Dreamwalker's Tale: An Anthology

It was a long night.

“I gaveth thee the directeth order to stayeth out of this!,” Luna bellowed straight into my face, seeing as we were standing muzzle to muzzle. Her wings were flared to their fullest and even shook in her anger, “Thee still hast issues following simple orders!”

“I saw this nightmare spawn and corrupt another guardian, but would you listen? Oh no, certainly not!,” I shot right back into her face, screaming at the top of my lungs. “You still don’t trust me!”

We glared at each other. And we both got lucky enough to realize just in time that we might be about to say things that could not be taken back that easily. In unison, we shut our mouths, jaws grinding, cheeks puffed, faces red.

It was certainly not our first clash. I would certainly not be our last. We both could be quick-tempered at times. Luna was a passionate mare. While it usually affected me less often and not as gravely as her, I had my limits. All ponies have limits. And we had quickly learned to establish routines for such circumstances.

She turned around and sat down on her haunches, crossing her forelegs in front of her chest. Her wings were still fully extended. I mirrored her movement, turned and sat down. A couple of seconds later, despite our situation, we closed that small gap between us. Back to back, coat on coat. I could feel the heat of her body seep into mine. She was almost burning.

For however long it took, we just sat there. This routine was still young. Fragile. To ingrain it further, we still needed to actively heed our own decisions. One of us had to make a first step. And Luna being Luna… she had learned a lot, grown a lot, but she was passionate. She knew how to hold a grudge. She was stubborn at times. I did not mind – I loved her anyway. So I did not mind as well, caving again. “I’m sorry,” I tried, but my voice felt hoarse and barely audible, so I repeated myself with a little bit more force while I cautiously tried to avoid sounding too forceful. “I should have listened to you. You’re doing this a lot longer than I am. I’m just a guard, and you have all the expertise and experience.”

She was silent for a short while longer. But I felt her shift against my back. Felt her wings retract slowly, probably with some effort on her part. She finally gave a quiet sigh. “Nay, it is I who should apologize. You are as much an advisor and an extra pair of eyes than you are a guard. But more importantly, you are a friend, trying to look out for me. I should not have refused to listen this stubbornly.”

For a moment, I smiled. Not only because it worked, because our routine had once more deescalated the situation. But because I could also hear a little piece of advice Fluttershy had given me some years back. Her voice was only in my head, of course, and I made sure that the dreamscape surrounding us would not catch that memory and throw it back at us as an echo.

I turned around and hugged Luna from behind. “I’m sorry.”

She gave another sigh and I could feel some more tension melt away from her body. “So am I.”

With the immediate issue resolved for now, I dared to take a look at my freshest batch of memories. And I grimaced when I remembered a particular scene. I involuntarily pulled back a little and started to very, very cautiously prod her left side.

“What are you doing?” she asked. Despite our attempts to make up, there was still a sharp undertone of annoyance.

I did not answer her and I could not have told why. I instead extended her wing with my magic, inspected bone and joints and feathers. “Are you hurt?” I finally asked, my voice laced with worry.

She pulled her wing and I dared not to reinforce my magic, instead opting to let the spell break. “Nay, we—” She sighed. “No, I am not. You know that we do not carry our wounds over.”

Some very uncomfortable memories were clawing at the walls of my mind upon hearing this. I remembered Applejack’s guardian beating me to a pulp. I remembered falling out of her dream and lying on the dreamscape. The wounds were gone, sure enough. But I remembered them. I remembered how it felt, having your jaw broken and dislocated. How it felt, seeing your own limb twisted in decidedly unnatural angles. How it felt, looking through tears and blood with one eye, because the other was swollen shut. “That’s not the point,” I answered her maybe a little bit too sharply, “He still hurt you. I saw that—… I saw you—…” I could not even finish that sentence.

She had been downed. The strike had come fast, hard and most importantly, unexpected. Luna had been doing this for centuries before I even showed up, true. That was probably why she seemed somewhat unfazed when she got back up again. But I could not not worry.

She gave another sigh and turned around to properly look at me. She watched me closely for a moment. I felt guilty beyond words, and maybe she saw that. I was her guard. The only one capable of following her into the dreamscape. Of helping her. I should have been… something. Faster? Stronger? Wittier? What was I good for if I could not even thwart an attack I clearly saw coming?

“I am fine,” she replied with a surprisingly insistent tone, before continuing a little softer and with the attempt of a smile. “It might have gotten nasty for a quick twist, but we managed in the end, did we not?”

I reciprocated her attempt to lighten the mood with my own attempt at a smile. “We always do, don’t we?”

She pulled me closer, encased me in her wings, and we hugged out whatever annoyance and frustration, exhaustion and anger was left. “We do,” she quietly answered.

It really had been a long night.

I woke up groggy and still felt somewhat fatigued even after my morning routine. I made breakfast for Twilight, Spike and myself and just sat down at the kitchen table. I had no idea for how long I was sitting there. When Spike entered, asking about my breakfast philosophies this morning, I could not answer him with anything worth discussing. I had wasted minutes, maybe even an hour, just sitting there, staring into nothingness, unthinking and unblinking. Well, I had blinked. Probably. Hopefully.

Breakfast turned out uneventful, but pleasant. I talked to Twilight and Spike about nothing in particular and yet we enjoyed each other’s company. I had made some plans for today. Nothing spectacular, just a little stroll around town with Derpy and Dinky, some catching up was in order. We had not seen each other in a couple of weeks, and that would not do. The afternoon and evening were still free, though. And this supposed ‘free time’ had been scheduled. There were still a couple of things I needed to think about. Decisions needed to be made. Mostly in regards to my relationships, because for some odd reason, that was such an integral part of my life that I constantly needed to make a great fuss over it. Applejack had probably been right all along – I attributed way too much importance to this. But I could not force myself to care less either. I feared certain things, and wanted certain other things, and usually, these two impulses clashed. I had been with Celestia for more than four years and the situation with Twilight was stable. It could probably go on like this for years to come. But I did not want it to remain as it was.

I was being selfish, and greedy, and I wanted more. I had to broach the subject somehow. Test the waters, see what they were all thinking. What was possible, and what was not.

Later, I chided myself as I heard a knock at the front doors.

It was the kind of knock one made when running against a closed door at walking speed. Or flying into it. “That’s my cue,” I let Twilight and Spike know and stood up. “Can I leave that up to you?” I asked Spike while I looked at the dishes.

“Sure thing. Say ‘hi’ to Dinky!” he replied in a chipper mood.

“Have fun!” Twilight chimed in with a smile.

I made my way to the door and opened it. By now, Derpy had stood back up again and was giving me such a warm, radiant smile that it was impossible not to reciprocate it. “Are you alright? You’re not hurt, are you?”

Her smile grew into a grin. “Don’t worry, it’s not my first time crashing into something. I slowed down enough.”

While my concerns did not just evaporate like that, her gentle voice still eased them. I craned my neck a little, but to my disappointment, I found nothing. So I just stepped outside, closed the door behind me and we started walking before I addressed this. “Dinky?”

I noticed how one of her eyes drifted a little off, as if she was carefully watching me. I knew it didn’t work like that, but the impression was there nonetheless. “Sorry. She’s off with some friends of hers.” I nodded and a moment later, she continued. “You really do like her a lot, don’t you?”

I chuckled a little. “Well… yeah? I mean. I’ve been over so many times and she’s always this chipper little bouncy ball. And you have visited us often enough as well. It’s so freaking adorable when she gets into another tiff with Spike. To be honest, it helps a lot that she likes to listen to my pointless stories…”

Derpy extended her wing with surprising speed and gave me a good, solid shove. I almost tumbled to the wayside. A startled yelp later, with my heart racing, I stared at her with big, wide eyes. “What was that for?” I whined.

“They aren’t pointless,” she insisted. “They are good stories. And she likes them. And she likes you. She looks up to you. You’re maybe the closest thing she ever had to a dad.”

For some reason, that made me blush furiously. “She’s a great filly,” I weakly mumbled, unsure what to say.

And Derpy just smiled. The sky was blue, the grass was green, water was wet and Derpy was happy. Everything was as it was meant to be. “You know, one day, you’ll make a very lucky mare even happier by being a very caring dad.”

“I’m just… uh… I don’t… can we maybe… I don’t know what to say to that,” I admitted after some embarrassing fumbling for words. I could feel my cheeks burning. Even my ears were hot at this point.

She giggled. “A ‘thank you’ will be enough.”

“Thank you,” I mumbled, still embarrassed, but also… proud? Maybe? I could hardly tell Derpy that, when she and her daughter were around, it almost felt like a family. Like some exercise with training wheels, because Dinky was already past the early years and in a phase where she maybe searched, maybe needed some stallion to jump in and be a role model.

It always felt nice until I started thinking about it, at which point it started to feel weird. I did not know how to handle that, so I usually just opted to avoid thinking about it too hard instead. Or at all.

“I will tell her you missed her, hm?” Derpy offered with a wink.

“Thank you.”

We had cleared Ponyville’s city proper and were walking along rarely used trails just outside of town. Gently sloping hills, a lot of grass, the occasional lone tree breaking up the monotonous if beautiful landscape. I had visited Canterlot enough times by now to know that this was something harder to come by when living in a city. An actual city, not just a rural farming village. While nature was far from ‘untamed’ in these regions just outside town, it was still more nature than one would get from taking a stroll outside of Canterlot. Because quite frankly, outside of Canterlot there wasn't much of interest. The downside of a city built on the side of a mountain: There was a lot of rock to stare at. Though Shining Armor had insisted that it was great for hiking...

I had heard from my friends that other cities like Manehattan were a little bit more complex, less one-note. Densely built city blocks reaching several, if not dozens of stories upwards with streets connecting everything like veins. Hectic traffic and loads of ponies. But it was broken up by parks. Some of them were as ‘wild’ as ponies dared to let them become. And outside the city proper, the ‘suburbs’ were less densely packed. Smaller houses, grassy areas, more trees. And beyond even that? Maybe it looked familiar beyond that. Familiar to this field we were strolling through right now. Maybe.

Quite frankly, I had no interest in finding out. Ever. I cared not for city life, or the city itself. Any city, really, including Canterlot. If home truly was where the heart was, then my home was with my friends, my marefriend, and in Ponyville.

“You had a rough night?” Derpy ventured a guess after we had been walking for a while.

It snapped me right back out of my reverie. “Hm? Oh. Eh… yeah. Sorry. I was a bit cranky, wasn’t I?”

She just shrugged it off. “Don’t worry, it wasn’t all that bad. You just looked a little agitated.”

Did I? How strange. Neither Twilight nor Spike had mentioned anything. “Well… we had a rough night, yeah. A lot of nightmares. Some of which got surprisingly snappy. At some point, I joked about it being connected to moon phases, hence the ‘lunacy’ of it all.”

Even Derpy grimaced at that. I had bucked up that hard. “Ouch,” she commented.

And I just admitted to it with a nod. “Yeah, it was… it wasn’t exactly one of my smarter moments. We got past that quickly once I sincerely apologized, but the night just wore on and on and it wouldn’t stop.” That actually made me think. I obviously did not know every pony in Equestria. Far from it. Most of the time, when we helped a dreamer out, I didn't even notice much about him beyond what was necessary to help. Names, for example, often weren’t. But had I ever entered Derpy’s dreams? I would remember that, I liked to believe. She was one of my close friends, after all. But no. As far as I could remember, I never had. How strange. “Say, did you have nightmares last night?”

The question was innocent enough. Especially given the context. And yet she suddenly blushed a little and her giggle decidedly did not sound innocent at all. “No, no nightmares, no siree!”

That elicited a chuckle from me. “Uh-huh. You had fun, then?”

She grinned a little and with a twinkle in her eyes, looked over at me. “We had, yupp.”

It took a couple of seconds before the implications really sank in. After being friends with her for a couple of years, her open-mindedness really should not surprise me any longer, and yet I felt my cheeks heat up again. It was even weirder, given that I was patrolling the dreamscape with Luna. When guarding ponies dreams, one inevitably learned a lot about their wishes, fears and aspirations. Because dreams were usually unguarded, honest and open. A pony might lust after her best friend’s decidedly straight and decidedly married wife. It would affect her dreams time and time again. And we saw. A pony might steal from his employer out of necessity and feel guilty and ashamed about it. He dreamed, and we saw.

Luna had been doing this for millennia. Rare was the occasion that something she saw in a dream truly surprised her. Sometimes, she got intrigued. But surprised? No.

I had not been peeking into other ponies' most private parts of their minds for nearly that long and even I sometimes felt like there should have been a certain edge to what I was witnessing, but it was dulled, blunted. Maybe this was different because it involved me. If so, it was not likely that this would ever change then. Luna was a public figure. She had seen herself get beheaded by those that despised her for whatever reason. She had seen herself get railed by her entire night guard for that apparently was a fantasy for some ponies. She had seen ponies fret over their attempts to court her, but never did they muster the courage to follow through. She had seen a lot in regards to her own person.

I, on the other hoof, was a nobody. The press sometimes tried to bother me because of my relationship with Celestia, but these days, they rarely made an effort to come all the way out to Ponyville only to be sent right back home. Especially since I had gotten media training and just did not give them anything to work with. And Ponyvillians, well, they were a dedicated, committed lot. We had our own newspaper, sure. But in a town this small, where everypony basically knew everypony, their writers would not dare.

So I was a nobody. And I would remain as such. And I would not have it any other way.

That of course meant that I would only show up in dreams of my friends. It had happened a couple of times and always felt weird. At some point, Rainbow had apparently feared I would be a decent rival when it came to fighting over Applejack’s love. To this very day, I had no idea how that thought had manifested in her mind in the first place. When working with dreams, discretion was the be-all and the end-all. I never had said a single word about this dream. And it ceased to return after a week or so.

With Derpy admitting to dream about me, that still felt different. I have had my suspicions that she liked me, but she never acted on it. And neither did I, of course. She was a lovely mare, and quite lovely to look at too, but that certainly was not meant to be.

“Enjoying the view?” she asked with a soft giggle and shook her behind a little.

Aaand I heated right back up and quickly tore my gaze away. “Sorry, sorry, that was… wow, that was rude.”

“It’s okay. It’s nice being admired sometimes,” she replied.

I furrowed my brow. There had actually been something I never really looked into. “Why me, though?” I asked. “There’s a lot of fine stallions in Ponyville. Even more fine mares, depending on your tastes.”

She giggled again and nodded. “I know. Well… you’re very sweet. And you’ve been nice to me.”

That most certainly did not help make this any less confusing. “Derpy, half the town adores you, and is nice to you.”

She grinned and her blush deepened. “I know.”

Oh boy.

So apparently… she was dreaming about half the town then. I most certainly should not investigate that any further. “Right, so… hm… right.” Eloquence.

“You’re not upset with me, are you?” And just like that, she sounded worried.

And just like that, I felt like I had kicked a puppy. Sheesh, how did she do that? “No! No, no, no. I’m not. I mean, it’s just a dream, you can’t really control it anyway. If anything, I’m flattered.” I truly was.

But Derpy slowed our little stroll down even further and we were now basically crawling on the trail at a snail’s pace. I did not mind, it was a beautiful day with a warm sun countered by a soft, fresh breeze. She looked at me in confusion. “What do you mean, ‘I can’t control it’? Am I not allowed to? Did I do something wrong?”

“What? No, that’s not what I meant, I—… what?” My confusion only piled higher. “So, wait. You're saying that you decided to dream about us doing… whatever we did?”

A faint blush returned to her face, but her smile remained unbroken. “Mhm.”

Riiight. That did change things. Did it? What things? And how? Goodness gracious, I was not sure what to think anymore. I obviously knew that lucid dreamers existed. Pinkie was one. She occasionally became aware of the nature of her dream and started to play around with it. That could be a good thing in a way, because lucid dreamers rarely fell prey to nightmares. But they were a rarity. Not rare enough that it was unlikely for Derpy to be one as well though. However, my interest was piqued. “So… what did we do?” I asked her.

That tint in her cheeks became a little more pronounced and she grinned knowingly. “Do you really want to know that?”

It only took me a second or so to realize. “Ooon second thought,” I replied and we both shared a laugh. To push past any potential awkwardness, I sidled up to her and hugged her for a moment before I pulled back to a more appropriate distance. “I’m just surprised. Lucid dreamers are rare, you know?”

“Oh, so I’m ‘special’ now, huh?” she teased and again and we shared a little laugh. “So you mean… not everypony can control their dreams?”

I furrowed my brow and looked at her for a moment. She seemed genuinely surprised about that. “Have you never talked to other ponies about their dreams?” It was hard to imagine. Something like this would eventually come up in casual conversation or smalltalk, would it not?

“Well, I know what I do in my dreams. I just thought it would be… you know… inappropriate to ask,” she answered.

For a brief moment, I was almost disturbed. Somehow, in my head, Derpy was this sweet, innocent mare. And she was, she truly, really was. But Dinky was not exactly the result of mitosis, was she? Derpy had never struck me as a sultry mare. I had never noticed her flirting with anypony. She did not emphasize parts of her body with makeup, dresses, accessories or certain ways of walking or flying.

Yet here she was, sweet, innocent Derpy, telling me about her apparently rather lewd and varied dreams. In a way, it was funny. And I was quietly chuckling about it for a moment. But something about her phrasing bugged me, kept me on topic. To be fair – she did not seem all that bothered about that. “So you fantasize about me. And others. With full control.”

It was more of a statement than an actual question. More importantly, it was a repetition of what we already had established. “Yes. I mean… as long as you don’t act on your fantasies in any way that can hurt anypony, you should be fine, right? As long as you keep that in mind, there is no wrong way to fantasize.”

That was actually a pretty smart maxim.

It became apparent that she had thought about this extensively over the years. “You know,” I piped up with a wide smile, “some ponies don’t give you enough credit for how smart you are.”

“Thank you!” she merrily replied. “So you don’t mind?”

I listened to the myriad of inner voices, but found none that objected. So I shook my head. “No. Whatever happens in your head is in your head - you’re right: It’s private. I’m just surprised by the amount of control you seem to have. Do you control every dream you have?”

She smiled in relief and we picked up the pace a little. “Well… no. I do these days, but it was different when I was a lot younger.”

“Filly-Derpy was probably as cute as a button,” I surmised with a smile. “Maybe cuter as Dinky?” I teased.

She immediately puffed her cheeks out. “You take that back! Nopony is cuter than Dinky!”

After jabbing me with a hoof a couple of times and almost losing her footing because of it, we laughed about our antics. And yet. That nagging feeling was still present in the back of my mind. It was not overly intrusive, it was just there. By now, we had made it halfway around Ponyville, with plenty of time remaining for us to frolic around if we so desired. “You don’t happen to know when that started, do you? The lucid dreams, I mean.”

“Oh, that was when I first got my cutie mark!” she happily replied.

And my jaw figuratively hit the floor.

A couple of seconds after I abruptly stopped, she noticed me missing by her side, so she doubled back. “Is everything alright?”

“I… you just said… wait.” I had to take a deep breath to compose myself. “I’m about to be awfully rude again, and I wanted to apologize beforehoof.” With a less than innocent grin, she turned a little and showed me her rump. “T-Thanks.” And I took my time. Her soft, light gray coat made it difficult to make out her cutie mark in all that bright sunshine, seeing as it was just a bunch of bubbles of varying sizes, colored in even lighter gray. I knew that there was an interesting interaction with water, which made her coat look darker while her cutie mark for some reason looked even lighter, almost whitish.

An assortment of bubbles.

“Derpy, what do you think your cutie mark means?” I asked, my voice maybe a little bit more tense than it really needed to be.

“I don’t know,” she shrugged in response and without any hesitation or care.

“You don’t know?”

“No. I mean… I initially thought I might be the queen of bubble baths,” she started to explain with an amused giggle. “Because I had taken one for hours and I love bubble baths and the next day, tadaaa, cutie mark. But as I grew older, I realized that couldn’t really be it, right? But honestly, I don’t really care all that much. As a filly, I was a little appalled by how so many fillies and colts treated each other because of their cutie marks – or because of them missing one. All that name-calling seemed so unnecessarily callous. Don’t get me wrong, it was still a nice party, I loved all the presents and that my friends were there. But at the end of the day, it was just a cutie mark, you know?” She suddenly grew increasingly self-aware and looked around in all directions and even deemed it necessary to lower her volume when she added, “Please don’t tell the Cutie Mark Crusaders. They can get pretty scary when it comes to that.”

I quietly laughed but reassured her with a nod. “They won’t hear a word from me,” I promised her. The sudden revelation was still incredible and my mind was still reeling from it, but Derpy was just so charming that I could not help but grin from ear to ear. I needed a little while to sort myself out. We just stood in the middle of nowhere, but she did not seem to mind much. At one point, she even lowered her head to the ground and grazed for a little bit. The outrage such a behavior would have caused in Canterlot! Feral ponies! Barbarians! Those backwater hillbillies! It made me smile, seeing her enjoy the day without a care in the world.

“I have a proposal for you,” I finally spoke up again and immediately regained her attention.

Her eyes lit up, but only seconds later, she became increasingly confused. “Don’t you want to propose to your marefriend first?”

And once more, she had successfully flabbergasted me again. She really did have a knack for that. “I… uh… not that kind of proposal,” I corrected, while my mind mostly raced around that ‘first’. But I chose to ignore that for now.

“Oh, phew, that’s good. It would have been awkward otherwise,” she explained with a grin.

“Although I presume my proposal will still sound… eh… it could easily be misunderstood,” I continued and waggled my eyebrows, just because the entire situation did not feel ridiculous enough yet. I had maneuvered myself into embarrassing situations over and over again over the years. Especially in the beginning. This time, I did not actually mind the prospect all that much. Because it could be funny, and she would not mind, and we could talk it out if necessary. There were no real consequences to be feared and that helped me to be a lot more easy-going with her.

“That sounds promising then! Tell me!” she demanded.

I shook my head. What a mare. “Let’s walk, shall we?” We continued our stroll around Ponyville at a brisker pace than before. After all, we did intend to reach our goal at some point. “So, I would like for you to invite me to your home,” I started with a small grin, trying to hide how much I enjoyed this banter.

“Mhm. Consider it done!” she answered with a wide smile, “Dreamwalker, would you like to come with me? To my place? Maybe for a coffee?” Her face lit up and she stuck out her tongue. I had no idea why, but it made me laugh. She was adorable.

I stifled my laughter and shook my head once more. “I’m not the coffee-type, you know that.”

Her smile grew into a grin as well. “Oh, right. But don’t worry, I have tea as well. And juice. Really good juice. And probably some other treats and sweets you could be interested in. Or we just leave the coffee out entirely and get right to the sweets instead.”

At this point, I had to fight hard not to break out laughing. Again. She was trying hard, and it was just so incredibly endearing. Her flirting was more funny than actually seductive, but it promised a good time nonetheless. At this point, the only reasonable explanation why she was still single was that she wanted to be. “Well, that’s a very kind offer. I’d love to get very familiar with all your juices and sweets,” I managed half-chuckling about the corniness of it all. “And after that, I’d love to sleep with you.”

She blushed heavily and giggled like a love-drunken filly. It was adorable. “That sounds like a lovely evening then. Can we go?”

Without a second thought, I nodded and steered straight towards Ponyville. That surprised her. And I laughed merrily while she tried to catch up to me, seeing as I had started to trot. “Wait, for real?” she asked in utter confusion once she was almost at my side. “What are we going to do?”

I smiled, but did not slow down. Quite contrary – now that she was with me, I was eager to test this out and therefore sped up a little more. “Well I told you it would sound suggestive. I do want to sleep with you, just not like that. But I need to stay close to you to cast my spell, and we should make ourselves comfortable, so I would suggest either your bed or your living room couch.”

“Bed,” she immediately answered. Almost hastily. I looked over to confirm my suspicions that indeed, she seemed quite eager herself. Maybe something she would use for her fantasies – I decided not to pry.

Derpy was in the bathroom, preparing herself for an impromptu afternoon nap and I sat on her bed and tried not to get nervous about this. My mind wandered just as much as my gaze. It was a nice bed. Soft, cozy, spacious… for one pony. It would be a snug fit for the two of us. I doubted that she minded much. I did not mind myself. A shelf with some literature above the headboard. I was vaguely familiar with those titles from Twilight’s library. Novels. Mystery, romance, and one that stuck out from the rest, being about high science fiction. Some paraphernalia scattered about. Framed pictures of – and from – Dinky on the walls. The color scheme was a little more pinkish than I had expected. I had never been in this room before, there just had been no reason to enter. It was lovely.

I could hear the faucet being turned off, but the door remained closed.

The implications of my discovery were huge. I needed to confirm them first, of course, but goodness gracious, if this actually were to work out…

Being ‘special’ was all nice and good. For a while. Until it stopped being all sunshine and rainbows and started to become a burden that, because you’re so ‘special’, weighs you down. I have had my fair share of being ‘special’ and the nights started to become stressful. In my mind, a decision had been made the moment the possibility arose: I could remain special enough with some support, I did not insist on being unique.

I heard the bathroom door’s lock click.

But first, the confirmation.

When Derpy entered her bedroom, she actually did not look any different than before – at least as far as I could tell. There was this saying about stallions' attention spans and how they always missed oh so important details, but I liked to believe I was at least halfway decently observant. Well, at least she did not ask me ‘how do I look’ or something cliché like that. Instead, she just walked over and sat on the bed, right beside me.

“I’m a little nervous,” she said.

I could not help but chuckle. “Don’t worry, it’s just me. Nothing’s going to happen, okay?”

“I know, I know, it’s just… it has been ages since I last shared my bed with anypony. Well aside from Dinky, that is.” She did seem a little uncertain at least, if not a smidge uncomfortable. And as long as I had to say anything about that, this would not do.

“Alright, tell me – how can I help?” I asked. “I mean to make you more comfortable. You could… uh… I don’t know… wear pajamas or something, if you have stuff like that?” Most ponies considered clothing unnecessary. Especially in Ponyville. That did not mean that none were bought though. I knew for a fact that Lyra, always the weird, albeit lovely one, wore clothes when sleeping.

“I don’t have that kind of clothes,” Derpy replied with a smile.

I did not pick up on the hint and just furrowed my brow. “Well if it makes you feel more comfortable, you can wear whatever you want. It’s your house after all and I’m basically on a raid here.”

I was a little confused when she suddenly started to giggle. She stood back up again and moved over to one of her dressers, opening the upper drawer and gesturing for me to take a look. So I followed her, looked in and immediately blushed. Satin, silk, lace, and some beautifully crafted socks that drew my gaze to them.

I decided to look anywhere but in that drawer.

“Are you still sure that I can wear whatever I feel like?” she teased with a hearty laugh.

“Ah, well… m-maybe not that. Any of that.” She nodded, still grinning wildly, and closed the drawer. “So… that explains why you own clothes and I’ve never seen any on you…”

“I like to wear them,” she nonchalantly said. “They make me feel beautiful.”

Her statement simply baffled me for a good moment. “Come on! You are beautiful, Derpy.”

She smiled at me, leaned against me for a brief moment and nuzzled my neck. “Thank you, that’s very kind of you to say.”

I tried to distract myself from how nice that felt by puzzling over that drawer. “So… the lower drawer…?” I started barely above a whisper, eyeing that dresser with caution.

“Toys,” she just bluntly admitted.

“Thought so.” Well. I just had to ask, didn’t I? I tried to come up with another topic, any other topic, but it was difficult, as my thoughts got jumbled.

Before I could actually find a way out of this ditch, Derpy sighed. “Alright. I think I’m ready now.”

“Just like that?” I asked curiously.

“Mhm. I just needed to calm down a little. It’s really easy with you. You have a calming aura.” I did?

She turned around and lay down, waiting for me to follow. As expected, the bed was spacious for one pony, but a considerably tighter fit for two. So I scooched closer to her until my belly made contact with her back. She had a penchant for large pillows, which was great in our current situation, as it would be enough for both of us. With Dinky probably returning for dinner, we had at least a couple of hours' time. I doubted we would need that much. “You good? Everything settled?” I asked.

“Can you hug me?” she asked right back and without hesitation, I embraced her. One deep, happy sigh later, she nodded. “Ready.”

My horn lit up and I brought us away from this waking world.

“Well that’s just awkward,” I commented with a chuckle and inspected myself. Or rather, the version of myself that existed in Derpy’s dream. “Is he… larger than me?” I asked, standing right in front of him. At this point, I was used to dream figments blankly staring ahead without blinking when they got no input from the dreamer’s subconscious. The mind usually just dissolved unneeded assets, but sometimes they remained as background dressing.

Derpy rose from her bed and smiled a little sheepishly. “Maybe a little bit.”

“Would you like me to be bigger then?” I asked without any judgment.

She nodded. “If you were my lover, I’d very much like that, yes.”

For a moment, curiosity tried to run rampant and make me look between his hindlegs, but there would be little to see at the moment, this fantasy apparently being put on hold and all. “I’m not even going to question what I’m wearing,” I mused aloud while I looked at a strange contraption of rope and rubber.

“That is for—“ she started and I immediately interrupted.

“And you’re not going to tell me either,” I insisted with an awkward, quiet chuckle.

“Sorry. It’s just really exciting. I don’t normally get to share this with a real pony,” she replied. "Do you want to see Twilight? She's in that closet over there."

I was so surprised to hear that, I forgot to think before speaking again. "Why is Twilight here...?" I had seen her upper drawer. I knew what Twilight could be wearing, and it was hard to get these images out of my head.

Derpy grinned with a deep blush coloring her cheeks. "I like to watch sometimes. Before we move on to—"

"Right, riiight, got it," I quickly interrupted again and chuckled. Her enthusiasm was infectious, I had to give her that. Looking around the room, I noticed how strangely familiar it looked. Almost identical to her regular bedroom. “You know, I’m getting mixed signals here. On one hoof, you have me wearing that thing, but on the other hoof, your bedroom doesn’t seem all that different.”

“Oh, it’s just a scene,” she answered with an almost dreamy gaze that made me wonder. “For the more intimate fantasies.”

My eyes drifted towards the closet she had pointed out. “The ones where I – or somepony else – don’t just rut your brains out?” I joked. And of course, she just nodded enthusiastically, with a wide smile on her lips. I found it surprisingly easy to fabricate a story about why Twilight would be hiding in her closet while I walked around with that thing strapped to my hips. Right. Time to change the topic. “I have to admit, I’m a little confused though. I know my spell. Heck, by now, I can cast it in my sleep. Literally. Spike tried to wake me up early on Twilight's last birthday. He wanted me to help him with breakfast preparations. It was his first dreamwalk. It was quite chaotic. That day was. But hilariously so.” I looked around, lifted a hoof and carefully placed it in the air. At least that was what Derpy saw anyway. I prodded the dream bubble and confirmed that we were, in fact, inside her dream. Which was fine and obvious and still made no sense. When I used my spell, we should have landed on the dreamscape itself. Outside of any dreams. Something had redirected our arrival.

My eyes drifted over to Derpy. Or somepony. “Alright, fine, whatever. I can work with this. Mind coming over?” I asked her. Derpy stood up, sidled up to me and even dared to put a wing over my back. The audacity. I just smiled at her and gave her a wink. It was fine, really, she was not breaking any boundaries. I took note that her wing, while it still felt nice, was decidedly different from Celestia's, Twilight's, or even Luna's. For one, it was a lot smaller. But there was something else I could not quite put to words. It seemed a little bit rougher. Firmer. Maybe because she used them a lot more?

I shook my head, refocused my attention on the task at hoof and, with our bodies being in touch, carefully pushed forward. There was a surprising amount of resistance. As if the dream was not willing to let us go. “Derpy? I want to show you something, but we need to leave your dream for a while for that. Is that okay with you?”

“Oh, yes, of course!” she answered, and yet, the resistance remained on almost the same level as before. Almost as if it was neither her consciousness, nor her subconsciousness that tried to trap us in here. I was not aware of other forces that might be responsible though. Even dreamscape creatures did not do stuff like this. Maybe they could, but why would they?

Finally, after an unexpectedly long while, the dream relented and gave us free.

We both tumbled onto the dreamscape. “Are you okay?” I quickly asked. But Derpy did not answer. She instead stared in awe and wonder. And I just grinned. I watched her closely. I wanted to remember every moment of this. It had become quite precious to me, seeing somepony react to the dreamscape for the first time.

“This is what you get to see every night?” she asked almost breathlessly.

I proudly puffed my chest out, even though I basically did nothing to justify this sudden pride. This was Luna's handiwork, after all. “Mhm!”

“It’s incredible… it’s so… beautiful…” I silently snickered a little. It really was a sight to behold. One that defied attempts to describe it, so it had become a little funny to me that most ponies, upon seeing this, resorted to the same or at least similar phrases and descriptions.

“Uh, pretty!” she suddenly exclaimed and almost jumped to her hooves.

It startled me a little, if I was honest. I followed her gaze and noticed how decidedly odd the dreams around us had started to behave. I knew the dreamscape. I had been here for years. Patrolling it alongside Luna. Ensuring the safety of everypony. Everycreature, actually.

Dreams were like soap bubbles. Always moving about in a lazy dance. Bouncing off each other like magnets repelling one another. There was no haste in their movement. Dreams whose dreamers were awake were gray and even more lazy, while active dreams were colorful displays, shimmering and twirling about.

The dreams around us shimmered with a variety of colors. All of them did. Even those with a core of lazy gray at their center. And they hummed. Like wind chimes. Soft melodies, carried by ethereal winds. Different melodies and rhythms. They clearly reacted to something. In a way I had never seen before.

“Wow,” I quietly breathed, now myself fascinated by this spectacle.

“They are singing,” she excitedly commented.

“They are,” I agreed. “They sing for you.”

“For me?”

“I believe so, yes.”

She turned her attention to those dreams surrounding us. I meanwhile noticed how the effect she had on those dreams seemed to be localized. There was a certain radius of effect to this, whatever ‘this’ actually was.

“Ohhh,” she quietly whispered. “I understand.”

“Wait – you do? Tell me. Please.” I tried to be cautious. The dreamscape was not as safe as I had believed for a time. And with the recently increased nightmare activity, I was doubly cautious. I certainly did not want to risk any chance encounters. But my curiosity was burning.

“They try to tell me,” she answered and pointed a hoof at one bubble floating nearby, humming in a quick drumbeat rhythm. “This one is sad, because he got rejected.”

“Rejected? From what? By whom?” I asked.

Derpy listened, but ultimately shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s just repeating. And it’s hard to make out with all the other ones being around.” Derpy fell silent for a moment. “Dreamwalker?”

“Hm?” I absentmindedly replied.

“What does this mean?” she asked with some hesitation.

And that tone of voice was enough to stir something in me. Whatever had occupied my thoughts was shoved aside. I could not, dared not to allow her to question whether this was good or not. “It means something absolutely incredible. It means that both Luna and I might have been idiots for a couple of years. But I don’t think we can be blamed, really. It means you have dream magic, Derpy.”

“A-And that means…?” she asked, still wary.

Well. That was a good question, was it not? I sighed. “I’m honestly not quite sure. First of all, it means that I’m not unique anymore. Don’t get me wrong, that’s not a bad thing. It means that there are, or at least might be, other ponies out there, possessing dream magic as well. Luna has been keeping watch over the dreamscape and all our ponies – and other creatures – for millennia. She fought hard battles to keep everyone safe and sound. But Equestria has grown considerably. We are entering a time of peace and prosperity. Never before have so many nations agreed to shake hands, hooves, claws and whatever else appendages are present. The griffons might bemoan this peace, but they are busy bees, rebuilding their old glory days. The dragons might grumble under their breath, but trade has enriched their lives already. For centuries, nations have grown. Populations have increased. And the dreamscape is getting fuller. More dreams for Luna to guard. More dreamscape creatures to battle. More nightmares to keep in check. After her return, the task seemed almost too daunting to take up again, but she remained steadfast. When my talent became clear, she had me train to become part of the night guard. And now I help her out as much as I can, but… we talked about this when we started our stroll. It’s a lot to do. She’s pushing overtime every other day, figuratively speaking, and it still isn’t enough. We just… we never thought about this. We never considered that in this day and age, other ponies might be born with access to dream magic. Considering temporary theories about cutie mark distribution, it makes sense. In retrospect, it makes perfect sense. More work in the dreamscape would be balanced by more of those who are capable of actually doing that work.”

Maybe I had been getting a little bit too excited. I was breathing heavily, despite no need for air in the first place. My mind was yet again reeling with the possibilities. And Derpy remained silent for a while, before she spoke up again in an alarmingly grave tone. “So that means… I’m not the queen of bubble baths?”

It was silly.

She was being silly.

And my laughter echoed far and wide, as she unexpectedly cracked me up. It took a while for me to calm down enough to hug her. Tightly. “Thank you,” I whispered in her ear before I pulled back and kissed her. Straight on. I was not thinking straight. I doubted I was thinking at all, at that moment. It was a spur of the moment action and luckily, I did not do anything I would need to regret later. Anything else, that is. It was more of a chaste kiss, born from delight and relief.

We were not alone anymore.

Help was underway. Maybe.

“Do I have to give up my job now?” she asked after a while. “To become a night guard? Like you?”

There it was again. This uncertainty that I did not like at all. But I fully understood what her predicament was. She loved her life, just the way it was right now. She loved Ponyville, she loved Dinky, she loved her job as a mailmare. “I’m not sure,” I replied, sticking as close to honesty as I could manage. “There’s a lot that needs to be researched first. The reason I needed to be trained as a guard was because I could enter the dreamscape at will and meddled in it too much to be ignored. I endangered others, and myself, by simply knowing too little about the forces at work. You, on the other hoof, have never even left your dream before. And judging by the way your dream tried to hold us in, I’m not even sure if you can leave your dream without help. Or proper training, that is. And lastly, I can’t imagine Luna would force you to do that. Not if you don’t endanger anypony – which you don’t. So there’s that.” I was quite relieved to see that my words helped to put her mind at ease again. Still. The idea of running around with Derpy in here was a nice fantasy. “It would be an option though,” I teased with a grin. “You’d look really good in armor, I bet.”

And now I had made her laugh. It was only fair. “And you would like that?”

“Can you keep a secret?” I answered with a wide grin, not even waiting for her reply. “There’s a lot to be admired about Luna's body. But she looks hottest, by far, with her entire battle armor on.” And true to my words, the thought of her swinging around that massive, silvery scythe made me shudder for reasons not connected to danger or fear. Then again, maybe ‘danger’ did play a little role in this after all? Looking back at who I had been infatuated with over the years, there was suddenly this red line running through. Celestia? Luna? Twilight? Heck, even Applejack could crush my ribs with a less careful love tab from her powerful hindlegs. Then again, where did that leave Pinkie and Fluttershy?

The stare and the cannon. Pardon – cannons. Stashed all over Equestria for emergency villain fights.

Right.

Derpy meanwhile giggled a little, apparently quite enjoying a mental image or other. “You know, I suspected something like that. What about Princess Celestia?”

I blinked and then my brow furrowed. “Nah,” I shook my head after only a brief moment of consideration. “I know that, back in the olden days, she stood beside Luna on the battlefield if there needed to be a battlefield. I even saw her armor once. All golden and shiny. But those days are long past, I think. She can be strong and firm if need be, but I prefer her to be soft. Caring. Vulnerable. And she’s one heck of a prankster. I thought Luna was bad, but goodness gracious, let me tell you otherwise. Luna, compared to her sister, is straightforward. She pranks you and you immediately know it. With Sunny, it can take weeks before you even realize. And Twilight is on a whole different level, she’s really just—Wait, I’m totally getting off-track here.”

Derpy laughed again and thereby broke her suspiciously innocent smile. “Oh, that’s fine, really. I love to listen.”

“Uh-huh. Yeah, no, nice try though,” I retorted with a grin. “Come on, we should probably wake up.”

She grimaced, but nodded anyway, so I once more charged my horn and brought us back to the waking world.

“That was fun,” I proclaimed quietly. A second later, the scent of her shampoo hit my nose. Some fruity mixture. It was quite nice. Seeing as we were basically cuddling in the afternoon, we had opted to nap without a blanket and yet, I could still feel my back being considerably cooler than my front. Almost made me wish for that blanket to cover us. Almost. “I need to head back to the castle. Twilight will be thrilled to hear of this. Maybe she can draft up a new spell, to find other ponies capable of dream magic. Sweet Celestia, she’ll be so glad. Luna was overworking herself and being stubborn about it. Maybe now she has the necessary lift to get her to stop and listen. And Spike! Spike could send her a letter as soon as I’m back. Just a couple of words, the research obviously needs to take place later. Hm. Research. Good point actually. Derpy, would you be willing to help us find out more about this?” Silence. “… Derpy?” As she remained silent, I tried to lift my hoof, pulling away from the embrace in which I was still holding her. That finally elicited a reaction.

“I’m pretending to be asleep,” she admitted and pulled my hoof back down.

I chuckled a little bit. “I noticed. Thing is though, I’m pretty sure that I know how my spell works. Meaning I know you are awake, because I am awake.”

“Maybe you aren’t awake, then?” she retorted. “Maybe this is a dream within a dream?”

I quietly laughed. “Please, no mind games. They always mess me up so badly.”

“This feels really nice,” she answered with a soft voice that suddenly sounded a lot more vulnerable. “And I feel like I might have needed that for a while? Would it be alright if we remained like this for a while longer?”

I gave a soft snort and pressed myself against her, tightening the embrace. “Sure.”

She sighed, and we fell silent again.

Maybe half an hour later or so, she was willing to let go of me. I had not been sure if she did not just doze off up to the point where she patted my hoof and merrily proclaimed this to be enough now. Oh how I envied her carefree nature at times.

We both stood up and looked at each other. “Your coat is ruffled,” she informed me with a smile.

“Your mane is a mess,” I replied with a grin. “A pretty mess, but a mess.”

She ran a single hoof through her mane once. It unsurprisingly did basically nothing. But that was fine — she was at home. “You are always welcome to come back and mess my mane up some more,” she let me know with a smirk.

I chuckled. “Right. I’ll keep that in mind. It is a nice mane to mess up, after all. Try that with Celestia’s mane, it’s just not the same. Ethereal thing keeps sorting itself out after a while.”

We made our way to the bedroom door and opened it the very same moment Dinky raised a hoof to knock.

She stared at us.

We stared at her.

We stared at each other.

Ruffled coat, messed up mane.

We stared back at her, and her eyes lit up in delight.

Oh boy.