A Shadow of Myself

Impossibly tall alabaster buildings glared down at her—their vacant windows like eyes, their colossal doorways like gaping mouths. There was no one else on the street. No liter. No signs. No decoration. Above her was the sun, so close that it took up the entire sky, yet somehow she was not burned to a crisp.

"Where am I?" Charlotte asked as she looked around.

"You are in The Outside. It's called the Outside because it is outside everything else. The Outside gets confusing at times. Even I don't fully understand The Outside, and I have spent more time here than anyone."

She turned to see a heavily wrinkled woman leaning on a staff. She was so wrinkled she looked ancient but wore jeans and a t-shirt, and she had some sort of electronic device hanging on the rim of her pants. Charlotte was unsure where the woman's mouth was amongst the wrinkles.

The woman stopped leaning on the staff and took a few steps forward. "But if you want to know about the setting, this is a facsimile of Jeg'galla'gamp'pi. It isn't the real place; nothing is real here until it is. I've been to the real place a few times. I was looking for someone there, and sometimes, I felt like they were there, waiting for me around the next corner, but I never found them. Just these big buildings staring at me like some unwanted guest. Miserable place. Cameras don't work, and maps are useless because it is always changing where buildings and doors and windows are. It's too easy to get lost there in more than one way."

Charlotte backed away. "Who are you?"

The old woman stopped. "I'm The Traveler or just Traveler for short." She reached into her jeans and pulled out a bracelet, and held it up. "The most pertinent question for the moment is whether you have gotten any of these."

She stared at the pink plastic of the bracelet and gulped. "I've gotten two of them. What are they? Who are you? Are you messing with my head?"

The woman blinked. "Two? My, we must be on the third lesson then."

"Third lesson?" Charlotte questioned. "This is the third time I have slept since coming to this world. Who are you, and what are you doing to me?"

"Catch," Traveler instructed and tossed her the bracelet. Charlotte caught it with both hands. "I'm guessing you have lost the other two. They don't do anything; they're just a way of keeping count. We've met twice before, even if neither of us remembers. This is lesson three. I'm The Traveler. I travel from place to place. I mean you no harm. I'm here to help you learn how to use your powers."

Charlotte glared at her. "If you mean no harm, why don't you come to me in person instead of in a dream? You could help all of us."

The woman coughed and then tapped the electronic device on her side. "To that dismal world? Do you see this life support unit on my side? That horrible air would kill me. Plus, I'm no adventurer. I just travel and watch. I'm just giving you a tiny bit of preparation." She coughed again, then looked Charlotte in the eyes. "Plus, you may be asleep, but you aren't dreaming. The Outside is outside of everything, including the dream realm."

"So…Phobia isn't watching us?" Charlotte asked in a small voice.

"We aren't where she can see, even if she were still a warden," Traveler said. "Now, we might not remember, but you've had two lessons on using your powers so far. You're making good progress. Let's continue that."

"How am I making progress if I can't remember the lessons?" Charlotte asked in confusion.

Traveler twirled a free hand. "It is like an instinct. You don't actively remember it, but it's there. Didn't you notice Cadence bubbled your hands? Why do you think she did that?"

"How did you know she bubbled my hands?"

Traveler chuckled. "I have seen a lot of things. You were having a panic attack and you were going to use your powers. That would have probably gone badly for everyone at that point, but you still were able to do it, even if you weren't thinking about it. Progress!"

Charlotte backed all the way up until her back hit the wall of a building. "Shit, I almost ruined everything again!"

"Urgh!" Traveler groaned. "That is so tiresome. First off, young lady, lay off the cussing. It makes you seem less mature, not more, and I know seeming mature means a lot to you. Second, you aren't some walking catastrophe. You're young and inexperienced, everyone starts off that way. You shouldn't feel bad for it. Yes, you make mistakes, but so does everyone. You won't outgrow your mistakes if you keep with all this negativity. Try to look on the bright side more often."

"What's there to be positive about?" Charlotte asked. "I got Kristin killed. I could get everyone else killed."

Traveler scowled, or at least, Charlotte thought she did– it was hard to tell through those wrinkles. "Let that go. Stuff happened. Yeah, you opened the gate, but you didn't pick where she would be standing when someone decided to come through. If you hadn't done what you did, Empathy would have died instead. Whether you did or didn't, people would have died. That is one of the hardest things to learn in life. You can't assure everyone's safety. Death comes for us all, and sometimes it comes suddenly and unexpectedly. You want to minimize how much of a problem your portals cause? Pay attention to my lessons so you can learn what you are doing."

"How do I know I can trust you?" Charlotte asked. "It seems more than a little strange that some old hag comes into my dreams-"

"Brings you into The Outside, not a dream," Traveler corrected.

Charlotte shook her head. "Whatever, close enough. Some strange old hag-"

"I find the terminology very hurtful," Traveler interrupted. "The hag part. I'm definitely old and somewhat strange."

That earned a frustrated stomp. "You show up while I'm sleeping to offer me, not everyone else, help, and I'm told I won't even remember this. You don't even give me a reason why you're doing it!"

Traveler laughed. "To help you succeed. Let's say I have a vested interest in your success. I wish I was your age so I could have all that ferocious energy, but I'd probably shatter my hip again or something if I stomped like that. About the only thing I have that isn't failing is my mind. I'll give a straight answer about one thing. I'm old and on life support. One of the reasons I can't meet you inside the real world is I am at the end. These synthetic organs and bones have done what they can to extend my life long past what it should have been, but I'm dying. I probably wouldn't live through instructing you there. Here, I have all the time I need, or to be more accurate, all the time you need."

Charlotte narrowed her brow. "So you're training me…to be your replacement?"

Traveler seemed to smile, or at least, that was the impression Charlotte got. "Your paths are your own, but you can't walk those paths if you don't know how to walk. Let's begin lesson three, and by the final lesson, maybe you will be able to run where you want to go. We still have many lessons to go yet, and we will have to go through this introduction every time."

Sunset walked beside Vice Headmare Decorum. It was more like inched along beside, because the mare, who seemed to be a perfect example of unicorn noble inbreeding judging by the shape of her nose, didn't move particularly fast, and Sunset walking on two human legs could outpace her going at a leisurely stroll.

"It is great that you are taking an interest in our entrance examination, Miss Blessing. Headmare Snarepage took little interest in students unless they were sent to her office or won some accommodation," Decorum said, nose held high. That thing was so pointy. Did she have to be wary of cutting her hoof on it when she wiped it? Every time the mare said Snarepage, Sunset swore she heard Snore Page. Maybe the second moniker would have been more accurate. She could imagine students calling an administrator that name behind the administrator's back.

"It's Headmare Blessing, not Miss Blessing," she corrected politely, not for the first time.

The pale cream unicorn stopped again. "Of course, Head-" The mare looked Sunset up and down. "-mare Blessing. I understand that you must be displaying your famous talents with pony transmogrification, and we here at the school are all very impressed, but don't you think that perhaps it would be best if you changed back now?"

"Oh, today, I feel this form will do nicely." Sunset said with a shake of her head. "You see, I am meeting prospective and possibly nervous students. While they might find me being in this form odd, they are unlikely to find it intimidating. You see, I have a very prominent scar in my natural form that can be disturbing to look at. I believe it makes me appear less welcoming."

Not to mention, this form likewise makes you more uncomfortable. I need to see which staff members need to take extended vacations and go on speaking tours, she thought to herself.

"Of course, Headmare Blessing," Decorum said with an imperceptible bow of her head. "You know, it may be a rarity on Earth, but here in Equestria, we have medical mages that can remove such unsightly blemishes."

"I'm well aware, and my eldest son is a medical mage of some renown back home. He could have done it at any point, but my battle scars are reminders that I like to keep. He has done me the service of making it so they don't hurt when I move, and that is good enough."

Decorum blinked. "Battle scars, ma'am? Is Earth truly so savage?"

"No more savage than me, I assure you," Sunset replied with a smile. This stupid noble apparently didn't know anything about her other than having heard about her spells. "Please, let's continue to go see the students."

"Yes, Headmare Blessing."

They walked a few steps before the mare finally decided she had to know. "Was it a human who inflicted your mentioned scars on you?"

Sunset shook her head. "No call them self-inflicted. I was fighting another unicorn who was many times more powerful than I was at the time. What exactly is your specialty, Vice Headmare?"

The mare stopped, taken aback at the sudden insertion of the question. "I am the foremost expert on Trotsen's Law."

Sunset already knew that. She had read the profiles of every staff member. "I defeated this other unicorn by proving Trotsen's Law is not true."

Decorum's coloration shifted so her pale cream now looked a nice shade of pink to match her mane. "That is absurd! Magic would be in chaos without Trotsen's Law! Generations of unicorn scholars have written at length-"

"Scholars," Sunset replied, as if tasting a bad word. "You arrive at the fundamental problem with your education system. You repeat the same tired ideas for endless centuries and never once do you question whether it is right. You fail to experiment to confirm the validity of your ideas because you are so certain that mages dead a millennia somehow figured out everything that was worth figuring out. We who are pushing the boundaries do not need to be scholars. What we need to be is scientists."

"Trotsen's Law is an absolute!" the red-faced Vice Headmare said in outrage.

Sunset smiled again. "Well, there is only one thing to do in the face of this disagreement."

Decorum stuck her nose high. "Yes, you must withdraw your nonsense claim."

"Perhaps," Sunset conceded. "Once you have performed extensive experimentation to test the claims of Trotsen's Law. Best me at my own game, Miss Decorum. Prove you are right using my methods. Try to replicate the conditions under which I showed Trotsen's Law to be false. I can provide you with a generous grant."

The Vice Headmare's scowl dropped at the mention of a grant. Sunset highly doubted all the grant money would end up being used for the testing. There would probably be some sizeable amount paid for labor fees to the mare. She could live with that. There were a few possible outcomes, and all of them favored Sunset's goals. Hopefully the outcome where Miss Decorum incinerated herself in the resulting magical backlash wouldn't come to be. The best outcome would be Decorum took this seriously, verified that Trotsen's Law was indeed incorrect, and converted to valuing experimentation. That would make her invaluable. One thing that she had learned as a preacher was that fresh converts were always the most vocal and most committed, especially if they had been your most vocal opponents.

"I accept your challenge," Decorum replied. "It doesn't need proving with experiments, but if this will correct your faulty logic, I shall make the sacrifice of my valuable time."

"I look forward to seeing your results, and will give you a report on how I conducted the law-breaking feat so you can see if it is duplicatable," Sunset said cheerfully.

Oh, these games. She had been so good at them back in Riverview. Unfortunately, she had helped make the monsters that regularly attacked the manor with them. She had believed that she was doing it for a righteous cause back then. Hopefully, this time around, she genuinely was.

Charlotte stared down at the bracelet in her hand, an exact match for the previous two. Everyone was staring at it.

"There was no portal and no teleportation. It just appeared when we woke her up," Luster said in confusion.

"She didn't dream. I waited for anything, but a dream never appeared," Phobia said.

Charlotte shook her head, eyes still glued to the impossible bracelet. "I was sure I dreamed. I can't remember what, but there was something."

Everyone looked at Cadence, waiting to see what she would say.

Cadence stared at the bracelet in Charlotte's hand. "You are confident that there is no mind magic at work, Phobia?"

"Completely," Phobia answered.

"What in the world are we dealing with then?" Cadence asked.

Phobia frowned. "This reminds me of something. Something I saw only once. I can't give the details, since it is not my secret to share."

"That isn't helpful if you can't talk about it," Cadence said with exasperation.

"I'm sorry, but the Oaths still hold," Phobia replied. The former warden walked, circling Charlotte. "Perhaps another aspect of Charlotte's powers has awoken. We saw her hands before she was subdued. Magic wants to be used."

"What about my hands?" Charlotte asked. "The bubbles, did I do that?"

Cadence shook her head. "No, that was me. Your hands were glowing. I don't know what you were going to do, but you were going to do something."

"Only because Phobia scared the shit out of her! Andrea protested. "She was panicking, not thinking."

"She was thinking, just not clearly," Phobia corrected. "She wanted to get away, and I assume that was exactly what she would have done. She would have summoned a portal." Phobia stopped circling. "I don't think she has been compromised. I think she tapped into something else. I vote to continue the mission."

"And if the bracelets keep appearing?" Sapphire asked.

"Then we see how many Charlotte ends up with," Phobia concluded.