Dreamwalker's Tale

Chapters

Day 1: Back to Zero
Day 2: Study Session
Day 3: The Conspiracy
Day 4: A Relaxing Bath
Day 5: Interior Redecoration
Day 6: A Party for Four
Day 7: The Caretaker
Day 8: Forgemaster
Day 9: Visitors
Day 10: A Day in the Field
Day 11: A Quiet Day, A Rough Night
Day 12: Gravitational Pull
Day 13: Everything is Fragile
Day 14: Preparations
Day 15: Fragments of the Past
Day 16: Sunny Skies
Day 17: Home, Sweet Home
Prologue
Epilogue

Day 1: Back to Zero

Hi. My name is Dreamwalker. And my story began with… puking, sadly. Puking and trembling legs and a mighty disorientation and loads and loads of vertigo. Everything seemed to spin and wobble. Colors constantly bled into one another. Sounds mixed and matched together in disharmony, varying in frequency and volume. I smelled grass and flowers and dirt and rain and it made my stomach churn even more. My attempts at standing up resulted in me undignifiedly crawling sideways until my legs, once again, revolted against my mental commands, shuddering and twisting in new spasms. Whenever I tried to look at something, anything within my immediate surroundings, my head started to spin horribly, everything was out of focus and I was quickly forced to close my eyes again, pressing my lids shut with force as if that would somehow help.

So… yeah, my arrival was well-underway and it was just… just peachy. Everything was peachy.

I wasn’t sure how much time I spent writhing on the ground. I felt grass and dirt rub against my coat. But only on my right side, since I somehow did not figure out just yet how to… flip over. So my right side was getting damp and cold and my left side felt like it was getting cooked. Slooowly. Almost carefully. By a midday sun, as was my best guess.

There were trees somewhere nearby. I couldn’t exactly tell the distance, but I had ‘seen’ thick brown trunks or what I believed to be trunks and dense green canopy. And I could hear birds. Right now, with my hearing all messed up, I really hated those birds. Their chirping drilled into my brain and hurt what felt like a sensitive and probably important area.

So, I did what I could. I did what, somewhere in the back of my mind, a snarky little voice whispered I could do best: I gave up.

I stopped struggling. I stopped any attempts to flip over or stand up or open my eyes and I just… laid there. Aside from my erratic, but slowly stabilizing breathing, I must have looked like a corpse.

I did not know anything, initially. I tried to remember. Where I was. How I got here. Why I was here in the first place. And then, with dread creeping up my spine, I dared ask the even scarier questions. Like: Why my body failed me so utterly. Or… you know… who I even was.

While my body calmed down over the course of… minutes? Maybe hours? I could not tell, really. While it did that, I tried to remember. Something, anything. It felt like… fishing in a pond, with bare hooves, searching for certain stones on the pond's bottom. I could see them, but once I reached for them, the water got all muddy and I lost track. Sometimes, I got lucky and found something anyway. Not always what I was aiming for, but at this stage, I wasn't picky.

My name was Dreamwalker. Basically the only real, tangible information I started with. I could obviously name things. Grass. Birds. Trees. Equestria. Oh, that one was interesting. Ponies. Pegasi. Earth ponies. Night sky, sun, tea, water, rainspooncloudwhitetip—

Stop.

That got a little out of hoof.

Carefully, I tried to open my eyes again. Juuust a tiny gap. The light was bright, it still somewhat hurt in my eyes, but I powered through and they adapted after a couple of seconds. I had hooves on my forelegs, as far as I could tell. Being a pony. Nice. Good. Claws were useful, but I very much preferred hooves.

Also, there was a certain something at the upper edge of my field of vision. It seemed to protrude from my forehead. Maybe I got hit by—

Oh boy.

What if there was something in my head? Something that was decidedly not meant to be there? Could I have been hit by… a sharp rock or something? Thrown by… a freak Everfree storm cloud?

Unicorn.

Oh. Right. Those.

It was a horn. My horn. Because I was a unicorn. Yeah, sure. That made so much more sense.

Buuut. I couldn’t help but recognize those trees as the Everfree Forest anyway. Mostly because the trees there grew wild and untamed, and they looked the part. The more I tried to focus on those trees, the more I felt like I was close to getting another one of those shiny rocks from the bottom of the pond. And then, it happened. I would later come to call those instances ‘flashes of insight’, mostly because that sounded cool. It was a horribly mixed up series of mental images, mangled dialogue and other impressions - sensory overload in way too short of a time to process it all in detail. It did not so much ‘answer questions’ as it imbued some unspoken wisdom. Evil trees with scary faces, evil flowers with trickster nature, evil manticores and evil cockatrices and evil enchantresses which would put me in evil trances…

Wait — actually, Zecora was quite friendly. She was a zebra. An alchemist of sorts, as far as I could tell. She lived deep in the forest — surviving and thriving, somehow — and made potions and remedies. Maybe I should try to crawl my way to her and ask if she had any idea how to restore memories? Thinking about how her answer would probably rhyme made me chuckle. I immediately regretted my life choices as the migraine made itself known again.

My throat was sore. My voice was almost non-existent. Everything burned. It pushed tears into my eyes, so I closed them again and tried to calm down.

That was when I heard her hum. The melody was off-kilter, which was strange, because I was certain that this voice — a voice I vaguely started to recognize — was indeed a beautiful singing voice. I tried to look in the direction of the humming, towards the Everfree, when another flash hit me. This, I understood, was some kind of weird… cycle. It was obviously hard to tell where the ‘start’ of a circle was, but I had been here before. We had been here before.

The humming drew closer. She paid her surroundings no mind, having left the Everfree behind her. This area was still close-by, sure, but it was safe for the most part and she was anything but defenseless. Ponyville was close. I pressed my hooves against the dirt and the grass and this time, managed to lift myself off the ground. Carefully, I craned my neck and looked over my shoulder. There were houses in the distance. Some of them I could even name. Carousel Boutique. Town Hall. Rainbows stupid flying palace of clouds and, well, rainbows. I knew this town. I knew these—

And then she just walked straight into me.

It was more like a soft bump, really. She was startled and started to mumble an excuse for not paying any attention, something about how she did not expect anypony to be around here this time of day, but she cut herself off. Because I was, once again, lying on the floor.

It felt familiar by now. Once the aching muscles grew tired of complaining and the dampness seeped into my very being, lying down in the dirt wasn’t all that bad, really. I sighed heavily and under her concerned gaze, I tried to stand up again. Wouldn’t do for her to see me like that, even if it was a little late for that notion. So, I got back up and I tore my gaze away from Ponyville and the ground and dared to look at her.

Mulberry coat. Saddlebags over her back, emblazoned with her cutie mark. Her wings seemed a little jittery. I could make out some clay vials in her bags. Zecora. There was so much… worry in her eyes. Her beautiful violet eyes. I felt like drowning. Breathing became harder and harder. My heart was thumping against my ribs, trying to break out. Twilight was asking me… something. Surely she was asking if I was alright, because I could only imagine what I looked like right now. Disheveled mane, ruffled coat, glazed eyes. I stared at her, dumbfounded. I stared at her moving lips and… remembered.

Next thing I knew, I clumsily scooched forward, pulled her closer with a flick of magic and pressed my lips to hers. I should have noticed how she froze up, how her muscles tensed. To be honest, there was a lot concerning this moment that started with ‘I should have’. I kissed her. My Twilight. With all my love for her, all my desire for her, all my desperation for her, my hope, my relief. I was longing to be reunited with her. She was here. She was still here. I remembered her. I remembered so much…

Then she withdrew with as much force as she needed to get me off of her. Considering my weakened state — it did not take much. She pressed one hoof against my chest and slightly pushed. Hey, at least I did not topple over again. However… did I mention that my journey started with puking my very soul out? Yeeeaaah. That might have contributed to the face she was making.

Didn’t change how her face flushed, though. It looked cute. She mumbled something, and then got her bearings and her facial expression and body language changed considerably. There was a mixture of shame and embarrassment and, well, obviously… anger.

It took me a moment to consider what I had just done. Yes, I remembered her. Fond memories, front-loaded with love and desire and I was currently the only one bearing those memories. Because try as I might, looking into her horrified eyes, I could not quite see my Twilight in there. She was Twilight Sparkle, local book horse and magical powerhouse, but she was not who I remembered. Because this was not a perfect loop, they never were, and details changed every time and even if they would not have, I was back at the start. And I was a random stranger to her.

Seeing how she took a step back once, and again, how obvious it was that she seriously considered slapping me with a hoof… I could not find words for just how much that hurt.

Seeing that, plainly written on my face made her halt for a moment. Just a moment. No matter how much this pain clouded my mind, there was an opening and I had to use it. I just had to. It started with her, I knew that. It always did.

“I know you,” I blurted out.

She nodded slightly. “I do not know you, though,” she shot back and a soft raspberry glow enveloped her horn.

Right. Princess status. I remembered a time where she was just… just Twilight. A unicorn of impressive magical talent and prowess, but a unicorn nonetheless. She had been smaller back then as well, had she not?

Putting my observation aside for later, I started to panic. I knew her. She wanted to avoid this awkwardness, this imminent conflict. Being Twilight, she could do so without problem. All she had to do was to teleport away. I could guess what spell she was preparing. So what if she did it? What if she just vanished, in a small little pop, a flash of light and the smell of ozone? I could go to Fluttershy, I thought. But that would be wrong. It would have been the wrong order. No. No, it had to happen. It had to happen here, now, with her!

So, slightly panicky as I was, I blurted out the next best thing that came to mind. Because that had helped me out sooo much the first time. “Time travel!”

She held her charge. Which was a good thing, and a bad thing. Bad, because I knew for a fact that holding a spell mid-casting was exhausting. She was aiming for a quick resolve either way. Good, because she did not pour more energy into her teleport and gave me a few short moments to explain myself.

“That is impossible,” she stated matter-of-factly. “All time travel spells are in the Star Swirl-wing of the Royal Archives in Canterlot, accessible only with the express permit of Princess Celestia.”

“Or Princess Luna. Or Princess Cadance,” I tried to supply. That only earned me a withering glare. Right. Not helpful. So, in those precious few seconds I had, I remembered Applejack's advice. Pony up and face the facts head-on! There were probably nicer ways so say that, but why bother with all that decorum. It was honest advice and I would have expected nothing less from her. Honesty then. Fine. “I… have no idea how I got here. Or… who I even am. Kind of. But I do know you, Twilight. I remembered you from the first moment I heard you humming.”

She grew a little self-conscious about that, a tinge of red returning to her face. But… she discharged the energy around her horn, much to my relief. I let go of a breath I had not realized I even held. She was still… ‘displeased’ did not quite cut it. She was pissed. Yeah, that sounded about right. But she was also intrigued. My predicament seemed to be a strange one. Nothing new for Ponyville so far. ‘Weird’ was the new normal around these parts since she was sent here by Celestia. Her eyes drifted back to the Everfree and I could not fault her for that train of thought. “As far as I know, I didn’t enter the forest,” I offered. “But… I did come to my senses in its immediate vicinity, so… who knows.”

“You claim you know me. Prove it.” She still sounded indignant, in addition to the obvious disbelief and wariness. But I couldn't help but smile. She gave me a chance. She always did, didn’t she? Because we had been here before.

For a moment, I watched her. Her wings rustled in mild agitation every now and then. She was focused, but wary of me. That was fine. I could fix that. I hoped. “Spike eats sapphires the most and rarely ruby, but he actually prefers ruby. He abstains from them because he doesn’t want the taste to ‘wear out’. Owlicious eats mice and those first weeks after you got him, you freaked out about telling Fluttershy because of all her mice friends. You tried on several occasions to get a new mane style done, but even with Rarity’s help, it just wouldn’t stick. You broke into the Royal Canterlot Archives with Pinkie in very form-fitting black suits to steal one of those time travel spells. You stole your first kiss from your foalsitter Cadance, curiosity of the youth and all that, which was the first time you thought about your sexuality and potential attraction for both genders. You prefer your pancakes with honey instead of syrup. And you make this adorable, high-pitched whinny right before you cli—”

Funny. The world was sideways again. That happened pretty fast. Also: Ow. I felt like there should be a sizable, obvious hoofprint on my cheek. Admittedly, I absolutely deserved that one. The bright, wide smile tugging at my lips however told me right away that I would shamelessly do it all over again, given the chance.

Oh well.

I heard her stammering, muttering an excuse that did not really sound all that rueful. But as I had said: I did concede that I had deserved that one. So it was all fine by me. To be fair — I had fully expected her to punch me when I brought up her first kiss. As far as I could remember, I only learned of her deep dark secrets after years and years. Maybe it was wrong to just spill it like that. Probably.

Yeah. I should apologize.

“Hey, I’m… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. If it’s any consolation, you only told me after many years…?” I dared to look at her while I once again attempted the arduous task of standing up. She, however, just stared at me. She had her difficulties accepting that she might have told me — anypony, really — at all. But how else could I have known? I saw the gears turning. Mind-reading? Divination spells? There were always other possibilities.

I wobbled to my hooves and stood. Somewhat steady, for the moment. It took some time until she collected herself enough to bring up the obvious first question. The one to which there were two answers and I could only give the less satisfying one. “Who are you?”

I forced a little, wobbly smile onto my face. “My name’s Dreamwalker. A, uh, pleasure to meet you.”

“Right,” came her immediate, flat response. After a moment, she sighed and even giggled a little. “That is a weird name, you know?”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, I know. ‘Only Luna should be capable of walking the dreamscape.’ Heard that one before,” I countered with a tired smile.

Her eyes grew bigger. “Wait — you… you can actually do that?”

“Yes?” I half-asked. I didn’t know, per se. But I highly suspected it. After all: Dreamwalker. The name came with some heavy implications, did it not? And Equestrian names were weird like that. Otherwise, that would be like… having ‘Applejack’ for a name and not having to do anything with alcoh—

Oh. Right. Maybe I should choose another example here.

Still, I nodded with a little more vigor and enthusiasm as was good. For my vertigo, mainly. But I was proud to claim control over my stomach. I did not throw up. Again. Of course now I had to brace myself for the inevitable. Hovering low with her excitedly flapping wings, she grabbed my shoulders and grinned like the madmare she could be when faced with something like this. It was an adorable sight to behold. She rattled on about experiments. Studies. Thesis. Something this, something that, studying magic. Because I was different from Luna, obviously. She could not just canter up to a Princess and tell her to follow her into the basement laboratory of her place for intense study sessions.

Somepony could overhear and draw the wrong conclusions, after all.

And she complained about the lack of written material about dream magic. There were some mentions of Luna's capabilities back in the olden days, but they were few and far between and these days, well… Luna was still in the process of reintegrating herself into society. Other scholars would probably run into the same issues as Twilight did. Adding to that, Luna was rather… possessive. I could imagine quite well that she might not even have wanted to share this knowledge with the general public. Or anyone, really.

Might have had something to do with privacy concerns as well. That had not been much of a topic of concern back in her days, but in modern times?

Twilight calmed down after a few more moments (and rants), finally realizing how I was subtly rubbing a hoof along my neck and trying to keep my wobbly smile intact. “See,” I started meekly, “I’m happy that you’re happy. Really, I am. But there’s a little… uh… problem. I would love to help in your research, but right now, I have a couple of urgent issues. Like…” I looked up at the beautiful evening sky. We had not talked that long, had we? Didn’t matter much, I decided. “A roof above my head.” My stomach returned with a vengeance, reminding me of other bodily needs. “Oh. Right. Food. Food would be nice, too. And I don’t have any bits yet, sooo… I should probably get my ass into gear and find… stuff.” Like a job. My eyes drifted down as my stomach rumbled again. “Hm. I suppose I could just… graze.” The grass looked unappealing, but it would do in a pinch.

Another flash. A short one, quick and simple, thankfully. I could not help but smile and count down. Three… two… one…

“That should not be much of a problem,” she started. “Spike could have a guest room ready in a couple of minutes and he usually makes a little too much for dinner anyway.” Because he is trying to keep your alluring curves in good health and shape, Twi. Bless his little heart.

I loved her. I had loved her previously, some time ago, some circles ago, whatever. But the qualities I loved about her were still present. There was still caution in her eyes, obviously. Experience is a cruel teacher and she had some bad ones. However, she was still trusting. She was still willing to give me a chance. She was still kind and friendly and nice and I just could not help but feel familiar warmth spread throughout my body. She might not have been my Twilight. But I was pretty certain that any Twilight was irresistible.

Curiously enough, the impulse to get closer to her seemed rather subdued for the moment. I looked her over. Her shapely legs, her still occasionally ruffling wings, her toned rump and back, her neck… but there was no urge to kiss her, to nip at her skin, at all those familiar weak spots my vague and jumbled memories told me about. How peculiar.

“If it’s not too much of a bother… I would love to!” I accepted her offer as gracefully as I could manage.

She raised an eyebrow. “You expected this,” she merely noted. My smile grew a little sheepish. Nevertheless, she just shook her head and walked past me. After a moment, she stopped and looked back at me. “Are you coming?”

I hurried up to get to her side and fell in step with her as we walked back towards Ponyville. A town I loved almost as much as the pony walking beside me. “So, tell me. What do you remember?” she started her little interrogation.

I sighed and tried to answer this question as well as all the inevitable follow-ups as best as I could. “It’s less ‘remembering’, in most cases anyway, and more… a flood of impressions? Like… I stood there and all of a sudden, there are different voices speaking over one another, smells, tastes, something brushes against my fur, I see a couple of seconds of some scene or another, it’s all… as if someone took a couple of sometimes barely related memories and put them into a blender. And then force-fed me the result. And yes, it’s as enticing and pleasant as it sounds.”

She scrunched up her nose a little, but her analytical mind was already racing. After a couple more questions, she eliminated regular old amnesia as one of the possibilities. I would not know — my talent was not anything related to medicine. Got a scrape? Pour water over it and put a bandaid on it. Done.

“If we find the source of the issue and can resolve it, maybe we can even send you back?” she thought aloud.

I knew that it was just idle musing on her part. I knew that. And yet…

“No!” I yelled. I snapped at her with such force that somewhere, a couple of startled birds flew into the sky loudly protesting. I looked at her, stared her down almost. I was breathing heavily, my hooves dug into the ground like I would make my last stand here on this dirt road and my mind swam in panic. Horror and panic. She was taken aback, I saw how her ears pinned back against her head, saw her shrink away from me, but for a precious few seconds, I could do nothing about that. I could do nothing in general. I just stood there, breathing hard.

She recomposed herself quicker than I could. A hoof touched my shoulder. I glanced at it. Mulberry fur. What a nice color. I traced that leg to a very worried looking pony. “I… I’m sorry,” I mumbled. Almost whispered. I started to shrink, almost physically, and averted my eyes. My muscles relaxed and were quite vocal about their displeasure regarding the sudden tenseness. It burned all over again, just like it had done at the start. When I looked back up again, I felt tears sting my eyes. I forbade them from leaving, and they obliged. It did not help my vision at all. Everything was blurry. The whole of Equestria was drowning.

I blinked a couple of times to get myself under control again. “I can’t,” was all I told her. All I gave her as a reply. And I was so immensely grateful when she made it quite clear, by nodding once and returning to my side, that at least for the moment it was all she needed to know.

I could not fathom where that had come from. The suddenness of my own emotional outburst left me somewhat shocked and even more drained then I had felt before. I could not wait to get into a proper bed and just end this lousy day. I knew that better days were to come. I knew that with the same certainty that a new dawn would come. But right now, thinking straight became harder and harder.

We resumed walking, albeit at a slower pace. I could not help but think about what had happened. Why the sudden outburst? There had been no flash of insight, no discernable memory, just… creeping, deeply rooted, existential dread. Like… the endless void between the stars in all its inky blackness could not be as cold and lonely and unforgiving as that place. And I didn’t even know ‘that place’. Heck, I didn’t even know with certainty that there was a place to go back to. She had asked me a lot, and I had answered as thoroughly as I could, but we still did not know anything about me or why I was here or what had happened. Time travel did not exactly seem likely.

“Where are you going?” came her voice again. Softer and quieter than I would have liked. But that was probably at least partially caused by the physical distance between us, her standing a couple of feet away from me. Huh. I looked towards her, then turned my head and looked down the road where I had been walking towards before. I knew Ponyville. Like the back of my hoof. I could have walked these streets blindfolded, so sure was I.

“Uh… home?” I answered confused.

She looked down the street and furrowed her brow. After a short moment, she shook her head, and a tinge of sadness lingered in her eyes. “The castle is this way,” she just told me and resumed walking at a slow pace.

But the library…

Another flash hit me. Hard. It knocked the wind out of me and made me struggle to keep standing. My head spun, the vertigo returned with a vengeance and I closed my eyes in an attempt to stop the incoming tears. I heard an explosion that wasn’t really there, but it rattled my bones nonetheless. I choked on smoke that did not fill my lungs, flinched from heat that did not singe my coat and smelled the burning wood of books and leaves and furniture and… a tree. Cold ashes mixed with dashed hope and buried memories.

For a short moment, I choked again. This time, it was not because of any imagined smoke.

It was our home.

No. No, apparently… it had been our home. Once upon a time.

A castle then. That sounded more decadent and enormous and so absolutely not like Twilight. For a moment longer, I looked back down that road. I would have to go there someday soon, I knew that. Just to… to see it. To separate false memories from new reality. I tore my gaze away and trotted after Twilight. The loop is always the same, a tiny voice in the back of my head told me, but details change. I just was not sure if I would call that a ‘detail’.

“You don’t want to go back… even if there would be a ‘back’ to return to,” she said while I fell in trot with her again. “And given your reaction, I am inclined to presume that there is, in fact, such a place. Or time. So… what do you want?”

The question gave me pause. It was a good one, was it not? Then again, the answer seemed simple, at least on a surface level. But there was more to it. Because things could never just be simple. “I want a home. And I don’t just mean ‘a roof over my head’, but a place to be at home. I want to make my own bits. Somehow. You taking me in for now, as a guest, is a kind offer and I’m absolutely willing to show my gratitude however I can. But I suppose, at some point, I should work towards something more… long-term? I want my friends back. That includes you. And then… I think I’m going to… help them.”

That sounded nice, did it not? Make a home, become self-sufficient, and create my own little family. Because what else was a circle of friends if not the family you choose? A smile creeped up her face, accompanied by a slight blush as I explicitly included her in my… let’s call it a friend-wish list. Really, I could not help but smile. The start of this day had been a little bit more tumultuous than I had liked. But she was here, still here, smiling, walking me to her home.

Then, out of the corner of her eye, she looked at me curiously. “Help them?” she asked.

I nodded. “I know them. I know that I can help them. I’m not implying that I’m the ‘be all end all’-solution to all their problems, far from it. And certain things are… different than I remember. But I know them. And I feel like I know… stuff… that can… I don’t know… enhance their lives? Their love lives? Make them happy? Happier? Something like that.” I fell silent for just a moment, mulling things over. “They have their friends and lives and each other. They have their community and support. Jobs and homes. They have learned a lot over the rather… adventurous last years.” Well, that, on the other hoof, sounded rather ominous.

Twilight seemed to come to the same conclusion. “Who exactly are we talking about, if I may ask? And… you still have not answered me. How do you intend to help?”

I chuckled lightly. “Yeah… I haven’t, haven’t I? I’m talking about… well, I guess ‘your’ friends. Because as far as I can remember, they have been my friends as well. Rainbow, Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinks, Spike, Derpy, Roseluck, Lilly,… sheesh. Half of Ponyville, to shorten the list. I don’t think that I’m going to meddle with all of their lives. Just… giving nudges here and there, you know? Shamelessly abusing my superior interdimensional wisdom, or something.”

It struck me as odd that she remained silent for a while after that. Twilight was a good listener, sure. But silence can talk and this one whispered of awkwardness. So I looked to my side, looked at her and realized she was blushing furiously. For a moment, that had me stumped. I went back, thought about what I had said. I could not imagine that she reacted so strongly to me giving Pinkie Pie a pet name. Maybe she was reading too much into that? But then I remembered the kiss earlier. And my proclamation that she, in fact, was on my friend-wish list as well.

Ah. Right.

I could not help myself and chuckled silently. She was adorable and if I let myself, I would come up with a lot more flowery prose to describe her. But I did not want to embarrass her. Not here, anyway, where we were in the open and others could — and indeed did — see us. While we walked through Ponyville, I had politely nodded here and there to greet those who I could name or remember as friends, but who did not quite know me yet. So, everypony, basically. Now I added the occasional wave, as Twilight had subconsciously slowed down a little and was falling behind.

She was beautiful. And no, I was not about to start again. But I had to face a certain dilemma I was presented with. She felt so incredibly familiar, yet strangely foreign at the same time. Her allure was unbroken, but I found my desire for her to be lacking. I had enjoyed that kiss — as far as I had been able to, anyway. But now, looking at her receding blush, I had no impulse to repeat that. My head had started to make a distinction between this Twilight and my Twilight. A distinction that greatly confused my heart. And while details might have changed, I had a growing concern that my rather intimate knowledge of her may become a problem further down the line.

I knew what she wanted. What she liked. What she tasted and smelled like. How it felt to snuggle up to her. I knew her frazzled morning mane and how she sometimes kicked in her sleep.

I sighed deeply. Yeah. This would be a problem. But it was a problem for another day. Today, I counted myself amongst the luckiest stallions in Equestria, because just like Fluttershy gathering up a lost little chick and taking it home to dote on it, Twilight had found me and decided to take me in as a guest. And as far as I remembered, there were far worse fates than that, really.

Spikes’ pancakes were great.

I slowed down to be on par with her again. I did notice her looking over to me from time to time, just out of the corner of her eyes. Her blush had died down considerably, but it did not quite leave her face entirely. Finally, as we had cleared most of Ponyville’s town center and more populated areas, I spoke up. “So, uh… not that I mind an awful lot, but… you’re staring. Something on your mind?”

She took a moment to collect herself. After a silent sigh, she raised her head. “You mean it?”

“Mean what?” I replied.

“That you want to… you know… play matchmaker?” This time, she had herself under control. Good for her.

I thought about it, but… there really wasn’t any doubt within me. Anywhere. “Yeah. And it’s not really ‘playing matchmaker’, I… basically already know who I’m going to nudge to whom. There are certain… hm… harmonies that are hard to ignore once you’ve seen them. And while they might not know my name yet… I still feel like they are my friends. I know that must sound weird, but it’s true. I already know so much about them, share so many… admittedly vague and unhelpful memories I can’t recall in detail, but… there’s history. A lot of it. I can feel it. I want to uncover it. I want to restore it. And above all else… I want them to be happy. Or as Pinks would put it: I want to see them smile, smile, smile. Huh, come to think of it, I would’ve expected her to barrel straight into me by now.”

“She is at the rock farm, family visit,” Twilight replied. But while I had explained myself to the best of my abilities, a small smile had bloomed on her lips. At this moment, for her, I was probably still a weird mixture of a creepy stranger that went around kissing mares and her newest pet project to study. Maybe I did not do right by her with this assessment. But whatever the case, at least she seemed to believe me that I honestly, deeply cared for those ponies I considered my friends. Then again: Princess of Friendship. Supposedly, she knew a thing or two about that.

It was getting darker. The sun sank towards the horizon in the west and the sky was filled with a colorful spectacle. It was both pretty and serene. “Whoever reaches the door last is a rotten egg!” I yelled and just sprinted ahead. I had no idea what was going on in my head. I could not even defend action with ‘it sounded like a great idea at the moment!’ — because it didn’t! And I clearly wasn’t thinking. At all. Adding to this momentary lapse, I didn’t even know where to run to. A castle, she had said, sure. I guessed it could not be that hard to find a… giant… massive… crystalline… wow.

Wooow.

Yeah. That.

This place was massive. I kind of forgot about the race and all that, slowed down to a trot and stared ahead. In the setting sun, it was quite a sight to behold. It freaking sparkled!

The closer I got to its doors, the more I grew suspicious, looking back over my shoulder. I was still fighting my aching muscles and was running on an empty stomach. As a unicorn, no less. Twilight, however, was nowhere to be seen. Either she had just scoffed at the idea of a race, or—

I returned my now-glare to the castle doors. She looked so smug, standing there, patiently waiting, and smiling at me. Cheeky little mare.

Sure. Little. I trotted up to her. “You cheated,” I accused her.

“I did no such thing,” she defended herself. “You did not specify any rules, which means you did not clarify any bans on, for example, teleportation. Or magic of any kind, for that matter.”

I knew that. She knew that. We stared each other down for a moment. It felt thrilling, intense… and then we both giggled. “You know, I should probably have thought of that,” I admitted, pointing to my horn. “But to be honest… I haven’t quite figured out how to use that darn thing yet.”

And there it was again. That passionate fire in her eyes. There was somepony she could teach. That was almost as good as learning and unraveling the mysteries of the universe. I chuckled a little more and we entered the castle. I immediately felt… lost.

It sure was a castle. Grand and open and… empty. Nice to look at, yeah, sure. Crystal floors and crystal walls and crystal columns supporting a crystal ceiling. I had a stupid joke about Sombra being her interior decorator on the tip of my tongue, but chose to swallow it down. She looked down the hallway dejectedly. Adding to that, Sombra could have been a risky topic. I did not know yet if he had already emerged, if they had defeated him already, if King Sombra was even a thing in this loop.

If he wasn’t, Princess Cadance and Shining Armor should be in Canterlot, right? And if he was, they should be in the Crystal Empire. Sometimes, random snippets like those drifted to the surface of the pond without much fanfare. I was grateful nonetheless, picked them up and stored them away for later. I was pretty sure that, Twilight being Twilight, this castle sported an impressive library. A single history book should be enough to find out if the Crystal Empire was a thing.

I let my eyes wander. No shelves. No books or pictures, framed or otherwise, no carpets, no nothing. It was empty, which only further increased this aura of emptiness and loneliness. She seemed to notice my first impression. “I am… I have not lived here for long, it is… a work in progress.” It was a weak excuse.

I just nodded. Come to think of it, I could not even know for sure if it was Lord Tirek who blew up the tree. Could have been anything else, really. Parasprites, Everfree monster, second changeling invasion… or would that have been the third? Ah. Who’s counting? Blasted bugs.

At least I knew for sure that this certainly was not a good topic for dinner discussion. And the mere thought of dinner instantly made my stomach rumble. Quite loudly. She giggled and began to walk again, calling for Spike. The little dragon came running; I heard his feet on the floor, tap tap tap tap tap, and then his head poked around a corner. He looked at Twilight with a wide smile, but then he noticed me and his brow raised a little. “Who’s that?”

Twilight stopped, looked back at me and after a moment of silence, a small smile graced her lips again. “His name is Dreamwalker. He’s a friend. He will stay with us for a while, so I would appreciate it if you could maybe prepare one of the guest rooms for him? After dinner?”

“Uh-huh. So… why’s he staying?” Well, wasn’t that inquisitive.

I just shrugged and tried to help Twilight out. “I might know fancy magic stuff she doesn’t, which drives her mad with envy, obviously, and in return she might teach me how to actually use my horn for more than opening cans, so that I learn to use and cast that fancy magic that she shamelessly wants to steal from me. Also, if you could maybe, please, make some of those awesome sandwiches you do, I’m sure Twilight won’t mind if you take one of the smaller rubies from her totally-secret Spike-reward-chest that she stores at the bottom of her dresser in her bedroom.” That should do it.

It was hard to restrain myself, to contain my mirth at how Twilight gaped at me when I ‘accused’ her of such vile behavior. And then she groaned in frustration while a very pleased, very happy looking Spike left no time to object and ran away chuckling, throwing back a giddy “Sure!”

I mean… I did say ‘please’, right? I walked over to Twilight, stood beside her and asked her wordlessly what was wrong.

“Why? How did you know where it was?” she groaned again. “How do you even know that there is a dresser?”

“Well… I mean… you have to store your dresses somewhere, right? Rarity would behead you, laughing maniacally, if you would dare to just throw them over a sofa or let them lie around on a bed or something barbaric like that.” I was pretty sure I was right. My description of a rampaging Rarity gave her pause for a moment, until she blinked those pictures away and once again seemed frustrated. With me. And/or what I had done. “I… uh… I’m sorry?”

“He had not figured it out yet,” she half-explained. There was a pregnant silence for a couple of seconds until she continued with the other half. “After moving in here, he did not know where I put it.”

“… oh.” I gave myself a little push, almost literally, and bumped my shoulder against hers, smiling at her when she looked at me. “I’m sorry. Really, I am. But you’re a smart cookie, I’m sure you’ll figure something out. And this place is massive enough to hide half of Ponyville, so it shouldn’t be too hard.”

Maybe my smile was infectious. I actually quite liked that idea. She smiled back at me, nodded and then proceeded to lead me to the… to a room. It was hard to give rooms names in here. On the way here, she explained a little bit about the castle, showed me several other rooms — an impressive number of unused guest rooms among them — and tried to come up with something, anything, to say about several of them. And she kind of, sort of... failed? I was not really surprised that some of these rooms were just empty space. She had some ideas what to fill some of those with, but her list of ‘rooms that could be useful to have’ was quite a bit shorter than the list of actually available rooms.

“Spike could be granted a comic book gallery, you know?” I tried to offer. She snorted at that, blushed a little while mumbling an excuse and then looked at me. Her brow raised itself as she noticed that I was being serious. “What? I mean, think about it. You don’t really know what to do with all these spare rooms anyway. Use them. Use them for something. Anything. Whatever comes to mind. Rarity needs a new showroom? Well, these crystals have an interesting way to interact with light, maybe she could work with that. Or offer Pinkie a new baking supply storage room. You know how much sugar she uses up in one week, right? A single room and she could have a years’ worth stored in here. Plus the added bonus that your friends would actually need to come by from time to time. Even if times are difficult, spare time is hard to come by, they’d be around every now and again. A few hectic minutes while running around like headless chicken are still more than nothing? And if you ever actually need those rooms… you could just empty them again. Seriously, I think it’d be a neat idea. If I were Spike, that is. Because, to be honest, I’m less into comic books and more into book-books.”

And once more, her eyes lit up. “You read?”

I chuckled again. “No, I just stare at letters until they offer me their wisdom out of fear that I might eat the book itself.”

Again she furrowed her brow in disdain for such a barbaric idea and weakly jabbed my shoulder. Still, I couldn't help but notice that she had an older brother. “Ow.”

“What do you read?” she continued her investigation.

“Weeeeeell…” And that kept us busy until dinner was ready and Spike called for us from… somewhere. But Twilight knew her way around this place, so everything was fine and I would not starve on my arduous journey. Obviously, I could not really name many titles. But I was surprised to find that I could, in fact, name some. That was more than I had expected. Which was less surprising was the realization that some of those books I had supposedly read I could name, but didn’t remember what they were actually about.

Twilight knew. Of course. And she was all too happy to tell me. Until we arrived at dinner and her smile grew into something more predatory and wicked and she leaned back, daintily nibbling at her sandwich and asked me in the sweetest voice to please explain to Spike how I knew her. And surely I knew him as well, did I not?

Cheeky little mare.

I could almost hear him vibrate in his seat. While I was loathe to admit that I forgot most of my table manners once food was served and I dug in like a pig would at its trough, the food was delicious and definitely worth the incoming torture. So — mouth full and chewing with the occasional appreciative hum — I dared to look at Spike and the floodgates immediately and enthusiastically swung open. Apparently, he was now convinced that I was a time traveler and could tell him all about the upcoming villains and his future great deeds and how he could woo somepony dear and special to him.

Right. I stood by my previous statement. Those were damn good sandwiches, worth this noble sacrifice.

“So, how would I go about… you know… impressing somepony?”

I sighed. Again. “Spike, that’s not… that’s not really how this works. Whenever I ‘remember’ something — and I use that term loosely here —, it’s more like… like my brain is flooded with a weird and often somewhat incomprehensible mixture of impressions. Smell grass, taste sugar, see a beautiful night sky and hear several voices from several memories that should’ve been divided by years of life. It’s more like… fractures of different lives flash before me. Heh. Flashes of insight, if you will. The name sounds kind of cool.”

It was a little disheartening to see his shoulders slump as his hope of an easy fix slowly drained away. “That… sounds like it really sucks.”

Blunt, but honest. “It does, sometimes. The smaller ones I don’t mind as much. They have kept coming every few minutes since Twi found me. But…” Should I really go on? I had already mentioned the smaller ones and I actually had one while we were discussing this. Things that had not happened quite yet, I was pretty sure. But then again, it was what I tried to do, was it not? Nudging my friends along. And Spike was a dear friend indeed. So I mustered my courage and soldiered on. “I’m trying not to be rude here, but there’s no… easy way of saying this. You’re young, Spike. Very much so. And dragons go on to live for thousands of years. They age quite slowly. I won’t tell you that she’s out of reach. Because quite frankly, I don’t even know myself if she is. However, there’s something I do know for a fact. You yourself have already been… noticed. There’s someone else vying for your heart, you’re just… laser-focused. You don’t see it.”

That made him pause for a moment. “Wait… what? Who is it?”

I chuckled to myself. “Yeah, no. That would be a little bit too easy, now. You’re a smart cookie. And most ponies don’t give you enough credit for how observant and mature you can be. I’m pretty sure you can figure that out on your own, given time. That is to say, if you even want to. I mean… opening up to that idea would mean accepting that maybe, just maybe, she isn’t the one any longer.”

As Spike fell silent and his face contorted in efforts to figure this riddle out, Twilight reentered the conversation and took it upon herself to continue her interrogation. Curiously enough, she asked me about her own adventures. Things she had done, things her friends had done. I could answer most of the time. I could even supply some interesting facts she herself did not know about. At some point, the sandwiches were gone. And the conversation slowed and dulled once again.

Spike took that as an opportunity to excuse himself, taking the empty dishes with him towards the kitchen. Twilight and I remained seated for now, waiting. Or rather, she was processing… stuff… and I was waiting for her. At some point a little later on, Spike emerged at the door once again, with a small ruby in his claw. “I’m going to bed…?” he asked cautiously. Twilight recognized that tone in his voice and looked him over, noting the gem.

But she did not go back on her word. Or mine, rather. She just smiled and nodded. “Have a good night, Spike.”

He grinned happily in return. “Good night!” And his head vanished. After just a couple of seconds, it returned. “And, uh… Dreamwalker?”

“Hm?” I just answered in a show of great eloquence.

“You’re cool. Good night.” I was a little nonplussed for just a second. Enough time for Spike to vanish again, chuckling to himself while holding his precious gem close. A tasty treat before bedtime. I sat there looking at the door and smiled. I was welcome here. Accepted by both, for the time being. And for a moment, I cautiously allowed myself to be… happy. Tired, but happy.

“Come on,” Twilight said after a moment. “We can make another pot of tea, take some cups and move to somewhere more comfortable.”

“Sounds lovely,” I admitted. “Right behind you.”

I called it the ‘living room’. For all intents and purposes, that is what it was used for. Officially, it was part of the castle’s library. She shot a magic bolt into the fireplace, which sparked to life and immediately gave off a pleasant warmth and light. We settled on a sofa nearby and with little effort, she took several dozen books off the shelves that lined the walls of this room. She sorted them into neat little piles on a table nearby and took two of them, giving one to me. For a moment, I just stared at the book in front of me. Right. Reading. I love that. So… how…?

I just shrugged and tried to take the levitating book with my hooves. If earth ponies could do it, then I should be able to as well, right? After some awkward fumbling around, I… held the book steady. And I realized: I would not be able to read like that. Of course I could put it down onto the sofa itself, open it up, turn pages with a hoof, that was all… possible. But her book still floated in midair and she would not have any problems reading like that. Because she used magic. I was a unicorn, was I not? Once again, I crossed my eyes to look at the protrusion of my horn. How does one use that thing?

It took me a while to notice how she observed my progress. She looked oddly worried.

“Mind if I check something?” she asked.

“Nah. Go ahead.” I did not know what she wanted to check. Or how. But I didn’t mind either way, because I simply trusted her. She smiled in understanding and cast something. Her horn glowed for a couple of minutes and her eyes darted about, following lines and waves and whatever it actually looked like for her. She was scanning me. Searching for something. Finally, when her horn dimmed down, she was not… well, she wasn’t worried anymore. But she looked so… apologetic?

“If you’re going to tell me that there’s Pegasus magic in me and I should’ve sported wings instead of a horn and I messed up this badly, seriously, I’m going to cry you a river. Just as a heads up.” I had tried to lighten the mood and judging by her small smile, it worked. Just not as good as I had hoped. So something really was up then. “Okay, shoot. What is it?”

“As far as I can tell, you are… uhm… one of the… weaker unicorns I encountered.” She hesitated while talking. That was always such a great sign.

“Okay. So… first off — you can tell that? I have to admit, that’s some fancy magic… that I’ve never heard of.” Really, I could not remember encountering something like that ever before. For some strange reason, she seemed to take it as a compliment and her chest swelled with pride. I did not mind.

“It is a spell I developed myself after my ascension. I wanted to know how my magic was affected. It measures how deep your magic reserves are, which spells should come easy to you, which ones you are going to struggle with or won’t be able to learn at all.” My little genius… That sounded smart. Really, really smart.

“Let me guess — there isn’t any spell you can’t learn, you have affinity for all of them and your reserves are as deep as the ocean, while the rest of us walk around with the equivalent of a puddle?” I was trying to tease her and it worked like a charm. However, I could not help but notice that apparently, at least some of my exaggeration was close to the truth.

“I am not as good with illusion and divination magic,” she admitted. Almost ashamed. Because Twilight was Twilight and in her head, it made total sense that the Element of Magic should probably ace each and every spell under the sun. Including the sun, come to think of it.

But it made sense to me, at least. Depending on how one went about things, illusion magic was somewhat dishonest. It meant tricking somepony’s senses. I could not imagine that she felt comfortable with that, and in turn, the magic reacted to her feelings. As magic did. Her ‘problem’ with divination magic, if one was to even call it that, was a little less obvious. Maybe because she just did not like being handed every answer and solution, preferring to work for it?

But the fact remained that she had said ‘as good’, meaning I was right. She basically aced all other areas. And had an ocean of energy to draw from. Lucky for me, I was not about to get envious over magical aptitude. I just wanted to know what was up. “Right, so… muddy puddle?” I could see how she considered her words carefully, so I smiled and pushed her a little. “You don’t have to walk on eggshells around me, you know? I can take it. I promise.”

After another short moment, she exhaled. “It is true, you do not have a lot of reserves to draw from. You seem to have an exceptional affinity for telekinesis, but that is a fairly simple, low-energy spell. Something most unicorn foals learn as their first spell ever. I do not… I don’t see any other affinity. But…”

While she stopped herself, I could almost hear the rest of her sentence. But a long list of spells I will never be able to learn. For a moment, that made my stomach churn. And then, it sank like a lead balloon, as I started to think about my name. She must have seen some part of that on my face as she hurried along. “But there is still some hope!” she pushed. “I wrote that spell, it only recognizes spells I could teach it.”

For a short moment, that actually worked. It meant that her analytical spell could not tell me about affinities for spells she did not know herself. Which might actually include all of the dream magic. Since there were no books or written records of studies or anything about that. But, it also meant that everything she had access to was out of the question. And she had access to the Royal Canterlot Archives. The biggest spell section in all of Equestria. Every spell that was ever brought to paper was in there, at least in copy.

Greeeaaat.

I did not feel like I was impaired or anything. Derpy was. And she was one of the loveliest, most kind-hearted mares I ever had the fortune to call my friend. I just suddenly felt… weak. And unsurprisingly, I did not like that. I felt like falling and I needed to center myself, steady my fraying nerves. So, I closed my eyes and started to mumble to myself. “Celestia, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

I took a deep breath and allowed myself a small, serene smile. When I opened my eyes again, Twilight was staring at me with the weirdest expression. An awkward smile, mixed in with curiosity and embarrassment. Of course she knew where this prayer was used. How it was used, and most importantly, by whom.

“I don’t drink,” I answered the unspoken question. “I mean… I suppose I do, but rarely and in moderation. It’s not about alcohol, you know? It’s about… life choices, I suppose. Always strive to be the best pony you can be. Reciting that helps me calm down. It’s like… when you use Cadance’s breathing technique. I attempted that once and immediately hyperventilated.” I had a good little laugh at the memory. “Tia taught me the prayer. It has worked just fine ever since.”

She seemed a little shocked by me calling a Princess of Equestria by a pet name, but she let it slide. Instead, she smiled again. This demure, pleasant smile full of warmth. I appreciated it. And then proceeded to rile her up, because that sounded like fun in my head. “So… are you going to teach me how to throw books after ponies now, or what?”

Slowly, her brow creeped up higher. “If you so much as attempt to throw a single book anywhere, I promise you that I will throw you out of a window!” she retorted sternly.

“Uh-huh.”

“We are in the third story. It’s a ways down.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I swear, if you—“

She stopped when she noticed my barely contained snickering. Before she aimed another punch at my shoulder, I held up a hoof in defense. “Alright, alright! I, Dreamwalker, hereby solemnly swear on the sun's warmth and the moon's beauty, that in the execution of this lesson, no book shall be harmed in any way!”

While my oath seemed to bring forth a mixed reaction of fast switching emotions, she did at least acknowledge my pledge to the safety of her beloved books and shook her head, smiling again. “Goof.”

“Now look who’s stepping low enough for name-calling!” I accused.

After a moment, we shared a smile. It felt familiar. It felt great.

Shortly after, we started our first and maybe only lesson. ‘Focus on what you want’, she said. ‘It will be easier’, she said. “Fly, you fools!” I laughingly yelled at the books, but they did not budge. Ungrateful little chumps, couldn’t appreciate a reference to one of the greatest epic adventure stories ever told.

My heart thumped in my chest when I noticed her laughing with me.

After what amounted to maybe an hour or two, I kind of had it down. I had a book floating before my eyes, and if I concentrated enough, I could lift a couple more. It was not so much about the effort — I could not even feel any drain of energy, to be honest. It was about coordination. I was just… just horrible at trying to do several things parallel. Moving all floating books back at once? Easy. Same direction, same distance, no problem. Moving one book left, one right, one up, all different directions, maybe even opening one up while moving it? Woah nelly, slow down there!

While I was casting away, she checked me out once again. Not like that though, sadly. Afterwards, she told me what she had found out. The whole ‘working different commands parallel’ was not any magical limitation. That was just me and my stupid head. Something that could be trained though, as she promised me. My ‘exceptional affinity’ for the spell was not a mystery any longer as well. I could not lift houses or stuff like that. It was exceptional because it cost me almost nothing to perform the spell. And given that relation, my muddy little puddle of magical energy became a vast ocean in its own right.

Not exactly the most helpful ocean, but an ocean nonetheless.

Levitating living things was a lot harder to do. Especially if those things were struggling against being levitated in the first place. I could lift Twilight. We tested it, with her volunteering. To be honest, it was her idea in the first place. As long as she held still, I felt the strain, but it did not bother me much. Once she started to struggle against it — just physically by weakly waving one leg around —, I could not hold her up for more than a couple of seconds. And once she used magic, I just didn’t stand any chance at all.

Given that holding a book and turning pages had been the entire goal we had in mind for this evening, that was fine for now. Still, it was good to know. I remembered myself being way more magically inclined and adept than I seemed to be now.

We sat down again, sipped our by now cold tea and enjoyed ourselves. We relished a good book as well as good company. And I was so indescribably relieved by that. It had taken me less than a day to go from that creepy stranger to someone she felt decently comfortable around. Me being magically inept might have contributed to that, but again: I did not mind.

We had taken a liking to the ‘weird magic stuff’-section for the evening. Searching for incidents near the Everfree Forest, or magical mishaps involving memory. Anything that could further clue us in as to where I came from, really. We did not find anything, but to be honest — I did not mind, either. I was just glad to see her smile from time to time. With the hours passing, she started to yawn and I followed suit. Finally, with the fire dimming lower and lower, she just leaned against me. “Twilight?” I whispered. No answer. Just her silent breathing and her barrel rising and falling in a slow, steady rhythm.

I loved having her against me. Feeling her warmth, her coat brushing against mine. But at the same time, I knew that this was not right. I could have stayed here. Indulged myself. But it was not right. So I sighed heavily and levitated her off the sofa. I was surprised that she did not immediately wake up from that. I looked back over my shoulder and considered just laying her across my back, but holding her aloft was not that hard to do right now. So I started to walk, held the distance between her and myself steady and brought her to her bedroom.

That had been the intention, anyway. Because the very moment I stepped hoof outside those doors, the epic odyssey of Dreamwalker the Lost began. Lady Luck had damned that poor soul to venture through endless crystal corridors for ten whole years for the affront of… hm. Not sure what I have done, really. Something bad, probably. I got lost immediately and several times over and finally found her bedroom with Spike's help. Because he was snoring.

I chuckled as I opened the door and pushed a floating Twilight in. She seemed content. Smiling even in her sleep. Spike seemed happy as well, nestled in his little bed. Snoring away without a care, with tiny splinters of ruby on his scaly lips.

I laid her down on her bed after successfully attempting a little bit of mental acrobatics. She floated over her bed and I managed to remove the blanket with my bare teeth before I put her down and draped the blanket over her. Then the room fell silent, aside from Spikes continued snoring. I just stood there. Smiling to myself, smiling at her, watching her wriggling into her blanket until she was comfortable, giving a content little sigh.

Then I realized what I was doing.

Somewhat-stranger, standing in her bedroom in the middle of the night, staring down at her while she was sleeping. Sweet Celestia, I'm a creeper, aren’t I? At least I had the decency to feel ashamed and with a heat in my cheeks and ears, I quickly and silently retreated from the room.

She did look cute though.

Now, standing in the middle of these wide, empty corridors, I found myself confronted with another problem. I did not know if Spike had actually prepared one of the guest rooms. Or if he did, which one. And where those were. Sooo… I once again started walking down the hallways, nosily opening each and every door as silently as I could manage. Until I found at least one of them and snuck inside.

A bed. Finally.

But before I was lying down, I aimed at the candle on the low dresser and… nothing happened. Right. Not my kind of magic. Seriously? I could not even light a freaking candle?

I swallowed the frustration down and moved over before the tall standing mirror. It was my first opportunity to get a good look at myself. I did not know what exactly I expected to see. Brown fur, slightly brighter brown mane, almost yellowish-brown eyes aaand… a star-strutted walkway that looked like a piece of night sky as a cutie mark. Apart from the cutie mark, I looked mind-numbingly boring. Like someone one could put in a crowd with three other ponies and on a first glance, others would swear that they had only seen those three.

Bland. Yeah, that was the right word. I looked bland.

Then again, I actually did not mind that. I was not short or big, pudgy or muscled, I was just normal. The normalest normal to ever normal. And I did not come off as threatening. Which, come to think of it, might have helped me with winning Twilight over in the first place. If a towering hulk like Big Mac would have done anything I had done today, things would have been quite different.

After my self-inspection, I walked over to the window and looked out at the moon. Luna had done a great job, the night sky looked stunning. “Have a good night, my Princess,” I whispered to nobody in particular, and went to bed.

For a couple of minutes. Then some more minutes. Then, maybe, half an hour. Until I gave up.

I was tired, sure, but I just could not sleep. So I once again got lost in the castle hallways until I found my way back to the living room. From there, I dared another adventure in an epic quest for the kitchen and started to rummage through the different cabinets and shelves. I did not want to make something quite yet, it was more about getting myself acquainted with how the kitchen was organized. I knew that Spike usually woke up way before Twilight did. He helped around the castle in many, many ways. Making breakfast was just one of those and I intended to make myself useful. Now as far as I knew, I wasn’t exactly a great cook. So I would leave warm meals to him. But breakfast? Surely I can manage breakfast, right?

After I thought I had gained the understanding I wanted, I returned to the main library. Twilight had sorted a dozen books out for reading and we had managed to conquer four of them. So I returned to reading until the sun rose. I was lucky that the fireplace still had some heat in it, so I could relight it. Otherwise, that would have been my, what, third castle-based adventure this evening?

“Baby, come on light my fire…” I grumbled to myself while settling in with a new book. Can’t even light a candle…

Day 2: Study Session

When the room got brighter by itself, I knew it was time. I closed the book, sorted it away in the ‘not helpful’-pile and made my way over to a window. Because dawn was spectacular. Usually I was kind of a night owl and would never see a sunrise, sleeping into the midday hours. But since sleep eluded me, this was an opportunity to behold a beautiful spectacle. “Good morning, Tia,” I mumbled when her sun dipped above the horizon in the east.

Once the sky took on its familiar light blue hue, I returned to the kitchen and busied myself with attempts to get breakfast ready. A bowl of cornflakes for Spike was not hard to get together. Grinding a bit of sapphire down to sprinkle it over the stuff was more of a challenge, but as I found out: Even unicorn hooves were quite sturdy. My next proud achievement was to make a second (and third) bowl and not mixing up which one was for Spike. Because I was pretty sure that Twilight would not appreciate sapphire dust in her cereal.

And finally, la piece de resistance… coffee.

I hated that stuff. Its acrid smell was awful, it tasted bitter and it made my heart race, and not in a good way. I tried it several times. Twilight asked me to. Luna almost demanded that I do. And to everypony’s horror, Pinkie had presented me with a whole pot at some point, revealing how she usually emptied an entire pot each morning. I remembered there had been attempts to say something along the lines of ‘well, that explains things’, but they quickly gave up on that. No, it did not. It was still Pinkie Pie and even an entire pot of black coffee did not explain Pinkie Pie.

I was deep in thought, trying to decipher which instance of me trying coffee came first and which one last, when I heard the cutest zombie in existence moan outside. I looked out the kitchen door and found Twilight shuffling her way forward, groaning and blinking occasionally. I chuckled. “Wow. You look like the life of the party,” I greeted her. She grumbled something unintelligible in reply.

Apparently, Spike hat accidentally slept in, because he immediately appeared behind her, low-key yelling about how he would have everything ready if she just gave him a second and hurried past Twilight into the kitchen. She did not even seem to notice much.

“You know… you looked so damn cute, lying on my side, I really considered letting you rest there. But seeing you now, I’m glad I dragged you off to bed. Sleeping on a couch is romantic and all, but the next morning, you’re going to feel that,” I teased. That got her attention and a slight blush. She really was not in any state to freak out over it, which played in my favor.

Then Spike reappeared from the kitchen. “Uh… breakfast… was already done?” he asked and looked between Twilight and me.

“Oh. Yeah. I tried to make myself useful. If I’m allowed to live here for a while, I thought that would be the least I could do. The coffee should be rather strong, though.” For a moment, they both considered me with looks I could not quite decipher, but then they both smiled and I just shrugged and told myself that apparently everything was fine.

We sat down for breakfast and Spike's entire face lit up with delight when he noticed the sapphire dust.

“So… you made breakfast,” Twilight stated while taking the fourth sip from her coffee.

“Yupp. Couldn’t quite sleep, so I kept on reading, but the letters blurred into one another and once the pages started to look like maws with inky teeth and the library was trying to devour me, I came to the conclusion that it would be best to pause for a moment and just—“ I stopped at Spikes unrestrained laughter. Hoping for an explanation, I looked over to Twilight, but her blush was so intense that it almost made her look like Cheerilee.

So, instead of pressing her for an answer, I simply waited until Spike reigned himself in and cocked an eyebrow questioningly. “You have the same ‘late night reading binge’-hallucinations,” he stated and started chuckling again.

I once again looked over to Twilight, but she did not deny it. She even hesitantly nodded after a moment. I chuckled. There was a short lull afterwards, but it was not uncomfortable. Just silence. We continued breakfast until our bowls were empty, the coffee was gone and Spike became more fidgety. “You look like you got plans,” I noted.

He nodded rather eagerly. “I want to go help Rarity,” he answered quickly.

With Rarity-things, I presumed. Probably a dress or another, maybe gemstone hunting again. So I just nodded. “Well… off you go?” In this household, I really should not be the one giving out any permission. For that exact reason, he looked to Twilight for confirmation before joyfully sprinting off. “Just remember to keep your eyes open,” I sent after him. I heard him stop somewhere in the hallway outside, and after a moment, he continued on his merry way.

“Will do,” came his muffled voice before the sounds of him running away resumed.

“And what, pray tell, are we two going to do, now that the little dragon is out and we have the entire castle to ourselves…?” I tried hard for what I had hoped was my best impression of ‘bedroom eyes’. She took her cup in her magic and swished it my way. Hard. Which meant that, expecting an onslaught of coffee, I held up my hooves and flailed around wildly. In turn, I lost my balance, fell from the stool I was sitting on and landed on my haunches with a thud. Obviously, there was not any coffee left in the pot to begin with. I knew that.

She held a hoof to her mouth, trying and failing to contain her mirth. Success, then. I was satisfied. I was unable to put into words how much fun it was to flirt with her, to tease her. Yet there was still no impulse to do more than that. But I buried that thought and just enjoyed myself. And her company, of course.

After cleaning up, we returned to the library. Books. Books. Booooooooooks. For today, to switch things up a little bit, we tried to research dream magic. We made several short breaks, mostly for tea so we reminded each other to drink enough throughout the day. We talked about interesting passages, discussed some weird or unnecessarily provocative opinions in those books and at the end of the day, we could show for ourselves: Three dead legs, red eyes, aching necks and one sprained ankle. We had gone through almost everything that promised as much as a hint and had landed in the esotericism part of the library. That truly spoke of desperation.

Of course there was more. There are always more books. But we had spent an entire day and had gotten nothing. Most research processes were not done in a day, as Twilight reminded me. But I already knew that. “You can’t tell me that you’re not at least a teensy bit frustrated anyway, right?” I asked, but she just smiled.

“Maybe we should just write to her,” Twilight mused.

I knew who she meant. And I did not quite feel comfortable with that. I could not tell why exactly, but involving Luna already…

I just popped into existence yesterday. I was kind of an intruder, was I not? How did that even work? Did one become a citizen of Equestria just by being in Equestria? Surely not. What then? Was being a Pony in Equestria enough? No, that could not be it either. That would have been way too racist. Did I have to have a house, then? What about homeless ponies? Maybe I had to be born in Equestria, but that opened up another can of worms.

“Nah,” I started my answer, “I don’t think that’s a good idea. First off, she’s a princess. Yes, yes, I know, so are you, but she’s more involved in state affairs, isn’t she? She’s probably busy and this isn’t exactly an emergency. We still have material to sort through. Maybe if we run into more dead ends. Adding to that…” I looked out the window. The sky had a pretty, rosy tint to it. “She’s probably still sleeping, right? Or in the middle of getting ready for Night Court. I wouldn’t want to be a bother.” I did not exactly feel great about manipulating her like that. And it would have been a different matter had it concerned Princess Celestia. But it did not, and my words fell on fertile soil. She was considering whether she would be bothering a busy princess.

“Come on,” I tried to push further. “We still have work to do.” I waggled a book in front of her nose like a carrot on a stick. She giggled and agreed to my proposition. We did not come far however, as Spike finally returned. With an impressive amount of cupcakes, courtesy of Pinkie Pie, who apparently was back from the Pie family rock farm. The mere presence of delectable treats made my stomach growl and reminded me of my missing dinner. Twilight's belly chimed in as well, so we both accepted the gift a little embarrassed and let Spike lecture us for a short while about how we could not just ‘forget eating’ because of books.

We both ‘hmmm’d and nodded and so forth, but once he went off to bed, we just shared a little look, grinned and dug in. The food was great, but… boooooks.

It was getting late again. By now, the ‘not useful’-pile had almost swallowed the entirety of the other pile and Twilight was once again yawning. This time, however, she did not just keel over and slump against me. I was almost a little bit disappointed. “We should head to bed.”

“Same one. Gotcha.” I was already cracking up internally at the mere expectation of how her face would look once my words registered.

“N-No…!” she stuttered embarrassed and actually hit the back of my head with a book. How rude…

“That poor book!” I remarked, at which point horror bloomed on her face and she feverishly searched it for any damages.

I was just laughing hard. I saw her swinging the book again, but she thought better of it last second and laid it down gently before tackling me. “That,” I remarked grinning, “was a stupid decision!” Because I knew all her weak spots. All. Of. Them.

I did not know what train of thought had made her tackle me, to be honest. Twilight never was all that touchy-feely with others; she preferred her private space and gave that to others in return. But I was glad she did tackle me. We rolled off the sofa, wrestled a short moment on the floor, choking on our laughter, until I just lost. She got lucky and had found one of my own ticklish spots and was trying to hone in on it, so I just lifted her off of me. And held her in levitation.

She still grinned wickedly, not struggling yet, but the threat of breaking free was written all over her face. “I surrender!” I blurted out between quick breaths.

She grinned triumphantly and nodded. “You better,” she threatened and I set her down on her hooves.

I followed her to her bedroom after that, walking side by side with her again. This time, I did not enter with her. I had no reason to, so I thought it would be weird if I attempted it. Instead, we stood in front of the door like on some kind of weird first date, which was quite hilarious in its own right. “Have a good night,” she said.

I hesitated for a moment, looking into her eyes, before I moved forward. I saw her tense up, but I did nothing other than embrace her. “Thank you,” I whispered. “And sleep tight.” She relaxed into the embrace and reciprocated it after a moment. Hugging her tightly, I felt… good. This was, as Fluttershy would have put it: Nice.

I let go of her, she went inside and I found a guest room. I did not know if it was the same one, a different one, it did not matter much. After half an hour of tossing and turning, I gave up again and went back to the library. There had to be some hint somewhere in here. I was not looking for a step by step tutorial on dream magic, though that would have been nice. I would have been fully satisfied with a little hint that I could present to Twilight, so she could use her super-librarian-powers to sniff out further knowledge about the matter.

Day 3: The Conspiracy

… aaand it was sunrise and I had nothing.

Well, not nothing-nothing. I had breakfast ready, once again.

It was only the second morning of me doing this, but Spike, always the business-savvy dragon, tried his best to negotiate with a zombie-Twilight about this. If I wanted to help out around the castle, surely I could be responsible for breakfast. And if he wasn’t responsible for breakfast any longer, surely he could be left to sleep in a little longer, right? Right?

I said nothing. I ate silently, breathed silently, and moved slowly, just so neither of these two got the idea to somehow involve me in that discussion.

It obviously led nowhere. Because him getting up this early was not about breakfast. Not really, anyway. It was about a structured day and discipline, but he was not all that keen on hearing this. So they had a little spat between siblings, before he harrumphed and gave up. It was for the best, I thought. She was right. I knew that. She knew that. I was quite convinced that even Spike knew that. But losing a spat never felt great.

There was a short, awkward silence until Spike gave a final huff, tried to reign in his frustration and disappointment and gave Twilight a short embrace. “I’m gonna go and help the CMC with some… stuff,” he proclaimed.

Twilight checked her mental list, then nodded. However, I could not help but notice that little, grass-green ribbon on one of his head fins. Stuff, eh? To be fair, with the cutie mark crusaders, one never knew what kind of catastrophe was to be expected next. One would be wise not to question it, too, as down that path lay only madness. Just like asking Pinkie Pie anything starting with ‘how’.

“Alright. But be back earlier than yesterday, you hear, young drake?” She ruffled his head fins and smiled.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” he mumbled, pressing against her a little more before running away.

He’s going to be fine, don’t worry.

When I heard the castle door close, I looked over to Twilight. I didn't know if she expected another jab or tease, but she shot me a warning glare. I just asked “Library?” But to my never-ending shock, she smiled and shook her head. “Not today. At least, not the entire day. I have to get some things in order, fetch some groceries, order new quills… you would be very welcome to accompany me, you know?”

I could not help myself. I loved her dearly and I wanted to spend more time with her, but the thought of going outside, out there…

I shrank back. I didn't even know why. Ponyville was great. Most of the folks in this town were wonderful ponies I knew and cherished. But at this time, I just could not bring myself to actually step outside. “It’s okay. I will be back later and we can still read the afternoon away.” I numbly nodded while we both stood up, cleaned the kitchen of any traces of breakfast and then she left.

I sat in the living room, staring blankly at a book, not reading a word. Instead, I was deep in thought. Analyzing my own behavior. I came to the temporary conclusion that I wanted to avoid social interaction as long as I did not exactly know who or how I was. I felt… incomplete. But the books in here would not give me a straight answer to that, now would they? In fact, they just simply could not.

Because of that, I found myself distracted. Walking around aimlessly. At one point, I stood in the middle of another nondescript crystal hallway and wondered how I got there. Or why. I randomly opened the nearest door and found what looked like a study of sorts. A heavy wooden desk with paperwork and ledgers. A couple of heavy chests, shelves lined with books and scrolls… it did not look private, though. No pictures. No art of any kind, really. From her reaction and the few words spoken about it, I knew that Twilight still felt alienated here. And this room, while certainly meant as a workspace, did not look like it had really been claimed by her. Did she even know it was here?

I was a nosy pony, apparently. A very nosy pony. Because I knew that I should not rummage through her stuff and yet… and yet. The drawers on the desk mostly contained writing supplies. Quills, inkwells, empty scrolls, wax, and her cutie mark as a seal, everything neat and organized. But I did not recognize Twilight’s organization in this. Some of the shelves contained actual paperwork. Old one, though. Tax laws and foreign treaties. Who owed what to whom, for generations past. I also found a really, really massive, leather-bound book. There was no title imprinted, so I opened it up. It turned out to be some sort of overview for the books stored in the Royal Canterlot Archive. That certainly explained why that thing was this heavy. Each book was named, with certain details given. I was mostly interested in the remarks about how certain books were locked away in areas with restricted access and could only be lent with direct and written permission of one of the Princesses. Of course I already knew that. Not only from my own memories, but from Twilight explicitly telling me this after our initial encounter and my mention of time travel.

She had remarked about lending more books from the Archives yesterday…

It was a novel idea, one which deserved more thought at some point. I closed the book and put it back to where it belonged, resuming to rummage through more of her presumably untouched and undiscovered stuff. Just a couple of minutes later, I found a neat stack of forms. It was not the first one, but this one caught my attention. I felt my ears stand at attention while my eyes trained themselves onto the text. It was about lending books. My gaze immediately drifted back to that heavy tome. Lending books, eh?

I curiously took one of the forms and read it more carefully. I did not know these things were standardized. Each form could be used to appeal for… no, wait. There were options. It was not just about lending.

With a simple mark at the very top, it could be used to appeal for copies.

I had to admit, the idea forming in my head felt really wicked. I did not know if I should feel elated or worried or downright frightened by what was brewing on the horizon. But things were in motion and I could not stop it, could not really stop myself. I remembered how sad she had looked, standing in that wide and high and empty hallway. I remembered her funny little stories about a very young Twilight and her greatest dream of living in a book fort. How she buried herself in the Archives when she was still enlisted at Celestias’ school. There were so many memories just raining down on me. But through it all, one did not budge — that sadness in her eyes when she tried to muster a smile. When we first set hoof into this castle and she tried to somehow wrestle up something good about her abode.

With that tome over there — the one that could be used to bludgeon a pony to death with three strikes or less — and these forms, the quills, the ink… sheesh, even her cutie mark wax seal was there. Wax included. It was as if this room laughed itself silly watching me slowly but inevitably fall for its irresistible temptation.

That did not mean that I was stupid. If I were to go through with this — and from the looks of it, there was no stopping it —, then I had to be smart about this. If Twilight got wind of it, she would stop me. No questions asked. And if I somehow messed this up, it would do more harm than good. From what I knew and had heard, Twilight had applied for certain copies for research projects before. So asking for more copies should not be that big of a deal. I just had to… not get greedy.

Sure. Easy.

In addition, I had no use for doubles. Twilight and Spike knew each and every title in this library, they did not have to reference any book and I doubted that there was one.

Spike.

Oh boy.

Admittedly, he would know what books were here already. And if I was smart enough about this, he would maybe even be able to distract Twilight for a while. And what was even more important, he cared for Twilight. I could not imagine that he had not noticed how awful she felt about the loss of the old library. This might be a chance. And what was a little bit of royal identity theft and forgery, right?

I knew Canterlot had dungeons. Very dusty, almost never used but still maintained dungeons.

I heard the front door close. Short-circuiting my brain, I grabbed the entire stack of forms, the massive tome and made for the entrance. Lady Luck be with me, I beseeched her, as this felt like it was out of my hooves now. Either Twilight came back and I would spill the beans about a room I had discovered and the idea I had, just so she could shut it down immediately - or it would be Spike and I would attempt to make him my accomplice.

Or, you know, maybe it was somepony wanting to lend a book.

Yeah. Sure. As if.

I found Spike running down the hallway. Welp. Here goes nothing. Though I hesitated for a moment. He looked a bit panicked. “Hey, Spike? Everything alright?” I asked in sudden worry.

He stopped dead in his tracks and stared at me for just a moment, and then relief showed on his face. Probably because I wasn’t Twilight. “Ehehehehe… yeah, I’m fine, it’s fine, really.”

“Uh-huh.”

We just looked at each other for a moment until he could not stand the silence anymore. “Ballistic experiments with semi-liquid matter,” he faithfully recited. “It sounded fun?”

Oh. “… oh.” I furrowed my brow. “Nopony got hurt?”

“No… no. It’s just a mess. A giant, sticky mess in the market square.”

He did seem to regret his involvement, and I was still the stranger, so I did not even think about lecturing him. Howeeever… he knew that he was in trouble once Twilight heard the news. And I needed an accomplice. “Tell you what… I will try to defend you before Twilight if you’re going to help me out with a stupid idea of my own. Sounds good?”

He was easy enough to read. He did like the idea of having some backup, especially if it were me, because for whatever reason, Twilight seemed to like me. This, probably, would mean that she would go easy on him. But as I had told him myself — he was a smart cookie and this did not sound like blackmail at all, nahhh. Obviously, he could just say ‘no’, but then again, I could just blurt out something about ballistic stuff… just on accident. So, looking rather doubtful, he raised an eyebrow. “So… what’s the idea?”

What was that saying? Hook, line and sinker? I was willing to wager that I got the hook in. It was a start.

Smiling to myself, I came closer, forms and book in tow. “Twilight is sad because this castle is a massive, empty, cold hole reminding her of how lovely and warm Golden Oaks was,” I stated plainly, then showed him the tome and the forms. While he was reading, his eyes getting bigger and bigger, I innocently asked: “… do you happen to know which books you guys already have in here, by chance?”

When he looked up at me, thinking a mile a second, I internally remarked: Line.

“So… you wanna get her… more books?” he asked, still full of doubt. Because that surely could not be the great idea that I had. And he was right.

“You don’t have enough shelves, the library is full — I know,” I admitted. “Buuut… bookshelves can be built. Quite quickly, I might add. And she did love her book fort, didn’t she?”

His eyes grew wide.

Sinker.

We had to return to the study quickly. We did not know how long we had until Twilight would return. While Spiked made a hastily written list of books, I was searching for another form I thought I had seen. It was some kind of universal craftsman order thingy… meant for when Twilight needed a new desk because of her latest rage-fit or something like that.

I stopped for a moment. Because Twilight was obviously prone to outbursts of rage, especially the desk-destroying kind…

I shook my head and resumed searching, finding it just a few seconds later. That should be enough. And once again, it only needed her seal of approval. Which I could use. Without her approval. Like a clerk would, I supposed. Or a personal as—

Don’t. He is already doing more than enough.

Time passed by with the two of us furiously scribbling away at forms, rarely speaking a word. “You’re going to be in so much trouble for that,” he remarked as he put down another list of book names.

“I know, I know… I just can’t help myself. I can’t stand to see her sad,” I sighed. "And I don't exactly hear you beseeching me to stop, either." He tried to remember all the books they had in Golden Oaks. The ones Twilight had wanted to read for a long time, but did not manage to find time for. The genres she liked. I supplied my own knowledge of that and we cross-referenced with the massive tome. Obviously, we did not even try to apply for any books marked as restricted. But everything other than that was fair game and I could write down dozens of titles in a single form. I explicitly forbid Spike from even so much as touching the forms themselves, though. I did not know for sure what divination magic could tell and did not want to incriminate him further than I already had.

Finally, with all forms used up — yeah, I didn’t get greedy at all — and thereby hundreds of books ordered, I put down the quill. Applying the wax seal took just a couple of minutes once the wax was warm and malleable and there we were, ready to… oh.

“Alright, that should do it. Now… uh… How do we… get them…”

Spike immediately started laughing. “Great plan!” he remarked and punched me against my shoulder. Curious. Twilight must have rubbed off on him. After a moment, though, he calmed down and looked me over once more. “You really like her?”

I smiled. Maybe grinned, even. “I love her, Spike. I… am being weird about it and I’m struggling with conflicting feelings, but I love her. I want to see her happy and I sincerely hope this might help. If not… I hope the food in Tia’s dungeons is half as good as yours, then I’ll at least survive in style.”

He chuckled again and breathed green flames all over the desk. In an instant, all the scrolls and forms and applications were gone. Luckily, we had cleared the workspace of other stuff so we could work properly, but now I was worried. “You really shouldn’t have done that,” I said with a frown.

I could not remember how exactly dragon fire worked. There were several kinds of fire a dragon could breathe and some of them had almost spell-like qualities. Spike used one of those to transport messages in an instant — that, I knew. It was obvious as well, because the surface of the desk wasn’t burned at all. Neither did the desk itself vanish, because it had not been fully engulfed by his flames. But I did not know how he made those scrolls pop up where they were intended to go. “Carpenter and Archive clerk, I guess?” I asked, still a little bit shocked.

He just nodded. “I love her too, you know?” he told me in a quiet, soft voice.

I just nodded. It took me several minutes to wrap my head around what had just happened. What I had just done. I really liked the idea of praying at that moment. “How… long will this take, what do you think?”

He put a claw to his chin and rubbed, humming to himself thoughtfully. “Stonewood usually works quite fast. It’s only early evening, so the order should reach him before he closes shop for today. He might prepare all the stuff to come in tomorrow, maybe? Then again, it’s a big order, he probably needs to call in his guys, so maybe a day more? If he has all the materials ready to go. As for the Archives…” He shrugged a little. “I dunno. Copying a regular old book is just a single spell, but we applied for, like… a lot.”

Once again, I nodded. And my stomach growled. That gave me an excuse to bring myself out of this stupor, at least. “We… should make dinner.” I stood up, immediately cringing due to all the aching muscles. Maybe a walk was in order, too.

We packed all the materials back onto the desk, then made our way to the kitchen and started cutting up some vegetables for a nice little salad, all the while talking about his little exploits with the CMCs. It was like watching a train crash. Just marginally less dangerous. One catastrophe followed by the next. Sometimes, even their attempts at hiding their disasters or making up for their disasters caused new ones. Listening to him was quite entertaining, but it somehow also imparted me with the feeling that for whatever reason, Lady Luck really had it out for these poor little souls.

“So,” I jumped in after another hilarious story, still grinning. “Where’s the ribbon coming from?”

Suddenly feeling self-conscious, he took a claw up to his head, feeling for the ribbon on his head fin. “It was a gift,” he replied.

“Uh-huh.” I just smiled while he started to fidget around with his claws. “Don’t worry, Spike. I’m not going to pry. Can’t tell you how Twilight will react, though… but I think you should be safe for another couple of weeks until she notices anything.” I could not help but chuckle as he appeared both relieved and horrified at the same time.

With both salad and dressing being ready, we waited for another half an hour or so until we decided that apparently, something had delayed Twilight's return and we just dug in. Salad should be eaten when fresh and I could easily make another one once she was actually here to eat it. Then again, as Spike remarked, there was a good chance that she already had eaten somewhere else.

We lounged in the library later on, Spike reading one of his comic books and I once again attempted to read one of the remaining books from the ‘might help’-pile.

Twilight returned what felt like hours later. Somewhere in the meantime, Spike had gone to bed. And she looked like she could just march on through to hers, as well. Happy, yes, but mostly tired and exhausted. “Want something to chew on? Literally?” I offered. She was not in any state to protest too much, so she just nodded and I made myself busy in the kitchen once more.

I returned with a small bowl of salad and levitated it over to her.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. So… ‘just some groceries’, eh?” I smiled and chose not to comment on the lack of bags. It was my way of asking what had happened and she understood, smiling to herself.

“Yes, well… I ran into Pinkie.” I snickered. Just a little bit. Pinks had a talent for utterly derailing any orderly laid out plans. “Then, somehow, Rainbow joined and for whatever reason, I got roped into helping them out with one of their pranks.” Right. Rainbow. Good addition. This mixture already sounded like disaster. No CMC-level yet, though. “And then, a rightfully furious Rarity chased us around town with a pair of shears.” I had all my hooves full, trying to contain my laughter. She chuckled lightly herself, her smile brightening all the while. “Then Applejack stopped us all before Pinkie could cartwheel into her market stand and tried to sort things out, with Fluttershy’s help no less…” D’aw. The whole gang came together. She was painting quite the lively day. It sounded like a ton of fun. “And then,” she continued, “a massive — and I mean massive — amount of jelly just dropped out of the sky. The entire marketplace was covered in it!” At this point in her recounting of the day's adventure, even she herself was laughing.

That does sound like ballistic experiments with half-solid matter, does it not?

“Everything was sticky and green and smelled like apples. I had a new idea for a clean-up spell, but… that… still needs some work.” That last sentence she almost mumbled to herself, blushing furiously. So I just presumed that she made a mess. Out of a mess that was already there, so… how bad could it really have been, right? It wasn’t like another ‘want it need it’-incident. Probably.

“Rarity?” I simply asked, still smiling so much that my cheeks started to ache.

“We collectively decided to go to the spa to get rid of the sticky mess. Applejack had to carry her on her back, because…”

“… she obviously fainted as soon as she realized what had happened,” I finished. She nodded and we both continued to giggle for a little bit. “Sounds like a great day,” I summarized. There was a distinct and notable tinge of nostalgia in my voice, one she apparently noticed as well. I missed my friends. As much as I had loved her story, I wanted to be part of that again.

For a moment, she seemed to struggle with herself, but then made some sort of decision and simply asked how my day had been. I was immediately thinking about Stonewood and the Archives and Spike and wanted to spill just about everything. It isn’t too late, you know? She could probably still stop this nonsense.

And remain sad. Yeah, thanks, ain’t gonna happen. We're going to see this through.

“I tried to find something in those books again, buuut… I came up empty-hoofed. I know, I know, I should be more patient.” It was not a lie, per se. I did read, and it did yield nothing.

She was too tired to question me further, so once she had finally bested her salad, I took the bowl to the kitchen, returned and levitated her to her hooves. “Off to bed you go,” I demanded.

“You’re not my mom!” she grumbled in return.

“No. No, I’m not. That would make that kiss infinitely more awkward.” The mere mention of that had her off-kilter again. She blushed, sputtered and finally gave up with a groan.

“You are awful.”

“Love you, too.” That red shade deepened a little further. “Now — you’re exhausted, you need sleep. Off you go!” I repeated. This time, she did not even try to fight me. She instead just shook her head, smiled and trotted off towards her bedroom.

And I turned around, sighed heavily and stared at those pesky books. “Tell me your secrets or I will have to break my promise to Twilight, and believe me — we both don’t want that…!” My threats were empty, of course. And the books perfectly knew that... of course. It was the only reasonable explanation as to why they still adamantly withheld their knowledge from me.

Day 4: A Relaxing Bath

The next morning almost felt like routine by now. Even though this was just… what? The fourth day?

Breakfast was ready, I smiled, she groaned, we ate. While doing so, Spike seemed rather enthusiastic again. “So, uh, is it alright if I shirk some of my duties again today? Because Pinkie told me about this new emerald cupcake recipe she came up with and being the only dragon around, she kinda needs me to taste-test it and—“

Twilight just leaned over and gave him a kiss on his forehead. “Don’t overstuff yourself and be back early enough to do your work. Other than that… have fun.”

He grinned, nodded and was off.

After her coffee was empty, she looked a lot more awake than before. And used her newfound perceptive skills to regard me with concern. “You are unwell,” she stated. I was about to disagree. She knew that, and pushed forward. “In the last couple of days, you have become more and more distracted. It is getting harder for you to concentrate. And those dark circles underneath your eyes are growing.”

I sighed. “Twilight, really — I appreciate the concern, but I’m fine.”

“No. No, you are not,” she said. Quieter. Earnest.

That made it a lot harder to object again. Harder, but not impossible. “I’m being serious. When I said the library wanted to eat me, I was just joking around. I can read just fine and so far, I haven’t cut myself into salad-suitable slices.” My attempts at lightening the mood were not quite appreciated this time, though. In an attempt to escape the oppressive silence, I stood up. I wanted to clean the dishes, but something did not quite feel right with my blood pressure. There was a sudden influx of vertigo and…

“Please do not lie to me,” she asked. Not only did she somehow manage to be even quieter than before, but it sounded so strangely far away, too.

Then I suddenly understood. “I’m falling…” I noted with some disconnect. Indeed, the world was once again sideways. I was pretty sure that I had blacked out for a couple of seconds. When I reopened my eyes, I stared into hers. I loved those pretty violet eyes so much. She held me in her magic. A strong, firm grip which somehow felt warm and soft at the same time. Familiar. Caring. Safe. It tickled my belly a little. At this moment, I wanted to just close my eyes and sleep sooo badly. But I couldn’t. I literally could not.

“Are you alright?” she asked and hurried over to me. I nodded. But she furrowed her brow and a slight blush of embarrassment returned. Until she asked, “When was the last time you… uhm… took a shower?”

Oh.

I wanted to die a little. Just shrivel in on myself and vanish from this existence. Right this instant, please! Shame burned hot in my cheeks and I felt it creep up to the tips of my ears, burning along my neck. I did not… I had not… I was left speechless. Defenseless. I heard myself mumbling excuse after excuse, most of them did not even make much sense to begin with, while she just… carried me along, with a little more distance than before, to one of the bathrooms.

I stopped rambling a minute or two after she had left me alone in this room. My knees were still weak. I looked around me and reasoned that, given my sorry state, a bath might actually do wonders. So I let the steaming hot water pour in, added some of those oily things Rarity always raved on about (and Twilight continuously received as gifts) and climbed in there. It was not burning hot, but it still felt uncomfortable initially. I thought I could actually feel all the grime wash away.

That. Was. Embarrassing.

However, with the steam rising, the hot water all around me and those last couple of days on my shoulders, I felt incredibly heavy. More tired than ever before. So I tried. I just closed my eyes and let myself sink. My head tilted forward, probably in expectation of a pillow or mattress. Instead I gracelessly face-planted into the water. Panicking immediately, I flailed about wildly, spraying waves of water everywhere in an attempt to not drown. Finally, I came to a rest at the edge of the tub, gasping for air and holding on for dear life.

That could have gone better.

I got out of the tub, drained the water and dried myself up with a towel as best as I could. Twilight had fancy spells for that, but… a towel would do for now.

I had no idea how long I had been in that bathtub. I had not noticed the water turning cold. But when I came into the living room, a simple look at the window told me that it was late. Very late. Middle of the night-late. Twilight sat on the sofa again, her muzzle buried in a romance novel — and she was sleeping. A change of pace was nice sometimes. A tea pot was standing on the nearby table, one mug full, the other one half full. Both cold by now, obviously. The tea had been cold for hours. There were a couple of halved sandwiches on a platter near the tea pot. No sign of Spike, so I could only presume that he was sleeping already.

I felt regret. I stood there, not daring to move or breathe for a couple of seconds and just regretted my own idiocy. She had been waiting for me. And I could not even tell her that I had slept. Because I just knew that I did not. I could feel it. I had been drowsy. In some kind of stupor, maybe.

Ahhh, but what did it matter now?

Dissatisfied with myself, I once again lifted her up and carried her towards her bedroom again. I put her down on her bed, covered her with her blanket and allowed myself a little moment. I leaned forward and gave her a chaste, brief kiss on her forehead. “Sleep well,” I whispered, brushed my cheek against hers and then remembered decorum and manners and all that stuff and left.

Back to the library.

I loved libraries. Really, I did. But this one… this one was testing my patience. It ate hours of my life without rewarding me anything in return. I was not used to that. And it did not feel great.

Day 5: Interior Redecoration

The next morning came with a slight change in our new routine. Spike did not oversleep this time, so he was up early and came into the kitchen while I was still preparing stuff. “Oh, hey, morning!”

“Good morning. Sorry that I missed you yesterday, I… uh… took a bath.” I still felt quite embarrassed and rubbed my neck with a hoof.

“Yeah, I heard. Lucky I got to you before Twi is up, though. I managed to talk to Stonewood yesterday. He said he was ready to start work today.” Going out for Pinkies gemstone cupcakes, coming back with useful information.

I smiled. “And that’s why you are the number one assistant!” I praised him. After a moment of thinking, I turned to him again. “So… I need your help again,” I started.

“Distraction?”

“Distraction.”

“Got it.”

I could not help but laugh a little and ruffled through his head fins. “You’re the best.”

When Twilight came down a short while after, we were already waiting for her. And almost immediately, Spike started his attack. While she was eating and still taking in her coffee, he began to list all his little triumphs and achievements and successfully completed tasks. Those that were not part of the daily routine package. Finally, she had enough of this list and addressed him. “Spike… what do you want?”

He grinned widely. “So you agree that I did really good as of late and deserve some—“

“You’re not getting more gems,” she interrupted. Although he seemed a little put off by that for just a couple of seconds, we all knew that his draconic greed needed to be carefully controlled, lest unfortunate things might happen. Again.

After a moment though, Spike regained his composure and started awkwardly fidgeting with his claws and avoided looking at Twilight. “So there’s this comic book store… in Canterlot… and they start selling a new line today, a week before everyone else, because the main artist was from Canterlot and they struck some deal or something…”

It took just a couple of seconds for Twilight's features to soften considerably. She glanced over to me for a moment, studying me, searching for any improvement of my condition. And while I had not slept per se, the bath did make me look a lot better than I had yesterday. “Will you be alright if I leave for a day trip?” she asked, still not having decided on anything.

“I know you’re worried because we haven’t made much progress yesterday. And I fainted. I guess that, too. But I’m feeling way better and I want to remind you of your own words. About patience when researching and stuff.” I did my best to muster an honest smile and hide how tired I still was.

It seemed to work for once. Thank Tia for that. “’Patience and stuff’, yes, that does sound exactly like something I would say,” she teased with a smile. She looked back to Spike, who mustered his best impression of puppy dog eyes, silently pleading with her. It really wasn’t fair. But that was what siblings were about, I guessed. “Fine.” Spike jumped up, elated about her decision, and simply stuck himself to her side. “Spike!” she tried to reprimand him. “I still need to… to do stuff and… this is not… helping…” She tried to pry him off, but she failed. She could obviously have just used her telekinesis, but she did not. Because this was part of sibling teasing or something, I presumed. And judging by how she grinned, it did not really bother her all that much.

Love and be loved.

I smiled. While she got her saddlebags and some bits, I cleaned the dishes and waited for them at the door. “Spike, I wish you good luck and I hope you get one!” I told him and then looked at Twilight. “Take care. And see you later.” I stepped closer and went in for another embrace and noticed with no small amount of satisfaction that she did not flinch. She just smiled and reciprocated it.

And hooo boy, was it high time. It took less than half an hour for Stonewood and his crew to arrive after Twilight and Spike had left.

The muscular earth pony was broadly built, pitch black with a stone-gray mane and curiously enough, two crossed pickaxes for a cutie mark. His ‘boys’, as he referred to them, were mostly earth ponies as well, but I did spot a couple of unicorns and a single pegasus. “Mister Stonewood, welcome!”

He raised a brow at me. “Mornin’, mister…?”

“Dreamwalker, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Princess Sparkle sadly won’t be joining us today, as she had to depart with an early train to Canterlot. Princess-business, I presume. However, I was instructed thoroughly on what to do.” I did my best ‘clerk’-impression. And to be fair, I thought I sounded pretty convincing — and it seemed to work. I was pretty sure that in any other town or city, be it Appleloosa, Manehattan or Canterlot, what I was doing just would not fly. At all. But this was Ponyville. These were good and honest folks, right? And it was not as if I was asking them to empty Twilight's library for me. He remained a little cautious because I was a face he had not seen before, of course. But my posture, how I spoke, how I offered him entrance with a warm smile… I convinced him.

Sweet, sweet success.

They brought in enough wooden planks that I was starting to ask myself if a little forest was being stuffed inside this castle. But I immediately had a very good feeling about this whole thing, because it smelled so fantastic! I did not know what kind of wood it was. Maybe oak? That would have been a nice bonus, but I had not thought about that when we wrote up those orders.

So, I gave them a tour of the castle. That I had gotten lost on numerous occasions in the last couple of days actually worked in my favor now. I instructed them where to place which shelf and they got to work immediately. I was almost astonished at how straightforward everything seemed.

Stonewood was the supervisor here. I knew that and I did not interfere if I was not asked a direct question. But, I thought that in my role as Twilights clerk, I should walk around and take a look over their shoulders, so to speak. They did not seem to mind at all.

And then, I smelled ozone. For a short moment, I panicked. Had something gone wrong? Had Twilight forgotten something and just returned? I knew she could do that. Teleport from Canterlot to Ponyville. Once per day. But then again she probably was not even in Canterlot yet. I carefully, slowly, quietly opened the door to the living room.

What I saw was both a relief and very, very troubling at the same time.

The Royal Canterlot Archive had started to deliver. Apparently. Piles of books and maps and scrolls and banners and-

Wait, banners? What the heck? “Mister Stonewood, if you would excuse me for a moment?”

“Sure, go on. We got this.”

I nodded in thanks and hurried inside the library. I had to dig through an ever-growing pile in the middle of the room, because it just kept coming. Several books, neatly stacked, with each teleport. Or scrolls. Or maps. Or banners. And a bunch of other stuff that was just weird. Like… there was a bust of Princess Celestia.

What. The. Heck?

I found a single scroll with a seal. It was not the seal of one of the Princesses, but that of the Archives. I broke the seal and started reading it immediately. Flowery language, something something, very surprised, yes yes, big order, hopefully everything is in order, yadda yadda…

Spike.

They addressed Spike. From what I could gather, at some point, somehow and without me noticing, he must have slipped a note in that pile he sent to the Archives. The writer of this letter tried to be formal, but there was a faint hint of something personal in there. No wonder — Twilight had practically lived in that library for a couple of years and so, too, had Spike. If they still employed the same librarian as they did back then, they probably knew each other quite well. And it would be really hard, especially for a librarian, to not like both Spike and Twilight.

So apparently he had asked for ‘some decoration’. Nothing specific, as the letter explicitly mentioned ‘making an educated guess’. And it included a little complaint about not having enough time to put something together.

I wanted to hug that little dragon. And strangle him. At the same time, preferably.

Alright. Fine. So this room was a lost cause. The books would just keep coming. As would the decorations, apparently. I would have to sort this out later. 'Later' sounded fine. It sounded like a future-Dreamwalker-problem.

Right now, I had to take care of Stonewood and his crew. So I returned outside and found everything to be in order. They were still working tirelessly, without any incident to speak of. Nice.

A few hours later, they were actually done. It had been quite the spectacle. Watching those new shelves come together, lining the walls. When he whistled, his ‘boys’ came, tools all packed up. “That would be it,” he remarked, taking one last look at his work and apparently being satisfied with what he saw.

“Thank you!” I offered. “Princess Twilight will surely appreciate your work for many years to come.” After just a couple of seconds, a horrifying thought creeped up on me. “What about payment?” I asked. I felt the color drain from my face.

However, Stonewood remained professional and just shrugged with a slightly raised eyebrow. “This fancy form of yours was quite clear on that. I’m going to send an invoice to the Royal Treasury and that’s that.”

Before I could actually start to panic, I found myself relieved. I nodded eagerly, maybe breaking character a little bit too much. But right now, I did not quite care as much as I probably should have. “Right, right… thank you. Again. For your work. And the shelves.” I realized that I was rambling, but I just could not stop talking. And judging by his look, he was starting to get a little creeped out.

“No problem. If you find any tools lying about, just send Spike over and I’m coming to fetch them. My regards to the Princess and have a nice day, mister Dreamwalker.” He nodded, turned and with him, his crew started to leave. When I closed those doors behind them, I took in a deep, deeeeep breath and exhaled slowly. They were gone. The shelves were in place. Step by step.

Time to tackle the next one.

I returned to the library and started by opening the window. The smell of ozone from so many teleportations had become quite heavy. But from the looks of it, it had stopped to add to the pile. By this point, it almost reached the roof of the room and stretched in all directions. But there was still a nice little walkway around it.

I started by removing all the decorations from the pile and sorted those to the side, building a smaller, second pile. Then I studied the massive amount of books. There was no way in Tartarus that I would be able to sort those in the time I had left. A quick look out the window — it was afternoon. Yeah. Not gonna happen. I had to get my sorry ass into gear.

So I grabbed as many books as my magic could carry and did what would immediately make every single true-hearted librarian faint in horror. I shoved them into shelves, with no regard to title, genre, color, size or any other method of sorting.

I really, really hoped that Twilight might actually have fun with this, though: Sorting and rearranging her library. She did it on a regular basis and I remembered that she once told me how she found peace doing it. Spike hated that and after all he had done to help me, I could not help but smile a little guiltily while shoving more and more books into random shelves. “Sorry, Spike… gotta do what I gotta do,” I mumbled.

It took longer than I had expected to just reduce that pile in the middle of the library to nothing. With the last books in place, I sorted through the secondary pile. I had seen those rugs in Canterlot Castle before. In the hallways, to be precise, so out there they went. The busts and smaller statues I shoved in with the books, breaking the monotony of some of those shelves. I actually had to chuckle a couple of times. Miniatures of Tia and Lu? Yeah, sure, I could understand that. But there was a small replica of Star Swirl's hat, staff and cape. A clay replica of chancellor Puddinghead's… head. It was just paraphernalia, I knew that, but those were nice little details.

And that left me with the banners. They were simple, but beautiful. Twilight's colors, with her cutie mark being the central aspect, but flanked by stylized depictions of Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. Someone had fashioned them a long time ago, letting them wait for this moment in some dusty closet — of that, I was sure. So I spent my next couple of minutes trying to find a toolbox. I was then trying to figure out how to fix a nail within the crystal without breaking said crystal and then realized that one single nail would never hold the quite impressive weight of those banners.

So in the end, I just pinned them to the sides of some of the shelves. With quite a lot of nails. It really was not perfect. But I did not dare to risk damaging the castle and what I had tried was not anything that could not be reversed. Getting a nail out of wood was easy. Restoring crystal? Not so much.

When I put that toolbox away again, I closed the closet door, turned around and sat down on my haunches. I felt exhausted. But at the same time, I noticed a growing tension. I was getting nervous. Everything was done. For better or worse, this was it. I would sink with this ship if that was indeed its destiny. All that remained was waiting for the only passenger’s approval. And I was horrible with metaphors.

I let my eyes wander along the walls of the hallway. The rugs helped break up the monotony, the bookshelves were imposingly tall and filled with knowledge and little winks to a history nerd who gushed over some dusty old ponies. It seemed perfect. And there was no singular library in this castle any longer. This castle was a library. It was the closest to becoming a book fort as it could get.

I wandered the hallways, not getting lost for once. The smell was unique, and enticing. Freshly worked wood had its own appeal, and it mixed with old books and ink. It smelled great. It smelled like home.

But my attempts at distracting myself started to fail more and more. I found myself arguing pros and cons of this whole endeavor, knowing that it was too late anyway. Finally, I just settled near the door and resigned myself to my fate of becoming a frazzled, nerve-wrecked mess by the time they got home.

Which was more or less exactly what happened.

They returned late. Not being in a room with a window, I did not know how late exactly, but it felt late. I heard Spikes excitedly babbling, muffled through the door, before I heard the door itself open up. The sound of hooves on crystal, then hooves on carpet, then… silence, until…

“What?” It was a simple, single word that Twilight uttered. She sounded more confused than anything else. I looked up and saw Spike gawking at the changes. Well. At least he seemed to be impressed. But he stood right beside Twilight and she… I could not get a proper read on her, but I would not let Spike take that fall for me. He was not to blame here. I had roped him into this whole mess!

“Before you start freaking out,” I pleaded, “please let me explain.” She nodded dumbfounded, her eyes flitting here and there, not able to focus on a single thing in particular. “I… thought it was a nice idea. Something to make you happy… or at least a little happier?” Nice idea. I should clarify. “It was my idea!” I added hastily. “Spike had nothing to do with—“ Please don’t lie to me. Damn it! “Okay, so, Spike helped a little, but really it was my idea and I basically blackmailed him into it. You were just so sad with this place and I could tell that you were missing the old tree and now it smells like tree and it’s basically a book fort now and look, they even had banners for you prepared and I think they had those lying around for weeks or months now and those aren’t the actual books from the Archives, just copies, but you need new forms for ordering those, as we, I mean I, used them all up and I forgot to close the library window again, because it smelled of ozone in there—“

Rambling. Couldn’t stop myself. Great.

“Listen, I… I’m really sorry. I just—“

That was becoming part of a routine, I felt. The world laid down sideways. However, this time, she did not kick me or punch me and I certainly did not faint. She tackled me to the ground. And she held me. And rubbed her damp cheek against mine. And her ragged breathing tickled my ear. I flicked it involuntarily, but as soon as I comprehended my situation, I hugged her as tightly as I could. And I held onto her for dear life.

It was embarrassing, really. How just a couple of hours had reduced me to Rarity-level dramatics. To be fair, what I had done was not exactly a ‘small change’. I suppose, if I actually had messed up badly, she would have been quite cross with me. Maybe some yelling would have been involved. A couple of days of a cold shoulder, even. But we would have figured it out. I was convinced that we would have figured something out. Together. Because Twilight did not abandon her friends, and neither did I. And while for me, it was set in stone that she was my friend, if not more, I believed that she saw me as her friend as well by now.

I took a deep, shuddering breath and tried to regain control. It was not easy, with Twilight being this close, her fresh tears still staining my coat and her pressing against me with such force. She calmed down. Slowly. As did I. And finally, we let each other go to disentangle your limbs.

“Thank you,” she whispered, still standing quite close, and pressed her lips to my cheek. It burned. And I loved it. And I wanted more. Suddenly, the urge was there. To tilt my head ever so slightly, and switch up her target from my cheek to my lips. But I controlled myself and just smiled.

“I’m just glad you like it.” As if on cue, somewhere in the background, one of those heavy banners ripped its nails out of the bookshelf and fell to the ground with a mighty clutter, eliciting a startled yelp from both of us. “Bucking banners,” I cursed. A second later, we both giggled quietly. It was a relief. I felt like a weight was lifted from my shoulders, my lungs, my heart, even my head seemed to clear up a bit. Enough to notice Spike’s immediately suspicious absence. But I did not comment on that until Twilight asked me if he really had helped. Squirming a bit and remembering her plea, I nodded. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it without him, actually. He loves you dearly, and when I presented an option of making you feel more at home in this place, making you feel more comfortable here… even if it was just a ‘chance’ of success, he basically jumped at it.”

Purple light engulfed her horn, she closed her eyes and a stream of active magic snaked away, down the hallway and around the corner. A couple of seconds later, an unsuccessfully wiggling young dragon was dragged through the air, back to us. “I didn’t do much really,” he tried.

“She likes it,” I interrupted his starting plea.

“She does?” he cautiously asked.

“She does,” Twilight answered and hugged him with all of her might.

Once again: Sweet, sweet success. Though I still felt like I was sweating buckets.

So, with Spike firmly planted on her back, I gave her a tour. I told her about Stonewood and his crew, how I might be seen as her clerk now and how I totally did not freak out when I entered the library and there was just this growing book monster. I showed her some of that paraphernalia and she immediately tore into it. Obviously. Star Swirl's hat was not long enough. His cape would have been too tight for his neck. Puddingheads nose was not that long. Yet while she listed all the imperfections, she did not stop smiling once. I recognized it. She knew these busts and statues and whatnot. She sounded like she had played that game before, maybe with a librarian of the Archives, maybe even with Princess Celestia — a game of ‘find all the mistakes’.

I did not mind. It was perfect. I knew that, because she told me so. Multiple times.

After the tour, we returned to the living room. I snuck sideways, finally closing that darn window I forgot about like five times already, while Twilight relit the fireplace and Spike vanished in the kitchen, shortly after returning with the explanation that he had started to make some tea when somepony had dragged him away for sudden cuddles.

We sat down, all three of us, and for a good while, we were just silent. It was comfortable. Then Spike spoke up, putting his emptied mug on the table. “I really don’t know why so many ponies like this stuff. It’s just herbs with water, it tastes… I dunno… bland.”

“Rarity likes tea,” I tried to tease.

“I know,” he replied and it almost sounded like he did not care all that much. That… took me by surprise. He looked down at his fidgeting claws and he did not seem entirely comfortable with saying anything ‘against’ his beloved, but he did not retract his statement either.

Good on you, buddy. It was a simple change. A small one. But even those could be important.

“Did you get your comic book?” I asked and offered a change of topic.

“Yeah. We had to wait in line for a couple of hours, though. Still, it was pretty great.” He mused a moment, then shook his head. “I’m heading to bed. You guys have fun, good night!”

“Good night, Spike,” Twilight answered quicker than me, so I just echoed her.

I watched him go, listened until his steps were not audible anymore and then looked at her. “Now. I have… prepared something.”

She looked up from her tea, first towards the door and then with a rising eyebrow towards me. “Did you now?”

I chuckled. “Uh-huh.” With my magic, I grabbed two books I had hidden beneath the sofa. She blushed a little when she read the title. “Supposedly, there’s, like, a single adult scene somewhere in there. I don’t think Spike knows what kind of book that is and I had a feeling you didn’t want him to learn about that. But, you know, it’s still relatively harmless and I thought we could read something fun for a change. I felt horrible when I found you last night, but you were reading this romance novel, right? Nice change of pace, so to speak? We can continue research tomorrow.”

After a moment of thought, she accepted my proposal and we started to read. I had grabbed the first Daring Do novel. I knew that I had read that one before. Multiple times, even. Probably in multiple loops. But I wondered if things changed inside the book as well. And honestly, my recollection of its contents were fuzzy at best anyway.

The next hour or two were quite comfortable. She once again leaned against me. Sometimes she chuckled and, when asked, read a paragraph to me. She had to give a little context first, of course. And she did it with this precious spark in her eyes. Oh how I loved her. But even though she was this close, I did not want to lean in and kiss her. The impulse was gone again. It was the first time that I considered that maybe, just maybe, it was more like… the love siblings shared? Was she like a sister to me now?

I buried my muzzle between her haunches, one last lick and the tremors started to rock her body…

No. Alright. That was… a clear no.

Not making any progress on that front, then. Fine. I once again decided to just leave it be for now. Once she started to get tired, she closed her book, laid her head on my shoulder and just watched the fire burn away merrily. And a couple of minutes later, she drifted off to sleep.

I probably should not have been as surprised as I was. She trusted me. She felt safe with me. I closed my own book, put it down on the table and once again started to lift her up. This time she reawakened, though. At least halfway. She still seemed drowsy and only partially there. “Your head… is in the noose…” she mumbled, sporting a warm smile for me.

“Is that so, huh?”

“Mhm… met Pinkie on our way home,” she continued to mumble. “She was sooo sad… her Pinkie Sense had told her somepony new was in town, but she could not find him…” I immediately knew where this was going and braced myself. “She looked like she was about to cry… I just… could not…”

I sighed. “It’s alright. I’ve been sort of hiding, haven't I? I should really stop that, it’s a bad habit.” She nodded. A little bit too eagerly as well, which made my magic strain a little bit. “Sooo… ‘welcome to Ponyville’-party it is?” I dared to ask.

“No… not quite. I managed to talk her out of it… for now. I, uh… might have compared you to Fluttershy? I made her promise not to go all out Pinkie on you immediately. But she is coming over tomorrow, though.” She watched me closely, even in her sleep-drunken state, while I was carrying her aloft towards her bedroom. I was not sure what she was searching for, but apparently she did not quite find it and that relieved her.

So. Pinkie. Tomorrow. I could expect a guest. That… was great. Right? I liked Pinkie. I loved Pinkie. She was like family. And I was still… incomplete. But hey — now I did not have much choice anymore and maybe that was for the best.

When we reached her room, she was asleep again. I put her to bed and once again left her room to return to the library, skimming through book after book, for hour after hour. I tried. With somewhat renewed vigor. I was glad Twilight had refrained from mentioning my sleep deprivation again. This was… what? The fifth night? Considering that, I was doing great. No hallucinations or health issues or other things I should have experienced by now.

The texts blurred again. And nervousness creeped along my spine all night. But I tried to power through anyway, because what else was there to do? I was looking forward to this visit as much as I was afraid of it. But maybe, juuust maybe, these books were helpful. And thereby, different from the others.

They were decidedly not.

Day 6: A Party for Four

I started to appreciate our new morning routine. It felt… homely. Spike came into the kitchen with a little “Morning!” and started to help me out as if it was the most natural thing ever. Sure, doing most of the kitchen work was what he did on most days, but working side by side with another pony…? I guessed Twilight was there with him on the odd occasion, though she was usually banned from the kitchen due to circumstances neither of them wanted to elaborate on.

Sometime later, Twilight emerged. Less zombified, this time. “Good morning!” she greeted us with a rather chipper tone.

We sat down and started to eat. I told her the incredible and unbelievable news of not finding anything useful. Again. Well — at least I could joke about it. We were still in the middle of breakfast when we heard some rather insistent knocking on the front door. “Spike, could you clean up, please?” Twilight asked him while she stood up and made her way towards the door.

I tried to reign in my own nerves and lend the little dragon a hoof. Twilight did not even reach the door when the insistent knocking occurred a second time. Somepony was up early and impatient. I had a feeling I knew who was waiting outside and really, it was one of Twilight's greater accomplishments that she was waiting outside. For just a short moment, I entertained the idea that it might have been Rainbow, but then I shook my head with a smile. She would have just crashed into the castle through one of the windows.

Once I heard hushed voices talking at the entrance, I put the plate down as well as the towel I had used to dry it and looked over to Spike. “You know… you might wanna take a step back,” I warned him with a weak chuckle, then focused my attention towards the kitchen door, closed my eyes in trust and opened my forelegs for a big old Pinkie hug. From what I remembered, they were rib-crushing, but soul-mending.

I heard a loud gasp and took that as my cue to take a deep, deep breath. One last chance to enjoy lungs full of air. Then, a sudden pink blur zipped past the kitchen door, stopped midway down the hall, zipped back and almost broke the poor door. She ran straight into my embrace and tackled me down. I could not help but laugh at her antics. After a second or two, I calmed down. I just relaxed into her crushing embrace and felt all those nerves from the last couple of hours melt away.

She felt familiar.

Pinkie was great at that, somehow. She appeared to be a bottomless fountain of bubbling, swirling, excited energy, yet somehow, she could always make me worry less. I squeezed my cheek against hers and enjoyed the closeness. Out of all of my friends, Pinkie was the well-rounded one, so to speak. She burned massive amounts of energy with just being herself each and every day, but her intake was even greater than that. Came with the profession, I supposed, being a baker and all that. But her being a bit pudgy was just lovely, it was an enhancement. It made her crushing hugs softer, more comfortable. For a short moment, I could not help but wonder: I knew Applejack could give well-meaning hugs like that. And she had the famous earth pony strength as well. But she did not have a single gram of fat to spare, she was all muscle. I just could not quite remember how her hugs felt, so I could not compare them.

After a moment, the warmth she radiated started to seep into my very bones. It threatened to lull me into a drowsy stupor and getting less reasonable, I started to slowly rub my neck alongside hers, all the while deeply inhaling the scent of her mane. She smelled like a bakery. Flour and honey and nuts and oven heat, hints of cinnamon and cherries, each stroke, each patch, yielding a different bouquet.

It was quite unlike Twilights. Living in a library, working as its caretaker, and continuously studying all that the world had to offer, she smelled like age and paper, with hints of metallic ink. I loved that smell as well, it was just… different.

I did not know how long that embrace lasted. Probably long, as Twilight at some point must have pulled herself together again, closed the front door, made her way into the kitchen, watched us for a moment until she became self-aware and felt awkward about it and finally gave a polite cough. I had not been willing to let go of my new pillow though, but Pinkie giggled into my mane. “That tickles,” she whispered and pulled back. I was almost disappointed. She sat up straight, pulled me onto my haunches and subjected me to a critical, intense stare as she inspected me thoroughly. She probably took note of my color composition, cutie mark, immediately apparent behavior, and noted everything down somewhere in her head. For future party planning reference. She then suddenly inhaled deeply, gave a quick gasp and started to talk. In that funny, endearing and utterly overwhelming way only Pinkie Pie could talk in. Without any pauses or breathing and at breakneck speed.

“Who are you? Where are you from? How old are you? When is your birthday? What’s your favorite color? What’s your favorite muffin? Or do you prefer cupcakes? Why is your mane all messy? What’s up with that cutie mark? Why didn’t you come to me when you first showed up here? How would you stop Twilight if she were to take over Equestria? Do you like balloons? What—“

“Pinkie.” It took just a single word from Twilight and Pinkie's mouth snapped shut. Although she started to slightly vibrate on the spot.

I had a good chuckle. Especially about Twilight's plans of world domination. Something my favorite book horse seemed a bit troubled about. “Alright, here we go,” I answered, took a deep breath myself — noting Pinkie's bright, wide smile and expectant giggle — and tried to uno reverse. “Hi, my name’s Dreamwalker, I have no idea where I’m from or how old I am, I just plopped into existence about a week ago on the edge of the Everfree; I do like a lot of colors, especially dark blues and grass green; I love cherry and don’t care if it’s in a cupcake or muffin, because both are tasty treats, especially made from my favorite baker Pinkie; I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in a while and was reading the whole night and kinda forgot to get to the bathroom… again; I have no idea what’s supposed to be weird about my cutie mark; I didn’t come to you because I didn’t know who I was at first and to be honest, I was kind of scared that I would mess it up with you, because you’re actually quite important to me and who says anything about stopping her? Oh, and… yes.”

I was wheezing at that point. My head felt unnaturally light, Twilight shot me worried glances again and I could not stop smiling. And Pinkie was happy. I loved to see that. Her grin had actually doubled in size, which should have been physically impossible, when I mentioned her as my favorite baker. And I had noticed, out of the corner of my eye, how utterly disturbed Twilight had looked for just a short moment when I apparently pledged my undying loyalty to her, even if she were to attempt a coup. So another success, then.

Pinkie then gasped quite suddenly. It had finally clicked, it seemed. “You knew I was going to tackle you!” she accused and immediately started to ramble on again. “How did you know? Are you from the future? Can you see the future? What number am I thinking of right now? Would you—“

She would not stop for quite some time, I knew that. One option would have been to just let her ramble on and on and on. At this point, she was used to a lot of ponies letting her talk, smiling to themselves, enjoying her antics but answering only a couple of questions instead of every single one of them. I would do that as well someday. But right now, I did not want to be one of those ponies. So, I just moved forward and embraced her again. Not exactly an entirely selfless act — hugging her felt great. She closed her mouth, snuggled against me and let me answer. “I know you, so I knew what to expect. I’m not from the future and I can’t see into it, so I have no idea what you’re thinking about right now. Sometimes, I get these weird mixtures of broken up memories, but everything is jumbled and distorted. I call it ‘flashes of insight’.”

“That sounds funny,” she noted.

Funny. Hrm. Not exactly what I was aiming for, but close enough.

Pinkie had always been more physical than most of the others. Hugging and touching and embracing, she experienced a lot in this world through touch. That sometimes led to misunderstandings or minor issues. Ponies like Fluttershy, Twilight and Rarity were a little more aware of personal space, and insistent on it being respected. Rainbow and Applejack leaned more on Pinkie's side, but were not quite as expressive as her.

We decided that further questioning could be postponed until we had made ourselves more comfortable in the living room. There, for the next hour or two, I answered as many questions as Pinkie could come up with. A bottomless well.

She was a little disappointed that I was not from the future or could read minds. But she was very interested in knowing just how good I knew her friends. We compared notes, so to speak. About distastes and favorites, routines and quirks — sometimes to Twilights dismay. I thought I had actually managed to impress Pinkie somewhat. Then I wrinkled my nose. “Hey, uh, Twilight? Where’s Spike?” I had not seen scale or fin of that little dragon since breakfast.

She giggled lightly. “Oh, he’s doing his chores. I told him what to do today while you two were… occupied. He’s making a list of the new books for future sorting reference…”

I thought about jumping in and defending my brave accomplice for a moment. Something she could read but chose not to comment on as she just slightly raised her eyebrow. I had to give up on that intention for now, though. It was a task that had to be done eventually and as far as ‘punishment’ went for going behind her back in such a major way, this was rather tame. So I just nodded.

“Enough talking!” Pinkie suddenly shouted and jumped up like a coiled spring. “We need to party!”

“Pinkie,” Twilight warned, “remember what we talked about. Small scale. Spike, Dreamwalker, you and me.” She looked over to me and smiled as I nodded gratefully.

Pinkie deflated just a tiny bit for a moment while her expression turned thoughtful, until she indeed seemed to remember such a conversation taking place. Her lips then immediately formed a hardened line of determination. She was not just any party pony. She was the party pony! She could work with this! Somehow. Obviously, knowing her, I fully believed in her. I nevertheless gave her a little push. “I suppose it would be quite a difficult challenge to make a party for four just as awesome and fantastic as one for forty…”

Her grin became almost predatory. “You’ll see!” she threatened, pulling her famous party cannon from her bouncy mane. Oh boy. We had just about enough time. I held my hooves to my ears and Twilight cast a quick dampening shield spell she had learned from her brother around her head. With a thunder, the cannon exploded and before we could see straight again, it had already vanished. Back into her mane, supposedly. What it left behind were streamers and confetti and balloons, pre-inflated apparently, and a massive banner hanging from the ceiling, reading ‘Welcome to Ponyville, Dreamwalker!’

I did not question any of it.

Down that road lies only madness.

I had this theory that, for fear of endangering Twilight, I really did not want to share with anypony. I suspected that Pinkie, by some sort of strange mishap, might actually be connected to chaos magic in just the same way Discord was. Her connection was obviously not as strong or deep. Same with me being a weak unicorn compared to Twilight. But her having access to chaos magic would actually explain sooo much about her weird quirks and behavior. We may never know…

Pinkie gasping again brought me back from the brink. “Quick, hiiide!” she yelled, then forcefully closed her eyes and started to count. I shared a short glance with Twilight; we both giggled and made our way out of the room to find decent hiding spots. We played several rounds of hide and seek, but the game was not ideal. One might think that the castle, being as massive as it was, would pose the biggest problem. One might be wrong, though.

I hid in a little cabinet under the kitchen sink. I had to work to somehow cram myself in there and close the cabinet doors. But, Pinkie being Pinkie, she yelled “Found you!” right beside me, appearing from the dark. This was physically impossible. As usual. Whenever Pinkie was searching, rounds tended to be on the very short side. Surprisingly, she found Spike last. And at that point, he did not even know that we were playing. Or rather, that he was playing as well.

It became even more of a mess once the tables turned. I had a lot of fun searching for Twilight and Spike, but not once did I find Pinkie. I always had to give up after a couple of minutes trying. One time, she hid in a potted plant. No, not in the pot. No, not behind the plant, either. In the plant. Seeing her step out made me laugh quite hard, but there was a barely noticeable undertone of ‘decidedly not healthy’.

So, once we were back in the living room and before we started the sixth round, I proposed to move on to the next game, with everyone being in favor of it. Twister it was.

Pinkie sometimes still had issues with being impossible, quite literally, but it was loads of fun anyway. Limbs twisting in all directions. Spike had the advantage of a very dexterous tail, but struggled with his shorter other limbs while Twilight was forbidden to use her magic after the second round. Pinkie used her tail and mane as extra appendages, which worked surprisingly well. And I… I just lost. Making good on what my bland appearance promised, I was normal in what I could do and I still felt bad for Spike somehow, so I sometimes might have lost on purpose just so he could live one twist longer.

After several rounds — I did not count them this time — we gave up and declared Pinkie the blushing winner. We brought out the board games, played pin the tail on the pony for a little while and in the afternoon, we had cake. Oh goodness gracious me, did we have cake. Not knowing what I preferred yet, Pinkie had opted to bring one slice for each of us… of everything they had in store. “I would’ve made more,” she explained remorsefully while shoving another entire slice into her mouth and somehow still speaking around it clearly. “But Misses Cake said that I shouldn’t use up all the ingredients and that maybe you wouldn’t like some of the flavors and that you probably couldn’t eat that much.”

I looked over the ocean of cake slices. Where had they even come from? “I… yeah, when you get the opportunity, please relay my gratitude. She’s quite right, this is… a lot. I don’t think we’ll need much dinner tonight.”

We wanted to spare Twilights and Spikes board games any sticky fates, so we busied ourselves with riddles and guessing games. This time, Pinkie's answers were rarely correct, but always funny. “Sooo… oatmeal?” I asked curiously.

“Yeppers,” she answered vigorously.

“Uh… how’s that relating to you helping Twilight win a singing contest again?” Before she could answer, I shook my head while chuckling. I had a devious idea at that moment. I looked down at the board we were currently playing on, then shared a pregnant look with Twilight and leaned against Pinkie. “Say… if you had to decide for just one favorite type of cupcake, what would that be?”

Admittedly, I felt a little guilty for sending her into such a frenzied panic. While she rattled on about her reasoning, I saw Twilight's horn softly glow and a couple of figurines on the board move around silently. I had Pinkies full and undivided attention until she, by chance, looked at the board and immediately noticed our meddling. “Aw! Cheaters!” she accused us, jumped to her hooves and… searched the room for the culprit, apparently? I barely contained my laughter, but once Twilight's façade broke, I followed suit. With a mighty war cry, Pinkie jumped on her friend and started a merciless tickle attack. Seeing Twilight writhe around beneath her friend, I laughed even harder. Just up until Pinkies intense stare hit me. Uh oh.

I tried to scurry away, but I wasn’t fast enough. Her mane whipped about and dragged me into the pony pile while her tail took hold of Spike and after a short while, the room was filled with exasperated yet merry laughter.

A couple of minutes later, we were lying down on our backs, shoulder to shoulder and just enjoyed breathing. Every now and then, one of us chuckled a bit, but mostly we just laid there. That is, until Twilight and Spike both yawned and thereby broke the moment. “It’s getting late,” she remarked and I found myself just nodding dumbly. After a moment, they got up.

“It was nice having you over, Pinkie,” Spike started and suddenly looked so much more tired than before. “But I’m off to bed now. Twilight, I’m going to finish that list tomorrow, if it’s alright with you.”

“It's fine, Spike, don’t worry.” She ruffled through his head fins and we watched him waddle off. Then she turned towards us. “I think I should be reasonable and follow him, though.” She hugged Pinkie again, mumbled a little thank you and offered her to stay in one of the guest rooms for the night and then left us to our own goodbyes.

However, something about this just did not quite sit right with me. Pinkie sat there and she looked tired. For Pinkie, at least. She still exuded this bubbling, barely contained energy, radiating it like the sun radiated light and heat. Ponyville was not massive. She would have to walk for an entire what? Ten minutes, maximum?

I was not entirely sure what the issue was, but I furrowed my brow and addressed it anyway. Rambling without a plan or idea had yielded some interesting results in the past, maybe that would help me out again. “You know… you could sleep with me,” I offered. After a moment, I blinked. Wait. What? “Sorry, that… came out weird. I meant it like… in the same bed as me? I’d like to try something. Maybe show you somethi—… this isn’t sounding less weird, is it?”

She still smiled happily, tilted her head lightly and after a moment of thought shook it from side to side. Right.

However, she was not embarrassed. Looking at her expression, I was not even sure if she had understood the potential implications. I knew from memory that she could be quite adept at innuendo herself, but right now, she seemed wholly innocent.

I should not have been surprised by that, of course. She probably was the most innocent of us all. Twilight studied everything that did not run away from her fast enough. At some point, she would have studied anatomy and breeding and whatnot. It was not exactly romantic, but she probably knew about stuff in theory — as per usual.

Rarity was always talking about her Prince Charming and I highly suspected that, even if by some weird miracle she did not have an impressive collection of naughty ‘romances’, she would at least have a vivid imagination, being the creative type and a healthy young mare with urges. A proper lady would never discuss such vile topics, of course — but she could dream. Then again, maybe her attitude to sex was not even that hostile. It was a normal part of life, after all.

Rainbow was cool. And twenty percent more awesome than anypony else, according to Scootaloo. Being a top-athlete, having a trained, sleek body, being this boisterous… with an attitude like that, she could draw a crowd, sure. Fans and groupies could be weird sometimes. I could not imagine that none had ever… propositioned her. Maybe she even had her fun now and again, I could not remember.

Applejack… was an Apple. Duh. She had her family. In all of Ponyville, she was probably the most reasonable, down-to-earth pony in existence. She saw things as they were and bluntly stated such. Maybe that had something to do with the whole Element of Honesty-thing, maybe it was just her. However, I could not imagine her sex life being all that active. She usually tended to outright bury herself below layers and layers of workload.

And then, there was Fluttershy. Everypony seemed to believe that this soft-spoken pegasus was innocence incarnate. And I just could not understand why. How one would come to think that. She was a caretaker. A mother, in a sense. For animals, no less. She cared for them, mended their wounds, tended to their illnesses, defended them if necessary, sure. But I could not imagine a bunch of snakes asking for permission before mating. Or for bunnies to even care about where they were doing it, or who was watching, as long as it was not a hungry predator. Fluttershy was all about nature… and breeding was one of the most natural things animals did. I was pretty sure she knew more than most of the other ponies about the topic, maybe even more than Twilight, seeing as she probably ‘only’ had theoretical knowledge to work with.

But Pinkie? She had been the Cakes’ apprentice for a long time. She was a baker. She made ponies happy by throwing parties, telling funny jokes, listening, being there for them, making them smile. Whatever it took. Maybe her family had ‘the talk’ with her at some point? Maybe she had asked the Cakes about where Pound and Pumpkin had come from? I just did not see a lot of opportunities for her to lose that innocence. And at this very moment, seeing how she looked at me, without any doubt or suspicion, just smiling and trusting. She knew about romance. How could she not, with Rarity as a friend and Hearts and Hooves day coming around each and every year.

A pink hoof knocked on my forehead. “Huh?”

“Are you back?” she asked with a grin.

“I was I gone?”

“Yepp. Spaced out. Sooo far away. You didn’t hear me.” It was just a statement, not a hint of accusation or hurt feelings.

“Oh. Sorry about that. What did you say?”

“You wanted to show me something. I wanna see it!” She seemed almost excited about the prospect. It made me chuckle silently.

“Alright. Let’s go, then.” I felt excited and led her through the hallways to one of the guest bedrooms. She went to the nearby bathroom and then climbed up onto the bed while I went to the bathroom myself and returned a short while after. She had already snuggled into her side of the bed by that point, taking half of the blanket for herself and leaving the other half unused for now. It would not have been hard to find another guest room, take a second blanket and—

But I did not want to.

She was silent, but awake. I stood before the bed, feeling self-aware and awkward. Moonlight illuminated the room. This moment felt precious. Rare was the occasion that she was this quiet. Slowly and cautiously, I moved up to her side. “You sure it’s okay?” I asked. When she nodded, I wriggled myself under the blanket and closer to her. She turned around and I pressed my barrel against her back, carefully moving a foreleg around her, holding her. For the second time that day, even if it was only a brief moment of indulgence, I allowed myself to enjoy that unique smell of her mane. A hint of peaches, this time, and caramel.

I did notice her tensing up as time passed by. She might have been innocent, sure, but she was not stupid. A healthy young mare in her own right, she probably started suspecting something. And I did not want her to get the wrong impression. So I raised my head, propped myself up a little and looked down to her. Noticing the shift behind, she turned onto her back and looked up in turn. She was beautiful. The moonlight reflected off of her cerulean eyes and made them appear as a much darker shade of blue. And right now, she was so very tired. And silent.

For just a moment, my mind ran away. It would be so easy to lean down and kiss her. There was so much trust in her eyes. If I would lead her, she would follow. Taking her first time. Enjoying all she had to offer. Maybe even taking things more seriously. Building something up, together with her? Starting our own family? Looking into her eyes, it all seemed so possible. Easy. Within reach. Just lean down. I would not even have to do it all the way. Judging by the look she gave me, maybe she was toying with similar thoughts? And all of it, all of these possibilities, felt... familiar. No concrete memories came forth, but I could feel them swirling around at the bottom of the muddy pond. I had gone down that path once.

But it was not about attraction. Or rather, not only about attraction.

Pinkie was, given her attitude and usual exuberance, surprisingly insecure. Always hiding behind a mask, in a way. At least hiding some parts of her own being away. At this moment, I realized what I had to do first. I did lean down, but aimed for her ear and whispered quietly. “Don’t doubt yourself,” I started to say what I thought she needed to hear. “You have so many friends who love you, care for you. For your well-being and your happiness just as much as you care for theirs. And I know for a fact that they won’t love you less if the party animal sometimes stops having fun, sometimes runs out of fumes, if you sometimes just want to be your quiet self, enjoying a bit of silence and respite. They will still be there. They will still care for you so very much. You are a wonderful pony, and you are not defined by your parties. You are gifted, Pinkie. You bring light and hope to other ponies’ lives. And you deserve somepony special who will let you rest and be yourself whenever you want, who will be there with you even when your own smile falters, who will be strong for you and will let you be strong for them. Somepony who loves you even more than just a friend.”

While I was softly talking, her quiet breathing hitched. The moonlight reflected off of increasingly watery eyes and like shooting stars, spilled tears ran along. Her sobbing was almost inaudible and broke my heart a little. But I did not falter. I still felt that this was right, that this was needed.

I gave her as long as she required to recompose herself at least a little bit. Once she had managed that, she looked back up at me again. “You mean it?” she asked.

“Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye,” I recited without issue from memory. There was the tiniest little smile on her lips, but it spoke of great strength. “I promised to show you something, didn’t I?”

When she nodded, I closed my eyes and concentrated. Please let it work, please let it work, please… this would be a great moment for it to work! I felt the faint sizzle as magical energies wreathed around my horn. It felt weird. Foreign, at first. It drew strength from my legs, along my flanks and barrel up my neck, my whole head prickled a little. And then, I lowered it and touched my horn to her forehead.

The last thing I remembered was my body slacking and my nostrils filling with a scent of orange peels and mustard, for some reason. And then, we were there.

'There' was an… interesting place. A pristine white emptiness that stretched in all directions as far as the eye could see. There were no walls, no floor, no ceiling, and no features of any kind. Pinkie was still there, though. She still seemed small. Quiet. And there were tear stains on her cheeks.

A larger flash of insight made me reel for a moment. I remembered. A dreamer’s appearance was a reflection of his self-perception. She knew she had cried, so it showed. If she would have cut herself, but did not notice, she would have appeared here without any trace of that cut.

“Where are we?” she asked without her usual exuberance. She did not appear to be frightened or disturbed. Maybe it was actually the best thing that could have happened. Starting this with her of all ponies.

“This is the dreamscape. It’s original, unshaped, raw appearance. Someone more skilled and prepared than I am right now could make it appear as something else. Usually, this place is filled to the brim with… hm…” I turned around searching. I found a single bubble behind me. It was thrice as big as I was and right now, it contained a distorted, slowly swirling gray mist. “Found it.”

Pinkie stepped up to my side, close enough that her coat was brushing against mine. I smiled at her. “What is it?” she asked.

“It’s a dream. That lazy gray in there tells you that, right now, the dreamer this dream belongs to isn’t actually asleep. Every dreamer has his own bubble. Under rare circumstances, they can even merge, although that’s only temporary. Shared dreams are a rarity.” At this point, I was not really answering her (potential) questions. I was just babbling on about the information from the last flash, stating facts I remembered the moment I successfully sorted them out. “If you’re careful, you can enter a dream. Change things, even. Talk to and interact with the dreamer. If he accepts you as part of his dream, which is usually his first inclination, then there’s only a small chance that he’ll remember details about the interaction after waking up. If you’re weird about it,” I started to chuckle quietly, “then he’ll probably remember. These bubbles can burst, too, if you’re not careful. Doing it from the outside is actually quite easy. The dreamer would just wake up. And create a new bubble the next time he sleeps. Ending a dream from the inside is a much more finicky task. It often requires proving to the dreamer the nature of his dream. That usually wakes them up, but it’s no guarantee.”

She nodded here and there, as if it were just another instance of Twilight lecturing her on something. “So… what about this one?”

I smiled. “It’s mine. This is quite a lucky find. I don’t know what happened here… as I told you, this place should be packed with dreams, but somehow, it’s empty right now. But for tonight, we only require this one, anyway.” I then started to carefully instruct her on what to do. “First, lay one of your front hooves on the bubble. Don’t worry — as long as you’re careful, nothing will happen. It should feel sticky. Once the bubbles' surface has a hold on you, lay your second front hoof on it as well. Then, slowly push forward. This dream is mine and you are quite welcome in it, so at some point it should start to pull you in.”

I had a sinking feeling that soon enough, I would have to deal with the other kind of dreams as well. The ones where I was not welcome at all. Instead of being sticky, their effects were more similar to two magnets repelling each other. One had to force oneself against it, but still remain careful not to burst the bubble, and then push into the dream. There were more problems with entering a dream uninvited, but I pushed those thoughts aside for now. I knew that distance and time were mere suggestions here and although I could not tell the flow of time, I did not want to waste any of it either.

So I demonstrated what I had said and she followed suit.

According to the sun in the west, it was late evening. Gnarled old trees stood around us like an angry but patiently waiting army. The Everfree Forest. In front of us was the rebuilt castle of the two pony sisters, with a small town all around it. I vaguely remembered this place. Greentail? Greenbark? Green-something. We will retake the Everfree Forest, we will cleanse it of Discord’s chaos magic and we will bring this land back into the fold of Equestria. Luna's voice. Right.

I shook my head. This had been another time, a different life.

Because of the waning daytime, the streets were getting emptied. Ponies vanished into their houses to spend another evening with their loved ones. That was actually the reason we were here. “Fly with me,” I told Pinkie and levitated off the ground. My horn did not glow with the wreath of magic, obviously. This was a dream. My dream. Much of the dreamscape's mechanics were tied to willpower, not magic as such. If I wanted to fly, I could — I just had to force my will upon this imagined reality. It was made infinitely easier, as this was my dream. Forcing my will into being within someone else’s dream was a battle of mental strength. Admittedly, the dreamer was usually at a disadvantage, only fighting with the might of his subconsciousness. It was less focused, not quite as smart and usually used a good amount of its power to sustain the dream itself.

Lucid dreamers were a problem, though…

I looked over to Pinkie. Once again, I was grateful that Lady Luck had brought her to me first. She had no problem accepting what I told her. She could fly? So she flew. We made our way across town and I saw her curiously looking down the entire time, scanning all the familiar looking ponies below us.

We landed on the outskirts of town. Ponyville was in that direction, but a couple of hours away. Instead, we landed before one mighty weeping willow. Because of the dense, lush canopy, it was hard to see the lights of the windows in its trunk. There was a home built within that tree, not unlike Golden Oaks, which had been used as a library. She stared in wonder at the massive tree, appreciating just how imposing it was. I gave her a moment before I politely coughed. “So… a couple of things before you go in there,” I started.

“You… you’re not coming with me?” Suddenly, she seemed uncertain again.

“No,” I answered and shook my head. “That would be… wrong, I think. It’s private. Quite intimate, too. Anyway, listen. This dream? It’s a little bit more than that. You might’ve noticed how some buildings seem blurred? Or how some ponies don’t have cutie marks, or… heh… proper faces? That’s because this is a memory. I tried to restore it as best as I could, but I can’t remember all the details. Most of it isn’t important anyway, but it would be more effort to go and cherry-pick what I want and what I don’t need than just… doing this.” I gestured to the town. I was sad for a moment. I would probably never see it again. Not this version of it, anyway. “What is in that tree is meant for you to see. Being a memory, they cannot see you if you don’t want them to. And if you want them to, remember that they are just reflections of my memories. There’s a Pinkie Pie in there. But she isn’t you, obviously. She’s the culmination of everything I know and remember about you and will behave as such. You understand that?”

It was adorable how she furrowed her brow in thought. After a moment, she nodded and slowly made her way towards the door. She stopped right in front of it, laying a hoof on the wood. “It feels so real,” she remarked.

I chuckled quietly and with no small amount of pride. “Yeah, it better. I was so shocked and impressed when Applejack grew that thing in a couple of seconds…” How had she done that, though? It was frustrating, knowing only parts of a story. At some point, I would have to come to terms with that.

Pinkie looked back, about to ask something, but then just went inside. Once that door closed behind her, my smile fell away from my face. I suddenly felt guilty all over again. Pinkie was such a fun pony to be around. She was sweet and caring and smart in her own weird way and I did not want to cause her to shed more tears. But I had sent her in there. And on some level, I knew that would hurt.

I stepped closer to the door myself, sitting down on my haunches beside it. And then I just… waited. This, my memory told me, was Pinkie’s and Fluttershy’s home. It had been for years. Somewhere in there was a shy little pegasus filly with a hot pink coat and sunflower-yellow mane. Whisper. They had named her Whisper.

After some time, Pinkie reemerged from ‘her’ home. Without speaking a word, she sat down beside me. I immediately shuffled a bit closer and pressed myself against her in an effort to comfort. Those trails on her cheeks her earlier tears had forged were damp again. I gave myself a moment to muster some courage and started to speak again, meanwhile looking out over the fields that sustained this town. “You know… there are many ponies that think of Fluttershy as being ‘weak’. But that’s just a shell. You know that. She’s skittish and easily embarrassed and prefers to be quiet, away from spotlight and attention. But if anyone or anything threatens those dear to her… they will learn of her inner strength. What enables her to stomp right up to an angry manticore. How she makes a fully grown dragon weep and cower. How she effortlessly fights alongside her more capable looking friends against armies and villains alike. But she only uses that strength when necessary. And let’s be honest, she fears her own capabilities.” Somepony should make her feel more comfortable with herself. Maybe coax her out of her shell every now and then.

“You… are different," I continued. "Your merriment is your shield. You wield it proudly, and you defend yourself with it if necessary. But if one were to actually look behind that shield: You’re sensitive. And vulnerable. The most innocent being I know.” If only somepony else would give you a safe space to be defenseless in…

I sighed and smiled. “When Whisper joined, it took the entirety of one week for her to become the CMCs newest club leader,” I stated.

She was sobbing quietly again. But a happy little smile graced her lips. After a moment, she laid her head on my shoulder, looking out over the fields with me. “Thank you,” she whispered.

I had no words for how much it meant to me, hearing that from her.

We sat there for some undefined amount of time. Dawn was coming, I could tell that much. The scenery was breaking apart. Houses vanished, ponies disappeared, the dream broke apart and we fell through the nonexistent floor into a dark void, waking up. That was quite a rude awakening, I really should work on that, I thought while falling.

Day 7: The Caretaker

Sunlight tickled my face. “Blergh…” I commented, drawing a faint giggle from below. Sometime throughout the night, Pinkie had turned around and apparently buried her face against my chest. Still holding her tightly, I laid my head upon hers and sighed, as happy as I could be.

“Thank you,” she remarked again. That giggle had somehow failed to make clear to me that she was awake. It made sense, though — the dream ended, I was here, so obviously, she was as well. She still sounded quiet. But this time, it did not feel like it was a bad thing.

“Don’t ever hide from me. Or the rest of our friends. Okay?” I was quiet myself, and tried to convey how serious this was to me.

“Mhm,” came her mumbled answer. She then raised her head and looked at me. That smile she gave me was honest to a fault and I loved it. And I loved her. And I slowly began to realize that, for the first time in ever, I had managed to sleep. Sort of. That was great, it really was, but the implications of that—

—were utterly lost on me when she leaned in and pressed her lips to mine.

I was not sure what I was thinking. Nothing, probably. Something stupid, maybe. It just felt so nice. Of course, I at least recognized the kind of kiss I was receiving. No desire at all. It was chaste. Grateful. I had to exert no small amount of willpower to control myself, to avoid deepening it while some of my memories lashed out against those restraints. One last time, I allowed my fantasy to run wild. What would a relationship with Pinkie look like? It sounded exciting. Thrilling. Someone with so much energy and curiosity probably had an endless supply of interesting ideas for all branches of life…

When she broke the kiss, I felt the heat radiating from my cheeks. And they hurt. Because of all that smiling I did. And my heart was pounding wildly against my chest.

After just a couple of seconds, a wild grin appeared on her face. One that very much marked the end of vulnerable Pinkie, and her inevitable return to 'normal' Pinkie. Oh boy, brace yourself…

She jumped. With the blanket still wrapped around us, lying on her side, entangled in my limbs, she somehow nevertheless jumped. Straight into the air, defying gravity by somehow hovering there, and simply stating that we’d be getting pancakes for breakfast. After her announcement, an indistinct pink blur zipped out of the room and left me alone on the bed, with a falling blanket. I chuckled to myself. I had helped... right? I had made things better for her, right?

I allowed myself another moment or two, lazily lying around. My head had not felt this clear for quite some time.

It took me a couple of minutes to disentangle myself from the blanket, sorting the bed out, getting in and out of the bathroom, walking down the hallway to the kitchen…

It took Pinkie a couple of minutes to make a banquet. The entire table was filled to the brim, no space left. Our plates were empty — for now. But the rest was not. Cornflakes, pancakes, waffles, salad, tea pot, coffee pot, apple juice… pot?... syrup, honey, a small collection of bowls containing different gemstones, grinded down into a fine powder, and a hefty helping of scrambled eggs. I was actually surprised that there was no cake.

“Cake isn’t for breakfast, silly!” Pinkie greeted me, bouncing along the table and sitting down in her own chair. Right. Mind reading. Or just… face-reading. Who could tell with Pinkie?

I sat down next to her. My idea was to wait for Spike and Twilight, but for whatever reason, I took the opportunity to lean over to her and nuzzle her neck for a moment. “Thank you,” I mumbled and withdrew while she giggled and commented on being ticklish.

I was so glad when Spike showed up that very instance. “Morning, Spike!” I hastily greeted him.

He grumbled something under his breath, at which point I slightly raised an eyebrow and he sighed. “Heaven’s gates have closed again,” he mumbled a little bit louder.

“Eh?” I was eloquent as always.

He shook his head and held an unfinished book list up. I honestly didn't quite understand his point. He was up early, yes, continuing his chores from the day before… so… what?

“Don’t be silly, silly!” Pinkie chimed in. “Those gates don’t close, ever. You just gotta turn around again!”

He looked at her, understandably confused, but she did not explain any further and just nudged the gemstone bowls. I could not tell if that was supposed to contribute to her explanation or not, but his eyes lit up anyway and he hurried to sit down, eagerly waiting for Twilight. She came in shortly after, less zombified but still quite drowsy.

At that point, we dug in. And given her unique ability to speak in a manner others could understand while still shoveling food into her mouth, Pinkie was the one carrying the breakfast conversation. She told Spike aaall about her new gemstone baking ideas and how funny dreams worked and how her Pinkie Sense had warned her to warn him that the small Luna-bust might fall on top of him and then… I remembered something. “Hey, Pinks? Since you seem to have a free day, wanna do something? Maybe no party games today, but we could—“

I stopped myself as I saw her look go blank. We heard an audible tick, tick, tick from somewhere and then a ringing clock. I was sure it came from her mane.

“I’m laaate!” she yelled at the top of her lungs. My ears splayed flat against my skull, as did Twilight's, while Spike just cringed. Hard. A fraction of a second later, a pink blur zipped out of the kitchen. I thought she had wished us a nice day or something, but she had once again spoken too fast. Spike and I stared at the door while Twilight, in her current state and being used to Pinkie, didn’t even so much as blink.

“Riiight,” Spike started with a shrug and aimed with his fork for those pancakes left on Pinkie's plate. “… that happened.”

Just as the tip of his fork was about to make contact, a pink blur zipped back in, devoured the pancakes, left a muffin sprinkled with smoky quartz on his plate and zipped back out.

Yeah. This was normal. I smiled warmly.

While Spike was happily gnawing away at his muffin and Twilight, holding her mug of coffee close, was still unflappable, I found myself thinking about my own plans. Meeting, helping and reconnecting with Pinkie had been great. But, it also forced me to accelerate my plans, at least partially. I had nudged Pinkie and that was all well and good, and maybe that would even be enough. But I was not about to actually take that risk if it was unnecessary and doing something about it meant so little effort on my part. I concluded that meddling a little bit more as a preemptive measure was in order.

With new ideas forming in the back of my mind, I looked over to Twilight and broke the comfortable silence. “I slept.” It was a simple statement, yet it encouraged a warm, almost relieved smile from her.

“That is great to hear!” she told me. And yet, after just a short moment, her look became decidedly more worried again. “However… what you have gone through in those first days is a serious reason for concern. It is not healthy. According to Pony Psychology 101, your mental—“

She was about to lecture me. Probably about how I should take this more seriously. How I should see a doctor. Or that we should write Princess Luna after all. And I was having none of it! “I did it, Twilight.”

My rude interruption clearly upset her. Especially because she knew for a fact that it was a ruse, meant to distract her and allow me to get rid of a serious and uncomfortable topic. I could almost see that inner turmoil. She liked me, which made my heart all warm and fuzzy, and she cared about my well-being. But I promised knowledge if she were to drop her lecture. This time, I did not even feel any guilt. Curiosity would win out. It usually did. And I was not disappointed this time.

Of course she already knew what ‘it’ was, considering her smarts and the fact that it was one of two research projects. Adding to that, it was the only one I actually had any real investment in myself and things were rather obvious.

She sighed and in a puff of purple magic, an empty scroll, ink and a quill appeared, floating in midair. She did not have to ask, she just looked and I nodded and started retelling the events of the previous evening. There were certain details I omitted. Because they were not relevant for our research, I hoped, and I really did not want to drag Pinkies issues out into the open. Instead, I focused more on the dreamscape, how I got there, what I found there, how it worked, what that latest flash of insight had taught me, what I could tell her about dream magic and its mechanics…

Her quill scratched along the parchment furiously and several times, new scrolls appeared out of nowhere. “And all I really had to do was sleep with her,” I finished with a chuckle.

It took me a couple of seconds to realize how dense and awkward the atmosphere suddenly felt.

Before things could escalate, I held up my hooves. “Shoot, that came out wrong, sorry. I did that with Pinkie last night as well, so weird. I just can't stop running my mouth sometimes. Anyway, what I meant was: I had to be close to her. Sleep by her side, in the same bed. I don’t know if I can do it any other way… yet… but I had to charge my horn and touch her head with it.”

Twilight's intense blush receded only slowly and she mumbled something under her breath that I could not quite make out. I was sure that she would refrain from repeating it louder if asked.

While Twilight had all but forgotten her breakfast plate, focusing entirely on her research and was very much ‘in the zone’, Spike had stolen a couple of pancakes from her plate and then started to clean up.

I looked out the window, noting the sun's position in the sky. “Listen, Twi… as much as I’d love to continue this discussion, I kind of started something yesterday and I really should see to it that it finishes smoothly. So I gotta go and do something, but I’ll be back later and we can talk some more, okay?”

She looked a little bit disappointed for a brief moment and then furrowed her brow. “What is it? Maybe I can help?”

Of course she would offer help. But I just had to get Fluttershy… hm. Technically, I was still a guest. Guests did not go around inviting more guests. “Would you mind if I brought Fluttershy over? For… uh… a sleepover, sort of?”

For a short moment, she looked at her notes. I could see the gears turning and when she looked back, she nodded vigorously. “That would actually be great!”

Right. No ulterior motives at all. I could maybe sleep another night. I could maybe gather more information about my dream magic. I could maybe help another one of her friends with an issue I did not disclose when talking about my experience with Pinkie. There were a couple of possibilities and while I knew that Twilight was not manipulative at all, I also knew that she tended to see all the possible benefits (and downsides, for that matter) of any decision. Because she actively searched for them. This kind of foresight had probably rubbed off from Tia.

It was not important, I told myself. She had agreed to my request, so I better got going then.

“So, Spike, how is that list coming along?” I heard her ask while trotting to the doors. Her question was followed by a muffled groan and once I closed the doors behind me, I thought I had even heard him giggle. Standing outside on the castle stairs, I needed a moment.

Goodness gracious me, this was bright. I preferred moonlight, but I could not argue that the sun was just warmer. Thinking back, I had been cooped up in the castle for almost a week. Heh. Maybe I was Twilight's long-lost second brother. I quickly shoved that thought out of my mind.

I vaguely knew where Fluttershy’s cottage was, which meant crossing the market square of Ponyville again. This time, thanks to Pinkie reducing my anxiety by a lot, I did not dread it. I lazily trotted along the path and let that familiarity with this town seep into my bones once again. I just had to smile. And great each and every pony I met and recognized. A nod here, a little wave there, a smile, a simple ‘good morning!’ They did not even know me yet and they still were so welcoming.

I'm home.

When I arrived at the market square, I stopped for a moment and took it all in. It felt almost as if several of my memories laid themselves over what I could see, so I had the best opportunity to compare earlier loops with this one. It was almost the same in each and every one of them. Funny.

I noticed Applejack tending to her stall. She had just finished another transaction with a customer and our eyes met for a moment. My smile grew a little bit wider, I nodded with an excited flutter in my heart and that only grew more fluttery when she tipped her hat to me as a greeting. She did not know yet that she was on my list. Sooooon, I ominously promised her without any word spoken.

I chuckled to myself as I walked on. But my direction was inevitably putting a damper on my mood. I really tried very hard to keep my spirits high, but I failed miserably. It had not been long until I reached what was left of the Golden Oaks library at the heart of town. It was a charred mess. Tirek, I thought. Probably, anyway. This mighty corpse was a dark memorial that even in sunny Equestria things could go badly. And if they did, it actually was bad. I carefully stepped a little bit closer, almost into the ruin. There was another pony here. I walked up to her side. Seeing the tree like this almost broke my heart.

“This had been a home,” I whispered. “Full of memories… happy ones, sad ones, weird ones, funny ones…” I miss this place. I had wanted to say it, but I could not. I was choking on my words. When I noticed my eyes filling up, I raised my head and tried to blink the tears away before they could have any funny ideas.

I felt her watching me. Carefully, maybe even cautiously. It was a similar analytical stare I was used to by Twilight. “You knew this place?”

I nodded once I had recomposed myself. “Yeah. It had been great.” I looked to the side, finally taking stock of who I was actually talking to. It was only fair, since she had done the same without shame or care. A pegasus, I noted. Soft lilac eyes. Her pristine white coat could almost rival Rarity’s. Blonde mane and tail, decorated with orange ribbons. Her cutie mark tried hard to make me think of her as an artist. It was one of those theater masks with the creepy eye-, nose- and mouth-holes and a flat smile. But a bright light was shining through those holes. It was a nice cutie mark. On a nice flank, too.

See something you like?

No. That had been a different time. And a different pony. Actually, I could not remember seeing her. At all. Ever. After a moment, I was pulled out of my thoughts when I heard her laughing quietly. A high, clear laugh, like a bell or a mountain stream dabbling along. It was a pretty sound and carried a certain playfulness I had not expected.

“Sorry,” I mumbled and tore my eyes off her flank. At least I had the decency to blush.

“Do not worry about it. It appears to be an effect I sometimes have on other ponies,” she good-naturedly joked. My eyes drifted back to the ruin before us, and her glance followed mine. “It is a shame,” she said.

I nodded. And had to think back about how inconsolable Fluttershy had been for a while. “Most ponies forget about it, or don’t even think about it, but… a life was lost that day. This tree was old. But still strong and full of life. Filled with paraphernalia, pictures. And love. And security. Anger and frustration, laughter and relief…” I sighed again. It hurt.

When I tore myself away from this sight, she gave me a small, sad smile. “I’m Sunny. Sunny Skies.”

I could not help but chuckle quietly. And for a moment, it seemed like she was considering being offended. “No, please… don’t get me wrong. It’s a beautiful name for a beautiful mare. It’s just… with a name like that, it must be extra-hard to… you know. Ever feel down. Or caged. It’s like your name is trying to force you to always be upbeat and chipper. Makes it actually a good thing, seeing you here of all places, I guess. I know another pony that is like that. I just recently made her realize that letting your guard down once in a while isn’t a bad thing. Well, at least I hope that’s what I did.”

It was a careful smile that I got in return. Guarded. One that seemed to be the result of a lot of practice. She looked at me expectantly and I knew that it was my turn to give her a name to be amused by. Following through with a funny thought, I knelt down as I would be expected to before a Princess. “I’m Dreamwalker,” I simply stated and stood back up again. Her eyebrows had crawled a little bit higher following my little show.

“You are new here, are you not?” she asked.

I quietly laughed. “Like you wouldn’t believe. Barely a week ago, I basically popped into existence. I’m still in the middle of trying to get myself sorted out. Finding a home, finding friends, connecting with Ponyville, the usual.” Now it was me who let that silence linger just a little bit.

And without a hitch, she understood and picked the conversation back up. “I am just visiting some friends around these parts,” she replied to the unspoken question.

I would not go as far as to call her manipulative. But she was definitely practiced in rhetoric. I did not tell her where I lived so she did not tell me who she was visiting. Quid pro quo or something along those lines. It almost felt like a little dance. Or a game, at least.

I looked up at the sky and once again noted how the sun had moved. So I turned to her again. “As nice as this chance encounter was, I think I’ll have to excuse myself if I want to get something done today. It was a pleasure meeting you, Sunny. If you stay around these parts for a while, maybe we’ll run into one another again.” And with that, I bowed to her again. Just because I thought it was funny.

“You know… you are only supposed to bow to Princesses,” she retorted with a smile.

“Maybe. But to be fair, I’d wager they’re all sick and tired of all the bowing and have had enough of that for the rest of their lives. And they are immortal, as far as we know, so that’s quite some time. Maybe it isn’t so bad to honor somepony else every now and again.” There was the weirdest look in her eyes. Raw, emotional, unfiltered, surprised. “Did I say something wrong?” I continued.

After a moment, she recomposed herself and smiled. This time, it felt more honest. “No. No, you did not. But you are quite right, we should get going.”

“Wanna try it?” I hastily asked before she could turn away.

“Beg your pardon?”

“The whole bowing-thing. It’s actually quite fun. Almost like we’re about to have a fancy dance.” She quietly laughed at that, despite her efforts to stifle it. After a moment, she nodded and we both bowed to one another, without taking our eyes off of the other. When we got back up, I was grinning. “See? Fun was had. See you later, Sunny.” With that said, I finally retreated and resumed my walk to Fluttershy’s cottage. The sight of Golden Oaks still weighed in my stomach like lead, but encountering Sunny had made it a little bit more bearable.

It was shortly after lunchtime when I reached the cottage. Did I have a plan? No. Did I have an idea, at least? Maybe. Would that be enough, though? We are about to find out.

I knocked at her door and heard something immediately clatter inside. “Fluttershy? I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you,” I told her through the door. There was a moment of silence until the door opened just the tiniest bit. I could see parts of her pink mane, a little bit of her eye and… Angel. He was staring up at me as if he was trying to freeze my blood within my veins. Nice try, you little pest. Try harder.

“Uhm… can I help you with something?” her demure voice asked.

Showtime. “I’m new in town and I had sort of an accident, and I’m living with Twilight for now.” I could see an unspoken ‘oh no’ when I mentioned an accident, but as soon as I name dropped Twilight, the door opened a little bit wider and she smiled lightly. “Right. So… I have three little things I’d like to talk to you about if you have time? Could I, uh… maybe come in?”

Angel was tapping on the floorboards impatiently. It took Fluttershy a moment to notice it, as she was considering my request. “Please, Angel, be a little bit more patient. I will get to your food shortly,” she pleaded. After another moment, the door opened fully. “Please, come in, I will just have to fix him something and then we can talk…”

“My name’s Dreamwalker, by the way,” I remarked while she trotted back to the kitchen. I closed the door and looked around for a moment. Fluttershy’s cottage was… nice. Not exactly what I preferred, but it certainly fit her. Animals big and small were scurrying around everywhere. Tiny holes in the walls so her mice friends got in and out without problem. Bird cages without doors to close and self-made perches. Adding to all the inhabitants and their needs were what she herself needed. Like actual furniture. She had a nice, big sofa that looked comfy and I knew that it was, in fact. So I walked over and plopped myself down. “Do you want some tea?” came her question from the kitchen nearby.

A short little flash and I remembered her tea being second best, only bested by Celestias — and she had several lifetime’s worth of experience and practice. “I’d love some,” I answered.

I knew I had to be careful with Fluttershy. She was easily spooked and I could not expect the same acceptance I had gotten from Pinkie concerning my wild claims. Body language, I cautioned myself, was important. Maybe even more important than the actual words spoken. But — tone of voice was another thing I should be wary of. And volume. Especially volume.

Directly in front of the sofa was a table. And Angel hopped on top of it. He gestured wildly. Something about me and the… door? You wish…

He grew more agitated, but suddenly one of the birds swooped down and he hopped off, running for the hills. Figuratively. With the bird — a crow? — still hot on his heels. It was a young bird, still learning to hunt, it seemed. Her claws did not catch him and after seeing no real danger to Angel’s life, I dismissed the idea of helping him. That ungrateful little shrimp would just try to get me kicked out anyway.

After a second round across the living room, Angel vanished from it. The crow perched atop one of the birdhouses and just watched. I smiled and nodded gratefully in her direction.

When Fluttershy called, Angel scampered through the living room and vanished once more. Apparently, his meal was ready. After a minute or two, Fluttershy appeared, balancing a tray on her wing with the grace and elegance of a model. She set it down carefully and I filled two mugs with what smelled like some herbal tea mixture by levitating the pot. It wobbled a little bit, as the sensation of lifting something hot was weird and unexpected. I had not anticipated that it would feel different. And why would it? I spilled only a little, luckily. “I’m sorry. I thought I had it. This whole ‘magic’-thing is quite new, apparently I still need more practice.”

It seemed I had run my sorry mouth again. She looked confused about that. “Your magic is new…?”

“Oh. Uhm… right. That. Yeah, it kind of is? It’s a long story. Or a short one, I guess. Maybe. I wouldn’t know, really, I can’t remember most of it. Anyway — tea!” I stopped myself from rambling on by levitating both mugs up into the air and, carefully, with focused concentration, levitating hers before her nose and mine over to myself. It worked. Yesss. It worked in calming and distracting her. She accepted the mug and we both took a sip. My memories, it turned out, had not lied to me.

When I looked over to her, she still had her eyes closed, focusing on the tea. She was humble and peaceful and almost centered and in this very instance, she seemed like nothing in this world could ever unsettle her. Then she opened her eyes again and became self-aware once more. Don’t try to hide it, I’ve seen things…

“So, what did you want to talk about?” she asked. “I-If you don’t mind me asking…”

“I don’t, really. Right, so… I’m kind of… searching for friends? I already made fast friends with both Twilight and Pinkie. And… now I’m here.” She nodded, apparently expecting more explanation than that. “Because of you.”

After another second or two, it clicked and she blushed heavily, immediately hiding most of her face behind her mane. “Y-You came to befriend m-me…?”

I worked overtime to swallow that good-natured chuckle just so I would not even risk alienating her. “Yes. See, I already know you…” Stop, backpedal! “I-I mean, of you. I know of you. Because of Twilight. And Pinkie.” Too late. Not only was she furrowing her brow, but Angel chose this very moment to reappear — knowing full well that the young crow would not dare hunt him while Fluttershy could see — and started to tell her… something.

Whatever it was, her eyes hardened considerably and she turned to me. “Is this some kind of prank?”

Great. Maybe I should have helped the crow instead. Speaking of which — my winged surprise-assistant swooped down again, driving Angel out of the living room and following him. Thanks, buddy. “Fluttershy, listen—,“ I started. I stood up and tried to appear even more non-threatening by raising both front hooves.

Non-pegassi cannot stand like that. Thank you, thank you, another successful episode of Fun Facts with Dreamwalker…

“Ow.”

My ears were ringing and both my jaw and my teeth hurt. Well, at least I had not bit my tongue. Considering I stood up on a sofa, I supposed it wasn’t a far fetch to assume that I had tumbled down. Hopefully not smashing the table, but it did feel like I hit it, at least. “Ow,” I repeated.

Finally, with the ringing slowly subsiding, I started to hear a very worried voice. “Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, are you okay? Sir? Mister?”

I pulled myself together and sat up straight. “Dreamwalker. Please. And… my head hurts? But I think I’m fine, otherwise. Listen, I meant it, Fluttershy. I know you. And I think I can prove it, if that’s alright with you.”

Her glare was back, hard as steel. There was an undercurrent of doubt and distrust. “How?”

I pointed at my horn. “I want to demonstrate something. Something I wouldn’t be able to do if I didn't know you. Just… trust me? Please? I know it’s much to ask, I just—“

In the time it had taken me to speak, she had won — or lost? — her inner battle. She just stood up, moved over from her chair to the sofa and sat down on it. Right. Well, she was the Element of Kindness. I asked for a chance and she gave me one. Maybe just to get rid of me sooner and with less resistance, but oh well. Sitting right in front of the sofa, I let my eyes wander over her form for just a short moment. I can work with that, I decided.

Carefully, I climbed up onto the sofa as well. I knew I could not let too much time pass without risking her putting a stop to everything. So, I cautiously pressed my front hooves into her shoulders. She immediately tensed at the physical contact. “Please,” I almost begged her. She did not relax. She probably just could not, no matter how hard she tried. But… she didn’t zip away or wriggle out of it either. For now, that was good enough.

With the first careful movement came a tiny but continuous trickle of memories. I had wanted to surprise Twilight. She was always tense and uptight, sitting around all day, reading all day. I had learned some techniques from Aloe and Lotus. But they had said something. Something important. Skill comes with practice. Right. That.

I started to knead Fluttershy’s shoulders, still careful and trying to read every sign of body language she gave. She remained tense and her wings fluttered from time to time. I could read her active attempts to keep them in check. But, with the first two or three minutes passing, I could also feel her relax under my ministrations just the teensiest tiniest bit. It’s starting. It’s working!

I needed practice. My first idea had been to ask Rarity, but she was a notorious gossip. Fluttershy, however? She would never talk. And even more importantly, she was patient. Coaxing critique out of her would be somewhat difficult, but that was something I was willing to put up with.

I moved down her back. Worked a little around her wing joints, but refrained from ever touching her wings. They were quite sensitive and I really did not want to make things awkward. Preening was something reserved for spas and lovers or family.

More time passed and I got into a certain workflow. Memories gave me a path, a somewhat clear indication of what to do, and I followed those half-instructions. Fluttershy relaxed a little bit more. Not entirely, never entirely, but more than before and that was a win in my book. I just need to find a good spot to stop, I thought. That surely should be enough, no?

There was this spot on her back, right above her dock, and when I pressed into that…

I really should have been more attentive. Following the flow of memories felt so natural that I did not think twice before doing just that. A soft moan escaped her lips.

I immediately withdrew my hooves, almost as shocked as she was. That… was probably just as awkward the first time around. “I-I’m sorry,” I mumbled.

She hurriedly pulled away from me and stared at me, still shocked. Embarrassed. Funny. She wasn’t even angry. And she had mumbled the same excuse I did, at the same time, including the same stutter.

There was a dawning realization for both of us. Now she knew that I knew of that spot. And in turn, I knew that she knew what I knew. Oh boy.

“I-I… need some air… can we t-talk outside? Please?”

I was not about to deny her that. In fact, some fresh air sounded like a great idea. I nodded dumbly, got up and stiffly walked over to the door. As soon as I opened it, Angel ran past me, with a happily cawing crow in tow. I looked on for a couple of seconds, then shook my head and left the cottage. I would have understood if suddenly, the door would have just swung closed. But it did not, and that gave me the tiniest glimmer of hope that maybe, just maybe, we could move past this awkwardness and it would still somehow have helped me.

While it might not have been entirely welcome, I had another sneaking suspicion why she wanted to talk outside. The great wide open was nice and all, less cage-y, but the soft afternoon wind would also mask any traces of potential bodily reactions.

I pushed that thought as far away as I could and plopped myself down onto the grass in the backyard of the cottage. After a moment, Fluttershy lay down nearby, but still kept a certain, generous distance. That was okay. It really was.

For a while, I just watched that crow hunt Angel. You’re doing great, buddy! Make him work for it! I silently encouraged my feathered friend as best as I could. Everything to teach that rabbit some manners.

“When you fell,” I broke the silence a couple of minutes later, “back in that race with Rainbow defending you against the bullies… you were lost in that forest. Harry’s dad found you. I forgot his name though. You were scared at first. He was this big, muscled beast, but… you learned quickly. He showed you around a little. He showed you a clearing nearby a little stream. You fell in love with that clearing. Years later, you built a small little cottage there.”

Come on. I was standing in a pond with very murky water, fishing for stones again. “You are utterly scared of ‘new Fluttershy’, but deep down, you know that she does not exist. Not as a separate personality, anyway. You are the Element of Kindness and you are utterly convinced that you shouldn’t be even able to have a single cruel thought. But you do. Because being an Element isn’t about embodying that Element, it’s about striving for a virtue. Having flaws… and working on them. That realization helped you reconcile with the entire incident later on.”

All good things come in threes, right? Okay, so, maybe that last one was not ‘good’, per se. I was figuratively clawing at the walls and found a last usable crumb. Nothing exciting, but maybe something useful. “Alright, that one’s gonna take a while,” I mumbled and then proceeded to list as many names of her animals as I could. And some of their food- and playtime preferences, if I actually knew them.

She listened. It was what she was good at. She listened attentively throughout the entire thing. When she spoke up, her voice was calm. Quiet. Composed. It gave me no indication whatsoever if I had succeeded or not. “What are the other two things…?” she asked.

Right. I had to switch things up a little. I would have liked to say ‘because things didn't work out according to plan’, but then again, I had started this whole thing without a plan to begin with. “I’m… actually searching for a pet.” Now I had her full attention. I even heard her wings rustle a little in excitement.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I mean, don’t get me wrong, Spike’s cool and all, but—“ Oh boy. I immediately raised my hooves in defense and backpedaled. “Okay, okay, sorry, I really shouldn’t even joke about that. I’m sorry.” Her glare was withering.

After a moment, she had herself recomposed. Again. “So… do you know what you are looking for?”

I still watched that crow hunt down that wicked, evil, rotten-to-the-core rabbit. And a smile creeped up on my lips. “Yeah… I think I like her quite a lot, actually,” I said and pointed towards the crow.

“Him,” Fluttershy corrected with a quiet giggle.

“Oh. Well, sure. Him, then.” I nodded. Her, him, that did not matter much to me. He was my feathered surprise-assistant-buddy.

“His name is White Tip,” she started. Strange, how that name rang a bell somewhere… “He is still young and, as you can see, a little bit wild.” Apparently, he had heard his name and came over, landing nearby Fluttershy and immediately started to care for his wings, while Angel stayed the heck away and just glared daggers at the crow. And me, for some reason. I like it. Yeees, bunny, give me your haaatreeed…

I chuckled again.

His name got me curious, though, so I shuffled a little closer to Fluttershy without standing up. In a proud display, the crow spread its wings and turned so we could gaze and wonder at his magnificent feathers. There’s a little bit Rainbow in there, I mused. That was not a bad thing, though. And indeed, the very tips of his feathers were somewhat white-ish. Reminded me of eggshells. “Hey White Tip. You’re awesome. Wanna come home with me?” As I addressed him, he turned around again, hopped over and looked at me, tilting his head this way and that way and then crowing. A little lost on animal speech, I looked to Fluttershy, who giggled into her hoof.

“He says you look like somepony who needs looking after,” she translated. “He likes you, though, so he would be willing to do that.”

“Heh. How generous of him.” I carefully extended a hoof and booped him on his beak. He crowed again.

Fluttershy nodded. “I found him on the edge of the Everfree a week ago. At first I thought he had broken his wing, but he had just crash-landed.” Sounds more and more like a mini-Rainbow. “You have to be careful, that wing still needs rest,” she continued and I was not entirely sure who she was addressing at this point.

“Okay, so. I… have no idea if I ever had a pet before. What do I need to know about crows?” I was smiling, knowing full well what kind of question that was.

“Oh my,” she started and then proceeded to list facts and figures in a way that would have made Twilight proud. She was very organized about the priorities in pet care, too. I tried to keep up with all of that, but to be honest… I knew there was a pet play day each week. I knew that Applejack knew her way around animals as well as Fluttershy. And lucky me had chosen a very, very smart animal that, if it was not sufficiently cared for, could make that clear to me. I was cautiously optimistic about things.

It was late afternoon when I nodded once more. “Got it. I mean… not all of it immediately, but I hope you didn’t expect that? I think I got the important parts and I’m gonna try and learn fast, promise.” She was not exactly happy, per se, but she could appreciate the honesty and when asked, I could relate some of her facts as proof that I actually had listened to her. That appeared to be enough for now, so we fell silent. It was not uncomfortable. She looked like she was thinking about stuff and I… I was honestly just enjoying her company. It was what I remembered doing with her most. Quiet tea times, a little bit of talking, a lot of silent time. Hearing the wind rustle through the leaves of the nearby trees. Training my ears on the stream. Feeling the sun move across the sky. It’s called ‘peace’. You should try it sometime.

There was one last thing on my list, of course. I had come for three, as I had told her. And one point remained. She seemed to have forgotten about it and that was alright. But I had not. And there was no easy way to breach this topic. Not with Fluttershy, anyway. “Sooo,” I started, “about you moaning.”

Her cheeks — and ears and neck and everything else — immediately flushed. She squeaked and hid behind her mane again. “D-Do we h-have to talk about… t-that…?”

There really was not much wind to begin with, but I still had a hard time hearing her. “Well… no, not that specifically.” A short-lived moment of relief vanished just as fast as it had appeared. “Fluttershy, listen. I know you’re very close with Rarity and she has been filling your head with her idea of romance for years. I might’ve only seen your living room, but assuming you didn’t hide any trace or evidence of somepony special to you, I’m guessing you don’t have a special somepony. Am I right so far?”

She did not answer. And really, why would she. I was a stranger to her and I was rather blunt with the whole ordeal. I pushed forward anyway, taking her silence as confirmation. “Do you want that to change? And don’t worry, I'm not talking about myself. I like you. A lot. And I want to help you. And I know for a fact that there’s somepony who is, probably right now, stressing out about how to ask you out. If you let me, I’d like to play a little bit of matchmaker. I don’t meddle lightly. Really, I don’t. I can’t stress enough how… how familiar everything feels. Everypony. Details might vary and change, but I know how happy you could be. I’ve seen it before, time and time again. And I want you to be this happy once more. Also, I want her to stop freaking out and stressing about it, it’s unhealthy.”

For a moment, that last comment gave her pause and she actually looked at me, no mane to hide behind. “T-Twilight?”

That caught me off-guard. What? I went back and skimmed over my choice of words. Alright, fair enough. Twilight was a good guess. “No,” I answered and she slumped a little in on herself, breathing a sigh of relief. But close.

“There’s a thing I have in common with White Tip. About a week ago, I came to my senses at the edge of the Everfree Forest. I have no idea how I got there. Or who exactly I am, even. I think this might be some kind of… time loop or alternate reality or something. Maybe even reincarnation, I don’t know. Twilight is trying to help me figure it out. But I get these… glimpses. Of other lives, other loops, other whatever’s. And because of those, everything feels so incredibly familiar. I feel like Applejack is my sister. I would jump in front of a dragon for her. And she doesn’t even know my name yet, for crying out loud!”

And crying out loud I did. I sighed as I saw Fluttershy flinch. Volume, I reminded myself. “Sorry, sorry. It’s just… it’s frustrating. There are so many memories. And so many more are still locked away. When I arrived, I kissed Twilight. I was so happy to see her. But she wasn’t my Twilight. I don’t know if that makes any sense? And I know you. We had so many fun times together. We’ve been through some stuff. And now I start at zero again. And I’m rambling again and I really shouldn’t pack all this weight onto you, I’m sorry.”

She just shook her head, a small smile gracing her lips. “It’s alright. I listen. It’s what I do.”

I chuckled at that. “I know,” I told her with a faux wail. “You always have this effect. Somepony is feeling down and you just… sit there and make them talk without a single word uttered. It’s a wicked combination with Twilight or Pinkie — you know that, right? Twilight’s gung-ho about solving whatever issue was presented and Pinkie’s all about distracting you from what made you sad or angry or whatever.”

I took a deep breath. Collected myself. Then I looked at her again with pleading eyes. “I want you to give this a shot. If it doesn’t work out, that’s okay. Really, it is. But I want you as my dear friend again. And I want you to be this incredibly happy pony again.” Maybe that was not fair. I did have these high expectations of how happy she would be. Of how happy they all would be, eventually. I knew they could get there. And I wanted to be the one pushing them there. I wanted that so desperately, it was almost frightening.

Lady Luck, please smile upon me…

“I won’t force my will upon you, obviously. If I already scared you away, then I’m really, really sorry and I won’t bother you again. I’m sorry for what happened when I massaged you. I didn’t think this through. But if you are willing to give me another chance… I would love to invite you to the castle this evening. For a sleepover. Twilight already knows that I’m going to invite you and she was okay with that. We could maybe cook something, eat, and talk, just a nice evening. And I’m sure Twilight and Spike would be thrilled to have you over. You don’t even have to stay the night if you don’t want to. It would be necessary for me to do my little magic trick, but you don’t have to.”

I ran out. Of words, of all things. I searched high and low, but could not find anything else to say. I had made my offer. In the most convoluted, roundabout way possible, but I had made it. Why can’t things ever be easy? So I stood up, removed a bit of grass from my belly, noted how White Tip landed on my back and how his claws were not entirely comfortable and then, ignoring that, started to walk back towards Ponyville.

I took four steps or something like that before she called out to me. “Dreamwalker?”

“Hm?” She probably did not even hear that. But I had stopped and looked back, so that was enough.

“Could you wait a minute?” I dumbly nodded and she made her way into the cottage, followed by a very, very angry Angel.

“You know, White Tip,” I said when the door had closed again, “we need to find a way to make it look like an accident…” I chuckled darkly and my new friend crowed a couple of times. This is going to be great!

Fluttershy reemerged a moment later. With a sack of seeds. Oh. Somehow, I had half-expected her to come along, which apparently was her intention, but of course she had to do her chores first. I knew about that! Right, right… seeds for the chickens. But after just a moment, I realized that I actually knew about that. What food to give in what quantity to whom. Even where she stored her supplies. “Hm. White Tip, do you mind sitting this one out on a branch of something? I think I’m going to help her out…” Without a word — or caw — he flapped his wings and indeed sat down on a nearby tree branch. “Thanks.”

I walked back into the cottage and looked for that small, narrow staircase at the back of her living room that led up to her very cozy upper story bedroom. I found it without any issues and indeed, on the side, there was a very small door leading to a space under the stairs. Filled to the brim with sacks. Each one had a handy little symbol on it, relaying just what kind of food it held. So, adding one and one together and trying to once again rely on my apparently sometimes traitorous memories, I pulled sacks out, half a dozen, including a little shovel, and set to my new task.

Maybe I should have asked first…?

I was pretty sure I knew what I was doing. Right? Right?

“Okay, fine… uhm, Fluttershy?” I stopped what I was doing, but at that point I already had given grains to her birdies, some nuts to her squirrel friends and I really did not want to know what exactly I had been feeding her otter friends right now. When I looked around, I actually found her standing behind me, only a couple of feet away, closely watching what I was doing. “Sorry, I really should’ve asked first. Is it alright if I help you?”

It took her a moment, but then she nodded and… followed me around, continuing to watch closely as I did what was initially her task. It was strange, being followed like that. I suddenly felt the urge to tell Twilight that I now knew exactly how she felt when she panicked because of an exam that she was supposed to ace. I just could not shake the feeling that I was being tested, somehow.

After a few minutes, she started speaking again. Celestia be praised. Apparently — from what I could gather — me knowing where the food was and knowing how much to feed to who was another indicator for her that I actually knew something about her. Maybe even knew her.

A few things I just did not know, though. Either because I never did those tasks, or because I did not remember them. So she taught me. That obviously meant that we did not exactly get out of the cottage earlier, but I did not mind. I learned something new and.. it was quite nice to spend time with her. She was a lot more relaxed when working.

After that was done, we put the sacks back in the storage, she got her saddlebags from her bedroom and we made our way to the castle, arriving shortly after sunset had begun. I was looking around for Sunny while we moved through Ponyville, but could not spot her anywhere. Once at the castle doors, I opened them for Fluttershy and she daintily stepped inside.

“There we go. That’s one quarter down!” I heard Twilight say.

“Twi?” I called. “We’re back.”

Spike came around the corner a moment later and smiled. A little tired, but he smiled. He came running up to us and hugged Fluttershy. “It’s nice to have you back again,” he greeted her. “I’m going to fix dinner, alright?”

Looking over at Fluttershy, I had an idea. “I… think we might be able to do that?” She only thought briefly about my offer before nodding with a smile. “So you go back and fetch Twilight and… do… something else, I guess.”

“Please don’t send me back!” he suddenly begged.

The heck? “What’s she doing this time?” I asked and raised an eyebrow.

A shudder ran down his spine. “She started sorting…”

Oh boy. I chuckled a little. “Tell her we’re here. If she’s sorting, I’m not sure she actually heard me. And pry her away from those books; the other three quarters can wait.” He nodded solemnly and slowly made his way back to Twilight. “Drama queen,” I mumbled with a smile. And immediately grinned when I heard Fluttershy stifle a giggle at my side. “What? I’m right, am I not?”

“Sometimes,” she just said barely above a whisper.

We made our way into the kitchen. “So I was thinking… casserole? Bits of potato, bits of spinach, maybe some carrots to give it a little bit more bite…?”

“Alright.”

“You know you can say something if I start doing or saying stupid stuff, right?”

She nodded. “It sounds…” Please don’t say— “… nice.” Haaah.

“Alright. Casserole it is.” I started to levitate several vegetables and kitchen knives around as soon as we entered the kitchen and only stopped for a brief moment, amazed by my own achievement and how I almost did not bat an eye. I was levitating those things around. Simultaneously. In different directions, without effort. Partially without line of sight, even. Yupp, I’m proud. I grinned to myself as I prepared a workstation for us and we got to it.

Cutting stuff up was easy enough — for a unicorn. But it would never cease to amaze me how Fluttershy, or any pegasus for that matter, did it. Her wings were surprisingly dexterous and capable of fine manipulation. And once again, her grace was impressive as well. She made no sound. Not when moving about, anyway. I could not help but think of Rarity and compare these two. Where Rarity vied for attention and strived to look her best, Fluttershy shied away and just… took relatively normal measures to care for herself. Well admittedly, that was not entirely true. Weekly spa dates with Rarity and actually a surprising amount of care towards her beautiful mane. But other than that?

One had to work for it; the other one just had it. I could understand why Rarity got envious from time to time. And I understood why that bothered her so much, being the Element of Generosity and all that.

The initial semi-awkward silence melted away after a couple of minutes and we started talking again. It had been my job to break the ice by asking her how her friends were, and that was enough to coax her out of her shell a little. A beaver had split teeth, which made me wince just thinking about it and one of her robins had caught a cold. In turn, I explained why the castle had looked a little bit more stuffed compared to her last visit and went into an unnecessarily dramatic retelling of that day. And then, we somehow ended up discussing the weather. Because why not, right?

The important part was: She was relaxing around me. I knew that this one nice little chat would not be a magical fix for everything, but I was hopeful enough to call it a ‘good start’. And it would certainly help ease the awkwardness later on, if she accepted my offer.

With the living room table set, we called for the others. “I got this,” I told Fluttershy, so that she could already go out and talk a little to Twilight and Spike. Learning from my experience with her tea pot, I carefully levitated the casserole out of the oven. I still did not quite understand why it felt so different, levitating something hot. Maybe I should find some time later on to ask Twilight about it.

I walked over to the living room, set the casserole down and then took my own seat. Twilight had already started a little conversation with Fluttershy about something I could not quite follow. Maybe they were continuing a conversation they had the last time? I looked over to Spike instead, who busied himself with shoveling food onto our plates. “So, how’s the sorting going?”

“I kinda regret helping you,” he grumbled. There was a short burst of guilt, but I tried to smile past that, hoping that he was not serious. And luckily, after a few seconds, he sighed. “Not really, though.” His shoulders slumped a little. “She’s always really into this and I have to look out for her, in a way. It’s easy for her to get lost. And then she’s going into a frenzy and no one except me is around to pull her out of it. Or get help. Because sometimes, even I can’t stop her.”

My smile grew a little more honest, and gained some strength. “You care a lot. That’s a good thing.”

“Yeah, but…” He looked over, but Twilight seemed rather focused on her own conversation, so he lowered his voice and proceeded, “I don’t really like it that much? We have been living together forever and I love that, but reshelving an entire library is just… it’s so unnecessary.”

“But you do it anyway… because she loves it,” I added. His curt nod made me think for a moment. He was not unhappy, per se. Just temporarily frustrated. Something Pinkie could probably fix in a second, but she was not here and I was one heck of a poor substitute. “We ordered a lot of books,” I started again, having a vague idea of what I wanted to say. “And right now, it sure seems like a mammoth task. But you won’t have to do this every month, you know? Right now, it’s a lot of work. But once it’s done, it’s done. At least for a while. Maybe I can talk to her, see if I could jump in for you tomorrow or something. It would be slower, because, well, I’m not her number one assistant. But I could try. And after you lending me a claw, it’s the least I could do.”

The offer alone was enough to make him perk up a little. He seemed somewhat conflicted about it, though. Probably because he did not know how well-acquainted I was with Twilight's (current) shelving system. And to be honest — I did not know myself. My past memories told me of dozens of systems. Some were almost identical to others. And that ‘almost’ was more reason for headache than a vastly different sorting style would have been. Before he could decide how to feel about this, White Tip flew into the room and landed on my shoulder, probably lured in by the magnificent smell.

“Hi, buddy,” I greeted him and held a fork up with a piece of tomato on it. As far as Fluttershy had told me, there was no reason why he could not eat that and after a moment of inspecting the offer, he seemed to agree, picking the piece off the fork.

“… What?” That sounded surprised. I looked over to Twilight, who was staring at the crow on my shoulder. Oh, right… haven’t told her yet.

“Hehe… sorry, I kind of forgot to mention. When I was at Fluttershy’s, I, uh… got a pet? This is White Tip. He’s great.” My explanation did little to smooth out her ruffled feathers, but luckily, I had a smart pet. He hopped off my shoulder, onto the table and carefully walked over to her, sitting nearby her plate — with a respectful distance, obviously — and looked at her. Maybe he was waiting, maybe he was presenting himself for inspection, I didn't quite know. I was just glad he reigned in his boisterous nature.

“He is a very smart crow,” Fluttershy cooed, patting White Tip on the head. “And so nice. He is a bit young, but Dreamwalker seemed almost smitten from the first moment. Oh, has he met Owlicious already? I’m sure they will get along well.”

It was almost unfair, I had to admit. White Tip gave Twilight little chance to find anything to get riled up over, and Fluttershy praising him certainly did not help. Then there was me, grinning apologetically and the implication that this crow might indeed be capable of befriending her owl and giving him some company.

“Fine,” she gave up and smiled, shaking her head at the same time. “He is welcome. I’m sure Owlicious can share his perch. Maybe you should meet him. Find out if you two get along?”

There had been a small ‘yay!’ from Fluttershy once Twilight welcomed him, and following her request, White Tip quietly cawed and flew off again. With a piece of her meal in his beak, because he was cheeky like that. “Well that is just… rude!” Twilight grumbled in what almost sounded like a decent Rarity-impression.

A moment later, we all had a good laugh about it.

We continued our meal, talking a little bit more about critters and pets. At some point, Spike began to wonder why he did not have one and Twilight played the 'reasonable big sister'-card, telling him that it was a big responsibility and that he could get one if he took it seriously. It was not so much that any of us doubted his capabilities. But we all rightfully feared that his question might just have been born from a feeling of being left out of something, instead of actually wanting a pet to care for. So it came as a relief that, after some soul-searching, he decided that he did not want a pet after all. At least not yet anyway. Maybe someday.

Once we were all stuffed to the brim, Spike and I cleaned up the dishes. Feeling tired, the young dragon excused himself for the night and went to bed, while the rest of us settled in the living room again. “You know… in my head, on the rare and odd occasion, I’ve been calling this room the ‘library’,” I stated. “But that doesn’t exactly ring true anymore. I mean… the whole place is one, at this point. I should try to stick to ‘living room’, I think.”

“Well, it’s not exactly a living room either,” Twilight countered. “It was the library, that much is true. Though I admit, according to usual naming conventions, I have a little bit of difficulty coming up with something that actually fits.”

“If it was the library before the library expanded to the entire rest of the castle, why not call it the ‘heart of the library’?” Fluttershy offered. Her suggestion gave us both pause. We looked at each other, blinked once, and then looked back at her. “Or not, it’s okay,” she added, shrinking behind her mane.

“No, no, that’s an… interesting idea,” I hastily replied. “It’s just… it sounds very… romantic? Like the flowery language you find in a novel. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

“Well… I do like those,” she whispered.

I… knew that? No. No, I actually did not. Maybe I did, but if so, I could not remember. I had seen some books on shelves in her living room back at the cottage, but I spared them no mind. Maybe because I had thought I knew what I would find if I were to skim those spines. But here I was, again betrayed… or rather, left hanging. It was not as bad a feeling as I expected. I had learned something new about Fluttershy. This Fluttershy, at least.

“I… have an idea,” I said while a grin tugged at my mouth. I glanced around the room and found what I had searched for. Levitating a book over, I showed them both the cover. It was a romance novel. One that even Twilight could stand to read without cringing too much. “We’re going to read it out loud, alternating dialogue. Fluttershy, you’re going to be the narrator. Twilight, you’re Lady Evergreen, and I’m reading Sir Emberstoke. For all the side characters… I’d say we decide on a whim?”

Twilight was all for it and to my surprise, Fluttershy needed only little prodding and convincing. Probably because I had offered her a reading part that did not involve the romantic part directly. The narrator's job was, after all, to set up the scene. Twilight, on the other hoof, did not seem to mind playing out an overly dramatic romance with me. Because it was just a book, I suspected. I did not mind either — it was just for fun, after all. Like any other game Pinkie could have come up with.

So we sat there, the fireplace lit again, and a floating book wandered from one pony to the next. Sometimes, a soft giggle filled the room when our pristine, top-notch acting did not quite live up to expectations. To cite Fluttershy: It was nice.

A couple of hours later, Twilight yawned. We were not done with the book by a long shot and the dramatic tension was rising, with more misunderstandings piled on misunderstandings. It had been fun so far, but I did not want to risk anypony getting hoarse from talking too much. Fluttershy especially, who was not used to it. So I took Twilight's sign of tiredness as an excuse. “Been a long day?” I asked.

She smiled and nodded. “Yes. Apparently, somepony just gifted me an entire library. I had to sort through it and I’m not even halfway done.”

“The nerve!” I stated with faux indignation. “Maybe I should help you out with that. You know, before you grind Spike to a messy pulp. But for now, you should probably head to bed.”

She blinked. Stared at me. Then blinked again. “Are you… sending me to bed? Again?”

I chimed in with her quiet chuckle and nodded. “I guess I am. You know how it is. If you walk down that hallway aaall on your own, I won’t have to exhaust myself carrying you there.”

She raised an eyebrow and I faintly heard Fluttershy giggle on my other side. “Did you just call me… heavy?” Oh boy. My cheeks were getting a little warm and I started to unwillingly lean away from Twilight. However, I did not dare break eye contact and after a few more seconds, the spell broke and we laughed. “Alright, so… apparently, I’m going to bed. What about you two?”

I looked over at Fluttershy. Immediately, her wings rustled in a sudden nervous impulse. I looked back to Twilight and smiled. “We’ll manage. To be honest, I think we won’t be far behind.”

Nodding to that, Twilight stood up and walked around me to hug Fluttershy. “Have a good night, Shy. You too, Dreamwalker. See you at breakfast.” I watched her go with a warm smile. “And stop staring at my flank.”

“Neverrr!” I replied with a laugh. I swear I wasn’t. I wasn’t! But her accusation, leveled at me in such a nonchalant tone, had me cracking up.

“She really likes you,” I heard Fluttershy whisper once I managed to breathe again. "She is usually more reserved with this kind of j-joke..."

I wiped away some tears with a hoof and nodded. “Guess so.” I looked over to her, stood up and offered her a hoof. She gracefully accepted and I helped her up. “So,” I started and rubbed my neck. “At this point, there are two options. Three, I guess. First: I escort you to the door, wish you a good night and we go our merry ways. It was a lovely evening, and we could keep it at that. Second: I escort you to the door, and then a liiittle bit further back to your cottage. Just to make sure you arrive at home safe and sound. Which, to be honest, I would prefer over option number one. I know this is Ponyville and all, but I don’t like unnecessary risks. Sounds funny coming from me, I know. Third option: You take my offer and we head to one of the guestrooms.”

It’s Fluttershy, I told myself, and you have to trust that she can stand up for herself if she really needs to. After all, she had come a long way since the day Twilight had arrived in Ponyville. I tried to be as non-threatening as possible. I made offers, not requests. I tried to be attentive. But there was always only so much I could do to ease the process.

I could read her expression and see that inner conflict. She blushed slightly and nodded. “I would like that.”

Don’t laugh, I demanded from myself. Forcing my smile to remain calm. How did Celestia manage that? I tried to make things as clear as possible. “Which one?”

“The, uhm, guestroom… if you don’t mind.” She became more and more quiet again, but at least I got the important part.

Breathing a sigh of relief, I nodded — and then froze, looking her over once more. “You sure?” She did not even try to speak this time and instead just nodded again. I wanted to ask again, but stopped myself. There’s only so much you can do… “Alright, then. Follow me, please.” I led her along the hallway to my guestroom. By now, I actually knew the way. Go me!

I opened the door for her, let her enter and closed it behind me. With moonlight spilling in from the window again, we stood there in silence. And I knew that this next part might become quite a hurdle. “Right. So. I need you to lie down on the bed… and I need to be there, right beside you, to cast the spell. We will both fall asleep and that obviously means that… we’ll be waking up together, tomorrow morning. Just as a heads-up.”

She awkwardly shuffled around with her hooves, her wings rustled, but she nodded. “Where… uhm… where is the bathroom?”

Right. Right.

I just waited in the room until she returned. I stared out the window and appreciated the moon's beauty without thinking about anything, really. Once she was back, I made my way to the bathroom and after my return, I found her covered by the blanket. Maybe it would be wise to get a second one this time. After all, she already had enough problems being comf—

My mind screeched to an abrupt halt when she lifted the cover with her wing. It almost looked like an invitation. Well. It probably was one. Just not that one. Get your mind out of the gutter. I was about to tell her that this was not necessary when she spoke up. “I-It’s getting cold.” Right. I found myself awkwardly stumbling forward, climbing up and scooching closer to her.

I was about to give her a long-winding speech about how I would not do anything she was not comfortable with, how everything was fine and maybe even remark that I could easily get a second blanket. But the words failed me and I realized that nothing I could say would make her more comfortable. Not now. Not yet. “I’m charging the spell now. I will have to touch your head with my horn, so don’t be surprised, okay?”

She nodded and I did as I had said.

Clinically white. But my heart made a tiny leap when I saw half a dozen bubbles floating about in different heights and distances. It felt like reestablishing a connection. Like unlocking parts of what I was used to seeing here, without actually remembering it. It was weird.

I did not forget Fluttershy though. She was right beside me, staring in awe at the bland, nondescript dreamscape. I almost regretted bringing her here. Her first time should have been more impressive than this and I knew that it was a sight to behold… when entered properly. Or displayed properly. I still did not know why this place looked the way it did. But it was wrong.

When I moved over to the first bubble, she followed. Without moving her hooves, but she did not seem to realize that. She just peacefully floated along. Height and distance wasn’t really a thing in this place. Everything was relative. I suspected that she was hovering beside me because her mind was set on ‘staying close’. So she did.

That first bubble was another gray, lazily swirling vortex. It was almost depressing, acknowledging that the primal state of every dream was… this. This boring looking, barely alive soup. This bubble belonged to the very pony beside me and was so non-descriptive about it because, just like with my own dream, the dreamer was asleep, but was not dreaming. There was nopony in there to form this soup. To make it more colorful and fill it with everything his imagination could come up with.

“This one is yours,” I explained. “It’s gray because you aren’t in there, dreaming and shaping it. These other ones are different.” Indeed they were. I floated over to a second bubble. Where the first one had given off a soft tone, like a wind chime, this one felt charged and aggressive and almost ready to strike. Like the last second before a lightning strike. A nightmare, I realized. At least one in the making. And on an instinctual level, I learned the name of the dreamer. I did not know who Dune Runner was, but his or her night was about to become a lot worse. I felt a… connection. Almost an obligation. To go in there and help.

But that was not why we were here.

Could I do it, though? Could I just… see his looming suffering and turn my back on this pony? Mark it. Sighing deeply, I carefully pressed one of my front hooves against it. Without the intention of entering, I simply would not. I was not exactly sure what I was doing, but after a moment, a colorful aura of light and magic enveloped the bubble. It was my magic, I recognized, but I still had no real understanding of what I had done. I only looked on puzzled as the sphere moved away at rapid speed. Off you go.

“Well… that happened,” I whispered and turned to Fluttershy. She had observed the whole ordeal and… to be honest, I could not read her expression at that moment. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to keep you waiting. We are here for somepony else.” She said nothing, so I continued on. The third dream belonged to Derpy, one of the local mail mares. A real sweetheart. I smiled as the dream pulsed with love under my touch. Dreaming about somepony special? I did not know yet. I would not, tonight.

The fourth dream was Pinkies. That slightly pink color scheme should have given it away, really. Or maybe how even her dream could not bear to stand still. I chuckled weakly. “That’s the one,” I told Fluttershy. “Now. Here’s what you do.” I repeated the same instructions I had given Pinkie Pie the night before, even though I felt silly for asking Fluttershy to be careful. It felt like asking Applejack to work. Redundant.

Pinkie's dream was an absurd mess.

That really should not have been a surprise. We were flying — Fluttershy obviously using her wings — over a landscape made of sweets. Rolling chocolate hills covered by extensive marzipan forests. A massive jelly-mountain range spanned across the eastern horizon. Cotton candy clouds gave a continuous trickle of chocolate milk rain. I spotted a herd of sheep, growing cherries instead of wool, and a flock of bubble gum birds. The most disturbing thing probably was the sight of a pitch black pool in a forest clearing. A tar-like mass bubbled there, constantly forming licorice tentacles that dissolved and reformed.

“This is Pinkie’s dream,” Fluttershy noted. And it was just that — a statement. A slight blush spread in her cheeks, probably because of the implications. I said nothing for now, since I deemed it unnecessary at this point. We flew for a while, searching for the exuberant pink mare. I had to be aware of the fact that Pinkie had lucid dreams from time to time, which could be a problem in this instance. And adding to that, I tried to keep in mind that all of this was created by her subconscious. There was a very real possibility that she either was not manifested as Pinkie Pie, instead opting to let some fantasy or scene play out without her direct involvement, or that she might be… down. She could lie to other ponies’ faces about her mood, but her dreams would always be honest.

But I remained hopeful. I knew Pinkie Pie. With what she had seen and how she had reacted to it, I was certain that she had spent every waking minute thinking about this. And with this much thought put into something, her dream should reflect that. They usually did.

She did not say anything. Fluttershy just pointed with a hoof to a cloud below us. My eyes followed her hint and I spotted Pinkie sitting there with… a second Fluttershy. Gotcha.

We settled down on a higher cloud for a moment, so I could relay the rest of my masterplan to her. And answer the obvious question. “It’s a dream,” I started stating the obvious. “I can fly here, without wings. I’m pretty sure that in your dreams, you can play around with Angel — although the real Angel isn’t there. Your subconscious takes what you know about him, how he looks and behaves, and reflects that. Oftentimes, it mixes in some of your feelings on the matter, or person. Wishes, fears, desires, anxieties. That’s one way regular dreams can tip over and become nightmares. Your own mind projects its fears into this one representation and it just runs wild. Anyway, I’m going to give those cherry-sheep a little scare. That should distract Pinkie for a moment. You need to use that moment, swoop in and take your place on that cloud. It should be enough to tap your doppelganger. Got it?” Although she looked uncertain, she still nodded, driven by curiosity at this point. And maybe something else. Naturally, it was not quite this easy, but she now knew what she needed to know. “And don’t worry,” I added when I noticed her frown. “Those sheep aren’t real.” That seemed to mollify her somewhat.

I teleported down onto the ground and dared a little battle of will to change my form into that of a fierce dark chocolate wolf with peanut splinters for claws and a walnut as a brain visibly sticking out of my head. I chuckled to myself, thinking how wicked it must look. And then, I went on the prowl.

For Fluttershy, tapping herself was not really the important task. Pinkie's subconscious tried to adapt to changes. When dealing with nightmares, that sometimes made it harder to dispel them. Here, it would benefit us. Her mind had conjured up a Fluttershy. As soon as the real Fluttershy started to interact with something in Pinkie's immediate vicinity, it would try to reconcile what it knew with what was actually there. It could not get rid of the real Fluttershy, but it could disperse the fake one.

As with a lot of dream mechanics, it was not quite that straightforward and no guarantee, but it was what usually happened. There were other possibilities, but this was our best chance.

I needed her to hear Pinkie out. Fluttershy would be far too embarrassed so actually say anything, or to stop her from rambling. She would hear how Pinkie tried. How she attempted to be careful and quiet and cautious, for Fluttershy’s sake. How she panicked at the prospect of being rejected or ruining their friendship. But knowing Fluttershy, the most important part was: She would see that strong, unyielding, yet so fragile love in Pinkie's eyes.

“I’m manipulating everypony around me, aren’t I?” I growled at nopony in particular. Looking down on my peanut claws, I sighed. “Tia, you and I need to have words. You’re rubbing off too much.” With another low growl, I jumped through some gingerbread bushes and gave the cherry sheep a good old scare. Like a stampede, they started to flee from me and I gave chase. They ran along the shore of the licorice pond, which actually played in my favor, since it allowed me to look up for a second and see if Fluttershy was frozen in place or if she was doing her part. It was the only thing I was truly worried about at this point — her not being able to push forward. But I saw her cautiously flapping her wings, descending towards Pinkie's cloud. Pinkie herself leaned over the edge of her cloud, looking down at what the entire ruckus was about and yelling for the sheep to be quiet before returning her attention to a very real Fluttershy.

Yes!

Either Pinkie had not seen me, or she did not care. That… had been my initial assessment, anyway. It turned out to be false. Maybe? I had given up on the chase once I had seen Fluttershy take her counterparts place and had, following some weird, dream-induced instinct, attempted to lick my claws clean. Only to realize: I was tasty. So I gnawed and licked at myself a little, until all of a sudden, something snaked around my midsection and just pulled.

At first, I thought about how Applejack might have found her way here. Then I realized that Pinkie could easily have dreamed up her own Applejack to wrangle the predator disturbing her cherry sheep’s peace. And then I realized, with growing horror, that it wasn’t AJs lasso, but one of the licorice tentacles.

Seen enough clop to know where this is going…

Pinkie was innocent. Had that not been my own assessment? But she was a healthy young mare, I remembered that part as well. How big was the chance that this black, bubbling pool was somehow a representation of her urges and desires…?

Looking down with dread creeping up my spine, I noticed several more tentacles snaking along my hindlegs, restricting any chance of escape further and further, while the one around my barrel just kept dragging me towards the middle of the pond.

Yeah, no, this was quite enough of that! I resumed my normal pony-form and tried to struggle against the tentacle's grip.

Dreams did not use magic. In fact, dreams did not even have magic. Not really, anyway. For a unicorn to ‘charge his horn with energy’, it was just imagination. It was manifested expectations. It was not a requirement to teleport, strictly speaking, but it was a focus component that helped my own will win out against hers. That being said, using a focus component like that had its own disadvantages. As I came to realize and remember when another long, sleek tentacle rose up and enveloped my horn. “Oh come on…!” I grumbled and shivered at the sensation.

I could break free. It would take effort, but it was more than possible. But I had maneuvered myself into a bit of a pickle here: If I would break free, I ran the risk of alerting Pinkie’s subconsciousness that I was here, which might in turn alert Pinkie herself. I looked up at the cloud and saw a beet red Fluttershy still listening to Pinkie and giving the occasional nod, fully transfixed on her energetic friend and hopefully soon-to-be lover.

“Ugh. Fine,” I mumbled and just… stopped resisting. It was Pinkie's mind, after all. I doubted that she would do anything actually harmful and as far as I knew, she was not exactly experienced. At all.

Knowing that, it came as no surprise as the tentacles restrained me just a little further and then… held me. It became quite apparent that she herself did not quite know what to do now. I could have lived with that. I could have just waited this embarrassing situation out until Fluttershy had what we had come for. But Pinkie, ever adapting, wriggled again. “Haaah… what now?” I asked and looked down my barrel. Another licorice tentacle cautiously stroked up my leg, along my side, then back down along my spine. It actually felt nice, in a very weird way. And I would not have objected if this had been the full extent of her ministrations. But nooo. She just had to get more adventurous.

Cautious, slow strokes had coaxed out my member and now made me shudder in anticipation. Fluttershy, would you please hurry up…? Then again, it was not really her choice, was it? I started wriggling again, resisting again. Maybe I could make clear that this was not supposed to be happening? Again I looked up, but they were just talking and talking and talking and I grew impatient. Mostly because Pinkie became more daring.

Maybe not quite as innocent…

It was not fair to judge Pinkie for her subconsciousness. There were a lot of urges and thoughts, observations and questions that we tended to ignore, shove to the back of our minds or downright forget. Most of that stuff lingered on in some way.

When I caught myself moaning, I shoved a hoof into my mouth. Alright, that’s it. I gave you as much time as I could! I looked up one last time, fully prepared to just rip this dream to shreds, but I saw the sky darken. Saved by the bell. The world around us started to break apart, clouds vanished, Pinkie smiled serenely at Fluttershy and we all… woke up.

Day 8: Forgemaster

I had learned my lesson. Sort of. There was light on my face and I wished I could hiss at it. Instead, I just refrained from opening my eyes instantly and instead attempted to crack it open ever so slightly.

Huh.

It was dark?

It took me a moment to realize. It was warm. Downright cozy. Fur was tickling my nose. It smelled like forest and underbrush, autumn leaves and loads of animals. Not my favorite bouquet, but still quite pleasant. Fluttershy had turned over in her sleep and… held me. I felt snug and secure in her embrace. She was so incredibly soft, I could have drifted back to sleep right this instant.

But my member was still standing at full attention and twitched, just to remind me of that fact. Why thank you.

If I was awake, then so was she. Lying as close as we were, if I had felt that…

There was a little squeak when she hurriedly tried to get away from me and almost fell out of the bed. I grabbed her in my levitation fast enough, but she was struggling quite a lot, so I set her down as fast as I could. Much to my dismay, she had taken the blanket with her in her struggle. I immediately rolled onto my stomach to hide my current embarrassment as best as I could. “Well… this is awkward,” I mumbled. “I’m… really sorry.” My entire face was burning.

She stared at me with flared wings and heaving breath. “W-What… w-what happened?” she demanded to know.

“Ehrm… you… have you ever had a wet dream?” She was blushing more furiously than before. “Pinkie’s dream wasn’t as… as innocent as I thought. She kind of surprised me and I didn’t want to interrupt your talk by breaking the dream, I… uh…”

I had to admit: I got nothing. She was standing there, eyes still full of a mixture of shock and fear and I was lying on the bed and felt incredibly uncomfortable. And that was not just because of the situation. She mumbled something under her breath a short moment later that I had no chance of hearing and then made her way to the bathroom. And I allowed myself a sigh of relief.

Well.

That could have gone better.

Could’ve gone worse, too.

I slumped and buried my face in the pillow. It still smelled like her. “Oh for the love of—,“ I mumbled before uttering a frustrated scream, muffling it with my trusty pillow.

After a few minutes, Fluttershy actually came back. At that point, I was glad to be somewhat more decent. “I… wanted to say that I’m sorry,” she said to my surprise. She was sorry? “I-It’s just… you startled me a-and… i-it’s a perfectly normal… t-thing… to happen…”

Right. Animal caretaker.

Internally cringing as hard as I ever had, I tried to lighten the mood somewhat. “Tell that to the licorice.” I did not wish for things to be left like this, though. It would leave a lingering taste — harr harr, funny — that would color future interactions. So I slowly walked over, stopped right in front of her and held up a hoof. A tiny smile brightened her features a moment later and she met me in a light hug. “Thank you,” I said.

I smiled widely as we pulled away from each other. “Listen, I don’t know your plans, but if you stick around for a couple of minutes, I’m gonna fix breakfast. Sounds good?”

She just nodded and let me leave for the bathroom. I really needed some ice cold water in my face.

When I returned to the guest room, Fluttershy had left. The bed was made, the window opened. I went to the kitchen only to find her setting out the table for breakfast. Apparently the mere mention had awakened some maternal instinct or something. To be fair, her salad looked great and was probably a hundred times healthier than waffles.

Twilight and Spike were already there and judging by the ordinary greeting I received, they knew nothing. Good. Great, even.

We were in the middle of eating when we heard a rather insistent knocking at the door. Again. Fluttershy had just asked me who I wanted to visit and reconnect with next — a very good question actually. “I’ll get it,” Spike said and was already up.

I held him in place with my telekinesis and looked over to Fluttershy. “Uhm… you might want to get that?”

It clicked immediately. She blushed, hid behind her mane and nodded. Maybe there was even a little “Mhm” in there, who could tell. So I let go of Spike, who just sat back down and furrowed his brow.

“Who’s that?” he asked.

“I can’t tell the future,” I reminded him with a chuckle, “But if I had to guess… I’d say it’s Pinkie, asking her future special somepony on a date.”

“Okay? But why would Fluttershy then— oh.”

Even Twilight could not help but giggle. Of course, being mature and reasonable and so-not-nosy, we stayed at the table and continued our breakfast in a civilized manner…

Nah, kidding.

We totally stacked up on top of each other right at the kitchen door, trying to hear and maybe even see everything.

Pinkie rattled down a lot of words, like Pinkie usually did. But none of us failed to notice that growing sense of dread and unease in her voice. Sadly, none of us could make out the exact words. They were too muffled and too quiet. So Spike dared to open the door just a bit so we could look down the hallway and see the door where Fluttershy was standing. And we had perfect timing to see her put a hoof on Pinkie’s muzzle. “I’d love to,” we heard her say. In reaction to that, Pinkie managed to once again vibrate on the spot. Like a drill or something that just moved without direction or real force. And we heard a Fluttershy-worthy “Yay!” from Pinkie. That was weird, given the hoof in her mouth.

“It worked!” I yelled excitedly. I was so happy, so elated and did not think this through at all. I pranced around merrily. In the middle of the hallway. I had accidentally tripped Twilight over when I burst from the door and now she was picking herself up and smiled apologetically in Fluttershy's and Pinkie's direction. I slowly turned towards them as well and my cheeks got considerably warmer again. “Ehehehe… heh… oops.”

“I am so happy for you two,” Twilight tried to divert the attention.

“Ehrm… Flutters, you might wanna…” I vaguely gestured towards Pinkie.

The sudden use of a pet name seemed to embarrass her, but concern for her friend made her address that first. And indeed, Pinkie's pupils had shrunk down to pinpricks, slowly drifting to the outer edges of her eyes, away from one another. “Pinkie?” she asked, her voice laced with concern. When she dared to remove her hoof from Pinkie's muzzle, Pinkie skyrocketed. Quite literally. In a continuous stream of confetti and glitter. I ventured a guess as to where she would be landing: Sugarcube Corner.

We could all hear her yell questions to Fluttershy about when and where they would have their first date. With her being high in the sky though, the pegasus had no chance of actually answering those.

Following the spectacle, we made our way to the doors ourselves. “Sorry for eavesdropping,” I apologized.

“It’s okay,” she replied and hugged Twilight first and me right after. “But I really should be going now. I have my animals to care for and I should probably do that before Pinkie finds me again.”

After our short goodbyes, Twilight closed the door. She turned around and sat down on her haunches, her back against the door, and looked me over again. Her expression was one of serious consideration, but beneath a very thin surface was an ocean of nervousness. “This is really happening… isn’t it?” she asked.

Should I have been offended? Then again, I had to consider her situation. She liked me, which was great. But she knew me for a very short time. And I just waltzed into her life, with the wildest claims, and basically threatened to bring about some very big changes. Twilight did not like changes very much. She liked consistency. Routines. Knowing what to do and what came next. Sure, she had gotten better at adapting and leading and a whole bunch of other skills over the past years, but for the majority of her life, she had lived a very different lifestyle. Old habits died hard.

Maybe she was just afraid.

So I sat down beside her. Close enough that our coats were brushing. She did not mind, and that alone brought a smile to my face. She did not flinch or tense up either. “I don’t… exactly know what to say,” I admitted. “Most of the time, I’m operating on… some sort of instinct. This feels right, this feels wrong, this must be corrected, stuff like that. But beneath that, there’s care. And love and wishes. I can imagine that it’s hard to grasp, hard to really understand what it’s like. To know someone, three times over, who doesn’t even know your name yet. And to remember their lives. With families and children and so much fun and happiness. Bad times too, obviously. I can’t tell you how… how many really bad arguments R—… two of my best friends had. Sometimes, multiple times, it really looked like that tear could not be fixed again. But they came out stronger than ever before. With help, obviously. Always with help. From those close to them. Who cared for them, loved them. As family. I… feel lost.” For the first time, I talked about that. I felt her eyes on me. But she did not say anything, did not want to make me stop. She had her reasons, I was sure. I was just grateful when she laid her wing over my back. “I have a hard time not feeling lost. I want to belong so much. I can’t put into words how desperate that desire is. I want my friends back. My family. My home. All these cherished memories are so charged with emotions that it’s sometimes overwhelming. Some of these insights feel like a carrot, dangling before my nose. I want what I see in them. Even knowing full well that I can’t have it. Because what I remember are times past. Other lives, loops or universes or whatever they are. But I want that. So, so badly. I want to love. And feel loved. I want to laugh with my friends. Running around in open fields. Swimming in a lake. I want to groan in fake agony, being dragged along for shopping. I want to… I don’t know… live. And I know that I have to deal with these details that vary and differ. I’m trying. But there is still… so much more to be done. And I just know that I won’t be able to rest until I somehow figure this out. This ‘life-‘thing. I—“

A sob choked me. I had not noticed tears streaming down my face and I could not bring myself to care. Her wing drew me that tiny bit closer and hugged me tightly. I rested my head on her shoulder… and just broke down. It's pathetic, really, I distantly noted. But it could not be helped.

She was there for me. And I was grateful.

I felt so utterly, utterly broken.

Spike had appeared at some point. Seeing my sorry state, he did not know what to do at first and looked to Twilight for guidance. In the end, he came over and just sat down before me. I pulled him into a hug and he endured it. Being squished like a pillow, rained upon and shaken with every tremor. Brave little soldier, weathering the storm. Nay, I told myself, just a number one assistant, doing his job.

I did not know how long we sat there. I felt like dirt. My eyes were swollen, my head felt uncomfortably light, my voice was hoarse. Weak and sudden tremors still shook me occasionally. My breathing had normalized by that point, so... yay. Go me.

I sighed deeply. “I love you guys. Like you wouldn’t believe.” Goodness, my voice really did sound horrible.

After some more minutes, I tried again. The tremors were gone and I took that as a good sign. “Twilight? Can we… maybe just… stay in today? Study magic? Please?” I instantly hated just how much it sounded like begging. And I knew for a fact that pleading with her was not even necessary in the first place. I could have just asked. A regular, normal question. But I was not really capable of those right now.

“Gladly,” she whispered and squeezed me a little.

“Hey, Spike,” I started. I forced a very brittle feeling smile when he looked up. “You look like crap.”

“You’re one to talk,” he retorted and we both chuckled quietly.

“Thank you,” I whispered. I held him up with my hooves and pressed him against my chest with all my not very impressive might. “You’re one cool buddy,” I added belatedly.

After setting him down again, I tried to stand up. My knees were still weak as jelly. Great, just great. Twilight used her wing, still draped over my back, to help me. She held me steady on those first steps towards the library. I really needed a good book right now.

In the end, we did not read much after all. Once we arrived at the library, I did pick up ‘The Mystical and

You: Cutie Mark Magic’, but I read three or four pages until I closed the book again. Not a single word from those pages had actually made it past my barriers and into my head. “It was different again,” I noted instead.

Spike was reading one of his comic books and enjoyed what had involuntarily become a free day. Owlicious was sleeping somewhere in the castle and White Tip sat on a perch near the ceiling and looked surprisingly drowsy. Maybe he actually did get along well with the owl. That would be nice.

It took Twilight a couple of seconds to realize that I had spoken, and what I had said for that matter, engrossed as she was. Her book was still open, still waiting. She looked over and studied me for a brief moment before she closed her book, softly floated it down onto the table and in its stead, several sheets of parchment levitated upwards. One summoned quill and inkwell later, she smiled and was now fully prepared. “’Different’ how?”

I was pretty sure that we had both accepted that books would not help us much by this point. At least when it came to studying dream magic and its mechanics. And concerning my amnesia or whatever that was, I highly suspected that Twilight was planning to rope me into seeing a doctor. Whatever that one might have to say about the issue might in turn help her with solving the riddle of my arrival. I felt guilty even for admitting it to myself: This meant that I had no intention of making it any easier for her to get me to that doctor.

I did not care about ‘how’ anymore. In fact, I felt a certain resistance building up over these past days. I did not want to know anymore.

But that was of little importance right now.

“It felt easier to enter the dreamscape,” I started. “And once there, I saw more dreams. Not just my own, but… maybe half a dozen others? I didn’t count them.”

Suspecting the need for something more than just notes, she effortlessly summoned a blackboard into the room. Chalk included. “Can you tell if this had anything to do with Fluttershy?”

I had not exactly expected this to be her first question, but of course it was a legitimate one anyway. Magic responded to emotional states, that much was common knowledge. If I were to have a stronger bond with Fluttershy than I had with Pinkie, maybe that could explain the ease of entrance. “I can’t,” I admitted. “Neither can I tell if it’s about practice or affinity or… maybe even flashes. Some of them have been so subtle that I have difficulties recognizing them.”

She hummed a moment to herself before writing down a couple of notes and questions both on the board and her parchment. “Then we need to keep an open mind. There are many variables at work and so far, we cannot exclude a single possible factor.”

Sounded reasonable enough, so I nodded and continued to describe in excruciating detail how last night went. Considering how much I wanted to distract myself, I didn't even leave out the part with the licorice pool and silently chuckled a little bit as she did not even seem to notice anything unusual. She was once again completely devoted to research and had thus detached herself from everything else.

It became apparent that we faced several problems. One of them was the impossibility of distinguishing the source of my knowledge. I reasoned that it probably was due to those flashes of insight, memories of past lives teaching me how to work my magic and talent. However, Twilight was right — we had to keep an open mind. She countered that it would be just as easily possible that my memories had nothing to do with it. My magic could instead just lead me to get an almost instinctive grasp on the matter. Her talent was magic as a whole and ever since she’d gotten her cutie mark, whenever she encountered a new spell or new type of magic, her mind was flooded with ideas about how it might work and how she could reproduce it. She understood, because magic talked to her, in a way. It was an intrinsic part of her. Dreamwalking, given my name, might be an intrinsic part of me then.

Since we were running into a dead end for now, we changed direction. The changes after my arrival were interesting in their own way. With only two data points, it was hard to make viable assumptions, but it left us enough room to speculate nonetheless. “It feels like… reestablishing a connection,” I tried and grimaced as the description felt imprecise.

Again, we ran into the same issue. It could be that I was learning and growing. Or it could be that I was reestablishing something piece by piece that was already there, just dormant, somehow. In addition to that, my flashes told me that the dreamscape should look different. I just could not tell how. Or why.

Another dead end, then.

That led us to my instinctual understanding of how to work with dreams. And while I once again could not bring forth any actual evidence, I at least had a strong suspicion that this knowledge was founded in my direct interaction with the dreamscape itself. “It’s like… by just being there, it’s teaching me. Back in the day, when you were still a student at Celestia's school, you sat down in class. You didn’t do much, per se. You just sat there and made notes and listened. This feels eerily similar to that. I know that the dreamscape isn’t conscious. It’s not even alive by any definition, it’s ‘just a place’, but at the same time, it reacts to me. I do something and it responds. When I first brought Pinkie in, it felt… patient. And last night, with Fluttershy… there was this other dream. Somepony was having a nightmare. I… forgot his name already. Something with dust? Dune? Desert? His dream was about to turn into a nightmare. I wanted to help him so badly. But I didn’t quite know how to do that yet. And I had Fluttershy with me. We had plans. I still don’t fully understand what I did, but while doing it, my surroundings felt… encouraging, but also… demanding. Like I was supposed to get this. To do it. And do it in a set amount of time. Like a test of sorts.”

Twilight was fascinated. I could get that. It was a kind of magic she had no chance of studying until recently. And while it was frustrating how little of actual substance I could give her, she knew how to handle such frustrations, as this was not her first encounter with something like that. When she had tried to study the celestial magic the two sisters used, or Discord's chaos magic, she had run into similar issues. Come to think of it, was Discord even a thing this time around?

We continued on for another hour or two until Spike basically force-fed us with some oat cookies and we took the interruption as an opportunity to once again change the subject. Or rather, Twilight did. “I’m worried, though.” Her words confused me. I looked at a stack of notes I could not read from that far away, then at a blackboard with so many notes that she had started to write them ever smaller. Since I could not find any clue, I looked back to her, waiting for an explanation. “Obviously, we need more data points. But you have been here for a week now. And you have slept twice.”

Oh. That again. “Twilight… I’m fine,” I tried to appease her.

But she shook her head. “No. No, you are not. I’m trying not to intrude too much. You are your own pony and you are entitled to your own decisions. But I worry about your health. I have to admit, you seem to take it well, so far. After so many nights without sleep, you should have been a mess. Such a long period is not just unhealthy — it is dangerous! But I believe you when you tell me that you did not have any hallucinations or other side effects. It is strange, but maybe it has to do with your connection to the dreamscape.” Her lips pressed into a thin line as she mulled it over. “So far, you have only been able to sleep when sharing a bed with somepony else.”

I chuckled. “I think that has more to do with the spell than with the bed.” For just a short moment, her look was almost inconsolable. “I don’t intend to make that a habit, if it helps?” I tried again, but to no avail once more.

“I’d rather you do, if it helps,” she said in a surprisingly quiet tone.

I wanted to comfort her. She worried about me and I felt guilty making her worry about me. Not that I had a choice to begin with. But once again, I found myself in the awkward situation that words just failed me. So I scooched over and snuggled up to her side. And I dared to nuzzle her cheek for a moment. “I’m fine,” I told her, as if repeating that would somehow make everything pointing towards the opposite being true just go away. She sighed and said nothing.

Apparently failing in my attempts, I reached for another straw. “I can fly in there.”

“I know,” she answered quietly. “You already told me.”

I nodded and forced a smile on my face. “It’s about willpower. Within the dreamscape, there’s nothing working against me. If I want to fly, I just have to will myself to do it. Within dreams, it's a little bit more complicated. I can even teleport! Or light a bucking candle!”

Well, that got her attention. “Language,” she chided softly and looked for Spike, who was not even in the room anymore. She shook her head. I did see a little, precious smile tug at her lips. “I’m happy for you.”

“Yupp. I mean, I could’ve just given myself darkvision, but it was about the principle.” Her giggle was almost silent. I did not hear it so much as I felt it, still sitting quite close to her. The silence that followed was not as oppressive as it had been before. I was counting it as a small victory.

“We need more data,” she said after a while. “I think I have an idea how we can gather that.”

My first assumption turned out to be entirely false after she led me down into her basement laboratory. “You know… I never quite understood why these things are being built downstairs, instead of upstairs,” I wondered.

“Because of gasses, mostly,” was her immediate response and after I just looked at her funny, she explained further. “If something goes wrong, the surrounding earth can take the impact without splinters and debris flying all over the place, in turn endangering other ponies. But at least for me, it is mostly about gasses. I work with a lot of alchemical ingredients, some of which I get from Zecora. If I accidentally create a heavy gas, it fills this basement and remains there for later cleanup or until it dissolves. If it is a gas lighter than air, it will rise up and, depending on how judicious I was, might fill the castle before venting into the sky. But you do not have to worry about that one — there are several spells weaved into the ceiling, teleporting any rising gasses high above the cloud layers, so they don’t inject any substances into potential rain.”

I nodded dumbly, looking around the room with a newfound sense of appreciation. I had a sneaking suspicion that she had created these ventilation spells herself. I was about to ask how many accidents she had had, but thought better of it. It is safe here, don’t worry.

“So… what are we going to do?” I asked.

“I believe some forging is in order,” she said in excitement. “I have not done any of that for so long!”

“Okay. So what are we going to forge, then?” I continued my inquiry.

“Considering it is supposed to be a tool to help our research along, I do not think it needs to be overly complex or fancy. Two bands of silver should be enough, maybe… but… hm, no. We better make that four. It would be easier on the enchanting and we do not want any cross-interference between the enchantments. Then again, we could just make two and then duplicate them.”

“Duplication spells are notorious for messing with pre-existing enchantments,” I threw in. My statement surprised her as much as myself. Apparently, I knew some stuff about that.

She nodded slowly and a wild grin spread on her lips. “Yes, but we are still talking about the forging process. We duplicate the silver bands and enchant them afterwards, separately.”

“Why silver?” I wondered. And mere seconds later, I gave myself the answer. “Because it’s one of precious few metals that have the unique ability to not only hold multiple enchantments, where most other materials can hold one at most, but it also eases the appliance of enchantments in the first place, significantly reducing the cost of magic and thereby the toll enchanting it takes on the enchanter.”

She had stopped, turned around to me and was smiling at me like a very proud teacher. “Very good,” she praised.

I shook my head. “Okay, another question. Why not gold, then?” This time, there was a noticeable hole in my memory. I knew that gold could be enchanted with several spells as well.

“Because gold is actually harder to enchant, but it increases the strength of the enchantments used. And it’s more expensive.” Right. “In this case, however, we do not need stronger magic. I just want to put some spells on those bands to automatically gather information and store it for later. They are supposed to monitor your physical, mental and magical well-being. Mental and magical state being intertwined like they are, they should easily be able to share the same space. You get two bands, and I take the other two. We wear them around our legs, which should be unobtrusive enough. I’m going to be the reference group, so to speak. The next time you dreamwalk, we should gather a lot more data this way.” I chuckled. She slightly tilted her head in reaction and her ears stood at attention. “What is so funny?”

“I just… I don’t know… at this point, I really shouldn’t be surprised by how smart you are.” I chuckled a little more as she blushed and then turned away to start our work. And to hide her rosy tint, maybe.

I somehow knew how to operate a forge. Or at least parts of it. I applied fuel, carefully tended to the fire and melted several bars of silver while Twilight had started to prepare all the things she needed to apply the enchantments later on. From time to time, she took a look at what I was doing, more out of curiosity than to double-check. In the same vein, I looked over to her and tried to understand what she was doing and why.

With the silver melted and the mold prepared — something that had taken her a single spell after measuring out the girth of our legs —, I carefully poured the liquid in and set the molds on the side to cool down and harden. Midway through, they had to be dunked into a barrel with some sort of acid or alchemical mixture, to prepare the metal for the appliance of magic.

Doing all this made me wonder. I still had no bits of my own. Because frankly, I was still a freeloader at Twilight's castle. I had no job. While she did not seem to mind, these hours spent down here made me think if maybe, I could open up a smithy? Apparently I was quite good at it. At least according to what she told me. “It does look like you have done this hundreds of times,” she remarked at some point.

Dreamwalker, the smith. Well. That was just all kinds of wrong.

Librarian, then?

Or… uh! Writer! I could be an author, publishing my own books about… the… stories I saw in… dreams… yeah, no, that was a terrible idea.

Maybe I should apply for an assistant job with Cadance? I was trying my hardest to play matchmaker, with at least one roaring success so far. Or what I hoped was a success. Then again I would probably run out of memories to draw from at some point, right? Maybe. Potentially.

These musings led nowhere. I discarded them for now and presented the silver bands to Twilight. “They look perfect,” she remarked. And she was not exaggerating either. She looked a little bit too surprised to do that. She took them in her magic, laid them down on her massive stone table — because having too much wood in a laboratory was just an invitation for fire — and started her part of the process. Applying the enchantments was surprisingly fast. “It’s the preparation of all parts involved that takes the most time,” she explained. She even had to take a short little break at one point, due to the enchanting process draining her magic a smidge too fast.

As she was reeling from the strain, I suddenly was the blur in the room as I zipped to her side and stabilized her by propping myself up against her. “Please, please, please — say something before you do stuff like fainting! I’m not Rarity, I can’t summon a fainting couch within fractions of a second,” I joked as she leaned against me for support.

“This is better than a fainting couch,” she answered with a smile.

I swallowed my comment about maybe not being able to summon myself to her side in time either, as the only instance of that was this very moment and I thereby proved myself wrong.

A couple of minutes later, both bands were ready. They were cold for a couple of seconds after donning them, but then adapted. Aside from some unfamiliar additional weight, it was like they were not even there. We walked around a little bit. Twilight checked the enchantments and was happy about them working properly. We returned to the library only to find Spike asleep, curled up on the carpet before the fireplace.

We had no reason to disturb his nap, so we just sat down on the sofa again and after silently exchanging some glances, we each took a book to let the remnants of this day fade away in peace and quiet. She read something about Equestrian geography. Studying the Everfree, I suspected. I tried not to shirk my new duties and chose a book about crows. Habitat, life cycle, behavior, all the good stuff. It was somewhat surprising to me how adaptable they were.

I vaguely acknowledged that we had skipped dinner. Or rather forgotten about it entirely. It was almost midnight when we both closed our books in unison. Spike had not reawakened at any point and neither she nor I were particularly hungry, judging by the missing growls of empty bellies.

“I had my doubts,” she broke the silence. “When we first met, it was…”

“Strange. Weird. A little embarrassing,” I supplied.

“A little,” she quietly snorted. She resumed after recomposing herself. “I do not have them anymore.” Well, that got my attention. My ears swiveled in her direction and stood at attention. “When I first met my friends here in Ponyville… my first friends here, anyway… it was a rush. I met them out of necessity and by chance. We stood up to Nightmare Moon, overcame challenges, and learned to trust each other. Sometimes, I find it hard to believe… sometimes, I have trouble remembering… that all that happened in less than one day. We had a long road ahead of us. A lot to learn about each other, and ourselves. And we did, in time. But at the end of that first day, I trusted them. I believed that, if I were in trouble, they would have my back. Because I had gotten into trouble, and they proved themselves trustworthy. I have known you for a lot longer than one day. However, we had no Nightmare Moon as a catalyst.”

“I’m not at all heart-broken about that,” I interjected.

“Neither am I. But these past days got me thinking. Maybe it would have helped me overcome my reservations faster. I think, initially, I did not want to believe you. But I have seen you struggle. I have seen you risk something for those dear to you. Even though you were a stranger to them.” She was losing focus. I could tell. It was a problem we tended to share. Soon enough, she would careen from one random thought to the next, start to ramble and fail to make her point.

So I tried to help her out. “Twilight… where are you going with this?”

It took her a moment. She leaned back, away from me, so that we could turn to each other and look into each other’s eyes. “I trust you. And I feel safe with you. And you are my friend, as much as I am yours.”

I had to swallow hard to get that lump out of my throat. It meant so much to me to hear her say that. I leaned in, as did she. Not for a romantic kiss, but to embrace each other. I brushed my neck against hers. I smelled her mane again, that bouquet of wisdom of ages past, paper and ink. I felt like melting into her. I retreated slightly after a few seconds to whisper an honest “Thank you” into her ear. I retreated further but stopped again to kiss her cheek. And finally, I pulled back after that. She was smiling at me. Just looking at her smile filled me with warmth. I suddenly felt like I had been a frozen block before, but now I started to melt. Her smile radiated.

It took me a moment to realize what was happening.

Over the past few days, I had slowly started to understand her sorting system. I knew where to find towels, knives, plates and coffee in her kitchen. I suspected that it would not be too much of a problem if I were to accidentally barge into her bedroom. She felt safe with me.

I was home. Truly home.

I would need to talk to her about this at some point soon. To state it. Plain and simple. So that it had been said at least once. But at this moment, it seemed too fragile and too precious to disrupt the mood with something like that. I was sure, however. Sure that she had invited me to stay. The castle was massive… and empty. There were a dozen bedrooms nopony cared about. Spike and I got along really well. Even Owlicious and White Tip seemed like they had hit it off immediately. We had worked in her lab, side by side. It had just clicked. We were great lab-buddies.

Home.

I liked the sound of that. No, I loved it.

We were silent for a little while longer. Just enjoying each other’s company. When she grew tired, I wished her a good night and watched her leave. My eyes fell upon the table in front of the sofa. The tea pot and our mugs remained to be cleaned up. You wouldn’t leave that to a guest. But I was not a guest anymore, was I?

I cleared the table, cleaned the mugs and put our books back. I went to the bathroom afterwards, then into my room. My room? A room. This had been a guest room previously. Now, it might very well be my room.

I tried to sleep for a couple of minutes and expected no wonders and was therefore unsurprised at receiving none. I found myself fiddling around with the silver bands. I feared I might accidentally break them somehow, so I got back up and went back to the library. Owlicious and White Tip were both wide awake now. Apparently my feathered buddy was taking on some of his new friends routines? “Hey you two.” I lazily trotted over to the window they used to look outside. A beautiful moon and all the sparkling stars shone their light on a sleeping town. No clouds in sight. That gave me an idea. “How about a walk, hm?” Soft hooing and cawing confirmed their approval of my idea and shortly after they tried to settle down on my back. “Eh. At some point, we have to find a better solution for those claws of yours,” I stated. It did not hurt, per se. But it was not entirely comfortable either. I could bear it for now.

We went for the door and as soon as we were outside, both of them relieved me of their claws by taking to the air. They chased each other around, flew side by side and then… hunted, maybe? I tried not to think about it too much, just in case Fluttershy would come around asking about some mice friends of hers…

I walked along the edges of town until I found a nice looking bench and sat down. A brisk but lazy midnight breeze blew through my mane. It felt great. My eyes adapted to the low light levels and I watched Owlicious and White Tip chase what looked like a fox around in a field. On the odd and rare occasion, I felt like being observed. But whenever that happened and I looked around for some other night owl, nopony was to be found. Maybe there was a point to the rumors that Luna could use her stars and moon to spy on ponies. I thought about it and found that I did not care much either way. I did look forward to meeting her though. At some point.

Meeting with the Princesses was admittedly something I still dreaded in a way. Luna had some similarities to Pinkie in that she could be quite exuberant and bubbly. But she could be dead serious just as easily and her mood could change rapidly. What had her Elements been back in her days? Laughter, Loyalty… and Honesty, was it not? It fit quite well. She could be blunt as a hammer. That was funny, considering her favored weapon was a silver scythe. Don’t know what it is? Poke it with a stick!

Her ‘advice’ made me chuckle.

That left Generosity, Kindness and Magic for Tia. I felt a sudden pang of longing as I thought of her. I could not quite decide if Luna was an introvert with too much energy or an extrovert with surprisingly low battery life. But she could be exhausting at times. Celestia, on the other hoof, had always been the eye of the storm. That one point in all the chaos where one could find peace and calm. She could be mischievous if she wanted to, and one was better off not underestimating her, but her serene smile could calm down rampaging dragons.

I felt unprepared for meeting either of the sisters.

And with a little bit of a guilty conscience, I remembered there being a third Princess. Cadance. If the Crystal Empire was a thing here — and I had failed to check yet, I noticed —, then she was a sovereign ruler in her own right. Even without her own empire, she had her own domain. But curiously enough, ‘love’ was so much less tangible as the sun in the sky or the moon at night. More easily forgotten about. Maybe because one could not see it.

Cadance could. I knew that. On several occasions, I had been given several descriptions of how she saw love. Lines connecting ponies, colored according to their kind of love. Auras around ponies, their intensity telling her about the strength of their heart. Even a colorful glimmer in ponies’ eyes.

Searching my own memories, I did not come up with enough to decide if I should be disappointed or not. I never had any issues with Cadance. I got along with her just fine. She was easy-going and it was therefore hard to not get along with her. But on the same grounds, I had never been really close to her either.

And for now at least, I barely remembered anything about Shining Armor, Twilight's brother and Cadance’ husband. I knew that he was the kind of brother that would relentlessly question my intentions out of a sense of duty to protect his baby sister.

It would probably be best to stay away from Canterlot for just a little while longer.

Looking up in thought, I marveled at the beauty up there. I preferred star- and moonlight. It was soft and careful. It flattered what it touched, played with it. Celestia's light was different. Strong and unyielding, exposing all flaws and imperfections without mercy.

Day 9: Visitors

The midnight blue sky slowly became brighter again. Dawn drew closer. I felt a tingle under my skin, as if magic was used nearby. But I could not see anypony in the vicinity once again. I shrugged it off and called for Owlicious and White Tip. They landed on my back a moment later. “We’re returning home, guys. I hope you had fun. Come to think of it, you could fly ahead. I believe the window was slightly ajar.” I watched them fly off towards the castle, giving chase once more. They would be sleeping like logs.

“Have you been here the entire night?” an amused voice asked me from somewhere behind me.

I recognized her immediately. I turned around to greet Sunny and smiled. “You’re an early riser, huh?”

Her tone became a little reprimanding. “You should know better. Staying up all night is not good for you. Ponies need their sleep.” She had not answered me.

I laughed quietly. “Yes, mom. I know, mom.” She looked almost offended, so I shook my head. “Sorry. It’s just that… right now, I don’t appear to have much of a choice in the matter. It’s not like I didn’t try.”

“Oh?” she just asked and obviously waited for me to tell her more about this.

I had other plans though. “So. You’re already up, hm? Out for a morning walk?”

She once more hid behind her practiced smile and nodded. “Something like that. I love this moment of the day. Dawn is my favorite.” She walked up to my side and we watched the sunrise together. It was magnificent. “You were about to head off? Back home, I presume?” she asked as the sun had successfully climbed up over the horizon.

I gave it some thought. Owlicious and White Tip were fine. And it was still quite early. Why not actually go for a walk then? Especially with such good company. “You know… I thought I knew this town like the back of my hoof. But as it turns out, some things aren’t quite as I remember them.”

She smiled as she picked up on my subtle hint. “Well, maybe I can show you around, then?”

“That would be great,” I agreed and we started to walk down the street towards the town center.

“When have you been here the last time?” she asked as we passed the first building.

I once again ran into that wall of not wanting to lie to her face. “You won’t believe me,” I stated flatly.

Her practiced smile turned playful for a brief moment. “Try me.”

Well. She asked for it. “Alright. Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you. So, this week-long tale starts not at the beginning, but right in the middle. I wake up at the edge of the Everfree Forest, barely knowing who I am, or where, or what, and I immediately puke my very soul up because I see everything in doubles and triplicates and I’m utterly overwhelmed by my own senses. Then out of nowhere, a wild Twilight appears and I kiss her. Because let’s be honest, it’s Twilight, who wouldn’t, right? But I did that because I remembered her. It’s just that this Twilight isn’t my Twilight, the one I remember. So, awkwardness ensues. I more or less beg for her help and she somehow doesn’t kick my teeth in, but instead adopts me as her newest pet project. Because there’s this slight chance that she’ll be able to study dream magic if she helps me.” I looked down at the silvery bands around my hooves. "We're actually doing pretty well on that front."

I was in high spirits. Sunny quietly giggled. She tried to hide it, but she did not try very hard. And since I was in good spirits and had no qualms about a bit of good-natured self-deprecating humor, I did actually end up telling her almost everything. Even the juicy bits. I did try to be vague about the very personal stuff concerning Pinkie and Fluttershy, but she apparently was fine with that.

She was incredulous at times. Amused at others. But she did not interrupt me, not even once. We were walking along Ponyville streets, giving out the occasional ‘good morning’ to the other early birds, but apart from that we paid little attention to our surroundings. “That is one very adventurous story,” she finally concluded, neither implying that she believed me, nor stating her obvious skepticism of my retelling. It was a very diplomatic answer, all things considered.

It irked me a little. I would have let it slide usually, but in this instance, it just rubbed me the wrong way. “Are you always this evasive?” I asked bluntly.

That actually made her laugh. It was honest. And once more clear as a bell. “I am sorry, I meant no offense. It is a habit of mine, I fear.” The smile that was left behind in the wake of her laughter seemed more honest and warm as well.

“Alright, fine. I can’t stay mad at such a beautiful smile. So, you heard my entire life’s story. All the tragedy and unexpected twists and hidden plot reveals… how about you? See, I remember Ponyville quite well. I know a lot of its inhabitants, their names, their homes, some of course better than others. And I can’t help but notice that for the past half hour or so, I have been leading you around town. Makes sense, of course — you being here to visit somepony, right? Who are you visiting? Maybe I can come over sometime. What are you doing all day?”

She raised an eyebrow at my forwardness and looked me over. She eventually sighed. “After being so forthcoming with your own story, I suppose it is only fair to answer at least some of your questions. I am in the civil service, so to speak. A true-bred bureaucrat.” As she was calling herself by that title, she once more laughed. It was a quiet sound, tinged with mild bitterness. I didn’t like it very much. “Oh don’t look like that. Admittedly, I do not enjoy it either, but it must be done.”

Thinking about it, I shrugged. “Why not change profession then? You’re not nailed in place, you know. Switch it up. Do something you actually like.”

Her demure smile widened into a playful grin. “Oh but I am doing that. Right now, in fact. I should be at work, playing the busy bee. I have instead taken some time off. I have been meaning to make that a new habit for some time now. Wandering around a little, relaxing, refueling, and enjoying the sun.”

I could understand that. That sense of duty, and the longing for a proper balance. Being a craftsman or artist was different. Raw materials were used to create something else. Something useful, hopefully. But working as a bureaucrat — it just never ended. The same forms for the same problems and the same applications with the same law-supported hurdles. Day in, day out. With paperwork, it rarely felt like something actually got done.

“You know, I get that. Feeling responsible. Feeling like only you can do this, or only you can do it properly. That’s an illusion though. You just don’t know those other ponies that could do it in your stead. Who are maybe even able to do it better. But even if you are right — still doesn’t mean you have to do this. Others might struggle trying to take up what you put down. But they’ll adapt. They’ll learn. And how are they supposed to grow into such a role without practice? And everypony struggles in the beginning, don’t we? We can learn from examples, sure, but the truth is… most ponies learn best from mistakes. And most mistakes don’t spell the end of the world. Especially in bureaucracy.”

“You clearly have not heard nobles talk,” she mumbled and lowered her head.

I suspected that she had not expected me to hear that. And I did not comment on her remark. I instead turned to the left and led her to Sugarcube Corner. “I can’t take that weight off your shoulders, I know that. Buuut… maybe I can do the next best thing.”

She looked up in confusion. I nudged her a little until she looked over to the building and a smile spread on her lips as we pushed inside. She recognized the building.

A familiar pink blur zipped about and it took less than half a second for said blur to stop right in front of us. “Sergeant Pinks,” I addressed Pinkie who, in a hilarious yet not entirely unexpected reaction, stood at attention and wordlessly raised her right hoof to her forehead in a salute. “Desperate situations require desperate measures,” I continued to Sunny’s endless bemusement. “Deploy emergency cupcakes immediately! I fear that we won’t be able to rescue recruit Sunny’s smile otherwise.”

Gasping just a little and with a grim and serious expression, she saluted again. “Sir! Yes, sir!” She zipped past the counter, into the kitchen and right back out again, presenting a single cupcake and smiling like there would be no tomorrow. “It’s on the house,” she whispered sideways in my direction.

Right. No bits. Although I furrowed my brow thinking about it, my attention was drawn to Sunny and her reaction. Considering Sugarcube Corner was not empty and all the other patrons as well as Mister Cake behind the counter were staring at us, we had put her on the spot juuust a little.

Sunny giggled without any sign of discomfort or embarrassment, like a good little trooper. One used to this kind of attention. Still, it took her a second or two to realize what was expected of her. “Oh, right,” she mumbled and then saluted as well. “Thank you, Sergeant Pinks.” She carefully took the cupcake with a wing and sat down on her haunches, gazing at the sweet treat. After a moment of apprehension on our part, she took a bite out of it. Her eyelids immediately fluttered shut and she sighed deeply in satisfaction. A genuine smile spread across her muzzle mere moments after that.

I was satisfied as well at this point. “Sergeant Pinks — it appears the emergency has passed. Your efforts for land and crown are appreciated and will not go unnoticed.” I saluted her, she saluted me and I tried my hardest not to break character by laughing. “Carry on.” And back into the kitchen she zipped.

I looked around at the other ponies. To my incredible relief, none of them looked disturbed. To be honest, they did not even look confused. Most of them just smiled or held a hoof up to their mouth to contain their own mirth. Even Mister Cake who was still standing behind the counter was just smiling. With that genuine warmth only an exhausted young father could muster. When I looked over to him and he nodded, silently thanking me. Probably not for the little show, I suspected. Pinkie was buzzing with joy. And the Cakes cared for her like a surrogate daughter.

I replied in kind and seeing as nothing remained from that cupcake in Sunny’s hooves, we exited the store again. The sun's warmth felt great on my skin. And apparently gave me an excess of energy. “Whoever’s last at the castle is a crazy old coot!” And off I went running. Because that had worked out in my favor last time, right?

I heard her laughing behind me and she gasped indignantly at my insolence. “You’re cheating!” she yelled after me.

Good point! “No teleporting!” I yelled back instead of making any excuses or any sense. I probably should have denied her the use of her wings, being a pegasus and all that. But I was breathing hard at the moment and still chuckled while running and only remembered Twilight's endlessly smug face.

Looking back, I noticed that she was gaining on me fast. And after a very short while, we were running side by side. I was certain that she could have outrun me if she wanted. But she did not. When we came close to the castle, a short flash made me falter for a step or two.

It was the running of the leaves, I mean… who doesn’t want to win that? So I just bumped her with my flank. Just a little swerve, so she would be off-balance.

Rainbow had sounded so endlessly embarrassed. And I could hear Applejack trying to stifle her laughter. Without thinking twice — or even once, for that matter — I bumped my flank into Sunny’s. The difference was that we were not athletes. We were not running at breakneck speed and I was severely underestimating her. She looked outraged for about half a second. Then a very wicked grin spread on her muzzle and I swallowed hard. Uh oh.

She spread her pristine white wings and I tried to duck out of the way. Another failure. We tumbled to the side onto a patch of grass in a tangled mess of limbs. I had to give her credit though: She was careful. More so than I had been. We could have easily sprained something with that tumble, or worse. But she had closed her wings around us like it was a mantle of steel. How? I did not care once we came to a rest. I was on top of her with her splayed out beneath. “Ha!” I yelled, tasting sweet victory until I felt her hindlegs on my belly. Oh no.

I braced myself for a short flight as she kicked me off. Knowing what was to come helped me, as I landed and immediately rolled to the side. She had an intimidating amount of agility and was surprisingly strong for her frame, but how surprising was that really when a pegasus was concerned? She landed in the wrong spot as I had rolled away and now pulled her legs from under her. A subdued shriek of surprise and she landed on her side. This was my chance!

I was over her in an instant and… failed to find any ticklish spot.

My attempts came to a screeching halt as I realized their futility and I slowly looked up to her, dreading what I was about to behold in her eyes. A playful, wicked twinkle, matching her grin. Oh boy.

She reversed our roles without much effort and I, on the other hoof, was very ticklish. Basically everywhere.

Maybe it was a good thing that I had waited until we had at least reached the outer edge of town. Less ponies wandering about. None of them minded much, of course. They were amused. But I could not control any longer how loud I was. And I was screaming laughter at the top of my lungs until they gave up.

When I started to see stars, I went for the emergency solution. My magic snaked around her barrel and lifted her off of me and I held her up in mid-air. It worked for more than a couple of seconds, much to my surprise. Because she did not struggle against it. I was lying there breathing hard and tried to recompose myself. I finally looked up at her. She looked rather smug and therefore reminded me a lot of Twilight. “You would not have won any other way,” she told me. And I was in no position to disagree with that. But I couldn't help but smile — because in a way, she had just said that I had won.

I stood up and regarded her. And I felt a little bit emboldened. She was hanging there patiently waiting. Little tendrils of my magic snaked away from the soft glow she was captured in, pressing and prodding here and there along her body. The alien sensation surprised her, but she quickly understood my intention and grinned again. “You will not find any,” she claimed.

“Because even if, by chance, I’d find a spot, you wouldn’t let me know,” I guessed.

“That is cor—,“ she started, only for me to find a spot by chance, just as I had said. She was surprised enough that she let half a laugh out before she could stifle it. I made a mental note that her ears, of all things, seemed to be very sensitive. Good to know. “You better forget about that,” she warned me. Judging by her smile, she knew full well that there was no way in Tartarus for that to happen. “And what, pray tell, are you doing to me anyway?”

“Preemptive recon, ma’am!” I grinned and used one of the tendrils to slowly stroke down her back. Her eyelids fluttered for a moment and her smile widened. So that felt nice, huh? I was about to end my investigation and used just a little bit of pressure on her cutie mark. I was immediately surprised by her quiet moan. As was she, apparently. Hearing that kind of sound from her, I utterly lost my concentration and the telekinesis failed. I knew that she would not be able to get her wings out fast enough at this height. So I jumped.

My idea had been to catch her. Somehow.

I instead ended up being the pillow she landed upon. “Ow,” I groaned.

“Deserved,” she muttered and stood up again. She helped me up as well just a moment later. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, really, and I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to embarrass you. Are you okay?”

“I am… fine, yes.”

There was a moment of intense awkwardness where we were standing around and avoided each other’s gazes. Until I realized that we were literally standing a dozen or so feet away from the castle. “Castle! Right. So. Here we are. At the… castle. That I had mentioned. Previously. Right.” I sighed and tried again. “Why am I always like this…? Okay, let’s start over. This is where I live right now. Do you want to come in?” There was no astonishment, no admiration in her gaze as she regarded the massive crystalline structure. Just her practiced smile and recognition. She raised an eyebrow at my invitation. “Ehrm… I’d like to say sorry. Maybe with some tea and ice cream.”

“A cupcake first, and now ice cream? You are spoiling me,” she joked.

“Nah. That was an emergency. Come to think of it, this one is as well.”

Her gaze drifted back to the castle and she nodded. “I would like that.” Her more playful smile returned quickly. “After you. Just so you will not stare at my flank.”

“I just— I wouldn’t— I mean I— you know, if I walk in front of you, you would just stare at my flank!” I tried to counter while blushing furiously.

“I am a proper and decent mare, I’ll have you know!” she retorted. That had almost sounded like Rarity.

“Ugh. Fine.” I trotted past her without waiting. I looked back at the halfway mark and could have sworn that it was suspicious how fast her eyes flitted up to look at those nice, fluffy clouds. Maybe I had given her an idea.

I bowed again when I opened the door for her. She just shook her head and entered with a smile. A couple of minutes later we settled down in the living room. The castle was surprisingly silent. I had called for Twilight and Spike, but neither had answered and I found Owlicious and White Tip sleeping on a perch near the window. So I went to the kitchen and made a pot of chamomile tea and prepared two servings of strawberry ice cream. The choice had been easy enough: Trust in what you have seen. If it was not something special, Pinkie tended to color-code her sweets. The cupcake Sunny had enjoyed so much had white frosting. As far as I remembered, that was strawberry. And I had no idea why those were white. Pinkie logic, I assumed.

I returned with my offerings to appease my guest and she looked surprised for a moment when she noticed the scent of the tea. After a few spoonfuls of ice cream, she sighed happily.

“Everything alright?” I asked.

She nodded and her expression turned more reminiscent. “It just… it has been a while.” I just looked at her and patiently waited for an explanation, which she graciously delivered soon after. “The last time I had such a nice day on, well, such a nice day.”

I looked out the window and smiled to myself. “Yeah, Tia’s been hard at work today.” She looked surprised and I could guess why. “It’s not a lack of respect,” I explained quickly. “But I mean, just think about it for a second. Celestia has been in charge of this entire nation for over a thousand years. Nopony knows how long before that. A thousand years of bad habits and routines. It takes time to get rid of such stuff, you know? She sees these bows each and every day. Dozens of times each day, in fact. And she receives all these gifts, too. Rare stuff, expensive stuff, impressive stuff. Meant to impress her. To sway her. She gets a lot of shows of respect. Honest ones and dishonest ones. I don’t… want to be ‘just another one’, you know? I do respect what she has been doing, and still is doing to this very day. But I carry that respect with me, I don’t need to boast about it. If she insists on it? Sure. If others are watching? Sure. Because it’s a formality. Decorum. It exists for a reason, but… we’re not in her throne room right now. Or, heaven forbid, in court. And as long as it’s not in an official capacity, I don’t think I would even address her as ‘Princess Celestia’. Especially not in that awe-inspired, idolizing tone Twilight tends to use. She puts her on this unreachable pedestal… many do that. The immaculate, flawless, perfect Princess Celestia, Timeless Beauty Incarnate.” I had not even realized that an almost angry undertone had wormed its way into my little speech. I shook my head and tried to clear it. “She’s a friend of mine. Or… was one, once. I hope she’ll be my friend again. On a normal day, she was Celestia. On a good one, she was Tia, my little minx.”

I sighed again. “Everypony has these stupid expectations of her. How she ‘has to be’. They expect her to be distant. To stand above all others. And it’s just the saddest thing in the long and tragic history of sad things. Because at the end of the day, she’s just a pony. And she’s not allowed to make her own choices. To live however she wants to live. She wanted this nation to grow strong and her ponies to be happy. And she had to make so many horrible sacrifices to get there… I hope that I’ll gain her friendship once more. I have a present for her: I want to give her the feeling of being just a pony. I couldn’t overwhelm her with gifts and riches. I can’t write epic prose to save my life. And Pinkie agrees that I’m not enough of a mind reader to know every wish and whim before she does. But I could treat her like any other friend. I could treat her like I treat Twilight or Pinkie or Derpy or Lyra. Maybe even more, someday.”

Had I always been this big on monologs?

Sunny had been silent throughout the entire thing. She absentmindedly chipped away at her ice cream before it could melt and sipped her tea and just listened. It reminded me of Fluttershy. Kindness makes you open up. “Is that something you want then? Courting a princess?” she asked quietly.

I shook my head. “No. I don’t care that she’s a princess. Actually, if I were to fall for her again—“ Again? Huh. “I-I… I’m terrible with this much attention. I know it is part of the deal, you can’t have one without the other and she’s definitely worth it, but… I just hate the spotlight.”

Instead of honing in on that as a part of me had feared she would, she changed the topic. “You said you know her? That you were friends before?” I just nodded. “What do you know?” she added.

My cheeks and ears felt warm. And I did not care to suppress a dreamy smile. “They have both been alive for longer than my mind can grasp. They have seen so many wonders of this world. They do have the knowledge and wisdom of ages long past. Luna has always been the more emotional one. Or rather, she’s more upfront with her feelings. It fits, I guess. Her night domain is associated with desire and passion, for good and ill. Celestia, on the other hoof, is a diplomat at heart. For her, it isn’t even an effort to steer any conversation in any direction she wishes. She can talk down enraged emissaries and offended leaders in a couple of minutes. She cares. A lot. For everypony. Her heart is that of a mother, and she carries a heavy burden because of it. When it is time to make difficult decisions, it falls to her. When the question arises if it is better to sacrifice the few for the good of the many, it falls to her. She’s been dealing with this for way too many years. Without break. And without breaking. She is a born leader. A caretaker. Her love is unyielding as the sun, warm and nurturing and capable of fierce vengeance upon those who threaten what is dear to her. But she is lonely, too. She knows loss like few others do. Countless students, lovers, friends. Families. She carries so much pain and regret on her shoulders, hiding it behind her mask. And as long as she hides it, it cannot heal. Because she doesn’t process it. Doesn’t let it go. She holds on to it for dear life, because it is a reminder. Every failure and every loss is sweetened with the memory of a name or a face. She radiates serenity and brings peace to others, sharing so much… and keeping none for herself.”

My voice had become barely a whisper over time. My heart felt as heavy as my words had been. When I looked over to Sunny, her smile had fallen away. Her eyes were watery and tears stained her cheeks. I tried to lighten the mood and forced a smile upon my features, only to feel how full of sorrow it was. “And she loves chamomile tea. And strawberry ice. And almost every kind of cake there is. She despises coffee. Which is just one more reason to love her. And she makes the best tea there is.” It was admittedly a weak attempt.

Sunny’s distant look was replaced by one of thought. She stared down at her mug. And her ice cream bowl. It took some time, but she smiled again. I could not tell if it was honest or not. It was… different. She carefully stood up. “Thank you for the tea. But I think I should return home.”

I nodded and brought her back to the entrance door. “With any luck, we’ll bump into each other again soon enough. I’m looking forward to it.”

She smiled again. It was another honest one. “Me too.”

The door closed and I turned around. I closed my eyes as well and took a deep inhale. Cadance’s breathing technique did not work for me when I was panicking. But it had its merits in other situations. Opening my eyes again, I felt a little bit more centered.

Right. Now — Twilight and Spike had not answered any call and had not shown up either. But I found no trace of a note or something. None at the door, none in the living room and none in the kitchen. This led me to believe that they must still be around this massive place… somewhere.

Walking around the now less empty hallways for a couple of minutes of admiring Stonewood's work yielded nothing… until I heard a strange noise. I walked in that direction, drawn to its source. I was almost sneaking at that point and started to recognize it as somepony sobbing. The kind of unbridled sobbing that followed after bawling one's eyes out.

It’s not Twilight, I tried to reassure myself. But that did little to calm me down. It was not her, yet it sounded familiar nonetheless. A sound I had heard rarely, I remembered. And it had almost broken my heart every time.

I stood frozen at the entrance to one of the guestrooms. It was one of a few with larger proportions, enough room to feature a sofa of its own. On which Twilight sat, holding one of her friends in a tight embrace. She tried to comfort her. Be there for her. But that look of pain on her face spoke of her failed attempts.

And Applejack continued to weep.

Applejack cries on the inside, Twilight! Pinkie's voice echoed clear as day in my head.

It’s true, AJ nonchalantly confirmed and crossed her front legs.

Her shell was hard as stone. Not just because of her muscles, but because Applejack was rooted to the ground. She stood firm, unyielding, come storm or flood or the end of the world. It took tremendous effort to break her down like that. Or a very precise stab.

I suddenly felt nauseous. I reeled. Seeing Big Mac weakly crawl his way forth from under a fallen tree. It had taken him months to heal…

I saw Applebloom almost hitting the roof of the farmhouse. If Rainbow hadn’t caught her last second…

I saw Granny Smith. She smiled serenely while sitting in her chair, but her chest did not move.

Don’t.

I almost choked. What if something had happened? Obviously something had happened, but what if something serious had happened to them?

No, I begged internally, I didn’t even get to say ‘hi’ yet…

My gaze was drawn to AJ once more. I was searching for a clue, any indication of what might have happened. She was grief-stricken. Tears stained her coat, dark patches on Twilight's fur told a depressing story of how long she had already been crying like this. Her eyes were clenched shut. She continued to sob, to shake. I could see her attempts to restrain herself, to regain control, but every single time she failed and wailed on just a little bit harder than before.

Don’t.

I stepped forward. Just one step. Twilight’s ears swiveled around. She looked up and her eyes locked with mine. What happened?, I silently asked. She read my face. My worries. My wishes. And she shook her head while once again stroking AJs mane and shoulders with a hoof. And she held her tighter with the other.

Don’t! You’re hurting her! Dreamwalker, stop! I remembered Fluttershy of all ponies, tackling me to the ground. Standing over me, wings flared, eyes wide with anger. My hooves were bloodied. It should have been impressive. Intimidating, even. But I couldn't care less, I wanted to punch her some more and tried to crawl back to Rainbow to—

Don’t.

Of course you’re invited. You’re part of the family, Applejack said. Her words echoed in my mind until it hurt. Part of the family. Part of the family.

Another step forward.

Twilight's gaze transformed. Cold and hard and warning me away. She shook her head again, softly as to not disturb Applejack. A single nod for the door was all I got. Go away. It was clear enough. Even for me.

Don’t go!

Don’t leave!

Don’t come closer!

Don’t hurt her!

Just don’t.

I almost tripped as the memories flooded my mind. Twilight was right. I was a mess. And a mess like me would be no help right now. She had all her hooves full with that situation, whatever it was. I turned. Slowly. Quietly. One step away. A second step away. I felt horrible. She was family. I should not leave her like this. I should be in there. I should be helping. Trying, at least.

A soft raspberry glow encased the door. I looked back over my shoulder. The gap closed. Not entirely, though — Twilight did not want to risk Applejack being startled by the doors lock clicking close.

I stood in that hallway and felt numb. Tears were threatening to spill from my eyes, but they just didn’t. After who knows how long, I moved again. I felt strangely detached. Distant. I went to the kitchen. Made some tea. I left the door purposefully ajar. Anyone attentive enough would see that the kitchen was in use. And I could hear anypony milling about near the entrance door that was not purposefully sneaking around.

I had a mug in my hooves and I couldn't care less. I stared at it and thought of nothing. Like a massive earthquake, this flash of insight had aftershocks. I was relieved to find that I was not some violent brute. I did not know what Rainbow had done to her. To deserve me flipping out like that. However, I remembered her just taking it. No resistance whatsoever.

For now, it was the only incident I could recall of me resorting to violence.

They always got through, I heard myself say, With help, obviously. Always with help.

Always.

My ears swiveled around at the first sound in ages. Hoofsteps. Two ponies. They were coming down the hallway. The kitchen door was still ajar, but the candle had burned out at some point. It felt like a week ago that I had been running around with Sunny. But that had been this morning. At dawn, even. Where had all that time run off to?

Applejack did not notice me as she walked past. Or maybe she did and just did not care. They both reached the door and I heard whispering. Something like a ‘goodbye’, maybe. A lot more was said, but I suspected that a farewell was included in that.

Twilight made her way back. “What happened?” I asked. It was not even really a question. I accidentally gave Twilight a start, made her jump a little. She cast a simple light spell on her horn, blinding me in return. I flinched and closed my eyes until she reduced its intensity. “Maybe it would be best if she stayed the night?” I offered while blinking the stars away.

She sat down at the table, opposite of me. I wordlessly refilled my mug and levitated it over to her. She accepted with a nod, sipped and slumped. She looked exhausted. Her eyes were bloodshot. She had at some point shared in Applejack's tears. “Twilight… what happened?” I asked again. More insistently.

“You know Applejack,” she started. “She has some issues and she is going to bury them under work.” She sounded frustrated. She had every right to be. Applejack was stubborn. Maybe the most stubborn pony I knew. And this lesson… she had learned it in the past. Over and over again, in fact. Yet it was a lesson that came up every now and then, in dire need of some repeating.

I nodded glumly and waited for her to continue. Only after a minute or two did I realize that nothing else would come. “I am going to know,” I said with gravitas and determination. I had not expected to sound like that, but I was not about to take it back either.

She looked at me, her face moving through several emotional states. Warning. Threat. Protest. Pleading. And finally, surrender. I knew it was unfair of me. After what she had been through, she just did not have it in her to fight me. “I could snoop around,” I told her. “Ask Pinkie or Fluttershy. Check her dreams the next time I get a chance. In fact, I could make a chance if I felt like I really needed to.” I was not above making some threats of my own, apparently. Mine were just more concrete. To make a point.

I would know.

She sighed. “You would learn of it soon enough anyway,” she conceded. She took another sip to prolong her need to explain by just a few seconds. “Apparently, she had been in a relationship with Rainbow.”

It was a volatile cocktail of emotions. For those precious first seconds, tremendous relief was the most prevalent one. Nopony was dead. No burned down farm, no dead Winona, nopony was crippled or blinded or anything else. After that came surprise. I once more skimmed through what I thought I knew about how things usually went. As far as I remembered, this was a first. They were together already? Well. That was great, was it not? One nudge less that I had to give. Two, technically. But then worry creeped in as her word fully registered. Had been. As in: It was over.

Don’t.

I had been there before. We all had been at some point. I remembered awkwardly sitting around as Fluttershy cooed to a distraught Rainbow. I remembered Pinkie almost literally crying a river in sheer compassion for Applejack. I remembered Twilight and me, holding Rainbow between us as she suddenly felt so very small and sounded so very young and fragile again. And I remembered bloody hooves, which made me wince.

“What happened?” I asked yet again.

Twilight just shrugged. “I don’t know. She would not tell me. Honestly, I had a feeling that she just could not.”

Rainbow had not told her? Another flash, mercifully short. Apparently something that happened quite often. Get a hold of yourself, filly! How can you be this bad at communication?! Maybe I should ask her someday. Just to see her face. “How long?” I continued to ask.

“A couple of months, I believe,” she replied. “Applejack said that they had a bumpy start, but the last two weeks had been especially rough. They had tried to keep it a secret for now, even from her family.” She started to be more forthcoming with information. I noticed. I also noticed that tiny glimmer of hope in her eyes: Maybe I had seen this before. Maybe I had been here before. Maybe I could fix this.

Yeah. Maybe I could.

I would certainly try.

I could not not try, anyway.

Keeping secrets was not exactly their forte. For neither of them. “So what happened?” I asked a fourth time. Two rough weeks, culminating in an end of this relationship. Sure, it was something. But if I could get more to work with, I would gladly take whatever I could get.

She looked uncomfortable for a moment. I was about to tell her to stop when she spoke up again. “According to Applejack, Rainbow was acting strange. Awkward and distant. I had not noticed any such behavior during our meetings as a group, but she said it was only when they were alone with each other. She… tried to force Rainbow to tell her.”

Ah. Now I got the picture. Rainbow usually reacted rather badly to threats and pressure. At least pressure she had not applied herself.

“You don’t really feel comfortable with telling me this,” I noted the obvious. She nodded. And I… I was an idiot. I had basically pressured her into answering me. I had threatened her. Goodness gracious, what was wrong with me?! I sighed deeply and shook my head. “I’m sorry. I should not have forced you. You were just trying to help a friend and protect their privacy.”

“You are going to help, are you not?” she asked quietly and shied away from my gaze.

“I… I’m going to try, yes.”

She bit her lower lip in thought. She nodded more to herself than to me. “Then hopefully, it will be worth it and they will forgive me.”

I felt strange sitting there, pondering the question: How far was I willing to go for the sake of my friends? For their happiness? Would I betray them if it would make them happier in the end? Would I be willing to sacrifice my own friendship for that? I was trying to answer that on her behalf, for her sake, as much as mine. Twilight had made no promise to keep her mouth shut. After her experiences with Pinkie Promises, she had grown more cautious. And this had been a random encounter, forced by chance. Had I spent the entire day with Sunny or in the library or literally anywhere else, I would not have known of any of this. Spilling the beans was a sacrifice she was willing to make. Because she was the one bearing the consequences.

How about myself then? I apparently had been willing to threaten a dear friend. One who just yesterday had told me that she trusted me. And felt safe with me. I wanted to kick myself so hard at that moment. Twilight was not one to hold a grudge. She probably had already forgiven me, arguing in my favor that I was just protective or something. And while that was not wrong, it felt like a cheap excuse.

Was I willing to bear the consequences of my own actions?

So far, I had shared a smile at a distance with Applejack. She was reasonable, sure, but she was also wary. And neither she nor Rainbow would take kindly to me meddling in their affairs.

Was I willing to take the risk of losing their friendship before it had even begun, just so that I could have a shot at fixing their already broken relationship?

Because that was what this came down to, was it not? Risking something for a chance. Success wasn’t even guaranteed here. I did not know what had caused this rift. I remembered dozens of instances where they had called it off for dozens of different reasons. Half of them stupid as heck. Who breaks up over a pig?!

I looked at Twilight. She was trying to smile. Emphasis on ‘trying’. So I tried as well. “I’m not sure how, yet. But I will fix this.” I tried to be careful with promises as well. But I really wanted to promise it. I reigned myself in, though. No need to upset Pinkie should things not work out.

Never promise something you cannot guarantee to keep!

Right. That.

“Come on. You could use a good night’s rest.” I walked around the table and leaned in, placing my forehead against hers. Our horns crossed and sent a little, satisfying shiver down my spine. Under any other circumstances, it could have felt intimate. This time, it was just an unspoken promise of backup. Of help. I walked her to her bedroom, watched her go in and then did not even bother trying to sleep myself. Instead, I immediately returned to the kitchen, made a fresh pot of tea and settled in the living room. I had to plan my angle of attack.

Whenever I ran head first into another dead end, I distracted myself by presenting White Tip — and to an extent Owlicious — with a riddle. I knew a couple and they apparently enjoyed the challenge. And I returned to brooding every time they were done. This was shaping up to be a fun night.

Day 10: A Day in the Field

The next morning came and I still had no plan. I tried to fight any oncoming panic with the thought that I would not need a plan, because I had something better! An idea. I just had to lie to myself about its quality, because deep down, I already knew that it was a bad, bad, baaad idea.

But I was committed.

As soon as the once again stunningly beautiful night sky brightened, I made my way out of the castle. Applejack, much like the rest of her family, usually started their day with the roosters’ first call. A dreadful tradition for a night owl like me, but I supposed it made sense for a family of hard working farmers.

I did not spare any time or mind for breakfast either. I felt more like puking, honestly. Because of nerves. And Twilight would not be up for several hours anyway. Even Spike would still be fast asleep for quite a while. Oh. I stopped in the middle of a street when I realized that I was about to leave him hanging. I had promised to at least ask Twilight if I could help her sort the library in his place. But then I had forgotten all about that and then this had come up and now I was on my way to… well, probably a good beating.

Maybe a sapphire muffin was enough to make up for that? Or ten?

Bought with which bits again…?

Right. Riiight.

Maybe that plan needed some more thought. I shook my head and walked on. One step at a time, I was no Twilight.

My mood brightened considerably when I saw Sunny. She waved at me and smiled, so I made a beeline for her. I sadly did not have much time to spare, but I wanted to at least keep her in the loop. “Heeey,” I greeted her and went straight for a hug. “I’m awfully sorry, but I’m kind of busy today and don’t have much time. I’m on an important mission to rescue a relationship whose participants both have already given up on it and I’m the poor sod that needs to somehow break through their thick, stubborn skulls, so wish me luck and I hope I’ll see you soon again, hopefully with a little more time then! Oh and you look gorgeous!” I pressed a chaste little kiss to her cheek and cantered off to make up for lost time, leaving her standing there flabbergasted.

I reached the extensive apple orchard a short time later. Now, my only task was to find Applejack. In square miles upon square miles of apple trees. Cakewalk.

It quickly turned out that it was quite easy, much to my honest surprise. Maybe I should have trusted my knowledge of Applejack that had previously told me that this would still count towards the ‘easy part’ of my plan.

Sleeping through a single night — already presuming that she had slept, which was not a given — would do little for Applejack. She was great at carrying. Carrying grudges. Carrying emotional ballast. Carrying bushels of apples. Carrying Big Mac, if necessary. Carrying the weight of the world.

Given how emotionally charged she must have been to break down like that yesterday, she surely would not stand in the kitchen baking pie. Because those were made with care and love, not frustration and tears. A recipe Discord would approve, I was certain. In the same vein, she would not risk alienating customers by tending to the market stand and yelling at everypony who mentioned Rainbow. No, of course not. There was only one thing she could be doing right now. And my ears honed in on her position as I trotted past rows and rows of trees, following the violent thud of her back hooves connecting with sturdy tree trunks. She was trying to get rid of excess energy, trying to get that grief and frustration and anger and sadness out of her system via the only way she knew worked with a modicum of reliability: By exhausting herself.

There was a crux though. She had been doing this for years. And I meant the apple bucking, not the very poor coping mechanism. Although. That too, probably. She was trained. She had endurance. And strength. Earth pony strength and earth pony endurance, on top of that. If she wanted to keep her trees alive and healthy, she needed to restrain herself at least a little bit. This meant that it took so much longer for her to actually get exhausted. And it meant that it did not feel quite as satisfying as just bucking something to pieces. If she were to keep this up throughout the next couple of days, I was sure she would tire out eventually. And then probably become a friendship crisis once more, as she tried to keep this up beyond any reasonable point. Because she would then freak out and try to keep herself this calm and unfeeling.

It was a mess, really. It always was with these stubborn types. And I had to look forward to not only doing this once, oh no, I had to do it twice.

Yesterday had actually been really nice, by comparison.

“Applejack?” I addressed her. Here we go.

She turned to face me and I could not help but appreciate her appearance. Contrary to Pinkie Pie, one could prod and probe her basically anywhere without finding any fat whatsoever. Her well-toned body was impressive and I appreciated it for the sign of dedication that it was. And her face was covered by cute freckles. Her work ethics were unmatched. Still, I had to focus on the task ahead and I suspected that the first step would involve me desperately trying to get her to accept help. Because that was a reappearing issue with her.

Her brow narrowed as her eyes took on a wary tinge. She was already drilling into me. “Leave.” Before I could even start to object, she added, “I don’t know what business brings you to the farm. Talk to Big Macintosh at the market or return in a couple of days. But leave me alone, please.” Her ‘please’ sounded terse. It cost her dearly to even use such a word in her current state.

“I’m here to help,” I tried. I had to get through to her first. I had to get her to listen. Somehow.

“If you’re here to help with the harvest — we ain’t hirin' right now. We’re doin' fine.” She knew this was not about employment. I could see it in her eyes. But she wanted to get rid of me, and fast. There was a lot one could say about Applejack. Some ponies thought she was a little simple-minded, mistaking her straightforwardness. Her endearing southern drawl, her affinity — and preference — for physical labor, her massive, tight-knit family, her distaste for the ‘upper class’ and their mannerisms. Especially outsiders tended to underestimate her, to think of her as some kind of living, breathing hillbilly cliché.

Most of those ponies did not know her though. As far as I knew, none in Ponyville would be stupid enough to even think that Applejack wasn’t smart as heck. She was no Twilight, sure, but then again — few ponies could measure up to her. Applejack just used her smarts in a more subtle way. And her intelligence was not so much based on knowledge gleaned from books and more grounded in experience. Her family was actually part of her strength in that regard. She did not just learn from her own mistakes. She learned from those generations of Apples that came before her. She learned from her peers in Appleloosa and wherever else they settled. She learned from Big Mac, Granny and even Apple Bloom. She even learned from the Oranges, her more distant relatives in Manehattan. She had a massive pool of wisdom to draw from, honed and cultivated by generations prior.

And she had no love for fancy talk. She considered it a waste of her time. So I tried to use a language she was familiar with. One she spoke frequently, because it suited her needs just fine: One of blunt and direct honesty. “I can help you with Rainbow.” Her brows sank lower still, drawing together and almost forming a line. Her eyes became hard as stone. Just a glimpse of surprise, followed by suspicion and determination and then… something else.

I did not see it coming. For a pony of her size and weight, she was surprisingly fast. And I meant no offense with that, but earth ponies tended to be larger and heavier already, and she was a hardworking farm mare to boot. A quick jab against my chest made me feel like my lungs had just collapsed. I wheezed and reeled back. Standing on my rear legs gave her the perfect opportunity to get up close and personal. She pushed me backwards until my back hit a tree trunk. I was pinned in a rather uncomfortable position, with her staring me down in apparent anger.

“I remember you know,” she almost spat. “You’ve been in Twilight's castle yesterday, snoopin' around. I’m tellin' you only once: This is none of your business. Stay. Out.”

With her subconsciously putting more and more pressure on my throat, it became harder to breathe. She must have noticed the red tinge, because she gave me free as quickly as she had pinned me and stepped back a short distance. I saw regret in her eyes for a brief moment, but then she shook her head. It was not like her. Applejack was grounded. Centered. She usually was not this prone to outbursts. I rubbed my throat and chest for a moment and I sighed internally. I had not expected this to be easy.

“If you put your mind to it, you can tell if somepony lies to your face,” I half-asked.

She looked away. “Maybe,” she muttered. She muttered. Goodness gracious, something really was off with her.

“Alright,” I started again. “I know you. There was a time when you called me a friend. Part of your family, even. I’d like to be your friend once more, if you’ll have me. But that’s not what I’m here for today. I want to help you.”

She did not look at me. That was a problem, as far as I remembered. Because she needed to see somepony’s expression to tell. However, it appeared that she had used that time to think to herself. And once she raised her head again, her glare had become accusatory. “How would you even know?” she asked. And her eyes inevitably widened a second later. “Twilight,” she almost hissed with a bitter undertone. “She promised!” she cursed quietly.

“No she didn’t,” I immediately threw in. She had half a mind to punch me unconscious, I could see that. Lucky for me, she restrained herself. But I just could not let her lay down all the blame to Twilight's hooves. As much as I wanted to help her, I had to defend my other friend as well. “She didn’t promise you anything,” I insisted. “After the whole crisis with Spike's crush on Rarity, she became a lot more careful with what she promised. And she knows she’s bad at keeping secrets, especially if her friends are hurt. You know that as well. You are just awful at keeping secrets in general. She would have promised, of course. She would have if you had asked. But you knew what it could do to her. And you wouldn’t put that weight on her shoulders again.”

I was obviously operating on a lot of assumptions. I hoped that most of them were true or at least true enough and judging by how she looked, I was doing okay. She still appeared to be a very angry earth pony, which was intimidating. But she had herself under control for now.

“How?” she asked after a while. I could see her mind racing. Weighting opportunities and potential traps against each other. She tried to find a silver lining in this encounter. To find a way to both respect her own nature and include her mistrust of me in her decision making. But there was this tiny spark of hope that I might actually be helpful at the same time.

I saw an opening and had every intention of using it. “If it’s any consolation, Twilight didn’t go into detail. What she told me I could’ve figured out several other ways, and I would have. Rainbow dumped you and you don’t even really know why. She only did after you tried to force some answers out of her, but as usual, that featherbrain doesn’t exactly react well to external pressure.”

“Don’t,” she started to yell and her mouth snapped shut. She then reigned herself in and continued in a halfway decent volume. “Don’t call her that.” She still loves and defends her. Good.

“I can’t guarantee success. But I can try to give you an opportunity to get the answer you are searching for. I can help you figure out why she dumped you.”

That fight was still ongoing. Even with my offer now plain on the table, she struggled against herself. She wanted this answer. Badly. But to her, this felt like the wrong way to get it. Like an intrusion into Rainbow's privacy. And maybe it was. Dreams were personal, very much so. Witnessing those was an almost intimate experience. But this was how I operated. All I knew. All I could do. And I was not about to give up.

Applejack tried to, though. She tried very hard right now. “No,” she answered and tried to put as much determination into her voice as she could muster. Probably because she still tried to convince herself as much as me. “Our friendship is stronger than this. It’ll take some time. She’ll get over it, and so will I. We’ll be able to talk about it somewhere down the line.”

I scoffed. And for a brief moment that was all she got from me for her efforts. She glared at me. “You know better, AJ,” I remarked.

“Don’t call me that!” she insisted. “My name is Applejack.”

Right. Fair enough. I had to work for that name. It hurt... but it was fine. I could do that. “Right. Sorry. Anyway — I know Rainbow. Heck, you know Rainbow even better. There’s something of a… let’s call it a ‘dubious quality’ you two share. Depending on your mood, it’s stronger than your sense of truth and stronger than her sense of loyalty. You both are stubborn. She won’t talk about this. Sheesh, you won’t even ask about this! Maybe in a few years, sure. But by that point, quite a few things will have changed, no? Are you really willing to let her go this easily?” She was still shaking her head. A little bit too violent to be just a simple denial. She was trying to get rid of my words, poisonous as they must have sounded to her now. I was the snake and I was tempting her to sin.

I realized that I was about to lose her. She would just dig deeper into her trenches, pile up more work, close those walls around her further. She would canter over to the farmhouse. And leave me standing here. She would avoid me at all costs, at least for some time.

I sighed. I had tried to avoid doing this. She was wounded. I wanted to help her, not hurt her. But I had to get through to her first. So, I readied my poisonous little fangs and bit where it would hurt the most. “You are going to lose her.” It was a simple sentence. Spoken without malice or threat, without pleading or mercy. It was a statement. And it was that delivery that truly hurt her. They had been friends for years. They had endured so much. Together. Always together. And I was ruthlessly turning those doubts she already harbored against her. Her doubts, and more importantly... her fears.

I saw something in her break. It hurt seeing it. She looked up at me and for just a moment, there was a silent plea in there. To take back what I had said. “You’re a cruel pony,” she whispered. I can be, a part of me agreed. Her body was firm and steady, but her voice trembled. Swallowing the lump in my throat, I tried to speak and failed. I really hoped she was wrong.

I moved forward instead. One step. Two. Three. She did not back away. And she did not object either when I pulled her into an embrace. Slowly. Cautiously. After all, she still was a very angry and very strong earth pony. “I know you,” I whispered. “And once upon a time, you called me your friend. I want to help you, Applejack. You're hurt. And I hate to see you hurt. Please… please let me help you.”

She stood there in silence, unmoving for what felt like hours. Her eyes were filled with tears when I pulled back, but by sheer force of will, she did not let them spill. “How?” she asked. Her voice was fragile. Uncertain.

“By breaking and entering, if you want to be technical about it,” I answered. It was a horrible explanation, so I tried again. “A heist of sorts.” No, that still sounded wrong. This really was not the time for light joking. “I can dreamwalk. I have a spell that can bring us into Rainbow's dream. I’m pretty sure we can find your answer there.”

“She won’t tell me,” Applejack countered. “I’ve tried.”

“She won’t have much of a choice,” I replied. “In her sleep, her subconsciousness generates her dreams. Usually based on whatever occupies her waking thoughts the most. Her subconsciousness is a lot less experienced in defending information.”

Of course, my explanation only increased her discomfort with the idea. She shook her head again. She objected to my proposal. “This is underhooved. It’s wrong.”

“I won’t deny that,” I admitted much to her surprise. “But she left us little else to do. Think back about all the drama you two had. Or better yet, about all the drama you six, as friends, had. Assuming things that turn out wrong. Keeping secrets that spoil and rot. How many times did any of you have to snoop around someone else’s private affairs to finally fix another issue? This isn’t any different just because it involves magic. We could just as easily ask Twilight for that cloud-walking spell and ask her to teleport us up to Rainbow's house. We could snoop around each and every room. It wouldn’t be nice, sure. But it might help. I just think that my way has a higher chance of success. Because whatever led to this might not be anything we can find in her home.”

Maybe I was twisting things a little bit too much. But I was talking to the Element of Honesty. And while one had to be careful with somepony like Fluttershy what she agreed to, Applejack was different. She had no qualms about saying ‘no’ and sticking to it. If she truly wanted that.

But she did not. And I allowed myself a tiny sliver of relief.

“Why?” was her next question.

I chuckled quietly. I felt like a broken record player at this point. “I already told you,” I said.

“Tell me again,” she just demanded. And this time, she watched me.

I sighed and nodded. “Fine. I’m warning you, though — it’s a weird story.” She did not care. So I told the story once more. Of my arrival at the edge of the forest, how Twilight took me in, of my memories of her and my other friends. She listened... and she watched me the entire time throughout my retelling. Studied the shifts and changes in my expression and body language. Searching for lies and half-truths.

She found none.

“It’s these changing details that keep throwing me off,” I concluded. “Like… I don’t remember Sunny being in Ponyville at all. I don’t remember coming here and you two being an item already. This Twilight, although lovely and adorable, isn’t my Twilight. And you… aren’t part of my family yet.”

She looked down at her own hooves, finally breaking away from her inspection. We had been sitting under Tiberius, one of her younger apple trees. He could use the company, she had said. I looked up at the branches. Splotches of blue sky were visible here and there. Some trees around us still sported delicious looking apples, others were harvested already. It was midday. We had really been at this for hours already. It took some time to tell the story and explain all the inevitable weirdness, of course. Thinking back though… Applejack had not asked all that much.

“You don’t know me,” she concluded for herself.

“I haven’t told a single lie and—“ I started, but she interrupted quite fast by holding up a hoof to signal me to stop. Which I did, shutting my mouth.

“I know. It’s one heck of a story, I’ll give you that. But I know you didn’t lie. Thing is though… accordin' to your own story, you knew a Applejack. Several Applejacks. I might be similar to them. Name and color and all. But they ain’t me. And I ain’t them.”

In a strange way, it felt like she was lecturing me. And she expected an answer. So I nodded. “Okay.”

“I have decided to accept your help,” she continued. “Still feels icky, but I’m gonna go through with it anyway. I must know. I need to know, or I won’t be getting any peace of mind anytime soon. No matter what this brings about though… I’d love to have another friend. Maybe we can throw some horseshoes sometime. ‘Being part of the family’ takes time though. And effort. We’ll have to see about that.”

I was elated. I surprised myself with a sob and nodded vigorously. A grin split my face and for a short moment, I just hugged her with all my might. “Thank you,” I replied. “I can wait. I’ll try. I’ll just… yeah. Thank you.”

You're part of the family, the voice of a Applejack echoed in my head. It felt like I was about to reclaim yet another piece.

She chuckled. “You do remind me of Twilight a little. And Fluttershy, actually.” She fell silent for a while. “So how are we gonna do this?”

I felt my smile grow a little lopsided and awkward as she looked at me. “Yeah, so, about that…” Her eyebrow rose questioningly. “We need to sleep. In the same bed, because I need to be close by to cast the spell and touch my charged horn to your head. And we should remain undisturbed throughout the entire time, because otherwise, the dream will collapse. Now, I know how it sounds and I can promise you that I don’t—“

“It’s alright.”

“Huh?” Her immediate acceptance had somehow blindsided me.

“Listen. You seem to be an okay fella. You care and you mean good. Doing something stupid wouldn’t help you. And if you did, I would punch you back to yesteryear.” I laughed. I just… yeah, I just laughed. She was so nonchalant about this and I loved her for it. I had almost forgotten how easy things could be with her. She was a grown up pony, she knew who she was and what she wanted in life and it was hard to unbalance her. A steady rock to cling to.

“Right. So what now?” I dared to ask.

She stood up, looked around and nodded with a renewed look of determination in her eyes. “Now I work. You’re welcome to stay over tonight, so we can do your magic, but there's still daylight and a lot of apple trees that need a good buckin'.”

“I can help!” I offered. I honestly saw little point in going back now and even if I could have helped Spike with sorting the library, I felt like maybe it was better to keep her some company. Just so she could not sink down into that hole again where I had found her.

She laughed, obviously. “Sorry, sugarcube, but you’re not exactly the kinda guy we usually hire for harvest help.” Brutally honest. Ouch.

I wasn’t about to give up though. I walked over to one of those unbucked trees with determination, placed the bushels down with telekinesis and turned around. She just stood several feet away and watched with an amused smile on her lips. I looked over my shoulder and tried to gauge height, distance and required force. And then flung my hooves back and… landed on my belly. Because I had completely misjudged. “Ow.” I looked over to Applejack, who was just laughing her ass off and — in a very smug demonstration — used a single hoof to buck a trunk nearby and all the apples fell exactly into the bushels she had placed.

“Stupid sexy earth pony magic,” I muttered.

“What was that?” she asked with a wide grin.

I just shrugged. “I was cursing Pinkie Pie,” I half-lied. I stood back up again and tried again. This time my hoof connected to the trunk, but just did nothing. A third attempt almost made me trip again as my hoof just slid off the bark somehow. Fourth try, nothing. Fifth try, nothing. Sixth try — a single apple fell. On my head. I got lucky it did not just stuck to my horn or something equally comical. I sat down and just glared at the tree. Maybe violent thoughts would make it cooperate.

I heard AJ snicker while she walked around and effortlessly harvested tree after tree. Then it hit me. She harvested the trees via kicks. This made perfect sense for an earth pony using its magic. I just wasn’t one. My eyes crossed as I tried to look at my horn again. Unicorn. I got magic. Right.

Sitting down and closing my eyes, I tried to concentrate. Life was energy. Energy was magic. Life was magic. Of course, it was not quite that simple, but breaking it down like that helped me visualize. Twilight would have had a field day, explaining all the intricacies. What had she said after studying my magic? An exceptional affinity for telekinesis.

I opened my eyes again. Studied the tree in front of me. Its branches, its leaves, its apples. Big and red and ripe. I closed my eyes again and charged my horn and imagined plucking them by hoof, one by one. As I opened my eyes again, I had several dozen apples floating in the air. “Yes!” I yelled and celebrated my victory over the trees by prancing in place.

Applejack's chuckle floated over to me. She watched as I carefully put the apples into the bushels. “Took you long enough,” she remarked. “Twilight had that down almost immediately.”

“Yeah but that’s Twilight,” I whined. “Comparing me to her just isn’t fair!” After a moment, I shook my head. AJ would not deny me my victory! So, being the mature adult that I was, I stuck out my tongue. She chuckled again and I turned my attention to the next tree. And the next after that. It became easier and faster with every single one of them. After ten trees, I did not have to sit down and close my eyes each time, I could just walk over, stare intensely at the apples and then levitate them all off. What made apple harvesting so much harder than, say, levitating a dozen books off their shelves was the fact that the apples were still part of the tree. I tried to break a connection by force, taking something apart. The same way plucking a single hair from a mane was significantly harder than just lifting a single hair that was already lying around.

I was seriously spending my day harvesting apples. And I loved it. When Applejack finally came over and told me to stop, I had not noticed how low the sun hung on the eastern horizon. I had built up quite a sweat though. Not by physical exertion of course. Walking around, standing, that was not all that hard to do. But even though my telekinesis did not cost me all that much, doing it for hours on end was still exhausting.

“Sooo… dinner?” I squeaked as my stomach grumbled loudly.

Applejack chuckled again. “Not yet, sugarcube. We’re gonna use the last light to bring these here bushels and the cart into the barn. Won’t do leavin' them outside overnight.”

Right. With our last chore of the day done and the massive barn door closed, we walked over to the house. “That has actually been fun,” I mentioned.

“Glad to hear,” she smiled in return. “And I appreciate you sticking around. Helped me stay focused.”

“You’re welcome. Hm… I haven’t seen — or heard — Winona all day,” I wondered.

“She’s with Apple Bloom,” Applejack explained. “They are crusadin' again.”

Poor Ponyville. Stay strong! I chuckled.

I followed her through the door into the hallway once we arrived. A stairway led up to the upper story. The living room was on the left, no door barring entrance, and the kitchen was on the right. I followed her there and to my surprise, Applejack made dinner for two.

“Can I help?” I asked.

She smiled. “Yupp. Sit down.” I did and somehow expected her to hoof me stuff to do. Maybe something to cut or peel. I realized after a minute or two that I was just going to sit here until dinner was ready. Fine. At least she noticed my confusion about the small table arrangement and explained that part. “’Bloom’s with the other crusaders at the tree house. Granny is already asleep in her room and Big Mac is on a ‘secret date’. Big oaf won’t tell who he’s datin'.” It irked her a little not to know, probably because of her dislike of secrets in general. But she smiled anyway.

Applejack reheated some delicious potato soup from yesterday and we stuffed ourselves with a nice slice of apple pie for dessert. I had every intention to talk to her. About something. Anything really. But sitting down in this oddly familiar house was just so relaxing and I started to feel tired. I could see that she was not faring much better at least. She had probably gone one hundred and twenty percent before I had shown up this morning. I had to admit though — the silence was not unwelcome. We ate, we cleaned the dishes — yay, I was allowed to help! — and we made our way up the stairs. I was trying to be careful. This house was well-maintained, but still old. Every single floorboard was perfectly capable of groaning and squeaking and we both tried to make as little noise as possible so we would not wake up Granny Smith.

And I was growing frustrated with every step. I remembered these stairs. I remembered them squeaking. And every single time I tried to rely on my old knowledge, these stairs just changed. Maybe I should have found some comfort in the fact that even Applejack did not reach the top of the staircase without some noise, but I felt like I had done this thousands of times. I should have perfected this!

“You look funny when you dance around like that,” she whispered as she stood at the top.

“Shut up, I was trying to be considerate,” I grumbled in return. But could not help reply in kind as she smiled at me.

The bathroom was at the end of the hallway on the left side; her bedroom was on the right side. So we were not quite done tiptoeing around and trying to be silent. She was already lying in bed when I got back to her room. She laid with her back to me, but her neck craned so she could look in my direction. “It’s a little tight, but it’ll do,” she said. She would know, of course — it was not the first time she had somepony sleep in her bed with her.

“If you kick me in your sleep, I will be very cross,” I tried to lighten the mood. I could not even tell why I felt the need for that and it made me wonder for a moment longer. I then realized: I was somewhat apprehensive about this. But there was no point to it. It was way too late to turn back now. So I moved to the bed, climbed up and scooched close to her. I used my magic to draw the blanket over us, just so we would not get cold in the night.

And the bed smelled like her. But my nose, despite how bad my sense of smell usually was, picked up on Rainbow's scent as well. And if I noticed that, so did she.

“This feels weird,” she noted. At least she was honest about it. I would not have expected anything less from her.

“Does it help if I tell you that you aren’t my type?” I joked.

“Not really,” she answered, but after a moment she wriggled around and turned over. It was a mess and took us several moments to somehow make it work. Once we settled again, she looked me in the eyes with curiosity. “What’s your type then?”

I raised an eyebrow. “Really? And this will help the awkwardness?”

She thought for a moment and shrugged. “Maybe. Can’t tell yet. This is a first.”

“Hm. Fair enough,” I mused. “Okay, so… you’re great. Don’t get me wrong. You have a physique that’s almost intimidating. It radiates strength and power. Hugging you, being close to you, it makes me feel safe. And I would bet other ponies feel the same. You make for a great shield to hide behind. But I think that’s not a priority of mine. Speaking about appearance alone, I think I’d go with Twilight first and Pinkie second. I, uh… I mean ‘somepony like them’, of course.”

“Sure,” she just said without any hint of suspicion.

“Even if I were into you, I just couldn’t. Not only because of Rainbow, although that obviously plays a big part in that. It’s just… well, I told you before. You feel like family. I wasn’t snooping around yesterday. I was searching for Twilight and I heard you sob. Admittedly, I probably shouldn’t have let my curiosity run away like that. But when I saw you crying, I just… I wanted to help you so badly. Twilight noticed me and basically kicked me out. I waited in the kitchen until you were gone and asked her about it. She was exhausted and… I said a couple of things I shouldn’t have. I will try to make it up to her somehow. But… when family needs you… when someone you care about is hurt, you don’t just… leave. You at least try your darn best to help them. Right?”

She nodded. Applejack was lost in thought for a short while until a small, cheeky smile tugged at her lips. “So… Twilight or Pinkie, eh?”

I chuckled quietly. “Nah, not gonna happen. I already nudged Pinkie towards where she belongs. But goodness gracious I’d be lying if I said that I won’t miss snuggling up to her. It just feels great. Twilight is special though. Always has been, always will be. I know that her heart is already vying for somepony’s attention. And this time around, we just didn’t… click like we usually do. It feels weird but I think I’ll just… help her along.” The more I was talking about romance and mushy feelings and my plans, the more this felt like some campfire story, told by giggling young colts and fillies. It slowly drained the tenseness out of the air and I realized that this was what she had aimed for. Clever AJ.

“You seem very hung up about this whole romance thing,” she remarked.

It made me think about it for a moment. I was, wasn’t I? “Yeah, I guess. It’s important to me. I suppose I could be out there, trying to fix my life somehow. Getting my own roof over my head, getting my own bits, applying for a job, stuff like that. I could walk around town and make friends. Relearn Lyras quirks. Annoy the heck out of Bonbon. Go for a walk with Derpy. Break my own mind by talking to Zecora for too long.” So. The question then obviously was: Why was I not doing those things? A question, I was pretty sure AJ had purposefully led me to. “Maybe I don’t have my priorities straight yet,” I mused. “Those first days, we tried to research my condition, my magic, how I got here… but I would’ve just hunkered down forever if Twilight would have let me. It wasn’t even her decision to end this trot. Pinkie just did a Pinkie. And suddenly, things moved on their own. Once I had nudged her, I had to make sure that the connection worked out on the other end as well. Then I stumbled upon you and just… had to involve myself once more. And once this is over… I dunno. Right now, Twilight seems somewhat happy. Stable, at least. Could be better though. I can’t help thinking about that. I could see her being happier than she is right now. I could make her happier.”

I was working for the benefit of my friends. I wanted to see them happy. As happy as they could be. As happy as I could help make them be. And that took priority over my own… well, it was not exactly my well-being at stake here. With Twilight offering me a home, I had what I needed most for now. Having some bits would not hurt, but I had not had much use for them so far. Maybe my priorities would straighten out once that need arose?

“I can’t find any fault in putting my friends before me,” I stated the temporary result of my train of thought.

AJ clucked her tongue. “But there is,” she said. “Your friends shouldn’t be before you. They should be beside you.”

I thought about that. Caring for my own needs and wishes. Valuing my state of being and my own happiness at the same level that I did theirs. Suddenly my skin crawled. It felt itchy and uncomfortable and wrong. “I don’t think I can do that,” I admitted. Not yet, anyway.

She stared at me for a long old moment. She finally gave a single nod. “I see,” she said and put on a little smile. “I think I know a little better now who I’m dealin' with.” And with that, she started to turn over again. I was confused, but I did not dare to ask. So I just helped her until her back pressed against my chest. She relaxed and everything was fine. Maybe. I was still confused. “You can do your magic now,” she said after just a moment. I charged my horn and complied.

I was sure something had gone wrong for a brief moment. I expected us to arrive in the same bland, white nothingness that had welcomed me the previous two times. Instead I stood there gaping in wonder at the miracle in front of us. The entire dreamscape was a replica of the night sky. Maybe it was the night sky. I saw the lazy movement of nebulae, galaxies tiny and far away swirling like ballerinas, constellations forming and dissolving over the course of hours.

It was a truly magnificent spectacle. And most importantly, it felt right. It felt oh so right that I didn't even notice the happy little noise I made. This was the dreamscape! This was how it was meant to look!

It was beautiful beyond comparison.

Applejack stood by my side and recovered even slower than I did. She was simply stunned by what she was looking at as well. Her continued silence and my recovering mind gave me enough wiggle room to finally listen to a small, flash-induced voice in the back of my head: I remembered only one pony capable of designing this look for the dreamscape. And I still did not feel prepared enough to face Luna.

She knows we’re here, I realized. Maybe she was currently in a dream though. It would somewhat dampen her perception of things happening outside of it. Especially if she was focused on dealing with somepony’s nightmare. My memories reminded me that we could hide from her by that same logic. It would not be perfect, but I could maybe make it work.

I initially tried to see if I could spot Luna nearby. And my heart skipped another beat or two as I looked around and saw the dreams. All of them. Hundreds, thousands, more. They were back. They were there, where they belonged. All of them were there.

I still felt lost and confused and incomplete. But standing in the middle of this beauty, beholding all those dream bubbles floating about… I felt a little less so. Another piece recovered.

“It’s nice,” I heard Applejack say. I was almost offended at that. My head yanked around and I stared at her. With a very quiet chuckle, she belatedly added “Gosh-darn pretty. That better?” It did not fix the insult, but I let it slide. She was no word smith. The greatest poets in Equestrian history would have failed to capture this magnificent view. I allowed myself to marvel at it once more. “But we’re here for work. Sorta.”

I had to admit: I wanted to be offended. I wanted to tell her to just shut up and look. To take it all in. But I could not, because I knew she was right. Time was a finicky concept in this realm and we should not risk wasting ours lightly. I walked and after a second, she adapted my slow pace amidst the midnight sky. Despite the myriads of dreams floating in apparent chaos, it would be easy to find Rainbow. Even walking was not required to do it, actually. I just did it out of habit and because there was a lot I needed to tell Applejack before we started. Pinkie had just accepted whatever she saw or whatever I told her. Maybe in her own weird and funny way, she had even understood things without my need for explanation. Fluttershy had little need to be told too much. But this time would be different. We were planning a heist.

After I gave her the usual initial warnings and instructions about how to interact with dreams, I got into the nitty-gritty. “Most things here as well as in those dreams are about willpower. You want to fly? Will yourself to do it. Don’t throw a tantrum or demand something, just… will it into being. It’s hard to explain… hm.”

“Like buckin' apples?” she supplied. When I looked at her in confusion she elaborated. “It’s about feelin'. Feelin' the dirt under your hooves, feelin' the wind on your skin, feelin' connected to everything around you. Everythin' that grows. It’s almost like… talkin'. I don’t force those apples down. I could, I guess. But then they wouldn’t land in those bushels.”

Life is energy, energy is magic, life is magic. Maybe that explained why she gave all her trees names. To her, they were living beings with personality. Almost like extended family. Talking to a tree… by way of feeling connected… maybe something about energy transfer? But the dreamscape had no energy. No real dirt or real magic. But maybe I did not need to get too deep into the details. Maybe this would suffice. “Could work,” I said. “Now, it’s important that you don’t—“

I stopped and blinked. She was gone. I looked back and found Applejack standing a couple of feet behind me. Her gaze was transfixed on something ahead of us, so I looked there and saw something small, almost tiny, scurry from one side to the other. The body of a rat, but entirely made out of light. Orange light, like that of a sunrise. Its shape flickered and distorted, but always reformed into that of a tiny rat, scurrying about.

“Somepony needs to get pest control in here,” she joked but still looked a little uncomfortable. She walked up to my side and looked around to see if she could spot more.

I was frozen, however. I had felt it coming seconds before it hit. So I had planted my hooves firmly on the ground and braced against the onslaught. Another massive flash of insight, another wave of memories flooded my senses.

Life. There was so much life here. This rat was no rat at all. Its shape was just a poor attempt of my mind to recontextualize what it perceived into something it could understand. Size was proportionate to strength. This being was small, so it was weak. Maybe it was young — I could not tell if there was a correlation between age and size. My mind tried to sell it as a rat to me, to make me realize: This was no threat. No threat to me anyway. Given the right perspective and circumstances, everything was a predator to something else. Wolves ate sheep. Fish drank water. Trees dug their roots into dirt. Pulling what they needed to grow and thrive from somewhere else, something else.

I did not deem rats to be dangerous. So in turn, my mind used that. I knew Applejack had had some less comfortable encounters with rats. Maybe she had seen it as something else. Still something harmless probably. A small cat? A fish, swimming in this sea of stars?

The next wave hit. I groaned under the strain. These beings had no air to breathe, no water to drink, no flesh to devour. They had dreams and will and emotions. Dreams were loaded with those. Love, joy, grief, anger, hatred, greed. Some of these beings were parasites. Latching onto dreams, eating certain emotions, or all. That was beneficial sometimes. Eating hatred reduced it in the pony dreaming. Eating love did the same though.

Some were farmers. Sustaining themselves by sowing what they wanted. That too was not necessarily bad. Some were sowing nightmares, to gorge themselves on fear. Others were sowing sexual fantasies, to sustain themselves on carnal pleasure.

These things did not die of old age. They were timeless, as this plane knew nothing about time. Some ate and grew and became powerful enough to step beyond this plane and into our world. Out of greed or curiosity or even without thinking. Most were confused once they arrived. This strange place with its strange laws of ‘nature’. With time and gravity and brittle bones. Disasters ensued, usually. It did not happen often. But when it did, it was bad.

Windigos howling in the icy storm, feeding on the ponies’ hatred below them.

Green flames enveloping changelings, switching forms to drain more love.

A massive, gaping maw that—

“Talk to me.”

I blinked. Once, twice. I felt a hoof on my shoulder. Heard worry in a familiar voice. I slowly turned my head. Wheezing breaths rattled in my lungs. There was no air to breathe, but my mind did not care. I heard the blood rushing in my ears, a constant thumping behind my temples. AJ looked worried.

We’re here for work, her voice reminded me. An echo in my pulsing, aching head.

Right. Let’s get to it then. I lifted a hoof. It felt heavy, as if laden with lead. I stomped down onto the starlit black void. Once, twice, thrice. Each time, I felt the vibrations ripple out like aftershocks of an earthquake, and could hear the sound echoing into the infinite void. Rainbow, come forth!

The sea of dreams parted and a single bubble floated before us. It was gray. “What the heck? It’s the middle of the night, Rainbow, come on!” I cursed. My annoyance helped push past the flash.

Another flash immediately followed, a minor one. Barely an aftershock, compared to the massive earthquake that had come before it. I knew what to do. I carefully 'charged my horn'. It was not a requirement, but it helped me focus. I cautiously touched the sphere. Colors swirled. Formed, collapsed and reformed. Until, with the clarity of a one-way-mirror, we could see her.

“That’s her bedroom,” Applejack noted, slightly disturbed.

What else could it have been? But I kept silent. I inspected the scene. Walls made of enchanted cloud material. Pegasus magic. A window. I could see the night sky. A dresser on the edge of our ‘window’. It lay in shambles. I had not even known that those could be broken like that. Rainbow was lying on her cloud bed. Apparently awake. She trembled slightly. Twitched from time to time. She held onto one of her cloud pillows for dear life. She tried to curl in on herself, tried to become smaller still than she already was. Her wings were a mess. She was a mess. I heard Applejack gulp. “Oh Rainbow,” she whispered and lifted a hoof.

“Don’t!” I warned when I noticed her involuntarily reaching for her ex-marefriend. She held still and then let it drop. “This is just a minor hiccup,” I promised. “I’m gonna try something.”

I charged my horn again without waiting. It was just willpower. No real magic. “Sleep,” I commanded and shot a continuous beam at Rainbow. The spell impacted the dream sphere. There was no visible change in the real world for a few seconds until suddenly, Rainbow relaxed. I could not quite tell if I had been successful or if I had just gotten lucky. Her dream changed. I tasted something bitter on my tongue. Breathing became harder as if something was trying to choke me — so I just stopped caring about breathing in general. A nightmare was growing. And it felt threatened. It wanted us gone. It recognized us, to a certain degree. Applejack as someone who could starve it. And me as someone who could mess with it.

I looked over to Applejack. “This is it,” I said. “Remember: Careful, but unrelenting.”

She fixed her expression in a mask of cold determination and nodded. We both touched the sphere. It tried to push us away, tried to deny us entry. We pushed forward into it. Each inch was a little battle fought and won in our favor. “Steady,” I reminded her when we were a good ways in and made for a final push. Then we suddenly just fell in.

Bad sign.

We both hit the floorboards. Wooden floorboards. “What went wrong?” I heard her ask when I was still busy standing up. I was surprised as I looked around. We were standing in the Apple family farmhouse. The door was right behind us.

“Don’t touch that door,” I warned her with a whisper. “Or any window. It leads outside and will kick us out again.”

“Why are you whispering?” she asked and now whispered herself.

I looked around once more. The house was dark and empty. No Granny Smith rocking in her chair. Not a single candle anywhere. And it felt wrong. It was missing that comfy warmth it usually radiated. A home was more than just a house. It was a place filled with love and laughter. With a lot of negative emotions as well, admittedly. Arguments were had, tears were shed. But a true home should always brim with more positivity than it had negativity. This place was no home. It was just a house. One that tried very hard to be scary and intimidating.

“We are not alone,” I once more whispered. She looked confused, then alarmed. It was a good reaction. At the last second, the dream had allowed us in. Probably in an attempt to confront us more directly, as I slowly started to realize. Every subconscious had its own security. Things we wanted, things we feared. Things we want to stay hidden. They could manifest.

Some of these guardians were friendly. Even talkative. Most… were not. A brief flash told me that I had long suspected that Nightmare Moon had been a guardian once. Born from a wish for recognition, learning from the dreamscapes creatures, feeding on envy, anger, hatred, jealousy, until she broke the bounds of what she was and what she was supposed to do.

I noticed a quick movement to my left. Felt it more than I saw it. Just a sudden air current, but once I looked I saw just the living room. Empty, dark and cold. “There is a guardian here,” I told Applejack. “It can take many forms. It wants to stop us.”

“So it already knows we’re here?” she quietly asked. I nodded and carefully scanned the stairway and what I could see of the kitchen. She dropped her slightly crouched stance and stood tall and proud once more. “Well then there’s no reason to whisper, right?” she said and I flinched at the sudden change in volume.

I sighed. “Guess not.” I saw nothing that was immediately helpful. I did feel like someone was staring me down though, I just could not pinpoint the location of its source. “Say… if you were Rainbow and would create this as your fortress to make a last stand… where would you hide your secrets?”

“What, you don’t know?” she half-jokingly asked before answering, “In my room.”

I just shrugged. “With the amount of horror stories she tells, I wasn’t sure if she wouldn’t just pick the basement or attic or something.”

We both walked up the stairs. We were still creeping along slowly at first until Applejack remembered that our presence was already known anyway, so there really was no reason to be stealthy about it. It nevertheless made me wince as she stomped up the stairs.

Something zipped past us, but it was too quick for me to make out any details. Applejack had apparently felt it as well and returned to a little more careful approach. We reached the top of the stairs when something clashed downstairs. Instead of returning, I just looked over the railing to the floor beneath. A single brass candle holder was lying on the floor. Seeing that somehow still gave me goosebumps. I felt like I was being hunted and I decidedly did not enjoy the sensation.

I returned to Applejack’s side. "Candle holder," I whispered.

She had not moved from her position and instead opted to stare down the hallway to the right. “It’s there,” she flatly stated.

I focused in an attempt to see what she apparently saw, but the harder I tried, the darker it seemed to get. Until I realized that it was getting darker. The darkness all around us seemed to coalesce into a being. Ruby eyes opened in the blackness. Not quite the cerise of Rainbow's eyes. It looked more like blood. A maw with sharp, pointed teeth formed a wicked grin. And the shape of a pony finally stepped forward from the inky blackness. The cerulean tone matched Rainbow's coat, but this pegasus was wearing armor. Very, very spiky looking armor. And her rainbow mane was instead divided into six nuances of red. Lovely. Even her wings appeared to be laden with blades and spikes.

The guardian stepped forward and both Applejack and I involuntarily took a cautious step back. It stared us down, its eyes full of rage. “Is… is that Rainbow?” Applejack asked clearly distraught to see her friend in this state.

“No,” I immediately shut that thought down. “That’s a guardian. A part of her subconsciousness that’s trying to keep us away from that door.” I huffed. This was not going to be pretty. Slowly, without taking my eyes off that damn thing, I turned to Applejack. “AJ, we need to get through that door!”

Her gaze flickered between me and the guardian and the door, as if she had not noticed it being there before. Her uncertainty was quickly overwhelmed by a growing sense of purpose and determination. With steeled resolve, she dug her hooves against the floorboards. “You better hurry,” she remarked.

“I—“ What?

I was about to say something. Ask her what she meant. Maybe warn her not to do anything rash? But I was too late. Applejack charged head-first into the guardian. I really, really did not want to imagine what those armor spikes were doing right now. I just gave myself a jumpstart and ran. I ran as if the Grim Reaper was right behind me.

Maybe I should have told Applejack that there were consequences for wounds? Yeah. That would have been smart. Luckily, this was Rainbow. And with no disrespect to her, she would not be able to conjure something up that would actually have been capable of killing or even maiming us. That did not mean that it would not hurt, of course. But Applejack could handle herself in a fight and I had to trust her on that front. What had been the alternative anyway? Guardians did not tire. If destroyed, they just reformed. If pinned, they dissolved. And looking like a battle-hardened warrior like that, I was pretty sure that I would not stand a chance.

I reached the door and bucked it open. I could hear metal clatter behind me and AJ growling through pain. I heard the guardian hiss as I closed in on what it wanted to protect.

I faced opposition. Just like when we had first entered her dream, the door did not want me to get past it. There was a gaping black emptiness beyond an opened threshold, but stepping past it proved to be another battle. Slowly, ever so slowly, I pushed forward. Using enough force to make progress, but not enough to even risk destroying the dream. Because at this point, I was pretty sure that this was the guardians’ final weapon. To make me burst the bubble.

I pushed past the blackness with effort. And promptly stood in what I suspected was Rainbow's kitchen. Walls made of clouds were a good indicator, as well as several rarely used shelves and a sink. There was a table in the middle, sporting a single sheet of paper. It looked like some sort of document. I smiled as I regarded the rest of the room. It looked neat and clean and orderly. So very much unlike Rainbows actual kitchen, as far as I remembered. A tiny piece of wish-fulfillment, then.

But there was no time to pluck apart her dream. I stepped up to the table and took that document in my hooves and… groaned quietly. “Applejack?” With a mighty thud, the sounds of fighting stopped. I heard hoofsteps drawing closer to me a few seconds later. I still tried to make out what was written on this thing, but the text constantly blurred and shifted.

“So, uh,” she started and sounded hoarse and exhausted. “You can’t actually die here, right?”

My blood froze immediately, although I should have known better. I swirled around and faced her and let out a frightened whinny. She was a mess. Cuts and bruises all over her body. She was limping, trying to keep her left hind leg off the ground. There were so many holes and gashes she was bleeding from, a particularly large one on her neck…

I felt nauseous. I had to look away for a moment just to calm myself down. “It's fine,” I said more to myself than to her. “It’ll be fine. You, uh… you can die here, but it’s… it’s complicated. Each wound you accept puts mental strain on you. And our mind is wired in a specific way that makes it hard not to accept wounds. Once you accept that you have taken on enough, you ‘die’ here, which usually just makes you wake up. Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat, because of some nightmare? That’s that. And if you ever heard the phrase ‘frightened to death’, yeah, that’s a real thing. It can happen here. But Rainbow shouldn’t be strong enough to produce something that can do that to us.”

She looked confused. Probably because the concept of ‘not accepting to be wounded’ was indeed a weird one. As far as I remembered, I had never managed to learn it myself. I only knew of it in theory, as Luna herself was the only one who could deploy it in practice.

Then she grew worried as I continued on, but in the end, after I gave my all-clear, she just shrugged. “You… uh… you’re still going to feel that tomorrow,” I warned her. “Might wanna take it slow for a day.” She looked down on herself. Looked at all the blood that continued to seep from her wounds. More blood than she should have, really. But in her head it made sense that wounds this deep and large should bleed, so they did. She looked a little put off by the idea of not working herself to the bone, but chose not to comment. She instead came over and looked at the document.

“What’s that?” she asked with her brow furrowed.

“That’s what I’d like to know as well. It is the only important thing here. I’m pretty sure that’s what she was guarding. But text can be weird in dreams. So… what did you do to that guardian?” She understood what I was going for and turned around. Applejack limped out of the room just to return a couple of seconds later, dragging the mauled body of the dazed guardian with her by her tail.

Once inside the kitchen, she spat the tail out. “There you go.”

I walked over and took a good, long look at the guardian. I almost chuckled, but the sight of bloodied Applejack was still too fresh in my mind. It looked like one of those ‘you look awful — you should see the other one’-type of scenarios. I was not sure if guardians could fall unconscious. I suspected not. So I just gently tapped her on the cheek. She cracked an eye open accompanied by a groan. “Read that,” I demanded and put the document in front of her eyes. So she did. I growled in frustration after just a moment. “Read that out loud,” I added. “Or Applejack will punch you some more. She’s got a lot of frustration to work out of her system,” I belatedly threatened.

My threat seemed to do little. The guardian grew more agitated as it read the page on its own accord. Applejack was above her in an instant and pressed her down to the floor with both front hooves. “Talk!” she demanded.

Actually a good question. Could this one even—

“One day I’ll be the fastest, bestest, most-beloved flier in all of Equestria! And everypony will cheer for me! And I will leave you lot in the dust!”

Nevermind then.

Looking at the page again, the text did not make any more sense than it had before. But! There was a logo at the top, now discernable. I showed it to Applejack. “It’s the Wonderbolts Headquarters,” I remarked in confusion. “Why would that be an issue? She’s in the reserve already, isn’t she?”

Applejack nodded. “She is.”

This did not make any sense. So I mulled it over in my head, again and again. Until I felt like I was getting somewhere. One day. This guardian was not Rainbow. But a part of her. Rainbow loved to boast. Like, a lot. But she boasted about already being the best.

“She was applyin' for active duty,” Applejack mumbled as she mulled this over herself. “But she got denied. Several times actually.”

Maybe she got accepted? But why would that be an issue? One day… I will leave you.

Oh.

“She got denied,” I said.

Applejack nodded. “Yeah. She tried once a month or something, but—“

“No,” I interrupted and raised the document. “She got denied. This thing. Two weeks ago, from what you told me. Just her latest failed attempt.”

Applejack was confused. I noticed to my relief that her wounds had stopped bleeding. Probably because her focus was intensely directed at this conundrum of ours. “But that doesn’t make a lick of sense! Why would this time be different?”

I smiled sadly. “Because it doesn’t always click the first time. Or the second time, or third time. Here’s my theory: She got this letter, she was frustrated, she was trying to cheer herself up by thinking about how awesome it would be next time, when they finally saw reason and allowed her in. So far, so Rainbow?” She thought it through for a moment and nodded. “But see, that’s the problem. If she got accepted… what would happen?”

AJ furrowed her brow. “We’d be havin' a mighty fine party?”

I nodded. “Yeah, probably. But it wouldn’t stop there. Then she’d be a Wonderbolt. Training as much as you work each day. Having her shows all over Equestria. Having to show up at awful upper class parties, because they are celebrities. Trying to smooth talk to some stuck up noble instead of, you know… being at home. With her marefriend. Snuggling on the bed. If they said ‘yes’, she would have a career. A very, very time-consuming, very demanding, very tiresome and exhausting carrier. The Wonderbolts Headquarters is, if I remember correctly, in Canterlot. They have nice barracks, you know? The way from Canterlot to Ponyville is pretty far, if you think about it.”

It started to dawn on her with each word. “She’s choosing between me and her dream.” Her expression became weirdly lifeless after a moment and she sat down on her haunches. She released the guardian who did nothing now that nothing was to be gained by fighting. “I lost her,” Applejack numbly stated.

The guardian, as if participating in an entirely different conversation, just took one last look at the document and mumbled, “You deserve better…” And then dissolved. For such a fierce protector, that had even been strangely… helpful.

“No. No, no, no. Applejack, look at me.” She wasn’t reacting. So I grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “This isn’t what you think!” I insisted. “You’re running head first into a dead end and you’re running in the wrong direction, no less!” Her expression changed to something more guarded. “We even talked about this earlier — putting your friends before yourself. She wants you to be happy, even at the cost of her own happiness.”

“… by dumpin' me,” she flatly replied.

“By giving you a chance to find somepony who doesn’t think for a second and chooses you. Somepony who isn’t conflicted about this choice. Being a Wonderbolt has been her life-long dream so far. Maybe I’m wrong here. Maybe it’s something else. But with all that I know of her, I think it’s the most plausible explanation! Choosing between her loyalty — and love — for you and her dream… I don’t think you lost that battle. But I think she panicked because there was a battle. I mean… think about it. When we saw her, she wasn’t sleeping like a good cadet should, or training. She was sulking, crying herself to sleep.” I pointed a hoof at the spot where the guardian had dissolved. “A part of her psyche had said it herself: She thinks you deserve better.”

She didn’t look convinced. She looked conflicted, if anything. To be fair, I was once more operating on a lot of assumptions. Maybe Applejack was right. Maybe I should have made progress in other parts of my life first. Maybe it would have been better to befriend Rainbow first. I supposed that could have given me valuable insight into her psyche. A better foundation for what I was rambling on about. But things hadn't worked out that way and here we were.

Well at least we knew what the original incident had been. Given the circumstances, there could be little doubt that this document had been another rejection. Pinkie’s senses would have told her to prepare a ‘congratulations, Wonderbolt Dash’-party otherwise. What exactly had happened in Rainbows head in the past two weeks to lead from this to dumping Applejack was a different story though. I had tried my best to give a decent explanation. It seemed pretty coherent to me. And while not convinced, Applejack did not deny it as a possibility. I could not fathom what that conflict was that appeared to rage in her head now — or heart. Or both.

The Fact of the matter was — we were done. It felt unsatisfying. But there was nothing else here to gain.

“I should probably—“ I started.

Only for her to interrupt me with a quick “We should go.” Right.

Day 11: A Quiet Day, A Rough Night

I ‘cast’ a spell. We left Rainbow's dream behind and the dreamscape shortly after, awakening in her bed once more. I blinked a couple of times to clear away the drowsiness. I laid still, silent... waiting. She was awake as well, obviously. But she had not moved yet.

“Could you leave, please?” she finally asked. She sounded awfully tired. No wonder considering the beating she had taken. My heart sank a little at her request, but it did not come entirely unexpected.

“Yes. Sure. Should I… tell anyone? Big Mac, maybe? To continue the harvest? Apple Bloom could bring you some tea or—“

“Just leave.” There was no malice in her voice. No trace of anger, just… tiredness. “I need to think,” she added belatedly.

That addition was welcome, although I could not tell if she was being honest right now. It made things easier for me. I climbed out of bed, careful to tuck the blanket around her again. Even without seeing her face, I could tell that she felt like crap. That fight had taken a lot out of her. Hopefully she did not blame me. “Get well soon, Applejack.” I left the room and walked down that hallway towards the stairs. I could not help but stop midway through and stare at the wall. I had distinctly heard Applejack ram the guardian into it. Soon after, I stood at the upper story railing and looked down and indeed saw a brass candle holder on a dresser. Eerie.

Granny Smith was softly rocking in her chair, fast asleep. Big Mac was nowhere to be seen, probably already out and about. And Apple Bloom, from the looks of it, had not returned from the CMC clubhouse yet. There was just nopony here to notify anyway. Maybe she had known.

I was not giving up this easily though. I rummaged through some drawers in the kitchen and managed to scavenge together writing supplies. I sat down at the kitchen table and stared at the little empty piece of paper. What to write?

‘Applejack is tired, please bring tea and spare her from work.’ Yeah, she’d love that.

‘Applejack got into a fight and needs to recover.’ That was even worse. She was exhausted, not actually hurt.

‘Please look after Applejack.’ Well, that was not ominous at all.

But I decided after a couple of more unsuccessful minutes that it was the best I could come up with. I pinned the note to the farmhouse’s front door, dispersed the supplies back to where I had found them and then left for Ponyville. Applejack wanted to think, wanted to have peace and space to do so. I honestly felt like I could use some space myself to clear my head. Those last flashes had been several instances worth of migraine. Adding to that the dwelling frustration about how unhelpful my attempt had proven and I felt like lying down. I was just searching for a nice place to do it.

I had never quite understood the concept of a ‘park’ in a town like Ponyville. It was a rural area, was it not? Greenery was all around everypony, every day. Whoever wanted to see even more trees, grass and flowers just had to walk a little bit out of a not very massive town and he would find himself standing right in the middle of it.

I was not about to question decisions of whoever was in charge of city development around these parts right now though. I instead let myself plop down at the shore of a very small lake, crossed my front hooves and laid my head upon them. I looked out over the water and every now and then picked up a pebble with magic and threw it in, just to see the water ripple and the reflection on the surface distort. A couple of birds were chirping somewhere nearby. I heard the hustle and bustle of Ponyville. Another pony walked past occasionally. I could not be bothered to even nod this time. Hm. Maybe I was sulking now?

I had just thrown another pebble into the lake when I saw a distorted white shape come down in tight circles. I heard her land with the utmost grace shortly after. How rude. Did she not see that I was sulking? Just by being here, she made that quite a lot harder.

“I take it you were not quite as successful as you had hoped,” she stated and laid down beside me.

“I’m sulking,” I mumbled. “You make that harder,” I complained just a moment later.

“Oh. Well in that case, I will not keep you.” She was about to get up when I grabbed her in my levitation. There was no real force behind it. I just wanted her to know that the attempt had been there. It was enough for her to sit down.

“I’m not Cadance,” I sulked some more.

Don’t smile, I demanded of myself as her light, bright giggle almost forced me.

“And that frustrates you?” she asked. “Would you switch places with her, if you could?”

I really was not in the mood for games, but it sounded like a funny question. Something amusing to lighten up my darkened thoughts. “I don’t know,” I started. “She seems like she’s got stuff figured out. Her empire hasn't crumbled yet, her subjects adore her, she's got a hunk of a stallion at her side. Seems like it could be a lot worse?”

She giggled and failed to hide it behind her hoof. “You would be utterly overwhelmed with having wings. They require a lot of care.”

Sure. That‘s what this was about. Absolutely. “You could teach me. I wouldn’t mind.”

The slightest hint of a blush — still very visible due to her pristine white coat — made me realize. Right. Preening. Intimate. But I still could not be bothered. Not even enough to be decently embarrassed. Actually thinking about it, though — it was honest. I would not mind.

She sighed once she had recomposed herself. “Sometimes ponies have to find — and walk — their own paths.” I heard her stir at my side but did not want to look to see what she was doing. Due to this laziness, I was a little startled as she whispered into my ear: “And sometimes, both have to be nudged a little in the right direction.” Her warm breath tickled my ear, my heart made a little jump and I kept my eyes closed for a moment. Then I heard wings beat. Her warmth had vanished and left me disappointed, yearning for more. She was gone as quickly as she had showed up. Was that her revenge for this morning?

I had enjoyed having her so close.

Seeing as she was not here anymore, I considered returning to my sulking. Surely it had to be done at some point, right? But I could not help thinking about Sunny. What had that even been? A statement? Cryptic wisdom? Advice? Over and over, I repeated her words in my head. Like the densest school filly I apparently was. I mean… she would have had problems spelling it out any more clearly.

Nudge. Them. Both.

Had I not gone to Sweet Apple Acres knowing full well and even bemoaning my own fate because I had to deal with two stubborn mules? I had messed with one so far. True, I was frustrated right now. Rightfully so. I was disappointed. But once I tried to look at it with at least a little bit more distance…

I had not failed. Sure, I had not succeeded either. Things were still up in the air, simple as that. And just like before with Pinkie and Fluttershy — just with a bit more drama and urgency this time — I should really get my ass into gear and get moving.

I smiled at the clear blue sky. “Thanks, Sunny.”

“No problem!” answered a familiar voice. I looked further above me to find Derpy smiling serenely as she glided by. I could not help but snort and laugh. Her smile grew into a grin and she nodded in satisfaction. And with that, the spell of my sulking was broken.

“Thank you too, Derpy. I needed that,” I told her. She mock-saluted like Pinkie had done in Sugarcube Corner and resumed her scheduled delivery route, clutching her saddlebags tightly as her wings flapped harder to build up speed again.

I should totally bring her some muffins sometime soon. Just buy a dozen, knock at her door and shove them in her direction once she opened up. That should be funny. She would love it.

I got up and walked towards the castle. I needed a new plan. Or idea. Or whatever. Most importantly, I needed Twilight's help. Because if I wanted to catch the Rainbow Dash, I needed to be able to walk on cloud nine.

That almost made me gag.

I chuckled a bit when I reached the castle. Derpy was there and currently sorted mail into Twilight's mailbox. “Small town, hm?” I greeted her.

“It is, but the ponies here are so nice,” she replied with a huge smile.

Meeting her here again made me think about my conversation with Applejack. About friendships and priorities. “Say, Derpy… are you still into board games?”

Her eyes lit up in excitement, one drifting up to the sky. “How do you know?”

I quickly found the perfect excuse. “I’m friends with Pinkie. So maybe you could come over this evening? That is, if you find a foalsitter for Dinky.”

She stifled a little laugh. “She’s not that young anymore!” she objected and then mulled my offer over. She suddenly stopped to look at me in embarrassment. “I’m sorry, I… I forgot your name.”

“Oh. Right, don’t worry, I’ve been a little bit too excited about this, I guess. I haven’t told you yet. I’m Dreamwalker.” I grinned a little lopsided and rubbed my neck.

But judging by the way she just smiled and nodded excitedly, I guess it was not that important. “I would love to! And where do you live?”

She had me chuckling again. “Ehrm, actually… in there.” I pointed towards the castle.

I was not sure what kind of reaction I had expected. There were certain ponies — like most of the Canterlot elite — that would be shocked by such a statement. Others might have reacted with envy or doubt. Derpy, however? Not her. “Oh, so you live with Twilight. She’s nice!”

Yes, yes she is. “Sooo… see you later then?”

“Yes!” She had a little spring in her step when she left. Considering she was flying, it looked awkward.

I turned towards the castle again and took what Derpy had left in the mailbox with me and entered. It did not take me long to find both Spike and Twilight. “Hey guys.” They were sorting, of course. But as soon as I made myself known, they stopped. Spike looked bored, but bravely soldered on and gladly took the mail I gave him as a distraction and promptly ran off with it. “Never seen a dragon this excited about mail.”

Twilight smiled and stepped up, mirroring my movement for a warm embrace. Hugging her never got old.

It was early midday, as I reminded myself. So that should hopefully leave me enough hours to get everything prepared. “I need to talk to you,” I started as soon as we pulled apart again.

“Me too,” she answered. That was unexpected, but alright.

I looked around and sighed. I had made him a promise. “So… maybe I can help you out until — if at all — Spike returns and we can talk in the meantime? Not sure how well that’ll turn out, but I’m willing to give it a shot.”

She briefly considered the proposal and gave it a curt nod. “Works for me.”

Within a few minutes she gave me a short introduction about what would be my task in the foreseeable future. And I knew that I would be here for a while because… I had picked up Spike, turned him around and set him back down as he walked around the corner when he returned a few minutes later. I faintly heard him giggle and run off to enjoy his free afternoon, so he clearly got the hint. Worth it.

Twilight had noticed of course, but she had no objections. So we were all in the clear. “So, I went to Sweet Apple Acres,” I started and inevitably immediately soured the mood. But there had been no way around that. And just as one was supposed to do with a band aid, I chose to rip it off quickly. “I found her, gave her ‘the talk’ and used my irresistible silver tongue to sway her to my dark and cookie-laden side.” Simply raising an eyebrow at me was enough. “Alright, fine. Less silver and less cookies. She almost punched my head clean off because I had to provoke her into talking to me. Important part being that we worked the fields the rest of the day, which seemed to do wonders for her mood. We had a nice, albeit lonely dinner and then went to the dreamscape. It changed again, Twilight. Dear Luna, it changed. You should’ve seen it. It was as if I was walking on the night sky itself. And the dreams… they were there. All of them were there!” I was about to rave on and on about this phenomenal beauty again. I luckily noticed it and reigned myself in. “Focus, right. We found Rainbow's dream. She wasn’t sleeping yet. So… turns out I’m able to use dreams to see the non-dreamer, somehow? She was wide awake, lying on her bed and crying. I’m not entirely sure what happened next, there had been a… massive flash before. I tried to shoot magic from my horn into her dream bubble, commanding her to sleep. I have no idea if that was successful and no idea if that even could have been successful in the first place. But she did fall asleep. With her in her dream, we both entered and found ourselves in an eerily creepy version of the farmhouse. Applejack took up the fight with Rainbow's guardian. A sort of… manifested splinter of her personality with the sole intent and purpose of defending her — or something more specific — against intruders. In this case, an armor-clad Rainbow was trying to keep the reason why she broke up with AJ from us. Applejack kicked her butt. Admittedly, the other way around was happening as well. In the wake of all this, I actually regained a lot of knowledge about dream mechanics and stuff. Like… there’s living beings in the dreamscape. Well, I mean… not living-living. Then again, they do reproduce and can be killed. Hm. Anyway, we managed to get past her guardian and it turned out that she had applied for active duty in the Wonderbolts. Again. And was denied. Again. Applejack told me that this isn’t exactly news, but I think I have a working theory why Rainbow freaked out this time. I just… I couldn’t convince Applejack. When we left, she asked me to leave her alone. ‘To think’, as she said. But she didn’t look me in the eyes when she said it, so… my guess is as good as yours. I got some decent advice on my way home, so I was thinking: If you could give me that cloud-walking spell and teleport me up to Rainbow's house, I could try to poke the second half of this issue. You know? Thinking about it, I might actually not even need the teleport. Maybe I’m able to lift myself up there with my telekinesis. I never tried using that on myself. Eh, getting off-track again. So, yeah, that’s the plan. Oh and one last thing, I, uh… might’ve sorta, kinda, invited Derpy for dinner? And some board games. I had this nice long bedroom talk with Applejack about life and priorities and friendships and I think she would be very cross with me if she ever learns that this is what I took from that talk, because I think she wanted me to just get a job. Oh, right. What did you want to talk to me about?”

Twilight blinked once. Then again. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out and after a second, she closed it again. It took her several attempts until she slowly and carefully started to dissect everything I had said. I was fine with that. My plan for the day had been to help her with the library, have some fun with Derpy and go bother Rainbow in the evening. Considering how I had found her wide awake last night and had maybe-forced her to sleep, I doubted that I would find her in any other state that ‘awake and miserable’ this late evening. And dealing with a tired Rainbow might even make things easier, all things considered.

So I answered her questions. Sorting the library slowed down considerably because of that, but I still tried to keep a part of her focus on it sometimes. She had summoned writing materials again and took notes of basically everything I said. All of the details about the dreamscape, its inhabitants, its mechanics, how I had ‘cast’ spells, everything.

That she was perfectly fine with having Derpy over for dinner had more or less become just a footnote in my own mental notes, as I was pretty sure that it found no space left on hers.

Once I had exhausted everything I could tell her and she in turn could not find new questions to poke me with, I asked again. “So about that cloud-walking spell.”

“No.” Her answer was immediate. She sounded rather insistent and made it intentionally seem non-negotiable.

“What do you mean, ‘no’? What? Why ‘no’?” I had not planned on this being a hurdle.

“That is actually a part of what I wanted to talk to you about,” she started to explain. “I have analyzed the data from last night.” Oh. So those silver bands did not even need to be physically present and she could remote access their data storage. “It is… it has me worried. Comparing significant data points with your report leads me to believe that every time you ‘cast’ in the dreamscape, you put significant strain on your mental well-being and exhaust yourself physically by proxy. Due to a process I do not quite understand yet, your magical reserves seem to counter parts of this stress, but it cannot handle all of it. What I’m trying to say is: Every time you dreamwalk, you put yourself in danger.”

“Every time you eat, you could choke on a piece of cucumber,” I countered. Maybe I was not as mature as I should have been at that moment. I was just miffed and strangely enough, felt kind of attacked.

“What? No! That’s not even in the same category!” she disagreed.

“Okay, let me rephrase it then. Every time you cast a spell, you weaken yourself, expanding your magical energy. And somehow, I have a feeling that if I were to ask around, I’d find a lot — and I mean a lot — of instances where Twilight Sparkle, Element of Magic, exhausted herself to the point of physical and-or mental collapse. You know what these instances have in common? You were trying to help somepony. This isn’t different. And before you start, I’ll have you know that I’m perfectly capable of looking out for myself. It’s not like I have a death wish, Twilight. I am in control. And this is… I mean… it’s what I do. My bucking name is Dreamwalker. What do you expect me to do, here? Give up on my talent? Because that surely worked out great whenever somepony tried it, right? If it helps you, I can promise that I will try to be careful. But really, that’s the best I can do. Just imagine, for a moment. Imagine I’m so worried sick about you that I really, really want you to give up magic. Not just levitation. Or teleportation. But magic. All the spells. Research is fine. Just please, Twilight. Don’t cast anymore. Anything. Ever again. At least until we found a way for you to cast without exerting yourself.”

Maybe it had been unnecessary to become this snarky. Probably. I meant no harm of course. But I thought I had brought up some good and valid points. What was she asking of me? So dreamwalking was putting ‘strain’ on me. I was pretty sure apple bucking did not do a whole lot of good for Applejack's body. Not in the amount that she did it. Exercise was all well and good, but what AJ did went far beyond that. Same with Twilight's casting. Or Rainbow's rigorous training exercises. But Twilight was not about to pester her farmer friend to search for a new job for herself, was she?

I was being defensive again.

I sighed. “I’m sorry, Twilight. That was mean and uncalled for.”

She nodded and sat down. She even put down the three dozen books she had still gripped in her levitation. When she paused like that, it was usually a sign of her gears turning with added urgency. Although I grew restless with the amount of minutes that passed by, I tried to calm myself. She was thinking. She needed time. I had to be patient.

It helped somewhat when Spike came along and carried White Tip. “Hey there buddies,” I greeted them. My feathered friend hopped over to my back and carefully searched for a good spot to perch after my last comment about his claws. I petted him on this head. “Thanks.”

Meanwhile Spike watched Twilight. “What’s she thinking about?” he quietly asked.

“I tried to fix AppleDash,” I started and got an incredulous look from him. “What? It’s shorter. Anyway, I tried to fix their problem, but so far, I only, like… softened it up? I need to get to Dash. But she doesn’t want to give me the cloudwalking spell because apparently, these rings told her that dreamwalking is bad for my health or something.”

He furrowed his brow for a moment. “You mean… like too much pizza?”

I snorted hard and then immediately proceeded to ruffle his head fin. “Yeah, kinda like that. Anyway, we’ve been doing some sorting, but I fear due to me talking a lot about dream magic, we’ve been coming along slowly. Hey, since you’re more or less the castle chef… mind making a little more for dinner tonight? Derpy’s coming over for some board games.”

His eyes grew wide with excitement. Strange. I could have sworn I had seen that just a couple of hours before. “Sure thing! Am I… I mean, are we…” He was fidgeting with his claws again and it was rather adorable.

“Of course,” I answered the question he tried to ask. “Most board games are more fun with four players anyway.”

“Have you decided what to play already?” Ah. So he was hoping for something specific.

“Nope. But I feel it’s only fair to warn you: As far as I can remember, Derpy is a wicked hard player.” I stifled a laugh as I saw how his face fell a little. Maybe he had actually planned to cash in on some easy victories. But that would not do, not on my watch.

“So no Monopony then,” he quietly chuckled and nodded to himself.

“Fine,” came from the other direction. We were not startled in the slightest, no. We jumped to see if your legs still worked. And then we looked at Twilight expectantly, while she looked confused for a second where Spike and White Tip had come from.

“So you’ll give me the spell?” I asked with renewed hope.

She immediately squashed that with a single head shake. “No. I mean… maybe.”

'Maybe' was good. I liked 'maybe'. It meant that there was a chance. “Alright. Tell me about ‘maybe’.”

“You said you have this under control,” she started. “That you can look out for yourself. No death wish, just a strenuous special talent. However, my data points have me worried. But I have to admit: They are just numbers.”

I nodded. “Sooo…?”

“So you will show me,” she concluded.

I blinked. “Uh… show you what?”

She sighed and smiled like a patient teacher. I didn’t like it. “You will show me that you are in control.”

I was about to ask ‘how’, but thought better of it. There was only one real way to show her that. “Alright. Fine. But in that case, I have a condition of my own.”

“That being?” she asked warily.

“If you agree that I can handle myself in there, you will give me the spell.” She tried to stare me down. I tried to stare her down. We exchanged terse “Deal!”s and then she just smiled happily. Probably because it meant that she was about to see the dreamscape for herself. Maybe all of this had been a ploy to get her there? No. No, she was not a manipulator. It might have been a beneficial side effect for her.

“Thank you.”

Huh? “Huh?” Eloquence. I got it. “For what?” I belatedly added.

“You are driving a hard bargain,” she giggled. “But you are doing it for their benefit. You’re trying to help my friends. You’re not giving up, although they already have.”

I quietly laughed. “Well maybe it just means I can out-stubborn them!” I boasted.

Both Twilight and Spike shared a look and then snickered. “Nah,” both replied in unison.

“Wow, gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, guys,” I replied in mock-indignation and then chimed in with their snickering. “So with that all settled for now, who wants to sort some books, eh?” I tried my best snake oil salespony impression and even Spike laughed for a moment.

“Fine by me,” he chirped. “I had my fun and actually came back to help out some more. If we do this together, we might actually get it done before Derpy comes over.”

“Sounds like a plan,” I agreed and ruffled his scales some more.

We both looked to Twilight for any statement, but she looked at us bewildered. “Derpy is coming over?”

Our laughter filled the halls of the castle for a couple of minutes. And much to Twilight's dismay, Spike and I shared stories of her missing parts of conversations for the next hours. She tried to budge in with some embarrassing stories about Spike now and then and while I did appreciate those as well, she was fighting an uphill battle.

At some point during our sorting craze, Owlicious showed up and he and White Tip tried their best to help us out even further. “He told me that you went out with them one night,” Twilight remarked in a short break between stories.

“Oh, yeah. Couldn’t sleep and they watched the sky through a window, so, you know… thought I might let them stretch their wings a little.” And it had nothing to do with me needing some fresh air.

“They both had a lot of fun, so… thank you.” She gave me a kiss on the cheek. And I blushed. And Spike started to laugh again, that little scamp, so I chased him down the corridor with my angry attack bird. Fear the crow, caw, caw!

We had a good time.

All three of us were in the kitchen when we heard a soft knock from the entrance door. Owlicious and White Tip had returned to their perch for another nap, Spike was busy checking the oven and Twilight was apparently making a science out of salad dressing. Sure, why not. “I’m going to get the door,” I said and walked out.

I was surprised to find both Derpy and her daughter Dinky once I opened the door. “Oh, hey.”

“I hope this is okay? She was very insistent,” Derpy started, but her daughter chirped in immediately.

“Hey Mister Dreamwalker! I’m Dinky!” She was cute as a button.

I ruffled her bright mane and simply hugged Derpy. It was more of a reflex pushed by memories. We had been close before. I could not quite tell how close though, and it did not matter at the moment. She was surprised but did not object at all. She just took a moment before reciprocating the embrace. And Dinky giggled.

“Come on in, you two. Spike should be done with the table by now and Twilight… might have dissected the salad. We’ll find out.” Both entered giggling to themselves and I led them to the living room. All the while, both stared in wonder at the massive hallway, lined with bookshelves and banners and carpets. They had never been inside apparently, so any attempt to tell them about the changes was somewhat lost.

A couple of minutes and some greetings later, we all sat down to eat. It smelled great, it looked great and with Spike leading the charge in the kitchen, it tasted great as well. And the salad had survived its dissection. Twilight had even managed to avoid setting the kitchen on fire. Apparently that was a real worry Spike had. A reasonable one, too.

Spike blushed furiously the more praise we heaped upon him. And at some point during the meal, it became a little contest who could make him blush the most. While Twilight knew his weak spots and I just made up with quantity, Derpy used a surprisingly flowery language to flatter him. In the end though, Dinky won. Noticing how she could not compete against our arsenal, she stood up with a huff, stomped over and kissed him on the cheek. “It was really tasty!” she insisted before she stomped back to her seat and sat down again, sticking her tongue out at the rest of us.

The whole table cracked up at that. Or, well, everyone except Dinky and Spike.

As adorable as this little show had been, I was pretty sure that Dinky was a little too young for Spike. And that Spike had already noticed a certain other young filly trying to get closer to him.

Why?

Applejack might have been right. I apparently had a one-track mind. Sheesh. Maybe I should consider applying for an assistant position in Princess Cadances’ staff.

After all plates and bowls were emptied and the table was cleared, we searched the various shelves for what games we wanted to play. It became apparent pretty soon what most of the evening would be spent on as Derpy noticed with horrifying glee Twilight's edition of Monopony and it took just a few of her comments about how she won most of the time to rile up Spike who in turn challenged her and well, that was that.

However, both Twilight and I knew well enough that even one game of that could take up to six, eight, in extreme cases even ten hours. Something you would normally play over several days. None of us had any problems with that, but given both Twilight's and my lack of enthusiasm for the rather competitive game, plus we could not gauge how Dinky felt about it, we opted to instead play a couple of shorter games before that.

In our search I came across two editions of a guessing game called Fortune Stories. And the other half was appropriately named Misfortune Stories. I quickly scanned the instructions and it seemed easy enough. A short story was presented and read aloud. One pony read the backside of the card, where it was explained how said story came to pass. The other players then had to guess by asking questions that could be answered with ‘yes’ or ‘no’. The Misfortune Stories seemed to have a rather morbid sense of humor, so I levitated the Fortune Stories over to Twilight. Judging by how she grimaced and had to read the instructions herself, she did not quite remember owning that game, but she was in favor of it as much as I was.

We settled down around the table with Twilight and Derpy on the sofa and Dinky right between them. Spike and I sat on the other side near the fireplace on the carpet. And we started playing. I drew the first story and read. “After enduring many hardships, an old stallion finally wore the sun he cherished.” Well, that gave them little to work with. But I guessed that was exactly the point.

“Was it because of Princess Celestia?” Dinky immediately chirped in long before I had a chance to read the text on the back.

I turned the card over and took a minute. “Eh kind of?” I replied. “Yeah. Let’s go with ‘yes’.”

“You’re only supposed to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’,” Twilight noted.

I grinned and levitated a certain book about sleepovers from its shelf — just enough for her to see the title — and laughed when she blushed. “Point taken.”

It took them a while but they eventually figured it out. “I wonder if that is historically accurate,” Twilight mused.

“I wonder how such a noble bloodline could end up with a jerk like Blueblood,” Spike threw in.

“Spike! Language!” Derpy chided.

“No idea,” I addressed both — at least in my mind — before giving the stack of story cards to Spike. “Neeext.”

We played several more stories, got engrossed in this surprisingly fun game and did not notice how time passed us by. Only when Twilight tried to hand the stack of cards to Dinky did we come to realize that the young filly had fallen asleep. “Oh. Guess that explains why she had become so quiet,” I said.

I made an educated guess, looked at Spike to my left and saw the young dragon blinking rapidly, fighting his own tiredness. Twilight had apparently noticed as well. “Maybe it is time,” she remarked.

“But Monopony!” Spike whined quietly.

“… won’t run away,” I interjected. “And neither will Derpy or Dinky or Twilight or I. There’s going to be a next time and then you can battle to the death or something.” I snickered a little and then looked over to Derpy. “There will be a next time, right?”

Being a little tired herself, she opted for a smile and a somewhat subdued nod. “Yes please! This has been so much fun.”

I carefully lifted Dinky onto her back as she made to stand up. “I’m going to escort you to the door,” I offered and then addressed Twilight. “And you might be able to convince him to go to bed?” I nodded in Spike's direction who apparently had decided not to be tired or sleepy or anything like that, but was not quite attentive enough to hear what I had said either.

Twilight smiled and nodded. “That sounds like a good idea.”

I walked alongside Derpy. We moved slowly so we would not end up waking Dinky. “It was a fun evening. Thank you for coming. I’m hoping that we can repeat that someday soon and maybe you’ll consider me a friend somewhere down the line.”

“What makes you say that?” she wondered. And it was just that. Honest surprise.

It was disarming. “Well… friendships can be quite complicated,” I started, not entirely sure what to say exactly.

She softly shook her head. “I thought you were friends with Pinkie?”

“I am!” I hastily replied.

“Then you should know better,” she said and stopped walking. She waited for me to turn to her. “Here, it’s easy, I will gladly demonstrate. Ask me if I want to be your friend.”

Alright. “Uh… okay? Do… do you want to be my friend?” I complied and felt rather foolish.

Her eyes lit up in joy. Honest, genuine joy. As if she had not seen that question coming. It was a nice sight, but a little confusing at the same time. “Yes!” she replied and closed the distance to hug me. She was still careful not to wake up Dinky and somehow managed both. I lost her feathery embrace a moment later and fell in step alongside her once more. “See? That wasn’t so hard.”

“I… hm. I guess not? It’s just that… I don’t know…” I really had no idea what to say, did I not?

“You can’t earn friendship,” she objected to something I had not said. “No matter how much you try, how much you work for it, how much you risk and do. Friendship cannot be earned. Or owed. It can only be given freely. That’s what makes it easy. And hard.”

I still felt strangely speechless, but a smile lit up my face, so I could not complain too much. “I like you. I think I’m going to keep you.” I chuckled quietly. More so as I saw a slight blush grace her cheeks.

“Thank you,” she replied in a whisper.

We said our goodbyes and good-nights at the door and I enjoyed that persistent smile that she left behind even after I started making my way back to the living room. There was no trace of Spike to be found, but Twilight was in the midst of restoring order. So I wordlessly helped her out until the final piece was back in place. She stepped close to me once more, like she had done before we had started sorting her library, and just as she did back then, leaned against me. I embraced her gladly and almost melted into her. And in that moment, I recognized that I could now reply in kind to what she had said to me. “I trust you. And I feel safe with you.”

She did not respond. Not with words, anyway. She just hugged me that little bit tighter. “We should go to bed,” she said after what felt like a blissful eternity. I found it to be a particularly interesting choice of words too. ‘Let’s start’ would have done the job just as well. ‘Let us proceed with our evening plans’. Okay, that just sounded stilted as heck. But with her choice of words came certain implications.

And I tried not to let my imagination run away like a madly giggling colt.

I stood in front of her bed a few minutes later. And I was not tired at all. I felt a similar apprehension and nervousness again. Similar to when I had done this with Pinkie, Fluttershy and Applejack. The difference was clear as day though. This was Twilight. I was standing in her bedroom, she was lying on her bed and waited. Her beautiful violet eyes were always full of curiosity and thirst for knowledge. I swallowed hard and tried to force myself to move forward. Being here, with her, did not feel uncomfortable at all. Quite the opposite. And that was part of the problem.

I still struggled.

My memories told me to kiss her. How to do it. Whispered that I should just follow my instincts, honed by experiences I had not made yet, not with her anyway. If I would nip at her lower lip right after pulling away from a kiss, I would hear the softest, most beautiful little gasp from her. But there was a different reality in front of my eyes. Another Twilight. One I had known for a week, not years and years.

“Is this… uncomfortable?” she quietly asked. She tried to smile for my sake, despite her own insecurity. I would not lie to her. I could not. I finally overcame myself, moved forward and climbed up to her side. Mere inches apart, I gazed at her. “You are stunningly beautiful,” I whispered. She always had been. She always would be. She blushed. I could see it despite the night sky’s light being partially blocked by a thin layer of clouds. “It’s the sum of everything you are. The most beautiful mind I was ever allowed to touch, hosted in an attractive shell…” Weird choice of words.

“Is that something good then?” she asked and ignoring my weirdness.

I thought about it. We were lying close enough that her breath tickled my nose. I felt utterly comfortable with that. I could even scooch a little closer still and hold her. Stroke her mane. Let my hooves wander down her spine. Tease her wings. I knew this spot right between her shoulder blades. Massaging a little circle there would let her wings snap open. I would feel comfortable with that as well. On a certain level anyway. Because there was this nagging feeling. This alien voice that just told me to stop. This was not meant to be. Not this time anyway. And thus, I was conflicted.

But that was my burden to carry. So I steered away from the heavy thoughts and focused more on her expectant gaze. “I’ll have to correct myself,” I remarked. “I have come to the conclusion that it might, in fact, actually be a product, not a sum.”

She giggled warmly. I was certain that there were not a lot of ponies who would actually find this joke funny. Or this kind of compliment flattering. But leave it to Twilight to appreciate something involving mathematics.

My smile faltered. “I shouldn’t be flirting with you,” I admitted. “I shouldn’t even be able to. But it just… it comes so naturally. I remember our life. Lives, even. I… I want to show you. Parts of it, at least. If that’s alright with you?” It was a crackpot idea. Something that had come out of nowhere. I could not even tell if it would help at all, if sharing this burden would ease it, or if I was just about to weigh down on Twilight as well.

I was glad then that I was not alone in this. Twilight was smart. On many levels. And she considered the implications and potential consequences of my offer carefully before nodding. I really hoped she had done that at least.

I charged my horn once more, but stopped. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

I wanted this. “Do you mind…?” I asked. I could not tell if she understood what I was asking for, but she nodded again. So I did scooch closer. Closed the gap and pulled her against me. I held her close and I could not describe how great it felt. Our bodies still radiated warmth into the cover where it mingled. Her breath on my neck, her scent in my nose… it did nothing to solve my conflict. It was oh so right and yet still wrong. But I had wanted this badly since day one and now I got it. I cherished this moment. Etched it into the walls of my memory. Let it linger for a little while,until holding the magical charge in my horn became strenuous.

I lowered my head and finally touched hers.

We arrived and I almost chuckled at the gasp I heard from her. She stared slack-jawed at one of the most beautiful sights I had ever seen. One of the most beautiful sights she most likely had ever seen as well. “It’s awe-inspiring, is it not?” I asked and once more appreciated the spectacle before us.

While she stared on in wonder, I tore my gaze away and started with what little preparation I needed. As per usual, my own dream was close by. I brought it a little closer still. Instructing Twilight on anything was a moot point as I had already told her everything I was able to remember so far. So instead I finally, softly, poked her shoulder. “Hey there. You still with me?” She had some initial difficulties battling her admiration, freeing herself from her trance, but finally I got her attention. “We need to get in there first,” I told her. I pushed a hoof into my own dream and it willingly accepted me in. As for Twilight… she was close behind. I liked to think that my dream would never put up resistance to her entering it.

“I’m sorry.” I should have warned her. That realization had hit me a couple of seconds too late. We stood before the Golden Oaks library. Intact and unburned. The late evening sun was setting in the west. She stared in disbelief. I could see that little bit of pain still lingering. Pain and love... and longing.

She recollected herself after a moment. “It’s alright.”

Accept what we cannot change.

I opened the door and she went in. “It’s different,” she immediately told me after I went in after her and closed the door again.

“Of course it is. It’s been our home for many years.” My voice felt strange. Sounded strange. Thick and viscous. I swallowed again after hearing them laugh. Twilight glanced back at me curiously. I nodded. “It’s okay. They can’t see us.” We went into the kitchen and saw a family at the dinner table.

“Stardust,” I intoned at the same time that my counterpart at the table raised his voice in an attempt to make the young colt stop. “If you continue to tease your sister, there will be no desert for you!”

The rambunctious colt considered his options. In the end, he looked over to Twilight. An older Twilight sitting beside 'me'. “Don’t look at me sweetie, your dad is right.”

The disappointed colt huffed and lowered the spoon full of peas. At the other side of the table, his sister sighed in relief. She was all about manners and etiquette; she would not have even defended herself against an onslaught of peas. But she would have remembered. Still so young, but she already knew how to hold a grudge.

“Arcana, please don’t,” Twilight requested.

The young filly, just as well as the colt before, considered her options. “He is going on the list. Again.” It was a defiant statement, but one that left room for argument.

“You know your brother,” Twilight said. “He did not mean anything by it. He is just bored again.”

“I know,” she remarked, but her grumpiness melted away under that soft and warm look in Twilight's eyes. “I know,” she repeated in resignation.

“When is mom coming?” Stardust whined.

I once more interjected in perfect unison as I answered with myself in tandem. “She should be here any moment now. Probably got swamped by a load of paperwork again.”

The scene ended. Well, it did not end so much as it just froze mid-conversation.

Twilight turned to me. “What happened?”

I shrugged. “That’s all I got. From this one at least. There’s more. Dozens and dozens more. Little snippets. Sometimes single sentences, sometimes a conversation, and sometimes half a day. But it’s all drifting around in my head without much to connect them with. I know that some of those memories are from different lives. I don’t know how many though. But in the vast majority of them, it is like this. Or similar to this.”

Twilight looked back. Carefully, as if her hooves could somehow damage anything, she walked a few steps around the table and inspected her alter ego closely. Then she inspected me and finally our offspring. Arcana had light brown fur, similar to my own eyes, but proudly wore her mother’s haircut. Her mane color was a touch off though, and we had never allowed her to dye it appropriately.

“We had a daughter…?” she whispered. Being confronted with a life that she had lived at some point, but that was not hers at the same time, was probably hard.

“And two sons, Stardust and Magnus.” The latter of which, as she immediately noticed, was absent from this particular dinner.

Twilight regarded Stardust with interest while furrowing her brow. “But he said his mother was not here yet…”

I blinked. Once, twice. Right. She did not now. And how could she? Well, this had potential to be rather awkward again. “You are not his… ehrm… mother by blood. But believe me, you are his mother just as much as she is. Was. Whatever.”

She looked him over once more. A bright purple coat, a lighter tone than her own, but a dark blue mane. I could see the gears turning until they came to a screeching halt. I thought I had a good idea of what she was thinking about and by the looks of it, she was decidedly not ready to go down that path just yet. So she pulled back and let that question linger unanswered for now. “We had an unusual family dynamic,” was all I offered and decided to follow suit and leave it at that.

We had made it work. Somehow. And we were happy. Very much so.

“Why show me this?” she asked before she immediately corrected herself. “Why this?”

I shrugged at first. “One is as good as the other. I wanted you to see how… crystal clear and detailed these memories can be. And I wasn’t sure if you would be able to pay much attention to that if I were to show you what we did in the bedroom.” She stammered for a moment and blushed heavily again. I noticed with some amusement that she looked rather conflicted before agreeing with me. “Now, let me try and show you the other end of the spectrum. Sit down and close your eyes.” After a moment of uncertainty, she complied. I concentrated and let the scene around us fall apart, let the colors run into each other and bleed out until only the black void remained. I concentrated on a particular memory and a second later, a voice was heard in the void.

“Don’t!”

Her ears strained, they swiveled about, searching for more, but... there was nothing more to it. That was it. She furrowed her brow and opened her eyes to look at me. “That is it?”

I nodded. “Sometimes it associates itself with other memories. Bleeds into them, or completes them. It came up a lot when I was with Applejack. A warning. Someone begging. Me trying to reign myself in. Internal, external. The voices change, too. But this was the original. Recognize something about it?”

“Can you repeat it?” she asked.

“Sure.” She closed her eyes again and I let the memory play on repeat. She almost looked like she was meditating. Probably some technique for enhanced sensory input or something.

“That is my voice,” she noted after a moment of concentration. Her analytical mind was racing. “It sounded like part of a lecture. But it was not the beginning of it. Or the end.”

I smiled. “Figured as much. It just took me longer to arrive where you are right now. A lot of them are associated with you, in some way. Makes sense, considering how large a part you were always playing in my lives. Though I have to admit, I lied somewhat. I told you that this was the ‘other end of the spectrum’, but that’s not entirely true. There’s a wealth of stuff even less tangible.”

She again fell silent for a while. “How… how detailed is it?”

I shrugged again. “Varies. You felt those floorboards in the kitchen, didn’t you? You could hear their voices, smell the food.” I could hear the giggle of our newborn son as clear as day. I felt her breath on my neck, erratic and full of desire right before it hitched. I could taste coffee on her lips after a breakfast kiss. Vile stuff. But still worth it. I felt that heavy, relieved breath after quickly searching for serious injuries when our daughter had tumbled.

Silence. Contemplation. “I’m sorry,” she finally said.

“I—“ know? No. Thank you? No. I said the only thing that sounded right in my head, accompanied by a lopsided smile. “I’m not. Don’t get me wrong, this is… it’s a problem. But it’s also helpful, right? And it gives me something to aim for, I guess? I told you that I feel lost. And while that’s true, I think I would feel even more lost without this. It’s confusing as heck at times and I at least internally curse a lot when these flashes happen, because dear Luna, sometimes they have unfortunate timing! But this is mine. Some ponies have their diaries. Or stamp collections. Or… I don’t know. Do you have this little wooden box with all the memorabilia under your bed?”

She looked almost shocked. “It will not be under my bed much longer,” she mumbled.

I just nodded. “It’s like that. This is a part of me. Admittedly, it’s a mess. But then again, so am I and therefore it suits me quite well, does it not?” While she did not exactly look convinced, she did look like she understood. At least parts of it. Which was fine by me. It was good enough.

She chewed her lip for a moment before she stood back up again and walked over to me. “Can we maybe visit Rainbow? I want to check up on her. See how she is doing.”

Her request threw me off a little. Enough that I tried to object without thinking. “I actually rather stay inside a dream right now?” A pleading undertone had mixed in at the end, much to my dismay.

Twilight watched me closely though. “Why?”

A manageable little flood of memories came. No flash of insight, no. Just a recollection of things I already remembered. Throws of passion, pleading, moaning, a cry of ecstasy… a shudder ran down my spine, goosebumps… and for just a second, my breathing hitched. When I had seen Twilight for the first time, I immediately rushed to kiss her. And I knew: Had she not taken measures, I would have tried more.

She, on the other hoof, had always been a lot more open about just how passionate she was.

I really was not prepared for this.

But I did not want to answer Twilight's question and choosing between the two options…

I brought us back to the dreamscape. My dream bubble spit us back out, the color drained from it and it returned to its inactive state of a swirling gray mass.

We both walked through the endless night sky, side by side, looking for Rainbow. It was not necessary, I knew that. And by extension, so did she. I could honestly not find a single reason why we were walking. So I stopped. This place was as good as any. I raised my hoof and… hesitated. Calling for Rainbow was easy enough. Her dream would comply and come forth. But my call could be heard.

By Luna, for example.

I looked over to my side, where Twilight was standing. She was marveling at the dreamscape's sheer beauty again. This was for her, was it not? I was trying to prove something to her, so that she would help me help Rainbow. “Fine,” I grumbled.

“What was that?” she immediately asked as her ears swiveled around.

“Nothing,” I deflected and stomped on the ground. Once, then again, and again. I formed an image of Rainbow in my head, her boisterous grin, her windswept rainbow-colored mane, her sleek, athletic body. It did not take long to see her bubble float closer. And then I chuckled. “You really can’t keep these two apart, even when they’re having another tiff,” I said and pointed to a second bubble following closely behind. Once they were nearby, they once more started to orbit each other.

“Are they merging?” Twilight asked almost enthusiastically. She obviously hoped to see something I had described as insanely rare.

It brought me no joy to deny her that. “No,” I replied and shook my head. “They could be. In a couple of years, maybe. They harmonize with each other well enough. That’s just what I meant… it’s like they were meant for each other.”

She mulled this over. “Do Pinkie’s and Fluttershy’s dreams do that too?”

I shook my head. “No. As I said, it is insanely rare for dreams to harmonize this well. Think of it like this: Every pony is both consciousness and subconsciousness. Two parts forming something whole. Here however, one of these parts is severely underrepresented at best. These two fit together like puzzle pieces though. They could very much create something whole. And maybe they will one day. But that doesn’t mean they will just magically stop to bicker and argue. Their consciousness is still there to trip them up over and over again. Because it’s true that we are our own worst enemy at times.”

I turned to face her dream. A swirling mess of colors at least let me know that she was asleep. Yay for small victories. I carefully touched a hoof to its surface.

… and I felt something hungry lunge for me.

“Stay back!” I warned Twilight and took a couple of steps myself. Rainbow's dream immediately went gray and lazy. A nightmare. She had woken up. Great. But what was even more important was the fact that something oozed out of her dream. Something that, after my untimely interruption, still remained hungry.

It reformed before our very eyes. “A timberwolf…?” I heard Twilight gasp. “Here?”

It was made out of light. Cool, blue-ish starlight. The creature was a little bit bigger than Winona and while Twilight apparently saw a collection of sticks and stones, I saw a regular wolf. The important part was: This was a predator.

“Ready a weapon,” I ordered her. I concentrated without taking my eyes off of the snarling creature and I thought of a sword. The most common weapon ever used. Pegassi could carry them in their mouths. Earth ponies could strap smaller blades to their legs. Unicorns could easily wield them with magic.

“Running is not an option?” she tried to make sure.

I shook my head. Both in an attempt to answer and to brace for the incoming flash. “Memories,” I whined. They really did choose the most unfortunate times.

Twilight gave up on her attempt to mimic what I had done and rushed to my side to steady me with a wing over my back. She held me tight while I used what remained of my focus to keep that one glowing sword in between us and the creature that had now started to circle around us. It looked at us like it had found its next best meal.

You do not cower if you stand at my side!, Luna's voice boomed in my ears. I felt tiny and useless, fearful due to her disappointment. I had mumbled something in reply, had I not? I could not remember.

The flash was strong but mercifully brief. “Weapon,” I croaked as I steadied myself. “They hunt for thought patterns and emotions. We cannot tell what they want so we cannot shed it and with time and distance being relative, escaping is somewhat complicated.”

Twilight tried again. Her horn aglow, she manifested a sword of her own and obviously tried to replicate what I had done. It would serve well enough, I thought. “… they?” she asked. I had no actual need to answer her. On one hoof, she was smart enough to recognize wolves as pack animals after another second or two, and on the other… even if she would not have understood, there were low growls and snarls coming from other directions now.

I counted six of them in total.

She tried to ready herself for what seemed inevitable, but I could see that fear in her eyes. This was not her first battle, not by a long shot. But these were quite unique circumstances. She did not know her surroundings all that well. Did not quite understand their mechanics. She had no practice fighting in here and her mind probably constantly told her that her magic was not real in here, which in turn explained why her blade flickered out of existence and back in every so often.

Adding to that… “I have never killed before…” It was a soft whisper. Quiet. Fearful. Troubled.

I had to think quickly and decided: I would be damned if I was the one to make her kill. “Shield yourself,” I instead commanded. Just as the first wolf pounced. I had expected her to form a… well, an actual shield. A round shield, a broad shield, a tower shield. Any shield really. She instead formed a shimmering purple bubble around herself on which the wolf just dented his snout in. It recoiled with another growl, only to immediately jump at her again. It did not even reach the shield this time, I made sure of that. My blade zipped forward and embedded itself in the wolf’s throat. The creature’s body dispersed into particles of light.

Just to keep them at bay a little longer, I used the moment and slashed at another. It tried to jump away, but the blade made contact with its shoulder anyway. A deep gash and it looked like it was bleeding light. Contrary to what I had hoped, the pack did not see this as a sign of unusually defensive prey, but instead a challenge.

“Behind you!” Twilight yelled.

I knew I could not hope to defeat four enemies. Not with a single sword. So I strained and created more. I threw them with force of will, like lances, and dissolved them as soon as they missed or hit. One creature I pierced with three swords at once, another jumped at me and landed head first into another blade. The third had managed to sneak close and kept low to the ground. “Behind you!” Twilight warned again and I kicked back in reflex, feeling some resistance as my back hoof connected to a snout. I whirled around and slashed with another blade but only managed to lightly graze its skull.

The two remaining wolves jumped back. Their first attack had been somewhat decently coordinated on their part, but utter chaos on mine. I barely pulled together enough information to know how to defend myself. I noticed how little remorse I felt striking these creatures down, however. Something to think about for later…

The two wolves were circling us again. Observing, lurking. This would not end. Dreams never fought back. The only defeat these creatures knew was at the hooves of others of their kind. And they did not recognize us as such.

It became obvious to me that they were testing us. Trying to decipher what we were. If we were prey, or predator. Being able to defend ourselves apparently was not enough information to make a choice quite yet. Did we really look that tasty to them? What in Luna's grace were they hunting us for?

When both wolves started to howl, I used the opening without a second thought. I lunged forward, the single blade I had gripped hard in my telekinesis and rammed it into one of the wolf’s throat. It dispersed instantly.

The other one successfully finished his call for help.

That’s a bad thing, I vaguely realized.

I looked over to Twilight. She seemed horrified. Maybe because of the attack. The viciousness displayed. Maybe because of me.

Murderer.

I tried not to dwell on the thought. “Twilight?” She was startled and quickly jerked her head around as she heard her name. “Let the shield drop, now we run!”

As soon as the shield was down, I rushed over, flung my last sword vaguely in the direction of the last wolf, grabbed Twilight and ran. The creature jumped out of the attack's way with ease and did not follow us right away — because that would have been useless all alone and without backup. These things were smart.

“Why are we running?” Twilight cried. “I thought that was useless?”

I nodded while I still ran straight ahead and dodged and weaved between dreams. “It kinda is? It will confuse them for a bit.” I felt strangely refreshed. Alive. In a totally not murder-hobo’y way, this was invigorating. Almost fun.

It scared the crap out of me.

“Stop!” I almost yelled as I felt… something. Something was decidedly wrong about this place. We slowed to a canter, then a trot, and then walked slowly side by side again. This part of the dreamscape was no different from any other. Night sky, stars, dreams floating about… but after a moment, we reached a clearing of sorts.

“They are coming,” Twilight told me.

“How many?” I asked while I was somehow unable to take my eyes off of that one single dream floating in the dead center of this clearing.

“Two Dozens minimum,” she gauged.

Yikes. Still. Something was up with this dream. I dared to step closer, just a little bit. “Dreamwalker? What do we do?”

“… let them come,” I said absentmindedly. I was certain they would not dare enter this clearing. I looked around and noticed all the other dreams, drifting and floating about, pushing each other off like magnets. “Dreams aren’t sentient,” I explained without even caring if she listened. “But in a way, they care about certain things… staying intact, for example. That’s why they float around but ultimately repulse each other. If they were to touch, the bubble would usually burst.”

I finally managed to tear my gaze off and look around. Although Twilight had noticed the wide berth every other dream seemed to give this one, she was more focused on the starlight wolves. She was right of course. Dozens. I had tried to count, but they were constantly moving. Some thirty plus wolves. They growled and snarled and circled and yet did not dare come any closer than those other dreams did.

Something was in there. In that one dream. Something that uncaring things like dreams suddenly cared about. Something that scared a massive pack of predators into cowering.

Well, they were not quite cowering. They were still very much aiming for our tails. And not without a certain dread did I recognize that every now and again, one of the creatures dared to step closer. And seeing as nothing immediately happened, the entire circle drew closer as well.

In a way, they were still coming for us.

“I need to know,” I mumbled. I charged my horn, turned around and carefully stepped up to the dream. A jolt ran through my horn, freezing me in place as fragments of a powerful dream overwhelmed me. I could feel cold marble tiles under my hooves, a freezing breeze caressing my coat... and I heard a voice sing. Thick with sorrow and despair, night after night, often half choking on her own words... for a thousand years. My knees gave in and I crumbled to the ground. Tears streamed down my face and my voice denied my every effort to utter even a single word.

I now recognized this. It was Celestia's dream.

A dream that felt as old as the world itself. And it was grief-stricken. So much of it that I could not bear to even think about it. So much of it that a single touch of my horn had reduced me to a mess. As I had suspected, there was a creature in there. And it was a farmer.

To have this kind of effect, it must have been old. Very old. And very, very well-nourished. It devoured her grief, but always sowed more to feed itself. It had grown massive. Enough that it affected the dreamscape around it. Enough that it scared everything away. It never left its dream. And why would it? It had everything it needed. All the pain and suffering it could ever desire.

It was feasting on Celestia. And thereby poisoning her.

What was I to make of such information? What? What to do with this revelation?

“They’re closing in,” I heard Twilight say. “Please… please come back to me.”

She sounded desperate. And I realized why. I was still lying on the ground. Unmoving, unblinking, with tear-stained fur, while dozens of enemies surrounded us. I would not, could not, let her come to harm. Had I not brought her here to prove myself? To show her that I could handle myself? That I was in control?

Putting that first hoof down felt like a colossal act. Then another. As soon as she noticed the movement, Twilight was there by my side again. She always was. With a little help, I stood up and slowly turned around to take in how close the enemies had gotten. They were becoming bold.

“Stay behind me,” I ordered and stepped up. I was in control.

I summoned swords. A dozen at once this time. I spaced them out in a circle around us, their pointy ends directed outwards. Try me, I internally challenged them. I should have been less cocky. But knowing about so much suffering right behind me, I felt so incredibly angry. And lest we never forget — magic was influenced by emotion.

I really should not have drawn from anger though. For obvious reasons. The magic of friendship made a pretty (awesome) and colorful rainbow laser that zapped the evil right out of someone. At least according to horrific simplifications of the process, usually made by Rainbow Dash. Anger… had less pretty results.

Before I could get myself worked up again to the point of actual consequences though… something fell.

Like a comet from the sky, something bright just dashed down from above and impacted with the amount of force one would expect from a comet impacting solid ground. I could feel the ripples of the aftershocks. I saw several of the creatures fly through the air and dissolve before they even hit the ground again. A cloud of pure, physical darkness floated above the place of impact. Everything was frozen for just a second. None of the creatures dared to move, unsure of what had happened. Twilight probably feared the arrival of another hostile force.

Which, to be fair, was not entirely wrong.

I was frozen because I was not ready for this.

The first thing that came out of that cloud was a double-bladed scythe. It whirled around like a boomerang, slicing and dicing more and more wolves as it made its way along the edge of the clearing. The first wolf that came to its senses and tried to flee was speared. Literally. An impressive longspear of pure moonlight shot out of the cloud and pinned the thing to the ground before it dissolved. And finally Luna stepped out in all her glory. She wore her silver-plated armor, enchanted with spells no book dared to list or name. It contrasted perfectly with her dark blue coat and her ethereal, starry mane. The latter was braided. Her cyan eyes were fierce, burning with the passion of combat. “Thee shouldst not has't cometh h're,” boomed her voice as she regarded her enemies for just a second before charging to her left and just trampling over the first two creatures with armor-clad hooves. She shoulder-checked a third one before she even noticed us.

She looked very, very confused when she noticed Twilight standing behind me. And just a teensy tiny bit miffed when her glare turned to me. She nevertheless rushed over. “Behind me,” she ordered just as I had done before. She recalled her scythe and spear and readied herself for the coming onslaught.

Because these creatures did not learn.

Half their numbers had fallen within mere moments and yet they persisted in their endeavor. In fact, the fearsome dream that had kept them at bay for so long seemed all but forgotten now and they just charged from all sides.

I knew Luna was a capable warrior. She had done this for centuries even before her banishment and had continued to do this after her return and recovery. But I had brought Twilight here. I had endangered her. Luna was pissed, to put it bluntly, and I could understand why. I would be too.

I tried to make it up somehow.

I turned around, stepped forward and put Twilight between the two of us. I had lost concentration when Luna ‘arrived’ — the little show-off — and my swords had vanished. But now I recalled them to my side and formed a half-circle before me this time. I looked over my shoulder to check on Twilight and while I was relieved to find her still standing there and looking okay-ish thus far, I also noticed how Luna raised an eyebrow in disbelief and stared at my swords. “Armor,” she noted.

“Right. Good idea.” I focused my thoughts and willed the image in my head to become part of reality. Heavy steel plating weighed me down in an instant and covered me like a shell. But I was a unicorn in a situation where the enemy was more than willing to come to us — mobility was not exactly a priority.

“Incoming!” Twilight warned and we turned back to face the onslaught.

Three wolves had thought of our ‘banter’ as an opportunity. And three swords zipped forward, precise as arrows, to answer their misjudgment. I focused on my side and trusted completely in Luna both handling herself and keeping Twilight safe between us. Twilight even recovered somewhat once her role had shifted so significantly. Since nopony expected her to kill anything, she could focus on what she did best. Lead and coordinate. She analyzed their movement patterns and yelled the direction of incoming attacks at us. She pointed out openings and we wore them down little by little.

A pair of wolves, the last two, finally, finally tried to flee. For a fraction of a second, I thought about letting them get away. Maybe it would help? Maybe the knowledge would spread that—

But it did not work like that, I reminded myself — and threw the remaining three swords after one of them, only calling out, “Left.” Luna nodded and flung her spear in a high arch to pin down the right one.

Once we were done with this grisly business, she turned to us and inspected Twilight for visible injuries first. With the utmost care, as I noticed. “Are you hurt?” she asked with an unexpected softness in her voice. And I noticed how she immediately switched to modern Equestrian.

Twilight smiled bashfully and took a step forward to hug Luna. “No. Just a little shaken, is all.”

The Princess of the Night almost melted into her embrace before she squared up again and turned her attention to me. “Thee has't been most careless, young fool!” she reprimanded in a firm, stern voice.

I immediately panicked. Maybe because of that earlier flash. Maybe because I still felt utterly unprepared. Maybe because she looked so gosh-darn attractive in her armor. Maybe, maybe. It mattered little as I grabbed Twilight almost possessively — or maybe like some kind of life jacket — and rattled down my farewell: “I know, I’m sorry, so sorry, bye!”

I could only imagine her standing there, blinking, maybe uttering something like ‘I wasn’t finished!’

We both jolted awake in her bed. “I cannot believe you just did that!” Twilight panicked.

“Neither can I,” I whined. “She’s gonna be sooo mad! She hates it when I leave her standing!” Or when I interrupted her. Or when I ignored her.

It was probably the tone of my voice that gave it away. That not-really-real-terror usually reserved for talking about a disgruntled spouse. “She has been your wife,” Twilight guessed in disbelief.

I was still panicky, very much so. I liked to think that otherwise, I would have shut my mouth. “Don’t try to get out of this one! She’s your wife too!” It clicked a second later and I cursed some very unsavory things beneath my breath as I looked over to her. “I’m sorry,” I tried. She had not been ready before. She had tried to steer away from this answer. Yet here I was, running my mouth again.

I did not know what exactly I had expected to see. How I expected her reaction to play out. I could not even muster any amount of fake-surprise as she blushed so hard that ponies outside who might have seen her bedroom window could probably take her for a foal’s night lamp.

Just as usual when things got awkward between us, Luna tried to help. Because surely that was the only way to interpret Spike sitting up startled from his sleep and burping up a scroll with her wax seal in a burst of green flame. “Sheesh. In the middle of the night?!” the drowsy dragon grumbled. “She could’ve at least waited 'till morning…” Vaguely seeing us sitting in bed, he threw the scroll over, only to immediately lie back down and pull the blanket over his head.

The scroll had hit Twilight on the head. She did not mind much. She instead opened it up and read through its very few contents. There was no address at all, no formalities or niceties, not even a signature. Even the two questions written upon the parchment seemed to have been scrawled there in utmost haste.

Are you alright? Are you safe?

Twilight stared at the parchment for a moment.

It felt like an eternity. I thought I could tell that she was still trying to process the whole wife-thing. In the end though, she used Cadance’s breathing technique, calmed herself down and summoned writing materials.

I’m fine. And safe. She was already about to send it, when she dipped the feather into the ink well again. It was lovely seeing you again and it warms my heart to know how much you care.

I did not read her letter. I would never lean over and satisfy my own curiosity. Just thinking about such accusations… the nerve!

She sat her signature under the text, put a proper address above it, curled it up, somehow magic’ed her wax seal on it and, floating in midair, let it be consumed by a plume of green flame.

Wait, what? “Wait, what?” Eloquence. I got it.

She smiled a little awkwardly. “It’s… dragon magic,” she whispered. “I studied it a couple of weeks after my ascension… please don’t tell Spike?”

Her plea was unnecessary. “I won’t, promise.” A quiet sigh of relief and we were both back to… what, exactly?

It was that moment that I noticed her shivering. Middle of the night. Made sense. So I scooched close again. “What are you doing?” She sounded confused. Maybe she had not even noticed being cold yet.

“Lie down with me. You’re freezing.” She complied a brief moment later. I used my magic to pull the blanket up once more and hugged her tightly again. She’s not mine. Stop hoarding her. She did not belong to me. And yet I clutched her tightly and a knot formed in my stomach, knowing what I had to do eventually. Because I knew where she belonged.

She was mine. For now.

I buried my muzzle in her mane. “Thank you,” I whispered.

There was a lot to be grateful about and I could not have pinpointed what exactly I was thanking her for in that instance. Maybe for trying to get Luna off my tail. Maybe for helping us in the fight. Maybe for giving me a chance to prove my capabilities. Oh, that was an interesting question. Had I proven myself capable? I had half a mind to ask Twilight about it, but when I listened… her breathing was slow, relaxed and even. She was sleeping again.

A couple of hours until sunrise. I hugged Twilight. Yeah, that was alright. I would survive.

Day 12: Gravitational Pull

It were those late morning hours when Twilight stirred again. She did not quite wake up but shuffled a little more against me as she fled from the cruel sunlight. I did not mind at first. But her movement not only interrupted my serious thinking time which, to be honest, was not all that productive and probably never had been, but it apparently also interrupted my blood flow. It was just once again the smell of her mane, her familiar warmth, how familiar she felt in so many ways… and the way she moved. I was unintentionally prodding her rear with a little twitch of my member and I was certain that she had to be awake by this point. How could she not have been? Surely she must have noticed? “I-I’m sorry,” I mumbled a little short of breath, but there was less of a reaction than I anticipated.

“’S ‘kay…” she mumbled so quietly that I almost did not hear it. Then she proceeded to wiggle a little in search of a comfortable position and sweet Luna, please send help, she was grinding against me with her rump.

It’s unintentional, I berated myself. Yet despite the conflict raging to a new height, I just wanted to take her and make her my own right here, right now.

But I could not.

It would have been selfish. Worse, it would have felt wrong. Maybe not at that moment. Spurs of passion left little room for doubt or coherent thought after all. But this nagging feeling that kept creeping up on me was not just going away because I slept with her. I had yet to figure out what it was, what its source was.

It was only a short while until she fell still again, even though it felt a lot longer due to my inner struggle. And I released a breath I had not noticed I was holding in. I stopped chewing my lower lip. It was always nice when the pain started to subside, was it not? But it would not do if I had just passionately, desperately moaned into her ear.

A couple more minutes might have passed by while I was fighting myself, then I made the only reasonable decision. I could not stay here. I could not keep myself from doing something rash and stupid forever. So, with a heavy heart, I lifted the blanket, snuck out and tucked her in. She gave a disappointed little noise, which made my heart flutter yet again. But I remained steadfast in my resolve.

I at least tried to tell that to myself.

I exited the room with my tail tucked low and took a nice, long, ice cold shower. A necessity at this point.

I was searching for Spike when I wandered the hallways. His bed in Twilight's room had been empty, so I presumed him to be up and about already. And sure enough, I found him in the kitchen as he prepared breakfast. “Hey buddy. You’re already up?” I greeted him.

“Well, someone has to be, right?” he jokingly retorted. “Did that whole dreamwalking-thing work out?”

I sat down at the table. I did not feel up to the task of helping him out today. He was doing fine anyway, from the looks of it. “Eh. Half good, half bad.”

He cracked some eggs over a pan and nodded. “Tell me.”

I considered the offer and shrugged. What harm could that do, right? “Bad: I met Luna. Or maybe that’s a good thing, I’m… I’m still not sure. Good: We had an epic fight! With some wolves made out of light, not… not between Luna and me. Although that might’ve followed if I had not… eh, nevermind. Good: I think I convinced Twilight to help me reach Rainbow. I think. I hope so. I really, really hope so. Ah… I have no idea where to sort Twilight seeing her foals…”

An egg landed on the ground. “Her what now?”

“Different time. Or live. Thought I'd share a memory. And I have no idea if that was a good decision. You know, this whole good-or-bad-game is more difficult than I thought.” I absentmindedly levitated a cloth over and cleaned the smashed egg up. “Alright, listen,” I started again, having made my decision. “I think I’m going to take White Tip and Owl—… nah, he should probably sleep. I’m going to take White Tip and go for a walk. I really need to clear my head somehow. I'm skipping breakfast. Just in case Twilight asks where I’m off to.”

Spike chuckled, turned around and presented me with a plate of scrambled eggs. “No can do.”

I grinned and nodded appreciatively. “Very good AJ-impression.” We both chuckled at his little bow. I looked at my impromptu breakfast and smiled. “Thanks buddy.” I nevertheless dug in fast as I wanted to get out of the castle even faster. I really did not want to face Twilight right now. Even thinking about this morning, about what she might remember once she would eventually wake up…

Yupp, nice little walk with White Tip. Sounded perfect.

I obviously was reasonable enough to know that I could not run from my problems forever. That being said, though — I could run a little bit, right?

I put the plate in the sink once I was done, ruffled Spike's little head and trotted into the living room. White Tip was perched next to Owlicious, just as I had expected. The crow looked startled but did not protest vocally as I levitated him over. “Sorry, I was trying to let him sleep,” I whispered. With him on my back, I made a beeline for the door.

I opened it carefully. I did not want to make too much noise, which really was a silly notion. Twilight’s bedroom was a good distance away. However, it meant that Sunny did not immediately hear my approach. I had stopped with a small gap opened and just looked at her in confusion. Not only was she up early again, she was here of all places. Then again, why would she not? I had told her where to find me. If she was here for me in the first place.

She stood with her back to me and muttered something inaudible under her breath. Once she gave a final nod to herself, she turned around and was immediately startled by me just standing there. “Hi,” I greeted. Her wings shot open, she reared back and ungracefully sat down on her haunches.

It took her a moment to carefully fold her wings again and she put a hoof to her chest to check if her heart was still beating at an acceptable pace. “You should be ashamed,” she tried to reprimand me. “You could have killed me!”

I raised an eyebrow, smiled and shook my head. “Nah. You’re made of tougher stuff than that.” I offered her a hoof and pulled her up again, all the while carefully closing the door behind me with my telekinesis. “If you’re here for Twilight, you’re a little early. She’s still asleep and after a rather turbulent night, I think she’ll continue to do so for a few hours more.” She furrowed her brow. “Don’t worry,” I added, “Spike is in and he’s looking after her. If you’re here for me though… first off, I’m flattered. Secondly, I was about to take a walk. You could just accompany me, if you’d like.”

Her expression made it clear that she had questions. Several of them. But instead of speaking up about any of those, she tilted her head a little to the side and watched… my ear? My mane? My back? Oh, right. “White Tip, this is Sunny Skies. Sunny, this is White Tip. Fluttershy… uh… gave him to me?” He cawed and even I, without Flutter's knowledge of animal language, understood his dissatisfaction with my description. The slight claw grip in my back might have clued me in on that as well. “Alright, so maybe I just showed up and it was more like he adopted me?” He seemed pretty happy with that.

Sunny giggled quietly. It was a welcome sound. “Pleased to meet you, White Tail,” she said and to my utmost delight bowed. All hail my feathered friend! Who in turn crowed again. Then she turned her attention to me. “So how has your day been?”

I let out a long and deep sigh and with a flick of my head gestured for her to either walk beside me or… well, stay at the castle. Luckily she chose the first option. “Could have gone better? Then again, the day was fine, I suppose. Twilight denied me her immediate help, so things between my other friends haven’t been resolved yet. As far as I know anyway. But she at least gave me a chance to prove myself, so that I could earn her help.”

She looked doubtful. “That does not sound like Twilight at all, from what I have heard.”

“Well I mean…“ I sighed again and swallowed my pride. “It’s not like she did it willy-nilly? These bands measure stress levels or something. And looking at her raw data alone, she got worried. So she gave me a chance. If I could show to her that I wasn’t reckless and could handle myself while dreamwalking, she would help me out with that darn spell. I was honestly tempted, for juuust a moment, to go find somepony else. But cloud walking is a tricky spell for unicorns. One few have even any use for. Knowing half of Ponyville, she was the only one that came up in my memory even possessing that spell.”

“She tries to look out for you,” Sunny interjected in an attempt to defend Twilight. Which was not necessary and quite frankly rubbed me the wrong way. As if I would ever attack her...

“I know. I know! It’s just… egh. Nevermind. I had a long and exhausting discussion with her about this. She’s not going off to clip Rainbows wings because she could crash, or to shoo Applejack away from farm life because it hurts her body in the long-term. Dreamwalking is what I do. It’s what I want to do and what my cutie mark tells me to do. It’s even what my name implies!” I was getting riled up again. I mumbled a quiet excuse. And a little "Thank you" in White Tips direction as his claws were the reason I had noticed it in the first place. I switched the topic to get away from the tension. “Anyway. Because of that, we went to the dreamscape last night and—“ Again, his claws strengthened their grip. He was a lot softer this time around though. “Right. Thanks for the reminder, buddy. We had Derpy over for dinner and played some board games. There’s this guessing game we played all evening, Fortune Stories. Ever heard of it? It’s all kinds of fun. And her daughter Dinky is just the cutest.” She shook her head about the game, but smiled as I spoke so fondly of what I hoped was a couple of new friends. “Guess AJs ‘wisdom beyond her years’ did somehow get to me after all. Probably not what she expected or wanted, but hey. Progress is progress, right?”

While Sunny agreed and wore her practiced smile with ease again, I could not help but feel like she worried about something. There was clearly something on her mind, I could tell. “So you went dreamwalking with her and could not secure her help?” she finally spoke up.

“Ehhh…” How to put that…? “That’s a really good question actually. See, the thing is… things didn’t quite go according to plan. We went in, I showed her some stuff, it was all very beautiful and very impressive and then we ran into an ambush.”

Her expression immediately turned to an even deeper seeded worry. “An ambush? By who? Is she alright?”

Even I was inspected closely once more. “Don’t worry,” I tried to ease her concerns, “she’s fine. I wouldn’t have left her alone if she weren’t. And it’s less about ‘who’ and more about ‘what’. There are creatures living there. Those were, by a misfortunate chance, hostile predators. I managed to fend some of them off, but they kept coming and called for backup, so we fled. We found a place where we were safe for a moment and could get our bearings, but time was clearly running out. And then Luna showed up. With all the theatrics I love her for. She just smashed into the ground like the wild and untamable force of nature that she is. And gosh, did she look gorgeous in her armor. We put Twilight between us and fought these creatures off. After that, she… I dunno… for a short moment, I was pretty sure she was about to punch me. Hard. Or worse yet, give me that ‘not angry, just disappointed’-look. So I did what every reasonable pony would have done. I panicked, grabbed Twilight and exited the dreamscape without letting her get another word in. And I know how she hates that. And because I’m such a brave stallion, I fled Twilight's bedroom before she could wake up. Okay, no, that’s not entirely true. She did wake up for a short spell to write Luna that she was okay, and then fell asleep again.”

Sunny wore the weirdest expression I had yet seen on her usually meticulously controlled face. It shifted and merged in subtle ways — like a changeling that could not quite decide yet what it wanted to look like. “Well,” she started after quite some time as she settled on bemusement for the time being, “I had heard rumors of half the palace being on high alert because a very disgruntled Princess Luna was stalking the hallways, barking at everyone who so much as looked at her wrong. Or at all.”

I laughed. I honestly laughed and was happy and relieved and even stopped our little walk around the edge of town just to hug her for a moment. “Sweet Celestia, thank you. Oh that's such a relief! That’s great news. Thanks.”

She looked at me rather perplexed. Like I had grown a fitting pair of wings. “It is?”

I nodded vigorously. “Yupp. First off, it won’t be long until Celestia hears of this. And seeing as she is utterly devoted to doting over her little baby sister and cares deeply for her happiness, she won’t allow her to run around scaring her little ponies.” Sunny gave an awkward laugh. Probably because of the rather familiar way I was talking about the Princesses. Yeah, probably. “Secondly, what you described is just Luna being cranky. She's not really angry Luna. Because believe me, I have seen her angry. If she were angry, ponies wouldn’t be on ‘high alert’, they would be fleeing the castle with silent screams on their faces.”

“That… doesn’t sound right,” Sunny weakly disagreed and furrowed her brow as if my statement refuted whatever she had heard or knew.

“Luna can be kind. Innocent like a filly, with awe and wonder in her eyes.” Sunny agreed with a nod as I explained. “But she is the Mistress of the Night. It’s in her domain, really. Above all else, Luna is passionate. She does everything, and I mean literally everything, with passion. If she sulks, it’s the end of the world. If she loves, it can almost be suffocating. If she is truly angry, the fiercest of beasts quiver and tremble before her. Stomping around the castle yelling at ponies is her lovely way of subtly telling others: ‘Look, I am angry, now do something about it!’ Basically just a call for someone to cheer her up.”

Processing this new information she had given me, I perked up a little. My chances of not getting smashed into a pulp had risen significantly. Sunny meanwhile regarded me with a strange, fixated stare for a moment, until she shook her head and put that practiced smile back on her face.

“Sooo,” I started again after we had settled on a nice little bench and White Tip was flying overhead, stretching his wings a little. “How has your day been?”

She gave a derogative snort. “Same old,” she replied. “The same supplicants with the same requests, the same documents on my desk each day and no regard for the well-being of others.”

I looked around, gave a little wave to Lyra and watched other ponies walk by. “Hard to believe, actually,” I finally answered. “Equestria is a wonderful nation. Sure, it’s not perfect. Nothing ever is. There’s always going to be a dozen Bluebloods, much to Rarity’s chagrin. But we also have our Fancy Pants and Fleurs. I think you may be exaggerating. Might not even be intentional. As you said, the same stuff over and over again. If you’re the kind of person to fixate on issues, imperfections and flaws, you’ll eventually only see those and start ignoring or disregarding the rest. You know what helps when that happens?”

I stood up again. I had made up my mind where this little walk would take us. I wanted to treat Sunny. She seemed overworked and I knew that a little relaxation could do wonders for her. Given that I still had no bits to spare, I thought of something simple that would not cost any.

I would drag her uptight flank to Fluttershy.

So as she looked at me with some doubt in her eyes, I let my smile grow a little wider. I stepped close to her and took her hoof in an attempt to help her up. But before I did so, I brought my lips close to her ear. “Vacation,” I whispered the magic word and pulled back. She hid that goofy little grin well, but not quite well enough.

Of course she had her reservations about my earlier musings. Nopony liked to hear that they might be running around with blinders. But it was an issue I knew from first-hoof experience. I was prone to focus so intensely on mistakes and problems that I lost sight of the greater picture.

You seem very hung up about this whole romance-thing.

Right. Thank you for reminding me, Applejack. Preaching water, drinking wine. Got it.

Still. The attempt at helping was made, baby step by baby step. Just because I had a hard time following my own solid advice did not mean that it was less solid, right?

We started walking in a comfortable silence. Sunny stayed close by my side and I enjoyed that quite a lot. We were a good distance out of town already and closer to Fluttershy’s cottage than to Ponyville proper when I heard a familiar voice. And she sounded distraught.

I looked up ahead. I saw Derpy sitting on the ground, clutching her saddlebags with her wings to keep its contents safe while a downpour drenched her further and further. It appeared as if she was pleading with that single cloud above her at first, a thick and dark gray one responsible for the heavy rain. It was of course not impossible for a rogue cloud with a mind of its own to break free and torment ponies nearby with us being this close to the Everfree.

But I heard laughter and it sounded cruel. On further inspection, I saw three pegasi. Two of them flanked the cloud to keep it in place above Derpy while one lazily laid down on it and occasionally stomped a single hoof down to keep it pouring.

I froze for about a second as my mind was racing. Oh how I now understood that story Rainbow had told me once. When she was still in Junior Flight School and these bullies had tormented a younger Fluttershy. Even as a rambunctious little filly, Rainbow had been capable of genuine anger. Not just the tantrum that one might expect from a foal, but true anger.

“Wait here,” I snapped. I did not wait for any answer Sunny might have. I walked towards them, but in a matter of seconds, I was running at top speed. White Tip had taken to the air as he was not feeling comfortable with me moving this fast. “What do you idiots think you’re doing?!” I yelled at the top of my lungs as I drew closer.

I was close enough now to see how utterly miserable Derpy looked. That warm and nice smile I remembered from our evening — and so many more memories — was gone. Replaced by a defeated, sad stare that only doubled my rage.

The one on the cloud presented himself as the leader as he stood up to address me. “None of your business,” he drawled in a dialect I could not place at first. “And if you don’t want trouble, you’d be better off walking along. Go on… shoo!”

His patronizing tone only made me wish I could just rip his nasty tongue out and stuff it back down his throat. Maybe I could, a beastly voice mused, but I tried to remain civil. I was about to answer when Sunny cantered past me. She stepped under the cloud without a second thought and raised her magnificent white wings as a roof on top of Derpy while she became drenched immediately. While it was a nice gesture, it only elicited laughter from those three and did nothing to solve the situation.

Make. Them. Pay.

Where was all this anger coming from…?

I only hesitated for a couple of seconds until I charged my horn. A light blue aura weaved along its length. “Last warning,” I told them and clenched my teeth.

His two buddies, or henchponies or whatever they were, were taken aback. Not enough to actually say or do anything, but I could see doubt creeping into their minds. They looked to their leader for reassurance. The main idiot just smiled though. An unspoken challenge was uttered and I would. Not. Back. Down.

Three magic bolts fired in short succession. One hit, two, three. All three pegasi had a look of shock on their faces that I would actually go through with an outright attack, but after a couple of seconds and a moment to look themselves over, they started laughing again. Uproarious laughter. My bolts had done absolutely nothing. Nothing they could see or feel, anyway.

“What, you think you’re the shining knight, rescuing the fair cripple?” their leader taunted once more.

I wanted to punch his teeth in so badly. Maybe it was for the best that he was up there and I was not. I tried to keep control and fought to keep my voice at least somewhat steady as I answered him. “No. I’m a friend defending another friend against some measly bullies. And that spell you’re carrying now? Oh I’d love to see you enjoy it for the rest of your lives. You will wake up each and every night from now on, drenched in sweat, maybe even screaming and wetting your bed sheets, trembling, with vivid memories of your latest nightmare, because every single night, you will see through their eyes! You will feel like those you bullied, you will hear that cruelty for yourself and you will know that pain you so thoughtlessly sowed. And it won’t. End. Ever. At least not until the day you make up for your failings as decent ponies!” Of course I had talked myself into a fit of rage again. It had been inevitable given the circumstances. I screamed the last sentence at the top of my lungs.

His two fellows looked worried. Scared even. Their leader however shook his head in disbelief. I noticed how serious even his expression had become though. “There’s no such spell!” he proclaimed and tried to sound steadfast.

“Right,” I answered half-laughing in a cruel tone just like theirs had been. “And a pegasus like you would obviously know, because you’ve been all over Equestria and know every inhabitant of Ponyville. How silly of me to forget that for my obvious bluff. Given that, I am sure you have absolutely nothing to worry about.” I could see them grow more and more nervous. Uncertain. His buddies looked ready to flee at the drop of a hat. Time for the final push then. I recalled all those lessons Rarity had given me about acting. I let a smile, a cold, heartless smile, spread across my muzzle. “Since there is no such magic,” I started in a giddy voice, “it obviously would not be possible for me to demonstrate the effect of that spell by shooting you with a simple sleep spell, right? To send you into your first nightmare right now. It would be careless too, would it not? I mean, if you just slumped right there, you could fall, maybe even break a wing or something. I’m not sure if your two buddies would be fast enough to catch you… but you know… there’s no such magic.”

My horn was once again threateningly shrouded with a light blue light.

He was hesitant for mere seconds. Fixated on me but unsure if I was bluffing or not. So I fired. Pegasi had the impressive agility and flexibility one otherwise only found in cats. He very much saw it coming and he dodged the bolt. “Oh, we got a nimble one. Let’s see how many you can dodge before I’ll get you mid-flight.” I was about to shoot again when one of his buddies spoke up.

“Let’s just leave,” he pleaded with his leader. And after just another second, they did exactly that. Without another word. They even spared me the cliché ‘this isn’t over’-monolog. They just opened up their wings and left.

I watched them go as I held the charge in my horn until it became unbearable. I could see Sunny out of the corner of my eye spreading her wings and giving a mighty flap in the meantime. She reached up and used her pegasus magic to disperse the cloud with a single, strong kick to its center.

I took a deep inhale, counted to three, and let it out.

I had to repeat that process four times until I felt stable enough and walked over to Derpy. “Are you okay?”

She fought hard for that shaky little smile, but she used it to greet me. “Thank you.”

She was drenched. Her mane hung limply over her shoulder. Water constantly dripped to the ground. Her coat wasn’t better off. I could not have cared less. I stepped up and hugged her tightly. “Don’t mention it,” I whispered. I pulled back after a moment to look her over once more. “How’s the mail?”

She carefully fiddled with her bag and checked up on its contents. “A few letters are a little damp, but they should be fine.” I nodded and was dumbstruck when she suddenly leaned forward and tried to give me a brief kiss on the cheek. Seeing as her eye had wandered off to the upper left corner, she missed the mark and instead kissed my nose, but really… that was fine. I involuntarily chuckled as my nose wrinkled.

“Don’t ever listen to those kinds of ponies,” I said and tried to be stern in my request.

She smiled again. That warm, welcoming smile that knew no evil. I loved seeing it back on her face. “I know. Those aren’t the first bullies I had to deal with. It… it doesn’t really get any easier, but Ponyville is great! Nopony here bullies me!” I looked in the direction they had flown off to once more. I searched my memories and tried to find an answer. It appeared as if she knew these three. And more so, they apparently were not from around here. Cloudsdale is in that direction. Right.

I wondered what had brought them here.

“He was right though, was he not?” I heard Sunny say behind me. “There is no such spell. Right?”

As it turned out, ‘stable’ was not quite the same as ‘better’. My anger surprised me as it flared up again. I did not raise my voice, nor did I say anything I would have to regret later. However, I replied with a sickly sweet tone. “Well as I had said: Then there’s nothing they have to worry about, right?”

I turned to face Sunny. She was worried. She had asked in a quiet, subdued tone. As if she was searching for reassurance. So my rather snippy answer was utterly uncalled for, but any apology I had got stuck in my throat when I saw her. Her mane a mess. Water still ran down her coat. I blurted out the first thing that came to mind. “You look gorgeous…”

She raised an eyebrow. “I’m wet.” I nodded and continued to stare at her like a fool, completely ignoring Derpy’s giggling. “Very much so,” she added. I nodded once more and she shook her head. A small smile creeped up on her lips anyway as her worries were sidelined for the moment.

I could not explain why. It obviously had to do with the water. A short memory flashed before my eyes: Twilight getting out of her shower and I just gawked at her. I clenched my eyes shut for a moment and opened them again. The memory was dispelled. I looked over to Derpy, just to confirm my theory. Compared to that lovely mare I had said my goodbyes to that evening, she now looked more appealing than before.

Maybe I was just weird.

“You should be careful,” Sunny warned me. I blinked and realized what she meant and… tucked my tail in and crossed my hind legs. Right. Derpy giggled like a madmare.

“Aaanyway. Uhm, Derpy, this is Sunny, she’s on visit or vacation or something. And Sunny, this is Derpy, she’s one of our local mail mares.” After the proper, if somewhat late introduction, they turned to each other and exchanged smiles. And I was grateful that I had successfully deflected any attention.

“Nice to meet you,” Derpy said. “And thank you too for your help! My bag would be worse off if it weren’t for you.”

“No problem at all,” Sunny replied. “I was just happy to help.” She turned to me. “Now if I am not mistaken, we might want to move towards Fluttershy’s cottage. She is waiting for us with some towels we dearly need.”

“Wait, she is?” I looked up ahead and indeed saw her standing in her opened door with a bunch of neatly folded towels on her back. White Tip was perching right above the door on the lintel. “Well let’s not keep her waiting then,” I remarked and we walked over. “Apart from minor mishaps, how is your day treating you, Derpy?”

“Oh it’s fine. The sun is up, it’s all nice and warm, all the ponies have been very nice so far and I only crashed once. It wasn’t that bad.” I chuckled a little as she giggled. She usually stuck to walking. With her hooves on the ground, the worst thing that could happen because of her bad eyesight was tripping. Ponyville was a small town mostly populated by earth ponies, so walking around was easy. But the occasional pegasus house floating above made flight necessary at times. And if she wanted to get off the hook early to spend more time with Dinky or follow up on other plans, she simply had to be quicker in doing her job — something flight helped with. Lady Luck seemed to favor her though. Something I was grateful for. In all her years — or at least all the years I remembered — she only had a few really bad crashes, and even from those she recovered quickly.

Once we reached Fluttershy, I tipped my non-existent hat to White Tip. “Thanks buddy.” I had a feeling that he had somehow made Fluttershy aware of your presence. And maybe even our need for some towels. Towels that were immediately distributed to both mares in need upon arrival. I briefly toyed with the idea of using my telekinesis to grab those towels and help them dry up, but discarded it just as quickly. As soon as I would even try to dry their manes, backs or tails — or wings, for that matter — it would turn awkward.

A part of me still wanted to try though. Maybe something for later.

“Thank you too, Fluttershy,” I chimed in with the gratitude Sunny and Derpy had already expressed.

“It’s nothing really,” she quietly replied with that little, satisfied smile of hers.

Derpy nosed through her bag and hoofed Fluttershy the single letter she had come out here to deliver in the first place. “I should continue my tour now,” she said. “But it was lovely meeting you!”

“Spike is still clamoring for that Monopony game!” I sent after her and raised my volume a little as she flew away. I thought I heard a ‘soon’ in response, followed by an endearing giggle.

I turned around and saw Sunny winging her towel over to Fluttershy who trotted back inside to get rid of the damp towels after a curt nod. “My mane is a mess,” Sunny quietly whined.

“Can’t agree,” I chirped. “Still looks gorgeous.” While it did little to restore what she deemed the ‘proper state’ to her mane, the compliment did make her genuinely smile again. And that was worth more anyway.

“Fluttershy? Can we come in?” I yelled into the open doorway. I did not want to just barge in uninvited.

“It’s alright,” I heard her muffled voice and just as I was about to step into the cottage, that pesky little bunny zipped up to the door. I was not sure what his intentions were. Maybe he was willing — and capable? — of slamming the door shut in front of us. Maybe he wanted to physically block us from entering. Maybe he just wanted to glare at us some more. Whatever it was… White Tip was delighted to see him again. He immediately cawed and swooped down towards the white rabbit. Angel’s eyes grew wide in horror and like Pinkie on coffee, he zipped out of the house — because with his speed, his chances of escape were better in the open than in a confined space. “Have fun, you two!” I called over my shoulder and chuckled darkly. I looked over to Sunny. “Isn’t it great when they enjoy themselves?”

She giggled but shook her head at the same time and tried to keep a reprimanding tone as she answered. “You, Dreamwalker, are one wicked pony.”

I bowed in mock gratitude. “Always trying my best.”

She lightly jabbed me against my shoulder before we finally entered Fluttershy’s homely abode. We both sat down on her sofa in the living room and it took just about the time we walked over there for all the animals to either hide or come out to stare at us. Most of them kept their distance, since we were strangers. But I couldn't help but feel like they were more worried about me than Sunny. I tried to pay it no mind and leaned over to whisper to her, even though we were sitting pretty close to each other anyway. “As you will find out shortly, Fluttershy makes the second best tea in all of Equestria, beaten only by Celestia herself. But that comparison isn’t exactly fair. Her tea even beats most of those fancy tea houses in Canterlot.” These things did pop up like mushrooms in a forest after rain, didn’t they?

“I-It’s really not that good,” a very polite and quiet voice floated over from one of the other rooms. It made me pause for a moment. How had she even heard that?

Looking around, I found my answer easily enough. There were eyes and ears all around us. And I realized with a quiet chuckle how hilarious it would be to tell Rainbow about Fluttershy’s totally awesome spy network. However, the thought of telling Rainbow anything currently made my stomach drop a bit. Right. Still work to do. But that was not why we were here.

Fluttershy returned to us a moment later, only to immediately get up from the chair standing opposite the sofa again to walk over into the kitchen. “What kind of tea would you like?” she asked.

I looked over to Sunny, grinned and replied with a simple, “Chamomile, if you have?”

“Okay.” We heard the kettle whistle a few minutes later and shortly after that she came back, carefully balancing a tray with the pot and three mugs. Fluttershy gracefully set it down, poured us tea and we each received our mug with a grateful ‘thank you’.

Silence reigned for the next couple of minutes as both Sunny and Fluttershy deeply enjoyed their tea while I… well, I meant what I had said. It was the second best tea in all of Equestria. But to me, it was ‘just tea’. I had no strong feelings about it, certainly not in the same vein as Celestia. Or even Fluttershy, or Rarity. I found coffee to be utterly revolting and most sodas were just too bubbly for me. I liked water. It was plain, it was simple, and it did its job perfectly. And if I wanted to be fancy, I would usually go for some juice. Grape, cherry, orange, apple… but I rarely indulged like that. The only reason that I knew so much about tea and its different qualities to begin with was that I had drank more of it than water, mostly due to Celestia being part of my life, if my memory served me right.

So instead of reveling in the quality, I took a sip from time to time, enjoyed its aroma and warmth, but otherwise observed the animals slowly return to their daily routines, skittering and scuffling about.

“You should have talked them down,” Fluttershy finally broke the silence.

It took me a moment to make the connection. I thought about it for a moment, but ultimately shook my head. “It wouldn’t have worked,” I concluded. “They had strong builds for pegasi. Cloud factory workers, I presume. A meek little unicorn like me wouldn’t be able to intimidate them. And from how they behaved themselves… they weren’t open to listen to reason, either.”

“But you didn’t even try,” she protested.

I nodded and tried to smile. And failed. “Fluttershy, I appreciate your way of handling things. You’ve come a long way. But I am not Twilight. She is perfectly capable of that. She could have stomped up to them and lectured them into the ground, until they saw reason, apologized and became better ponies in the end. Because that’s just the force of nature she is. And you too. You are kind and your kindness knows few bounds. That’s why the Element chose you. I… I’m not proud of admitting it, but I was angry. I was furious. They were bullying my friend. And just like Rainbow back in the day, I could not idly stand by. I have to work with what I have and sadly, that doesn’t include a silver tongue, I believe. You know it yourself though. Sometimes reason and diplomacy fails. It’s always sad when it happens, but it does happen. You had to fight changelings. You stared down beasts that would not listen to you. You’re not proud of these moments, because it means that other options, more civil options, have failed. But that wasn’t your failure, it was theirs. And in the same vein, I am not proud of how I handled this — but I would do it again in a heartbeat. Because standing up for your friends is the right thing to do.” It was hard to object to that one.

Fluttershy was not happy, that much was plain to see. But at least she was satisfied with my reasoning. I was not just another bully, bullying the other bullies.

Feeling the silence turning into something less pleasant, Sunny chose this moment to speak up. “I’m Sunny Skies, by the way.”

“Oh crap, I totally forgot!” I blurted out.

“Language,” Sunny chided me leniently.

“Sorry, sorry. Right, so. Sunny Skies, this is Fluttershy, our local veterinarian, hobby alchemist, pet shelter…er… and probably a couple of other things too. She’s not a model though. We don’t talk about that.” I chuckled a little bit as I saw how Fluttershy hid behind her mane, as usual, and turned beet red… as usual. “Fluttershy, this is Sunny Skies, our overworked bureaucrat with a penchant for tea and pretty sunrises. She also looks great when wet and yes, that is most definitely a vital detail.” This time, both blushed and as a sign of gratitude for my effort, I received another light jab to the shoulder. “You know, at some point there’s going to be this squishy, mushy mess of what was supposed to be bone and muscle there. Who’s going to pay the doc to fix that, huh?”

“With bits? Certainly not you then,” she shot right back and grinned.

“Ouch. Right where it hurts — in the purse.” I quietly laughed. It took a little bit of effort, but it was worth it to not startle Fluttershy. I turned to our host. “Right, so. Tea. What else do you actually have? A wide range of herbs, I presume? Something more fruity, maybe?”

I was just jump-starting a conversation. Sunny recognized this and gave me a brief, grateful smile as she started to get into a little discussion with Fluttershy. It was lovely seeing them both interact so casually. Fluttershy relaxed as time went on and Sunny's soothing voice seeped into her mind. She apparently even forgot that she was sitting across at least one, if not two strangers and was talking to them. Sunny had some recommendations for interesting mixtures and promised to bring something with her to test next time they would meet. This already implied that there would be a next meeting. Another success. Fluttershy in turn offered her insight into several herbs, flowers and plants that she made into tea. Some of that stuff she collected herself from the Everfree Forest or traded for with Zecora, others she got from the market or the surrounding area. It was clear that Sunny knew her stuff when it came to tea, but even she was surprised when Fluttershy told her about bark tea. Due to my waning interest in the conversation, I only listened with half an ear and apparently, certain kinds of tree barks could be made into tea. It sounded weird, but hey, what did I know? Sunny’s interest was piqued, and that was enough.

I just enjoyed myself in the meantime. I enjoyed the sound of their voices as they talked animatedly about tea. I enjoyed looking around and making myself familiar with Fluttershy’s cottage once more. I enjoyed seeing her critters run around as they paid us less and less attention. That actually made me wonder about White Tip for a moment, but I was sure he was fine. I enjoyed looking at Fluttershy and seeing how relaxed she was. How she wore that precious, tiny smile that told me that she was comfortable. Her wings rustled at her sides from time to time, but I supposed that was due to excitement about their topic. And of course I also enjoyed looking at Sunny. That pesky practiced smile was still present, but it seemed like there was a real one right beneath it. Her coat had dried fully by now, but it still looked a little ruffled in places, not quite as immaculate as it usually did. It looked good, to be honest. And I noticed her wings stir a little every now and again as well. Excitement about tea, I presumed once more. But her right wing — the one I sat next to — looked a little more agitated than the other one. I wondered why that was.

Little by little drifting off into my own world, their words blurred and became one with the background noises. I studied Sunny's wing, its movement and its subtle twitches. I tried to find a recurring pattern. I carefully lifted my hoof. I obviously did not want to disturb their conversation, so with the faintest touch, I stroked down her wing, along her primaries. The twitching subsided for a little bit it seemed… only to resume more agitated than before. Why, though? Relax, gosh darn it! I noticed Fluttershy having a strange expression out of the corner of my eyes. She tried to hide a subtle blush behind her mane and looked like she tried very hard not to notice something. Weird.

I paid her odd behavior little mind, it was something to get to the bottom of later. I was utterly entranced by the mystery of the twitching right wing for now. I carefully applied a little bit more pressure at its joint and hoped that I could release some pent up tension, maybe…

And all of a sudden, I had a face full of feathers. I heard Sunny’s startled yelp, then lost my footing and tumbled off the sofa. Somehow.

While falling, I had clenched my eyes shut. I cautiously opened them back up once I apparently had come to a full stop. Sunny’s face peeked into my field of vision from above just a few seconds later. She was upside down. “Are you alright?” she quietly asked. Her voice ranged somewhere between amused and worried.

“Eh. I’m fine, I think. You, on the other hoof, are upside down, lady.” She giggled briefly and I was pleased with myself. After no part of my body seemed to report any pain, I finally got back up and sat down before the sofa. I looked around for potential damage and realized that I had gotten lucky as I had only shifted the table around when I fell instead of falling on it and probably smashing it to pieces. Then again, it was a sturdy thing and I was just a unicorn.

Anyway. I climbed back up onto the sofa, back to Sunny’s side and refrained from my wing study for now and instead focused my attention on a beet red Fluttershy. Maybe I had exposed myself with my ungraceful tumble, maybe it was still about that other thing, I did not know. But I was determined to make her squirm some more if she had started already. Because she looked so freaking adorable when she blushed like that. “Sooo,” I began and my smile grew into a predatory grin. “How are things coming along with Pinkie?” That lovely shade of red grew a nuance in intensity. That good, huh? Seeing as she was not answering and probably — because Fluttershy was Fluttershy — simply could not answer, I had another idea. “If it’s too awkward to say anything, we can just stick to yes- and no-questions?” I offered. She nodded and I felt like a predator on the prowl. I also suddenly felt a certain kinship to Rarity. Because I was hunting for all the juicy details. “Have you had your first date yet?” Nod. “Second date?” Nod. “Third?” Head shake. But only after she had looked out the window. To see the sun in the sky and gauge the time of day, I presumed. It should have been hilarious really, but with Pinkie involved, it was less of a surprise. There had probably been a ‘date’ every couple of hours.

Well. As long as they were both happy and comfortable with that, everything was fine. Then again… it was better to make sure. Just in case. “Are you happy?” Well, that was one vigorous nod if I ever saw one. And she beamed at me with such excitement. I smiled to myself and felt my heart make a little happy jump in turn. “Have you gals kissed?” I heard a little gasp from Sunny, but was too focused on Fluttershy. She blushed even more and nodded. I starting to worry that she might actually faint at this point. Okay, okay… one more. Just one. “With tongue?”

Before Fluttershy could answer — or faint —, I was once more jabbed into my shoulder. With a little more force this time. “Dreamwalker! Have a little decency!” Sunny chided me.

“I am! I mean… I’m just happy and enjoying the fruit of my labor, so to speak. I admit though, my curiosity might’ve run away a little.” I felt it was a generous admittance. And I was glad to see Fluttershy's blush recede at least a little bit. Still comparable to a tomato, however.

“A little,” Sunny echoed and jabbed me again. Ouch. Sometime soon that might actually leave a bruise.

“W-Well… h-he did help… a l-lot,” Fluttershy squeaked from her chair and caught the attention of both of us.

“Aw,” I replied, “that just makes my heart melt. Apparently I’m quite good with those. Hearts, I mean. Those fleshy little pumps that keep her blushing whenever—“ Another jab. “Ouch.” But I got the memo. There had been juuust that tiny bit more force behind it to understand. Enough was enough. I held up my hooves to show my submission and she seemed somewhat mollified.

Fluttershy meanwhile had looked on with her own curiosity piqued, but was still occupied with her blood flooding every patch of skin that could make her look more like a robin than a pony.

The three of us had more or less recomposed ourselves a few moments later. “The tea, while great, wasn’t the only reason I came here for though,” I admitted as a moment of silence allowed for it. Both mares looked at me curiously. “See, while the nice chat and tea obviously helped and I'm so, so glad that you two hit it off like that, there’s still one thing I’d like to do. Fluttershy, have you had lessons with Lotus and Aloe? Because I remember you surprising Rarity with a birthday gift, some sort of voucher or something. For an entire day of utmost pampering without the need to even leave the house. Is that a thing?”

Fluttershy smiled serenely at the fond memory. “Oh yes,” she replied happily, “she had been very stressed after that big order from Haute Couture and redeemed it once she was done. She said she would not dare show herself on the streets after what she had been through.”

Funny. In my memories, it had been a big order from Hoity Toity, but the rest seemed to be the same. Knowing what a full day spa treatment involved, I knew that she would be up to the task. Now I only needed to find out if she was willing to help. “Great! Now, I’d like to give Sunny treatment number… twelve? It was number twelve. Plus number seven. Maybe with a side dish of special treatment number three, but we’ll see about that. You’d be up for that? I would do seven and three.”

Sunny looked confused as heck. She had no idea what we were even talking about and that was the point. I wanted to keep it a secret as long as possible and Fluttershy, on the other hoof, seemed to understand perfectly. She looked Sunny over with the same critical eye an artist might employ judging his raw material. The same eye that made her such a valuable assistant seamstress to Rarity whenever she was biting off more than she could chew… again.

“I would be willing to help with that, yes,” she finally agreed.

“Yes!” I hoof-pumped into the air in excitement. “Alright, we need some incense, a bowl of warm water and proper tools. I can get the bowl?” She nodded and we stood up to fetch what we needed. Sunny’s eyes were following us around the entire time. I guessed that she did not want to spoil the surprise by asking or maybe was just willing to let herself be surprised, but she couldn’t just not look and think about possibilities at the same time.

We were ready and in the starting position only a few minutes later. A nice floral scent hung in the air and Sunny found herself on her haunches as she complied with Fluttershy’s request. Her back hooves were dipped into the water to soak. I placed myself behind her in the meantime. “Please don’t send me flying again,” I whispered into her ear and stifled a chuckle as I carefully started to press my hooves into her back. I was just feeling out where exactly she was tense at first, where knots had formed, where muscles ached. Progress was slow since her body was unfamiliar and it was not helped by the fact that she moved ever so slightly every once in a while. It honestly surprised me that she seemed so unfamiliar with a massage. It surprised me even more then, that despite this she was not that tense to begin with.

Fluttershy cared for Sunny’s hooves over the course of the next hour or so. She cleaned and filed and polished and whatnot. I had undertaken some lessons myself to care for Twilight at some point and I remembered only half of those, but it was clear to me that my focus had been a lot narrower. Probably because of her constantly aching shoulders from her research binges.

Once Sunny’s back hooves were cared for, she was allowed to sit down on her belly again, while her front hooves soaked. We were working in comfortable silence and only shared the occasional glance and smile. It was nice, really. Working with Fluttershy side by side felt good. Familiar. And seeing Sunny relax more and more was a nice sight as well.

I leaned back for a moment and looked down on her. I had kneaded most knots away at this point and Fluttershy was still going. “I think I’m going in for number three,” I said softly. Fluttershy blushed a little and just nodded.

“What is—“ Sunny started as she saw that look on Fluttershy’s face, but she stopped abruptly as I oh so carefully unfolded her wing.

Preening was something reserved for spas and lovers or family. My own words came back to haunt me, but I dismissed them. We were being friendly here. We were using spa techniques. It was fine. This was fine. Everything was fine. "Your wings are so pretty," I mumbled and slowly traced a hoof along her pristine white primaries. I garnered an appreciative sigh as a reward.

Now. As far as I remembered, there were several options to go about this. And although Sunny seemed a little flustered, she did not object per se. She could have easily pulled her wing back and refolded it again. But she did not. So the question arose: How did I wanted to do this? I knew that there was a way a unicorn could do it with magic. I was even somewhat sure that I could do it. It was cleaner, faster and more efficient. Ooor I could use my mouth. This was slower, messier and a lot more intimate. Yeah. I would totally give her a magic once-over as soon as I was done with the other way.

She must have expected me to use said magic. Because as soon as I started and did not, she tensed up for just a moment. I gave her a moment and she relaxed again. Fluttershy was, very busy and kept herself very busy. She only glanced up occasionally and tried to hide her continuous faint blush behind her mane. And she only looked up to make sure I was doing it right, surely.

Nosing around in her plumage was actually kind of fun. Especially with her reactions being this unbridled and genuine. She usually wore her pristine smile with unmatched elegance. But she probably did not have practice with this, and it showed. Barely anything to draw from to collect herself and restore her vigilant mask. I was so delighted to witness her control fail. She sighed and hummed and smiled and I occasionally even heard a little gasp as my lips traced along her wings, as I realigned feathers with my tongue or plucked out a broken one.

Once I was done with her now considerably less twitchy right wing, I moved over and repeated the process on her left side. As I moved closer to her joint, I saw Fluttershy bite down on her lower lip to keep her smile from morphing into something else while she watched Sunny's expression. I withdrew my muzzle because I wanted to see for myself, only to be met with a high-pitched, quiet whine. I smiled brightly and as I got back to it, she rewarded me with another content sigh. I had to suppress a chuckle as I smoothed out another feather.

I had reached her joint once more and carefully licked a few stray hairs of her coat back in place when a quiet, soft moan escaped her lips. Fluttershy immediately looked startled and turned red again. “C-Careful,” Sunny tried to joke, but half of it got lost.

I had a rather devious grin as I nodded. “Don’t worry, I am…” I lowered my head again, nosed back in and did that again, because I was mature and responsible. To be fair, it had been such an alluring sound. I wanted to hear it again. I needed to hear that again. Sunny clearly expected something like that and was more successful in stifling her second moan, much to my dismay. But she was not quite fully successful.

“I-I’ll make some m-more tea,” Fluttershy squeaked and was gone in an instant. “I’m done already a-anyway…”

I felt bad as I watched her almost flee the living room. But at the same time, I wanted to laugh. Just a little bit. She was adorable. And I was being very uncouth, as Rarity would put it. Maybe I was going a bit too far. “I’m not going to sleep with her on your sofa,” I sent my half-promise after Fluttershy. My voice was filled with amusement.

“Oh, you’re not?” came from down below me. She playfully winked at me.

“I-I don’t m-mind,” came from the kitchen.

If it had been physically possible, my jaw would have hit the floor. I instead just slowly looked down to Sunny. She smiled, her eyes half-lidded and they sported a mischievous twinkle. She’s toying with you, I realized, That little minx!

I stared at her and my gaze lazily trailed from her very delectable looking ears to her neck, along her barrel and—

It hit me once I slowly came back to my senses. I started to realize that Fluttershy had basically exiled herself to her own kitchen. She would most definitely not come back out. Well, that wouldn’t do!

But I really wanted—

Shut up.

I lowered my head once more and aimed for Sunny’s ear this time. I agonizingly slowly licked along its edge and nipped its tip a little. I knew she had sensitive ears. And it was delightful to see her eyes flutter shut while a shudder ran through her body and a quiet moan escaped her throat once more. “One of these days,” I whispered and then pulled back with a mighty effort. Her bedroom eyes promised me much. Much that I wanted right now, they drew me in, lured me…

But I resisted. For now. I instead finished what little of my work was not done by this point and in yet another great show of self-restraint did exactly as I had planned and went over my entire work once more with magic. It was a fine-tuned use of telekinesis, one that had to be applied very carefully — but lucky me, that spell had remained in my repertoire.

While I was finishing up my work, Sunny had given up on her teasing, closed her eyes again and just enjoyed herself. She realized the end of this little session when she felt the shift of weight on the sofa as I stood up and climbed down. I carefully stretched my legs and looked back at her. And my heart picked up its pace a little. “Still gorgeous,” I whispered and received a bright smile as a reward. I made attempts to clean up for Fluttershy. Given that I did not know where she had procured the tools from, I instead took the water bowl in my magic and made my way to the kitchen.

Fluttershy was politely sitting at her kitchen table when I entered and stared at the wood, avoiding eye contact at all costs. She gave a startled little noise when I emptied the bowl into her kitchen sink and set it down. “T-That was quick…?” she started and then immediately looked up in horror. “N-Not that anything’s w-wrong with that,” she shot right after.

I walked over and cautiously pulled her into a hug. “As I said. We won’t do anything in your cottage, Fluttershy. That would be weird.” A part of me had wanted to add an ‘even for me’ at the end there.

“Oh,” she replied at first. She furrowed her brow in thought and then cautiously and quietly added, “But you looked so well-paired,” once I pulled away from our embrace.

I chuckled a little and felt heat rise to my face. “Well, thanks, I guess. But that’s for another day, I suppose. Stuff to fix, friends to find.”

It surprised me, because it was so unlike Fluttershy: I wanted to move back to the living room, but before I had even taken the first step, she carefully placed a hoof on my cheek and turned my face back, as to make me look her in the eyes. “You should be kind to yourself as well,” she quietly said. Yet there was so much force in her words that I dared not to disagree.

“I… I’ll try,” was the best I could offer as I averted my eyes. Maybe she saw that too. She sighed and gave me free. Her smile returned though, and she stood up to follow me. I could not help but notice that there was no new tea to be found.

Sunny was back up on her hooves as well. She had already put the table back in its original position.

“I think we shouldn’t keep you to ourselves any longer,” I started and turned to Fluttershy when I stood near the door. “I’m very grateful for your help. And the tea. ‘Tis a most wondrous tea, as a dear friend would put it. Before smashing a mug on the floor, probably.”

“Oh… oh my…” Fluttershy looked at her floor with concern, then at her mugs.

“Don’t worry. Twilight can fix mugs. Wait, that was… hm… let me rephrase that: Don’t worry, Twilight can learn to fix mugs. Maybe she can even do it already, I mean… Spike seems prone to break stuff sometimes.” Quills, mostly. The spine of a book, once. Just once. I had been lucky enough to not be present, because that had happened long before Twilight was even sent to Ponyville. But judging by her retelling and his additions, it had been quite the drama.

“Well that is good. Pinkie will probably be over soon too,” Fluttershy said and looked out the window once more.

I had the luxury of just opening the door and seeing a lot more sky out there. from what I could tell, it was late afternoon. And I still did not want to return to the castle just yet. But I had another idea that would probably keep me busy for another one, maybe two hours. ‘Return home for dinner’ sounded better anyway.

“Then I hope you two have a great time. It’s a little sad to miss her, but maybe that’s for the best. Give her my regards and we shall see each other soon enough!” I hugged Fluttershy as she came to the door to see us off. Sunny had once again been relatively silent and observed our farewell. When it was time, she stepped up as well. She was not quite as familiar with Fluttershy and therefore did not go for a hug. Our host probably preferred it that way, even though it had been a lovely day so far.

I was just being pushy.

“White Tip?” I yelled into the open sky once Fluttershy had retreated inside. My feathery friend landed on my back again barely a minute later. “Had fun?” He cawed once and rustled his wings some more. “Great to hear that. You’ll be sleeping like a log today.”

Sunny walked beside me again and watched the exchange with curiosity. “Can you actually understand him? Like Fluttershy?”

I snorted in amusement. “Nah. While for some reason — probably because he’s a very smart cookie — he seems to be perfectly capable of understanding us. But I don’t get a single thing he says. I just assume a lot and if I’m annoyingly wrong with that, he’s digging his claws into my back. I mean… as far as teaching goes, it’s rough, but it works.” White Tip cawed thrice with what I assumed to be a happy inclination.

She nodded and thought about… probably not how White Tip was training me instead of the other way around, but something else. “It has been a lovely day so far,” she said with a serene smile.

“Ah, ah, ah,” I quickly interrupted. “Not so fast. You're not going anywhere, we're not done yet! You’re free to go after our next stop.”

There it was again. Her bright, clear laugh. Quiet and short, but it had been there and was appreciated. “And how, pray tell, do you intend to stop me?” she asked and fluttered her wings a little for emphasis.

“I’ll have you know that I have a very decent telekinesis!” I countered with my best attempt at a posh accent.

“… which immediately breaks as soon as the one you are holding so much as moves a hoof,” she retorted.

Well. Fair point. “I know some of your weak spots now!” I threatened.

She slowly raised an eyebrow but could not stop herself from grinning at the same time. She was apparently enjoying herself too much to care about her mask. “You would not dare…!”

I just shrugged. “Try me. Your moan might even sound more beautiful than your laughter and I’d like to hear a lot more of both, to be honest, so… yeah, try me. Please.” I laughed. A little harder still as I saw her blushing slightly. How, I wondered. How had she been this unflappable tease just a couple of minutes ago, but was now this prim and proper mare, ashamed of an embarrassing moment? It amazed me.

We once more walked in comfortable silence back to Ponyville through its winding dirt paths and past market stalls and ponies alike. I once more had my fun greeting ponies by name and watching their confusion, yet they still reciprocated the friendliness all the same. Berry, Lilly, Roseluck, Time Turner…

I loved this town so much.

We finally stood before Sugarcube Corner. Again. And I still had zero bits. Let’s see if we cannot work something out, I told myself as we entered.

Quite a few customers were still around, though I spotted an empty table. I pointed towards it. “Just wait a second, okay?”

“This is really not necessary, I—“ she started, but I shushed her.

“Please.” I knew that my puppy dog eyes were not all that great, so I did not even try. But I hoped once more that honesty would be enough. She sighed with a smile and walked over to the empty table. Yes! One point for Applejack!

The line in front of the counter was not exactly long. I got curious though as I saw Scootaloo telling Mister Cake what she wanted. And it apparently was quite an extensive list. After he had packaged everything up, Scoots was carrying half a dozen boxes on her back and head. “Don’t aim for the market this time,” I quietly whispered as she passed me by. She froze in place for a second, slowly craned her neck to look at me and I was nice enough to use a little magic to keep those boxes on her head.

She did not recognize me. Again — how could she? I had not met Rainbows semi-surrogate daughter yet. The little scamp seemed alarmed by my comment. That only told me that they had gotten away scot-free so far. Nopony knew they had been the culprits of the market bombing. Good for them. “Don’t worry, I won’t snitch,” I added with a little wink. “Say ‘hi’ to Spike for me, will you?”

She nodded despite her bafflement which only served to make the boxes shake some more. “Uh… sure, mister. And… thank you?”

I grinned. “Head straight or your boxes will fall. Have fun.” Once she remembered that she was indeed carrying boxes on her head, she straightened out and I could let go of them. She hastily scurried out the door, probably back to her friends. And maybe Spike, who could explain who the heck I was. Slowly but surely, I would integrate myself again.

It was my turn to step up to the counter and Mister Cake immediately recognized me. “Ah,” he started and searched for my name.

With how many customers Sugarcube Corner got every day, I was not surprised that he struggled remembering mine. It had only been my second visit after all. “Dreamwalker,” I supplied with a warm smile.

“Right, right,” he nodded. “Pinkie left not long ago.”

“I know. I’m actually surprised that we didn’t run into her, to be honest. But I’m not here for Pinkie. I was actually wondering if I—“ But that was about as far as I got.

His eyes lit up and he nodded. “The cake! Right! Pinkie told me about it.” What? After a moment, Mister Cake presented me with two very delectable looking slices of chocolate fudge cake. One of their many specialties, with a molten core. It oozed a little because it was still warm. He divided them into two plates and pushed them to my side of the counter.

“Alright, nice, yes, that is… what I was going to ask for. What about… uhm…” I looked around a little more nervously. Nopony cared. Nopony was looking. Even the pony behind me, one I did not know the name of but vaguely recognized, did not care. Yet I felt like a sitting duck, as if all eyes were on me. I leaned over the counter and, understanding my intent, he did the same. “What about the payment?” I whispered.

With a sigh of relief — why was he relieved?! — he straightened up again. “All done.”

It took a second and then it clicked. Pinkie Sense. Right. That was a thing. I decided I should make something nice for her, I decided. As a ‘thank you’. I smiled and levitated both plates up. “Thank you, Mister Cake!” I turned and apologized to that leaf green pony for taking so long and then trotted over to Sunny to present her with her plate. “Just to be clear,” I started addressing White Tip on my back. “You’re allowed to peck at mine if you want, but if you so much as touch hers, I’m gonna feed you to the first manticore I see!” Once I sat down, he hopped onto the table, gave my slice an inspecting glance and quickly decided that he was not interested to begin with.

Sunny however very much was. “Oh my goodness, this is incredible,” she raved in elation. I looked over to her in surprise to see that she had already dug in. I chuckled a little as I had not expected her to be the impatient type. Having a bit of foresight and knowing the Cake’s… well, cake, I halved my slice and nibbled away at the first piece.

“How am I supposed to say ‘no’ so something this good…?” Sunny whined a little to herself.

“You’re just not supposed to say that,” I countered. Seeing how fast her slice just vanished, I grinned and levitated my other half over onto her plate.

“Are you sure?” she asked but I could tell that it was more out of politeness. Once I gave my all-clear, she cherished the rest of the cake. With both plates emptied, I felt pretty stuffed. That should have been weird, considering I had some scrambled eggs for breakfast thanks to Spike and it was late afternoon or early evening or something. Thinking about dinner did give me a little appetite though. Maybe I just was not after sweets right now.

“See something you like?” Sunny mused with a quiet giggle.

I blinked. And stopped staring at her flank. No sweets. “Delectable,” I blurted out and felt heat creep up my face again.

Silence fell over our table once more, if only for a couple of seconds. “While I did enjoy this day greatly, I cannot help but feel a little bit guilty,” Sunny admitted.

“Guilty?”

She nodded. “After what you had told me about the events of the previous night, I was… I wanted to tell you that you should not run from your problems. Especially your friends. But I could see reason in your decision to clear your head, so I stayed quiet and hoped for a better moment to bring it up again.” She sighed. “I may have enjoyed myself a little bit too much.”

I laid one of my hooves over hers to get her attention. “You didn’t. No, seriously, it’s fine. I needed that and so did you, I think. And I’m not running, not really anyway. I’ll be returning to the castle after this.”

She allowed herself a small little smile. It seemed almost fragile. “Thank you.”

I returned it in kind, scooched over a little and lifted her hoof with mine to place a little kiss on it. “No, thank you.”

I was probably being weird again. Or worse yet, I was demonstrating behavior that would make Rarity giggle in excitement. I almost shuddered at the thought.

We got up a moment later. I levitated our plates back to the counter where Misses Cake would collect them for cleaning in the kitchen at some point. “It was great! Absolutely delicious,” I let Mister Cake know. He grinned gratefully and proudly and wished us a nice evening. “Same!”

Sunny looked up at the sky once we were outside. “I should probably return to my sister now,” she thought aloud.

“Ah-hah!” I half-yelled and startled her a bit. “She has a sister now! Ladies and gentlecolts, she has a sister! Slowly but surely the mystery that is Sunny Skies is unraveled…”

“There is a lot more to unravel,” she sighed with a smile.

“Oh I’d love to unravel you some more…” We were silent for almost three entire seconds before I started laughing and she giggled heartily. “Okay, I admit, that was a bit much.”

“It was very… how do they say? ‘Corny’,” she agreed.

I stepped up to her and nuzzled her neck up to the crook without a second thought spared. “I know we’ve been over this already,” I whispered as I hugged her. “But I had a lot of fun today. Thank you.”

She reciprocated the embrace once she had overcome her initial surprise. “It was my pleasure.”

Literally, a voice in my head chuckled. I then let go of her and stepped back. “Say ‘hi’ to your sister. Maybe I’ll get to know her as well someday.”

“Would you like that?” she asked and raised an eyebrow.

My smile grew into a grin again. “Well I mean, it wouldn’t do if I first got to see her face at the wedding, I mean—“ Seeing it come from a mile away, I quickly ducked out of the way of another jab. Once I was reasonably sure that no further attacks were incoming, I nodded with a grin. “Yeah. Yeah, I think I’d like that very much. You’re very secretive about yourself. Like someone who got hurt pretty bad in the past. And I try not to pry too much. But everything I’ve seen and learned so far only makes me want to see and learn more.”

Her expression quickly morphed through several emotions she tried to keep hidden. Pain, grief, relief, gratitude, joy. In the end, her practiced smile successfully covered it all up again. “We’ll see about that,” she ominously remarked with a little twinkle in her eye. “Have a nice evening, Dreamwalker.”

“You too, Sunny.” And with a mighty flap of her wings, she lifted herself off the ground and flew away. The direction mattered little, I reminded myself. With her being how she was, it would not tell me anything she could not have fabricated. “You too.”

I stood there for a moment. Rational thought dictated that it was time to go back and face whatever was going on. But emotionally, I suddenly felt alone. Because… “Oh crap.”

I ducked my head into Sugarcube Corner again and saw White Tip sitting on our old table, fast asleep despite the noise the other customers produced. I carefully lifted him in my telekinesis and managed to not wake him up this time. I even allowed myself a proud little smile at that. And then, with my floating bird in tow, I started to trot back to the castle. I vowed to myself that he would never know that I had simply forgotten him…

As soon as I opened the castle doors, the enticing smell of a warm meal started to lure me in. Bell peppers, garlic and a hint of peanut sauce. “Fancy,” I mumbled and briskly trotted towards the kitchen. With the smell already reaching the entrance door, I should have expected them to already be eating, thus it came as little surprise when I found the kitchen deserted. So I walked over to the living room and entered.

I initially wanted to do it with a certain flair. Bellowing ‘behold, for I have returned!’, or something of that ilk. I instead found myself once again strangely nervous. These were my friends, I told myself. And I had no reason to shy away from them!

Well except maybe everything about last night. And this morning. But really. Nothing at all.

I swallowed and meekly opened the door and almost cautiously stuck my head in. Both sat at the table and were obviously immediately looking at me. Awkward. I tried to gauge their reactions or general mood, but there was little to go by except welcoming smiles. My attempts to take those as a good sign were somewhat successful in that I actually managed to enter the room, close the door behind me and notice that they had put out a third plate.

I'm home.

I totally blamed my hunger and I would never apologize to my stomach for any false accusations. A low grumble and an awkward chuckle later, I made my way over to the table and sat down while carefully placing White Tip on his perch again. “I… uh… hope this is mine? Were you expecting somepony? Oh no… do you have somepony over? Am I sitting on a guest’s chair?”

As quickly as my mood had swung one direction it now barreled down the other. I was panicking. Sure, I had managed to make it back to the table, but now I really wished that teleportation would have been a possibility for me.

“Wow, what’s gotten you riled up?” Spike started with a chuckle. “It’s almost like—“

“Don’t say it,” Twilight warned him and groaned as he did anyway.

“… like you’re twilighting.”

“That is not even a real word!” she grumbled.

“Well… it wasn’t, until you made it one, and now it is. Describes perfectly what’s happening,” he deadpanned and pointed at me with a fork.

Twilight on the other hoof, just reached over and laid her hoof on mine. “Yes, it is your plate. Spike told me that you were going for a walk and we expected you to be back for dinner.”

I took a deep, very deep, it-almost-hurt-deep breath and released it slowly. And I felt my nerves calm down at least a little bit. “I’m sorry, I was just… that was weird…” I leaned back and immediately panicked again. “White Tip!” I tried to swivel around, but did not see a single feather of him.

“Over there? Like… since you entered the room? You even put him on his perch yourself?” Spike pointed out and nodded towards the window perch, where both White Tip and Owlicious slept side by side. Spike shook his head. “Totally twilighting.”

I sighed. I was being unreasonable, wasn’t I? Once again, I tried to calm myself down. Knowing what worked best, I closed my eyes and mumbled. “Celestia, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” I had to repeat it, just to be safe. I dared another attempt at normalcy after. I opened my eyes and they were still there. White Tip was still sleeping, Spike was still eating and treating this as the most normal thing ever and Twilight still had this forgiving, understanding smile on her face.

It was okay. I was okay.

My own smile was a little shaky, but it was there. Small victories. “Smells delicious,” I said and a low grumble from down below agreed with me. I thought that my stomach was exaggerating things a little, painting me like an almost starving unicorn, but I found that I was actually, legitimately hungry. So I filled my plate with a colorful something out of the oven and started to dig in. “What, uh, have you been up to?” I asked between mouthfuls.

“Once breakfast was done, I had to run to Twilight every couple of minutes,” Spike grumbled. “Then every couple of hours. I’m just glad that’s over.”

I probably looked just as confused as I felt. Had I missed something? I obviously had missed something. I turned to Twilight for an explanation. “Well, after our trip last night, Luna was… insistent on me sharing more information. She threatened to come over and ‘deal with things herself’ and I thought that that might not actually be helpful at all. So I implored her to stay her hoof. She complied, but only if I shared my knowledge. I have had a very… busy day. And not just because of all the exchanges between the two of us. Last night also yielded the largest set of data points since we had started recording!” While she had looked somewhat uncomfortable with discussing her exchange with Luna… she was immediately hyped to talk about her new analysis. As was to be expected of her. “It’s the first time I can compare your results to those of a pony without your special inclination towards dream magic and let me tell you, those results were fascinating!”

I chuckled despite feeling like an insect being studied by a dangerously enthusiastic scientist. “Alright — shoot. What did you get?”

She clearly had hoped for me to ask, so it was no surprise that she immediately started one of her little lectures, appropriate voice and all. There was a certain tone she reserved for these. “While there is yet a lot to be proven by irrefutable evidence, the data so far strongly implies that these nights, when you dreamwalk, count as actual sleep and a regenerative phase for you — but they do not count as such for me. See, while your body was actually regaining energy, my body reacted to it like I had run a marathon.”

“She looked like it too,” Spike interjected with a chuckle and decidedly ignored Twilight's warning glare.

“You are okay, right?” I asked in a sudden bout of worry. I had told Sunny that she was alright… and I had believed that myself.

“Oh, yes, I’m fine now. I was just worn out. I had a little nap in the afternoon, once Luna slowed down. I also tried to compare the times you ‘cast magic’ or used similar abilities to the data, but it is quite hard to stick certain spikes to points in time. My suspicion is that, each time you enter the dreamscape, you take a little bubble of time with you that continuously runs out and gets distorted around locations, creatures or events that I have not been able to categorize yet. But! Having been there myself, I could follow the chronological chain of events, as I do not think that will be distorted and I have once more managed to compare that to what I did. The examples I provided were admittedly few, I just summoned a sword for a few seconds and a shield for a little while longer, but even that gave me so much more to work with! The energy levels lead me to believe that I might actually have expended massive amounts of magic, comparable to, let’s say, when I try to teleport from Ponyville to Canterlot. Something I can usually only do once per day, although Princess Celestia told me that my reserves will only deepen with time. The important point is that I took a massive hit to my energy levels at those points and you… you did a lot more than that. I mean, there were so many swords flying all around and you were just… but your energy levels were relatively steady. The spikes I noticed were not part of that chain of events. It’s like… like doing these things barely costs you anything at all. So that obviously begged the question then: If your ‘magic’ is not the source of these spikes, what is, right? And I do not have an answer for that one yet. But! I have the hypothesis that it might have something to do with your buried memories and emotional instability.”

I blinked. Once, twice. “Uh-huh.” As soon as I saw her disappointed look, I backpedaled. “No no no, don’t, it’s… it’s just a lot to take in at once. See, the thing is, I was sure that there would be a correlation between my dreamscape-internal ‘casting’ and these energy levels, but you’re basically telling me there isn’t, which just sounds so weird. It would imply that I could keep doing this forever, or summon as many swords or whatever as my mind could comprehend and that just doesn’t feel right. But I can’t say with certainty that it’s not true, so… just a lot to take in. Aaand I’m a little worried that I have worn you out so much without even realizing.”

“Oh it’s fine,” she deflected before straightening her posture and reciting one of her favorite quotes: “In the pursuit of knowledge and truth, sacrifices must be made.” Yes, Twi. I know. And your willingness to sacrifice yourself continues to disturb and worry me.

I cringed a little as I suddenly remembered Celestia telling me about who exactly had said that and how, for some strange reason, history had all but forgotten about what a decidedly not nice pony he had been. “I… would be cautious with that,” I just replied.

Her gaze softened once more and she gave me my friend back where my teacher had sat. She tried to disperse my worry. “I am,” she said with conviction. And I believed her.

“Okay, so… what about the strain I put on myself that had you so worried?” I asked after a minute or so.

“Yes, that. I… I’m not sure. Right now, I find it hard to come up with a safe way to test my hypothesis. If we assume for a moment that I am right about this—“

“Which you probably are, because you’re Twilight,” I interrupted and earned an incredulous look from her.

“If we assume that,” she started over, “then that might be something out of our control. For now, at least. From everything you have told me so far, nothing indicates any common triggers to bring forth your buried memories. And even if we found something that would work in a reliable way, I do not think it would be safe, since we would not be able to control the intensity of these ‘flashes of insight’. Oh and… I thought you might like to hear that I have decided to use this name in my notes and reports.”

That actually, genuinely made me smile. “Yes. Yes I like that.” After mulling this over a bit longer, I furrowed my brow. Twilight was observing me expectantly. She wanted me to reach a certain conclusion like she had as well. And I was about to give her just that. “So we have strain we cannot explain properly, a hypothesis we cannot test and no control over these flashes. We cannot tell when they will be coming, or how strong they will be.” As she nodded, signs of concern bled into her expression despite her best efforts. And then it dawned on me. “Oh. Oh, great. So… I’m a ticking bomb, and we can’t even see the timer.”

“It is… it is not that bad,” she tried to soften the blow. “So far, your flashes have not hurt you in any significant way. It is more like… migraine?” she offered.

I was about to object, but ultimately decided against it. I did not want to trouble her mind any further than it already was. True enough, the flashes had not ‘damaged’ me in any way, aside from the occasional case of headache. It was their often inconvenient timing that worried me more. Having a head-splitting flash while some creature was about to eat your face could probably quite easily result in actual damage. But she was the smart cookie. She had had a full day to analyze the crap out of those numbers. She had already shone a light at this from all possible directions.

She knew.

“Sooooo…” Spike started at the other side of the table and thereby startled both of us. We had kind of forgotten that he was still there and judging by the look on his face — he knew. He was worried as well. “There was a lot of science-y mumbo-jumbo. Are you going to explode? Please don’t explode.”

I chuckled quietly and shook my head. “Don’t worry, Spike. You’re not gonna get rid of me this easily. It’s just a…” I looked over to Twilight. “… a minor inconvenience.”

She looked grateful. And Spike was relieved. “Oh! That’s good then. Because it’s actually fun having you around.”

“Aw. Thanks Spike.” I ruffled his headfin a little.

It took a good old while for me to realize something else. Spike had already started taking our emptied plates to the kitchen by that point and was cleaning up when I turned to Twilight once more. “When you said you had to share your knowledge with Luna so she wouldn’t come over…”

Ah. There it was again. That slightly uncomfortable look. It already told me everything I needed to know. Luna knew who I was and how I was and where I lived and when exactly I had gotten here and my resting heart rate and that I was a somewhat decent smith and whatever else Twilight knew about me.

She knew everything.

Twilight simply nodded to confirm my suspicions. “Well,” I started and felt slightly strange now, “you know, it’s only fair, I suppose. As far as I know, it's the first time that somepony else knows me before I know them. I never really thought about how that might feel. Feels…”

“… weird, sometimes,” Twilight supplied with a small smile.

I grinned and nodded. I could not have explained why I was grinning like an idiot. But I was.

“Luna also asked me to formally request of you ‘that you do not dreamwalk again for the time being’,” she cited the exact quote from one of her letters. Her tone was clear to read. I still had to get to Rainbow though. I had promised to help her friend. Twilight was not okay with Luna asking this of me and she obviously hoped I would do exactly what I had decided to do as soon as I heard those words.

“Well,” I hemmed and hawed, “the good thing about requests is that they can be denied. But please don’t ever tell Rarity, she will hack me to pieces if she ever hears that I refused a royal request.”

Twilight giggled quietly. “I cannot in good conscience make such a promise,” she teased.

I sighed deeply and dramatically. “Hacked to pieces it is then. Fine.”

Spike returned from the kitchen. Had he looked this tired before? “Kitchen’s all done and if you guys don’t mind, I’m off to bed.”

We both shook our heads. “It’s quite alright. Thank you for your help and have a good night!” Twilight said.

“What she said. Also: That was some fantastic cooking, buddy,” I added.

He proudly puffed his chest and left us to our own devices. I noticed a faint blush on Twilight's face that I could not quite explain. Did she remember this morning’s events after all? I was about to ask when she spoke up. “You have only been able to sleep when in company so far. I was thinking… since we want to find and sort out Rainbow tomorrow and you will probably need a clear head, maybe it would be best if you slept with me?”

That’s not intentional innuendo. Can’t be. Get your mind out of the gutter.

Right.

Riiight.

She had a point though, to be fair. Dealing with Applejack had been exhausting and I could only guess that it would have been a lot easier had I gotten a lot more sleep. Both Applejack and Rainbow Dash were notoriously stubborn. But Applejack was probably still the easier of the two. As an earth pony, she could not just fly away, which was — speaking from experience — one of Rainbow's first instincts whenever she really wanted to get away from something. In addition, Rainbow's stubbornness usually meant she would try to squirm her way out of things, where Applejack — just like a boulder — would try to ‘sit things out’. It was like dealing with a turtle or a hare: Each exhausting in their own way.

I agreed and Twilight seemed both overjoyed and… nervous? There's something else at play then.

She dimmed the fireplace down with a bolt of magic. Can’t have an open fire hazard around, of course. I followed her out of the room and for some reason, I felt like my hooves were weighed down by lead. We walked over to the bathroom and Twilight got in first. It gave me a couple of minutes to sort myself out.

So what had me all nervous all of a sudden? Was it that mixture of emotions I had briefly glimpsed on her face? Was it really just that odd choice of words that unbalanced me this much? Was there a lingering fear I was not aware of that she might recall the morning’s events? Was it the morning's events themselves?

I basically just ran in circles. Potentially screaming, without knowing why. However, while I was busy doing that, I did also notice that the bathroom door was slightly ajar. Under any other circumstances, I would have easily dismissed it. Things being how they were though… was it an oversight? A test? An invitation? I could barely see anything at all, if I was being honest. Just the mirror and… the shower, via the mirror… in which Twilight—

Stop staring.

I figuratively collected my jaw from the floor and looked away while heat shot up my neck and flushed my entire head. Had… had she really…

I glimpsed back… and immediately tore my eyes off again.

Yupp. Definitely touching herself.

Why. There was a whole catalog with very good, very important, very urgent questions. And most of them started with ‘why’. Why was I still standing here? Why was I like this? Why did she do this? Why was I feeling this confused. Just… why, in general.

I could not recite the prayer to calm myself, as the words would just not come to my mind. I tried Cadance’ breathing technique with middling results. It was enough to keep my blood from rushing downstairs any further than it already had. The more I thought about my situation, the more frustrated I grew with myself.

A couple of minutes later — earlier than I had expected, given her preoccupation —, Twilight opened the door. Her smile radiated warmth and familiarity, like it always did. Like nothing had happened. Like everything was fine, everything was normal. It was almost calming.

Almost. Because when she had declared the bathroom to be free and that she would wait for me, she turned and flicked her tail across my muzzle. By accident, I tried to tell myself. I insisted on it. It sounded desperate, even in my head. I could not even convince myself. Something definitely was up.

Why the sudden change?

What was it that I had missed?

I gave a dumb nod and almost staggered into the room. I closed the door. Yes. Closed it. Like she should have done. And for a moment, I just stood there. I listened for her soft hoof steps to retreat further down the hallway to her room. Was I seriously considering if she would spy on me?

It was only fair, was it not? Had I not done the same to her?

I almost stomped through the room, placed myself under the showerhead and started the cold water. It somehow actually was not even that cold. Had she manipulated the spell regulating the water temperature? Was she sabotaging me? Sabotaging what, to begin with, though?

Every time I closed my eyes or so much as blinked, a flood of images pressed to the surface of my mind. Images, scenes, smell, taste, touch, the whole program, and on top of it all the newest addition — Twilight showering, unsuspecting and—

But had she really been? Unsuspecting?

Twilight was meticulous in every aspect of her life. There was a certain way bedsheets had to be folded. Because a book had told her once. There was a certain way cutlery had to be arranged, because her classes in etiquette had taught her so. There were rules and regulations and expectations governing almost every waking minute of her life. It was impossible to think that there was none telling her to close the door.

An oversight then. She had become a lot more relaxed in the last few years after all. She was less Twilighting these days.

With a groan, I leaned forward and put my forehead to the somewhat cold crystal of the wall. I took a deep breath… and cursed some more. It smelled like her in here and it was driving me wild on an instinctual level. Of course it did. Her shampoos, her lotions, her care products… it was the best I could do. Telling myself that those were the only things I noticed.

Why?

The shower would not help, clearly. I was clean without feeling clean. I dried myself up, brushed my teeth and left the bathroom behind me. A dimly lit hallway. The only light emanating from some enchanted crystals that hung from the ceiling every so often. Just enough that one would not trip on a carpet that had not even been here for most of the time.

I could just walk past her door. I entertained the idea for a moment while I slowly walked towards it. It would be easy, right? Just… step past.

Easy. Sure. And then what?

I would have eagerly flung myself towards her in every other lifetime. Why? Why was she trying to seduce me in this one? Maybe it was a cosmic joke? Maybe Moira had a giggle at my expense? And what about Luna?

I stopped when I reached the point of no return. Not that I tried to solve any of this any longer, no. Quite the opposite. I tried to clear my head. Not by solving mysteries or answering impossible questions, but by taking all the junk that was cluttering my headspace up and shoving it away. It would obviously come back. Eventually. Maybe some of it would have cleared itself out once that point came.

Whatever happened, happened. Whatever was going on, I would find out. It was of no use freaking out over it before I actually had anything to go by.

Her bedroom door was once more slightly ajar. I opened it, stepped inside and closed it. I could muster no surprise to find Spike’s bed deserted. I walked over to Twilight's bed. She was lying down, but used her wing to lift up the blanket as I stepped closer. I looked over to Spike's bed once more, then back to her. She was beautiful. She always was. But right now, her eyes had an almost pleading expression. “Twilight… what’s going on?” My own voice was quieter than I had expected. Barely above a whisper. And it seemed fitting how thick with apprehension it was.

“Please,” she answered in a whisper. “It’s getting cold.”

Right. I sighed. I would get answers. One way or another. I climbed into bed and automatically scooched closer to her. The blanket lowered itself and its enticing warmth tried to make me relax. It would not be that easy this time.

“Are you alright?” she asked. Her tone was carefully measured.

“I—“ I started and immediately stopped. Was I? What if all of this had a perfectly reasonable explanation? It was possible, was it not? Applejack had always been a strong influence on me. While I sometimes wished she would be less blunt and self-destructive with her coping mechanisms, I saw her as a good role model. Honest to a fault, with others and herself. Something to strive for. “I’m worried,” I answered honestly.

I felt it more than I saw it as my gaze drifted to the window. She scooched over, closer to me. A lot closer. Enough that there was practically no room left between the two of us. She shifted just that little bit more, as if to reduce nothing to less than nothing. And she buried her face on my chest. And I felt that vast longing that always seemed to connect me to her, across all lifetimes.

It was not quite involuntarily that I laid a hoof over her withers and held her tight. I remembered this well enough. It was something she usually did when she was searching for a safe space. When she made herself vulnerable. She could have easily opened her wings and embraced me as well. She could have formed an entire feathery cocoon around me as Fluttershy had done. But that would make her the strong one. The protector. And right now, for whatever reason, she wanted to be small and fragile and she wanted to be protected. So I did what I could to give her that. I nuzzled her cheek and placed a kiss on her forehead. I intertwined my legs with hers and held her close. And I felt her heartbeat and listened for her breathing.

She was silent in a way that was everything but. It told me that she was mustering up the courage to talk. Something was bothering her. And the longer she took, the more it worried me.

I resigned myself to waiting as best as I could. Wait it out. Applejack would understand.

She finally drew breath. More than just what was needed to keep on thinking and avoid falling asleep in a very warm, very welcoming embrace that did its best to steer her exactly in that direction. Enough breath to speak for a while. “I want you to sleep with me.” It took only a couple of seconds before she added more. “… and I want to sleep with you.”

I felt like my thoughts were running away from me. But once I stopped and actually listened, there was just this oppressive, deafening silence in my head.

So I was not crazy. What a relief.

It took me a moment to notice that she started to tense up. She was waiting for my reaction. Any reaction. And my continued silence had her on the edge. As weird as it sounded, I considered giving it some thought. I thought about thinking about it. And what was even weirder — I decided against it. Of the two of us, she was the smart one. Or the smarter one. Her analytical mind was unmatched. I had always been better off following my gut. It led me to weird and awkward places, because it seemed to enjoy putting me into these slightly uncomfortable positions, but more often than not, it worked out in my favor.

“Why?” I finally gave my answer. It was honest. And it wasn’t overcooked like the rest of that jumbled mess in my head.

She sighed in relief and relaxed again. So that was all it took? I just had to give her a chance to explain herself? Silly Twilight. I leaned down a little and kissed her forehead right beneath her horn. A soft shudder ran down her body, but she did give me a little appreciative noise in return. Don't, don't, don-

The tip of my tongue slowly crawled up her horn. She trembled slightly and only at the midway point did I manage to tear myself away. I felt guilty to have caused that longing, quiet whine she made.

Silence fell once more as she sorted what I expected to be an over-prepared speech. She had a soft spot for those.

Whatever she was about to tell me, I was relatively certain that it would contain the answers I sought. More than that, I expected it to be reasonable. Because Twilight was Twilight. She really could not do ‘not reasonable’. Not without others noticing it. Especially Spike and he had seemed fine at dinner.

“I am in love,” she started cautiously. I know, I answered in my head, but not with me. “Or… or maybe I just have a crush. I find it difficult to differentiate between the two.” That alone. We could have talked about that alone for the rest of the night. But I let her go on. “And no, it is not you. But… you already knew that, didn’t you?” I did not answer. It was neither necessary, nor did she truly expect me to. “I want to share this with somepony special. Because I want it to be special. And I thought about sharing it with her, but…” A shaky breath hit my chest and she buried her face in it once more. She needed time, and I gave it to her. “I cannot tell you how scared I am. How terrified. I think about her, and I think about doing this with her and… and then my mind just blanks and I think about everything that could go wrong, will go wrong, and I will mess it up, because I always do on first tries and I just can’t, I can’t this time, not with this and—“

“Shhhh…” I stroked her mane, her shoulders. I carefully let my hoof glide over her agitated wings while she trembled a little. Her speech had almost derailed itself, picking up way too much speed.

“I know it’s irrational,” she started again after she had calmed down a little. I was proud of her. I half-expected her to call it ‘stupid’, which would have been just another example on a long, long list of her being to harsh with herself. “I need safety,” she quietly resumed. “I need safety to… to make the next step. I have not even told her yet.” As I expected — it made sense, in a way. Twilight was in control. She had absorbed every little piece of knowledge for all her life. Every spell. Every euphemism. Every dialect. Every tidbit about historical events. Whenever she was confronted with a challenge, no matter what shape this challenge took, she could rely on an ocean of knowledge. And magic. Spells were helpful too.

This of course had resulted in her trusting in that solid foundation. Rare indeed was the occasion that she was confronted with something that defied classification, that was so alien and new that none of her prior experiences and none of her many pieces of lore and nothing from her vast collection of spells could help her.

Feeling like she had no control, especially when it was something this close to home? I could perfectly understand being terrified by that.

This was where I came in, then. In her chain of thoughts at least. “I am different?” I asked just for clarification’s sake.

She nodded almost immediately. “I feel safe with you… but there is no… pressure.”

Because success mattered little. There was nothing to gain. And since she felt safe with me, there was nothing to lose either. It would be an experience. It would be knowledge. Something to cling to when her nerves threatened to get the better of her once again. She would know what to expect, because she had been there before. She could indulge in the illusion of being in control again.

I understood.

And I was about to reject her. There were other ways, myriads of other ways to deal with nerves and insecurity and lack of experience. Heck, a single honest and open talk to her sister in law and former foalsitter and, oh, yes, Princess of Love, could probably shift her perspective entirely. Making her realize that this starting phase, this time without experience where everything was half a failure and more funny than sexy was something precious, something to be treasured, something that she would never have again once it was gone.

Even putting Cadance aside for a moment, she simply should have this conversation with her beloved.

“I know that there are other ways,” she started. Reading my mind? I thought that was Pinkie’s dubious privilege. “But I thought about this. A lot. It is my decision to make and… I made it.” Which obviously would not help much if I were to refuse her. Then again, she would know as much so there had to be more to this.

I nodded. Just to let her know that I at least accepted her making her own decision.

She buried her face on my coat again and took a deep, steadying breath. “Thank you,” she said. I was not sure if she misunderstood my affirmation for a moment. But after recollecting herself, she continued her argument. “I think it would help you as well.”

Huh. “How so?” I quietly asked. And I was really curious about that answer. I had been battling my conflicting feelings for her since the very start and this… this teasing and… promising… had certainly not helped so far. Even right now, her proximity was an issue. If I were to lift the blanket right now, I would pick up on her excitement. If I angled my knee a little bit differently, I could oh so carefully brush against her teats. My tongue wanted to finish what it had started on her horn. A dozen different voices, all mine, screamed at me to just pin her down and have my way with her. She had asked. And I knew what to do. So many memories, an entire flood of them, yelled at me and showed me what to do.

“I have seen you look,” she quietly started again. “How you look. At me. When Spike is with us… and when he is not. You have been pretty upfront with how you feel about me from day one, even if these feelings are a convoluted mess. All those memories fighting this resistance, fighting each other… it is like an itch under your skin that you try to rub out, but you have been doing it for so long that you do not realize that there is barely any skin left. You are hurting. I can see it sometimes. You waste a lot of energy fighting yourself, only wearing yourself out more and more the longer you go on. And I do not think this can go on for much longer. It should not, at any rate. And for better or worse, I think this could at least settle it.”

She was right. It hurt. It hurt hearing it too. Feeling a grain of truth in it. Maybe more. But at the same time, I was the one terrified now. For better or worse. It was clear which was which. She was in love. If even that was true — because being in love meant that one was still willing to play down or completely overlook the flaws a partner had, among other things. She was perfectly aware of those, however. And she accepted them with all her heart. She was not just ‘in love’. She loved. She loved her dearly. Enough that Nightmare Night had been the single day each year that she almost feverishly awaited. Enough that this supposed single night had become the starting point of little, a few days long ‘vacations’ for Luna.

It was clear indeed. I would be better off finding out that, after all was said and done, I could let her go be happy with Luna.

What terrified me was the alternative. The very real and very possible alternative. What if I found out that I could not let her go? That I wanted her for myself? That I could not look at her the same way as I had before after this night was over?

Several flashes rolled over me like the lazy waves on a sandy beach. Her bedroom eyes, inviting me. The memory mixed with that friendly look she had given me after leaving the bathroom. Her enticing scent. I heard her cry my name in ecstasy in my left ear, just a faint echo, and a ‘thank you’ pregnant with warmth in my right one. I heard, felt, and experienced.

“Please say something,” she spoke up again. Her voice wavered. She sounded... afraid. “Anything.”

Be honest now, sugarcube, I heard Applejack say. I tried. Had I not always at least tried? “I love you with all my heart,” I quietly whispered to her. Love was a funny thing. It did not care about the laws of nature. Something was given away and thus should be reduced in quantity. Changelings certainly worked that way, but they usually took instead of giving. But for the rest of us? I was not lying. I loved her with all my heart. And I loved so many other ponies as well, with nothing less than that. Because they deserved it. And sometimes, as irrational as it sounded and surely was, it almost hurt to love so much.

My words were obviously little in the way of an explanation. Or answer. There were many types of love. A mother loved her child. A ruler loved her nation. A pet loved its caretaker.

My answer was enough to make her relax for now. But a decision would need to be made soon. Surely she had been facing the same doubts that I entertained now? How awkward the next morning could be. How it might impact our friendship. We were living together, after all.

In all this swirling chaos, a single thought persisted: It wasn’t fair.

Be honest now, sugarcube.

You should be kind to yourself as well.

I’ll always come through for my friends!

Darling, there’s nothing wrong with a little drama once in a while.

I'm moral support! Whhheeeeee…! Go, team, go!

Thanks, Pinkie.

The point still stood, I reasoned. It was not fair that there was so much pulling me towards her, so many memories trying to make me take that step, so much lived life to tell me all about preferences and quirks and whatnot, but it was all stomped into the ground and stopped by a single ‘oh I don’t like this, something is wrong’.

I wondered: Had it felt ‘right’ when we decided to start reform our relationship into something resembling a triangle? Or had I struggled like this before, back then? I had bits and pieces. Rarely did anything fit together. Rarer still was a coherent narrative formed by more than two pieces. But I had been married to both of them. We had lived with each other. And we had been happy.

Could my ‘gut’ lead me right and astray at the same time?

It was more than just a flip of a coin. I made a decision who to trust. And since my faith in my own instincts wavered, I decided to trust Twilight.

“I want you.” Uttering those words was enough to make her look up in surprise. It was the perfect opening. I dove down and sealed her lips with mine. The chaos in my head and heart only intensified. I grew hungry for more and wanted her more than ever before. “I want you so badly,” I managed to string together as I slowly gave in. I remembered the passion we had shared. I called for it and it rose up. No effort required at all.

She was overwhelmed at first. But Twilight had always been a fast learner. And she tried to catch up with the pace I set. I needed her. I craved her. And I was willing to see where this would leave us by the end of it.

It did not take long until my greed made her almost forcefully push me away. “Need air,” she gasped. My hoof trailed along her side. As I reached her flank, I applied just enough pressure to her cutie mark to make her breath hitch a little. And I smiled. I smiled as I saw the same passion in her eyes, the same desire.

“I’ll try to slow down a little,” I whispered accompanied by a quiet chuckle.

“Don’t,” she immediately objected, “I don’t want you to.”

A little snort escaped me as I shook my head. “Twilight, I want to flip you over and mount you and rut you so badly that you’ll end up a sore mess by the end of it right now.” Maybe there was such a thing as ‘too much honesty’.

Due to our rather intense kissing and exploring hooves, she was already blushing furiously. Yet her cheeks somehow managed to darken even further. “Then do it,” she offered.

I was tempted to just follow through. But I had heard that little tinge of uncertainty in her voice. And it was just enough to keep me at bay. “No,” I replied and shook my head. “A little restraint is in order. I want you to feel good. I want you to enjoy this as much as I will. We have all the time we could ask for and I know that being even a little bit patient and making you squirm and beg will be so much better in the end…” I brought my lips to her horn and licked along its length once more in an attempt to tease a little. “I just know it,” I insisted and her breath hitched just as I had hoped.

We started slow. Exploration was a good part of the fun and it did not fail to deliver. But at some point, I whispered “Let me show you something.” And I trailed down her neck with little kisses, nipping at her skin occasionally, until I ventured below her belly and enjoyed myself greatly, hearing her unbridled moans.

Her first climax came hard and fast. I held her in place, continued my ministrations, egged her on just that little bit more until I finally let go of her. I sat up and looked proudly over my work so far. Her wings splayed out on the bed, the blanket had been kicked off at some point. Her coat was ruffled, her expression still marked by delirious ecstasy. I decided at that point that by the end of this night, I wanted her to be a sticky, sweaty, messy, quivering pile of exhaustion incapable of coherent speech. And she would be even more beautiful than before we had started.

My musings gave her enough of an opening to calm down her breathing at least a little bit. Enough to move again and surprise me as she pushed me onto my back. She wanted to reciprocate, that much became apparent as her tongue was trailing along my member. I wasn’t about to deny her. I did quite enjoy her learning experience. It had a unique charm to it. With Luna, I had always known what I was getting myself into. She knew exactly what she wanted and she just went for it. And she was experienced. Twilight… Twilight’s actions were defined by curiosity, first and foremost. And a great deal of care and caution.

I felt the pressure build up. My own voice tinged with an underlying impatience. “I’m close,” I tried to warn, but she apparently cared little. I grunted and tried to resist a little longer, only for the pressure to keep mounting until I just could not hold back any longer.

It took me a good moment to clear my head. She was standing over me and grinned so proudly that it made me laugh a little. “You did great,” I confirmed what she was already suspecting.

Her eyes drifted down my body and I felt my smile grow into a grin. “Refractory period — my turn!” She yelped a little as I grabbed her in my magic, turned her around and put her down again. I certainly was not about to let that just be the end of it. If I really were to only get this one night, I would make sure that it was one heck of a night!

I tended to her for a second time and I was less driven by insatiable hunger this time around. I instead tried to become somewhat of a teacher myself. A curious filly certainly had explored her own body at some point, no question about that. But I wanted to show her so much more. Things she might like. Things my memories told me she most definitely liked. And I always kept her away from the edge. It took a while for her to notice. But once she did, she looked down at me, her eyes hazy, and still managed a ‘don’t you dare!’-stare. I grinned and kissed my way up to her ear once more. “This should be fun,” I promised as I stood and lined up. I gave her a moment to realize and brace for it before I carefully, agonizingly slowly, proceeded. Our breath mingled. I stopped only when I could press no further. I held her. Listened to her heartbeat. Her breathing. Any indication of discomfort, as I had done all the while throughout. She instead dared to move. Just a little. It sent a tingle up my spine. She withdrew just a little, only to push back immediately. Testing it out, I assumed. It was enough for me to understand. She grew impatient. Needy. I could not in good conscience claim to be any better off.

It was a fun ride. The words were swirling in my head as I lay next to her. It sounded funny in my head, but maybe they were a little in poor taste? I did not want to utter anything anyway. I instead gazed at her. We were both busy collecting our breaths. She giggled quietly a moment later. “That was fun,” she said. Her voice sounded strained. Tired. I looked her over once more. She was a good distance closer to that mess I wanted to make her into. But she was not quite there yet. I wasn’t quite finished with her.

Then again. Given the choice — would I ever be?

Standing up, I grinned as I noted with a good deal of satisfaction that my legs were following orders properly. “Again?” I asked.

She blushed again as after only the shortest of moments, she nodded with quite some vigor. She looked a little tired, sure — but that would not stop her. Not for now anyway.

And we had all the time in the world.

It was still night. I had lost any semblance of sense of time. The sun was not even close to rising and that was the best I could do. I was lying on the bed. I held Twilight close. She nestled against me and occasionally nuzzled my chest. Everything was a mess. She was. I was. The bed we were lying on was. The air in the room was thick with the smell of sex. Our bodies radiated heat into the surrounding area. I had already gripped the blanket and sorted it to the end of the bed, ready to be deployed in a couple of minutes. But right now, it would have been too much.

“That was great,” she mumbled.

I enjoyed her breath tickling my chest and just nodded in return. It had been all I had dreamed of. All I had wanted. We really could have used a shower right now, both of us. We were sticky in places, sweaty… but neither of us wanted to stand up. Or move at all, really. Not to speak of breaking up our very comfortable embrace first.

“How do you feel?” I asked her. My voice was as warm and caring as I remembered hers to be.

“Tired,” she admitted. “Very tired.” After a moment, she quietly giggled. “And sore.” I chuckled a little and was quite pleased with myself. “You?”

I searched for an answer. She was patiently waiting while I prodded and tested my inner workings, but so far… I could not find any viable answer besides: “Tired. And very, very happy.” I stretched my neck a little to reach her horn and gave it an appreciative lick. She giggled and without wanting to move much gave me a little kiss on my chest. I felt it. And I appreciated it.

I finally broke the silence with a deep sigh once more. “Blanket?”

She barely nodded. Twilight was already about to drift off to sleep. I levitated the blanket over us. It took maybe a minute to get comfortably warm. And I felt myself drift off as well.

I had had this hypothesis about me only being able to sleep when I was dreamwalking. That would obviously need some revision…

Day 13: Everything is Fragile

I was glad that she was still there when I woke up again. I could not remember what I had dreamed about. No nightmare apparently, so I found it hard to explain where this irrational fear had come from. She had shifted and flipped over sometime throughout the night and now lay with her back against my chest. I was playing the big spoon and I certainly did not mind.

I grimaced. The smell in the room certainly had not gotten better with time. I used a little bit of magic to open the window. Fresh late morning air streamed in. A few birds were chirping and could now be heard more clearly. The town’s muffled and distant hustle and bustle was growing as well.

A few more minutes would not hurt, I told myself. It gave me time to rethink the events. To at least try and sort through everything. Holding her tight still felt great. But it always had and it always would. Even when I was conflicted, it never felt wrong in any way to be close to her. But sharing her bed, holding her like this… I was hard-pressed to call this ‘friendly’. This was not a sleepover. There were dried patches of my seed in her coat. I could still taste traces of her on my lips.

But I enjoyed it. Very much so. And I felt a twinge of sadness for a moment as I thought about how I might lose this. Because if I really were about to bring her and Luna together once more, there was no doubt in my mind that I would lose this.

Luna was rather possessive after all. Prone to jealousy. She did not mind sharing as such, but clear lines had to be drawn and respected. And last time I had seen her, she looked very much like she wanted to punch me.

So where did this leave us? I thought back and tried to compare my new reality to old memories. It was hard to distinguish between them at times. We have clearly had a lot of fun. Everything had clicked into place. We still harmonized quite well. Completed each other.

I looked down to her and saw the back of her head. I did not feel like kissing her. Or rutting her impressive brains out all over again. I sighed. But was that all it was about?

I did feel drained, to be fair. Like something that had had no outlet had finally been vented. Maybe it was my desire for her?

I felt her shift. Maybe it was the increased volume from outside. Or the slightly colder fresh air that was streaming in. She turned around, careful not to disturb the blanket or me too much. She looked almost relieved to find me awake. And for a precious moment we just gazed into each other’s eyes. Full of worry and fear and hope, searching for answers. Was this the moment we broke apart? Were we lovers? Friends? Neither? It would have been easy to lean forward and kiss her. But I found that I did not even entertain the idea on any level.

Finally, as if we were both making a conscious effort to break a spell, we smiled at each other. We leaned in to nestle against one another. I nuzzled her cheek and grinned as I heard her softly giggle. And we simply enjoy a moment of utmost closeness… between friends. “Ew,” she giggled again when I let my tongue dart forward and licked inside her ear for a second. I found it to be quite relieving to know that we could still joke around like this without it being immediately awkward. And just like that, I had my answers.

She now had her experience to draw from. That one time she could rely on to give her indication what to do and what to expect.

And I finally knew that she belonged to Luna. Always had been, always would be. But this time, she belonged to her and only her.

And we were still friends. Very, very close friends. Who knew a lot of stuff about each other that was not ‘friend’-stuff in nature, strictly speaking. But we would not let that come between us.

She pulled back after a moment and looked at me before she turned around again. And she wordlessly scooched close against me and took my foreleg, laying it around her like she was wrapping herself up in me. ‘A few more minutes’, was what I gathered from this. I did not mind. It was only fair — I had gotten those minutes to sort myself out before she had even woken up. So I used those minutes to just enjoy her presence and listen to the town close by.

I did start to think about Luna more and more as time passed. How her and Twilight's interactions had gone in the dreamscape. They had been quite friendly then, had they not? “Will you tell her?” I finally asked. I was not even sure if she was awake, to be honest. She could have just as easily nodded off again. But I felt her wing stir a little.

“I think I will,” she answered quietly. “I just need to come up with… something, first.”

That was so very much Twilight, it made me chuckle a little. “Don’t do that.”

“Do what?”

“You’re trying to come up with that biiig, fancy idea that would make everything perfect,” I guessed. “Don’t. You can certainly try. Both for ‘big’, and for ‘fancy’. But I know you. You will aim for ‘perfect’, and… I think we both know: It will never be perfect. Last night had been decided by whims and intuition, what felt right at the moment. For both you and me. And if you ask me, as far as sex goes, it was perfect. But that wasn’t something that could have been planned. Try to be more flexible about it. I know you can be. Take a nice sounding idea, prepare a little — just a little — and go from there. You have these very expensive telescopes and a nice balcony. Maybe invite her for a night of stargazing. Of course she knows her own night sky, but she won’t say ‘no’. Because she’ll be coming over for you, not the stargazing itself. And maybe she’ll even start to tell you stuff about it you might never find in any book. Or take her to the forge downstairs. You could show her some of your work, how you have modified your equipment. She had been a widely known and revered enchanter in her days and I’m pretty sure she hasn’t come around to research how that has evolved quite yet. Heck, you could even take her to the spa for a day. She loves to be pampered on occasion. Don’t overdo it, though. Pick an idea, any idea, and run with it. It’ll work out just fine, trust me. She’ll love it. If only because it involves you.”

She sighed deeply but nodded. “I’ll try.” Of course I had now given her some ideas to work with, but to be honest: It was nothing she could not have come up with in a few minutes anyway. But I knew how hard it was for her to restrain herself. To not overthink things. I knew it because we shared quite a few similarities at times.

As silence fell over the room once more I wondered. According to her own reasoning — and I was inclined to believe her on this — Twilight now felt the necessary confidence to be open about her feelings. She would at least try to woo Luna — because I had basically asked her to and in a weird way, she would feel obliged by her affirmation. Maybe she had navigated herself into that position knowingly. It was another reasonable point to go through with it. Something to poke herself along the way.

Maybe I had already given her all the nudging she required. That would leave Luna, of course. But I was not exactly worried about her end of this deal. Then again… why had she not acted yet if she felt strongly about Twilight? That thought actually gave me pause. Luna tended to be impatient. Sure, the impatience of an immortal being might still be vastly different than that of a mortal, but still. It seemed something was somehow blocking the road on her end.

I would obviously have to look into that.

At some point anyway. Because today would be another exhausting day, I was sure. Dealing with Rainbow would be messy. I dared to hope that maybe, just maybe, these past few days with me dilly-dallying around would have helped her cool down a little. But I already knew better than that.

My thoughts derailed when Twilight started to stir again. It was the tiniest movement, and then she lay still again. Only to move a little bit more, before she lay still yet again. It took me a moment to recognize: She grew uncomfortable. And just as I was about to say something, she spoke up first. “I need a shower.”

Her voice was almost a little bit whiny which made me chuckle without restraint. She turned around with an indignant huff and poked me in my shoulder. “And what’s so funny about that, mister? You are the one responsible for that!”

I only chuckled harder for a moment before I managed to calm myself down enough to respond. “I’m pretty sure most of that was you, but I would not mind cleaning you up again…?” I offered in jest and just as I had anticipated, she stuttered a little and blushed furiously. I laughed hard once more.

“Y-You are impossible,” she grumbled with the most endearing pout I had ever seen.

“Love you too, Twily,” I joked further.

“Hey! That one is reserved!” she protested.

I calmed myself down a little — again — and nodded. “Right, sorry. So. About that shower. Do you want me to carry you or shall I just spray all over you? Water, that is. Probably.” Her face paled a little, which contrasted quite nicely with her deep blush and as I was laughing my ass off, she literally kicked me out of her bed. Because now it was hers again and I was decidedly not welcome anymore. What a shame.

Despite my surprised yelp, I continued to laugh myself silly while she mockingly sulked a little. After I finally got myself together again and stood up, I smiled at her. “I’m so glad I still have you as a friend,” I remarked.

“That’s not fair,” she whined a little. “I wanted to stay mad at you!”

“Tough luck.” I dared not to step onto the bed again, but she was lying close enough to the edge to not make it necessary. I leaned down and nuzzled her neck for just long enough to let her fake anger drain away.

Once I pulled back, she stood up and looked herself over. “Geez, I am a mess,” she remarked.

“Yup. Absolutely proud of it,” I added and grinned a little as she tried to stare me into silence. It was not helped by the fact that she was still smiling, despite her annoyance. “Just take your shower and take your time. I’m going to fix the room, don’t worry.”

Her expression softened as warmth and gratitude returned. She nodded once and left. Which left me with this room. To fix it up took a lot less time than I had expected and seeing as the sky was free of any clouds, I left the window open. The blanket was in dire need of a thorough wash, as were the sheets and one of the pillows. So I just remade the bed. New sheets, new blanket, the soiled stuff went right into the laundry and I made a mental note to at least try to care for that before Spike got the chance. Because honestly, my memories told me nothing about who was doing the laundry to begin with and I could imagine him doing this as part of his daily chores. I would make at least an attempt to spare him that.

I left the bedroom and stood in the middle of the hallway for a couple of seconds. What to do, what to do. I could hear the shower running. I turned and walked towards the kitchen on a whim and found Spike there. Maybe I should not have been surprised by this — it was late morning, after all. He had probably been up for some time. “Hey buddy,” I greeted him.

He chuckled and then his eyes grew wide. “Woah. What happened to you? You look like—“ But he stopped himself rather abruptly. I raised an eyebrow at him to make him talk, but he blushed and shook his head. “Nevermind.”

Ah. Smart dragon. Spike was first and foremost a very young dragon. I made a conscious effort to treat him like an adult, as he was more mature than most ponies gave him credit for, but even so, I had not anticipated him putting one and one together this quickly. Or at all actually.

Despite that and to my own surprise, I felt no awkwardness. “Wanna help me make pancakes and coffee? Twilight should be here soon.”

Grateful for a new topic to latch onto, he nodded vigorously and even boasted a little as he puffed his chest out. “You meant to say ‘can you make pancakes while I make coffee’, right?”

I chuckled. “Right.”

So we did just that and we managed to get breakfast together before Twilight came in. She looked a lot cleaner. Much to Spike's relief, as I noted with amusement. “Oh?” was all she said at first, taking in the sight of the two of us standing there, grinning and presenting her with some of her favorites.

“Right,” I started and trotted past Twilight. “That would be my name now that the bathroom is yelling. Enjoy breakfast!”

I felt no need to torture myself with ice cold water. I instead opted for a nice hot shower. Not scalding hot, of course. Just hot enough that it prickled under my skin and burned those pesky thoughts away. And right now, all thoughts were pesky. So I stood there and enjoyed a silent and empty head. It felt nice for a change. I was certain that soon enough things would become complicated and messy again. That was alright. Such was life. But this moment, right here and right now, was my little reprieve.

After what was surely way too much time, I actually started doing more than just standing there and letting the water pour down on me. I tended to my coat, cleaned my mane and tail, and fixed myself up again. Once out of the shower, I used a brush to tame my knotty, messy mane and tail and brushed my coat a couple of times, just because it felt nice. I knew that Rarity swore that brushing one’s coat for who knows how many times per day gave it a pearly shine or whatever she called it, and she was very insistent that we at least try it once. I vaguely remembered that I did and I also vaguely remembered that it had an effect. Just none that was worth this much time and effort in my eyes and much to her dismay.

When I returned to the kitchen to fix myself some breakfast as well, it was already patiently waiting for me. Twilight had used her magic to keep the leftover pancakes warm and levitated me a mug with apple juice. “I love being home,” I mumbled with a grin and graciously accepted both. While I sat down and ate, my own words came back to haunt me a little as they reminded me of something I had wanted to bring up. For clarification’s sake at least. “Twilight?”

“Hm?” She had drifted deep into her own musings but looked up immediately.

“Do I… do I still have a guest room?” I asked.

She furrowed her brow. “Of course you do?”

I shook my head. “No, I mean… do I still have a guest room?” I repeated and switched to a more clear pronunciation.

She made a little ‘oh’-face but did not hesitate. “No. That is… we have not really talked about this yet, have we?”

I shook my head again. “No. That’s why I brought it up. I thought that you had invited me to stay at some point…? But I did not want to be presumptuous.” I did not like how cautious my voice suddenly sounded.

She took note of it as well and promptly sent me a reassuring smile. “When that crystal castle grew out of the ground,” she started with what sounded like a longer explanation, so it left me enough time to eat some more meanwhile, “I despised it at first. To be honest, I did so for a long time and maybe a small part of me still does. I had lost my home. I had loved my home and now, before I had been given any time to grieve, I was presented with this cold, jagged crystal thing that tried to replace one of the warmest, most welcoming places I had ever known. How could I not hate it a little? But I adapted. I grew accustomed to it over time. My friends tried their best to make it easier. But there were certain things they just could not hide. The many, many empty rooms for example. This castle is so vast and grand and empty and on some days, I ask myself why I had never felt like this in Canterlot Castle. You might laugh, but at some point, I even played around with the idea of inviting my friends to live with me. I tried to come up with all manner of reasons. It would be easier to assemble when another villain, banished or lost or imprisoned for a thousand years, suddenly reappeared. It would be easier to stay in contact. It would be easier to share stories, comfort and help with each other. I came up with so many reasons because there was one I did not want to tell.”

“You’re lonely,” I interjected.

She sighed. Her hesitation quickly drained and she nodded. “And for every reason I made up, my mind told me about one more thing that spoke against it. Applejack cannot leave her farm. She is basically rooted to this place. To her family. Rarity would be elated to live in a castle… at first. There can be no question that she would have enough workspace here. And I would welcome Sweetie Belle as often as she wanted to be here. But she lives by her own rules, and she cherishes them greatly. Pinkie has a similar problem as Applejack with the Cakes basically being her second family. The same is true for Fluttershy and her animals. And Rainbow… I asked her once why she insisted on this cloud palace. Sleeping on clouds, being surrounded by them… for a pegasus, that feels natural. In a different conversation, she had told me once that being inside of this castle felt like being in a cave. She never did outright say it. But she is uncomfortable with that. Most pegasi are, I think. It never made sense to ask them.” I could understand her reasoning. It most assuredly was a vastly broken down version of all the little details that certainly had arranged themselves into neat little clusters in her head. But it was enough to get the gist of it. “Then you came along and it just… it worked? I was not even sure if I wanted it to, but everything just seemed to fall into place. You almost instantly got along well with Spike. He genuinely seems to like you. You do not just ignore Owlicious’ presence and you even changed the castle interior for me. Then you started making breakfast and brought White Tip along and… it is moving fast. It has not been two weeks and you already integrated yourself into this household. I will admit that this pace scared me at first. Maybe it does a little even now. But at no point did it feel too fast. Or wrong. It just works and… I really like it. I would love for you to stay. It might be that we run into issues later on and if that happens… we will deal with them then.”

Her expression turned apprehensive. Silly Twilight. I had finished my pancakes, set the fork down and stood up. I simply walked over to her and hugged her tightly. She relaxed immediately. “I’d love that. Seriously. As I said, I thought you had invited me anyway and I just wanted to clarify. If you’ll have me, I’ll gladly stay.”

She sighed. “Deal.”

“Deal.” I pulled back and booped her nose. Because I felt like it. And I was only encouraged to do so more in the future as she wrinkled her nose and her quiet giggle rewarded me greatly on top of that. “Now. While Spikes’ pancakes were awesome — hey, where is Spike anyway?”

She smiled knowingly. “Oh, you know, apparently Sweetie Belle had invited him over. So they could both help Rarity with a hat.”

“… a hat,” I deadpanned.

The spell was broken shortly after with both of us giggling a little. After we had calmed down, I cleaned the plate, set it down to dry and turned to her. “Shall we try and catch ourselves a Rainbow?”

She smiled and stepped up to my side. “We shall.”

“Phase one completed,” I noted looking up. I saw Twilight nod out of the corner of my eye. High up above our heads was the obscenely large three story house of Rainbow Dash. More like a palace really. Two rainbow pools embedded within the thick cloud cover that made up something akin to a ‘floor’ served as decorative elements to either side of a winding path that led up to the door. The house had an almost tower-like shape and being neither a pegasus nor an alicorn, I knew little about its internal structure.

“Do we have a plan?” Twilight spoke up.

This time I actually had one. The relative silence we had shared walking over here and searching the skies for Rainbow's house drifting about had not only been comfortable, it had been useful. For once I had more than just ‘an idea’. “Several in fact,” I started. “Plan A: We teleport in there only to find out that they have solved their issues by themselves in the meantime and everything is fine again. We apologize for the rude intrusion, I introduce myself and we leave.”

She seemed to like that one. “That would be ideal,” she mumbled but we both shared a look and already suspected that as much as we wished for that to come true, it seemed way too easy.

“Right. Everything after Plan A might require you to keep her from just flying off. You know how she is. Especially when confronted with something she can’t just kick in the face.” We both shared a smile. “Plan B: We teleport in there, we find out that things haven’t changed much, we talk things through with Rainbow. Depending on how that conversation goes, we might want to stick around and make sure she’s okay. Maybe we even need to go and talk to Applejack again, we’ll see.” While she was not keen on keeping her friend in an uncomfortable situation, pinning down her tail with magic so she could not flee was hardly new to Twilight. “Plan C: We teleport in, we find out things are bad or worse, we try to talk things over with Rainbow and depending on how that goes, I go for a dreamwalk with her. Considering how Applejack reacted last time, it might become necessary for another heist. If that is the case…” I furrowed my brow in thought. “Twilight, if it would be alright with you, I could really use your help. It’s not even afternoon yet. If this comes to pass, I will try once more to make Applejack sleep, so the heist has a chance to proceed. But that will likely mean that she’s lying somewhere in the orchard. I don’t worry about predators as much as I worry about Big Mac or Applebloom simply waking her up. Could you maybe look for her and watch over her?”

Twilight’s smile only grew warmer as she stepped up and hugged me for a moment. “I would love to help. Do not forget that they are my friends as well. And I think I can even do you one better.”

“Oh?”

Her smile turned into a grin. “That day when I stumbled into you, I was at Zecora’s house to refill some of my ingredients for alchemical experiments. I should have enough lavender and passionflower for a sleep potion.”

“… lavender and passionflower? And that would work?” I curiously asked.

She nodded. “The variants that grow in the Everfree are a lot more potent and actually quite dangerous because of it. A little bit of alchemical preparation to enhance their potency even further and she should fall asleep fast.”

“And sleep depending on the dosage,” I mumbled. “That might help, yes. Just don’t forget to include in your calculations that she’s an earth pony. A pretty stubborn one, at that. How do you intend on administering it?”

Twilight giggled this time. “Don’t worry, my calculations are fine. It accounts for her weight and resting heart rate, everything really.” Right. Twilight being Twilight. And I was not about to ask how she knew Applejack's weight. “I think it would be easiest to just walk up to her, talk a little and offer her some water.” It was almost devious. We were admittedly practically planning on poisoning one of our friends. A fact that Twilight knew just as well and she did seem a little torn with the idea.

“Don’t worry,” I tried to reassure her. “She will be fine. And so will we be. She might not be happy about it, but… well, you know. Wouldn’t have happened if she weren’t this stubborn.”

While it did little to help her with her conflicting feelings, it did at least steel her resolve in going through with it. “Time for some magic,” she said with a small smile. The first spell she cast on both of us — the cloud walking spell. Knowing how the spell worked, I was not surprised as a tingling ran up my spine and my hooves started to feel strangely light. The second spell was cast only on me and after my questioning look, she explained it to be a simple one to shield me against the cold up there. If we actually were to dreamwalk from Rainbow's house, it meant potentially lying down while cold winds swept our unmoving bodies and sucked any heat out of them. Pegasi might have been fine with that, their bodies had adapted to such an environment. Mine… less so.

And finally, she charged her horn with the teleportation. “Ready?” she asked.

I stepped a little bit closer to her and felt better as she laid her wing over my back. “Ready.”

If my memory served me right, teleporting myself felt a little disorienting at first, but that got better with practice. Being teleported however always felt like an entire trip on a rollercoaster stuffed into a fraction of a second. Nauseating. I expected that exact experience and I tried to brace myself but it did little to actually help.

When the flash of light cleared from my eyes, I tried hard to keep myself from retching. I trusted myself to look around and move a couple of seconds later as the vertigo started to recede. We had successfully arrived in Dash’s bedroom. Twilight apparently wasted no time even trying the door. I could understand why.

The room was a dump. Half of the chaos we were seeing seemed to be the result of its owner just being a generally messy pony. Worrisome was the other half, which included the still broken dresser made of cloud material lying on a wall in a heap. It looked like a tornado had come through. A technicolor tornado, I suspected.

Rainbow was lying on her bed, with her back to us. She knew we were here though. Teleportation was not exactly subtle. A loud pop, flashing light and the smell of ozone. Her ear swiveled in our direction but she remained quiet. She probably waited to be addressed, maybe she even hoped that whoever so rudely intruded upon her domain might just leave again.

Twilight and I shared a look. This was no Plan A situation. So we were already down on the ideal outcome. What a pity. While she readied herself, I stepped aside, to the end of the bed and out of immediate sight should Rainbow just flip over.

“Rainbow?” Twilight quietly asked.

“Go away, Twilight,” came the reply. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Rainbow, I’m not going anywhere. I know that. You know that. We might be able to help you. Please talk to me!” Her little slip-up, if it even was one, was neither acknowledged by herself nor by Rainbow.

The pegasus sulked just a little bit longer before giving a defeated groan. And as expected, she just rolled over onto her other side and faced Twilight. “Fine. What do you want?”

Seeing her face made Twilight only worry more. This in turn made me worry, as I had not seen it yet. “You look awful — how long have you not been sleeping?” she blurted out.

“Gee, Twilight, thanks. Nice talk. I feel so much better now.” She huffed but did finally answer. “A couple of days or so, I dunno. What day is it?”

I snickered. It was a dumb move really. It blew my status as a silent observer. And it was in poor taste as well, as Rainbow clearly was not feeling well at all. But her nonchalance about not knowing what day it was, it just cracked me up. It was oh so very Rainbow.

She immediately tensed up, sat up straight and glared daggers at me. “And who the hay are you?!”

“Sorry, sorry, I, uh… I’m Dreamwalker,” I offered.

“He’s a friend as well,” Twilight threw into the mix.

Rainbow looked me over and apparently recognized something. “You,” she spat. For a moment I thought she was about to seethe. But I obviously misinterpreted the signs as only a second later, she deflated with an annoyed groan and let herself fall onto her back, wings splayed out. “That’s not fair,” she mumbled.

“You… uh… you know me?” To say that I was surprised was an understatement. How? Just how did she recognize me?

Rainbow gave a snort in response. “Pinks told me you brought her and Flutters together. So, uh… thanks, I guess.” Another groan. “And Derpy told me about this dude that ‘seems to be really nice’ and ‘gets along well with foals’ who’s apparently hunkering down with Twilight. I’ve heard of you.”

“Oh.” That was all the response I could muster while my mind drew blanks. Ohhh.

I felt a massive heat wave spread from my thumping heart throughout my body. It lit up everything along the way that could turn red. Good with foals, am I? I should probably thank Derpy again for speaking so highly of me. I had not expected her and Dash to speak though. Or Dash and Pinkie. Or Dash and anypony really. But now that I was standing here, left speechless for the moment, I could not even explain why I had thought that. I knew Rainbow. She could sulk around for a couple of days, sure, but being confined to a single space for too long would have her chomping at the bit in no time. She was always darting about, being social with just about anypony she wanted to have around her. And quite similar to Luna, she usually just went for it. She just had a little more problems figuring out what she wanted from time to time.

“Rainbow, he is a friend,” Twilight reiterated and filled the void. I was very grateful for that. “And I believe that he can help you. Both of you. He is willing to try, at least. If you would let him.”

With another groan — playing it up a little, are we? —, Rainbow sat back up and looked around between the two of us. “And do what? Is he gonna try and sidle up next to me, so he can do his weird dream stuff?” she asked Twilight only to turn to me before waiting for any answer. “I swear to Celestia, if you even try to hug me, I’m gonna kick you out the window.”

I chuckled heartily despite the threat and nodded. “Duly noted. And yeah, I know. You’re not into all the mushy stuff.” She gave a curt nod in affirmation before turning to Twilight again. We were at this point still aiming for Plan B. And it did not even look all that bad. Rainbow looked like she had been to Tartarus and back and we would probably have met her in a vastly different, more hostile mood yesterday or the day before that, but she was talking to us, had not attempted to flee even once and seemed somewhat reasonable as far as Rainbow Dash was concerned… so maybe things worked out in our favor?

“Rainbow… what happened?” Twilight finally asked with a pleading tone and warmth in her eyes that was just disarming.

She was not playing fair and everypony in the room knew it. “I was just being stupid again,” Rainbow lamented. “I got this letter from the Academy a couple weeks ago. Another rejection for active duty. I can fly circles around some of their active flyers! I even bested their best team!”

Twilight saw just as much as I did that there was a risk of Rainbow derailing herself. Maybe it was just subconscious, but she tried to get away from the topic. “I’m very sorry about your rejection, Rainbow—“ Twilight started when Rainbow suddenly interrupted with a quiet voice.

“I’m not.”

The room fell silent for a moment. “… come again?” Twilight finally spoke up in confusion.

It took Rainbow a good while to open her mouth again. “I’m not,” she repeated almost defiantly. “If they would finally take their heads out of their asses and put the best flyers on the ‘best flying’ team, then I… I would’ve…” Her voice cracked. It usually did that when she was in turmoil, so it was only fitting here. “I would’ve lost her.” ‘And yet I lost her anyway’ was as strongly implied as was possible without outright saying it.

“But why would that—“ Twilight started.

I was the one interrupting this time. “Because of the traveling,” I answered the half-spoken question. “And everything that entails. The Wonderbolts do a lot more than just fly and look awesome doing it. They parade around. They put on shows for dignitaries, go to galas, and they travel all over Equestria. Sometimes even beyond. She would be away for months, if not longer, only to return for a couple of days at best. Winter season might be different. But there's a reason ponies say that 'you give them your best years'.”

“Winter is pretty chill,” Rainbow weakly agreed, but her look of sadness said it all. Winter was not enough.

I furrowed my brow. Something about this felt off. “You wouldn’t have enough time for her… and you’re not all that sad about the rejection… so why did you dump her?” I was not so sure about my initial hypothesis any longer. I had thought that she had ended the relationship because she felt that Applejack deserved someone who would not hesitate to put her above anything else. But I could not fit that together with what I was hearing and seeing.

Rainbow's eyes widened in surprise, which only served to prove my doubt further. “What? No! I didn’t dump her!” But seconds later, she added, “Well I… I didn’t mean to.”

Twilight moved up and sat down on the bed beside her friend and slowly stroked her hoof along Rainbow's back. The pegasus shot me a look that could have killed a lesser pony. A silent threat that none of this was happening, my eyes were lying and I was better off not to mention that to anypony ever.

I could live with that. Quite happily so. It was a nice sight to behold how the slightly larger alicorn comforted her friend. I even thought of Rainbow as actually quite cute, despite her attitude. She would hate that. Gone was the boisterous mare that knew everything and could do anything and was the bestest and fastest. Now she was just Rainbow Dash. A pony. A pony in need of some comfort and she allowed herself to receive what her friend was willing to give.

“I was panicking,” Rainbow started to explain. “After the letter, I thought about stuff. If I still wanted to become a Wonderbolt. If I wanted to quit the reserve. Heck, I even thought about settling down as captain of the weather team or something. I needed to figure this out. What I wanted. And where Applejack's place in all this was. What I wanted for us. And it all got so complicated, like… everything was just knots in my head. There wasn’t a single part that I could just tackle. Like I’m used to. And then she started pressing me for answers. I kept avoiding it, but she wouldn’t let me. She even asked me if I had lost interest or found somepony else! A-And then she… she said I would answer her now… or n-never… a-and I just panicked… I just… flew away… I had no answers, I couldn’t have answered anything!” Her voice cracked again. All that work over the last couple of days, slowly and carefully putting the pieces together, fell apart in an instant. She buried her muzzle on Twilight's shoulder and tried to hide tears we were all aware of anyway. My heart sank seeing her suffer like this.

I turned. Rainbow did not want me to see this and that was fine. With Twilight being there for her, I would have been fine actually going for a walk, but… I did not want to get lost in this house or snoop around. And just as well could I not just ‘go back down’ on my own. So I did the next best thing and turned around and ignored how Twilight softly cooed to her friend as best as I could, while her walls broke down further and her erratic breathing became quiet sobbing.

While nothing was happening behind me, I tried to sort through this new information. I was so furious with my beloved almost-sister Applejack. I did not think for a second that she had actually lied to me. While she was capable of it, she was everything but good at it. And I believed whole-heartedly that she believed what she had said. The fault was mine then. I should have asked for more details. I should have asked how exactly Rainbow had dumped her.

It would have made things so much easier.

Having heard Rainbow's side of things now, it became apparent that something was up with Applejack. I was honing in on a detail that still seemed to be amiss when I heard Rainbow's devastated voice behind me just hoofing me the exact thing. “There’s nothing left anyway,” she cried. “I tried to talk to her yesterday, b-but… guess she’s finally sick of it…”

Yesterday. So after our talk. After she had said that she needed time to think. I wonder what she had been thinking about and what the results had been. Apparently nothing that made her want to reconcile with Rainbow.

AJ pressed for answers. Rainbow squirmed around. AJ pressed harder. Rainbow freaked out and fled. I knew this scenario. My memories served me a whole heap of them on a silver platter. A recurring theme. On rare occasions with inverted roles. But they made up. They always did.

With help, obviously. Always with help.

Right. We were here. We knew now. What to do next?

Rainbow desperately wanted her back, that much was clear. But Applejack had shrugged her off when she tried to make amends. Why? Of course we could try and talk to Applejack at this point, which was not looking all that promising. Plan C then.

I turned around to face them both again. I envied Rainbow for a fraction of a second. She was entirely lost in a feathery cocoon, only her tail and mane poking out here and there. I knew that feeling. It was great. I quickly shook my head to clear it and focused on Twilight, who shot me a sad little smile. I returned a hopeful one. ‘Plan C’, I silently mouthed. She nodded, but then looked down at Rainbow who had calmed down but still clung to her.

“Rainbow?” I asked her.

“What?” came the muffled reply. She sounded so miserable.

“I don’t get it, you don’t get it, and I bet not even Twilight gets it,” I proclaimed in a snake oil salespony pitch. And I knew that I had to sell this one. “So I’d like to offer that ‘weird dream stuff’ to you. Twilight is going to have our back and we are going on an epic heist mission. We will find out why Applejack is all weird. You in?”

I waited in bated breath for a moment before Rainbow carefully lifted one of Twilight's wings out of the way so she could see me. “No hugging,” she demanded.

“No hugging involved,” I promised. Wasn't Applejack complaining that she was clingy at some point...? "No hugging," I repeated insistently. She stared me in the eyes and I stood my ground. After what felt like minutes, she disentangled herself from Twilight. “Fine.”

Now we are talking. I nodded to Twilight. She looked Rainbow over once more, but her friend seemed to be stable enough for now and had given no indication of any impulses to flee. Once she was satisfied with her inspection, she vanished in a raspberry-colored flash of light.

Without warning.

“I hate it when she does that,” both Dash and I said in unison. We stopped to look at each other and shared a weak smile after a moment.

“Why are you doing this?” she asked me. “I get Twilight. But you? I don’t even know you.”

Ah yes, there we were again. Well, Twilight needed to prepare a potion, find Applejack in acres of orchard and smooth talk her into drinking what was essentially poison. Surely we had a spare minute or two.

“I had a very good friend once,” I started and grinned. “I didn’t always agree with her. And at times, we struggled to find common ground. But it did work out somehow. We both cared, so, you know… we made it work. I guess over time, she rubbed off on me. I won’t leave my friends hanging.” I pushed on as I saw her eyebrow rise. “She was this cocky, boisterous pegasus. Quite the athlete. Always up for any challenge, out to prove herself in anything, to anyone. First to perform a sonic rainboom. I really didn’t like her attitude at times, but… she had this deep drive, this admirable determination, this persistence despite overwhelming odds. The least I could do was respect that. And with time, I really grew to like her. She had a wicked sense of humor, without it ever feeling malicious. She was always game to do something obviously dangerous or stupid. She was just… so much fun to hang out with. And in those rare moments when she got quiet, I think I appreciated her even more. She was an avid reader of adventure stories. I could nerd out with her so hard for hours on end. Daring Do really should have used a whip for that stupid gemstone.”

“That’s what I said!” she agreed enthusiastically. Of course Rainbow had already put one and one together, but, well… I had to acknowledge that it probably was hard to believe such a wild story.

“Hm. Tell you what. See if you can recognize this tune, alright?” I closed my eyes and called forth a specific memory without waiting for Dash. She was no slowpoke like me, after all. I had experienced this melody before. The accompanying scene was blurry and lacked detail. No other sense was present except sight and hearing, but what I heard was crystal clear. And lacking any musical talent, I tried my darn best to hum what I heard.

“I do,” she squeaked out after just a couple of tunes. Well. That had been quick. “Where… uh…”

I smiled, opened my eyes again and looked at her. She seemed embarrassed. “You care. A lot. But by Celestia, are you messy,” I started my explanation with a little chuckle and ignored her indignant glare. “A while back, you took lessons in music theory with Twilight under some weird pretense. And you took practical lessons with Fluttershy as well. She couldn’t teach you much in terms of instruments, but she taught you singing. You were all hush-hush about it so that nopony would suspect the incredibly mushy stuff you were up to. But when it came time, you chickened out. You wrote that song to tell her how much you loved her. But your fears ate away at you. If I recall correctly, you mostly feared that your voice would crack. Of course you would only tell us all this once it wouldn’t bother you anymore, many, many years later. We were helping you clear out your house. You had no need for it any longer, since you were moving in with AJ. She found it in a dresser or drawer or something. It was the perfect song to be played with that silver harmonica that Applejack still hides from the world as the greatest treasure she possesses. The one she inherited from her parents. AJ loved that song.”

I had her dumbstruck. She was silent for a good long while and tried to process what I had told her. That initial blush came and went and then came and went again. Rainbow was fairly easy to read. Some more indignation here, a little bit of embarrassment there. Finally, her expression settled for hope. “She did?” her voice squeaked again.

I nodded with a smile. “She did. I must admit, I don’t know if you ever actually sang that song, but she played it. A lot.”

She was silent once more before furrowing her brow. “So you’re telling me we were buddies sometime, somehow. Are you a time traveler or something? Because that would be so awesome.”

“Why does everypony assume time travel first?” I chuckled in response.

“Ehrm, hellooo? Twilight?”

“Right,” I chided myself. “The incident with Pinkie and the Archives. But no, it’s not time travel. I think. Honestly, I don’t know. And neither does Twilight, so far. Though I have to admit, I’ve been around for almost two weeks now and we weren’t exactly diligent in our research concerning the matter. Somehow, we had… other things to do. Like fixing relationships that were meant to be.” Now that got her attention. She obviously tried to feign disinterest. After all, that was much too uncool for The Rainbow Dash. But I had seen her head snap around at top speed. I grinned a little. “It’s hard to describe. Imagine you have a puzzle. That is one life you live. Now, break it apart and take, let’s say… half the pieces? Maybe less. Then do the same thing for… I dunno… three, four, ten, fifty more puzzles? And mix those halves together. With the exception of those last two weeks, that’s basically my memory.”

“That sucks,” she simply stated and I simply cracked up. It was refreshing to talk to her again.

“It does at times, yeah. But there are other times when it really isn’t all that bad. It helped me a lot actually. I mean, I woke up and basically knew who my friends were, where they lived and what they like and dislike — sort of. But that’s not even the part I was aiming for. Thing is, whatever this is… there are certain constants. Things that happen, again and again. I have memories of Pinkie being very, very happy with Rarity. But those form such a miniscule minority. You and AJ though? That’s just a given. It’s there. Always has been, always will be.” I was not sure how much thought Rainbow had ever put into topics like ‘fate versus free will’ and I was somewhat certain that even if she suddenly found interest in it, it would not take long until its philosophical nature would bore her to death. But right now, I enjoyed seeing her fancy the idea of them being ‘meant for each other’.

It was more complex than that of course. It always was.

Rainbow knew what I thought Rainbow had to know for now. It was enough. There was still one thing left though. A personal matter. “Oh and yes, we were buddies. I don’t exactly expect you to fall head over heels for another friend of the ‘weird’ variety. But maybe, once the dust has settled, we could play some horseshoes? Or go for a drink? I think you might have a couple halfway decent stories to tell.”

She looked over to me with a certain caution I could not fault her for. It had been difficult so far and I had no reason to believe that it would get any easier: Explaining why I knew things, and why I was so intent on gaining certain friendships. Lucky for me, Rainbow was rather straightforward and easy to deal with for the most part. “Maybe,” she said and thereby at least gave me a chance. Then she patted the bed beside her. “Move your ass, slacker. And remember — I’ll kick you if you touch me!” Her threat was accompanied by an almost daring grin.

“Duly noted. Again,” I replied with a smile and walked over while she settled down. Once I was beside her, with a proper distance remaining of course, I started explaining a couple of things before Rainbow came into direct contact with them. Because all of my memories almost screamed at me that once in the dreamscape, I would have a hard time getting enough of her attention to explain anything then and there. “Right, so. I’m going to charge the spell, touch your head with my horn and we’ll sleep. We will awake in a different realm. It will probably look like the night sky. It’s actually quite beautiful.” She mock-gagged and I made a mental note to remind her of that when we got there. “There will be a lot of big bubbles floating about. Those are dreams. Don’t touch them, they are very delicate. If they burst, the dreamer wakes up, so it’s not the end of the world, but it’s… you just shouldn’t. Second important thing: There might be creatures there. They appear as animals or beasts made out of light. I saw a rat before and Twilight and I faced a pack of what she perceived to be timberwolves while I saw regular wolves. Their appearance isn’t really… well, ‘real’. Keep in mind that, what you see there, is your mind attempting to make sense of it. It’s trying to tell you what you should fear, and what should be relatively harmless. And the last thing before I bore you to sleep: In this realm, you don’t need to breathe, fly, walk or anything like that. You will probably do so, just because you’re used to it. So will I. Over there, it’s all about what you think. You can manifest weapons and armor, you can still feel pain and get hurt, you could grow a horn and cast spells — but all of that is your mind interacting with this realm's own set of laws. Since we are going to face Applejack in some capacity, I fully expect there to be a guardian that will try to stop us. It might come to pass that we need to fight it. Don’t let yourself get beat up — while you won’t take any physical wound with you when you wake up again, it will exhaust you. Possibly up to the point that you wake up and can’t lift a hoof. I would very much prefer for this not to happen, alright?”

I had studied her expression and its shifts as well as I could manage in order to gauge how much she actually listened and which parts she took away from my explanation — in hopes that I could course correct something if anything actually important got lost. It was a little disheartening to see her get bored so fast, but it was nothing I had not expected. A pain Twilight knew all too well and that we shared in. Rainbow did not deal well with lectures. What I did not see coming was the moment she turned to look at me, a cocky grin plastered on her face, and shortcut most of it. “Got it. No touchy, stay alert, be awesome. Can we start now? I’m kinda getting itchy. Also, has anypony ever told you that you can sound a heck of a lot like Twilight in lecture mode?”

I was left speechless for a couple of seconds and my jaw hung slightly agape. I fixed the latter first. “How can you just—… did I—…”

“I know, right?” she added without rhyme or reason and dared to wink at me. Why that cheeky little—

I shook my head and I had to laugh. “We’ll get along just fine,” I concluded more to myself than her before charging my horn and doing exactly what she had asked. Starting already.

“Woah, this looks awesome!” came Rainbows excited exclamation as soon as she set hoof in the dreamscape.

“Yupp,” I replied with a smug grin. “I can barely contain my gag reflex as well.”

“Hey, dude,” she started getting defensive, “you made it sound like some boring painting or something Rarity would fawn over. This is so much better! It’s so cool!”

I chuckled a little and shared her enthusiasm. “It is, isn’t it?” I quietly spoke to nopony in particular and once again took in the sight. I would never tire of its beauty. Or awesomeness, as Dash put it.

“So what’s next?” It had not taken her long to get bored. Or maybe she was not bored as much as she ‘had her fill’ and was ready to move on. Something I struggled with a lot more than she did.

But she had a fair point of course. We were here with an agenda. “First off, we’re going to try to tiptoe our way around without getting caught,” I carefully mumbled more to myself while I cautiously looked in all directions. I could see neither hide nor hair of Luna. A good start then. “This way.” Moving was not strictly necessary, just as I had told Rainbow. But on one hoof, it gave Twilight a little bit more time in case she needed it, and on the other, it might have helped Rainbow get accustomed to this realm a little more.

I did not waste too much time though before I randomly stopped, closed my eyes and concentrated on Applejack. Her orange coat, her — depending on the mood either adorable or sexy — freckles, her shining emerald eyes, her blond mane, usually bound by that red ribbon, her brown Stetson… the smell of apples and dirt and sweat and open air… I lifted my hoof once the image became clear enough and stomped it down onto the surface that was neither there nor absent. Once, twice, thrice. I felt the ripples under my hooves, heard the echo of it, and when I opened my eyes again, I saw her bubble a good distance away slowly closing in as if I had lassoed it. “Cool,” I heard Rainbow whisper. I almost wanted to laugh but I restrained myself. I had to focus on AJs dream to draw it closer. In Rainbow's vocabulary, everything seemed to be either ‘awesome’ or ‘cool’ if positive, or ‘mushy’ or ‘uncool’ if negative. While I did not possess the same rhetorical skills Twilight did, I was proud enough of my grip on the language to consider writing as a potential employment. Yet I found myself speechless and at a loss for words again and again. I wondered just a little bit how it must feel for Rainbow. She appeared to be completely satisfied with what she had. She did not mind calling things cool when they were beautiful. And while my first instinct was to assume that she had some form of a little translator in her head, on second thought, I did not support my own hypothesis. She really just was content with that.

I shook my head to free myself from my own musing when Applejack's dream reached us. “Now we get into the ‘touching things I told you not to touch’-stuff,” I explained and looked over at a suddenly very eager and interested Rainbow. Applejack's dream was a colorful display that right now and without further effort could not be deciphered. But the presence of color and vague shapes meant that she was sleeping already. Twilight had done her part. And probably still did as she kept watch over her.

I instructed Rainbow how to enter the dream. It did not want us there and tried to push us back as expected. I had to call out to Rainbow more than once to be careful, to push slowly, as bursting the dream by applying too much pressure would destroy our chances. She was annoyed but complied anyway — because we both knew what was on the line.

We finally managed to get in. It had taken considerably longer than with Rainbow's dream, funny enough.

“Wait, what?” Rainbow asked and looked around in confusion.

We stood at the entrance to Sweet Apple Acres. “We’re in,” I told her. “This is her dream. Keep your eyes and ears peeled, we do not want to run into Applejack herself. We’re aiming for the farmhouse. I have a feeling that she’s keeping secrets in the same place y—It’s probably in her room.” Slip of tongue. Bad, bad tongue! Rainbow did not seem to notice though. She still looked around and tried to find differences between reality and dream.

Applejack's subconsciousness did a great job to be honest. She knew every tree, every branch and leaf and wrinkle in its bark, every soft rolling hill in her orchard and the sound of every little stream crossing through it. She had lived in this place for almost all of her life and it was reflected here.

I started to trot along the dirt path that would ultimately lead to the house and Rainbow quickly fell in with me. “So if we already know where it is, why don’t I just… you know… fly up and crash through the window or something?”

“Because we don’t know,” I corrected her. “I assume. It seems likely to me. We have to look out for both Applejack and her guardian. Applejack we want to avoid as we really don’t have time to play along in whatever dream she is having and not doing so would risk making her aware of the dream’s nature, which in turn could mean she either wakes up or will at least remember our interference. We don’t want to get busted, so that’s a no-no. Her guardian might actually be helpful though. It will probably try to keep us away from whatever she’s hiding.”

It clicked for Rainbow. “So we find that and it’ll tell us where we want to go.”

I nodded and tried hard to ignore her wicked grin. Yes, we were searching for the one source of potential conflict here. We were asking, no, begging for trouble. And she was all for it of course.

As we passed row after row of trees, I started to notice the appearance of faces on them. As if the bark had grown in curious ways to form them. This being a dream, it would not have been all that strange to see them move and talk, but they did neither. They just stared at us. With very judgmental eyes. Maybe it was the guardian. Maybe it was a sign that Applejack was somewhat aware of our presence. With them not actually doing anything for now, I could not tell for sure. “We’re being watched,” Rainbow whispered. So she had noticed it as well.

I nodded. “Ignore them for now.” Maybe they would vanish. Maybe ignoring them would coax a more direct action. Either way, I was still betting on the house which by this point had come into view.

I stopped abruptly when I heard something. An almost ethereal gust of wind had carried with it the faintest noise of a whimper. And sobbing. Very, very quiet sobbing. My heart ached as I recognized it as Applejack. The memory of this exact noise from just a few days prior flooded my mind. I wanted to help her. I had so desperately wanted to help her back then… and I still did.

“Don’t,” I warned Rainbow as I noticed her wings slowly unfolding. “Remember what we are here for.” Maybe it was a decoy. I did not expect Applejack's guardian to be that devious though. So I was more inclined to think that it actually was Applejack. This made it harder and easier at the same time. We now knew roughly where she was. In what direction anyway. But we had to ignore her suffering.

“This sucks,” Rainbow grumbled.

“I know. It hurts hearing her like this and trying to ignore it. But that’s what we’re here for. To change that.” None of that made it any easier. She nodded anyway and forced a rather grim looking determination on her face.

We reached the farm house. Granny Smith's rocking chair sat on the porch, empty and unmoving. I had expected nothing else. I suspected we would not find any trace of Big Macintosh, Apple Bloom or Winona either. Because this was another nightmare. Maybe not a fully grown one quite yet, but this dream would inevitably become one. I opened the door. “Be careful. Doors, windows, portals like those have special meaning in dreams. If you pass through and suddenly find yourself somewhere else than you saw before or expected, don’t freak out.”

We both stepped in. I went after her, but we did just enter the farm house. Everything appeared to be normal. Except a lot darker. And when I turned to look outside, there was only a gaping black void. I quietly closed the door before Rainbow saw that and then turned to survey our surroundings. It was an almost uncanny déjà vu. The exact same scene I had found when Applejack and I had entered Rainbow's dream. It was obviously less weird finding the farmhouse in the farmer's dream, but still.

“Up the stairs,” I whispered as I fell back into old routines.

There was a quiet rustling to our left, from the living room. Rainbow tensed up immediately but kept her wings tight for now. I didn't even bat an eye this time — there would be nothing to see. The guardian was here and it was aware of us. It tried to lure us into the wrong rooms, sending us on a merry goose chase. But it would not face us just yet. Not when there was still a chance for us to leave or get lost.

We slowly made our way up the stairs and expected an ambush that just did not come. I looked over to the right once we reached the top. There it was. A single door at the end of the corridor. A short glimpse to the left told me that at least half the doors on this story were gone. Just non-existent. “Be prepared,” I whispered and slowly turned right.

I set a single step forward in that direction when in yet another déjà vu the darkness around us seemed to be drawn to a point in space before us and coalesced into a cloud of pitch black from which a pony-shape stepped forward. It was Applejack and yet it was not. Her coat had a darker tone, almost red. Her mane was a wild, untamed mess. Untold anger shone in her eyes and she bit down on the handle of a whip. My eyes trailed along her weapon, noticing sharp metal spikes woven into it. That sight made me wince a little.

“That’s not AJ,” I heard Rainbow half-ask, half-state.

“No. No it’s not. We need to get past it.” And with that we charged. Because what was planning good for if you did not know the first thing about the enemy you were about to fight anyway? In addition to that, I had my doubts that Applejack's guardian would just stand there and be content with glaring daggers at us.

Our first clash was quick and brutal. The whip cracked and tore wood apart as it hit the wall, missing Rainbow by a hair’s breadth. Rainbow could rely on her pegasus agility and reflexes, but the confined space we had to work with was clearly working against her. Knowing that I had neither Rainbow's speed, nor Applejack's strength, I had tried — and apparently failed — to draw the guardians’ attention to me. It attacking Rainbow with decent range meant that I came close enough for a swing though and I tried… for testing purposes, so to speak. I actually landed a good, solid hit and it appeared to do absolutely nothing. Yikes. Well, judging by the outraged look it shot in my direction, I had successfully enraged her further. After Rainbow had successfully evaded the whip, she dove down for a solid kick. The guardian turned around with surprising speed and struck out with both hind legs. A solid hit to the chest sent me flying back down the corridor and pressed any air out of my lungs. Rainbow landed not far away from me, reeling from a similar strike herself.

“Where had that come from…?” she wheezed.

“She’s quick,” I agreed and stood back up. Under any other circumstances, I would have smiled as I saw a few technicolor stripes glow in the guardian's mane. She channeled her inner Rainbow Dash. It would have been adorable, were it not for the issue that presented us with.

I did notice that there was no immediate follow up though. Not-Applejack could have used our setback to get up close and personal, get in a couple more kicks and punches or at least a whip attack, but she did none of that. She once more stood where she had appeared. A formidable bastion, unyielding and unfazed. Rainbow’s guardian had been a lot more aggressive once she entered combat. Given their respective personalities, that made sense.

When Rainbow tried to immediately go for it again as soon as she had stood up, I held her back. “Wait,” I asked. That short moment of pause was enough for her to notice the odd behavior as well. “We now know a little about what we’re dealing with. We need a plan. That whip has a decent reach but she has difficulties using it properly in here and can’t use it to its full extent. However, from the looks of it, it will hurt quite a bit if it actually connects. She’s strong and fast and as a guardian, she won’t grow tired. She’s not out to destroy us per se, but she will do anything to prevent us from our goal.”

“Maybe we can goad her or something?” Rainbow offered. Planning phases usually were not her strong suit and that was okay. She did give viable input though.

The inky black cloud she had appeared from was still there, obstructing the view to the back of the hallway. However, if I remembered correctly, there had been a window back there. If we could kick her out of that, maybe it would take her some precious seconds to return. “I have a plan. We charge, I fake, you push. Got it?”

Rainbow furrowed her brow. She looked between the guardian and me and then, for a short moment, behind the guardian. What bloomed on her face was the same cocky grin that made me groan so many times and filled me with confidence so many other times. “Got it. Don’t get yourself killed.”

I chuckled. “I’ll try.”

To the guardians’ obvious confusion, Rainbow turned and trotted back. Past the stairs to the left side of the hallway, right up to its end. Where she carefully positioned herself by pressing one back hoof against the wall and then used a little body tension to keep steady as she joined the other one. She flapped her wings to test out how wide she could spread them. Meanwhile I faced off with it to distract a little from what Rainbow was doing. I stomped my hoof on the floorboard and pawed at it before I lowered my head as if I were about to skewer it with my horn.

Lady Luck, smile upon me, I pleaded as I charged. I felt the whip graze my shoulder as I dodge to the left and screamed, “Now!” at the top of my lungs.

A hurricane got unleashed in that little wooden corridor. The air pressure shifted suddenly, I heard wood crack and splinter behind me as Rainbow pushed herself off with all she got. She flapped her wings as hard as she could and picked up as much speed as the admittedly short corridor allowed. She zipped past me in a blur of rainbow before I even reached the guardian myself and slammed into her shoulder first with all her strength and momentum to push the creature back. I ran at top speed in an attempt to catch up to them. If Rainbow's attack would be enough — that was great. But if it would take more than that, I would just ram into them, hoping that neither Rainbow nor I would just tumble out the window with the guardian.

It became apparent quite fast that we had misjudged. Slightly.

Surprised by the one-two-combo, the guardian actually moved. Rainbow managed to push her back a good amount, way past the door we needed, but then the guardian dug her hooves into the floorboards and just stopped dead in her tracks. Like the theoretically unmoving bastion that she was. “Problem,” Rainbow yelled.

“Move! The door!” I answered without thinking. I did not waver nor wait. I continued my charge right up. Rainbow moved out of the way just in time to not be included in any mess and was about to fly for the door when I slammed into the guardian and noticed how it — unaffected by what little force I had to contribute — readied its whip. “Duck!” I ordered but I was not willing to risk Rainbow getting hit. The whip swung wide and I bit down on it to sabotage its course. I felt a metal spike pierce through the roof of my mouth, the vile taste of blood filling it up.

I heard a lock burst open and saw the fury in the guardians’ eyes. “It’s open, come on!” I heard Rainbow yell.

The guardian was perfectly capable of following us there. I knew that. Rainbow probably did not. This is going to hurt a lot…, I thought to myself. “I’ll keep her busy, move!” I yelled and spat blood to the side. Rainbow being Rainbow, she was of course not about to just abandon me. But she wasn’t. Not in my mind anyway. I used my telekinesis and just shoved her in.

Next thing I knew, a hard hit sent me flying down the corridor once more. I saw doubles when I tried to get back up and noticed how not-Applejack was aiming for the opened door. “Heck no you won’t,” I growled and tackled her. She was more annoyed than anything, but I did manage to keep her busy once more by blocking her way.

She accepted for the moment that this would apparently be a close quarter combat, spat out the handle of the whip and bit down on my shoulder. Hard.

I cried out in pain as I really had not seen that one coming. I punched against the side of her head and aimed for her ears but she continued to barely seem affected by anything I was doing.

After a moment of wrestling, she somehow managed to get a grip on my back legs. Like a filly playing with a puppet, she flung me around and smashed me through a wooden wall. The initial impact felt awful. I heard cracks I really did not want to think about and when my head hit the wood, I was sure I had blacked out for a fraction of a second. I knew — mostly thanks to Dash — that in these newer, grittier stories, they described breaking a wall as something that was easily done and left little impact on the one being punched through it. I could not, in good conscience, agree with that depiction. I lay there for just a short moment, unable to breathe, to move a single limp, to focus my vision. Everything was just pain. And if that was not enough already, I felt several gashes all over my body. The splintering wood had scratched me up badly when I moved past the hole. And pieces of debris stuck in my flesh.

I knew that I did not have much time. This guardian in particular appeared to be a single-minded monstrosity. I had never known just how strong Applejacks will was. Now I slowly got the picture. Her willpower dwarfed mine by a lot.

But I still had to buy more time for Rainbow. How? I was in bad shape. Maybe I could muster enough willpower to go for one more round, but that was it. If I died here, the dream would end.

I then had an idea. A really stupid one, which made me cackle like the madpony I might have become. “Hey, Jacky,” I croaked. “Tired already?” What I tried to do would have been so much easier with Rainbow. But I knew that it was possible to taunt Applejack into doing something stupid. Rainbow did it on a regular basis and had almost made a sport out of it. “Sorry if I got blood on your stupid hat. Might look better that way though. Those things are so out of season.” I was still lying there and stared at the ceiling and I had no indication of my attempts actually working. I should change that. “I mean, gotta give you props though. A whip is suuuch a huge improvement over a lasso. Almost like eating with actual cutlery, you know?” Slowly and under much strain, I tried to stand up. I was pretty sure my back leg was broken, the angle did not look right. So I was careful not to put any weight on it. I rolled over to stand up. And of course I rolled into a lot of wooden splinters. But they were all over me anyway, embedded in me. It barely made a difference despite the pain trying to tell me otherwise. I tried to ignore the blood around me. I just had to look out for slippery parts of the floor.

Once I finally stood, I turned around and could not help but smile in satisfaction — and feel those goosebumps out of a very simple fear — when I saw Applejack standing beyond the hole. She looked in, pawed at the ground and sported so much intense anger that the word just did not seem appropriate anymore. “I’m more of a cherry pony, you know? But wanna know what the most disgusting, vile crap was to ever touch my tongue?”

There was a very, very desperate chuckle that wanted to get out when I saw that ‘don’t you dare’-look on her maddened face. I swallowed hard, closed my eyes for just a second and stared at her. I wanted to see that one coming.

“… apples.”

Her guardian had not spoken so far. In retrospect, I was not sure if it had made any vocal sound at all. But once I dared to utter that single word, she reared back and let out what could only be described as a war cry. She jumped through the hole in one fluid motion and was close to me before I could even blink. Her first strike dislocated my lower jaw. I could feel that. The second one cracked another rib or two. After I had collapsed to the ground again, they just kept coming. Like a punching bag, I took hit after hit. I could no longer tell what hurt where. It all just hurt. I tried with what little of my willpower remained to shelter myself. I contorted inwards.

The pain is not real, I told myself. Neither are any of these wounds. I understood the theoretical approach to ‘not accepting wounds’. Luna had explained it to me on more than one occasion. But I had never been able to pull my theoretical knowledge into practice. Because once it came down to it, the mind was usually hot-wired to react to external stimuli and unlearning those instincts took tremendous effort.

This time was not any different, much to my dismay.

It helped. Thinking about something else with all my might to distract my own mind helped. A little bit. Everything swam in pain. My whole world was pain. And then suddenly, it stopped. Not the pain itself of course. That was still very much there and would be until we left the dream. But the merciless onslaught had stopped. There were no new layers piling up on top of it all.

I dared to crack one eye open. Or at least I tried. I had to put in actual effort to see past the swelling. I saw no dark orange any longer. Had she realized my ruse? Was she after Rainbow now? I’m sorry, Dash. I tried…

“Woah, what happened here?” I heard Rainbows voice from the hallway. Oh. So that was why she was suddenly gone. Like in Rainbow's dream before, the cat had been out of the bag. No reason to defend something that was not secret any longer. I heard hoof steps closing in on the hole. Then a gasp. “Holy crap,” she uttered and climbed over the broken wood to get closer. “You… you still there?” she asked. Her voice sounded utterly terrified. She looked me over and searched for a spot that wasn’t a bloody pulp. And touched it. Very, very carefully. But that did not make any difference.

“Ow,” I tried to groan, but out came some form of gurgle.

“I-I… we… we gotta go get…” she started. I heard panic climbing up her voice. Get help? Yeah, no. If I actually were in the state I was in now, I was pretty sure I would have been a goner.

“Done?” I tried. But once more, I could hardly form any sounds at all. She must have kicked in my throat at some point. I tried to take in some breath only to feel my lungs fill with blood until the pain made me give up on that as well.

Right. I had no other option. She was back out, she was here, and I had to just assume that she was done. My horn, although it had been broken at some point, gave off a soft glow and we left the dream. I had no energy left for any style, so we were just unceremoniously dumped back out onto the ground beside Applejack’s bubble.

I was just lying there for a good moment while Rainbow stood up and walked over. She walked around me, once more carefully prodded me here and there. She was obviously searching for wounds I no longer bore. “That…! I'm never going to do that again,” I groaned and threw a warning glare in Rainbow's direction.

I heard her breathe a sigh of relief. “Holy Celestia, dude! Don’t do that! Like, ever again, you hear me? I thought she had killed you.”

I knew that despite no wounds to show for it, I was still very much in bad shape. I did not dare to try to stand up. If Rainbow saw how I struggled — and quite possibly failed and just tipped over —, she would potentially remember what I had told her about the consequences in this place. And right now, I did not want that. Because I was smart sometimes and had a bit of foresight. Twilight was with Applejack, sure. But she would return soon enough I assumed. And I really, really did not want her to see me like this. Not after I had made such a big deal out of being able to stand my ground and watch myself and whatnot.

“She kinda did,” I admitted. “Don’t think I would have survived if that had been real. Luckily, it wasn't.”

After another moment of her prodding me and looking me over, she finally sat down beside me. A few moments of peace and quiet. Yes please. “You didn’t give up, did you?” she asked.

Well. Peace at least. No quiet though. I sighed deeply and allowed myself a smile. It felt so good to be free of that world of pain. “I couldn’t. I had to come through for a friend, you see.”

She nodded and reciprocated my smile. “You might be alright.”

I laughed. Got her. And all it took me was me d—

Better not to dwell on it. “Might be, yeah.” We stayed quiet for a moment. Her wings ruffled every now and then, betraying her aversion to sitting still for too long. It was me who broke the silence this time. “So — you got it?” She cringed hard at that. “Please don’t tell me it was all for nothing…”

“No,” she hastily answered. “No it wasn’t. It’s just… I don’t think she would want me to tell you.”

Oh. Privacy and stuff. Right. That was a thing. As disappointed as I was, I could — and quite frankly, had to — accept that. “Alright.”

“She was cheated on,” came after a few seconds anyway.

That was one heck of a turn. A quick one too. Out of the corner of my eyes, I tried to read Dash’s expression. Something must have made her turn on her heel this quickly. She looked troubled. Uncertain. I recognized that look. She wanted to help, but couldn’t quite figure out how just yet. So I processed this new information.

Cheated on. Like… in a relationship? And it clicked.

She had, according to Rainbow, asked her if she had lost interest. Or found somepony else. When discussing the potential reason why Rainbow had supposedly dumped her, Applejack had not been convinced by what I, at the time, thought to be a very decent, reasonable explanation. Instead, she had asked me to leave, so she could think.

Really, AJ?

I had to admit, I was mildly annoyed once more. The simplest solution is often the correct one, I heard Twilight lecture me. Yes, thank you, Twilight.

“Want my advice?” I started after a moment.

She nodded with a little more enthusiasm than she had liked judging by how she grimaced immediately after. I had no intention of embarrassing her of course. Such fun could wait for later, when our friendship was a little stronger and more established. “You’ll need a nutcracker first. Something to open her back up to you. To make her listen. I know it’s ‘uncool’, but consider digging that song up from wherever you buried it. Take it, bring it to her and tell her about it. Tell her about the lessons, the practice, your intentions, your fears. It’s gonna suck, I know. Making the first step always does. But it proves to her that you actually care for her, and just how much. I think it has a good chance to make her listen. And… if she does… explain yourself. How you panicked. Why you panicked.” That actually made me think for a moment and I steered in a new direction. “Do you know what you want by now? Concerning the Wonderbolts? And her?”

She lowered her head a little. “Not really. I want her, but that’s about what I have.”

I carefully poked her shoulder and made her look up so she would actually see me smiling at her in what I hoped would be an encouraging way. “That’s good,” I proposed. “Because it means you haven’t gone ahead and decided everything by yourself. You two are a team, right? No captain needed. Talk to her. Ask her. What does she want for the both of you? Think about it. Do you feel comfortable with what she’s presenting you with? It’s a lot of mushy stuff, I know. But sorry to say, Dash — you’ll have to get through it this time. You two should decide together where you want to head. And I think with that solved, you’ll find it a lot easier to make decisions on the other part. Because you will then know what you’re working with.”

She was not exactly thrilled by the prospect, but I had apparently struck a chord as she nodded. “You sure your coat isn’t purple beneath that?”

After that beating? Maybe. I chuckled a little bit but spared any answer. “Ready to wake up?”

“Sure. It won’t be the middle of the night or something, right?”

“Honestly… I have no idea. Time is weird in this place.” I concentrated and led the two of us out, back into the waking world. When I cracked my eyes open, I was surprised to see rainbow. Her mane was right in front of my face as she had buried it on my chest and snuggled quite close to me. I grinned as she woke up.

“Hey! What’s wrong with you!” she yelled at me and just as she had promised, kicked me out of the bed. Just not out of the window. For which I was very grateful.

“If you take a look,” I offered from my new position on the cloud floor of her bedroom, “I was still lying where I had been at the start. You are the one moving all over the place while asleep. Apparently.”

“Am not!” she protested, only to stare at the bed like it was a traitorous thing. She stood up a moment later, walked to the edge of her bed and looked down to me. I was still lying around. “Uh… you okay there?”

“It’s a very comfy floor,” I remarked and slowly raised a hoof to pat it.

“Uh-huh.”

I allowed myself a weak smile. “Wanna know something funny?”

She raised an eyebrow. “Sure. Shoot.”

“It appears to me that we haven’t even been gone for long. Like… there would be plenty of time to get that sheet and fly over.” She quickly confirmed my observation by looking out the window herself and swallowed a forming lump in her throat the moment after. “You’re Rainbow Dash,” I continued. “The Rainbow Dash. You fly into a cave and kick a fully grown dragon right in the face. You wouldn’t back down from this challenge now, would you?” My teasing tone was enough to make her flare her wings in defiance. “Right. Good to know. Now… I don’t want you to carry me down, but maybe you could fly over, tell Twilight to come get me and then, you know… be there when Applejack wakes up from her little nap. Might actually make her a little more compliant, too.”

“Right,” she nodded and started rummaging through several drawers until she tucked something small under her wing. She was already at the window — because being a pegasus, why use doors if any opening might do the job? — when she turned and regarded first her room and then me with a warning glare. “If you touch anything, I’m gonna—“

“Kick my flank, I know, I know. Don’t worry, I’m not going anywhere.” She nodded with a little force, but then regarded me once more with something akin to worry. I had not moved a single inch since my ungraceful tumble to the floor. I could see her gears turning. Should she ask me again if I was alright? But then her other half imagined herself being in my position. Maybe she did remember what I had told her about the consequences now.

She thought better of it in the end and smiled. “Thanks, Dreamwalker. You’re okay.”

High praise indeed, I noted amused while she jumped out the window and headed off towards Sweet Apple Acres. Given her nervous state, she would not be flying at top speed. But she clearly had been worried about me and excited with the prospect of winning Applejack back, so she would not dally too much either. That gave me a couple of minutes to try to pull myself together. Because so far, I had barely been able to lift a single hoof. I sighed deeply and put in a little bit more effort. “To cite The Rainbow Dash,” I grumbled to myself, “this is going to suck.”

The process of trying to regain command over my own limbs — one at a time — felt weird and was going slowly. By the time I needed to have some semblance of success, I could proudly if shakily present just that. A flash of light, a pop and the smell of ozone announced Twilight's arrival. “Dreamwalker?”

Time to test myself. I carefully stood up. My knees wobbled, but with sheer force of will, I stopped my legs from trembling too much. “Over here,” I called. She looked confused for a second. Probably because she had immediately scanned the room on entrance and had not seen me. She walked around the bed to the other side. The side I had been lying around on, and stopped right before me, eyeing me rather critically. “I’m fine,” I tried to preempt her worry, “Just a little tired, is all.”

She wordlessly leaned forward and embraced me a brief moment later. In comparison to her warm neck, I suddenly felt cold. Maybe I was? I did remember that spell she had put on me, to brace me against the lower temperatures that would be up here, but I had not noticed anything quite yet. Maybe that was it.

Maybe.

I just wished I could embrace her as well, but I dearly needed my hooves on the ground to prevent myself from collapsing. I pushed those thoughts aside, I inhaled deeply and tried to hide that pesky shudder. I loved that smell. It reminded me of home and filled my heart with warmth every time. “This is nice,” I whispered without thinking.

She giggled, but worry returned immediately. “Are you sure that you are alright?” she questioned me.

“We ran into a little bit of a roadblock with Applejack's guardian. Remind me to never mess with her again if I try.” Despite my best attempts to not dwell on it, I still felt my lower jaw hang in an angle that it really should not. I still felt my throat being tight enough to not let air pass through. I shook my head to clear it a little.

“I will,” she promised and pulled back. “Rainbow came over to ‘relieve me of my watch duty’. She told me to get you out of here before you started snooping around. She… she sounded worried.”

“Of course she did,” I remarked in perfect seriousness. “She would be furious if I found that drawer with all her toys, if you know what I mean.” Waggling my eyebrows used a lot less energy than other gestures might have. And that small grin I spared was enough to distract Twilight for the moment. She blushed a little and shook her head.

“We should leave,” she just concluded and looked around with a sudden apprehension. There were things she really did not want to know about her friends. And I was clearly toying with her. Maybe such a drawer existed, maybe not?

When her horn flashed, I took it as a warning and braced myself. And it did not help once again. We arrived at the ground below Rainbow's house and I immediately vomited whatever had been in my stomach to begin with. And a little more for good measure. I heard her ramble on about how sorry she was while she kept close to me and carefully stroked a hoof along my back. “It’s fine,” I tried to say in between retching. “Just a squeamish stomach.”

After a minute or three, I was done. Hopefully. She conjured some water — I did not know nor question from where — so that I could get rid of the awful taste. “Thank you.” I inhaled deeply, exhaled slowly and had a good explanation for my wobbling legs. “Could you do me a favor, Twilight?”

“Of course!” she hastily replied. She still felt guilty because of that teleport-fiasco. I would have loved to rid her of it, I just couldn’t right now.

“Everything is out in the open now. Wounds can heal, words can be had. They should be fine. At least for a while, until they somehow manage to butt heads with one another about something else again.” And indeed, it felt like my involvement was over, at least for the moment. Considering how smoothly things had gone with Pinkie and Fluttershy, I was very grateful for this mess to be sorted out. Hopefully sorted out, I reminded myself. It was not over until it was over. But I was optimistic that Rainbow would make it. They were meant for each other, after all.

My little rant obviously contained little in terms of asking a favor. That was why Twilight still looked at me expectantly. “I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. And I’d like some time to process that whole mess, if that’s alright with you? I think I’m just going to go for a walk. That sounds nice actually. I’ll be home for dinner, I promise.”

There it was. Please leave me. As soon as she understood, her ears splayed back against her head. But she did not take it personally, for which I was so very grateful. Maybe my reasoning made sense. I felt guilty lying to her of course. I loved Twilight. Sending her away was not easy for me. Her presence usually made everything better and I suspected that, if I gave it a chance, it might this time as well. But I dreaded it so much — I dreaded her realizing just how much this had taken out of me. I did not, really did not, want to worry her any further than she already was.

“Are you sure?” she asked with no small amount of caution in her voice. “I could just teleport us back to the castle. You could lie down on the sofa. I... I could get you some juice.”

I smiled and nodded. “I know. But yes, I’m sure. It’s just a walk, don’t worry.”

She hesitated a little longer before she nodded once more and withdrew. I battled my immediate regret and any impulse that wanted to take back what I had said until she was gone with another blinding flash. I looked around. Nopony was in sight. I looked down at my own trembling legs. “Come on, guys. Just a little further and you’ll have some rest — I promise.” My own legs did not answer, of course. And neither did they stop trembling. But as I walked along the path, they at least did not immediately fail me either.

It took me way longer than I cared to admit to basically crawl my way back into Ponyville and back to that little lake. I stood on its shore once again and looked around. A sigh of relief escaped my throat. Nopony seemed to mind me much. Perfect.

As soon as I let my willpower slip the tiniest bit, my entire body just collapsed. I slumped down like a puppet whose strings were cut. I watched the water softly ripple when the wind caressed its surface. It was pretty. And I slowly realized that I would be lying here for a good long while. And I was not sure if I would be able to keep my promise.

My eyelids felt heavy. So I let them sink shut. I heard the hustle and bustle of Ponyville. Of the many, many ponies I cherished. In that town I loved. My heart ached just a little bit. Its beat was steady. And slow. And steadily slowing. I would miss—

I heard a soft whoosh in the air. Even softer steps as a pegasus landed nearby. A smile tugged at my lips. “Hey Sunny,” I croaked. My voice strained to be heard at all. I felt like I was sinking. While lying on solid ground. It was the weirdest sensation. I did not quite feel the dirt under me any longer, or the grass tickling my belly. I did not feel the sun's warmth on my coat anymore. Or hear the wind.

“Stay with me,” I heard her voice. Soothing. Pleading. A little tingle under my skin told me of magic being cast nearby. And a second later, I felt warmth flood my body. It was pleasant, so very pleasant. After that came the feathers. She must have put her wing over me. It was nice. Warm and cozy. I could stay here, I mused. I could stay right here, with her, and be content. Happy, even.

My mind was spiraling down into the abyss and lost soon after.

“Be not afraid. And doth not tryeth to flee. Please.”

I blinked. How long had I been here already? I could not tell. But I blinked. And with that, I was back. I was aware again. I had expected Luna's voice to be a little bit more booming, like she usually was. But then again, I could hear how she tried to restrain herself.

I looked down and noted with some satisfaction that I could move my head around. I was obviously in the dreamscape. The endless, beautiful night sky stretched in all directions as far as the eye could see. With shimmering little bubbles floating about.

I slowly turned to Luna. And I did not just crane my neck. I just awkwardly shuffled around without standing up. She looked as beautiful and ethereal as her night sky. She had put away the armor and impressive weaponry for this meeting, it seemed. And after a moment of me giving no indication of flight impulse, she sat down on her haunches as well. “T’is timeth yond we talketh.”

“You’re speaking Old Equestrian again,” I remarked. My voice sounded weird. It surprised me.

She nodded. “My apologies, Dreamwalker. We simply wished to state that we need to have a conversation.” After I gave no reply and just looked at her, she cleared her throat and continued. “You have been most foolish earlier today, and because of your actions, you have almost perished.” I was pretty sure that she was exaggerating. It had not been that bad. “But,” she continued on, “that has been fixed. You still have a lot to learn and our sister has been kind enough to… open our eyes to the fact that, without guidance, it will be quite dangerous. We had asked you not to dreamwalk again, yet you did so anyway.”

“My friend needed help,” I heard myself reply.

She raised an eyebrow. “And thus you would deny us? A Princess of Equestria?”

I thought about it for just a moment and nodded. But I felt like I should say at least something to my defense. “You asked,” I remembered Twilight saying. “You did not forbid me.”

A huff of frustration. She looked cute. “T’is a technicality!” she exclaimed. It took her a moment to calm herself down. “While your loyalty is appreciated, our sister was right. You need guidance.”

I was starting to feel a little bit more like myself, despite being myself already, with each passing moment. “And you need assistance,” I offered. Right now, that made perfect sense. "I like what you did with this place. It's pretty. Like you."

She huffed again and chose to ignore the latter parts of my answer. “We are perfectly capable of handling our own duties and realm!” she insisted. I had hit a sore spot, it seemed. Probably something Celestia had told her as well. Then again, was any of that a surprise? Celestia had ruled Equestria for a thousand years after her sisters’ banishment. She had had enough time to realize how important delegating tasks was. She had a small swarm of personal assistants and the entire castle staff at her disposal. Since Luna's return, who had the Princess of the Night instated?

“I saw Celestia's dream,” I countered. My voice remained calm and steady.

Luna's conviction wavered. “T’is true that there are things that we cannot deal with right now.”

“We could,” I offered. I lifted a hoof to rub my temple. “That thing needs to be gone… like, yesterday. I cannot have her suffer like this.”

She clearly considered it. I was untrained. I acted based on knowledge I barely understood. But she had seen me fight and I suspected that there was potential to work with. I really hoped so anyway. But she shook her head after a moment. “We are getting sidetracked. We were told that you are still seeking employment. Is that correct?”

What a weird topic change. I furrowed my brow but nodded. It was true after all. “I have not decided in what direction I want to go yet. To be honest, thinking about it fills me with no small amount of choice paralysis. Even though my talents are few and far between.” But I remembered. I remembered callings from previous lives and they all vied for attention, for a revival.

“You sell yourself short, from what we were told.” Twilight’s letters. It was the only reasonable expla—

No. No, it's not.

“But we may be able to help you with your ‘choice paralysis’, amongst other things.”

“How?”

She seemed satisfied by the mere fact that I was not outright defying her again. “We have made arrangements for your enlistment in our night guard.”

I wished I had water in my mouth so I could spit it out. I instead just coughed. “Come again?”

She furrowed her brow. “You have heard us loud and clear. Our sister was kind enough to work out some paperwork to create a new position in our guard. You will not be part of the regular guard and will be at our direct command only, but you will need to be trained properly. You will work ‘under us’, is the term as we understand?”

I could not help but grin a little lopsided. “I remember being quite satisfied with that position previously,” I joked. But much to my dismay, that joke was utterly wasted as she only stared at me in confusion. Before she could remark on it, I hastily added, “No, as far as I remember, I have never been part of the night guard. It was just a stupid and immature joke. I’m sorry.”

“Immature?” she echoed and mulled it over again. She suddenly giggled. “I see. We think that would be most uncomfortable for you — we are heavier than you.”

It felt nice. Her giggle, that stupid, half-wasted joke… it was the first time we actually managed to break the ice. Get away from the formality of it all. “You really want me to be part of your guard?” I asked, still a little incredulous. She nodded and that gave me something to think about. As I did not mind sharing my thoughts, I spoke aloud for at least some of them. “I never saw myself as part of the military. And to be honest, I don’t think I would fit in. If you had offered me a regular place, it would have been easier. I could have refused right here and now.”

“Our sister assumed as much,” she replied.

“Luna?” There was something that was bothering me. Something that kept that distance up and I felt it was unnecessary.

“Yes?”

“I know you don’t give two horseshoes about ponies addressing you with your title. But could you maybe drop the royal ‘we’? Please? I… it just feels… weird. Having you be this formal with me. I remember lives where we were married and while that probably won’t be the case this time, I at least would like to treat you as a friend and would love for you to do the same. If I really am to take this offer, it would make things a lot easier as well. For me anyway.” And there was the crux, was it not? She had any right to insist on her title. It was hers after all. As much as I had no right to deny her speaking in Old Equestrian or however else she liked. But I wanted this to work out. And Applejack was already nagging me again about being honest.

Luna seemed taken aback at first. But she considered my request and to my relief complied. “We will—I will try. To be honest, you are not the first pony to request such a thing of us. Me.”

“Twilight.”

She smiled at just how immediate that response had been. “Indeed. Fair Twilight felt much the same way you apparently do. My own sister does not mind, but she remembers the old days while most others do not.”

“So your offer — is that something I can think about? Or is it a ‘once in a lifetime’-decision I have to make right now?” I was rather uncomfortable with the idea that the latter might hold true. But Luna once again tried to accommodate me.

“You may take your time. From what I understand, you are sheltered and fed for now and have little use for the pay you would receive,” she explained. “I would only ask… and yes, I refuse to forbid you. I would only ask that you refrain from dreamwalking so long as our lessons have not started. It appears that you have been quite lucky so far, but you should not test that luck. It will run out eventually.”

I grinned. “Is it okay if I hug you?”

She hesitated but gave me a curt nod a moment later. “You may.”

I stood up on still slightly wobbly legs, walked those few steps separating us and embraced her. “Of course I will listen when Lady Luck speaks. I cannot make promises, but I’ll try. It’s what I do. I try a lot.” And fail? Maybe.

When I pulled back and sat back down, now significantly closer to her, she looked bemused. “It has been a long time since I heard that title.” I could almost see the nostalgia in her eyes. “So you will consider it?”

I nodded and took notice of her sigh of relief. “We always got along with each other splendidly and I have no doubt that we will this time as well. I don’t… I’m not sure if I will live up to the uniform. That’s one concern I have. And I’m not exactly looking forward to the harsh training. I’m ways off from physical peak performance. I know that and so far, I had no reason to care much. And I fear that the other recruits will… sooner or later, they will hear that I am somehow ‘special’. And I’m rather apprehensive of what reactions that will provoke.”

I could not tell how silly some of my worries were. But to her credit, she listened intently and took them seriously all the same. “I want you to take this offer, so let me try to disperse some of your worries. Your body might not be up to the task yet. But that is the easiest thing to fix. It can be trained. And you don’t have to worry too much about representing the night guard. Given the position I have in mind for you — one where we patrol the dreamscape and keep the dreamers safe and sound, fixing nightmares and disposing of those who would harm our subjects —, I doubt that you will be seen, or in fact needed, in official capacity much. As for the other recruits… I cannot make promises of course. It is always possible to have a rotten apple in the mix. But my night guard, being a decidedly smaller unit than my dear sister’s guard, has been a tightly knit unit defined by teamwork.”

It was the best she could do. I knew that. I could not expect her to just wash away all my worries of course. But I had a couple more concerns I wanted to share — and think about. “What about Twilight?” I asked and her expression shifted through several emotions before she reigned herself in. “Training will be in Canterlot, I presume. Won’t I be stationed there as well? Would I need to move into my own house? Leave Ponyville? Because… to be honest, I don’t think I’m willing to.”

She smiled. “It is true that, for several months at a time, you would need to come to Canterlot. If it pleases you, we could have a guest room in our wing prepared for you. Or you could sleep in the barracks with the other recruits, if you so choose. But once you have finished your training, I see no reason to keep you in the capitol. Your tasks and responsibilities would not require it. In fact, I would very much prefer for you to stay with Twilight. I have offered her on several occasions to lend her a small retinue of my guards for safety reasons, but she refuses every time. She is of the opinion that having guards stationed at her castle would make her appear less approachable to the public. But you already live with her and she considers you a dear friend. Having you with her, trained to defend her if necessity arose, would ease some of my own worries.”

I chuckled a little. She clearly had given this a lot of thought. Or maybe, Celestia had. Or both. Still, the thought of leaving for such long periods did not exactly sit well with me. That gave me another idea though. One I wanted to talk with Twilight about.

I turned my attention back to Luna. “Thank you. I think I have what I need to make up my mind.”

Her crystal clear laughter stopped me dead in my answer. After her amusement had subsided, she shook her head. “You are not even going to ask?”

“Ask what?” I replied in confusion.

“About the compensation?” she offered.

That was such a weird thought. “No, of course not. Why would it matter? We have already established that I am perfectly comfy where I am. I have little use for it. Whatever you pay will surely be more than enough for what I need. The most this income will do is allow me to spoil all of you rotten.”

She laughed once more. “Me included?” she asked and after I nodded without hesitation, she giggled a little. “Maybe I should raise your compensation, then.”

Thinking about payment. Pch. Silly Luna. “Talking about ‘spoiling my friends’, though,” I started to switch topics. “You haven’t asked Twilight out on a date yet. Any particular reason?”

Now it was my turn to laugh uproariously as her dark blue coat flushed with red and she spluttered several miserably failing attempts to deflect and defend herself. As far as I remembered, she was no Celestia in regards to her calmness, but it wasn’t all that easy to unbalance her like this. I was almost proud of myself.

“We… We didst not knoweth yond the lady hadst any intentions,” she immediately reverted back to her comfort zone as soon as she had calmed down enough to talk at all. For my part, I just looked at her and waited. “What?” she finally asked.

I rubbed my neck in faux uncertainty. “Well, I mean… you’re talking crap right now and we both know it, so I thought I just wait until you try something more believable?” My barely hidden grin might have spoiled the show, but she huffed in dissatisfaction nonetheless. “Adding to that, your answer doesn’t even make all that much sense to begin with. I mean, you basically just said that you haven’t attempted to date her because you didn’t know that she felt something romantic for you. That’s really not how this works. And for a mare with your record, you should know better.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?” she honed in on the potential insult.

I shrugged with a grin. “Talking from experience: You are a passionate mare. And you don’t keep yourself closed off like your sister does. Now please. Don’t deflect. I want to help you.”

She tried to keep alive what little anger she had amassed, but it failed. A quiet sigh later and she looked me over once more. “Because we are friends?” she asked.

Of course Luna would be cautious. Just like everypony else had been. “Because I would like to be your friend, yes. And I would like you to be my friend as well. Hm. Then again… even if that would not work out, I’d probably try to help anyway. For Twilight's sake. And even if that was out of the calculation, I’d still do it. Because I know that it will be good for both of you.”

She chuckled a little. “Maybe I err in recruiting you for myself after all,” she mused.

“Please don’t tell Cadance,” I quickly pleaded.

I had her laughing once more. “Dear Dreamwalker, you seem to think that we don’t notice what is right under our noses. Our niece has been informed of you at the earliest opportunity. She had little reason to care beside her concerns for Twilight until you started to meddle in her domain and believe you me, if she were not so swamped with her duties in her empire, she would have visited a good while ago. As it stands and from what I am aware of, it is mostly due to Twilight and my dear sister that she does not shirk her duties.”

While Luna was more than just amused by my apparent naivety, her words gave me three details. First off, that the Crystal Empire apparently was a thing here. This meant that I could cross that from my to-do-list and that Cadance was a good distance away for now. The thought of her just standing in front of the door one day — as she was prone to do — scared the heck out of me. Just another meeting I was still trying to put off.

Secondly, Twilight apparently had been a lot busier than I had noticed. I actually started to wonder if she had been dutifully writing her weekly reports to Celestia this entire time. I had been here for almost two weeks now…

And the grating third revelation was that, despite me appreciating and sharing in Luna's enjoyment, she once more had tried to switch topics. So I let her enjoy it a little more until I tried once again. “You know… it’s alright if you don’t want to talk about it. Really, it is. I’m basically a stranger to you, no matter what I tell you and if you don’t feel comfortable with discussing this with me, that’s fine. Just… please tell me? So I won’t try to press you further?”

Her smile faltered and after a moment, her ears splayed back against her head. “We… I don’t know how,” she confessed in a startlingly fragile voice so full of uncertainty.

I was taken aback and just looked at her. She was a power to be reckoned with. She was thunder and lightning. Wild, untamable, powerful. She was the Mistress of the Night. And right now, she looked just as lost as I felt from time to time. “Why?” I asked and tried to put as much care into my voice as I could possibly convey.

She tried to steel herself, but the attempt ended in a sigh. “We are simply overwhelmed. We… I tried to get a grip on what has changed. In my time, courting was very different.”

I furrowed my brow. The time displacement was a problem, sure. But she had been back for a while now. Several years, in fact. Being a slow learner myself, I could perfectly understand that some things took time. But from what I knew, they had hit it off the first Nightmare Night. And there had been several of those so far. “Have you talked to Cadance?” It was the first obvious place to seek help after all. Cadance was swamped with letters seeking her counsel each and every day and she took great care — and pride — in answering them. Surely she would have some good pointers for Luna as well?

But the problem became apparent as soon as I spoke. Her beautiful eyes widened in what resembled horror. “No!” she almost cried. “No… we cannot… I mean, I can’t— I can’t. She is not only Twilight's old foal sitter and wife to her brother. She is the Princess of Love! She gets… excited. You have no idea how she is when she is excited!” A visible shudder ran down her spine and her wings rustled in agitation.

Right. I had to fight to keep that chuckle down. She apparently feared Cadance’s enthusiasm just as much as I did. "Oh don't worry, I do remember her," I replied with a smirk. "So what did you do instead?"

“I have tried to consult with present day literature, but these ‘magazines’ are all stating different approaches and rules and contradict each other.” Oh boy. I did not need to know any names of her ‘literature’. I understood perfectly well without. It also meant that she was wary to ask her sister as well. Probably because talking about romantic pursuits felt awkward? Or maybe she just did not want to involve Twilight's former teacher and maybe even surrogate mother. “This ‘dating’, as it apparently is called now, is… confusing at best.”

I could not disagree with that sentiment. But after giving it some thought, I smiled as I had found a silver lining. “Then don’t,” I started and earned a very confused look from her. “Don’t date, I mean.” My clarification still did little, so I elaborated. “We both know Twilight, right? And as far as I know, you have been over to visit Twilight for a couple of days after the actual Nightmare Night was over, each year, every year. Have you been to her bedroom? Or talked to Celestia about what she’s studying? Because half the time, she seems to have her nose buried in a book about the ancient past. She studied the music theory of your time. She studied general history. She studied Old Equestrian and mannerisms just to get a better grip on you and to better understand you. Sooo… what do you think? How likely is it that, if you were to start courting her, she’d recognize it as such? Because I have seen those book piles on her table and I’m not so sure that she hasn’t been looking for signs.” It was easy, really. She was not comfortable with ‘dating’ — and that was fine. She was however very intent on winning Twilight over. That much had become clear enough. So why not stick to the ways that she was comfortable with and that would get her to her goal on a different path?

My smile grew according to my satisfaction as I saw the revelation dawn on her face. She had missed the forest for the trees. I honestly understood that perfectly well. I was prone to do that myself on occasion. “You just have to keep an open mind,” I continued belatedly as I remembered the little nudge I gave Twilight. “Because quite frankly, after all this time, I would not be surprised if Twilight grew a little impatient with you. Might be that she’s starting to court you, which would be all fine and dandy, but it could also be that she’s trying to date you. With the stuff you’ve read, you should be able to tell. Though to be perfectly honest… those ‘magazines’ are probably trash.”

She laughed once more and I quickly chimed in. “T’is what I told Tia as well!” she replied and grinned. Hm. Interesting detail. So she had spoken with Celestia about romance in some capacity.

With both our smiles slowly receding, silence fell over our little area. It was not uncomfortable. We just had things to work out and think about. Both of us. She was probably trying to formulate a plan of attack for courting Twilight, and I…

I knew that I should be thinking about becoming a night guard. I had to admit, they had really good looking uniforms. And not becoming part of the actual military force somewhat eased my apprehension. Enough that the decision had already been made, if I was honest with myself. It was too good of an arrangement, too much of an opportunity to not take it. Working with Luna. Staying with Twilight. Getting bits for doing what I had basically planned to do anyway. It even sounded a little bit too good to be true.

No. What really kept me thinking was Twilight. She had been worried and I now remembered with an uncomfortable clarity the events that had transpired after our exit from Rainbows house. I had sent her away. And collapsed shortly after. With those darn silver bands still sending aaaall the data to her. I had tried to ease her worry, but she had every right to be worried. I had promised not to lie to her. And then turned around and told her that I was fine.

I had messed up big time. Simple as that. A deep sigh escaped me.

Luna walked over, sat down beside me and put a wing around me. It was nice of her to offer me shelter. I leaned against her without a word.

“What troubles you?” she asked after growing impatient.

“I’m afraid,” I heard myself say. I had difficulties thinking straight. Sorting out what it was that I felt. There was a lot of chaos. Again. Anger played a big part in it. I was so angry with myself. At the same time, apprehension. What would her reaction be? Would she be mad? Disappointed? A tiny voice even dared to ask: What if this was how I would lose her?

“Of what?” she continued.

Of Twilight. It was my first instinct, my first answer. But I thought better of it. I was not afraid of Twilight herself. “I’m afraid that I hurt Twilight.” That sounded right. Because on second thought, even though it had only been such a short time, I was not even afraid of losing Twilight. I was afraid of hurting her.

It took her a moment to respond. She craned her neck and noticed the metal bands my dream reflection was still wearing. Thinking back to the rather vivid exchange of letters she had had that day with Twilight, she put one and one together.

“I… she had asked me not to lie to her… and I had sent her away… and told her that I was fine…” I choked on my own words. Getting it out made me feel even more horrible. I had betrayed her trust.

“You probably have,” Luna agreed in a soothingly calm voice. Her tone was in stark contrast to her words. They hurt. But she had been the Element of Honesty once. What had I expected? I knew her. She continued after a deep sigh. “What has been done cannot be undone. No amount of apologies, gifts or distractions will change that.” There had been a lot of potential ways to sidestep the issue. And with just a single sentence, Luna had closed off most of them without effort. They were dead ends of course. I had known that deep down. Using any of them would only have made it worse. I was thankful, and at the same time disgruntled.

“An apology might still be a good start though, right?” I asked with desperate hope.

“Maybe,” she half-agreed. “You caused her pain. Face that. And learn from it. And let her know that you have learned. This grave mistake of yours means nothing if she cannot be certain that you will do better in the future.” I had to think back to the start of our conversation. How Luna had reprimanded me for my recklessness. How she had once more asked me to refrain from dreamwalking.

I would not stop. I could not. But maybe she was right. Maybe I could wait. Until I was better prepared. “Thank you, Luna.”

She raised a hoof and lightly tapped the ground. Once, twice, thrice. The lazy swirling dance of dream bubbles surrounding us was interrupted when a single one of them closed in on us. “You are very welcome… friend,” she said and used her hoof to raise my chin. I saw a gray swirl in that dream and felt an immediate connection to it. Because it was mine. “I will make sure that you remember this conversation to its fullest extent. Now go and dream. If you wish to right what went wrong, you will have to be able to walk on your own. Rest now and let your imagination soothe your pain. I will make sure that no nightmare shall trouble you.”

I embraced her. Pressed myself against her with force and nestled into the crook of her neck. She was so nice to me. Each and every time. And I felt rotten, undeserving of that friendship she so casually accepted. And offered. Her magic gripped me and a mere moment later, without much force, carefully levitated me towards the dream. There was no resistance as I sunk into it. And my consciousness drifted off, back to that moment when I felt so much relief hearing Sunny’s voice, hearing her land nearby, feeling her downy wing all over me…

I woke up feeling like Applejack had run me over with her cart.

But it was admittedly not all bad. I was warm. Cozy even. Due to Sunny’s wing still covering me like a blanket. I wanted to snuggle up a little closer when I started to notice details I had not anticipated. First off, given how perceptive she usually was, I had somehow expected her to notice me waking up the very second I did so. Maybe she had, but she did not address me in any way. I concentrated on my hearing as I let my eyelids fall shut again. My ears swiveled. I could hear other ponies way off in the distance. I heard wind rustle leaves in the nearby trees. I heard birds chirp overhead. But that all faded into the background as the most prevalent sound was her labored breathing. That was odd.

Once I cracked my eyes open again, I took a second to inspect her as best as I could from my position. I was still lying on my side with her pressed against me and her wing draped over me. But I did notice that she sported a heavy blush. She stared ahead at the lake in front of us. She was so obviously distracted by something—

And that was the moment it hit me. A light breeze hit my nostrils and they flared as I noticed it carried the scent of her arousal. And I was lying close enough that I could feel her coat being slightly sticky. Despite better knowledge, I really hoped Luna had shirked her duties and this would just turn out to be a nightmare. Just what had happened here? The familiar throbbing I usually felt with my member standing at attention just wasn’t there. It was in its sheath, where it belonged. But something obviously had happened.

I wracked my brain but the only answer I came up with… was a tiny snippet of the dream I had. A dream centered around Sunny. And it might not have been appropriate at all. So a wet dream then? Maybe this was the offset. Luna had remarked on my luck so far and how it would eventually run out. I had maneuvered myself into awkward situations in the past, Bad ones too, innuendo included. Was this some kind of ‘payment’ then? A toll?

Her scent clouded my thoughts every time it hit me. It was just so intoxicating.

Given her usual composure and perceptiveness, I could only take a wild guess just how much this must trouble her. I found myself asking: Could she stand? Walk? Fly?

My gaze drifted a few feet away. The lake was nearby. And nopony was around right now, as far as my ears could tell. Some cold water to wash away the sins then? But something bothered me, kept me from following up on that thought. It took me a moment to coax myself into giving up the necessary information. My mind drifted back to Twilight, to the night before, and I realized — with a groan that I had very much difficulty keeping down — that I wanted her to be a mess. My mess. I involuntarily thought back to Fluttershy's cottage and our unbridled flirting. To her alluring bedroom eyes and how much I wanted her then. And had she not claimed to be up for it?

But at the same time, my mind had to barely graze the thought of Twilight and my guilty conscience returned with a vengeance. Torn between feeling horny as can be and feeling bad for mistakes made — that really was a conflict I had no need for right now.

I looked her over once more. Her sublime features. My eyes traced down from her ears stiffly standing at attention to her lower jaw, along her neck and over her shoulders, sporting those beautiful wings. Down to a shapely rump and a tightly tucked in tail that swished just the tiniest bit on the odd occasion.

Buck it.

Before my inner Applejack or Fluttershy could get any funny ideas about reminding me of previous lessons, I decided to be proactive. I had considered opening with a stupid joke along the lines of ‘Did somepony see the driver of that cart?’ or something, but despite things already being bad in that regard, I wanted this to have at least a modicum of gravitas. “Sunny?” I simply addressed her.

She tensed up immediately. Even more so as I softly put a hoof to her side. For a few seconds, she did not move at all. When she finally turned her head I could see just how bothered she was. I had the strange feeling that we were both about to apologize. Maybe she saw that I had noticed her state. So I acted quickly. I did not want to hear a single word from her — not if it was an apology. This was my mess after all. Literally. I had caused this stupid situation. I still did not know with certainty what had caused her state, but I liked to think that in some way, it had been me. I actually hoped so.

She could have gone. At any point. Nothing was stopping her from just leaving.

“Thank you,” I whispered and slowly trailed my hoof along her side, down to her haunches. I pulled her in with my other hoof. There was still a mighty chance that I just misread the situation of course. Misinterpreted the signs. It would not have been a first.

No apologies, was the primary goal — but I was not about to deny her some precious seconds to decide if she wanted to let happen what was about to happen. Yet she did not pull back. She did not lift her wing or even loosen its grip. She still held me close and tight. She did not take flight or object, neither with words nor sounds or any other gesture. She just sat there and stared at me in a mixture of apprehension and panic and excitement and fear and anticipation and surely a lot more that I could barely read in these beautiful eyes as I slowly pulled her towards me.

I let my hoof slip under her tail the very moment before our lips connected. She gasped and immediately went silent. Her inner tights were basically drenched. She had been enduring this for some time, it seemed. The initiative was almost entirely on my part at first. I kissed her. I carefully applied a little bit more pressure with my hoof. And in the back of my mind, a nagging voice was questioning me. Everything I did. And my motives for it.

The voice grew a little quieter once Sunny actually kissed me back. And she looked so grateful as she moaned into me, only for the sound being quieted down considerably. It was obviously a risky game we were playing. It was becoming late, so there were not as many ponies around as before, but the danger of being spotted was still there and I tried to help her keep the façade of decency intact, but I was not sure how consistently successful that would remain.

Sunny broke the kiss. I was not sure what to expect from that but I certainly did not expect her to bite down on my neck. My mind drew an immediate connection to my ‘fight’ with Applejack, but this was different. She tried to use as little force as possible, but I still expected there to be a mark of some kind. A little soreness at least. I understood why as she started to quietly whimper in her attempts to keep herself silent. I doubled down on my efforts. Her breathing hitched and a moment later, her restraint slipped. I grimaced as it took a little effort to push past the immediate spike of pain when she doubled down.

Even with her biting down on my neck I was decently sure that anypony even remotely close by could hear her keening wail as she lost it and the first tremors started to rock her body. All that remained of her self-control was required to keep her wings from proudly snapping open.

At this point, the tiny voice told me in no uncertain terms that everything more was utterly unnecessary. Yet I found myself admiring her too much in her current state to just simply stop and consider this ‘done’. I slowly continued to move my hoof and watched her body language closely as I extended her climax as long as I could until finally, the tremors shaking her body started to subside and I pulled my hoof back. She was breathing hard against my neck. Her hot breath came in shuddering bursts straight against my neck and it all felt and sounded amazing. But I pushed that desire for more back down. This was still neither the time nor the place. It hadn’t been to begin with. This had just been… an emergency solution. I had helped her out. Right?

What a stupid excuse, I chided myself. It was doing her a disservice. And myself. I liked her. A lot. And there was no shame in admitting that I wanted her as well. I had been pretty sure that she liked me too and this seemed to only further cement this assumption. I had not been so sure about her desires, as sympathy and desire did not necessarily go hoof in hoof. But right now, I felt like that might have been cleared up as well.

“Are you okay?” I quietly asked.

“It has been a long, long time, just… give me a moment,” she replied with her voice still quaking. I nodded and did just that. I waited. She sounded a little more in control after a deep sigh. “I… am sorry, that… must have hurt…” Her gaze lingered on my neck. I obviously could not see how bad it was.

I was about to curse because all my efforts in avoiding any of us apologizing to each other seemed null and void. Ah. The bite mark. I gave a quiet chuckle. “That’s quite alright. It was… hm. It was nice.”

“Nice?” she echoed incredulously.

I had not noticed the heat rising into my face up to the points of my ears before, but became quite aware of it now as it intensified a little more. Now how was I supposed to explain that? In all honesty, it was a myriad of little reasons and most of them were difficult to put to words.

Despite me not having any issues remembering her, this would be something I cherished because it would remind me of her every time I noticed somepony staring at it or mentioning it. Or whenever I walked by a mirror. Or absentmindedly brushed a hoof over it only for it to hurt ever so slightly. And I would remember this moment. When I had made her feel good enough to let loose. Or lose control involuntarily — either was fine with me right now.

It was a mark too. In more than just the physical sense of it. It marked me as hers and mulling that sentiment over in my head, I quite enjoyed that thought. The idea of walking around with it for everypony to see, even though they would not be able to identify the perpetrator of course, somehow filled me with a strange sense of pride that I could not have explained for the life of me.

Then there was the fact of what that pain stood for. She had tried to be silent, because I had made her become louder. I had coaxed these beautiful sounds out of her, and her attempts at muffling them had only partially succeeded. She had resorted to biting me, because nothing else had worked sufficiently. It felt like the physical evidence of the power I could have over her. It made me euphoric thinking about it.

Of course, there was also the point of pain being a stimulus that, all by itself or in mixture with other stimuli, could be enjoyable just for the sake of it. That jolt running up and down my spine had made me shiver for a short moment. I had a rather low pain tolerance and the threshold of what I could take before it became uncomfortable was equally low. But that bite had hit the mark with astounding accuracy.

Now. How to explain all that?

I basically gave up after a couple of seconds of her waiting and shrugged, but accompanied by an enthusiastic grin. “Yupp. Nice. Really, really nice actually.”

She opened her mouth to pursue this further but ultimately thought better of it. And I saw storm clouds gathering strength over her head as another troubled expression started to grow on her lovely lips. “What just happened—“ she started.

“Do you regret it?” I quickly interrupted.

I could read her enough to see that she had expected as much. Still, it took her a couple of seconds before she answered. “No.” She looked like she had to feel out her own answer. How it sounded. If it felt right to stick with it. If anything needed to be added. “But it has some— It was not—”

It was strange to see her get tangled up in her own thoughts. She did not seem to be the kind of pony that was prone to that. “It wasn’t ideal,” I supplied and craned my neck to look around. Still nopony anywhere close by. So there was that at least. “And yet, neither of us regrets anything. That’s good. I sure like to hope so at least. And we both enjoyed it, I assume. Which is great.” I sighed. “I like you. A lot. I sure like looking at you a lot as well. And I want more. More of this. More of you. But, you know… less public next time, maybe.” A memory sprang to mind. Fluttershy’s cottage once again made itself known. Our timid host hid away in her kitchen and Sunny gave me that bedroom stare, daring me to make a move. Maybe without friends being present, as well?, I added in my head.

She had been silent and remained so. A glance into her eyes told me how little my words had changed. From her point of view, a lot of consequences and potential factors had to be given proper consideration. She could not allow herself to take the same liberty I had so graciously bestowed upon myself: To just ‘go with the flow’.

But she did not walk back on her answer. There was no regret for what we had done. For now anyway.

“You fancy a swim?” I asked her with as much nonchalance as I could muster. I had successfully interrupted her spiraling thoughts and could see her look around until she noticed the lake again. She nodded and we both stood up. It was the first time that I actually saw her side and blushed quite hard as I tried — and failed — not to stare. “You had a rather vivid dream, it appears,” she explained what really did not need to be explained. “I thought…” But she trailed off, shaking her head.

Probably something about protecting my decency. It mattered little. “Thank you,” I once again said and started to slowly walk towards the water. She followed suit and the water engulfed us both.

Cold. As. Ice. But that was the point. Whatever horny little thoughts and impulses remained were thoroughly frozen and drowned. The partially dried patches on Sunny's coat, her tail, my belly, everything was just drenched in water and slowly cleaned as we swam around a little. It seemed to help her clear her mind as well, because I saw those clouds drift off and her usual composure take its place.

We stepped out of the water and onto the shore again. I found myself admiring her once more and just like that day at Fluttershy’s cottage, my mind started to wander and ask questions about the inherent capability of water increasing the attractiveness of mares.

“I will need to head home soon,” she said and thereby ripped me out of my reverie. I followed her gaze up to the sky. The sun was hanging low. It would be dinner time soon enough. And that thought alone put some solid rocks into my stomach. Looking back at her though, I finally noted that her words had not been entirely true. It was more of a desire than a necessity, and more of a ‘now’ than a ‘soon’.

I tried to smile anyway. I tried to tell myself that I had not scared her off. I opened my mouth to thank her yet again, but noticed how worn out that would start to sound if I kept this up. So I opted to ask something that was actually close to my heart and something that worried me the more I thought about it instead. “Will I see you again?”

She sighed. Maybe she had hoped I would not notice? Or would not dare to speak of it? Maybe I was being clingy and she was annoyed? Truth be told, I utterly failed to read her. She would not let me. That would have been less surprising were it not for the fact that her usual mask of a practiced smile wasn’t even back in place yet.

She considered her answer carefully with her gaze averted to the ground. Maybe looking at me was a distraction. With each passing second, my stomach felt heavier and heavier. But I held onto that little bit of hope. I had not messed up. Not again. We both had no regrets. This had not been another failure.

Maybe it was Lady Luck smiling upon me once more. I dared not to question it. Sunny lifted her head again. A shaky, tiny smile graced her lips. “I hope so,” she replied. It made me exhale a breath I had apparently held in. However, she seemed uncertain what to do next. She could have just flapped her wings and lifted herself off the ground. So I took it upon myself to take initiative once more. Because I had such a great track record with that. I stepped up to her and waited. I stopped myself before I could lean in and kiss her again, because for some reason, now of all times, I wanted her to kiss me.

I saw her hesitate before she eventually leaned in and did just that. And I felt immeasurable relief. I even became cheeky enough to let my tongue slip out and graze her lips for a second before we pulled apart again. “Have a safe flight.”

“Thank you. And good luck with Twilight,” she replied and flew off.

Twilight. Right. Time to face the next disaster.

Why, oh why, could I not shake the feeling that despite my achievements and moments of success, I was still just stringing together failures like pearls on a necklace? Maybe those achievements and successes were the string connecting it all? Would that work as a metaphor? I tried to keep myself busy and distracted with musings like this while I walked back towards the castle, almost on auto-pilot.

I arrived without incidents and entered, seeing neither hide nor hair of Twilight at first — or Spike, for that matter. I ventured a guess, I walked towards the living room and indeed, as I drew closer, I could hear voices. Spike's voice, to be precise. “—worry, I’m sure he’s—“

A certain impatience had grabbed hold of me. It had creeped its way up my spine from the moment I had entered the castle and there had only been so much I was able to do to keep myself from running through the hallway and shouting Twilight's name. It meant that I had no intention of slowing down or listening for what kind of situation I might be running into. I instead simply entered the living room and as soon as I stepped inside, I looked around for both of them. They sat on the sofa and much to my dismay, Twilight looked devastated.

“Hi,” I weakly offered as both fell silent the very moment I opened the door.

This oppressive silence persisted for a couple of seconds until Spike belatedly finished his sentence. “… fine.”

“Spike, leave us alone please,” Twilight asked in a toneless voice that made me shiver.

The young dragon complied. He hugged her, then climbed off the sofa and hastily walked over to the door — and to me. I was a little startled when he hugged me as well. And his embrace was fierce enough to realize that he knew. “I’m glad you’re okay,” he whispered and allowed himself the briefest of moments before he withdrew, walked out and closed the door behind himself.

Twilight stood up and slowly walked over to me. I was not sure what to expect, so I just stood there and waited until she stopped a short distance away. We looked at each other for a moment that seemed to stretch longer and longer. I noticed the tear stains. The bloodshot eyes. The slight tremble in her lips. Her frazzled mane. Her roughed up coat. I was painfully aware of having caused all of this. And I burned it into my memory. You caused this. Look at it. Remember it. Learn to never, ever do that to her again!

She was waiting for me to do something, say something. And I wracked my brain for what to say. I had asked Luna if an apology would be a good start and while she had not denied it, she had not quite agreed either. Maybe because she had foreseen this moment. How difficult it would be to apologize for what I had done — as an apology just did not seem to quite fit the bill.

Well. I had to start somewhere. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

“For what?” she immediately asked. Although her voice trembled, it held the tone of a demand. A demand to elaborate.

I wanted to hang my head in shame but pushed past the impulse. I tried to look her in the eye, see how much pain I had caused, but I only managed for a short time. “For lying to you.” Despite everything, I was not about to apologize for what had actually caused my desolate state earlier. I had underestimated a force of the dreamscape. And had almost paid a very high price for it. But my intentions had been good. My heart had been in the right place. And I could not in good conscience apologize for wanting to help a friend.

Everything else though…

“I—“ she started but her voice broke. “I—“ she tried again but a choked sob escaped instead. Tears welled up in her eyes. Anger bled into her gaze a moment later. She raised a hoof, ready to strike. And I was waiting for it. She had every right to slap the stupid out of me. And I demanded of myself to not flinch away. To reap what I had sown.

The strike never came. Her hoof, held under such tension, started to shake. But she could not release it. So I took my chances and tried to expand on my very sorry apology. “I was wrong. In more ways than one. I underestimated a potential danger. I underestimated what damage it had done. I wanted you to be proud of me. I wanted you to still think of me being capable of holding my own. I was afraid you would think less of me once you saw just how exhausted I was. I should never have sent you away. And I should never have lied to you.” I took a deep, steadying breath as I felt my own nerves getting to me. My own voice barely contained that growing quiver. “Luna came by and fixed things. I agreed to let her teach me and wait with further dreamwalking until her lessons are over. If I can. It— I can’t— It won’t happen again. You mean so much to me, I can’t lose you over this…”

“You almost did,” she snapped. Her voice was thick with emotion. “You flatlined.” I swallowed hard. So she had not been exaggerating after all. I did not know what to say to that. And I did not want to say how sorry I was for the umpteenth time. I was still searching for words when she finally lowered her almost violently shaking hoof. She carefully rubbed along her leg to ease the ache and she stepped closer after that. I thought — hoped — I understood her intention, mirrored her movement and embraced her. She put her forelegs around me, sat on her haunches and almost choked the life out of me, so tight was her embrace. She held on for dear life. My life.

I reciprocated with force just a moment later. My fears were different than those she harbored. But they were fears nonetheless. She gently opened her wings and formed a cocoon around us. I heard no sobbing. Those were silent tears I felt in my coat as she buried her muzzle in the crook of my neck. “I was so scared,” she admitted. I was still at a loss. I was not about to say ‘I know’. So I kept quiet. And began to slowly stroke her mane and down her back in an effort to calm her. “Never, ever, do that again, you hear me?” she demanded with an unsteady voice. A small amount of her anger returned and vanished just as quickly.

I nodded. “I won’t,” I said. And I meant it. I felt her nod, mollified by my sincere answer.

I assumed that it took us several minutes to part again. In truth I had lost my sense of time. I was focused on her and her alone. Every shuddering breath a little ache in my heart. They piled up to hammer home the message loud and clear and not to be forgotten: Never. Again.

When she finally pulled back, she looked even worse than before. But she managed a genuine little smile this time. “Honey, I’m home,” I whispered with a breathy voice.

There was the barest hint of a head shake, but to my relief, her smile did not falter. “Not funny.”

“I know. I rarely am,” I admitted.

“It’s not that bad… you get used to it,” she tried herself. I offered a quiet chuckle in response and we shared a look. “I meant it,” she whispered with a more steady voice. “Please don’t leave me like this. I… I am really bad at dealing with loss.”

The image of a charred tree stump flashed before my eyes. I sighed and nodded. “Everyone is, I believe.” I pulled her back in for another hug. “I’m not going anywhere.” I could have stayed like this forever. Her embrace felt nice, her warmth slowly seeped into me and I felt my own fears slowly, very slowly, drain away. She was here. I was here. The rest could be worked out later.

“I forgive you.” And with just three words, she made me wish for this moment to last even longer. Or at least for a lot longer than it did as it took Spike just a couple of seconds after that to cautiously knock on the door and stick his head in.

“Are you guys done yet?” he quietly asked.

Twilight and I shared a soft giggle and pulled apart again. We looked at each other. Were we good? Had everything been said that needed to be said?

“Yes. I think we are done,” Twilight answered with a last sniffle and I nodded in agreement.

“Good, good, because dinner would be ready,” the young dragon stated. But instead of vanishing back to the kitchen, he walked over. Slowly, almost hesitantly.

“Don’t worry, we’re fine,” I told him and opened up for another hug. He hastily approached and drew both of us in.

“That’s good.” His muffled voice came from somewhere between us. “Then we’re gonna have dinner now, right?”

As if on cue, my stomach grumbled a little. “Well… I guess,” I replied.

“Would you two mind taking care of that? I… feel like I could use a little time in the bathroom,” Twilight asked. Some water to her face and a brush, I presumed. Both Spike and I agreed.

Dinner was served shortly after and Twilight was looking… well. Better, by far. We had just sat down to eat when White Tip landed on the table. “Hey there, buddy. Sorry that I’ve left you hanging for a while, it was… a busy day.” He cawed happily — I liked to think — and let me pet him a little, all the while merrily snatching a few pieces off my plate. It was okay, really. Spoiling them was what pets were for, right?

“Let’s dig in,” Spike proposed the very second we heard a knock from the front door.

“Huh. I wonder who that is,” Twilight said.

“This late… has to be something important, right?” I added.

She stood up and made her way to the door, seeing as whoever was visiting probably was not here for me and Spike was not about to let his meal get cold. Due to the fact that Twilight had left the door to the living room open, we could hear the conversation taking place and all of a sudden, Spike was very willing to let his food cool down.

“Terribly sorry, darling.” Rarity. “I didn’t mean to interrupt this late. I fear my little project has developed a life of its own again. I could come back later if it’s inconvenient?” Twilight was not about to send her friend away of course, but she hesitated just that fraction of a second too long, so Spike chirped in.

“It’s not!” he yelled and thereby startled both White Tip and me. He noticed White Tip crowing at him and my feathery friend then flew off to his perch again. Spike merely chuckled a little embarrassed. “Sorry.”

“You’re not still ogling her, are you?” I asked amused about his enthusiasm.

“N-No,” he stammered in response. “But… she is Rarity… you know?”

Twilight was not my Twilight any longer. But she was still Twilight. I actually thought that yes — I did know. So I nodded and patted him on the back when he quickly inspected himself to see if he was presentable.

“Is that you, Spike?” we heard Rarity ask with delight.

“Why don’t you just come in,” Twilight offered as it became clear that Rarity was not going anywhere. “I am sure you are welcome to join us for dinner!”

“Oh I wouldn’t impose… but dinner does sound rather nice. I believe I may have forgotten breakfast again.” As soon as her potential participation in our meal was even mentioned, Spike was gone. And before Rarity entered the room, he somehow had already returned and placed down another plate, sat back down in his chair and tried his hardest to look casual… which obviously defeated the point.

As soon as Rarity entered the room, our eyes met. Her gaze was intense, I had to give her that. Considering I had been around for roughly two weeks now, I was surprised that we only met now. Rarity was basically the linchpin of Ponyville's rumor mill, rivaled only by Aloe and Lotus. But the spa sisters had a unique advantage, given that most ponies became somewhat talkative during spa treatments. Rarity however worked for it. Hard. She was designing fashion in a town where barely anypony wore anything at any given time. She was a socialite — in Ponyville. She was a classy, proper lady in search of her prince charming. In Ponyville. That mare never chose the easy route.

It sometimes baffled me how exactly she maintained her status. Maybe she was just so much nosier than I knew and remembered, but I dared not to speak that thought aloud. She was known for her flair and dramatics and after today, I was in no mood for a scene.

She inspected me for a good long moment, probably noting down my color scheme, features to highlight, potential for accessories and maybe even making some assumptions on my measurements. It felt similar to what Pinkie had done on our first meeting. But there was something else. A glint. Something I found hard to read. But I was suddenly sure that this visitor was here for me.

It had taken me almost a week to even leave the castle again. But at the end of that first week, I had ordered a redecoration and Stonewood might have been a source for her to hear things. Her regular visits in Canterlot might also have contributed something, as there had probably been quite a busy day or two, maybe involving several ponies, before the Archives could deliver on a massive book order from Princess Twilight… while Princess Twilight was not even at home.

Thinking back, there were a lot of incidents that could have contributed to her seeking me out. Out of curiosity. But that glint was no curiosity. I had brought Fluttershy and Pinkie together. Two of her closest friends. I did not know for sure, but I still had high hopes for Rainbow and Applejack worked things out as well. And Rarity, despite being the Element of Generosity, had a poor track record with her suitors so far. She gave with joy and she gave in full, but there had been nopony so far to give back in kind. Spike had tried, obviously. I suspected that on some level he still did, given how long he had harbored this crush. But for all her sense of romance, Rarity was alone. A beautiful mare, stylish, well-mannered, with a sense of fashion, a successful business owner despite the adversity of her hometown, with so much of herself to give… alone.

I had heard of the saying. Those with beauty are cursed by it. ‘She’s so out of my league’, many would think. And therefore did not even try. And those disregarding that sentiment tended to have reasons to do so — reasons Rarity took a very close look upon.

One could argue that she had too high standards. Her prince charming had to be the textbook example and that just wasn’t going to happen. Maybe that was it then? This idea of romance, this idea of how romance had to be, poisoned the well and made everything way too convoluted in her head.

Maybe.

After a moment, her studying gaze drifted over and became a lot softer and warmer as she regarded Spike. “Oh, well, hello there!” she greeted with a giggle as Spike was absolutely casual.

Twilight filed in after Rarity. She smiled and shook her head as she saw Spike and closed the door. Knowing something about manners, I stood up as both mares stepped closer to the table. I would not have bothered with Twilight alone, but I knew that Rarity appreciated such gestures.

“I do not believe we had the pleasure of meeting quite yet,” Rarity said.

“The pleasure is mine, Rarity,” I replied and bowed a little. Because I was pretty certain that would catapult me into her good graces. And judging by her elated smile, I was probably right.

“Right. Rarity, this is Dreamwalker,” Twilight belatedly introduced us. “He has been living with me for the last thirteen days. Oh gosh. I have not been around for some time, have I?”

Rarity just shrugged it off with a well-balanced nonchalance. “It’s quite alright, dear, we all have our projects to keep us busy these days. Nothing to worry about. Though I have heard some things about your new…?”

“Friend,” we both hastily replied before she could insinuate anything else. Us answering this quickly obviously had quite the opposite effect. Great. Rarity would not say anything about it of course. But the wheels of the rumor mill were ever turning, mercilessly.

Rarity sidestepped to Spike to greet him with a little hug before both mares finally sat down and I could do the same. “This does look and smell divine,” she praised our little cook and filled her plate with a serving that was a lot more manageable than ours. After daintily picking at her food, she restarted the conversation. “So, Twilight, dear. Do pray tell, what have you been up to these past days?”

That little flutter she did with her fake eyelashes was disarming. Twilight smiled bashfully and I had a good inclination as to what she was probably remembering as her cheeks flushed ever so slightly. Rarity of course took note of that but did not pry any further just yet, given Spike's and my presence. And so began a conversation that seemed innocent enough on a surface level. Over the course of the next two or three hours, we sat at the table and ate, then sat around the fireplace and talked, until Spike at some point just curled up and slept on the carpet. It was getting late and I had almost given up on my suspicion. I was willing to accept that this was just friendly banter and an opportunity to get to know each other. But then Rarity quietly whispered Spike's name and as the young dragon was soundly asleep, let an almost predatory grin grow on her face that warned both Twilight and me.

“Friends, my darlings? Really now? From what I have heard, you had quite an interesting time together.”

Ahhh, Rarity. To be frank — dancing around in a mine field was exactly the part I had not missed about her. But I knew that she had fun doing this. Outmaneuvering others in verbal ripostes. Teasing and waiting for denial or confirmation.

Maybe she knew about our first kiss. It was possible that some birds had seen it and told Fluttershy, who in turn could have told Rarity at the spa — because Rarity was constantly fishing for new snippets like that — and Fluttershy was the kind of pony that would never, ever, let me know she saw or heard anything like that.

Maybe she knew about our first and only night together. Spike had been somewhere else. Maybe he talked to the crusaders and grumbled about not getting enough sleep because of the volume from some rooms over. And wouldn’t you know, Sweetie Belle — one of the Crusaders — was Rarity’s little sister, bugging her on an almost daily basis. Or Spike could have told Rarity himself. Maybe she had heard or even witnessed herself one of the many, many quite intimate embraces we had shared.

There were just so many options. And she was keeping her cards close to her chest as usual.

I would let her have her fun on any other day. But today had indeed been eventful and I just could not be bothered. “I kissed her when we first met,” I started to shortcut her game. “And yes, we have been very close so far, but we are just friends. Good friends. Close friends. But friends.”

She seemed almost a bit disappointed and looked to Twilight for something juicier. But Twilight just gave her affirmation to what I had said with a nod, grateful that she would not have to brave this interrogation alone. “Hmmm,” Rarity hummed as she mulled my answer over. “I must admit, I am quite interested in this ‘closeness’ you two share, but maybe that can wait for another day.” Twilight sighed in relief, much to my surprise. She knew Rarity. She really should have known better. I kept my guard up as I knew that the pristine white unicorn was only readying her next attack. “The castle looks marvelous. I admire what you did with the interior,” she innocently continued and addressed Twilight first but watched me like a hawk out of the corner of her eyes.

Really, I could not.

I dragged a hoof across my face and rubbed my temple. “Rarity… I like you. Really, I do. We had a lot of good times. But could I maybe interest you in a consistent, chronological retelling of the events of the past two weeks instead of you fishing for details? It would make things so much easier.”

She looked almost shocked for a few seconds. “Well you’re no fun,” she replied with a dainty huff.

I tried to smile apologetically. “I’m really sorry. But I had a long and very stressful day. I’m a little unbalanced and I believe so is Twilight. I don’t mind telling you stuff. I would love to have you as a friend again. But right now, I just… I can’t play games. Any other day, be my guest. But please, not today.”

She regarded me with an inquisitive look. She Searched for evidence of what I had claimed. And she inspected Twilight in much the same way. The good thing was that, as a creative mind, as a fashion designer no less, Rarity was very much used to having a critical eye. She saw details others needed instruments to notice. Twilight's eyes were still slightly redder than they normally were. Her coat was ruffled in a few places, even after her quick self-care in the bathroom before dinner. And I probably still looked like an extra from the Walking Dead musical.

She relented with a sigh. “Just my luck, I suppose,” she mumbled to herself. “I pick the one day when everything is utter mayhem.” She scooched a little closer to Twilight. “You do look worn out, darling. Are you feeling alright?”

Twilight tried to smile past her exhaustion, but only half-succeeded. “I’m fine, just… tired.”

Despite her occasional mercilessness when it came to rumor hunting, Rarity did care. Quite a lot actually, as she usually enjoyed the rumor mill, but ultimately used it for good intents and purposes. “I am given to understand that Dreamwalker over here has your trust and is living with you in a permanent arrangement?” she asked. Although the question confused Twilight for a moment, I had my assumptions about what this was for. As soon as Twilight nodded, Rarity gave her a warm smile and hugged her. “Then you shall take little Spikey over there and go to bed, darling. Dreamwalker and I will have a little chat and he can see me off once we are done.”

The idea of going to bed was obviously enticing to Twilight. Her gaze first fell upon Spike who was happily snoring away on the carpet and mumbled something unintelligible. Then she looked at me. I had to stifle a giggle as she looked so concerned. Almost like Rarity would devour me the very second she left us alone.

She would try, of course. Figuratively speaking.

“It’s alright. Go to bed,” I said. “I promise she’ll be safe with me.”

“Such a gentlecolt.” Rarity’s overjoyed smile had me chuckling again. For a brief moment, a very brief moment, I could absolutely understand how Spike fell for her.

“Alright,” Twilight relented. She stood up and carefully took Spike in her magic, levitating him off the floor. “Good night, you two. And sorry, Rarity.”

“I won’t have any of that, Twilight,” Rarity objected. “We have been talking for quite some time, have we not? If anything, this only proves that we should do this more often.”

Twilight hugged Rarity first and me right after. “Good night,” we wished each other and she finally retreated from the room. The door closed and we heard her hoofsteps receding. I missed the warmth of her hug already.

“And just what has drained her this much?” Rarity quietly asked as she turned her attention from the door back to me.

“I died,” I answered with a dark, nonchalant chuckle.

“Oh… oh dear…” She paled a little — which was an impressive feat, given her coat color.

“It’s fine. I’m all better now. Maybe you want that story now? I promise, despite my lack of enthusiasm, I will make a decent storyteller — even in this sorry state.” I tried to convince her with a smile but quickly found that ‘convincing her’ was absolutely unnecessary.

She crossed her front hooves while she settled down on her belly on the sofa again and appeared as regal as a lady should. She then flashed me one of her famous smiles to loosen my tongue. “I would very much like that, yes.”

And so I started. Again.

Rarity knew how to read ponies. And she knew even better how to read between the lines. Certain things I surely would not have to spell out. I knew that. At the same time, I was well aware that, given my state, she was probably getting a lot more from me than I intended. But I was fine with that for now. It was still the lesser of two evils.

There were certain parts I left out completely. Despite knowing that Twilight and Rarity were very close friends, I was certainly not about to tell her about my night with her. In the same vein, I did not tell her what exactly had happened just a couple of hours ago with Sunny at the lake. She was free to fill in the blanks however she saw fit. I certainly knew I could not stop her anyway.

She listened intently and rarely injected her questions, to my surprise. Either she was being considerate, or I was indeed a halfway decent storyteller.

“Luna basically shoved me back into my own dream after that and I woke up at the lake. Sunny was still there. She had apparently watched over me. We talked a little, went for a swim… but she had to head home eventually and I returned here. To nopony’s surprise, Twilight was… well…” My throat got tighter again and I swallowed. “She was devastated. Stupid bands. I thought they were a great idea at first, but…”

“Do you really wish to rethink your position on that?” Rarity asked with something in her voice that made me look up. As usual: If she wanted to be ominous or mysterious, she just was.

I mulled her question over and realized that she was right. If she was implying what I thought she was implying anyway. “No. It wouldn’t have made anything better I suppose,” I admitted. And she looked quite satisfied with that answer. “Spike was happy to see me again. Given how clingy he was for a moment, I guess either Twilight told him what was going on or he figured it out himself, at least partially. Either way, he’s a lot better at taking such stuff in stride. He left and… Twilight and I had a talk. I like to think that we successfully cleared the air. We sat down for dinner after that and you came along.”

Rarity hummed to herself again. “There is a lot I would like to ask you. And even more to think about. It is quite a story. But seeing as night has fallen and my boutique needs to be open at a certain hour, I shall refrain from unleashing the bulk of my curiosity for now. There is something I like to say however.”

I smiled and nodded. I was pretty sure that I knew what was coming next. “As I said, I promised Luna — and more importantly Twilight — to wait with further dreamwalking. Luckily, we won’t need that for you. Considering everything that’s been going on, you might actually be the easiest case.” Rarity did not mind putting in work herself. I actually expected her to be revolted by the idea of me 'fixing' things for her. It went against her fantasies and her understanding of how romance was supposed to work. I could however show her a path she had overlooked so far.

Incomparable confusion. It was not the expression I had expected to see on her face. She blinked a couple of times until she recomposed herself. “Excuse me, but could you maybe... elaborate on that?” she asked.

“Oh… I-I… uh… I thought you wanted… some…” Element of Generosity. Rarity was all about giving. Neither taking, nor asking. Had some of the friendship problems of the past not been due to the fact that she found it hard to say ‘no’ at times? To claim something for herself or to ask favors? How had I suspected that whatever she wanted to bring up with the little time remaining was about her? “… pointers?”

While that certainly had not been on the forefront of her thoughts, I could see that my misjudgment had placed a new idea in her mind, mixed with a great deal of curiosity. After weighing her options, her decision became apparent once her alluring smile threatened to draw me in. “Pointers, you say…” she almost purred. “I admit, I am curious about this as well. You claim to have intimate knowledge of all of us and I find little to object to the idea. Given what we — Ponyville as a community, Equestria as a nation and our little ragtag band of friends — have been through in the last years. So I am willing to take your word on this. I…” Her smile faltered for a moment and her gaze drifted off to the side. It grew clouded with regret and even shame. “I am loath to admit it, but I had to battle my envy just a little bit. Seeing my dear Fluttershy this happy, like a beautiful desert rose drinking from the first rain in many years. It is a sight to behold. Even Pinkie seems different now, despite her being happy all the time anyway.”

She was the lynchpin, I reminded myself. Which meant that she probably knew about something that was still bothering me. “Do you know what happened between Applejack and Rainbow Dash? Today, I mean?” The idiocy of my own question became clear once I had said it out loud. Rarity had mentioned how her project was keeping her busy enough that Twilight had seen neither hide nor hair of her in two weeks. Some new dress or fashion line or something like that. She probably was not quite up to date on—

“Oh yes, those two.” Nevermind. “While Sweet Apple Acres is a little off the beaten track, I still heard that there had been a most joyous reunion. Apparently Apple Bloom could barely stop rambling on about it and neither could Scootaloo.” A deep sigh of relief escaped my throat. That was obviously not proof that it had worked. But a ‘joyous reunion’ was a good enough hint for me. It was not time for any Apple family reunion I knew of, no holidays around either. So it seemed likely. Rarity regarded me with a sympathetic smile. “A weight off your shoulders?”

I smiled tiredly. “Like you wouldn’t believe.” Silence fell over the room, broken only occasionally by the fireplace giving a quiet crackle. Rarity seemed… well, not uncomfortable per se, but she seemed hesitant to speak up again. It took me a couple of seconds to realize why. “Right. Hints,” I resumed. “So you’re willing to listen to me?”

She gave an unladylike shrug which betrayed her refined manners for just a moment. “Whatever you can tell me is but information to be used however I see fit. If I decide that I do not like what I hear, I may as well disregard it, no?”

I chuckled and nodded. “Sure. Reminds me of Applejack actually. If she had not been in a relationship already, I probably could have told her whatever I felt like, she would just listen and do whatever she wanted with it. Probably store it away for later and forget all about it, because of work.”

“That does sound like her,” Rarity agreed.

“Right. So. I hate to break it to you, but this isn’t exactly anything that can be handled with subtlety,” I started and I was not surprised to see Rarity raise an eyebrow.

“Dear, everything can be handled with subtlety,” she objected. “But I understand the point you are trying to make. Please excuse the interruption. You may continue.”

“You have a problem, Rarity. You are smart, you are beautiful and you are successful,” I noted with satisfaction how her face lit up due to the pleasant compliments. “True, we all have our own little idiosyncrasies. But by any means, you should be way more successful than you are in your search for a suitable partner. While I am not one hundred percent certain to understand why you’re not, I do know of a few things that might give you just what you want. But… you will have to make some concessions.”

“And here I was thinking about praising your skills of flattery,” she sighed. She looked down at her own hooves, probably weighing her options. I had yet to continue — because I waited for her to allow me to do so. If she was not willing to make any concessions at all, then all I had to say was already a lost cause. “Please. Tell me.”

I nodded. “You pined for Blueblood and… well. The less said about the incident, or him, the better.” She grimaced in annoyance. It was enough for me to cut this reminder short. “I won’t tell you that there’s only one prince charming out there. There are probably a lot. But I know of one who would very much welcome you into his life. In fact, I believe he already did. Or at least tried. On numerous occasions.”

Rarity furrowed her brow and regarded me with a hint of impatience. “Was it not you who told me that there was barely any energy left to play games?”

I grinned sheepishly. “Fair enough. I'm talking about Fancy Pants.” The name alone made her eyes go wide. “He’s a good stallion. Upper class, respectable, successful, articulate, well-mannered, good-looking… and what is a lot more important anyway: He has a good heart. Good humor, generous, respectful, looks out for the ‘little ponies’ around him. He explicitly invited you to several parties and each and every time, he makes an effort to spend some time with you specifically.”

Rarity’s smile grew sadder the longer I talked. She nodded to all I had to say and in the end added her own little detail. “You are quite right, he does that. So does his paramour, Fleur de Lis.”

My smile only grew into a grin. I had anticipated something right. She was not seeing it. “I know.”

She shook her head in confusion. “Then how is this supposed to be helpful? Surely you don’t intend for me to sabotage their relationship?”

“That’s where the concessions come in,” I started and immediately held up a hoof to stop her shocked objections. “And not in the way you think. See, I don’t think you can sabotage what they have. They live in an open-ended relationship. As far as I am aware, they both invited you. They both cherish your company. They both attempt to spend time with you whenever you are in Canterlot, be it as a couple or one on one. There is a reason for that.”

“Oh.” Hearing her realize it was perplexing. I could not have told what kind of reaction I had expected. Just something more wordy than this probably.

“Details vary from memory to memory. There’s always a chance that I’m off the mark,” I admitted. “But you… you don’t love stallions.”

“Excuse me?” There was a carefully guarded neutrality to her remark. A warning that I was standing on thin ice.

“Please go on. Tell me how you care what’s under somepony’s tail,” I snapped. And I immediately cringed and wilted under her withering glare. “Sorry, that was uncalled for. What I wanted to say is this: You appreciate beauty. And eventually, you come to love it. And you are not restricted by gender, or even race. You can see the beauty in anypony, anycreature, anything surrounding you. It’s what drives you. What constantly spurs you on to create. Add new fabrics, work with new color combinations, and let yourself be inspired by a sight that has caught your attention. Fleur is beautiful and you know that. And I am not talking about her shapely body, because the way you see the world, most creatures in it are more than just the shell they live in. It’s what allowed you to see beauty in a water serpent, where others only saw a creature at best or a beast at worst. I think you appreciate her as a friend already, a close and dear one. I just want to put the possibility out there and open your eyes to the idea that there’s potential for more. There’s a reason they share your attention and time. Both are interested. They both vie for you. They balance it so as to not upset the other. They have a whole set of rules and I barely know any of those, because quite frankly, those are just not the social circles I usually find myself in. But maybe think about it? Instead of one prince, you could have a prince and a princess. Instead of one stallion to spoil rotten with suits, you could fawn over the newest dress with the very paramour that’s supposed to wear it. I certainly know that you have enough to give for two ponies. But as you said… you do whatever you want with whatever I tell you.”

She fell silent for quite some time. If not for her expression changing now and then and her eyes blinking, I might as well have guessed she drifted off to sleep. “How many?” she finally asked.

I quickly understood what she was asking and shook my head. “Does it matter?” I declined her request. “As those last weeks have proven, my memory is helpful, but it’s traitorous as well. Something that cannot be relied upon like a crutch. I have enough memories to support what I just said. Now if you tell me, going back through the years of you visiting Canterlot since that first Gala with Twilight, that you never noticed them doing any of what I told you about, then I am obviously wrong. At least this time. But if you remember these instances and especially if they are numerous, then consider what I told you to be an option. A hint rather. Something to be investigated.” I chuckled. “And I know that you love to solve a good mystery.”

“That is true, I have my vices,” she joked with a smile.

“Nah. I don’t think that counts as a vice. Eating too much cookie dough strawberry ice cream, that’s a vice.” I laughed as she levitated one of the sofa pillows and threw it at me full force. Of course I just took it in my own magic and stopped it right before my face. “How unladylike,” I chided.

Instead of retorting she drifted off to her musings once more. “How would that even work…?” she mumbled more to herself than me, but looked up at me anyway.

“Well honestly, I’m not sure I’m able to tell you,” I replied with a shrug. “Funny enough, I have very vivid memories of living in a similar relationship with Twilight and Luna. It wasn’t open, just the three of us. But three is more than two and that already makes my head hurt, just thinking about the logistics of it all… But I remember us being happy. So very, very happy.” I was running my mouth again and I knew it the very second I saw her eyes light up with glee. “Won’t happen this time,” I quickly added, but I could not tell if that did anything to whatever was going on in her head. Maybe she should write fanfiction…

Then I remembered something. “Say, I don’t suppose you’re done with this topic for now?”

She looked up once more, curious about what I was getting at. “Well you certainly gave me a lot to think about. None of it will be resolved tonight however. So if there is anything you wish to talk about before I take my leave, please — be my guest.”

I smiled gratefully. “Thanks, but it’s actually the other way around. Before I assumed the wrong thing once more and got us horribly side-tracked, you were about to tell me something?”

“Was I?” she asked and thought back. She clearly remembered as her expression shifted into a determined mask. “Ah. Yes, that. I just fear that with this little side-track of ours, it might not have quite the gravitas I had hoped to imbue it with.”

“Maybe,” I replied. “But it seemed important to you.”

“It is,” she confirmed. She considered her approach and after overcoming her hesitation, she slowly started. “This is about Twilight. And the others for that matter. But mostly about Twilight.”

“Is this the ‘state your intentions!’-speech fathers are supposed to give to the young suitors of their children? Because I gave that speech recently and it would be quite funny to receive it myself now…” She once more shot me this surprisingly effective withering glare. I thought Fluttershy was the one with stare-based powers. “Gravitas, right. Sorry,” I backpedaled.

A quiet huff escaped her before she continued. “You seem to be very dear to her, that much became quite clear. And you seem to be a decent pony, which I am grateful for. But I am worried about these memories you have. They give you what appears to be an advantage on the surface, but as you already found out yourself — looks can be deceiving. I can only imagine how difficult it must be, having this supposed knowledge and not using it. In a sense, this is a warning and I promise you that it is with good intentions that I utter it. But more to the point, I wish for you to be careful. You are not just rearranging a puzzle someone broke. You are dealing with ponies, with their hearts and dreams and lives and wishes. And some of these ponies are especially dear to me. Now, you have already hurt Twilight once and while I am not happy about that, I can see that you harbor honest regret about it and that she has forgiven you. However I will be very cross with you if you hurt any of them in future and I want to make sure that I am understood: Despite what we may look like or what you may remember, it is neither Applejack nor Twilight you will have to fear in the end. It is me.”

Halfway through I realized what kind of speech this would shape up to be and braced myself for it. Of course I could not promise her that I would never hurt her friends. Even though I had promised something very similar to Twilight a few hours prior. First off, I loathed promising something I could not guarantee to keep. Having such promises in effect was always a little grating. Secondly, I hoped that soon enough — if not already — her friends would be my friends as well.

But I was not about to object. She needed to make this speech to make a point. She was mama bear, the great protector, and I had to fear her ferocious rage. It was all quite clear and endearing and I tried very hard not to smile. Even though her reminder that I had hurt Twilight still stung and felt unnecessary. But I remained silent and let her finish.

It is me, her voice rang in my head. My sight swam, my head suddenly felt light…

Oh no.

“Falling,” I croaked as I already saw the world tilt sideways. Lucky me, Rarity was a professional fainter. She knew exactly what happened and acted quickly. She broke my fall by levitating a couple of sofa pillows under me.

I barely felt them. I barely felt my own body at all. I could not even close my eyes. Or see what they were supposed to show me. I instead tried to push through another flash of insight. It felt like ages since I had a bigger one. I trudged through muddy waters, everything slowed me down, and all this muck clung to me…

There were sounds. A sudden smell hit my nose but was gone before my mind could actually categorize it. Scenes flashed before my eyes, way too fast to comprehend…

After maybe half a minute I blinked and signaled my return with a groan. “That was weird,” I croaked and slowly sat up.

“You don’t say,” she replied. Rarity was in front of me and looked quite worried. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah. I’m fine,” I replied almost automatically — a bad habit of mine, apparently. “It was just another flash. It’s just… they are usually not this vague? Like… I can’t even tell you what I remembered. Sorry. I did not want to ruin your speech. I know what you’re getting at, you’ve been quite clear. I… I’ll try. I care about them. Of course I don’t want to hurt them. So yeah. I’ll try.”

She regarded me a little longer, as if I could tip over at the drop of a hat — which was probably possible to be fair. She had listened of course. And she seemed satisfied with both what I had said and what she saw. ”Good. Now I believe you have told me that you had quite the exhausting day as well. Might that have played a role in your… fainting?”

I shrugged. “Maybe. I wouldn’t be able to tell.”

She gave a curt nod and stood up. “Well in this case, darling, I believe it to be time for our farewells for this evening.” I escorted her to the door just as I had promised and we each said our goodbyes and good nights. I still felt a little woozy, but I tried to keep that hidden and it seemed to work well enough.

I briefly returned to the living room once the door was closed to sort the pillows back to their intended place and open the window for Owlicious and White Tip. “Sorry, guys, but I won’t accompany you tonight. I’m spent. Have fun though.” A quiet crow, a quick hoot and they were off into the beautiful night sky. I admired Luna's work and her beautiful moon for a few minutes before a particularly chilly breeze made me shudder.

I found myself wandering the hallways after that. I had concluded my little trip to the bathroom and was now uncertain what to do. Twilight was certainly fast asleep by now. Spike as well. The only inhabitants that were awake were gone and only I remained, with the very unappealing prospect of not being able to sleep again.

I had forgotten about that.

“Right. What now?” I asked in the empty, dark hallway. I walked around some more and hoped to get lost again for some reason, but with the new interior it was considerably harder. And so I stood before Twilight's bedroom. I considered my options. My own indecisiveness frustrated me and I pushed past with great effort. I opened the door and closed it behind me once I was in. Spikes’ snoring, albeit quiet, was still breaking the silence permeating the room. I walked over to the bed and stopped in front of it. It was actually a funny scene, I mused. Twilight was lying on her back, her wings tucked close, her mane a pretty mess sprawling across her pillow, her lips ever so slightly parted and her tongue hanging out the side a tiny bit. I wondered for a brief moment how she could sleep like that, but disregarded the thought. It would only serve to keep me rooted to this very spot for even longer. And I still needed to make a decision. Preferably before it became even creepier. I had basically snuck into her bedroom and was staring at her at night while she slept.

I turned around.

I would not let her wake up just so I could—

“Crap,” I hissed quietly as something sharp and pointy found itself under my hoof while I was slowly walking back to the door. I sat down and inspected my hoof, but found that it had not pierced the skin. A tiny splinter of ruby. I had my suspicions where that had come from and grumpily looked over at Spike. The little dragon was happily snoring away of course. Little scamp.

I craned my neck a little to look behind me and much to my dismay, a very drowsy looking Twilight regarded me with light confusion. “Go back to sleep,” I said and with a little more care inspecting the floor started to make my way to the door again.

“You don’t have to go,” she said. And just like that, I stopped. My resolve melted away and I looked back once more. “You can stay,” she offered and drowsily rubbed her eyes. “Please?”

Maybe. Maybe I could have refused in some way before that last word, but now? I hesitated only briefly before I turned back and climbed into bed. She lifted the blanket with a wing and a welcome and familiar warmth surrounded me immediately upon scooching closer. “Thank you,” I offered. I was not even sure if she listened or understood. She just smiled happily and almost crawled into me. And she once more buried her muzzle on my chest. I embraced her. I held her tight. And with her close, I felt at ease.

Just friends, it echoed in my mind.

Sure. You keep telling that to yourself. Maybe one day, you'll even believe it.

Her warmth seeped into me. Spike's little snores were almost as precise as the sounds of a metronome. And eventually, I drifted off.

Day 14: Preparations

When I opened my eyes the next morning I felt renewed. And to my surprise, Twilight was already awake. Her eyes were open and she gazed at me with amusement and curiosity. “Hey there,” I greeted her.

“Hi,” she replied, giggling.

The mere fact that she seemed to be in good spirits made my heart lighter already. “Sorry for barging in last night… I didn’t quite know what to do with myself.”

“It’s fine, don’t worry. You slept?” There was just the tiniest hint of concern, strangely coupled with hope.

“Like a log,” I replied with a nod. “And I didn’t even have to whisk you away for that.”

It had obviously been intended as a joke. She did appreciate it as one, but her reply was still a little bit on the serious side. “I would not have minded.”

I quietly chuckled. “I know. But I really shouldn’t let this become a habit. Maybe, if things get a little too much, I could ask Fluttershy or Pinkie.”

“I don’t mind. Really,” she tried to assure me, only for her to immediately furrow her brow in thought. “Why those two?”

I felt warmth flood my cheeks. “Snuggling up to them is quite cozy,” I admitted. “And I know that you don’t mind, but… after how I initially avoided her and then proceeded to ignore her wishes, I think I have some ways to go before I get into Luna's good graces. I'm inclined to say: Hogging you all to myself won’t help. No matter how much I’d like that.”

“You would like that?” she echoed with another giggle.

I leaned forward and kissed her forehead. “Very much,” I assured her.

We fell silent for a while and just enjoyed the comfy warmth of each other. She buried her face on my chest again and sighed. “You smell nice. I think I never told you.” She pulled back and looked up at me, trying to gauge my reaction to such a compliment.

I was flattered of course. But after answering her question with a small head shake, my curiosity won out. “Like what?”

“It’s hard to find the right words for it,” she admitted. But she was willing to give it a try. “Like comfort. A hot bath after walking through rain. That one shoulder when you really want to cry. Like my bed after a long, taxing day.”

A playful smile tugged at my lips. “Well… I mean, we are in your bed, so…”

She smiled and jabbed me in the shoulder. “Don’t make fun of me!” she demanded.

“Because you’re a princess and your mere presence commands respect, right?” I offered.

“Right!” She gave a curt nod, but mere seconds later we both grinned.

“Well… thank you for the compliment,” I finally replied. “If I may be so bold: You smell like paper and books, a library’s worth. There’s an almost metallic note, it’s the ink. A little bit of wood and… it’s less about smell, more… I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I’m a unicorn, but I can almost smell the magic on you. All of it combined is very much ‘you’. It means comfort. Shelter. Home. Warmth. Love. Trust. Joy. So much joy. It’s intoxicating.”

She blushed and mumbled a quiet “Thank you.”

I hugged her tight once more and I felt like I was finally ready to face the day. Which meant that I had to keep her in bed with me just a little bit longer so we could talk, given my plans and ideas. What a tragedy. And there really was no other way. None at all. “Do you have any plans for today?” I started again. “Because I have one, and it requires your full attention.”

She smiled a little lopsided. “Does it now?” She went through her mental checklist and ultimately shrugged. “Nothing important comes to mind. I was thinking about spending some time with my friends today.” And then she suddenly remembered. “How did your evening with Rarity go?”

“Well lucky me — my plan includes dinner tonight. With all of them,” I replied with a smile. “If they can make time of course. I thought we might send Spike around town inviting them, so they have enough time to prepare?”

She nodded. “That would work.” She was curious of course, but she refrained from pushing further for now and I turned my attention to her other question.

“It went well, I think,” I mused. “I had difficulties finding common ground with her in earlier… uh… iterations. But I think I’ll just increase my effort on that front. I like her. She gave me the whole ‘I’m going to come after you if you hurt my friends’-speech. It was a nice conversation, despite what that last part might sound like. I think she just needed to say that. You know? She can be quite protective. Guess that’s a side effect of being an older sibling. Applejack is like that as well.”

“I will not be able to tell you — I only know the other side,” Twilight answered with an amused smile. “But I’m glad you two get along.” She pulled back again after a longer moment of silence and looked up at me with a playful smile on her lips. “So… if we meet them at dinner, what are we supposed to do until then?”

Her sudden attempt at innuendo had me quietly laughing. It was just so unexpected. Once my amusement had died down to a grin, I scooched closer and brought my lips to her ears. “Oh don’t worry,” I started fully intent on paying her back for that. “You’ll be enjoying yourself, I think. And I’ll be right there with you. Why, I would even expect there to be some wistful sighing and the occasional groan.” Just to reinforce my own attempt, I let the tip of my tongue trace along the edge of her ear and noted with great satisfaction the shudder that ran along her body. That was the point when I went in for the kill. “Research.”

She immediately started to giggle. I received another jab to the shoulder and I was quite happy with that. I pulled back to a more proper distance and watched her one or two failed attempts to calm herself back down. She even tried to hold her breath to keep herself from giggling further. It was adorable.

“And what are we going to research,” she asked once she had herself under control again.

“That,” I said with gusto, “is a great question to discuss over breakfast!”

Although she pouted at me with her best puppy dog eyes — these big, pleading eyes — I remained adamant and—

I just fled the bed.

I laughed like a madpony when I crawled away from her and left the enticing warmth of the blanket to scramble to my hooves. “See you at breakfast!” I half-yelled over my shoulder while I made a beeline for the door. She could have stopped me of course. In a myriad of ways. She could have just encased the entire room in a protective barrier. Or she could just as easily take me up in her telekinesis and put me down on the bed again. But this was sort of a game and without the rules ever being clarified, she understood and accepted them, only whining after me about how unfair that was.

I might have been first in the bathroom, but I sure wasn’t at the table. “Good morning Spike,” I greeted once I entered, only to find Twilight already sitting at the table. She raised an eyebrow at me and looked very smug.

“Good morning, Dreamwalker. You sure have taken your time,” she replied with a mischievous playfulness.

I was about to ask when I remembered that there were several bathrooms and she could effortlessly teleport around the place. But sure, I was the one playing unfair.

Spike had meanwhile greeted me in much the same manner as I had him and filled my plate with scrambled eggs. A delicious looking fruit salad was patiently waiting in a tiny bowl right next to my plate. “Looks great, buddy,” I praised him and his eyes lit up.

“Thanks! We’re a little short on some stuff, but I was working with what we got. Twilight? I was thinking about maybe going to the market after breakfast?” Just his body language and intonation alone made it quite clear that shopping for groceries surely was not what had him so excited about the indirect question.

She shared a short look with me before she turned to him. “Let’s make this one of your two chores for today and after that, you can run around with the Cutie Mark Crusaders.”

Observing his reaction was quite entertaining. First there was his delighted smile about the prospect of having less to do and therefore more free time. Then came the creeping suspicion about what might have brought on such a generous offer and it immediately latched onto that currently unnamed second chore. And before he could think about that more in depth, he finally registered her assumption about why he was so intent on getting out of the castle today. “How did you—“ he blurted out but cut himself off. Not that it helped him much. Twilight just smiled serenely and in that instance almost looked like Celestia. Celestia, The All-Knowing. According to a frankly insultingly large number of ponies anyway. “What’s the other one?” he settled after another few attempts that found no words.

“Dreamwalker and I are going to delve into the library today, so I presume we are going to be quite busy,” she informed him. “But we would like to invite our friends for dinner tonight. Do you think you could go and invite them?”

He perked up in an instant and his light chuckle filled the kitchen. “Sure thing, Twi! Applejack will probably be at the market anyway, Pinkie and Rarity aren’t that far off and Rainbow… might be a chance encounter.”

“Fluttershy should be at the market today as well, around midday,” I added. When both of them looked at me funny, I shrugged. “What? If Twilight keeps her calendar up to date — which I know she does —, then today should be the day of the month where Fluttershy goes to get new bird feed.”

Both nodded and I was pretty sure that somewhere in Twilight's room, a lone pencil floated over to a calendar to make a little note on today’s entry. The magic wreathing along her horn with no indication what she was casting in the kitchen was admittedly a small indicator for that.

“You wanted to tell me what we were going to study,” Twilight meanwhile shifted the topic while we all started to dig in.

“Right,” I replied and collected my thoughts. “First off, I need to know a couple of things to see if this idea is viable at all. I need to know a little bit more about enchanting.” Aaand I had her full attention. “When we created these bands, the properties of the used material were crucial. Silver can hold more enchantments, gold amplifies them. But my question concerns the energy flow. You, as the enchanter, had to put a lot of energy into these things to make them work as intended. But it’s not a continuous drain on you. You pay that energy upfront once, and now they just work. Is there some kind of expiration date on these?”

Several books plopped into existence in the kitchen right out of nowhere. They floated in her magic and opened to the pages she required. She wanted to show me certain passages since she knew every word on those pages by heart anyway. She was about to answer when Spike loudly cleared his throat. “No books in the kitchen!” he reminded her with a reprimanding tone one would have expected from a stern father.

“Oh, right, sorry,” Twilight conceded and the books vanished again. After he gave her a nod, she turned back to me. “They have. I planned for these experiments to take no longer than two weeks approximately.”

I nodded. “So you put enough energy into them for the spell to work for two weeks, right?” I tried to make it as clear-cut as possible. Mostly for my own sake. Once she had confirmed that, I continued. “That means that it is possible to craft artifacts by giving them their own magic reserve to draw from. And the crafter designs how large that reserve is when the item is enchanted. Usually as large as the initial intake of energy. Is it possible to specifically create an artifact with a reserve larger than the amount of energy you initially put in?”

Spike flung his claws into the air after giving up. He had tried to follow our back and forth, but this was beyond his knowledge. “I give up. I’m out. See you later.” He cleared the table of our plates. They had been emptied rather fast. But he left the bowl of fruit salad where it was: Untouched before both Twilight and me. He then walked out of the kitchen and I just… I wanted to say that I was sorry, that I was not excluding him from the conversation on purpose, but my attention was fully absorbed elsewhere.

Twilight was in her lecture mode again. It made me smile seeing her like this. “Well, it is possible on a theoretical level, sure.” With Spike being gone and his earlier admonition all but forgotten, several books once again popped back into the kitchen and floated in a lazy swirl of skimming pages. Her voice clearly intoned an unspoken ‘but why would anyone want that’ and I was about to answer when she continued. “If you intend to create an artifact capable of consuming energy at any point after its creation, you are usually better off creating one without reserve at all. It’s a more complicated process, but if you have the necessary knowledge, it is less taxing on the creator's magical reserves.”

“It is a longer process though,” I countered. “And more taxing on your mental state, as you have to concentrate a lot harder to activate it. There is a smaller margin for errors, given the complexity.”

“True, but…” She blushed a little and got quieter. “That has never been a problem for me…”

I chuckled. She was just so gosh-darn cute. Of course it had not. “Next question: Any enchantment that needs activation can be activated by a sufficiently equipped wielder. Right or wrong?”

She furrowed her brow. “Depends,” was her immediate answer. “Unicorns are not the only known race to produce artifacts, as we are not the only race to be capable of actively wielding our magic. There are even some rare earth pony and pegasus artifacts. I always had the intention of studying how these came to be. I assumed they were created by some way of passive absorption, but that would obviously require further study, as it does not explain their scarcity. Equestria’s population is at an all-time high. If proximity was the only requirement, we should see an increase in creation of these artifacts. Anyway — enchantments can be created with explicit rules governing who, how, and even when they can be activated. For example, a Timberwolf Tooth can only be activated by somepony under stress or fear, with a timberwolf in close proximity. Such adjustments can even be made by a skilled enough enchanter after the initial creation process was concluded. That is one of the many reasons I have to be so careful with newfound relics — you never know who has tampered with them over the years.”

I refrained from chuckling and tried hard not to grin. Once we entered a topic she was not only intimately familiar with, but ecstatic about, she got distracted so easily. I saw the source of the issue — for her, right now, this was a general lecture. It was not her research project. Not yet anyway. “That being said,” I brought her back on track, “an ordinary enchantment without further modification should be able to be activated by most wielders using active magic, right?” She thought about it for a moment and nodded. “Okay, so… last question before we can get into the nitty-gritty. What does it take to make an enchantment run infinitely?”

“The obvious first answer is: infinite energy,” she replied with a knowing smile. “But that is the good thing about magic. There are ways around this. They are just very, very, very dangerous.”

For the first time since we had entered this conversation, concern started to grow in her eyes. But I was not satisfied with this answer yet. “Is it possible to create an enchantment with a somewhat flexible source of energy income?”

Instead of answering, she regarded me with that bright curiosity of hers — and worry. “Dreamwalker, what exactly are we trying to create here?”

I might have had a tendency to be dense at inopportune times, but lucky me, this was not one of those times. Her voice made quite clear that this was no longer a situation to be joking around or pushing my luck. “Alright, so… hear me out,” I asked her and she seemed fine with that for now. Time to make a pitch. “Luna is in Canterlot. Because, well, she lives there. The palace is there, her Night Court is there, her guard is there, all that stuff. Celestia is there as well, for the same reasons. And the both of us are stuck here in Ponyville. Flying over takes hours, and you can only teleport this ridiculous distance once per day. I know, I know — that might increase with time. But we’re talking, like, decades. If not centuries. To be honest, the idea was born out of a very selfish thought. Soon enough, I will enter guard training. I will have to move to Canterlot. Either get a house or take a guest room in the palace — Luna offered one —, or sleep in the barracks with the other recruits. But to be honest, I don’t want to. I want none of that. Neither do I want to leave you alone in here again, nor do I want to move. Flying takes hours, train takes even longer, and teleportation is out of the question. But! What if it wasn’t? If we could create a set of artifacts that could allow teleportation between two fixed locations — wherever the artifacts are — then that would solve quite a lot of problems. But we would have to consider a lot of factors.”

“Like the amount of energy it takes to teleport such a distance,” she took over. She started to see the puzzle pieces come together. “Or by whom and how these can be activated.” I nodded. She mulled it over some more and stared holes into her fruit salad. Eventually, she turned her attention back to me. “The magic reserve?”

I took my cue. “Luna and Celestia both have massive amounts of magic just lying around, collecting dust. Ah! Before you object: That was just the thought that got me started. Of course this kind of long distance teleport would be draining, even for them, if performed on a daily basis. And I know next to nothing about how they recover lost energy. But I remember you talking about weird artifacts you uncovered, recovered, rebuilt, encountered, read about… and I remember some of them being described as ‘getting stronger with time’. Of course I know that these, especially, often turn out to be of the very dangerous sort. Feeding off emotions, draining life energy, that kind of stuff. But: Magic is energy, energy is life, and life is all around us. There is magic in those clouds above us. There’s magic in every blade of grass. There’s magic in a rock. There’s magic in crystals and gemstones. There is the faintest veil of magic in the air itself. If these artifacts were capable of connecting to that, we might be onto a winner. Of course we would have to be careful to somehow dictate how much energy the artifact is allowed to drain from which source. Given how little magic the air actually holds, there’s little to gain there. But air is constantly moving, mixing. Take, say, ten percent. Ten percent from almost nothing might still be almost nothing. Almost. Take another thirty, forty percent from rock. Doesn’t use it much, right? Doesn’t need it, either. Still, rock only holds little energy to begin with. But repeat that with every source in a given, defined proximity and you get something. I have no idea how viable that would be, but it would be something to ease the burden. And whatever else is needed, whatever else is required, should be filled up by whoever is attempting to use it. Luna wants to come over for dinner? Sure thing — charge that artifact and she’s here. I want to go home after training? Charge that thing and here I am. It’s admittedly a massive effort just to gain some convenience. But I would really, really like that convenience? Even if, in the end, it would only allow me a single night per week, that would still be better than having to return after several months.”

With my pitch now being out in the open, she stayed silent and considered my proposal. I took hold of my fruit salad and absentmindedly started to eat again to keep myself busy — and to refrain from getting anxious. Funny enough, Twilight did the same after just a moment.

With the salad eventually being gone and nothing much left to keep me busy, I looked at her. “So, what do you say?”

She sighed, but a small smile brightened her features. “I really liked this morning. I can see how this might be a problem in the future, with Luna and I hopefully becoming… closer, but… it might take a lot of time until she will be around for each and every night.” Judging by the bright red in her cheeks that continued to light up her ears, she enjoyed the very idea of that quite a bit. “And given our duties, maybe that won’t ever come to pass. But I had enough lonely nights. Spike has grown too old to snuggle up to me anymore, it’s all too ‘mushy’ for his tastes now, but I very much enjoyed the company. It’s admittedly my favorite part of any sleepover. Not having to sleep alone.” She looked up, our eyes met and I could see that she was searching for understanding. Somepony to tell her that it was not weird.

So I stood up, walked those few steps over and embraced her. “I understand,” I said with as much gravitas as I could muster. Because I did. Sleeping alone, night after night, for years on end… most ponies seemed perfectly fine with that. For me — us, apparently — it was an endurance test. Something that, over long periods of time, slowly ground us down.

I withdrew sometime later and sat down again. She looked grateful. “I think I want this as much as you do,” she concluded. It was not the answer I had expected. All this time she had apparently not thought about how to do this — rather, she had thought about why. And if she wanted it. And how much she wanted it. That made perfect sense for her, in retrospect. She was the Element of Magic. She was a living grimoire, containing more spells than most ponies encountered in their entire lives. She had enchanted her first items while others were still learning how to control the flow of their own magic. ‘How’ was rarely a question she needed to ask. Either it was possible, or it was impossible. Simple as that.

And apparently, this was important enough to her to find out which one was true.

It filled me with anticipation. “Shall we see if it’s viable, then?” I asked her with an excited grin.

“Let’s,” she replied in kind.

We got up, levitated our empty salad bowls to the sink and walked over to the living room. As soon as we arrived, Twilight started to levitate several stacks of books around. They had cluttered the floor long enough and we needed the space. For new stacks of books of course. She was not about to actually sort them away, as that would have taken too much precious time and focus away and most of them were research material for ongoing topics anyway. She instead just shuffled them into a corner where they were less obtrusive.

I tried to help as much as I could, occasionally glancing at the titles and wondering just how many topics she studied in parallel. However, there was one stack that caught my attention and made me stop. I stared at it with conflicting feelings before settling on a course of action. “Twilight? Can we sort these away?”

“Is that not what we are doing right now?” she asked, amused.

“No, I mean… yes… but I mean… can we sort these ‘away-away’?” Some of my apprehension must have found its way into my voice as she immediately stopped what she was doing and walked over to have a look.

It was a stack we had not touched for a couple of days. All the material we carried together in hopes of finding out what exactly had brought me here. My mind almost revolted against the very idea of that research now. “Are you sure?” she asked. She cared. Despite her own uncertainty — as I could only imagine what it made her feel to give up on a research project by just outright abandoning it —, she was willing to do as I asked. If only I was certain about this.

And there was no hesitation on my part at all. “I am. I admit, it has been rare that I thought about this at all. With all the stuff that’s been going on. But it quickly turned to ‘I don’t care anymore’, and now I don’t want to know. Wherever I came from, whoever I was before — I don’t want to know. I have a place here. I belong.” I had not realized how agitated I had grown until she stood by my side and put her wing over my withers. “Sorry, I just… I’m staying.”

This time.

There were a myriad of voices in my head. Some edged me to indulge. Some were angry. Some were whiny little—

They each represented something. Some emotion or wish or desire. Something. Even those voices constantly doubting me, those filled with hatred… it was just an expression of my self-deprecation. This voice, however…

Only two words. The only two words I had ever heard from that voice. I heard it for the first time. And I hoped almost desperately that I would never, ever, hear it again. It sounded foreign. Not just strange, not just weird or alien — it did not sound like it belonged in my head.

“I’m glad,” Twilight remarked and her soothing warm voice brought me back from wherever I had gone off to. I shot her a shaky smile and we simply disbanded the stack. This one stack, we did sort away properly. As a token.

After we had cleared up the living room as much as we needed, we settled down on the sofa. Several sheets of parchment were at the ready, with two inkwells and half a dozen feathers nearby. The blackboard blocked the sight of the fireplace and within a few couple of minutes, we were utterly surrounded by new stacks of books.

We worked together as if we had done so for years on end. It made me smile to notice it. And it took us less than ten minutes after really starting our work to figure out that such a teleportation device was very much possible. In theory. It was all about binding an inactive spell to a material and forcing a self-renewing command upon it. The spell would automatically draw the amount of energy required from the provided reserve and do what it was meant to do. A simple failsafe would guarantee that nothing at all would happen if the reserve could not offer enough energy. Because that was still better than anything weird happening, like the artifact searching for alternative energy sources nearby on its own. As Lord Tirek himself had proven — ponies were great energy sources.

Most of these first minutes were spent confirming that almost all parts of the artifact were quite simple. The only complex part was the magic reserve itself. Constructing it larger than initially required was moderately sophisticated, but still easy compared to our intended pièce de résistance: Teaching the reserve how to draw energy from its surroundings.

We had to define ‘surroundings’ first, which was more difficult than anticipated. Just like the flow of time in the dreamscape, spells had a rather unique way of measuring distances. We could not just tell it to leave everything beyond a three mile radius alone. The density of materials, both physical and magical, was of importance. Air was a gas, but its relatively low quantity of magic made it harder to pull energy through and out of. Rock, while having more energy stored, was a very dense physical material. Which inadvertently pulled our research into an impromptu material comparison. Rock was different from concrete, concrete was different from marble. Glass, sand, basalt, limestone… depending on the surroundings the artifact would be placed in, there were a lot of very specific materials to be found and potentially used.

We postponed the detail work on that front for now, having run into a very open, but still manageable field. It was busywork in a way. A lot of names had to be looked up. Density needed to be compared. Ideally with some samples, since material density could vary and the exact composition of gasses was a headache in itself. But that was fine tuning. It could be worked out later. Heck, with Twilight's know-how, it could be worked out over decades of actively using that thing, with little recalibrations squeezing another tenth of a percent of efficiency out later on.

Next, we had to work on the energy limit. We were starting with the obvious: Relative numbers were better than absolute ones. Taking forty percent from a rock would result in little difference. Taking forty percent from a pony might kill it via system shock. In addition, there needed to be some sort of memory. A rock had one hundred percent energy. The artifact took forty. After an interval of time we had yet to specify, the reserve scanned its surroundings again — because we quickly came to the realization that interval scanning was more manageable than a constant field of drain — and oh look, a rock! Taking another forty percent from that rock, treating the remaining sixty percent as the new one hundred percent… that would clearly have catastrophic results. Sure, it meant that the energy level would never reach zero. But that was not necessary for things to go awfully awry. The reserve had to somehow ‘remember’ the rock's initial state of being, so that it could recognize on future scans how much the rock had absorbed in that time, so it in turn did not take more than that.

The long and short of it was: There was a lot of math involved.

A. Lot.

Suffice it to say, Twilight was euphoric. Soon enough, duplication spells were unpacked to just make more blackboards. The dialogue between us heavily tilted to her side as she jumped like Mare-do-Well from one train of thought onto the next one and back, following up on several leads in parallel. I injected my ideas and knowledge here and there, brought up the occasional concern or remarked on some of her tracks leading down to obvious dead ends, but in the end… I was well aware that this was a Twilight-show now, with me as a sometimes helpful sidekick. And I was fine with that. This was magic, after all. Her element. Literally.

So I basically just enjoyed the ride.

Spike had left the castle after breakfast. And he came back several times. Probably to dispose of the groceries, to sort them away in the kitchen. On one of his returns, I thought I had heard a filly giggle in the hallway, but I refrained from thinking about it too much.

I had barely noticed the sun move across the sky and slowly dip down to the east when I heard a knock at the door to the living room. Considering how Twilight was deep in thought going over the several complex calculations, I used my telekinesis to open it. Spike peeked his head in. “You guys doing alright in here?” he asked and looked over the massive amounts of books and several blackboards without so much as an inch of free space and stacks upon stacks of research notes with a couple of empty ink wells distributed throughout the room. His eyes grew wider. So this was a little bit more than her usual research binge then.

I still sat on the sofa and allowed myself a quiet chuckle, so as to not disturb Twilight. “We’re fine, we’re just… busy. What is it? Need any help?”

Spike looked on in disbelief and took in the sight once more. He stopped when he observed what Twilight was doing. “Is she Twilighting again? You can tell me.”

Despite my best efforts, I had to laugh a little at that. “No, she’s not. I gave her a conundrum that, apparently, can be solved by using copious amounts of math.” I looked around the room. “And research material.” I looked once more. “And notes. Lots of notes. And blackboards. Multiple.”

He snickered because I only now realized just how overstuffed the room had become. “If you say so,” he conceded for now. “I was about to start making dinner.”

My ears perked up. “The invitations?”

“All delivered and confirmed,” he said with no small amount of pride and puffed out his chest.

I smiled. “You’re the best. Thank you, Spike! Do you need help in the kitchen?”

He looked at the once-room-now-disaster and shook his head. “I think she’s close to that point where she really needs supervision, and I’d be done with dinner by the time you found your way over here anyway,” he joked. Fair point. There had been a sort of alleyway at some point, leading from the door to our current center of operation. I had used it a couple of times to make new tea for us and we had both used it to go to the bathroom, but the research material had simply closed that gap by now, it seemed. “However,” he belatedly added, “I think the others might be around anytime soon, so maybe try to get her to take a break?”

I looked over at Twilight. She had apparently run into another minor hiccup with her calculations, as three dozen books were levitating around her head, their pages quickly turning. Her eyes rapidly scanned the familiar lines of formulae. “I’ll… try,” I replied. Once Spike was gone, I felt a little conflicted. On one hoof, I was perfectly aware that I was waiting for a ‘good moment’ to interrupt her. On the other hoof, I was just as aware that such a moment would not come to pass. I sighed heavily, stood up and walked over to her. I looked at the blackboards, but the complexity of the calculations had reached a level where my eyes just glazed over. “Twilight?” No reaction. I ducked under a couple of floating books to get even closer and now stood right beside her. I thought that she did notice my presence, but since I was not interrupting her, she just continued on.

“Twiiiliiight,” I sang in a whisper and nuzzled my way along her neck. I was grinning like a madpony and expected some hilarious reaction that… did not come. Her wings rustled a little, I could see her get goosebumps, but other than that, the magic of math was unbroken. A worthy opponent then.

“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” I said with a sigh. I took one of my quills in my telekinesis and slowly lowered it until it was almost on the floor. I then guided it over to us, right under Twilight, only to be raised a little higher. A single stroke along her belly was all it needed.

Of course I was aware of the three dozen books floating around us. And she would never forgive me for hurting them. And yes, it was ‘hurting them’, not ‘damaging them’, as Twilight revered them almost like living friends the same way Fluttershy thought about trees. Those admittedly were living. So when a sudden bout of laughter shook her to the core and her concentration broke, I was ready, took over her telekinetic grip on those books and quickly lowered them to the ground. The amount was a little much for me but I managed barely. I forgot about the chalk, but that piece dropping and rolling off between the stacks was not quite as bad.

She looked at me in confusion and mild irritation. “What was that about?!”

Her huffy face made me chuckle. “It’s evening, Spike is back home and has started preparing dinner and our friends will be here soon.”

“But… but it was…” She looked out the window and noted the time of day as well. “It had only been early afternoon,” she dejectedly replied.

“Aw… don’t worry,” I said and brushed up against her. I raised her chin with a hoof and nuzzled her cheek. “We got a good start in, I think.”

She perked up a little, mostly because of the closeness, but then turned her attention to the blackboards again. “This is very complex. The calculations all require each other and this is work for… years, maybe.”

“Decades, probably,” I added. While hesitant to do so, she nodded and looked at me. I could almost read her mind. We had hoped for something more than that. But I remembered a simple fact about Twilight and smiled. I leaned over to nestle against her. “It doesn’t have to be perfect, Twi. The important thing is that it works without endangering others. So long as we can guarantee that much, everything else is a bonus. And this bonus is something you can work on continuously whenever you have time for it. Let’s say we start out with one teleport per week. That’s not exactly a lot. But it’s still something. We build that. We establish it. And if you find something to fine-tune it so that it comes down to five days instead of seven — great. We can implement that later on.”

I saw her gears turning. Saw how she regarded those calculations again. She wanted those answers. She wanted them to be perfect. To be the most efficient they could be, right from the start. But I hoped I had made a decent point, one she could not object to. There was time. And rarely did things start without the need — or capabilities — of further improvement.

“Fine,” she conceded and turned to me for a hug. “But don’t you dare whine about being homesick!”

I chuckled. “I will most definitely do that. A lot,” I admitted and we both giggled a little. Then we heard a knock from the main door. “Ah. That will probably be our guests.” I looked at the ocean of books around us. “Uh… mind telling me which ones we can pile onto which?”

She looked things over for a short moment and proceeded to restore the alleyway to its former glory. We then made our way to the door.

“—n’t think they would do that, it’s just so— Oh, hello, darlings!” Rarity greeted us and broke away from her prior conversation with Rainbow Dash.

The whole bunch was there already, much to our surprise. Pinkie was the first to hop in — literally — and give both Twilight and me a rib-crushing hug. “I’m so happy!” she yelled. “We didn’t have one of these in ages!” I could not help but notice her saddlebags. A part of a banner stuck out from one, reading ‘—epover ever’. Sleepover. Best sleepover, I presumed. We had sent out Spike to invite them for dinner, sure, but I was not about to object. It may even make it easier for me.

Fluttershy meanwhile walked past us three with a happy, beaming smile. “Hello Twilight. It’s so nice to see you again,” she greeted and carefully hugged her as well before turning to me. “And you too, Dreamwalker.”

“H-Hi,” I croaked out.

“Pinkie, darling, would you mind not choking them unconscious just yet?” Rarity tried to help. Successfully, as it turned out. While Pinkie walked over to Fluttershy and apparently glued herself to her side again, Rarity stepped up to greet us in her usual fashion. “Twilight, really… you need your beauty sleep. You look frazzled again.”

“It’s just been a busy day in the library, Rarity, don’t worry,” she replied.

Rarity eyed her critically but decided to leave it be for now. She gave a nod and moved on to me. “Well, well, I’d say, you look almost radiant this lovely evening!”

I grinned from ear to ear. Making ponies feel good about themselves must clearly be part of her elemental magic. Or it was just a Rarity-thing in general. “Thank you. And you look positively smashing yourself,” I gave back and we both deigned to ignore Rainbows gagging sounds in the background.

“Hey guys,” was the full extent of Rainbow's overjoyed greeting when she lazily flapped her wings and flew in, straight over our heads. Or it would have been, were it not for Twilight grabbing her tail in her magic and carefully yanking her down to the floor so she could hug her. “Ugh,” she protested weakly, but I did see her reciprocate. Which was the reason she shot me another of those ‘snitches get stitches’-looks. I only grinned and said nothing.

And finally, Applejack came in. “Howdy sugarcube,” she greeted Twilight and thereby saved Rainbow from her terrible, terrible fate and sacrificed herself to it in turn. “Mind if I lend Dreamwalker for a moment and you gals just went on? We’ll come along shortly.”

As much as her request surprised me, I was not about to object. In fact, I honestly wasn’t even paying that much attention. I was watching. Observing. Fluttershy leaned over and nuzzled Pinkie's cheek, only for her to grin and bump her flank into the yellow pegasus. In the same vein, Rainbow was very much ‘checking out’ Applejack, back to her confident, proud demeanor.

They were doing fine. They were alright. Safe and sound and happy. And by extension, so was I.

I barely noticed all of them walking down the hallway. Applejack stood not that far away, watching them go as well. With the door now closed behind us and the daylight receding, the hallways were dimming down again. It made it hard to read her expression when I turned my attention to her.

“I’m gonna be nice about this and make it quick for you, alright?” she asked.

I did not know what I was getting myself into and nodded. And I gasped and wheezed a second later as a single, powerful punch of one of her front hooves connected with my chest and seemed to press all air out of my lungs. “That is for hurtin' Twi and almost dyin'. And for goin' behind my back,” she stated. I was about to topple over when she was suddenly there to hold me. It was the kind, warm embrace I had not expected, least of all given the circumstances. She stroked a hoof down my mane and neck and just helped me stand. She kept me upright and steady, gave me time to recover and behaved almost like a doting sibling. “And this is for helpin',” she quietly whispered. “It takes more than that of course, but… maybe you are part of the family.” With words being somewhat uncooperative again, I instead opted to hug her more tightly. With more force than I had thought I had left in me after that punch. It was now very clear to me why she had sent the others away of course. There would have been unnecessary drama. But she and I had an understanding. It had been her right and she had exercised it. I had faced the consequences of my actions — both good and bad.

Once I pulled back, I smiled at her. “Thank you.”

She chuckled. “You’re probably the first to say that after havin' his breath squeezed out of his lungs,” she drawled. “So what do you say? We’re good? Time for supper?”

I grinned. “Maybe, but knowing what you’re capable of, that was still barely a ‘love tap’. And yes, I think so.”

We went to the dining hall. And for once, standing at a junction in the hallway, I actually had to think about where that was. It did not take me long, but the mere fact that I had to stop walking and think about it at all was astounding to me. The dining hall, being this grand, lofty room, was rarely ever used. When we wanted to eat, we did so as a family of three in the kitchen or on rare occasions, when we wanted to get fancy, in the living room. But the dining hall had an advantage these two rooms lacked: Enough sitting space for all of us.

Twilight and Rarity immediately looked over to us when we entered. Twilight was obviously trying to gauge if there had been any problems, so I subtly shook my head to ease her worries, while Rarity was just good old Rarity — a little bit nosy.

Applejack walked over and took her seat next to Rainbow while I sat down between Twilight and Pinkie. The seat on Twilight's other side was empty as well and given that Rarity was sitting next to it, I presumed Spike would attempt to smother me in my sleep if I took it. The thought made me chuckle a little and reminded me of a prior conversation. Rarity will always be Rarity.

With all of us except Spike being present, they started to talk up a storm. Fluttershy inquired about the bat population in Applejack's orchard, which did not exactly thrill the farmer to talk about, but she made an effort to assure the pegasus that yes, they were still there and they were still well. Rainbow meanwhile boasted to Pinkie about her newest flight routine and how utterly death-defying it was, only to earn herself a sidelong glare from Applejack that could have melted stone into a puddle. Pinkie in turn giggled — as she often did — and told Rainbow aaall about dating Fluttershy. It took less than ten seconds for the pegasus to deeply regret her life choices as she was not only bombarded with mushy stuff, but some more risqué details about Fluttershy that she probably had not wanted to know. Fluttershy herself seemed utterly oblivious to that. Rarity had her ears swivel this way and that way to be a little part of everything, as per usual, but did engage in her own little conversation with Twilight by asking about her new research. A topic which included me as well. We tried to explain the concept to her and that went over well enough, but as soon as we tried to go into more detail to explain the several problems we were facing, her eyes glazed over just the same way mine had when staring at the blackboard.

It was kind of funny to watch.

So I tried to claw my way into her good graces and rescued her. I switched up topics and asked about that ominous latest project she had. It was at that point that Spike returned. He balanced trays and plates and whatnot. I excused myself for a short moment to help him get everything set and he became a part of that discussion afterwards. Rarity was quite frustrated with one of her clients from Canterlot. Because a written contract stated such, she was not allowed to even name the pony, but the demands that had been made reminded her of that one time she had offered all of her friends to make dresses for them, only for them to turn around and demand fixes and alterations which, by the end of it, had maimed and distorted her initial vision.

Considering how Spike was quick to try to console Rarity and Twilight, always the critical thinker, was already analyzing and dissecting a problem that surely had a proper solution, I held back and quite literally leaned back. I decided to just… enjoy myself. Enjoying the company. The room was full without being overcrowded. It was somewhat loud, without it being deafening or even uncomfortable. Even Fluttershy seemed fine and she really was no big fan of increased volume.

I did not take myself completely out of the equation of course. I participated here and there, depending on how topics shifted. I told Fluttershy about how White Tip was doing, I told Rainbow about how Twilight and I were developing a totally wicked teleportation artifact that would allow us to zoom around quicker than she ever could hope to be — just to rile her up a little, for funsies. And then…

“You got any idea yet?” Applejack asked me. Talking about the Cutie Mark Crusaders latest attempts at alchemy under Zecora’s careful guidance — was it the fifth or sixth attempt? — had somehow led to her asking me about my job. Or lack thereof.

“Kind of?” I replied. “I can do something nopony else can, even though I’m apparently a bloody amateur stumbling around mostly based on luck. Luna wants me to work under her direct command.”

The farmer let out a low whistle. “Well that sure is somethin'!”

“Wait! You’re going to be a guard?!” Rainbow interrupted and immediately abandoned her own conversation to gawk at me.

“Uh… maybe?” I suddenly had a lot more attention than I wanted right now. And I did notice that dangerous little glimmer in Rarity’s eyes.

“I think that’s nice,” Fluttershy offered to nopony’s surprise. Nevertheless, her honest smile could only be answered in kind.

And then Rainbow broke out in laughter. “I’m gonna mess with you so hard. Like, all the time,” she promised.

It did not take me long to understand what she was thinking. “Actually,” I objected, “I’m going to be part of the night guard.” Was I really about to boast about the very thing I had not wanted? “Sort of,” I belatedly added as a compromise.

“Uhhh!” Rarity started with glee. “Their armors are so dashing!”

“I don’t think I will actually wear any,” I tried to nip her enthusiasm in the bud. “Aside from the times we’re dreamwalking. Which will be the job.”

“So you’re literally going to make your bits by napping?” Rainbow asked envious beyond belief.

That actually had me in stitches. “Sure,” I wheezed out, “that’s one way to put it.” Once I had finally managed to calm down after a good while, I cleared some tears away. “But I fear ‘messing with me’ won’t be half as much fun. I’m not going to stand still for hours on end in some empty corridor or something.”

“Yeah, I figured,” Rainbow grumbled with a pout. She perked up again quickly once Applejack gave her a little jab. “They do look wicked though,” she admitted. “Maybe Rares has a point for once. You should wear it. It would make you look, like, a thousand percent cooler. Which isn't much, but still an improvement.”

“Excuse me?” came the offended interjection from Rarity, before she lit her horn and twisted Rainbow’s ear.

“Ow, ow, ow, I’m sorry, okay? Ow… would you… ow… stop already? Ow!” Rainbow replied. Rarity gave up with a huff and accepted the lousy apology anyway. Rainbow looked over to Applejack. “And you just sit there?”

The farmer shrugged. “What? You deserved that. And you’re perfectly capable of defendin' yourself. Really want me to jump in and save my poor little princess?”

Rainbow blushed furiously. “N-No,” she stammered quickly.

Applejack just nodded in satisfaction. “Thought so.”

Conversations drifted away again after that, switching who was talking to whom about what throughout the evening while our plates got emptier and emptier and our stomachs fuller and fuller. Even after the food was gone we continued to sit there and just talked and enjoyed each other's company. That might admittedly have had to do with the living room being in no condition to host this many guests in.

With conversations eventually slowing down a little, I thought that it was as good a point to bring up my proposal as any. “If it’s alright with you,” I started a little louder and, seeing as I had their attention, dropped to normal volume again, “there is another reason I asked all of you to come here tonight. Besides the obvious of course. I… I want to ask for your help with something. But it might be dangerous. I thought about it a lot and I think it shouldn’t be if we're careful? But, you know, I don’t exactly have a perfect track record when it comes to my assumptions and—“

“Now will you spit it out already?” Applejack interrupted with a chuckle. “Nopony here’s goin' to rip your head off.”

“Zombieponies might,” Rainbow objected. Applejack just raised an eyebrow at her. “What?”

I took a deep breath and tried not to look in Twilight's direction as I knew full well that she was as surprised as the rest and quite possibly even more curious than them. And she probably was slightly worried about me mentioning danger, since that had not worked out so well for me last time. “Well, seeing as this is my second pitch today and the first one went over swimmingly, I’ll try: I want you to be proactive as the Elements of Harmony.”

There was a short silence. I had every intention of continuing my pitch but apparently, ‘short’ was still too long for Rainbow. “… uh… what?”

“I want you to zap some old evil thing with rainbow lasers,” I broke it down.

I noticed Fluttershy carefully retreating behind her mane, while Pinkie giggled a little. Rainbow, hearing ‘potentially dangerous’ and ‘blasting stuff with rainbow lasers’ was already convinced to do whatever I was proposing. Applejack was more hesitant, as was to be expected, and both Rarity and Twilight looked slightly concerned. “Has something come up?” Twilight asked. “Was there something in the books?”

I shook my head. “No, nothing like that. What I’m about to tell you next is… well, it’s not exactly a state secret, I guess, but it is a secret. And it absolutely needs to stay in this room, because it’s very personal information about somepony. Anyone feeling uncomfortable with that? Fluttershy?”

She gave a little squeak in surprise and only retreated deeper, but her one visible eye focused on me. She was uncomfortable. I could see it without her admitting to it. “Are… are we going to help somepony?” she quietly asked.

I nodded. “If everything pans out as I hope it will, we will do just that. And by extension, a lot more good for a lot of other ponies.”

She gave it some thought, cautiously looking at her friends, before she finally replied. “Then I hope it will be fine,” she said.

I looked around to the others. “Somepony we know?” Applejack asked next.

“Yes,” I answered without hesitation even though I already knew that this made it only worse for her to decide.

“Is there no other way, dear? Can we not talk about the issue?” Rarity spoke up next.

I sighed. “Probably not. This pony is suffering. And has been for a long time. I suppose one could go about it thinking ‘a little bit longer won’t make much difference’. But I think that’s exactly the thought that led to this situation. All the research in the world won’t help. Because all the necessary details are already known. In a couple of years, I might be able to help right this wrong. Emphasis on ‘might be’. But to be honest, I am decidedly unwilling to wait for years to go by like this.”

“This is about some kind of dreamscape creature then?” Twilight more stated than asked, as she was already puzzling details together. “But how are we supposed to help with that? The dreamscape does not support the use of magic…”

Before I answered her in any way, I once more looked around my friends. “Any objections to telling me what this is about?”

“I’m not happy with snooping around in somepony else’s business,” Applejack stated. “I just… needed to have said that.”

“But you’re not against listening?” I tried to clear this up. She hesitated again but ultimately shook her head. “Alright. This is about Princess Celestia.” And as if on cue, jaws hit the floor. Figuratively of course. Well, except for Pinkie. She managed that literally. Somehow.

As expected, Rarity looked utterly shocked. Fluttershy, Pinkie and Spike were obviously deeply worried. Applejack tried to keep her calm and, surprisingly, Rainbow looked almost unfazed. Twilight on the other hoof… “Breathe,” I ordered her. I stood right next to her and stroked down her spine while she tried not to hyperventilate. Of all my friends gathered in this room, she knew the most about my abilities and the realm they gave me access to. She had seen the dreamscape creatures and knew about them as much as I did. I had mentioned an old evil, powerful enough that I deemed it necessary to employ the Elements of Magic.

It took a few minutes for her to calm down enough to speak again. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what came over me, I was just… unprepared.”

“It’s alright. I’m sorry too.” I gave her a short hug and nodded with gratitude as Spike wordlessly offered to take care of her so that I may explain further. “I have told some of you already that the dreamscape isn’t exactly an uninhabited empty void. To be honest, I’m not sure anymore who I’ve told what. There are creatures there, but they are unlike anything here in Equestria. They may appear as such to you, but comparing them to animals would be dangerous. They don’t think like anything we know. They don’t age, as that realm doesn’t have time. They reproduce by gorging themselves on whatever drives their core being. And they only die by force, usually when devoured by other creatures. Some of them feed on love. Or hatred. Or envy. They cling to dreams and reduce these emotions in the dreamer. That makes some of them useful. Or at least, less dangerous. But a few of them have become what we call ‘farmers’. They enter a dream and start to sow what they want to harvest. A creature feeding on fear will sow terrible nightmares. A creature feeding off carnal desires will sow dreams primarily focused on lust. The longer they remain within a dream, the stronger they get. As they grow in size and power, their influence over their dreamer grows as well. They don’t leave on their own. And seeing as most dreamscape creatures don’t enter dreams, the only way to get rid of them so far has been Princess Luna. It is an ongoing, never-ending battle she has fought for all of our sakes for as long as the Night has been her domain. And then she was banished. In the years since her return, she has made great progress in bringing order back to the dreamscape, but Celestia has been infected by a farmer. This thing is centuries old. It has grown to such massive proportions that Luna does not dare challenge it. I won’t ever insinuate cowardice — this creature might be too much for her and setting it loose without a plan, risking it rampaging through the dreamscape, would be irresponsible.”

“Is that the dream we saw?” Twilight meekly asked. Her hooves were shaking and her face was pale. “That clearing? Where the timberwolves did not dare enter? And even the other dreams stayed away?”

“It is. It’s a farmer of grief, as far as I can tell. We all know the story. At least the important parts of it. I don’t think I need to spell it out.” For a moment, I let them think it through. And they all looked stricken. Hundreds of years, each night dreams of guilt and remorse.

“So let’s kick its flank,” Rainbow stated defiantly. She looked almost aggressive in her body language. Which was an impressive feat given that she was still sitting on her rump. She would probably have hovered above her seat if it were not for Applejacks hoof holding her in place. Both Twilight and Fluttershy were fighting back their panic.

“Easy there partner,” Applejack said as she tried to calm Rainbow a little. She turned her attention to me. “How? Twi said somethin' about magic not bein' a thing? It is called the ‘magic of friendship’…”

I was grateful that she was playing ball with me. “It is. It’s even worse than that. These metal bands,” I explained and lifted my hoof to show them Twilight's work, “they record data. Twilight analyzed it and found out that being in the dreamscape puts massive strain on ponies without affinity for that realm. And that’s why we won’t fight that thing in the dreamscape.”

“Surely you cannot imply that—“ Rarity started but quickly cut herself off as she saw my expression.

“I am. As I said — the plan could be a dangerous one. I want to go into the dreamscape, find Celestia's dream, destroy the bubble to set that thing free and bring it over to Equestria, where you gals will be waiting, ready and set, to blast that thing to smithereens as soon as it shows up. There’s obviously a couple of details that need to be worked out. First of all, I can’t bring this thing over. I need Luna's help for that. And she already made it perfectly clear that she doesn't want me to interfere with this thing. Or the dreamscape, for that matter. Not until my training is done. Which, let me remind you, will take some years. So let’s say I manage to convince her. Maybe by not giving her much of a choice, if I have to. And that thing actually crosses over. Every single time something escaped from the dreamscape, it was a disaster. The wendigos, the shadow, the first changeling queen, maybe even more than I am aware of. But: Whenever that happened, it happened unexpectedly. And therefore uncontrolled. Luna should be able to control where that thing pops up. If I manage to convince her to send it to me — because she needs a focus point for it and, well, we can’t let her be the focus — then it will pop up where I am. This gives us the ability to plan where we fight. To reduce even the risk of damage to the surroundings, I would like to go to the Castle of the Two Sisters with you. The Everfree sure can take it if something actually happens — which ideally, it won’t. And the ruins will have enough space, I think. Anyway, as soon as it appears, I… I can’t tell you what it will look like. These creatures don’t know time. Or sunlight. Or gravity. Or hunger. There’s a very good chance that it will be utterly confused for at least some precious seconds. I don’t know if its predecessors immediately took on their currently known forms or if they just wobbled about for a while as some cloud or mist or figure made of light. That’s why, upon arrival at the scene, we need to make ourselves intimately familiar with our surroundings. Trees, rocks, wildlife. If this thing, despite being what it is, is not confused upon arrival, I am quite certain that it will fall for the usual ‘evil monolog’-thing. It utters so much as a single syllable and you blast whatever makes that noise.”

“You said this is no animal,” Fluttershy quietly spoke up in the silence that followed. “But I really don’t like hurting it either way.”

I sighed. “I know. But the Elements are not a malevolent force, are they? They cleanse, they purge and if the time isn’t right yet, they contain. I don’t think the Elements will kill or even hurt that thing. But we might end up with another statue for Celestia's garden. Or another confused former villain in need of reformation.”

“Is it a villain though?” Twilight carefully asked, almost quieter than Fluttershy had. I had expected objections from Fluttershy, first and foremost. But from her? “From what you have told us… it sows bad dreams and eats the resulting grief. And it only does what its nature dictates.”

I cringed a little. This was going in a direction that could turn very nasty very quickly. How many have you killed?, another Twilight yelled at me in a small flash. I remembered her taking a step back when I tried to come closer. She had looked at me like I was a monster. It had hurt. And in my pain, I had lashed out. Not even a fraction of the body count Luna has, I had replied with a nasty and cold voice, Yet I don’t see you shy away from her!

An ongoing, never-ending fight.

A war, more like.

I breathed in deep, filled my lungs with air until it started to hurt and released it slowly as I was pushing the memories away. “Spike, you were shopping for groceries earlier, right?”

Startled by suddenly being addressed, he looked up at me. “Uh… y-yeah?”

“So we need to do that again tomorrow, right?”

Now confusion spread across his face. “Why?”

“Well… because you ate it all? I mean. Why wouldn’t you?” They understood. Spike grimaced as he was not exactly thrilled that I had used him to make my point. I would apologize later, I decided. “As for their nature… it is in a manticore’s nature to devour flesh. When one of those hunts you, do you lie down and let yourself get eaten?”

“No,” Twilight replied. “But I don’t go into the Everfree looking for one either.”

Keep calm, I told myself, You can do this, you can still convince them. “I’m not doing this without rhyme or reason. It has Celestia. It is already feeding off of her. It has done so for way too long. And I want to stop that.” I was not sure why Twilight, of all the ponies in this room, was putting up the most resistance. But I was willing to face her, I was determined to make her come around.

I dared to look at the others for a moment. For Pinkie, everything seemed to be quite clear. Fluttershy, given my remark about the Elements’ nature, was on board as well. Rainbow had been even before I started to explain anything. And even Rarity seemed convinced. Applejack wasn’t exactly thrilled, but then again… aside from Rainbow, none of them were. I could understand why of course. It was one thing for a villain ‘banished for a thousand years’ to pop up, wreak havoc and then be defeated by their last ditch effort. It had almost become a routine at this point.

But to go out there and actively search for trouble?

The reason to do so needed to be sound. Infallible. It was a question about motivation, about intention. And for Twilight, it was about helping her surrogate mother, teacher and friend — or so I had thought. Maybe I should have been less surprised? Given her dealings with hippogryphs, dragons and all manner of other creatures, maybe she was actively trying to put herself into their perspective?

I could not tell.

After a good long while — and I noticed the increasing tension in the room, with most eyes being on Twilight —, she finally spoke up again. “I don’t want Spike to be there,” she said, hugging her number one assistant to her side protectively. “So we will have to agree on a signal, maybe a magic bolt shot into the sky that he can see with one of my telescopes from the castle balcony, so that he can then send a prepared message to Princess Luna. We will need a way to make you sleep. The only way so far has been for you to share a bed, and we won’t have that option. I agree that the ruins in the Everfree might be the best place to do this. Maybe we can make a stop on our way there, see if Zecora can help us out with something. And we can use the same signal again once we are done, so that Spike can send a second message to Luna to inform her that everything has worked.”

“And if it doesn’t work?” Spike quietly asked.

Twilight winced a little. “… then I assume you will see that and send a letter asking for help.”

Spike swallowed audibly. Twilight turned her attention to her friends and me. “So you’re in?” I asked. I needed to make this as clear as possible.

Like Applejack before her, she hesitated. “You’re right. We cannot leave this like it is. If we can help her, we should at least try and we have to trust in the Elements.”

I finally allowed myself a deep sigh of relief. “Thank you,” I said and embraced her. I pulled back a good moment later and looked at the rest of them. “Thank all of you. This means a lot to me.”

“We still need to get the Elements though,” Fluttershy spoke up.

“Aw, silly, didn’t I tell you I’m prepared for this?” Pinkie suddenly chirped up and… well, in theory, she only unclasped her saddlebags. In practice, they burst open at the second of contact and sprayed the entire room, somehow decorating it, accompanied by a cannon blast. Streamers, confetti, balloons… even cupcakes landed in front of each of us. There was a picture of a pony without a tail on the wall next to the door. And as suspected, a banner reading ‘Best Sleepover Ever’ was hanging from the ceiling.

While we tried to comprehend what had just happened, Pinkie just giggled. “Oopsie-daisy, wrong saddlebag.” She nosed into the other and put the Elements on the table.

“How—“ Rarity started but Applejack quickly cleared her throat and shot her a warning look. “Right,” the seamstress backpedaled. “Pinkie.”

“Yes?” Pinkie immediately responded.

“Lovely decorations,” Rarity deflected.

Pinkie's smile grew wider. “Thank you! And I got all your favorite cupcakes as well!”

Considering the heavy subject we had been talking about, it took tremendous effort from all of us and a good deal of time to recover the light-hearted mood from before it.

… or one pink pony and a couple of minutes.

Pinkie understood ponies like few others did. She saw connections, cracks, opportunities. It started with something simple — pranking Rainbow. Because lifting her spirit was easy enough, given that she had not been dragged down by the topic quite as much as the others. With a chuckling Rainbow chasing after Pinkie, the scene was set to include the next one or two. Fluttershy and Applejack, as it turned out. Pinkie hid behind Applejack and pleaded for amnesty — to which Rainbow answered by ‘threatening’ Fluttershy. With ‘mushy stuff’, as she had put it. Seeing Rainbow romp about helped Applejack get out of the dump and Fluttershy, always trying to be accommodating, focused more on her ‘part’ as the hostage and played along. She even started to plead with Pinkie to give in to Rainbow's demands… which, if I was not mistaken, had not even been named.

Spike quietly started to giggle just by watching the scene unfold and it did not take long for his merriment to infect Rarity as they started to wager on who might win.

I sat down closer to Twilight. She still looked troubled. “Hey,” I quietly addressed her and bumped my shoulder against hers.

She sighed. “You don’t have to do this,” she told me.

“I don’t have to… what?” I replied.

“Cheering me up,” she answered. She lifted her gaze and looked at her friends goofing around.

“Maybe,” I answered. “But I would really like to.”

She shook her head. “There’s just… there’s a lot on my plate.”

I held my tongue instead of following up on the first thing that came to mind and thought about it a little more. The way her wings rustled sometimes. How she tried to keep an eye on everypony… dragon included. How her brow creased from time to time. And I realized that she was still calculating. I raised my head and stared at the ceiling for a moment as if that could provide me with any answers. “You are still unsure if what we are about to do is the right thing,” I ventured a guess. “And you want to make sure that, if we attempt this, everypony gets out safe and sound.”

“Amongst other factors, but yes, those are the main issues right now,” she admitted.

It was the first time I wished I had wings. It would have been nice to mimic her regular comforting strategy and drape one over her back. I instead could only lay my foreleg around her and pull her in a little more. There was no resistance to speak of. She gladly leaned against me. “You haven’t seen war,” I started barely above a whisper. The others did not need to hear this. “And I pray to every power that bothers to hear me that you never will.”

“But you have?” she interjected.

I nodded without hesitation. “I barely remember anything. I remember the fallout though. Conversations we had. I had been fighting alongside her for a long, long time. To be honest… I was so glad that you did not have to kill that creature back in the dreamscape. Even more so, in retrospect. It does something to you. And with my memories fractured as they are, I exist in this weird half-state. It is both done, and not yet done. But with my position at Luna's side, it will be done once more. There is no way around this. And I’m not trying to make this about myself again or to vie for your pity. I think what I’m trying to say is: I am convinced that we are doing the right thing. Not just because I want Celestia to be free. I mean in general. There are creatures living there that are perfectly harmless. Friendly, even. I just didn’t want to muddle the waters. But this thing is anything but. It’s just another of those ‘wait a couple of years and a scroll will pop up, telling you of a disaster caused by a villain sealed away for a thousand years’-cases. Celestia really does have too many of those lying around. But back in the day, sealing them away by any means possible was easier. Equestria wasn’t quite as established, its military barely trained or functioning and low in numbers, its population a bunch of scared ponies with remnants of tribalism… I’m getting sidetracked. I meant what I told Fluttershy. The Elements don’t harm. And if we manage the timing right — which is, I want to stress, one of your specialties —, then this whole ‘fight’ should be a nice little light show of no more than ten seconds flat. It’s the preparation that is time consuming. Being on the offense for once has the advantage of us being able to thoroughly prepare. And I think it’s this ‘the night before battle’-feeling that pulls you down. We share some similarities. I know how hard it is, but… try not to think too much about it. Our friends are here. Let’s have a nice evening, okay?”

The silence lingered for a minute, maybe two before she finally sighed. “Okay.”

I smiled. “Right. That’s the spirit. Also, duck.”

“Duck? Wha—“ She could not finish her sentence. I would not let her, as I simply pulled her down with me and a pillow sailed straight over our heads.

“It appears we reached the pillow fight part of the evening,” I clarified. I did not know where the pillow — pillows, I corrected myself as another one flew past — had come from. Maybe Pinkie was involved again. She probably had secret pillow fight emergency stashes all over Equestria.

“Ah, I see,” she replied as if it was the most natural thing in the world. “Well, in that case…” Her horn was wreathed in magic and several pillows appeared down under the table where we were currently hiding — together with Rarity apparently, who was clutching Spike close to her chest. He did not seem to mind all that much.

“Such brutes,” she complained. However, upon seeing the pillows a wicked smile grew on the seamstress's face. “Well that should even out the field.”

I recognized these pillows. Twilight had gathered them from all the rooms of the castle. Guest rooms, the sofa pillows from the living room, even the seating pillows from the kitchen. “So we’re going into the offense?” I asked my two allies. Three, I corrected myself as Spike wiggled out from Rarity’s grasp and grabbed a pillow for himself. “Spike, you’re up first, draw their fire. As soon as you give the signal, we will give everything we have. Ready?” The poor little dragon. He did not see it coming. He did not even ask what kind of signal he was supposed to give. He just eagerly nodded, ready to impress Rarity, and once I gave the all-clear, he bravely stood up and was immediately pelted by the entire barrage of enemy fire. “Go!” I told both Twilight and Rarity once the onslaught ended. We jumped up and gave the other side of the table our answer. Soon the entire room devolved into chaos. Pillows were thrown left, right and center, Rarity — mourning her perfectly styled mane — entered combat with a vengeance and even Twilight could loosen up enough to get lost in the moment.

I took the opportunity to rescue Spike from another coincidental onslaught and ducked under the table with him. “Hey there. You okay buddy?”

“Pch, I’m fine!” he said with a grin.

I smiled and ruffled his headfin. “What a brave dragon. Listen, I’m sorry for the barrage I sent you out to just take to the face.”

He chuckled a little. “Yeah, that was something. But don’t worry, I’m not stupid. I mean, I kinda knew what was coming?”

Brave indeed. “I, uh… I also wanted to apologize for what I said earlier, when I asked about the groceries. That was uncalled for, I shouldn’t have used you to make a point.”

He regarded me with a similarly inquisitive look that Twilight sometimes had. Eventually, he put up his extra serious face and nodded. “You can make it up to me,” he offered.

“How?” I asked.

His smile grew into a devious grin. “You draw their fire and when you give the signal, I give them Tartarus!”

I laughed merrily and immediately agreed. “Sounds like a deal.” And so, I followed his example of bravery out into the battlefield to be pelted by pillows. He did not even have a single one himself to follow through on his promise to return fire.

We joked and played for maybe an hour or two and settled for some more light-hearted talking like we had done at the start of the dinner afterwards. But with time constantly trickling away, conversations slowed down again and minds were dulled until a snoring young dragon and a few yawns from different ponies signaled the end of the evening.

“So we’re getting guest rooms, right?” Applejack asked for clarification. She looked over at Rainbow who was barely awake at all and heavily leaned against Applejacks side. She had spent herself in a blaze of glory, as one would expect from her.

“Of course!” Twilight replied. “We have more than enough spare rooms.” As I saw her beam happily, I was reminded of something she had said previously. About how she had played with the idea of inviting all her friends to just stay with her.

I saw Pinkie's ears droop a little shortly after and quickly put one and one together. It was supposed to be a sleepover and while yes, those could be had with everypony sleeping in separate rooms at some point, she had hoped for something more like those days in Golden Oaks. And that gave me an idea. “Twilight, how much juice do you have left in you?”

“… w-what?” she asked.

“If we rearrange some stuff,” I continued and skipped her little stammer, “we could maybe fit another one or two beds in your room. It would be cozy, sure, but it would be enough.”

I smiled as her eyes lit up at the idea. “On it,” she said and just vanished in a raspberry flash.

“I hate it when she does that,” I remarked and rubbed my eyes. I chuckled as I noticed that Dash had once again mumbled those same words in unison with me, despite her drowsy state.

“Well we should all head to the bathrooms then, yes?” Rarity tried to spur us into action. I looked around and my smile grew a little wider. Applejack tried to poke Rainbow awake, just enough so the speedster could walk herself. Because despite her capabilities to carry the pegasus, the farmer had no intention of doing so. On the other spectrum, a very much spent Pinkie Pie looked quite drowsy herself and was steadily helped along by Fluttershy, who stabilized Pinkie's moves with a wing around her barrel. I turned my attention back to Rarity and was not surprised to notice that she still looked wide awake. Being a creative mind, at least for some ponies, meant having somewhat flexible sleeping schedules. And the seamstress had pulled more than enough all-nighters in her creative phases. “I think we shall. If the fair lady would accompany me to said… uh… I’m missing a fancy word for bathroom,” I replied sheepishly. I heard Applejack chuckle a little while she gave up and just carefully lifted Rainbow over her back.

Rarity stifled a dainty giggle and nodded. “That’s quite alright, dear. The attempt was made and is appreciated.”

We made our way in and out of the several bathrooms one by one and came back to Twilight's bedroom. She had prepared everything in the meantime and gracefully accepted my gift of one sleeping young dragon to be placed in his own bed.

Rainbow and Applejack had settled into their bed shortly after and Fluttershy and Pinkie in another one. Twilight was already lying down on her side of her bed, clearly waiting for me. And Rarity grinned like a shark as I stood near the door and fidgeted with my hooves. “It’s, uh… it’s alright, it’s a mare’s sleepover, I’m going to—“ I started, but Rarity interrupted me.

“Oh shush, you. We are all adults here. Well, except Spikey-Wikey, of course.” As if on cue, a happy little sigh was heard from the side, making Pinkie and Applejack giggle a little. “Twilight’s bed is the largest one by far and there is plenty of space for three. Though I have to ask — do you snore?”

For some reason, that question took all the tension and nerves out of me. I quietly laughed and shrugged. “Uh… don’t know, actually. Twilight?”

She grinned a little lopsided. “Just a little and only sometimes. If he does, lightly poke him in his side. He’ll mumble something and stop.”

When—? How—? “… what?” But her expression did not change. She instead just gestured for me to finally get a move on and I stumbled my way over.

I scooched closer until she once more lifted the blanket. I had my own this time. In theory. For decency’s sake. I looked back to Rarity, who was patiently waiting for me to settle in, but she just smiled and did not seem to mind. So I gave myself a little push and vanished under the blanket and immediately sighed happily as the familiar warmth surrounded me. The bed was large enough for three, according to Rarity's estimate. But given how close I snuggled up to Twilight, we could have fit four easily.

“Turn around,” Twilight requested. I was a little confused at first, but did so anyway. She closed whatever gap remained between us and enveloped me with a wing. I suddenly found myself being the little spoon. A very happy little noise escaped my throat. One that made Rarity quietly coo in delight as she was now settling in on Twilight's bed as well. With her own blanket and a little distance, as was probably appropriate.

“I’m so happy to have all of you,” I quietly whispered into the room, unsure who was even still awake at this point.

“Same, partner,” Applejack replied. And a quiet but content “Mhm” marked Fluttershy’s agreement.

I felt an overflow of pure happiness. I'm home. I closed my eyes and listened to the soft breathing of my friends filling the air.

Day 15: Fragments of the Past

I woke up to the feeling of Twilight slightly shifting behind me and the sounds of quiet conversation.

“—really think that there is any reason to worry about that,” Rarity mused. “You seem perfectly comfortable with this arrangement for now, do you not?”

“I am,” Twilight replied with some hesitation. “It’s just that… I’m worried.”

Rarity’s giggle was barely audible. “You always are, darling.”

“So let me get this straight,” Rainbow’s voice scratched.

“Rainbow, mind your volume,” Rarity chided her.

“Right, sorry, whatever. He stayed awake for five days straight?” the pegasus continued. After a short moment, she inhaled. “Woah. That’s so awesome.”

“No, it really is not,” Rarity disagreed. “As far as I am aware, it is actually quite dangerous.”

“… is totally what I said,” Rainbow insisted.

There was a sigh behind me and while Rainbow and Rarity seemed to get into a little discussion about the ‘awesomeness of danger’, I felt Twilight shift again. She brought her lips to my ear and quietly whispered. “Good morning.”

Her warm breath tickled my ear. I heard the playfulness in her voice and I smiled. I assumed my less steady breathing had given me away and while I did not open my eyes immediately, smiling sure revealed me to be awake. “Do I have to wake up?” I mumbled and shifted ever so slightly in her embrace, just to become aware of how close we were lying. “It’s so cozy.” She nipped my aspirations in the bud by quite literally nipping my ear, albeit very carefully. “Ow,” I quietly whined despite not feeling any pain to begin with. But my eyes snapped open due to the unexpected jolt and therefore, Twilight was content.

“Oh look who finally deigned to join us,” Rarity interrupted her little spat with Rainbow and smiled. “Good morning, dear. You have been quite the sleepyhead.” My confusion grew as I looked around. A quick glance out of the window told me that it was still morning, even if it might have been a little later than usual. But there was no sign of Applejack, Fluttershy or Pinkie Pie. Upon noticing my realization, Rarity spoke up again. “Don’t worry, they will be back soon enough. Pinkie is plundering the kitchen together with Spikey, I believe. They intended to make breakfast for us. Applejack had to rearrange some chores as ‘going off to be a hero again’ had not been part of her initial plan. I presume Fluttershy’s reasons are in a similar vein.”

“She didn’t tell?” I asked. Concern creeped up on me. What if she was not convinced after all…?

“Well she tried,” Rarity huffed a little. “But Pinkie was very… Pinkie, this morning. Albeit the quietest Pinkie I have ever experienced.”

I did not question what exactly that entailed. I was just relieved, as the explanation did not sound like she was just leaving us hanging. Then again — what was I even thinking? Would she ever had done that to begin with? I rubbed my eyes and temples. I was clearly not awake enough yet. I was certainly not thinking straight.

I craned my neck a little and looked over my shoulder at Twilight. She had this faraway look in her eyes and seemed utterly content. It made me want to hug her and squish her like a pillow, but at the same time, I did not want to intrude on that moment. So I waited for a little longer until I felt a certain urge become more pressing. I carefully disentangled myself from her before I left the bed. “I’m heading for the bathroom… uh… should I…”

“With the exception of Twilight, we have already been,” Rarity replied with a dainty smile. “But thank you for asking. I presume we shall meet in the dining hall for breakfast, dear.”

I nodded and made my way out. While following basic maintenance, I reminisced about how I had woken up, surrounded by friends — at least some of them — and how I had fallen asleep in the first place. It had been so quick. Surprisingly quick. Maybe my sleep deprivation was finally catching up to me? Or it was always the same, and had always been like this? Maybe it was a side effect of my condition. That I would just not be able to sleep for the first couple of weeks after a new whatever had started? And it evened out over time?

I did not know.

I briskly trotted down the hallway towards the dining hall and could already hear my friends chit chat and I noticed with satisfaction that both Pinkie's and Applejack's voices were among them. Once I entered, I saw Fluttershy daintily nibbling on a sandwich that, seeing the impressive buffet Pinkie and Spike had produced for us, was probably something she had brought with her from home.

“Good morning everyone,” I greeted those I had not seen yet and was welcomed to the table. The assortment on offer looked mouth-watering. A pot of melted cheese Twilight stayed far away from, fruit salad, three kinds of vegetable salad — carrot, tomato and something with a lot of greens —, scrambled eggs, toast, regular bread, what was left of those hayfries — they had the unfortunate fate of standing too close to Twilight's plate — and several spreads. And rice pudding. With cinnamon, judging by the smell. That has my name on it.

I had to restrain myself to eat something else first, just to sample all the deliciousness on offer before I really dug in with a large bowl of rice pudding. “Oh sweet Celestia, this is sooo goooood,” I mumbled around a mouthful.

“Manners, dear,” Rarity chided.

Applejack regaled us with a funny tale about her morning so far over the course of our breakfast. As she came home, Apple Bloom was apparently about to sneak out the kitchen window. And why was she using the kitchen window? Well because Big Macintosh, who was not aware of her being awake and around already, was trying to sneak out the front door.

“I swear to the heavens, somedays, it’s like herdin' cats!” she complained as she chuckled to herself. “At least Granny didn’t give me a hard time.”

“Because she was asleep?” Rainbow ventured a guess.

“You know it,” Applejack replied and everybody had a good laugh.

With Pinkie and Spike being in charge of the kitchen, it was no wonder that there was a lot more food than any of us could hope to eat. We allowed ourselves plenty of time but this buffet was ultimately an opponent we could not defeat. We all declared breakfast to be over at some point as we surrendered before the might of the buffet… only for Pinkie to utterly annihilate it after that. It was a sight to behold as she shoveled everything that remained in her mouth, not with speed, but gusto.

I guessed that lovely pudge of hers had to come from somewhere.

We all stared in varying amounts of fascination until Pinkie was done and grinned in satisfaction. “Oookay, so that happened,” I started and chuckled. “Thank you again for the delicious breakfast, Pinkie and Spike. Is everypony ready, then?” Twilight, Rarity and Applejack were reasonable enough, they had eaten lightly. Fluttershy did not eat a lot in general and Rainbow had stuffed herself to the brim but was willing to power through her food coma.

Pinkie, on the other hoof, looked down on her visibly bloated belly and smiled sheepishly. “Give me one second!” she requested and before Rarity could say anything about the horrors those words had conjured in her head, Pinkie put both her hooves to her belly and pressed down. Somehow that worked and her mane wobbled a little, as if absorbing additional weight. Rarity closed her mouth again. “Ready,” Pinkie announced.

“I’m not,” Spike groaned and we all had a good laugh.

“Don’t worry,” I addressed him while carefully rubbing his back. “We’ll find you a nice little spot on the balcony where you can sit down and relax. Just don’t fall asleep.” I turned my attention to Twilight and added, “We still need to write those letters.”

She just grinned. “One step ahead of you. Or four I guess, since it's three letters and the correct positioning of the telescope.”

“You… what?” I was perplexed. “How? When?”

Her smile grew a little prouder, her chest puffed out just a little bit and I could clearly see where Spike had learned some of his behavior from. “I wrote those letters while you were still sleeping and I positioned the telescope while you were still in the bathroom.”

I looked around to my other friends in bewilderment and could not help but ask. “I am not that slow… am I?”

Fluttershy hid her smile behind her mane, Pinkie flip-flopped between a vigorous head shake and nod, Applejack managed a silent chuckle and Rainbow was trying hard not to burst into uproarious laughter. It was Rarity who finally gave me an answer. “Taking your time is not a bad thing, dear — I like to enjoy my morning routine quite a lot if I don’t have anything urgent to attend to.”

I gave a nod and tried to push past the revelation. I was apparently a slow-poke. “Right… uh… anyway. So, can we go?”

Everyone agreed and we all helped clear up and clean up the dining hall before leaving the castle to Spike. We trotted through Ponyville and eventually past Fluttershy’s cottage and into the Everfree Forest. As soon as we entered, they all put their respective elements on. While most predators around these parts preferred to hunt lone prey, a particularly hungry manticore or a larger pack of timberwolves — the most common threats in here as far as we knew — would maybe try something anyway. We stuck close together and we stuck close to the dirt path leading through the mass of writhing underbrush and gnarled, twisted trees. Their thick canopies almost canceled out the entire daylight in some areas.

We heard the occasional rustle of smaller creatures, usually as they rushed away from us, and at one point Fluttershy had to convince a young snake that messing with us was not in her best interests. But aside from that, we got through to Zecora’s hut without incidents. It was exhilarating to see them stride through the forest, confident and determined. It seemed so long ago that they were frightened by some scary looking trees or panicked at the slightest predatory noise nearby.

“We’ll be waitin' outside,” Applejack stated as we stared up at the tree Zecora had chosen for her house. “Her rhymin' tends to make my head spin a little and it would get awfully crammed in there with all of us.”

I nodded and looked over to Twilight. She would follow me in. She made it clear with a single look and I was glad for her company. “Okay. Keep an eye out,” I reminded the rest of them. “Most predators won’t come near here, but better to be careful than to be sorry.”

"He even sounds like Twilight," I heard Rainbow groan in a whisper behind us before she was shushed by the others.

Twilight and I walked up to the door and knocked. Zecora was home — we already knew that because we had heard some Zebrian cursing after something clattered. “I should have stuck to my expertise,” the zebra quietly cursed inside before raising her volume to address her visitors. “Mind giving me a moment please?”

“We are not in a hurry Zecora,” Twilight replied.

After some more clattering, we heard her hoofsteps closing in on the door and it was finally opened for us. The zebra looked tired but sported a genuine smile when she saw Twilight. “How lovely it is to see you again,” she greeted and then took notice of me standing beside her. “And who might that friend of yours be then?”

“Zecora, this is Dreamwalker,” Twilight started to introduce us. “He is new around town. And Dreamwalker, this is Zecora. Our local expert for Everfree flora and fauna as well as alchemy.”

“An ‘expert’, she says — that remains to be seen. For sadly I failed to concoct my vaccine.” Zecora's ears pinned back. She looked over her shoulder and after craning my neck to do the same, I saw the chaos that made up the huts interior. Her cauldron was lying on its side, apparently… cracked? I didn't even know that was possible.

A sudden flash made me squint. “May the land be flat and the grass be green,” I started to recite from memory. “May the sun shine bright and the water be clean. May the night stay calm and the company fair, safe journey ahead and please take care.” I reopened my eyes as the memory started to fade into the background. It sorted itself away with the rest of the other puzzle pieces. Twilight looked at me intrigued while Zecora seemed astonished. “It’s… uh… the Traveler’s Greeting, right?” I sheepishly asked.

A couple more rhymes later, Zecora invited us into her hut and closed the door and I started to understand what Applejack had meant. Deciphering what the zebra said was not all that hard, but for some strange reason, those new memories constantly interfered with my thoughts and tried to make me rhyme like she did. It put knots in my head where none belonged, entangling and confusing me in the process.

So I left most of the conversation to Twilight while I busied myself. Zecora had started to clean up the mess she had accidentally produced earlier and for some reason, I knew where to find her small broom and the dustpan. So while they talked and Zecora put a sponge to the slowly drying puddle of gray goo, I swept up the broken pieces of what I presumed must have been pottery of some kind. She had a special bucket for waste material from her experiments, as it was far too dangerous to just tip the bucket out the window.

Although Twilight had initially been a little bit distracted by my sudden bout of knowledge, she quickly regained her footing and asked about something that would help me sleep.

“A strong concoction to help you sleep?” the Zebra mused and promptly started to rummage through her shelves in search of something specific. She finally presented us with a small brown clay pot. “This might do the trick, but it will send you deep.”

I shook my head. Despite Twilight's best efforts, I knew this would not work — it was not enough. “No, I don’t need anything to help me sleep, Zecora. I need something strong that makes me sleep.”

Despite the favor I had gained by reminding her of her faraway homeland, the zebra still lowered her brows at me, warily searching for something in my demeanor. “Those are perilous brews you are asking for. Before I decide, I need to know more.”

It was a reasonable request, I had to admit. There was a risk of endangering somepony’s health with a mixture as strong as I was asking for. So, I started to tell her. Of course I spared her most of the details, as that would make for a great story for another time. Right now, she only needed to know that we wanted to bring the fight to a dangerous foe that needed to be brought here in the first place. This, in turn, could only be done by me using my connection to the dreamscape. And that connection was inaccessible while I was awake. I did, for honesty’s and completion’s sake, briefly mention that I had been able to access it when dreamwalking with other ponies. But given the circumstances, there was no option present. We would not endanger anypony else and we could not risk anything going awry by bringing even one of the Elements to the dreamscape.

She mulled over what I had given her and finally agreed. “I see a difficult fight ahead of you. I wish you good luck and hope you pull through.” She shelved the first pot again and after some more rummaging gave me a thick-walled, round glass bottle containing a deep purple, viscous liquid.

“Looks appetizing,” I joked while shaking it a little.

“It tastes and smells as vile as it looks — I wear a clasp on my nose while it cooks,” she promised me with a concerning amount of amusement.

“Thank you, Zecora,” I replied. Twilight chimed in on that and we left her hut shortly after.

“Took you guys long enough, slow-pokes,” Rainbow greeted us upon our return to the group. “We got ambushed. Several times! It was one heck of a fierce monster!”

While Twilight immediately went into a semi-panicked state and checked everypony for injuries, I noticed that mischievous glint in Rainbow's eyes. “Uh-huh. And what attacked you, if I may ask?”

I deliberately provided her with a prime opportunity to get her punchline out so that Twilight might calm down a little sooner. “Boredom!” Rainbow excitedly yelled and both her and Pinkie broke out into fits of giggles.

“Really now?” Rarity chimed in. “You had all this time and this was the best you could come up with?”

Clearly misunderstanding her a little bit, Rainbow proudly puffed her chest out. “Yeah. It was awesome, wasn’t it?”

“That was not a comp— Haaah. Nevermind.” Rarity gave up when she saw both Applejack and Fluttershy grinning in amusement. Twilight, on the other hoof, looked less amused and seemed to battle her impulse to give Rainbow a lecture, but after a moment of hesitation she let herself get swept up in the merriment and at least smiled at her friend's antics.

“Let’s not dilly-dally any longer, darlings, I would very much prefer for us to be out of all this… muck” Rarity proposed, spurning us into moving once more.

We closed in on the castle ruins around late midday. I felt strangely apprehensive about this the closer we got. There had been a building tension in the back of my head, telling me that there was something I was forgetting. I focused on our surroundings, tried to be even more attentive than I already was, but all I could hear was the wind rustling in the tree’s canopies, all I could see were those chaos-riddled, warped trees themselves.

“You okay there, partner?” Applejack asked as she trotted up beside me.

“I’m not sure,” I honestly admitted. “I feel like we’re about to… I don’t know… walk into something?”

“A trap? You remember somethin'?” she was immediately alert. Her ears swiveled around, her eyes scanned the treeline flanking the dirt path, searching for any signs of danger just like I had done before… and was still doing.

“No,” I answered. “It’s something else. It feels like asking yourself ‘have I forgotten to lock the door?’ or ‘did I turn the stove off?’ Something is nagging me and I can’t pin it down.”

Applejack chuckled quietly in relief. Her good-natured smile eased my worries a little bit, I had to admit. “I know that one. It’s just the tension of knowin' what we’re about to do. Don’t worry. I feel it every time we waltz up to some fancy-schmancy world-ender or some such.”

I tried to let her help me, and it half-worked. But this feeling would not be quelled that easily, not entirely anyway. A few minutes later we finally cleared the forest and entered the thin band of clearing that surrounded the castle ruins. I gave a startled yelp as I suddenly heard a filly merrily laughing right behind me. I hastily turned around and there was… nothing.

“What is it?” Twilight asked, alarmed.

“I… I don’t—” I started and I got no further than that. My legs froze in place. My ears stood ramrod straight and my eyes glazed over. I felt all my muscles strain with tension, ready to burst. I could not move, could not even think straight, could not close my eyes or hear the probably worried voices of my friends while I shook like a leaf. But whatever it was, it got better after a moment. Probably just the stress getting to me. After all, there was always so much to do in Greenwood, and we had all been grinding ourselves to the bone to make it work. Maybe I ought to arrange for another picnic or something.

I looked around me. What had I been doing again? I felt strangely disoriented for a moment. The castle — my home — was close by. I stood on the street. Only a few ponies were milling about. Most of them looked exhausted, but happy. Some were heading for Flim and Flam's Tremendously Tranquilizing Tavern. Hmmm. Getting something in my stomach actually sounded great. I looked up at the sky. Early afternoon. Had I skipped breakfast again? Maybe I should go get something before my growling stomach frightened the foals again. Maybe I got lucky and would even be able to see one of Trixie’s shows.

“Where is he going?” Rainbow asked. I stopped and looked around. She was easily spotted with that technicolor mane of hers. I smiled and waved.

“Oh, hey Rainbow. Hadn’t seen you there, sorry. I was about to head to Trixie’s place for some stew, you wanna join in?” Seeing as she tried to follow me, I took that as my cue to move on. “How’s the endless battle against the Everfree weather going? You’re still winning, right?” She smiled. Of course she smiled, because she was on top of things. She always strived to be. Greenwood was still in its infancy. We had not even had our first anniversary. A famine was the last thing we needed. Then again, if things really got this tight, we could always just send out a call for help. Ponyville would answer. Which turned my thoughts to other matters entirely. It had been a long time since I had last talked to her. “How is Scoots doing?” I asked her. Despite my better knowledge, I was still concerned for the little filly. “Is she settling in alright? From what I’ve heard, she gets along quite well with Ambrosia?” The Apple household was a loud one these days. Applejack's daughter was a rambunctious little filly, and with Apple Bloom and Scootaloo in their teens… I sometimes wondered if Rainbow really was up to the task.

Speaking of little whirlwinds. A trio of foals ran past us and down the road. Ambrosia apparently tried to help Whisper up into the air, but the shy little filly got frightened every time her hooves actually left the ground. Stardust trailed behind, he gave little encouraging hints and comments, ready to use his magic to hold the filly before she scraped her knee with an unlucky landing again.

“Stardust? Mind coming here for a second?” He stopped as he heard his name and looked around.

Once he spotted me, his eyes lit up. “Dad!” He cantered over and I hugged him tightly against my leg.

I leaned down a little to get on eye level with him. “Hey, little one. You’re helping Ambrosia with looking after Whisper?” He eagerly nodded and in turn, I ruffled his mane. “I’m proud of you. Just remember to keep an eye out for Magnus. I don’t want him to tease her again, she got really scared last time.”

“Will do!” He hugged my leg once more. “Can we go see mom? I have a gift for her.”

I looked up at the castle, then back down to him. “Stardust, you know better. Your mom is still sleeping. But I’m sure we’ll manage to catch her before she opens Night Court. You can give it to her then. Now, go play with your friends, I’ll be home soon. Shoo!” I gave the giggling little colt a nudge and he ran off after his two friends. I looked after him until he vanished around a house corner. I turned my attention back to Rainbow but she was gone. Maybe something had caught her attention, or she was simply flying ahead.

“Sugarcube… who are you talkin' to?” came Applejack's voice.

I turned around once more and saw her just standing there. Like a landmark. I sighed, smiled at her and closed the distance, hugging her tightly. “I didn’t notice you sneak up on me. I was talking to our kids, they were here just a second ago. Were you looking for them? I thought the fields would keep you busy this time of day. Actually, your wife was around a second ago as well, but she vanished on me.” A strange thought occurred to me. We had spent so much time fixing problems, meddling in their relationship that it was only natural, at this point. “You two aren’t having another spat, are you? If so, I don’t want any part of that! I think I meddled quite enough as is.”

Applejack furrowed her brow as if she did not understand what I was talking about. No spat then, good, good. Despite their current harmonious lives, their filly would grow up knowing her way around a dispute. I sometimes worried about Fluttershy’s offspring. Whisper was just as timid and superficially fragile as her mother. And in Fluttershy’s and Pinkie’s household, ‘real’ arguments were hard to imagine. Maybe it would do the little filly good to be this close with Ambrosia.

While Applejack was apparently still trying to figure out how she could rope me into her business, Pinkie casually walked up to us, all smiles as usual. “Where are you even walking to?” she asked.

I smiled. “Home,” I answered her and nodded up to the castle. “I was about to get something to eat at the tavern, but Rainbow left me and I remembered that Twi should be home as well, so I was hoping to get some pre-dinner-snuggles in and distract her a little. You know how she gets with these old books. It’s like Golden Oaks all over again.” I thoughtfully tapped my chin with a hoof and shook my head lightly after a moment. “Actually, it’s worse. She has to restore these books first. You should hear her coo to them when she works. Sounds similar to Fluttershy tending to one of her injured animal friends. Anyway, it was really nice talking to you gals, but I’m heading home. See you around?”

They nodded and waved their goodbyes, so I once more turned around and started my walk back home. Past humble homes and the few first shops we had, past the granary and Pinkie’s bakery. I entered through the castle gate, respectfully nodding towards the two night guards flanking the entrance. “Gentlecolts,” I greeted. They did not reply of course, but they gave me a curt nod. I took in the sight before me: The castle garden. Four twisted, cursed trees—

What?

I blinked and shook my head lightly and looked again. Four beautiful apple trees grew into the air from their patches surrounding a decadent fountain. The trees had been a little gift for Applejack. Leaving the farm behind to build up a new one could not have been easy, especially since Greenwood could not survive on apples alone. But she was always welcome here and her four favorite trees had found their way to the heart of the village. Lying down in their shade looked enticing, but I still needed to get something in my stomach first. A simple sandwich from the kitchen would do and then I would find Twilight and pester her for attention.

“I don’t think he sees us,” a timid, quiet voice said barely above a whisper.

I chuckled a little bit. “Sorry, Fluttershy,” I replied and looked over to her. She stood at the fountain. “I have to admit, I had not noticed you. I do seem awfully distracted today. Everpony’s just been sneaking up on me. What brings you to the castle? Everything alright with Hector?”

She looked confused. “Who?” she replied.

Her question in turn confused me. Had I remembered his name wrong? To be fair, she hosted dozens, if not hundreds of her animal friends and maintained contact with even more. All of them had names and she used them all the time. I tried to keep up, but there were just so many… “Sorry, did I use the wrong name again? I meant that manticore you were so fond of? The one that mediated for us?” Greenwood was small. Barely a year old. Most ponies here were craftsmen, farmers, weather duty pegasi… sure, we had the night guard, but with so many manticore territories all around us, there would have been a lot more strife and conflict without Fluttershy. And Hector, of course. Or was it Harold? Harry?

No. Harry was the bear, I was pretty sure. Then again, names weren’t quite that unique, right? It was more than possible that Harry the bear and Harry the manticore could both exist.

I had been lost in thought for just a moment, but that had been enough, it seemed. Fluttershy was gone. Maybe she had only been visiting the castle to get some business done with Twilight? She did like to read some of those novels my love had restored recently. Or had she been searching for Whisper? Damn. I could have told her where to find her, or at least that she had no reason to worry.

Well. Missed opportunities.

I trotted into the castle and greeted the next pair of guards holding the main door. I crossed the massive entrance hall and marveled at the enormous banners and stained glass windows. It was just so beautiful. Luna had reconstructed everything from memory alone. And never had there been a more obvious proof that she was the Matron of the Arts. Certain details were altered to accommodate the new age. But even after living here for almost a year, the wonder to see this castle in all its glory did not seem to fade even the slightest bit.

Up the stairs and—

“Well we must do something! If we let this continue, he will eventually break his n—We can’t let this continue.” A smile creeped up my face. I stopped on the stairs, turned and walked down a little bit to greet Rarity with a warm hug. It felt nice. Familiar.

Of course she was fretting about something again. She always was, it seemed. “What is it this time, Rarity?” I asked her with a good-natured chuckle. Maybe I could sort her out before I got something to eat. But then I remembered who I was talking to. And that she would very likely spring into another of her ‘oh woe is me’-tirades if I would let her. “If this is about Luna's dress again — please don’t burn it this time. I still think the last design was perfectly fine and if you keep burning stuff you’re not content with, you’ll eventually set a bad example for the other Royal Seamstresses in Canterlot.” I chuckled at the mere thought of Canterlot Castle being stormed by firefighters because they followed her example. Rarity still seemed concerned, however, so I sat down before her and laid a hoof on her shoulder. “Don’t worry,” I tried to reassure her. “Whatever it is, we’ll deal with it. Together. As we always do, hm? Let me make you an offer: We head to the kitchen and I make myself a sandwich, because quite frankly, I’m starving. You can tell me all about what ails you and after that, I wanted to head upstairs and bother Twilight a little. Maybe we can use that time to search for a solution for whatever troubles you? Sounds good?”

“Where… is the kitchen again?” she cautiously asked.

I laughed. I always forgot that, with her position, she basically had an entire wing of the castle to herself. Storage, show rooms, dressing rooms, more storage, workstations, bedroom, bathroom, guest bedroom… as if somepony had looked at Carousel Boutique and thought to himself ‘yeah, we can pack all that into the castle, easy, but I wonder if that will be enough…’ I could not quite remember if she had her own kitchen as well or if she was just so used to the staff bringing food to her, almost force-feeding her, that she just forgot.

“It’s right over there, Rares,” I replied with a grin and pointed a hoof at one of the doors leading away from the entrance hall.

“Marvelous!” she replied. “That would be perfect, yes.”

I shook my head, smiled, and we walked down the stairs again. The kitchen was another massive room, but crammed at the same time. Dozens of chefs and kitchen assistants could work here side by side, throwing out the best dishes served aside from Canterlot Castle. Of course, with Greenwood being this small, there was no need for so many ponies working here. In fact, we currently had… none. Spike and I usually used the kitchen to throw something together, and a few staff members who were brought on for other tasks were kind enough to sometimes deliver what he had cooked for us.

I busied myself with throwing a sandwich together and took note of Rarity sitting down on the floor instead of using one of the stools. Weird, but alright. Maybe whatever troubled her really was a problem.

“Dreamwalker?”

I sighed a little. Why, Tia? Why was I always this unfortunate with my timing? I closed my eyes for a brief moment, yet despite my frustrations, a loving smile tugged at my lips. “Hey, Twilight.” Maybe I should not have gone for the sandwich? Then again, that would have meant missing Rarity’s most recent crisis and I could not bring myself to regret that. She needed help and no matter how serious her problem might have been for me or anypony else — we would take it seriously, because it was serious to her.

So I would not be able to surprise Twilight. Fine. “Stardust was asking for Luna earlier. Apparently he wants to give her something? I was thinking… maybe we could have a nice, big family dinner again? All seven of us? We hadn’t had one of those for some time. Would be nice.”

I finally turned around and therefore ignored my half-finished sandwich. As I looked at her, my heart leaped in my chest. She had been this beautiful from the first day I laid eyes upon her, and here she was, still this beautiful many years later. Despite my own position and no matter how many years of writing experience I would gather — words would always fail me to describe how much I loved her.

Luckily, some actions were decent in expressing that and the results of these actions were running around out there, playing. Come to think of it though… “Have you seen Magnus? I presume Arcana is in the library, but I haven’t seen hide nor hair of him all day. I thought he might try to bother Whisper again, but I hadn’t seen him when I spotted her and it’s not like him to stay cooped up in the castle all day.”

Slowly, carefully, she walked over to me and sat down before me. She had this serious ‘we need to talk’-expression. That usually gave me quite a fright, as there was always a good reason for it, but this time? I was not conscious of having done anything wrong. “Please, I can’t lose you,” she pleaded as she laid her hooves on my cheeks and focused all of my attention on her — as if it had been anywhere else to begin with.

I smiled warmly. “You won’t. I will never—“ Flashes. I smelled burned flesh and my empty stomach twisted. It was so overwhelming. My legs trembled. I could feel the blood on my hooves. See the bodies… dear Celestia, sweet Celestia, have mercy… so many bodies… torn limbs, ripped out wings, I had killed so many—

“Please stay with me!” she yelled. I blankly stared at her. I felt numb. I felt like a monster, like I had—

She pulled me in. Pressed me against her so tightly that breathing was becoming harder. I felt her tremble a little. Just a little. And what I saw, and what I smelled, and the cries of pain and death and those for mercy, subsided. In a muddied pool of memories, the monster, once awoken, let itself sink down, deeper and deeper to the pool's very bottom once more. It knew mercy. It spared me. So that I could comfort her. Because even this monster loved her dearly.

I laid my hooves around her. Stroked down her mane, her back. “I will always—“ I started, but she interrupted me.

She pulled back, but held me close. I saw those tears in her eyes. It stung. I saw the desperation beyond the tears. And it stung. “Please stay with me!” she pleaded once more.

I felt strangely distant. For just a fraction of a second, I felt like I was outside my own body. As if I hovered around above our heads and did nothing of any importance whatsoever. But her voice cut through everything I was not doing and not thinking.

I blinked.

And I was back. I sat there with her opposite me. She had managed to hold the tears back, but she was fighting hard, and she was losing. Please don’t cry!, I wanted to say. “I can’t dance,” came out instead. I blinked again in surprise.

“… what?” she asked while sniveling a little.

“I can’t dance,” I repeated. I sounded like a fool. “For the life of me, I can’t. Everypony at our wedding attested to me being a worse dancer than you, and you are already a hazard to the public.” I jumped a little as I heard some of our friends giggle behind me. Looking around and I saw them stand close by. Pinkie and Rainbow snickered merrily, while Rarity, Applejack and Fluttershy seemed worried. Deeply worried. And they stared at Twilight and me.

“Is he back for good?” Applejack asked in Twilight's direction.

I blinked again and shifted my attention to Twilight. “What…?” I started.

“You were gone,” she replied once she had recomposed herself. “You were talking to ponies that were not there, walking around and…” Her brow furrowed in thought. “I think you had another flash?”

I winced a little as a short flood swept by and nodded. “I… yes. I don’t think I had… anything like that up until now. Nothing… nothing this strong.”

“Yeah, well, you better spill,” Rainbow riled herself up. “What the heck was that all about?”

“Oh, there had been a village here,” Pinkie merrily chirped in. “It was kinda small though. And I was living with Fluttershy in this gigantonormous tree! And all her friends were my friends too. Even though I didn’t understand them as well as Flutters does. And with so many friends, we had so many itsy bitsy tiny parties all the time, because of the many birthdays! And we had the cutest little pegasus daughter and we had named her Whisper and she was destined to become the Element of Generosity because the stars said so.”

That had surely been seven seconds. Maybe five. And Pinkie would probably have moved on with her ‘explanation’, had she not noticed most of the attention drifting away from her, towards me, for something a little bit more comprehensible. “She’s right,” I replied. I stood up and looked around. It hurt my heart to see these ruins. I had been at home here. So much work had been… what? Lost? Rolled back? Was there maybe still a place and a time when this magnificent castle still existed? Or maybe it would exist again?

“There had been a small village here,” I said as I looked over the clearing around the ruins. “Pinkie’s and Fluttershy’s house over there,” I pointed my hoof at the empty space. “Applejack’s and Rainbow’s new home over there. Greenwood needed food. Its flora and soil needed taming. The wildlife around this place needed some of that as well. The library was in dire need of someone looking after it, repairing the damage failing wards had admitted over the centuries. The castle had been rebuilt to host the Princess of the Night, and her Royal Seamstress of course. You had a bakery over there,” I pointed towards another empty space and looked towards Pinkie. “Rainbow was fighting the Everfree weather for us, spearheading the charge together with those she was willing to trust by her side. It was… our ambitious little project. We were pioneers. Reclaiming lost and chaos-riddled land.” My throat tightened a little before I belatedly added, “It was home.”

“But for heaven’s sake, why go to all this trouble in the first place?” Applejack asked incredulously.

I chuckled and felt heat rise into my cheeks. “Luna was pregnant. She didn’t quite feel at home in Canterlot, she missed her old home and she wanted to avoid the press for as long as possible, since her relationship was… uh… a little unconventional. Canterlot’s elite would probably not have taken kindly to this news. We had thought about Ponyville for a while, but… it would have changed the sleepy little town so much. We didn’t want that.”

“So we became part of her entourage, I presume?” Rarity asked. That gleeful smile only got stronger when I nodded in confirmation as she seemed quite satisfied with the thought that she had managed to gain such a prestigious position. “If I may be so bold to ask, what was all that about ‘destined to be the Element of Generosity’?” While she did not feel threatened per se — by a filly no less —, her expression did change into something more worried.

I smiled at her in an attempt to ease that concern. “The Elements will find new bearers eventually. Even if everything is smooth sailing from here on out, eventually, they will move on to a new generation. I don’t know how exactly that works. Maybe they only chose bearers when they are needed. But for some reason, the Elements stuck close to their previous wearers.”

That last statement unsurprisingly confused her a little bit. She looked over to Fluttershy, who immediately hid behind her mane and mumbled a little excuse. “No reason, darling, I am just thinking. So her daughter went on to get my Element?” she asked for clarification.

I was considering if I should just end this. Nip their curiosity in the bud right then and there. What use was it anyway, gaining knowledge about other lives they had never lived and would never live? But despite my own growing concerns, it did feel nice to talk about it. I was not sure if it would bring me closure. I highly doubted that. But for a short while, it made me feel closer to those times again. “Yes,” I confirmed her question and saw a similar question arise on Applejack's face. Ambrosia was some kind of apple after all. She knew that by heart. I did not. When she first uttered that name, I had to ask about it, because the only context I knew it from was as a fictional food for gods. Which was actually the source from whence the apple had gained its name, as it turned out. “Your daughter would eventually become loyalty,” I told her.

“Aw yeah!” Rainbow hoof pumped the air as if that somehow was her achievement. She suddenly seemed to remember something as well. “Hey, uh, what was that about Scoots earlier?”

I cringed. “Is she alright?” I asked. “Like… are her parents alright? You have seen them, yes?”

I tried to keep my own agitation out of my voice and believed myself to be decently successful. Enough to not raise suspicion with Rainbow at least. “Yeah, sure. Busy folks, but you know, they love her, she loves them, all the mushy stuff. Why?”

I could see the recognition dawning on Applejack's face. Maybe she would tell Rainbow sometime, someday. Maybe not. I sure wasn’t about to. “That’s good,” I replied with a relieved smile.

On some level, Rainbow understood. At least that she was not getting the answer she had asked for and she was not willing to press me on it either. I looked my friends over. Most of them were thinking about what they had heard. And I was certain that at some point, each and every one of them would come to the same conclusion I had: That it mattered little.

I tensed up a little as Twilight sat down beside me and laid her wing around me. I quickly relaxed and leaned into her. “Are you alright?” I asked. I was still worried for her. She had seemed so devastated. I had once again given her quite the scare. It was becoming a bad habit, one I really would have liked to kick.

She gave me a little squeeze and smiled at me. “I was about to ask you the same thing,” she replied barely above a whisper so as to not disturb our friends.

Don’t lie to me, I heard her plead. I was not about to. I instead thought about my answer for a moment before nestling into the crook of her neck. “A part of me is heartbroken about seeing this ruin,” I replied in honesty. “And seeing the emptiness outside. When we founded Greenwood, we attracted some interesting characters. Misfits of society. Those searching for a second chance. Or third, or fourth one…”

“Trixie,” she interjected with a quiet laugh.

I nodded. “You should have seen her. Flim, Flam and her worked out some kind of partnership. They opened a tavern and she was the only entertainer. They thrived in this place. Remember Lightning Dust? That reckless pegasus Rainbow had a spat with? When she showed up, Rainbow made her leader of her own team. We worked hard for this place and… it’s all gone now. Or rather… it just never came to be. It makes this place feel familiar and alien at the same time. It’s strange. How about you?”

Twilight continued to observe her friends as they started to share their thoughts and theories and speculations with each other. They seemed light-hearted about all of this, occasionally giggling or laughing. It helped slowly lift the weight of my chest. “When you showed me our home, you did not show me this castle.”

“Back then, I didn’t remember any of that. We're not talking about one live, but dozens. Maybe more.”

Her ears drooped. “I’m sorry.”

Now it was me squeezing her a little bit tighter. “Don’t be. Honestly, I still don’t know what to make of it. These memories are a curse and a blessing in equal measure. I remember my sons and my daughter and I could tell you so much about them, and it would fill me with joy. It does so even merely thinking about them. I remember how it feels to be a father. To be utterly overwhelmed and unprepared, to slowly grow according to the many challenges. I remember the exhaustion and the elation. I miss them of course. But at the same time, that was a different life somehow. Before I remembered, I could not have missed them anyway. And now, things seem… balanced? So… are you not curious? About the Element-thing?”

She smiled and shrugged. “If you are eager to tell me, feel free to do so. But to be honest… no. It is strange. But I do not care much about where the Elements would end up, or why. We have been chosen, for now at least. But if you do not mind, if it does not bother you — and only then — I would very much like to hear more about our family at some point.”

I nuzzled her neck for a brief moment before I pulled myself away. “Gladly.”

“Should we maybe reconvene on another day?” she asked thereafter.

I sighed deeply. It was a question I had thought about myself as well. We were in the early afternoon hours and time was mercilessly trickling away. We decidedly did not want to fight any dreamscape creature at night. I did not know if they would gain strength from that or could somehow draw from Luna's magic reserve, but the mere fact that none of us had darkvision was enough to facilitate that decision.

We still had more than enough daylight hours left, in theory. So I shook my head. “I’m alright now, I think. It was just the initial burst that took me by surprise. To be honest, I was kind of an idiot. I had told Applejack that I was feeling something, but I couldn’t specify what. Should’ve clued me in, I guess.”

She watched me closely for a moment, and I held her gaze. She was satisfied with what she had found a moment later and addressed the others. “Everypony ready?”

Their wild speculations came to an end and their attention drifted back to us. “We had just been waiting for you slow-pokes,” Rainbow teased. “Are we doing this or are we doing this now?”

Twilight could not help but smile at her friends’ eagerness.

“Could we maybe do this in the garden?” I asked and received puzzled looks in return. “Uh… the… courtyard? That big open space out front with the four dirt patches, the three gnarled trees and the rubble in the middle?”

Suddenly their faces lit up with recognition and they all knew what I was talking about. We returned there and it was once again a shame to see what had become of the place. The trees looked vicious and twisted, the fourth patch was empty and the once impressive fountain could only be recognized as such if one already knew what it was supposed to look like.

But it would do, I presumed.

To prevent any inconveniences, we stayed clear of the three trees and trotted over to the fourth patch. I was about to just plop myself down when Rarity spoke up. “Ah, ah, ah, dear! Please, we are civilized ponies in no need of such barbaric ways.” She had apparently packed a picnic blanket. Of course she had — she was Rarity after all. She levitated it out of her saddlebag, carefully unfolded it in her magic and lowered it to the ground at just the right angle.

I looked down at my hooves. And then over to the hooves of the others. “It cannot be helped, dear, but I appreciate the hesitation,” she said before, with a slight twitch in her eye, she roughly cleaned her hooves of muck with her magic and stepped onto the blanket herself. The patch below was dry dirt — that was not the problem. The problem had been the numerous puddles and creaks along the way. I carefully knocked my hooves together to get rid of at least some of the half-dried muck-crust before stepping onto the blanket with my front hooves and kicking back with my back legs. It was not perfect, but it was an effort made and appreciated. The others followed suit and soon enough, we had made ourselves somewhat comfortable.

“If this works out,” I began explaining, “it will only take a couple of minutes. But it might be longer. I have to convince Luna, after all, and she can be stubborn if she wants to. Ideally, she will give you some kind of hint that it’s coming, so keep your eyes and ears open.”

“Good luck,” Fluttershy replied and the others chimed in.

I smiled. I had half a mind to tell them again how lucky I felt, how happy I felt, but… eventually they would get sick of hearing it if I overused it, I told myself. So I instead opened the thick-walled bottle Zecora had given me. “Oh dear Celestia, this stuff really does smell vile,” I coughed and fought my gag reflex. “Well, here we go. Down the hatch with you!” In one fell swoop, I emptied the entire bottle. Or so I had hoped. The viscousness of it meant that the semi-liquid took its time to even empty out and more so to leave my mouth and almost crawl down my throat. It was disgusting.

“And keep it down too,” Rainbow added with a snicker.

“I’m trying,” I wheezed out. And I was only partially being dramatic — this stuff really was nasty. Thankfully Twilight was once more better prepared and demonstrated more foresight than I did — she levitated a bottle of water over to me. “Thank you.” The water helped clear my mouth of it and bring it down faster, but it couldn’t quite get rid of the awful taste. Still — it was way better than before.

I started to grow frustrated around two minutes later. “This is not where this was meant to become difficult,” I sourly stated.

“You don’t feel anything?” Applejack asked.

I sighed. “I do feel drowsy. Heavy eyelids, relaxed, like… I should be able to sleep… I just… can’t.”

“Pinkie? Would you maybe help me?” Twilight asked. I looked around to see what they were up to. Twilight stood up and Pinkie followed her example without question. She seemed to know exactly what was expected of her. “Rarity, could you shuffle over a little bit please?” After some more rearranging, my confusion started to dwindle. Twilight nodded to Pinkie and sat down on her belly, so close to me that a sheet of paper would have had problems fitting in between. And on the other side, Pinkie did the same.

I felt my cheeks heat up as I realized what they intended. Twilight had apparently remembered my comment about how nice it felt to snuggle up next to Pinkie and Fluttershy. And I could imagine why she had not asked the latter about this. Thinking about her made me realize that there had been literally no confirmation from her that this was even remotely okay, so I craned my neck to search for her. Fluttershy sat a small distance away, leaned against Rarity and smiled towards us. Not exactly the face I had expected and certainly not a single trace of jealousy.

“T-Thank you,” I mumbled into Pinkie's ear as I turned my head back. She giggled quietly. Possibly because of my breath tickling her ear. I laid down my head, I closed my eyes and tried to drift off. I focused on the warmth that came from both sides. On the light breeze rustling the leaves in the distance. Twilight even extended her wing over my back and another side became comfy, snug and warm. Their breathing was calm and steady. And a moment later, Twilight started to softly hum a strangely familiar melody.

A deep, happy sigh escaped me as I finally drifted off.

And with that, Twilight was free to send the first signal for Spike to send the first message to Luna.

The night sky was welcoming me when I arrived in the dreamscape. Floating bubbles lazily danced all around me and none of the inhabitants were to be seen. Good. I had no use for further complications. I instead tapped the ground three times while I focused on the mental image of Celestia. Her regal pose, her practiced smile, her pristine white coat, her ever-flowing ethereal mane. That playful smirk when she got one over on Luna in their endless prank war.

Her dream followed my call back to me and all the other dreams fled from it. Even knowing full well what happened last time, I could not keep myself from cautiously touching her dream again. I was not surprised to merely get confirmation that I had not imagined her burden. Her song might have changed. To reflect the loss of others dear to her. But her grief and desperation was still very much there. My vision blurred within seconds, my heart grew heavy and my breath became erratic. Despite this torture, I had difficulties tearing myself away from her dream. I desperately wanted to help her. In any way possible. Even if that meant to carry it with her. But I was still rational enough to realize that what I was doing right now would not help at all.

We have a plan. It will help. Stick to it.

It was time to wait for Luna to arrive and have a little conversation. So I just plopped my rear down onto the ground and exercised some good old-fashioned patience and self-control as I had to continuously fight the urge to return to that dream behind me. Maybe I was just a glutton for punishment...

I took her less time than I had anticipated.

When she arrived by stepping through what appeared to be a vertical rift in space, I stood back up. She looked around for a moment, took in where I was and of course she took note of the dream behind me. Her eyebrows knitted together in annoyance. She regarded me for a little while and I endured her inspection despite my growing nervousness, until she finally raised her voice. “Dreamwalker, I thought we had an arrangement?” she said.

I looked to the polished marble floor and thought hard how to phrase my explanation. When I looked back up, I smiled. She was radiant. Even now, tired and worn out because I had stirred her from her slumber early, she was still so irresistible. “Let me explain, Lu,” I pleaded and closed the distance. I carefully cupped her chin with my hooves, “Twilight and I have been talking. We understand your determination, we admire your drive, and we would not dare interfere with your duty, but Luna… we miss you. Some of these days, we barely see anything of you at all. And we are not the only ones. Stardust misses his mom. He’s still too young to understand. He asks about you a lot. And I try my best to be there for him, but he needs his mom just as much as his mommy or his dad.”

Her eyes grew wide as the door opened and a little colt ran into the room. “Mom!” he cried happily and lunged at her. She barely felt the impact. “You’re awake early!”

I threw her a ‘see?’-look and smiled as she furrowed her brow in contemplation. “I’m sure we can figure something out. We have been able to do that so far, haven’t we?” I leaned in to kiss her and—

I managed to rip myself free from this memory.

Luna was close enough that I could still feel her breath on my muzzle. I distantly noticed the ‘walls’ of the room dissolve again, the ‘marble floor’ returning to its star-strutted form. And a little colt clinging to her leg, smiling happily, faded away. But my attention was on her and her wide eyes.

I slowly and carefully pulled back. “I-I’m sorry about that,” I mumbled. I took a step back, then a second one. And sat down with a soft thud.

“What was that?” she quietly demanded to know.

I took my front hooves to my face and slowly wiped them down. “An aftershock of my most recent flash, I assume. I’m really, really sorry about that, I… I had not expected that. And more importantly, that is not why we are here.”

She needed some time to recompose herself and although I feared that she might have questions, she spared me for now and turned her attention to the letter she had received. “Twilight was asking us for this meeting on your behalf,” she roughly summed it up. “But she did not state why it had to be here.” Her gaze drifted over my back to Celestia's dream of course. She had a sneaking suspicion that she now knew after all.

“I want to free her,” I plainly stated.

Her deep sigh spoke of exhaustion. “We know. And we have been talking about this before. It is—“

“I have a plan,” I interjected and cringed only a little bit when her glare hit me. She oh so hated it when I interrupted her.

However, she was attentive. Yes, I had been dreamwalking again, going directly against what she had asked and what I had agreed to. However, I had obviously been sitting here. I waited for her arrival. I had not done anything stupid as far as she could tell her. And I had arranged for a conversation. “Speak then,” she gave me permission. And I was quite happy with that. I smiled and nodded enthusiastically.

Until my smile faltered. Because I knew what came next and she really would not like that part either. “My assumptions so far — and correct me, if I’m wrong at any point: You care about your sister’s well-being.” A snort was my only answer to that first point — fair enough. “You want that thing gone more than I do. But you don’t challenge it, because there is a risk of you not being able to defeat it properly, which means that it might run wild and endanger other dreamers.” I waited a few seconds, but there was no denial coming. Good. “Right now, the situation is stable enough. It has no reason to move, as long as you don’t poke it. But even given the necessary years of training, you are not sure if we can manage to defeat it together.” I saw her uncomfortably squirm in place as I plainly spoke my third point. I was not about to hold it against her. While my ability was unique, I was far from being as capable as Luna. And I might never reach these heights to begin with. The longer I dabbled in this unique ability, the more I became painfully aware of my limitations. And maybe that was a good thing. “So, my plan is based on somepony else defeating it.”

“You cannot possibly insinuate that our own sister should defeat this thing!” she immediately objected.

Would Celestia even have been capable of such? It was an interesting question I had not even considered up to this point. Of course I was mildly annoyed that she had been slipping into the royal ‘we’ again, but this was not the time to remind her of that. “No. I have arranged for Twilight and the other bearers to stand ready. We are currently at the ruins of the old castle. They are alert and waiting, Elements at the ready. We open a tear, we bring that thing to where I am and they immediately blast it. That is my plan. Twilight will signal Spike, who’s waiting at the castle in Ponyville, as soon as either they are successful, or they need help. Spike in turn will send one of two messages to you immediately.”

Her eyes spoke of inner conflict, she switched between regarding me with annoyance and her sister's dream with trepidation. “It is dangerous business to bring these creatures into the waking world,” she meekly objected. And that tone was enough for me to know that she wanted this as much as I did. Her heart sang at the opportunity, begging her to take it. It was only a matter of convincing her reason.

“I know,” I replied. “That’s why we took precautions. We went out to the Everfree Forest where nopony lives. Well, except Zecora maybe, and she is informed about what will be going down soon. If the Elements can’t handle that thing, then… nothing can. And no amount of time will help you win this fight. She could be enslaved like this forever. And it will only grow…”

“We do not know what shape it will take once it passes between worlds. Nay, we cannot know,” came her next attempt to deflect.

I nodded. “I know that too. I told them as much. I told them to be attentive. Look around. Get a feeling for what is where and how. Sounds, sights… a single out of place tree, a suddenly missing wall, upcoming mist, whatever it is. They will know and they will not hesitate. And given this thing is this old and large, I highly doubt it will choose the form of a single blade of grass.” I tried to lighten the mood with a silly joke, but she just nodded in serious agreement and mulled the rest over again and again.

She finally looked at me once more. “Why are you here?” she asked.

This plan could have been given to her via letter, obviously. Or Twilight could have talked to her in private. My involvement was not strictly necessary. I blushed the tiniest bit and I rubbed a hoof along my neck. “Well, to be honest, there isn’t exactly a lot I can contribute to this — I give you that. You are the one that needs to give some kind of signal to Twilight as soon as we start this party, and you are the one that needs to tear open the rift. I can’t do that. But you have been hesitant to even go near that dream and I noticed. I want to spare you from releasing it. You have struggled with this burden long enough and while I might not be able to offer you to carry half of it, I can at least offer you to carry some part. Let me burst the dream. Let me be the one to anger it and set it free.”

Some part of my answer seemed to surprise Luna. Her mild astonishment soon made way for a warm smile. “You really do try a lot. We—I agree however. I must admit, I had not thought of bringing it to Equestria to give the Elements a shot. Literally.” She even giggled and I quickly chimed in.

“Well despite what some ponies might think, you are responsible and reasonable. Bringing that thing over is neither of those.”

“Be that as it may, you have convinced us. Me. I beg your pardon. I wish to try to rid my sister of this plague.”

I lunged forward again without hesitation and embraced her. She quickly tensed up, but relaxed again just as fast and eventually reciprocated the hug. “Thank you,” I mumbled into her coat and nuzzled her chest.

“No, thank you,” she replied.

I took a couple of steps back and nodded to her. “Send the signal. I'll pop it as soon as you give me the all-clear.” I walked over to Celestia's dream and regarded the lazy, gray mass swirling in it. She was not sleeping. She probably still held Day Court right now, so the farmer inside was lying dormant as well. I presumed it felt my presence, but I was tiny. Bold to dare go near it, but ultimately not worth the effort to scare away. I looked over my shoulder and saw Luna brace herself as she gave me the signal. Whatever message she had sent to Twilight, this was it — the moment of truth.

I turned my attention back to Celestia's dream, drew my hoof back and gave it a single, good whack. The bubble burst immediately and an ever-growing mass of blinding bright light was set free.

“Crap, forgot about the light,” I whined as I pressed my eyes shut and stumbled backwards. I tried to open my eyes again every few seconds to see the mass growing even larger and larger until its growth stopped and it started to form into something.

Considering how huge and angry it was, I expected an Ursa Maj-

Or a dragon. Dragon works too.

Luckily the form our subconsciousness picked did not impart any abilities — the option to breath fire, for example.

“Rift, Luna… rift, rift, rift!“ I was egging her on.

The dragon roared. The sheer might of its roar made the dreams flee even further than they already had, giving us a nice, huge clearing to work with. But it also vibrated through my actually non-existent bones and paralyzed me for a brief moment. I distantly noted how I was still standing between that dragon made of light and Luna and how very satisfied I felt because of that. That was probably very stupid, I thought to myself — Luna might have been able to tank a couple of hits from that thing. I surely wasn’t.

The dragon focused its entire attention on the two little things that had dared to stir it from its slumber. Oh, now we were very much worth the effort, as it slowly lumbered closer to us but picked up speed along the way. “Luna…?” I asked with barely restrained panic and looked back. Her horn was wreathed in cobalt blue magic, trails of it snaked across the dreamscape like needles, not sewing shut what harm was done, but piercing the veil and ripping it apart.

Once the rift was large enough, we only had to get the dragon through. Which was surprisingly easy. Sure, it noticed the strange something on the ‘ground’ that it probably did not even understand the nature of. But avoiding it seemed simple enough, it just flew above it.

It’s all a matter of perspective, I told myself. I knew what would happen any second now. It was the oldest trick in the book when it came to outmaneuvering dreamscape creatures. Because for some strange reason, our three-dimensional understanding of space confused the heck out of them most of the time.

That dragon was not thinking about ‘flying forward’. It was thinking about reaching us. Flying straight towards us. So all Luna had to do was focus her willpower and force her mental image into the reality of this realm. She tilted it. The entire dreamscape tilted by ninety degrees, until the horizontal rift had become a vertical one. We had not moved, of course. And the dragon, in its single-minded approach, flew right in.

The needles of magic she had used to pierce the veil immediately went to work to stitch it together again. She closed the rift with practiced ease so that the dragon could not just simply return here.

Once done, she looked utterly exhausted. I ran over to her in a probably laughable attempt to steady her. I pressed against her and tried to hold her tight and close. “Are you okay?” I asked her. She smiled. It was enough that I allowed myself a little bit of enthusiasm. “Woohoo! We did it!” I yelled. It quickly turned out that joyfully prancing in place was a lot harder to do when a pony a few pounds heavier than me leaned on me.

Her ears splayed back because of the sudden volume increase, but she allowed herself a cautious smile and even giggled as she noticed my failed attempts at prancing. “Let us hope the second part of your plan has worked just as well or this nightmare has just begun.”

“Eh,” I replied and grinned in utmost confidence. “It wouldn’t worry. I mean, Rainbow is with them, and she just loooves zapping things with rainbow lasers.” We chuckled for a moment. There was an underlying tone of unease, so I did not dawdle for too long. “We should probably still check though. I mean, I’m still here, so I take it as a good sign that I wasn’t immediately crushed. But yeah, let’s wake up.”

Although unnecessary, we both closed our eyes and concentrated and willed ourselves to wake up. “How’s it going?” I mumbled when I reopened my eyes and blankly stared at the night sky in confusion. With dream bubbles floating all around me. Something very soft suddenly hit me from behind and as I jerked around, I saw my own dream swallowing me. I had mere seconds to react, to do or say or even think anything, and maybe, just maybe… Rainbow had been right.

I was a slow-poke after all.

“… what?” And I was gone.

“Good filly. Now eat your veggies and I’ll read you a story,” I mumbled as I slowly rose from the depths of my dream. A content sigh escaped me, a smile tugged at my lips. It was warm, it was cozy, and I could just as easily drift off to sleep again. A sudden thought almost made me jump however: Why had I been dreaming in the first place?

My eyes shot open and a rising panic tried its best to spur me into action, but all the energy got taken away as soon as I stared into Twilight's eyes, a glint of amusement adorning her expression. “Hey there pretty,” I greeted her and tried to cover up my confusion.

“Hi,” she replied with a giggle. My cover-up clearly was not flying.

I raised my head off the pillow and looked around a little. I recognized her bedroom. A look out the window told me that it was early evening. I must have been asleep for hours. But I still remembered the plan, my conversation with Luna, how she woke up… and how I did not.

I tried to answer the obvious question: Why?

The answer was given to me when I took notice of that foul taste in my mouth.

“Do you want us to get up and get some dinner?” she asked.

I remained silent for a little while, but found no particular need to get up at all. No hunger was spurring me on, no thirst… actually… “No, I don’t think I want to get up,” I replied. “But I feel like I could really use—“

A glass of water levitated over before my face, carried in her raspberry aura. I grinned. “Yeah. That. Thank you.” I took over and gulped down the entire content. It felt refreshing. And it did manage to wash away that awful taste. Finally!

“You had really bad breath,” she remarked and giggled again when I grimaced in return.

“Yet you still insisted on lying in front of me,” I retorted.

She nodded. “It was worth it. That way, I could do this.” She scooched a little bit closer and, as was almost becoming routine, buried her face on my chest. I had to admit: This most certainly did feel nice. If it felt just half as nice for her than it did for me, I could understand her reasoning. I tightened my grip on her only to nuzzle her mane and take deep breaths to fill my lungs with her scent. Never, not in a million years, would I ever get enough of this.

Still, I wanted to sulk at least a little, so I gave a little huff. “I’ll have to talk to Zecora about that stuff sometime. That potion really did a number on me. I couldn’t even wake up again!” I complained.

“I know. Applejack had to carry you on our way back home. She had you draped across her back like a sack of flour and you still refused to wake up, you just kept snoring quietly.” It was all very amusing. For her. Alone.

But I could not stay cross with her, even if I tried. In a weird way, this somehow only felt like second-hand embarrassment. Like it had happened to somepony else. It still made me blush a little as I could only imagine all of them joking around at my expense on the way home. But it was okay. They were my friends.

They were my friends again.

I absentmindedly stroked a hoof along her back, sometimes I let it slide over her wings, always carefully, and enjoyed listening to her content sighs and happy little noises. But eventually, I had to address the elephant in the room. She was here, she was relaxed and that had been enough so far. It told me a great deal of how things had turned out. But I needed more now. “So, since all the awesome rainbow power was obviously too boring to behold… mind giving me a rundown of what happened? Everypony is okay, I hope?”

She did not budge from her position, and I had not wanted her to. She just started to talk, her voice a little muffled at times when she talked straight into my coat. “Luna appeared,” she recounted much to my surprise. How had she done that…? “It was really impressive. She was this translucent recreation of herself… I think she used an astral projection. I have never seen one of those in practice, it was fascinating. She told us to get ready and asked if we really were okay with doing this. She then vanished and we tried to prepare, but there was little else we could do besides standing up. Applejack carried you to a more secluded area in hopes that if an actual fight might break out, you would not be in any trouble. But not far enough away that predators from the Everfree would sense an opportunity. Shortly after, the rift started to appear. To be honest, it looked pretty scary at first. And out of it came this strange mist. It had no defined color, it constantly shifted and there were little dots in there, glowing like stars. The rift closed and it started to take shape.”

So they did not immediately blast the darn thing. I gave a little sigh but tried to restrain myself. Attacking without provocation just wasn’t in their nature. Maybe I should have known better. The brief, light tremble I felt in her made me worry a little as well. So I hugged her even tighter for a moment. “What shape did it take?” I asked.

“I had really hoped I would never have to see her again,” she quietly replied and got even quieter when she dared utter that name. “Nightmare Moon.”

Huh.

That revelation actually gave me pause for a moment. My thoughts were racing as I tried to decipher how this had come to pass. How Nightmare Moon had managed to survive despite what had happened in those ruins years ago, with Luna — her host — being involved. And then I started to understand: She didn’t. She had not survived at all. This creature had been a farmer with a frightening amount of control. It had probably known Celestia's memories in intimate detail. I had my doubts that it understood them, but it knew them. And it was suddenly thrust into an alien world, following alien rules. Maybe it had recognized the castle's ruin? Maybe it had recognized Twilight and the others. These ponies and events must have been linked in some way even in Celestia's mind. Especially in hers actually.

The first form it willingly took in its entire existence was that of a cruel and selfish tyrant. Aside from what that said about this creature, I had little doubt left that they were less hesitant to fire at this point.

“You were right,” she said and her voice grew a little bit stronger. The tremble all but vanished.

“Villain speech?” A nod confirmed my suspicion. I had to admit, though: I was surprised. This creature had no understanding of our world… yet it knew how to talk. Or maybe it was just dangling along from one memory to the next, following them like a script. Maybe it had not even spoken a single original word, only replaying what had been said a thousand years ago. Or followed a script of one of Celestia's nightmares. “So you blasted her then and there?”

“Mhm. She got three and a half words out.” That made me chuckle. Of course she counted. I was amused about how fast they had apparently acted as soon as the enemy looked eerily familiar.

“What came next?” I asked. I was not sure if there was anything left to tell at this point.

The fact that she remained silent for a while was telling. Something had happened. And she was apparently still struggling to fully comprehend it. Or she had difficulties finding the right words for it? I exercised some patience and instead just enjoyed how close she was.

My eyelids started to get heavier again and I considered closing them when she spoke up. “When the Elements lowered us back down onto the ground, Nightmare Moon was gone. Again. There is this… tree now. In the courtyard, on that fourth dirt patch. The empty one where we had waited. I think it is a special tree.”

I furrowed my brow and immediately blurted out what I was thinking. “Special how?”

“She did not say anything and with everypony cheering and celebrating, I did not want to press her,” Twilight hesitantly explained, “but I think Applejack recognized it? She was eager to return home after that.”

Huh. I was confused by this news. “Is it an apple tree?” I felt her nod again and for some reason… I could not help but hope. I was not even sure what exactly I was hoping for.

“From what I can tell, it is a perfectly normal, perfectly healthy apple tree. The dirt around it was overgrown, too. With grass and flowers. It looked really nice.” While it sure sounded nice as well, I still noticed that uncertainty in her voice. Judging by what she had told me, and how, I assumed that these plants showed no signs of corruption. No influence of the chaos that saturated every living thing in the Everfree, every cloud above it and every crumb of dirt below. Maybe she was worried that these lives could not be saved from becoming corrupted eventually? Maybe.

More importantly, I knew that I had to see it for myself. There were things that I could not describe, things that had to be felt and experienced. “Twilight? May I ask a favor or two?”

I could feel her swallow down that giggle. “Anything.”

I raised my eyebrow for a moment and was willing to abuse her offer so hard. Just to see how far she was actually willing to go until ‘anything’ became ‘something’. “You really shouldn’t let Rarity hear that. She might think we’re an item,” I teased her.

She drew her muzzle from my chest, up my throat and gave me the tiniest little kiss on my lower jaw. I could not deny that it made my heart flutter a little. “I’m pretty sure they all think that already anyway.”

“Oh.” I found it hard to define what her assumption made me feel. Was I bothered by this? Did I care? Should I? I leaned in and gave her horn a kiss in return. I delighted in seeing her eyelids flutter and hear that quiet, restrained gasp. They thought we were an item anyway, so why not-

Don't.

It took me some time to disentangle myself from these fruitless musings. There was a specific order to things. She belonged to Luna. I had decided on that days earlier. I was not reverting that decision. So I refocused my attention on my initial request. “I hate to ask this, but could you maybe lend me some bits? Enough for a piece of cake from Sugarcube Corner and a train ticket?”

With her having pulled back a little bit, I could see the apparent confusion in her eyes, but she nodded anyway. “Sure. Where do you want to go?”

“Canterlot,” I replied. It's about time. “There’s something I need to do. And could you maybe write a letter to Luna? She offered me a guest room in the palace at one point, but I’m pretty sure that offer was only meant for the duration of my stay during guard training. If she would be fine with that, I’d like to have it anyway, for one night, and I would need to talk to her. Tomorrow, if possible. Late afternoon, early evening, whatever works for her.”

Her confusion only seemed to grow, much to my amusement. “I could just ask Princess Celestia if you could stay in my old room, if you like?” she offered.

I chuckled darkly and my smile grew into a predatory grin. “What a kind offer. I’m sure there will be nothing to find in your old room during my stay, right…?”

Twelve seconds. She had to think and mentally go through her drawers and dressers and whatnot for twelve seconds before she blushed furiously. When I arrived, I knew of her secret gemstone stash. Not only that, but I had known where it was. “I’ll write Luna,” she quickly conceded.

I chuckled and kissed her on her forehead. “Thank you. And one more thing, if that’s alright?”

Now she was the one raising an eyebrow at me. “This is becoming quite a list,” she jokingly replied.

“That might be true,” I ruefully admitted, but perked up right away and grinned. “But you did say ‘anything’ and I haven’t even asked for anything naughty yet.”

She gave a strangled little noise that I found to be most adorable while her blood returned to her cheeks in force. “… yet,” she echoed with a whisper.

I quietly laughed for a moment before kissing her forehead again. “Teasing you is just so much fun,” I admitted and for a brief moment nuzzled her cheek before I pulled back again to look at her. I forced my expression into something more serious. “I need to see it for myself. The courtyard in the castle ruins. Would you be willing to go there with me? Tomorrow morning?” Because even I was not reckless or stupid enough to venture into the Everfree at night. That was just asking for trouble.

Since my question had given her some time to recompose herself, she focused more on my request and smiled with glee, as I had apparently asked exactly what she had hoped to hear at some point. “Yes!” she squealed. “I had been thinking about conducting some experiments. I was thinking about asking Applejack or Fluttershy to accompany me, but both are always so busy and Fluttershy really does not like going into the forest at all. I had already packed all the equipment I would need in my saddlebags downstairs after our return, so I would love to have you with me.”

I grinned and squished her a little bit. She apparently already had a plan. And I had been kind enough to unknowingly play along. But really, that was fine with me and seeing her this excited was just so incredibly endearing. Plus, spending a couple more hours with her was always a welcome bonus. “Sounds like a date then. We’ll get some shut-eye and head out first thing in the morning.” I hugged her tightly and shut my eyes just like I had announced and I found it surprisingly easy to drift off to sleep this time.

Day 16: Sunny Skies

When I cracked my eyes back open again, they tried their damn hardest to tell my brain: It’s the middle of the night, go back to sleep. It was still dark outside, but I noticed the slightest changes in color. It was getting brighter. Soon enough, a spectacular switch would take place, bringing forth all the beauty Sunny so admired.

Despite parts of my body protesting this decision, I was wide awake now and I saw no chance of going back to sleep either. I had slept for the majority of yesterday, we both had slept through the majority of last night — I was just done with sleeping for now.

I regarded Twilight and wondered how to go about this. I wanted to wake her up, but I was feeling a little playful again. So I lowered my head and softly whispered into her ear. “Luna.” That smile gracing her lips grew a little. “Ancient relics.” It grew brighter. “Unknown magic.” And larger. “Research.”

She finally giggled quietly at that last one. “I’m not sure if you are trying to excite me or arouse me,” she quietly whispered back and opened her eyes. My heart made a little tumble in my chest and I barely stifled that gasp. She looked at me with half-lidded eyes, still a bit drowsy yet so full of warmth. It was moments like these which Twilight would never understand. How irresistible and alluring she was right here, right now, with this gaze of hers.

I reconsidered my choice of words and shrugged softly. “I’m honestly not sure myself, I think,” I admitted. “I mostly just wanted to wake you up.”

“Well, I am awake now and it was a nice way to wake up,” she replied and hugged me.

“Right, so… can we go now?” I pressed a little fidgety. It only served to make her giggle.

“Look who’s all excited,” she teased. And yet I knew she was looking forward to this just as much as I was. We snuck out of bed and tried hard to not wake up Spike who was still happily snoring away in his own bed. We succeeded and left the room. One trip to the bathroom later, we met up in the kitchen. Twilight was faster than me. I tried not to let it get to me too much. She had already started to prepare some sandwiches as snacks, so I started to work beside her and made us a quick breakfast and a mug of coffee for her.

We settled down on the kitchen table, she summoned writing supplies from thin air and started on that letter to Luna I had asked of her.

“Sugarcube Corner won’t be open at this hour, will it?” I asked. I had planned on ordering a slice of cake and taking it with me on my way back, but being up this early had its disadvantages.

“I don’t think so,” she briefly replied, but she clearly focused more on the letter and occasionally took a sip from her mug.

I munched away at my bowl of cereal and came up with a decent idea. “Can I have a piece of paper? I think I'm just going to tug a note to the door.” Another sheet of parchment appeared and floated down before me. It took her no effort at all. “Thank you.” And a second feather. “Thanks.”

Once we were done with breakfast, I separated the note I had written into two pieces. One I intended to leave behind for Spike, as he might be a tad confused about our absence. I took Twilight's plate and mug with me, as well as my own, cleaned the stuff up and set it down to dry on its own. It gave Twilight enough time to finish the letter, seal it and send it with her spell.

“All clear?” I asked.

“I still need to write something to tell Spike where we are off to,” she replied and conjured another sheet.

“Aha! I'm one step ahead of you for a change,” I sang and pointed towards the note on the counter. Her eyes quickly scanned its contents, her expression shifted from analytical to mild exasperation and settling on amusement. Surely not what she would have written, but it got the job done.

“That should be fine… I think,” she said and sounded everything but certain. She shook her head after a moment to clear it to focus more on what was ahead of us. “Now, I’ve been promised some A-grade research!”

I chuckled and quickly snuck a little peck on her cheek. “Well, I wouldn’t say ‘promised’, but sure…”

So we packed our things and headed out. I had initially tried to insist on carrying her saddlebags for her, but after trying to do so, I quickly came to the conclusion that her research material must consist of bars of lead, which was the only reasonable explanation. Seeing her carry those without any issues reminded me of the quickly forgotten fact that she was an alicorn and thus had earth pony magic. ‘Carry lots of stuff’ usually did not sound as fancy and impressive as soaring through the sky or levitating entire apple carts, but there were quite enough situations where it came in clutch.

Sugarcube Corner was not exactly on our route, but wandering by was only a small detour. I left my note and we started towards the Everfree, reaching the outer tree line in the late stages of dawn. We were both hyped for this trip, which became most apparent in the fact that she had a little spring in her step and sometimes hummed a melody to herself.

And we once again saw neither hide nor hair from any of the forest's predators. Maybe choosing this early of day for our trip had been a small blessing — the creatures hunting at night were going back to sleep and those hunting at day had yet to wake up.

As we reached the clearing, a little bit of apprehension had once again built up. But I did not freeze or babble about nonsense again this time. A concern Twilight had apparently shared, as she stayed close to me and kept an eye on me. “I’m fine,” I declared and nuzzled into her mane for a moment. “But thank you.”

She gave me a relieved smile and we made our way across into the ruin.

I immediately saw what she had described. The barely recognizable ruin of the fountain was surrounded by four patches of dirt, three of which looked strangely scorched, burned, with three twisted Everfree trees growing out of them. The fourth patch however looked so utterly out of place. As if Applejack had just put her mind to it, taken up a shovel and carried a piece of Ponyville's surrounding area here on her back, just to plant it down perfectly. Green, healthy grass, a couple of flowers mixed in here and there, and one heck of a massive apple tree.

You gotta be careful and gentle, he can be a tad shy, Applejack's voice echoed through my mind. A smile broke out and I quickly trotted over and did something I could not remember I had ever done before.

I hugged a tree.

I was pretty sure Fluttershy could understand me perfectly well. Surely better than I did right now. The bark was still rough and scratchy and the way it had grown was somewhat uncomfortable for me to be pressed against so tightly as this was decidedly not how my spine was supposed to bend… but for a couple of seconds I could not have cared less.

When the slight discomfort grew into the first pangs of pain, I released the tree from my embrace and stepped back. A single apple fell. Right into my hoof. I looked down at it. Shiny. No bruises, no flaws. It looked delicious. And I couldn’t help it. I just started to laugh. It was a strange sound, carried on the wind and laden with merriment and gratitude and sorrow and hope. My gaze became obscured by tears and shortly after, I felt them stream down my face and for the life of me, I could not have told if those were happy tears or not. They were just… there.

In a corner of my mind, I noticed how Twilight had observed the entire reunion take place. She had put down her saddlebags and opened them up, some of her flasks were still levitating around her, but she sat there and just watched. Her expression spoke of her uncertainty, she was asking herself if she should intervene. So I tried to lighten her burden a little and turned to her, my face still a mess and I was barely able to see her clearly. “Twilight,” I spoke up with a hitch in my voice, “may I introduce you to Bruno? It’s one of Applejack's favorite trees. He actually shouldn’t even be this old here. It was the first tree Apple Bloom planted.” The implication was clear enough for her. It was not supposed to be this old here, but it had been someplace else. Or sometime else.

I had no idea how Bruno had gotten here. What the Elements had done baffled me to no end. They turned villains to stone, they shunned others to the moon for a terrifyingly long exile, they turned a foreign, hostile creature into things that should not be here. Maybe that was the connection? I had been the aggressor in that creature’s eyes. It had set its sight on destroying me first and I carried all those weird memories about other times and other castles. Had the Elements somehow reflected that? Used that? But why? And how?

I just shook my head, and bit down on that apple Bruno had gifted me with. It was delicious, just as much as it looked. Just as a memory of mine remembered. A new wave of tears spilled forth. Despite my attempts to ease her worry, Twilight set down her various doodads and came over to sit down in front of me and hug me tightly. “They’re not gone,” I whispered. “And I’m n-not insane,” I added before my voice just gave up and resorted to occasional sobs. I clung to her, drenched her coat and maybe I wailed at some point. These next few minutes became a bit of a blur as so much tension bled out of me, as I felt such a tremendous wave of relief I had not realized I needed. It took a while to calm down after that.

This tree was irrefutable, physical evidence of my memories. They had been more than just products of a twisted, vivid imagination. They still were more than that.

I took a lot of slow, shaky breaths before I finally managed to let go of her. I felt like apologizing, since I suspected that I might have crushed all the air out of her at some point. Or several points. But I could not bring myself to do so. Not when she was smiling this warmly at me. Was she as relieved as I was?

I could not remember if she had said anything. Twilight being Twilight, she probably had. I looked around and found that apple again. I had taken a single bite from it and now it was lying in the grass. I carefully levitated it over and gave it a little shine on my coat. “Here. Try it.” I offered it to her and after a moment of hesitation, she did just that.

“It’s… a really good apple?” she replied with a hint of uncertainty. I could understand that. What was she supposed to say? An apple was an apple. Some were sweeter, some less so, but at the end of the day, it was just an apple. Yet so much more. To me.

“It is,” I confirmed the obvious with so much happiness in my voice that she could not help but smile a little brighter. Giving one final sigh, I looked up at Bruno. “You want to take samples, right? Dirt, grass, some from the tree itself? Remember what Applejack had taught you whenever you gals helped out with harvesting. Be gentle and patient with Bruno and he will help you in return.” She nodded, gave me one last look over to judge if I was alright, if I was stable enough, before she returned to her saddlebags to resume getting her samples. “It’s good to see you again, old friend,” I whispered to the tree and carefully laid a hoof against its bark.

I plopped myself down in its shade and for a good old while, I just watched Twilight work, content with the silence and with studying her expressions shifting from curiosity to confusion to understanding and back.

“It is growing,” she presented her first conclusion after quite some time.

“What do you mean?” I replied.

“The affected area is growing. Further observation is required of course, but the effects are noticeable.” She pointed to a few blades of grass that, stubborn as most plants were, grew right between the cobblestones of the path. Now that she had pointed that out, I looked around and noticed them in several other places as well. They looked noticeably different from the grass and other undergrowth that one would usually find in the Everfree. It looked brighter, the color more saturated and healthy.

The implications of this were huge, of course. After what Twilight had told me, I had expected this patch to be a serene beauty in a sea of nastiness, slowly being consumed over time until nothing would remain.

But now? This not only gave me hope, it made me think. Most things could be reduced to energy. Ponies, objects of any kind, even several laws of nature could be expressed in energy. Of course I did not know if the dreamscape operated on any familiar law of nature at all. But if I were to assume that energy was a thing there, then that farmer, being hundreds of years old and having feasted like it had done, must have had a lot of it… right? The idea led me to the speculation that this growth might eventually stop — at the point when the farmer's energy would run out. Whenever that might be.

But would that mean the death of the creature?

As I looked over at the dirt patch, I had difficulties not calling its current state as being ‘dead’ anyway. There was an apple tree and a bunch of grass and flowers. At which point became the transformation of a being the destruction of it? Especially when using its parts to create something new?

The Elements don’t kill. I was certain of that. So if this creature was not dead… what — and where — was it?

Given that I could not answer any of that, my thoughts drifted back to the other question — when would that actually stop? It would stop, right? What if it would not? In the Everfree, this transformation was obvious enough. But what would happen once it reached ‘Equestrian soil’, so to speak? Would the grass become greener? Would the transformation just stop? Or would one just not be able to notice the effect spreading even further?

Was another reality slowly bleeding into this one, replacing it over time?

Would we need to stop this effect? Could we stop it? Would I want to stop it…?

My gaze shifted back to the path between the dirt patches. The cobblestones seemed completely unaffected. I knew that path, I had trodden it a thousand times. The stones had become loose, shifting around a little. They should have been more tightly packed together. But the transformation did not affect the path. Or the stone. Or any stone for that matter, as the border around the patch was in disarray as well, with no sign of magical fixing anywhere.

So maybe it would be just about the plants?

“Bruno, I need some leaves and a little bit of tree sap, maybe a sample of wood and bark as well, for my research. Would that be okay? Please?” Twilight’s voice broke me out of my musing. I smiled as she asked so politely, so patiently. I could see that even after everything Applejack had told her and shown her, she was still not sure this was even a thing. That this would even work. She was a natural unicorn, she was the Element of Magic, and she had taken to flight well enough with some rigorous training from Rainbow and Fluttershy. But she sometimes still struggled with her earth pony magic. The finer aspects of it were more difficult to grasp. And I would not know of any of that if it were not for Applejack teaching me. In a time where, as scenes flashing before my closed eyes told me, I was quite close with her. I blinked a couple of times to get rid of the images before they could pile up on me further.

And I grinned as a soft breeze swept through Bruno’s branches and with a quiet crack, a smaller branch fell to the ground. Bark, wood, leaves. And a little bit of sap to gather from his small ‘wound’, if she was quick enough. She was, of course — despite her surprise. “Thank you, Bruno.” She took her samples and turned, intending on returning to her little impromptu research station, when she noticed me grinning. ”Don’t,” she half-warned, half-pleaded.

Told you, I gloated in the privacy of my head while my smile became a little lopsided. “I didn’t say anything,” I replied.

“I can see you thinking it…!” she smiled, shook her head and returned to her research. And I kept watching her. Some things she did I could understand. Testing soil samples for traces of certain elements, comparing them to the regular soil found nearby, trying to get a sample in the midst of changing. Testing organic material for composition, potentially lingering magic…

Other tests and tools I had less of a clue about. The most important thing to me however was seeing how happy it made her. This was field research. Something new and unforeseen and exciting was happening and she was at the forefront, leading the charge in studying it. She was born for this work.

True happiness, somepony had told me once, was found when one was following his destiny. Could a pony have more than one destiny?

Rainbow Dash and Applejack, at least from my point of view, were destined to be together. But was ‘being destined’ the same as ‘destiny’? Surely they were not defined by their relationship. So maybe destiny only concerned itself with parts of a life. Goals, wishes, stages, achievements. Given the many facets a single life had, could there even be something like an all-encompassing destiny?

“Dreamwalker, look!” Twilight spoke up and her urgent intonation immediately caught my attention. I looked over to her, but she pointed towards something else. I followed the directions and noticed… I honestly was not quite sure what I saw. I assumed the transformation process had reached the other two dirt patches, as the grass was partially of the healthier variety, but the real spectacle were the trees. Since the effect seemed to spread evenly in all directions, it had reached two trees at the same time and now… they appeared to be only the faintest bit translucent as little specks of light traveled up from their roots, along their bark and into their branches and leaves. Like an ant trail, these specks followed the same veins over and over, crawling, floating their way upwards. And with quiet groaning and creaking, we heard the material strain. Wood was shifting and bark was stretching as the twisted, gnarled trees straightened out and grew a little higher, as its somewhat drooping branches proudly lifted up, displaying a full canopy of healthy green leaves.

And some apples.

Once the trees were fully transformed, any trace of light or translucency vanished entirely, leaving behind only new, healthy apple trees in its wake. It was astounding and Twilight was quick to gather a sample, probably hoping for some sort of residue or something. “That… was something,” I stated.

“More of Applejack's trees, I assume?” she asked me.

I inspected them closely, but no memory came by to help me out. It was frustrating to have no control over these flashbacks. Some things should obviously trigger them but didn’t, while other actually working triggers just seemed so… random. Still, I knew the answer anyway, if only on a superficial level. “Yes. I assume once the effect reaches the dirt patch on the other side of the fountain, it will happen again. This courtyard was home to four apple trees. Applejack had difficulties leaving the farm, even if one of her relatives took over and she could visit at any given time. It just wasn’t the same. So we compromised. She took four trees with her and we planted them here in the castle courtyard, to symbolize how, once again, an Apple ventured out to help claim new land for ponykind.”

Twilight smiled. “That sounds like a lovely gesture.”

I snorted. “Sure. It was awful getting those things here. Remember that one time you had to transport Bloomberg to Appleloosa? Now imagine it three times over, but without a train.” I looked up at Bruno again and my smile grew warmer. “But it was worth it in the end. Not only to see Applejack at ease and smiling. Entering or exiting the castle always leads one through here. And seeing these apple trees… I mean. Most of us came from Ponyville anyway. The orchard and its fruits are iconic. It was a piece of home we were granted to take with us. Whenever we got homesick, we would sit down under these trees and talk about the good old times back in Ponyville. Or, you know, told those not from there about it until they were eventually sick of hearing all those stories for the umpteenth time.” I chuckled as I remembered a certain facial expression Trixie had given at one point. Or the utter annoyance plastered all over Lightning Dusts’ face.

While I had started to reminisce about this, Twilight had obviously continued her research and now let go of an earthworm that was quickly wriggling away. “It appears to affect plant life exclusively,” she mumbled and quickly made another note on her parchment. She looked over to me and smiled. “It sounds nice. Hm… maybe…” She looked up at the sky and then to the ruins we had barely entered. “I need more samples. Like… a lot more. I should probably do these trips every couple of days to write down the changes, the speed of the spread, everything. But if this does continue, the Everfree Forest could become a lot less hostile.”

We both knew that this was quite a massive change. While animals might not be affected directly, this would change their habitat considerably. Maybe Fluttershy could help out with some of that, maybe Applejack could as well. For a brief moment, I thought about how thrilled Zecora would probably react to this news. She was here for the rare and often dangerous to gather resources. Quite a lot of those were plant-based. Since this effect was the result of the Elements, I had a hard time imagining the forest becoming completely harmless because of all the poisonous flowers vanishing or all the flesh-craving plants being turned into nicely cut garden bushes. But something would happen and it would have consequences. Probably.

“Maybe the castle can be rebuilt,” Twilight mused.

And suddenly my stomach was filled with lead and all warning bells rang, making quite the ruckus in my head. “No!” I half-yelled before I could stop myself. She flinched, startled by my sudden outburst and looked taken aback. After a moment of less than controlled breathing, I shook my head. “I… maybe. Yes, probably. It has been done before, it is very much possible. Even without this transformation taking place. That would just massively ease the process…”

“I… thought you would like the idea,” she meekly interjected.

I sighed. “I would. I mean, I do. Very much so, even if things will never be the same. But there is a problem here…” My explanation was rudely interrupted. I pressed my hooves against my temples. “Shut up,” I hissed and lowered my head until my forehead was close to the ground. New images flashed before my eyes. The smell of burnt flesh hit my nostrils with full force. After what felt like minutes but were probably only a couple of seconds, I took a deep, steadying breath and raised my head again. She looked worried. Of course she did. “I’m sorry. There is a changeling hive somewhere in this forest,” I blurted out. Her eyes grew wide as dinner plates. “Yeah. We didn’t know either. We settled here and were fighting for this town day in, day out, and one day, a group of night guards came up to us. They had been on perimeter patrol and encountered a small group of strange ponies asking where Greenwood was, claiming they had gotten lost. But by that point, the town was still small enough that everypony knew everypony, and they sure didn’t know these faces. With their ruse being useless, they attacked and our guards managed to push them back and escape. There had been a… full scale attack later.” My throat tightened considerably. I remembered us winning. I tried to focus hard on that, and that alone.

“They might be in danger then,” I heard Twilight think aloud.

Bile was rising in my throat. A volatile mixture of anger and hatred and frustration tried to take over. So I closed my eyes. “Celestia, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change," I started. Pile them higher. Make them into a wall. If they want to get to me, they will have to go through their own. Literally. "T-The courage to change the things I can," I continued with a weakening voice. Bugs. Just bugs. I hated them. Hated the noise their wings produced. Hated their eyes, their smooth exoskeletons, their raspy voices. The only good bug was a dead one. "A-And the wisdom t-to know the difference,” I finished my recital. There will be no captives. I will teach them to never, ever touch my family again. I had to repeat it two times before I felt calm enough again to trust myself. My voice quaked and wavered and lost strength with every repeat. But ultimately, the voices subsided, the images and other impressions faded, and I opened my eyes again. I felt drained. Exhausted beyond words. And I saw the conflict in her eyes. “I’m— I don’t— I have a... history with their kind. I know they changed. Or… that they are capable of change. I hope that what I feel towards them is somewhat normal. Not that different from what most ponies from Canterlot feel, I assume. And yes, I know, that still does not make it right and I should work on that… at some point. Can we… maybe… focus on something else?” It was still there. I could feel it lingering in the back of my head, lurking just beneath the surface.

She once more set down her tools, walked over and sat down beside me. She embraced me with a wing and smiled with her usual, enticing warmth. “’I didn’t say anything’, to quote a friend of mine.”

I gave her a wry smile. “Smartass,” I shot back and snuggled up to her. “Thank you.” I took another deep breath and refocused. “You might be right,” I admitted once I could allow myself to see past the prejudices. “If this change continues, it could affect their hive. Wherever they have built it, from whatever material, it could pose a threat. We have seen how quickly it transformed an entire tree. But I don’t think it would be wise to send a messenger.”

Twilight grinned excitedly. And that obviously immediately worried me. “Don’t worry about that. It is about diplomacy, that is kind of my thing,” she replied.

I chuckled weakly and tried to prevent all the horrible scenarios playing out in my head from getting a foothold. “You have a lot of things that are kind of your thing, peanut.” I stopped abruptly as I noticed the slip of tongue. And it seemed she had noticed it just as quickly. “Sorry. Force of habit, I think.”

She was confused at first. She obviously did not know the history behind it, but my intonation had made quite clear what it was meant as. The latter caused the faintest tint in her cheeks and the former made her shake her head. “Don’t worry, it's fine. Knowing about your state helps. Do you... maybe want to explain that?”

I actually felt a little bit embarrassed and quickly shook my head. “Thank you, but no... n-not anytime soon...” I looked around in hopes of distracting both of us and noted that most of her vials and glasses had been filled and closed off with a stopper. “You got everything you need for now?”

She quietly laughed. “Nooo,” she stretched the word for comedic value while she grinned like a maniac, “But! I’m out of vessels. I really should have brought more, but I was so excited and thought it might be enough for a first dip, you know? And don't think you're off the hook that easily. I have my eye on you, mister!”

I laughed and hugged her. “I understand. Don’t worry, we can return here whenever you want. Well, except today. And, uh... no idea what you're talking about, but I feel a sudden need to add to my hip swing.”

I grinned as she blushed. We both looked up to check on the sun in the sky shortly after and noted how it was almost midday. “We should probably start heading back, right?” she half-asked, half-stated.

There was a tinge of disappointment in her voice, but really — there was nothing I could do to help her out. “Yeah, we should. Sorry.”

She shook her head. “It is fine. We'll just have to come back. Sooner rather than later.” She gave a determined nod, used her telekinesis to pack her things back into her saddlebags and levitated them onto her back once more. “Ready?”

I stood up myself and looked back at Bruno. “See you later,” I bid my farewell and fell in step with her as we made to leave the forest.

“Shoot! I forgot about the bits!” I blurted once we stepped back into Ponyville proper and I remembered my initial plan.

“Good thing you have me, right?” She opened her saddlebags with a grin and levitated a small pouch out. It had the trademark design of Rarity, thankfully without being too gaudy.

“Aw, thank you!” I stepped up and hugged her. I pulled back and took the purse in my own magic and… stopped.

“You can be such a featherbrain,” she giggled. “Which is quite the achievement, given your obvious lack of feathers.” A quick conjuration later and I had my own saddlebags to store the purse in.

A part of me wanted to complain that I had had no use for saddlebags up to this point and therefore, it was not as obvious to take a pair along to me. With the little addendum that I did not even own a pair, so these were clearly a loaned item from her. But that part was small enough to shut up when asked and I instead just gave her an apologetic smile. “Thanks, mom.”

I laughed as she grimaced. “Do not make it weird,” she requested and I was all too happy to oblige. I hugged her once more.

“Okay, I won’t,” I promised. The paths were obvious as I looked around. “So. This is the point where I start my epic and dangerous quest to visit Pinkie. And you head home to analyze the hay out of those samples, I presume. Will you be alright?”

“Are you asking me if I will find my way back home?” she joked and pointed a hoof backwards without even looking in that direction. Of course she pointed directly at the massive castle towering over the surrounding buildings. “Or are you asking me to bring you to Sugarcube Corner, so that your travels may be safer?”

We both smiled. “While I’d love to take you everywhere I go, it’s actually neither.”

I gave my answer without answering and she immediately understood what I meant. She replied with a sigh. It was the first night for a long while that I had not been in the castle. And while things might have worked out, there was surely still lingering doubt about my well-being and my common sense, or lack thereof. “Promise me you will be fine and that you will come back to me?”

She sounded a lot more vulnerable than I liked. But she let me hear it, just to make crystal-clear that I had to watch my steps and that I was not just looking out for myself. I took one of her hooves, lifted it up and gave her a little kiss on it. “I promise that I will always come back to you.” This really should have bothered me a lot more than it did. I was once again promising something that I could not reasonably hope to fulfill no matter what. Maybe this was becoming a bad habit of mine. But it was a promise I still felt comfortable making at the same time. Because despite everything reason and logic told me, I was certain of what I had said. I would always gravitate towards her. As a friend, as a teacher, as a role model, as a fellow scientist or reader or unicorn or student, as a lover, as a soulmate, whatever roles we would be given. I would always return to her side.

I just really could not promise that I would be fine. I was about to travel to Canterlot after all!

She blushed at the conviction with which I backed up my answer and nodded. “That will do,” she replied with a smile.

We said our farewells and I moved on. Sugarcube Corner was not exactly far away and I arrived in the late afternoon hours. “Pinkie?” I asked with measured volume as I did not want to disturb the other customers, but did not want to wait in line to talk to Misses Cake either. “Hello Misses Cake. It won’t take long, I swear!”

I greeted the baker but she just waved with a good-humored smile. “Don’t worry, deary, she’s a quick one,” she replied with a wink.

Oh. Right. I might not have encountered Misses Cake before. She seemed to think that I did not know Pinkie personally? Whatever the case might have been, it was rendered moot as soon as the expected pink blur zipped from the kitchen. “Hiya!” she greeted me and stopped right in front of me. Close enough that we were standing muzzle to muzzle with maybe half an inch between us.

“Heh. Hi Pinks. You got my note?” I asked while I followed what felt like instinct and hugged her. She smelled like winter. Plums and cinnamon, a hint of gingerbread. Had I been less focused, maybe I would have licked her. Just to see if she tasted as good as she smelled.

“Oh yes, the note!” She zipped back into the kitchen and thereby somehow escaped my embrace without me getting a say in it whatsoever. And she came right back out before I had so much as blinked once. “There you go.”

She presented me with a nice little box. Sturdy enough for transport, just like I had asked. It sported the little logo the Cakes had started to use after Twilight had given an impromptu lecture about marketing at some point. I lifted my purse out of the saddlebags but stopped. That box felt suspiciously heavy for what I had ordered. “Pinkie, what’s in there?” While I tried to let my voice not sound too accusingly, I started to suspect she had gone out of her way again. And as I opened the box, I indeed found three slices of chocolate fudge cake instead of one. “… why three?” I wondered.

She gave a wide grin. “One to bribe Princess Luna, one for Princess Celestia and one for you of course, silly.”

“O-of course,” I stammered and blinked. How did she—

Down that road lies only madness.

Right. Pinkie being Pinkie. “But I don’t need one for myself, Pinks,” I meekly protested anyway.

“Aw, but Dreamwalker! Eating cake all by yourself is so much less fun,” she objected with this tinge of sadness in her voice that I really just could not stand.

“Fine,” I sighed, closed the box and hugged her. “Thank you.” I just hoped Twilight had given me enough bits for this. I ignored the admittedly small waiting line as we stepped to the side. I had once again my suspicion about the price she told me, but I was still unfamiliar with what usually costs how much, so I had no reason to level more accusations her way. And really, what was I accusing her of in the first place? Being too nice? “Again, thank you,” I said once she had sorted the bits away and my purse was secured in my saddlebags again. “I’m not going to keep you any longer, have a nice day and say ‘hi’ to Fluttershy later on, alright?”

She grinned with all the enthusiasm one was to expect from Pinkie Pie. On sugar. “Will do!” she lilted and zipped back into the kitchen.

I chuckled a little and looked over to Misses Cake. “She’s lovely,” I told her, wished her a good day and left with my supplies packed.

A steady trot later, I emptied most of the purse onto the desk of the clerk working the train station booth. “Uh… will that be enough for a ticket to Canterlot with the next train?” I asked sheepishly.

The gray stallion raised an eyebrow at my probably slightly suspicious behavior but then again, this was Ponyville, so he turned it into a slight sigh and started to count bits, shoving the rest of them back to me. “These you should keep,” he said as he offered me the ticket.

I grabbed it in my magic and stored it away in my purse, together with all the remaining bits except five. I had no idea if that was a lot or not. Apparently it was not enough to insult him with the amount, so I shoved them back to him. “As a thank you for your troubles,” I told him.

His slight frown turned into a small smile. “You Ponyvillians are a strange bunch,” he replied and therefore outed himself.

I laughed. “Sounds like you’re new to town?”

He nodded. “Moved here with my wife three days ago.”

I suddenly felt ancient. Like a cornerstone of the community, deeply ingrained within its bones. It felt quite snug and I liked it a lot. I chuckled a bit. “Well, as a heads-up: You don’t even know half of it. But despite the strangeness, it’s lovely here. You’ll get used to it. And don’t let Pinkie scare you, she will be your best friend eventually.”

“… who?”

Oh sweet Celestia, the innocence. I laughed a little more. “Oh, you’ll see. My name’s Dreamwalker. Welcome to town!” I quickly looked around the platform, but no other pony was waiting so I offered him a hoof. “Proper welcoming committee will follow shortly.”

“Uh, Sharp Clock, it’s a pleasure,” he replied with mild but growing confusion. “There’s a committee for that?”

“Well, sort of. It’s unofficial, but yes,” I explained. “Our resident party planner will want to throw you a ‘welcome to Ponyville’-party. Her name is Pinkie Pie, she’s a little… exuberant.”

He nodded. But it did not look like I was actually helping in any way. That was okay, I told myself. I was not doing any damage either and maybe he would even surprise Pinkie by knowing her name already and make her start one of her ‘can you read my mind?’-rants. It would be hilarious.

But I heard the train coming. “Well, it was nice having a little talk, but that’s my train. Have a nice day, Sharp Clock.”

He wished me safe travels and I got on board as soon as the wagons stood still and the passengers had gotten off. I always had a sharp, disgruntled look and, at least in the confines of my head, some stern words for those ponies who boarded a train while others still tried to get off. It was just common courtesy, for crying out loud. The train would not depart sooner and there were always plenty of seats, there was just no reason to be this impatient and ill-behaved.

I sat down on an empty bench and mulled my own thoughts on the matter over and I came to the conclusion that Rarity would have loved to discuss this with me, if only to whole-heartedly agree. Etiquette was admittedly something I rarely spared much thought. Things either felt right, or they did not. Somepony balanced their groceries and something fell down — picking that up and hoofing it over was just the right thing to do.

Maybe I should not visit Manhattan or Baltimare anytime soon, I mused as the train slowly picked up speed again. I vaguely remembered things being a lot rougher around these parts. And the thought made my skin crawl, for some reason.

I was on my way to Canterlot, but my thoughts about the city did not ring any bells so far. That did not mean that everything would be sunshine and rainbows over there of course. I looked out the window and saw the landscape drift by and I accepted that I would find out soon enough. Just a couple of hours by train ride.

A couple of hours.

Oh boy. I had not thought this through.

I was suddenly confronted with the prospect of several hours of boredom. And ten minutes in, it already started to creep up on me. However it seemed Lady Luck had not abandoned me after all, as the conductor made its way through my wagon and asked to see the tickets of the passengers. “Thank you, lady,” I heard him say with a happy tone, still a good distance away.

And an all too familiar voice suddenly answered with a prim and proper, “You’re quite welcome, dear.”

Rarity? Huh. I had not seen her at the train station. And I had not seen her actually board the train either. Then again, given my conversation with Sharp Clock, I had been less than attentive. Her presence held the unexpected promise of distraction, but at the same time a bunch of memories clawed their way to the surface and reminded me of awkward silences and stuttering conversations. We usually had difficulties finding common ground. We tried, and it worked, but they were there. Did I have the energy and muse to face this issue head on? Now of all times?

But I knew from experience what ‘waiting for a better opportunity’ could do, did I not? And what would we talk about? Maybe she could share some gossip with me. And I could tell her… about… hm.

“May I see your ticket please, mister?” The conductors’ voice was suddenly right beside me and startled me a little bit. I fumbled with my saddlebag and took three attempts to free the ticket from the purse within.

“There you go, sorry for the hold-up,” I apologized.

“Nothing to worry about, mister,” he replied with a patient smile and nodded towards the ticket. “Have a nice day.”

“Thank you, uh, same.” Eloquence, darling, I heard Rarity chide me. Speaking of the dem—pony. Without further overthinking and trying to pre-plan out conversations, I made a simple decision. Namely that overthinking it and attempting to pre-plan conversations would not help me much. Well maybe it would waste some more minutes, but at the cost of frazzled nerves. And I was not willing to pay that price.

So I got up, levitated my saddlebags with me and walked up to where she was sitting. “Hey Rares.”

She looked a little indignant at being addressed with a pet name when she tore her gaze from the window to regard who was this insolent, but upon seeing me her expression softened. She raised an eyebrow at me and that was all it needed to make one thing very clear: Just like with Applejack, I had to work for the right to use that name. So I awkwardly cleared my throat and started over. “I meant to say — hello, Rarity. Didn’t see you there. May I sit with you?”

Now her expression really softened and a warm smile greeted me. “Why hello there, Dreamwalker. How nice to see you again. Please, have a seat.”

I placed my saddlebags nearby hers on the opposite seats and sat down beside her. “What brings you to Canterlot?” I tried to initiate a little small talk.

Lady Luck might have been smiling upon me once more, but that apparently did not mean she was going to make it easy on me. Rarity’s mood instantly soured, if only for a brief moment. But the dip was noticeable enough. “A difficult supplier, I hate to say. He is a rather eccentric personality and insists that transactions are always done in person, so that ‘ponies do not lose touch with each other’. Quite literally. I had placed my last order with him… I believe it was one and a half years ago. To be honest, I had hoped that somepony else might rush into this little market niche and present some decent competition, but to no avail. He remains one of the very few who provide, and from the whole lot, he is still the one I can stand the longest before more uncivilized urges arise.”

The fact alone that she mentioned even having these urges spoke volumes about how aggravating this pony must be, if given enough time. “Wow, that sounds rough. What the heck does he supply that's worth all that trouble?”

“Language, dear,” she urged. “He offers a variety of rare dyes.”

I furrowed my brow. “You dye your fabrics yourself? I was always under the impression that you buy them pre-dyed?”

She smiled. “Darling, do you have any idea how many dyes there are?” Assessing me for a moment, she smiled and softly shook her head. “No, I guess you would not. You may have seen my storage, and you may have thought of it as excessive, yet it is but a droplet in an ocean. Adding to that, some fabrics are a lot cheaper if you dye them yourselves, as the techniques used can be quite tricky, especially for non-unicorns. And finally we have the unfortunate reality of custom orders sometimes requiring only a very small amount of a very specific fabric. It is usually not feasible in such instances to expend bits for an entire roll of it. Oh, and patterns. I do love to work with intricate patterns at times, and rare is the chance to buy those. Yes, I let myself get inspired by what I see when I’m out shopping and yes, I buy the odd roll of patterned fabric here and there, but I am an artiste — I must create.”

She uttered that last sentence with such flair of grandeur that I found it hard not to stare in awe. She really was an artist, although I would have ventured a guess that the actor community lost a promising star in her. “I… didn’t know that, no,” I admitted. It sounded rough. Those dyes apparently really were rare. “So you’re taking a late train to have a perfectly decent excuse as to why you can’t dally around for too long? Because you have to get your train back home?”

She winced just a little bit and sighed. “I would love to use your suggested explanation, if that is quite alright with you. But the fact of the matter is that I simply… overslept.”

Despite my best efforts, I chuckled a little bit and just weathered the burning glare she half-heartedly shot me. “I’m sorry,” I offered. “It’s just… I really appreciate you being this open with me. Thanks.” I leaned over and gave her a little bump with my shoulder against hers. Although she huffed a little, she did not seem offended any longer.

“Despite my… unplanned late arrival,” Rarity resumed, “I will not have to worry too much about getting back home. In fact, this little accident might turn out to be of a happy nature after all.” A smile spread across her muzzle. A noticeably dreamy smile. “A lady is always prepared. As such, I had asked Fleur and Fancy if they would mind terribly hosting me in one of their guest rooms, if the need to stay overnight would arise. Given that I made these arrangements before our little talk, I may actually take them up on their generous offer. They were indeed so smitten with the idea and offered me that I would be welcome at any time. With this new context you provided, their joyful agreement does shine in a new light. Maybe I will… test some waters, so to speak.”

I grinned happily. “Sounds great. I wish you luck.” The faintest blush graced her cheeks as she smiled in return. We fell silent for a while as the train steadily moved through the landscape. “I wish I had packed Fortune Stories,” I remarked after a while. “It’s usually better the more players you have, but I’m sure it would have been fun with just the two of us as well. Say… how do you usually cope with long travels? Since you’re constantly traveling to other boutiques, you must have developed some routine, right?”

She smiled serenely and her horn was wreathed in magic. Rarity opened her saddlebags and drew forth a book from one of them. “With literature,” she replied. “I find it quite relaxing, actually.”

I took the book in my own magic and she ceded it to me. It was a… how would Rainbow have said it? A mushy, sappy, totally uncool romance novel, of course. Rarity loved those. And I knew for a fact that both Twilight and Fluttershy enjoyed them on rare occasions as well. I even suspected Applejack might read one of those every odd year or so. While I stared blankly at the cover, I remembered her little theatrics at the start of our conversation. And as if the floodgates had been opened, the many theatrics throughout the equally numerous years flashed by.

I glanced at her and tried to gauge something. She was an actress at heart…

“Do you want to read?” I asked.

“You make it sound like this will be more than just reading, dear. If you have a proposal, please — continue.” She fluttered her eyelashes at me and wore her mask of patience with practiced ease.

“Well, I was thinking we read to each other and switch it up every other paragraph or so, whatever feels comfortable, and we get a little into the roles? Intone them properly, body language, voices, the whole spiel?” I was not exactly surprised to see her eyes light up. Acting was a creative endeavor after all and I started to get the feeling that no matter what medium, all creative outlets were welcome to her. She was dying patterns, which surely counted as painting in a way, she was singing with the Pony Tones, she was creating dresses and now I had offered her somepony to act with.

I was awful of course. Or at least I suspected I would be, since nothing I remembered gave any indication to the contrary. But we were not on stage — thank Luna for that — and were just about to have some harmless fun. So it was all good.

“I love the idea,” she agreed enthusiastically. “I have only been four pages in so far.” She removed the bookmark, opened it on page one and started herself. It lifted a little bit more weight off my shoulders. Over the next couple of minutes, I eased myself into this little pastime. I had no idea if my acting was decent or not, and I cared little — it actually was fun. She praised me for my gruff voice, which made me blush for a moment, and I chuckled about her dainty little lady, speculating that she was obviously going to be the damsel in distress later on. She agreed but reminded me that this was not about some riddle that needed solving. These kinds of books were usually quite clear with what they were and what they offered. It was about the journey.

And what a nice and entertaining journey those next hours were.

“Hmmm,” she hummed, “we are getting close.” And with that, she closed the book.

I looked out the window and noticed Canterlots architecture surrounding us and I was surprised that I had not noticed it before. However what I had noticed was the nature of her chosen romance novel. A romantic triangle made everything so much more complicated than it had needed to be. While that was a commonly used trope to ‘spice things up’, I wondered if there might have been an additional incentive to pick this one specifically.

The book went back into her saddlebags and we silently waited for a couple more minutes before the train started to slow down. “This has been quite entertaining,” she let me know. “We should do it again sometime. To be honest, I had not expected to enjoy it as much as I did. Maybe, if you are not terribly opposed to the idea, maybe we could dress up next time as well?”

I quietly laughed. “So we put some effort into our roleplay? With fancy dresses, you lounging on a fainting couch, me gracefully stepping down the stairs with a nice tuxedo and puffing away with my pipe?”

It was a rare sight to see her nod this shyly. And her radiant smile was accompanied by a slight blush coloring her cheeks. “Something along those lines, yes.”

I thought about it. It would still be private of course. We could include some of our friends at some point if we wanted to. Rare was a decent novel that only used two protagonists. And there were side characters as well. It could be fun as long as we did not have any audience. Because I would become terrified at that point, just like Fluttershy. But just goofing around with her for fun? “Yeah, sure. Sounds like a great time. We just have to find a solution for the obvious problem,” I replied with a smile.

“Problem?” she echoed in mild confusion. “Whatever problem are you speaking of, dear?”

I could not help but chuckle. It was hard to imagine she had not thought of it herself. Or maybe she had, but in that case, I needed to intervene as early as possible anyway. “Well, I know these novels can get quite spicy at times. And I think that at some point, our respective significant others might have some issues if I were to just throw you onto your fainting couch, bend you over and mount you.” My chuckle grew into uproarious laughter as I watched her splutter and blush furiously. Of course I was not about to give her time so that she could recompose herself enough to start the inevitable lecture about proper manners. I instead leaned in and gave her a chaste kiss on her cheek while grinning like a madpony. And I hugged her closely for emphasis. “Inappropriate language, I know. Very blunt, how dare I,” I tried to preemptively chide myself.

As the train stopped, I levitated my saddlebags on my back — and her saddlebags onto hers. We both stood up, but she still had not found her voice again. Only as we exited the train did she speak up. “I say,” came her agreement. A little late, but it was there. She shook her head and fixed me with an annoyed glare. “Please refrain from doing that again, Dreamwalker. Ever since our late evening talk, I have been thinking about too many things that bother me in too many ways. I would prefer not embarrassing myself in public — or at all.”

My grin dimmed down to an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean any harm, I was just teasing you.”

She nodded and we left the very busy train station side by side. We walked a couple of streets when we reached a seemingly random corner and she made a left turn. “Eh,” I spoke up, “this seems to be the point where we part ways then. I will have to head that way,” I remarked and pointed straight down the road.

She turned and trotted back to look in the direction I had showed her. “It appears so, yes. Well, it had been a lovely train ride. Much more enjoyable than reading by my lonesome, I might say.”

“Always happy to help,” I replied and bowed a little, which made her giggle. In a very ladylike manner of course. “I wish you good luck with that supplier of yours, and even more luck with Fleur and Fancy.”

Her smile grew into a wolfish grin once I mentioned her likely evening encounter, even if only for a brief moment. “Why thank you, dear. And I hope you…” She stopped, hummed to herself for a moment and her eyes grew wide. “Goodness, how rude of me. I had not even asked what brings you to this fine city!”

I chuckled and shook my head. “That’s quite alright.” Instead of answering that, I stepped up and embraced her.

“Well then. Good luck with that mare,” she replied with a knowing smirk that actually gave me pause.

“W-What? How?” I blurted out.

And just like that, she had her victory of the day. “A lady recognizes the signs. That chuckle of yours tells me everything I need to know. You appear to be quite smitten. I hope she is as well. Or he, for that matter.”

“She,” I continued to speak without thinking. “Straight as an arrow.” She just shrugged, as she cared little about that detail — on a surface level, anyway. But I knew I was in for some questioning once we met back home in Ponyville and had a hot minute to talk.

Ahhh well.

“Thanks,” I finally replied and before she could decide if it was worth interrogating me right then and there, I fled the scene and cantered down the street with a little more haste than I had liked. I was pretty sure that she had been exaggerating for dramatic effect. A chuckle, no matter how close one might be with somepony else, could indicate something, sure, but outright tell her everything? Surely not. Right?

She was good at reading ponies, I had to admit. Maybe it had been for the best that I basically ran off after all.

Adding to my anxiety was the fact that she probably had a good idea of who I was here to see as well. The street we had been walking on led straight to the nobles’ district. A place where I would stick out like a sore hoof. With no connections, no fancy clothes, the wrong body language and attitude. This was not the right place for a pony like me. However beyond that lay the palace. She already knew of my connection to Luna and would probably suspect that I was heading there for her. Which was neither fully right, nor entirely wrong, but it was uncomfortably close to the truth.

Maybe I should just unpack whatever there was to unpack after my return? But I remembered her excited look when she had managed to coax something from me. Letting her play around while playing coy myself might actually be a better option. It would drain me a lot, frazzled nerves included, but she would have a lot more fun doing it.

We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, I told myself.

I looked up at the sky. Late afternoon. I was on time. I crossed the palace gate, nodded to the stationed day guards who of course did not react in any way. I crossed the courtyard and noted its striking similarities to the old castle courtyard. And finally, I entered through the main gate into a massive hallway. It made me feel tiny and I suspected that this might have been exactly what the architect had intended. I saw guards positioned along the hallway and made my way towards the east wing, where I knew Luna resided. I rounded corners and passed by some intricate doors while I admired the massive banners hanging on the walls and the artwork on display. I did not know most of these pieces. Yet I knew perfectly well how to navigate the castle. How? Why? Was there again something at play here? Something guiding me, too subtle to be noticed consciously?

After a flight of stairs and a last right turn, I knew I had almost reached my destination. While some doors were still guarded by Celestia's servants, I could see two night guards down the hallway, stationed before her chambers. I slowly came closer and could not have pinpointed why exactly I slowed down to begin with. But the closer I got, the more my apprehension grew. This felt eerily familiar. I wracked my brain for answers and I had crossed half the hallway when I remembered.

It had felt just like this before we had stepped into the clearing at the old castle’s ruins.

I stopped immediately. Maybe I brought down my front hoof with a little more force than had been necessary, because even the thick carpet did not swallow the sound entirely. I knew I had drawn the attention — and wariness — of at least those two night guards. But I couldn't care less. My breathing became ragged. My sight wavered. “Help,” I whispered. I had not intended to whisper at all. Even with these grand halls, I was sure nopony had heard me. “H-Help,” I tried to repeat louder. I could not tell if I had succeeded as the only sound I heard was my blood rushing and a growing tinnitus.

“L-Luna!” I tried to yell. She knew. She had read Twilight’s letters. She would understand. My legs trembled, but at the same time, I could not move, could not give in, as my vision started to cloud over.

“Luna!” I yelled at the top of my lungs. I was furious. How dared she?

I blinked. No. I was in control. This was my—

The ceiling was giving in. What had happened?! I saw Luna sitting there, right there, in front of her chamber doors, her ears drooping, her head low. She stared at the floor dejectedly. What did I say? Why had I hurt her? Celestia was sitting right beside her, a wing across her little sister's withers. What? Tell me! What had happened?!

Celestia looked up at me. Unfazed by parts of the castle coming down. She looked so disappointed.

I shook my head as violently as I could, desperately trying to regain control. This was not happening, I had decided. Not now, not here, not anywhere else or anytime ever again, this was my—

Life.

I needed to save her life. Maybe it was not even required. She was an alicorn after all. She would probably be fine anyway. I would certainly not be fine. But I didn't care. I raised my horn high, collected all the energy I could gather and then some, and cast a shield spell. A glowing hemisphere shimmered around the two sisters. When did I learn this spell? From Shining Armor maybe?

A massive piece of concrete smashed onto the shield and drained me of most of my energy in an instant. Dust clouds blocked the view. More rubble came down. And something heavy hit me on the head…

“Buck my life,” I groaned as I came back to my senses.

“We rather not,” I heard Luna reply. I could hear her smile. “Are you alright?”

I opened my bleary eyes and looked around. It was dark. Heavy curtains shut out any sunlight that might remain. I was lying on her bed. Great. Another considerably smaller flash deigned to inform me of the many times I had visited this bed. I shook my head to clear the images and sounds and-

Her scent lingered. I withdrew my muzzle for just a brief moment and was delighted to hear her mewl.

I shook my head once more, with more force than before. It almost hurt my neck this time. “And here I had thought I had done a good job of staying away from your bed so far,” I half-groaned, half-chuckled. She raised an eyebrow and levitated a glass of water over to me. “Thank you.” Why did these stronger flashes always make me this thirsty? “How long have I been out?”

“Only a few minutes,” she replied. “My guards informed me as soon as you called for help.”

So I managed to increase my volume after all. Nice. I slowly and cautiously sat up. There was a little bit of vertigo, but it receded fast. I put down the empty glass on a nightstand nearby. “This isn’t exactly how I had imagined this would go,” I grumbled a little. But it was my fault, was it not? I had dreaded visiting Canterlot because I had known that some major flashes would occur.

“We can imagine,” she agreed. “We must admit—“

I just could not sit here and listen to that. Not right now. “We,” I just interrupted with a quick remark.

She wasn’t exactly happy about it, but she understood and decided to be lenient with me. “I must admit I had not expected you to come here. When I received Twilight's letter asking for a guest room on your behalf, I had first thought that you may have come up with further questions about your employment and training, but that would have been something we could have talked about via letters.”

I was glad. Enough that I offered her a warm and grateful smile. She was not even going to ask what this flash was about and to be honest, I was not entirely sure myself and did not care right now. I had my own plans, I had my own ideas, and I wanted to see them through without some memory interrupting it by throwing random stuff at me. So I was very happy with the direction this conversation was going in. “Well, I— shoot! Did the cake make it?!” I was pretty sure I had tumbled at some point.

She chuckled in amusement. “Indeed, there were no casualties to mourn.” She pointed to a familiar box sitting on a dresser near the door, alongside my purse and saddlebags.

A sigh of relief escaped my throat. “Good, good. Well… I’m here for your sister.” I took another page from Applejack and was just blunt with it. No fancy words, no dancing around the point of it. Just put it out there. “I want to surprise her and do something nice for her. Something that will help her, I think, and something she will enjoy. But ultimately… I…” Despite my attempts, it was hard to say out loud. It sounded so brazen. How did I, of all ponies, think I deserved her? But that was the point, was it not? I had made these fancy speeches about how ponies put her on a pedestal. How they expected her to be immaculate. Perfect. Untouchable. And I wanted to touch her very much. It was not about ‘deserving her’. “I want to court her,” I blurted out with an effort of courage. “Or date her, I guess, since I have no idea how the old courtship rituals work,” I corrected myself.

I was honestly not sure what I had done to Luna. If I had done anything to her. I found it incredibly hard to gauge what she was to me, and what I was to her. She had seen some of my memories that clearly indicated a happy life together, but what those visions meant to her, I could not tell. She had not flirted with me in earnest or shown any interest in any other way that I could tell. Yet she was still conflicted and I could not read her face for the life of me, even though it felt so familiar.

After a good long while, she sighed. “Am I supposed to hold a speech now? To warn you not to break her heart or we would cometh after thee and break thy legs?”

I chuckled and shook my head. “No. I would prefer you not holding such a speech, because I very much know what you are capable of. I like my legs unbroken. And I can’t make such a stupid promise. Heartbreak is an inevitable part of any romance. Most of the time, it can be mended, and the relationship is strengthened through this process. Oh and I would then probably need to make such a speech myself, and I would just hate trying to break your legs for breaking Twilight's heart. Because it wouldn't even work.”

“You do sound like our niece at times,” Luna interjected.

That had me quietly laughing. “Right, uh… I need your help.”

“With courting my sister?” she questioned and quickly raised an eyebrow. “Do not misunderstand me, I love her dearly and would move the heavens to see her truly happy again, but this love does have boundaries.”

“What? No. No!” I hastily replied and chuckled at the absurdity of the thought. “Goodness no. I need to sneak into her study. I presume her old tea set is still in there?”

Her relieved gaze wandered over to the box of cake and back to me. “It is. You hope I will be able to sneak you past her guards?” I nodded. “Why, pray tell, do you have three slices?” she asked after a moment of silence.

From her voice alone I could already tell that this question had bothered her from the moment she had taken a look inside the box. I looked around and spotted a plate. It was part of the décor, embossed with some scene or other — I cared little — and propped up against the wall. Probably some ancient trinket worth thousands of bits. I levitated it over to the box, opened the box, put one slice onto the ancient plate and levitated it over to Luna. “Pinkie Pie sends her regards. And I won’t ever tell that she gave me this as a bribe for you. Because I would never dare attempt to bribe a Princess of Equestria. I’ve been told that’s bad manners by Rarity. And could you get banished and put in a dungeon in the place you're banished to! According to Twilight. Oh and Fluttershy said ‘eep’, I believe. She was very quiet, it was hard to make out.”

What had started as a small snicker on her part grew into a healthy laughter with that last remark. I smiled brightly, satisfied with my little joke. “Is that so,” she stated and took the plate in her own magic. Luna produced a fork from somewhere, probably via conjuration. After a first bite, her eyelids fluttered and she gave an appreciative hum. “Well, with not-bribes like these, I find it hard to deny even such ludicrous requests as this one. We shall certainly try.”

I smiled from ear to ear. “Thank you, Luna.” I hugged her. She seemed surprised by such boldness but did not appear to mind much. I instead heard the soft clink of the fork on the plate and while she busied herself with the cake, I apparently had plenty of time to just enjoy hugging her. It was nice. Hard to compare to Fluttershy, Pinkie, Twilight or any of my other friends. Her larger frame might have had something to do with that. Twilight was larger than me as well, but it was not quite as noticeable with her. Mostly because she tended to make herself smaller.

Luna was not built as lean as Rainbow or as sturdy and muscular as Applejack, she lacked Pinkie's pudge and the softness of Fluttershy’s coat. Compared on the basis of touch alone, Twilight might have been the closest result, but at least for me, it was simply impossible to separate how Twilight felt and how she smelled. Luna wore the scent of a brisk night wind, of cold clouds and fresh rainfall. It was so vastly different to Twilight.

“I will admit, this embrace does feel quite nice,” Luna spoke up minutes later. The fork and plate had been gone for a good while as well. “But I am done with this slice and you still cling to me.”

I chuckled a little and gave a nod without pulling back. Which led to me nuzzling her side. “That I am,” I confirmed. After hearing her sigh, I finally let go and straightened myself out. “Sorry. I was about to try and excuse myself with ‘force of habit’ or ‘my memories made me do it’ or some such, but in truth, it just feels really nice hugging you.”

She smiled happily at that. “Thank you!” Her embrace was short, but crushing. After we parted, we stood up and made our way to the door. I levitated everything back into my saddlebags and then put them on my back again before we left.

“At ease,” she ordered her guards, who were about to fall in line with her. “I am just visiting my sister's study and will be back in no time.” Although I was certain that the explanation was not strictly necessary, the guards nonetheless seemed glad to get it anyway. They both gave a curt nod and remained where they were.

I knew that our way over to Celestia's study would be a short one, but I had a topic I wanted to bring up anyway. “I had hoped you could come with me once I return home,” I started.

“’With you’?” she echoed. “As in ‘to Ponyville’? Is there any particular reason for that request?”

“I don’t know if Twilight has told you about this particular project of hers yet,” I started my explanation. “She’s currently researching a way to craft two linked artifacts that actively and passively absorb magical energy to power a two-way, long-distance teleportation system. When we reached the old castle ruins, I had a massive flash and I remembered that you and your sister had crafted something very similar before. They were mirrors. You could use them to scry a place you already visited and, given enough energy, could step through them. So I was thinking… there’s a high likelihood that you have this knowledge, or power, and could maybe help her out. Although I was the one who was almost begging her for this, I think it would profit you two just as much. Maybe even Celestia, if she ever decides to visit Ponyville for a quick trip instead of spending another fruitless hour in her study.” As she might have done in the past weeks on several occasions.

Before Luna had any real chance to answer, as I could see her still mulling this over in her head, I continued in an attempt to make the prospect more enticing to her. As if that was really needed, with Twilight basically waiting for her on the other side. “Oh and I should add that Twilight was playing around with the idea of restoring the old castle. And I mean ‘restore’ as in ‘rebuilt’, not just a fancy stop on a sightseeing tour.”

That was apparently news to her. She stopped dead in her tracks and regarded me with a mixture of emotions I once again found hard to describe or pin down. A fragile smile spread on her muzzle as she lifted me up in another crushing hug. A second or two later, the force drained and the embrace became a lot softer. “I admit, I have mixed feelings about this,” she quietly said. “But a part of me, a very vocal one, is elated about this news. I will have to talk to her about this sooner rather than later. I will consider your suggestion, Dreamwalker. Thank you.” I grinned once she put me back down. This trip to Canterlot was shaping up to be quite a success so far. I had escaped Rarity — the fallout of that would be future-Dreamwalker’s problem —, I had managed to rope Luna into my idiotic plans, I was about to treat Celestia and I would take Luna back home with me to shove her and Twilight in a small room, preferably one with a bed, to close the door on them and throw the key away for a couple of hours.

This wasn’t just one success. This was a line of successes. And I was very careful not to jinx it by calling it the Best Day Ever or something like that. I was not that stupid.

We reached the study shortly after. Two day guards were stationed at the door. “What are your names?” Luna demanded to know.

“Wall Runner, my Princess,” replied the one on the left.

“Hawkbit, my Princess,” replied the other one.

With a name like that, I suspected the latter to be female. Of course they looked and sounded identical. White, broad-shouldered stallions with fancy armor. Some sporting horns, some sporting wings. The two in front of us both appeared as unicorns. I knew better though. Their golden armor had been enchanted with some impressive illusion spells. They sounded, looked and even felt the same. But those unicorns might not even have been unicorns to begin with. This was mostly so that no personal grudges could be fostered against particular individuals. And to confuse and confound the enemy when engaged in combat. Counting on a slower, lighter spell slinger was a dangerous mistake to make when in reality, a pegasus was drawing closer, or an earth pony.

“Who is your commanding officer?” Luna asked next.

“Sergeant Posey,” both replied in unison.

That name strangely tickled the back of my head, but I could not be bothered to engage my flashing memories right now. I just took note of Luna's face changing as it showed frustration for a brief moment. That was apparently a problem? Luna instead took a step to the side, granting them a better view of me. “This is Dreamwalker, he will be staying as my guest in the castle for today. Search him thoroughly for securities’ sake and then let him enter the study. You two are not to inform my sister of this.”

Both exchanged short glances before they looked up at Luna in mild confusion. “My Princess?” Hawkbit asked.

“You heard me,” Luna replied, but her features softened and she gave a small sigh. “This is meant as a surprise. Search him and I’m sure you will understand.”

They hesitated for just a moment before stepping up and doing as they had been commanded. The only things I was carrying was the purse — which gave no clues whatsoever — and the box, of course. As soon as they opened it, one of them — it must have been Wall Runner — gave half a chuckle before he could restrain himself. They closed the box carefully, placed it back in my saddlebags and returned to their post. “Secure,” concluded Hawkbit. “You may enter.” She (?) opened the door for me.

I looked over my shoulder, back to Luna. “Thank you, Princess.” And I bowed. Because we had an audience, and these annoying formalities existed for a reason and were expected. Still — it felt wrong to bow to Luna.

She must have noticed as she smiled a little lopsided. “Good luck.”

I stepped in, and the door closed again. Several magical seals were reinstated, enforcing several additional layers of security on this room. I looked around and saw her study in a very similar state than I remembered. A massive wooden desk was the centerpiece of it all, standing close to the back wall of the room. The entire back half was lined with bookshelves on its walls, filled with stacks upon stacks of scrolls, maps and tomes. It looked orderly, unlike the desk. Stacks of parchment piled up on either side. A comfortable nice chair custom made for her larger frame sat behind it, and a decidedly smaller chair in front of it. For some reason, I had a memory of a very young Twilight sitting there, and I had no idea why, or how. It was weird. I had assumed that every new cycle started roughly in the same time frame, but this Twilight was still a filly.

I chose to ignore the discrepancy and let my gaze drift around. In the first half of the room, some nice albeit massive paintings graced the walls. A little podium displayed a bust of somepony important, probably. But what I had really been looking for was the massive fireplace right next to the balcony door. A thick, soft, fancy red carpet, round in shape, was lying in front of it and wood was already pre-stacked for its next use. Some necessary tools hung on the side of the fireplace, and there it was: On a little stool stood her tea set. “Perfect,” I mumbled into the room. “Let’s get to work.”

First things first, I searched the bottom left drawer. One of the few on this desk that — as far as I knew — had no enchantment on it that would send a mental alarm to Celestia if opened by anypony other than her. Because it only contained some cutlery from the kitchen and a little assortment of plates and mugs. For those times when unexpected guests came by and she was willing to share something that was already here. She could obviously just order the correct amount of plates from the kitchen otherwise, but with Twilight living here for years, she had grown accustomed to sharing her cake on the odd occasion. She liked to be prepared.

So I had two plates to put the remaining slices on, and some forks to boot.

I discarded my saddlebags in a corner where they hopefully would be less obtrusive. And I set about to make tea. Chamomile, as usual. I had to rely on memories while making it, as Celestia had taught me at some point. Still, my tea was not nearly as good as hers. Or Fluttershy’s, or that of any tea house in Canterlot. But it was tea, and I had made it. I hoped that counted for something.

I looked out the window and noticed how low the sun had already sunken. Day Court must have been over for a little while now, which meant that something had kept her busy. Probably the last supplicant arguing his point despite her very diplomatic attempts to make him understand that his time was up. Or her army of assistants, clerks and aides hoofing over all those forms and applications and whatnot that she would come here to work through.

I looked over to the desk. “Eh. They can probably wait a day,” I once again mumbled to nopony in particular and, with some trouble, started a fire in the fireplace. Celestia usually just shot a spark of magic in there and poof, fire happened. Since I could not do that, I had to use those tools provided, which apparently had not seen any use in a very long time. But — Lady Luck was smiling and they still worked.

With everything prepared according to my plan, I sat down in front of the balcony glass door and stared outside. I watched the sun dip lower and lower. It really must have been a busy day, she should have been here by now, but I could see the sun dip below the horizon… which meant that she had cared for her celestial duty before turning her attention towards the paperwork. She was probably expecting to spend half the night here then.

Or she does not even come here today.

Well that thought was frightening. It would really mess everything up, as I could not just—

I heard a click as the door unlocked and a relieved smile spread across my muzzle. I heard the quiet clip-clop of metal horseshoes on immaculate marble tiles as she entered and the sounds ceased when she suddenly stopped. “What is the meaning of this?” she asked, her voice even and measured as usual.

I was so giddy with anticipation that I could almost understand how Pinkie jumped up into the air from a sitting position and levitated there for half a second before turning around and zipping in a direction without being a pegasus.

Almost.

I instead just stood up and turned around to face Princess Celestia with a wide smile. “Hey there,” was my most improper greeting. I exaggerated a little by leaning to the side to make a show of looking past her to the still open door. “You… might want to close that?” I offered.

A soft golden glow encased her horn and the door's handle, closing it with a thud and therefore reinstating the wards and enchantments once more.

“How did you get in here?” she inquired before she quickly shook her head. “Who are you?”

Oh boy, I would be in sooo much trouble if I were wrong. “I think we’re past the stage play, Sunny. I have to admit, I was surprised by how unusually unsubtle you were, dropping hints here and there. Almost as if daring me to ask you. It’s a neat transformation spell. I would venture a guess and say it served you well over the decades, but then again, one could hardly expect less from the former Element of Magic, right?” I had slowly made my way across the room and now stood in front of her. She wasn’t budging. And her soft golden glow still levitated a fresh stack of paper. “I missed you,” I started anew. “A lot. After last time, I had feared that you might resent me for what had happened. And you did miss your usual visit.”

She finally caved in. Celestia levitated the stack of papers over to set them down on her desk and put away with that practiced smile. After a moment of consideration, she even stepped out of her horseshoes and discarded her regalia onto the smaller chair. Now she really was just Celestia. “My usual visit?” she echoed, apparently still uncomfortable with entirely giving up the charade.

I nodded. “I will admit, it took me some time to figure it out. But after I got worried, I thought back. Tried to remember. We met at what’s left of Golden Oaks. Day seven — one week after my arrival. Two days later, you raised the sun from Ponyville. I took you around town and invited you to the castle. We had tea and ice cream. The day after, I only shortly met you, more or less running by. I guess it was a slow day for you? I was on my way to Applejack's farm, fixing her relationship. Or trying to anyway. Because I kind of failed. And the day after that, you were there. By the lake. Just a quick stop to give me some advice and perk me up. I’m really grateful for that, you know? And another two days later, you were there at the lake when I collapsed. I’m pretty sure Luna does not know a single healing spell. They are quite complicated and take vast amounts of energy to perform. But there you were, the gorgeous pegasus, casting a healing spell. You literally saved my life. So, minor discrepancies aside, you more or less stuck to a two-day-rhythm. My guess is that you just set this arbitrary number for yourself. You are, more than any of us, a creature of habit, after all. But you weren’t around yesterday. And I can’t have you already break a habit that I very much want to support.”

I grinned as I saw a smidgeon of surprise despite her still wearing a mask. The practiced smile might have been gone and she was letting me see at least part of the exhaustion that was plaguing her, but hiding her feelings was second nature to her. She could not just flip a switch and be open about them. “You have decent observation skills,” she replied with the usual, regal tone of voice, before a glint of amusement showed in her eyes, “but you forgot about our visit to Fluttershy’s cottage.”

I furrowed my brow in thought. The massage, yes. How could I have forgotten that? It had been after our evening with Derpy and my dreamwalk with Twilight, but before I had tried to sort out Rainbow. Day twelve then. A major visit on an even-numbered day. It threw off the entire thing. I could not help but chuckle a little bit. “Damn it. Point taken,” I admitted.

With her victory secured, she took the time to look around and take in my preparations. The lit fireplace, the two plates with chocolate fudge cake slices, the two mugs and the steaming pot of chamomile tea.

“To answer your question,” I continued, “this is an intervention.”

She gave a tired sigh. “I can’t.”

“You can. And you will. Sit down in front of the fireplace.” I tried to order her, tried to make my voice sound firm and unrelenting. Emphasis on ‘tried’. I could see her arguing with herself and attempted to throw some weight on my side. “I’m basically holding your study hostage. I have decent levitation skills and an open fire.”

That made her giggle quietly. She obviously had a thousand and one options to avoid that result, starting with teleporting me out of this room. But I was glad my threat served to entertain her, and it did give her a little shove in the right direction. “Fine. But I will have to take care of matters later on.”

“Yeah, sure, later,” I half-heartedly agreed and walked with her. We both sat down, side by side, our coats brushing, and each of us levitated a plate and a mug over.

“As far as interventions go, this is the most preferable one I ever had,” she admitted with an honest smile as she greatly enjoyed the cake little by little.

“Well I mean, I guess the other ones are Luna's handiwork. And while she can be subtle, it really isn’t her first instinct…” We both grinned a little and for a couple of minutes, she actually regaled me with a little story of one such instance. Apparently Luna had deemed it a marvelous idea to hide her sister’s tea set, including all tea in the entire castle, to fix her ‘tea problem’. “You wouldn’t really have dropped the sun on her, would you?” I asked while I was still laughing.

She mused for a couple of seconds before giving it a shrug. “She could take it.”

Despite the horrifying imagery this non-answer conjured, it only made me laugh more. I leaned against her and once again saw her right wing rustle a little from time to time. Maybe she was suppressing the urge to stretch it over me. I liked that idea. But I did not ask her about it. I instead needed to make sure. “Why weren’t you there? Yesterday?”

It had been an incredibly busy day. We were all grouped together, we had started early to venture to Zecora and then to the old castle ruins. I had spent a couple of hours knocked out because of that potion and once I woke up again, I was at the castle and decided to sleep some more. There had admittedly not been much opportunity for her to see me at all.

But she had not known. When I had mentioned her not visiting, she had not disagreed.

Her gaze drifted over to her desk, the new stack of papers especially. “I was busy, sadly,” she told me.

“And is that all there was to it?” I immediately followed up with another question.

She fell silent for a while and stared at what little was left of her cake. My plate lazily floated over to hers and my fork carefully deposited half my slice on her plate. It was a fun little reminder of our visit to Sugarcube Corner and I could tell she recognized it as such from her smile. But that beautiful smile fell again soon after. “There are consequences to be considered,” she replied with unease.

I knew what she was talking about of course. This was about the big picture — diplomacy, politics, her public image — as much as the small one — personal fears, the potential for loss and grief, pregnancy. There was a lot to be considered. But it irked me that she was so adamant about considering it alone. “And are these consequences yours, only?” I shot. Her grimace was quite easy to read this time. “Sunny, not long ago a friend of mine told me that I am apparently utterly ‘smitten’. And I can’t disagree with that. I don’t want to. And a Princess of Equestria, another friend as well, once told me that love can never be wrong. Only how we go about it is the point where we stumble and falter. I don’t want you to burden yourself more than you already are.”

I had tried to make clear that it was meant as an invitation to ask one very specific question. And always the attentive mare, she read the cue and did not disappoint me. “What do you want, then?”

I smiled. “Right now, or in general?” I joked before diving into the thick of it. “I want to share. I want to help you carry your burden. I can’t deal with any of your royal duties, I can’t make the nobles see reason or the supplicants to actually listen for once. But I can help you with some less nation-changing decisions. I can help you think through the consequences. I might not have your experience, but I can offer a fresh perspective. Another angle to see things from. Something less set in your ways. I can be there to help you relax. I can listen to worries and fears you don’t want to share with Luna, because you don’t want to worry her. I want you to relearn to be yourself again. I’ve seen you — the real you — break through from time to time. When you prank Luna and joke around with her, when you give a genuine smile or a startled little yelp at being surprised. But it happens so rarely. There are thick layers upon layers of years and routines to break through. I want you to have fun again. To be happy. Not just content, but truly happy. I want you to be free from your shackles — those at least that you don’t carry willingly. I want you to stand alone no longer, up high on that stupid pedestal. I want you to be flawed, and less than perfect, and I want you to make mistakes and joke about them. I want you to let that happen. To rediscover yourself beneath those layers, and dig her free. I want to help with that. I want to love you. And I want you to love me. I want to make you happy.”

I had started rambling at some point. It was admittedly quite the enthusiastic rambling. But even I had noticed how I started to repeat myself. So I stopped and after some thinking, capped it with a — in my opinion — decent summary. “I want you.” The real you.

At some point during my impromptu speech — because unlike Twilight, I was just incapable of preparing nice speeches and actually delivering them —, she had set down the two plates beside our mugs. She had listened and remained silent after I had exhausted my word count for the day. Felt like it, at least.

She stared into the fire for a couple of minutes. Sometimes she snuck quick little glances at me out of the corner of her eyes. Sometimes she gave an exasperated sigh. She was thinking, gears turning at rapid speed, not unlike Twilight at all. After what felt like ages, her expression settled. There was an unmistakable spark of playfulness in her eyes that made my heart race in anticipation. Because whatever it might have meant, whatever she might have planned and whatever she was considering — that spark sure did not look like rejection.

“And what about ‘right now’ then?” she asked and that same subtle playfulness lingered in her voice.

What do I want right now…

My eyes drifted quickly through the room. Stacks of books and scrolls, desk, chairs, tools, nothing that captured my interest. My eyes were constantly drawn back to her. So I complied. Without the transformation spell, she was a lot larger than Sunny had been. But her body language remained the same. I could see her flick an ear as I stared at it. I still noticed her right wing gave a little twitch. Her pristine white coat. I remembered that bite mark she had given me that, lucky me, had left a little soreness for a day, but nopony had commented on it. I involuntarily raised my hoof to the spot and rubbed at it with a dreamy smile tugging at my lips as I remembered why she had bit down on my neck. And the lower down my gaze drifted on her body, the more my mind started to focus on that. I remembered her moaning at Fluttershy’s cottage, how we were all surprised by it. Her bedroom eyes daring me to make a move. I remembered her downy wing over my barrel on the shore of the lake, how heavenly soft it felt as I woke up. I remembered that beautiful whinny she gave right before she reached her climax.

Heat was flushing my face and burning in my ears and I felt a familiar throbbing down below. “To be honest… right now?” I picked up again with a breathy voice. I could see a faint tint color her cheeks ever so slightly. And I was grateful. Because she was letting me see it. Of course she had noticed my eyes trailing down her form. She wasn’t blind. I desired her oh so very much and I did not hold back. “Right now, I want to mount you so badly. I want to make you moan again, because it was such a beautiful sound. I want to make you a mess again, my mess.” Restraint, I tried to reign myself in. If I let my tongue loose for too long, I would eventually come to regret it. Even these couple of sentences might have been a bit too much already.

She carefully craned her neck to bring her lips to my ear. “And you are holding back because…?”

Her warm breath made me shudder. Her words filled me with excitement and I had to fight hard to keep myself from following up on those wishes and half-promises. Especially since those last couple of seconds, her tail had swished just a little bit and the enticing scent of her arousal had once again hit me full force.

“Because that,” I replied and tried to keep my voice steady, “is step three.”

I honestly had no idea which step exactly it had actually been. Or if ‘rutting Celestia’ had been on the list to begin with. It sure as heck was now! But magic was not her only forte. Back in the day, when she and her sister had shared the Elements between them, she had also been chosen by kindness and generosity. And I was not about to let her step back and disregard her own enjoyment. I wanted to make her feel good.

So I stood up, took a careful step back and took a deep breath. In an attempt to calm myself down at least a little bit. Which immediately backfired of course, because her scent was starting to permeate the entire room. Despite that, I stuck to my plan and grinned. “We’re starting slow,” I announced and chuckled as she pouted for just a brief moment.

We had met five times and I was about to sleep with her. ‘Starting slow’ might not have cut it. But she did not mind, and that was enough for me. So I stepped closer again and carefully started to massage her. Sitting on that damn throne for hours on end was not ideal for her back and rear and I was determined to make her as relaxed as I could.

I remembered from our second meeting, after the little race to the castle and our tumble, how I had held her aloft in my magic and prodded here and there, originally searching for ticklish spots. I had instead found something else. I carefully brought a hoof down on the upper part of her back and stroked down her spine with the faintest pressure. And just like she had done back then, she sighed softly in satisfaction. So I incorporated that into my little routine.

As I reached her rump, I applied a little pressure to her cutie mark and elicited the same gasp as had been the case previously. She looked over her shoulder, her eyes half-lidded. She said nothing. Only her tail swished from side to side a little bit more agitated than before. And then it stayed on the side.

Well. “With an invitation like that, how could I not?” I whispered to myself. I placed my hooves on her flanks and lowered my muzzle to her rump. It apparently was not what she had been expecting, but she did not object to my idea all that hard. She instead softly moaned as I enjoyed her taste. She was getting a little more restless and fidgeted with her hooves, her breathing became more erratic. It only served to notify me when it became time to double my efforts and increase my speed a little. I drove deeper and I firmly grasped her flanks. She gasped and shortly after I enjoyed watching her reach her climax. I savored every tremor, her hitched breathing, her powerful outcry — it was primal and beautiful. I subconsciously liked my lips and chuckled quietly once I noticed. I could get used to this. Easily.

Celestia took a couple of deep breaths to recompose herself. She wore an endearing, goofy smile for a few precious moments that I instantly fell in love with as she looked at me. “That…” Whatever might have been in her mind, the rest did not make it out. I just nodded as I thought I understood perfectly. Her eyes wandered a little bit lower and this time, I had no aspirations of hiding anything. I felt an almost painful throbbing, but I was still in control. And I decided that it was not time yet. “We’re not done,” I told her. And myself.

Her invitation had been something I could not have ignored or declined. No way. But now, with her being this sensitive? I was excited to continue. First off, I properly brought the massage to an end. I cared for her legs as much as my knowledge allowed me and then even more carefully extended her unruly right wing. Her eyes grew wide for a moment, but once again and just like in Fluttershy’s cottage, she did not retract it or say anything to object. After all, I had done a fine job the first time around.

With the night dimming down every light source and the fireplace being the only one around, it was considerably harder to tell, yet I was convinced that she blushed as I once again lowered my mouth to her plumage. I had to constantly remind myself to be slow and careful, to not rush this work, as it was delicate and I could very easily hurt her.

Once I was done with her wing, I allowed myself a little bit of fun and let my tongue circle around her wing joint on her back. She drew in a sharp breath and released it in quiet, shuddering bursts. I smiled throughout. I cared for her more well-behaved left wing next and repeated the process, including the moment when I slowly, agonizingly slowly, drew my tongue down her wing to her joint. She gave a low, quiet whine as several small shudders ran along her body.

Huh. Didn’t see that one coming.

I grinned once more as I watched in satisfaction as she rode out a considerably shorter, flatter climax. I had not remembered her wings — or wings in general — being quite this sensitive. But then again, maybe that was a side effect of her previous orgasm. I took a mental note of that for later study and research purposes, but refocused myself on here and now.

I walked around her and brought my muzzle to her rear again and gave her a long, broad lick upwards. She shuddered again, much to my delight. I reached her dock, rounded it and continued a trail of kisses and careful soft bites along her spine, upwards until I reached her ears. I knew full well how sensitive they had been when I first had discovered this and I could only imagine how sensitive they must feel now. I licked along the edge and relished every tiny tremble I noticed. “Ready?” I breathed hotly.

She tried to recompose herself with a deep breath and I immediately sabotaged her by cautiously nipping at her ear. A mixture between a startled yelp and a delighted moan was my reward. “Should I transform?” she managed to ask.

I honestly did not give it much thought. “No, I want you,” I replied with basically no hesitation at all. I enjoyed Sunny’s frame. It was certainly more manageable and allowed for a wider variety of activities. But it was a compromise of sorts. It was putting something between us — the transformation spell itself. While it might come in handy in the future, I wanted this time to be her, fully her. And I could see in her face how her mask had completely vanished, how she was filled with desire and passion. It was a sight to behold and I loved it. I lunged forward on a whim and we shared a deep and hungry kiss. She was all too welcoming.

After I managed to tear myself away again, I walked back and positioned myself. Both our voices filled the room just a moment later. I had never shared Rainbow's penchant for exaggeration and boasting. There had been a reason behind my decision to care for her before I got my turn. With how aroused I had been, I just did not last very long. And I was not about to see this as some kind of marathon, trying to stretch it as many seconds longer that I could by any means necessary. I instead just enjoyed it. I let loose, gave up control and enjoyed the ride. Literally. I relished her moans, the feeling of her warmth clinging to me, every contraction, her scent, that almost needy, certainly greedy look she shot me.

And when I felt the pressure built up to a critical point, I thrust as deep as I could. In hindsight, that might have been a really stupid oversight on my part. Despite my fancy ideas and somewhat usable plans, not thinking about contraception was just downright stupid. There was magic for that of course, but that mattered little. It was about the principle.

In the heat of the moment however, I was not thinking about it. I was not thinking at all. There was only pressure and pleasure and finally sweet release.

My legs might have given in, I was not sure. I withdrew at some point and laid down beside her and I probably sported a similarly goofy grin like she had before me. “I love you,” I whispered and gazed at her.

She allowed herself a small giggle. “I can see that,” she replied and met my gaze. She dove in for a kiss that was driven less by desire and more by warmth. “I can feel that, too,” she added after the kiss. I grinned a little and maybe, maybe I would have realized at that point, had she not charged her horn with magic and teleported us.

Last time somepony had teleported me, it was Twilight. And I had immediately vomited. Because being teleported felt really, really strange and came with a massive sense of vertigo. But this instance made me question this assumption. Maybe it was just Twilight's teleport that did that. Because we arrived in Celestia's chambers and I felt a little tingle of magic and little else. From the teleport anyway.

We were lying on her bed and I grinned. I had asked Luna for a guest room of course. Mostly so that everything seemed proper and in order. And in case my plan would fail, I had a room to withdraw to. But I had to admit that I had looked forward to this. A lot.

I was about to attempt to pull back the covers when her magic suddenly gripped me and flipped me on my back. I gave a strangled little noise in surprise before I chuckled. She was roughing it. She towered over me a moment later. “To quote: We are not done,” she told me. But the refractory period was a thing, so she had to have some patience at least. That obviously did not mean she was about to sit idly by, apparently. Giving back as much as she had received, I found myself peppered with kisses and little bites. She was exploring in much the same way I had done earlier. And it did not take too long until I felt a familiar throbbing once more and a moment later, she lowered her head and I threw mine back as I moaned without restraint. It had come somewhat unexpectedly — I would not have been able to keep it down even if I had tried.

She was a lover with a lot more experience than me after all.

That did not mean I was about to give up.

I could not tell how much longer we fooled around. Her endurance was incredible and I was starting to think that maybe guard training would have more benefits than just offering me shiny armor and the opportunity to rekindle my friendship with Luna.

But once we finally settled, I had reached my goal and felt pretty satisfied with that. She was a mess. So was I, but that was irrelevant to me. She was lying on her side and I snuggled up to her back. I quietly chuckled as I tried to imagine what this must have looked like from up above. The little spoon was considerably larger than the big one.

“I will feel that tomorrow,” she stated. It was probably meant to carry an accusatory tone, but she sounded way too pleased and content for that to be possible. And my chest swelled with pride.

“You are incredible,” I replied and elicited a subdued giggle. I buried my muzzle in her mane and took a deep breath. Morning dew, summer’s heat, a faint floral something I could not pin down… and a lot of sex that was still lingering in the air. I let my front hoof trace lazy little trails along her side and smiled at that content sigh she gave me in return. “I meant what I said,” I spoke up again. “Every word.”

After a moment, she turned around and looked at me. She was silent for a while, just searching for something. “Despite what you might think, I am not broken.”

I nodded. “I know. You are not my damsel in distress, I am not your shining knight, and I am not here to rescue you. You don’t need rescuing. Even if you did, you’d be perfectly capable of rescuing yourself. Well most of the time anyway. But I stand by what I said. You are hurt. And lonely. This isn’t why I’m here, however. Helping you mend old wounds and giving you company is just a nice bonus. I’m here for you. And I love you.”

“You barely know me,” she tried.

“I would like to disagree. But I had that discussion with Applejack already. So let me just say: I’d love to change that,” I replied without hesitation. Applejack had a point: I knew a Celestia. And as had been demonstrated in these past weeks — that could be a boon as much as a hindrance. But everything I knew about any Celestia was something I loved. It wasn’t that much different with Luna. Or Pinkie. Or Derpy. I could not tell why I wanted her, like this, and not the others. I did not claim to understand love. I just had the dubious honor to have seen, time and again, what worked. And I felt it. Applejack and Rainbow Dash worked. Twilight and Pinkie worked. Fluttershy and Pinkie worked. Rarity and Pinkie wo—

Huh.

You should be kind to yourself, too, Fluttershy had told me. This… this was it. This was me, doing something incredibly selfish. I wanted her. Not just as a friend. Not just as an affair or a friend with benefits, but as a solid part of my life. Somepony to share my life with as much as I wanted to share in hers. And here she was, asking me if I was sure about this.

I leaned in and gave her a kiss. I knew no words for what I felt and thought. I fancied myself a storyteller at times and as such, I should probably have been able to find some description, anything really. But I could not. However, I had read enough romance novels to be familiar with the trope of ponies conveying their feelings with simple gestures. Like a kiss, for example.

In my unsophisticated mind, a kiss was a kiss. There were several kinds, some more intimate or enjoyable than others, but I found it hard to say that I had understood something as fundamental as the feelings of another by just being kissed. But in this instance, I really hoped that she understood.

I held her close even after I pulled apart. “I said: I want you. I said I love you. I meant it. With all that entails.” And that was one heck of a rat’s tail, I knew that. But here I was anyway.

She briefly hesitated before she leaned in herself and kissed me in return. I loved every second of it. And after she broke the kiss, she turned over again and levitated the blanket over us. “Good night, Sunny,” I whispered and gave her neck a little peck.

Day 17: Home, Sweet Home

It was both the best and worst feeling ever as I woke up again. On one hoof, it meant I had successfully slept again without the need to dreamwalk — which was great. And I was lying next to Celestia, which was even better. On the other hoof, I felt like my mouth was coated in something furry and I woke up because Celestia was subtly shifting as she tried to escape my embrace.

A single look towards the window told me why. It was still nighttime, but the sky was growing brighter again. Time to raise the sun. That was most certainly something I had to get used to or had to arrange myself with in some sort of compromise. I was a night owl by nature, getting up early was not meant to be part of my repertoire.

“Where do you think you’re going?” I teasingly whispered and pulled her back in for just a brief peck on her cheek.

“I need to raise the sun,” she replied equally quietly, but at least she let me drag her back for a moment.

“Now?” I asked with a hopeful undertone.

She turned around and smiled. Her mane was a tangled, limp mess far from the usual ethereal glory, her coat was ruffled and sticky in places… she was beautiful beyond compare. “No, but soon,” she answered. “And I usually prefer to get my morning routine in before I do that.”

“Hmmm,” I hummed to myself, “see, that’s an issue then.”

She still smiled as she raised an eyebrow. “And why is that?” Instead of answering her, I slowly shuffled my way below the blanket and once more traced a trail of kisses and nips down her barrel. “You cannot be serious…?” she whispered aghast. A couple of seconds later, I heard her sharp gasp. “Heavens, you are,” she breathed and let her head fall onto the pillow.

I did not know how long her usual morning routine took. I did know however that I would not have the extensive preparation time I had last evening. Of course that only meant that I had to be a little bit more aggressive right from the start.

It would have been a euphemism, if not a blatant lie, to describe her taste in that moment as anything I thoroughly enjoyed. Not after last night’s events and us falling asleep shortly after. But I could very much tolerate it. And her scent had not lost its enticing quality. Neither had the sound of her moaning lost its appeal. So it did not take long for me to get back into it and I enjoyed myself greatly as I licked her and occasionally pushed the tip of my tongue past her folds.

Without the anticipation and proper buildup, it took a while longer. Despite my tongue and jaw at some point starting to protest the notion, I did not mind much. Her voice was music to my ears and in the end, I felt more than rewarded as her legs twitched, she clenched shut and wave after wave of tremors ran along her beautiful body. Since it had gotten quite hot under the blanket, I did not dally too long and crawled back up. I lay down at her side and grinned very satisfied with myself. I gazed at my handiwork as she laid there, eyes closed, her breathing still a little bit erratic but steadying with every moment, while the last ebbing shudders made her sigh.

“You are staring,” she tried to chide me without opening her eyes. It lost a lot of its bite due to her incessant smile.

I quietly chuckled. “No, no, you got that all wrong. I am appreciating. Admiring. Relishing. And really, can you fault me for that? How can I not enjoy one of the most beautiful sights I could ever dare to behold?”

She giggled, shook her head and looked at me. “I am not quite sure what to do with you yet,” she replied after a deep breath, but her ominous answer did not worry me at all. “I need to raise the sun now.”

“Now-now?” I asked in jest and threateningly scooching closer again.

“Yes,” she replied almost forcefully, “Now-now!” And as I made to grab her and drag her with me, she yelped and fled the bed with a giggle so unrestrained that it made my heart do a little prance in its rib cage.

I laughed as I watched her walk towards the balcony. Of course without any haste, she was the graceful, regal Princess of Equestria after all. But I dearly loved that mare that looked a little bit frazzled and shot me a playful, happy grin over her shoulder. I knew that seeing this was something of a mystery for Twilight. The sun-raising part of course. And not because she did not understand how it worked. I was pretty sure that by now, she knew. But it was the summer sun celebration that had awakened a little filly’s fascination for magic and her undying admiration for a certain princess. But while I did admit that it looked impressive and she exuded this powerful, elegant aura when doing it… it was just another display of magic. For me, it did not hold the same appeal as for Twilight. And that was perfectly fine. I had other parts I cherished. That cheeky wink Sunny gave me right before stepping outside, for example.

Parts, right.

I silently chuckled as I did not want to disturb Celestia's concentration at this moment. She stood back from the balcony and closed the door a few moments later. I saw her shiver a little. Cold night air, having escaped the bed just recently… it gave me an idea. She made her way over to the door that led to her bathroom and less than a minute later, I heard her shower come to life.

I braved the cold beyond the bed myself now to sneak up to the bathroom door. I was admittedly arguing with myself a little bit — because I was basically creeping around. Again. Yet she had not closed the door entirely. And as soon as I widened the gap a little, welcoming warm steam clouds rolled out. A warm shower actually did sound great.

I snuck in, closed the door silently and stepped up to her. “Need a helping hoof?” I asked.

Fluttershy would have jumped out of her skin. Probably literally. But Celestia merely tensed up for a fraction of a second before she looked over her shoulder and shook her head while she smiled. “Why am I not surprised?”

“Well, I mean, you basically invited me in, right?” I countered grinning. “Half-open door, nice warm shower, letting me see you shiver… really, how could I not.” I stepped up and ran a hoof along her back. And I smiled as I saw her shiver again. She seemed so unrestrained. Last evening, the night, this morning. I was proud that she felt this relaxed around me. Soon enough though, she would step out of this shower, finish her routine and put on her regalia and horseshoes. And she would be Princess Celestia again. Fair and beloved, benevolent and immaculate.

I was getting greedy. And I knew it. Maybe even clingy. I should watch that, I decided, while at the same time also deciding that I could worry about that later. After the princess had reemerged from her chambers to rule her great nation. After I was left alone to my own devices again. Because I simply could not keep her to myself forever. Buuut… I could keep her just a teensy tiny bit longer.

“Could you bring out Sunny for a spell?” I asked her. I grinned a little lopsided as I took note of my accidental joke. It was a bad one, but hey. She raised an eyebrow at me, but complied anyway mere moments later. She must know that I‘m up to no good, right? Especially after how we had woken up. Yet here she was, shrinking down and losing her horn.

“And what will you—“ she started and immediately fell silent as I kissed her.

The warm water was still pelting us, driving away any remnants of sleep. It actually helped me reawaken the last vestiges of my mind. I let the kiss grow a little bit more passionate and slipped my tongue beyond her lips, pushing her with her rear to the wall as I drew her in closer. We both gasped for breath and I felt that same fire again that I had carefully fostered the previous evening. “Turn please?” I asked. My breathing already started to become somewhat labored.

It was a question. She could deny me. She could stop at any given moment. Up until now, I had not even realized how utterly afraid I was of pressuring her into something. Was I being manipulative? Was there even such a thing as a single conversation without manipulation? Wasn’t all interaction manipulation on some fundamental level? Was I trying to just squirm away from an uncomfortable answer by getting all philosophical?

I would have time to tear myself apart over that later. "You are insatiable," she softly chided while simultaneously blushing deeply. She regarded me for just a moment, her eyes trailing down my barrel, before she bit her lower lip and actually turned around, her dripping tail raised to the side and stuck to her flank. I could not help but bring my muzzle in first again, as it seemed that I just could not get enough of her. She did not mind much judging by her moans and I tried to watch her body language closely as I searched for a moment that told me that she was ready, as ready as I was. I felt adventurous and with the artificial rain still on us, I slipped my tongue a little higher and grinned as I heard her breath hitch. I took a moment to let her get used to it, slowly circling the muscle with the tip of my tongue, before I pulled back and carefully positioned myself behind her.

A little prod and she looked back. “That is not—“ she started and immediately stopped again.

Just say no.

If you don’t want to, just say no…

Celestia had a spine. I was pretty sure of that. Yet there was a moment when I started to panic. A part of my mind began to draw parallels between her and Fluttershy, probably because the whole ‘Element of Kindness’-thing and Fluttershy’s really unhealthy impulses to accommodate everypony with literally anything. I was about to pull back, my second thoughts getting to me, when she surprised me by actually pushing back against me.

I managed to brace myself in time, a deep moan escaping my throat as the tip slipped past. “Tight,” I softly groaned as I tried to get used to the feeling.

“Mhm,” she agreed and bit down further on her lower lip.

A moment was spent just remaining still. We collected our breath, relaxed, and the pressure lowered. I contemplated asking her if she was sure, considering both of us had hesitated, but before I got the chance to manage a straight thought, she cautiously started to move. “Oh sweet Celestia,” I gasped.

That was a widespread idiom of course. One that made her giggle for a moment as she heard it. “Indeed,” she let me know with a lopsided smile of her own.

It took us a short while to figure out a rhythm which was comfortable for both of us. We certainly had to be slower, more restrained. But that only helped to build up the pressure faster in the end, as growing impatience was driving me mad. “I’m close,” I managed to string together.

I felt her magic. It was strange being with a pegasus and yet she still had access to it. Maybe I would ask her how that even worked at some point. But most certainly not now. She was guiding my movement and angled my chin a little. I understood. I had closed my eyes to further wholly enjoy what we were doing, but she wanted to see. And I tried to give her what she asked for, prying my eyes open again. I looked at her, straight into her eyes as I grabbed her flank tightly. “Do it,” she almost commanded. With a final few pushes and still holding her gaze, I drove deeper than I had before and sank into bliss once more. She held me steady as the slippery wet floor certainly wasn’t any help with that.

I was panting heavily when I withdrew, the warm water feeling strangely cooling now. My legs felt a little wobbly, but a grin threatened to split my face apart. I walked a few steps to her side and quickly pulled her into another passionate kiss. A simple ‘thank you’ seemed inappropriate, so I was once more testing that theory about gestures being able to tell stuff. Maybe it worked.

“Am I now allowed to actually take my shower?” she asked with a sultry purr that honestly made me want to mount her again instantly.

I smiled even brighter. “If you manage to get out before I get funny ideas again? Sure,” I joked and levitated her shampoo over. “Here, let me help you.” I was trying to help. I swear. As much as I could swear that it was about the damn water. Helping her with her mane and rinsing her off afterwards somehow still became quite a sensual event, but at least I showed a little bit more self-restraint this time around. I still had a couple of questions to tear myself apart over later on, after all.

We exited the shower a while later, all signs and traces of our night and morning were gone. Celestia had canceled the spell and the only thing that could give away anything at all was the fact that she sometimes walked a little funny. Something I was not about to comment on and noted with a weird satisfaction.

Celestia used some sort of modified teleportation spell on me to warp me into my guest room and once again, I braced for vertigo and nothing happened. I instead immediately made my way to the door and down the hallway towards the dining hall. Where Celestia, emerged fresh as a daisy from her chambers no guard had seen her enter the previous evening, was waiting with Luna to share a meal. It was a perfect opportunity for me as well.

I sat down on the opposite site to Luna once I arrived at the table, with Celestia sitting on the head of the table. “Good morning Luna,” I greeted her. She seemed rather amused and in high spirits and for a brief moment, I wondered if she already knew something about the events of last night.

“Good morning Dreamwalker. How pleasant that you could join us. Have you slept well?” she inquired.

She was a trickster. A joker and prankster. I could not help but grin. “The night was a little short for my taste, not enough sleep, but well… that’s just complaining on a high level. I’m not used to these surroundings, you know?”

She turned her attention to her sister — including her increasingly mischievous smile. Luna continued her little interrogation. “And you, sister dearest? Have you slept well?”

Knowing that lying to the former Element of Honesty, despite her extensive practice with Canterlots elite, was doomed to fail from the start, Celestia sighed and nodded. “While I have slept well, my night has been a little on the short side of things as well.”

“Is that so? How curious,” Luna replied and almost managed to subdue that silent chuckle completely. “Anyway.” Smoothest conversational transition ever. “Dreamwalker, you have my ever-lasting gratitude for that thing we discussed yesterday.”

I almost spit out my tea. “Mhm,” I replied and tried hard not to cough.

“And what might that have been?” Celestia obviously asked.

Luna gave a knowing smile and a deflective shrug. “Oh, just Twilight being Twilight, apparently. She seems to be toying with the idea of rebuilding the old castle and I was considering giving my input on the matter. In addition to that, she has started the research and creation process on a pair of artifacts that, if successfully concluded, might be worth its own research paper or two. Maybe even a book for your precious Archives.”

“Luna was nice enough to grant me the guest room that I totally stayed in for last night,” I chipped in and grinned like an idiot as Celestia just took a deep breath and her sister snickered under hers. “But considering what is still left to do, I sadly can’t stay for long. I was thinking that I might just abduct her, throw her onto the train and keep her hostage until our arrival in Ponyville, and then feed her precious brains to Twilight.”

That train of thought had been derailed surprisingly fast. Both looked at me, perplexed for just a moment, before Luna giggled and Celestia smiled. “That does seem like a fitting end for such a nosy little sister,” the latter agreed.

“We like to see you try!” Luna challenged me.

I just grinned in response and continued to nibble at my donut and sipped my tea. I tried to ignore the vile scent of Luna's coffee with the same practiced ease I usually could rely on when Twilight enjoyed hers, but for some reason, her specific blend was a little more intrusive. At least that meant that I was not about to stuff myself too full.

I tried to ease myself into the background a little bit, to leave the sisters some space for their usual banter, which soon enough restarted again. I did not know how long exactly I would ‘abduct’ Luna, but I could imagine it being weird for Celestia, maybe even a little bit difficult. It was the first time after her return that she was leaving the palace for—

No, that wasn’t even right, I reminded myself. Twilight had told me that she stayed for a day or two extra after every Nightmare Night. Strange. Was it just another interference from other iterations? Times where Luna had never left the palace upon her return?

“—was just insufferable,” Luna got worked up. Her agitated voice drew me back from my musings. “We told him the exact same thing we had told him the night before: He will not be granted a different answer just for asking us instead of you!”

Celestia gave a sigh. “I honestly do not understand why he has to be this insistent about it. At this point, I am willing to believe that he just wants to prove a point. Maybe this whole ordeal is about him demonstrating that he is capable of extorting ‘favors’ from us? To gain some favor with the other nobles?”

“We care little,” Luna replied with an indignant huff. “If he shows up again, we will have him ex—“ As soon as she started, Celestia — albeit smiling — raised an eyebrow at her. “—iled,” Luna finished with less enthusiasm.

Her sister’s smile turned into a grin for just a couple of seconds. “Maybe we start somewhere lower down on that ladder. Open his eyes to the prospect of switching into a higher tax category.”

“Taxes?” Luna echoed in incredulity. “Taxes, sister?” She got riled up once more.

Celestia just giggled and nodded. “You would be surprised how effective this has turned out to be in the past.”

“Effective, maybe,” her little sister shot back while crossing her forelegs over her chest. “But it certainly sounds less fun.”

I smiled to myself as I followed their exchange about… some pesky noble, apparently, but the words themselves drifted away once more as I found myself occupied with my own musings and observations. Celestia had a certain glow to her that she had lacked last afternoon when she entered her study. I liked to think that at least. Yet her night had been considerably shorter and more tiresome than other nights. I took it as a good sign, as much as that glance she shot me every now and then, always accompanied by a warm smile. Was she making sure that I was still here? Or was she just trying to make me aware that she knew I was staring at her again?

Either way — as long as she did not complain, I had no reason to stop. And I did love to look at her. With this company and at this time of day especially. Luna was tired after her night, ready for a good night’s rest… or day’s rest, in her case. And that made her a little bit cranky. But in the morning, shortly after dawn when coming together with her sister for breakfast, Celestia was at her peak. She seemed so light-hearted at these times. Those were the moments I wanted to expand upon.

As Luna cleared her throat, I blinked and returned from my thoughts. “Hm?” I once more established my eloquence.

“I was asking if you are done,” she repeated and pointed to my empty plate. I could swear I had, like, half a donut left...!

Their plates were just as empty, apart from a few crumbs. I furrowed my brow. It had not felt like this much time had passed but breakfast had apparently come to an end. “I, uh… sure. Yeah, I’m done.” I realized that both would stand up soon and thus continued with a little bit of haste. “Celestia? I would… I would love to visit you again, but I can’t keep loaning bits from Twilight or she will own my very soul before I actually start the training. Not that I’m worried what Twilight might do with my soul, as we are still speaking of Twilight. She would probably just freak out about the responsibility of keeping it safe or something like that. Anyway, getting sidetracked. I would love for you to visit sometime. I was thinking we might be able to rope Rarity into an impromptu painting session.”

“Rarity is a painter as well?” Celestia replied with surprise.

“Well, not exactly,” I admitted with a smile. “She creates her own patterned fabrics with dyes and stuff, so I’d wager the talent — and interest — might be there. And it could be fun.” And it would be another opportunity to find some more common ground with Rarity. A nice little bonus on top of spending time with Sunny. After all, there had been no promise that it would end after the painting session. I was very much thinking of taking her home with me afterwards. Twilight would surely be thrilled to have her over for dinner and I wouldn’t mind the company at night.

“I am awfully swamped with paperwork,” Celestia replied with a quiet sigh, but it took just a short moment of reconsideration — and an almost venomous glare from her little sister — before she perked up again. “But I think I will make some time.” I smiled happily. “Maybe in about two days,” she added with a wink and I could not help but chuckle. She was a pony loving her routines after all.

“I’d love that,” I replied and stood up first. I stepped up to her and embraced her and I inhaled her scent once more, enjoyed her warmth, how close she was, how—

I managed to throttle my yelp considerably despite my surprise as she lowered her head and bit me. It was more than just a surprise though. It had actually hurt a bit, but despite that, I dared not to pull back. “What was that for…?” I whispered.

And in a whisper she replied. “Something to remember me by.”

I quietly laughed at that. Maybe she did understand after all. I had failed to explain it after the incident at the lake, but here we were. When I did pull back, I sneakily kissed her neck a few times and fought hard to resist the urge to lunge forward and kiss her outright in the open. The castle staff would have a field day if they were to see it. “Don’t take too long,” I warned her with a happy smile before I stepped away, lest the guards would start to get ideas after all.

Luna, on the other hoof, had watched the entire exchange with amusement and now that her sister was free again, she stepped up and embraced her as well. “Have a calm day, sister. And dare not to bite me, or you will suffer the consequences!” While both Luna and Celestia shared a sisterly giggle, I stood at the side and blushed furiously. And I subconsciously rubbed the spot on my neck and still felt it prickle a little bit. Which only brightened my smile.

Saying goodbye was hard, even if it was just for a couple of days. But we managed and soon enough, Princess Celestia, regal and graceful as ever, was on her way to open Day Court, while Luna and I were slowly making our way through the castle.

“The last time I have seen her glowing and exuberant like that was a long, long time ago,” she let me know. “I thank you for that.”

I grinned and once again puffed my chest out in pride. This time, it felt more deserved. “Thank you too. For helping me out. I think she just needed the… uh… company.”

“Right,” she replied with a silent giggle. “I must admit though. I had not expected this to move along quite so fast. My sister usually tends to be a lot more reserved.”

My grin dimmed down to a small smile, but I was still in high spirits. It was just a more serious topic. “I know. She has been depriving herself of a lot of stuff for a long, long time. And with her up on that stupid pedestal, nopony really tried to crawl through all those defensive layers. At least nopony with her happiness in mind first and foremost. To be honest, I had hoped that it would work out, of course, but even I wasn’t so sure that it would. That’s one of the reasons why I asked for that guest room. I was perfectly prepared to sleep in there, I swear!”

She smiled. “Be at ease, Dreamwalker. I believe you. I am happy that my sister is happy, and she seems to be very happy indeed.” We turned again and closed in on the main doors when she suddenly opened an unremarkable door on our side and stepped in with me. It was a very small and mostly empty chamber. Seeing my confusion plainly written on my face, she started to explain. “My sister has always had a knack for most facets of magic. Her immense reserves were what allowed her to establish the widespread use of gold for enchanted items. While I am perfectly capable of using her transformation spell, I find it to be quite taxing and hard to perform. Mine is a more subtle art.”

A cobalt blue shimmer wreathed around her form, seemingly shrinking her down and changing her color palette. A light blue coat not dissimilar to Rainbow Dash’s with a silvery mane. Her flank bore the Ursa Major star constellation as her cutie mark. Subtle, she was not.

Once her magic subsided, she appeared as a ‘regular unicorn’. Though as I carefully prodded her, I quickly noticed her larger frame still being there, it was just invisible in a way. “Illusion magic,” I stated and she confirmed it with a nod.

“Now we can go.” Right. If we were to use the train like regular ponies, it would probably be in our best interest to look like regular ponies. Come to think of it — why were we using the train again?

I had been joking about that. And truth be told, I had been planning on that. But she had a chariot, which was faster, easier and cheaper.

Bits!

“I forgot my saddlebags in her study,” I blurted out.

She just grinned and conjured them onto my back. “I know. I went to see how things were going later that night, but you two had already left.”

I was not sure how to feel about that, so I just decided to leave it as it was and thanked her again. We exited the small chamber and shortly after, the castle as well. We walked down the streets of Canterlot in the early morning hours. She remained silent for a while. It was a comfortable silence and we continued to walk side by side.

But as time wore on, I could see those clouds gathering over her head, figuratively speaking. Something was coming. “Last night gave me an opportunity to think,” she remarked. I gave a nod to signal that she had my full and undivided attention. “Do you love my sister?”

It was supposed to be the easy part, I could tell. The obvious question with the obvious answer that was supposed to slowly lead to the more complex, more difficult parts. Yet I already struggled to just say ‘yes’ as she was clearly expecting. She obviously noted my hesitation and I could see how quickly that started to worry her. So I gave myself a mighty shove and just started to talk, not quite knowing myself what words would fall out my mouth this time. “I find it difficult to answer that with the certainty that I would like to answer with,” I explained. Stick to the truth, I heard Applejack urge me. I tried. I always tried. “This is not just a simple crush. I’m a hundred percent certain of that. And it isn’t just desire either. I am in love with her. But there is a difference between being in love and loving. A difference I sometimes find hard to define. Funny enough, Twilight struggles with this as well. I like to think of ‘being in love’ as this small seed sprouting into a very fragile young plant. It needs so much tender care and it appears to be the greatest thing ever. Everything about it is exciting. But ‘loving’ somepony… that seed has grown up into a sturdy tree. Up in its branches, there is still a lot of excitement to be found, but it's spread out a lot further and down below, there is this massive, sturdy trunk to rely upon. It’s less flexible. Change doesn’t come as easy or as often. There are flaws in how it grew, due to hardships and conflicts. It’s a product of its nature as much as its nurture. That alone would be enough conflict, I think. We just started. It is incredibly exciting. And we had had no time for hardships or to overcome them yet. This would usually lead me to believe that I am ‘merely’ in love with her. But I bear memories of lives past. So many of them, fragmented and incomplete. Memories of durable friendships tried and tested. Memories of both laughter and tears. I remember hardships. I remember her flaws. I have encountered them before, and dealt with them. And I will gladly do so again, because she is more than worth it. But… I still have not decided. I have yet to decide what to make with these memories. Are they allies, albeit unreliable ones? Or are they enemies, albeit somewhat useful ones? I feel like I would do her a massive disservice to just… assume she’s that other Celestia, one of them, or all of them, and go on from there. I want to treat her like a new pony that I have never met before. I want to explore her. Grow closer to her. But at the same time, I already feel close and I can’t just ignore that either. You ask me if I love your sister, and the most honest answer I could give you is this: In one way or another, I loved all of them, every time. And I am in love with your sister. Is that enough?”

She had listened intently and not interrupted me once. Because unlike me, she hated doing that herself as much as she hated suffering it. She remained silent for a moment after I had finished, mulled things over in her head and finally gave me a single nod. “It will suffice for now,” she replied and we shared a warm smile. However, her smile faltered after a moment and mine followed as I remembered that this had just been the prelude. “I will have to ask some… uncomfortable questions. I cannot back down now. Not after what you explained. Are you ready?”

Apprehension filled my very being. I half-expected to know already what this would be about. But as she had said — the previous night had given her enough time to think about stuff. Night Court, while livelier these nights, was still no comparison to Day Court, probably giving her plenty of breaks to dive into whatever occupied her thoughts. I took a deep breath, tried to steady my nerves and braced myself. We were still ways off from the train station and ponies passed us by every now and again. Nopony really stuck around of course, which meant that even if somepony overheard something, it would be but a fragment with no context.

“Probably not,” I replied, “but shoot anyway.”

She nodded. “What about me?”

I gave a deep sigh. There it was. She really was not pulling any punches. And the obvious follow-up was: “And what about Twilight,” I added. After a moment of hesitation, she nodded. I wagered that the latter question was a bit uncomfortable for her as well, seeing how she was prone to jealousy. Despite the background noise of a bustling city, I could hear her wings rustle for a moment. “As you can probably imagine, I face a very similar problem.” Well, she had said that she would not be able to stop now after what I had explained. I had brought up part of the reason why this had become a little bit more urgent, it seemed.

“Why do you favor her?” she asked me in a subdued, rueful tone. She had a guilty conscience. She was not interested in me per se. At least I thought so. But from her point of view, I had more or less identical situations regarding three mares and I preferred her sister, of all things. Something that hit too close to home, I presumed.

I stopped walking and ignored the pony grumbling something as they stepped to the side to get around me. She stopped as well as soon as she noticed me missing on her side and turned around to look at me. “I don’t,” I replied quieter than I had wanted to. We had been married for forty years, kitten. You don't forget that. I shook my head and sighed. I remembered at least half a dozen marriages. Minimum.

“But—“ she started and that word, that lonesome word, made panic crawl up my spine. I had made a decision. It felt right. But I knew deep down that this decision was not set in stone.

“Please,” I pleaded, begging her. “Please don’t…!” She quickly noticed how distraught I suddenly was and in an instant walked those few steps back and positioned herself at my side again. And she pulled me against herself with a wing. “Don’t make me choose,” I pleaded as my voice started to crack. “Because I can’t.”

“I apologize. I did not mean to frighten you. And neither do I want to force anything,” she tried to reassure me.

My heart was racing, frantically beating against my ribs. Let me out, it seemed to scream, Let me run for the hills! Standing on three legs, I pressed one of my hooves to my chest. It just wasn’t calming down again. Let me out, let me out, let me out! I firmly planted my hoof on the ground again and closed my eyes.

Celestia, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. While reciting it in my head, I saw that beautiful smile she had gifted me this morning. It helped soothe my frazzled nerves.

It was a ritual. Deep intakes of air, holding it for a moment, and controlled, slow exhalation. While I repeated my little mantra in my head three or four times.

When I opened my eyes again, I needed a moment before I dared to look up to Luna. “Sorry. I… uh… panicked.”

She shook her head and tried to smile despite her worry. “It is alright. Nothing I have not seen before.”

Right. Twilight. I gave a shaky smile myself. Once I felt steady enough again, I urged her to start moving again. There were two or three ponies watching us with concerned expressions and I was not about to explain myself. “Fact is,” I tried to restart the conversation, as it was not done and I did not want to leave Luna hanging with something that obviously troubled her mind. “I love you. And I know you. When I dare to listen, I can clearly hear you moan my name right before you cry out. I can’t just pretend these memories don’t exist, because they obviously color every interaction I have with everypony I once knew or remember. We were married. We had a son. I can't just... but at the same time, these ponies don’t know me. You don't know me. Yet. I’m a total stranger to them and I constantly struggle with that. I try to tell myself, over and over: I barely know you. And you barely know me. We might have hit it off quite well once I stopped being a coward and stopped hiding from you. But we hit it off well each and every time. We get along all the time, every time. And it’s driving me nuts sometimes. Same goes for Twilight really. I seem to gravitate towards the same ponies each and every time. It’s just a matter of compatibility I think. But with so many lives reinforcing certain friendships and details and general broad strokes, it becomes impossible to really start over, to really start anew.”

“Do you want that?” she interjected. Not interrupted, of course — but when I took a break to breathe and calm down and sort through my thoughts to find what I wanted to say next, she jumped at the opportunity.

“Yes and no,” I replied honestly. “I feel like it’s unfair to expect you to just go along with what I’m telling you. It sets expectations and tries to enforce a certain chain of events. But at the same time, my memories are overwhelmingly positive ones. Happy ones. How could I not want those times back? Relive them, or at least get something close to that happiness? It worked before apparently. Why fix what isn’t broken? I want to try it with Celestia as much as I want to try it with you and Twilight: To get to know you. To let you get to know me. Grow closer, together. As friends, and maybe more.”

Once again, she was silent for a while. “It would not be the first time my sister and I share a lover,” she started and I just… blanched and stopped again.

“No,” I replied and almost violently shook my head. “Luna, please, no. Don’t start that. Not now. I am working hard to push past that thought, to keep it where it belongs. For now anyway. I cannot decide and I won’t let her suffer for my… I don’t know… idiocy? Do you even realize how laughable that sounds? There’s this nobody from who-knows-where who’s dating three of the four princesses.”

“Oh, now we are suddenly princesses again?” she shot me a portentous look.

I groaned. “You know what I mean!” Luckily, I had enough presence of mind to start walking again to avoid another scene on the streets. “You don’t love me. You can’t. I’m not even here for three weeks and in that time, I have met you on even fewer occasions than your sister.”

“I will not argue your points,” she replied.

It sounded sooo much like there was an entire second half of that sentence missing. “… but?” I inquired.

I was surprised to notice her troubled expression. Not all parts of this conversation were apparently meant to be uncomfortable for me. “I can be quite possessive,” she cautiously started to answer. And I remembered. Twilight. “And what was seen cannot be unseen. I have visited your dreams and I know how close you are to Twilight.”

That made me wince. “I’m sorry,” I replied, not even sure what exactly I was sorry for. “We are just friends.”

She gave an incredulous huff. “Friends that share a bed on a regular basis, yes, I am aware. Perfectly normal, friendly behavior.” It had not been a conscious decision to step a little bit away from her. But I had angered her, it seemed. Or frustrated her at least. And I regretted my first instinct when I saw her being hurt by me. It wasn’t anything big. Nothing that could not be fixed in a heartbeat. But it had been there and as far as I was concerned, that had already been too much. “I am sorry,” she apologized. “I did not mean to get so worked up over it.”

I jumped over my own shadow and I closed the distance again and I carefully leaned into her. I even dared to nuzzle into her mane. “I’m sorry. I should have known better and left her alone, but I just can’t seem to bring myself to do so. I’ll try harder. I promise.”

I seemed to be able to calm her down a little. We turned another corner and the train station came into view. She took notice and slowed our walking pace even further. Luna put her wing over my back once more and sighed deeply. “I am grateful for the offer, but… I do not want you to.”

“You don’t?”

“No. She has taken you into her heart, and there you will remain,” she replied. “You two have become close in a short amount of time. She cherishes your company. Truth be told, I suspect I might simply be jealous. For years I have come to Ponyville to spend the night in her beautiful castle, to spend as many hours with her as I could, yet I failed to work up the courage to act on my feelings. You make it seem easy.” This time I was the one huffing in disbelief. “Despite the troubles your memories give you, they help you as well. You said so yourself. Let me be frank, if you allow?”

I wanted to see this through. I needed to do so, for both our sakes. “I still think you should have nothing to fear from a bumbling fool, but... sure, go ahead.”

“You are right — I barely know you,” she began. “But from what I have seen so far, I would not mind changing that. And as selfish as that might be, I think I would feel better about your closeness to Twilight if I shared in it.”

I almost laughed. Almost. But I was prepared to show some self-restraint and did just that. I instead allowed myself a small smile. She sounded so much like the Luna I once knew and loved. “I don’t mind any of that really,” I replied. “I was actually looking forward to rekindling our friendship once my training starts and we get to spend more time together. We had... it sounds like so much fun to patrol the dreamscape together. Care for dreamers, laugh away nightmares, ease the worries of those troubled minds. And I would love to watch the stars with you two again. I’m sure you have a lot of stories to tell about constellations and their history. Reading together, board game nights, there’s a lot we could do. And I hope we will do it again. But none of that makes us lovers. Neither you and me, nor Twilight and me.”

She scoffed in amusement. “Give it time.”

Now I actually laughed. “What makes you so sure about that anyway?” I half-accusingly asked her.

She sighed deeply once more. “The way she writes about you. The way you talk about her. It just seems inevitable. And I know myself enough to realize that, one way or another, I will not allow myself to be left behind again.”

Well. She was the mystic. I did not share her conviction on this, but I did not have to. It was strangely freeing to talk about it so openly. And judging by her expression, I was certain she felt the same. However, this still posed some problems.

“I still can’t, though,” I replied. I mulled over what we had talked about and there had been a lot about possibilities and eventualities. About options. “I have just started a relationship with your sister. And I am earnest about it. I don’t know her stance on all this and to be honest, right now? I don’t want to bring this up. Any of that. Let me establish our relationship first. Let it grow a little, until it has a solid trunk to fall back on if things go awry. In the meantime, I will try to go easy on Twilight. I was hoping, with things finally smoothing out a little, that I might be able to sleep on my own sometime soon. I will try anyway. I do that a lot… trying. I will start my training and we will get to know each other and Twilight will have her friends and studies and magic doodads to work on. You might be right in a way. Give it time. Give us time. All of us. It might work out. I hope it will. Might get really messy though. And if that happens… I don’t want to juggle more than necessary at that moment. Let me get settled, start the training, calm down… and then we can find out if this will turn into a fun kind of messy, or a nasty one. Sounds good?”

She giggled a little and gave me a warm smile. “You have a funny way with words, Dreamwalker. It does sound like something I can live with. I am usually not exactly a patient mare. But maybe I can take a page from your book and… try.”

I grinned and leaned into her a little more. “Not a patient mare, huh? Whooo boy, will Twilight be in for a ride,” I joked.

We finally arrived at the train station. I paid for my ticket back and Luna gave the clerk some sort of signature or something, I could not see it clearly. I just noticed how his eyes went wide and he stuttered his best wishes for a safe trip. Maybe she had informed him who she was? I did not care enough to ask and instead sidled up to her side again. The train pulled in soon after and we got in. She took her seat and I took mine, which would have been fine with me if not for the discontent look she gave me.

“Did our conversation alienate you?” she asked straight away.

“… uh, what?”

“Why are you sitting there?” she clarified.

I looked at the seat. A perfectly normal little train bench. Enough for two ponies sitting down on their bellies, or three if they got a little cozy and sat down on their haunches. I looked over to her, sitting opposite of me, and she patted the empty space beside her with a hoof. “Oh,” I realized, and blushed in embarrassment. “Actually, I can’t. Travel sickness. I can’t sit with my back to the direction we’re traveling in. It upsets my stomach.”

She looked surprised but a quick decision was made and she moved over to my side and sat down beside me. I smiled happily as she laid her wing over my back. “I did not know such a condition existed,” she admitted.

“Oh. Well… I guess you wouldn’t, I mean… when was the last time you took a train ride, right?” I replied. That was actually a good question. “Actually, is this your first train ride?”

She grinned excitedly and clopped her hooves together. “Indeed!”

Oh boy. “Heh… well, we’ll see then…”

“See what?” The train lurched forward and slowly gathered speed as it exited the Canterlot train station and it took us only a couple of minutes and some switching of seats to find out that Luna now perfectly understood my preference to sit down in the direction of travel. “This is awful,” she replied, still a little pale.

I could not help but chuckle. “Yeah. Do you want to know what’s even worse?”

She looked at me with a horrified expression, as if I was about to tell her of even more terrible fates awaiting her on this train ride. But I instead opted to take her mind off of things. Distraction did wonders for travel sickness — as long as it was the right kind of distraction. “First off, it gets better if you look out the window. Don’t focus on the landscape in the immediate vicinity, that’ll only worsen it. Watch what’s further away. And what I meant was teleportation. Your sister teleported me yesterday and much to my surprise, everything was fine. It even felt nice in a way. But every single time Twilight teleports me? I feel so much vertigo that, most of the time, I find it hard to keep the contents of my stomach down.”

Luna looked at me with surprise and then started to giggle and nod. “I can imagine,” she replied.

“You can?” I furrowed my brow.

“Yes. You seem rather sensitive to this to begin with and from what I gathered, Twilight is not used to teleporting others. When we were young and still learned to use our magic, my sister teleported me a couple of times. She thought it was funny but stopped immediately once I puked all over her precious mane. And tail. And her favorite brush.” The memory seemed to amuse her greatly. Probably something she used to tease Celestia to this very day.

“Well, she teleports her friends around sometimes? They seem fine,” I countered.

She just nodded again and smiled. “As I said — you seem to be sensitive. Everypony reacts differently to being teleported. Some don’t feel anything at all. It is normal for magic users to be more sensitive to it.” That meant that she and I shared another trait, apparently. It was not exactly a good one, certainly nothing to be thrilled about, but it made me smile nonetheless.

“Okay, so we both have to ride trains and carts, and wagons, and maybe even hot air balloons?... in a specific way. And we both don’t deal well with being teleported. I feel like we’re making a lot of progress here,” I mused and shortly after quickly chimed in with her giggle.

“It appears to be a decent start,” she agreed before mulling something over and addressing me again. “Dreamwalker? I must admit, I had an exhausting night and these are usually the hours where I would recuperate. If it would be fine with you, I would like to take a nap at least. If the train will let me, that is.”

“Oh, sure,” I replied. “Being tired actually helps with travel sickness as well. Sleeping is great, if you can. Skips part of the journey.”

I repositioned myself a little to offer my side as a pillow of sorts and she gladly lay down. “Thank you.”

I stroked down her mane with a hoof — which, given the illusion, was an interesting experience — and smiled as she relaxed. “Sweet dreams, Luna.” She mumbled something unintelligible and within another minute or two, she was gone.

The train rattled on and I stared out the window myself now. I slowly sank deeper and deeper into my thoughts. At some point I showed my ticket to the conductor passing by and it seemed good enough for him to not wake up Luna for hers.

Slowly but surely, the landscape changed. Back to that rural area with wide fields and soft hills that I had grown so incredibly fond of. And soon enough, we started to slow down as we pulled into Ponyville’s train station. “Luna,” I whispered into her ear. At least I hoped her ear was around where I was whispering. That illusion really started to become a nuisance. Seeing as I had no luck in waking her up, I carefully shook her with a hoof.

“Tis too early for this, sister mine. Five more minutes,” she quietly groaned. But she eventually cracked her eyes open again.

“I’m sorry, but we arrived,” I let her know.

“Already?” She blinked with bleary eyes and looked out the window to recognize buildings passing by at a slowing pace.

I had woken her up a minute or two before we actually came to a standstill, so that she had some time to fully wake up. I had severely underestimated just how necessary that vile morning coffee of hers was. When we left the train, she was half awake at best. “Come on, let’s head for the castle. Maybe you can lie down again once we’re there.”

The idea seemed to appeal to her greatly, because a very, very drowsy Luna was about to cast a teleportation spell. My eyes shot wide open and in a panic, I pulled her head down and let my tongue dart forward. For a brief moment, I licked along a short part of her horn as I had gotten lucky enough to actually hit it. Then again, ‘lucky’ might not have been the right word after all.

It did what it was meant to do. Her concentration got utterly shattered in an instant and the spell fizzled out harmlessly. She yanked her head away, a blush spreading in her cheeks. “What was that for?” she asked, now suddenly wide awake.

“Heh, eh, sorry,” I stuttered. “You were about to cast a teleportation spell… half-asleep…”

“I… I know?” she replied in disbelief. So maybe I had misjudged her abilities. Maybe she was perfectly capable of pulling that off, even in that state. But could she really fault me for not risking that?

“Sorry, I just… I was under the impression that casting while not being ‘fully there’, due to whatever reason, is just asking for very bad things to happen,” I admitted. Twilight had taught me exactly that. Time and time and time again. Never cast drunk. Never cast drowsy. Would I get away scot-free if I blamed it on Twilight then?

“It can be,” Luna admitted meanwhile. “But you could have just… said so.”

“I would have gotten a single syllable in, at best,” I tried to disagree.

Despite her disgruntlement, she was willing to move on from that moment of awkwardness. “Let us continue… walking.” As her blush succeeded and we left the train station, she snickered quietly. "I cannot believe that licking my horn, of all things, was your first impulse..."

I decided to stay very, very quiet.

We walked through town and in an effort to dispel the remnants of that awkwardness, I told her about what we saw. Bonbon’s confectionery offered some incredibly tasty sweets. The mail office where Derpy was working. We passed by Stonewood, who did not seem to recognize me in his haste. It mattered little — it gave me a chance to recount my little ‘adventure’ redecorating the castle in cahoots with Spike. “So you are telling me that roping others into your dastardly plans is normal for you?” she shot with a teasing smile.

“’Dastardly’? Really? I would’ve understood ‘shortsighted’. Even ‘eccentric’. But ‘dastardly’? Come on, you give me too much credit,” I replied with a lopsided grin. “Also, I should note that you might get into trouble with Spike over that. He’s the one owning a fake mustache and he loves to twirl it while laughing evilly.”

“We should keep a close eye on this one, then,” Luna replied with a chuckle. “A dragon discovering his mean streak at such a young age might pose a threat as much as it poses an opportunity to straighten him out with the power of—“

“Friendship?” I interjected with a smirk.

“Yes. Certainly. Let’s go with ‘friendship’.” We both broke out in laughter a few seconds later.

We entered through the main door once we reached the castle. I stopped and listened, but could not hear anything so far. That was obviously no sign that we were alone, given the size of the building. “They are probably in the living room,” I let Luna know and we walked over there. When I opened the door and we both stepped in, I was surprised to see the room in a somewhat decent state with Twilight sitting on the sofa. “Oh wow, cleaning this all up must have taken ages,” I muttered.

Twilight jumped a little and turned around. A wide smile immediately spread once she saw us. She stood up and came over. “Luna! How nice to see you,” she greeted the princess who, unbeknownst to me, had at some point gotten rid of the illusion. They embraced just that tiny moment longer than was strictly friendly. And I smiled contently.

“It is lovely to see you again as well, Twilight. And I am glad that Dreamwalker convinced me to come here. This way, I do not have to wait for the next Nightmare Night,” Luna replied with a smirk.

“Oh, did he now?” Twilight turned to me with a grin before she stopped just to remind Luna of something. “I told you, though: You are always welcome here. I meant it. I would love to have you visit more often.”

Luna sported a faint blush due to Twilight's enthusiasm and nodded. “I will. I can assure you, I most certainly will.”

The implications made Twilight heat up a little as well. She turned to me once more and embraced me tightly. “I’m glad you’re back,” she quietly greeted me.

“I told you,” I equally quietly replied and nuzzled her neck, “I will always come back to you eventually.” I reciprocated her embrace and allowed myself a deep inhale. The library around us, her scent… but a hint of midnight breeze and fruity tea. While the first reminded me of Luna's presence, which was both in itself a reminder not to go overboard with enjoying Twilight's closeness as well as it revived memories of a home we had shared together as a family, the latter surprised me.

Having grown up at Canterlot Castle under the watchful eye of her surrogate mother and teacher, Twilight usually preferred herbal teas instead of fruity ones. I was the one favoring the latter. If it had to be tea at all. I looked over to the table and indeed, there were four mugs neatly sitting on it, and the tea pot was still steaming.

“Do you have guests?” I asked in mild confusion and at the exact moment that I heard voices growing louder and the other door to the living room cracked open a small gap.

I was slow on the uptake. Too slow.

Twilight sidled up next to me, putting me between Luna and herself, almost sandwiching me. I did not mind, it actually felt quite familiar and quite welcome, but my mind was racing to identify those voices. One of them belonged to Spike, clearly. The other one was male, playful, older, and the third one female, carried by an almost songlike quality.

Oh no.

The other door opened fully, Spike walked in with a smile. He had not noticed us yet. And behind him appeared none other than Shining Armor. And Cadance. Princess Cadance.

Oh no.

I looked over my shoulder in rising panic, but a cobalt blue magic surrounded the door and closed it.

Ah, nooo, betrayal…!

“You!” came a shout from the other side of the room. My head jerked around and I faced a very upset looking Cadance staring me down.

“Save me,” I begged Twilight in a whisper. Her wing extended, laid itself over my back, warm and reassuring… and quite tight… holding me in place…

Prologue

Hi. My name is… hm. I probably should not tell you, should I? Because we live in a weird world. One that seems to be cold, uncaring and tiresome on a regular basis. One where even a simple gesture, one which seems harmless enough on the surface, might get you into trouble. Because a name can be used to scam. To rob. Who knows what else for?

Now, I never considered myself special, although — as everyone probably does at some point in their life — I always hoped that, someday, somehow, I might prove the opposite to myself and the rest of the world. There is a saying about dreaming big. However, I have a hard time deciding if wanting to be special could be considered ‘dreaming big’. Is it? Is it not? For a couple of weeks, dreaming, waking, writing, I felt special.

I like to think of myself as an artist. Initially, that was the weirdest feeling, quite outlandish. I did what I did — writing, that is — because I liked it. It brought me joy. And it was a nice little bonus if others enjoyed it as well.

So let’s go with: I’m the Storyteller. Seeing as I intend to do what my name suggests, it should not come up again and therefore, should be without much relevance.

Given other circumstances, I would call this story a journal of sorts. But it is more than that, so much more. It is an interconnected series of dreams and fantasies lively and detailed and strong enough to endure past the barrier that separates the dream realm from the waking world.

It’s my story.

Epilogue

Hi. I’m Storyteller. We live in a weird world. One that seems to be cold, uncaring and tiresome on a regular basis. One where even a simple gesture, one which seems harmless enough on the surface, might get you into trouble. One where everything you see, everything you know, is just as real as you accept it to be.

I never considered myself special. Although — as everyone probably does at some point in their life — I always hoped that, someday, somehow, I might prove the opposite to myself and the rest of the world. There’s a saying about dreaming big. However, I have a hard time deciding if wanting to be special could be considered ‘dreaming big’. Is it? Is it not? For a couple of weeks, dreaming, waking, writing, I felt special.

It made me wish for something specific for the first time in a long while. It made me reconsider what I deem to be real, and how much I cared about what supposedly was real, and what was not.

I like to think of myself as an artist. I write because I feel a need to. Because I enjoy it. Because stories deserve respect, and want to be told. Stories are very much like people. They have personalities. They can change, evolve, be stubborn, get hurt, and heal. They never start and never end — we just start telling them, and stop telling them.

And with a desperate wish, I cling to my hope that by some miracle, what I want can be real.

This is my story.