leathery wings, staring around at my surroundings. Half rock and half crystal, this place was as far underground as anyone could go; the deepest cave in Icereach, and the most beautiful, too. If I fell any further, I'd hit a river of ether, an endless, glossy black plane of liquid that shimmered like starlight and concealed a world's worth of mysteries. It was part of why I loved this place. It was also why someone had installed that noisy pump. Some ponies just had to think ether belonged closer to the surface for experimenting and testing.

...I mean, it probably did. Ether was critical to Icereach's research and the main catalyst that let us produce rocket fuel. But they really couldn't have left this one cave alone?

The crystal spur I stood on jutted out over the ether river from an open cave, which had once been a chapel of some sort. I imagined that whoever built this chapel had appreciated staring into the starry ether river just as much as I did. Within my lifetime, even, this place had been private and quiet every minute of the day, but now it played host to a rack of machinery that took the ether pump's output and stabilized it to send up to the surface. Steel shelves and scaffolding held up modern technology, yet shared space on the rock floor with carvings so worn and intricate, their age was probably better measured in millennia. But no one knew for certain. The Icereach institute was only eighteen years old.

At least the technicians who had bolted them down took care to make sure their bolts didn't crack or damage the rock and its artwork too badly below. I wasn't the only one who still cared for this little church at the bottom of the world.

I glanced back to my manuscript and frowned. There was no way I was going to get anything more productive done on it now that my focus had been stolen by that rude pump, and it was the end of the week... It was turn it in and call it finished now, or sit on it for days on end.

So, I set it down, turned to the last page, pulled out my quill, found the blank spot for a signature, and in a carefully-practiced font, signed, Corsica.

I should probably mention that my name isn't Corsica. Mimicking others' writing is just a thing I do.

"Ouch! Watch where you're going!"

I rubbed my head and grunted, sitting on my haunches after colliding with another mare in a hallway. Nice going, Halcyon. Between her tone and the fact that I actually hadn't been watching where I was going, too busy stewing about the ether pump and trying not to pay attention to how hungry I was, I was pretty sure this one was all on me.

And she was far worse off than I was, the load she had been carrying strewn all over the concrete floor. About a dozen mechanical parts had skittered this way and that, and the mare was crawling about in a panic, trying to find and put them back in their box again. She was a tall turquoise unicorn with a blond mane, and I was certain I had met her before yet couldn't remember her name. Great. I had to deal with that on top of knocking her over? Nothing like the vague, awkward guilt of completely forgetting a pony's name to motivate you to help pick up their stuff...

"Err, sorry. Here. Let me." I swiftly tucked my report under a wing, reaching for a fallen part. Once I got a good look at it, though, I held it up, blinking.

"An inertial stabilizer rotor?" I looked up from the fin-shaped device at the mare, realizing the entire rest of her cargo consisted of more of the same. "These are used to muffle vibrations around the engine. I thought these were stupidly expensive and cutting-edge. What are you doing, running around with a whole box of them?"

The turquoise mare blinked, taking my retrieved rotor in her aura and pushing at the bridge of her nose, like she had recently switched to contacts and wasn't yet used to not needing to fix her spectacles when they slid down. "Yes they are, and that's classified. And I was not 'running around'. Who are you? And how do you even know about these?"

I let out an internal sigh of relief - if she didn't know me, odds were I wasn't supposed to remember her after all. She also didn't sound particularly nice, so I guessed there wasn't any pretense of us being friends. Maybe she was just stressed out, though. Everyone had bad days from time to time. Perhaps I could make this easy for both of us...

"I'm Halcyon," I mumbled, making eye contact with the stabilizers instead of the mare that was carrying them. "You probably wouldn't know me. But I saw these at an internal release! A friend got me a seat. Are you on the kinetics team? By spinning these around a core at high velocities with carefully timed pulses of energy, you can offset-"

"I-I'm sorry, I have somewhere to be," the unicorn stammered, taking a step back in the face of my clumsy curiosity. "I have the communications conference to set up for, high-priority delivery, thanks for your time." She turned and bolted, running hurriedly on her way.

Bingo.

I gave myself a smug smile as she left. One of the perks of being an awkward little nerd who preferred to be ignored by strangers was that you didn't need to put on any acts to get them to do so. A bit of carefully-directed enthusiasm in just the wrong place, and she had gone from chagrined that I knocked her over to perfectly happy to leave me alone. Problem solved... and I had gotten a look at those beautiful stabilizers as a bonus. At times like this, I couldn't complain about the world if I tried.

Of course, then I had to go and do things like forging the signatures of important ponies on reports, and I was right back to pretending to be someone I wasn't. If only my life could always be so simple and-

"Hello there, Halcyon," a mature voice said from over my shoulder. "Looking for me, by any chance?"

By some strange twist of genetics, I had been born with ears that both opened and pointed backwards, but they still managed to stand up straight in surprise as I let out an eep and spun around. A short, older unicorn was walking around me, holding a cup of tea and a clipboard with her horn. As a matter of fact, this was who I was looking for, and the fact that it was that obvious made me blush a little. Sure, this was the administrative level, but we weren't that close to her office... Was there really no one else up here I ever had business with?

"Err, well, you know..." I presented her with my cheeriest fake smile and scuffed at the ground with a hoof, not because I had airs to put on but because I really was getting quite hungry and didn't want to accidentally be cranky because of it. Maybe this would teach me a lesson about spending all day working with no breaks. Never mind that I had been taught this lesson dozens of times before, and never seemed to learn... "I have Corsica's latest research paper. Nearly two months in the making. She asked me to deliver it?"

I held out the paper, and the unicorn took it with a sigh. This was Elise, the most senior Ironridge official in Icereach, representing half of the coalition that sponsored all of our work here. And for reasons that had more to do with Head Scientist Graygarden than her or me, she was on far better terms with me than the Yakyakistan side... That was why my paper submission was going through her instead of the Head Scientist, Icereach's chief administrator and the ranking representative of our other sponsor state.

Elise sipped from her tea as her eyes scanned back and forth over the cover page, her mane blowing quietly in an invisible wind. Whatever magical manecare ritual had given her that effect was a closely-guarded secret, but she wore it magnificently: this mare had practically invented the idea of age with dignity. She had to be in her fifties, yet her fur was immaculate, and she never carried herself with the slightest hint she was aware that the better part of her life was behind her. I couldn't imagine reaching an age where my body started slowing down and being less capable than before, and yet Elise walked with pride and grace.

What I wouldn't give to be able to look the same. And yet, even if I knew the secret to her mane, that look would never work on a scruffy urchin like me who constantly wore boots and a coat to hide her legs and her talent. That fact that I was getting this distracted by it was proof I could never handle a look like that.

How distracted was I? Distracted enough that Elise was telling me something and I was too busy goofing around in my own head to hear it. Whoops.

"Ach, sorry..." I rubbed an ear bashfully. "What was that? I'm, err... I was working all day, and I'm hungry and thinking about food."

Elise snorted. "Of course you were."

What was that supposed to mean?

"Never mind," Elise reassured, giving me a smile that promised she wouldn't mention it even though she very much knew I hadn't been paying attention. She glanced back at my paper, and her ears fell as she skimmed it. "Corsica knows it isn't my job to see these published, right? I understand that she doesn't have much of a choice, but really..." She pursed her lips. "Tell her this is interesting material, but at the end of the day I'll still be passing it on through Graygarden and no amount of research laundering is going to change the way that stallion sees her. I'll do what I can to promote this, but she should keep her expectations down." She sighed again and started to walk away. "At this rate, she's going to spend the next decade hampering her career with petty squabbles. Oh well."

"Hey!" I frowned, taking two steps along behind her. "Can she help it if Graygarden doesn't like her work? She's plenty talented, I'll have you know."

Elise shook her head. "Talented or not, she's made this my problem now, and my problem it shall be. Unless there's anything else, you run along and get some dinner."

"Yeah, yeah... Thanks for taking it to Graygarden for me." I lowered my head, turned around and skulked away, trying to avoid a sudden onset of anxiety now that the deed was done and the paper was out of my hooves. I had made the right call, right? Weeks of work went into making that paper perfect. Surely when Graygarden actually read the thing...

I shook my head, trying to stave off thoughts I knew were pointless. I would find out what happened one way or another soon enough. For now, I needed food and a distraction... and the latter presented itself more quickly than I had hoped, a shiny glimmer catching my eye.

Down on the floor, wedged in a small gap between the chipped concrete wall and a bare steel lattice tunnel support, there was a fallen inertial stabilizer rotor the mare with the box from earlier had missed. Huh. I guess she had been in enough of a hurry to leave me alone that she hadn't bothered to count her wares after picking them up again.

"Well, hello, there," I softly declared, bending down, fishing it out from the crevice and holding it up. "You're a pretty one, aren't you?"

The thing really was beautiful, a collection of translucent, faintly iridescent blades held with a hinge between two strips of silvery metal in a way that reminded me of a folding paper fan, or a futuristic pegasus wing. It was sculpted and nuanced, looking more like an art installation than a machine part, and I imagined that if I used it as a lampshade, the effect would be spectacular. Folded up, it was only a little bigger than a stallion's hoof, but spreading it out let it grow to more than half my length, nose to tail. What a shame something so lovingly designed and crafted was destined to be sealed in an intermediate engine casing where no one could ever look at it.

Or was it? Icereach suffered delays all the time. Things went missing, turned up behind schedule or got flat-out mothballed so often that some scientists complained about poltergeists in the halls between meetings. Time that could have been spent making things functional was dumped into frivolities, like doing visual design for things like this. Odds were, no one had even taken a proper inventory of these before they were shipped out. It made for a faintly depressing work environment, when we had been 'two months away' from a live astronaut launch for more than a year now with no public plan for actually getting there, but that just meant we had to take advantage of the little pleasures in life to cope.

"I suppose I can give you back if anyone comes looking for you," I told the pretty rotor, stuffing it in my satchel and heading off toward the cafeteria. "But who knows where you were even going, and it would be a shame to leave you there for someone less altruistic to find. So you're coming home with me!"

My relationship with machinery was funny. I treated this rotor like a lost little foal, yet was mortal enemies with the pump system down in the chapel. I guess when you live underground for this long, even machines start becoming people to you.

We all had homes, of course, but a good home-cooked meal was something I never could eat unless I made it myself, thanks to an old war injury that gave Mother a lame side and made it hard for her to stir or measure things. Fortunately, Icereach kept a sizable underground food court designed to let all the scientists eat and socialize in a more convenient manner, and thanks to half the colony's population being batponies who could never make up their minds about when to sleep, it had to be open at all hours... I wasn't sure why we kept hours in the first place, when hardly anyone bothered to go up and look at the sun, but all the better for me.

The cafeteria had a high, jagged ceiling that had once been the roof of a natural cave, and apparently Icereach's designers and decorators didn't think it needed renovating. It did make the place feel much bigger. I turned my eyes away from the ceiling, looking for a place to sit.

Blocky, rectangular tables with benches that felt more military than civilian filled the hall, with aisles running through them and food stations lining three of the edges. I paced through them, my eyes flicking between the tables usually haunted by my friends. Aerodynamics? No one I liked from that team. Fuel compression? Also empty. Meteorology? A different squad of ponies sat where they usually were today, all stallions whom I didn't recognize. They must have worked somewhere else.

I wasn't part of a team, myself. At eighteen, I was old enough that no one would ask questions if I tried to contribute or hang out, so long as I had a passing understanding of what I was doing, but also young enough that the higher-ups didn't care to officially hire me or give me important-

"Well, look at this damsel, gracing me with her presence. What have I done to deserve such an honor?"

"Aaack!" I jumped as someone tugged on my coat, whirling to behold a seated earth pony with a dark coat and a blue mane, an eyebrow raised that asked plainly if I had really just spaced out enough to walk right past him. "Ansel!"

"Gray mane, silver fur, dressed like a detective in a noir film..." Ansel gave me a curious look, tilting his head. "Do I know you, little bat? Not every day I run into a cutie like you." He held the look for a moment longer, timing his next words to interrupt me perfectly as I was about to respond. "The pump turned on and kicked you out of the chapel again, didn't it?"

I puffed out my cheeks. "None of your beeswax. And I'm older than you."

"Meaningless semantics." Ansel waved a dismissive hoof, then made room on the bench and patted it. "Still, it's convenient how predictable your schedule is. Here. I saved you a seat, Sis."

I glanced at the invitation. "Thanks. I... need to go get food first."

Good old family. All things considered, mine was pretty alright.

I returned with a metal cafeteria tray heaping with snow potato salad that was drenched in mushroom stew. Not my absolute favorite, but a reliable comfort food, and I wasn't feeling adventurous after turning in that paper. Ansel was waiting with folded legs and a superior grin on his face, as if he couldn't wait to make a show of laziness by telling me everything he had avoided doing today.

Instead, once I settled in, he held his silence, observing me quietly. Eventually: "You look glum, chum. Unproductive day with the history books?"

"Well, wouldn't you like to know?" I wasn't too keen on talking about it, and blocked my mouth with salad and stew. It was more savory than I was expecting... a little over-seasoned, but good. Of course, my silence was less because the day's activities weren't on my mind and more because one didn't just talk about forging signatures on academic research papers in the middle of a crowded cafeteria. I raised an eyebrow, hoping Ansel would get the hint.

I really did want to talk, of course. How Corsica would react wasn't even the issue: I was more worried about Head Scientist Graygarden, and what his opinion on its authorship would be. It was a well-documented fact that he and Corsica didn't get along... And this was hardly the first time their feud had inconvenienced me. If Ansel and I were in private, I could blabber on for hours about that paper like it was the only thing in the world.

"Figures." Ansel nodded, leaning on the table as I ate. "Here, have a pick-me-up. I scrounged up tickets for the three of us to go watch the communications conference this weekend."

I looked up and blinked, my mouth full of potato and gravy. Ansel was holding out a ticket stub. "Oh, the one that's tomorrow? Or the day after?" I asked around my food, trying for a question that would hide the fact I had no idea what communications conference he was talking about. The name did sound vaguely familiar, but I was spacing out on why...

He just laughed and patted my back, tucking the stub back away in his satchel. "Don't look so embarrassed. It's just a monthly demo by the wireless communication team on the state of their technology. Probably won't even make local headlines, but you've always liked the obscure stuff, right?"

"Thanks," I mumbled earnestly, shoveling more food down and trying to quiet my empty stomach. My brother could be a tease when he wanted to be, but we looked out for each other. After all, when I was in a mood, I could be just as bad.

Ansel was content to let me sate my hunger in peace, sitting around like a watchful guardian. But the rest of the world wasn't.

Hoofsteps sounded in one of the entry corridors, amplified by shoes that were designed to clack against rock at the perfect frequency to be audible through the din of mass conversation. They were a set of shoes worn by only one mare in Icereach, a very loud mare who had no problems with all eyes being on her, and I looked up from my half-finished dinner to see that raspberries-and-cream mane and long, slender horn bobbing closer and closer through the crowd.

Corsica came properly into view, noticing me and adjusting her course appropriately. It was impossible not to get lost in her presence. Less than a year my senior, she already had a position of Chairmare and a doctorate within the institute, and she carried herself toward me with all the authority of an avenging angel, her perfectly-striped mane flapping against her pink shoulders and her tiny, ornamental shoes clack-clack-clacking against the hard stone floor. She had small, silver, wing-shaped mane ornaments tucked behind her ears that drew my eyes and almost made her look like she was gliding as she walked. They had to be custom; I had never seen any other pony with the same things. Every month or three she swapped them out with a golden pair, and I could never decide which color accented her better.

She was a mare who cared a lot about her appearance. I was a mare who cared a lot about Corsica's appearance. I wished I could carry myself like her, so I could afford to make the most of my own looks... And even after two years, I still wasn't used to it as she took a seat right next to me.

"'Sup?" Corsica asked, leaning on the table.

"Oh, err..." Internally, my brain raced. Did she know already? Come on, just tell me how it went over...

"Heads up, best to avoid the lab for the rest of the day," Corsica said, nodding back at the door where she had entered. "Old Graygarden's looking for me for some reason. Better not be there just in case he gets off his butt and comes in person for a change."

Okay, so she didn't know. But I had a very good idea what this summons was about... "Any chance it's good news for a change?" I prodded, stealing a glance at her. "Say, maybe he's happy with something you've done, for once?"

Corsica looked at me like I had suggested the sky might be green.

"That stinks, chum," Ansel said, his empty cafeteria tray pushed to the side so he could lean across the table toward us. "Did anything special happen to bring down his wrath? Hard to imagine someone like him making house calls for no reason."

"My entire existence brings down his wrath." Corsica rolled her eyes. "Besides, better safe than sorry, right? It's a weekend. Weekends are for relaxing."

I sighed. My ears would have fallen if they weren't eternally in that position already. "Can't imagine avoiding him every chance you get does much to improve his opinion of you."

Corsica raised an eyebrow at me. "What's gotten into you today?"

"Nothing," I protested, leaning my chin on my forehooves and poking at my food with my tongue. "Just tired of your little feud. Imagine how big of a research budget we could be rolling in if you weren't a pariah to the guy? Maybe it's time to... I dunno, extend an olive branch or something. Mend some bridges, or at least try."

Corsica eyed me up. "You know what you need? A vacation. You look beat. Good thing it's the weekend, right?"

"And I'm sure it'll be real relaxing, knowing that you're shirking a summons from the Head Scientist himself," I countered, flipping a potato coin from my salad into the air and catching it with my teeth. "How about this, yeah? You go see what he wants, and give him the benefit of the doubt, just this once. I'll go with you to back you up. Then no matter what happens, we slack off like crazy over the weekend and have a good time. Deal?"

Ansel nodded. "I suppose I could come along too, if it would help. Not that I've got much of a clue what you two have been working on down there."

"Ugh, fine." Corsica pushed herself to her hooves with a huff. "Not like I came here to get dinner, or anything. But who knows, maybe you're right. Let's go get this over with..."

Together, the three of us retraced a path I had walked barely half an hour before, finding our way to the administrative zone of Icereach. This was the layer of government that kept the institute running: Elise and Graygarden were the leading representatives of both nations, but each of them employed about two dozen scribes, accountants and lawyers dedicated to understanding the complex treaty the alliance was founded on and ensuring we stayed in accordance with its many rules and regulations. There was even an 'embassy', though its primary role was to house and maintain a machine that could send instantaneous communications back and forth to Yakyakistan. I had never seen the machine, and its workings were a closely guarded secret, probably due to the fact that Ironridge didn't have one and Yakyakistan didn't want to share.

Treaties were weird. Then again, this was less an anomaly and more a poster child for the reason Icereach never got anything done.

We rounded the final corner before Graygarden's office. Graygarden himself was just closing up shop.

The Head Scientist of Icereach had a round, balding temple and small face and wore an expensive suit, and I judged him to be somewhere around fifty. He was handsome and well-groomed, but in a way that left a vague impression that he was trying not to be ugly. And yet, the attention to detail in his grooming didn't speak of someone with so little talent that they would make that mistake by accident: this was a pony who just didn't care in the first place. He only looked the part because his job demanded it. Part of me suspected he would have been happier as an engineer.

"Corsica," he said in a hoarse voice that sounded overused, reminding me of a dusty clock. "I see you brought your friends."

"I got your message," Corsica replied coolly and with a formality that didn't suit her, yet was very well-practiced. "What do you need?"

"That paper of yours made its way to my desk," Graygarden said, his orange aura fiddling with a key in the door's lock. "Still trying to prove yourself by being unique, I see."

Corsica blinked in confusion. "My paper, sir?"

Graygarden didn't even nod, finishing with the door and walking past her without making eye contact. "Your research seemed thorough, but you forget that Icereach is not a history academy. No one ever bothered to make our library's texts on the subject authoritative. They're just there for pleasure reading when real scientists get bored." He continued down the hallway, neither stopping nor looking back. "Rockets are for going to space, not burrowing beneath the ground. Give me an argument that can convince the higher-ups that there's money to be found in those crystals, get your work reviewed by a historian who can check your dates, and I'll put you in the queue for a patent. It'll be an honor, getting one at your age..."

"A patent?" I ran up beside him, feeling my heart sink. "And what about a research budget? Come on, is that the best you can say? We're literally using ether to make rocket fuel! Don't try to tell me it isn't relevant!"

Graygarden may have had no glances to spare for Corsica, but he did give one to me. "Oh. Were you involved in this, too?"

"I..." I stumbled to a halt. My name hadn't been on the paper. What could I say?

The stallion shook his head. "Just like Corsica to leave her collaborators' names off her paperwork. Well. None of my business. After all, that kid's always wanted to go it on her own."

I sat back in a heap, feeling like I had been sat on by a yak made of irony. It hurt more than I was expecting.

"Well, three cheers for civility," Corsica said with a shrug, watching Graygarden walk away.

Ansel just shook his head. "I'll never get what you did to tick that stallion off."

"Hey, I was a perfect gentlemare. That was all on him." Corsica gave him a look. "You saw how he..." She deflated, then let it go. "Look, never mind. Anyone know what paper he was talking about? I haven't sent him anything in months. I know better than to waste his time."

I slumped. Mission failed, then... and a perfectly good research paper to go with it. At least he said the research seemed thorough, right? We might have gotten dismissed, but it could have been a whole lot worse...

Corsica frowned at me. "Hallie?"

"It was me," I sighed, planting the top of my head against a wall. "I might have... maybe... submitted the fault plane dating paper for you. In your name. And gotten two months of our work thrown out."

Had I been on the receiving end of such news, I would have been mad. I was mad - at myself, but still. And yet Corsica, by means that I could envy and only she could understand, didn't look angry at all. "How come? That paper was supposed to be your ticket to a little more clout around here."

"...Because he's your father," I spat. "You two aren't supposed to be at each other's throats all the time! One amazing genius who can do anything she puts her mind to, one government bigwig who can get all the resources in the world? Just think of what we could accomplish if you weren't constantly giving each other the cold shoulder! Maybe we could even crack the secrets of that chapel once and for all... I thought if I could impress him by making it look like you were giving him an earnest effort, it could maybe rebuild some bridges..."

Corsica just stared at me. "But all we need is one research grant and we can buy airship tickets for Ironridge and never have to think about him again! We were supposed to use your name and keep me out of the picture so his bias didn't get in the way. And we need to travel to get distant core samples and test our triangulation hypothesis anyway. We were so close. Did you forget how much you wanted that?"

I sat in a cringing pile. "Look, I know, okay? But the parents you have are the only parents you've got. I just figured... we've got a lot of years ahead of us. Might be better to gamble a loss of time now to get a better possible outcome..."

Corsica shook her head. "You spent months on that paper... Well, what's done is done. Dinner?"

She had spent months on it too. And yet she cared more that my time had been wasted than hers. What I wouldn't give to-

"Okay, you need to buck up." Suddenly, her aura grabbed me again and set me upright on my hooves. "Work day is over. You were a dummy, but no point in feeling sorry for yourself. Go home and get some rest, and then let's enjoy our weekend before figuring out how to get back on track after this. Remember your promise? We talk to Graygarden, and whatever happens, we slack off like crazy."

The whole time, Ansel had been staring at us with a dubious expression, and now he finally spoke up. "So let me get this straight," he began. "The two of you wrote a paper together, related to that project you're constantly working on down in your lab. Everything's gone belly-up because Halcyon cheated and submitted it in only your name. But your own plan was to submit it in only her name instead?"

Corsica blinked innocently at him. "What's wrong with that?"

Ansel adopted a casual pose, lounging against a steel support girder and whistling. "Oh, nothing."

I couldn't help it. I laughed. Ansel wasn't a scientist like the other two of us, but he knew how to cheer me up, and for that, I loved him all the same.

"That's the spirit," Corsica encouraged, patting me on the back and then starting down the hall. "Now back to the mess hall! Who's down to annoy the powers that be with a cafeteria tabletop karaoke tournament?"

Two hours and a lot of annoying the powers that be later, I tromped through a concrete passage with shabby lighting and water stains. Exposed, uninsulated pipes ran along the ceiling, and tiny stalactites grew from their joints where small leaks had sprung up over time. It was the opposite of lavish, looking more like a seventy-year-old maintenance corridor than the hall in a residential block in a futuristic underground city that it was supposed to be. And yet, it was still the familiar path home.

My determination had slowly returned, now that my stomach was heavy with too many second helpings and my ears were ringing with Corsica's terrible made-up songs, most of which were packed with tech jargon and in-jokes about Graygarden being dumb. I made mistakes a lot, but I was far from stupid. With a good night's sleep to distance me from this setback, I gave myself eighty-five percent odds on being able to find a way to fix it with less than ten days' work. Rough estimate. I'd be able to plan better when I wasn't tired.

"...Stuck as the Chairmare of Environmental Impact," Corsica was complaining, hoarse from singing, her dainty shoes tap-tap-tapping on the floor. "You know, a joke office with no power that's just there to make it look like I get pretty things? The way I see it, I say I was well within my rights to impact some environments."

Ansel raised an eyebrow, walking alongside me with saddlebags filled with groceries - apparently he had gone shopping while I listened to Corsica's party. "In that bald heckler's defense, I'm reasonably sure singing loudly and disturbing the peace wasn't the kind of impact Graygarden had in mind."

Corsica waved a hoof as she walked. "If he's too jealous of everything I do to give me anything that's supposed to be useful, I just have to do what I want with the things he does give."

Ansel snorted and looked to me, hoping to change the subject. "So what's on your mind then, Halcyon?"

"Well, the main issue is getting Graygarden to not dismiss anything straight out of hoof because he sees Corsica's association with it," I replied, wearing a perfectly straight face. "You saw how he shut us down. Now I'm afraid my name might not be far enough removed from Corsica's to get him to hear our work out. Currently, I'm thinking I might be able to make up a fake identity and submit the papers in their name, and see if I can get the institute to award them a research grant instead without realizing they don't exist."

Ansel blinked twice and groaned. Clearly, he expected me to still be berating myself for what I had done with the paper. Unfortunately for him, now I had moved on to thinking about ether crystals at a mile a minute. With an emphasis on fishing for grant money. And I was perfectly happy to talk about what was on my mind.

"A fake identity?" Corsica gave me a concerned look. "Are you sure that's the best course? Personally, I was going to suggest we register a shell corporation to lobby him and make him think there's economic interest in our research."

I guffawed. And then hesitated. I had been joking before, but could that actually work?

My brother hit his head against a wall. "Mayday, this is Ansel, why yes, I'm surrounded by teenage mares..." He got up and gave us the flattest of looks. "Have you truly learned nothing about the pitfalls of academic dishonesty from this?"

Corsica chuckled. "It only went south because we weren't careful. Around these parts, this is par for the course."

"Pretty much," I agreed with nonchalance, straightening up again. "Literally all anyone ever cares about here is patents, patents, patents. Surely you've noticed how rarely they get any actual progress toward a launch around here, right? Always focusing on what would look good in a display case with their name on rather than what'll work in a system." I thought of the inertial stabilizer rotor sitting snug in my satchel. Odds were ten to one that was why it looked as pretty as it did.

"Look, just... never mind." Ansel shook his head, pretending the last three minutes hadn't happened. "What was such an important paper even about, anyway? Or dare I ask?"

I shrugged, happy to have something to talk about that didn't require much thought or focus. "History, mostly. It's all about demonstrating that we can correlate major historical events with ether crystal fault planes."

Ansel gave Corsica a look that said plainly that I was a nerd who didn't remember this wasn't his field. She sighed. "You know those crystals that grow all over the place by the pump in the chapel?"

He nodded, and Corsica watched his expression, continuing. "They're oldest at the center, and grow outwards as new material accumulates and solidifies on the surface. Well, if we put them in a certain kind of strong magical field, it changes the surface permanently. Then that changed part gets grown over and trapped inside. We call them fault planes. It's easy to do in a lab, but no one's ever been able to figure out what causes the layers to form in the wild."

Ansel listened, following along. "So you wanted to see what caused them, then."

"Right. And our paper had a breakthrough," Corsica went on. "Recently, we've gotten precise enough measurements of the rates at which the crystals grow to go back and date exactly when each fault plane formed. They're all the same - something affected the whole cave, not individual crystals at random. Previously, we've looked for numerical patterns with these dates, but this time, we looked for historical patterns instead. And it turns out that more than half of the planes formed on or within a day of the dates of some pretty major historical happenings." Her brows furrowed. "What it means is that there could be a relation between the crystals far underground in Icereach, and places thousands of miles away in the world. What we don't know is why... and figuring that out will take money and travel that we can't currently afford."

"Historical events all over the world," I emphasized. "There was one at the end of the Yakyakistan Imperial War sixty years ago, and two of them eighteen years ago, only a few months apart. In Ironridge during the Steel Revolution, and then in the Griffon Empire when we were... you know... Had to leave."

Ansel's face shadowed. "Most of those events you're talking about didn't go down in the history books as happy or uplifting times. I'll admit that doesn't sound like a coincidence, but what if it's something you don't want to know?"

Corsica just shrugged. "Not how curiosity works, I'm afraid."

"Besides," I added, "a lot of the newer ones, we haven't tied to anything yet. One happened during the eclipse three years back where the Mare in the Moon disappeared, but we're pretty sure that's a coincidence because so many others involve something on a societal level. Although there was also one right after the... er..." I trailed off, having talked myself into a corner. "After the accident..."

"But Ironridge's is the most interesting," Corsica cut in, sensing my discomfort and changing the subject. "Because the same year as the Steel Revolution, their climate permanently changed. We already know an area's latent magical properties can have an effect on the weather it experiences, so this is a sign that there could be other measurable magics at work here. That location is my best bet for where we could make a major breakthrough, if only we could go there and take measurements ourselves..."

Ansel yawned. "Sounds like a passion project. I have to admit, all this mention of wars and catastrophe has me a little turned off. You do remember Mother brought us to Icereach precisely to run away from dirty business like that, right?" He gave me a look that was far more serious than his tone. "Wars are no fun for anyone, Hallie. All this talk of travel abroad and studying the tree rings in these war crystals-"

"They're called ether crystals," Corsica interrupted with a huff. "And so I want to get out of the bunker and away from my big bad dad for a change. Sue me."

I bit my lip.

Ansel shook a hoof at Corsica. "Look, whatever. My point is..." He paused, gathering his words. "Why do we care about the fault planes inside of ether crystals? Are they important? Or is this just curiosity that could be focused on any number of things? Hallie and I might be too young to remember it, but we're refugees, Corsica. And it's because of one of the events you said your crystals correspond to. Frankly, we're ridiculously lucky to be here, because Icereach is one of the safest and most isolated spots in the world right now. Allies to the east, allies to the west, nothing but mountains to the north and even bigger mountains to the south... We're happy here."

"Oh really." Corsica swished her tail, raising a sassy eyebrow. "Sounds to me like someone just doesn't want to admit they'd miss me."

"Tch." Ansel didn't spare her a glance, trotting confidently along. "You and your wily ways can do as you please. I just have this bothersome hunch Hallie would try to follow you."

I glanced over at Ansel as we paced through the worn-out tunnel, a flickering length of strip lighting marking a metal door with metal hinges and a welcome rug out front, no other ornamentation to be seen. "Look, I know there might be bad things out there," I protested. "Believe me, I know. But there could be awesome things too, yeah? I don't wanna grow up to become some patent monger who sits around in a lab coat ruling a world of experiments all day. I don't want the only unknowns in my life to come from me. So don't say it's just a hunch. I know you don't agree with it, but it's my dream."

"Well said." Corsica gave a small nod, her telekinesis forming around the door handle. "Anyway. Guess I've seen you back to your apartment. Wish old Graygarden would give you a place in a nicer part of town. Sleep in tomorrow, got it? It's a weekend. No shirking your slacking off."

I grinned, waved and stepped through the door. "Sure, whatever. Hey, we're home!"

"Hey," Mother greeted, laying on the couch that served as Ansel's bed and giving us a distracted wave. She was a thin, dark-coated batpony who didn't look like she could bench thirty pounds, with an open bathrobe and black eyeliner and an electric-pink mane that showed telltale signs of needing its dye job renewed. The mane was asymmetrical, stiff from bleach and flipped over one eye in an aggressive punk cut, and her good wing nursed a half-empty mug of coffee while her hooves held a Varsidelian espionage novel I was pretty sure she had read at least twice already. She wouldn't tell anyone her age, but a little math based on everything I knew about her said she was a year or three shy of forty. When the war came, she had been barely older than I was now.

Our mother was the spitting image of someone whom life had chewed up and tossed away long ago, and was just as bitter for it as her drink.

"Well, if it isn't my old mare," Ansel swaggered, hanging his saddlebags by the door and leaving his battered demeanor out in the hallway. "What can I do for you, o venerable one?"

Mother carefully turned a page. Even from this distance, it wasn't hard to see her fumble slightly from her tremor, or to make out the tiny look of frustration at her own inability. "I clogged the toilet. And we're out of crunchy peanut butter. Did you bring home any leftovers?"

"No, but that's quite alright." Ansel strolled into the tiny kitchen that only he and I used. "I'll put in a maintenance request and see if I can't burn some orange juice or something. Take it easy, Hallie. I've got this!"

I followed him into the kitchen.

"What's up?" Ansel asked, rooting around in a low-down cabinet for something canned and easy to warm up. "You're not hungry too, are you?"

"Nah." I patted my stomach with a reassuring smile. "Stuffed myself at Corsica's party, remember?"

"Here to help cook, then?" Ansel pulled out a tin of sliced pears and straightened up, acting like our conversation in the hallway had never happened. "I'm afraid our mother dearest won't be getting anything special today. Just garden-variety fruit from Ironridge... Would be splendid if one of us could actually draw a full-time salary for a change."

I gave him a look, my face turning serious, and I chose my words remembering that Mother was probably listening in. "We didn't finish our conversation out there."

Ansel frowned, then lowered his voice. "What more is to say? It's two against one. I know how both of you feel. And democracy is the highest form of government, as the bards sing it. Look, for what it's worth, I appreciate that you're giving me as much thought as you are, and I know it was at least partly for my sake that you did what you did with that paper. Take away Corsica's reason for restlessness, try to buy us some more time that we can all be together here before life takes us its separate ways?" He sighed. "I know you'll be leaving someday or other, and just because I haven't made my peace with it yet doesn't mean I won't get there when the time comes. As long as you promise not to fly off literally tomorrow, or something."

"Promise." I winked. "As long as you can forgive me for being afraid of living out my decades as an unfulfilled number cruncher who will probably die of old age before Icereach gets its game together enough to launch one measly rocket."

"That's a deal," Ansel said, "provided you can forgive me for being downright terrified of whatever gave Mother that injury and imagining it doing the same to you."

I felt just a little cold, and my smile vanished. "Perfectly understandable," I replied, shoulder-squeezing him with a dirty boot to hide my face. As gung-ho as I could be, my eagerness to get away and embrace the world was a reaction to Icereach, and I knew it. A little fear of the unknown could still be very healthy. Mother could attest to that.

"Anyway, I'm gonna hit the sack," I yawned, leaving him to brush his shoulder off with a frown and wandering back into the living room. "Thanks for making Mother's dinner. If the loo is still broken in the morning, I'll try and con a plumber into checking it out..."

The couch's raised back was to us, but Mother's eyes and ears peeked over the rim. "Stop making me sound like an invalid," she grunted. "I'm a vet. I could take you both with one hoof tied behind my back."

"But you don't need to," I calmly replied, summoning back my focus and kindness and turning it all to my only parent. "You won that war when you got us here safe and sound, remember?"

A sound like a bowling ball being dropped rumbled across our roof. Through the apartment's incredibly thin concrete walls, a foal in a neighboring unit began to wail.

"You had better believe it." Mother sounded more like she was the one who needed convincing, and slumped back down again behind the couch rim, returning to reading her book. "We've got the life of the century, right here."

I shook my head. There had to be more to life than this.

In an alcove at the side of the living room was the door to my bedroom. Questions about why I got a room to myself and my brother got the couch certainly existed, but both of us knew they were too much trouble to be worth addressing, and so we were content to let it remain the way it was. Besides, I enjoyed having a bit of personal privacy.

Maybe I enjoyed it a little too much. I had permanently barred the door with a wooden plank from the inside.

Just like unicorns had their horns, batponies like me had a common species magic too. I called it shadow swimming, and it was fairly self-explanatory. The area around my bedroom door was poorly lit, so I pitched forward, meeting the ground face-first and plunging on in as if it was water. I held my breath, didn't think too hard about how wrong the three-dimensional world looked when viewed from inside a flat plane, and swam forward along the ground, stepping out of the shadows again once I had slipped through the narrow gap beneath the door and the floor. The door had passed above my head; I was in my darkened room. And that was all there was to it.

With a rumple of clothing, I exposed the leg bracelet I had used for light down in the chapel, mentally commanding it to glow again and showering the room in warm emerald green. My bed took up a full third of the floorspace, next to a neat little desk with some library books and a chessboard for playing against myself. My vanity sat scrunched up against that, and in the space that wasn't devoted to a small dresser for my coat and other affects, I had somehow crammed a tiny, upright piano for playing when I really needed to have a talk with myself. I only knew one song, and it wasn't a song I was particularly fond of, but there were things music could do that no amount of words could ever accomplish.

Between all that and me, I had economized space to the max. I let myself tip over, falling onto my bed on my back with my bracelet hoof in the sky, bathing the walls in light and casting a giant, vaguely boot-shaped shadow over my poster-covered ceiling. Front and center was a picture of Corsica from two years ago, wearing a then-rare smile yet with her eyes closed, because I wanted to see her but didn't want to feel like she was watching me. I had a few other pictures of my friends, as well as a big print-out of the underground chapel, back before the ether pump had been built. Then there were more normal posters, like one for a science fair I had entered as a filly, and another advertising a Griffon Empire band called the Firefly Sisters that had to be older than I was.

This room was mine. The decorations were mine. Mother and Ansel probably hadn't even seen the inside of it for ages. I had made fun of scientists controlling their worlds of experiments earlier, but everything in this room was exactly as I decreed it. It was the world's only portrait of who I truly was... which made it matter all the more because sometimes I needed a little reminding of who I was myself.

Understandably, it could be a little difficult at times to hold onto my sense of self when my special talent was pretending to be someone I wasn't.

Heavy fabric shifted, and I doffed my signature coat, hanging it where it belonged. My flanks, now bare, showed off my brand - a cutie mark, Ansel called it, though I had no idea where he came up with that name. It was simple, not ornate, and moderately unnerving to anyone unused to seeing it: an upside-down crown. The story, for anyone who needed to know, was that my talent was chess, the crown representing a fallen king after the enemy's surrender. I had even spent a while mastering the game so I could back that story up if needed. And for everyone who didn't need to know, which was most everyone, I had my coat to hide it. Nobody sees, nobody knows. Corsica knew to joke around about fraud and forgery with me, but as far as I knew, even she and Ansel weren't aware of the true function of my talent. The fact that I really was good enough to fool everyone with Corsica's signature in the process of faking that paper probably hadn't even crossed their minds.

Now in just my boots, I stared into the mirror, and everyone but me stared back. Elise, and her ageless grace. Corsica, and her confident beauty. Even Mother, and her eternal defiance. It was easy to say I cared too much about the appearances of others. Certainly, other mares' looks were always something I was keenly aware of, and on more than one occasion I had been caught staring, though I was luckily young enough that no one had started drawing false conclusions about philandering. That would be a world of awkwardness, right there...

No, I cared about my friends' appearances because I wanted to look like them.

But not physically, though. No, that part was easy. I had played with Mother's dye and make-up until I had mastered their usage, could self-style my mane, had learned to stitch and sew my own clothes, owned a kit of common-colored contact lenses for both round and slitted eyes, could throw my voice and was sharp enough to copy a pony's gait and accent with barely a minute of observation... I could even get my weird, backwards-facing, laid-back ears to stand up and face forward, if I used an uncomfortable wire kit I had made that hid in my fur and invisibly braced them in just the right way. Pretty much any skill, I could learn in a heartbeat if it related to hiding who I was or pretending to be another pony. Like chess. Or forging signatures. Or knowing exactly what to say to get out of an awkward situation when I bumped into someone after not watching where I was going.

With enough effort and time to prepare, I could probably even pass myself off as a convincing-enough double of Corsica to flummox a casual acquaintance. And that was saying something, because she was an incredibly distinctive mare.

If only looks and mannerisms were enough. I could copy the accessories and nail the snark and the raspberry mane, but even with all that, I would still be pretending. And what drew me to Corsica, what had made her my idol since early foalhood and my best friend as of two years ago, was that she was utterly unreserved and unapologetic, rarely lost sleep over her problems or things that bothered her, and did everything she did with perfect confidence in who she was. I wished I could have that self-confidence and earnestness. That was what I desired, what I wanted to copy, what I stared at in passing and wished that I could have. But no matter how much my talent let me nail the execution, it wouldn't make it any less of a lie. I would still be hiding, still be moving in the opposite direction of who I wanted to be.

What made it doubly frustrating was that I didn't even need a talent like mine to look good in the first place. My body was hardly Corsica-tier - admittedly, a huge bar to clear - but I went about my daily business wearing a coat that belonged in a comic book, all so ponies would think I was trying too hard to get attention and summarily ignore me entirely. If I stopped trying to be invisible, ditched the costume and brushed my mane like an ordinary mare, I'd clean up well enough to turn heads and maybe even take some names with my looks. At least, that was what I told myself in the shower.

A talent for external looks was wasted on me. What I wanted was the authenticity, to be able to walk around without feeling safer when I wore a disguise, to be free from the mental block that made me freeze up when I contemplated being without a way to hide. I wanted to look any hypothetical consequences of my actions in the eye, shrug, and do what I wanted anyway. Corsica and I could swap bodies and lives, and practically nothing would change. It was all in my head.

"Sorry, Ansel," I told my pillow, pulling off my boots one by one and then faceplanting into my bed. "I'm trying my best to keep things smooth between you and Corsica, and your plans for the future. But I have hopes and dreams too, and finding out how to make myself who I want to be? I don't think I'm going to find that in Icereach..."

I thumped a foreleg, and my bracelet turned off, bathing the room again in comforting darkness. I closed my eyes, said a little prayer, and let myself drift off to sleep. I would find a way to make up for losing Corsica that research grant in the morning.

Locked Away

"In my younger days," Elise complained, sparks flying from her horn, "I would watch stallions cast this spell all day long, welding together steel plates and machine chassis parts with ease. They barely broke a sweat! Clearly, my memories were rosier than I'd hoped..."

Corsica, Ansel and I were all watching her with wide eyes. "You're trying to melt through solid rock with a horn laser," Corsica pointed out. "I don't buy it that anyone can do that all day long."

"A welding spell," Elise corrected. "And I'm very certain it was an employable skill. However... I'm not so certain this is going to be the most immediate way to make headway."

A good two minutes of bright flashes and recharging had burned a hole in the wall about the size of a breakfast cereal bowl. By my best estimates, the wall was about six or seven feet thick. As impressive as Elise's spell was, I was starting to agree with her that brute force wouldn't do the trick.

I had given my friends enough of a rundown on my exploration to cover the important parts: there was an exit, we were a difficult yet feasible distance from Icereach, it was late evening, and there was a mist monster we really didn't want to talk to. I didn't mention the magic scrolls, though. Some wary instinct told me it just might be better to figure out what those were without letting anyone know I actually had them.

Either way, it hadn't taken much discussion for us to unanimously agree that finding a passage to the other half of the hideout was a priority. And so, here we were, acting on any ideas that came to mind.

"Well, good luck with that," Corsica said as Elise charged up another burst. "Guess I'll go look for secret doors again, or something."

I nodded. "No matter what, it's not like we'll be making that climb tonight. Even if we find a way through and get some ideas for what to do when we get back, there's no way we'd survive at night, in a storm."

No one said it, but I was taking it for granted that we would do anything at all, and I knew it. We might be close to Icereach, but we were indefinitely safe here, barring anyone doing anything dumb with the mist monster. Sure, Leif and her goons would likely be back someday, but they wouldn't have locked us up if they wanted us dead. If we showed up unannounced in Icereach, though, and ruined their element of surprise? Who knew how things would go down? They might start using the Whitewing, or...

The idea of fighting in Icereach made my fur prickle. We knew so little about what was going on there, how could we possibly intervene in a way where we had control over what our intervention would do?

As far as I could see, the only possible way for us to do anything about Aldebaran would be to go back to Icereach and figure out what was going on without being spotted. And thanks to my talent, that was probably something only I could do - though being capable of doing it and being eager to do it were very different things. My own feelings aside, I had a feeling everyone else would disapprove.

"Hey, chum," Ansel said, snapping me out of it. "You got a sec?"

My ears twitched back at him. "Err..." Did I really want to talk with him? I was still mad about his comments earlier, and... "What's up?"

Apparently, my tongue cared more about what he wanted than what I wanted. I bit it and winced.

"I'm thinking about what we do once we get back to Icereach," Ansel began, confirming that I wasn't the only one with this on my mind. "Like, what is Icereach to you?"

I turned halfway to face him. "Why me in particular?"

Ansel shrugged. "Because you didn't look too busy, and you're way more approachable than those others. Anyhow, my question stands."

"Right now, it's the place where I wanna be, and the place where I'm not," I replied. "What's it matter?"

"It's just... You're always wanting to fly away." He paused searching for words. "You know, with Corsica. See the world, and all that. Don't pretend the idea hasn't crossed your mind. With changelings running amok in our home right now and our identities effectively accounted for, there's even less than usual stopping you from taking the easy way out. Hide out in a corner somewhere, wait for a passing airship, stow away... Or take one of the perfectly good ones moored there right now, if you're feeling daring."

I actually hadn't considered it. And I was frightened by how logical a way out it was.

"Maybe it's a bit premature for that kind of talk, but it's a choice all of us are going to have to make," Ansel continued. "Once the option presents itself. Right now, everyone's all excited about this news you brought back, and I can't say I blame them. But now that you've found this, it looks like physically returning home is going to be the easier half of seeing our lives back to normal."

"I dunno about that," I pushed back. "Have you ever climbed out of the Trench of Greg? It got named for the first guy to scale it for a reason. Dealing with Aldebaran's not gonna be easy, but this is hardly a cakewalk."

Ansel shook his head. "Stop sandbagging. What I want to know is, how hard does the going have to get before you two bail on Icereach and fly away? I'm not asking because I want to guilt you one way or the other, I'm asking because this will be a whole lot easier if you think about these things beforehoof."

My ears twitched in frustration. He actually had a really good point - if I couldn't put a number on how badly I wanted to get my old life back and at what point I was willing to throw in the towel, I was just going to have to make that decision later, once complications inevitably arose. I'd be under a lot more pressure then than I would be now. This was something I shouldn't put off. And yet, my personal limits were the last thing I wanted to discuss right now with Mr. Your-Talent-Makes-You-A-Bad-Pony.

"Like, here's a really obvious case," Ansel went on, mistaking my silence for wanting to hear more. "Suppose the only way to actually take them out is to literally take them out. Like, to kill them. But even they left us here without a scratch, so wouldn't that be stooping lower than their level? We'd hardly have ground to stand on..."

Oh, shut up, I wanted to say, forcefully tuning him out. Talking like he was concerned about us maintaining the moral high ground, when he already had no idea that he was lumping me in with them? If he felt-

I stomped that train of thought into the ground, not letting it finish. Where had that come from? I was hurt by what he had said earlier, sure, but I understood he was just a kid in a stressful situation who had no idea how his words could be received. Right? I didn't need to return the favor so venomously.

Well... except... No. There was a possibility, but not one I was going to think about in public.

"...Right?" Ansel was saying. "Look, I know I'm playing devil's advocate, here, and encouraging you to fly away is the last thing I should be doing, but..."

"Pause," I said with a sigh. He looked up, questioning.

"What is it you want?" I asked, questioning. "What's your end goal out of this? Getting back to Icereach? No more adventures for a year or three?"

"That's the pipe dream, alright. But unless you've got a magic changeling fly swatter hidden away in that coat..."

I tilted my head. "Fly swatter? You what? Err, look, never mind. That's what I want too. So chill out and stop worrying about what I'm gonna do, yeah? We'll get our boring Icereach lives back, and that's a promise."

Ansel gave me a wry grin. "You're cute when you try to look all responsible, Sis."

"Put a sock in it," I retorted, flicking my tail at his face. "I'm being serious, though. I've had my fill of signing on with strangers in airships for the time being, too. Besides, I've actually scaled the Trench before, so I know it can be done. So stop getting your ears in a twist and take it easier, alright?"

"Well, glad to hear at least your spirits aren't in a funk." Ansel turned to leave. "I just hope the rest of this is as easy as you make it out to be."

Mission accomplished. He was gone, and probably without hurt feelings over the matter. I, on the other hoof, felt tired and drained, and needed to be on my own to think. The bedroom, maybe? I hadn't slept long or soundly, and was starting to get a headache again from sleep deprivation. And we weren't going anywhere before morning, most certainly.

But it wasn't like sleep was going to make things better between me and Ansel. I felt like something I couldn't see was tying me in a knot. I couldn't understand why my skin wasn't thicker, why I couldn't give him a pass, knowing he was under duress. And I hated not understanding my own thoughts. It was like waking up to find that one of your hooves had been swapped out for one from a stranger.

...No. It wasn't that I couldn't understand. It was that I didn't want to admit it to myself. Just thinking that caused my mask to crack a little, the set of habits and tenets and desires that comprised post-accident me.

I hung my head. Maybe I should go back to talk with the statues again. I needed to rearrange myself a little, and it would be nice to have some company that wouldn't judge.

"Hey there," I greeted, instantly knowing I had made the right decision. The alicorn statues all watched me, their features carved to look like they were listening, like they cared. Whoever made them clearly intended for them to be talked to.

I settled down against the base of one of the statues and sighed. "You wouldn't believe the day I've had. Mind if I unload a little? I mean, I kind of just did, the last time I was here, but..."

The statues didn't seem to mind.

"Awesome." I leaned back and let my breath out. "Can't believe it's only been half a day since they marooned us here. Things are so twisted up in my head, it feels like it's been ages. Compartmentalize, then survive first and deal with it later, you know? The funny thing is, it's not even the danger or the life-changing whatever of it that's getting to me. It's my friends."

The air was still save for the steady flow of ventilation, chilling the tips of my ears. "Ansel in particular. He's... How should I put this? He's my brother. And most of the time, he's awesome. The kind of guy who gets you tickets to obscure press releases he knows only you will care about, and puts up with Mother being a layabout and works part-time to keep the family in the green and keeps the old couch-sleeping thing so I don't have to give up my room. He teases and he heckles, sure, but he's way better than... than before the accident. We might have been related by blood, but there wasn't much else tying us together. And even then, we were half-siblings, at that."

I took a deep, deep breath. "That's why I should be able to get over a couple dumb comments he made today. It should be no biggie. Especially when I've been through something like this after the accident, so I know how stressed everyone probably is. But... I can't. My thoughts just keep hitting a wall, like I'm not letting myself think the way I need to. And I know why. It's because..."

The statues waited, listening. Drama queen, I imagined them saying.

Every muscle in my body slumped, and I heaved a shuddering sigh. "I can't look at the truth like this. You lot can keep a secret, right? Give me a moment..." I steeled myself. "Alright. Let's do this."

And then I reached into my coat pocket, pulled out my ocarina, and began to play.

I only knew one song, and it wasn't a song I was particularly fond of, mostly because of what happened when I played it. Maybe it was magic, coming from my talent. Maybe it was psychosomatic, coming from how I thought about myself. The two were intertwined enough that it was impossible to tell where one stopped and the other began, but I played anyway, the simple melody filling my ears and molding my thoughts until I was able to take off-

-her mask.

Halcyon looked small, sitting against the base of a statue in her oversized coat and clunky boots, an instrument held to her lips with her wings. Part of the effect was caused by her ears - pointing backwards instead of sticking up, they cut a few inches off her height, making her look soggy, or like she was hiding.

"I swear, this gets weirder and weirder every time," she complained, putting down the ocarina and testing her limbs. "I'm me! Same Halcyon I've always been, right? Why do I have to think about myself like I'm someone else? Pretty sure I'm literally even looking at myself from outside my body. I know it's my talent's magic doing this, but what if it's all in my head?"

She did exist, she was certain of that much - insomuch as a void could be a state of existence. The emptiness was so much louder here, now that she had taken off all the traits she usually applied to it to create her. A distant rushing blew through her ears, and everything felt just a little too big or too small, as if her senses were trying valiantly to prove their own existence. An immense longing to be something washed through her, and it took all of her willpower not to put the mask back on, not to return to the illusion of knowing who she was.

Halcyon called it a mask, but a better word for it might have been lens. She wasn't really Halcyon, she was a... something... holding a lens that focused her into the pony called Halcyon. Every meaningful part of her, her habits and routines and mannerisms and beliefs and desires - beyond the desire to exist - were contained in it, and it was malleable. In fact, she was almost surprised that she thought of this as herself holding a mask, rather than a void holding her. But those thoughts were proof of her own existance, so she held tight to them, too.

Being separated like this terrified her. She looked so tiny and vast and cold and exposed, and she could remember things, knowledge that she excluded from the mask so that she could live more like a normal pony. She thought thoughts she knew she wouldn't remember once she put the mask back on again. Except for one thought that she was here specifically to retrieve.

"Get in and get out, Halcyon. Don't spend too much time thinking about it," she urged herself, saying her name to help tether herself down. She was here in the first place because her mask wasn't working. A little layer of the story that she lived as her life, one that had grown up over the last two years, wasn't working right, so she had to remove it. Chip it away a little, move the life that she usually lived one step closer to the truth - here, without her mask, she understood everything, yet trying to function with that void at her core and nothing else around it just wasn't feasible. So, she needed the mask.

"There we go. All done." She nodded in satisfaction, running her mind around the contours of her work, thinking through its implications and imagining how she would probably think once she put that mask back on. This was good. Usually, while she wore the mask, she was averse to the idea of changing it, hence why she had waited so long to come here. Her identity was precious to her, even if it was mostly made-up, because it was still the most substantial thing she had. But this time, she had only rewound it a little, removed a piece so she could think like she had two years ago. She was still going to be a Halcyon she had been before. So, she figured it would be fine.

But she still hesitated before putting it back on, glancing up to a statue. It felt like looking at a mirror. "This can't be normal, right?" she asked, seeking some reassurance. "The way I'm feeling. I get that there's magic, and all. But even if normal ponies don't literally look at themselves like they're an external person, do they ever have no idea who they are? I wonder if this is actually all I am, or if this emptiness just prevents me from seeing anything else. It's kind of distracting, you know. If it wasn't there, would I see something else instead, something I'm missing? Logically, if you take away nothing, you'd still be left with nothing, but this can't be something everyone has inside of them. Someone would have said something. Right?"

Well, she hadn't said anything. This was among her deepest secrets, after all. And she could say that with confidence, since all the secrets she usually buried and locked away behind her mask were plain for her to see here.

"Fine, then. Maybe others do feel like this," she admitted. "But I sure hope they don't, because it's weird. Or maybe I hope they do, because I'd love to know how they deal with it. Or maybe they deal with it like me, and just pretend all the time. Urgh. Why can't I just be normal, like Corsica or Mother or Elise...?"

Enough of that, though. It didn't take any music to reverse the process. Time for her to get back to-

-my more comfortable self.

I flopped on my back, panting, as my senses returned to their rightful functions, the rush subsiding and my body feeling like a cohesive entity again. I wasn't the Halcyon I had been just a minute ago. I was new. I had changed something.

"That," I managed, "has got to be the weirdest thing I've ever heard of a pony doing." I lay there for a while as the thoughts I had just been having recontextualized them in terms of my present reality, and shuddered. I had already told the statues how I felt, what I wanted, and putting the mask back on hadn't changed any of that. All that was left was quietly repeat my prayer that someday, I would find something beyond the emptiness and the facade, and know who I really was inside.

"...Anyway." I shook my head, still on the floor, ready to stop stalling. "I, err... Wow. I guess that worked. I hate it when I do that and it works, since it's a huge reminder that this really is how things work for me. So, you mind if I spill some beans a little? I think I'm gonna have to talk this one through with someone."

The statues didn't seem to mind at all.

"It's Ansel," I said, my thoughts flowing freely where earlier, they had been getting twisted and stuck. "He's my brother, right? Sort of. Well, it depends on your definition of brother. Actually, he mostly just is because I say he is. But..."

I let my head tip back. "Elise has the right of it. He died, two years ago. This Ansel is... someone else."

My mind felt like an unclogged drain, familiar and comfortable banks breaking down as I acclimated to things I had always known, deep down.

"Pretty crazy, right?" I went on with a feeble shrug. "There's, um, a lot to explain. Where do I start? The bottom line is, I knew, and I didn't care because he made a much better brother than the one he replaced. I wanted a second chance. I wished for one with everything I had. And, when I got it, I took it. And it was good enough that I just let it become part of my reality..."

My limbs fell spread-eagled around me on the cold stone floor. I knew this. I had always known, deep down, but I just liked the story I told myself too much, that he really was my brother and nothing suspicious had happened, and I let it grow into something I lived and believed... just like so much else in my life.

"I don't know that he's a changeling, though," I pointed out. "Just someone who's really good at looking like Ansel. But, that's the truth. I guess..."

Now that I had broken the lie and could think clearly about my history with him again, I could see the real reason his comments about identity theft bothered me. It wasn't for my own sake - I was annoyed, but a sensible level of annoyed. It was because his comments must have also been about himself.

"You're probably curious about the details," I guessed, looking up at the statues as my thoughts continued to flow. "It was after the accident. He never recovered. It was my fault, in a way... Several ways, actually. But, I wished with everything I had that it wouldn't end like that, and that everything would be alright. I wished for a second chance. And then he just... showed up."

I shook my head and continued. "He called himself a missing piece. Said he was a refugee, like me, who stowed away on an airship and made it to Icereach about a week before. I first found him in an air duct in the real Ansel's hospital room. He said he knew, somehow, that I felt the same way he did, and that's why he came and talked to me. Beats me what made him think that. But when he showed his face, he looked just like Ansel, and he... was exactly what I had wished for. A second chance."

The statues quietly glittered.

"Big shocker, huh?" I said with a rueful shrug. "It's obvious, now that I'm not pretending he's the original. He's so different than he was before. Honestly, I think I'm the reason no one else found him out before this. He had me around covering for him, glossing over the awkward holes in his memory and pretending it was real. As time passed, he got better and better at it and all I needed to do was keep pretending. Of course, it must have helped that no one knew anything about changelings, since literally everything is censored... I know it sounds like a crazy risk on my part, letting a stranger I knew nothing about steal the face and life of a family member, but I wasn't exactly rational at the time. And you have to remember, the old Ansel and I didn't get along well. We were family, and I sure felt guilty about what happened to him, but I didn't like him. Trying again to have a sibling with someone new... It seemed like a good idea at the time, I guess."

I shrugged. "And then it became too good of an idea. The new Ansel was a way better brother than the old one. We actually got along perfectly. I'd take that life to my previous one any day of the week for him alone. And for him, well, it must have been a whole lot better than whatever he had before Icereach."

More connections formed in my mind. Ansel was so opposed to leaving Icereach and seeing the world... If he had actually lived in the rest of the world, if his current hatred of identity thieves and changelings wasn't founded by Aldebaran but by something he had been through out there, maybe his desire to stay isolated at home and never travel wasn't just based on paranoia.

"Anyway," I continued. "Nowadays, I don't even know now if it is a lie to call him my brother. We might not be related by blood, but maybe that's not what's most important. I never asked him, ever, about who he had been before coming to Icereach. I didn't want to disturb the good thing we had going, and he's clearly touchy about whatever's back there in the past. But... I guess I've gotta. When I went through the accident, I was alone. This time, I think I can handle it, but he's probably right where I was. Especially if he thinks Elise is poking somewhere he doesn't wanna have poked... I've gotta do something to patch this up."

Aside from broaching the subject, though, what could I do to help him? Did I have psychotherapist written on my flank? I understood so little about my own self, helping other ponies work through their personal issues was probably the one thing my omni-talent didn't qualify me to cheat my way through. Especially when using it to rearrange myself tended to strain my grasp on sanity for a while...

"Hey," I said, getting back to my hooves. "Apropos of nothing, but what do you think I should be when I grow up? Not a whole lot that's off the table. And before you ask, I can use my talent to learn skills just fine. It's not only good for weird sensory out-of-body stuff. It also lets me just be a really quick study."

Unhelpfully, the statues said nothing.

"Figured you'd say that," I grunted. "Imagine there's a kid with a talent in starting fires. Sounds like a risky thing, right? Could easily become an arsonist. Could just as easily become a world-famous chef. Now imagine they're a good kid - shut it, I'm going somewhere with this. Imagine they're a good kid, and they'd rather be the chef. But how do they learn the limits on their talent if they never go all out with it? And if they don't know their limits, how do they safely practice with it without risking becoming an arsonist by accident? It's a dilemma."

I straightened my coat and folded my wings. "See, I'm a lot like that kid. My talent's pretty strong, but it's hard for me to really push its limits and learn about it and stuff without risking something I'll regret. It just feels like the kind of thing you don't mess with, you know? I might be a phony, just a void with a mask on, but what if I break that mask and can't fix it? It's sure better than nothing. Right now, that mask is literally me. And even if I just stick to learning new skills, who says I won't learn something I don't want to know I can do? That's why I like being more passive and letting others lead. But if I'm going to climb that cliff and mess with Aldebaran in Icereach... which is something I could do, not something I'm going to do, and might still be a terrible idea... I'd need to be at my best, go all out and hold nothing back. I'm probably going to cave and bail with the airship like Ansel said, to be honest. But just in case, look out for me, okay? I could use anyone in my corner I can get."

And now I had put voice to my fantasies of maybe having the tools to play against Aldebaran. Great. Unlike admitting Ansel's origins to myself, this truth just made me feel silly. What was I, some kind of superhero? That's what I wanted to travel the world to meet, not to become myself.

Even though my talent could probably make me into one if I wanted.

"Secret passage: rumbled," Corsica declared with a satisfied sigh, standing with me and everyone else in the hideout's posh bathroom. A hairline crack in the wall tile grout had been widened, and a door swung outward on specialty hinges that let it open outward while staying hidden inside. That would make it completely undetectable while closed, as well as only openable from the other side.

Unless you were good with telekineis, apparently.

"I don't know which I want to know less: how you found that, or who chose a bathroom as the endpoint for a secret passage," Ansel muttered, warily eyeing the contraption.

"It's a spell Elise showed me," Corsica bragged, bags under her eyes and the fur around the base of her horn looking frizzed. "Piece of cake, really..."

Elise shrugged under Ansel's questioning look. "It involves trying to grab at places behind walls with your telekinesis to search for pockets of air," she explained. "I learned it decades ago from the daughter of a mutual friend. Admittedly, I've never had need to use it before now."

"You all look like you're going to pass out," I noted, observing signs of magical fatigue around both unicorns. Corsica in particular looked exhausted, and I could tell she was putting on a blustery face to cover something else up. Quietly, I noted to myself that Ansel wasn't the only one I needed to worry about.

"I may have overestimated my own magical strength," Elise admitted, not particularly abashed. "Fortunately, my horn has always been quick to recharge, but thank you for your concern. It did feel rather good to let loose with it again."

"You were melting a hole through solid rock with a horn laser," Ansel pointed out. "If you thought that was going to succeed, I think 'overestimating' might be too tame a word, don't you?"

"Can it with the grumbling," Corsica snapped. "I found a door. Do you want to see the other half of this place or not?"

Hesitating, I stepped in. "Don't forget it's kind of nighttime out. And the middle of a blizzard, to boot. Maybe we should rest up a little and go staring at the Trench later, yeah?"

Corsica sighed. "Doubt it'll be very restful. I wanna see what I just spent all this time looking for."

"Actually, I think Halcyon has a perfectly good point," Elise interrupted, her mane halfheartedly fluttering instead of its usual eternal blowing. "This is good progress, Corsica, but we have little to gain from pushing ourselves when we are tired. Furthermore, I don't believe Halcyon found the other end of this passage, so we have no guarantee it will be a simple sightseeing tour through familiar terrain. All of us ought to get some rest before exploring this together."

"Fine by me," Ansel declared, waving a hoof and walking out of the bathroom. "Dibs on the couch. You mares can have the fancy bedroom. I've never had much use for those, anyway."

I glanced between Elise and Corsica, expecting Corsica to push back. She was stuborn, and this was more of good advice than a strict order, right? Exactly the kind of thing she'd usually shrug off.

"...Whatever," she eventually said instead. "But the bed's all mine. You two can sleep on... something." She didn't even finish her thought, walking out without looking back.

Elise and I shared a look. And how about you? it seemed to say.

I shrugged. "Well, I'm far from a hundred percent, but I'm not that out of it. Maybe I should go talk to her?"

"If my experiences with teenage mares are any guideline," Elise replied, "you'll have more luck than I will. But don't wear yourself out on others' behalves. You might be better at hiding it, but I can tell this isn't easy on you, either."

Once again, she could read me perfectly. On top of all my earlier fatigue, my head was still a little shaky from the readjustment I had done in the statue room. Fortunately, my thoughts were finally in a place where I could try to relax, with some new distance and clarity on my feelings toward Ansel and Aldebaran. I also hadn't really started digging into what I intended to do once - of if - I made it back to Icereach. This would be the best chance to rest up I would get.

And yet... even if I was tired, I was still able to function despite it. Maybe I should push myself a little more before bed and check on my friends.

"Oi," I greeted, tromping into the bedroom and noticing Corsica already there, hogging the center of the bed like a cat on a throne. Now that I was a little more coherent, it suddenly struck me that trying to share would be a lot more awkward when I wasn't half-passed out from fatigue like during my earlier nap. In fact, I couldn't remember for certain that someone hadn't dragged me there.

"Back off, muddy boots," Corsica warned, her eyes glowing faintly with reflected light. "I spent ten minutes cleaning this out after the last time you hopped up here."

Something inside me from more than two years ago let me absorb the barb like it was part of a perfectly normal conversation. "Coolio," I responded, laying down on the floor and curling up against the side of the bed, still wearing my coat and everything. "I'll just take this spot instead. Can I have a tiny corner of blanket, Your Majesty?"

If Corsica read any sarcasm in the request, she didn't show it. "Here's a spare pillow. Use that," she said, unceremoniously dropping it by my head.

I took it and spent a minute arranging it. "You still awake?" I eventually whispered.

"What else would I be?" Corsica asked immediately, a slight hitch in her voice.

"...Are you alright?" I lifted my eyes, but didn't light my bracelet, leaving the room in darkness.

Corsica didn't respond.

"See, I know you usually are," I went on. "You're pretty resilient, and I admire you for it. But I also remember how we became friends. When I... you know... kept bugging you about it when you obviously weren't. So I don't wanna let this drop. You know you can talk to me. You've done it before, last time. Remember?"

"You have no idea what you're talking about. And when did I tell you what I was thinking back then?" Corsica asked. "The way I recall it, I just started helping you with your chapel project because it was a better use of my time then everything else I had been doing. And then, we got close doing it."

I frowned. "I mean, it was obvious that you had a falling-out with your father, and it had to do with your hospital stay, and..." I trailed off. "Okay, I guess I put most of the pieces together myself. But still. You've obviously got something on your mind. If not me, who are you gonna talk to?"

"I wasn't going to talk to anyone," Corsica said with a forced nonchalance. "It's very personal. And don't worry too much about me. I'm not blind, I know I look like a lethargic heap. I'll walk it off. It's happened before. Just an issue that's part of being me."

Funny. That was how I thought about myself and my situation, too: my memory-dreams, my mask wearing, my backwards ears. Just a part of being me. I knew how badly I wanted to keep my own secrets, how dangerous and precious they felt. Oddly, that just made me want to hear Corsica open up even more.

And then I got an idea. "How about this," I said without thinking. "We're besties, right? You share with me, and I'll tell you something private of my own. Equal exchange. Something I'd normally never tell anyone. Like, err..."

Like what? Would I tell her about my talent? My emptiness? My mouth had gotten ahead of my thoughts, and now I was regretting it. Deep down, I did want to share my secrets, to be known by someone more powerful and absolute than I was, who could understand me and help me make sense of myself and who I was supposed to be. But that wasn't Corsica. She was just finding her way through life like me. Right?

"Hmm." To my dismay, Corsica was seriously contemplating it. "How about your boots," she decided. "I want to see what you look like with them off. No clothes. And I wanna know why you wear them, if seeing doesn't make it obvious. Then I'll tell you why I'm in a funk. Deal?"

I froze, imagining it playing out. My stomach twisted involuntarily, and my ears pressed harder against my skull.

"Thought not." Corsica rolled over in bed and dropped it.

But the idea didn't leave me alone. On the scale of potentially harmful things I knew or could do, showing my legs was hopefully pretty tame. Probably. How many times over the last week had I needed to explain to Corsica that I wasn't going to take the boots off while someone was looking? Most of those times had been fueled by our trip with Aldebaran, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized that if we ever tried traveling together outside of Icereach, those dustups would continue. Maybe... this was something I could actually do.

Except for one tiny little problem. She didn't just want to see, she wanted to know why. And I couldn't tell her that even if I wanted to, because I didn't know myself.

I played with the cuffs of my boots in the darkness, turning the idea over in my mind. It wasn't like I was... well... it was hard to say. My thoughts sort of froze up and got twisted around when I tried to rationalize it, but I knew for certain that letting anyone see me with them off was something I needed to avoid at all costs. Logic couldn't explain the strength of the desire, and part of me wanted to rebel against it just because I could. But, no. I had to trust myself even when I couldn't understand myself. And besides, deep down, I had a feeling that I actually did know why I had to keep the boots on, and it just wasn't a reason I let myself be aware of. The kind of thing I locked out of my mask, excluded from my life and only remembered when I took the mask off. Exactly like how I had made Ansel into my real brother and pushed his origin to the side.

The only reason I had unblocked that was because I needed to. This hardly seemed like an urgent need to go diving into something I must have left out for a good reason, and I really wasn't keen on becoming that version of me twice in one day. Especially not while someone else was watching. The sensory side effects were severe enough that it would almost certainly end with her giving me strange looks and me panting on the floor.

Good night, I thought at her, giving up and closing my eyes. I couldn't help but feel like I should have done more.

"Huh huh. Halcyon pony posture all wrong. Need to brace self with legs, like this!"

"Are you sure we can't just hit it?" Corsica asked from the side. "Scientifically, a single blow would deliver a much higher peak force than continual pushing."

Balthazar shook his shaggy head, lumbering amiably over to where Corsica was watching me strain against a training machine. It looked like a giant gong strapped to the front of a hay bale, but was actually, I was told, a sophisticated yak machine to measure the force with which I could push against something. I had a hunch it really was just a giant gong strapped to a hay bale. Either way, Balthazar was adamant that spending hours pushing on an immovable object would turn us into true yak warriors, and the other yaks agreed.

"Hitting not help," Balthazar explained to Corsica and Ansel as they rested in between their turns with the hay bale. "Hitting is single strike. Either works or doesn't work! Once hoof stop moving, hit is over. Can always hit again, but then is downtime between mighty blows. Fast foe might recover. But when pony push, never have to stop until ready to stop. No gaps in defense."

"Are you sure about that?" Corsica argued. "Imagine pushing a rock continually along. It might keep moving, but you won't be strong enough to stop it from moving backward from a shock force! Why isn't the most important thing to break an opponent's guard?"

Balthazar ruffled her long, raspberry mane, earning a loud huff. "Balthazar never said this not so. But pony who only hit, only know how to hit. Must know how to push too."

"But punching things is better!"

I forced my shoulder against the gong, my hooves scraping the rocky mud floor, a little too concerned with the physical exertion to give the argument in the background much merit. Don't stop to redo my stance when my shoulder started to ache, Balthazar had told me. Readjusting myself counted as letting up.

But didn't Corsica have a point? Wasn't letting up now to come back stronger better than never breaking in the first place?

The mountain sun shone down on my efforts, and paradoxically, I relaxed. I had been expecting another nightmare, and a training session with Balthazar - an earlier one, I gathered, but I didn't remember precisely when this one occurred - was a welcome reprieve. I still felt my past self's exhaustion, the burning in my muscles and the cold air in my lungs, but it just felt good. It felt like I was doing something.

My past self's thoughts were still there, easy to read. Looking back, I never really had grasped the point of this exercise. At the time, I assumed it was some bodybuilding thing, a benefit to my strength that had to be done this specific way. Balthazar was the expert, after all. But what if that perspective had been wrong? Balthazar had no book smarts, but he was wise.

If I looked at the gong as a problem to be solved, Corsica wanted to hit it a bunch - like coming up with a plan, trying it, and then making a new one based on what happened from there. But what if, Balthazar's lesson suggested, you came up against a problem that required not cohesive singular solutions, but constant stamina and determination to make it through to the other side?

Something like keeping your sanity during a stressful exile.

...I stopped thinking about it. Instead, I thought about the immobile hay bale, and how I wasn't stopping even though my legs were starting to burn, and I listened to the sound of Balthazar's voice in the background. It felt far better than any training session I had ever been to in person. I resolved that once I was back safe and sound in Icereach, I owed Balthazar a cake.

Time didn't speed up. Usually, my dreams would skip over unimportant bits, my thoughts skimming over the memories like swiftly-turned pages in a book. But tonight, I stayed in the training yard, stayed in the monotony of perseverance, and was perfectly happy for it. Thanks, brain. Sometimes you really-

The sun went out.

I woke with a start, my dream shattering as it sometimes did when the waking world intruded too aggressively. Something was wrong. What? The lights. It was darker than it should be. But hadn't I left all the lights turned out?

No, there should have at least been light coming under the doorjamb. Without turning my bracelet on, I fumbled my way to the door and opened it. Pitch black. Even my sensitive batpony eyes couldn't see a thing beyond.

"This had better not be some automated system that tells you to go to bed when it's late out..." I grumbled, already dressed and scrubbing at my eyes, commanding my bracelet to glow and heading out to investigate.

I met Elise in the broken terminal room, the unicorn descending from the stairs. "Halcyon!" she greeted. "It appears we have a power outage. None of the lights are working. Were Corsica and Ansel in there with you?"

"Corsica's there," I managed, my mouth still waking up. "Maybe Ansel's upstairs?"

Elise shook her head. "He was napping on the couch in the lobby, but then I took it for myself when he went to do something else. I haven't checked the rest of the area. We ought to regroup, although I was primarily looking for you. Did you see a generator room when you were exploring the maintenance section earlier? I'm afraid of the possibility that this hideout was unused for so long that bringing it back into service has taxed a system that may have degraded while it was dormant."

Generators, generators... I felt like I should know that, but couldn't remember off the top of my head. "Well, let's at least see where Ansel is," I pointed out. "Probably not best to ditch him since he can't see in the dark."

Elise shook her head. "These quarters are not so large that if he was in distress, we would be unable to hear him. I think it's more likely he went somewhere else in search of rest, or perhaps to be alone for a while."

"Oh." Made sense. Sort of. Where was he, sleeping on top of the food supply like those tin cans were dragon gold? I almost could see it really happening... But would that really be more comfortable than the couch?

"While you think on any possible generators, I wanted to ask you something," Elise said. "You overheard my conversation with Ansel earlier, when we discussed changelings, among other things. I want to make sure you can ask any questions you have, resulting from that."

I blinked into the colored hornlight, my brain slowly pulling back out information I had already archived behind the more pressing matters of literally rearranging my brain, not to mention our misty jail mate and our proximity to home. "Err... Questions about which part?"

Elise shrugged. "I did question whether your brother might be a changeling, as well as squarely announce that your mother once was a member of a criminal group in the Griffon Empire. These were things I told to Ansel based on his specific feelings and situation. But I imagine you are feeling Aldebaran's betrayal keenly, and want to ensure I am not unduly adding to any worries you have that things are not as they seem."

Huh. Little did she know, I already knew way more about Ansel than her, and had known about him all along... At least, as of a few hours ago.

"It's... not that big of a deal," I said, hoping to placate her. "Yeah, you made some points about Ansel. But we've been better friends these last two years than we were the years before, so if he was someone else, would it be that much of a bad thing?"

Elise tilted her head. "You seem remarkably at peace with the idea, considering what has happened over the past few days."

She must have sensed there was more to it than that, but my talent and years of covering for Ansel let me answer like I hadn't even noticed. "I already knew the Aldebaran ponies were hiding something about who they were," I replied, leaning on the truth. "From way before we got on that airship. It was everything about them. Leif in particular. Their careful presentations, the way they dressed, the way they tried to read others... My read on it was that Leif was really a batpony disguised as a pegasus, and they were a group of friends from before the war who had some hard feelings about being told to fight each other." I shook my head. "I was wrong about what they were, but right that they were hiding something. Point is, it doesn't bother me when ponies keep secrets. Everyone does that. I know I do. The only thing that bothers me is that they betrayed us, which is different from not being who they said they were."

Elise nodded slowly. "That's a very resilient worldview. It also sounds like you're quite observant about these things. Would it be too much to ask what you think of Ansel, then, and my ideas about him?"

"Too much to ask?" I averted my eyes. She was just as keen as during our chess 'game'... "Not really, but... I don't wanna question it, you know? He's a cool brother. Why would I want to go digging into reasons why he might not be?"

"I see." Elise straightened up and backed off, apparently not wishing to press. "In that case, it sounds as though it is best to leave well enough alone. Is there anything else you would like to ask?"

"What are we asking?" a groggy Corsica inquired, joining us with an unbrushed mane and a flicker of sapphire around her slender horn. "And why's it so dark?"

"We're asking why it's so dark, of course." I stuck out my tongue at her. "Elise says that the power's out."

Corsica frowned, considering this. "Well, good thing we've got a way out?"

"Insomuch as a nigh-unscalable mountain face constitutes a way out," Elise replied. "Although it does sound prudent to think about how we could overcome that and what we could do once we reach Icereach now, rather than waiting to see if the power comes back on and finding ourselves low on heat if it doesn't."

Low on heat... I stared deeply into a wall. What was it I wasn't remembering? It was right on the edge of my mind...

And then it hit me. "The mist monster," I groaned. "The one I found in the other rooms. It said something about being put down here as a power source."

That instantly got Elise's attention. "Oh dear."

"So... what, it escaped?" Corsica asked, pulling her mane out of her eyes. "Is that it?"

I glanced at the air vent I snuck through the last few times I visited the outer rooms. "Not that splitting up seems like a great idea, but since I'm the only one who can go, maybe I should go check it out? I was hoping to avoid talking to that thing again, though..."

Elise shook her head. "I would rather we prioritize finding Ansel. Splitting up seems unwise if there is any risk of an unknown, hostile power in these tunnels."

"But Hallie's the only one who can go through the wall," Corsica pointed out. "Aren't we splitting up anyway? We still haven't checked out the secret passage in the bathroom. That's what I'm doing."

"And I wouldn't call the mist hostile, exactly," I added uncertainly. "It did seem kind of evil, but it was friendly, too. Not exactly chomping at the bit to come grind our bones. That said, we probably want to avoid talking to it if possible..."

Corsica nodded. She did sound a bit better with half a night's sleep behind her, I decided.

Elise regarded the two of us. "I suppose Corsica does have a point," she admitted. "You are the only one currently able to reach that mist, Halcyon, at least until we explore the tunnel. However, I don't imagine a lack of heating will cause us to freeze instantaneously, and this issue is my responsibility. I won't stop you from going if you truly mean to volunteer, but you shouldn't see it as a duty."

I thought about that for a moment, my brain tugging in four different directions. Part of me insisted that it was a duty, that as the best pony for the job, I should go to maximize our chances of a good result. Another part of me felt that the mist was bad news, and told me to avoid it. A third, childish part just wanted someone else to rely on, and was happy to hide behind Elise in the illusion of safety. And an even more childish part of me was curious and just wanted to investigate, all consequences forgotten.

But I had talked to the mist before, so out of all of us, I was probably the most equipped to talk to it again, assuming it hadn't just up and floated away. And more importantly, I had an unsettling feeling about what might happen if the mist monster got a chance to talk to anyone other than me. If it was just me listening to its ramblings, I could filter and process everything I heard, and if there was one quality I had in abundance, it was self-control. But I didn't trust it not to try and convince someone else to do something stupid.

"...Yeah," I eventually said, making up my mind and nodding. "I'll go check it out. I appreciate the offer, but I probably would be best at this. No offense."

Elise watched me, then relented, nodding toward the air vent. "Very well. Be safe, Halcyon. The world is a very old place, and it is far from thoroughly explored. It would be most unwise to make assumptions about what an unidentified magical creature can or will do."

I nodded and slipped into the duct, leaving her and Corsica to find Ansel and search the bathroom passage.

I ran to the sealed door, feeling a lot less brave than I had in the company of Corsica and Elise, breath catching in my throat as I slowly started to realize the situation I was putting myself into. What if... Well, anything was possible. Checking it out alone? I had to be nuts.

The door was still sealed, though. I threw my weight against the lock wheel, and felt my heartbeat spike when it swung open: the floor beyond was clear. No blue mist flopped and undulated, and no unsettling music tinkled in my mind.

I sped up, skidding to a halt in front of the half-melted inner door and frowning. It looked like the lights were still on in the room beyond... I lifted my bracelet leg, stepping closer when I realized there were words written in frost on the melted door.

Out For Lunch

Why do I even need lunch anyway? It's a question for the ages. What do you think, friendo?

I blinked several times. "What the...?"

It felt like the kind of message that was designed to look like a riddle, but was actually meaningless and just existed to waste the reader's time. Was there something else I was supposed to make of this? Was the power really out because it had just flown the coop? It had told me it wasn't really trapped...

Well, there was an easy way to find out. Briefly considering that this might be an even worse idea, and then deciding that the mist seemed far more interested in messing with me than hurting me, I extinguished my bracelet and swam under the door.

The light in the room ejected me forcefully from the floor as soon as I was far enough inside to fit, and I stumbled, catching my balance. The room was about the size of my living room at home and roughly circular, with a domed, jagged roof and a flat floor taken up by a huge circle made from chiseled runes, full of angles and connections and arcane symbols. At the center of the circle was a tiny pedestal that couldn't have been meant to hold an object bigger than a potato, and above that pedestal floated an impossibility: a phantasam of white and blue, its frontal half vaguely equine and its barrel trailing off into a plume of churning clouds. It regarded me with pure white, luminous eyes that made me feel as if my heart was being turned to ice.

Also, Ansel was in the room.

"Phooey," the mist-thing complained, blue mist seeping out from it and covering the floor once again like a released breath. "I forgot you could do that."

"Told you so," Ansel retorted, looking smug.

My eyes bounced between them, eventually settling on Ansel. "There had better be a real good explanation for what's going on here."

Ansel gestured to a cleft in the far wall I had overlooked. "Short version is, I was exploring that tunnel Corsica found in the bathroom and wound up here. Ludwig and I were just getting to know each other."

"Ludwig?" I glanced at the mist monster, trying to avoid thinking about how Ansel had agreed that we should hold off on exploring the tunnel together, then apparently gone down on his own. Not that I had ground to complain when I had been exploring solo as well, but still... At least now I knew why I hadn't found the other end of that tunnel.

"That is my name, friendo." The mist-thing shrugged. "Well, technically it is Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III, but that is a bit of a mouthful to say with your mouth. You can call me Lord Frederick instead if you want to sound cool."

I had to sit down.

"Anyhoodles," the mist - Ludwig - continued, "you are a kind of annoying ponyo. You didn't even play my game. So I think our bet is null and void, grumpy ponyo. Too bad. Want to try again?" It looked to Ansel.

"Your bet?" I glanced at him too. "Seriously? Can't you tell this place has bad news written all over it?"

"In case you haven't noticed, so does everything about our situation," Ansel insisted, calmly holding his ground. "We've been bamboozled and betrayed by brigands, and to make matters worse, they did it in such a way that we can't know one of us isn't their fifth member. Elise already suspects me, and that only got me wondering about everyone else. It seemed like solo operations were the best way to go, not that you haven't been doing your fair share of solo exploring as well. And if there's one person down here I can be reasonably certain isn't a changeling, it's this." He pointed a hoof at Ludwig. "Believe it or not, it's actually kind of relatable."

"Relatable?" I glanced sideways at the mist. "Relatable enough that you're making wagers with it? You know the power's out right now, right? Is that your doing? And what's with the weird writing on the door?"

Ludwig happily cleared its throat. "Oh, that is easy, little cigar," it boomed, its voice just as metallic here as it was in the outside tunnel. "Your friendo was like, 'Do you know any ways to the outside, O magnanimous mist?' And I was like, 'Sure do, grumpy little ponyo! In fact, I live in this particular hole because it is one you have to go through to get from in here to out there! I am really quite smart.' And then he said, 'O mist-'"

"This thing put its lair in the middle of the intended route to get from the living area to the maintenance area, basically," Ansel clarified. "The whole point of our wager was that if I won, we'd get free passage to come and go between the halves of this hideout. As for the lights, the whole wager was on how you lot would react."

Ludwig sighed laboriously. "It is so hard to find ponyos who do not trust each other these days. I thought for sure you would assume he asked me to possess him like a puppet to go help kick some bad guy tail, and that was why I was no longer around. You trust each other so little! Why not jump to conclusions, little cigar?"

I stared at both of them incredulously. "What the...? Are you seriously that daft? That makes so little sense, I don't believe either of you. And I'm not a cigar."

"That's why I agreed to it." Ansel shrugged. "I said the thought wouldn't even cross your mind. It's just not how you operate."

"I left a message for you to read with your very own eyes," Ludwig pouted. "On the door. It told you to think about the reasons I might have really had to leave!"

"You're so bad at this, it's almost adorable," Ansel taunted the mist, waggling a hoof. "I told you, that's not how ponies work. Leastwise, not us. Anyway, I told you she'd see through it and get the facts first, and boom, there you have it. I'd say that counts as a win for me. So let's say we can come and go now?"

I loudly cleared my throat. "That still doesn't explain why you were betting on how I'd react to being put in weird circumstances in the first place. I'm a pony, not some test subject!"

Ludwig did the spooky cloudy mist monster equivalent of a shrug. "It was his idea, little cigar. I just said yes because I was bored!"

"Hey!" Ansel took a step back. "Watch it, frost breath. Hallie, I'm sorry if that came off differently than intended. I only asked if there was any way we could get safe passage through this room."

This was exactly what I had been afraid of, with multiple ponies getting to talk to the mist: the emotional temperature in the room was rising, and Ludwig seemed to consider egging it on to be good sport. We needed to both get out of here as soon as possible, and then talk this out or agree to put it behind us somewhere that thing couldn't contribute.

"Well, it's been real," I said, taking a few steps toward Ansel and offering a wing. "Come on, let's go back up, enjoy the power being back on, and-

"What's going on in here?"

I remembered far, far too late that Corsica said she was going to check out the tunnel in the bathroom.

"Hallie? Ansel? And what's that?" she asked, stopping at the edge of the room with a lit horn and a half-brushed mane.

"Hello, raspberry ponyo," Ludwig greeted cheerfully, doing a loop in midair and turning to face her. "I am Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III, but that is a bit of a mouthful to say with your mouth. You can call me Lord Frederick instead if you-"

"We were literally just getting wrapped up with the power back on," I interrupted, marching across the room toward Corsica. "Excellent timing, care to head back with us?"

It wasn't going to work. As if I could see the future, I knew her reaction: to her, seeing the two of us here would look exactly how running into Ansel had looked to me, plus the added novelty of never having met the mist before. And out of the three of us, she was the most likely to do something hasty or jump to a conclusion.

Ludwig's creepy little tune grew more lively in my head, like it was setting the soundtrack for an upcoming fight scene.

"But what is it?" Corsica protested, dodging my effort to push her back into the tunnel. "And that doesn't explain what you two are here for."

Ansel gave me a look as if to say, See how I felt?

"Bail now, talk later," I declared. "Just take my word on this, I promise there's a good reason and I'll explain as soon as we're in another room."

Ludwig whistled, validating all of my wariness. "Get on with your bad selves, yes, nothing to see here!"

"Oi. Put a sock in it," I warned, glaring daggers at the mist. "We're bailing because I've got a bad feeling this is going to get chaotic real quick."

"Is that the mist monster that runs the power supply?" Corsica pressed, resisting my pushing. "Halcyon, leggo! What's Ansel doing here?"

"Eyyy, but I've got a good feeling this is going to get chaotic real quick," Ludwig smugly replied. "I have another riddle for you! A lack of trust and a communications breakdown depart from two opposite train stations, moving toward each other. The lack of trust is moving at thirteen secrets per paragraph and the communications breakdown is moving at one perplexed bystander who does nothing to help. How long does it take until I need popcorn?"

Ansel nodded, moving towards us. "Hallie's got the right of it, let's absolutely talk somewhere this jester isn't-"

"Everyone, stop speaking immediately!"

A pulse of magic washed over the room, and I suddenly found that my mouth didn't work quite right. The feeling intensified, until it was full-on filled with cotton. I moved it and no sound came out.

Elise stepped into the room, horn glowing. "Give each other some space," she commanded. "And whatever you were just thinking about, I urge you to set it aside for the time being." She turned to Ludwig and sighed. "...Well."

Ludwig regarded her owlishly. "Killjoy."

"A windigo," Elise remarked, watching it. "I hoped I would never have to meet one in person. They thrive on conflict between ponies, and attempt to create or exacerbate it wherever they go. Creature, I apologize for depriving you of your sport, but these three are my charges. You will not touch them."

Ludwig examined her for a moment. "...You are pretty good, friendo. Where did you learn about us? I thought we were just spooky stories out there."

Elise met its empty white eyes. "I am not here to banter. I'm here to collect my little ponies. We'll be on our way, and will leave you in peace."

"Ehhhhh, peace is boring, friendo," Ludwig decided, leaving its pedestal and doing a loop midair before settling down in front of the tunnel entrance everyone but me had used. "You talk like you know what I can do, so why also talk like you can make me do what you want? You're just one ponyo. A shrimpy one, too. Shrimp."

Elise bowed her head. "Diplomacy is always my first recourse. I am indeed outmatched, but you've engaged in civil discourse thus far. I hope I can assume you will continue."

Ludwig scrutinized her closely. "Mmmmmmm... Hmmmmm... Hrrrmmmmmm... Good idea, shrimp! I like diplomacy." A tiny little flicker of blue energy pulsed from its body, hitting Elise's horn and encasing it in a thin layer of ice. The ice caused her aura to go out, and suddenly my mouth felt normal again.

"You talk too much, though," the windigo decided, the ice already melting away. "Let the others join the fun!"

To our credit, none of us spoke.

Elise winced a little from the cold, but recovered quickly. "Corsica, Halcyon, Ansel, please leave this room. I shall be right behind you."

Ansel took several steps toward the exit to the bathroom tunnel, but stopped, turned his head and bowed. "With all due respect, this windigo room is the halfway point between where we're bunking and Hallie's exit to the outdoors. It's probably not in our best interest to vow never to visit here again. Also, I don't believe the power ever got turned back on..."

"Oh yeah, I totally forgot about that, grumpy ponyo." Ludwig did another loop, then circled the room. "You are giving me so much to think about!"

"It's bizarre, but I don't think it's trying to kill us," Corsica remarked, leaning her head forward and squinting curiously at the windigo. "Right? What's it even made of?"

"All of that can be settled later," Elise said, giving them a stern look as I crept toward the door, deciding that leaving the room would provide more of a benefit than I could possibly give by being present. "Corsica, Ansel, please-"

"Meh! Diplomacy boring," Ludwig abruptly decided. "I am thinking the shrimp has a really good point. You young ponyos are too young and stupid to hang around a dangerous windigo. OoOoOoOoOo... Off you go!"

Suddenly, it surged with far more power than when it froze Elise's horn. I looked around frantically, realizing ice was forming along the floor. Thick ice, that seemed to be rising beneath us, pushing us up instead of trapping our hooves...

Slanted ice. One by one, we lost our hoofing, fell down and slid down the formation, to where it funneled us in a heap just inside the tunnel entrance. A sturdy grate of ice rapidly grew from the floor, forming in midair and completely blocking the passage back into Ludwig's room. Etched into the ice, on a panel that looked specifically made for it, were the words, Come Again Soon, Have A Nice Day!

Corsica huffed, getting back to her hooves. "Rude," she pouted, staring back through the ice to where Ludwig was hovering smugly.

Ansel glanced up the tunnel. "The power's still out, isn't it?"

I met Elise's eyes, and saw that we were thinking exactly the same thing: by cutting off the conversation so abruptly, it was less like Ludwig was encouraging us to leave and more like it was daring us to return. We hadn't been allowed to make up our own minds about being able to walk away. Instead, we had been unceremoniously booted from the most interesting place in the tunnels - a place someone would need to venture to petition for the power to come back on. I gave it two, maybe three hours until someone would want to go down there again.

Faster, if we started to get cold.

Tranquil Freedom

I stepped onto the first train platform in the Day District, a hot breeze blowing against my coat as the last light of evening crawled up the eastern mountain face. I almost felt like I could see the sun's rays stretching over the darkening valley of the Night District, the air shimmering and distorting from the day's lingering heat. It was hot for me too; uncomfortably so. But, overall, I felt good, because I was here on my own.

Kitty had been sent back to Jamjars with a message that I was going to explore for a while, and with all of Egdelwonk's merch that I didn't feel like carrying in public. If Jamjars didn't like that, she was welcome to come find me herself and drag me home, but I already regretted nothing. The open sky, the wind, the knowledge that everyone around me was a stranger and we knew nothing about each other at all...

This was what I had been missing.

I ran to the edge, where a stone fence separated the platform from a dropoff to the next street a long ways below. Then, putting my hooves on the fence and feeling the wind in my mane, I breathed deeply and took it all in.

Ironridge's sunset was red, exceptionally so, but it was behind me so I couldn't watch it directly. Out to my right, to the north, I could see the horizon, a gap in the sun-yellowed mountains that formed Ironridge's boundary, with the Night District's sprawl of trees and buildings pouring out through it like cereal from a broken bowl. Drifting left, my gaze found factories, big and boxy shapes of gray that crawled their way up the northwestern Day District, like the airship port where Gerardo had moored us. Was he still here in Ironridge, I wondered? I didn't know.

To my left and to the south, the colors of sunset seemed faintest, blocked by the mountains, which were bluer in the dampening light. Several waterfalls fell, I noted, guided down the mountain side by a pair of steep aqueducts the roads and buildings all ran under. The buildings to the south were much less building-y and much more underground, with only facades and windows to show above the surface. In the Day District, at least.

The valley floor was a field of orchards and trees, tall and wild and small and cultivated alike, split up by a web of cities within a district and roads that connected them, each one with its own building style and identity. The closest one looked like a chaotic cake, with buildings stacked atop each other in layers, high enough that the upper floors might even have a view above the trees, yet it was ramshackle and clearly unplanned. To the northeast, I could see a settlement full of low-slung buildings on a part of the mountain slope that was deforested, but not high enough to belong to the Day District proper, all with flat roofs and crenelations. Far to the north, there was a noble, silvered tower with a wider top floor, and I could make out a large, round building far to the west, though by there my advantage of height was gone and all I could see were occasional gaps in the trees.

What did I want to bet each of those places had names, all that I didn't know? What did I want to bet there were ponies who had called each of them home for generations, who had stories of those places that went back hundreds of years? Ironridge, to hear Icereach's modified history tell it, was around eight hundred years old.

There was so much I didn't know, and... this reminded me of why I loved the unknown. Standing alone at the edge of a cliff, Cold Karma's dictators and lunatics far away behind me, it was easy to believe that some of the things I hadn't discovered yet were good things. Wonderful things, even. Maybe I had struck out a few times before, but with this much left unexplored, there had to be more for me to see. And Ironridge was only one city. I had set out to see the world, not just a place I could behold the entirety of from a single vantage point. Even if I somehow exhausted all this city had to offer, I knew there would be more.

My mane fluttered in the breeze, and for an entire moment, nothing happened to ruin my mood. I almost felt like I could fly.

A hiss behind me marked the train departing. I glanced over my shoulder just in case, and noticed a passing stallion tip his hat at me.

Huh. Not that I had done much looking, but a week later I had yet to figure out what that was about.

Maybe... Maybe I should hold onto this feeling, though. Jamjars wanted me to get myself employed and do something useful with my time. My friends didn't seem to have a terrible aversion to the idea, but I didn't have a terrible attraction to it, and now that I suddenly felt so hopeful and excited about the future I realized submitting heavily-embellished resumes, practicing for interviews and dealing with dangerous power brokers like Egdelwonk clearly wasn't making me happy. If it did make me feel like this, this wouldn't feel so special, now.

Maybe I should kick that idea to he curb, apologize to Jamjars but not back down, and do what I wanted for a change. After all, Mother had raised me to more or less take care of myself. And as much anxiety as I used to have about putting myself in situations where my actions could have consequences, it had clearly been diminished by all my bad experiences with putting myself at someone else's mercy.

I could do this! I smiled, making up my mind.

Now, there was just one more problem: where in this giant city did I actually want to go?

With no goals or obligations, I decided to just let my hooves carry me and see where I wound up.

Before too long, I found myself back in the familiar hall of Eaststone Mall. Not because I wanted to go shopping - all my money was back at Jamjars' - but because the heat made me thirsty, and this was a place I knew to have water fountains.

I found what I was looking for in a wall alcove between a billboard for public announcements and a jewelry store, next to a maintenance closet and some restrooms. After drinking deeply, I wiped my lips, turning my attention to the billboard to see what the locals had to say to each other.

Help wanted: Rocktail's arms surplus shop. No Sky Districters!

I scratched my head. Sky District? I remembered Gerardo saying that one was sparsely populated, but what would someone have against it? Apparently, there really were some inter-district tensions in this city...

Pirate King Rhodallis strikes again at Varsidelian border: read all about it in the Nightly Times!

A pirate king, huh? For a moment, something about that tugged at my memory, and then I remembered: Leif and Rondo had mentioned getting in good with Cold Karma by helping protect some of their assets from sky pirates. I had no reason to trust them, but no reason to suspect that part of their story, either. Maybe Ironridge really did have a pirate problem.

Public Service Announcement: per city ordinance 503992, heterosexual sarosian couples are entitled to 350 green quads upon registering a marriage in city records. Further tax credits for foals may also apply! Remember: only you can help rebuild endangered populations! This message paid for by the Division of Societal Planning.

Now that was interesting. Cold Karma was paying batponies to have kids? I wasn't sure if that was noble and high-minded, given the state of my race, or sort of weird given how personal that was supposed to be. Maybe both. Either way, it wasn't an insignificant amount of money. I had no idea how Ironridge's economy compared to Icereach's, but my home at least saw Ironridge's currency, and green quads were a fairly high denomination. The research grant Corsica and I got after the Aldebaran incident only totaled about a hundred of them.

...Also, wasn't that the branch Lilith was in charge of? One more connection to build out my picture of Cold Karma...

Missing pony: have you seen this mare?

I scanned the photograph, but no, I couldn't say that I had. The mare in question - almost more of a filly than a mare - looked plenty strong-willed and rebellious. Probably a runaway, then.

In a sense, I was a runaway too. I nodded briefly in respect, and wished her the best.

REPENT.

Okay...

A tapping stole my attention, and I looked up to see a unicorn stallion perhaps five years my senior adding another poster to the board. When he saw me looking, he tipped his hat with his aura and gave me a cheery wink.

Alright, enough was enough. Time to see what this was all about.

"Hey there," I greeted with a nod. "Dig the hat."

He nodded back with a white, toothy smile. "Thanks! Got it at a small outlet in Mosstower. In the market yourself?"

Mosstower. A new name I didn't know; better file that away... "Nah," I said with a good-natured shrug. "Just in the business of appreciating fashion when I see it."

The stallion chuckled lightly. "A good business to be in! Mind if I ask where you got your own clothes? Full-body garb like that is heavy with class."

"Gift from a friend," I admitted, sizing this pony up. He looked smart and respectable, yet without any haughtiness or arrogance that suggested he belonged to a snooty upper class. Lots of savvy, no malice. That was a dangerous combination: this was a pony you would subconsciously want to make yourself look good by agreeing with. And he pulled it off with such a strong degree I was almost certain he was doing it on purpose. What had he posted? It looked like an announcement for a rally of some sort, but I couldn't stare at it without being conspicuous.

"I see." He nodded deeply. "You must walk in high circles, then. It's heartening to know that at least some of our city's sarosians have escaped from the morass of public opinion. I wish you well, friend."

"Morass of public opinion?" I asked, suspecting he was about to turn away. "Most of the folks I run into have been unfailingly polite."

The stallion looked proud. "New to the city, perhaps? We've certainly worked hard and changed a lot in the past few years, and I'm glad it's gotten to a point where that can be someone's experience. Though it wouldn't be change if there wasn't a past we were moving away from."

"New around here? Is it that obvious?" I chuckled, doing my best to live up to the high-class demeanor he had ascribed to me.

He shook his head. "Activists like me have seen a lot of ponies from all walks of life. But live in the same city for long enough, and some experiences will be shared. Forgive me if I'm being presumptuous, but... what do you think of ponies who are less fortunate than yourself?"

Ponies who were less fortunate than me? Probably that they would all be dead, given how many miracles it took to survive such a spate of misfortune during the Aldebaran incident... But I didn't say that, because this stallion had crafted his own mask of assumptions about me, and I was going to wear it to keep him happily talking until he had told me what I wanted to know.

"Eh, they're alright," I said noncommittally, suspecting he was fishing for someone he could sway to his point of view. "Why?"

"A burden shared is a burden lessened," the stallion explained, extending a hoof. "The name's Kuiper. I volunteer with an organization called the Zero Armada - maybe you've heard of us, it's on the poster - that does outreach work for the oppressed sarosian minority, and also to help the ponies who oppress them learn to walk a better path in life. Now, I don't want to presume anything about how difficult your life has been, but there are always those who are less fortunate than ourselves, and sometimes, all we have to do is try to find out there's more we can carry! We try to take the weight off the shoulders of those who have too much, offer cathartic healing toward the rift between oppressed and oppressor, and give our utmost to make tomorrow a fairer and more equal future!"

He coughed into his forehoof, then giggled uncertainly. "Err, stump speech. Sorry if I got a little preachy, there. The point is, if you're having a good time in Ironridge, odds are high it's thanks to our work. Not to toot our own horns, but just as an invitation if you've ever wanted to pay it forward."

Sure is a long-winded invitation, I thought but didn't say. Although, assuming he was telling the truth, this could be a useful way to learn about the societal forces at play in Ironridge... Forces I could probably find dozens of pragmatic reasons to learn about, but mostly just wanted to understand because I was curious.

"Alright," I replied, bumping his offered hoof. "I'm pretty busy and not always free, but I might come learn more. Where's your group located?"

Kuiper's eyes brightened. "We have daily meetings in the Old Blueleaf Mana Reactor whenever we're not staging rallies around the city. Mostly in the Night District, though. I'm going to guess you haven't frequented the Night District?"

I shook my head. "Anything I should know?"

"First, leave the clothes," Kuiper instructed. "I know, I know, sensibilities must not be offended, but if you're hobnobbing with lower-class ponies, there's no need to display your wealth. Also, you'll probably pass out if you try to wear that down there without being very acclimated to the heat. Second, it's usually a dawn-to-dusk affair, since you can't, you know, go outside in the Night District during the day. So, be prepared to spend the day! Third, if you don't know the way, buy a map. I know paying local tour guides helps the economy and those in need, but I really wouldn't want it on my hooves if you get kidnapped or something and your parents come to call."

"Kidnapped?" I raised an eyebrow. "Is that a thing that happens regularly?"

Kuiper raised an eyebrow at me. "There's a reason social outreach is a noble calling rather than a thing expected of each and every pony. It might shock you to see it, but being lower down on the ladder isn't pretty. The last thing the Zero Armada is about is helping rich ponies feel good about themselves." He shook his head. "Or maybe you've come from Varsidel and know all about it, and just haven't shaken the image of Ironridge as a shining city on a hill. Even though we're technically in a crater..."

"Yeah. Noted. Never mind." I was still thinking about the fact that the Day District at night was already at the upper limit of my heat tolerance threshold. Unclothing myself was not going to happen, but the consequences of going down to the valley floor without doing so would probably be dire.

"Anyway, I best be off!" Kuiper tipped his hat again, conspicuously shuffling a stack of posters he was carrying. "Gotta finish my rounds for promoting tomorrow night's rally. By the way, did I ever get your name?"

"Nope." I sent him off with a wink of my own. "I guess it'll just give you something to look forward to if we run into each other again."

Kuiper took off with a spring in his step. Moments later, I was once again alone in a crowd.

I took... whatever personality I had been wearing for that off, and became good old regular masked Halcyon again. Part of me felt like it should feel a lot weirder than it did to put on an act like that, and say things that the normal me would never be caught dead uttering. And yet, this was my talent, and doing it felt about as natural as could be. In fact, it almost felt good, like I was putting an extra barrier between myself and someone I had no reason yet to trust.

The me that had talked to Kuiper could trust him. The me that I was now could assume he was a cad. All the mental health benefits of not having to assume the worst of everyone I met, while also staying safe from a pony who was probably very good at getting others to do what he wanted? I'll take it. And the best part was, he was apparently a recruiter for an open string of events, so if I did want to check it out it would be very easy to go home, dye my coat and switch up my manestyle, then pick up a false name and a pair of colored contact lenses, and attend as someone completely anonymous and unrelated to me.

Exploring the world like this was fun!

Now... time to do it some more.

Ironridge's train system, I soon discovered, was shaped like a spoked wheel. Several lines ran around the curvature of the Day District at varying elevations along the mountainside, but there were also a number of trains that went straight from the ring to the center of the Night District, low enough down that they cut beneath the ground even there, at the bottom of the valley. An impressively long set of escalators linked the stations where they vertically crossed, which meant you could make it from the Day District to any station in the Night District without leaving the air-conditioned underground.

I knew about this from looking at train maps and then from doing it, and now I stood at a surface exit to the central terminal - a city-within-a-city called Grand Acorn, which I was fairly sure housed the silvery tower I had seen earlier - pondering what to do about the heat.

Ponies kept shooting me dubious glances here, much more so than I usually received in the Day District. And probably with good reason, because most of the ponies entering the station visibly sagged in relief upon hitting the air-conditioned air, and all the ones leaving girded themselves for an ordeal. Hats were common here, but even collars were rare, and no one wore anything else except the absolute thinnest of open-front, sleeveless vests. And then there was me, all dressed up like a comic book superhero, showing no fur save for my face.

Tendrils of hot air licked in at me, the subway entrance shielded from the outdoors by two sets of revolving doors. I stood in the lobby between them, the air already uncomfortable but nothing near what it was outside, and steeled myself for another try. Maybe by now, I'd have acclimated a little better?

I stepped through the revolving door during a lull in foot traffic, when there were fewer ponies to see if I made a fool of myself. Instantly, my coat became a shield against the heat, though I could tell it was about five seconds away from becoming a liability as blazing air wrapped around my head and tail, slipped through the seams in my collar, and nearly paralyzed me as my body instinctively tried to stop moving and generate as little heat as possible.

Just... ride the heat. Don't try to fight it. Focus only on moving where you had to move, right? I wasn't sure if that was advice I had ever been given, but as my mind started to swim, it sure sounded sensible enough. My throat was already dry, even though the Night District wasn't particularly arid. Large floodlights lit the plaza I was on the edge of, probably not helping with the heat. Or maybe that was my imagination.

I lasted seventeen seconds by my own delirious counting, before stumbling back into the station, knowing that it would be a bad idea to push myself so hard I ended up like Corsica and passed out out there. Moments later, I was hydrated and resting on a bench in the cool interior, my cheeks flushed and my fur sweaty. I felt... wobbly. That was the last time I could try this tonight.

How did everyone else manage it? They didn't make it look easy, not at all, I decided, following the ponies walking back and forth with my head held low. But still... Was it experience? Genetics? Just them not wearing clothes?

I wasn't about to accept the latter, because that meant I wouldn't be able to visit this district without doffing my garb. Genetics seemed like a likelier explanation - look at Corsica, after all. And yet, if the temperature had risen as fast as Gerardo made it out to, what population would have time to adapt? Besides, I was from the Griffon Empire, not icy Yakyakistan. The only option I was left with was experience.

Which meant I'd just have to learn how to take the heat in stride.

I glowered at the night air, feeling a little steadier but still drained. Maybe my talent could help with this, if it was purely a matter of learning? I'd still need someone to learn from, and to understand how they did it. But for now, I had to watch out for my health and retreat.

The train clattered along its underground tracks, carrying me back toward the Day District as I slumped against a seat, thinking. At this point, Kuiper and his organization were far from my primary interest, and had been replaced by another, much worthier goal: there was a place that didn't want me in it, and I took that as a challenge.

It was a particularly appealing challenge because the weather was an equal-opportunity villain that couldn't possibly have anything against me in particular, which meant that my own unusually wild luck had nothing to do with whether or not I succeeded. The next night, or maybe the night after, I would come back and try it again, or maybe go find a library and read about how ponies acclimated to heat, a subject that was nowhere to be found in Icereach due to its complete lack of necessity.

Not like this was an important goal, of course. It was just one I got to choose, as opposed to escaping from Aldebaran or getting hired.

I glanced around the train, wondering if an inevitable problem would rear its head to sidetrack me, like the train being held up by a militia or the tunnel collapsing. What would militias around here skirmish over, anyway? In Icereach, most everyone had seen eye to eye, or else kept their head down or just went away. Experience told me Ironridge should be the same, but common sense insisted it would be different. What kinds of things did ponies here disagree on? What did they care about? What were they afraid of?

Some of the train's passengers seemed drawn into themselves, as if they didn't want to interact with anything. Some were reading. Two were making out. We stopped at a stop, and a stallion almost sat by me, then gave me a proper look, blinked, and pretended to be innocuous as he went to sit somewhere else.

Well, it didn't seem so improbable that opinions on batponies were an issue.

The Day District almost felt cool after what I'd felt down below, though it was still much hotter than the air-conditioned underground and I was still worn out from pushing myself, so I quickly took shelter in the open-air lobby of a fancy business building that seemed to want pedestrians to come in and admire how wealthy it was.

Several newspaper racks sat against a wall, and looked free. One of them caught my eye, and I picked it up: the front page was dedicated to that pirate king I had seen mentioned on the bulletin board. Maybe this would be interesting?

I seated myself and began to read, and things I had sort of always known about the world's geopolitical state came into much greater clarity. Yakyakistan and Ironridge had an alliance, and both of them were bordered by the Aldenfold, the apparent edge of the world. Icereach was in between them. North of Ironridge was the failed nation of Varsidel, and on the Varsidel-Yakyakistan border far to the north of Icereach, there was a citadel called Fortress Anemo. Backed by Yakyakistani hooves and Ironridge technology, Anemo was a kingpin of the alliance's military strategy, and the base of air power that let them keep the route between Ironridge and Yakyakistan safe.

Ironridge, being a city-state, didn't have a lot of territory with hooves on it. Most of its actual national space was airspace, a bubble to the north and east situated above uninhabitable badland that was too rough for any commercial building. So Ironridge could defend its interests and trade routes close to home, and far to the northwest using Anemo. But the farther north or east you went, the more that dominance waned... and at some point, there was a very unofficial border based on who could sneak what past increasingly sparse patrols.

Pirate King Rhodallis was an anomaly because while most illegal air activity was based around smuggling goods or else attacking merchants, he and his crew exclusively hunted military patrols. He only attacked Ironridge patrols, never ones flown out of Anemo, despite being in the area where the two were equally common, and he always subdued his target. And most strikingly, he never took a life once a ship had been boarded. Once it was abundantly clear that he was in control, he and his crew would release the patrol ship and all prisoners and simply fly away, without a care in the world.

I pieced most of this together from the column's speculation and analysis, but the writer was obviously more concerned with his motives. Those were apparently unknown, but the effects were clear: it had an incredibly demoralizing effect on the border patrol, made the authorities look incompetent and was a prime catalyst for unrest at home. Many of Cold Karma's detractors, the column noted, cited Rhodallis' track record near the top of their arguments against the company, though it was quick to point out the detractors probably wouldn't fare that well against pirates either.

Interesting. Now I was even more curious about Aldebaran's supposed history defending Cold Karma from pirates. I finished the column, picked another and kept reading.

Hours ticked by, and I read the entire paper front to back, driven by curiosity and a fantastic feeling of illumination about finally knowing what was going on in the world. It was more like a sequence of randomly-chosen deep dives on individual happenings than a cursory picture of the city as a whole, but I still began to get a clearer image of all the things Ironridgians cared about. Number one was the weather, which hung over the city like a pall even though no one understood why it was happening and thus no one could find a long-term solution. Number two were a pair of places called Sosa and the Steel District, which I suspected might be the same thing and couldn't tell whether they used to exist or were planned to be built in the future. Everyone seemed to have strong feelings about those.

Not mentioned anywhere at all were batponies. That made me a little worried.

Maybe a different paper would think we were worth writing about? I tucked the one I had just finished into a deep pocket in my coat in case I wanted to revisit it for some reason, and had just picked up an issue from a different outlet when my stomach reminded me of two things: I hadn't gotten breakfast before going to see Egdelwonk, and I had been out here for hours. Also, I hadn't exactly remembered to bring money.

Good thing I could read this anywhere. I stashed the paper and stretched, ready to get back home.

Hunger prevented me from feeling too proud of myself on the last legs of my trip back to the Ice District, which was especially annoying as I had problems all the time in Icereach with not paying attention to my needs until I had been working without food for an entire day, and still not learned how to do anything about it. But still, I was happy, moreso as I got closer and began to recognize my surroundings. I had gone out on my own, gone exploring, learned interesting things about the world, found some much more interesting things to do than the ones that kept getting prescribed to me, and pulled off all of it without getting kidnapped or dragged off on some bogus adventure I didn't want any part of. Maybe I was learning, maybe I had done something smart for a change, or maybe the freak incidents with the avalanche and later Aldebaran really were just bad luck. Either way, that was good for me.

No bogeys jumped out at me as I turned the final corner before Jamjars' house. I didn't fall through any grates in the floor into secret underground testing dungeons, didn't run into any sinister Cold Karma executives, never needed to be rescued, and overall felt great. Except for being hungry. Hopefully I was walking in on a meal in progress...

I rapped on the door and let myself in. "Hello?"

"Ah! There you are!" Jamjars bustled into the foyer in a cutesy apron, and suddenly I remembered I had technically run away without permission. Hopefully that wasn't where all this turned around.

"Sorry I up and disappeared," I explained, trying to head off any possible reprimands. "I was-"

"Taking initiative and doing what you want on your own power?" Jamjars ruffled my mane with her telekinesis. "Atta girl! Any fallout I need to clean up, or are you good?"

I blinked, not at all expecting that. "I, err... wasn't looking to get in trouble..."

"Of course you weren't," Jamjars said. "Ponies rarely look to get in trouble, but it often happens anyway. Anyway, dinner's around thirty minutes away. Go wash up, you look like you've been out in the heat too long. And hopefully you didn't care too much about that stuff you sent back with Kitty; her fee for being a courier is that half of it is now hers. La la la la..."

Moments later, I was at the table, reasonably clean, and trying to let my hunger distract me from the fact that Kitty was wearing a shirt with Egdelwonk's face on it over top of her usual gamer hoodie. Predictably, she saw no problem with this.

"Don't tell me where you go shopping for clothes," Ansel mumbled, his head in his hooves. "I don't know who or what that's supposed to be, but please never tell me?"

Kitty stuck her tongue out. "Okay!"

Well, I almost forgot I was supposed to be looking for it, but there was my proof that I wasn't the only one who had mysteriously 'forgotten' our first visit to the dumpster despot on that first day. Not like it was any of my concern now. I had firmly turned him down, so-

The door banged open. "I'm back!" Corsica called, stepping in.

"Just in time!" Jamjars sang, clearly in a good mood. "Dinner's up! Come and stuff your faces!"

"Can't wait," Corsica mumbled as she dumped her stuff in the foyer, sounding more upbeat than usual as well... though Jamjars was regularly cheerful, and Corsica had seemed to be under a little less pressure with each passing day. "I'm sure you'll be proud of me today."

"Oh?" Jamjars raised an eyebrow, floating out a platter of grilled veggies.

"Yup. Got hired," Corsica said, tromping out into the living room where the table was set. "Might just be a temporary thing while I look for something more glamorous, but money, here comes me! Anyone else have..." She stopped, blinking, looking at Kitty with a frown.

Kitty stared back at her. "Hiya, lady!"

Corsica squinted and tilted her head. "Why are you wearing a shirt of my new boss?"

New Friends

"I have arrived," Jamjars declared, leading me into a large enclosure in the southern Day District, plenty big but with more of the trappings of a warehouse than a church. "Last meeting took a little longer than planned. Who's ready to meet the new hire?"

I looked around the room, which was in various stages of decoration and construction. Four ponies were here, all of which I recognized from last time: flower staff mare, the other two bridesmaids, and the janitor. All of them looked up, and several waved.

"This is Halcyon," Jamjars explained, beckoning me forward, standing on a square of ground that was less dusty than its surroundings, as if a crate had just been moved away. "Halcyon, meet Lalala, Saturn, Thumper and Booster. You all handle deeper introductions yourselves, I have half a dozen planning sessions and a charity banquet to attend. Take care of her and show her the ropes, alright?"

The janitor gave a lazy salute. "You got it, boss. Just leave it to me."

"Excellent!" Jamjars twirled and flicked her tail on her way out. Suddenly, I was on my own.

"Err, hi?" I greeted.

"Yeah! Hi!" One of the bridesmaids, a broad-shouldered purple mare with a long, messy black bang that covered her eyes, stomped a hoof and grinned a big grin. "And welcome to the Jam Clan! Nepotism, ho!"

"The what?" I blinked.

"Oh, the Jam Clan." Janitor stallion winked, a short fellow with a bushy black beard and craggy mustache and a pair of pilot goggles around his forehead. "That's just the name we have for the boss's extended family around these parts. You can call me Booster. Thumper there is my significant other, and she's the boss's little sis, so we're both honorary members. Welcome into the fold, little dude!"

Thumper kept grinning, waggling one eyebrow.

The other bridesmaid rolled her eyes. "Saturn," she said, a hint of wariness in her voice. "Pleased to meet you."

I sized her up. Peach fur, purple mane trimmed short but with a very wide part and no bang. Unicorn - the previous two were earth ponies. Her expression was controlled, enough that I couldn't tell where the wariness was coming from, but odds were it was me being a batpony. Maybe I would finally get to ask someone what their deal was.

"And I'm Lalala," flower staff mare said, holding her staff and bowing. She was the oldest of the bunch, though hardly elderly, and had a white mane and soft lime fur. Maybe thirty-five, I guessed. And her eyes-

I started slightly. One of her eyes was yellow, and the other was orange.

It wasn't a huge difference, not enough for me to notice across a dimly-lit room in a chaotic wedding party where she had been constantly lurking at the back, but now that we were face to face, it was plain to see. Staring was rude, and so I forced myself not to, but I had a feeling she was used to that reaction enough to spot it anyway.

Thumper didn't notice, or at least didn't say anything. "So, kid. Halcyon, right? Let's learn you the ropes around here. The boss is the boss. I'm second-in-command, because reasons. Everyone else just gets along. That includes you. Pal around, get to know everyone! Nothing ruins a romantic celebration like a hostess feud. Easy rule, right? Common sense."

I nodded.

"Boss probably drummed this into you, but we're a wedding agency," Thumper went on. "Both planning and execution. There's a lot more that goes into it than standing around looking pretty in a dress. Boss handles the front-end logistics, meeting and screening clients, arranging dates, getting client desires and ensuring they're reasonable and well-understood. Venue searching, all that. I do back-end logistics. Supplies, other contracting services, everything the customers won't think about and don't need to know. Lalala's our spiritual advisor, since lots of ponies like feeling like their union is blessed from on high. It's her thing, she really believes it, talk to her instead of me."

My ears pricked. That was definitely something I was interested in...

"Biggest part of the job is setup and cleanup," Thumper continued. "These wedding halls don't arrange themselves, and we don't use the same space for more than a few days at a time. Booster and I bring the muscle 'cause we're buff, and Saturn's our horn for all those high-up decorations and stuff. Looking at you, I bet you're gonna be her new best friend..." She visually appraised my wings. "But who knows? Maybe you've got huge biceps under those boots. Can't imagine dressing up in weather like this..." She blew on her bangs. "So, now that I've told you a little about us, tell us about you. Where do you see yourself fitting in with our operation?"

I hesitated. "Well, I'm stronger than I look..."

Thumper waved me toward a metal crate. "Stand there," she instructed, pointing next to it.

I did.

Then, she climbed on top, then stepped onto my back. I blinked in surprise, steadying my stance against her sudden weight. "Hey, what are you doing?"

"Testing you," Thumper grunted. "Mmm, you're sturdy. Saturn, gimmie a Booster!"

Saturn's horn began to glow. To my alarm, her aura surrounded Booster and lifted him off the ground, hoisting him and stacking him atop Thumper.

My legs almost buckled, but I held firm, gritting my teeth and standing steady.

"Hey, not bad," Thumper remarked, unstacking herself and Booster and then seating herself by the crate she had used to climb up that far. "Hoof wrestle me."

I nodded. "Alright..."

We locked forelegs, Thumper leaning in her seat for more leverage. I leaned back. For a long moment, she refused to budge, no matter how much force I put into it, and a few times, my leg wavered... and then she nodded in approval, letting her leg go limp and giving me the win.

"Good." She stood back up, a small note of respect in her voice. "Didn't take you for someone who works out, but if you've got it, we can use it. Good."

I wasn't certain whether to tell these ponies that I used to run drills with yak warriors for fun and had since traded that out for mountain climbing, so I held my tongue.

"Well, you can probably hang with the heavies." Thumper brushed herself off, everyone else having gathered around to watch. "Still probably going to have you with Saturn most, since up until now she's been doing the ceilings on her lonesome. Right then! We have three ceremonies here tomorrow night, so I want this place ready to go by sunrise. Everyone back to work!"

She wandered off, as did Lalala and Booster. Saturn, however, remained. "I guess you're with me, then," she said uncertainly.

"That alright?" I tilted my head.

She jumped a little. "Fine! No, it's fine. So, come with me. Our materials are over here, and I'll show you what they're for..."

Not long after, I was armed with a long, sheetlike streamer and several light-duty spring clamps. The warehouse had steel rafters, and Saturn's horn was aglow, an amber aura fashioning a similar streamer across them clamp by clamp, so that it hung down in waves. "Like so," she explained, eyes on the ceiling. "We need to get enough of the room looking like that that you can't see the ceiling unless you look straight up. Fly up and set yours two or three feet down from mine. I'll watch."

I swallowed and looked around... There was a high crate stack just next to me. Coiling my streamer under a wing and keeping the clamp bag in my mouth, I crouched and leapt, landing atop the boxes. Then I jumped again, flinging myself at the rafters, grappled one between my forelegs, and swung for a second before pulling myself up.

Saturn gaped at me as I crawled atop the rafter, gripped it with all four legs for balance, and started inching along, managing the streamer with my wings and adding new clamps as I went.

I didn't get it up nearly as fast as her, even though I cheated a little by partly shadow sneaking into the beam to improve my grip and speed myself up, but when I dropped back down she looked very surprised. "Why didn't you just fly?"

"Because." I shrugged, nodding up at my work. "Much easier to work with my wings than my hooves. I can hold myself steadier, too."

Saturn nodded slowly, thinking about it. "Eccentric, but I guess you've got a point. Do all sarosians think like that?"

"Beats me," I answered, though since even I didn't think like that, I had a hunch the answer was no.

Shrugging, Saturn went back to work, and I did too. She didn't ask any more questions about my methods, and we alternated rows until the entire ceiling was dressed. The rest of the room took shape around us at an alarming speed; ornate pillars were added that were hollow and fake, and wall barricades were dragged into place along the edges to make it feel more like a cozy indoor venue than an industrial warehouse. Floor mats, refreshment tables, flower wreaths, candle sconces, several decorative tapestries of vaguely romantic or celebratory things, lace doilies and fold-up chairs...

We broke for lunch and got back to work, though I had a hunch we were almost finished. Saturn and I finished with the ceiling and moved to helping with the rest of the room, including decorating the entrance and making sure the catering area was in order. And then, at last, we were done.

"Good work, goon squad!" Thumper called, drawing us all back together. "Looks like we finished early tonight. You pulled your weight, new kid." She nodded at me.

"Thanks," I said, more focused on what time it was and whether I'd be able to make it to the Sky District and back again before dawn. Although after doing that climb once tonight, plus an unnecessary amount of shimmying around the skyport's underbelly since I couldn't find the lift, followed by an entire workday of jumping up and down to this warehouse's ceiling while carrying loads... My legs were wobbling. If I could manage it, it sure wouldn't be comfortable.

Booster glanced around eagerly. "...Work party?"

"Hey, yeah!" Thumper perked up. "Saturn! Your place free again?"

Saturn shrugged noncommittally. "Same as it usually is."

I blinked, realizing I was suddenly getting drafted into something, but before I could speak, Thumper had a purple hoof on my shoulder. "You'll love this," she began. "All of us are friends off the clock, so since we finished early, why not hang out for a while? Show each other our moves, brag, get to know everyone when you're not hauling boxes around. You in?"

Well... I really wanted to go back to the Sky District...

But if I was going to be working with these ponies long-term, it would be a good idea to start off on the right foot, and refusing an invitation to a get-to-know-you party when I was already in poor shape to be climbing a mountain sounded like a bad idea. So I nodded. "Alright. I'm in."

Booster cheered.

After a train ride, myself, Thumper, Booster, Saturn and Lalala were walking through a lower level of the southern Day District, close enough to the crater floor that the temperature was very noticeably hotter. I plodded along in my coat, sweating, as the others talked at each other and occasionally at me.

"So the reason we meet at Saturn's house is because she owns a mansion," Booster was explaining. "I'm not even kidding. Three floors! Seven bedrooms! Indoor balconies! Two pool rooms, one for pool the ball game and one for a real swimming pool. Like, wow. Someday, when I get rich-"

"I don't own a mansion," Saturn sighed. "I live with a friend who owns a mansion."

"Ehhh, technicalities." Booster blew a raspberry. "You've got enough clout in the place that we can use it as a hangout zone."

"Don't remind me," Saturn droned.

I tilted my head, focusing on the conversation to take my mind off the heat. "Wouldn't that be a good thing?"

"Well, Saturn's touchy about her living arrangement," Booster explained, nodding seriously at me. "See, you know how in harem stories, there's always that one pretty mare who moves into the protagonist's house for no reason and is just a freeloader you can't get rid of 'cause she's pretty? Saturn is literally that. Literally. Like, wow, what a sweet life."

"Except I pay bills, do chores, buy and make food, and am not a freeloader," Saturn sighed. "In fact, I more or less exclusively do those."

"You know," Thumper remarked casually, "if it's such a romantic lifestyle, I could always stop doing anything around our own place. Let you do all the work. How about it, tubby?"

Booster grinned deviously. "Oh no. I ain't fallin' for that one, chief. Nice try though. But that trope is only romantic in fiction."

"You sure changed your tune," Lalala chuckled. She was by far the quietest of the bunch, though she had a force of presence I couldn't put my hoof on that could make you easily forget she wasn't saying anything. It was like she was participating in the conversation just by existing.

"What can I say?" Booster shrugged. "I'm a stallion of principles."

Saturn groaned.

We kept up our walk, entering an area where the mountain face got a little more rigid and the streets a little more sparse, and the architecture larger to take up the extra room. Higher up, buildings seemed to rise out of the mountain and hug the wall, only three sides and a roof exposed to the air, or else be entirely underground with only their entrances exposed. Here, the cliff was like the latter category, underground buildings with only their fronts exposed, except it was high enough to add balconies and carvings and ornate pillars to the usual doors and windows. I was looking at a wall of giant dwellings, each made out in enough detail that their faces had to be worth a fortune alone.

"This is the Avenue of Kings," Lalala explained to me, noting my awe. "In previous centuries, the Sosan elite lived here to take advantage of the mountain slope's cooler climate. That trend started falling off about eighty years ago, and now the richest of the rich live in the Ice District and Skyfreeze Tower. It's still one of the highest-class areas in the Day District."

"Not the only one, though." Thumper wrinkled her nose. "Lotta rich types don't like the idea of living in a museum, no matter how fancy it might be."

"How'd your friend get one of these, then?" I asked Saturn, hoping I wasn't treading on a sore subject. "And how'd you meet them?"

Saturn shrugged. "We were college roommates. Stayed together after that to split the cost of living. Then her estranged family paid her off with it to back them in some high-profile legal business. It's complicated. Do you know who Mobius is?"

I shook my head.

Saturn sighed. "He was the last Sosan factory chief. Probably had about a hundred offspring, but nobody knows for sure. Really destroyed the idea of dynasties in more ways than one. Also the stallion ponies blame the most for all the turbulence in recent times. Anyway, there was a reckoning, the authorities wanted to leave him alone but pop culture came to call, some of his kids started showing up and wanted a piece of the pie... I'm not good with history. Point is, Mandlebrot - my roomie - is one of his daughters, and she got a mansion. And, this is it."

Now my curiosity was piqued, but it would have to wait. We stopped in front of a dwelling that looked no different from the others on the row: carved entirely into the stone, all the fixtures and pillars and stuff just part of the natural rock that had never been removed, very ornamental. It almost reminded me of the Icereach chapel, except with more ambition and less mystique.

Saturn trudged in, leading the way.

The 'door' was sized for a rocket ship, a smaller-but-still-large door cut into the base that she unlocked and used. I half expected to be greeted by a fancy butler, but instead we just piled through, as if it were any other house.

A grand foyer opened up before me, two curved staircases leading up on either side to a second level, the trim and carving immaculate... but the decorations much less so. All the painting slots in the upper walls were empty, there were no drapes, there was no furniture, and a fixture on the ceiling for mounting a chandelier was empty. Instead, a pile of cardboard boxes and assorted junk was heaped against the side of one staircase, looking like someone had started moving in and then forgotten to finish.

"Ahh," Booster sighed, breathing deeply. "Gotta love that nobody-home vibe that comes from having your way with an old and venerable place! What should we do first, girls?"

"Gotta let Mandle know we're here," Saturn said, waving for everyone to follow her toward a door on the first floor. "Then, whatever."

The door opened out into a spacious library... Or a room intended to be one, at least. Despite being made of bookshelves, wooden slots forming every panel of every wall, there were no books.

Far to my left, in a lounge chair that didn't match the architectural motifs at all, there was a mare.

"Saturn!" She looked up from a book - the shelves near her were populated, if sparsely - and beamed. "You're off work already? No way!"

"Hey," Saturn said, motioning at me and the others. "We'll be hanging out for a bit, 'kay?"

Mandlebrot was a unicorn, a black mare with soft red eyes and a long, luscious wavy chocolate mane. "Hiiiii everyone," she said with theatrical girlishness, waving earnestly. "Enjoy your partyyy! I'll join in as soon as I finish this, okay?"

Saturn shrugged, and I felt like she did it specifically at me.

"That's cool," Booster declared, stretching. "What say you we start off our luxurious shebang with a tour of the kitchenerino?"

"Yeah!" Thumper cheered, following him away.

I followed too, wondering why every stallion I knew was a goofy clown who loved the sound of their own voice.

Disappointingly, the kitchen was stocked about as well as the rest of the mansion, which was to say it looked like someone had taken the contents of my old Icereach apartment and tried to make them adequate for a place fifty times bigger. The kitchen was a complex affair, with two aisles and a central preparation table and four ovens and four sinks and a host of machines I appreciated but didn't recognize, which all looked like it was designed for servants to use in preparing a banquet. But the contents of the fridge and shelves...

"Alright," Saturn said, "we've got frozen lasagna, instant noodles, frozen vegetables on rice, crackers and dip, and candy bars. Who wants what? There's only three lasagnas, so you better not all say that."

I blanched. She hadn't even given me time to fantasize about seeing what I could make with a room like this before shooting that dream out of the sky.

"Dibs on the noodles!" Booster shouted. "Can I get two cups?"

Lalala just shook her head. "I had a large lunch. Saturn, we've got to get you eating better."

"Then buy your own party food," Saturn threatened. "I'm stretching my budget as far as it will go, and those fools at Cold Karma don't make cooling a space this big cheap."

I did notice it was a little warmer in here than the warehouse, and most of the other indoor venues I favorited... but after the nasty heat getting here, it was still a welcome reprieve.

"What's wrong with this food?" Booster pressed. "She knows how to shop."

As everyone else argued and jostled, I settled for crackers without dip, munching away and thinking. Before my thoughts could go anywhere coherent, we moved on into a room with a swimming pool. Thumper immediately cannonballed in.

Booster followed suit, and I quickly dragged myself back to the present. Someone had mentioned this was here, hadn't they? Of course everyone would want to cool off, and jumping into a giant basin of water would accomplish that handily. Judging by their attitudes, it would even be fun, provided you had ever been immersed in water before. I knew what swimming was on a technical level, of course, but I suddenly realized not only was it real, but I had no idea how to do it.

Also, I was fully clothed and not about to undress in a room full of strangers. Out of the pool I would stay.

Fortunately, there were chairs by the edge, and so I relaxed and lounged and took in the architecture. My brain seemed to have suddenly had enough of other ponies for the day, and I tuned everything out, my ears vaguely ringing with splashes and shouts and droplets occasionally raining against my nose.

This was... a good day. I was tired, the way I used to feel after spending days on end getting flattened by yaks from dawn to dusk. My muscles felt clean and wrung-out, my energy was spent but my obligations were completed. Also, I hadn't been harassed by Egdelwonk for a full two days, which was something of a miracle. And while I didn't have a perfect read yet on Jamjars' employees, I somehow doubted any of them were con artists or changelings here to kidnap me and turn my life into more of a roller coaster than it already was. They seemed to be friendly, if eccentric.

I had so many goals left to accomplish in Ironridge, and was stumbling across new ones far faster than I was checking them off, but some of the things I had done so far were going off without a hitch. And I had so many new leads to pursue, I was-

A gust of frigid air tore through me as if my coat was made of tissue, my hooves too frozen to the ground to be bowled over, though the wind was certainly trying. I lifted one and moved it forward anyway. "Corsica!" I heard myself call. "Corsicaaaaa!"

A blue light twinkled faintly in the distance, receding swiftly into the storm. Instantly, I snapped back to lucidity: I must have fallen asleep at the swimming pool. I was dreaming of the day a windigo stole my best friend.

My past self pushed feebly through the storm, intermittently hallucinating as winter clawed at my senses and body. The cold dug into me, hurting as though the frostbite was real, but I fortunately knew that injuries sustained in my dreams couldn't come back with me to the waking world. This flashback had haunted me often in the days following the Aldebaran incident. Less so recently, though. This was the first time since coming to Ironridge.

"Corsica? Ansel!? Corsicaaaaa!"

I cried frozen tears and scrabbled forward in the snow, the drama and violence of the moment clashing in an ugly contention with the peace that had lulled me to sleep. I was too used to my dreams to be properly hurt by the past pain, my previous self's thoughts running along parallel to my own, but it was difficult to do anything more than ride along with some of the more intense ones. My body collapsed in the snow, and the best I could do was maintain a detached apathy as the weather wracked me and my song started to play at the back of my mind. Dreams like this one weren't here to be enjoyed or learned from. Just like nightmares for ordinary folk, they were things that sometimes just happened and were there to be endured.

Flash! My bracelet came alive, green light morphing to green flame as I broke my promise to myself and called on it to save me. Energy licked around my body, repelling the weather while somehow not consuming me in the process-

A tingling shock jolted me awake, canceling the dream abruptly and sending my mind spinning like a thrown die as I re-oriented to the waking world. With a start, I realized what had woken me: I had somehow turned up my bracelet in the real world, too.

I quickly turned it off before the flames could grow, wondering with alarm if anyone had seen... but the pool was empty. I must have been here for a while.

Unsettled, I lifted my foreleg and studied my bracelet. I had never actually turned it on in my sleep before. And it had crackled so easily, not just stopping at light like I usually used it for. Although, I basically hadn't used it since coming to Ironridge... Maybe I was getting rusty at how to control it?

That sure was a thought. For so many years, I had only used it at a low setting, afraid that if I turned it too far up, I might cripple myself like Mother. But I had never considered that this might be a good thing, that I could be practicing with it in a way that would lend me greater finesse and a better ability to use it without hurting myself. I remembered her telling me I wouldn't be able to blow out my leg like she had done by accident, but still...

New goal: find somewhere private and practice some more with my bracelet. If I was right, keeping myself in tune with it was a lot better than the alternative.

Mentally, I thanked my dream for reminding me of something important... and then I realized with a start that I wasn't alone: Lalala was resting in the next chair over, her eyes closed and her hooves folded peacefully.

I hesitated. Was she sleeping? There was a whole lot I wanted to ask this mare in particular, namely about her work as a 'spiritual advisor' or whatever Thumper had called it. What did she know? What did she believe? Could she answer any of my questions about what was out there, or how I could meet the light spirit again? And... how would I even ask questions that were so personal?

A door creaked open, and Thumper crept through, moving far more stealthily than could be expected for a mare of her size. When she saw I was awake, she hurried over.

"You awake? We're playing sardines," she whispered furtively in my ear.

"What's that?" I breathed back, sitting up and copying her tone in case silence was important.

"It's like hide-and-seek," Thumper hissed, "except when you find the one who's hiding, you hide with them, and the last pony to find the group has to be it next time. Mandle's hiding now. You in?"

I nodded. "Sure."

"Stick with me for this round," Thumper whispered, "so I can show you what's off-limits. And keep your voice down. You don't want others to know where you are when you go dark. Come on!"

I slipped to my hooves, silently following her. This sounded like my sort of game! We left the pool room opposite the way I came in, emerging into a dark stairwell that Thumper immediately ascended. I slithered on behind her, not making a sound, my ears perked for telltale thumps and bumps.

We crossed through a small room with a piano built into the floor, one of the few things that was apparently too fixed down for its previous owner to take with them. I considered the possibility of hiding inside the piano, but Thumper didn't bother checking. Maybe she knew hiding places that were too cramped wouldn't be a good idea, because if the first ponies to find you had to hide out in the open, your cover would be blown for everyone else. Or maybe she just wasn't thinking of all the places a pony could fit if need be.

We crossed a third-floor balcony looking down over the foyer and searched several posh bedrooms, most of which were fully made and pristine, if very dusty. Maybe someone had decided disassembling multiple giant four-poster and taking them with them was a little too much trouble when they were moving out. Nowhere I had lived before would be able to fit even one of these things.

Thumper checked under the beds and had me check the closets, and in the third bedroom along the line, we met with success: Booster, Saturn and Mandlebrot were all lurking under the bed, the former very barely managing the fit.

"Heyyy, good game!" Saturn cheered, her demeanor much more cheerful than I remembered from earlier. Maybe the games were helping her to unwind? "Looks like you lose this one, chief."

I stepped over to watch as they crawled out from under the bed. "Technically, Halcyon loses," Thumper explained. "Since I checked the bed first. Tough break! But she only started playing halfway through, so I'll take this one. Five minutes to hide, timer starts now!" She bolted, closing the door behind her in a flash.

Everyone else started laughing, their manes and tails showing signs of being dried recently. "Sorry I fell asleep," I apologized, stepping closer. "Been running around a lot the past few days, and-"

"Dude, don't worry about it." Booster clapped me on the back with a hoof. "So this party's a sleeper. Just gives me something to heckle the girls about! Have any sweet dreams down there?"

A nightmare, actually, but-

"Wait a minute," Mandlebrot interrupted, staring at me with wide eyes. "Are you a sarosian?"

Oh, great. More ponies who had unusually strong reactions to batponies... or maybe it really was a good thing, since I had yet to figure out what that was all about. "Sure looks like it," I said, stretching my wings.

Mandlebrot's jaw dropped. "I am so sorry I didn't notice earlier! Welcome to my house! I'm so happy to have you here! I hope you've made yourself comfortable..."

"A little too comfortable, if you know what I mean," Booster said, punching her on the shoulder.

"What's so special about me being a batpony?" I pressed, deciding it was high time I get an answer.

Mandlebrot tsk'd. "You should never have to ask about what makes you special. I'm sure you're a unique and wonderful pony, no matter who says otherwise. Did I get your name, by the way?"

"Halcyon," I said. "But who's saying otherwise?"

Mandlebrot's face broke into a wide beam. "I'm so glad everyone's been treating you well, then! That's great to hear!"

This was... weird. I scrutinized her, her facial ticks and ear position and tail movement and where she was looking and everything I could think of, and still couldn't pin down the feeling I was getting from her. Part of me wanted to say inauthenticity, but that didn't fit well: she seemed to be legitimately happy. Illogical, maybe? The first thing you learned when trying to understand ponies' personalities was that there was always a good reason they felt the way they did about something. But even though I had just asked her what that reason was, I had no idea what she was trying to tell me.

Saturn nervously gritted her teeth. Booster seemed to be too-patiently waiting for something.

"I'm glad for your gladness," I offered. "But what are you so happy about?"

Mandlebrot gave a worried, clueless look to Saturn.

"Ladies, meet values dissonance," Booster announced, stepping forward. "Think about it this way: Mandle lives in a cave, socializes with a select few, and is a paragon of feminine hospitality by measures known to that select and privileged few. Halcyon hails from a literal cave in a land far, far away that probably knows none of that. Now, ignoring the cavemare-meets-cavemare brain food that idea has to offer?" He nodded at me. "Just divide the volume and intensity and implications of what you're hearing by about a hundred, and I bet you'll get what she's trying to say."

I reddened just a little, feeling like a foal getting a patronizing lecture on something someone falsely assumed I didn't know. "I know what a friendly host is!" I insisted. "I just wanna know why me being a batpony is such a big deal. This isn't the first time someone has shown me a weird amount of deference."

Booster shrugged. "Don't look at me, dude. I just wanted to say the cavemare thing when it popped into my brain. Didn't mean to ruffle your membranes."

Saturn sighed. "Mandle is a member of a popular movement that believes sarosians have been not-that-well treated in Ironridge's recent history, and that the road to enlightenment lies through doing penance and overcompensating as hard as possible. I am a member of the extreme minority school of thought that thinks all ponies should be treated based on what they actually do. That clear anything up?"

Actually, it really did. Not the why, at least, but the what and the how... I nodded. "Any chance it's called a Zero Armada, or the like?"

Mandlebrot beamed. "You've heard of us! Yes, that's the one!"

Meanwhile, Booster was glancing at Saturn. "You still sore about the time when Valey-"

Saturn slapped him.

"Ow..." Booster held his cheek. "Yep, she's still sore..."

A small pendant around Mandlebrot's neck flashed, and she jumped a little. "Oh! There goes the timer. Let's get searching, everyone!"

I didn't search in a pair this time. The others had filled me in on a few rules: no hiding inside the piano, decks and balconies were fair game but no leaving the premises, no hiding in bathrooms and one wing on the top floor was off-limits due to a relative currently staying there who wasn't inclined to play along.

Exploring the giant mansion was actually really fun. I was fairly sure I'd be last again just due to not knowing my way around, but the game was an excellent way to learn. After my nap, I was a little more feeling up to running around, and I soon had the entire building's layout memorized. But the longer I searched, the fewer and fewer of the others I saw.

Finally, I resigned myself to the one place I had yet to set hoof: the outdoor balconies. I really didn't need the close proximity to the Night District to cook me in my coat again, but I had to check sometime and didn't want to keep my new co-workers waiting. Picking at random, I decided to check the second-floor right side balcony first.

My senses told me something wasn't normal as I approached the doors, but I slipped through them anyway, not quite able to stop myself in time... and then I froze, blinking.

It was actually cool outside. And the source of the chill was deafeningly obvious: a storm had arrived, and rain was thundering down.

The shock to my expectations was almost great enough that I missed several ponies hiding behind a large, empty flower pot... or not so empty, since Thumper and Booster were both inside. It looked like I was, indeed, the last one here.

Congratulations and condolences were handed out, everyone started laughing, and someone asked me if I wanted another round to explore before I had to be the one hiding. I passively nodded, my thoughts far away in the past: hadn't Gerardo mentioned, while we were flying here, that the mountain storms occasionally cooled things down?

Maybe he had, or maybe I was misremembering. Either way, I had made a crucial new discovery: whenever the rain came, that was my opportunity to explore the Night District.

Repeat Customer

I was locked up. Again.

And it was nothing like the first time.

Part of that was because I wasn't really imprisoned, imprisoned. The police wanted me because I happened to be in an adjacent room when something exploded and someone disappeared, less because I was an immediate suspect and more because they had no idea what was going on and wanted to keep immediate tabs on everyone involved. Was that grounds for keeping me in an upscale conference room for over an hour after the under-caffeinated detective finished getting my version of events, not legally jailed but expected to stick around as a person of interest?

...I kind of wished it wasn't. But when you ran the city, you got to do whatever you wanted, I supposed.

Idly, I rotated, lounging in a swiveling office chair and wishing I had brought a book with me. What I figured must have happened was that I ran into another crazed batpony-hater like the one in the clothing store, and the weapon shop duo staged a poorly-thought-out crime on the spot to try and frame me. Stupid? Definitely. But I could believe Ironridge was the sort of place where this just randomly happened from time to time.

The only thing that gave me pause was that if the police thought it had such a simple explanation, they wouldn't need to keep me here for so long. And they, being a watchful authority over all of Ironridge, would certainly have an idea of how common these sort of land-mine experiences were. So, the fact that I was still here probably meant there was more to whatever I walked in on than just a random act of opportunism.

Or I could be here because I was blank. The directors knew something about what I was, I was absolutely certain. Them wanting to get a closer look at me was a much more sensible reason for keeping me around than whatever had happened in the weapon shop.

But if that was the case... then where was everyone?

Bored, I drummed the edge of the table with my boots. This actually wasn't that different from Aldebaran, now that I thought about it. They, too, had locked me in a space of relative physical comfort with too many hints and no actual idea why I was there. And back then, like now, it had been extremely sudden. And involved a betrayal - by walking into a shop, I kind of trusted the proprietors to not devolve into hysterics about me doing something they knew I didn't do.

The real difference between then and now was me. Back in Icereach, I had a set of actions I could physically take to escape from Aldebaran and fight back, and I nearly tore myself in half fighting with my fear of taking on that much responsibility and pushing my limits so. Now, I also had a clear path to freedom: there was nothing stopping me from hitting the lights and shadow swimming under the door.

I wasn't afraid. Half of me was curious to see if I could pull it off. But I didn't have a very good reason to try and flee, either, and so I stayed put with no turmoil whatsoever. Just a little boredom. The difference was so striking, it made me want to laugh.

Maybe this was how Elise stayed as calm as she was during our exile.

I sure was bored, though. My thoughts kept swirling back to my emptiness, to what Samael and Estael might have sensed - or not have sensed - and how. To the me I used to be.

The fears I had left behind... Those all belonged to the previous Halcyon, I was all but certain, when I was more like her and hadn't fully grown into myself. All but certainly, they were meant to keep me away from things she didn't want me going near, for my own good. Or that she didn't want me bringing her near.

I wondered what could drive a pony so far that they wouldn't want to be themselves anymore. That they'd rather become forgotten and let someone else take the lead...

How had the old Halcyon made me, anyway? In that last memory, I got to see myself, the mask, a chunk of green crystal. Something magical and physical. How was it, mechanically, that she could edit my memories? This wasn't just a mental state, there was something real involved. Something that normal ponies just didn't do.

And she had made me afraid of pushing my limits and testing my potential. Odds were, she was afraid of me discovering something she already knew we could do. Something relating to how she made me, I guessed. Or how she left and made us blank in the first place. Or something completely different, related to why she couldn't live with herself anymore.

...That made me slightly less gung-ho about wanting to push myself just because I could. But only slightly. I had too many things to do with my life to want to throw it away over some piece of knowledge, no matter how eerie or sinister. And besides, how could I not be curious?

My thoughts were soon interrupted by a noise coming from the ceiling.

"What the...?" I squinted and craned my neck, tracking a series of clangs that sounded like reverberating metal hoofsteps coming from just above the roof. It was moving... No, it was right above the air vent.

The air vent caved in, and a pony fell into the room with an explosion of dust and a horrendous crash.

It was Kitty.

"Hiya, lady!" She stood up on the table where she landed, clad in her signature hoodie, apparently not at all bothered by the way she arrived there.

I gaped. "And just what are you doing here?"

Kitty winked at me. "Kitty heard you got arresteded. So she went somewhere important an' tipped over five whole vases to get herself caught and arresteded too, so she could keep you company!"

This didn't help with my surprise.

"...You knew what happened to me?" I pressed, finding something to focus on. "What about Jamjars? Does she know too?"

"Kitty has a psychic powers and knows everything in the whole world," Kitty happily explained. "Told Jamjars all about it!"

I frowned. "Seriously?"

"Yup!"

I glanced around. "Alright, where's Ansel? And why did... whatever just happened to me happen?"

Kitty's tongue started poking out. "Don't know!" She beamed proudly.

Right...

My gaze fell upon a trash can built into a countertop. You know, if I really wanted to talk to someone who probably did know everything he didn't have a reason to...

Nah, not gonna go there. There were backup plans, and then there were last resorts.

Before I could second-guess myself, or act on it if I did, the door opened. "What's going on in here?" a guard asked, poking his head through. He blinked when he saw Kitty.

Kitty stuck out her tongue and waved. "Hiya, mister!"

The guard swore, closed the door and went away.

"Is that bad?" I looked sideways at her. "You didn't just get me in trouble, did you?"

Kitty pranced in a circle on the table. "Nah. He's just happy to see Kitty. Everyone here knows her!"

"That's not how ponies sound when they're happy," I pointed out, eyeing the broken air duct cover. It would be pretty easy to jump up there and sneak away...

Kitty puffed out her hoodie-covered chest. "That's 'cuz the kind of happiness Kitty makes ponies feel is special."

"I'll say," I muttered under my breath, weighing what was least likely to get me in even more trouble.

The door opened again. It was the same guard as before. "Executive orders are in, the bosses want to see you," he said, making eye contact strictly with me. "Please, uh, come with me, preferably alone..."

Not a way out, but I'd take it over sitting here with Kitty. Instantly, I was at the door. "Thanks," I whispered, nodding in Kitty's direction with an I'm not with her look.

The guard looked relieved.

Of course, Kitty was far from dissuaded. "Silly," she told the guard as she marched past. "Kitty's a friend. Why be alone when you have friends?"

"You're not allowed here," the guard started to point out, but Kitty wasn't listening.

"You'll be arrested for trespassing-"

"If Kitty gets arresteded, she'll belong in jail," Kitty chirped. "Which is where she is now! Then it won't be right to arrest her so you can't do it and she won't belong there. You're a paradox, mister."

I glanced at her. "You told me you were already here because you got arrested for tipping over flower vases."

Kitty beamed at me with immeasurable pride. "Kitty arresteded herself!"

I was starting to revise my opinion on Kitty from my first few days in Ironridge. Jamjars was right. She was definitely being an idiot on purpose.

The guard just grumbled and kept his head down. "Worse than Valey, I swear..."

"Hey, uh, what about Ansel?" I asked as we walked, trying to distract the guard from my nerve-inducing companion. "You know, the guy who was with me?"

"Earth pony colt, same case?" The guard looked up. "They let him go immediately after questioning. No clue why you're different. Word on high from the Directors. Not worth trouble with that kid, though." He nodded at Kitty.

Kitty smiled fondly. "Kitty's always worth trouble."

I ignored her too, picking up that the guard seemed happy to have something else to think about than the fact that she was right there. "Big history with her?"

"Repeatest offender in all of Ironridge," he grumbled. "Usually turns herself in after infractions too minor to warrant calling the police. I swear, it's like she wants to be in jail. Wouldn't have a problem with it if she wasn't tied to influential ponies who can make trouble for us all..."

Right. So Jamjars apparently had enough sway that random prison guards were afraid of bothering her acquaintances. Good to know.

It was nice to have someone like that in my corner when I could apparently get shabbily framed for murder just by walking into a random store.

We rounded a corner, and ran into a second guard and one of the creepy teleporting unicorns. She blinked when she saw us.

"Taking her upstairs," my guard explained, pointing to me. "You here to deal with the kid?"

The new guard shook her head. "Directors want it hurried up. I have a teleport ready."

"That urgent?" My guard scratched his head. "She's been here for an hour, and they said walk like two minutes ago..."

The new guard shrugged. "Orders are orders?"

"Kitty likes orders," Kitty helpfully volunteered, gluing herself to my side.

"Hey, uh..." My guard glanced at her. "Summons are for her too? Because if not..."

The new guard narrowed her eyes at Kitty. "...I ain't moving her."

My guard sighed. "Kid, please step away... We can't teleport only one of you when you're standing that close together, and you're not invited."

"I know!" Kitty chirped. "Kitty's giving herself an invitation!"

"Kitty..." I shoved at her. "I'd really rather not get in more trouble over this..."

Both guards gave me an apologetic look. Which, normally I'd appreciate, but the fact that prison guards were being nice and understanding to me when I was being called before the head honchos was really starting to weird me out. I'd have expected guards to be just a teensy bit more power crazed and a whole lot more condescending to ponies who usually were here for doing crimes.

The guards gave each other a look that said together, and then they both took one of Kitty's sides. "Alright, kid, just a moment..."

I was free. Kitty looked disappointed, but didn't struggle. The unicorn was waiting.

Suddenly, I was nervous. But if Kitty could instill such dread in the guards via her connection to Jamjars, stemming from consequences that would first be felt by the higher-ups, hopefully I could do the same to the higher-ups directly.

I stepped up to the unicorn, and the circle began to rise. When I was out of this, I wasn't going to stop until Jamjars told me exactly what kind of leverage she had that put her in this situation.

Then, suddenly, there was a snap of cold air. Both guards yelled out in surprise, and Kitty lunged for me, tongue flapping and eyes wild with unwarranted joy.

Flash!

The teleportation circle receded. Me, Kitty and the unicorn were in a gilded white room that felt like a cross between a hospital, a preschool and a boutique. Samael and Estael were nowhere to be found.

Instead, there was Lilith.

Tall and black, with long green eyes and a jewelry-studded horn, swathed in silver and wielding an ornamental scepter in her aura, Cold Karma's Director of Societal Planning looked me over with a hardened stare. Not a pony I wanted to meet, or to work for, I had heard on many occasions. And, if my first night in Ironridge had been any indication, someone with ties to the Composer.

She looked at Kitty with a hint of surprise. "Bold of you to set hoof here in person."

Kitty smiled at her. "Didn't know where Kitty was going!"

"What's going on?" I asked, assessing the room for options. Three doors, though one was smaller and looked like a closet. No other ponies save for us, Lilith and the unicorn. I only saw one light switch, which meant I had a single target if I needed to get some darkness and shadow swim. No windows, or any indication of where in Ironridge I was.

"One moment," Lilith told me with a tone almost approaching fondness, but still cold as ice. She turned back to Kitty. "You're not going to leave, are you?"

"Shan't," Kitty pompously declared, glomming onto me. "Move Kitty, and she'll lick you an' cause five whole tons of pollution."

I nudged uncertainly at her. Much as I didn't want to be alone in a situation like this, I'd have a lot more confidence in my ability to navigate it if there wasn't such a wildcard on my team...

"Fine," Lilith sighed. "Then remain." Her gaze returned to me. "Halcyon. I've been waiting quite patiently to see you again. Welcome to my domain."

"...What do you want with me?" I asked, my fur prickling. "And how do you know my name?"

"I wish to protect my own," Lilith explained, her tone once again something approaching warm, by the standards of a world that had never known anything but snow. "Every sarosian in this city is known to me. I have been watching you since you first set hoof here. But though I care for all your kin, you are different. Your hope and innocence fascinate me. Either you know nothing of your race's destiny, or you have a resilience and ability to live with hardship I have never seen before. Or perhaps something more..."

She leaned minutely closer. "I intervened when I did because you were about to meet someone who might try to claim you for their own, instead. That would be an unconscionable tragedy. Something as pure as you ought to remain free."

"Oh, Kitty likes freedom..." Kitty breathed.

Lilith gave her a look that said if you're going to be here, stay out of this.

"You know, that's nice," I said, muscles tense. "But if you want me to be free, why bring me here instead of back home? Or out on the street, or wherever?"

Lilith chuckled icily. "You think that will cleanse you of Samael and Estael's attention? They'd just come find you again, and then they would claim you. Fortunately, Cold Karma's non-compete clause runs both ways."

Oh, I saw where this was going.

"And what if I don't want to work for either of you?" I asked, remembering the pre-written contract from Egdelwonk I kept in a pocket for just such an occasion. Hopefully this wouldn't be when I needed to use it.

Lilith watched me with interest. "It is a rare occasion that we get to choose our masters."

"And suppose I did have a choice," I countered. "Why would I want to throw in my lot with your team instead of anyone else?"

Lilith nodded, considering this. "I can see you value your freedom. What is it you desire to be free from?"

"Goons with agendas who think they can use me to get what they want," I countered. "Like a certain Whitewing who works for you, whom I've got a history with. Or whatever you're currently scheming."

Lilith and Kitty shared a look I couldn't read.

I frowned. "You two know each other?"

"Yup!" Kitty chirped.

"It would be hard not to," Lilith sighed. "But that's no story for your delicate ears. Tell me, how much loyalty do you feel to your race?"

"Why's it matter?" I asked, tilting my head.

"As a measure of your sympathy toward certain ideas," Lilith answered. "And aversion to others."

I met her gaze. "It's not the thing that gets me out the door in the evening, if that's what you're asking. Sure, I think it's tragic that we're almost all gone. I don't think it's worth doing anything dangerous or illegal over."

"I see." Lilith nodded. "Nothing you'd want to join a side over. What if some groups happened to be fighting over something different? Are there causes you feel strongly about, other things that could prompt you to pick a side?"

"I didn't come here to fight a war," I told her firmly. "I want to see the world, and I don't wanna get tied down with stuff like that. I already know all the Cold Karma divisions are after their own goals and don't care much about the company as a whole, and framing it as a fight is gonna be a tough sell if you want me to fight for you."

Lilith smiled. "So, you would be the kind of pony who would rather fight both sides in order to avoid compromising on your freedom."

I blinked. "Maybe. But if you're about to tell me that's what your team does-"

"Oh, not at all," Lilith chuckled. "I very much have an agenda. It is my desire to bring sarosiankind back from the brink of extinction, and I will stop at very little to see that done. A free, determined spirit like you... It would be very much a shame to waste you on a cog in a machine."

"You know, you could have just said that from the beginning?" I raised an eyebrow. "The part about what you want? Like, I already heard somewhere that's what you were up to, but all the questions and beating around the bush turned me off a lot more to your plans than whatever shady stuff you're probably actually doing to accomplish them."

Lilith met my stare. "But I care much more about how you feel than what you do. That is the reason I couldn't allow you into my allies' clutches. I am certain Samael and Estael would use you for ends sympathetic to my own. But would you be happy about it? You are a free spirit. Perhaps the last in the world sarosiankind has to offer. Above all, you must not be squandered."

"Really starting to creep me out, here," I warned. "I know you've got something you want me to do, and the more you stay vague about it, the less I want to join your team."

"...You're right," Lilith said. "I do want something, and it isn't for you to join me. Your species is dying, Halcyon. Slowly. Silently. Painfully. Even the sarosians who remain are consumed by the past. And someone like you can help with that in a way no one else can."

She stepped closer. "Don't worry. It's a simple thing."

I took a step back and focused on my bracelet.

"Stay free," Lilith whispered. "You reject my side? Then reject the others as well. Walk your own path. You have the power. I can feel it on you. A wall that even my magic cannot pierce. Fly, Halcyon. Fly above your species' fate. Don't become captive to a cause like so many others. Fly free..."

And then she was gone.

With a click, all the doors unlocked.

"What...?" I glanced around, alert and on edge. At some point - I hadn't noticed when - the teleporter unicorn had vanished, too.

"If you think you can do it on your own..." Lilith's voice echoed from somewhere. "Then how about a low-stakes test? Start by finding your way out of my facility. I'll be watching. I'm curious how you will react to anything you might find on your way."

Okay. Now I was a lab rat, and I was pretty sure Lilith was a psychopath. Not that I hadn't been warned, but now I had seen it for myself.

Beside me, Kitty burped. "...Kitty wants cake," she decided aloud.

I glanced at my companion. "Alright, you-"

One of the doors opened, and a bespectacled batpony stallion stumbled in. "Milady, there's a report..." He glanced around, seeing no Lilith. "You there," he said to me. "Where is Milady?"

I blinked. If Lilith wanted to screw with me... fine. I'd do it too. "Something came up," I explained, drawing up my posture. "She authorized me to handle any affairs in her absence. What is it?"

The stallion blinked at me. "Begging your pardon, but who are you? Should I know you?"

"You wouldn't," I explained with a shake of my head, keeping my voice just a little cold - but not too cold. "Lilith summoned me here for a direct interview for a leadership position in research. It's still ongoing, but this is the hot portion - seeing how I interact with staff in the role itself. You can give the report directly to me."

This was a ridiculous act, and if Lilith was watching, she would surely know it. Fooling the stallion wasn't my goal, though: I was more interested in seeing how and whether Lilith would react, and also whether her employees thought her an irrational enough leader to find this trick believable.

"I-I see," the stallion stammered, bowing. "I'm not sure it'll mean anything to you, then, but we've received a harshly-worded communication from the Directors of Public Security asking us to kindly keep out of their share of the network, please and thank you." He bowed again and made to retreat.

"Them? Showing emotion? That's a laugh," I remarked, adjusting on the fly to a level of harshness I hoped Lilith would find appealing in a new hire. "You, don't leave. I intend to tour these facilities. Guide me to a map."

The stallion sighed. "Mistress will please follow me..."

This was surreal.

Never before had I actually, honestly used my talent like this. Back in Icereach, from the privacy of my own room, I had reinvented myself time after time, as part of my quest for solidity in who I was. I practiced with my voice, my mannerisms, everything, until I could do a perfect impression of Mother or Corsica or Elise or anyone else. I worked my appearance, told myself my abilities were flawless, that I could become anything and make myself anyone.

But the truth, the one I never admitted even to myself, was that my abilities were completely untested. The most I had ever tried to do in public was make myself an awkward little nerd who would be very easy to ignore, which barely even counted as a disguise when it was the only thing I ever was. Out in public, in the real world, I had no idea how convincing my abilities were. Doing it now, I suddenly had a very new feeling I guessed to be impostor syndrome, was keenly aware of every chink and flaw in my act, every incongruity where I made something up that might not be perfectly consistent with every single thing I had done before. I was no longer performing for an audience of just my mirror. Instead, I was marching brazenly through the lair of a very unstable mare whose short-term intentions were every bit as difficult to parse as Aldebaran's.

And on her underlings, at least, it appeared to be working.

The stallion guiding me made a point of pretending Kitty was invisible, and she responded by nuzzling walls and wobbling around with her tongue poking out. I strode with my head held high, trying to look like I was leading while having no idea which direction I was going. Several times, we passed other batponies, and they bowed as we passed. Apparently, my fancy garb and high demeanor were all the indication they needed of who was in charge. Not the way I'd design a system if I really was in charge, but nobody ever said corruption wasn't easy to exploit...

We entered a room, just as white and sterile as the previous room, and the hallway connecting them. This one looked like a classroom, albeit not in session, filled with desks in the middle and countertops along the side. It was deserted save for two batpony mares talking in a corner. Both were visibly pregnant.

Definitely not a place I want to work for real, I reminded myself. Saving sarosians from extinction, indeed.

Both of them stopped talking and bowed when I stepped through, just as taken with my garb and indomitable posture as everyone else. "Madam!" the older of the two greeted, even though she looked nearly twice my age. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

But I had already spotted my prize: a wall-mounted map purporting to show the entire complex. "Is this accurate?" I asked, stepping up to it.

"I don't see why it wouldn't be..." the older mare said.

"Here's your map," the stallion who had guided me said. "Any chance I'm free to go now?"

"Yes, get on with yourself..." I dismissed him with a wave of a wing.

He was gone in a flash. The two mares stayed, trying to be unobtrusively curious about what I was doing.

They didn't say anything, and so I ignored them, committing as much of the map as I could to memory. This was a large complex, and depending how tightly its 'housing units' were packed, I estimated it could comfortably live about fifty to a hundred ponies. And it was clearly designed to be residential. That, or Lilith's employees had amenities fit for a king.

Unfortunately, that gave me a pretty good suspicion some of the names on this map had been sanitized for civilian use. There was a large wing of the facility labeled maintenance, which ordinarily wouldn't be labeled at all, and would have been up or down a floor instead of far off to the side. Also, I couldn't find an entrance anywhere. Plenty of rooms labeled research, though. And a VIP living quarters as well. As for the rest of the facilities... a bizarrely high number of them sounded educational. It was like Lilith was running an entire university down here.

"Hiya," Kitty told the mares, reminding me that she was dutifully following along. "What'cha doing?"

"Discussing today's coursework," one explained. "Who are you?"

"Name's Kitty!" Kitty puffed out her chest. "What's coursework?"

The mares, I noted out of the corner of my eye, looked somewhere between taken by her cuteness and unsure what was going on. "Schoolwork," the younger one said. "To learn? The thing we're here for? You go to school, don't you?"

"How did an earth pony even get in here?" the older one asked.

"Official business," I answered. "She's with me."

They both started, remembering I was there, and clammed up a little.

Okay. New hypothesis about this place: Lilith actually was running a school, but it was limited to new and growing batpony families. Encourage them to have kids, give them a competitive edge in Ironridge... That was slightly less shady than whatever other possibilities I had been imagining. But given her temperament, Gerardo and Slipstream's reaction to meeting her, and her involvement with the Composer, I was certain she was still up to no good.

If most of the ponies here were civilians, though, that was good to know. I had a much more low-profile option for blending in now, if I ever needed it.

I finished studying the map, feeling like I at least knew how to find my general way around. "Come," I told Kitty, ignoring the mares and striding towards the door. "Let's go."

Kitty followed. I could feel tension leave the mares as I left the room.

With a shudder, some tension left me, too. Pretending in front of a mirror was one thing, but a consequence of doing this for real I had never considered before was how it made the ponies around me feel. Acting like the kind of boss Lilith would hire... It was certainly effective, but anyone who needed a place like this, I wasn't sure I wanted to make their day any worse.

Unless it was just me who was on edge from the overly white architecture. Maybe they legitimately enjoyed it here. Who knew?

What was I doing? I was reacting to the situation in front of me, reading the rules as best as I could, but... ultimately, just like with Aldebaran, I didn't know the rules and the rules didn't make sense. What happened to me was, effectively, all up to luck.

Except for my bracelet. If I was physically imperiled and needed a nuclear option against an aggressor who meant me harm... Well, I didn't know exactly what it would do. But then at least I wouldn't be the only one whose fate was up to luck.

"Hey," I whispered to Kitty when no one else was in sight. "Is there a reason you're here? Like, following me, right now?"

Kitty smiled up at me. "Nope!"

I stared at her and sighed. "Listen. I'm kind of at my limits right now. I'm doing stuff that would have caused me to majorly freak out several months ago. I think I'm managing it, but I don't have any extra capacity for, like... anything. You see where I'm coming from? The whole I'm-a-dumb-kid thing is cute when we're at Jamjars' and she's the one to deal with it, but right now I need to feel like I don't have a wildcard tagging along for reasons I don't understand and also don't need to feel like I've got a dumb kid tagging along who needs me to look out for them. I know you're faking it, I know you and Jamjars have some kind of leverage on Cold Karma. You don't need to play games with me. Can I ask you to please be smart and trustworthy like I know you can be, at least until we're out of here?"

Kitty kept smiling. "Yup!"

I hesitated. "And will you actually do it if I ask?"

Kitty's tongue poked out. "Maybe!"

I gritted my teeth. "Come on, how do you want me to ask? Who are you and what do you know that lets you just wander around with impunity in all the most restricted areas in Ironridge?"

Kitty pointed to her hoodie. It still read 'Gamer'.

I raised an eyebrow. "Is that some kind of code phrase? A secret organization, whatever?"

Kitty stuck out her tongue further. "Nope!" she chirped. "It means Kitty's got skills."

"Every observation I have made," I whispered, "tells me I could ditch you right here and now and you'd wind up completely safe and sound at Jamjars' place by morning, which means either every single square inch of Ironridge is not a legitimate institution and doesn't have any rules or else you are a cheater to whom the rules of reality magically don't apply. Every reasonable expectation of sanity I have for the world tells me that's not how things should work. I am a scientist. I follow my observations. If you want me to use a lick of common sense and not just throw you to the wolves, I need you to make my life easier, here. Please?"

"If you want something, lady, just ask!" Kitty gave me a big, innocent grin.

"...Right," I sighed. "Like that's not asking directly enough. Do you know a way out of here?"

Kitty's tongue poked back out, as if she didn't understand the question.

I narrowed my eyes at her. "I know you know your way around this place. Please get me out of here."

Kitty giggled. "Took Halcyon long enough to figure it out. Come on, follow Kitty!"

Right. Note to self, asking Kitty questions got absolutely nowhere, but if you gave her orders, she might potentially listen.

"So how do you know Lilith, anyway?" I asked as we crept through corridors that were probably in the maintenance wing I saw on the map, and didn't look very maintenance-y. By now, I had given up my act, tired of the looks it was getting me, and settled for shadow swimming in Kitty's shadow. Ponies still gave her baffled stares, but if anyone called anyone to do something about her, nobody came.

Kitty snickered. "One time," she whispered, "Kitty sat on a fence and sang songs all night long. Lilith hated it! They drove her mad. Songs Kitty wrote, too! Wanna hear?"

"Maybe later," I breathed, reminding myself once again to stop asking Kitty questions. "Maybe later..."

"Hmm." Kitty stopped at an intersection, tongue poking quizzically out. "Kitty thought it was this way... Maybe this way? Doesn't look right. Maybe here!"

There were no other ponies in sight, so I emerged from the ground. "You better not be lost," I warned. The lights here were dim enough and the architecture dark enough that I might be able to shadow swim even if I didn't have something explicit to hide in.

"Kitty's not lost," Kitty promised happily. "She's just on an adventure."

This was a bad place to be adventuring. A few halls ago, we had passed through a door, and the building went from sterile white panels to raw hewn stone. It was hot here, not scalding like the Night District but far more all-encompassing, with no hints of cool anywhere to be found. The facility clearly continued, divided into rooms and halls and the like, but I no longer saw ponies who looked like they could be easily cowed. In fact, I saw very few ponies at all.

"Fine..." I sized up our options for myself. We were at a four-way intersection, with more dim lighting down two of the prospective paths. But to the left, the tunnel bent again, and the bend was illuminated with glare from a very harsh light source. "What do you wanna bet that is?"

Kitty watched it too. "Maybe a party," she whispered. "With cake... Hey, lady, Kitty's hungry!"

"Take care of it yourself," I muttered, prowling closer to see around the corner.

Several large floodlights lit the room beyond, which seemed to be a broad corridor bordered by iron-barred cells. The iron looked twisted and wrought, as though forged under very imprecise conditions, and the lights were bright and certain. I would have know this was bad news even without a good idea of what it was being used for: a light that bright would surely make it impossible for batponies to shadow swim between the bars.

But I saw no guards, and my curiosity made it impossible for me to turn away.

One cell was empty. The next, empty. Empty. Empty. And...

My eyes widened. "Leitmotif?"

Think, Don't Feel

A few moments of solitude were all that separated me from a task I had sworn to myself I would do, yet wasn't looking forward to at all.

Corsica, as if she could magically tell exactly what I needed, stood guard, deflecting attention as Papyrus made unknown preparations and Unless wandered off as well. And so I leaned against a wall and breathed, trying to blank my mind and reset my thoughts and psych myself up for breaking into Lilith's weird batpony school and rescuing my imprisoned mortal enemy. Things I had to my name? My wits. Egdelwonk's contract, which I could pull out at any time and allegedly use as a free get-out-of-jail card, though now that I thought about it, I wasn't sure what being unaffiliated with Egdelwonk actually did for me when Papyrus was coming along. And then I had Papyrus himself, an even bigger wildcard than Kitty - and last time I nearly drove myself to panic with the possibility of her doing something stupid. This time, I was bringing Papyrus on purpose.

Oh, and I had a ghost that was apparently the real me.

Nothing in my life was stable. I didn't have a home that I trusted - Jamjars was all but certainly affiliated with Aldebaran, and likely owned the hideout where we had been kidnapped. I barely even knew the mechanics of my own head, and what I did know told me there were at least two other ponies in there whose thoughts were completely hidden to me. My self-control, usually ironclad, had nearly been compromised by a few minutes of fighting with Papyrus. Searching for the light spirit was the closest thing I had to a cause to be loyal to, and my reasons for doing that had been far from the most important thing in my life ever since the Aldebaran incident.

On the one hoof, it felt like I was doing something stupid purely because I had nothing to lose. On the other, maybe risking danger and taking a chance on an old enemy was exactly what I needed in order to get something to lose. If Leitmotif betrayed me again, big deal. I'd been there before. If things somehow didn't turn out like last time...

I didn't know, but it would be better.

"You know, I'm disappointed to say this..." The voice of Papyrus interrupted my musings. "But that thoughtful look on your face really makes you look almost like an academic."

I blinked at him. "So?"

Under his wings, the pegasus was carrying a pair of gas masks attached to respirators. "So I've known a hundred and one academics in my time who looked like sticks in the mud, until you poked and prodded so much that you actually got to know them and discovered they really were sticks in the mud because they had learned some awful existential truth about reality which they then share with you to try to get you blue too. Yech." He scraped at his tongue in a show of disgust. "Actually, I think I've only known a small few of those, but my point still stands. Tell me you're not the same, Butterfly."

"I don't know any existential truths about reality," I said, turning to face him properly and taking a step back. "Where'd you get those? And what are they for?"

Papyrus flipped a helmet with his wing and caught it. "Well, tragically, I've never died and been reincarnated as a sarosian, which is about the only way I'd ever be shown through the front door of that school. That means we'll have to do our burglary the boring way and go in through the back. Which, since the place is underground, means dealing with a bit of mine gas. And I for one would rather let the place be some other scrub's problem than clean it out myself by using my lungs as a sponge."

I gave him a look. "For such a professional you sure take a lot of words to get your point across."

"It's a sad story," Papyrus sighed, offering me the other helmet. "To make it a short one, I love to talk and have nothing productive to make of it. Probably for the best. All the fools in charge like me precious little when I'm not up to anything, Garsheeva forbid I should get some goals for a change. And so I run my mouth. To whomever will listen." He gave me a pitying smile. "Like you."

Procyon hovered nearby, watching and evaluating.

"As long as you can shut it if we need to go stealth mode." I took the respirator and examined it. "So we're going through the Flame Barracks, then?"

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "You know the way? Excellent! Then I shan't have to lead!"

"I know about it," I protested, putting a hoof down. "I've never actually been-"

"Hey, goon squad. What's up?"

Suddenly, Valey was here.

I jumped a little. "Where'd you come from?"

"Shadow sneaking." She shrugged. "You know about it, right? Yeah, of course you do. Nice fight, by the way, but tip from a pro: neither of you should be messing with real soldiers. Now what's all this about sedition against Cold Karma I'm hearing?"

My ears twitched in alarm. "Were you eavesdropping?"

"Was she?" Papyrus tilted his head. "We have been discussing this in the middle of a public courtyard."

I glanced around, craning my neck. Fortunately, we were in a slightly secluded area and there weren't too many normal onlookers, but Corsica was still here, and she didn't look incredibly pleased... "Yeah, but you were the one who started..."

Papyrus shrugged. "They also aren't my secrets to hide."

Valey raised an eyebrow.

I tried to make myself small. I didn't want to do this anymore. If I was so distracted and drawn into myself that I couldn't notice my basic surroundings, I was in an awful state to attempt a heist. I just wanted to go home...

But I didn't have a home to return to. The closest thing I had was Jamjars', and that no longer felt like home. My home was waiting in the future: an airship I could live on, that could be my own. And tonight, I had to do everything in my power to reach that future.

"Just trying to make sure I've got this straight," Valey told us. "You and you are planning to use those gas masks to go through the Flame District, break into Lilith's school through the back entrance, steal stuff, and come back out the way you came in. Got any contingencies for when something completely unpredictable goes wrong?"

"Were you just listening to every last thing we said?" I took a step back.

"Yup." Valey gave me a serious look. "What have you got up your sleeve?"

A flame bracelet, a contract that could supposedly summon Egdelwonk to bail me out, and a partner I really wouldn't mind letting take the fall if the opportunity arose. "What's it to you?"

Valey shrugged. "Some random griffon asked me to keep an eye out for you a week or two ago. You are aware that, as a batpony, you can completely legally march through that school's front door and do whatever you have in there that needs doing, skip the toxic caves and leave Mr. Trouble With A Capital T out here where he belongs, right?"

Papyrus groaned. "Come off it, lady, stop preaching sense to the mare! I never get to do anything around here!"

Valey swiped the respirator I was holding with deft ease. "You plot your bad ideas out in public, you don't get to complain when I intervene. Now, you wanna tell me anything else about your plan so I can replace it with the sane and sensible alternative that doesn't involve a death wish? Maybe starting with the reason you wanna mess with Lilith, because I dearly hope you're not dumb enough to miss that she's bad news."

Papyrus's tail flicked in irritation.

I sighed. Not like I had good reason to trust any authority figured at all, but if I had to pick one... Then again, for all I knew Valey and Leitmotif were enemies. Leitmotif was my enemy, and I already felt some conflict about whether or not to save her. Outing my full plan probably wasn't-

"Nope," Valey told me flatly. "No thinking about how to lie in a way that gets me on your side. I'm already on your side, in the talking-dumb-kids-out-of-bad-ideas way that dumb kids usually hate. I'd know; I had a lot of bad ideas when I was younger and no one to talk me out of them. You wanna tell me in private without this bad influence around?"

Papyrus cleared his throat indignantly. And then another voice did, as well.

From what could better be described as a debris heap than a trash can, Egdelwonk was peering. "Oh, Valey, I dearly hope you're not asking my minions to divulge secrets they'd rather keep."

Faster than I could follow, Valey picked up a scrap board from the ground and threw it at him like a javelin. He was already gone.

"I'm not your minion yet," I muttered to the trash heap. "I just wanna be free and not have all this garbage following me around. Is that so much to ask for?"

"...Yeah." Valey gave me a solemn look. "Sometimes, it is. Some folks are just cursed to never be free of the baggage in their lives. Believe me, I know. Now talk to me here, kid. You wanna come back to my office?"

"Not particularly." I took a few steps away. "I just wanna be left alone."

"Alone with your friends?" she asked. "Or alone, alone?"

I shook my head. "The latter."

"Then head up to my office anyway," Valey said, waving a wing. "It's empty. And with my say-so, it'll stay that way. Go get the space you need."

I sighed. I nodded. And then I left to go do just that. It was tempting to shadow sneak and stay behind and listen to whatever they would have to say once I was gone, especially once Papyrus started ranting about killjoys, but I just wasn't feeling up to it. If Valey was legitimately offering me solitude, that was the most precious gift I could receive.

Valey's office was much the way I had seen it last, only this time devoid of shadow-sneaking faces in the floor for me to step on.

The place had once been the stern of a ship, now raised high above Fort Starlight's main clearing and set upon a mountain of other hulls, its polished dark wood still intact and beautiful to look at. I shut the door behind me and took in the silence, breathing for a moment the still air.

There were memories in this room. History.

Not suffused throughout the room itself, as if the history had been made here. It was more like the things that had been brought here had histories of their own. I couldn't explain how I felt it, deep in my heart, but I did. Behind Valey's desk, in a small display case, there was a pony bust wearing a golden pendant that had an empty, hoof-sized slot where a large gemstone could go. This pendant, for example, had an incredible story, and I knew none of it.

Maybe I was oversensitive. Easily overwhelmed by other ponies doing things outside my control, yet able to pick up things like this without even trying. I had always been able to read ponies by the things they left behind. So, maybe...

I opened my heart, and listened to what this room had to say about its owner.

There were pictures on the walls, and they drew my attention first. The biggest one showed a multitude of ponies, far too many for me to count. It was a deck party on a sea ship, floating in front of a pristine white beach with a harbor nearby. I had seen pictures of the ocean before, but something about this one felt more vibrant, even though it had been taken at night. About a dozen ponies stood in the foreground, with countless more behind them, all young and fit and a few looking like they had just finished work at a construction site. Without exception, every last one of them was smiling. The smiles looked real.

A griffon was there, I noted. A younger Gerardo? Valey was there, looking exactly the way she looked now, wearing a ragged beret and with a pendant clasped around her neck that I realized was probably the same one in the display case. Next to Valey was an orange mare with a short, spiky red mane that was trying to disguise the fact that she was a unicorn. She had the look of immeasurable weariness and a survivor's determination side by side on her face. The two of them were standing close. I remembered Jamjars mentioning that Valey and Shinespark used to be close. And while the statue of Shinespark in Dead Herman didn't have any colors, the mane was the same.

Speaking of Jamjars, she was there too, with an impish grin and a mane just as poofy as the present day. She was a filly in the picture. It was nice to see evidence that at least someone got older as time passed.

There were others in the front row, too. A purple unicorn who looked exactly like Shinespark save for the coloration, and made me suddenly unsure which of the two was actually Shinespark. A tan mare with a long, brown, braided mane and orange eyes, standing over a little lilac unicorn filly who looked unhappy at being near the center of attention. A yellow earth pony who was posing with some of the ponies in the back row, looking the happiest out of anyone to be there. Two pegasi, one of whom I realized must be Slipstream, even though she had a completely different manestyle and wasn't wearing a sweater. I even saw another batpony, a heavyset mare with a long, thoroughly-groomed red mane.

Along the picture frame, I realized, was a title: Kinmari restoration of the Immortal Dream.

The Immortal Dream, huh? I wondered what that was.

There were other pictures, too. The next one that caught my eye was in a long, windowless room, the floor and walls and ceiling all made out of reddish-orange stone, a few carved support pillars and some stone trim decorating it without removing the utilitarian feel. A few refreshment tables lined one side, and a lot of paperwork tables were clustered against another. Valey stood in the center with several griffons - no Gerardo - and an assortment of other ponies, all of whom looked distinctive and powerful. The most eye-catching of the bunch was a pegasus who was built like a gorilla, flexing mightily in the back row.

Organizing the Empire's final tournament, the picture frame said.

I moved on and on and on, each picture equally vibrant even though in many of them, the ponies looked worn or beaten down. And, eventually, I had seen them all.

The last picture was of the lilac filly I had seen in many of the others. Her purple mane, often straight and well-groomed, was a windblown mess that hid its usual teal stripe. The sun was low on the horizon and out of the frame, tinging the mountain peaks behind her with the colors of dawn. She was standing in front of a carved wooden railing, and beyond was a barren field strewn with immeasurable chunks of stone, as if an entire mountain had fractured and fallen apart. Her eyes carried a weight befitting a world leader, and yet she wore a shaky smile, a smile so battered that it might have been rescued from a long imprisonment in the depths of the Flame Barracks. But still, a smile.

All the frame said was Starlight.

Jamjars' voice drifted back to me on the currents of my memory, telling me about her feud with Valey across a host of conversations. Valey and everyone else had walked out on Starlight, Jamjars told me. All they needed to be reunited was a sufficient quantity of Writs of Harmonic Sanction, and after a year of searching, Valey just didn't feel like trying anymore.

But these weren't the decorations of a pony who wanted to forget the past. Even the pictures that showed smiles had a sense of regret about them, like someone wished they could go back to those times and choose a different path. Whatever Valey was doing here, sitting around and ruling Fort Starlight, I knew for absolute certain that she had somewhere else she would give anything to be.

"What happened?" I whispered, staring into the picture of Starlight. "What made Ironridge the way it is? I know you were involved..."

Procyon hovered up through the floor. "If you'd like to ask her, Valey's waiting at the bottom of the stairs."

I tilted my head at her, snapped back to reality. "How'd you know that?"

Procyon shrugged. "I'm not fully a figment of your imagination. Whatever the magic is that allows us to exist like this is - and it is magic, it's not just a quirk of the mind - I have my own eyes and ears." She tapped her face. "I see what I see, not what you see. Just can't go too far from you."

"You don't know how our powers work either, then?" I raised an eyebrow, more interested in this than the fact that she could see on her own.

"I know some things you probably don't," she said. "And given that I've been gone for two and a half years, it's very possible that you know some things about us that I don't. I made you afraid of learning more about yourself and your capabilities, didn't I? I certainly didn't do that because I knew for certain everything across which you might stumble."

Oh.

That smarted a little, hearing that there wasn't even as good a reason for the fear as I had always been led to believe... but whatever. I was feeling a little better. I felt like I had a window into the things Valey cared most about, and exploiting me for personal or political gain didn't factor in. In fact, political gain entirely seemed to be missing from this picture. If I trusted her... maybe it would be okay.

"So," I said moments later, after descending the stairs and letting Valey know I would accept her offer to talk, and now back in her office once again. "What do you want with me?"

"Same thing I want from everything in general," Valey said, sitting at her desk. "To keep this city from exploding again, like it did two decades ago. It's wound tighter than you can believe, though I know you've seen a lot of it - I've got eyes in a lot of places." She folded her forehooves and leaned forward. "Now let's be very clear about something. Ironridge is a place where the only people who can trust each other are fools and fire-forged friends, and sometimes not even that. You don't trust me. I get it. I've got power and I can threaten your goals. But it goes both ways: you've got power and can threaten my goals."

"You think I've got power?" I took a step back. "How do you mean?"

Valey shrugged. "You've got powerful friends. Jamjars, Egdelwonk, Papyrus, Corsica. And Cold Karma's interested in you. They don't take interest in folks who don't matter. And I'm sure you know plenty of stuff about yourself you wouldn't like anyone else to know, too. Papyrus did a pretty mean job figuring that out, pardon me for eavesdropping. But the fact that you're even considering breaking into an underground bunker tells me you have the will to change things, and we both know you have the ability to at least try. So yeah, you've got power. And most everyone who's anyone knows it."

My mind slowly drifted to Mother's bracelet. "And what if I do?"

"Then it stinks to be you," Valey said. "Because you'll have a lot of problems coming your way, and you have exactly three options: try to fix them, try to profit from them or try to foist them on someone else. None of which are guaranteed to work out in your favor."

"How did Ironridge get like this?" I asked. "Surely that's not the way things always used to work. You talk like no one can trust anyone. It can't have always been that way."

"That's a long story," Valey sighed. "It started, oh, forty years ago. Maybe more. When airships were invented, it promised to change everything. You see, geographically, Ironridge is right smack in the middle of the known world, but in terms of actual trade routes it was far removed from anything else, on account of the mountains and wastelands cutting it off from Yakyakistan and Varsidel. You had to go way round and about to get here, up the Yule river from the eastern sea. But things changing creates winners and losers, and there was bound to be a fight. I'm sure you've heard at least some about the Steel Revolution. The point is, Ironridge was already backwards and upside-down, and then it got broken by a tiny little war fought over a single night that destroyed three quarters of the city's infrastructure. Ever been doing crazy gymnastics, throw out your back and suddenly you're paralyzed for a week? I haven't, but I've heard it's like that. Point is, Ironridge got beaten down, tried to come back... and then it came back wrong."

I lifted my ears.

"I dunno what other answer I can give you," Valey said. "The city got taken apart. It had to be rebuilt. And different folks had different ideas of what to build it into, and eventually you got what you see today. There's no one actually benevolent in charge, no one with any interest in governing. You see, when Ironridge got leveled in the wake of the revolution, it was down a lot of infrastructure, but it did have two things in abundance: ponies with nothing to do, and food to keep them alive. Untapped potential, looking for a purpose. Ironridge used to be a city where ponies took immense pride in their professions, you see. Ponies' jobs were their identities. Take those away, and suddenly you've got an enormous amount of energy yearning for a way to go back to normal. And so the way we got how we are now is that a few crafty dudes figured out how to tap that energy to further their own personal projects."

I stayed silent.

"Cold Karma does the bare minimum it can get away with to keep Ironridge a livable, functional city where the lower and middle classes can live more or less like they used to," Valey went on. "The ponies don't want to change. They spend an incredible amount of effort to avoid doing it, whatever hooffull of loudmouths might tell you otherwise. And the small few at the top have learned how to take that effort and put it towards their own goals, regardless of weather or not those goals have anything to do with anything."

"And what are their goals?" I asked.

"Could be anything." Valey shook her head. "I don't know the full extent of their schemes. All I know is, for every last one of them, Ironridge is nothing more than a means to an end."

"And you're trying to change that?" I tilted my head.

Valey stood up and walked to the frosted glass windows. She didn't answer.

"Why does Jamjars say you abandoned Starlight?" I asked.

Valey sighed bitterly, but still said nothing.

I frowned. "Don't just tell me to come up here and talk to you and then have nothing to say."

She gritted her teeth.

I waited.

"You ever... thought about doing anything really big for the world?" Valey asked. "Like, trying to fix all these problems yourself? Or even just trying to get revenge for all the ways they've inconvenienced you? Problems like Ironridge being ruled by that circus at Cold Karma, or there being no cosmic sense of justice."

"Honestly," I told her, "I'd rather just run away and try my luck somewhere different. The moment I'm able, I'll skip town and happily leave Ironridge to its own devices. So if you want me not to muck around in your stuff, all it takes is-"

Valey hissed, then slumped against the wall in resignation. I tried to figure out what was going through her mind, and couldn't come up with anything.

Doing something really big for the world, though... Before she told me about Chrysalis, Coda had generically talked about saving the world with the power of love. I wondered if there was at all a possibility Valey was worried about the same thing.

"Are you alright?" I asked, the idea crossing my mind that she might be clamming up to avoid spilling sensitive information I already knew. Though that didn't quite seem to match up with her demeanor.

"Jamjars said we abandoned Starlight because, technically, we did," Valey said. "Specifically, we ran into a barrier on our quest to find Writs of Harmonic Sanction that we weren't willing to pay the price to surmount. Before you ask, it wasn't a price we could have paid... Not technically, at least. It was a price we would have been signing up Starlight to pay, down the road. And keeping her from paying anything more is why we parted ways when we did."

"How's that work?" I looked at her sideways. "Someone wanted you to take out a debt in a filly's name?"

Valey gave me a dead serious look. "You are not going to repeat this outside this room."

I swallowed and nodded.

"There are two sources of writs in the world," Valey told me. "The Griffon Empire, and Yakyakistan. Both of them get their writs from Equestria, at a rate of one per year. The writs going to the Empire got... suspended after it fell, for political reasons south of the border. So our two ways of getting them were to go to Yakyakistan and try to monopolize their supply for a few years, and go to the rest of the world and try to buy them from collectors and stuff. Birdo - err, Gerardo - he's been doing the latter for pretty much as long as you've been alive. We tried to do the former, initially, immediately after Starlight and us parted ways."

She stared at the window. "Yakyakistan gave us a bargain for all the writs we could need for the foreseeable future. In exchange, they wanted... a certain harmonic relic of mine. Not the kind of thing I could part with easily. They needed it because the windigoes beneath the Yak Hoof Glacier - I know you know they're real - were woken up about sixty years ago, and Yakyakistan wanted my stuff to reinforce the seal down there. If this seal were to break, and all the windigoes get free at once, it would probably mean the end of the world. Or at least the north. Windigo power grows exponentially the more of them are present at once. You come from a snowy wasteland. I'm sure you can imagine what they could do."

I waited.

"Starlight," Valey went on, "would not take kindly to me giving up this... relic. She'd probably want to get it back for me. And something you should know about her is that she can, under very specific circumstances, kill windigoes."

Corsica had told me that, back at the rocket crash shrine, hadn't she? I nodded. "I think I heard that."

"It's true," Valey said. "She saved Ironridge from Yakyakistan's windigoes during the Steel Revolution, even though she didn't want credit for it and everyone who knew her helped to obscure it. But the leadership of Yakyakistan's church knew. You see, this artifact of mine wouldn't actually seal the windigoes forever. If it was left alone, they'd eventually get strong enough to break free anyway. What Yakyakistan really wanted it for was bait, to lure Starlight under that glacier to solve their windigo problem for them. And she'd hate doing it, hate needing to do it, but mark my words, she would come. World salvation, powered by a forsaken child."

I stared.

"So, I told them to get bent and come up with their own way to deal with the windigoes that didn't involve our filly," Valey told me. "Said bye-bye to our entire prospective source of writs in the process. Bananas, I sure hope they actually found a permanent solution, but me and them haven't really been in close contact since, so for all I know the world could be about to get windigo bombed whenever those cretins decide it's a good time to break their seal once and for all. Don't think it's already happened, either. Any isolated agents you've met or heard about are only a prelude to the full host."

"But isn't that urgent?" I whispered. "What are you doing sitting around here in a makeshift fort when there are problems like that out there to be solved?"

Valey waved a wing. "I did my time playing hero and trying to solve all the world's problems. Actually did a really lot of good at points, too, for all it did for my state of mind. But I know my limits. You try to do everything and you wind up doing nothing at all. What I'm doing now is a lot more than most ever accomplish: I've got a tiny slice of Ironridge that's still free, a tiny little paramilitary spy network helping me keep it that way, and a few friends who still have heads on their necks as a result. You see, modern-day Ironridge works by making ponies desperate, then trying to suck up desperate folks and get them to put that desperation to use for someone's agenda. Anyone I can get to land here, instead of, say, Lilith's school? It's a win in my book."

She sighed. "Back in the revolution, me and Starlight and everyone else who helped to save Ironridge didn't do it because we were free and powerful and benevolent and woke up one morning and decided to do the right thing. We did it because we literally had no other choice. It was do or die. We were at the end of the line, tired and terrified with no ground beneath our hooves. I can't speak for them, but me, I had just thrown out a stable, cushy job for a complete gamble that having friends might actually be worth something. Now, Ironridge is wound just as tightly as it was back then, or maybe even tighter. We need some new crazies who can do the impossible and buy the city another chance. But, before someone can take those kinds of risks, they have to be really, truly, desperate... At least, for it to happen the same way as it did for us."

Valey looked me in the eyes. "So that's what I'm doing here. I'm spent. I know what's coming and don't have another round of heroic antics in me. But if ever there was going to be anyone who did, I'd want to leave them a path to that, without letting them fall in with some goon who just wants to use their desperation to advance their own agenda, like Ironridge is so full of these days."

"How do you live like that?" I asked, looking away. "Discounting what you're capable of and waiting for someone else to come save you? I really want to know." Particularly because I had lived much of my life like that before.

Valey shrugged. "Focus on the concepts, ideas and plans. Don't dwell too much on the feelings. And if you do start to dwell, that's what we're linked to a tavern for."

"So much for adults having all the answers," I told her. "No offense, but that's really lame."

"I earned my happily ever after long before you were born," Valey insisted, pointing a hoof at me. "It is lame. I was complaining about how lame it was to anyone who would listen, and occasionally punching out jerks who disagreed with me. But you know who earned her happily ever after even more than I did? Starlight. I don't know what kind of news she gets about the north these days, living her life in Equestria. We left her there so she could grow up and be normal and be free from all the pressures of our adventure, and we swore to finish our goals and one day fly south together and live together again. Maybe we've failed, maybe it's too late and we're too tied up with Ironridge and trying to keep the world from exploding to hunt writs anymore, maybe we'll never get to cross the border as a team and go look for her. But even if we can't keep that half of our promise, we can keep her from needing to come find us and get involved again. As long as we draw a line somewhere and keep the north's problems in the north... then we won't have failed her completely."

I didn't know how to answer, other than that I knew this wasn't right. "And how do I factor into it all? Why are you telling me all this?"

Valey shrugged. "'Cuz you wanted to know. You're just a refugee kid whose mother Shinespark helped get a place in Icereach. Physically, you've got nothing tying you to Ironridge, but your history is inextricably tied up in all that stuff that happened twenty years ago. I just... Bananas. You said your ideal solution was to keep moving on and looking for a place that's better. That's how we got started, all those years ago. I just don't wanna see you wind up like Starlight. But, I dunno how to do that, because I did what I thought was best with her and it worked out... Well, you know."

"Why do you think I might wind up like Starlight?" I pressed. "Do I look like a windigo-killer to..."

I trailed off, remembering how Ludwig and I had parted ways during the Aldebaran incident. Ludwig, in my own house, trying adamantly to convince me that yes, I really could kill him. Me, deciding not to test because I didn't want to know.

My eyes widened. I lifted my bracelet and stared at it.

Valey nodded. "The last thing I wanna do is give you something to worry about that you don't need to know. Didn't work out so well with Starlight, but what would you do, try to pile more and more on an already-troubled kid? But I don't think I need to. You know at least something about what you can do. If you wanna make a splash in Ironridge, you can do it. And everyone else who knows anything about what you can do is very interested in what kind of splash you'll make, if not controlling it to their own ends. Maybe you could walk away. Maybe you could break something. Maybe you could even fix something. If you're anything like me, it'll probably be all three at once."

I lowered my hoof. "What makes me so special? And why?"

"It's always gotta happen to someone," Valey replied. "If a pony's one in a million, then take a million ponies and the special one will have to be somebody. Maybe we're just the ones who didn't get lucky."

"What if I gave you this bracelet?" I asked. "You said you're all out of heroics. You think I've got so much potential, you want some of mine?"

Valey chuckled. "No way. I'm just as strong as I always was. It's more of a mental thing. I'm tired, I've got obligations, I can't afford to risk myself. More accurately, Starlight can't afford for me to risk myself. Even if we'll never see each other again, she needs to be able to trust me not to go get in any situations where she needs to save my rear, which has happened a lot more than I'd like before. Wish I could do the same to keep you out of harm's way, kid. But, bananas. I'm only one mare."

"That's... That's fine." I shook my head. "I've gotten saved before, and I've tried and failed to save other ponies before, and if living in peace and quiet is off the table, I'd rather be the one doing the saving. But I don't have any obligations toward Ironridge. Your city hasn't been great to me, and at this point it feels like the generous thing would just be to walk away and have us leave each other alone. If you're scared of me, I've got no plans to make things worse, but that's about all I can offer."

"Guess I'd be greedy to ask for more." Valey stretched. "Thanks, kid. So, you're still plotting for who knows why to break into Lilith's school?"

I slowly nodded.

"Snazzy," Valey said. "Then let's get you a crash course in making intelligent stupid plans so you can maybe avoid a novice bump or two along the way."

Halcyonic Wars and Peace

Emotional whiplash caught up to me like a flying brick as I stumbled, frozen, back through the entrance to the hideout, a long stone tunnel leading up to the main vault door. What was I doing? How had I let myself get into this mess?

First, I got kicked around by Ironridge. Then, I told myself I had toughened up. Next, I stuck my face back into Icereach, knowing nothing except that whatever could go wrong probably would. And now, I was getting kicked around by Icereach. Exactly what I asked for. Couldn't simplify it much more than that.

I could make it more complex, though. What had driven me, upon getting ambushed by Jamjars and a bunch of confused yaks, to decide the immediate best course of action was to go out in a storm, turn on my bracelet, and try using it to fight Balthazar? Sure, there were logical reasons, like how it would be a substantial advantage to have a handle on my own abilities now that the going was getting rough. But the more I thought about them, the hollower they seemed.

You did it because you were desperate, I told myself, my internal monologue speaking in Procyon's voice. You took a gamble. Showed off your secrets in front of someone else, broke your pact with yourself not to press your limits. You did it to test your luck, because you wanted to see if there was a higher power watching over you again like last time. To see if you could rely on more miracles. And you can't.

My backwards ears went further back.

So much for having grown, the voice of doubt insisted. You feel yourself losing control, and you panic. And do you know why? Because you're carrying a load that's too important to drop. Because you've taken on too many responsibilities. And, back there, you were trying to take on more, by demonstrating to yourself that there is more you could do. You know the adage, Halcyon. Because you can, you have to...

I hissed and shook my head, trying to distract myself from... myself. It wasn't perfectly effective. I dispersed the voice, but not the train of thought: Papyrus and his cavalier attitude drifted through my mind, making light of our situation and being as disrespectful as ever. Not a bad set of qualities to emulate, at least during this present dilemma. It would be much easier to-

"Stop it," I whined under my breath, feeling myself falling to pieces like sand through a sieve. "Why can't I get these thoughts out of my head? If this is Ludwig's aura..."

"It isn't," Procyon said, floating out of a wall as I leaned against the opposite one. "Your thoughts are our own."

I raised an eyebrow at her.

She shook her head. "Surely you've noticed the protective barrier around your mind. We're unique in more than one way, Halcyon. Multiple factors converging in a perfect storm that make our head nigh-impossible to tamper with... at least in theory. Even I have to settle for guessing at what you're thinking. For better or worse, all your problems right now are of your own making."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," I grumbled. "But I'm gonna go ahead and blame Ludwig."

Procyon shrugged and floated away.

I slumped. Prioritization was basically impossible when, in my mind, all my goals had melted together into a soup of 'do something'. I wanted to get Mother back to Ironridge. I needed to make some degree of peace with myself so I wouldn't have to worry about losing control of my body again. And, already, I badly needed a rest. But all of that would have to wait, because Balthazar didn't feel like letting this Holy Sparkbearer and her entourage into the hideout, and so I was being sent back to rally the yaks for a parlay outside.

In the night. Where I couldn't survive if I couldn't use my bracelet.

"Hey," I shouted as I walked through the vault door. "There's some folks in the trench who want to... parlay..."

The relative warmth of the cave interior made me realize that I was a lot colder than I thought. Immediately, I fell over.

Several yaks immediately surrounded me. "Yo, you've got ice in your mane," Darius remarked. "You probably want to get that looked at..."

"Outside. Shoo." I flopped a wing at the vault door. "Your problem now. Go deal with it, please..."

The yaks shuffled around, clearly torn between checking out what was happening outside and paying attention to me, but at least a few started to leave through the vault door.

Good. If I hadn't shown up here, they would have proceeded to deal with this themselves anyway, so at worst I was having a neutral impact on how things went down. Now I just-

"Well, someone got down in the dumps in a hurry," Papyrus announced, swaggering over to me. "I swear, not ten minutes ago you were raring to go and begging me for some help in getting started. Bit off more than you could chew, eh?"

"Wouldn't you like to know," I grumbled, my limbs frozen and my eyes heavy. "Buzz off..."

"Oh, but I would like to know." He shoved his smile right up in my face. "And maybe you'd like to step away from that frigid door and get somewhere you can tell us all about it without dying of hypothermia. Fair's fair, eh?"

I blinked at him.

"Get up," Corsica commanded, stepping up beside him. "Or I'll carry you."

I heaved myself to my hooves, my body leaden and numb. Maybe I really had just gotten too cold... After Ironridge's heat, it was entirely possible I had lost my ability to differentiate between good cold and bad cold. "You got a tropical sauna in mind?" I mumbled. "I don't remember much of anywhere in this place being warm."

"Nope." Corsica shook her head. "Whatever you were doing out there, we've been busy in here, and we found something you need to see."

I found that I did, in fact, have the energy to walk, once I realized that Corsica's idea of carrying me was to ask Papyrus to do it himself. If only I didn't have a bad feeling that I was being summoned somewhere to call the shots on something, getting bossed around about where to go would almost have felt nice. I wanted to lick my wounds and figure out how to get back to the normal that let me think I was ready to go to Icereach and find Mother, not make any important decisions.

Corsica led us to the Nemestasis room, where, predictably, I saw Leitmotif staring at the machine. More surprisingly, Coda was there too.

"Luminous. Found her," Corsica declared, flopping down on a makeshift bench at the side of the room.

"Putrid," Papyrus added.

Leif nodded, pacing over to me. "Pastiche. Halcyon! Got a couple questions for you."

"Eh?" I tilted my head. "Might want to make 'em easy ones, because-"

Before I could blink, I was flung into the air and dropped on my back, a firm hoof holding my head to the ground. "There were two reasons we captured you the first time we met," Leif said, her voice sharp and urgent. "One of them was a side job. Why did we take it on?"

"What?" I struggled briefly. "You... It was from Graygarden, right? To get us out of the city..."

"Not who or what," Leif said. "Why did we accept the job?"

I didn't have the energy to fight. "You... Err..." Had she told me about this? When we were in the Sky District, surely... My brain clicked. "For money?"

Leif sighed and released me. "Sorry. Changeling precautions. Your password is now subliminal. If you're ever in a group of two or less for more than ten minutes, or after an hour regardless of who you're with, re-confirm who you are and then get a new one. Got it?"

I looked at her with a slightly surreal expression, climbing back to my hooves. "You're a changeling, and even you are this paranoid?"

She shrugged. "Just means I know better than most what our kind are capable of. And if those yaks are spooked enough to set a trap like that, I'm not about to write off their paranoia as jumping at shadows."

Behind us, Papyrus gently clapped. "Personally, I'm more of a fan of embracing the confusion, but this whole prove-your-identity thing does get entertaining after a while. Now then, Senescey, about your machine friend..."

"Stop calling me that," Leif growled. "Halcyon, I need to ask you: do you know any secrets about Coda's parentage? Anything at all she might not be privy to herself?"

I raised a weary eyebrow. "What's it matter?"

Leif pointed over her shoulder at the Nemestasis machine, which looked a lot more alive than when I saw it last. "Because she can make that thing turn on."

I blinked. There was absolutely significance to this I was missing.

Leif sighed, looking every bit as antsy and wound-up as I was weary. "Do you want the long version, or the extra-long version that I've already told twice today because nobody here knows how to sit still and stick together?"

"I'll tell it," Corsica volunteered, also audibly weary. "So. Remember last year, when they wanted my horn to unlock a terminal in the other room, that turned out to have a letter saying they were changelings?"

I nodded, part of Leif's story starting to come back to me, though I didn't want to interrupt now that Corsica was talking.

"That terminal was a fake," Corsica said. "Who knows why it was there; the windigoes probably did it to mess with them or something. The real machine they were looking for was this. It's allegedly got some hereditary biological locking and control mechanism. Beats me how it works, but it was supposedly tuned to 'the head scientist's daughter'. Which apparently isn't me..." She pointed at Coda. "It's her. Any ideas?"

I scratched an ear. "You mean it only works for one pony or family or whatever in the entire world, and out of every possible pony it could have been, it just randomly happened to be one we had with us?"

"Did somebody say suspiciously slim odds?" Papyrus asked from a corner. "See, that's what I said, but everyone else cares more about how pretty little Coda could be related to Icereach than how convenient it is that the first time anyone ever managed to drag her out of her isolated little airship, they took her right here."

Leif gave him a sharp look.

"What?" He shrugged. "All I'm saying is, if a certain secretive batpony from Icereach whom we know knew about this machine in advance happened to come to Ironridge with the intent of securing the friendship and presence of an elusive, wayward filly who happened to be the key to one of the world's most ridiculous weapons and bringing her back here, it would be an interesting plan to be in on, is all!"

I stared at him.

Coda was staring at me.

"...Halcyon?" she asked nervously. "This machine is... dangerous. It seems to be a control panel by means of which Icereach can launch bombs through the air at any place in the world. And everyone is debating the possibility that you won my trust and brought me here exclusively to have me use it. I can see their intentions, and no one truly believes you did, but only Corsica is certain you didn't, either. And even she is trying to hide from her doubts. It does seem quite the coincidence that... I know not even how it would be possible for control of this machine to run in my blood. Is there anything...?"

She trailed off and looked away, clearly not wanting to finish her question.

"No one except Papyrus is seriously floating that idea," Leif said, standing between me and the machine. "And I'll certainly not begrudge anyone their secrets. But if there's anything you'd like us to know, now would be a great time to say it, because the two alternatives are that this really is a coincidence - low odds, if I've ever seen them - or that someone else is manipulating things to a very thorough degree."

I...

I didn't have the mental energy for this. I was exhausted, and one little stun powder net, an involuntary bath and getting kicked around by the me under my mask was all it took to bring me this far down when I had been at my best.

Did Leif and the others seriously consider this was something I might do? Looking around at my company... Yes. A plan like that probably would be perfectly at home with Leif or Papyrus, and Corsica looked like she had just as much appetite for this as I did. And Coda was far too emotionally immature to sort through something like this on her own.

And, honestly, I had no alibi because even I wasn't certain I hadn't done this on purpose. Not when I had parallel selves who could keep my own memories hidden from me, or influence my phobias to control what I did with my life. For that matter, the avalanche - the point in time where I effectively came into being as a distinct person, according to Procyon and my own observations... The avalanche had brought me to the bottom of the Trench of Greg.

For all I knew, I could have been to this facility before, back then, and just not remember it. I sure had been within walking distance.

Maybe I had set all this up, subconsciously yet deliberately.

I swallowed, and made my choice.

"You should... probably tie me up," I sighed. "With a flashlight. Just in case."

Leif's eyebrows went up in alarm, and Papyrus's in eager interest.

"There is a very, very slight possibility..." I winced, choosing my words to hide as much as possible. "That I might... not... be playing with a well-shuffled deck. I promise you all I'd never do something like that on purpose. But there is a way, that I'd really rather not talk about, that I could be doing exactly what you just suggested while not being aware of why I was doing that. And I'm too worn-out already to be of much use to anyone, so you might as well be better safe than sorry."

Corsica looked at me with suspicious recognition. "Is this about the thing you told me in the sauna? About... you know?"

"Yeah," I said, nodding gratefully. "It's exactly that. And I'll try to deal with it. But still."

Leif started toward me. "When someone asks you to tie them up, questioning them is a great way for someone with a shallow imagination to meet their end."

Before I even realized what I had signed myself up for, it was done.

I was bound, gently enough that it wouldn't chafe but tightly enough that I couldn't escape, the old office room where I had once lost a game of chess against Elise serving as my well-lit prison. And, for a mercy, I was alone.

What was I doing with myself? Hadn't I just gone down this train of thought, walking in from the cold? And now I was worse off than I had been then, not just with dubious agency but with none at all.

I had thrown it away. Gotten overwhelmed, and my only response was to hide and curl up when there was who knew how much work to be done. If anything, I was worse off than the previous time I had been imprisoned here. It was like all of my experiences, my lessons, weren't building me up, but breaking me down.

It wasn't fair. I started to cry.

"This is always our response, isn't it?" Procyon asked, appearing once again.

"Shut up," I told her.

"Still think you can carry all of our burdens put together?" She raised an eyebrow, refusing to disappear. "An accidental, well-meaning betrayal did this to you. There are hundreds of thousands of millions of worse possible fates ponies can suffer, and you're well and thoroughly broken after a few little knocks. I regret my time in the void, Halcyon. Disappearing, nonexistence... It wasn't all it was cracked up to be. But look at yourself now and tell me you truly can't understand why this is a reaction you - and thus I - might have."

"Shut up," I repeated, a little more forcefully.

"You just need to accept our lot in life and stop trying to make us whole again," Procyon insisted, shaking her head. "I'm doing this for both our survival. Because, in case you forgot, I'm currently dependent on you to do anything except float around and phase through walls." She tapped one for emphasis, her ghostly hoof slipping right through. "You don't need to fight yourself like this. Just accept our limitations and live with what we can't do."

I glowered.

"If you want to prove me wrong, the bracelet is right there, on your leg," Procyon pointed out. "I bet you could burn away those ropes, if you could turn it on. Go outside, survive in the cold, be a hero and solve everything. The issue isn't whether you can, but whether you will. Because if you try, you'll only end up hurting yourself. Badly. It's how you wound up like this, right now." She stared me in the eye. "So if your vision for our future will work, then bring it about. The only thing stopping you is yourself. Keep trying to prove it until you give up and realize I'm just trying to protect you."

I took a deep breath... and yanked off-

-her mask.

A green crystal tumbled from Halcyon's bound hooves, landing a few steps away.

Oops.

She sighed, looking up at Procyon. "Stop trying to make your point. You aren't helping."

Procyon blinked. "Ahh. You again."

"Me." Halcyon's voice was dour, her void rushing distantly in her ears. "So... you know anything about what Leitmotif was talking about? Did we know about Coda, and bring her here on purpose?"

"You need to ask me?" Procyon shrugged, her posture slightly more confident and aggressive than when Halcyon had been wearing her mask. "Speaking of, I'm surprised you're asking anything at all. An empty, administrative shell like you shouldn't have those kinds of interests and desires. Or have you grown back a little bit of a soul while I've been away?"

"I am as I've always been," Halcyon replied coldly. "The only hole in my memory is the price we paid to Unnrus-Kaeljos... which you claim used to be filled by you. And I certainly don't wear a mask because I have no soul. So if you have any information about Coda and Nemestasis that you conveniently took with you when you left... Now is the time to turn it over."

Procyon frowned. "No need to be so prickly. We're on the same side, aren't we? Our goals for our old body going forward are the same: live out a life in peace and normalcy, and not go digging into things that are better off forgotten."

"Like you?" Halcyon raised an eyebrow. "Miss 'I didn't used to be a very nice pony'? Because I'm always watching, and you've been acting more like you're trying to break my mask than help her. What do you think is going to happen if you keep up goading her into playing with our powers and making her feel like fixing your dim outlook on life is her responsibility?"

"I've experienced what it's like to be forgotten," Procyon countered. "And it's worse than you think. I'm not just doing this for her, but for myself and apparently you, too. Living out your existence as a shade at the back of someone else's mind is an existence you'll eventually tire of, and you'll thank me then for all the work I'm doing to head that problem off."

"That's not an answer," Halcyon flatly stated.

Procyon rolled her shoulders. "Well, forgive me if I've forgotten the question, Your Emptiness. Look, it was you who tripped her up back there when she tried to use the bracelet. She's been growing, Halcyon. She's pushing your limits. And far better for her to run into them in a situation where doing so won't get us all killed, no? You and her need to have this fight so you can establish some hard, spoken rules with each other. Otherwise, with me or without me, she's going to keep pushing you."

"Then I'll phrase it as an order..." Halcyon's eyes narrowed. "Stop messing with my mask. I'll accept her having a greater grasp of our powers if it means I get to think less and do less interacting with the world. Everything you've done since appearing is trying to get everything outside my mask to have a greater role in her life, and that's the opposite of why she's here."

"What can I say?" Procyon didn't look particularly bothered. "Oblivion changed my mind."

Halcyon sighed.

"You know what I don't like about you?" Procyon asked, hovering. "You remind me of the way I used to be. I'm sure you're about to state the obvious reason for that, so spare yourself the trouble and move on to the less-obvious but more-important one instead: I've changed. You haven't. You represent a me that I dove into the very abyss itself to escape from being, and apparently the miserable shade I left behind is still trying to do the same in the shadow of our new, dominant self. Seeing that it hasn't changed you the same way, I'd hazard a guess it isn't working. Our mask might be trying to face her fears because she wants to cheer me up and get me a happy, flowery future, but I don't need it. Don't you realize that the one who benefits most from the fruits of my labors is you?"

"You know nothing about her state of mind," Halcyon growled. "She's not doing it for you, or me, or anyone else. She's doing it for herself. She's got causes she cares about, ways to use our powers for good, and that's something I might have not wound up the way I did if I had some growing up. It's not about you. Or me."

Procyon arched the bare corner of an eyebrow. "You almost say that like you weren't the one to interfere back there when she tried showing off with the bracelet."

"If I was strong enough to sit back and let her do it, I wouldn't have needed her in the first place," Halcyon sighed. "Now leave me alone. She's broken enough to come to me, no thanks to you, and I need to put her back together enough that we can survive this and I don't have to get my hooves bloody all over again to do the work for us."

Procyon shook her head. "Just try not to change her in the wrong direction..."

And then she floated through the closed door, and was gone.

Halcyon's heart hammered, a whole host of unwelcome emotions tight in her throat, and all of them thanks to Procyon. Keeping a distance from things was easy when she was in the back. But stepping up front to deal with the world like this...

Well, she could understand her mask's response, at least. It was the same as her own.

She focused on the bracelet's power. Her mask was beyond the kinds of personality melding she had once employed, months and years ago. There was only one good way to do this, though she wasn't looking forward to where it would lead.

With a flicker of emerald flame, a pointy, hole-ridden changeling horn appeared on her forehead, longer even than Corsica's. Unlike most of the other changelings she had seen, hers was also straight.

An emerald aura came to life around it, her void rushing louder as the power congealed into a light far solider than a normal, shimmery unicorn aura. It focused on the gemstone sitting on the floor...

And I opened my eyes.

"What...?" I scrubbed at my eyes, kicked a hoof, tried to get up... and my hooves went straight through the floor.

I was ephemeral. Just like Procyon.

Halcyon... My body was right in front of me, which meant I was where the gem had been. I looked down, pulling up and away into the air with an instinct so easy, it wasn't even intentional. The gem was gone.

I looked back at myself.

"I figured," Halcyon said, meeting my eyes, "it was time we met face to face."

For the first time, I could talk to the me behind the mask, know for certain she was listening, and expect an immediate response. And I had nothing to say.

"Not a pretty sight, is it?" she asked, her oversized horn disappearing. "Watching other parts of yourself argue. You probably don't envy either of us. But that's why you exist. To be better than we'd be otherwise."

I shivered. "The bracelet..."

"Is powerful," Halcyon finished for me. "Even I don't know everything it can do. But, I know enough."

"And you're that afraid of letting me use it," I said.

Halcyon just nodded.

"I could..." I touched my leg, where the bracelet belonged, and realized that once again, I had no clothes on. "I might need that power. With... where I'm going."

"You might," Halcyon agreed. "Maybe even you will."

"Then why not let me use it?" I whispered. "Why fight me? Don't you want me to succeed and be happy and protect my friends? You have to care about Mother as much as I do."

Halcyon averted her eyes. "Where do you think... the fear you felt back then comes from? You think I just pluck it out of thin air? That I say, 'wow, I could use some fear right about now,' and then you feel it, just like that? That I'm twisting knobs on a machine?"

I didn't answer.

"It doesn't work like that," she said. "You knew this at the beginning, but the idea was for you to forget as you grew more solid. The mask is a filter. A lens. You are me, just... protected a bit. In ways that I don't know if I deserved to be, but never was. All of your emotions, though, I feel too. You may not understand why you're feeling them, but we're the same person. Everything you feel, I feel, and vice versa. So back then, when you were trying to use the bracelet just now... We just got a little closer than normal. That's all."

My ears fell. "What are you that scared of?"

"Savor the time before you find out," Halcyon replied. "By now, you're well-formed enough that I'm not sure I could take it away if you learned everything and regretted it. Perhaps you could handle it. Like I just told our third counterpart, you have tools and resources that I never did: friends to share your burdens with, and a worthy cause to apply your strength to. But I don't know for sure that it'll be enough. Maybe it's more than enough and I'm a coward who's afraid of nothing, but... can you imagine what it would be like if you had to join me at the back of our mind and we started over again with a new mask? I'm not sure I could take it."

I shuddered.

"I know you want to say you're strong enough," Halcyon insisted. "But you've seen where we are now. You're keenly sensitive to how and why we got in this state." She pushed uselessly at the ropes holding her. "I know this. I felt it too. I don't mean to discourage you or beat you down, I just... We have to be able to survive this. Because situations like this are going to happen again. There's just no amount of molding a mask can do to make us... me, you... not want to take risks and step out of our comfort zone in search of something better."

"Can you help me?" I asked. "Is there anything you can do?"

Halcyon shrugged as best as her ropes would allow. "I'm already doing more than I've done in nearly three years, coming out and meeting you like this. I can't live my life, staying in control for every hour of every day, being me and knowing all my decisions will have consequences and everything else involved in living. But what I want more than anything else is for you to be able to do that. Take this with a grain of salt, because most of my limitations are emotional, not physical... but if there's any way I can help you, I will."

I sighed. This was... not how I imagined trying to make peace with myself would go.

"What about Procyon?" I asked. "Why were you and her so hostile to each other?"

"Dunno." Halcyon slumped. "Maybe she's telling the truth about not liking the way she used to be. I certainly wouldn't have become you if I was happy with the way I was. But... I don't like what she's turned into, either. Listen, our power... I know that power is only a tool, and whether it's used for good or bad depends more than anything on the heart of the one using it. But can you truly say you don't have a dark side, even after all my work to keep you from having one? We were raised without friends, Faye notwithstanding, by a negligent single mother. For an understandable reason, but the effect was the same nevertheless. We're lacking a lot in life. We have so little that we can't afford not to be at least a little selfish, and we maybe haven't had the best role models either. Procyon just feels like what I fear I could turn into if I stopped caring about the consequences of my actions."

"...But she's still part of us," I pointed out. "We've gotta learn to live together somehow. And trying to disappear or live off the map from each other clearly isn't working."

"I know," Halcyon sighed. "And maybe you can do it. I'm just afraid of what she represents."

I thought on this for a moment. "What's she even want? She was talking to me like it was impossible for me to use the bracelet, but talking to you like she wanted to goad me into trying it."

Halcyon shook her head. "Wish I could tell you. I can't see her thoughts like I can to yours. I don't remember her at all, either. Which, according to her, is the point..."

"You think she knows anything about Coda and Project Nemestasis, then?" I asked, aware this had been discussed already.

Halcyon frowned. "I couldn't tell you. I really don't know what to make of her. You know the feeling you get when you think on things that are obscured from your memories, right?"

I nodded.

"I never get that feeling when I think back on my life," she said. "Ever. There's one time, when I visited Unnrus-Kaeljos, where my memories are a different kind of fuzzy. There's gray static. It feels like watching a projector film when the recording is bad, and then there's a split in the middle where two ends are just stitched together. But I don't feel like that anywhere else. However Unnrus-Kaeljos's magic works, it's different from what I did when making you. Because of that, I have no clues to anything that might have been taken along with Procyon when she left."

"Huh." I looked away. "How many memories are there? Ones that I don't have?"

"Not as many as you'd think," Halcyon answered. "One dream, that I re-erase every time you have it again... or at least try to. It involves our red hooves. I also obscured events around our meeting with Unnrus-Kaeljos, because... I thought your life would be easier if you could place your belief in a mysterious deity you knew nothing about, and build up your own belief system instead of relying on what I saw. Your friendship with Corsica never would have been the same, otherwise. Then I let you forget Ansel was a changeling, though that one got reverted already. Beyond that, just things I learned early in life about the nature of our powers."

"Huh," I repeated. "Guess you're as clueless as I am about that business with Coda."

Halcyon hesitated. "I know... one thing that might be a piece of the puzzle. But it's dangerous, and it wouldn't help you right now anyway. If this particular thing does become important later on, I promise I'll at least try to make myself tell you."

"As long as it doesn't involve us trying to use Coda as a key to the rocket controls," I said, shaking my head. "Well... what now?"

"How are you feeling?" Halcyon asked, tilting her head.

I seriously considered it. And, honestly, I was feeling a lot better. Somehow, getting to sit back, take a break from the action, and talk in earnest with my secretive inner self was exactly what I needed.

"Decent," I decided. "Not sure how much good it does us, though, now that I've gotten us tied up."

"We're not that stuck." Halcyon pulled at a rope. "With the bracelet, we could break these easily. But what would you do next?"

Odds were, emotionally wreck myself again. I looked down. "I dunno."

"You could stay like this for now," Halcyon suggested. "As a... whatever you are. Being up front isn't so bad when there's nothing to do like this. And being invisible, intangible, going through walls... Maybe you could learn something useful like this. Don't pretend for a minute we've walked into an easy situation. Come back here when you've got something you know you need to be free for. Get your determination back, show yourself you can bounce all the way back from what just happened to you. When you're ready, I'll turn you back into my mask, put you back on, and you can try again to use our power."

I nodded. "Do I have a maximum range? How does this work?"

Halcyon shrugged. "Never done it myself. You'll find out, though. You've always been fond of testing your limits."

"Thanks," I said earnestly, psyching myself up for a lowest-possible-stakes reconnaissance mission where I actually, unironically, had no actions I could take that would affect the world or have immediate consequences. "Once we're properly safe and finally get a break from all the crazy, I'd really like to talk to you again, by the way."

"Heh. Maybe." Halcyon's laugh was flat. "Just focus on making something of our life first. I'll be rooting for you, even though you know how I feel about what will happen if you win."

"Last question," I said, floating towards the door. "We're a changeling."

"That's not a question," Halcyon pointed out. "Anyway, didn't Leif tell you as much?"

"Yeah, but she said there was a difference between batponies and ones who had 'awakened' or something," I pressed. "And you summoned a horn just then. We can shapeshift."

Halcyon hesitated. "What we can do... is far, far from normal, even by changeling standards. Don't put too much stock in how Leif says this works." She tapped the bracelet for emphasis. "She doesn't have one of these. But, yes. We can shapeshift. I may have cheated just a little bit in the past to make your disguise kit talent work better."

"Hope you're feeling up to cheating a little harder in the future," I told her, floating for the door. "Something tells me that if I do come back here with something urgent to do, that would be a pretty useful ability to have."

Limits

I was shocked by the speed with which Leif's organizational skills brought our caravan together. By sunset, we had stocked the wagon with camping supplies and enough food to last us for six weeks - the upper bound on how long it would take us to reach Snowport, depending how long we kept up our pace each day and how long we stopped in the two towns along the way.

On the one hoof... six weeks. That was a time loss we couldn't afford to take, not when there was a four-month journey up next to get to Catantan. On the other, we hadn't wasted any time in preparing.

As the sun dipped below the western mountains, I cut a swift pace through the town's streets, the wagon tied behind me and Braen at my side. The two of us were probably going to do the bulk of the pulling, so we decided to practice before taking on passengers who could complain about a bumpy ride. Our pace was half again what we had been told would be sustainable, and when my bracelet was off, I could feel myself already beginning to flag... but when I turned it up just a little, the tiredness was pushed away.

If only I had the courage and the resources to properly study what this thing could do. Now that I knew it was my changeling queen crown, I had something resembling a point to begin that research... but the true test would be now, trying to use it for hours at a time over a span of weeks, enhancing myself and pushing my strength to move the wagon faster, in a situation where every day counted. If my bracelet had limitations - or rather, if I had limitations that manifested through my bracelet - I would probably find out soon.

We got an early sleep and an earlier start. I stalled just long enough to watch the sun rise over the water, and then we were off: myself, Corsica, Braen, Papyrus, Mother, Leitmotif and a stallion called Plaid Trousers who gave us a decent price to serve as our guide. Fishy saw us off with a pre-dawn breakfast at the town hall, and Fluffy Fleece left us with a useful parting gift that even Leif hadn't thought to ask for: a colored-pencil sketch of Starlight as a filly, with extra detail on her special talent. For some reason, only Corsica and Braen seemed to appreciate having a visual reference for our target.

The road leaving Sires Hollow was anything but straight. We wound our way through a steep, awkward pass on the southeast side of town, descending into the valley of a river that flowed northeast into the talon. Soon, the river forked: a branch coming from the north, Trousers explained, was fed from an underground spring that was probably sourced from the river we had entered town on. That river poured into a lake, and the lake sourced several creeks that ran through town, but all of them eventually disappeared, resurfacing here to complete the final leg of their journey to the sea.

We followed the southern branch instead, the road sticking close beside it as numerous tributaries flowed down from the west. Pine trees dominated the valley, and Braen matched my pace, pulling the wagon along even as its wheels bumped on roots and uneven stones. Trousers warned us against pushing ourselves too hard, but Mother brushed him off: we were kids. No way to learn a lesson except through experience.

Seven hours in, and we were forced to stop for food. I kept my bracelet going, a funny sensation warning that if I turned it off now, all the exhaustion of the past few hours would hit me like a falling tree.

Eating with the bracelet turned on was... strange. I had done it before while using the bracelet for light, snacking in Corsica's lab while being too lazy to turn the proper lights on, but having it turned up enough to bolster my strength was a different story. Food felt tingly in my mouth, and kind of flaky, and it was like I was trying to taste it through a layer of cotton. And whenever I swallowed, I got the vague sensation that it wasn't really reaching my stomach... but eventually, after a little more than I usually ate, I still got full.

We set off again, and I volunteered for another shift. This got some strange looks from the others, especially Trousers, but as long as my bracelet stayed on, I was pretty sure I would be fine.

Braen, for her part, showed no signs of exhaustion: repeated attempts to press her on her power source were met with vague and dramatic answers that sounded like they were meant for entertaining young children. But for some reason, nobody save Trousers asked after me.

Once, the lack of attention would have been my ideal existence. Overlooked, ignored, ponies assuming I was insignificant... Now, however, it gave me the unsettling feeling that they didn't need to ask. As if what I was doing - a process I barely understood myself - was an open secret, and I was the only one who didn't realize everyone else knew.

Mother would know, of course. But. Leitmotif? Corsica? Papyrus? A worm of doubt nibbled away at me, and as it did, I started to realize how badly I needed dinner.

Halcyon, Faye said inside me. You probably can't hear it, but as you've been doing this, the rush of our emptiness has slowly been getting louder.

Huh. That was... ominous.

Keep listening, I thought back. Let me know if anything changes fast enough to be alarming. I doubt you've ever stress-tested us like this, so let's keep going and see what we learn.

A few hours after we stopped for dinner, night fell. During dinner, Trousers counseled that we stop to make camp: we had made great time for the first day, and the spot where he usually stopped when caravaning was already an hour or two behind us. But that emboldened me to push on, because I still felt fine beneath the bracelet's soft crackle. And while I thought about how much time we could save by covering extra miles today, Faye informed me that the rush had quieted ever so slightly.

I didn't know what to make of that. But I did know that if I went to sleep and woke up too cramped to move, it would be nice to have a little more distance already logged. So, we kept going.

Trousers counseled a little more forcefully for us to make camp as dusk fell, but upon learning that we had covered a full day and a half of ground today, I was hesitant: with the bracelet on, I wasn't feeling the tug of sleep on my eyelids, and Braen was apparently fine as well. What if we just kept on going? What if I could walk all the way through the night, and make one day count for three?

Corsica had to get right up in my face and point out that, unless I felt like never sleeping for a whole two weeks, I'd just be building up a sleep deficit that I'd have to work off at some point before I could pull again... and that was ignoring how this work was infinitely more strenuous than merely sitting around at home while pulling an all-nighter. And then Papyrus reminded me that, because I had been pulling all day long instead of taking shifts like we planned, he was still fresh, and so was Corsica, and so was our guide.

Reluctantly, I relented, letting my bracelet go-

"Huh," Corsica said, catching Halcyon as she went limp, barely halfway out of the wagon harness. "Sound asleep. That was fast."

"I'm amazed she didn't pass out miles ago," Plaid Trousers grunted, not actually wearing any of his namesake. "Now are we making camp, or are you doing this your way?"

Papyrus yawned. "Well, I'm technically fresh, but it's also my bedtime, and the only one pushing us to keep going is no longer able to advocate..."

"I'll be curious to see if she feels that in the morning," Leif mused, getting equipment out of the wagon. "If she's somehow able to sustain sixteen hours of pulling a day, we could set up a rotation where the rest of us pull when it's light out and she handles nights. I bet she'll be out longer than the rest of us, and might even naturally be awake tomorrow night as a result."

"You kids sure are in a hurry," Trousers grumbled. "I guess for a machine it makes sense, but how determined are you that you can push yourselves that hard?" He shook his head in bewilderment at Halcyon's slumbering form.

"Dunno." Corsica hoisted her friend, looking around for a place to set her. "Maybe we're just that good."

"It's her leg band," Leif explained. "It's enchanted. Also cursed, so it doesn't take kindly to changing owners - don't think we can share it. But it allows for some funky stuff."

"Giga cursed," Papyrus added, nodding sagely. "Believe me, I've heard the stories. You should have seen what happened to its last owner... You were there, right?" He gave Corsica a nod that said your turn.

Corsica didn't miss a beat, faking a massive shudder. "That's... Ugh. I don't wanna think about it."

Plaid Trousers looked disturbed.

"Important thing is, we're all a little eccentric," Corsica continued. "You have to be, to get a writ north of the mountains. But who doesn't have their quirks, or a little trick they can do? Hallie's got a magic bracelet that gives endurance or something, but that's nothing compared to Papyrus's ridiculous knowledge of far eastern politics."

Papyrus chuckled and took back the conversation, leaving Corsica to look sideways at Leitmotif: Halcyon's bracelet, huh?

She knew it was an heirloom from the Griffon Empire, knew it could grant the wearer some sort of power, and back in Ironridge, Halcyon had seemed to think it was special enough that it could be the reason all of Cold Karma's divisions were interested in her. But what did Leif and Papyrus know about that? Corsica first suspected it of being special when she saw it blazing while Halcyon chased her through a blizzard, back when she got possessed. And she felt like Halcyon had told her Leif specifically didn't know it was special...

Or maybe both of them were just fast thinkers who saw it glowing while Halcyon was running and picked up on it as a convenient excuse.

Corsica finished setting up a tent with her horn, sighed, and lugged Halcyon's unconscious form inside, preparing their bedrolls. If the bracelet did something as simple as letting Halcyon run all day while pulling a cart while suspending her tiredness, you'd think Halcyon would have no problems telling her that. But instead, she was just as tight-lipped about it as Corsica was with her special talent. And that probably meant her silence had a good reason... but what?

She tucked herself in and let her horn go out. At least her special talent wasn't nearly as conspicuous when it was being used as a glowing green bracelet. Sure, intentionally triggering it involved an activation phrase, but one that was easy to weave into normal conversation. If Halcyon kept using her bracelet, though, ponies were bound to get curious.

I awoke to a wall of cramps and the feeling of the wagon bumping beneath me.

It was late afternoon, we were still following the river, and Papyrus was taking a shift pulling with Braen. There wasn't much room to stretch in the wagon, not with four other ponies and our supplies, but I did the best I could, and after an hour we stopped for lunch, and I volunteered for another shift.

My bracelet felt different, somehow, when I turned it on. More familiar, as if something in my body was acclimatizing to having it turned on for long periods at a time. Mother's burned leg still hovered at the back of my mind, but I had never really felt my fear of overdoing it the same since I learned I was a changeling queen: it made too much sense that this was my bracelet, and Mother got penalized somehow because she wasn't its real owner.

At the same time, Mother always talked about her injury like it wasn't a price you could pay by accident. Like there was some threshold of pushing the bracelet that I would feel as it approached...

I wasn't using it hard, though, just using it long.

The road began sloping upward more steadily. I imagined we would eventually hit a pass and from there it would be downhill all the way to the next town, but as night fell, there was still no pass in sight.

I tried to gauge how I was feeling, but it was an impossible task while the bracelet was on, and if I turned it off I risked passing out again from exertion. But, I had woken up late, and no one was yet calling for us to make camp, so I pushed on.

Eventually, I called back to the cart, where multiple ponies were fitfully sleeping. No, I was told: if I was this determined to make headway, I was welcome to drag us on all throughout the night, and either stop when I was tired or let someone else take a shift so I could go to sleep in the morning. Apparently, this had been discussed in the morning, while I was still unconscious.

The tone of the announcement reminded me of a parent figuring it would be fine to let a filly help in the kitchen because they expected to do everything themselves anyway, so it wouldn't matter if the kid contributed nothing. Which was a weird tone to have, considering I was contributing quite a lot... Maybe Trousers was put out at having his advice being ignored, and maybe Mother and Leif were frustrated they couldn't do this themselves? Or maybe...

"Those flames don't set things on fire. If they did, you wouldn't be able to turn it off once it's burning. And the scars aren't burn marks. They're more like a... price. And not one you can pay by accident."

Mother's words concerning my bracelet's effects on her floated through my mind. She was right here, actually, watching me use this same power that had crippled her for life. There was probably no way she would allow me to push myself in a way that might be legitimately dangerous, right?

Or maybe she was expecting me to reach my limit, learn it, back off and be useless for the rest of the trip. Those expectations could warrant this, too.

Embarrassed, I pushed on. As nice as it would be to pace myself and respect my limits, I had to learn them before I could plan around them. And if a cross-continental hike where speed was of essence wasn't the time to push myself, I wasn't sure what was.

I expected a pass, and we finally reached one as the sky was beginning to tinge with dawn. Unfortunately, what lay beyond looked a lot more like the Trench of Greg than a smooth, easy ride downhill to the next town.

A lake filled the valley in front of us, and the road swung sharply to the left, winding down the steep mountain wall. In the distance, I could see the road skirt around the lake's eastern end, where it looked like the mountains got lower and it could continue without climbing back up again.

Halfway down the mountain, I encountered a large clearing with ample evidence of previous convoys, and we stopped there for breakfast.

Remembering what had happened the last time I turned my bracelet off abruptly, I kept it burning this time, eating a modest portion - not enough to be full, since I was going to sleep immediately after, but enough that I wouldn't wake up starving and weakened. My experience of eating with the bracelet on remained unchanged: it felt like the food didn't quite fully exist, or wasn't entirely reaching me.

Why was that? And where did the power it lent me come from, anyway?

I knew what the bracelet was, now, but if anything, it made less sense than before. This wasn't some mystical external artifact that was lending me power, it was tied to me and me alone. And while I actually knew nothing about where changeling queen crowns came from, or why we had them in the first place, Coda had talked about hers more like it was a focus for her power.

Was my bracelet like a key, unlocking abilities I possessed all along? If so, then where was I getting my power? It was basic science: no matter how powerful a being was, the things they did still took energy, and all that energy had to come from somewhere. How Braen was powered was just as good of a question as what I was running on.

After breakfast, I sat in the cart and let someone else take a shift, and tried to cling to consciousness as I turned my bracelet off. I lowered it slowly, backing off as I felt a wave of exhaustion approach, dimming it again when I had steadied myself... It was the staying-up-too-late equivalent of trying to ease yourself into a scalding bath. And while my body was a solid wall of hurt, I managed to stay aware enough to feel it.

Maybe... Maybe part of how my bracelet worked involved borrowing from my future self? Numbing pain, postponing the physical consequences of my actions? Feeling the way I felt now, I probably really could hurt myself pushing myself this hard... but if I didn't, I could get really buff doing this.

In fact, my existing fitness was probably the biggest reason I could survive this at all. But if this hypothesis proved at all accurate, that would be a pretty big incentive to get even fitter.

...That could be a consideration for tomorrow. I didn't want to fight it anymore. I passed out.

The next time I woke, it was early evening, and I didn't recognize the terrain. We were now following a stream flowing in the same direction as us. Presumably, that meant we had passed the lake I saw, and this was fed by it?

Trousers confirmed that we had passed the halfway point to the first of two midpoint towns, and I felt a streak of jubilation. Assuming the towns were roughly equidistant, that was a full sixth of the way to Snowport. The estimates we planned for said six weeks, so about one week to reach this point. And we had done it in three days and two nights, one of which we weren't even moving for.

Plaid Trousers seemed torn between being impressed and counting Braen as cheating. Just as they didn't have any sort of mana engines on their boats, I learned, the ponies of Sires Hollow did their caravans without any machinery more advanced than axles and wheels. Having an untiring automaton who could cheerfully pull a cart for days on end completely changed the playing field, let alone me and my magical stamina. It was almost enough to make me consider whether our walking speed was faster than an average boat.

My knowledge of boats was too poor to guess for sure, and I felt like asking would be silly. So I focused instead on walking, experimenting with turning my bracelet up and down, seeing how higher settings affected my strength and how hard it was to push myself with the bracelet giving less aid. It was hard to know for sure, especially when I was beginning to feel the effects of so much heavy work even through the usual level of on. But at the very least, my theory that it was delaying the consequences of my exertions wasn't disproved.

I let myself pass out early, realizing that I was the only one pushing for us to travel at night, and that if I didn't wake up in time, we would make camp and lose a night. This time, falling asleep was a little harder than before, both because I was so cramped and limp and tired and also because I hadn't been pulling for nearly as long this time. But still, it happened.

On the evening of the fourth day, I awoke, and the cycle repeated. And just as I prepared to do the same on day five, we reached the first town.

I wished I could have experienced it, but about all I knew was that we spent two nights and one day there, waiting out a rainstorm and allowing ponies to rest up from the march. Did Papyrus need it? Corsica? Trousers? I was too out of it to check, but I had a funny feeling it was mostly for me.

Our march resumed, and I fell back into a routine, quickly losing track of the days. Wake up. Dinner. Pull. Night. Pull. Breakfast. Sleep. How many hours a day was I putting in? Was I walking, or was I running? Was everyone else as tired as I was? Embracing the monotony felt like the best way to get through it, and I felt like I always had the strength to continue, even as my thoughts grew distant and the scenery faded from my primary entertainment to a forgotten afterthought.

"Hey," Corsica said, pushing open the door to Nehaley's room in an inn in the second town. "Got a sec?"

"A lot more than one." Nehaley was chewing gum again, staring out the window at the town's talon. Unlike Sires Hollow, it was a gentle shore, and most of the town was built in sight of the water. "What?"

"I'm worried about Halcyon," Corsica said, getting straight to the point. "You seen the way she's acting?"

Nehaley raised an eyebrow. "Pulling that cart for twelve to sixteen hours a day and sleeping the rest, without fail?"

Corsica shook her head. "Going fast is a good thing. I'm just worried about whatever price she's paying to do it. No one's that strong and that determined... Except Braen, at least, but I have my own questions about how she works. I know it has something to do with that bracelet, I know she got it from you, and I know she wouldn't keep it a secret how it works if it was harmless and straightforward. So what's the catch?"

Nehaley chewed her gum. "Isn't that her story to tell?"

"She's pretty out of it." Corsica pointed back over her shoulder. "And not 'I just ran ten marathons' out of it. This is 'wave in front of your eyes and you don't blink' out of it. So I figured I'd ask you. It was your bracelet originally, right?"

"Might have been." Nehaley shrugged. "It belonged to someone else before that. Not sure how much I can tell you."

Corsica gave her a look. "You know more than that. Your kid is potentially misusing something dangerous and that's the best you can give me to help her? If it wasn't dangerous, there wouldn't need to be any secrets about it."

Nehaley glanced at the door. "You overestimate me. And you overestimate her, too. Neither of us know much about it. She's probably pushing herself, trying to learn. Are you that worried?"

"Come see for yourself." Corsica waved her along.

Nehaley actually followed, and moments later they were in the room Corsica shared with Halcyon. Halcyon was sitting in her bed, looking deeply lost in thought.

"Hey," Corsica said, strolling up to her. "I've been thinking: we're tired, we've got extra food, we need a rest. Think we should put our hooves up here for a week?"

"What?" Halcyon looked like she was sparing about a tenth of her attention. "Err, no. We're going on to Snowport."

"You sure look thrilled about it." Corsica gave her a cheeky grin. "That really as much excitement as you've got?"

"...Yeah," Halcyon managed. "Just gotta make it there first."

Corsica raised an eyebrow at Nehaley. "We're literally at a rest break. Coziest place for miles around. And she sounds like she's pushing through a shift on the wagon right now."

Nehaley frowned, walked closer, and stared at Halcyon's eyes. Then she reached down and popped the bracelet off her foreleg.

Corsica blinked. Halcyon's hoof hadn't left the floor. And it was a circlet. How...?

A spark of shock crossed Halcyon's eyes. "Hey, what-?"

"Huh," Nehaley said, holding the bracelet up to her eye and looking through it. She tapped the edge a few times. "Well, you've been overusing something."

"What are you looking at?" Corsica tried to get closer. "How'd you even get that off?"

"Here." Nehaley passed it to her. "Don't wear it. And don't give it back to her for... mmm, a day. Use your own judgement. I'm going back to my room."

"No, that's mine, give it back," Halcyon protested, trying to reach for the bracelet... and then trailing off. "Are we in... Wait, what happened?"

Corsica looked at the bracelet, then at Halcyon. "You good, there?"

Halcyon stumbled over to the window, pulling it open. "I think I need some fresh air..."

My mind felt as though someone had just shoveled years of detritus off a countertop. I knew, academically, where I was, and what I had been doing the past week or two. And I could remember my time in Sires Hollow, and everything leading up to it, with great clarity. But soon after, my memories started deteriorating... or perhaps my memories were fine, but my senses had been dulled during the experiences. The further I went, the duller it got, right up until this moment, right now.

Now, my ears rang, and my head buzzed, and all the cart pulling had still left my body aching beyond repair. But beneath those ailments, I was lucid. I was me. And something about those memories made me wonder if, just a moment ago, I couldn't say the same.

"...You good?" Corsica repeated behind me.

I turned, breathing deeply and collecting my focus. My bracelet was there, floating in her aura. Not on my leg where it belonged.

Get it back, all my instincts told me. That's only safe for you to use! And who knows what would happen if you lost it?

But at the same time, the look Corsica was giving me suggested she wasn't holding onto it because she wanted to use it.

"Was I really that out of it?" I asked, lowering my hoof.

"What did I ask you right before your mom took this?" Corsica asked, waggling my bracelet.

I hesitated. Was this a trick question? Or...

Honestly, I couldn't remember the specific words anyone had used since the first or second day of our travels.

Well, I had wanted to test the limits of my power, and apparently now I had found one. And it was a particularly problematic one, because I hadn't even realized anything was happening to me until it was all gone.

"You there?" Corsica waved at me. "Hallie? Anyone home?"

"Yeah, I'm here." I focused on reality again. "I don't remember what you asked me. I don't... remember a lot of anything. How long have we been walking?"

Corsica shrugged. "Counting our big breaks, about two weeks. We're close. The last leg is the shortest, and between you and Braen we've made ridiculous time. But you've been kinda..." She held up the bracelet and gave me a pointed look. "With how ahead of schedule we are, we can afford to dawdle. Everyone else is tired; I pulled that wagon for four hours a day and I'm wrecked. Whole team voted on this, no overruling us. So that means you've got all the time in the world to tell me why this thing turned you into a vegetable."

I looked down.

"Take your time." Corsica turned away. "Like I said, you've got plenty. But if this is at all related to what you clammed up about the night we arrived in Sires Hollow... think long and hard about whether that's really a secret you want to carry by yourself. Because if the way to snap you out of this is to take your bracelet away, you need someone in on the act who you can trust."

Snapping me out of it by taking my bracelet away... "Wait a minute," I said. "If you're gonna keep it until we can have a talk, that's... fine. But can I touch it first, real quick? Just for a second."

Corsica tilted her head.

I sighed. "I can't tell you how it works because I don't know, but you've got a point, so I promise I'll tell you why I don't know just as soon as my head stops hurting. But long story short, I was stress-testing myself on the walk here to see what would happen. Can I have it just for a second, for research purposes?"

Frowning, Corsica floated it closer. I reached out...

A little jolt of static shocked my senses as Corsica pulled the bracelet away. I hadn't been aware of it while it was happening, but when she removed it, I definitely was: even just putting a booted hoof on the rim had dulled me again, right up until I let go.

"Thanks," I sighed. "That's... what I needed to know. It doesn't do anything weird when you touch it, right? Better not wear it, just to be safe."

Corsica tapped it, then shrugged. "Not that I can see."

"Figures. Well, I guess you'll have to hold onto it for now."

It hurt to say it, and about three quarters of me felt like I was saying it prematurely, but I couldn't think of any other tests that might disprove my immediate hypothesis: I had overused it by a dangerous amount. Only, instead of burning out my leg like Mother, I had broken the bracelet, and now I could no longer even touch it until I figured out what was wrong and how to fix it.

Learning about the limits of my powers, I decided, was a pretty unforgiving task.

End Of Prologue

For a moment, Twilight was quiet. Then she said, "No. I'm afraid that doesn't ring any bells. But I'll see what I can do to help you on my own."

Corsica looked her up and down. Didn't know anyone called Valey or Starlight, huh? Then why did she specify helping 'on her own'? Even if she didn't know the two ponies she was specifically asking about, surely a princess would have armies of other ponies to do the job...

Back in Icereach, Corsica had been surrounded by patent mongers who were notorious for never saying what they were actually thinking. In Ironridge, it had been the same, working in a governmental office and seeing the nonchalance with which everyone lied and obfuscated what they were actually up to. And Corsica's best friend had recently devolved into a serial liar who couldn't even talk to her anymore without hiding behind a different persona, as though it was work that needed to be foisted on someone else. So it was safe to say that Corsica felt practiced in her ability to tell whether a pony was avoiding trying to give her a straight answer... and still, she felt like a foal could have seen that Princess Twilight was lying through her teeth.

So she smiled. "Oh! So you do know them!"

Twilight sputtered, her composure breaking instantly. "What? No, that's not... I-I said I don't! I mean, why would you assume otherwise?"

Corsica sat back on her haunches and folded her forelegs, still grinning. "You're pretty new to this, aren't you?"

Twilight sighed. "I believe I said that a while ago, yes. And while I was prepared for someone to try and take advantage of me to get some policy concessions, I didn't expect you'd come here just to be rude."

"Sorry," Corsica apologized with a shrug. "Had a stressful life. But you are holding out on us, right? If contacting Starlight is impractical or something, you could just tell us why."

"Oh, it's not impractical," Twilight said, blinking and appearing to realize she had just essentially admitted to her charade. "I just... think... you would probably be better helped by someone else! I mean, it sounds like you've got a whole host of problems that brought you here, ones that definitely aren't urgent at all, because you know how hard it is getting here, and maybe you should ask someone who both wants to and is able to do something about it? At the very least, you should talk to Celestia."

"Yup. Waiting on her right now." Corsica bobbed her head. "Any idea when she'll be back?"

Twilight frowned. "Well, she shouldn't be that far away. She and Luna are just out cleaning up the magical aftermath of that freak storm that showed up during the Crystalling, so you could probably see them from any window... Your train didn't get caught in that, did it?"

"The storm? Nah, we waited it out before we left," Corsica said, waving her hoof. "You sure they're out there, though? Didn't your guards say they went to oversee things in Snowport, or something?"

"Snowport?" Twilight blinked, tilting her head. "I'm not familiar with it. Is that an outlier town that could have been hit, too?" She glanced around for the guards, but none were present. "Where's a map when you need one? I knew I should have studied this region's geography closer! I mean, I've tried it a few times, but the cartographical surveys of the area are all badly outdated due to the Empire's return, and it's not like there was any reason to conduct accurate surveys up here before that in the first place..."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Port town just to the east? Major trade artery between water and rail?"

Twilight squinted at her. "Why would something like that be left off all the maps?"

Corsica chuckled. Telling one princess things other princesses didn't want her to know sounded like a terrible way to curry favor with Equestria's monarchy, but if it was really set up in such a ridiculously floppy way, they deserved it and she deserved to be the one to do it. "Well, have I got a story for-"

The elevator door slid open, and the guard stepped back out, accompanied by two more guards and a pair of pegasi, one yellow with a pink mane and the other teal with a rainbow mane that was probably visible from miles away.

"Your Highness," the guards said, bowing to Twilight. "Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy."

Leif's eyes widened as she saw them, and she sucked in a breath. "You're the-"

The pegasus with the rainbow mane - who had better be Rainbow Dash, or else the universe was a fraud - raised an eyebrow at her and grinned. "I'm the...?"

Leif closed her eyes and shook her head, pointing a wing at Corsica. "Never mind. She's speaking for us."

"Come on," Rainbow Dash badgered her, "you can do better than that! The helmetheads say you're here from Ironridge? And I'm famous enough that you know me up there? Come on, you totally recognized me!"

"Rainbow-" Twilight began, lifting a hoof.

"Wait wait wait," Rainbow Dash interrupted, cutting her off. "Uhh... pop quiz, to make sure you're not pulling my tail. What are the four districts of Ironridge?"

"Day, Night, Ice and Sky," Corsica said. "Depending what time period you mean. They've gotten shuffled around lately. Some ponies disagree on what to call them."

Rainbow Dash raised a suspicious eyebrow. "Oh yeah? What were they... twenty years ago?"

"Steel, Earth, Stone, Sky, Fire, Water and Shadow," Braen said, listening curiously.

"Woah, you can talk!" Rainbow pointed a wing at her. "And you're, like, a suit of armor... except you don't look big enough to have a pony inside? Do you know anypony called Shinespark?"

Braen stood proudly and puffed out her metal chest. "Shinespark is Braen's mother!"

Rainbow Dash stared forcefully at Twilight with a this-is-so-cool grin, daring her to get excited too.

"Rainbow-" Twilight tried again.

"No, wait!" Rainbow interrupted once more. "Do, uhh..." Her ruby eyes sparkled with anticipation. "Do any of you know a mare called Valey? And if so, is she still alive and kicking?"

"Sure do," Corsica said. "And she's the one who sent us here."

"Valey is other mother," Braen confirmed with a sage nod.

Twilight groaned.

Rainbow Dash whirled on her with a sky-splittingly stupid grin. "Yes! I knew it! I knew it! In your face! I told you she was still around!" She turned back to Corsica. "So, let me guess: you guys are either here because everything is magically nice and happy in the north now, and Valey wants you to go look for Starlight and tell her to come home... or, more likely, everything is a dumpster fire and Valey wanted you to go find her and ask her to come back and help save the city. Or the world. Am I right on the money, or what?"

"The second one," Corsica said with an appreciative nod. "See, you get it."

Twilight wilted.

"Hey, shellhead!" Rainbow yelled to one of the guards. "Think you can go find Starlight? She's probably still nerding out at Sunburst's house. And do me a favor and don't tell her about these guys or why they're here or any of it. Make it a surprise. I'll never let you live it down if I miss seeing the look on her face."

The guard stiffly saluted, apparently taking no offense to the nickname, and wandered into the elevator despite Twilight's look of resignation and outstretched hoof.

"Rainbow..." Twilight sighed.

"That's my name," Rainbow Dash said smugly. "So, wanna give me the lowdown on just how bad it is up there?"

Noting that Fluttershy had said nothing and was currently content to blend into the background, Corsica cleared her throat and prepared to launch into her spiel again. "Yakyakistan has been taken over by an evil shapeshifter called Chrysalis and her army of shapeshifting changelings and is preparing to wage holy war against Ironridge, which has had its government completely corrupted and hollowed out after itself being taken over by windigoes and creatures we're calling Changeling Bishops. Valey and her friends performed a successful coup and got the city at least partly under their control, but the war has been orchestrated by windigoes in order to create enough conflict to break an ancient seal and unleash all the windigoes on the world, instead of just the hoofful that are causing problems now. Also, there's a magic flame under the city I don't know much about that is currently gone and probably the reason the sky has turned gray."

"Oh my," Fluttershy said in a voice barely above a whisper.

"Yikes," Rainbow said, her eyes wide, albeit not quite as shocked as Twilight. "That's awesome. I mean awful." She gave Twilight a look that dared her to say something. "There's no way we're not getting involved, right, Twi?"

"Before anything else, we're seeing what Princess Celestia has to say about this," Twilight said, forcefully tapping the ground with a hoof. "But we're not getting Starlight involved."

Rainbow Dash gave her a blank stare. "Why not? These dudes literally just said her old friends are still up there, still fighting for survival after twenty years."

"Eighteen years," Twilight corrected. "But that's the point! Weren't you listening when Starlight told us how hard it was for her to break free from that way of life? Eighteen years, and the north is still teetering on the edge?"

"Um, yeah?" Rainbow arched a skeptical eyebrow. "Which is all the more reason we should go do something? I know Starlight has, like, giga trauma from the bad old days, but she's an adult now. At the very least, why would you not tell her and let her decide for herself whether to go?"

Twilight narrowed her eyes. "How long has it been since Starlight started staying with us, Rainbow? How long has it been since she finished telling her story?"

"Uhhh..." Rainbow Dash scratched the back of her neck. "Like... three weeks ago?"

Twilight blinked, then started counting under her breath. "Has it really been that long...? Huh. Well, my point still stands!"

"Girls?" Fluttershy cleared her throat. "Should you really be arguing in front of our guests?"

Rainbow and Twilight both cut off, turning to stare at her.

"I know Starlight had a difficult time in the north," Fluttershy said. "And I'm sure she'd appreciate you being considerate of her feelings. But it looks like our guests have had a very stressful journey to get here, so maybe we should show them the same consideration, too."

"Oh." Rainbow Dash's ears fell. "Right. Uh, sorry. I-"

"Nah, you're good." Corsica gave her a lazy wave. "I like your attitude, anyway. Definitely need as many ponies in our corner as we can get if we're gonna lobby the government for resources."

Rainbow winked.

Twilight bowed her head. "I'm sorry too. I just... I thought we'd already dealt with the crisis of the day, and... No, I shouldn't be making excuses. You said you knew something about Princess Celestia being in a place called Snowport?"

The guards by the elevator hesitated. "Affirmative," one of them said.

"You know what she's doing there?" Twilight turned to them. "Or more importantly, where it is?"

The guards saluted in unison. "Only the basics, Your Highness," one reported. "And only by word of mouth. Some issue came up that needed royal attention, and she didn't want to get too many others involved after how eventful the day has been."

"I know where it is," Corsica volunteered. "We just came from there, actually. Why?"

Twilight looked at her. "Can you give me a bearing and estimated distance?"

Corsica blinked. "Why?"

"Group teleportation," Twilight explained. "It's a bit tricky to pull off over any sort of distance, but I am Equestria's foremost wizard. I should be able to get us there faster than a train, at least."

"It's two hours by train," Corsica warned. "You can seriously teleport that far? It's not exactly a novice spell, and I'm sure you know how badly the difficulty scales with distance."

"Oh, I know," Twilight said, sounding vaguely distracted as she counted Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, herself, Corsica, Braen, Leif and Nehaley. "Two hours, you say... I should be able to make that in about... thirty hops? Half a minute to rest between each one?"

"We can sit this one out," Leif volunteered, motioning to herself and Nehaley. "There are actually more of us, so it would be best to leave someone behind to catch them up on where things stand."

"Yeah, good idea," Rainbow pointed out. "By the way, did I ever get any of your names? Aside from Braen?"

A quick round of introductions left Rainbow looking vaguely disappointed that she didn't hear any more names she knew, but that was fine with Corsica. "Four ponies and a robot, then?" She gestured to Braen. "You really wanna take us and go chase down your princess?"

Twilight nodded firmly. "If even a quarter of what you've said is accurate, she needs to know."

"Huh," Corsica said, landing on wobbly hooves near the edge of the forcefield surrounding the Crystal Empire, her body feeling like it had been electrolyzed and gelatinized at the same time. "So that's what teleportation feels like..."

"What a strange sensation," Braen remarked, recovering in no time at all.

"Oops. First time?" Twilight looked abashed. "I guess I should have prepared you for it..."

Corsica shrugged. "Maybe first. Maybe not. Feels like the kind of thing I'd try to forget about on purpose." She glanced at the train station in the distance, where another of Seigetsu's convoy trains was just arriving. "You're really going to hop us all the way to Snowport like this?"

"I don't see why not." Twilight lit her horn again, looking completely fresh and ready for more. "Ready?"

Everyone nodded, and the group resumed jumping. As Corsica endured the cycle of compression, reconstitution and taking a few breaths to recover, two thoughts fought for dominance in her mind: first, Twilight had successfully ditched Starlight and avoided a meeting with her, at least for now. And second, just because Seigetsu's train ploy had failed to flush out any Abyssinian ambushes didn't mean there weren't any still waiting to happen across a group of unsuspecting teleporting travelers.

Of course, if there had been an ambush in the first place, it would have targeted the trains. And the odds of stopping on top of it when they were making such big jumps were minuscule. And even if they did, Twilight's magical stamina was remarkable, and Corsica didn't doubt for a second she could pull off another unprepared teleport in a heartbeat if she needed to. Several jumps in, the princess was starting to show signs of exertion, but was clearly pacing herself like a distance runner: she was no stranger to this, and had a lot more in reserve.

After about a dozen jumps, Twilight stopped, panting, on the smooth base of the Crystal Mountains, just where the slope started to rise, the train tracks visible in the distance below. "Think that's about halfway?" she asked, wiping her brow. "I could use a breather, just so I'm not completely wiped out when we get there... Five minutes?"

Corsica glanced around, noting that there was relatively little cover save for a smattering of boulders that had tumbled down from up high. Now that she looked more closely at the landscape, the field down below seemed to be marshland, fed by countless trickles of runoff from the mountains and disguised by lush, vibrant grass. "Sure," she said, a cool breeze blowing in from the east. "Take your time."

"Hey, so while we're stopped," Rainbow Dash said, apparently not yet remembering that she had sent a guard to find Starlight. "Tell us more about the north! What it's like, right now! Do they still have that crazy llama city in Varsidel that's constantly changing its name?"

"Llama city still exists," Braen confirmed with a sage nod. "Couldn't tell you its current name."

"That's a real thing? Wow. Never been to Varsidel." Corsica shook her head. "I'm from Icereach, with a little Ironridge on the side. It's tiny and out of the way, you've probably never heard of it."

"Icereach?" Rainbow Dash frowned. "Uhh... Twilight?"

Twilight's brow shadowed. "The research colony where those scientists were experimenting on windigo hearts."

Corsica's eyes went wide. "You know about that?"

"I heard about it from Starlight, who heard about it from Valey," Twilight said. "It's... a long story."

Corsica just shook her head. "I didn't find out about it until I went to Ironridge. Icereach is... closed off, both inside and outside. You can't learn anything there. It was literally growing up in a cave." She looked up. "Before I let you listen to me ramble, answer me this: what's the deal with Starlight? I'm gathering that you know her, she's got some bad history with our side of the border, and you're trying to look out for her somehow by not making her feel like she's obligated to return?"

"That's exactly it," Twilight said, looking away. "Well... more or less. She traveled there as a young filly, talented and alone, with far more power and far less stability than most ever have. I don't want to tell too much of her story for her, but she wore herself out taking on far more responsibility than she should have, and she did it because there was no one else who could. The only way she was able to break free from living like that was to make a pact with herself to trust her friends to take care of themselves and their home without her, so that she could set down her burdens and try to live a normal life. And, for as long as I've known her, that's what she's been doing. Can you understand that, and leave well enough alone?"

"Maybe." Corsica was forcefully noncommittal. "Here's a question, though: maybe she's done her time, and deserves to uncouple herself from her duty. Why not treat me like that too? How do you know I'm not just like her?"

Twilight looked taken aback.

"Hmm..." Rainbow Dash rubbed her chin. "Well, Starlight was a pretty special case. She had some, uh... some stuff going for her that your average pony doesn't. Or going against her. But you've apparently crossed from the north, and rustled up three whole Writs of Harmonic Sanction to do it? And Starlight drummed into us how hard that is, so you're probably pretty hot stuff too." She turned to Twilight. "What do you think, Twi? She could be for real, here. After all, if one pony with that crazy of a history can fall out of the sky into our laps, why not two?"

Twilight, in turn, looked to Corsica.

"What are you looking at me for?" Corsica shrugged. "You're the ones who know Starlight now, not me. If she's really unfit for a war zone, fine. No one's fit for it. Me, I've got plenty of excuses to do nothing and not care, and yet here I am anyway because apparently I'm the only one in my group who can talk to leadership with a straight face. Someone's gotta do it, right?"

"Huh," Rainbow said, sagging a little. "Well, I guess the north just wears everyone down, then. I still think we should at least talk to her and see what she..." She blinked. "That guard's totally bringing her to an empty room, and no one will be there, will they."

Corsica suppressed a snicker.

"Hey!" Rainbow shook a hoof at Twilight. "Did you do that on purpose?"

Twilight shrugged helplessly. "Well, we did leave some of your group behind, didn't we?"

"Um. Girls?" Fluttershy spoke up quietly.

"Right," Twilight sighed, lighting her horn again. "I suppose it's time to get going again."

"Actually," Fluttershy said, "would you mind taking a quick detour down there?" She pointed at the forest fringe opposite the train tracks. "I think there are some wounded animals down there."

Braen tilted her mechanical head. "How can Fluttershy tell?"

"I just have a sense for it," Fluttershy explained. "I'm a veterinarian. When someone is in trouble, I can just tell. And I think a lot of someones might be in trouble."

"That's not good." Twilight frowned. "Rainbow, can you take a look? I suppose we can spare the time to go and help, but if there's something dangerous they were hurt by, we ought to know before teleporting down there."

Corsica glanced at Braen. Braen glanced at Corsica. It wasn't hard to tell what the mechanical pony was thinking.

Rainbow sped off in a blinding zip of color, so fast that tracking her made Corsica's head spin. Forget teleporting, that was how to travel efficiently...

Moments later, she came speeding back, pulling to an inertia-defying stop and saluting smartly. "Right on the money, Flutters," she said, hovering and not appearing remotely winded. "I found three polar bears wandering around suspiciously. They didn't look outwardly injured, but they seemed really confused. Didn't try to get too close, or see anything that could have hurt them."

Three polar bears? Corsica blinked. Duma had been meeting with a trio of polar bears when she first ran into him, in the Freedom Town bar...

"They look confused?" Fluttershy frowned. "I suppose they could be lost... but I'd understand if we don't have time for this, Twilight. I know we are in a hurry."

"Actually," Corsica said, "I think we should check it out. How long can it take? Besides, I'd like to see how you operate."

Twilight thought about this. "We are in a hurry, true. But I suppose if Celestia went there to accomplish something, we might get there and wind up waiting for her anyway. I suppose the worst that could happen if we're late is she goes back to the Crystal Empire and we miss her entirely." She glanced at Corsica. "But if you're fine with taking the extra trip, I can do it. Let's go take a look."

"Sure." Corsica nodded. "Just brace yourselves in case they're hostile. I can bail us out of an emergency, but I'd rather not get my hooves dirty."

"It's okay," Braen reassured her. "If fighting happens, leave everything to Braen. Built with many advanced combat systems just in case."

In retrospect, Corsica really should have kept her mouth shut about getting her hooves dirty.

The grass, which had looked like such a pleasant meadow from the train windows, really did hide a bog, fed by runoff from the mountains, and Twilight unknowingly teleported the group right into it. Fluttershy didn't seem to mind, and Rainbow Dash had been hovering when the teleport went off, thus arriving safely above the ground, but everyone else landed up to their belly fur in mud and muddy water, Twilight included.

"Aaack!" Twilight immediately teleported herself up onto the broad, sturdy roots of a tree, balancing on them and using her telekinesis to lift Corsica, Fluttershy and Braen free from the mire. With a hideous schlorp, the mud relinquished Corsica's legs and tail... but not her shoes. Her coat thoroughly ruined, she sat on a root where Twilight set her, looking forlornly at the spot of their arrival.

"Sorry," Twilight furiously apologized, already turning red at the cheeks. "I... I should have checked..."

Corsica started rummaging around in the mud where she landed with her aura. "No biggie. Just wish I could find my shoes again..."

Moments later, she retrieved her prizes, caked in mud and looking more like stones than regalia, just in time to see Fluttershy quietly point to movement through the trees.

The yellow pegasus, muddied like everyone else, flapped slowly forward. "Um... hello? Is anyone there? It's okay, I'm not here to hurt you..."

"Someone there?" a gruff voice called back.

"Someone's there! I heard a voice!" another said, excited. "Hey! Hey, whoever you are!"

Fluttershy sped up. "Huh," Twilight whispered, lifting everyone who didn't have wings and slowly flying behind her. "Usually, only Fluttershy can understand animals, but I heard that just fine..."

We emerged into a clearing containing three muddy, once-white polar bears, all seated on tree roots opposite Fluttershy. "More ponies!" one said jovially. "Well, our luck sure turned around fast!"

Corsica sized them up. It was undeniably the trio from the bar.

"So you can talk, huh?" Rainbow Dash asked, hovering. "What's up? I saw you wandering around looking like you'd just gotten off that spinny thing at a carnival."

"Why wouldn't we be able to talk?" one asked her, looking confused.

"Well, I guess it is lucky we can talk," another said, "considering our situation. Any of you ponies know where we are?"

"You're in a forest south of the Crystal Empire," Fluttershy gently said. "But how did you get here? I didn't know polar bears lived in these woods."

The bears shrugged. "Couldn't tell you if we tried," one said. "Our memory is completely gone."

"We just woke up here," another said. "Don't remember nothing. It's just a big mass of static. Feels like, uhh... You know, I don't know if I remember any metaphors to compare it to..."

"Don't even know our names," the third lamented. "It's humiliating. At least we seem to get along, so we were probably all friends?"

As they talked, a shiver ran down Corsica's spine. This was a group of Abyssinians from Freedom Town, lurking suspiciously near the train tracks, doing who knew what. Potentially even the hypothetical ambush Seigetsu was trying to draw out.

And yet, it seemed like the real danger out here wasn't Abyssinians, but the still-unaccounted for Yelvey.

"We shouldn't stay here," Corsica announced. "Whatever happened to cost you your memories, I'd hate to be here if it decided to return. There's a town nearby, along the train tracks and to the east of here, with some folks a lot like yourselves. Might be a good place to see if you can find anyone who knows who you are, or at the very least get some food and start putting your lives back together. Twilight?"

Twilight grimaced. "Well, I wasn't planning to do a marathon group teleport today with three bears in tow, but I suppose there's no time like the present to see if I can... I'm warning you, though, once we get there I'm not going to be up to the return journey for at least an hour."

"You can recover from all-to-nothing spellcasting in only an hour?" Corsica whistled. "Color me impressed."

Twilight blushed. Then she lit her horn, and prepared to teleport.

I stepped out of the bathroom, a happy Nanzanaya on my heels. The guard who was waiting for us looked visibly suspicious that we hadn't actually wanted to use the bathroom, but also professionally obligated not to ask.

"Have you any other business?" he asked instead. "Or shall I show you back to the waiting room?"

"Waiting room's good," I offered. "Got some ideas to run by my friends..."

Like whether we wanted to accept this zebra's request to hang out with our party and live and dine out of our wallet, in exchange for the possibility of information only I would receive and only I was aware was being given. Also, she was apparently here to petition Equestria for military aid for a nation on the opposite side of the country as Ironridge, which was potentially in direct conflict with our own goals.

It would be a hard sell... but I really wanted to know what she knew about that creepy third eye.

We entered the waiting room to find two guards, Mother and Leif. Mother was sound asleep.

"Hey," Leif greeted.

I looked around. "Where's everyone else?"

"Headed back to Snowport with Twilight to look for Celestia," Leif said, as if this was a completely unremarkable occurrence. "You missed a lot."

I blinked, her words slowly sinking in.

"How fortunate," Nanzanaya breathed. "There are now that many fewer ponies to countermand your generous offer of aid and succor!"

"Wait, what?" I shook myself out of my stupor. "They left? Without me? To go see...?"

"Yep." Leif was reading the magazine Seigetsu had put down when she left, and didn't look at all concerned.

I felt like I had been clubbed over the head. "How come?"

"Dunno. Do you want me to speculate?" Leif looked up from the magazine without putting it down.

I waited for her to go on, but she didn't, taking my silence as a no and returning to her reading.

Heavily, I dropped myself onto a bench. I was the one who knew about the pink flame, wasn't I? The one who had the most at stake, coming here to find a way to stop my biological mother and save Coda? Everyone else was...

We've got a long-overdue conversation to have about what everyone's here for, a memory of Corsica said in my mind.

Had she been right? Maybe that was important. I hadn't paid as much attention during that meeting as I could have, partly because similar meetings had all gone nowhere and partly because I was still shaken by the conversation Faye had with Corsica just before, which I didn't have any memory of. Meetings about why everyone was here always felt like veiled jabs at how I had passed out my two writs to ponies who wound up tagging along and contributing very little, anyway...

I swallowed, glancing again at Leif.

After a few moments of me staring, she said, "If you want to know something, ask. And be specific."

"Who all went?" I asked. "And why?"

"Twilight, rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Braen and Corsica," Leif said, still reading. "They did it because Twilight was unnerved after hearing Corsica's full report and wanted to get Celestia's feedback as soon as possible."

After hearing Corsica's full report? Fluttershy was here? Just what had I missed?

"Can't tell if you're keeping quiet because you're bad at asking, or because you already know what I'm going to say," Leif continued. "Guessing it's the former, hoping it's the latter. But I can see the look on your face, and unless you ask, I'm going to let experience be the teacher. And usually? It's harsh."

"What's on your mind?" I asked with a shiver, my earlier dilemma with Nanzanaya all but forgotten.

Leif folded her magazine. "We got tied up in Snowport for as long as we did because you wanted to be our spokespony, everyone let you, and then you made a suspicious enough case to Terutomo that it didn't get us a boat right away," she began. "Which worked out in our favor, because it turns out that would have been completely the wrong direction to go in, but that's just a fluke. Having someone else make our case this time is the pragmatic approach, even though you know more than anyone else about what happened in those caves in Ironridge and how they relate to why we're here. So for now, it's a matter of pragmatism."

She looked me square in the eye. "But it might not stay that way. There's something that's come between you and Corsica, and it wasn't always there... At least, not when we first met in Icereach. I suspect it involves you being clueless and not reading her signals, because overlooking the people around you is a major character flaw of yours. Take me, for example: I'm currently working for you on a very durable contract because I owe you my life and think helping you will further my own goals, and since that started you haven't asked a single job of me. So even though what Corsica did now was smart, putting her cards on the table and using them when you might have done otherwise, she didn't only do it because it was smart. I could tell she enjoyed it. And I think you should patch things up with her before things like this start happening even when they're not pragmatic. Speaking from experience: don't take your friendships for granted."

I felt alternately hot and cold. Was that what was going on here? Corsica had certainly been upset earlier. Was I taking her for granted and doing something wrong? I had tried to talk to her, I really did, but even though I messed up, Faye had me covered. Right?

Faye said nothing. I was alone.

"My, how dramatic," Nanzanaya breathed. "I never considered how avoiding such tensions might be a benefit of traveling solo! But worry not! Our accompaniment of each other would be mutually beneficial! Take me on as a traveling companion, and you would know exactly what I provide, and that I would stick around so long as you continue your own helpfulness to me. Any social slip-ups could simply not factor into it!"

"Sounds nice," I mumbled. "Hey, Leif. What do you think about letting her tag along with us?"

"A stranger we know nothing about?" Leif went back to her magazine. "Unwise. Working on contract, that's a little better, but make sure you've either got payment up front, something to vouch for it, or don't care about what you're parting with. And do a background check, just in case she's a local con artist."

I pondered what to say to that, and had almost come up with an answer when the elevator door slid open once again. A guard stepped out with a mare at his side.

"Is this the place?" she asked, glancing around, sporting a lilac coat and a purple mane and tail with a double blue stripe, styled in a way that looked fancy, yet without making too much of a statement.

"I believe so," the guard said. "But I don't see Princess Twilight anywhere. Did any of you see her?" He turned to the other guards in the room.

They replied, but my eyes were fixed on the mare he had arrived with. She looked healthy and well-built, but otherwise ordinary, probably in her late twenties. Something about her seemed to pull at my eyes, almost like looking at Yelvey had done, except much less noticeable and not discomforting or unpleasant.

And, most importantly, she was the spitting image - aged up, but still - of a portrait hanging in Valey's office in Ironridge, unadorned and sitting in a place of honor, labeled only as belonging to Starlight.

Full Fathom Five

It should have been dark in the tree once the entrance closed, but Faye had no need of her bracelet. The crystals around her gave off a soft luminescence, evenly bathing the corridor around her in a clear, even light.

She was in a short entry hall that gave way to a circular room, entirely sculpted from opaque, diamond-like crystal. The floor was made up of tiles, each decorated with an alternating geometric pattern that seemed to be made from crystals with different internal structures, even though they were cohesive and bonded together. It looked like something an equine architect would design, but she - as an accomplished scholar of ether crystals and all things related to them - had absolutely no idea how they could have formed.

The walls and ceiling held to an equal standard of unearthly craftsponyship, with microscopic artwork running in continuous lines up and down the slender support columns, barely the width of a mare's barrel, and along a circle inside the outer rim of the roof. All of it showed no signs of ever being worked, as if someone had designed it and then conjured it into existence, exactly the way they intended it to be.

"Sweet Celestia, this design is gorgeous," Rarity breathed, wandering toward the middle of the room with her neck craned. "Do all Crystal Palaces look like this?"

"No," Starlight answered. "Well... Sort of. Most of them are covered in a chalky film that probably built up over time. The only one I've seen without it has been in the Griffon Empire, presumably because Garsheeva lived there to keep it clean."

"So you're saying someone lives here, too?" Applejack looked warily around.

"Well, this is underneath the Princesses' old castle," Twilight pointed out. "They might have cleaned it. And maybe Celestia came back to keep it this way after that castle was abandoned. Or maybe these are just so old that a thousand years isn't enough time for that film to accumulate."

The room had alcoves all along its sides, though they weren't evenly spaced. Five in total, all spaced within the third of the room opposite the entrance, they were modestly deep, each one containing an ornamental pillar engraved with one of the special talents of Twilight's friends. Twilight's own talent was depicted, instead, above the door everyone had just entered through.

"I wonder if each one of these points to one of the other Crystal Palaces," Fluttershy mused, walking toward the alcove with her own talent, directly opposite from the entrance.

"That's my idea," Starlight said. "So, any of you want to take a guess at how to proceed from here?"

"Well, I don't see any obvious exits," Applejack observed. "Maybe we all go stand by our pillars?"

Twilight's horn was glowing. "...There's an empty shaft under the middle of the room. See this circle here, on the floor? This is an elevator. But how do we activate it?"

"You've got a spell for that?" Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Sounds handy."

Twilight shrugged. "Well, Starlight gave me the idea for it. All you do is make your telekinesis as big as you can, then try to lightly grab the area around you and see where you meet resistance and where you don't."

Starlight looked slightly sheepish, but Corsica looked intrigued. "Huh. I'll have to remember that one."

"Hey, I found something!" Pinkie Pie called from a wall near the entrance. "It's a mysterious wall whachamahoozit!"

"Like a switch?" Rainbow flapped over, and everyone else followed suit.

In a shallow compartment on the wall was a ring of crystal about the size of a stallion's hoof, attached by narrow crystal filaments to the compartment's top and bottom, like a gimbal. It was clearly functional, but as to how, Faye couldn't say.

Corsica, Twilight and her friends squinted at it, trying unsuccessfully to turn it or stick a hoof inside it, clearly having no idea what it was. Starlight watched them with a demeanor that suggested she already knew what it was for, but wanted to let them figure it out for themselves before stepping in to help.

Seigetsu and Nanzanaya looked like they knew something, but had far less altruistic reasons for keeping their silence.

"Well, it sure looks functional," Twilight said, stepping back after a minute to scratch her head. "But it's clearly not mechanical, and I can't detect anything magical about it, either. At least, nothing more magical than the rest of this room."

"Yeah, I'm stumped." Rainbow shrugged. "Don't remember anything like this in your stories, Starlight. Unless it was from before the part where I started listening?"

Starlight nodded. "See if this jogs your memory." She pulled out a two-pronged stick that looked vaguely like a magic scepter - where she had been keeping it, Faye had no idea.

"Where where you keeping that?" Seigetsu asked, suspicious.

Starlight shrugged at her. "Magic."

Rarity cleared her throat. "Forgive me if I'm missing something obvious, but what does that thing have to do with this, as Pinkie put it, mysterious wall whachamahoozit?"

Rainbow scratched her head. "...Yeah, I got nothing."

Twilight, though was staring back and forth between the stick and the ring in the wall. "If I'm wrong about this, I'm going to look ridiculous. But are you saying these have the same activation mechanism?"

Starlight looked at her, betraying no intent. Seigetsu looked confused.

Twilight stepped closer to wall, swung her hips, and touched the ring with her special talent.

There was a brief glow, and a sound of energy accumulating. And when Twilight stepped back, a copy of her special talent was there, floating in the middle of the ring.

"What!?" Rainbow burst out. "How were we supposed to figure that out?"

"More importantly, what just happened?" Applejack circled Twilight, taking a close look at both of her flanks. "Your cutie mark's still here, but it's also there..."

"Forgive me if the leap of logic you just made looks tenuous to me, Twilight," Rarity began. "But to an outside observer like our friends here, it must be completely unfathomable. Might it be prudent to get everyone together on the same page?"

Seigetsu was looking back and forth between the ring in the wall and Starlight, who no longer held any sticks. "Would you mind if I had a closer look at that object you produced?"

Twilight glanced at Starlight as well.

Starlight took a deep breath. "Much as I'd like to repeat a week-long story for the benefit of all involved, we are technically on a schedule, here. I don't want to stop you from enjoying the puzzles, but if we try to ensure everyone is approaching them with exactly the same starting knowledge, we'll be here forever."

"Forget why she tried it, what did it actually do?" Corsica asked, leaning against a pillar and watching the proceedings.

"Well, if it works anything like I'm expecting..." Twilight closed her eyes and focused. With a slight rumble, the circle in the center of the floor shifted, descending a bit before coming back up.

"Yep," Twilight said, the circle moving again. "It lets me control the elevator."

"I know we can't spend too much time on this, Starlight," Rarity cut in. "But you talk like you already knew the answer. Can't we get even the slightest hint as to how you figured it out?"

Starlight shook her head. "Just spent enough time here that eventually I got it by accident. For a while, this was where I went when I needed to be alone with my thoughts."

Twilight gave her a look that seemed to say if you don't want to say it, you can just be up front with that.

The group eventually stopped dawdling and gathered on the elevator platform, which proved to be a bit of a tight squeeze. Faye instinctively stood next to Corsica on the way down.

It was a short descent, only one floor until the bottom. The new room was roughly rectangular and furnished like a living space, with a light fixture on the roof that was useless when the whole place glowed and a crystal couch with crystal cushions that were hard as stone. All the doors in the room were closed, but Twilight looked at one, and it opened of its own accord.

"Huh," she said, stepping off the elevator. "I guess that ring controls more than just the elevator in this place."

Twilight opened all the doors, and the group spread out to explore. Faye followed Nanzanaya, and Corsica and Seigetsu followed her.

The room she found herself in was clearly a bedroom, with a dresser and a nightstand and a four-poster, featuring a mattress made of hard crystal and also pillows and blankets made of crystal that were part of the mattress and couldn't be removed. The elegance of the architecture was preserved from the room above, with geometric decorations where the walls met the ceiling and patterns on the floor, but this was clearly supposed to be some kind of home. The bedstand even had another alcove with a crystal ring, this one already furnished with a copy of Twilight's special talent.

Most interestingly, the room had a floor-to-ceiling window that emerged onto what might have been a balcony. It was hard to tell, though, because past it was plain old stone.

"We really are in a buried building," Corsica remarked.

"One designed for habitation," Nanzanaya added. "You see now how it is not so farfetched that my own people live in the tower left behind when one of these dies."

"Assuming you like hard pillows," Corsica muttered, trying and failing to dislodge the ones on the bed.

Seigetsu gave Nanzanaya a curious look. "Does your own home have the same ring technology that was just employed by Princess Twilight?"

Nanzanaya gestured to the ring in the nightstand. "These? Nope. Not just sitting around, at least."

Faye walked back to the main room and explored several others. There was a kitchen, more bedrooms, and several rooms that seemed to have no set function. Most of them had another ring alcove, usually placed out of the way and all already populated by Twilight's special talent. If this was a living space, it was a generously-sized one, probably bigger than Corsica and Graygarden's apartment in Icereach. Starlight, for her part, sat on the crystal couch and waited for everyone to explore.

"So, you've been down at least this far, I'm guessing?" Twilight asked, stopping next to her after checking several rooms.

Starlight nodded. "I've explored this level, but this is the deepest I've gone. That door right there is the way forward." She pointed at a slightly more ornamental door that hadn't been opened yet. "If you're wondering why this place is the way it is... Maybe it's always been like this. Or maybe the flame just realized that I needed somewhere to stay."

"You lived here?" Rainbow asked, emerging from another doorway.

"Not all the time," Starlight said. "But I couldn't just stay in Ponyville itself while... you know."

Faye filed this away for later. It was hard to tell for sure, because Starlight was touchy about her history in the north, but she didn't seem to like talking much about what she had done in the two decades between then and now, either.

"Well, let's keep going," Twilight said, opening the bigger door and leading the way.

Beyond it was a long, straight corridor with identical, evenly-spaced doors covering both walls. At one distant end was another window showing a flat sheet of rock. At the other, the hallway seemed to open out into a bigger space.

Twilight frowned at the other doors. "Weird. I can't open any of these ones. But I don't see any more rings?"

"They're all the same as this one," Rarity mused. "Perhaps we're inside a hotel or apartment complex, the kind you see in Manehattan?"

"More likely an underground housing bloc," Corsica said. "Icereach housing looked exactly like this, except concrete instead of crystal."

"Why would an underground Crystal Palace have housing?" Rainbow asked. "It's not like anyone ever comes down here. And it's not even good housing, either. I'd rather sleep on the ground than that bed."

Applejack nodded. "It's like someone took their idea of what a place like this was supposed to be, and then made it out of all the wrong materials. Look at the Crystal Empire. They've got real furniture."

"Well, better get a move on if we want to find out!" Pinkie spun around three times as if picking a direction at random, and then started toward the open room at the end opposite the window.

That room turned out to be a small lobby akin to the holding room in the Crystal Empire where Faye first met Nanzanaya. It even had potted plants as decorations. Like the cushions on the chairs, though, the pots and soil and plants themselves were all made of crystal. There were even framed paintings decorating some of the walls, but their different colors hadn't translated well to crystallization and they were impossible to make out.

There were also four cylindrical elevator shafts with transparent walls, each one sporting an empty crystal ring next to its doors. Further beyond was a grand switchback staircase. Faye took a peek over the railing, and several others moved to join her.

They were at the top floor. At least thirty more stretched out below them.

"Maybe we should take the elevator..." Twilight suggested, as Faye shook off just a hint of vertigo.

"Anyone else want to give these ring things a try?" Applejack asked, gesturing to the ones by the elevators. "I guess it's obvious what these ones do."

"Me!" Rainbow Dash was fastest, flying over and giving a ring an eager butt-bump. It looked slightly awkward - the ring's alcove wasn't perfectly positioned to be hit by a pony's hips, a bit too high and a bit too recessed. And while it was far from impossible to use, Faye found herself wondering why no one had thought of short foals and less-mobile elders in the design of such powerful technology.

As before, Rainbow's special talent lingered in the ring, a perfect copy shimmering in midair. Moments later, an elevator whisked smoothly to a stop, and the doors slid open.

"Wow." Rainbow blinked at it. "That was surprisingly intuitive. It's like it could read my mind."

"That might not be far from what's happening," Starlight said. "Anyway, this is as far as I've ever gone, myself. Beyond here, I'm as blind as you."

Everyone nodded. This elevator was much bigger than the one inside the living space, and everyone fit inside it with room to spare. The door shut, and it began to smoothly descend.

Many floors passed, each one showing an identical lobby through the transparent walls, with slight variations in decoration and seating but the same architectural plan. If this was aboveground, it would be a tower... and an impressive one, if the progression on Rarity's expressions was anything to go by.

"How tall do you think this is?" Corsica mused, echoing what probably everyone was thinking. "Same as they look when aboveground, just buried?

Starlight shrugged. "Never seen one, so I couldn't say. I don't know how far above ether level Ponyville is, either. Usually, the entrances to the Crystal Palaces are buried deep underground, but this one was near the surface."

Eventually, the elevator stopped in a lobby that was much grander than the others. The room Faye emerged in was an alcove off the side of an immense atrium at least three stories tall, with angular support columns that seemed to invoke sun rays at dawn. Crystal fountains along the walls bubbled with starry liquid, interspersed between reception desks, benches, and larger doors leading off to the sides.

Also, it wasn't uninhabited.

More than a dozen ponies populated the room, some staffing desks, others wandering around or simply waiting on benches. Crystal ponies, it looked like... except the more Faye looked, the more she realized they weren't that, either.

The Crystal Empire's ponies had coats that glittered like crystal, but were clearly still flesh and blood. These crystal ponies were more like golems, semi-transparent and completely composed of crystals that seemed to rapidly re-grow and break down at the joints when they moved. And, disturbingly, none of them had faces.

No muzzles. No mouths. No eyes. No ears. Manes and tails, yes. But no faces.

"What the...?" Applejack stared. "Are those ponies? Those things are creeping me out."

"Oh my," Fluttershy murmured.

"Hey!" Rainbow immediately flew up to one, hovering in a circle around it as it walked. "Hey, you!"

It didn't react to her whatsoever.

Twilight stared at Starlight. "You definitely didn't mention other Crystal Palaces having something like this."

"That's because they didn't," Starlight said, taking a few steps forward. "Are they... ponies?"

"They look like rocks," Pinkie remarked. "I've never heard of rocks pretending to be ponies before, but who am I to tell a rock what it can or can't do with its life?"

Rainbow winged her way back. "Well, they don't seem hostile? Or to notice us at all. But they're clearly doing something?" She pointed to one automaton, which seemed to be having a wordless conversation with another behind a desk, before leaving through one of the doors to the side.

"As fascinating as these things are," Rarity warned, "something tells me you're all too busy looking at them to look at the entrance over there."

Faye looked. One wall of the building was broken up into pillars and arches that created a row of open-air exits. And unlike the ones above, these were actually open air: instead of rock on the other side, there was empty space and, in the distance, more crystals. It was hard to tell how big the other side was from this distance, or what was in it, but it was clearly bigger than their current room.

"Well, let's go check it out?" Twilight led the way, taking the group close past one of the faceless ponies on her way to the arches.

"Wow," the automaton said as Faye neared it. "I just walked past, like, a dozen ponies who all have faces. Each and every one. And there's a civilized monster with them, too! So wild... You don't see something like that every day!"

"Excuse me?" Twilight balked at it. Starlight also jumped a little, but everyone else in the group looked more surprised at Twilight's outburst than at the faceless pony. And the faceless pony hadn't changed its demeanor at all, still walking the same path it was walking before.

For that matter... how had it spoken? It didn't have a mouth. Faye had heard plenty of telepathic chatter in her mind before, not least when speaking with Halcyon. This... might have been that? But it sure felt a whole lot more like natural speech than having something injected into her thoughts.

"Twilight?" Rainbow tilted her head at Twilight.

Twilight gave her a look. "You mean you didn't hear that?"

"Hear what, exactly?" Rarity asked.

"A better question is, who did hear it?" Starlight asked, glancing at Faye, Corsica, Nanzanaya and Seigetsu. "Any of you?"

Faye nodded. The other three looked confused.

"Would someone mind explaining what we're supposed to be hearing?" Applejack pressed.

As Twilight launched into an explanation of what Faye had already heard, Corsica stepped closer. "Hey," she whispered in Faye's ear.

"What is it?"

"I didn't hear whatever this is about. And I never saw anything like that magic ring before, either," Corsica muttered under her breath. "Tell me if I'm just being jealous, but the way they're all reacting to all these things makes it feel like they've never been in a situation like Ironridge before. You know, where things are happening too fast for you to verify the integrity of every bit of ground you step on. And I want to be happy for them, but it's worrying me about how much help they'll be."

Faye squeezed her eyes shut. "Maybe not the thing I'd prefer to be worrying about right now."

"In other words, it bothers you, too." Corsica straightened up and left her alone.

Corsica's words stuck in Faye's head and wouldn't let go, though, so Faye stepped away from the group, making her way to the arches at the building's entrance. Beyond them was a broad plaza, and the moment she set hoof on it, she was outside.

Far, far above, a cavernous cave ceiling soared, bathed from below in the glow of innumerable crystals. Ahead was building after building, an entire skyline of crystal towers, each with its own architectural flair yet blending together in a harmonious style, elevated crystal walkways winding and weaving between them. There were low-slung domes, elevated towers built atop squat, sturdy bases, spires and windows glowing with light. The buildings rose together in the distance, clustering together into a single, monolithic structure at the center of everything, a grand underground capitol for a grand underground city.

To call this a palace would be a gross misrepresentation. It was a metropolis.

With a footprint at least the size of Ironridge and a skyline infinitely more vertical, Faye tried and repeatedly failed to estimate how many ponies this city could hold. A million? Ten? Twenty? Ironridge was the north's most populous city, and its population was in the lower hundreds of thousands. The emotional core she had felt from the surface was now all around her, emanating from every crystal and every building, and yet she could feel it the strongest yet further down, coming from the colossal complex at the city's center.

She walked to the edge of the plaza and looked over the railing, several elevated walkways branching off from it and winding around the city. Below, her tower kept on going, with a bigger footprint as it descended, all the way to a second layer of streets that seemed to be suspended in the night sky.

The ether river. Looking back up at where her tower disappeared into the cave ceiling, she was perhaps halfway down.

Faye lit her bracelet just a little, expanding her senses. The radiance coming from the center of the city was blinding, and the crystal around her offered little respite. The longer she stayed in control, the more the lights she saw around other ponies felt normal, fading into the background of her perception - the same lights that Halcyon perceived as stars in the distance when their memories were closely entwined while passing control. But now, Faye had to consciously block them out to avoid being instantly overwhelmed.

She had wanted to see if she could sense any more constructs amid the glow of the crystals. The answer she got felt more like the city itself was alive.

A faceless pony walked past her, coming from one of the bridges on its way through the arched entrance. Faye stood where she was, waiting to see if it would have anything to say.

"My wife has been so distant lately," the pony said as it passed by. "Always thought I was lucky, marrying someone so smart. You think she's met someone else at that new job of hers? I swear, can't give her so much as a 'how was your day?' without getting an earful of tech jargon. It's passive-aggressive, is what it is..."

Faye frowned after it, but it kept on walking without any further acknowledgement of her presence. These things had families, huh? And family issues. That they talked about to complete and total strangers without even checking to see if they had been heard.

How bizarre.

A commotion behind her heralded the arrival of everyone else on the balcony. Faye tuned them out as well as they ogled the cityscape, concentrating on herself instead, trying to find a balance where she could feel this place without getting overwhelmed. As she was, it was hard to even untangle the cloud of emotions flowing up through the crystals from the city center: sadness and longing, solemnity, duty and grief.

"Hey, Starlight?" Rainbow's voice jolted her back to reality. "This place wouldn't happen to be that one super ancient world from your story, would it? Indus?"

Faye's ears twitched. She knew that word.

Starlight shook her head. "I doubt it. Indus itself is supposed to be long dead and gone. It is a place that mortals can still go, if they try hard enough - the Griffon Empire sent an expedition there once, over two thousand years ago. But it's the kind of place that would take an expedition backed by a powerful nation, or goddess powers, to reach. Getting here, ourselves? It feels too easy for it to be that. This place is definitely a Crystal Palace, just... not like all the others."

"It looks like quite a bit more than a simple palace, darling," Rarity pointed out, echoing Faye's own observation.

"The crystals that make up Crystal Palaces are malleable," Starlight explained. "Usually, their forms are maintained by the intentions of the flames that reside in them. A flame once explained to me that its own palace layout was a memory of the place where it was born. So, the same principle might apply here. This whole city is probably the shape chosen by this palace's flame."

"But why?" Twilight asked. "It's so enormous. When in the world's history would there ever have been enough ponies in one place to build something like this, assuming it is a memory? And if it isn't, what would prompt the flame to imagine something like this?"

"Okay, but if it's not Indus itself, what if it's a memory of Indus?" Rainbow suggested.

Starlight shook her head. "I wish I could say."

"And what about the weird faceless ponies?" Rainbow pressed. "Or the magic rings? I don't remember either of those in your stories about the other Crystal Palaces. Seems like this one isn't just different, it's got more going on, too."

Twilight considered this. "Well, my Element has always been different than the others. Maybe this flame has something more to it that the others don't?"

"The only way you're going to find out," Corsica pointed out, "is by getting where you're going."

"Right," Fluttershy agreed. "I can feel the Kindness flame guiding me. It feels more awake than it was before. We're supposed to go that way, toward the big building in the middle."

"Everyone got a good idea of what this building looks like?" Corsica asked, nodding back up at the rocky ceiling. "Hopefully won't be too hard to find again, since it touches the roof, but we could easily get lost in here."

"I'll be able to find it," Starlight promised. "And if we need it, we can always ask the flame for help getting out."

"I have always had a good sense of direction," Seigetsu offered. "You can count on me to find this place again as well."

"Right, then." Twilight nodded, once again leading the group. "Let's be off."

Navigating the city on hoof quickly hammered into Faye's head just how big it really was. Looking down on the skyline from above was one thing, trying to navigate it - especially when the elevated roads kept twisting, and seemed more designed to aesthetically connect individual buildings than to get ponies quickly from one place to another.

This pattern, after the third or fourth detour in an unnecessary direction, led the group to seek a way down to the streets below. While being at the city floor made it harder to see the skyline, and thus harder to navigate, the streets were straighter and progress was faster... and the ether river was right nearby, to boot.

In a space in between two roads, where a park or garden might ostensibly go, there was instead a gap filled with stars, the surface of the ether close enough that you could reach down and touch it. It flowed gently along, crossed by bridges and rippling against the edges of roadways, strewn with purples and blues and greens, galaxies and constellations, every color of the brightest imaginable night sky.

"Such a shame for all this beauty to stay down here where no one ever gets to see it," Rarity lamented, stopping to stare into the ether. "I'm sure we all can agree that turning such a place into a tourist trap would be a travesty, but this is a kind of beauty that not even Canterlot can achieve."

A passing faceless pony stopped and glanced around. "There's so much beauty all around us, and no one ever seems to see it. Such a shame," it said.

Twilight and Starlight gave it funny looks.

"What is it?" Rarity blinked at them. "Did another one say something?"

"It kind of... stole your observation?" Starlight shrugged.

"These things are weird," Twilight muttered. "I can never tell if they actually see us or not! It's like they do and don't, at the same time? Hey!" She waved at the faceless pony. "If you can see me, do something to acknowledge it!"

"Do you ever feel like nobody actually sees you these days?" the faceless pony said to no one in particular, still staring into the ether river. "I feel like that all the time."

Then it shrugged and walked away.

Twilight stared after it in helpless bafflement.

"I'm gonna guess it didn't tell you what you wanted to hear," Rainbow suggested.

Twilight just shook her head. "This defies all logic. There has to be something coherent going on here."

"Maybe something about this place makes them see us as faceless?" Applejack suggested. "And they see us just fine, but... I dunno, have trouble processing that we're trying to interact with them? Maybe?"

Twilight shook her head. "But that first one remarked on us all having faces. Even though it didn't try to interact with us at all."

"You might be overthinking this," Starlight suggested. "It's possible that they're living, thinking creatures that populate this place, sure. But it could also be that they're created by the same power as the rest of this city, whether it's a memory or something else. Maybe the flame wanted a city, and decided it wouldn't be a city without citizens to populate it. And if that's the case, they might not have complex thought processes to interact with, or be capable of embodying more than a single idea."

Twilight frowned.

Faye didn't speak up. On the train, Princess Luna told her she would be better served by seeking answers to her questions in this place... and that meant she believed this underground city had answers waiting to be found. If they wanted to get anywhere, to find more answers than questions, all they had to do was keep moving.

The Tenets of Eternity

Faye picked her way through the darkness, the stairs descending at a punishingly steep angle, carved from glossy black stone that seemed to devour the light. At its edges, it grew starkly white, creating a grayscale color-negative effect, like someone had drawn a staircase on black paper using a white pencil. But even though the lines showed her where to put her hooves, the pony in front of her was barely a shadow, her companions' glowing unicorn horns like ghostly lanterns in the distance.

Eventually, they widened out into a proper room. Twilight and her friends stood in a semicircle, with Seigetsu and Nanzanaya off to the side, leaving Corsica and Faye to bring up the rear. Everyone's faces and bodies were shadowed despite the glowing horns, as if someone had draped a thin blanket over the lights, even though the white facets were still perfectly visible and evenly lit from floor to walls to ceiling. The only distinct feature aside from black and white was the pools of ether on the uneven floor, shallow puddles of night sky lingering at the room's edges.

"I can't tell whether this is beautiful or... or..." Rarity fumbled for words. "What do you even call something like this?"

"Ominous?" Applejack suggested.

"In a cool way," Rainbow said warily, constantly checking her blind spots. "But definitely ominous."

Twilight bit her lip.

Faye's eyes traced a tiny flow of ether making its way to a puddle from a crack in the wall. The only way forward seemed to be a narrow door, still made of the same black stone, but nobody was in a hurry to open it.

"Awkward, right?" Corsica whispered in Faye's ear.

"Eh?" Faye turned and glanced at her.

Corsica nodded over at Twilight. "We came here to get the experts' help fixing your spooky flame. And now it feels like I'm a bystander while they get their world rocked."

"I suppose I should be apologizing for that," Twilight said, straightening up and stepping over. "If I had known any of this was here, I would have explored it myself long ago, and not made complete strangers have to sit through and watch all that while we're the ones supposed to be helping you."

"Why didn't you know this was here?" Faye asked, old annoyances from the way Snowport handled information still simmering in the back of her brain. "Aren't you supposed to be one of the most powerful ponies in Equestria? It's not like the other princesses didn't know about this, if they built a castle on top of it. Why didn't they tell you?"

"I don't know." Twilight shook her head. "But that's my problem to figure out. You've done enough already, making the journey here from Ironridge, and everywhere else you're from. I didn't mean to make you sit around and spectate things that will probably never be relevant to you, ever."

"Well, don't go and jinx it," Applejack warned.

Twilight gave her a look that said what are the odds, and then caught herself and winced.

"Here's a thought, though," Rainbow cut in. "How sure are we everything we've heard and seen down here - especially the stuff only you three can see..." She gestured at Twilight, Starlight and Faye. "Is accurate? According to Starlight, Flames of Harmony live in these crystal trees down near the bottom, and we haven't seen anything like that here. All we've seen is a bunch of golems and what was probably a second draconequus. Does that really scream 'wouldn't tell a lie' to you?"

Twilight looked stuck.

"I didn't hear about something like this from any of the other flames I've talked to," Starlight said, subdued. "But they didn't talk about the other palaces much in general, aside from the two that were specifically broken. And nothing Convergence said conflicts with what I know, either. So maybe it's real. Maybe it isn't. Our only options are forward and back, so it's not a complex choice."

"Well, I was thinking we save the postmortem for when we're safely back on the surface, mission accomplished-" Twilight started.

"Except we've just been given a trial by a draconequus," Rainbow interrupted. "And literally everyone remembers what happened last time we were given a trial by a draconequus."

"I don't," Nanzanaya offered.

"Same." Corsica shrugged.

Starlight nodded. "For what it's worth, I only got the abbreviated version..."

Rainbow sighed. "Okay, story time. You all know Discord, right? Other draconequus, pretty sure he was hanging around after the Crystalling for a bit?"

Faye and Seigetsu nodded. Corsica and Nanzanaya shrugged.

"So basically..." Rainbow waved a hoof. "He used to be evil, before he changed sides and became merely an unhelpful jerk instead of the enemy of all ponykind. How that happened is another story, but the important bit is, he showed up one day a few years ago, stole all our Elements, and made us go through this magic hedge maze to try and get them back. Two things about this maze: it split us up, broke us down, hit us where we were weak, and was generally an experience we agreed never to talk about again. Second, the Elements were never there in the first place, it was all a trick and we were wasting our time. You see any lessons in there that could potentially apply to our current scenario?"

"That we're going into a trial proposed by a draconequus in search of a harmonic place of power?" Fluttershy shivered. "I suppose you do have a point."

"Yeah, that." Rainbow did a flip. "But also, there's like a two-hundred-percent chance that any emotional baggage we haven't unpacked yet is gonna get rubbed in our faces really bad."

Twilight's brow furrowed. "If you're suggesting I stay behind just because Convergence gave me a lot to think about-"

"Don't worry about me, I'm snazzy," Rainbow said, putting a hoof over her heart. "But, uh. Hypothetically, assuming this place is going to try to split us up anyway, how bad of an idea would it be for someone who doesn't have a personal stake in everything that just happened to go on ahead and test the waters? Just in case."

"Are you volunteering?" Seigetsu asked. "I have rigorously trained my mind against emotional manipulation, but such training has served to open my eyes to just how many weaknesses one creature can have. If you are implying that this trial might seek to stop us mentally rather than physically, I believe there is no such thing as someone whose mind is completely impenetrable."

Faye swallowed. Was this a time to step forward? Her mind was so impenetrable, she could remember things reality itself had been twisted to shut out. Then again, she was so unstable, she made up different versions of herself and tried to become them to avoid being her anymore...

Resistant to the magical, vulnerable to the mundane. She decided to keep her mouth shut.

"You could send me," Corsica volunteered. "I'm pretty used to soldiering on even when I don't feel like it. Think of it like immunity through repeat exposure."

Twilight stomped a hoof. "We're not picking among us for the most durable sacrifices! I get what you're saying, and why you're concerned, but harmony is about sticking together and supporting each other, and we're not passing any sort of draconequus trial without that. If any of you want to go back..." She looked to Corsica, Seigetsu, Nanzanaya, and Faye. "You never signed up for this, so I'd more than understand. But this is what we do. We will not fail just because we've been shaken."

"Nope." Nanzanaya shook her head. "This is the most interesting thing that's happened to me in forever. I wouldn't turn back even if my house was on fire."

"Then I am obligated to remain as well," Seigetsu said, folding her hands behind her back.

Corsica glanced at Faye. "I'm with her."

"...I'm in." Faye wasn't going to be the only one to chicken out. Not after a speech like that. "What's through the door?"

Twilight stepped toward it. "Let's find out."

The door retracted smoothly into the ceiling, sliding up of its own accord. The next room was much like the first, only with more ether: over half the floor was nothing but stars, glowing streams dribbling down from the ceiling and splashing on rocks or landing in the puddles.

Protruding from the puddles were black vines, spiked with white thorns.

All of the Elements grimaced. "Great," Applejack griped. "These things again."

"These are the vines you had trouble with before, I'm guessing?" Corsica asked.

Twilight nodded, looking sourly at the plants. "From what we learned back then, they've always been here, but the weakening harmony in this area allowed them to start growing up to the surface again. Even though that's been fixed, I suppose it makes sense that they're still here, this far down... Try not to get too close. This might be a physical trial, after all."

The room widened further. In the middle, hanging from a chunky stalactite, was an elaborate astrolabe, set up over a wide pool of ether with a thin, winding bridge of rock stretching out to it, too narrow for safe footing.

"Wait," Twilight said, holding out a wing. "Let the fliers go check this out."

She and Rainbow swooped over to it, Fluttershy choosing to remain with the group. "Looks slick," Rainbow said, hovering around it. "What's this thing for?"

"Making star charts," Twilight explained. "But it's upside-down... and facing a sky that's below us instead of above. I wonder..."

Her lavender telekinesis enveloped it, pressing the machine into operation. "There are constellations in here," she said, clinging to the machine's side and peering through the sighting scope. "Actual constellations, with connections drawn out between the stars. Is this... text?"

Everyone back on the shore listened, and Rainbow shrugged, hovering back and leaving Twilight to her work.

"I recognize this," Twilight said after a moment. "I think. This is... something adjacent to an ancient zebra dialect. I might be able to translate it, but first I'd have to transcribe it. The lines only show up through the sighting scope on this astrolabe, and trying to read a common language through this thing would be hard enough as it is. Does anyone have writing materials?"

Nanzanaya perked up. "An ancient zebra dialect, you say?"

Twilight looked up. "Not a modern one, certainly. Is there any chance you were a language historian back at your home?"

"Would 'acolyte of a minority religious sect' be close enough?" Nanzanaya winked. "Come on, let me try! I know at least a few long-dead zebra languages."

"Be my guest," Twilight said. "Should I, um, levitate you over to this, or-"

Nanzanaya skipped across the winding stone bridge, barely acknowledging the precarious footing. She stood on two legs to reach the astrolabe, looked into it, and was silent.

"...Well?" Twilight asked as the silence stretched on.

"Just making sure I've got it all," Nanzanaya said. "See, I told you I'd be useful to have along. Anyway, those stars say 'Those who would glimpse the beginning, know that time moves only forward.' Mean anything to you?"

For a moment, everyone was quiet. "Seems straightforward enough to me," Applejack said.

"Well, it's presumably addressed to anyone who comes down here," Twilight said. "Which would mean that the point of coming here is to see 'the beginning'. Which probably means the beginning refers to Convergence's seat of power, which makes sense because Convergence said it was the first flame to be created. That much is obvious. But why 'time moves only forward'? First off, it doesn't. I've time traveled on multiple occasions. Starlight can back me up on this. But either way, what does time have to do with anything?"

"Perhaps it's a warning not to get too nostalgic for bygone days?" Rarity offered.

"I was thinking more like it's a No Trespassing sign," Applejack pointed out. "If ponies were as divided in those days as Convergence made it sound, some likely wouldn't be happy with the new state of affairs and would try tampering with the world in an attempt to go back to what they had before."

"At least they were polite enough to leave a warning," Pinkie said.

"Well, we're not seeking to change the past, or bring it back," Twilight said. "The only-"

She was interrupted by a groaning sound from one wall, as a tangle of vines began to slither and retract into the ether. Newly visible behind them was another door.

A moment after the vines stopped moving, several black rocks rose up and broke the puddle's surface, creating a bridge to the door.

"I think that might have been a code phrase!" Pinkie stage-whispered.

"I... don't see any other ways forward," Twilight said, glancing around. "Shall we?"

No objections were raised, and the group proceeded.

Next came a long, descending corridor, its slanted floor trickling with numerous streams of ether as more rivulets leaked in from the ceiling. By now it was impossible for Faye to avoid the stuff; it splashed on her coat and ran against her boots, evaporating quickly and not leaving any lingering wetness.

It felt... not that different from simply being close to it. The ether had a masking effect, a purity that drowned out the underground city's other forces pressing against her mind, replacing them with a singular steadfastness and determination. Faye could see how this would be addictive to some ponies, especially ones who never learned other coping mechanisms for the chaos in their lives. But to her, more than anything, it felt reminiscent of the peace and freedom from distractions she used to find down in the Icereach chapel, where she spent so many hours of her life.

Maybe because that chapel was also so close to the ether. As many times as she had heard warnings about what would happen if you fell in the river - and certainly, that would be more intense than just being splashed a little - she had never connected the ether itself to the way she felt when she was down there.

As the tunnel sloped down, its white-lined facets became less chunky and more regular, until the angles of the rock began carving out circular runes on the walls, shaped like white pinwheels or snowflakes. Thorned vines ducked in and out of the walls at irregular intervals, slithering along the floor like lazily-arranged cables, occasionally pulsating along their length as though they were hoses carrying globs of something.

The further they went, the greater the contrast between black and white became. Getting doused in ether had the side effect of conferring a faint, astral luminescence on everyone, making them easier to see, but it was almost as if the rocks were no longer there at all, and Faye was walking through a void with only disembodied white lines as her guide, rivers of stars tracing their way through the blackness.

This feeling quintupled when the wall runes started moving.

She couldn't question it. It didn't even feel real. But the white lines, especially the ones not connected to any others, seemed to be swimming, or else bobbing gently in place. Some were even spinning. A stream of ether poured down from above, striking the white spokes of one rune and spinning it like a waterwheel.

"So, uh," Rainbow said, breaking the silence. "The world is a disk, right? With actual edges that usually no one goes near because things just stop working right if you get too close? Has anyone ever tried getting past that to see what the underside of the world actually looks like? Because this is trippy. And it's making me wonder if you can get to the zone of things not working right by going too far down, too."

"Not that I'm aware of," Twilight said. "Though the Princesses would have to know. They've been to the moon, after all, and you'd be able to see the other side of the world from there during the terrestrial day. So why wouldn't they have tried to go there?"

"Rockets also exist," Starlight pointed out. "Unless those simply stop working when you try to fly them over the edge."

"But everyone who makes those is only interested in using them for weapons," Corsica countered. "Not in exploring new places."

"Still?" Starlight sighed. "It's been almost twenty years..."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Did I not tell you what Icereach is used for these days?"

Twilight cleared her throat from up front. "Look. It's widening out again."

Finally, the tunnel stopped descending, opening out into a space that was somehow cavernous and claustrophobic at the same time. It was a simple box, made of almost no white lines, with puddles of ether on the floor and walls and ceiling. Ether flowed through the air in winding currents without respect for gravity, moving lazily from puddle to puddle. And out of the puddles grew yet more vines, these ones thicker than a stallion's barrel and ending in fanged buds of blue and purple flowers, their maws devouring yet more vines.

In fact, almost every vine in the room was an ouroboros, its own root springing from between its flower's fangs. Thorny circles of all shapes and sizes, they were linked together into massive chains, shackling the roof to the floor, the walls to the walls, pulsating and slowly spinning and indiscriminately binding the room, yet leaving a clear path forward to the end.

Faye's heart hammered as the far wall came into sight. It was a massive door.

The door was ancient and sublimely mechanical, forged from hundreds of thousands of perfectly-interlocking metal parts, inlaid with channels of starry ether. The metal was every bit as black as the stones, and as she held up her bracelet for comparison, she knew there was only one kind of metal it could be.

A sharp breath from Seigetsu confirmed her suspicions.

Twilight eyed up the door from a healthy distance. "Those ether channels... They're more ancient text. Twelve places on the door, each looks like one word..."

"Need a hoof?" Nanzanaya peered up at them, stepping closer.

"Before you spend too much time on that, might want to look behind you," Rainbow added.

Everyone spun around. On the wall, above the exit, was written more ancient scrawl, this time formed with the plain white lines that made up the stone's edges.

Twilight stepped closer, frowning. "It says..." She paused, thinking, then took a breath. "Our perfect world has ascended. Its immutable foundation, free from folly: Three Laws of Evolution to guide our path. Six Elements of Harmony to temper our minds. Twelve Tenets of Eternity to shackle our past. We shall look upon that past no longer."

"Uhhh," Rainbow Dash said.

Starlight looked visibly baffled. "Twelve Tenets of Eternity? Presumably these Laws of Evolution are Yakyakistan's societal virtues - hope, love and knowledge - but twelve? I've never heard of anything in this world's cosmology that comes in a set of twelve."

"Think it has anything to do with the twelve words on that door?" Nanzanaya asked, walking back to the metal door.

"To shackle our past..." Twilight mused. "Well, they could do that in a literal sense if the words on the door happened to function as seals..."

"I've got them," Nanzanaya said. "From the top, it looks like we've got..."

Her face slowly fell.

"Don't actually know them?" Applejack guessed.

"Oh, I know the script," Nanzanaya said. "It's just that every single one of these is a proper noun, most of which I've never heard of before."

"Aldenfold," Twilight said. "Eylista. Indus."

Everyone turned to look at her.

"Optarsaga. Umhuxanjarn. Ymistjorna," Twilight continued, fumbling slightly to pronounce them. "Yriterfingy. Unnrus-kaeljos. Oeztrfroedi. Iklofna. Elskabera. Aflaefold. That's what we've got."

Rainbow Dash whistled.

"Well, at least you know what some of those mean, right?" Corsica said. "Like the Aldenfold is the mountain range dividing north from south."

Twilight nodded. "And Eylista refers to the Immortal Dream, the virtue of hope."

The ether forming the second word on the door pulsed, changing from a peaceful starscape to an apocalyptic, fiery red, exactly like the sky Faye had seen when the two gods did battle.

Everyone jumped back. "Whatever you just did, undo it!" Applejack shouted.

Nothing else happened.

Twilight stepped closer again. "Is this... simply a knowledge check? Correctly identifying what each word means will open its lock, and if we get all twelve, the door will open?"

"Could be," Rainbow said. "Just, that color doesn't exactly scream good vibes, you know?"

"Neither did our talk with Convergence," Rarity pointed out. "Theoretically, though, let's say that Indus is the world before ours, the one that city up above is modeled on."

The door didn't change.

"...No," Starlight said. "That wasn't the word's original meaning. We heard it up there, from the golems. Indus was the name of an inquirarch. The Steward of the Afterlife, he was called."

Again, the door pulsed, and the third word turned from purple to fiery orange.

"That must mean Aldenfold had a meaning before the mountains came to exist," Twilight said. "Which makes sense, because this door obviously predates those. But does anyone have any idea what?"

Starlight shook her head.

For her part, Faye wracked her memories. She knew quite a few of these: Unnrus-kaeljos, the light spirit. Umhuxanjarn, the name Terutomo had put to her bracelet, and the type of metal used in the construction of changeling queen crowns. Some of the others gave her deja vu as well, but she couldn't put words to which ones, or from where.

But did she want to help open this door?

Saving the Flame of Kindness was supposed to be paramount. But Convergence indicated that even with the aid of its place of power, they would need another flame to make this work, which they didn't have. And the longer she looked at this place, with its heavy chains forged from self-devouring vines, the more she wondered if there could be a really good reason this door was sealed.

She stole a glance at Seigetsu, who would obviously know what Umhuxanjarn meant as well. The dragon was characteristically stoic, and didn't seem inclined to participate.

"Well, here's something we could try," Rainbow suggested. "We know Eylista refers to one of Yakyakistan's societal virtues, right? Odds are, the other two are on here as well. So we could just pick and try combinations at random until we learn what the words for the other two are."

"Good idea," Twilight said. "Discounting the ones we know probably mean something else... Optarsaga refers to the Yakyakistani societal virtue of knowledge."

The door didn't change.

Twilight continued, cycling through every word except the first three. At last, she tried Aldenfold, but still nothing happened.

"No dice?" Rainbow frowned.

Starlight shook her head. "More likely, you're using the wrong name. Eylista isn't just called the virtue of hope, it's called the Immortal Dream. The others likely have proper translated names as well."

"Which are...?" Rainbow raised an expectant eyebrow.

"I think love is called the Lovebringer," Starlight said. "But knowledge, I have no idea."

Faye bit her lip. That one was called the Noble History. Princess Luna had specifically told her as much on the train ride, knowing that she was coming down here... Had Luna been intentionally furnishing her with information? There was no other explanation. But whether Luna actually wanted her to open the door, or just to know enough to figure out how the puzzle worked, was an open question.

"Elskabera refers to the Lovebringer, the Yakyakistani Societal Virtue of Love," Twilight said, cycling once again through every option. Suddenly, the door responded, the second-to-last word joining the other two in a fiery glow.

"Looks like you were onto something," Applejack said, patting Rainbow on the shoulder.

As Nanzanaya and the Elements milled around by the door, Corsica stepped up close to Faye. "You keeping quiet about the one the dragons told us for a reason?" she breathed.

Seigetsu glanced at them.

"Can you really not think of any reasons to leave a door like this unopened?" Faye murmured back, loud enough that others could hear if they were paying attention.

Seigetsu nodded in slow approval.

"I can," Fluttershy said, taking a step closer.

"Fluttershy?" Twilight glanced over at her, and the ponies closest to the door all looked up.

"It's just..." Fluttershy took a breath. "Ever since we went into this deeper part, the flame has felt like it's nervous. Not like it's afraid, but like it's not as eager to go on as it used to be. I can't feel it pointing me in a direction anymore. And especially now that we've come to this door. What if the point of the trial isn't to open this door, but to turn away without opening it?"

"We might have to do that anyway," Twilight said. "Unless someone here is holding out a very lot on us - in which case I'd presume they have good reason to do so - there's no way we're going to get all of these. We're at three out of twelve and have exhausted most of our ideas."

Pinkie nodded back at Faye, Corsica and Seigetsu. "Any of you silent types know any reeeally good reasons not to help us open this creepy old door? Beyond that a draconequus indirectly implied that we should do it? And the written warnings? And the way it looks?"

"Just a..." Faye searched for words. "Feeling. After all, this place must have been sealed for a reason, right?"

"Your princesses used to have a castle here, right?" Corsica asked. "On the surface above this place? If they didn't want it sealed, they wouldn't have left it this way."

"Or they've never been past this point themselves," Fluttershy suggested.

Twilight tilted her head at Fluttershy. "Then why would they give this plan their blessing? I'm sure the world is full of evil sealed doors that need to be kept shut at any cost, and this one certainly looks the part, but they wouldn't have let us down here without an unambiguous warning if we would inherently doom Equestria by pursuing our objective. Also, Convergence may have been part chaos, but it was still an Element of Harmony. And it embraced chaos in order to safeguard this world. I just can't see any of those signs pointing to there being something malevolent sealed behind this door."

"Okay," Rainbow said. "But here's an idea. What if whatever's behind this door isn't a thing, but a place?"

Twilight's eyes widened a little as she caught onto Rainbow Dash's meaning, but several others looked confused.

"Think about it," Rainbow said. "What did the warnings you read say? Stuff about not trying to go back to the past? What place were all of these ancient ponies from, and what place do we all know about but have no idea where in the universe it could be?"

"A place too big to easily hide, since it was an entire world," Twilight said. "That's still reachable, but only gets discovered once every few thousand years, if that. And a place we know both Celestia and Luna have been."

Rainbow pounded one hoof against another. "Indus."

"Well..." Applejack looked at the door with a newfound respect. "That change any of your thinking about whether we try to open this thing? I've only gotten the short version of what we know about it, but didn't the Princesses find things there that were better off forgotten? Like that Aegis?"

Twilight nodded. "Supposedly, the methods used to create the first alicorns came from Indus in the first place. Along with Aegis, yes."

"Still, the other side of the world..." Rainbow hovered in place, staring at the door. "What do you suppose it's like down there? Probably completely uninhabitable, if the ponies had to leave. Do you suppose gravity is reversed, and you can just see the other half of the sky, and literally walk around on the other side? Or is our world just another layer on top of theirs, and you can go further down still? I'll bet you those griffon explorers in Starlight's story that found the place two thousand years ago were trying to see how close to the edge of the world they could actually get, and found a way across."

"Probably the former, if you're right about the griffons," Starlight said. "Which you might be. The Griffon Empire borders the edge of the world. Also, Garsheeva was supposedly created through methods brought back by the Indus expedition, and she always frowned on her subjects trying to go too close to the edge."

"For their own good, I'd hope," Rarity added. "But this does make for a convincing ulterior motive."

Applejack tapped a hoof. "This still leaves us with the million-bit question of whether we even want to open this door."

"...Starlight?" Twilight glanced at her friends. "Fluttershy?"

"I don't know what we'd do if we didn't," Fluttershy answered. "I know I said the flame felt hesitant, but what are our other options?"

Starlight grimaced. "Nothing good. Out of eight others, three are broken, two more are in the north, one is at the bottom of the sea, one is in the middle of the dragons' war zone, and one I can't go anywhere near for personal reasons. That said, a lot of the troubles I've faced in life ultimately tie back to Indus. Actually going there is the surest way to get it back on the worst track."

Twilight turned to Seigetsu. "Are you familiar with there being a crystal palace in your peoples' lands? And if so, knowing our mission, would you help us get there?"

Seigetsu frowned. "I am familiar with it. But although I recognize the severity of your mission, I'm afraid that's not possible. Your target is the very focal point of our war. Even were the Convocation to allow it - such an ask would require completely unanimous approval - merely reaching it would put you in dire jeopardy."

Corsica blinked. "Wait, do you mean the dragons' crystal palace literally is Saint Tadashi's tomb?"

Seigetsu nodded. "You have the right of it."

"Alright," Rainbow cut in. "How about the underwater one, then? The Honesty one? Starlight, you've been there before. It took a submarine, but with Celestia on our side we should have no problem getting the resources for a return trip. Right?"

"It might be worth looking into." Starlight shook her head. "I suppose it's our best bet. I just... I hoped we'd be able to take care of this without leaving Ponyville."

"Dunno if I'm missing something," Corsica said. "But what about the one you've got personal history with? If that's the biggest thing wrong with going there, and you also don't want to leave this town, why not just stay here and let everyone else handle it?"

Starlight sighed. "It's complicated. If we have to discuss it, could we go back to the surface first? We should decide once and for all if we're going to leave well enough alone here."

Twilight gave the door a longing look. "Well, now that we know what's down here... Someday, I need to see it. It's my Element, so it's my responsibility, if nothing else. But how can you not be curious to see the remains of a long-dead civilization?"

"Even if we wanted to do it now, we're kinda stumped on the rest of these words," Rainbow said. "We know Aldenfold doesn't mean the mountains. We know one of these is probably the virtue of knowledge, whatever its real name is. And the rest is just gibberish."

As the others voiced their agreement, Faye remembered her conversation with Princess Luna on the train. When she asked about Unnrus-kaeljos, Luna had told her to seek answers here, instead... If the light spirit's name was one of the twelve keys to this door, the Tenets of Eternity, that explained why this place was relevant. But it also told her nothing useful at all.

To learn that, she would probably have to go deeper. But as it was, she knew little enough about the light spirit that she wasn't even confident the door would accept her answer, even though she knew its name. It seemed these mysteries would have to wait indefinitely once again.

The group started turning to leave, and her gaze found Nanzanaya. The zebra had been enthusiastic in helping to decipher writing and theorycrafting with the group trying to open the door, but she hadn't supplied a single answer of her own. What were the odds that she, like Faye, had been keeping her own answers quiet, trying to learn what she could from the rest of the group without sharing her own keys?

Probably very high.

Faye remembered her pact with Seigetsu: play along with Nanzanaya and try to learn what she could of the zebra's intentions and motives, anything that went beyond her professed interest in getting Equestria's military aid. What were the odds Nanzanaya was currently suspecting the same thing of her, that she had held her own tongue about the tenets she knew?

Probably also high.

How did she get herself into situations like this? Faye sighed, looking over her shoulder as she walked away. The three glowing words on the door lost their fire as the party retreated, returning back to normal ether.

When the final pony emerged from the staircase into Convergence's chapel, the crystals that made up the building shimmered, and the table that covered the staircase regrew, leaving no indication that it had ever not been present. Convergence itself was waiting, once again wearing its giant, hooded robe.

"You did not reach your goal," the empty hood said. "What will you do next?"

"Go home," Twilight told it. "And then think about our next move. Down there... That door led to Indus, didn't it? The previous world."

"That is something you must discover for yourself," Convergence rasped. "If you wish to return to the world above, I can alter this city to ease your path. But, before you go, there is one more thing I would tell you, about the nature of our Element and a way in which it differs from the others."

Twilight's ears perked.

"Your Elements are attuned to you through your cutie marks," Convergence said, its hood following all of Twilight's friends. "These marks were given to you because my siblings and I desired champions in this tumultuous age. But my power can also be given through another mechanism. It is hereditary."

Twilight's eyes widened. "You mean if I ever have kids, they'll be able to use my Element too?"

"Most likely," Convergence said. "There are some particulars. Not every descendant will have the power of their ancestor. And the trait has no dormant state, so once it is lost from a bloodline, it will remain that way. However, you are not the first champion to whom I have bestowed my power. Mine is the power to rebind what is broken, and you will see much on your journey to determine how you will use it. I give you this warning only so that you will not be surprised when you meet others who can wield it as well."

"...Right," Twilight said. "Let's go figure out what to make of that back at home."

Concerning Gods and Oblivion

Faye hung limply over the windowsill, the night breeze caressing her ears. No fire reigned in the sky; instead, there were only stars, with a noble moon lording over them in the distance above.

Procyon hovered patiently, waiting.

Faye swallowed, the sensation of sweat and soot baked into her coat. The longer she stayed here, the less tenuous reality seemed, the more solid the ground beneath her feet... and yet, that dream refused to dissipate in her mind. How could it? The light spirit had returned to her. And she didn't like what she had seen.

She sluggishly lifted her gaze to meet Procyon. "So. What do you want?"

Procyon looked back at her, tense but unshaken. "I'm here to make an observation. I could be here to do more than that... depending on what it is that you want. But we've been dancing around each other for long enough, don't you think?"

Faye's thoughts were too muddied with burning cities and light spirits to reply.

"Back in the Crystal Empire, we made our peace, remember?" Procyon said. "Not two days ago. But what comes after that? I told you I had made peace with my existence, and I have, but..." She gritted her teeth. "Watching the ease with which you've stepped back into the light sits frustratingly with me."

"You're jealous," Faye guessed. "You want to be a part of me and Halcyon's life, too. To a bigger degree than you currently are."

"But I'm different from you." Procyon pointed a hoof. "You and Halcyon reflect each other. You trust each other instinctively because you see yourselves in each other, because you're two parts of the same whole. And that's because you've grown up naturally with each other around a preexisting fault that I left behind. But I was cleaved out of existence by a god... perhaps the god. I can't see your exact thoughts, or feel your heart, but I can tell you don't see yourselves in me. And the reason for that is that none of me is in you. I was removed far more precisely than the tangled split between you and Halcyon. With such a dynamic, where do we go from here?"

"Like I said," Faye replied. "What do you want?"

"I don't know," Procyon growled. "I am jealous, but you're also better off without me - at least, according to my ideas of what I wanted to become. Did you ever wonder why you used to have no friends, how you came to be ostracized by Ansel and Corsica, why you're now a coward who can't put that bracelet to use even to save your friends' lives?"

Faye hissed. "I did put it to use! I carried Ansel and Corsica out of that canyon, and I agonized by their bedsides that my indecision about whether to use it might have cost them time they needed to survive!"

Procyon gave her a sharp stare. "No, I used it. And those were only the memories you were left with after my motives and I were cut away, the stories you told yourself to fill in the blanks and make your new, empty past cohesive again. I-"

"Halcyon dreamed that dream dozens of times," Faye interrupted coldly. "Our dreams don't lie. Even Egdelwonk can't hide the truth from them. Don't tell me I don't remember what happened."

That gave Procyon pause. Eventually, she backed down and shook her head.

Faye waited.

"I didn't simply wake up one morning and decide I wanted to disappear," Procyon eventually said. "I was keenly aware of the problems in my life, and of how many of them were of my own making. I was ambitious. Selfish. Jealous. I resented Mother, because to me, she represented a pony's limits - something I didn't want to ever have. Have you ever wondered why you're so unable to do any of these things? You're incapable of being mean, or of doing nice things for yourself. You only ever pick goals so big, success isn't a realistic possibility, so you never have to contend with it or risk meeting it. You want what others have, but can't dream of taking it by force, and when you try to copy it you're never satisfied with the result. And you're incapable of thinking poorly about Nehaley."

Faye felt herself wilting. "Do you really mean all of that? Is that all... true?"

"Have you never wondered why you couldn't do these things?" Procyon shrugged. "Certainly, you helped shape Halcyon so that she wouldn't want to do some of them. But she, likewise, shaped you. Remember, you were nothing but an administrative shell when I left, designed only to regulate our powers and provide a buffer for Halcyon against learning things that would interfere with my plan for her life. So why did you want to shape her that way in the first place? Have you ever stopped to think about it?"

Faye's ears were all the way down. "I've been back for only two days, really. Not thinking about it has been my way to cope."

"Don't get me wrong," Procyon said. "I still think you're better off without me. You might be more limited without the scales to push through adversity, but absolute power and absolute freedom are how tyrants are minted. And even when I was fully in control, I wasn't getting what I wanted. None of us should be thinking about how to integrate me back into your life. I just... want to know, for what purpose was I allowed to come back?"

"I don't know," Faye said. "You've got a lot to say about how bad you were, but what did you actually do? If you had misused our changeling queen powers, I doubt merely erasing yourself from our memory would have been enough to hide it."

Procyon raised an eyebrow. "Do you really want to know?"

Faye shrugged. "If I don't, does it matter? You clearly need to get something off your chest. And if this is really all true, which, I can't see anymore how it wouldn't be... I should know. Especially if it's relevant to my life today."

"I tried to sabotage Ansel and Corsica's relationship, on purpose," Procyon said. "Because I was jealous. I had a crush on Corsica."

Faye blinked.

"You barely know what love is," Procyon went on. "You don't understand romance, beyond from an academic standpoint. And you only ever feel physical attraction toward machines. Did you think that was normal?"

Faye felt like she had a clock in her gut. "Y-Yes," she managed, stepping away from the window and looking back at her bed. "I did think that was normal. And you're being serious?"

"If you need a minute," Procyon said, drifting away, "I've got all eternity."

Twilight's word was true: Spike did keep weird hours. And it wasn't too hard for him to point Faye to the castle's very luxurious shower.

She stretched out under the misting water, the feeling of soot in her coat finally starting to wash away. Surrounded by bright lights, crystal tiles, and steam, her body could at last relax... which only made the thoughts in her head all the more distracting.

Procyon - her past self - had a crush on Corsica. And tried to sabotage Corsica's relationship with Ansel because of it. Could that even be possible?

Certainly, Faye used to have an obsession with Corsica. But it had always been in the form of an idol or role model, someone she followed because she wanted to be like them. And it was true that she always got on Ansel and Corsica's nerves, but that had been for fun, right? Or, it was just her awkward way of tagging along? Or...

She rubbed her forehead with a wingtip. Procyon's story had shaken her enough that she couldn't even remember her own version of events straightly. Was that a sign that Procyon was right? Or was this just how ponies worked?

Were there any ways Procyon could be wrong?

How contrived of an explanation would she need to convince herself that everything Procyon said was a lie? What could possess a part of her to invent things like this? What opaque end goal could these stories be pushing her toward, if they couldn't be taken at face value, and why would Procyon have such a goal?

She spun her brain, and came up with nothing. The biggest argument against what Procyon said was how jarring it felt. But a story needed to do more than feel jarring for there to be a convincing explanation as to why it was wrong.

And that meant... she used to be a jealous mare who didn't have issues putting her cards on the table to get what she wanted, and loved her best friend in a way that would lead her to sabotage that friend's relationships so she could have her to herself?

It just didn't feel possible. If she really loved someone, wouldn't that make her want to do what was in their own best interest, or help them pursue their own desires? Not the opposite. But her inability to understand stuff like this was proof of how little she knew about this field.

Maybe it was worth asking someone else for a second opinion. In a way that didn't make her sound like a basket case.

Still, imagining herself with the confidence and the initiative to see her plans through, not being choked by her own fear... It would be wonderful. And liberating. And terrifying, too. What would she have done in the Crystal Empire if she hadn't stopped herself from drawing on the Crystal Heart's power?

And all of this was only about Procyon, and what she had said. Faye hadn't yet spared a single thought to Unnrus-kaeljos, despite the fact that a god of calamity had just ordered her to aid the pony she was supposed to be spying on at the behest of Halcyon's captor.

She desperately needed someone to talk to. And it couldn't be Halcyon - Halcyon had been fragile enough as it was before getting snatched away, and learning what Faye had learned about the light spirit wouldn't help. But then who could she possibly turn to?

And of the people she did have around her, who could she actually make herself trust that much, even if she wanted to?

That was the real issue she faced. And it was even worse with how many powerful eyes were on her. Seigetsu was watching her, holding either Halcyon or her bracelet captive. Twilight was watching her, judging whether to come intervene in the north. Corsica was watching her, probably still mad at her for whatever had come between them in Snowport or the Crystal Empire. By her own admission, Procyon was lacking in moral character. And then, of course, there was Unnrus-kaeljos.

Faye needed help. She needed help and she didn't know where to find it. So she sat down in the shower and cried.

An indeterminate amount of time later, a knock sounded at the door.

Faye's ears spiked. "Hello?" she shouted over the rush of the water, realizing that someone else would eventually want to use this shower too. "Sorry, I'm almost done...!"

"Eh, no worries," Spike's voice sounded from the other side of the door. "Just checking to make sure you didn't forget to turn the water off when you left!"

Faye quickly cut the tap and blotted herself mostly dry, too many other things on her mind for her to care that she had left her robe back in her bedroom. Moments later, her fur still damp and slightly matted, she unlocked the door and stepped out into the castle.

"There you are!" Spike called, walking by. "Early riser breakfast is starting, but, uh, it might just be me. In case you want some pancakes." He pointed over his shoulder down a hallway with a thumb.

Breakfast? "How long was I in there?" Faye asked, her body just as waterlogged as her mind.

"Hour and a half." Spike shrugged. "I know mares like long showers, but usually they top out at an hour. You alright?"

Faye hesitated. She barely knew this tiny dragon. Out of all of Twilight's friends, she had seen him the least, only really meeting him in the Crystal Empire when he was playing the role of bard for an audience of crystal ponies.

But he didn't seem like a bad guy. And maybe it would be easier to get advice from someone she barely knew.

"No. Not really. I've got a lot on my mind," she said, starting in the direction he had indicated and was now going himself.

"Not surprising, really." Spike stretched as he walked, cracking his knuckles. "Twilight made it sound like something big happened down there yesterday. But hey, if you wanna ramble, I'll listen."

"It's not even about that, believe it or not," Faye said as they crossed a balcony over the foyer, a dining room coming into sight around the bend. "It's... Well, do you think it's weird not to like anyone? I mean romantically."

Spike raised an eyebrow as he waddled along. "You mean to be in between crushes, like you just got dumped and haven't settled on someone else yet, or to never have had any in the first place?"

"The latter," Faye said.

"Eh..." Spike twiddled his thumbs. "Yeah, it's pretty weird. But so what? I don't think Twilight's ever been in a relationship. And who isn't weird in some way or another?"

As they entered the dining room, Faye let that sink in. It had a broad window showing off the colors of the pre-sunrise sky, and was empty save for Starlight, who looked deep in thought. Spike saluted her.

"Morning," Starlight said, distracted.

"Important question," Spike announced, marching up to the table. "We need a second opinion: is it weird to never have crushes, ever?"

Starlight blinked. "No? Why?"

Spike pointed at Faye. Faye reddened. Thanks for keeping confidence, buddy...

Starlight frowned. "...Is someone harassing you about not getting hitched?"

"No," Faye said, trying not to trip over her words.

"Oh." Starlight went back to looking at the table. "I used to have that happen a bunch. But whatever brought this on, it's not weird. Sometimes you have more important things to worry about than who you like. Other times, you just don't care."

Spike glanced at Faye and shrugged, as if to say, there you have it.

Faye stood in the hallway, and slowly realized that she did feel better. Whatever she used to be, whatever she was 'supposed to' be, who cared? Who she was now was who she was now. Maybe it was just a matter of hearing that someone else felt the same.

"...Thanks," she said, taking a seat. "Anyway. I was promised pancakes?"

Spike waddled away again. "Yeah, coming right up!"

After he was gone, Starlight's eyes met Faye's. "You couldn't sleep either, huh?" Starlight guessed.

Faye folded her ears. "Had a restless night."

"Sounds like you have more on your mind than just what happened in that city, too," Starlight said. "I know I've had a lot to think about. For one, I wanted to apologize."

Faye tilted her head. "For?"

Starlight gave her a you don't remember? look. "For running away when we first met? For being reluctant to give you a commitment or a straight answer when you came all the way from Ironridge to look for my help?"

Oh. Faye looked down. "I've had so much going on since then, I forgot all about that," she admitted.

"Sounds like life," Starlight said. "But still. I've been living these last few weeks with my head in the sand. I still haven't decided what I'm going to do. But at the very least, I should have been ready to give you a straight answer when you came. I've been expecting the north to catch up with me for decades now, after all. At the very least, I should have been ready to explain to you why I'm reluctant."

Faye shook her head. "It's fine. You're not some perfect, mythical hero, even if that's what your old friends currently need. Neither am I. In fact, I'm probably the least-perfect pony I know. And I've got too many problems of my own to hold you responsible for yours. I barely even know if I have the capacity to stay on track to see this mission back to Ironridge, regardless of how much help I get."

"Few ponies do," Starlight answered. "You're underestimating how much it takes to pursue a goal like stop a war or save a city. Wars are fought between thousands of creatures on each side. Each and every one of them has something they're fighting for. What are the strength of your desires when weighed against all of theirs? Do you even want peace as badly as one of those warriors wants to see their enemy fall, let alone all of them?"

"Do you?" Faye asked, knowing that as a changeling queen, she had the capacity to possess that desire, even if she currently didn't.

"More like, do I want it badly enough to leave the comfort of my new home," Starlight said. "You'd think that I would. You'd think it would be impossible for me not to, given what I told you last night about what it is that I am."

"The Flame of Hope?" Faye guessed. "The world's will to exist?"

Starlight nodded. "The only way I can achieve anything close to stasis or peace is by fighting myself, essentially locking myself in place. I used to think of it like damming a river. Even if I would try to live a normal life and keep myself from fulfilling my ambitions, I would invariably fail after some time had passed. But after meeting Convergence... Convergence is like me. Not just a flame, but a flame given flesh, and the capacity for thoughts and desires beyond just what the flame is. But you saw how it existed. Using chaos to deny its purpose, and existing in a stable, controlled, tenuous balance."

Faye flicked her ears, listening.

"It made me think about... the metaphysical implications of what I'm doing to myself," Starlight said. "When we talk about emotions given physical form or physical powers, a lot of things you'd normally think of as metaphors become more real than you'd expect. If I'm fighting myself to be able to live a normal existence, does that mean I'm quashing the world's will to exist in turn? Is this a path that will simply put it into a lethargic coma? If my balance tips too far in the wrong direction, could the world die? The world is better off without Convergence, since its power could unravel the world's foundation. But it clearly needs mine. These are... the thoughts that kept me up last night."

Faye's own turmoil was almost entirely purged, listening to Starlight speak. "Why are you telling me this, though?" she asked. "I'm a complete stranger. That's... gotta be some of the most private stuff you could be thinking about."

Starlight shrugged. "You struck me as someone who could use a good example."

Faye's heart lifted just a little. "So are you just that altruistic, then?"

"Is it altruism if it costs me nothing?" Starlight asked. "You're from the north. You've evidently experienced a lot of hardship there. And if you've met my friends, I know you're not exaggerating about the kinds of messes you've gotten into. Perhaps I'm just trying to look out for a kindred spirit... or perhaps I'm hoping that if you can rise above your own demons, you'll find the strength to solve this war on your own."

"Do you really think that's possible?" Faye asked. "That I could resolve a war all by myself?"

"You evidently think it's possible for one pony to do." Starlight nodded. "Otherwise you wouldn't have come all the way here looking for me. It still surprises me you'd do that, even with the legacy I left behind up there."

Faye looked away. "Yeah, well... I've always felt it's easier to see my own path in life when I have something in the distance I'm looking to. Not that I find something like that often. And most of the time, it doesn't even turn out to have been worth my trust when I get there. But if your friends thought you were a perfect hero who could turn any situation around, I guess I just wanted to believe it."

"They were relying on me to save them even when I was a young child," Starlight said. "Often subconsciously. Sometimes explicitly. For me, that's just been how it always was. And they're still doing it." She closed her eyes and sighed.

For a moment, Faye let the silence remain. "Can I tell you something?" she eventually asked. "Just to get it out there."

"Go ahead," Starlight said.

"When Convergence was talking about splitting souls into pieces," Faye began. "And the golems were talking about it earlier, too. If you're a Flame of Harmony, and that's how the flames were made, that means that you're like this, right? Are you able to tell, like, that this is the way you are? Do you know any ways to confirm what it was saying? Because... I think I might be too."

Starlight's ears stood straight up.

"Not a Flame of Harmony, I mean," Faye hastily corrected. "Just... split. In my head, there are three of me. It's a magical phenomenon, not just a mental one. You've seen my emerald, right? That's one of my... selves."

Starlight held her hooves together and took a long breath. "I don't know enough to help confirm or deny that. I could try to figure out. Being what I am, I have some powers that might help with this, but..." She hesitated. "There's something funny about you. I haven't mentioned it to anyone, but it feels like you aren't really here. It's possible that gone-ness could be due to you not having a complete soul, if this is really what's going on. But it feels more to me like the tools I would try to use to find out just wouldn't interact with you at all."

"Lovely." Faye's face fell. "That's what Princess Luna said, too."

Shrouded in a golden mist, Luna had said. Hard to feel like it was a coincidence when Unnrus-kaeljos was golden too.

Starlight nodded. "Many of my powers are similar to hers. She was the wielder of the Immortal Dream before before it became me, after all. If she can't tell you anything about yourself, I doubt I can either."

So much for that. "This might be a different topic yet again," Faye started. "But what do you know about the two gods that destroyed Indus? You saw them too, on that staircase, right?"

"More than I'd like. And not enough." Starlight looked towards the window. "Most of my knowledge is about Tetra and Aegis. Aegis is Tetra's body, but also an independent creature you can talk to and interact with, on a limited level. Tetra is supposedly a disembodied intelligence that was discovered by the griffons in Indus two thousand years ago. She taught mortals how to create new gods, and Garsheeva, Celestia and Luna all arose as a result. Later, Tetra came into the Princesses' custody, and they took her back to Indus and sealed her away again. But I don't know who her opponent was, or why they were fighting, or where either of them came from in the first place."

"Do you think they were evil?" Faye asked, recalling Unnrus-kaeljos naming Tetra the great destroyer. "Or that one of them was in the right?"

Starlight's brow shadowed. "In the wake of what they did, I don't know if it matters anymore. I do know that well-intentioned creatures can do terrible things when they lose their way, and especially when they don't have friends to tell them when they're wrong and steer them back to the right path. I also know that there are plenty of reasons worth fighting for."

"Do your friends in the north count as a reason worth fighting for?" Faye whispered.

"Yes," Starlight said with no hesitation. "Absolutely. That just has no bearing on whether I can bring myself to get back on my hooves and fight for them."

Faye looked at her, the resignation on her face and in her voice washing over her like a cold tide. This didn't feel like hope. A Flame of Harmony shouldn't be feeling this way.

"What is it you're living for?" Faye asked. "Back when you still were trying, what was the future you wanted to see?"

Starlight pulled out a sturdy slip of parchment - from where, Faye couldn't say. It was full of legalese, but Faye was good at parsing that, and quickly identified it as a land title deed. A large one, more suited to a municipality than a home.

"We were going to build a village in Equestria," Starlight said, getting a faraway look in her eye. "One where we would make the rules. Where we would never have to worry about getting drawn into political plots by corrupt locals, never face citizens hostile because of Valey's race, never have to deal with mobs afraid of me because I was a foreigner. A place where we could put down our roots and settle down, where we could get to know ponies outside of our immediate friend group for the long term. An economic artery that Shinespark could use to revitalize Ironridge in the wake of its war. A home that the more adventurous members of our crew could return to in between their quests, so that none of us would ever have to say goodbye. That was what kept us going... but, it was an impossible dream."

"Sounds awesome to me," Faye pointed out. "Tell me you wouldn't censor historical information at random, and I'd want to live there."

"It was too good to be true," Starlight insisted, shaking her head. "A place like that sounded perfect to my pre-teen self, but the reality is that I could never live with good enough because I would always be aiming higher and seeing some new problem in the world to fix. I didn't realize it until the very end, but the Flame of Hope won't ever be satisfied until the world is back to its new, pristine state."

Faye sat back. "I guess that's a pretty tall order. But do you really think that not being able to be perfect is a good enough reason not to try at all?"

"You don't understand," Starlight went on. "The world is alive. It's built on the Flames of Harmony, which in turn are made from people from Indus. And it's designed to be a world where the emotional regulates the physical on a metaphysical level. That means that actually fixing it, beyond the physical task of taking all these broken, warring societies and forging them into a utopia that no one even has a coherent understanding of how it could work, you would have to heal the world emotionally as well. You're clearly someone who has seen your fair share of adversity in life. And you probably have a lot of emotional issues stemming from that. So if you can't fix yourself, do you really think you could fix the world?"

"I don't know!" Faye raised her voice. "But isn't your flame supposed to be the desire to try, whether or not there is a way? Isn't it your job to show everyone that there doesn't need to be a way, and they can still move forward?"

"...I don't know," Starlight said. "Maybe you're right. Maybe it is. But it still became too much for me to take. Even with the power of the Immortal Dream, my quest was perpetually exhausting. It never stopped. When I did stop it, when I finally tore myself away from that and tried to go it alone, it wasn't when I was defeated and broken. It was when the path ahead was still clear and open. There was a way. For me, there's always a way. And that's the problem. It's a way that never ends. Moving forward is all well and good, but what if you move and move and move and never get anywhere?"

"Better than not moving at all," Faye insisted. "Ironridge needs you. Your friends need you. And even if you can't make as much of a difference as you want, you could still do something."

Starlight said nothing.

"I mean... Look at me." Faye shrugged limply. "I came all the way here on the off chance that putting my faith in you would be better than doing nothing. And I'm gonna need something or someone to put my faith in after I leave Ponyville, too."

"I don't know what else I can say that I haven't told you already," Starlight said, neither angry nor upset. "I haven't made my decision yet. And I won't have made it, until it's too late. And for me, it's never too late, because there's always a way forward if I want there to be. But if I do commit, I don't know if I'll be able to stop again. I'm sorry to dump all these problems on you, I just... You're pushing, but there's nothing here for you to find."

Faye sighed. "Sounds like you need your flame rekindled just as much as Kindness."

"If that's true," Starlight said, "your mission with Kindness might take more than just some other flames and a Tree of Harmony."

"Starlight..." Faye reached out a hoof, but dropped it. It was clear that she could go no further this way.

Starlight had helped her, and she no longer felt her own malaise of problems clouding her mind. If only she could return the favor.

She shook her head, and resigned herself to-

"Pathetic," said a voice from the window.

It was Papyrus, lounging on the windowsill, his tail swaying in the breeze.

Faye jumped. Starlight's pupils constricted.

"A god gets in your way, and you kill them out of pure spite," Papyrus said, pointing a hoof at Starlight. "A picturesque village falls a hair short of your standards, and you hop on a boat and go all the way across the world to try again. Your friend dies, and you run all the way to the afterlife to drag them back to the living. You hate losing even more than I do! And yet you can't even manage a measly jaunt across some mountains you've crossed on hoof twice before just to win a war against a foe you've already beaten?" His eyes glittered with a savage grin. "Pathetic."

Authenticity

As everyone else departed and he was forbidden from following, Papyrus found himself alone in Luna's office, with nothing to do but marvel that he was still alive.

It wasn't completely unpredictable. After all, Starlight had spared him too, with only the flimsiest of reasoning. And as Papyrus had learned long ago, mortal logic didn't apply to gods. They could do whatever they wanted. Because they could was the only reason they ever needed. And there was nothing stopping her from sparing him, despite his logically undeniable role in the near-extinction of her children. So, in a way, it didn't not make sense.

But there were fewer better ways to get in touch with your own helplessness and lack of agency in the world than crossing paths with a being whose grace you would live or die by, regardless of anything you could possibly do.

"Thinking deep thoughts, are we?" Egdelwonk asked, lounging against a pillar at the corner of the darkened suite.

Papyrus didn't even jump. "I thought you were off minding your own business after you got tired of my antics."

Egdelwonk chuckled. "Oh, Papyrus. I can get bored, but never tired." He stepped closer, into the bottom-lit path between the entrance and Luna's desk, casting his shadow up onto the ceiling. "Why do you think you're alive?"

Papyrus shrugged. "In the 'why did Starlight bring me back' sense, the 'why didn't Luna kill me just there' sense, or the 'where do foals come from' sense? Because frankly, I can't figure out a grand meaning to any of the above. If you're looking for anything more than 'happenstance of the universe', you'll have to come back another time."

"...Let's do a thought exercise," Egdelwonk said. "Imagine a town in rural somewhere-or-other cut off from everything. No trade, no news, might be barely aware the rest of the world exists at all. In that town is a stallion named Farmer Lenny. Lenny's parents were farmers. His grandparents were farmers. His great-grandparents were farmers too, or at least seven of them were, except for one who was the village drunk and perpetually unemployed as a result. Lenny's children are farmers too, as are his grandchildren, and his great-grandchildren are growing up on the farm and realistically stand very little chance of being anything other than farmers. Then, one day, elderly Farmer Lenny steps on a rake in the grass, is axepoled by the handle, breaks his neck and dies."

He leaned in to stare at Papyrus, his face questioning, his neck slightly longer than it should have been. "What was the meaning of Farmer Lenny's life?"

Papyrus frowned. "He provided food for his family, and perhaps for his community as well. Probably left a lot of progeny, to boot. Seems like a simple and straightforward-enough life. I'd call it a respectable existence. Can't make fun of the one who puts grub on your table."

Egdelwonk nodded along. "Now, let me change the story a bit. I notice you made no mention of the tragicomedic way in which Farmer Lenny met his demise, so let's scrap that. He isn't dead yet, he lives happily ever after, blah blah blah. With that morbid detail off the table, what is the meaning of Farmer Lenny's life?"

Papyrus squinted at him. "You think I can't smell a setup? That's the same question and you yourself admitted the detail you took out wasn't relevant, but if I give the same answer, you'll twist something to make me look like a fool."

"So shrewd," Egdelwonk sighed. "First off, I didn't say the fact or manner of his death was irrelevant, I said you omitted it. And second, those were in fact two very different questions. First, I asked what was the meaning, and then what is the meaning of his life. You more than anyone ought to know why that matters."

"Because I'm still alive," Papyrus swaggered. "Even though I've got no right to be. That where you're going with this?"

Egdelwonk stared him down once again. "Which means...?"

Papyrus returned the stare.

"Fine, then," Egdelwonk sighed. "Let's change the story some more. One day, a traveler from afar arrives in Farmer Lenny's town, and Farmer Lenny - still alive, in this hypothetical - crosses paths with them. From this traveler, Farmer Lenny learns that one week's march to the west is something called an 'ocean' that he's never seen before, nor has anyone else in his village. Taken by the traveler's romantic stories, Farmer Lenny decides he wants to see this ocean before he dies. So, he rallies his resources, gets together a band of able-bodied cart ponies with the supplies and provisions for a journey, gets quite a few in on the endeavor, both his own offspring and other villagers who want to see the ocean too. They set off, and about half a month later they return to the village, carrying wild and incredible stories about an endless expanse of water and all the other fantastical things they saw along the way. The next night, Farmer Lenny dies peacefully in his sleep, knowing that he has collectively stirred his town's imagination even if the exertion ultimately killed him."

He blinked slowly into Papyrus's eyes. "What question am I going to ask?"

"What was the meaning to his life, since he's no longer around to live it," Papyrus pointed out. "And now he's got a bit more on his resume than last time."

Egdelwonk drew back to his own personal space and winked. "And this could be relevant to you how, exactly?"

"If the whole point of your story was to tell me that because I have an extra lease on life, I need to figure out what to do with it, congratulations, you're only a decade and change late to the party," Papyrus scoffed. "I've already thought about it, thank you very much, and odds are I'm never going to stop thinking about it until-"

He was shushed by Egdelwonk sticking a feather in his mouth. "But but but but but," Egdelwonk interrupted conspiratorially. "What if it was relevant to someone other than you, instead?"

Papyrus frowned in confusion.

"You've put a lot of thought into your place in the world," Egdelwonk said, straightening up again. "But you also get utterly boondoggled when others treat you in ways you can't account for. Why did Woona just wander away without bothering to hit you with the hammer of justice for your transgressions against the crown? Why did Starlight chicken out when the time came to finish you off once and for all? Why even did your parents decide to have children?"

He gave a disconcerting smile. "I believe the answer you gave me was 'happenstance of the universe'. An appropriate answer, if you believe the actions of everyone but you to be either coldly logical or inexplicably random. But what if the real reason they treat you so vexingly is because their own heads are just as busy and full of questions without answers as yours is?"

Papyrus rolled his eyes. "Ah, yes, the introductory lecture from Have Empathy 101. Got that one a few times back in the Griffon Empire, not that it seemed to ever stick. Listen, I appreciate your tenacity for trying to drum that into me, I really do." He closed his eyes and sighed, doing his level best to take this seriously, even though something in his chest urged him to shrug it off as usual. "But I just don't see where that gets me. So ponies are complicated and even gods have thoughts and reasons for doing what they do. I certainly did, back in the day. But what's the difference between a pattern that's too complex to figure out and complete randomness? Sure, let me stand back and smell the flowers by appreciating how unique and nuanced Starlight's thoughts must be. Then what?"

He shrugged. "If she's too complex to predict, she's too complex to predict. End of story."

Egdelwonk stared at him for a bit, and eventually started rubbing his goatee.

"Well?" Papyrus asked.

"...You're making an effort," Egdelwonk eventually said. "Honestly, that's basically the only thing that's different about you from before. Old habits die hard, I suppose. But I believe you'll get there eventually. According to many, that effort is the most important part."

"Why are you so interested in me, anyway?" Papyrus pressed. "It can't be just because of the whole sphinx-chaos thing."

Egdelwonk leaned against a pillar. "I suppose you could say I'd like to prove a point to an old friend. You could think of it as... you may or may not have a choice to make in the vaguely-distant future, and I have a vested interest in you choosing a specific outcome that right now, you definitely wouldn't choose."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow.

"In fact," Egdelwonk said, "you might be one of the last ponies in the world who would choose it. But I've got a point to prove, and doing something the hard way when you don't have to does a bit more to drive things home than looking for a cheap win. In fact, I believe that's a philosophy you know plenty about? They do say there's no kill like overkill."

"Ah, so you're looking to stick it to someone!" Papyrus brightened, feeling the conversation moving in a direction that was more his forte. "Figures it would be something like that. Though if I might offer a humble suggestion, have you considered just telling me plainly what you want to do?" He strolled closer to Luna's desk. "Perhaps there's a grand game going on that goes so far over my head I can't even begin to perceive it, but from what it looks like down on the floor, you aren't having much success getting through to me with whatever these interrogations are supposed to drill into my head. On the other hoof, you're stronger than me, and I know exactly how the rule of the strongest works. Give me the script, and I'd be a fool to disobey."

"I'm afraid that would automatically make me lose," Egdelwonk apologized. "While I can give you all the nudges and guidance I please, actually threatening you or trying to put an answer in your mouth would make it my choice, not yours. And that doesn't count."

Papyrus grew a silly grin. "Did you just say you're not allowed to threaten me?"

Egdelwonk's eyes glowed red. "Only in matters pertaining to one teensy little thing you don't have the knowledge to identify."

"I kid, I kid!" Papyrus waved his wings and backed off with a disarming smile. "No need to take things so seriously all the time. Anyway, do you suppose I should wait around here until the princess gets back with my minions, or go skulk off somewhere and make myself useful in the meantime?"

Egdelwonk pulled out a stack of papers and perused them, muttering to himself. "Well, according to the script, they're going to be gone for a while doing nebulous spoilery things to extend the useful lifespan of Nehaley's body - yes, it says that's her real name now, you can stop calling her Larceny, thank you very much, I'll have you know that's even a note written in the margins so I don't forget to tell you. And they'll be gone a while longer securing a Writ for dear Floria, since she's somehow the only member of your group who doesn't have one yet, and they've got to arrange for an airship to get you to the border, yadda yadda yadda..."

"What are you reading?" Papyrus leaned in, trying to get a look at the papers. "Where did you even get that?"

"No! Bad." Egdelwonk pulled the papers away, still reading, and pushed Papyrus back by the nose. "If you read the script, you'd just wind up breaking causality and probably cause a time vortex or some other behavior that's currently undefined because it's not going to happen. Hmm, this says you're supposed to get bored and wander off into the city where you'll have an encounter that 'furthers your character arc', but honestly, it doesn't look too interesting. What do you say we skip that and I give you a ride back to Felicity's place so you can spend your time tormenting Floria instead?"

Papyrus made a show of yawning, looking out the panoramic window at the Manehattan night skyline. "Whatever you say, chief..."

Egdelwonk pulled out a tiny wastebasket, motioned toward it, and bowed. Papyrus stepped toward it, his thoughts beginning to turn towards new ways of annoying Floria coupled with plans for how to get the most information possible out of their first few hours in the Empire, now that it sounded like the roadblocks for that endeavor were falling away. But before he could let Egdelwonk's lecture slip completely away, push it fully out of mind, he stopped to wonder if he had really learned all he could from what the dumpster deacon was trying to teach him.

Not that he had learned much, save for a snippet about Egdelwonk's motivations and end goals. Not that the lecture had covered much new ground, or engaged with things he hadn't thought about before. Not even that he trusted Egdelwonk to have a point to make, and not just be screwing with him for fun. But Papyrus had changed. Brushing off well-meaning advice because he thought he knew better was something High Prince Gazelle would do, and Papyrus did know better than to waste his time on things that didn't pertain to him... or, at least, thought he did.

So, on the off chance he was wrong and Egdelwonk had an important point, Papyrus filed that lecture away in the back of his mind, and made an effort not to forget about it completely.

After a solid two days of not making trouble, I felt like the crew on Rhodallis' airship were warming up to me.

Not warm, warm. It was plain for me to see that not one of the ponies on this ship was here because their life was going well. Everyone seemed to have a bone to pick, and the best-adjusted ones were simply the best ones at hiding it, though with my talent for perception they all stood out anyway. But even though I was a stranger in a cage, no one had bothered yet to take out that ire on me.

In fact, it was starting to reach the point where I felt confident enough to draw attention to myself.

"He's lying," I said from my cage in the cargo hold, wearing the blanket they had given me as a makeshift cape. I tried my best to make it look like I actually deserved a cape, and wasn't just self-conscious about showing my body in public. No one had called me out on it yet, so perhaps it was working?

Across from my cage, a trio of pirates sat around a barrel, using the makeshift table to play cards. I wasn't familiar with the rules of the game, but the griffon with ripped forelegs and an absurd blond pompadour had just made a play, and I was confident enough in my ability to read people that I knew it was some sort of bluff.

"What?" All three of them turned to me, though it was the pompadour griffon who spoke. "Now why would you say a thing like that?"

"Just a hunch." I shrugged. "Take it or leave it."

"Gaston always acts like he's bluffing," said the second pirate, a mud-green stallion with sunken eyes, a blocky jaw and a bandanna that failed to hide his lack of a mane, his refined accent suspiciously out of place. "That's his default. You can't be too certain..."

The third pirate, a lanky mare with extraordinarily tall ears, beady eyes and a facial structure that didn't seem quite right who probably subscribed to the same manestyle publications as Mother, leaned over the barrel and shifted a card. "Eh. I'll put a bet on the newbie. See if she's made of anything."

Gaston drummed his talons together villainously and gave her a wide, flashy smile.

She didn't flinch, keeping her teeth on a corner of the card as both players looked to the bandana stallion.

He shook his head. "Hold."

They flipped their cards over. Gaston's expression drooped in defeat, and the mare blew a raspberry at her competitors as she pocketed the winnings - Ironridge currency, I noticed, even though we were in the Griffon Empire. Even though I had made the call, she didn't bother to share.

"Well, friend, either you're skilled or lucky," Bandana Stallion said to me, putting on an affable smile that was also at odds with his criminal countenance, looking as if he could be Gaston's weightlifting partner. "Perhaps if you're feeling like gambling, you might go out on a limb and... tell us about yourself?"

"You haven't heard what I discussed with your boss the other day?" I asked, sitting up. "I'm a traveler, and I'm looking for a friend. Specifically, the filly in the ice block you were trying to sell at that castle."

"I did hear as much from the rumors making their way around the ship," Bandanna Stallion said, his voice polite and airy. "Something of a pity for you you had to get attached to one of His Eminence's pawns like so. Unless you happen to have resources, as he's always willing to barter..." He sat back and closed his eyes, still smiling.

"So what's with you and the new guy?" the mare asked, stepping in to fill the silence as bandana stallion mused and Gaston sulked. "Perplexed Rondo? The rumors all say you know each other."

"Perplexed?" I frowned. "Yeah, we've got some history. But why do you call him that?"

"Not too familiar with how things are done around here, are you?" Bandana Stallion asked, breaking from his musing. "What's your name, if I can be so bold? Halcyon, they say?"

Well, Rondo already knew, and then I straight-up told Rhodallis with several of his crew listening, so if I was planning to lie about it, that ship had long since sailed. I nodded.

"Good, good," Bandana Stallion went on, nodding courteously and sounding half-focused. "A good name, Halcyon. Have you ever met anyone else named that?"

I thought about that. No, not in the way he was probably intending, but I had needed to differentiate between two other versions of me in my head that both also had a claim to Halcyon, and if they were right about our history then Halcyon had originally been a completely different mare whose name and appearance I was merely borrowing in the first place. That seemed like reason enough to nod.

"See, there's the problem," Bandana Stallion said. "You can't be the Halcyon if there's nothing stopping any old someone from using the same name by accident. And we can't strike fear into the hearts of our enemies with the sound of our names alone if those names could belong to just anyone. Hence, everyone has their epithets. There could be dozens of regular Bernards in the world, but I am the Sad Bernard, just as he is the Turnpike Gaston and she is the Melodic Lethe."

"What he said," Gaston interrupted, leaning in. "How about we start calling you Killjoy Halcyon for good measure?"

I blinked at that, and my ears went further back. "Do I get any say in this? Because that one might not be the greatest."

Lethe - or, the Melodic Lethe - chuckled. "You can take them. You can give them. But you can't escape them. Not unless you get stuck with something else. Though, I think Moneymaker Halcyon might be more appropriate."

The Sad Bernard nodded. "Two against one. I'm afraid that puts you on the loser's side again, Gaston."

I shook my head. No, I wasn't going to mentally add the in front of their names if they didn't even always include it when addressing each other. Probably a sign of familiarity, or something... "Well, what about Rhodallis?" I asked. "What's his epithet?"

"Do you even need to ask?" Gaston blustered. "Pirate King?"

Oh. Right. That... I didn't know why I didn't think of that.

"So if you're giving me an epithet," I said, trying to change the subject, "does that mean you're planning to induct me into your crew?"

Bernard folded his meaty hooves on the barrel-turned-table. "Well, that depends ever so much on you, Moneymaker Halcyon. Do you want to?"

"Don't you think it's a little early for me to make a judgement on that?" I tilted my head. "I don't even know what your goals are yet. I've just had plenty of shady groups try to hire me before, so it's my default assumption for what's going on."

Bernard chuckled. "Are our goals not obvious? To be the one and only, the most important version of us, the ones people think of when they hear our names. To suffer no other to lay claim to the things that are rightfully ours. Once, before I joined up with this crew, I ran a... legitimate business establishment in that many-named llama city, before getting ran out of business by competitors who had better luck picking the right side to back in local politics. They left me destitute, and more than a little angry, you understand. That was my business, my fortune, my clientele, my turf, my life, my everything. So what are our goals, you ask? To dispense with the interlopers, clear the stage and become the only ones known for what we are known for. For the world... to know our names."

I frowned, trying to process that. So Rhodallis' goal was... to get rid of anyone he believed to be infringing on his identity, sharing aspects of who he was? And he let anyone who had a similar bone to pick come help him, presumably so long as none of them tried to copy anything another one wanted to be known for? But what did that have to do with Coda? Unless the prisoner he was trying to trade her for so he could kill them was... like him, somehow...

And then it clicked in my brain: Rhodallis might not have been solely focused on Ironridge, but he certainly paid a lot of attention to it. And Ironridge had a lot of changeling bishops, just like he was.

Well, that sure was awkward. I wasn't the only version of me in a much more literal sense than these pirates were probably imagining. And I was a lot more concerned with finding more things to define me than preventing others from sharing those things, too.

"I think I get it," I said, not ready to put anything I had just realized on the table quite yet. "What about the rest of you? Same stories? Someone else tried to crowd you out from what you did, and you want to make a name for yourself to push back?"

Lethe gave me a hooded look. "You can probably guess from the name what I used to do."

Lethe, Melodious... "Songstress?" I guessed. "Or, performer?"

"The world's most eminent llama heartthrob," she droned. "Made it to the front of the stage on multiple occasions, but then this little thing happened they call getting too old. I didn't feel like being forgotten in the face of the next generation like so many before me."

A llama? Huh. So that was the reason for her proportions looking out of whack. I blinked, realizing this was my first time ever seeing one.

"And I was the fastest race griffon of the century," Gaston snorted. "Framed and kicked off the track for a cheating scandal, even though still none are faster!"

"He wasn't framed," Lethe added to me, ignoring Gaston's look. "Paid for a hit job on his fastest competitor's wings. Impossible to hide when the merc who did it is on this crew too."

I tilted my head. So... this was a support group for disgraced professionals who were caught playing dirty?

"As you can see," Bernard said, nudging his companions aside with a smile, "we're not a home for genteel types with easily-offended sensibilities, nor for anyone flimsy enough to fade quietly into irrelevance. Although, from the look on your face, I can guess you fit into one of those two categories..."

It wasn't so much that I was revolted by their ideas as I hadn't even processed yet what following that philosophy would mean. Would being the only, definitive version of me involve getting rid of Procyon and Faye?

...Yeah, okay, that was definitely not happening. Even if Procyon could be weird, unhelpful or completely absent most of the time.

"Just doesn't sound like the place for me," I admitted. "I've got big enough things I'm chasing already without trying to build a reputation big enough that the entire world will acknowledge it."

"One of the small folk, eh?" Bernard gave me a sad, predatory smile. "Well, never you fret. I, as a legitimate businesspony, feel an affinity for the common creatures, seeing as I'd be nothing without a clientele. And many of us feel the same! These two need fans. As long as you don't step on any of our names, I'm sure His Eminence will let you out of there the moment you're no longer of use to him. And if you happen to have anything worth having, have I mentioned we have some remarkably reliable trading partners on our crew? Some of us could get you absolutely anything you can afford, and it wouldn't even have to be legal."

"Does that mean Coda has a price?" I asked, feeling like it wasn't too soon to stop pushing my luck.

Bernard innocently shrugged. "I'm afraid she belongs to His Eminence, and we couldn't very well form an effective team with our goals if we didn't respect what belongs to our crewmates. Pursuing what we are rightfully owed might be one thing, but it would be unseemly to get greedy."

"You talk too much!" Gaston complained. "Shut up and deal us another hand, I gotta win back my winnings."

Lethe smiled at him. "If I open the cage, the Moneymaker goes to my team. Fair play?"

Gaston pounded his chest and glared at her. "Do it and you'll see just how much money she can actually lose you, I've figured out what makes her tick!"

Lethe smiled harder. "And if she beats you again for me?"

Gaston patted his biceps. "Heh. She won't, if she's smart enough to know what's good for her."

"Ahem," Bernard interrupted, dealing out another set of cards with a flourish. "Not to put a damper on the festivities, but I believe the Moneymaker Halcyon is currently the property of His Eminence. While we might have been expressly given the authority to open the cage on a whim, I believe that does make any winnings she's involved in technically become his property as well? Of course, if that's all the same to you two, then as the most trustworthy creature here I would be happy to act as a courier for delivering him your ill-gotten gains..."

The griffon and the llama both made their plays while glaring daggers at Bernard. I still didn't know the rules of the game, but Gaston was doing exactly the same thing as last time, and the others... Yep, Bernard was trying to rile them to distract from some simplistic and obvious gambit that anyone paying attention could root out instantly. I was sure of it.

Lethe glanced at me for my appraisal.

"Bet against Gaston," I said with a shrug. That would have been my line no matter what I suspected they were doing.

Someone flipped over a card. Gaston kicked the barrel over, and I watched as Bernard pocketed funds from both of them with his polite, unfailing and very unnerving smile.

Gaston got up, marched over and held up two talons. Then he stuck them straight at me, between two bars of the cage.

Then he spread them apart, pushing on the bars. The bars bent a little.

"You aren't safe in there, no-name pipsqueak," he warned, pulling his hand back out. "Next time you cross the Turnpike Gaston, you'd best watch out, because not a soul alive can outrun me. And there'll be nowhere to hide."

I swallowed. Partly because he was actually menacing, but for tough guys like this - especially given the pirates' stated purpose - it seemed like a poor idea to contest their supremacy. Even if I was way stronger than I looked, and potentially immortal to boot.

"Gaston," Lethe lectured, "if you treat her that way, she'll never help you make any money of your own..."

"Oh, I wouldn't worry overmuch about that," Bernard said with a wink. "After all, nothing bad ever happened to anyone from failing to pay off a gambling debt. Now, I don't know about all of you, but I think I best be getting ready for crew duty, seeing as I won the latest drawing of lots. Do try not to draw His Eminence's ire by injuring or disaffecting someone whose cooperation he desires, hmm? We wouldn't want the lack of my stabilizing influence to lead to any regrettable behavior."

Gaston looked slightly - slightly - cowed. Lethe looked not at all discouraged.

"Crew duty?" I asked, hoping to get a last question before the conversation's most talkative member walked out. "You win it as a privilege? Isn't that just work?"

Bernard chuckled. "Oh, pardon my language. It's a euphemism for 'head out with His Eminence and parlay'. Apparently, we'll be making another attempt to pawn off that friend of yours! I can't say I'm optimistic about how this one will go, but where there's a will, there's a way, and we've got nothing if not willpower. Oh, and firepower too, actually. Can't forget the firepower. And money..."

He continued muttering a list under his breath as he walked out of the cargo hold. I was far more concerned with finding a way - any way - to follow Coda.

Good Deal

Less than a day after first arriving in Stormhoof, Papyrus and Senescey alighted once again in the city streets, several hours to go before sundown.

Papyrus stretched, furling his wings as Senescey pulled up alongside him. Bustling roads wound in all directions, their white stone bricks pounded down by generations of hooves and talons, pedestrians ambling along in a mundane hurry or else without a care in the world. This close to the keep, there was a bit less open-air market activity and a bit more guard presence, but Papyrus still got the feeling the guards were more there to put on a show than because they expected something to happen.

"Right then," he muttered under his breath, just loud enough for Senescey to hear. "Step one, confirm that the castle is open to visitors. Step two, look and see if there are actually mares standing around purely for the sake of being pretty."

"Let's get to it," Senescey answered, with just a bit less enthusiasm than Papyrus.

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "Getting cold hooves now that we're back in action?"

Senescey huffed, then looked away. "No. Just... disappointed in myself for changing my mind so quickly about having nothing more to do with this stuff."

"We did decide this by unanimous vote," Papyrus reminded her. "You didn't have to get on board with it."

"That's the point," Senescey said. "I suppose you can't relate."

"As far as I'm concerned, our deal is still on," Papyrus replied. "I tag around with you and your sisters and do whatever. It just so happens that whatever turned out to be what we were already doing!"

Senescey shrugged. "I told you you couldn't relate."

The spiral path up to the castle was just as Papyrus remembered it, a ramp made of alternating staircases and small circular plazas that was more a bridge than a road. From the amount of hoof traffic, not as high as the roads below that actually went somewhere yet much higher than a dead end, he judged the castle was indeed open for business. And as the main entrance rotated into sight, his suspicions were readily confirmed: the door wasn't even shut, and the guards on duty were spending more time bowing than checking any of the creatures going in or out.

Whatever reason so many creatures were here notwithstanding, the castle staff clearly didn't mind their presence. And soon, he and Senescey passed through the entry with nothing more than the customary bow the guards gave to everyone.

That was actually odd. Papyrus glanced at Senescey, who was wearing the same disguise as before. If Tarunda really wanted to rope them into something, wouldn't he have notified his guards to keep an eye out in case she did show up?

He didn't have long to peruse that line of thought, because the inside of the castle actually had changed. In the old days, a short, defensible entry tunnel had opened into a grand ballroom and feasting hall, home to most of the castle's public events. That ballroom was ringed by a balcony several floors up, with no staircases and in fact no easily visible entrances or exits to invite the public further than the ballroom at all, save for two corridors that led to the kitchens and the bathrooms.

The infrastructure was all there to present the public with a clean lobby and nothing else, to segregate them out from the castle's more official areas. And yet the ballroom he beheld today had done away with all of that.

Every secret exit, hidden door and fake wall had been exposed, widened or removed. A new double staircase had been installed, winding symmetrically around the room's edges to grant access to the balcony above. And the floor had a much more permanent setup, full of benches and display cases and occasional velvet ropes meant to guide people along.

"They turned this place into a museum?" Papyrus guessed, tilting his head and walking up to one of the cases.

"They opened it up," Senescey said, following him loosely while staring at the ceiling. "What did they do about the upper class? The ones who were usually up there..."

Papyrus reached the first display, ignoring her, and frowned.

It was a giant, roped-off painting, accompanied by a lengthy description on a stand. The painting depicted a violent struggle on a dark, incoherent background, legions of griffons in House Everlaste armor crashing into a horde of untransformed changelings, swords and spears drawn. The contrast of detail between the griffons and the changelings was intense and deliberate; each griffon was pristinely rendered, attention paid to every facet of their armor. The changelings they tussled with blurred together into an impressionistic mass of fangs, eyes and limbs with holes in the carapace, though it was clear that whoever painted this had indeed gotten to look at changelings at length.

He almost felt like two different artists had made this in tandem, equally talented in different areas. Above the melee, under a ruddy sky of clouds illuminated red from below, the griffons' commander stood on a bleak outcropping, a sphinx reared up on two paws with wings spread and a sword drawn heroically. And the way the sphinx was colored...

Papyrus frowned, lowering his voice to a whisper. "Is this supposed to be me?"

Senescey started paying attention, looking to and reading from the information placard. "The Battle of Fourcliff Ascent. This masterwork depicts a pivotal engagement in the war, where Everlaste forces led by High Prince Gazelle held the junction between Wilderwind, Mistvale and the sea, stemming the tide of the invasion despite severe losses and a ten-to-one numbers disadvantage. Their success is accredited to the High Prince's transcendent strategic abilities, as well as the boldness and valor of Everlaste's forces."

Papyrus narrowed his eyes. "But I never..." Then he blinked. "Ah, so that's why that kid the other day seemed taken with my so-called cosplay. This daft Consul has co-opted my legacy and twisted it into a pro-sphinx propaganda piece. Well, I suppose no one was around to tell him otherwise. Or that he got my preferred weapon wrong..."

"Fourcliff Ascent," Senescey whispered back. "Did you even have troops there?"

"Well, that much is true," Papyrus admitted. "More for the purpose of turning on and subjugating Wilderwind than for fighting changelings, but this might very well have been a real battle. Just without the personal presence of one High Prince Gazelle."

Senescey stared at the painting a while longer.

"Come on," Papyrus beckoned, tapping her shoulder with his tail as he passed. "Might as well see what other curiosities they've got in their collection."

The castle displays weren't limited to paintings. Plenty of artifacts were present as well, many of which he recognized and more than a few of which he owned. Somehow, Tarunda had even gotten his hooves on a sizable part of one of Meltdown's old suits of power armor, which both baffled and slightly irked him.

But, invariably, everything was related to sphinxes. And even the things that should have cast sphinxes in a negative light - like one of the medals awarded to the volunteer army that had helped foil Papyrus and Senescey's plans - were spun around to make them look good, instead.

"Well, there wasn't much propaganda at the theater last night," Papyrus mused, walking past a uniform that had allegedly once belonged to the last Lord Stormhoof. "I guess they all keep it here, instead?"

"Hey." Senescey poked his shoulder, pointing to a tight crowd of creatures that was congregating near the entrance. "Something's going on over there."

Papyrus poked his way over to see. It appeared to be a guided tour that was getting its members together and just preparing to begin.

"Hey there!" greeted a wide stallion with a hat and a rustic accent, attended by a mare and five small foals, apparently mistaking Papyrus for a fellow tourist. "How far do you hail from? Me and the missus are from Goldoa, ourselves!"

"Close enough to call ourselves locals," Papyrus half-lied, figuring it would be easier to rely on his past knowledge to back up his story than brag about coming from Ironridge.

"Oh, is that so!" The stallion beamed jovially, completely oblivious about who he was really making small talk with. "Let me tell you, sonny, all this stuff on display is fine and all... but the real show here is how you can just waltz into a castle with no identification or nothing! If you tried that in Goldoa, you'd get some mercenary rooming in your master bedroom in a heartbeat. But the grass is always greener on the other side, they say."

Of course. The real propaganda on display here was the castle's laid-back security. They were showing off to tourists from the rest of the Empire that they didn't have threats here that necessitated a serious defense. Ironic, Papyrus thought, how no matter the age, Stormhoof's security flaws were deliberately implemented as a political ploy... Though since this castle getting attacked would certainly clash with their plan as he understood it, that had to mean there was additional security he wasn't seeing. Probably a lot of it. And probably something far more sophisticated than mere guards.

"You're kinda staring off into space there, sonny!" the stallion remarked, not a care in the world. "Oh well, I'm going to mingle. Been looking forward to this vacation for months!"

Fine by Papyrus. He did a quick scan of the rest of the crowd...

Senescey nudged him, nodding at the tour guide and giving Papyrus a questioning look.

Papyrus sized the guide up. She was a tall, red mare in a heavy back-only dress that covered her flanks and sides but not her chest, her mane done up in an expensive weave, the metal spokes used to hold it in place sticking out like elegant spikes. Her face was sharp, proud and haughty, albeit welcoming instead of hostile.

He nodded. She was certainly visually attractive; if Tarunda also had the changelings he hired performing mundane tasks to disguise the purpose of their employment from the public, she could very well be one. Unfortunately, surrounded by the tour as she was, neither of them could very well ask anything deeper than a question about the castle's history.

But Papyrus decided to follow them anyway. As the tour guide set off up the newly-installed stairs, he fell in near the back of the group; maybe an opportunity would present itself later. And he was admittedly curious what other lies and half-truths Tarunda had cooked up about his own history that a tour guide could be tasked with explaining.

On the higher floors, the exhibits did continue, elaborate enough that someone had commissioned serious artists to put them together. In what had once been a humble storage room used for surplus military equipment that didn't fit in the actual armories, someone had painted the walls and ceiling with a lifelike mural of Garsheeva destroying a storm with her goddess powers, the way it would have looked from the ground. Powers which, Papyrus knew from his time in Equestria, actually belonged to every feathered creature, including griffons and pegasi, simply on a smaller scale. Somehow, they had simply never discovered them in the Empire, perhaps because Garsheeva snuffed out knowledge of such discoveries but more likely because she never permitted any inclement weather that would encourage their discovery in the first place.

Furthermore, there actually were mares standing around doing nothing but acting as setpieces. Each one had been meticulously dolled up, and there were so many that he felt no particular urgency to talk to any given one, and more stuck with the tour because it was interesting than because he wanted anything out of the guide in particular.

"He really does just want people to stand around," Senescey muttered in his ear. "It can't be that all of these are vessels. Stormhoof barely had this many sarosians before the war."

"I'd venture their duties also include modeling and acting as practice dummies for beauticians," Papyrus muttered back. "All these dresses and all this manestyling can't come from nowhere. He's probably got a royal army of stylists for whatever reason, and they probably get their training on these fillies."

Senescey nodded. "But the way he approached us last night, and then that letter... This can't only be innocent."

Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "You sound like you're trying to convince yourself more than me."

Senescey hesitated, then sighed. "Alright. Fine. I... didn't expect to walk into Stormhoof Castle and find it free and open to the public, with the old barriers to off-limits areas knocked down. We'd be fools to think there are no skeletons in his closet, but even if he's lying to his visitors about history, even if we know this is a facade... It's a compelling one. And you can't lie about where we're physically standing, right now. I keep having to remind myself not to believe it."

Ahead, the tour guide was fumbling with a map, grumbling a frustrated apology about this being her first day.

That caught Papyrus's attention. A new hire? How long had all the rest of the show mares been here? How actively was Tarunda recruiting to find someone else so close to spotting Senescey? If the tour guide was a changeling who didn't realize it yet, she was probably still in the process of figuring out the true scope of the job... or maybe she was just a mundane mare with an eye-catching face here to pad out the ranks so that it would be easier for Tarunda to hire changelings when he saw them. But that would be boring.

She finished poking at her map and turned down a passage that had once been a servant's corridor, though the door had since been enlarged and displays were posted here, too. Papyrus used to love servant passages. The higher-ups never used them because they were too posh and important, so he had access to a whole network of hiding places and shortcuts all for the simple price of having flexible standards. Honestly, if the rest of the aristocracy had been willing to lower themselves similarly when pragmatism demanded it, he might not have gone off the deep end trying to clean them out in the first place.

But as they proceeded, deeper into the mid-level servant areas and following a few more map consultations, things started to change. Floors had simpler and less-ornate rugs, displays seemed less curated, no one had seen a window for a while. At least two creatures near the front of the crowd - which numbered at least a dozen, excluding Papyrus and Senescey - asked if she was lost. And when they passed by a portable storage rack with several paintings stacked up for transport, the guide finally admitted it.

"Alright," she said, turning back to the crowd and holding up the map. "None of you had better tell my boss, but... does anyone here think they can read this?"

Papyrus didn't need a map. He knew exactly where they were, on the outskirts of a former maintenance area located directly above the kitchens where most of the castle's heating and cooling equipment used to be. Odds were, it was still there. But he didn't speak up, because he was curious to see where this would go.

Someone seemed to have at least some idea, because the guide soon kept going in the direction she had been going, and then took a left. Or maybe they didn't have an idea, because that was the way to the maintenance sector...

Papyrus blinked. The corridor ahead was completely undecorated, and one door - a door that used to lead to a rarely-used storage room for spare pipes and other system parts - was heavily locked and chained, taped over by yellow and orange caution tape and protected by no fewer than five giant padlocks. The chains were so thick he could barely even count how many hazard signs adorned the door beneath them.

"I think we're definitely lost-" the tour guide started to say, when Senescey tackled Papyrus from the side, dragging him into the shadows during an instant where no one was looking.

Papyrus had been carried while shadow sneaking before, so he knew the drill: don't open your eyes, don't struggle, don't let go of whoever was carrying you, and try not to breathe. He felt her swimming rapidly for a moment, dragging him back the direction they came... and then she surfaced, just enough to listen and catch their breath.

"Woah, nelly!" came a memorable voice from around the previous corner. "This isn't supposed to happen! What's a tour doing all the way back here?"

It was unmistakably Tarunda.

Senescey held a hoof over Papyrus's mouth, listening intently. He didn't need it, though; he was listening too.

"I'm so sorry, sir," the tour guide's voice answered, bouncing clearly off the hard stone walls. "I got confused about the floor numbering on this map, and, um, I promise it won't happen again-"

"Hey, no harm done," Tarunda encouraged, cutting her off. "I just don't want my guests to think we're slobs because they got to an area we haven't properly beautified yet. All the art you lot have seen on your way here, it takes time to make stuff that good, and this castle's only been with us for so many years! Not that any of this is off limits, or anything... Uh, except for that one room, we had a chemical incident there last month while mixing paints, and it's not quite cleaned up yet. But it would be a shame to waste your time here on the un-curated stuff, don't you think?"

"Personally, I like seeing behind the scenes," said a voice that probably belonged to the happy stallion who talked to Papyrus earlier.

Tarunda grunted in thought. "Is that so... Anyone else feel the same? I wonder if there'd actually be a market for behind-the-scenes tours... Well, we're right by the maintenance area, so if that's really what you're into, how about a little impromptu tour of that place as an apology for things going off the rails? Let's just page up someone who knows their way around a bit better, get you in good hooves..."

A few moments passed, and then a new voice introduced themselves. After further pleasantries, a host of hoof and talon steps marked the tour moving on... but Senescey still didn't budge, so presumably she could still detect Tarunda.

Papyrus hoped she was banking on having a bigger detection range than him, and wasn't just waiting around to be found. Even though he had been nice enough to the tour as a whole, they were sneaking. And the tour had safety in numbers. But if he did move on without them, then they would be able to sneak under the doorjamb and see what was in that locked room...

"Alright, filly doll," Tarunda said, another moment after the sounds of the tour had completely faded. "Who put you up to giving a tour on your first day? I've got a reputation to protect as the best boss in the Empire, and that kind of behavior towards my valuable employees just isn't going to fly!"

In answer, there was a faint bursting, burning, flickering sound: the unmistakable noise of a changeling transformation.

Tarunda gasped.

"Been a while, Consul," said a proud, arrogant stallion's voice, harsh and strong. "Surprised to see me?"

"What are you doing in my castle!? And where's Sephora?"

"What, the mare whose form I took?" The new voice chuckled. "She got a visit from HR telling her her start date was pushed back a day. And the HR rep in question has no memory of doing the deed."

Papyrus's ears flicked violently. This voice... It was a while ago, and he had only been present for a minute at best, but was this the pirate who barged into Cold Karma while Discord was letting him spy on the war room there? Rhodallis?

It was incredibly distinctive. Even with such a small sample, it had to be him.

"As for why I'm here..." Rhodallis went on. "I just thought I'd do you a favor. We are business partners, after all... Prospective ones, at least. Don't worry, I didn't show anyone your secret collection. The only thing on display here was how much you could use the help of an expert in shoring up this castle."

Tarunda cleared his throat defiantly. "Your negotiations with High Prince Gustadolph have nothing to do with my beautiful castle and my beautiful mares. And I'm not feeling inclined to give a word in your favor when your manners are this rude."

"Heh. Don't give me that smart-cop-dumb-cop routine," Rhodallis laughed. "I already know all you Consuls are the same person. Putting in a word in my favor? You have all the authority you need to negotiate with me here and now. You know you need what I'm selling."

"I haven't a clue what you're talking about," Tarunda shot back. "This castle might be open to the public, you know, but my guards aren't just for show. And I'm this close to calling them up and having you removed at my sole discretion."

There was another burst of changeling fire, and then another, and then another.

"Go ahead and try," Rhodallis's voice replied. "I'm not here for a fight, and you won't get one unless you attack every random stranger in the hope that they're me. Just try not to keep yourself up at night wondering what would happen if you met a shapeshifter who wasn't interested in playing by the rules..."

He laughed raucously, and Papyrus heard him stomping away.

Moments later, Senescey surfaced with Papyrus in an unused closet, far enough that Tarunda probably wouldn't walk by, but still in the less-used portion of the castle. They looked at each other.

"I know who that was," Senescey said, apparently not realizing that Papyrus had a decent idea too. "Pirate King Rhodallis. His turf is mostly in Varsidel, and he's always antagonizing Ironridge. Surely you've seen him in the news while living there."

"You've met him in person?" Papyrus asked.

"Yes," Senescey said. "He and my old crew had some history. In fact, an altercation with him was how we got into the Composer's good graces and got the Aldebaran in the first place. He's a Changeling Bishop - the same kind of thing as Lilith, Samael and Estael. I don't know why he's here, but... this complicates things."

"Oh yeah?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "See, from what I heard, his parting line made it sound like Tarunda really doesn't know how to steal sarosian souls..."

"Maybe," Senescey said, shaking her head. "Rhodallis likes making deals, and he hates the other Bishops. He has several other changelings on his crew as well, ones like me who can transform freely, but are still capable of independent thought. He's ruthless and stops at nothing to get what he wants, but he can be reasoned with. The only way to change his mind about something is to offer him something he wants more. So if he's trying to get something he wants out of Tarunda..."

Papyrus nodded slowly. "You're saying that even if Tarunda is actually prey, we might not be the biggest predators on the block."

"We're not," Senescey said.

Papyrus waited for her to say something else, but she was quiet.

"So how does this change our calculus?" he eventually asked. "Stay the course? Run away?"

"We could try to make a deal with Rhodallis," Senescey said. "As I understand it, the whole point of us staying here is to try to get information for Luna so Felicity's job can be considered a success. Personally, I..."

"Go on," Papyrus prompted.

Senescey swallowed. "I think the knowledge that there are changelings here, being controlled by what's likely an amateur who's unaware of their powers - assuming everything Rhodallis implied was true - is more than enough to say we did our job. That might be the cowardly way out when there's clearly so much else going on here to learn and uncover, but the more I think about it..."

She sighed. "Be honest with yourself, Papyrus. Why did you vote to stay here? Was it for the sake of Felicity's job? For the sake of the Empire? Or because we discovered that Tarunda might be an easier target than we thought, and it sounded like fun?"

Papyrus narrowed his eyes.

"I'm trying to answer that, and I don't even know if I'm capable of being honest with myself about it," Senescey said. "Any excuses I make are just excuses. I know staying here any longer than we absolutely have to goes against what I resolved to do last night. I'm mad at myself for flaking out, for even entertaining the idea of..." She pulled out the box containing the Iklofna, briefly flashing it in the dim light. "Of using these the way they were suggested. I don't want my mind and body used as a toy. And I'm trying to rationalize why I voted the way I did, without considering that I might just like seeing the mighty fall. And I'm not having much luck."

"Sounds like a personal problem," Papyrus remarked.

"Tell me you feel the same," Senescey said. "That you were thinking during the planning meeting after the vote, 'this is just like the good old days!' You were, weren't you?"

Papyrus shrugged. "Guilty as charged. So?"

"So am I just a little filly who doesn't know what she wants?" Senescey whispered. "Torn between the allure of the adrenaline I used to feel, and the reality that subjecting myself to that much danger is no longer necessary?"

"Eh. I think you're overthinking it." Papyrus slapped a hoof on her back. "Chalk it up to peer pressure during the vote and call it a day. You want your sisters to like you, right? Of course it was unanimous!"

Senescey frowned. "Out of the three of us, I was the first to cast a final vote."

Papyrus blinked. "Were you? Perhaps you were. Oh well. Like I said, I'm just going where you three go, and like you said, we do have enough tantalizing info that if that puffy princess in Equestria wants to know more, she can organize a way to get it that's slightly less dangerous for all parties involved." He swiped the Iklofna box, turning it over in his feathers. "Why did she even give Felicity something like this in the first place? She said she was given all sorts of contingencies, but this sounds awfully dangerous for niche its use is. Was Luna really expecting us to need this?"

"Evidently," Senescey said. "Unless Felicity was lying about where she got this, but I can't think of a good reason why she'd do that..."

"Well, neither can I!" Papyrus passed the box back. "All I'm saying is, it's awfully convenient she had a thing like that. So, want to get out of here? And if so, want to check out that locked room first? Might as well grab one more snazzy piece of intel for the big boss goddess on our way out the door."

"Sure." Senescey nodded. "You really think it's fine to just turn around, flip-flop again and call it quits for the second time in two days?"

"It'll be fine," Papyrus promised. "It's not like anyone has anything riding on us staying here, after all."

Papyrus and Senescey reached the chained-up door without incident. Up close, it was even more heavily locked down, the padlocks all built in different styles, some taking keys and others varying formats of combinations. Yet in true Stormhoof fashion, there was a small slit at the bottom where a sarosian could shadow sneak with impunity.

Curiosity could not be denied. Under the door they went.

The room beyond was bitterly, surprisingly cold. Papyrus almost didn't want to let go of Senescey, his fur fluffing aggressively against the temperature as an automatic lighting system kicked on. Papyrus took a minute to blink against the harsh, white light... and then he blinked twice at what he saw.

It was filled with identical round black pedestals, featuring slanted edges and slightly recessed surfaces. An iceberg rose from the tip of each pedestal, dripping with frost and displaying not a hint of melt on their clear, crystalline surfaces. Each one was a source of the light that had turned on, glowing from within with a sinister sheen and perfectly illuminating what was suspended inside.

Sphinx corpses. More than half a dozen deep-frozen sphinx corpses, put on display like every other artifact in this palace turned museum.

Papyrus blinked in fascination and slight revulsion. He knew these people. Lord Everlaste, an impeccably clean stab wound straight through his forehead. Everlaste's daughter, a thin line of red circling her throat. Geribaldi Stormhoof, the nerdy Stormhoof scion and Floria's father, was positioned front and center... and actually had nothing visibly wrong with him at all. Didn't look much older than Papyrus remembered him, either.

All of the pedestals had placards describing who was entombed upon them. All of the occupied ones, at least. Several were empty, pushed to the back and still awaiting use.

"You know," Papyrus said to Geribaldi's frozen corpse, "I mentioned that flabby Consul having skeletons in his closet, but I didn't quite think it would be so literal..."

"T-This is..." Senescey looked somewhere between nauseated and resentful.

"Like what you see?" Tarunda asked, stepping out from behind a pedestal.

Senescey jumped. Papyrus had a lifetime of experience that allowed him not to, but it was still very tempting - trashing his image and putting on a show of being surprised was fun. If only he hadn't just overheard this stallion getting bullied into submission by a show of force.

"Where did you come from?" Senescey whispered, taking a step back.

"Good trick, right?" Tarunda grinned. "Anyway, fancy meeting you two again, and here of all places. And here I thought you were skipping town!"

"Why do you have these?" Senescey asked, bristling warily.

Tarunda turned to stare at the frozen corpses. "These? They're the pride of my collection! Though I've been told my tastes are a bit eccentric in this one regard, so I don't go around regularly displaying them. If you wanna talk about them, I could jaw about these babies for days, but first off old Tarunda's got a few questions for you, just to make sure we can stay friends."

Senescey stood her ground. Papyrus did too, though his posture was more casual than defensive.

"First things first," Tarunda said. "That Rhodallis fellow who was here earlier. You don't work for him, do you? Did he put you up to this in any capacity? Or do you not know who I'm talking about?"

"I know who Rhodallis is," Senescey replied levelly. "I don't work for him, nor have I ever."

"Good, good," Tarunda said. "Second, that was a pretty fancy trick you used to get under my door! Where'd you learn a move like that?"

"You don't need to beat around the bush," Senescey said, straightening her back. "You want to know if I'm really a sarosian wearing another form, don't you?"

Tarunda's eyes sparkled. "You're pretty smart, you know that? But there's no need to act so defensive about it. I'm an honorable stallion of my word, here. And let me tell you, when I see a talented, beautiful mare sneaking around in my castle - a castle, by the way, that's one hundred percent open to the public, no exceptions, not even this here room - the first thing I think is 'boy, it would be great if I had this hottie on my payroll!' Now, back the other night, I was just thinking of giving you an entry-level position, but that would be a criminal waste on someone with your skills. So what do you say? Work for me, and you could have some very good things coming in your future."

"Can you be honest with me about what those duties would require?" Senescey asked. "Or are you all carrot and no stick?"

Tarunda coughed indignantly. "Here in Stormhoof, we're nice to our employees, prospective and otherwise! It's a little old philosophy of mine, a way to poach talent from the competition. You kids ever been up in Wilderwind? It's a different world, I tell you. And the way the Consulate gets ahead is by giving such a nice deal that it would be stupid to choose the other team. Come on, you aren't gonna turn up your nose just because you're a little weirded out by my collection, are you?"

Papyrus glanced at Senescey, trying to read whether she wanted him to intervene. She seemed to be rapidly shedding her fear of Tarunda, though it was definitely possible he would turn around and stab them in the back if she said no too many times... but some sense, or perhaps a memory, was painting a whole different picture in his mind of what was going on here.

Looking at Tarunda, Papyrus saw an act, complete and total. And behind that act, he thought he could see someone laughing their head off with a juvenile sense of humor, screwing with someone purely for the entertainment value of watching them navigate an awkward situation, who could afford to say whatever they wanted because they had no stake in the future beyond their enjoyment of the present.

Maybe he was just seeing himself, and the way he had treated his favorite pawns in his past life. That had certainly been one of his signature techniques for always winning, making people think you had a goal beyond having a good time. Maybe this was just a false impression... but he trusted his instincts.

"If I can humbly cut in," Papyrus interrupted, preparing to fight fire with fire. "You wouldn't happen to be making an offer for my talent as well, would you? I can see that you're desperately horny, and I am tragically a dude, but my wary associate here isn't quite opportunistic enough to jump at an offer that's too good to be true. Not so for me. Might you have any ludicrously high-paying work for an ordinary, non-sarosian-in-disguise Gazelle cosplayer?"

"Heh heh." Tarunda turned to Papyrus and chuckled. "I appreciate you playing to my tastes, kid. But the truth is, that depends on whether your little friend here asks for me to hire you as a condition of her own employment. See, the truth is, I need some jobs done that can only be done by sarosians, whether they're in disguise or not. Simple stuff, really. Doesn't take any effort on your part whatsoever!"

"Such as?" Senescey pressed.

Tarunda shook his head. "You know, it's sad and kind of funny seeing how many ponies are scared of the single best deal in the Griffon Empire. I can't blame you for being mistrustful when the circumstances are what they are. Anywhere else, and you'd be in violation of a dozen laws right now and well on your way to jail or worse! Meanwhile, all I'm trying to do is cut your people a break after all the nastiness that went down twenty years ago. Ain't that just poetic? A silver bullet, the one way out of your old life and into a great new one, and you'll just up and turn away like so many others even when it's staring you straight in the eye. It's so sad. I'm crying right now, really."

Papyrus tried his absolute best to stare into Tarunda's soul. Was it possible he was telling the truth? Offering a legitimately great deal in the shadiest possible manner for the fun of seeing people turn it down?

"...You're smart, though," Tarunda said. "So here's the messy truth, all out there at once: it takes hoof power to keep Stormhoof the utopia that it is. You can incentivize folks to all sorts of good behavior when their needs are met and they've got a bogey up north keeping their ire preoccupied, but there's always cracks that are gonna need filling in. Cracks like inquisitive kids running around in my special collection like they're trying to get my attention. Now, sarosians like you, they've got this mystical connection-"

"You want to possess me and borrow my body," Senescey interrupted. "Just like Chrysalis did to everyone, twenty years ago."

Tarunda gaped. "You sure you don't work for Rhodallis?"

"Dead certain." Senescey flickered with green flame, and returned to her original sarosian form. "I work for no one but myself."

For a moment, Tarunda stared at her, transfixed. "Is that your original form? Are you... one of the assassin sisters who...?"

Senescey nodded. "Whoever you are, you are playing with powers you don't understand. I've been asking myself over and over why you didn't just take my body by force. After overhearing you and Rhodallis, I'm not even sure you can. And listening to you now, I don't think you have the slightest understanding of how the world works. These?" She swept a hoof out over all the sphinx corpses. "Do you even know why we wanted them dead?"

"That means you knew High Prince Gazelle in person? You were even one of his closest confidants?" Tarunda held a hoof to his chin. "...Forget working for me. How'd you like to straight up become a Consul?"

Senescey blinked.

"Your own little slice of land, govern it however you please?" Tarunda grinned at her. "Unlimited privileges wherever the rule of law is still respected in the Empire? You could even go to and from Neo Everlaste Palace and meet High Prince Gustadolph as much as you want, and if you really are working for Rhodallis, that's an offer I know you won't be able to refuse."

"Then it sounds like refusing it is the best way to prove I'm on my own side," Senescey said, turning around. "If you were competent, you'd know how to offer a proportional reward to get what you want, and you'd know how to do it without making someone suspect they're getting scammed. I've been in the scamming business for far too long not to have seen what happens when that fails. And if you were on the straight and narrow, you wouldn't have sent me that threat letter."

"Threat letter?" Tarunda frowned. "I wasn't thrilled about seeing you wander off last night, but I'm a more graceful loser than that. What are you talking about?"

"If you care about doing right by your people, like a leader should," Senescey began, "you'll find this advice far more valuable than having another sycophant to follow your orders: take your people seriously. And if you're corrupt, then the advice is the same, just for different reasons. But you aren't taking me seriously, and in less than a day I've gone from fearing you to realizing I have the upper hoof. Give out your Consul promotions based on experience and moral fiber, not because I once tried to kill a family whose corpses you now keep as trophies. Otherwise someone like the mare I used to be will show up again, and you'll be the one entombed in that ice."

Papyrus was ready in case Tarunda tried to backstab her. He could tell Senescey was ready too; he even saw the faint glimmer of the Iklofna case ready to be withdrawn if needed. But Tarunda didn't try to stop them as they left. Instead, he stood there wearing the expression of a foal who had just been given an expensive new toy, and was in the process of realizing it wasn't as cool in reality as it looked in the store's window.

"Welcome back," Floria greeted as Papyrus and Senescey re-entered the airship, completely unaccosted on the journey from the castle.

"Yo." Papyrus saluted with a wing. "Not every day I get a welcome home from you."

Floria took a deep breath. "About the vote this afternoon, I have been thinking-"

"We're calling it off," Senescey said. "The situation isn't how we read it. I don't know everything that's going on here, but we have more than enough information for the Princess. And I'm not happy with our thought process during the vote, anyway."

"You aren't?" Floria looked surprised. "Well, it seems I am not the only one having second thoughts. And I suppose this simplifies the matter of explaining how I've been feeling to the others..."

"Sounds like we've got at least three in favor of leaving," Papyrus announced. "At this rate, I ought to take us to Izvaldi or something so that the next time we change our minds, we aren't already halfway back to Equestria, but let's see what the others have to say..."

Outside, far to the south and even farther above, Discord sat on the edge of the Aldenfold's cliff face, legs dangling off into oblivion. Beside him was his glowing, phantom screen, depicting the deliberations between Papyrus and his friends as they concluded and the airship began to rise.

"You overstepped the bounds of our wager," a voice said next to him. "This doesn't count."

Discord put on a petulant face. "Are you so sure about that?"

"You presume I'm not?"

"First off," Discord lectured, "my intervention didn't actually change anything. So I forged a little blackmail to tempt them back into the ring. And look at them now, so gung ho to take over the Empire as a result!"

His companion frowned. "You gave them a lot more than a bogus letter."

"Pshhh, what are you talking about?" Discord waved a hand. "Didn't you hear Felicity? That little box of hers came from Princess Luna, not me. And she earnestly believes it, too!"

"This is what I'm talking about," his companion insisted. "Using a power like that absolutely falls outside the bounds of our agreement."

"Except my intervention was on the behalf of your own desired outcome," Discord pointed out, curling his lip. "I'll have you know I stacked the tables against myself with this little bout of cheating, and we both know the only reason you're sore about it is because you know I'll win and you know it'll make you look even worse when you lose."

His companion stared at him levelly.

"Oh well. Such are the pitfalls of gambling with a known cheater." Discord meticulously cleaned the claws on his paw, lifting them one by one and flicking out a few balls of lint, a hair, and a whole tumbleweed out into the abyss. "I'll have you know it's a personal philosophy of mine not to make a point lightly. It's no fun winning if you think I got lucky or slipped by on a technicality. I simply couldn't live with myself if I didn't give your own silly viewpoint the most help I possibly could, so I can knock it down at its strongest!"

"That sounds like an excuse for slight of hoof," his companion accused.

"Fine," Discord sighed, "if it makes you feel better you can chalk it up to me feeling sorry for you and your inability to cheat on your own behalf alone. Since I know you would if you could. Aren't you always going on about how eeevil you are?"

His companion scowled. "If you really felt sorry for me, you wouldn't make us meet somewhere so high up."

Discord gave a cheeky grin.

"I'm going back to bothering Halcyon," his companion said, floating downwards in a hazy shimmer of mother of pearl. "Maybe she'll have done something interesting within the last few days. Go figure the one other person who can see me is even more insane and less productive to interact with than she is... Where did you even get those Iklofna for Papyrus's gang?"

Discord yawned. "It's a very long story involving the fishing pond in Las Pegasus, a camera thief, and a packet of ball bearings..."

He checked to make sure his companion was still present before continuing, but they were gone.

Train Conspiracy Theorist

Be it past or present, Corsica had never been a morning pony. She couldn't remember a time she had ever enjoyed being woken up before she was ready: the best it got was when someone was there to pamper her, and that was more of a consolation prize than a fair trade. And a rare one, at that.

But what she could remember, and was fairly certain she had forgotten about over the last two and a half years, was how nice it felt to wake up at her own pace.

Corsica yawned luxuriously, testing out her battered body. She felt... marginally better than yesterday. Not enough to ditch the roller, but getting out and about had done her some good. Time for another day of more of the same.

Gently, she applied her shoes and ear ornaments with her telekinesis, noting the two identical sets in her dresser. Apparently, she hadn't been wearing any when she cast her final wish, but then manifested a set upon rewinding. Had she woken up in these last time, too? Most of what she remembered about her state back then involved needing a bath, but she couldn't say she didn't remember it.

Why had a hospital let her keep wearing these during a coma? And how come they didn't get knocked off during the avalanche? The only explanation was that someone had put them back on her while she was unconscious, and since it wouldn't have been Graygarden or the hospital staff...

Nah. No reason to ruin a perfectly good afternoon by thinking about Halcyon. Not yet, at least.

Corsica rolled out towards the engine room, just limber enough to get onto her roller by herself without breaking anything. Once again, the door was open, Starlight sitting inside, surrounded by magical texts and reading to the backdrop of the engine's buzz.

"Hey," Corsica said, getting Starlight's attention. "Any news? I'm gonna go explore the town if there's nothing urgent to do."

Starlight shook her head and looked up, not putting down her book. "I still think I can find a way to fix this, and still no estimate on when. If you want to do someone a favor, ask Seigetsu if you see her. I asked her to look into a matter for me, and if you brought the results on your way back, it would save her a trip."

"Works for me." Corsica shrugged. "Mind, uh... helping me with the stairs...?"

The sun was just low enough in the sky to reflect off the eastern harbor as Corsica disembarked, pausing on the docks to stare back the way they had flown in. A hefty ship was on the horizon, steadily drawing closer without any visible form of propulsion, its hull fat with cargo.

What had she heard last time she was here, that trade arrived from the west by rail, then boarded ships here to sail further to the east? She couldn't remember why they did that instead of taking the train all the way around the coast, thanks to Equestria's silly instant teleportation rail system. Odds were, there had been a reason, but it hadn't been good enough for her old, apathetic self to remember.

The ship inched forward, a tugboat dispatching to help it into the more industrial sector of the harbor to the south, closer to the trainyard. A ship like that, Corsica wagered, was the kind Lord Terutomo would have put them up on if their negotiations for passage hadn't been derailed by Halcyon's paranoia and inability to share basic information. Hadn't he said that trip would take a full month, one way?

If those plans had gone through, she would have been arriving at the Catantan Peninsula right about now, a place Starlight's airship had flown her to and back from again in the same amount of time, or maybe less. They would have found no Starlight waiting for them. Would never have met Twilight and the Elements, never seen the crystalline Macrothesis, never fixed the Kindness flame... Halcyon might never have left, and Corsica would never have wished her special talent away.

Her life would have remained in stasis, devoid of ambition, agenda and ability to appreciate the present. That, Corsica thought, reveling in the sensation of the sea breeze against the fur on her cheeks, was decidedly a worse future than the one she had now.

Isolated clouds guarded the horizon to the south, shaped like scoops of vanilla ice cream that had been dropped on the floor and left to melt. On both sides of the water, cleared land bordered the beach for as far as Snowport's domain extended, giving way to heavily coniferous forests that carpeted the Aldenfold's foothills. She could see the Aldenfold itself far in the distance, a great, grey shadow looming over the lands.

The stone pier stood solid beneath her hooves, a rugged surface held in place by sculpted walls that felt like it had once been liquid, poured and sculpted in place and left with an uneven texture that provided excellent traction. White marble, the top duller than the sides. The farther north she looked, the smaller and more artistic the piers became, offering space to local fishing vessels accessible from the residential part of town, droves of sparkly blue dragons lounging or carrying cargo in the distance. The sun caught their scales just like it did the wavecaps, blinding her whenever it struck that magic angle.

Everything felt so real and present and alive, from the shadows cast on the dock by the harmony comet rigging of the Immortal Dream to the draconic chatter carrying across the water to a bit of spray that splashed up and caught her forehoof as the wake from the cargo ship made landfall. Up until now, Corsica's memories of the world felt like listening to someone read from her life like a book, at least her memories since getting her special talent and leaving Icereach. And her memories before that... She had wanted to leave Icereach for a reason. This was the real world she always knew was out there.

"Can you see this, dummy?" Corsica whispered to the wind. "Wherever you are, you'd better put your plans and your paranoia to bed for a day and just appreciate what we were looking for."

"I hope I'm not imposing," said a voice behind her.

Corsica turned to see Seigetsu. "Nope! Uh, literally just admiring the scenery. Nice view you got here."

"It is a rather impressive visage," Seigetsu acknowledged. "Moreso from the castle towers as the sun is rising. Would Starlight Glimmer happen to be here? I have a non-urgent matter I would like to discuss."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "Any chance it involves something she asked you to look into?"

"It does." Seigetsu nodded.

Corsica gave her a feeble grin. "Any chance you wanna give me the lowdown so I can pass it onto her and make it look like I was helpful by saving you a trip out to here?"

Seigetsu looked amused. "It is not a trip I mind taking. Though all of this is a matter of public record, so I have no qualms with your curiosity."

She then stepped past Corsica onto the boat. Apparently, that was an invitation to follow and listen.

"Allow me to get to the point," Seigetsu said, seated in the Immortal Dream's library between Corsica and Starlight. "I searched our records, and we have indeed seen a northern traveler named Maple in Snowport."

Starlight tried to keep a stoic expression. "When? And where was she going?"

"About sixteen years ago," Seigetsu said. "Shortly before this city came under my family's control. It seems she was afforded some manner of attention here on account of her Writ of Harmonic Sanction, and I was able to find an official interview in which she described crossing the mountains from Ironridge in search of her missing daughter. She entered the city from the north along with a trade caravan, and professed her intent to take a train south to Canterlot."

"And did she?" Starlight asked, shifting closer to the edge of her seat.

"Next, I searched our shipping records," Seigetsu said. "We keep meticulous archives on every train and ship entering the city, along with passenger lists and cargo manifests. I determined that Maple lawfully obtained a ticket for a train to central Equestria. However, the train in question was unable to complete its journey and returned to Snowport due to its enchantment failing."

"The one that only works if nobody on board knows the true distance it's traveling?" Corsica asked. "You think Maple couldn't take the trains because she had seen too much of the world?"

Seigetsu nodded. "I could not find hard confirmation, but that seems like a reasonable guess. Unfortunately, I could find no further records of her travels. That is where the trail ends."

"So she came back to Snowport, and you didn't see her leave again," Starlight said.

"Correct." Seigetsu folded her arms behind her back. "Or rather, she would have left in a manner that we would not record. This rules out the possibility that she would have taken a ship to the east, but not that she would have turned around and retraced her steps to the north. As I was able to find no records indicating she remained in the city for an extended period of time, I think that is the most likely course of events."

"She couldn't have gone to the Crystal Empire?" Corsica asked. "Then tried again from there? That's basically within walking distance, if you're not in a hurry."

Seigetsu frowned. "The Crystal Empire only recently returned from wherever it was sealed. In the year this Maple was present, Snowport had only blizzards to the west."

Starlight's brow creased. "So there's nothing suggesting she stayed here for a while, made multiple attempts at the trains, anything? I can't imagine she would have given up and turned back..."

Seigetsu shook her head. "My search was thorough. If there were any records I overlooked, they would have to be stored in different archives not maintained by the city. It is not out of the question that some citizens might remember her in person, but I'm afraid I have not much further speculation to offer."

"...I see." Starlight nodded. "Well, thanks for looking into it. I wish this engine could take care of itself so I could be out there looking..." She sighed. "Returning to the north is going to sting even more if one of my friends is still looking for me in Equestria. Not to burden you with my troubles, though. I'll figure something out."

"I could help," Corsica offered. "Not like I've got much better to do."

Starlight gave her a sideways look. "You think you know the first thing about how this ship's engine works, let alone how to get that mess safely out of it?"

Corsica stuck out her tongue. "I was talking about asking around town."

Starlight glanced at Corsica's roller. "Aren't you pretty much immobile?"

"Excuse me." Seigetsu rose to her feet, preparing to take her leave. "I have other duties to attend to now that I have given my report. The castle guards will be happy to assist you if you need to find me again, or are looking for anything else. I wish you the best of luck on your endeavors."

Corsica watched Seigetsu's retreating form with a mischievous smile, turning it on Starlight when she was done. "Wow. That was so offensive you even scared away a special inquisitor."

Instead of bristling, Starlight wilted. "It... I mean, sorry..."

"Woah!" Corsica blinked, trying to signal her lack of actual offense with a hoof and wincing as her body protested. "Not trying to make you feel bad. I'm just the most mobile I've been all year. Better a body that can't climb stairs than a brain that can't see a reason to try to climb them. If you need some dragons pestered about your missing mom, I'm all game." She hesitated. "Not that I didn't live with that special talent for a year or two. The one that's gumming up the engine? I might not be an expert, but you could find people who know less about it than me."

Starlight appeared mollified, if slightly curious. "You really have changed," she remarked.

"For the better." Corsica winked. "So whaddya need? Free help from a bored invalid, going once..."

Starlight shrugged, got up and beckoned for Corsica to follow, walking into the engine room.

Corsica squinted at the confluence in the middle of the cloud of rails, her old special talent floating inside a dark halo of midnight blue storm clouds, all encased in a sphere of protective fiery energy. Lightning bolts occasionally arced along the rails, making her fur stand on end.

It was her special talent, true. The object that had both ruined and saved her life many times over across the past few years, and protected her friends to boot. Friends who were all gone now... One friend more than others. Giving it up was a brain-dead obvious move.

Unfortunately, all that history brought no magical flash of insight to mind. The once-familiar feeling of her thoughts stumbling serendipitously onto the right track, spurred on by a wish for knowledge, was nowhere to be found. This puzzle would take work to solve, and it felt like she was looking at a completed jigsaw frame while holding a single piece that fit somewhere in the middle.

"Alright," she apologized. "I may have overestimated how helpful I'd be just a little."

Starlight nodded, looking more thoughtful than bothered.

"I could at least be a sounding board," Corsica offered. "If you wanna see if your theories hold weight when spoken aloud."

"You're probably thinking that because you used to have this cutie mark, you have some connection to it that will help you solve this," Starlight said absently.

"Way to call me out." The back of Corsica's neck itched, and she didn't dare try to reach around to rub it. Maybe with telekinesis...? No, it wasn't the same.

"I've been thinking the same," Starlight said. "Not about you, but about me. This used to be my cutie mark as well, after all."

Corsica blinked. Right, hadn't that been why she came to Equestria to seek out Starlight in the first place? For advice on living with such a cursed talent?

"I only wore it for a short time," Starlight explained. "As a foal, my horn was broken. I could use extremely powerful magic, but it had poor stamina and would leave me with crippling migraines that lasted for weeks when I overused it. One time, when I pushed it too far, I lost the ability to use my horn altogether, and went blind as a side effect."

Corsica rocked the wheels on her roller back and forth, listening.

"I accepted this cutie mark during a time when I was desperate, and willing to do anything for power," Starlight went on. "It changed the drawback of my magic. Instead of physical pain and dizziness, overusing my horn brought on supernatural despair and panic attacks while I wore it, sometimes powerful enough to send me into a coma. Because I was accustomed to living life by giving more than I had to give at every opportunity, I had no strength to fight it with. It seems odd that an avatar of elemental hope would be brought down rather than empowered by an artifact that supposedly turns our hopes and dreams into physical power. But watching your experiences, the way it works seems to be very consistent."

"Oh yeah?" Corsica raised an eyebrow.

"We haven't known each other for long, but I watched you get worn down," Starlight said. "Regardless of how you might have felt while doing it, you had the initiative in the Crystal Empire to get Twilight invested in Ironridge's cause. I don't know the full details about what was going on between you and Halcyon, but it's been obvious that something wasn't right there. And it was only after she left for good that you collapsed and couldn't get back up."

Corsica shrugged. "If you say so. I don't remember doing a whole lot that was worthwhile since getting that thing myself, but I can't say none of that didn't happen. Where are you going with this?"

"Operating under the hypothesis that our old cutie mark is playing a role in what's currently happening, and this phenomenon wouldn't be possible with just any old mark..." Starlight walked back to the rail cloud. "I'm trying to correlate our experiences to understand exactly what Luna's Artifice does."

"Didn't you just explain that the other day?" Corsica asked. "The whole energy moving backward through time thing?"

"That's how it works, not what it does." Starlight shook her head. "The underlying mechanism, not the overarching effects. I have the beginnings of an idea where I could somehow use my real cutie mark as a substitute to keep the system stable while I make changes, sort of like how in Daring Do books she swaps out treasures with a carefully weighted bag of sand to avoid activating pressure plates."

Corsica nodded along. "Remind me how this thing relates to your current cutie mark, again?"

Starlight took a deep breath. "Yakyakistani church virtues like hope and love. They correspond to the varying Flames of Harmony, several of which you met at Laughter's palace? Usually they're actually flames, but sometimes they have physical bodies instead, like Convergence... and me. With me so far?"

Corsica nodded again.

"Twilight and the other element-bearers have cutie marks attuned to their elements," Starlight explained. "My current cutie mark, I don't fully understand whether to classify it as a part of myself, or a part of my flame, or a bridge between the two, or... It's hard enough for philosophers to decide how to define a pony when they aren't a piece of the world's soul that isn't supposed to have a body, but does. Either way, it's like a keystone. Ever since I got it, my magic has worked right, and it's closely related to my identity as a Flame of Harmony."

"Is it too much of an oversimplification to say that Flames of Harmony straight up are cutie marks?" Corsica asked.

"Probably," Starlight said. "But the world's three modern goddesses - Princesses Celestia and Luna, and Garsheeva - have wielded their flames' power as cutie marks, and Twilight and her friends have cutie marks binding them to their elements as well. I think the more accurate way to put it is that these powers are capable of interacting with ponies using the same magic that cutie marks do, and can attach to us by the same mechanism."

"Got it."

"Anyway..." Starlight pointed again at the engine. "That thing is one of Luna's Artifices, a set of three cutie marks that were essentially created as fake, watered-down copies of the real powers of Hope, Love and Knowledge. They use different, slightly less divine but still powerful mechanics to achieve similar and still supernatural effects in the veins of the originals. So I initially had an imitation cutie mark of the virtue of hope, and later traded it out for the real thing."

Corsica swiveled her ears in understanding. "So that's why you're hoping they're sort of interchangeable. Because they're intended to do the same thing."

Starlight smiled wryly. "Another way to think of it would be to try making money by supplying fool's gold to a cheap jewler, except without telling them, you give them real gold because you're all out of fake stuff."

Corsica whistled.

"Well, there are no guaranteed this will work," Starlight said, turning back to the engine. "That's just the best working idea I've been able to come up with. It still needs more workshopping before I'm willing to take any action."

"Well, I guess I can tell you about what using it was like," Corsica offered. "There's not much to say, though. Make a wish, get what you wish for, pay the price. Lotta regrets involved. Except for that last wish where I got rid of it."

"How did you do that?" Starlight asked. "What was going through your mind? Did you simply wish it wasn't on your flank anymore?"

"Uhhhh..." Corsica reddened faintly as she recalled her desperate state of mind, and its accompanying public breakdown.

"I offered to remove it for you," Starlight pointed out. "When we first met. It wasn't a tradeoff you were willing to take at the time, since it offered significant power to go with the drawbacks. But I don't think what I could have done would have rewound your body like this."

Corsica slicked back her ears. "I was thinking that it wasn't worth it. I wished I could go back."

"That shouldn't be possible..." Starlight frowned. "Says me, professional doer of the impossible, to you, someone who also appears to have broken hard and fast rules about what can and can't be done. I can't help feeling like there's some fundamental aspect about what happened here that we don't understand yet..."

"Well, I'm not complaining," Corsica volunteered. "Once I get healed up and then whip myself back into shape, at least. And hopefully get your boat fixed. Though, no offense, but I haven't been feeling selfish enough to value myself over a boat in a long time. And I don't really wanna stop."

That's rude, said the strange voice in Corsica's head.

Corsica frowned. Did Starlight not hear...?

"I can't really blame you," Starlight said. "Whenever you have a chance to rest and recover, you take it. Whenever you're not feeling ground down beneath life's hooves, you enjoy it. That's how you survive, as ponies with situations like ours."

"Hey," Corsica interrupted. "Apropos of nothing, but this could be important: do you ever have a voice in your head? Around here, over the last few days, and so on?"

Starlight raised an eyebrow. "Only when there's a reason for it, which hasn't been recently..."

"Huh." Corsica shrugged. "Guess I'm going insane, then."

"Are you hearing something?" Starlight asked. "When, and what does it say?"

Corsica tried to think back to anything more profound the voice might have said. "Hello, goodbye, simple stuff like that. Usually when I'm entering or leaving the ship. Only started since I rewound. Not much of a chatterbox."

Starlight mumbled something under her breath, then tightened her focus, standing still for a moment with an expression of tension and concentration on her face. Then she shook her head. "Well, it's nothing my powers can detect. I'd pay attention if I were you, though. That was a big event, and it almost certainly had consequences none of us know about yet."

"Will do, I guess," Corsica said, not entirely sure how to go about empirically investigating her mystery friend. "And I'll let you know if I have any magical brain waves about how this thing is working, though it sounds like you already know way more than I do..."

"Going out to enjoy your new freedom?" Starlight guessed.

"Nope. Gonna go interview some dragons about your mom," Corsica called back over her shoulder, rolling away... and quickly regretting it as her back twinged from the motion. "You mind helping me with, uh, the stairs? Like, again...?"

Another embarrassing ascent later, and Corsica was on the docks, rolling her way towards Snowport proper.

Part of her wanted to think about how to find Starlight's mom. Another part of her wanted to keep thinking about that voice. A third part of her wanted to pray and wait for divine inspiration about the ship's engine, and a final part as big as the other three combined wanted to laze around, enjoy the weather and slack off.

She settled for meandering to the south, in the direction of the rail yards. It was a coin flip whether she would find more information about Maple there, where the train that supposedly got diverted would have been, or the north, where most of the residential area was and where Maple would have come in if she was traveling from the north. Even if she didn't have any productive thoughts along the way, she would at least be going in a potentially useful direction.

The rail yards and the shipyard were unsurprisingly connected, and a convoy of dragons was hard at work lugging cargo from the ship she had watched docking earlier into a warehouse next to the trains. Most of the cargo was in large wooden crates, labeled with singular glyphs that looked like special talents. From the dragons' postures, it would have been back-breaking work for a pony or even a lesser dragon, and even these muscle mongers were too busy to stop and show off for the creatures watching from the docks, like her.

It gladdened her that she wasn't alone in coming this far south to watch the trade flow. Two stallions, a griffon and even a family of dragons with several young children had set up spots on the southmost public dock, watching the cargo ship unload.

"Is this an event you come watch regularly?" Corsica asked the dragon mom, who happened to be the closest.

She shook her head, smiling down at her little ones. "They just love big transportation. It beats keeping them entertained at home. Probably going to grow up to become train engineers or logistics coordinators... Hopefully by then, it won't all be for the war."

"That's where all this stuff is going?" Corsica asked.

"It's as safe a guess as any," the dragon mom said.

Corsica stared at the ship again. For all everyone talked about war - Yakyakistan and Ironridge, Cernial and Abyssinia, Nanzanaya's own plans regarding the tower at Aptann's border - she had never actually seen one up close. And with Equestria's signature restrictions of information, odds were she wasn't alone.

Was it the norm to just pretend it didn't exist, maybe? Probably not. The dragon mom had mentioned it first, after all. It must have been on her mind. But still, that was the explicit purpose for the information restrictions, according to Seigetsu. Keeping regional troubles localized and preventing them from spreading.

What a silly system. It got in the way of Maple's efforts to find Starlight, and it didn't even work.

Corsica migrated further along to the train yards, which were split between public areas for passengers and merchants, and private areas that were mostly off-limits so anyone untrained didn't get hurt. From the demeanor of the guards, Corsica guessed that she actually could get through on Seigetsu's authority if she wanted, but gravel beds really weren't good for wheels and she could easily imagine her roller getting stuck in the middle of a train track.

No fewer than four trains were waiting in the holding yard, with another at the passenger terminal she remembered boarding at on her first trip to the Crystal Empire. The dragons had constructed a series of raised walkways for safe navigation of the rail yard for their employees, plus a maze of paths on the ground below that were marked out with brightly painted lines to guide cargo around, like the bipedal dragon who was hauling a sack on a trolley to the passenger train that looked like it was full of letters. Being temporarily allergic to stairs, Corsica had to settle for the ground paths, which weren't quite off-limits even though it didn't feel like civilians were encouraged to congregate here.

She moved slowly, eyeing up all the creatures as they came and went. Who here looked like they might know how the trains really worked? She wanted to ask about trains that had been turned back, find out a little more about the consequences of breaking their rules by knowing how far away your destination really was, but didn't want to inconvenience the train operators by rendering them unable to do their jobs without a brainwashing.

Maybe this was a dumb idea. Anyone who did know how the trains worked wouldn't be in the rail yards, because there was no point in being here if you couldn't use the trains. But where else would someone knowledgeable on trains be found? She didn't just want someone who knew how they worked, she wanted someone who had pushed the limits and could tell her what Maple might have experienced. After all, retracing someone's steps was the surest way to find them.

"I wish I'd randomly run into someone who knows about this," Corsica muttered, reveling at the lack of a weight in her mind and also slightly annoyed that her wish wouldn't just come true.

"Knows about what?" said a nerdy-looking, four-legged dragon with an extremely flat build, save for a sail-like spine along his back.

Corsica blinked, checking to ensure she hadn't somehow had a wish come true after all... but no, there was no feeling of impending heaviness, no onset of supernatural fatigue. She felt fine.

"Trains," she said with a stiff shrug, remembering that the dragon had asked a question. "Don't have many where I'm from. I just think they're cool."

The dragon chuckled deviously. "Oh, you said it. I used to work here, you know! But I got fired for spending too much time looking at the trains when the bosses had other plans. So now I look at the trains from here. Do you want to hear a train fact?"

"Sure," Corsica said, placing a mental bet that this dragon was about to tell her exactly what she needed to know, without even a wish to prod him along.

The dragon looked from side to side, then dropped his voice to a whisper. "They say," he breathed, "that the trains are intelligent. That each train is loyal to a particular operator, and can come find them from anywhere in the world when they call!"

Corsica blinked. That actually sounded familiar, but she couldn't remember from where.

"That's a pretty good train fact," she agreed, wanting to keep him talking. "Gimmie another?"

The dragon gave a wide, toothy grin. "Alright, here's another great one: did you know that nobody knows for sure where trains come from? They say they're made by Princess Celestia, but have you ever seen her make one? You definitely haven't seen any dragons make one, I'll tell you that much. There was a hobbyist in town who replicated one perfectly a few years back, down to the last screw and drop of oil. And it wouldn't move an inch. So they sold it to a museum."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. "You sound less like a train enthusiast than a train conspiracy theorist."

"One's just a derogatory term for the other," the dragon said with a sly smile. "You wanna hear another?"

"Knock yourself out," Corsica goaded.

"Well, there are rumors," the dragon hissed, "that if you're born on a train, you're guaranteed to grow up to become a train conductor. It's a profession you need to be chosen for, see, because if you don't have a train, you're not much of a conductor. But you can game the system if you've got a properly-enlightened mama."

Corsica nodded along. "Oh yeah? Keep 'em coming."

The dragon grew an in-the-know smile. "Conversely, they even say that if you die on a train... That's where new trains come from."

This was starting to get ridiculous. "I thought you said nobody knew where new trains come from."

"Nobody's scientifically proven it," the dragon corrected. "And those conductors are a frustratingly tight-lipped bunch. But that doesn't stop train enthusiasts like myself from picking up on the threads of truth. So, I bet you wanna hear more, don't you?"

At this point, Corsica was starting to wonder if he actually knew as much as he thought he did, but there was no harm in listening if he could jog her train of thought. "When have I ever said no?"

"That's the spirit," the dragon encouraged. "But, see, we're in public, and there are certain precautions I'm not at liberty to go without, here..."

Corsica raised an eyebrow. Did he know about the train magic, then? That was definitely something it wouldn't be safe to discuss in public-

"Also," the dragon continued, "there's a, like, small membership fee? It's refundable after you've been a member of the 'fan club' for three months, just to weed out the lesser intellects with only a passing level of commitment. Much less than I've spent in my own pursuit of the truth, just saying."

"Oh, so it's a hustle." Corsica turned away. "Not really interested in joining a cult today. Sorry. It's free samples or bust."

The dragon didn't look at all discouraged. "Sure, sure! You don't think you need to know. But do you know for a fact where you were born?" He glanced conspicuously at Corsica's blank flank. "Or have you merely heard about it from your parents? Budding train enthusiast like you, hasn't discovered her cutie mark yet... I'm just saying, the system can be gamed with the right friends."

Strictly speaking, Corsica had no idea where she was born, or even whether it was still true that she was adopted now that she had rewound herself to a point before she started making wishes. But that was irrelevant. "Why would I want to be a train conductor?" she asked, frowning. "It's not like I'd be able to go anywhere, since-"

She bit her tongue. It would be pretty funny if this guy actually didn't know about the train magic and learned about it from her, but she didn't want to make extra work for the dragons.

"Siiince?" The dragon raised a very flat eyebrow.

"Can't tell you. It's classified," Corsica stoically said, giggling internally. "Government secret. Though, I suppose you could bribe me to spill the beans..."

The dragon blinked in realization, then stormed away, muttering something about lesser intellects and the complacent masses.

Corsica laughed. Hopefully he was actually insane and not someone she'd have to mend bridges with later. But the odds of him being an important source of information were way down, because the tail end of their conversation had spurred her to remember something critical: there was a train conductor who couldn't go anywhere in town. In fact, this conductor had flown with them all the way from Our Town, on account of having no other way to leave: Wheelcakes, the conductor from Starlight's village.

Of course, it was possible Wheelcakes had moved on to other towns now that she was away from the geographic area she was most familiar with, and the magic only prevented her from going to and from the Catantan Peninsula. Fifty-fifty odds between that and being stuck here too, Corsica guessed. And even if she wasn't stuck, maybe she would still be here, and not have left yet. And if she had left, maybe another conductor here would know how to contact her.

Being too late sure would be awkward, considering how much time Corsica had spent not even remembering she existed on the flight to Snowport. But a train operator who had repeatedly rammed her head against the enchantment was far and away the best source she could wish for to reconstruct what Maple might have experienced and done.

Hooves crossed that she hadn't just asked the dragons to brainwash her so she could go anywhere again, assuming they still could after their shadow cleric guy went rogue. But Corsica had a lead, and it was time to chase it.

Green Ice, Red Lightning

Senescey stared in shock at the thing bubbling away in front of her.

It was a windigo. An acid green one, its misty fumes drifting upward instead of down, a vaguely chunky texture hidden beneath its surface like a cracked iceberg.

"What happened?" Senescey asked again, holding Iblis between herself and the windigo like a shield, even though striking it with the knife had caused this in the first place.

"I just gave the guy some new ideas," Iblis innocently remarked. "If you don't like it, shank him again and I'll get rid of him for good. But the poor thing was all dusty and decrepit inside. How could you resist giving him something to do with himself?"

"What kind of thing to do with itself?" Senescey warily asked.

"Whatever we need," Iblis replied. "But preferably ruining someone who really has it coming. Ain't that right, boyo?"

Ludwig wobbled back and forth, a gummy quality to its usual etherealness. "Hey... weird ponyo. Your knife has a face that can talk? That is actually pretty cool. I kind of like its face for some reason. It reminds me of the time I got to be the rude raspberry ponyo for a day and suddenly liked staring at flanks. The same exact kind of like. Can I stare at you, cool knife?"

"Aww yeah," Iblis cheered, "stare away! This is the kind of void that winks when it stares back, you know. But hey, what's this about being a pony for a day? Is that, like a metaphor, or...?"

"It's not important," Senescey sighed, feeling a stab of guilt as her mind wandered back to the Icereach mission where Corsica got possessed on her watch. "Ludwig! If you like this knife so much, think you might want to do everything I say?"

Ludwig bubbled disdainfully. "Nah. You are lame, silly ponyo. It is your knife that I have the coolness for. Hey, knife! My lame boss is ugly and not very creative. She never appreciates my face and is always going on about blah blah this and super boring that. Want to come ruin her face with me? I am getting the strange vibe that you would really enjoy it."

Iblis thought about this. "Well, boss? Any chance you have it out for this guy's boss? You did say you were trying to get rid of some windigoes, right? I vote we do it, but your call's the one that matters."

Senescey sized Ludwig up. "You're talking about the Composer, right? What are you here for? What are they trying to accomplish?"

"What's that you say?" Ludwig started to rotate. "I thought I heard something that sounded like words coming from someone much less cool and interesting than my new talking knife friend, so I forgot to listen to what they were."

"Hey, bucko," Iblis warned. "She's calling the shots right now. You want to impress me, you gotta impress her."

"For serious, cool knife?" Ludwig stopped spinning. "Wow. For some reason I am trying to insult your judgement and it is not working. If you say so!" It bobbed up and down. "So, yes! It is the same lame boss chick as last time, in my hole in the mountains. And she is here to steal something! Which I already told you, so you must be very unintelligent to have forgotten already. I think it is something that is supposed to help stop Ironridge from losing to Yakystan, and maybe get the bird thing country involved too? My boss is so annoying that she never tells me the details. Or maybe I just forgot. I have many better things to think about, because I am very intelligent."

"Nope, didn't forget," Senescey corrected. "You just said it twice. You're sure you have no idea what this thing is?"

Ludwig nod-nod-nodded.

"Alright," Senescey continued. "Moving on: how many of you are here? You said you brought the Aldebaran? Any other windigoes? Any non-windigoes?"

"Yes, the windigo boat!" Ludwig bobbed happily. "I am the only one here. She put me in the engine to make it go faster. Everything else is just remote-controlled robobobots."

Senescey nodded. "Right, spare Whitewing bodies since she can transfer between them at will... How many? Any new abilities they have since last time?"

"Oh, little ponyo, you have no idea," Ludwig chortled. "There are the normal robobobots, and then, hoho, let me tell your face all about it..."

"This is the domain of the Forest King," Gawain challenged, stepping out in front of Papyrus, Braen and Floria, his wives hesitating in the background. "I am its king. And I don't recall extending you an invitation."

To punctuate his point, he drew a rapier, perfectly matching his flashy armor.

Across from him, on the other side of the foyer, the Composer barely acknowledged him. Backed by the open, towering door, the carpet of snow, and the baleful eye looming in the storm, it gestured to him with a dismissive wing. "Step aside, please. I see some... unexpected faces in your company."

Gawain glanced back at his wives. As he did so, Braen stepped past him. "Must be referring to me."

"You?" Papyrus raised an eyebrow. "What do you have to do with-?"

The Composer nodded. "We meet at last, dear sister."

A gear in Papyrus's brain skipped a tooth. "What?"

Braen glanced over her shoulder, offering him a sympathetic look before turning back to the Composer. "It true. Composer not talking about remote controlling mechanical body, but body itself. Whitewing specification based on plans stolen from Mother Shinespark after invent for Braen. Then mass-produce in Icereach. New coat of paint, but technology all same. Braen have many sisters."

"Indeed," the Composer said. "And your parents made observation of you in Ironridge difficult. It is rare to get a good look at you."

"That right," Braen agreed, taking a step forward. "Need to keep further modifications secret so Braen can maintain technological superiority. Very important for night like tonight, when Braen have to stop sisters from being used for evil."

"Evil?" The Composer took a bow. "Though it is intriguing to finally meet you, I gather you aren't the leader of this party. Not when I see a real, living sphinx..." It glanced at Floria, and then at Papyrus. "And everyone who matters knows who you are. Now what could a pair like you be doing here if not the same thing I am?"

Papyrus sized the Whitewing up, glowing teal energy conduits tracing a spider web around its armored body. "Actually, mate, we were just flying through when your storm came by and forced an emergency landing. Don't suppose you're going to throw shade on our intentions to make our hosts distrust us and start a brawl, are you?"

Gawain shot Papyrus a wary look. The mares behind them shuffled tensely; out of the corner of his eye, Papyrus could see hoof crossbows being distributed. Everyone who was running for the cellars had fled. The ones still here were preparing to fight.

"My storm could not force you to land in an area you were not flying over in the first place," the Composer pointed out. "And I come not to 'throw shade.' I agree that your claim regarding this place is righteous. After all, was Griffonstone not historically a province of the Empire your bloodlines ruled?"

Gawain snorted. "The last sphinx to rule these lands perished over nine hundred years ago, and my bloodline descends unbroken from that house. I am fully aware that there is a live sphinx in my parlor, thank you, but Griffonstone is mine and this is not the venue for discussing otherwise."

"Griffons are famed for their pride, greed and lust," the Composer said. "Every griffon in your country could count House Griffonstone among their ancestry before a third of that time had passed. Accordingly, bloodlines are not how rulership of Griffonstone is chosen."

Gawain gave the mechanical pony a death glare. "My station and country are not for sale."

"Not your station," the Composer coolly corrected. "Merely the power you used to claim it."

"They are one and the same," Gawain insisted, patting one of his pauldrons defensively. "Who are you to barge into my domain with such egregious demands, making proclamations and justifications about things that happened a thousand years ago, insulting the intentions of my guests, all under cover of a blizzard and that ghastly eye!?"

"As I said, you may call me the Composer," the Composer replied. "My true name is Lady Catherine Manchester Volkhelm Mk.I, and I am an elder windigo. I was present when the Empire was founded, and for that I was hardly young. As for this eye, you may think of it as... collateral for our dealings." It gestured to the crimson orb in the clouds outside. "Does this sate your curiosity? There is no need to respond in kind. I care little who you are."

Gawain indignantly punched the ground with a fist. "I am Gawain, the Forest King, and-"

"Allow me to make something clear," the Composer interrupted. "I am not in a hurry. Any stalling in our negotiations will be interpreted as an invitation to remain here. Once they have reached a satisfactory conclusion, I will leave." It stared at the bristling, nervous and by now heavily-armed crowd of wives behind Gawain. "You have my word as your guest that I will not harm anyone during my stay. However, surely you know what windigoes are infamous for."

"Wait a wait wait wait," Papyrus cut in, determined to hijack the situation before Gawain could realize that his flash mob might do things other than defending him from giant eyeballs. "A windigo? Like, the spooky ooo-things that float around and turn chums into enemies in old bedtime stories? You look more like a robot to me."

"I wear many forms," the Composer explained. "This one happens to be a favorite of mine."

"Windigoes a-aren't real," said a shaky mare from the crowd. "Who are you, really?"

The Composer shrugged. "Perhaps it would be more comforting to think of me as a business partner."

"Then consider our business relationship dissolved," Gawain spat. "I have no desire to hand over my birthright for nothing."

"For nothing?" the Composer stared at him. "If the freedom from my presence and my storm count for so little, then you would take no issue if we made ourselves at home in your manor?"

"That's extortion, not business," Gawain challenged. "You're here to hold me up and you know it!"

The Composer shook its head. "My apologies. I felt it would be polite to ingratiate myself to you by taking a page from the local culture."

Gawain looked as if he had been slapped.

"Allow me to elaborate," the Composer said. "Windigoes are possessed of keen senses for strife and discord. As I flew here, I could not help but notice the immense levels of distrust and desperation in your sparsely-populated kingdom. Fertile grounds for a less-disciplined member of my kin, to be sure. But this mansion provides a minor reprieve from those feelings. Boredom and stagnation still reign here, but no one is starving. As king, the responsibility for conditions in your domain falls to you. How else should I interpret this but you purchasing the services of your subjects in exchange for relief from conditions you yourself create?"

Gawain was furious, embarrassed, indignant and ashamed. "My country's problems are intractable," he ranted, hopping up and down. "I've spent decades-"

"Was I wrong to assume that these tactics were endorsed by the ruler of these lands?" the Composer calmly interrupted. "How would you prefer to conduct this transaction? Set an example that I might follow."

"Hey, now," Papyrus cut in, stepping forward. "That kingly guy might have done an atrocious job with the place, but there's a bigger chance than you'd expect that he can clean his act up when exposed to reason. Which, by the way, we've been working pretty hard at, and I'd appreciate it if you didn't try to sabotage our job."

The Composer turned to him. "You believe these conditions to be the result of incompetence?"

Floria cleared her throat. "You seem to have an agenda around not giving him the benefit of the doubt."

Now the Composer turned to her. "Do you know why windigoes were created, sphinx?"

"Either an accident or a divine joke," Floria deadpanned.

"We were created to prevent unrighteous civilizations from growing too powerful," the Composer said. "A corrosive tool that rulers of impure heart would reach for, and usher in their own undoing. I am intimately familiar with the minds of leaders who care only for their own enrichment, their own pleasure. I have met them, been used by them, watched keenly as they ignored chances to take the harmonic road, and I have ultimately brought about their demise. None alive know them better than I. They cannot change. They will not change, and everyone will become them if afforded too much power. This was not merely incompetence."

Floria took a step back. But Papyrus stepped forward in her defense. "That's a very important if you've got there."

"Is it not accurate?" the Composer challenged. "You should know the minds of rulers almost as well as I, Papyrus of Riverfall. Why are you here? To 'expose him to reason' and win the power of Griffonstone through a debt of gratitude? You believe he is unworthy of it, and seek it for yourself."

"Alright, enough of that." Papyrus swung a hoof out to the side, then held it to his chest. "I'm a great greedyguts miser who only works for my own benefit and am no different from everyone else, which means that's not remarkable and we're moving on. Here's what I want to know: how did you find out that Griffonstone's been sitting on the Rod of Kraken Summoning, and what are you going to use it for, anyway? Ironridge and Yakyakistan are in the mountains, not by the sea."

Gawain blinked. "The what?"

The Composer looked slightly taken aback. "Neither of us are here for a Rod of Kraken Summoning."

"Maybe you're not," Papyrus dismissed, taking his chance and running with it. "Wait, so are you here for that old cache of documents Garsheeva left behind about the you-know-what?"

The Composer gave him a blank look, which was impressive for a robot with mechanical eyes.

"No?" Papyrus tilted his head. "The teleporter to Indus? The knife that mind-controls people and turns them into assassins? The old signet ring that unlocks the passage down below Yakyakistan's glacier? This very nice rug?" He patted the grand carpet beneath his hooves.

"Everyone who matters knows what both of us are here for," the Composer sighed. "I felt it would be a show of good faith not to name it aloud in front of a crowd of servants."

Papyrus scrutinized the Composer. He hadn't seen any hint of a different reaction when he mentioned the knife... The Composer clearly thought he knew about whatever it was they were here for, so if it was the knife, he hadn't outed anything by mentioning it. But odds were up now that the Composer was actually here for something completely different, and didn't know about Cherrabell's weapon at all.

Gawain, of course, missed all the subtext... and if it really was a good idea to keep any objectives unspoken, he didn't seem to share it. "This bandit is talking about the Regalia of the Forest King," he declared, patting his armor. "This is what bestows my right to rule."

"...Really," the Composer said. "Either you're far more evil than I expected, or Papyrus has underestimated your incompetence."

A wave of murmuring swept through the crowd of wives, and one was elected to come forward and speak. "That old armor he wears is all you want?" asked a griffoness, packing a crossbow with a bolt that had a large, angry orange tip.

"A reasonable question," the Composer replied. "Yes, it is. Do you know what it does?"

"Some kind of heirloom?" the griffoness shrugged. "Gawain, look: we're being held up. If we use these crossbows inside the mansion, it's going up in flames and we're all going to die. Who knows what the eye can do. This seems like a bad hill to die on."

"As I said, the Regalia bestows my right to rule," Gawain protested, defensive. "That thing is demanding my kingdom, my resources, even all of you!"

"The right to rule comes from the obedience of one's followers," Floria cut in. "Whether that is won through force or admiration, a ruler is one who sets meaningful rules. What does a silly old suit of armor contribute to that when the safety of your subjects is on the line?"

"Well put," the Composer agreed. "What is that armor worth, indeed? I have yet to make a single threat beyond disturbing the tranquility of your home, and your subjects already seem to value that above the preservation of your Regalia. Would they see you differently if it was gone? Would anything change around here if you made such a small sacrifice in their name?"

Gawain looked frantically between Floria and the Composer. "Y-You're not agreeing with that thing, are you? Are you in cahoots to steal my country?"

The mood among the army darkened. "Gawain," another griffoness said. "I came here because you promised to use your resources to protect me. Paying ransoms isn't what I had in mind at the time, but you made an oath."

"This is no mere resource!" Gawain spun in a panicked circle, realizing he was surrounded. "Money, certainly, but my kingdom, my throne?"

"What does that armor have to do with your throne?" a mare protested.

As Gawain pleaded something back, Papyrus started to get a bad feeling that, not knowing himself what was so special about the armor, he was playing along with something he really shouldn't be playing along with. "Hey, windigo," he called to the Composer. "Nice job setting this up so they convince him to relinquish the armor, but aren't you forgetting about us? We were here first. How are we going to settle who gets it between the two of us?"

"An excellent question," the Composer said, ignoring Gawain. "You were the more timely of us, I will admit. And from what I know of your motives, you may yet use it in a way that furthers my ends. Tell me, how would you feel about making a deal?"

From a shadowy balcony railing, Senescey watched the confrontation in the entry hall, her ears picking up every word. And she didn't like what she heard.

"No, you idiot," she hissed under her breath. "Don't make a deal with that..."

"Painful personal history?" Iblis guessed, keeping its voice down as well. "I don't like the vibe of this Composer character either. Think I can really get behind taking them down a notch, though let's try not to bail out the griffon before he gets his just desserts. That's your boss, frost boy?"

"Oh yeah," Ludwig gurgled quietly, laying on the floor as a puddle of green fumes. "Have you ever seen an uglier face, friendo? If it was me down there, I could have had the bird things beating up their gross leader three whole hours ago."

"Right, so what do we do?" Senescey hissed. "If Braen is really a superior model of Whitewing, she might be able to take the Composer in a fight, and you said there was no one else here?"

Ludwig bubbled on the floor. "No meatbags or windigoes. Just backup robobobots on the boat. Plus the ultimate weapon."

"Yep. The one you don't know how to coherently describe," Senescey whispered. "How hard would it be to sabotage the reinforcements on the ship?"

"Good question," Iblis breathed. "I'm getting a weird feeling from those two machine ponies down there. Like my blade won't actually work on them. But I bet if you got an inert one that's still in a hangar, or something, I could find a way to pry it apart. Storm's going to make it rough to reach an airship hiding in the clouds, though."

"Eh, don't worry about that," Ludwig promised. "If I ask the storm with a supreme amount of politeness, it will probably move aside and let your ugly mug on board."

"Right, because you're a windigo," Senescey said, starting to move. "Alright. Let's look for a window I can sneak out through. Not taking the main door when there are so many people down there."

"Actually, cowardly ponyo, it is because I am handsome and charismatic," Ludwig happily told her, following along. "Storms have enormous brains."

Senescey shook her head, holding Iblis's handle in her teeth as she slunk quickly into a different hallway. "Disturbing implications, not gonna think about."

She reached a small study that had a window facing the storm. Relying on a modified windigo to protect her from the weather was sheer insanity... but she had technically done it all the months she rode on the Aldebaran, its technology protecting it from its own windigo storm. And she was already all in. There was no time to question things like this in the middle of a mission when it was do or die.

Senescey jumped onto the desk and flung herself into the shadows, slithering through the window and out into the storm.

The wind caught her like a ragdoll, flipping her head over heels in an arc that cost her all sense of direction. She couldn't even struggle to right herself; all her focus was spent on remaining conscious... and then a frigid updraft appeared, catching her wings and stabilizing her enough to get her bearings.

"Mister storm is listening!" Ludwig happily proclaimed from somewhere nearby. "You should remember to say nice things about his face from time to time. Now, to the boat we go!"

Having her wings guided by the storm was extremely unsettling. The snow had already felt alive on her trip from her own airship to the mansion, quiet and insidious. But now, it felt as if she was inside a creature, not just being nudged and buried by it but actively picked up and swallowed. She wasn't sure she could fight the currents if she wanted to as they lifted her up, towards the clouds with unnatural ease... Towards the huge, baleful red eye protruding below the raging surface of the storm.

"No way," Senescey grunted around Iblis's hilt, staring limply at the apparition as the winds bore her upwards.

"Wohoa," Iblis remarked above the winds. "Nice peeper. Is this storm literally alive?"

"No, that's..." Senescey sighed. "Rondo floated it as an idea when we were still working with the Composer. 'What if we build a giant eyeball effigy on the bottom of the Aldebaran so we can skim the bottom of the storm with it and give people the scare of a lifetime as we fly by?' Everyone else vetoed it because it was tacky and pointless, but I guess you-know-who was paying attention. Can't believe they actually did it..."

"Cowardly ponyo, you have no idea," Ludwig chuckled, looping around her in a green streak amid the storm. "It is the stupidest thing ever that there is mostly ocean between here and Ironridge, but the bird things on the coast just over there? We spooked them so good when we were flying in. It was legendary, friendo!"

Senescey sighed. Down below, she saw her ship, still sitting there with the lights on. Hadn't she told everyone to turn them out to avoid drawing attention? She couldn't remember. And wait, making their way across the snow to the mansion...

"Also, it is not just for show," Ludwig went on, rambling. "That is also now our cargo door for dropping bombs and Whitewings and the ultimate weapon on anyone we fly over. And maybe some laser beams too! My stupid boss was thinking it would be really cool if we could get the ship to shoot laser beams, but because she is unintelligent, she hasn't figured out how yet. If my face was in charge of this operation, we would have had so many laser beams..."

His voice was lost as the clouds parted, flowing past in conspicuous patterns that avoided a tunnel of free air as the updraft bore Senescey up and into the heart of the storm.

"A deal, you say," Papyrus said, leaning on one hoof. "Concerning the use of this armor. Does that mean you're offering to let us walk away with it?" He didn't know what it did, but keeping it out of the windigo's clutches could never be a bad thing...

The Composer nodded. "Perhaps. Contingent on what you would do with it."

Papyrus chuckled. "Much as I'd love to spill the beans to a sinister windigo, we've already established that you don't believe people can change and thus you probably wouldn't believe me even if I did give you all my plans."

"Have you changed?" the Composer asked, clearly aware of who Papyrus used to be. "I stayed abreast of your surveillance in Ironridge. You've lost both the tools and motives that fueled your previous crusades, but is there any doubt you would repeat your actions if those circumstances returned? You are a focused creature with a stunted heart, unencumbered by thoughts such as collateral damage and emotional consequences. You pick who you fight for, and then you move mountains for their sake, even if they wish otherwise."

"Shows what you know," Papyrus lectured. "Focused? Unencumbered? Me? If I had been able to stay on track and keep from getting distracted by chaotic impulses I would have won back then and not had it all fall to pieces. And if your knowledge of me ends at Ironridge, then I'm afraid it's sadly outdated."

"Irrelevant," the Composer dismissed. "I have watched your species for two millennium, from its inception to its destruction. You were no exception to the rule in your first life, and even after escaping your tainted flesh you refused the opportunity to change. Nothing can happen in one short month that refused to happen over so many eons. If you care to show otherwise, then dispel this storm using your trust in your companions."

Papyrus sighed. "Well, you've got me there: I'm not quite goodie-goodie enough to psychokinetically banish you with the magic of happiness, as fun as it sounds. I'll believe that one's possible for anyone when I see it."

"It has happened before," the Composer said, turning back to Gawain and his army. "Rarely. And never from creatures in positions of power..."

It wasn't looking good. Gawain was alone, and his wives, armed and afraid, looked increasingly in favor of handing over the armor. The crowd was still barely managing to avoid yelling over each other, but Gawain had yet to relent.

"It's only a matter of time before they start fighting," Floria hissed. "Shouldn't someone do something?"

"Who is qualified to intervene?" the Composer asked her. "He is their king, is he not? I gave no false testimony, and opened no fault lines that were not already present. Is it not just for him to face the consequences of his actions?"

Tension crackled through the air, and Papyrus could feel a faint delirium in the back of his head reminiscent of the thrill that used to carry him away as a sphinx. "Your storm is absolutely making this a thousand times worse."

"The only metric that matters is whether I accomplish my mission," the Composer corrected. "Don't you agree? If not, why are you sitting on the sidelines and leaving him to his well-deserved fate?"

Papyrus got up and marched forward. "Well, when you put it like that, maybe I ought to get my hooves dirty."

He strolled up while Gawain's back was turned, planting a hoof on the griffon king's shoulder and making him jump.

"You-!" Gawain's face didn't know whether to rise or fall when he saw Papyrus. "What?"

Papyrus looked out at the crowd of mares and griffonesses, unmitigated fear in their eyes. None of them knew what to make of him anymore, and they watched him for the slightest indication that could help make up their minds. Despite being by far the largest and most blatantly armed force in the room, they looked very alone.

"...Doff the armor, chum," he gently told Gawain. "Aren't they the girls you love? You've got to respect their decision."

The crowd looked ever so slightly encouraged. Folded ears rose halfway, tense headcrests regained a little of their bounce. Nobody changed their position.

"I can't," Gawain whispered, quiet enough that only Papyrus could hear. "They're in love with the king. If I'm not the king anymore-"

"Then you can make yourself king again through your actions, and not your clothes," Papyrus said, refusing to keep his end of the conversation quiet. "This country sure could use some kingly actions to whip it back into shape. And I still don't get why anointing rulers with that armor is so important, but looking at how well that system has done for the place, I say toss it and try something new."

"You're lying," Gawain accused, inches away from panic. "You do know what it does, you're just pretending not to so it sounds more reasonable to give it up!"

"Do we know what it does?" one of his wives demanded. "You keep making it sound like I'm not making an informed decision, but then you're not saying what I need to know! I don't care about your customs, just hoof it over and then keep calling yourself king anyway!"

"This is a lot less kingly than being without any armor," another one added.

Gawain looked desperately at Papyrus. "See? Of course you see! You know, you know, you-"

"This had better not be what it looks like," a new voice thundered from the open doorway.

Everyone looked up. It was Felicity.

"Felicity-!" Gawain choked.

"What are you doing here?" Papyrus asked, baffled. "And how many more 'reinforcements' are going to keep following us?"

"Interesting," the Composer remarked, just watching her.

Felicity brushed a heap of snow out of her coiffed, scarlet mane, marching into the mansion. "I am a doctor and busy professional who is trying to care for a mare who has just given birth," she declared, "and your shenanigans are making that completely impossible. You." She stopped in front of the Composer, pulling out a sheet of paper from her suit and presenting it. "Does this mean anything to you?"

Papyrus recognized it instantly. It was one of Egdelwonk's employment contracts for his Ironridge janitor service.

"I have it on some authority that this belongs to someone you have a truce with," Felicity told the Composer. "That somebody has currently taken up residence on my airship and is using a magical screen to show my patient a live feed of everything that's happening in this room. It is a horrible nuisance and they won't leave until you do. Now that we've established my motive, don't try to hinder me. Is that clear?"

The Composer nodded. "Make your move. I am curious to see what you will do."

Felicity continued her march, this time coming to a stop in front of Papyrus and Gawain. "Gawain," she said, phrasing it as a gentle order. "Give me back my armor."

Gawain blinked at her. Papyrus and the wives did, too.

"I am fully aware of what it does, and why you think you need it," Felicity told him. "And let me tell you right away that Papyrus is right and you are wrong. Give me the Regalia. I will then handle negotiations with this windigo. Then in the morning, we can discuss the state of your kingdom and where our debts presently stand. But I've left this on loan to you for nearly two decades, and circumstances have forced me to come collect."

Gawain was going to protest. He was going to plead, panic, struggle; Papyrus could see it in his eyes. No matter how much emphasis the griffon put on adhering to principles, there was no way he could think rationally in this situation. Papyrus knew it, and Felicity must have known it too if Egdelwonk had really been showing everyone on the ship the proceedings.

That was why Papyrus wasn't surprised at all by the sensation of a bucket of water hitting his thoughts. He had already been keeping his emotions on a tight leash to guard against manipulation, but suddenly he was perfectly cold, distant and lucid, and he could see that everyone else was, too.

Felicity's suit didn't cover her brand, and she stood with it displayed for all to see. Gawain clearly wasn't familiar with its effects, and his wives weren't either: most of them looked baffled in an academic sense, as if the weight that was tamping down their emotions was a curious puzzle to be solved rather than an existentially terrifying form of manipulation. But there was no power he would have chosen to shut down a brewing fight instead of this one, and Papyrus found himself glad - as much as he could, standing within her aura - that she had decided to show up.

"Gawain," Felicity repeated, gentle and earnest. "Your kingdom is already on fire, and you already know that we weren't going to leave it to burn. Give me the regalia, and I can solve this situation tonight. And then we'll help you solve the one that follows it in the morning."

She let her field go out, allowing everyone's emotions to restart and letting Gawain consider it on a fair and level plane.

Slowly, he sighed. "Please don't think any worse of me..."

Piece by piece, he started to remove it. And as he did, Papyrus started to notice a reaction in the crowd.

"Wow," a griffoness remarked. "He looks kind of... ordinary."

"Not hideous," another one added. "But I guess that really was doing something for his image. So what was its power?"

A nearby mare looked like she was trying to talk herself into seeing something, though Papyrus could tell she actually wasn't. "He looks... different, I suppose?"

And then, ignoring Gawain, a griffoness said, "I know it's night and an emergency, but was this place always so poorly lit? It feels like the mansion changed."

Murmuring spread at that. "Look, the wallpaper is peeling a little next to this floorboard," one griffoness pointed out.

"No, that was always like that," a mare reminded her. "I've tried to fix it, but it keeps coming undone. Pretty much every room has one."

Within the span of a minute, none of them at all were looking at Gawain. Standing there, unclothed and alone, Papyrus echoed the evaluations of his wives: he looked like any old random griffon. Didn't carry himself in a kingly or royal manner. Kind of lanky. Just average. It wasn't much of a shock, since Papyrus never thought he looked kingly in the first place.

"Congratulations," the Composer said to Felicity. "Is the Regalia truly yours, as you claim?"

"Depends how you track ownership," Felicity replied. "I looted it from a molding airship wreck where it had evidently been wasting away for years. Then I sold it to this griffon in a deal that was immediately rendered invalid by changing circumstances, and was not able to receive payment. In griffon economic ideals, I suppose that makes me something like this mansion's landlord."

"Interesting, albeit irrelevant," the Composer said. "I would like to negotiate with you a deal regarding the Regalia's continued use. While I cannot compromise on my goals, the method of reaching them is flexible. How do you intend to use this power if I leave you with it and withdraw?"

"Hold on," one of Gawain's wives interrupted. "What's it do, anyway? Could someone stop keeping us in the dark?"

The Composer nodded. "The revisions of history find fertile ground in mortal lifespans. Allow me to fix this."

It pointed a glowing wing at Gawain. "As you are hopefully aware, these lands were once a province of the Griffon Empire, before the Aldenfold was raised and split the world in two. At the time of this sundering, they were considered the province of Griffonstone, ruled by Galdar Griffonstone and his powerful sphinx house. One of the most powerful at the time, in fact."

The wives stopped chattering, and were fully paying attention. "But the sphinx population is reliant on interaction with the royal family to sustain itself," the Composer continued. "And Equestria's border policies made no exceptions for the land of their distant neighbors, due to a geopolitical feud at the time. Eventually, Galdar's line lost its last sphinx, and was succeeded by a griffon heir, Grover Griffonstone. Time before the Aldenfold was fading from living memory, and so with Garsheeva's blessing, Grover set out to forge Griffonstone into a standalone nation. That blessing, however, was far from symbolic."

It gestured to the pile of armor on the ground. "Griffons are weak of heart, prone to squabbling and being led astray by their vices. In ancient times, prior to the rule of sphinxes, they counteracted this using a set of divine artifacts passed down among the royal line... or, more accurately, passed down among griffons and minting new royals as they went. These artifacts hold the power to speak to the vices of griffons, drawing and focusing them in constructive directions. To direct their greed, a sword; to focus their lust, armor; to unify their pride, an idol. By turning those weaknesses into attachments to a leader, the griffons enabled themselves to grow strong. And Garsheeva gave that power to Grover, that his country might endure without the mandate of sphinxhood."

The wives in the crowd stared. "Did you say that armor arouses lust?"

"It grants the power to focus it," the Composer answered. "A long way to fall, isn't it? From unifying griffons on the path of patriotism to recruiting lowly housemaids."

A wave of murmuring swept through the crowd. "Gawain, does your armor really affect how we see you?" someone in the back called.

Gawain sputtered, back in the spotlight and defending himself with a stick against rhetorical swords. "Of course it does. This is an emblem of my station. I am not merely Gawain; I am Gawain, the Forest King. My worth to you comes in the gifts my station enables me to bestow. You have known this for years, don't pretend it's some revelation!"

"It is no mere emblem," the Composer apologized. "As I have said, I am in no hurry to leave. Why not try it on for yourselves? Don your liege's armor and demonstrate its effects to your peers. You, there." It pointed at a griffoness in the crowd. "Perhaps you would care to try it. What is your name and station here?"

The selected griffoness looked away from both Gawain and the Composer. "Galena. I'm his wife. Been married for almost a year."

"His wife?" The Composer seemed slightly surprised. "Then perhaps someone of a lower station could make a more effective demonstration." It singled out another at random. "You. What is your name and station here?"

The griffoness it pointed at stepped forward, her crest specially styled to flop cutely when she bowed. "Gloria. We've been married for nine years. Galena is actually one of the newer ones..."

"Really." The Composer moved on to one of the mares in the crowd, ignoring the griffons. "You, then."

The mare it focused on winced a little. "Sorbet Swirl. Fourteen years."

In the middle of the hall, Gawain was starting to turn red.

The Composer sighed. "I had assumed, from the lack of males in your company, that you employ biased hiring practices. But your entire staff is your harem?"

"I refuse to debate my rights as king with you," Gawain muttered from the floor, utterly humiliated.

"Perhaps," Felicity suggested, stepping forward and picking up a piece of the armor, "I might be the one to safeguard this, as its actual owner."

No one moved to stop her as she deftly strapped it on over her business suit. When she was finished, she struck a tasteful pose.

"...Okay," said one of the griffonesses. "I see what it does now. Your point has been made." She turned to the Composer. "If you're not going to immediately raze the mansion if you don't get what you want, could you please leave and come back in the morning? I have some thinking to do."

"Never thought I'd look at a sarosian mare that way," another said. "I feel kind of cheated."

"Always wondered why you never took that thing off even in bed," a third remarked.

A mare glanced between Felicity and Gawain. "I still don't get it."

"From what I've learned," Felicity explained, "it affects only griffons. Now, I second the request for you to withdraw for one night." She stared down the Composer, looking much more regal in the armor than Gawain ever had. "If you are truly prepared for an earnest discussion about how this tool will be employed in the future, and are considering solutions that don't end in you destroying this mansion to get what you want, you will have a much better time of it when I am not up past my bedtime. Those are my conditions: withdraw for tonight, remove your ominous floating storm eye, and then on my honor I will debate you in good faith tomorrow. Are these terms acceptable?"

The Composer considered this. "I accept your proposition. I shall withdraw for twelve hours, and you and I shall debate the Regalia's future when I-"

Suddenly, it flinched, whipping around to look back out the door. "What."

For the first time in what felt like a lifetime, Senescey was back aboard the Aldebaran.

The main cabin was dark. Clearly, it was being used only as a transport, without any living crew: the Composer probably only checked on it periodically while it flew here, popping in and out of the Whitewing bodies on board.

How did their focus work? Could they see through all bodies at once, or only the one they were actively controlling? Did she have to treat any that might be on board as active sentries, or could she disable them while the Composer's focus was on the mansion down below? Hopefully the latter. But as she stared around the empty room, with only the blue light of the storm to guide her, it was all she could do to stay here in the present.

"So, cowardly ponyo," Ludwig announced, swooping up from the hold down below. "Nobody is here, and none of the robobobots reacted when I gave cool frost mustaches to their faces. So I think we are good to do some super sabotage!"

Well, there went the element of stealth. With a sigh, Senescey flicked on the lights so that she could see better.

The cabin came alive with light, and suddenly, she was back in the past.

Across from her was the table where her crew had played cards during long voyages, though the ship was fast and trips were never slow. They hadn't left any messes or half-finished games, or if they had, someone had cleaned them up. But she could see another unfinished card game in her mind's eye, superimposed over a table just like this one, only a lot less fancy.

"Hey, you alright?" Iblis asked as Leif stepped into another abandoned hangout she had once called home. "Your chord in the song is kind of acting up, again."

Leif squeezed her eyes shut, and the ghosts of her one-time companions were right there with her.

"Sorry, guys," she apologized, shaking her head. "Can't dwell on this. I've got something actually important to do, now. Focused on my future, and not the past."

The course of the future isn't for us to decide, a memory of Rondo told her, pushing back on a day when she tried to talk about her plans. That's for higher beings. What we can decide is who to back. And my life belongs to whoever will value it as more than a piece on the board or an extra set of hooves.

I tried to tell them we weren't monsters, a memory of Vivace whispered, haunted and cornered. They didn't listen. I tried to show them, but they didn't see. I struggled for years, but in the end, it was I who was blind. They were right.

Could I have stopped it? I will never know, said a defeated memory of Tempo, flying with the group even though her passion was spent. I once thought I held ages of wisdom. Maybe what happened was inevitable, and I was a fool. Either way, she was right there in front of me, and I lost her.

I lost everything before I was old enough to have convictions to act upon, her own memory said, explaining to the others why she couldn't stop, even as their party was starting to lose cohesion during the Icereach mission. I lost everything again when I refused to buckle on the convictions I had gained. But fate wouldn't let me die. That's proof that I'm right. In the end, I can't lose.

Senescey opened her eyes again. "I'm sorry. But that's not who I am anymore."

She made her way to the staircase down into the chaotic hold, full of junk the Composer had them lugging around. "I'm not here to say goodbye, and I'm not here to loot our old resources and start over. And I'm not going to die tonight, either. I've already got a new cause. You'll see. I've changed. I'm not stuck on that anymore. Watch me."

Her booted hooves clunked against the metal stairs to the hold. Unlike the messy pile of crates she remembered, this place had been cleaned.

Ahead, she could see a red glow emanating from a circle on the floor, which proved to be the other side of the great red eye. A console of machinery next to it looked like the controls; she sized it up and quickly determined the mechanisms for opening and closing the eye's aperture, which was actually a door. Looking down through the eye's glass-and-metal assembly, made up of supportive rods and motors and scaffolding, she could see a red-covered outline of the mansion below, blown out of proportion by the eye's curved surface acting as a lens.

Beyond the eye was a line of five Whitewings, hanging inert in a line of docking stations that had been build into the ship. A sixth station was empty. That meant only one Whitewing was unaccounted for, and had to be the one the Composer was using right now.

Towards the prow, the hold ended in a broad, dark fixture that looked a little like a huge door.

"Nice going, cowardly ponyo!" Ludwig praised. "So, that is the ultimate weapon just over there. Want me to fire it up? I bet it can turn these buckets of bolts into leaky buckets of broken bolts."

Senescey eyed up the door. "How about you let me look at it first?"

"Sure thing!" Ludwig encouraged, doing something to the door. It split down the middle, and started to retract into the sides, the light revealing something massive beyond.

Senescey stared as Ludwig's 'ultimate weapon' came into proper view. It was a bigger robot.

The thing was shaped roughly like a mushroom, with a central stalk and a huge, domelike head, asymmetrical arms affixed to the stalk and hanging down from the dome's underside. At its base, it had three treads arranged in a circle, and behind it was a massive, conical device that looked a little like a tail, sticking down from the head and wrapped in concentric rings. Attached to its many arms were all manner of weapons, including an imposing claw and a massive cannon.

"Woah," Iblis remarked. "Someone with a fashion sense made that one. Think I should try breaking this one first?"

Senescey stared for a few seconds longer... and finally, it clicked where she had seen this before.

There had been one, or something like it, sitting destroyed in the mountain tunnel that led to the bunker where she had trapped Halcyon and her friends in Icereach.

Of course this was related to the Composer.

She searched it quickly, finding a plaque built into the side of its pedestal. Pavise-Class Soul Armor Unit 5, it read.

"Alright," Senescey said, brandishing Iblis. "So how do we break this? Can you cut metal?"

She tapped Iblis's edge against the machine. Nothing happened.

"Ooh, no dice," Iblis complained. "For the record, I'm basically unbreakable, so you can try as hard as you like. But something about this metal's telling me it's special. Like it's not just designed to block mortal weapons."

"Yeah, so I remembered!" Ludwig sang, bobbing happily around the Pavise. "The ultimate weapon is a bigger robobobot! I think there are a bunch of these back at my boss chick's base, but she put one on the boat so she'd still have one if they tried to take all the others away, since she is a failure and got owned in Ironridge."

"Uh huh," Senescey said. "Any ways to break it?"

"This is supposed to be completely indestructible, friendo," Ludwig told her. "No breaking. We could steal it, though! And then use it to break all the others. In fact, that is such a fantastic plan, I think we should do it right now."

Senescey raised an eyebrow at the monstrosity. "I can use this?"

"Nah," Ludwig said. "You are not intelligent enough. But I can! My stupid boss showed me how to do it so I could steal it and get it out of Ironridge to the boat, so I have even flown it before! I think she said being a windigo gives you cool windigo powers you can use to make it move, and if a lame ponyo tried to get inside, it just wouldn't go anywhere. So what do you say, cool knife? Forget this killjoy ponyo and go have some machine versus machine action?"

"Hold up, pardner," Iblis interrupted. "I'm detecting some unease about this plan from my compatriot, here. I stand by my work in reprogramming you, but you're going to take an oath on my good name that you'll only use the machine to mangle other machines, and won't lay a lug nut on any living things who may or may not be in cahoots with Senescey and may or may not deserve a more creative ruination than you can manage on your own. Isn't that right?"

Senescey nodded. "Not sure how much I trust a promise from a windigo, but that's right. And before you do anything, let's try to break the Whitewings without that Pavise..."

She stepped back over to the rack of Whitewings, raised Iblis, and started searching for weak joints or gaps in the armor. But after a solid minute of not even scratching the things, she was forced to admit it might not be happening.

"Same kind of metal on both of these machines, if you're curious," Iblis said. "I'm no scholar, can't tell you what's special about it. But it's definitely special, and definitely the same."

Senescey sighed.

"Well, cool knife?" Ludwig pressed. "Either we fire up the ultimate weapon and kick some rude butt, or do basically nothing, and I don't like doing nothing. I will even agree to your boring terms. How about it, eh eh eh?"

"Your call, boss," Iblis said. "I vouch for my work on this guy, but it's your friends who are down there getting terrorized by the other windigo in a robot."

Senescey was at a crossroads, and she felt herself waver. "Can the Composer not take control of this one directly, then, like they do for the Whitewings?"

Ludwig shrugged. "Boy, if they could, they should be feeling pretty stupid right about now for showing me how to fly it out of Ironridge for them."

"Right," Senescey said. "Then... do it."

Ludwig did an ecstatic loop before diving towards the Pavise unit. "Oh boy, here we go!"

The whole ship rumbled as the windigo disappeared. The lighting around the Pavise shifted, and began to turn green.

Slowly, the central stalk lit up, and then the sensors hanging from the dome that made up the machine's face. Green lightning flared to life on the surface of its conical tail, and the tail began to rotate within its rings, arcing and sparking as the energy melded into a fiery plasma that glowed from within with Ludwig's life force. The double-layer treads clicked, unlocked and began to move.

"Stay out of the way!" Ludwig called, rolling slowly off the pedestal, the treads swiveling and lifting into position to carry it forward. "Can't fault me for breaking your dumb contract if you make me squoosh your face!"

Senescey backed out of the way as Ludwig rolled up to the rack of Whitewings. It extended the Pavise's massive free claw, and gripped one of the docked machines by the head. For a moment, nothing happened as it struggled with its prey, and then... crack! The head popped loose, its body sparking where it had been forced free.

"Ooh, these things are tough," Ludwig remarked, rolling on to the next one. "I might have to sit on the one my dumb boss is currently using. It will probably not hold still for me to tear its head off. This body sure feels great, though, don't you think?"

"Uhh..." Senescey watched as Ludwig moved on to the third one, two out of five decapitated and crushed. The Whitewings were getting demolished, as promised, but Iblis had better be sure about its influence over the windigo...

"Oh. Wait. You don't think, because you are too stupid to have such a great body," Ludwig said, finishing with the third. "I think I am starting to get the hang of this! Watch, watch... There goes number four! I bet neither you nor my boss chick could count to four."

Senescey felt herself sweating as doubt wormed its way into her thoughts. This was never what she had wanted. Signing power away to others was how you found yourself powerless. That was why she wanted to become the changeling queen, the goddess who could enforce fair play for others. Because she didn't trust them to do the same for her. And even if it was a modified windigo, was there anything less trustworthy than a windigo?

The fifth Whitewing snapped, and none remained.

"Boy, that was easy," Ludwig gloated. "It must make you feel pretty inadequate to know that you could not do this without my help, little ponyo. So, now I will go dunk and junk my boss, okay? I am still keeping our promise, cool knife! Watch me go!"

The Pavise reached out its claw, manipulating something on the console by the eye aperture. With a tremendous whirring and sliding of metal, it dilated, the glass sliding aside and the supports retracting, the lights in the edges that provided its red glare now shining nakedly into the stormy air.

At the last second, an alternative plan popped into Senescey's mind. "Wait!" she called. "Braen's still down there, and she should outclass the Composer. We can have her deal with-!"

"Wait? Now? Screw you, boring ponyo. I have a boss to bash. Geronimo!" Ludwig made a rude gesture towards her with its claw, and then leaped out the unblocked hole.

Papyrus, Floria, Braen, Felicity and even the Composer stared, along with everyone else, as the eye hanging in the storm dilated, opened, and something fell out.

A thing was the only appropriate descriptor for it. A massive abomination of metal and green conduits, it looked like an armored mushroom crab with a rocket engine on its back, spewing emerald energy and hanging in the sky as its head unfolded, a pair of great steel wings folding and fanning out behind it. It hovered, and it burned, and it had a massive cannon pointed straight at them.

"Eyyyyyyy robobobot!" the machine called in the unmistakable rusted-winter voice of a windigo, the storm amplifying its words instead of carrying them away. "Guess what time it is!"

"Ludwig, what is the meaning of this?" the Composer demanded. "I gave you leave to terrorize the coastal settlements, not to bring out the Pavise. And what is that green light?"

"It is my aura of coolness," Ludwig explained, aiming the Pavise cannon. "And it is time for you to get your wimpy shrimpy clock cleaned! Or more like uncleaned, since you're about to get sootcaked!"

The cannon fired, a mass of crackling green energy bursting out and flying towards the mansion. With a burst of energy, the Composer fired back, rocketing off the ground and intercepting the shot cleanly in midair. It broke over the Whitewing's body in a shower of flames, barely even leaving a singe mark.

"Fool windigo," the Composer thundered, dark with rage. "You think your life force is great enough to do more than move a Pavise? I have no place for underlings that defy my most basic commandments. I offer you a chance to evolve, and you think to use my own gifts against me!?"

"My face is cooler than you've ever been, girly-girl," Ludwig taunted, starting to fly towards the Composer. "That's why I've got the bigger robobobot! Watch what this can do!"

Its arms rotated around its core as the Composer charged, withdrawing two blades from its forelegs and slashing at the Pavise, a fountain of sparks erupting as steel met steel. The storm grumbled, echoing their clangs.

"Hey, slow down a little!" Ludwig complained as the Composer darted around with agility Papyrus had only ever seen in top-level tournament fighters back in the old Empire. "This is the kind of not playing fair that gives you a stupid face, stupid robobobot. See how much mercy I show you when you slip up!"

"Your power is limited," the Composer replied, dodging and darting and keeping the pressure up despite its inability to penetrate the Pavise's armor. "Your flailings have doomed you!"

Down in the mansion, Papyrus glanced at the stupefied Gawain, and the crowd behind him, all of them watching the duel just outside the open door. "Hey, kingly guy!" he shouted, waving his wings. "This seems like an absolutely fantastic time to get yourself and everyone with you down to the cellars with the kids? I doubt little crossbows will do much against something that overengineered!"

Gawain swallowed, looking as if he would wet himself as the Composer continued baiting Ludwig. "Yes, that's... We should..."

"Is it just me," Floria cut in, "or is the floor trembling?"

Papyrus had to admit, he felt it too. His brain wanted to chalk it up to the nearby battle, but neither of them was touching the ground... "Oh, what is it now?"

"Braen feel something coming!" Braen warned, standing at the ready in case the fighters came too close to the door. "At ready!"

From the Aldebaran's eye, Senescey watched the fight playing out below, Iblis held at her side.

"Think he's losing?" Iblis remarked. "Didn't really see that coming. Isn't the bigger robot supposed to be more powerful?"

"Looks like a stalemate," Senescey replied. "Neither of them can hurt each other, so it's down to running out of power like the Composer said."

"Hmm," Iblis mused. "Well, the windigo's connected to my song, now. Maybe it would power it up or something if I sang a little louder? Not sure the best way to do that, and I sure wouldn't want to risk it backfiring on you..."

"Hold on," Senescey interrupted. "Do you feel that? There's something, it's like... No, it can't be..."

A continent away, Faye was in control, sitting in her bed aboard Puddles' airship and reading a book Lissa had lent her about Wilderwind fashion. Several days of flying had taken them between miscellaneous errands Puddles had found to do on their way to Izvaldi, and now that they were finally approaching the province's capital, she wanted to make the most of her alone time. Soon enough, she would be off the airship and out on another adventure, and with Flarefeather's energy...

She would have fun. That wasn't really in question, at least until her luck turned sour. But for now, she was getting what solitude she could. Just herself, her bed and Coda, the large filly's iceberg secured in a closet with the door open so she didn't slide around, but could still see. Assuming she was conscious.

Something wasn't right, though. Faye sniffed, and felt like it was the air around her: it felt almost like glass, a solid sheet under heavy strain that was preparing to shatter.

That wasn't normal. She slipped in a bookmark and hauled herself to her hooves, preparing to investigate or raise the alarm-

In Equestria, in a hole on the outskirts of the Crystal Empire, Aegis loomed large in the sky.

"Have you lost your mind!?" Starlight cried, dashing towards Twilight as the princess projected a shield, bolstered with the power of the Lovebringer, defending Misophaes from the metal dragon's onslaught. "Stop!"

Twilight buckled, and Rainbow Dash charged after both of them as the ground exploded and gave way, the rocky spur beneath Twilight's hooves shattering and sending her and Misophaes plunging into the abyss below. The abyss none had returned from, and none could plumb... but Rainbow dove after them undaunted, tracking Twilight by the crackle of red Lovebringer magic emanating from her body, the remnants of her shield as she fell. The shadows rose up around her like a maw, but she didn't look back as they blotted out the sky far faster than was natural, her gaze and her heart fixed only on her friend as she followed her into the void.

Red lightning blitzed across Papyrus's vision, and time seemed to dilate until the microsecond where he had seen it was too short to have happened at all. He blinked thrice, rapping his head with a hoof to shake himself out of it. What had happened? Things were... different.

Outside, both the Composer and Ludwig had crashed, laying in metal heaps on the ground. Time still seemed to not be flowing right; he could see snowflakes from the blizzard hanging in midair, neither moving nor falling. And he couldn't hear the wind at all.

"Power supply anomaly detected," Braen's voice said beside him, static and monotone. "Attempting to bring back online..."

The machines outside, too, were recovering. Ludwig recovered first, planting a tread squarely on top of the Composer's body and pressing down, grinding it against the ground.

"Hah!" Ludwig crowed, stomping and grinding. "Who's out of energy now, stupid robobobot? Watch the great Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III write his name all over your face!"

"Congratulations," the Composer's broken voice crackled. "You have made yourself my new priority to eliminate."

"Look at your stupid face, giving me the respect I deserve," Ludwig cooed. "Too little, too late, you bucket of bolts! Let's do a little something to rub it in..."

Ludwig started rolling towards the mansion. As he did, Papyrus noticed something small and gray slip out from the still-open aperture where the eye had been. Was that... Senescey?

He squinted. She didn't look like she was falling normally. There was no time to hesitate: Papyrus kicked off, pumping his wings and feeling the immobile snowflakes slap against his face as he met the trajectory of her fall.

Just in time, Papyrus caught up, catching her and sparing her a devastating landing. He pulled up, shaking her, and swooped to a halt in midair. "Hey! Hey! You alright in there?"

Senescey groggily fluttered her eyes. "Unnngh... Papyrus...?"

"No one else," Papyrus promised, holding her. "What happened just now? I felt this flash, and all the robots got messed up, and the weather..."

He slowly, slowly turned his gaze upwards. The entire storm had stopped, frozen in place, a sculpture of clouds surging towards the horizon. Its blue light had been replaced with a monochrome gray. From the clouds to the wind to the snowflakes caught in time, nothing moved. Nothing at all.

"What is this?" Papyrus breathed, a trail through the snowflakes carved in the air where he had flown to catch Senescey.

"I felt..." Senescey was struggling to get her bearings. "Some... kind of energy like what Chrysalis did. When I died... But it was unfocused. Just... my head..."

Papyrus glanced towards the mansion, where Ludwig was rolling back out, a barely-conscious pony wearing a familiar suit of armor held in its claw.

"Eyyy, boss chick!" Ludwig chortled, showing Felicity off to the fallen Composer. "So I remembered with my brain that this armor is what you were looking for! Yeah! You want it?"

"Oh, hold on," Papyrus said, dropping Senescey in the snow as he took off towards the bigger threat. "No, put her down!"

Broken motors whirred on the Whitewing's carcass.

"Well, how about you come and get it?" The tail on Ludwig's machine started whirring faster, and it lifted off into the air again, tucking Felicity in under the dome and shifting into a more aerodynamic form. "It would be an awesome way to prove how much slower and dumber you are than the great Lord Ludwig Frederick Mk.III!"

And then the robot took off, blasting upwards at a punishing angle, plunging into the clouds and boring a hole straight through them.

"Felicity!" Papyrus pumped his wings harder, soaring upwards after them. "Felicity!"

The air almost lacked temperature as he chased the windigo through the tunnel in the clouds, its machine moving so much faster that it was out of sight before he even reached the tunnel's entrance. But Papyrus didn't give up, pushing his body and his wings to rise faster, the ragged edges of clouds around him whizzing past in an almost perfect cutout of the monstrosity's shape. Above, he saw moonlight, and with a final burst of speed he broke above the storm clouds and beheld the world beyond.

The storm was like a glacier, sitting immobile against the banks of the Aldenfold, their rocky slopes rising out of it like teeth. The slant of the tunnel let him out facing north, with the mountains dead ahead of him, and a speck on the horizon that maybe, maybe could have been Ludwig and Felicity. But the mountains were dwarfed by a new structure rising in the background, a needle with a point that perfectly silhouetted itself against the moon: a ruby-red spire, impossibly thin and impossibly tall, rising from a spot beyond the mountains that might roughly have been in Grandbell.

It was just like the one that had appeared in Ironridge, disrupting the day-night cycle and turning the skies gray around the clock. The one that had also appeared during a period of windigo misfeasance... but Papyrus didn't have room to think about that. He screamed it one more time, with only the clouds and the stars to hear him: "Felicityyyyy!"

Unlimited

I sat in the coffee shop amid an awkward silence, starting to get the feeling that I needed to give Lissa and Flarefeather some space to talk about what I had just said.

It wasn't just about manners. I felt almost sticky from whatever came over me during Flarefeather's hug. Faye sat in my mind taking no pleasure in being right, and now neither of us knew what to do next.

"...Alright," Lissa finally said. "Let's say I believe you. Not sure if I do yet, but I can't think of a concrete reason why I shouldn't, so for now, let's see where this goes." She folded her forehooves beneath her chin, taking advantage of having a chair all to herself now. "So far you've told us that everything that's happening is caused by a tower that appeared somewhere to the south, and if you're going to fix it, first you have to go there and investigate. How do you know this, and what are you actually planning to do there? Is it related to this 'changeling queen' thing?"

"Yeah." I folded my ears. "Changeling queens have magical voids in our hearts. They're like really strong batteries or cages for things made of emotions. Now, these towers are grown out of structures that already exist deep underground called crystal palaces. Each palace has a magical keeper called a Flame of Harmony, which are really important to the stability of the world. When this happened in Ironridge, I went down to the bottom of the old palace and found that the flame had been really badly hurt by something, which was why everything went wrong. I also found that these flames are basically manifestations of certain emotions or concepts, which means they're the kind of thing I can put in my void."

Lissa frowned in thought. Flarefeather looked boggled.

"Actually fixing this, in theory, takes three steps," I continued. "First, I find the flame and take it away from whatever caused the damage, assuming it's still alive. Second, I take it somewhere it can be repaired, which last time meant the home of a flame that was still healthy. Finally, I bring it back to its own palace. But... like I said, I'm pretty bad at seeing things through. Last time, I only made it through the first two steps. So I don't know if things will actually go back to normal once the flame is restored, and if whatever caused the damage is still there, then this might just happen all over again unless I deal with that, too. And... all this is assuming I'm on a time limit and get there in the first place before it's too late."

Lissa blinked incredulously. "You know this and still went along with us exploring the manor last night? If that's true, wouldn't there be things a thousand times more important to do?"

"Power outage," I said, shaking my head. "And it was the middle of the night. Maybe I should have just left you all behind and started sprinting south on hoof. But, I figured, if there were any resources we might find..." I sighed. "What's done is done. The important part is-"

The cafe door banged open.

Flarefeather and I both jumped, and I spun around to see how un-private our private discussion room had suddenly become. It was a pink teenage griffon with an open vest and his crest done up in a spiky mohawk.

"Hey hey hey!" he announced in an outdoor voice, glancing between us and the now-awake bartender and the empty rest of the room to see if anyone else was here. "You dudes heard the news? The old crow's about to give a speech at the memorial crater stage! Be a good neighbor and spread the news on your way over, yeah? Maybe we'll find out what this power outage is about! Come on!"

"What?" I stood up. "You mean Crowscone?"

The griffon made a face. "Yeah, that guy. You look strong, by the way. Dig your glams!" He backed out the door, making a finger gun at us on his way.

I glanced at Lissa and Flarefeather.

"Hey," Flarefeather started, slow and ominous. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

The barkeep spoke up before either of us could answer. "You girls done over there?" he asked, getting to his hooves. "Don't wanna kick you out while we're still open, but it's not like I've got other customers today, and this sounds like the excuse I need to close up early. Want to hear what our mighty leader has to say for himself about this."

I glanced down at our tray, where two donuts remained.

Flarefeather swiped them, stuffing both in her mouth at the same time. "Yeah, we dome!" she mouthed around them, using her wings to herd me and Lissa towards the exit.

There it was again. That sensation, when she touched me, that I didn't deserve to settle for this. And neither, by the way, did I have to.

I stumbled forward away from her reach. This was not good. I trusted in my self-control well enough, but unlike the revulsion it displaced, resisting this greed was a matter of more than just proving I could do something.

As we stepped out into the foggy street, it seemed word was indeed spreading, and the griffon hadn't told a lie: a trickle of murmuring unicorns and earth ponies were moving steadily towards the richer district where Crowscone's manor was located, their tones weighted with expectancy.

"So?" Flarefeather whispered as we paused against the line of storefronts where the cafe was located. "You thinking it too?"

I frowned. "That if something big is going down, we might want to be there?"

"No, dummy," Flarefeather hissed. "Remember what I was saying earlier? If we save the Consul and prove neither side offed him, then it might just be enough to get us out of hot water!" In her eagerness, her voice rose a little. "And with Crowscone out of the manor giving a speech, now would be the perfect time to go look for-"

The pink griffon stuck his head out from another shop's door right next to us. "Hey, did you just say you're breaking into the old crow's lair?"

Internally, I groaned. This griffon even had the sense to keep his own voice down, which at this point felt like rubbing it in.

"An interesting conclusion for you to draw," Flarefeather said, her tone somehow not guilty in the least. "Not sure where I implied that. Don't you have somewhere to be?"

The griffon tsk'd. "Come on, lady, I'd know that tone anywhere. You're sneaking. And my place to be is wherever I want! Anyway..." He glanced around to see who else was listening, closed the shop door behind him, and dropped his whisper to something quieter. "Fight me."

"What?" Flarefeather frowned.

"There's a good alley over there," the griffon said, gesturing with his thumb. "Just a quick brawl with me and my mates. I need to see how good you are, see. Find out if this is something we want in on, or if we should stop you for your own safety. Couple of fancy dressers like you, I bet you've got nothing to fear from a little dust-up, right?"

"We're seriously not committing burglary," Flarefeather deadpanned. "We're his guests. And there are politics involved."

The griffon nodded sagely. "No cure for politics like a good kick to the face, right? That's what the Master always says, and if you ask me, he's on point. So? Going once, going twice..."

I hesitated. I strongly doubted I could lose a fight to some juvenile delinquents, and troublemakers tended to know things. If this was a trap, likely the worst that could happen was wasting our time, but in the present circumstances, that would still be pretty bad...

"Sorry, kid." Flarefeather shook her head, spending much less thought on it than me. "And please don't follow us, alright?"

"Hey." The griffon shrugged. "Your funeral. Anyway, you change your mind and feel like earning a little street cred, the name's Gonkers. I'm not hard to find."

All three of us blinked as he slipped away into the mist.

"That's a name," Lissa remarked.

"Are we actually going with this, though?" Flarefeather whispered. "See if we can find the Consul?"

"...Yeah." I nodded. This was a good idea. Maybe not a safe idea, but it could keep things moving along tracks that possibly led somewhere. It was far, far better than being idle.

But just to be safe... Could Faye ghost me and handle this one herself? If we were going to try to cure the Consul, she was more in tune with our powers than I was, and that would let me keep an eye on Crowscone and fly back to the manor to warn her if he finished his speech and started returning. Plus, it would be good to have ears there in case anything important did get said.

"I'm not using our powers," Faye replied flatly in my head. "If we do that, it'll be together, after you're back. You have a point, though. Guess it's my turn to be back up front already..."

This wasn't fair, Faye thought to herself as she led the way back to Crowscone's manor.

By telling Lissa and Flarefeather how prone she was to starting things that she didn't finish, Halcyon had demonstrated her point in practice: she was gone now, Faye was up front, and there were likely a torrent of questions building that would be unleashed the moment she did anything to prove what Halcyon had been saying. It would fall to her to answer them, and one thing Halcyon hadn't dragged out into the sunlight was the difference between the two of them. Lissa and Flarefeather didn't even know she existed, let alone that she wasn't the mare they had just been talking to.

But, such was her lot in life. This was what she had signed up for, ever since she let Halcyon drag her back up to the surface, ever since she chose to take a role in the world again.

As they approached the manor, Faye saw the gate's usual pegasus guards standing in their usual locations. The guards took a moment to squint at them through the mist, but as she got closer, they quickly nodded in recognition, swinging the heavy gate open.

"If that griffon's still following us," Flarefeather whispered, "I wonder what he thinks now."

Faye risked leaning into her star sight, but predictably, it didn't tell her anything: there was still only a small area around her where the positions of the stars she saw perfectly conformed to the locations of people in the real world. It was like superimposing two drawings on two pieces of paper by pinching them together at a single point. If that griffon was following, she couldn't tell.

What she could tell, though, was something she had seen and ignored the previous night: the manor held two stars that both weren't right. One looked like any other creature's, ordinary in shape and intensity but colored a deep, pure red. Another, also red, was shaped more like a ring than a star.

And there were Lissa and Flarefeather too, of course, bright and desirable in ways that made her uncomfortable to stare at. But if their hypothesis was correct, one of those two red stars was probably the Consul.

The question was, which one? And what was the other?

They entered the mansion, its shallow, asymmetrical foyer projecting an aura that said you don't belong here. Faye took a deep breath. Right. First things first.

"Let's start by heading back to our quarters," Faye whispered. "I want to check on Coda, and it'll let us see what security is like while we're still somewhere we're supposed to be."

"You know," Flarefeather muttered, "Crowscone did tell the Black Knight to investigate this Consul thing. Now that I think about it, isn't it weird that he got mad at us for sniffing around? We were basically doing what he asked us to."

"In a very suspicious manner," Lissa said. "And he asked her to do it, not us. She presumably knows all the unspoken rules here about what not to stick her nose into."

About halfway to their room, they ran into their first guard. He was a pegasus in a business suit, virtually indistinguishable from all of Crowscone's other guards, and he gave them a brief, appraising nod. "You three. Turning in for the night?"

"Thinking about it." Lissa made a show of yawning. "You know if the Black Knight's here?"

The guard shook his head. "At Lord Crowscone's speech. You could still make it, if you've got nowhere better to be."

Faye and Flarefeather glanced at each other.

The guard shrugged and continued his rounds.

"You know what else is odd?" Flarefeather continued once he was out of earshot. "They get mad at us for sneaking around, but nobody's actually escorting us from place to place. Couldn't we accidentally stumble into somewhere we aren't meant to be?"

"Once again, we were pretty suspicious," Faye replied. "Remember the locked door? The guards we snuck past?"

Flarefeather sighed. "Look, I'm trying to poke some holes in the conspiracy here, spot the logical contradictions. Doin' my best to be helpful, alright? Just a little bit better at the talky-talky than the thinky-thinky."

Faye checked herself. If this was Flarefeather's way of not thinking about her missing flight... "You'll get used to it," she promised. "When I'm around, every problem turns out like this. But being confused and feeling helpless is at least better than getting injured."

They reached their quarters without further incident, Faye's bracelet casting ghostly shadows around the otherwise-dim sitting room, only a trickle of evening sunlight filtering through the fog to their window.

Lissa closed the door behind them. "Right," she said. "That was uneventful. What's the plan?"

Faye took a deep breath. If Halcyon could do this... "I have senses that normal ponies don't," she started. "One of them lets me see the lives of people around me. It works through walls, but it's not accurate outside of a very close distance."

Flarefeather frowned. "Is that how you were so good at spotting guards last night?"

"It was." Faye nodded. "Some of the presences I can see around here aren't normal. There are two in particular I think might be our Consul. But one of them is in Crowscone's office, in the closet we didn't check."

Lissa narrowed her eyes.

"I don't know where the other one is," Faye continued. "I haven't gotten close enough to tell where it is in the manor. Even though I can see it at a distance, it's hard to even tell what direction it's in. It's... hard to explain."

Lissa nodded. "So we wander the mansion innocently until we get close enough that you can pinpoint this second spot? Is that what you're saying?"

"That might be our best start," Faye admitted. "But It does involve asking you to trust in powers you might not even believe exist. I haven't done anything to prove what I said back in the coffee shop. And if we can't get physically close to where the second spot is, I wouldn't be able to find it, and we'd only be able to check the first one. And I'd rather check the one I don't know first, because we won't be breaking any rules by just walking around."

"Eh." Flarefeather shrugged. "Call it a test of whether you really can do stuff like that." She tilted her head. "What else can you do, anyway? Aside from, you know... whatever happened twenty years ago?"

Faye hung her head. "I don't know. Like I said, I've never had a teacher. Some things are straightforward, like being unusually strong and able to regenerate wounds. But I don't even know the threshold for how far away I can see lives accurately. I probably have powers I haven't even discovered. It doesn't help that a lot of the abilities I'm supposed to have are extremely dangerous when not carefully controlled."

Lissa stroked her chin with a wingtip. "This sounds like a job for experimentation. Not now, though. Is there anything else to discuss before we start aimlessly wandering and looking for the Consul?"

Flarefeather frowned, deep in thought.

"...Actually, could you give me a minute?" Faye asked. "I want to check on Coda."

Neither pegasus objected, so she pushed her way into her own room, taking their light source with her.

There she was, just as she and Halcyon had left her: Coda on her trolley, sitting in the middle of a crystalline block of ice so frosted that you could only tell what was inside by rubbing and polishing one of its facets. Faye did just that, staring through at the filly within.

Coda stared back, her gaze fixed and unblinking, tears of frost dribbling from her wide eyes.

Faye held her gaze there for a moment longer. She didn't have the capacity to do anything for Coda right now, anything more than carrying her along on her travels. Not when her thoughts were preoccupied with not thinking of her friends as trophies. Not when the world was ending. And how would that go? Could she really afford to leave Coda unguarded in the manor of a stallion who had decreed she couldn't leave the city? Rhodallis was still out there, his claim laid to her and Coda both. She had dropped everything to come to the Griffon Empire and chase this filly. Everything. And even though Halcyon was the one who had really spent time with Coda, Faye felt their limits keenly.

What could she do? How could she balance this? Shouldn't a changeling queen have the capacity to do more?

She fought back a sniffle, and then another. It wasn't too late to try to juggle things, but she knew where this would lead. She had seen it before. And Halcyon had just given her stupid speech about their inability to commit! That wasn't that she stopped caring, or got bored, or afraid. She just didn't have the capacity-

"That kid means a lot to you, huh?" Flarefeather asked, standing with Lissa in the doorway.

"She's like me," Faye said, aware this wasn't her secret to tell. "A changeling queen. I found her being raised by a cult in Ironridge. She's a good kid who was raised to shoulder a destiny that wasn't her own. I wish there was more I could do for her."

"Anything I can do to help?" Flarefeather asked tentatively.

Something snapped in Faye's brain.

"Can you pull this cart?" she asked, a rigid sensation settling over her body. It had been her idea, but Halcyon was the one who made the choice to try to see it through... and now, something Halcyon had worked to dislodge seemed to have broken free for her, too.

"Um, probably," Flarefeather said. "Maybe not on my back like you can, but it's got wheels, right?"

Faye took a breath. "I need you to take Coda into the city and bring her to the hospital where I found the time-stopped batponies. Look for a doctor called Sophia. Tell her I sent you, and that if she can keep Coda hidden and safe, I'll be back later tonight with a way to cure her patients. I think she'll take your word for it."

Flarefeather's eyes widened. "You'll what?"

"I know it means sitting out on what we're doing here," Faye apologized. "But it would help more than you know. Lissa and I can meet you there once we have the unconscious Consul. Please?"

Lissa tilted her head. "You're planning on stealing the Consul, then taking them to that hospital?"

Faye nodded. "Assuming we're right about what happened to them. If we can cure the Consul, the Consulate might be grateful enough to secure us passage the rest of the way to our destination, and it's a lot more likely that they will than Crowscone. Besides, curing the batponies should be within the range of what my powers can do. I just... need to be comfortable with figuring out how."

Slowly, and then with mounting determination, Flarefeather saluted, realizing as suddenly as Faye did that they were past spitballing ideas: there was a plan. "You can count on me, boss. If that's what it takes, I won't let your friend out of my sight."

Lissa glanced between her and Faye. "I'll be sticking with you, right?" she asked Faye. "Or is this suddenly a solo?"

Faye shook her head. "I'll be a lot less suspicious if I'm not on my own. Think you can handle it yourself?" She glanced at Flarefeather.

"I will do my job," Flarefeather promised, "and I will not let you down. You can take Lissa for the time being. Just tell me how it goes when we meet up, alright?"

She threw in a wink for good measure, leaving her words almost ambiguously flirty. Suddenly, it clicked in Faye's mind just how much she needed to have something she could do.

Faye already knew that. She knew how much it hurt to have no agency in times like these. But now, feeling like she was swimming and had kicked far away from the safe shore, she really got it.

"Alright," Lissa said, nodding as Flarefeather started hitching herself up to Coda's trolley. "Let's do this."

Faye didn't relax as she prowled the manor hallways with Lissa, her legs stiff and impossibly straight. What was she doing? Had she lost her mind? And what if it actually worked?

The only guards they passed seemed to be patrolling rather than guarding specific points of interest. The patrolling ones, Faye quickly realized, were more interested in catching uninvited guests like that pink griffon than in shooing her away, and while they weren't much for conversation, Lissa eventually confirmed that any places they weren't supposed to be would have a guard directly stationed outside.

For those he had deemed worthy of being guests, it seemed, Crowscone wanted his manor on full display.

Lissa led, and Faye followed, the former taking point and tracking where they had already been so the latter could focus on her star sight. The red star seemed stubbornly elusive, refusing to conform to a spot on the physical plane, and soon Lissa was confident that they had scoured the entire first floor thoroughly enough to peer into any secret rooms.

Onwards to the second.

Minutes ticked by like a heartbeat as they crisscrossed the manor's four wings, passing by the alcoves with the paintings where they had stopped to ponder Crowscone's history with never-aging mares the previous night. Now, trailed by the late evening sun, they moved with far more precision, taking care whenever a guard saw them to appear as curious tourists researching for Crowscone's play. And whenever they weren't being watched, they hurried.

They searched the northwest wing, and found a room they were reasonably sure was directly beneath Crowscone's study - the walls and doors were laid out in such a way that it would be hard to notice the space taken up by the staircase to the basement unless one already knew it was there. As they searched, Faye saw the red ring star come into focus, the one she knew to be within Crowscone's closet.

It wasn't safe to check that one first. But this confirmed that her range was good enough to pinpoint things a floor above her. That would make this much easier.

So they continued, checking each wing as they went. The northeast wing had nothing, as did the southeast. But in the southwestern wing, overlooking the manor's front courtyard and the two guards standing watch over their gate in the fog, Faye finally felt the normal red star drawing near her.

Third floor. It was directly overhead.

"Right," Lissa whispered after hearing this information. "Now what? Is your shadow sneaking still unreliable? The stealthier we can do this, the better."

Faye glanced at the ceiling. This wing's second floor was made up of a windowless hallway surrounded on all sides by unfurnished bedrooms, each one too opulent to be a servant's quarters, yet too austere to be a guest room. Like all of the manor's interior, they felt just barely unfinished, as if Crowscone had built this place to have an impressive exterior facade without any ideas for how to use the space, building guest rooms for the guests he didn't have.

One of the things that was missing was the covers on the ventilation shafts.

Faye wandered into a west-facing bedroom, her neck craned high. The red star was almost perfectly above her; it had to be in the room right on top of this one. The problem was that the area around it held no fewer than five normal stars.

"It's guarded heavily," Faye whispered, wary that her voice could carry through the open ducts. "If I can get up to that opening, my sneaking should make it easy to get through the ducts. But I want to try poking my head up somewhere else first, to see if I can get a better look at the guards."

"They won't see you like last time?" Lissa breathed.

"I doubt it," Faye breathed back. "Last time, things went wrong when I tried going through glass. I was in a hurry then too, since I couldn't hold my breath as long with passengers for some reason. If I'm patient, I should be fine."

"Feathers crossed," Lissa said warily. "I'll stand watch down here, then. Where are you going up?"

Faye's eyes found the room across the hallway - a spot that should hopefully give her a vantage point of the pair of stars closest to her target. "Let's start with there."

Lissa nodded, following her across the hall.

This room had a ceiling vent too, though reaching it would be tricky. The door swung inwards, and if she could somehow balance on top of it while it was open... Faye swung it to the proper angle, weighing how much noise she would make if she simply jumped to get on top.

Lissa's gaze followed hers. "I'll hold it steady. Doff your armor, climb on my shoulders, and you should be able to get up there without much of a ruckus, if you're limber."

Faye blanched. Doff her armor? "What are you going to do with it if someone patrols through here?" she asked, fishing for a practical excuse why this wasn't wise.

"Think you can get up there quietly with it on?" Lissa asked. "Or you could boost me up there. But I'm not a sarosian, so I'll make a cacophony in the ducts."

Faye looked up at the air vent, then down at herself, then across at Lissa. They weren't anywhere yet that they weren't supposed to be. If she did make noise and attracted a guard, would they really guess what was going on just by seeing Lissa here? If she was guarding an empty pile of armor, that would be far more suspicious.

Right?

Lissa gave her a look. "You did just tell us not to take no from you for an answer. I dunno how important it really is to scale this door silently, but I can tell when I'm being misdirected. How good is the real reason you don't want to?"

Technically, Halcyon had told her that. But she was right. The only reasons Faye could say out loud were just excuses.

Faye sighed, forcing herself into another promise that only momentum could get her through. "There's gotta be a bathroom around here somewhere. I'll lock my stuff inside and then shadow swim under the door. Then you can stand guard outside and say I'm in there if anyone asks."

Lissa nodded, and they spread out to look. A bathroom didn't take long to find: the suite at the end of the hallway was bigger and nicer than the others, albeit still unfurnished, and featured its own private bath off to the side.

Faye clicked the lock shut, its mechanism sounding like a tick from a clock.

The fogbound sunset filtered in through a frosted, floor-to-ceiling window, painting the shower tiles orange and rose pink. Faye hurried, unstrapping her asymmetrical cloak and then her shoulder pauldron before she could come to her senses, laying them quietly on the floor one after another. Soon there was nothing left but her boots.

Was this really necessary? Faye questioned it once more as she stepped out of each one in turn, leaving them standing in place like the trunks of dead trees. But the twice-muted sunlight struck her legs, playing off their glaring, blood-red fur and turning them a shade of dappled orange ever so slightly closer to their original color, if Procyon was to be believed.

Of course it was necessary. Just not for any of Lissa's reasons.

Faye straightened up. If tonight was a night for breaking limits, to see if she really could succeed when she held nothing back, then she might as well run with it as far as she could. And then, when the consequences inevitably arrived - consequences like that new feeling living rent-free in the back of her mind, telling her that her friends were toys and she had no business sharing - she could weigh them against whatever she achieved, and judge once and for all whether her inhibitions were worth the cost.

She dove into the shadows and slipped out under the door.

Lissa was waiting when Faye returned.

"Right," Faye said awkwardly, swimming with just her neck above the ground. "I probably should have asked this before, but can you wait until we're out of here to ask questions? I'm really pushing myself here already."

Lissa shrugged. "Depends. Earlier, you asked us to ask more questions. But I won't ask irrelevant ones."

Faye sighed, and forced herself to surface.

Lissa's eyes instantly snapped to her legs, widening in sympathy and a bit of disgust. "Oh. Okay. Most ponies are born with a somewhat complimentary color palette. I can... see why you wear boots all the time." She shook her head. "Yeah, I guess you meant to say no commentary, not just no questions. My bad. Let's get this done quickly."

Faye winced hard. All the rationalizing Halcyon had once done about how this color scheme could be pretty, wiped away in an instant. But if Lissa was thinking about the royal spectrum, or about what that could mean for her lineage, she wasn't showing it. "Right," Faye agreed. "Let's do this."

They crossed back to the other room, where Lissa grabbed and steadied the door, standing on her hind legs and acting as a living ladder for Faye to climb. In hindsight, it was probably possible to get up there using shadow sneaking as well, since batponies could swim up walls when necessary, but Faye was anything but an acrobat, and trying to climb out of the wall onto the already-narrow door sounded like a recipe for a tumble.

Instead, she stood on Lissa's shoulders, grasping the top and pulling herself up. She balanced, wobbled and stood up again, ignoring the feeling of satisfaction in the back of her mind for using her friend as a stepping stool, managing to hook her forehooves over the rim of the ventilation shaft before she lost her balance and fell.

Perfect. From there, it was a simple matter of bracelet strength to pull herself up, and she was inside.

Faye swam through the air duct, dipping into the shadows to reduce her profile and glide silently along, searching for light filtering down from the ceiling. The floor grates weren't as big as the ceiling ones, and these actually existed, forcing her to be a lot more selective about where she tried to come up... but finally, she found one that had something dark close overhead, providing cover for her to take a look around.

Stealthily, silently, she edged her head up for a peek. Miraculously, a hanging tablecloth greeted her: she seemed to be in some sort of dining establishment, beneath a table easily long enough to seat sixteen, and had chosen to come up under perfect cover. Faye crept forward to the tablecloth's edge.

The entire wing was taken up by a bar lounge. The head of her table was centered on a curved window looking out to the south and west, with several smaller tables for two positioned against the window as it straightened out and overlooked the front courtyard. Two of the stars she had seen were seated at one: a pair of guards, taking a break and playing cards over drinks in the sunset's dying light.

They must have just gotten off their shifts. Still on duty was the bartender, yet another pegasus stallion in a business suit. Did Crowscone never get bored of his own tastes? This stallion was making a show of shaking a drink, or perhaps just practicing, looking as if he wished he had more customers instead of less. If Faye had walked in here by accident, she doubted he would have shooed her away.

And finally, two more guards stood, on duty and behind the bar, guarding the entrance to what was either a supply closet or the wine cellar. The red star was just inside it.

Right. Of course. Hadn't Crowscone said when they arrived that the Consul collapsed while they were drinking together? This must have been where it happened. And what else were responsible servants to do but stuff the body in a supply closet?

Faye pulled back before she could laugh. This was a good sign: if there actually was a corpse, no one would have left it to decompose around valuable drinks. No one would still be guarding it, either; even without her star sight it was obvious something was there. And the bartender was making just enough noise that he could cover up a tiny bump or scrape while searching.

She slipped back down into the vent, taking a different turn and seeking that red star. Unlit stones brushed past her fur and tickled her eartips; Crowscone had been too cheap to plate his ducts with metal. A right, and then a left... No light was filtering down from above, but Faye could smell the musky scent of old wood, and the red star was close enough to reach out and touch. This had to be it.

Silently, she climbed out of the ducts again, lighting her bracelet as dim as she could possibly maintain and shielding it from the doorjamb with her body. This was indeed a wine cellar, her eyes dilating until they could make out the silhouettes of two dozen barrels lining the walls on racks, crates stacked haphazardly between them.

One of those crates housed the red star.

Heart hammering, Faye crept up to it, daring to lift and slide back the lid.

Her bracelet was too dim to make out anything more than the barest contours of a body, stuffed in the grate along with something bulky and shiny that might have been a removed set of Consul armor. She didn't need their armor, did she? Thoughtful of whoever put them here to take it off, since she couldn't shadow swim with them as a passenger if they were fully clothed...

She brushed their fur with a hoof. No breathing. No pulse. And yet they were still warm and felt limber, exactly like Sophia had described. There was no doubt about it. No possible exception: the Consul was a sarosian who had met the same fate as all the others.

Faye swallowed. Next on the docket would be actually fixing this, and she hadn't just promised to try, she had promised to succeed. As quietly as she could, she heaved them out of the crate, made sure she had a good grip, and dove for the grate, plunging both of them back into the ventilation shaft.

It was far more awkward swimming in the vents with a passenger, though since they weren't breathing and she could keep her nose free anyway, it was still easier than last time. The real trouble came from her proximity to their star.

Just like Lissa and Flarefeather, physically touching them was different. This Consul had something valuable, something she could take and keep for herself, she could see it. That dark feeling in her mind was vibrating, eager to examine and appraise her catch. And yet, last time, it had been two friends she touched, ponies she already knew things about and had determined she wanted to be around. This Consul was such a stranger. The only thing Faye knew about them was that they were unconscious.

That made her desire hit different. With her senses, she thought she could hear parts of this pony's worth, like notes in a song that were played without proper amplification. They were... intimately acquainted with betrayal. They had vestiges of an intense faith that had been shattered and left to rot. Her own paranoia was a distant ancestor at best to this, something almost unrecognizable: she and Halcyon worried about whether it was wise to trust someone, while this note had long ago abandoned trust as a concept. There was nothing here but nihilism and a desire to symbolically atone, since real atonement was long since impossible.

Faye and her unnatural desire both blanched. Was this really something they wanted to eat? Sure, this creature wasn't good for anything else, and sure, this was what her void was for, but she could afford to be a little selective. What was the point of her power if it didn't give her choices?

...She forced that desire back down. The real problem here was that this plan banked on the Consulate being willing to repay a favor - an organization she knew nothing about. If their face was a pony like this, hopefully she wasn't making a terrible mistake.

Faye reached the hole where she had entered, her star sight helpfully drawing her to Lissa below and alerting her that no other guards were nearby. She peered down, saw Lissa loitering next to the door, and clicked her teeth to get her attention.

Lissa looked up.

"Got 'em," Faye whispered, loud enough to be heard. "I'm gonna land as gracefully as possible, but help catch them if you can. Hope we've got time to grab my armor, because we're ready to run."

Lissa nodded. "Ready. We're not going to check the one in Crowscone's office?"

Faye shook her head. "I've got the Consul. Best not to push our luck. If we talk and decide it's important, it'll be far better to come search when we don't have a body to cart away."

Lissa braced herself, making no protest. As fluidly as she could, Faye maneuvered the Consul in the darkness, getting them out in front of her through the shadows, dangling them out into the room, and finally dropping them for Lissa to catch.

Faye herself followed shortly, satisfied and yet still unnerved by the pair of soft thumps. But when she looked at the Consul in the evening's last vestiges, it became immediately clear that something was wrong.

"Hold on." Lissa frowned, setting the unconscious stallion down. "This guy's not a sarosian. He's a unicorn."

He was a unicorn. And not just a unicorn, but one Faye had seen before.

It had been months ago, but their meeting was impactful enough that she would never forget his face: Izvaldi's Consul was Vivace, changeling of Aldebaran.

Hunger

"How are you not starving too?" Rainbow demanded, holding Misophaes by the shoulders and shaking her like a broken vending machine. "I thought bringing myself to eat your cave gruel would be the hard part, not getting you to make it! Come on..."

"Save your energy," Starlight told her, laying with her legs tucked beneath her at the edge of the top rim of the nautilus island.

Starlight had slept as much as she was going to, and everyone else seemed to have, as well. This island was exactly the same as the one she had found Twilight at, right down to the inscriptions on the giant shell statue at the island's center. The only difference was, it was at the opposite end of a very long, black chain, one of many chains crisscrossing the empty horizon.

Maintaining a crystal boat wouldn't be any easier than it was last time. She was soaked through, and her hunger was impossible to ignore, but travel would only grow more difficult the weaker they became. It didn't matter that they didn't have anywhere to go. Survival meant not staying here.

She glanced at Twilight, the only one of the group to share her bizarre dream, the one where she was beckoned to a dark, floating tower. If the whole group had seen it, it would have been easy to chalk up to some sort of ambient power in this place, like a recording left for anyone to find. For it to be just the two of them... That felt more intentional. Starlight had a lot of experience drawing the attention of the powers that be, and felt she could recognize it when she saw it. But if there was a tower like that floating somewhere over these waters, neither of them had any idea how to get there.

Or whether they should go there in the first place. Neither of them wanted to say the obvious: if this was a place that had no possible connection back to the world above, it would be a really good place to imprison something.

At the same time, if they themselves were now imprisoned... Just about anyone could become an ally if they wanted to get out too.

Rainbow growled and dropped Misophaes. "Any ideas, Twi?" she begged, taking a few steps towards where Twilight and the Flame of Love were sitting.

"Well," Twilight sighed, "we could keep going in the direction we've been going, though without the chain to guide us we'll inevitably veer off course. We could pick another direction. Or we could try to sleep again, and see if anything else happens in our dreams. The Flame has never seem a tower like the one Starlight and I saw, so we have no information to act on if we do want to go there. But the tower voice didn't even say it had a way back."

Rainbow tapped a hoof pointedly. "If we had some food, there wouldn't be a problem with just boating around looking for it."

Reluctantly, Twilight looked to Misophaes. "There's no chance of convincing you to change your mind?"

"No." Misophaes shook her head, quiet and content. "Even if I starve, I can die in peace. If the accusations come back, then I'll be cursed to live with them forever again. And if they don't, I'm not sure I can use my powers anyway. So there."

"You're okay with your life ending on a clean slate?" Rainbow raised an impatient eyebrow. "You think just because you've no longer got a super guilty conscience you don't need some good deeds under your belt as well? See, that's what I like to call amounting to nothing."

"I don't care," Misophaes said, turning away. "It's perfection. I won't abandon that."

Starlight watched all of this, thinking. Things had spiraled out of control in Abaddon before they could figure out what Misophaes really was. The most obvious answer was Chrysalis, but that didn't feel right. Starlight had spent a long time around Chrysalis as a filly, both before she went on her rampage and after. The last time she had seen her, they were locked together in a purgatory not unlike this one, though then it had been of Starlight's own making.

She knew Chrysalis. Her caustic, almost witty spite. Her burning belief that she lived in a kill-or-be-killed world, and her adamant refusal to let it get in the last word.

If Chrysalis could be broken... Starlight didn't think this was what it would look like, because she didn't think Chrysalis could be broken. The more she lost, the harder she fought and the more she was willing to put to the torch if it meant some semblance of justice, at least in her eyes. Whenever she was forced to take a blow lying down, it only served to stoke her resentment.

Misophaes had some superficial similarities back in Abaddon, like how she assumed everyone was there to hurt her and then made no moves to defend herself. But Chrysalis did that as a defense mechanism, making her visitors feel dirty so they would go away. Misophaes seemed to legitimately want someone to hurt her, if only to help validate her worldview.

Even though their magic and eye color looked the same, and even though Misophaes was surrounded by broken changelings, the longer Starlight thought about it the more she felt like Misophaes had to be a different pony.

Was there a point to knowing this? Maybe. Starlight wasn't sure. Rainbow Dash was the one with a point: they wouldn't be able to keep exploring much longer without food, and then they would be finished. Misophaes could make food. And knowing what made her tick was the key to getting her to help out.

Using force was on the table, of course. Misophaes bore the lion's share of the blame for why they were down here, and the one most likely to argue against it - Twilight - bore the rest. Simply beating her up would accomplish nothing, though. Misophaes had been tortured by her own mind for long enough to welcome any pain of a different flavor. She'd just sit there and take it, and likely try to make everyone feel dirty for trying.

Rainbow noticed the look Starlight was giving Misophaes and raised a tough eyebrow. "You're thinking how to knock some sense into her too, eh?"

"Just thinking," Starlight replied.

"Well, I'm pretty sure beating her up isn't going to work," Rainbow said, echoing what Starlight had just determined. "She's probably twisted enough to enjoy it. But, see, I'm thinking... If this really is Chrysalis, that means she's a changeling, too. And that means she's also a batpony."

Starlight tilted her head. Where was Rainbow going with this?

"You did that thing once, in Mistvale, remember?" Rainbow gave Starlight a penetrating look. "You were telling us how you got a bunch of batponies to stop fighting by piping stuff into their heads, right? Well, what if you tried that on this sea cucumber here? Sounds like she's really enjoying having her head empty all of a sudden. Bet you that would get her off her butt."

Starlight blinked. The Daydream Network...

Rainbow had a good memory. That battle had barely constituted a page in the giant adventure that made up her foalhood, and far more important things had been happening at the time.

"That's an idea," Starlight answered, deciding to think out loud. "But there's some stuff you might be forgetting. I was moon glassed at the time, and my powers work differently in that state. And what I broadcasted to the batponies wasn't my own thoughts. It was a magical recording of the Firefly Sisters singing for peace. I don't know if normal words would have the same effect. I'm far less practiced talking on the Daydream Network than listening on it."

"Oh yeah..." Rainbow frowned and rubbed her chin. "What about you, Twi? Think I'm onto something? If we could ruin her day a bit, would you be on board?"

Twilight looked slightly offended, but still considered it. "All my experience with the Daydream Network is listening to those annoying golems in Macrothesis. If you're planning to bombard her with that, I guess I can't stop you, but I don't think I'll be much help either."

Rainbow pounded a hoof against the other, giving Misophaes a menacing look. "Hear that? Hoof over the food, or Starlight here might feel like experimenting on your peace and quiet."

Misophaes seemed legitimately disturbed by this possibility. "You can do this? Speak into ponies' minds?"

"I've done it before," Starlight said, standing up and sensing weakness. "Not an expert, so like she says, it'll take some experimentation. Your head's a good test subject, right?"

"You're bluffing," Misophaes singsonged, brittle and defiant, clutching her old confidence like a security blanket. "You can't do that. No one can. It's just us down here, and this empty, empty void..."

Rainbow Dash looked to Starlight and raised an eyebrow. "Well? Let her have it, Glimglam."

Starlight sighed and straightened up. Might as well see what she could still do. First things first: where was her Nightmare Module emulation mode?

Ambient environment data is corrupted and may be unreliable, a cool mare's voice said in her mind - a presence she had long understood as a recorded interface used to interact with her powers, voiced by the one and only Princess Luna. Nightmare Module emulation mode may not operate as intended. User discretion is advised.

Nightmare Module emulation mode got its name from its primary function: decades ago, Starlight used to turn gray when exposed to moon glass, losing her ability to see or remember colors and experiencing new sensations in their stead. A bright, starlike aura around ponies and creatures, an attachment to them that was far stronger than usual... In that state, she had been able to wield the Nightmare Modules left behind by Nightmare Moon, and other powers as well, Daydream Network broadcasting among them. Issuing commands to this voice, in her thoughts or out loud, had been her main means of controlling those secondary powers.

Back then, she would regain her color when exposed to powerful harmonic magic, and she had never been able to turn again after getting her cutie mark, presumably due to its own harmonic power. But the old interface was still there, largely useless outside of that gray state but still reachable when she called.

So, she needed to broadcast on the Daydream Network. She had only ever tried it while glassed, but she had been already glassed at the time for other reasons. Was that a power she could use without actually turning gray?

Pony-to-pony broadcasting requires a power source for signal amplification and an area of network coherence for signal propagation, Luna's voice said. Ambient environmental data is corrupted and network coherence and power source integrity cannot be verified.

Alright. Was there a way to fix that? Did it need to be fixed? Could she try anyway?

You are equipped to establish network coherence, the voice explained. Warning: attempting to establish network coherence where it is already established may invite backlash from existing maintainers.

Okay. So establishing network coherence was probably jargon for making an area's network usable, providing a backend that that broadcasters needed to use to send their messages? This wasn't just telepathy that worked all by itself?

Affirmative.

And the first time she had used this power, back in Mistvale... Had this been a problem there, too, that she had forgotten about? The whole point of that cove was that it was far away from the Night Mother and her control of the Daydream Network.

At that time, you established network coherence without issue, the voice said. Because current network coherence cannot be verified, user confirmation is required to proceed with establishment attempt or to attempt broadcasting without it.

Oh. That made sense.

Well, there was probably nothing else down here maintaining the Daydream Network, and if there was, getting their attention by trying to control part of it herself at least had a chance of working out well. More likely, the Daydream Network didn't function down here, period, and that was why her voice was having issues... but it was worth a try.

"Any luck?" Rainbow asked, interrupting her train of thought.

"Can't say yet," Starlight grunted, as Misophaes waited and the black rain silently fell. "I'm about to try something..."

Do it. Try to establish coherence. She didn't need a big zone; the area of this island would be more than enough. As for a power source, if the Immortal Dream wouldn't work, there was always the thing she had been using to cast Nightmare Modules ever since losing her ability to turn gray...

Starlight focused, summoning her black sword.

Something shifted in the world around her, almost like an ancient groan, a primeval beast stirring amid endless slumber. Starlight felt her perception expand.

Three things grew more pronounced in her senses, the island suddenly occupying a much bigger slice of her world than it previously had. One was Twilight. Starlight was intimately aware of her presence, and felt like she could even hear Twilight's thoughts if she thought them just a little louder, and she leaned in close. The next was Misophaes.

Misophaes was visible, vulnerable, and wide open, her emotions sloshing around at the top of her head like she was an overfilled, leaky kettle that had been pressed back into service after being fished out of a scrap heap. Her train of thought was as plain as a Manehattan neon sign, parked on one single idea and refusing to move: if magic existed that could project thoughts into someone's mind, could someone else have been making her feel that way, all throughout her time in Abaddon? Could her accusers have been real? And if so, what could she possibly have done to make them hate her so much? She just didn't understand.

Starlight almost prodded her, almost peered a little closer, but the third thing she could sense was more interesting. It was the nautilus shell.

The one that looked like a statue, that sat in the center of the island and fed a black chain from its mouth, off into the horizon until it reached an identical one where she had caught up to Twilight. It was responsive to the Daydream Network. She could feel... basically nothing from it, but it was there.

"Hello?" Starlight asked out loud, taking a curious step towards the shell.

Not dead, a small voice mumbled in her mind, sounding like a groggy foal. Only sleeping...

"Starlight?" Rainbow frowned, following her gaze to the nautilus. "Why are you looking at that?"

"I heard it," Twilight whispered. "Is this thing alive?"

Can't die, the little voice mumbled. Nothing to do but sleep...

"Can you wake up and talk to us?" Starlight asked. "Who are you? What are you doing here?"

Go hold your chain, little sister, the voice in the shell grumbled. Sleeeeeep...

"Hold our chains? What are you talking about?" Twilight pressed. "And what do you mean, little sister? We can't go to sleep. We just were sleeping. And we're looking for a way out of here!"

The shell's lighting shifted somehow, its mouth growing a little bit brighter. And then out crawled a creature that looked like a pony made of glass.

It was a batpony colt, glowing from within with a couple of tiny embers that looked a lot like the Flame of Kindness before they restored it. He was so translucent that he was mostly visible from the rain sliding off his back and neck, the water and his glass surface interplaying with the embers' light to make him look more like an illuminated outline of a pony. Starlight blinked, glancing between him and the Flame of Love, which still wore the form of a hollow, crystalline zebra. They looked kind of similar...

So noisy, the batpony complained, looking around at everyone with glass eyes. Hey... Are you like the Old One? You look weird.

Off to the side, Misophaes was holding herself and rocking back and forth. "It sounds just like the voices," she said with an everything-is-fine smile.

"Hey, what's it saying!?" Rainbow danced a little in frustration. "Can this thing talk out loud?"

"Who's the Old One?" Starlight asked the glass batpony.

The Old One, he explained, as if this answered her question. Little sister, did you forget already? Although... I don't remember you.

"Forget what?" Starlight pressed. "We've only been here for a day or so."

The batpony sighed and started crawling back into his nautilus. Don't know what that means. Go to sleep. Nothing else to do here.

"No, hold on!" Twilight moved to block his way. "Who is this Old One? What do they do here, and where can we find them?"

He's old, the batpony said. He sleeps. He doesn't have to hold a chain. Don't remember why.

"And where is he?" Twilight pressed. "Does he live on a floating tower?"

Floating tower? the batpony asked. No. Can't get to the floating tower. Can't fly. What was its name, again...?

"You've seen a floating tower, then?" Starlight asked. "Can you tell us how to get there?"

No, the batpony repeated. Can't get there. Can't fly. Can't remember where, anyway.

"Alright, and how about the Old One?" Twilight asked again. "We'd really like to meet anyone at all down here."

No, the batpony insisted. No meeting. No point. Hold chains and sleep. Don't remember where the Old One is, anyway.

"And why are you holding these chains?" Twilight asked. As she continued talking to this thing, her emotions were rising; Starlight could feel that it upset her in a similar way to how Abaddon had. This thing, this... Was it a person? It didn't seem to have a will to live.

The batpony thought about this. Don't remember, he said with a shrug. It's important, though. It's why I'm here.

"Is there any way to jog your memory?" Starlight pressed. "We'd love to get off this island and leave you alone, but we need somewhere to go..."

Nowhere to go, the batpony said, before catching himself and thinking. Nothing else to do. Though... If I remember where the Old One is and take you there, will you let me go back to sleep?

Twilight nodded. "We promise."

The batpony yawned, then started groggily walking towards the island's lower tiers and its shore. Okay. I'll try. Such a pain...

He jumped down the tiers without even chipping his glass hooves - they barely made a sound against the stone, just like the Flame of Love. Starlight couldn't feel the flame with the Daydream Network, actually. She didn't know what to make of that. Its body language was plain to read, though: it saw this glass batpony, and felt very, very sad.

At the shore, the batpony dipped a hoof into the perfectly flat, still water. A second passed, and then five, and then with not even a ripple, a boat made of ice floated up from the depths, bobbing to a stop against the island, somehow dry and empty.

Get in, the batpony said, climbing in and taking up a seat at the prow. It might have been this way.

Everyone climbed in, even the Flame of Love and Misophaes. And then, without a single motion, the boat pushed off and began to skim through the water, the world completely silent save for the growling of Starlight's stomach.

Faye slunk through the courtyard outside Crowscone's manor, the twilight lighting her path just enough so that she didn't have to use her bracelet in the fog. They had taken the time to run back and grab her armor, but even a minute longer and the light could be gone entirely.

Vivace was warm atop her back, even though he wasn't breathing. Lissa led the way, since Faye could pinpoint her despite the fog and the darkness using her star sight. Suddenly, Lissa stopped, crouched and jumped, clearing the wall at the edge of the courtyard.

Faye heard no guards and no sounds of pursuit, so she did the same.

It wasn't silent, jumping onto a wall she couldn't see with an unconscious stallion on her back. But she made it over, and suddenly the light was completely gone, the sky obscured by branches and leaves as they entered the grove northeast of Crowscone's manor.

For a moment, they held still, hearts pounding. And then, confident that they weren't being followed, they slipped deeper into the trees.

"I think we're safe," Lissa breathed after a few minutes of running, the only thing Faye could see in the darkness. "Should be easy enough from here to loop around and re-enter town from the north."

"I can't believe that worked," Faye said, shaken. "We didn't get spotted, or chased, or... anything."

"That's what happens when you don't fail at stealth," Lissa said, as if this should be obvious to anyone with experience. "Think we can chance a little light?"

Faye nodded, and turned her bracelet to a low glimmer.

Its light reflected eerily off the fog, glaring back into her eyes and revealing nothing but the ghostly stalks of tree trunks all around her - short, gnarled, fruit-bearing trees, planted in rows that were deliberate and cultivated. In the direction they were going, the terrain sloped gently upwards.

This place would be beautiful during the day, she suspected, without any fog to obscure it. But tonight, on the tail end of robbing a manor, her nerves were tight enough that it felt like a graveyard.

"So," Lissa murmured. "Think we've got enough time now for you to tell me what this means?"

She gestured to Vivace, and Faye sighed. She had gotten out of a lengthy explanation in the manor by pointing out that they had more pressing priorities, but now... "He's a changeling," she started. "A batpony who disguised himself like this by shapeshifting. So it's still the same thing affecting him the same way as the others." She broke eye contact. "I know this because I've met him before."

Lissa raised an eyebrow. "You can say that with confidence about someone you think is a shapeshifter?"

"He was a mercenary who came to my town the better part of a year ago," Faye explained, the mist hanging silently in the air. "He and his band were all changelings, and kidnapped me and some friends of mine by disguising themselves as prospective employers. But they eventually were captured and shipped off to Ironridge to be brought to justice."

"Alright," Lissa said, not particularly interested in the specifics. "But how do you know the one you met wasn't just pretending to be someone powerful or famous? If I could shapeshift, that's what I'd do."

Faye frowned. That was a good point... but none of Aldebaran had ever claimed to be anyone famous. In fact, Leif had gone out of her way not to, and she actually was. Or at least she had left a big mark on history.

Besides, Rondo was in Rhodallis' crew now, and he had recognized her. If one former Aldebaran member had wound up in the east's circles of power, why couldn't another?

She shook her head. Actually, it didn't matter so long as he was unconscious. "Let's try to get back into town first," Faye advised. "Meet up with Flarefeather and see if she and Coda are alright. Then we can figure out what to do once we're all on the same page."

"She'll be fine," Lissa promised. "Flarefeather only acts like an airhead when I'm around. Don't let it dull your confidence in her. But as long as you're sure we've got the right pony, then right. Let's get going."

The town, which had been bustling not two hours ago, was completely deserted as Faye and Lissa crept through the streets, Faye's bracelet once again dim as she relied on her star sight to stick with her companion. Lissa continued to lead, by far the most stealthy.

Amid the gloom, enough light filtered down through the fog to make out houses as a different shade of black and nothing else. Monoliths in the mist, every here and there one bore a solitary, pinprick light or two, perhaps the horn of a unicorn who wasn't ready to go to bed shining through the windows. The ones that didn't might as well have been abandoned.

How did Lissa have any clue where they were going? Was her sense of direction just that good? Faye was lost, and her star sight wasn't helping.

Barely a yard away, the stillness of night was shattered by the crack of breaking glass.

Instantly, Faye went on high alert, sinking partway into the ground to reduce her silhouette. Lissa was even faster, zipping several paces away and falling as silent as the grave.

Faye crept forward towards the next house's dim silhouette. As it passed in range of her star sight, someone a little brighter and more desirable than the average citizen hopped out through a window, their trajectory and motions suggesting they were carrying something lopsided and heavy.

They started running, their course taking them right past where Lissa was waiting. The moment they passed by, Lissa jumped them.

Faye scarcely had time to think about whether to help. With a couple of sharp squawks and swishes and a meaty thunk, their scuffle took barely three seconds, ending with tight breathing and a threatening hiss.

"Hi there, bandit," Lissa whispered. "Bad night for looting, huh?"

"Who do you think you are?" a youthful voice growled back. "Hold a knife to my neck, will you-"

Immediately, the scuffle broke out again. There was a grunt from Lissa, the scraping of hooves and talons against dirt, a sharp caw of pain and suddenly a thwack as Lissa's light spun and the bandit went splayed out against the ground, a loud jingling and clattering sounding around where he had landed.

This time, he didn't get up.

Faye crept the rest of the way forward, daring to light her bracelet just a little. It was a griffon, a young one, with a sack that was leaking money onto the road. Was this the same one from earlier...?

"Not the same," Lissa whispered, as if reading her mind. "But I'll be a fool if they're not part of the same thug scene." She grabbed him, hefting him awkwardly on her back. "Come on. We shouldn't stay here."

A few blocks away, they stopped running, and Lissa dumped the unconscious griffon back on the ground, staring down at him with annoyance.

"You alright?" Faye whispered.

"Yeah," Lissa whispered back. "Hopefully my outfit can say the same. But this kid isn't normal. I'm a trained bodyguard. A random burglar shouldn't have put up any resistance whatsoever, even in the dark. But he knew some real martial arts."

Faye raised an eyebrow.

"Not like he was good," Lissa continued. "Like he had a good teacher. The cops were saying looting was a problem when we were there this evening, right? If this is one of the culprits, this could mean he's working for someone."

"Is investigating this as high of a priority as getting back to the hospital?" Faye breathed. "Why are you bringing him along?"

"It'll make a great alibi." Lissa shrugged. "Hospital's right next to the police station, right? Which is bound to be guarded. If a guard tries to stop and question us, we say we're vigilantes, turn in this guy, and then claim the Consul is some stranger we caught him assaulting and are bringing in for treatment. The cop takes the thug and doesn't look too hard at the rest of us, just like that."

Faye frowned. "You really think it'll work out that easily?"

Lissa picked up the griffon again and resumed walking. "I think I've got the charisma to make it more likely to work than if we just try to sneak past and get caught."

They pressed on, and the residential district transitioned to a commercial one, the stars around Faye growing far more scarce as houses were replaced with businesses closed for the night. And when one finally did draw into sight, standing solitary guard in front of a strip of building fronts, Faye recognized where they were: they had reached the police department, approaching from the other side.

And of course it was guarded, just like Lissa said.

"Who goes there?" the officer growled, his horn lit warily against the night mist.

"Vigilantes," Lissa answered, stepping into his light with the griffon out cold on her back. "We caught this guy breaking into a house about five, six streets north of here. This is where we drop those off, right?"

The guard sighed an exasperated sigh, lifting the griffon in his aura and looking him over. "Well, this one's a known troublemaker, so I assume you're telling the truth. But I haven't seen your face around here before, so let's get something clear: the Department of Civil Obedience doesn't need vigilantes. We have the situation under control. There's a curfew for a reason, and it applies to you just as much as this kid. I'll let you off the hook for tonight since your heart's in the right place, but go home. You're just going to cause more trouble and get yourself hurt."

Lissa winced a little and nodded. "You sure? I mean, understood..."

The guard's attention turned to Faye, just far enough back in the mist that his horn glare let her see him easier than he could see her. "What about your friend there? Got another one?"

"No," Lissa explained, shaking her head. "We caught him in the middle of a burglary. Heard the glass break, went after him... Didn't get there in time to stop him from knocking out this poor stallion. Thought we'd bring him to the hospital just in case rather than leave him alone in the dark."

"Yeah," Faye agreed, skirting the edge of the guard's vision.

"Oh." The guard seemed slightly mollified. "Well, get on with that. And then go home. Might as well see if we can hold this one down for more than a day or two..." He took the griffon, who was just starting to stir, and lugged him inside the police department.

As soon as he was gone, Lissa gave Faye a cheeky wink. "Told you it would work."

Faye had to admit, she was impressed. Though whether it was by Lissa's luck, or her belief in her luck, she couldn't tell.

Lissa's face went back to business, and she pulled open the door to the hospital, Faye following her inside.