It was yet another vision, though she did not know quite how to understand or unravel it. This wreaked havoc with her mind. She was so inquisitive, so curious, and so unequivocally devoted to the fields of science and knowledge. Her brain worked on levels of thought not uncommon to those with her massive intelligence quotient. For others, it was a frightening and awe inspiring concept. How somebody at her age and with only a few comparative years of experience could think alongside some of the world’s top minds. She was very exciting to engage in conversation with, until the topic drifted into realms beyond even the smartest of their kind. When it came to things like quantum physics, extremely advanced algebraic formulas, and statistical work, each of her fellow students knew she was the one to confer with.
But, with that being said, she also had mental problems. Her mind was wracked with fantasies of the dark one that had once overtaken her. Even though her friends had done their best to rid her of the disturbing imagery, it remained solidified into her psyche. She saw the dark one’s face, her ice blue eyes acting as laser focused drills into her innermost sanctum. She saw the evil way that the dark one’s hair floated towards heaven, almost daring some deity to come and attempt to stop it. She saw the sharp, jagged horn that protruded from the dark one’s forehead. She saw it point at her friends with an unabashed, unadulterated hatred.
She saw the dress that the dark one wore, deeply purple to match the complexion which it coated. It was the clothing of one damned to walk the Earth in an ever intensifying search for truth. The garb spoke of someone reaching, grasping, but never quite making contact with the solution they desired. So, they continued on in their quest for knowledge and power, stealing the lives from those they claimed to care about. She saw death and wanton destruction in the dark one’s wake, and it was terrifying to behold. She saw cities burning, children screaming, and lakes of fire eroding away the very foundation of humanity. She saw the entirety of the world buckle under her cold purple boots, and she saw her flaming eyes cast hellish judgment on every living thing.
Yes…it was another vision…
For Twilight Sparkle, these had become commonplace. When she was at school, she’d see the dark one in the pages of a textbook, in the chalkboard behind the teacher’s shoulder, or within some swirling drink at lunch. But the most frightening thing about these daytime visions was when she’d see her acting in the events of the past. She would read about terrible atrocities committed, wars waged over strips of land barely half a mile long, and buckets of blood spilled for reasons that were so miniscule. While she knew that the dark one was simply her own invention, she shuddered to think of what she could have accomplished were she to have inhabited a ferocious dictator or a cruel warlord.
However, the visions during the day were child’s play compared to what she experienced during her slumber. The dark one would visit her, taunting her to the point of insanity. She would question her commitment to the scientific pursuit, mock and deride her friendships, and tell her that she was worthless. Twilight would attempt to fight the dark one off, but it was a useless gesture. The dark one’s games were bountiful in their own demonic harassment, and she knew exactly how to avoid Twilight’s logical deductions. She was as smart as Twilight, only with an infection to spread. Unfortunately, the purple girl was the only victim.
But this night…the vision was even more terrifying. The dark one created holes in the space-time continuum and used these to float Twilight throughout history. She was feasting on Twilight’s own fear, and she had seen the flashes in the girl’s mind while reading deeper and deeper into the past. The dark one attempted to throw her influence into events that Twilight had convinced herself were not of the evildoer’s bidding. As they went along, the dark one taunted and bullied Twilight. She would hit her at various points, reflecting the evil and cruelty humanity had shown to itself.
“See?!” She would shout, “THIS WAS ME! THIS IS ME, AND NOW, YOU ARE ME!”
“NO!” Twilight shouted back, “you aren’t real! This is only a dream! Just…go and leave me in peace!”
The dark one suddenly pushed Twilight through a hole back into her own realm. It was a place with purple and red streaks slashed across the ether. Gnarled clouds exploded into existence upon the dark one’s command, raining down liquid that was extremely corrosive. It burned into Twilight’s skin, causing her to shriek and beg for it to cease. But her inner enemy showed no mercy and sat her on a platform with the awful downpour continuing. To make the nightmare even more terrifying, her wounds automatically healed and made way for more pain and suffering. Each drop was a moment in her own past where she saw the dark one’s involvement. She might not have controlled history itself…but when it came to Twilight’s story…she was writing every page.
“Yes…” the dark one said as she hovered above Twilight, “…feel it. Feel the sting of every last friend you ever abandoned, every single project you ever failed, and every single moment of hopelessness that remains entombed within you. Feel the love you lost, and the death of joy in your life.”
The burning was almost too much for Twilight, but she managed to give the dark one a defiant look. “I feel…nothing,” she said in an attempt to sound brave.
The dark one cackled. “Nothing?! You fool! You feel everything, and you know it! But more than that, you know that six of those drops represent those pesky platonic plebeians that you call your friends. You know what happened at Crystal Prep, and you know that it shall happen again!”
Twilight’s eyes flashed. “NO!” She shrieked as more painful memories bludgeoned her mind, “I won’t let it happen again! I swear, I won’t!”
“But, it will!” The dark one taunted, “you cannot stop the inevitable! It has happened at every single school you’ve ever attended! From kindergarten all the way until now! Let’s face it…YOU CANNOT MAKE FRIENDS!”
Twilight’s tears rolled down as she saw flashes of all the friendships she had destroyed in her efforts to know more. She remembered the very first friend she had ever made, Candy Heart, back in kindergarten. The two were inseparable as young girls, and they shared a passion for high levels of reading that was shocking to all their parents. Little girls that age weren’t supposed to read at such an advanced level…or, at least, so they thought.
But then…something horrifically tragic happened, and Twilight had always blamed herself for it. One day, her request to have Candy spend an evening with her family had been turned down. The Sparkles were getting ready to go out of town, and they just didn’t have the time to accommodate Candy. That night, at about 1:00, Candy and her family were brutally murdered while they slept. They were butchered to death with an ax, and the bodies were so terribly mangled that the police couldn’t bring themselves to discuss it. The chief investigator said it was the worst crime scene he’d ever witnessed in his 30 years with the department.
The Sparkle family kept it from Twilight for some time, as she was considered much too young to process something so cruel. But by and by, she found out, and she’d immediately put some of the blame on herself. She reasoned that, if she would have begged and pled for Candy to spend the night, then her friend might still have been alive. As the years passed, the seed of blame that she’d planted grew into a tree of self-loathing. She always asked herself why she’d been so cowardly and just accepted her parents’ decision. Even after the murderer was caught and thrown into prison for life, she continued to put so much on herself.
After that, all of her friendships had gone downhill. She tried to make them, but when she finally did, something would always happen to toss a wrench into the machinery. There would be a bad experiment here, or an angered argument there. Sometimes, death would step in and handle the proceedings. She remembered having three good friends in the fifth grade who all died from cancerous diseases. She didn’t think she could bear the thoughts, and with the acid continuing to burn holes into her skin, she simply…gave up.
The dark one saw Twilight huddle into herself on the platform and floated down with a wicked smile. “Yes…accept it, Twilight,” she hissed, “friendship is a waste of time. You know what you want…knowledge, power, insight…and you have all the tools at your disposal. You’re smarter than them…you’re much prettier than them…and you’re simply better than them. Come now, my pet. Every friend you’ve ever had has gone by the wayside. Why should it be different with those six?”
Twilight’s mind suddenly cleared when her best friends came into perspective. These friends were different. They had a bond that was stronger than steel, stronger than iron…and even stronger than the manacles of death itself. It was built out of magic, but more than that, it was built out of their own respect and love for individuality. They each saw something in each other that was so deeply powerful, it could stop villains dead in their tracks. It had saved their school, and their friends on countless occasions. It was something that was completely foolproof. It blazed through their hearts with a fire unknown to anyone else.
These thoughts comforted the girl, and she suddenly found that her eyes glowed white. She rose from the platform, surrounded by a hazy purple aura. She felt magic and love flow through her veins, and she felt her blood boil. It wasn’t a raging boil, but one built out of the very essence of friendship itself. She bent into herself as a mystical force cocooned around her. Within the wrapping, she felt very safe and warm and saw all of the good memories she had of the six girls who’d changed her life forever. She realized that the dark one’s taunts and sneers were simply products of her own mind, and, as bashed as her mind was, she determined to allow herself a route of escape. She had found that in her friends, and she was ready to walk off into the sunset with them all.
She suddenly exploded in a bright white ball of energy. It caressed her and dressed her with its power. She was not wearing clothes made of human hands, but rather the power and beauty of her friendship. She felt it surround her body and her heart, and it placed a blinding crown upon her head. Wings sprouted from her back, but these were different from the ones that normally appeared whenever she “ponied up.” These were long, graceful, and strong, though they looked fragile. She felt a horn rise from her forehead, but this one was straight and taut. It never wavered, just like she was learning to do.
The dark one grimaced as she tried to peer into the striking ball. “You…you can’t be…”
“But I am,” Twilight said as she emerged, “I am clothed with the light of my friends, and I am comforted by the memories they share with me.”
“NO!” The dark one shrieked, “but…Candy’s death…your friendships…YOU AREN’T WORTH ANYTHING!”
“That’s a lie,” Twilight said, “I am worth so much to my friends, and I know that. What happened at Crystal Prep was a result of my own failure to socialize with anybody. I blamed myself for a death that I had no hand in, and I told myself the same lies you’ve told me. But now, I am free, and I can say that it is one of the greatest feelings anyone could ever feel. I am happy in my friendships…and I have no use for you anymore.”
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!” The dark one yelled as Twilight’s eyes glowed and her horn shot forth a beam of pure magic, obliterating the villain once and for all. The pieces scattered about Twilight’s psyche until they finally vanished, unable to work thanks to Twilight’s acceptance of the past and newfound hope in her friends. The girl floated for a moment before using her magic to awaken.
She sat straight up in bed, drenched in sweat. She breathed for a moment before noticing that the sun was trying to stream through her closed curtain. She looked down and noticed her beloved canine companion, Spike, steadily snoozing away at her side. She smiled and gave him a small kiss on the head before stretching and moving over to throw the curtains open wide. When she did so, a wondrous beam of sunlight came crashing down upon her, and she reveled in its warmth and the knowledge that the dark one could never hurt her again.
“Looks like it’s gonna be a beautiful day,” she said.
