The Crystal King grunted and stepped down to stretch. Hours of experimenting with new and innovative methods of mind control and corruption could easily take a toll on him, not least because he was also trying to focus on maintaining his constantly-active casts.

Much as he didn’t like to admit it, Sombra’s magical potential was not limitless. Taking over the Crystal Empire with only a few hundred-thousand soldiers under his direct command was one thing, but trying to be in control of the minds of seventy million ponies was realistically impossible. That was why, after his marriage and several months of less-than-careful research, he had developed an effective substitute.

He loathed the concept that individuals without the ability to take power for themselves should be able to participate in affairs of national importance. Those who had the strength to lead would take their place at the top, as he had. However, those without the ability to govern still had free will. That was where his first innovation had taken him, the complete removal of choice and self-awareness by subsuming the minds of his subjects with his own directly. This was effective, but tiring and unrealistic for a state as large and populous as Equestria-Crystalia.

Instead they now relied on a slightly different solution. He had invented a new kind of mass-magic, one with the power to keep a nation stable without completely draining him of strength. It was a kind of suggestive power. Those affected by the spell described it as though they had developed a second conscience or a form of latent schizophrenia which slowly and quietly encouraged them to assist their overlords, something that screamed whenever they did anything illegal. In essence, it was watered-down mind control.

He never would have had the idea for it if Nightmare hadn’t convinced him that ponies could simply be manipulated instead of entirely under control en masse to quell the threat of individuality. He had certainly married well, hadn’t he?

This new spell, one that he was still refining even after it had been used for many years by now, affected about fifty million of the seventy-five million ponies under his rule. With more adjustments he estimated that the number would increase to about sixty million within the next year or so. It was limited by distance and by magical capacity by extension, but there were always more efficient ways to craft magic such as this. He’d even addended an aftereffect of sorts, allowing the control to persist for a day or two if he needed to sleep or be outside of Canterlot for small stretches of time. That was how he had been able to visit Grover for his Coronation and, presumably, caused their intelligence department even more headaches than his immense abilities already did.

“Dear me, you look exhausted. Any luck with your little project here?” A familiar voice asked from just behind him.

Preoccupied with thoughts on his work, he hadn’t noticed Nightmare sauntering up from behind him. Or had she teleported? Really, he didn’t know. She must have been watching him for a minute or so at least, given her expression.

“No, not just yet I’m afraid. I was finishing up for the night.” The black-grey unicorn admitted with a tired look on his face.

Having to renew a spell so powerful and broad after a day and a half of its disuse was as demanding as the scale implied, it was no surprise that Sombra was exhausted after such a feat. He’d recover his energy slowly over the next few days, hopefully without incident.

“I could feel you falling asleep from Manehatten. Time for bed?” The alicorn asked with a slight tilt of the head and a chuckle.

“That sounds marvellous,” He responded with a weak smile of his own, rubbing his head and his horn for a moment now been reminded of how much both ached.

Nightmare calmly plodded over to her partner and wrapped one of her wings around him. He must have a splitting headache, a thought that was confirmed by a piece of paper with ‘HEADACHE’ written in red pinned up just by his desk. Clearly that was something he was trying to solve.

She rolled her eyes and laughed, “Here, allow me.”

Rather than the usual solitary teleportation that Sombra was used to for travelling around the palace, the pair of them blinked up to the bedroom standing next to one another. He was quite clearly not in any way to be using his magic unless he absolutely had to. At least renewing the spell tomorrow would be far less detrimental.

“Much obliged my dear,” He returned, gently parting from her wing with a little chuckle of his own.

The night’s consort leapt up onto the bed and plodded over to his side, before nearly collapsing onto the sheets. He hadn’t realised just how exhausted he was until his wife came and tore him away from his musings. She always knew when he was tired, thought that wasn’t much of a surprise.

The alicorn followed suit, though sitting up on the bed and removing her armour with telekinesis in preparation for sleep. It was still early, but they could both use the rest today.

The Crystal King turned his head, grunting as his horn caught on one of the pillows. “Sweetheart, may I be brutally honest with you for a moment?”

“Of course, go on.” She came back calmly, rolling over and looking at her partner with a raised eyebrow.

This was unusual. Sombra wasn’t much for thinking past his own snout most of the time. The means justified the ends, the ends were a conquest of the world much like hers and that was that. Surely, he wasn’t having doubts now. Maybe he was only conflicted because he was so worn out, or perhaps that state of mind had spawned the thought.

“I can’t rule the world.”

Nightmare just stared for a good while, wide-eyed and astounded. “W-What?”

He hadn’t heard his wife stutter in a very long time.

“Nightmare, I can barely maintain my magic with things as they are. I hate to disappoint you, as would anypony hate to disappoint their partner but… Well, you know it’s true. Even at its maximum possible extent this spell won’t be able to affect the entire country and it already takes an extreme toll on my body; you can see as much. I-“ Sombra began, trying to explain before burying his head in his pillows for a moment.

Saying that he couldn’t rule the world was potentially a little misleading, but it was really was true in the way that he meant it. Whilst his ability to fight wars, know the tolerance of his thralls’ bodies and the like would never disappear, he was limited. They might conquer the world, but how would they keep it without the control that he was so familiar with? Their iron grip over the empire relied mostly on Sombra whilst his wife ran the administration itself and the more specialised parts of the army. He could continue to control Equestria-Crystalia, but he was right to say that the world was beyond his magical grasp; at least from a practical standpoint.

His head emerged from the fabric again, now very much awake and seemingly terrified. “What will we have when all is said and done? A planetwide empire that has no ears for our commands, twenty million conscripts, another twenty million dead ex-conscripts and a celebration whilst everything burns? I’ll only live for another sixty years at most and-“

Before he could say any more he found that a hoof was pressed firmly but gently over his mouth. Nightmare was looking at him with as comforting a smile as she could manage. Immediately he sighed, took some deep breaths and began to take off his royal attire by hoof.

Some comfort, any at all would have been appreciated, but neither could really make an effort to do anything of substance. It was a hard truth that they had both been avoiding. So much of what they had planned to do was just… Impossible, at least by traditional means; meanwhile the griffons held a monopoly on all the innovative methods of exerting supranational influence.

Sombra’s crown hit the metal chest plate that he had taken off moments before and he rolled back over on the bed. All they could do was stare at each other, neither knew what to say to the other ancient creature.

“Do you still want to try?” the Crystal King asked, visibly disgruntled.

Nightmare blinked and looked over, “I do. It is our duty and our privilege to protect and convince the ignorant masses of their blind folly. Whether they accept it or not, we must try.”

He didn’t want spend his latter years watching all he had built crumble into dust.

~*~

Nightmare lay there, completely awake. In her hooves Sombra had snuggled up and into her chest, his horn laying on her neck and pressing down on it slightly.

She ran a careful hoof down through his dark mane every once in a while, knowing that he wouldn’t wake up and needing something to occupy her mind. Of course she had made well sure that he couldn’t rise from his slumber just yet, not until he had gotten a full nine hours of rest; it was the least that she could do to try and keep her dearest unicorn in one piece.

And yet, she couldn’t fall asleep. It didn’t matter that there was a handsome and wonderful stallion resting ever-so-peacefully between her legs, that the world was silent from up here in the towers of Canterlot palace or that she was really quite tired herself.

All she could think about was whether her husband was right.

That in and of itself wasn’t the issue of course, he was right a lot of the time; but the subject of this particular analysis made his potential correctness immensely distressing. They had ruled this empire for a decade and a half now, but if the moves made by resistance groups during the great war were any indication the desire to be ‘free’ hadn’t gone anywhere.

They couldn’t win as things were. Perhaps they could mind control Grover and those he cared about with some work, but the KG undoubtedly had plans for that and they might be worse for the world than he was. What were they to do when all odds were stacked against them? The griffons were too nationalistic to really engage with any kind of propaganda or to work with her in starting a revolution like the one that had nearly crippled their weak monarchy prior. Even established groups in Aquileia that were known to contain many thousands of members outright refused to shake hooves with her. She could understand the sentiment, even if it frustrated her; Nightmare was never blinded by the rage she felt.

Her musings were interrupted when she felt Sombra shifting about slightly, face seemingly pained as his head turned. It wasn’t a nightmare but it wasn’t a nice dream either, one she’d seen before and not interrupted; maybe fixing it for him would take her mind off of things.

The Empress’ horn glowed and she closed her eyes.

Sweet moon above it was grey. Everything was that same colour, or at least shades of it. Just looking around was uncomfortable for how washed out and decrepit the world seemed without the presence of any colour whatsoever. She looked down at her hooves for a moment whilst adjusting; at least she still had a hue.

Canterlot, it was supposed to be at least. Aside from the lack of colour there was a colossal stone wall that stood between where they stood, one of the main roads, and where the palace would normally be. Her husband was standing before the wall; his horn, eyes and red cape emanating the only colour she could see besides her own.

Sauntering his way, she could understand why he had looked so suddenly unnerved in bed. “I should have come to help you through these sooner.”

“Mmm. Hello darling.”

A lucid dreamer. Well, he was arguably the most powerful unicorn to ever exist; it was hardly surprising even if this wasn’t his area of expertise.

“Is this a memory?” She asked, already knowing the answer as she slid a wing over him again.

“A manifestation of my conscious state of mind in my subconscious, I think. I’ve had this one before, a couple of times. You would know.”

That she would.

“And your conscious state of mind is…”

“Blocked? Stopped? Trapped? I don’t know, I’m not a therapist.” He answered with a slight snarl, catching Nightmare briefly off guard.

Something to do with their earlier dilemma, probably. She was no more qualified to analyse this sort of thing than he was, even if she’d spent a lot of time in the minds of other ponies at night.

“I used to have this dream sometimes, whilst wallowing in my banishment. I would run headfirst at the wall, try to dig under it or climb over it. When I returned, I didn’t dream for a long time. Years, maybe more.” He went on, realising that he needed some kind of catharsis.

Nightmare stayed silent, looking to the side in order to meet his eyes; but they were locked forward, staring at the grey mass of apparently impregnable rock. He looked like he wanted to gaze back at her, but couldn’t.

“I never felt the need to look behind me then, look away from achieving victory over the crystal ponies and their weak friends. Then it was repelling Chrysalis, then those socialists… Always something else to do. Now it’s the griffons, but I feel it’s different this time. The wall is… It’s still here, thicker than ever.” He continued, blinking repeatedly and gritting his fangs.

“So, what now?” The alicorn asked softly.

His anger changed from anger to confusion and then to terror. “I don’t know.”

In an instant the scene changed. She didn’t want her partner to be thinking about this; no sane mare would want her husband to be dreaming about their waking fears. Now they were on a grassy turn of a river, beneath a willow tree and the stars. Everything was coloured, flourishing under the night.

Sombra sighed and finally looked up at his partner before kissing her, an offer of sorts that she didn’t hesitate to take. He dreaded that dream now. He knew she could feel that fear.

“We’ll find a way past your wall dearest; I promise.” She gave out after a minute, stroking his mane once more.

“Thank you. I love you Nightmare.” He managed in response.

She licked his snout affectionately and smiled, “I love you too.”

Was he really relying on hope, like his old foes did? It hadn’t gone very well for them.

~*~

Rarity carefully put hoof to stone as she exited the train carriage.

Dodge City wasn’t beautiful or well looked after in these times, but it was far enough south of Canterlot that Sombra’s velvet glove didn’t reach it. She could see as much from the way everypony trotted around; not joyously like they used to, but lacking any semblance of uniformity. Cities like these were the last refuge of ponies free to think without his influence, even if such didn’t make them any happier.

She didn’t know how she had managed to order train tickets specifically to get away from Ponyville, to go somewhere where their will wasn’t quietly encouraged. His magic was supposed to prevent that sort of thing.

Maybe she’d just been lucky.

“Ticket please m… ma’am.” One of the stallions working the gates asked, stuttering and staring a little when he looked at her.

“One moment, darling.”

She fumbled with the zipper on her handbag before reaching in and bringing out her ticket, hoof shaking a little. He took it, looked at it, nodded and handed it back again after she had plodded slowly through the gate.

“Have a good day ma’am.” He added weakly, probably in an attempt to apologise for his reaction.

Deep breaths. She couldn’t expect ponies not to react like that, it was natural. She sighed, swallowed and kept going.

Some lunch would take her mind off of things, even if it wouldn’t stop ponies from staring when they saw her. Was it really that bad? What in Celestia’s name was she doing here? Why hadn’t she just stayed back home where she could live quietly and-

“R-Rarity?” A deep voice asked from just on her right, somecreature at a high street stall that she’d been too preoccupied to pay attention to.

In an instant she stopped and started, almost scared to look. Who would recognise her all the way out here? Why was the voice strangely familiar? It took what felt like an age for her to turn and see where the polite question had originated from.

Her voice quivered as she finally spoke, “Spike?”

If it hadn’t been for the way he spoke and the distinctive purple-green colouration of his scales, Rarity might not have even known who it was. The last time she had spoken to Twilight’s little helper had been what… A decade ago? More actually, if she remembered rightly.

“Uh… Hi? Sorry I just… Do I shake your hoof? Hug you? I don’t really…” The twenty-six-year-old dragon stammered out, gingerly putting a stack of food on the floor.

Sweet Celestia how he’d grown, in muscle mass as well as height. He’d only been a young teenager back then, tall-ish and lanky, before everything fell apart for the Mane Six and their dragon friend by extension. What should she say to him? What could she say?

Rarity shook her head a little and forced something out, “I… I’m sorry. Oh sun above I’m sorry Spike, I’m so sorry…”

The mare plodded solemnly towards him, she could hardly even look at her old friend after all these years. She hadn’t written, hadn’t ever tried to get in contact, hadn’t made the slightest effort to see him or anypony else after her conscription term was up. She'd been too scared to even try.

Spike, for his part, reacted with confusion first; before realising and feeling what she felt himself. After that he took a few steps forward and wrapped his massive arms around the poor pony, who was almost too weak to reciprocate. Almost.

“It’s okay, it’s okay… I… Celestia, I’m sorry too… It’s not your fault Rarity, none of us are to blame; though I imagine that… That probably doesn’t count for much. I should have tried to send a telegram or… I don’t know, something…” He managed in response, having equally mixed feelings.

She was on the verge of sobbing, but managed to stay in one piece; if only barely. They’d both missed so much of each other’s lives and neither knew exactly how to express the elation at finding one another again whilst enduring that reality being pushed in their faces.

He hadn’t the slightest idea how to comfort Rarity anymore, or at least he assumed that his old antics wouldn’t do much to help. He just stared past her mane into the brickwork of the marketplace they were in for a little while, ignoring the strange looks that the pair of them were getting.

As it sounded like she was about to cry again he closed his eyes, gritted his teeth and began to slowly stroke her coast with his massive claws; careful to avoid her shattered horn and the silver part-mask that covered the eye which wasn’t buried in his scales.

He would have recognised her no matter what, he hadn’t spent his early years infatuated with this unicorn for nothing, but the dragon wondered just what had happened. Had she been tortured? Conscripted? Probably conscripted. He’d barely even registered the injuries at first, seeing only her hair and her cutie mark until she was right up close to him. That was mostly thanks to what must have been a deliberate hairstyle choice to cover the unhealed wounds as best she could. It would have been inappropriate to ask about them now anyway, that could wait. It wasn’t as though they made her any less identifiable, or pretty. He cursed himself for thinking about that right of all things now, he shouldn’t even-

“Th-thank you Spike… Oh goodness… I’m so sorry, for being absent…” She gave out, managing to stave off the intense emotions again with his help.

He sighed, relieved that this wasn’t weird for her; after all what was he supposed to do in a situation like this? “So am I, it’s okay… It’s alright, I’m just… I’m happy to see you.”

He could feel her slowly nodding and smiled a little, comforted slightly because whatever he was doing clearly helped in some way.

Now that Spike could think a little more clearly, he noticed that there were several bits of her white coat that were less uniform. The patches were very small in most places, but became more concentrated up to her neck and assumedly peaked in severity behind that stylish mask. Was it burn damage? Scar tissue, certainly; but from what? He silently prayed to Celestia again that she wouldn’t hate him for asking later.

They had to stay stuck together like that for a few minutes longer. He realised that trying to cheer both of them up was less important than just sharing that intense and admittedly confusing feeling. Was hugging for this long weird? Probably. Was it necessary for the both of them? Most likely. They could wait a little while, everypony else was capable of putting up with them.

“Would you… Should we catch up over lunch or something? I’m not sure-“ He offered timidly, not really certain of what to say now.

Rarity let out a slightly pained chuckle as spike leased his surprisingly gentle grip, “I’d… I’d like that Spike, darling. Do you… Ahem, sorry; do you know anywhere nice?” She managed, clearing her throat and smiling.

He might sound imposing, but even after all this time his speech was infirm as it always used to be; back when things were simpler. The Spike she once knew was still in there. Even if she didn’t know what remained of him and what didn’t, it was comforting. He was probably thinking about her scars now, but she appreciated the fact that he’d looked more nervous than taken aback. Probably hadn’t even noticed the damage at first. Maybe less had changed than she thought.

Author's Note

This chapter took a couple of go-overs. Originally I was going to include Grover here, but I needed more time to properly establish Sombra's internal conflict whilst also introducing another (probably the last, four is a lot) plot thread.

Speaking of, I've never written established MLP characters before. Yes it's a little terrifying, yes I'm going to keep going.

What happened to rarity I wonder?