You Are Your New Wounds Opened By Shards Of The Glass You Made
“Luna, do you ever check on my dreams?”
“Admittedly, I check less than I should, dear sister. There are so many souls to help through the dreamscape, I think I just always assume you’ll be fine. After all, with all we’ve seen and done, there’s not much that can frighten us into nightmares now, is there?”
“No, of course… it’s just… the last time you checked, do you remember what you saw?”
“I… hmm, you’re testing me now. I honestly don’t recall. Why, is there something you wanted to talk about?”
“I… no. No, I’m fine Luna.”
Celestia watched Twilight stare at the infinite faces peering back at her in childish wonder. She swayed from side to side, and giggled each time her reflections followed suit.
Which, of course, they did every single time.
“It’s an infinity mirror, Twilight,” Celestia began, “By positioning one mirror exactly parallel to the other, the light bounces between them. A little escapes with every reverberation, and so the reflections recede a little each time.”
“It goes on forever,” Twilight said, sounding out the word with an approximation of a booming, grand voice. Or, the best approximation an eight year old could produce in any case.”
“It certainly does look that way, doesn’t it?” Celestia said with a humourless chuckle. The subtlety of the void of good feeling seemed to be lost on Twilight, who took it at face value and laughed in response. She hadn’t wanted to do this lesson, but after the filly had happened across one of the castle’s many infinity mirror set ups, she’d insisted.
“You’re not looking! At the mirror!” Twilight exclaimed, and Celestia supposed she wasn’t.
“I’ve seen a lot of mirrors in my time Twilight, I’m much more happy watching you,” Celestia replied, and allowed herself a small, genuine smile at the feeling of earnestness. It felt good not to lie.
“Yeah, I guess you really love mirrors,” Twilight replied, her attention largely back to making faces at her infinite reflections.
“What do you mean?” Celestia asked, and she immediately knew she shouldn’t have.
“Well, there’s these…” she began, clearly trying to sound out the new word, “‘Imfimity mirrors’ all over the castle. You must really love them to build so many.”
Celestia’s throat went dry.
“I didn’t build these…” she muttered under her breath, and Twilight didn’t seem to hear her, “I didn’t build any of them. They just… when I, with the elements after I… after she… we couldn’t live there any more. Not in that old place. And it was… something with the elements, we built Canterlot around the new castle that had… it was just… here. Filled with mirrors.”
“Princess?” Twilight’s voice piped up from behind, the frantic mumbling finally at a volume to snap the filly out of her fun.
“I just…I always felt like they were here to remind me… to make me never forget what I’d… who built the mirrors? I didn’t build them, but I have to live with them and see so much… I’ve always just seen so much, and I-”
“Princess Celestia, are you okay?” Twilight asked, latching herself onto one of her teacher’s legs in a helpless display of comfort.
“I-” Celestia began, wheeling round to scream that it had never been her that wanted these fucking mirrors. But of course, she saw the fear in Twilight’s eyes. And, of course, she calmed herself immediately.
“I didn’t build them, little one. They just sort of… came with the castle,” she said, finishing with a tinkling, musical, forced laugh, “Come along now, it’s getting late, we should get you some dinner.”
The change in demeanour seemed to satisfy the child, who beamed a toothy grin at the promise of something nice to eat. She bounded down the halls in the direction of the kitchens, and Celestia saw the purple vanish from the mirrors from the corner of her eyes. And when Twilight was gone, she turned herself to look into the vast, two dimensional infinity, stretching endlessly until she became a tiny white speck on the horizon.
Every single one looked back at her, identical in every way.
And in every reflection, she was the sole constant in an ever-changing kaleidoscope of glorious, horrifying possibility.
CELESTIA CHEWED BROKEN GLASS
In her dreams, it was always the same.
A world of mirrors.
Every single her she would spy hiding in sheer glass would have that same look, a resignation of sorts.
This was how it was always going to be, and she knew that. And every she knew that. And every she and her would peer with such a pleading, pathetic look for Celestia to do what they didn’t. To not do what they did.
And Celestia would always be so terrified that she already had.
So she would scrutinise the mirrors, look at every sordid reflection of what had been and what might have been and what might be. Every crossed word, every selfish desire, every mistake and what it had created and could have created and could created and might have already created.
Celestia closed her eyes, then she opened them and looked again.
She had to know, something surely must have depended on it.
“Do you remember that day when we were in this hallway together, my lesson?” Twilight asked, and Celestia didn’t reply with anything other than a simple grunt of acknowledgement. She knew this infinity mirror hallway only too well. She knew all of the mirrors in the castle.
“I know I wouldn’t be anywhere near where I am not without all those lessons, and I don’t know if I thank you enough for that,” Twilight continued, turning to face Celestia.
The rush of pride and maternal love was still overwhelming to her, even after these many thousands of years, even after everything she’d experienced. In one sense, it felt grounding that Celestia could still be caught off-guard.
But that was the problem, wasn’t it? Celestia had been feeling like she was getting caught off guard so much these days. Every time she looked in the mirror. She tried to force herself to not turn her head to the side, but the temptation… no, the compulsion was nigh overwhelming.
“You’ve done plenty to thank me, my faithful student. More than you could have ever owed.”
Twilight smiled, tears beading in the corner of her eyes. Quickly she made to fix herself, lest she mess up the makeup Rarity had arranged for her. Her wingtip came to gently dab the tear away, and then it jolted as quickly as it had come.
“Goodness!” Twilight exclaimed, laughing, “I swore I’d never get used to these things, and yet here I am doing that.”
Celestia allowed herself the respite of laughing along with Twilight.
“Do you think I’ll do well, as a princess I mean?”
And it was the final straw, so Celestia turned to look into the mirror.
And she saw herself, a million of herself staring back with the same look of desolation Celestia knew she was wearing now. She looked at the infinite possibilities of how Twilight might do. She saw her student get crucified by a populace that had grown to despise her. She saw her become a murderous tyrant that slew babes in front of their parents on the barest whisper of a hint of treachery.
She saw the starving masses of Equestria, driven to near-death by her students' inept crop initiatives, their eyes ablaze with the injustice and fury and animalistic, innate aversion towards famine. She saw them storm the throne room and eat her student and all the royal guard living.
And in every glance of all those silent hers, standing pathetic sentinel to atrocity after atrocity, she saw the pleading, desperate questions.
Think on it Celestia, maybe this is what is going to happen. Maybe you’ve already created this world. Maybe this is the world you’re in now, and you’re just kidding yourself, have you ever thought of that Celestia?
Have you ever thought of all the things that could go wrong, that you’ve done wrong? Have you really broken down what it all means? Have you stripped and laid bare all the minutia of everything you've ever done and refused to let yourself fucking sleep?
Have you done that Celestia?
Live with it, or die with the rest of them, and fear death, and fear life, and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think and think.
Pray god you never stop thinking.
Who can imagine what will happen if you do?
“I think you’ll do perfectly,” Celestia choked out, and prayed the beaming Twilight couldn’t see the grimace hiding just underneath the porcelain. Porcelain that seemed closer and closer these days to finally cracking.
Like glass.
CELESTIA STAMPED UNTIL SHARDS RIPPED HER HOOVES INTO RIBBONS
“Celestia? Is everything okay sister?”
The voice waited for a response, and when it got none, the gentle sound of hooves lightly rapping on the door could be heard.
“I think she may be asleep, perhaps she may not be feeling very well.”
“Shall we go inside to check?”
“No no, just let her get her rest. I am more than capable of handling her duties for a short time.”
“Yes, Princess Luna.”
The conversation drifted through the inky black of the void. Shuttered windows, drawn curtains, no candles to speak of. The air was stale and stationery, the precious little light caught metal and twinkled before annihilating, absorbed into upholstery, stolen by bedclothes.
The conversation died before it reached the room’s occupant, eaten away by the nothingness.
In the bathroom, the world was bright and light, nearly too light to see. Gods, were it to be too light to see.
But there was no light that could blind the mistress of the sun, and she started into the mirror above her sink.
She looked at the her in the mirror, at the she who stared in return, at the I who was she who was the constant among all the chaos. A sorry sight, marred by sweat and eyes highlighted by the crust of sleep. Bags beneath eyes blemished immaculate white features.
Celestia peered past her and looked at the reflection of the bathroom, was it a vision of the past or future? Was Luna going to rush in and scream through tears at the big sister who let her down? Were the countless mistakes and errors and evil deeds going to spill through that bathroom door and remind her of the raking, nightmarish guilt and shame.
Sometimes Celestia wanted to sleep and never wake up because of these mirrors.
Maybe it was a potential future? Maybe it was the future? Would Twilight burst in? Would she be weeping with whatever betrayal Celestia had done to her? Would the kingdom have slipped into ruin because of all the ways she's tainted her student's mind?
Celestia wanted to leave the mirror, but this vision seemed to be completely the same as the bathroom she was in. No deviance, nothing changed, and there must be something to see, mustn’t there? Because what if there was something to see and Celestia didn’t see it? What if Celestia missed the spark, the clue? The thing that would clue her into the secret that had to be hiding somewhere.
She had to find out.
Oh she had to find out, believe it.
Celestia had to know.
Celestia wanted to go for dinner, but her appetite had left her.
Look into the mirror, forget the time that’s escaping.
Find what’s wrong.
Celestia had to know.
Surely, surely something must have depended on it.
It can’t all be for nothing.
Could it?
Please god, let this have been for nothing.
Celestia had to know.
In her dreams, Celestia peered through the mirror.
She hadn’t seen this one before.
The Celestia in the mirror was peering back with the same quizzical look she was surely being offered.
And around her, things were beautiful.
Twilight and her friends were happy, successful. Spike was such a handsome dragon when grown, so out of his shell. Cadence and Shining Armour were bringing up Flurry and doing it wonderfully, shaping a future crystal emperor that would be kind and capable.
Luna was a ruler in full-force. Magnificent, altruistic, a diarch who understood her population and how to treat them, how to influence, working through the simplest words to affect great and beautiful change and reform.
But for the first time, Celestia’s eyes felt drawn to herself.
She needed to know what was different about them.
Because something had to be different, something had to be rotten.
She looked at the Celestia in the mirror, their faces nearly touching, and tried to scrutinise what was behind those eyes.
But she couldn’t work it out.
There wasn’t enough time.
There was too much distance.
She leaned back, and was surprised when the Celestia in the mirror leant forward with her.
And then the Celestia pressed their lips together, and Celestia whimpered when she felt a tongue slip into her mouth. And Celestia ran her hooves through her and her and their and both of their manes and inhaled deeply the scent of them mingling together. She sucked on the tongue in her mouth and then spat it out, then leant forward to nip at the white swan-like neck and wept when she heard the her moan, the sultry dance reaching a fever pitch as Celestia groomed and tasted every hair on that body and every bead of sweat in that coat because there had to be an imperfection. She tasted like vanilla and coconut and sugar and cinnamon. Where was the taste of salinity and body odour and days-old halitosis curdled around unbrushed teeth and unwashed hair matted with grime? It had to be here but Celestia couldn't taste it.
There wasn’t enough time, was too much distance, it was like looking through fogged glass. Like touching through silk blankets, hearing through water.
Celestia felt tears bead in her eyes, and when she closed them to try to stop the shame of the drops pouring down her face, the warmth from the other her disappeared.
Celestia opened her eyes again, and wrapped in her hooves was… nothing.
In fact, there was nothing all around her. No Celestias, no mirrors, no visions.
She sat alone in a void that seemed to stretch on forever.
She didn’t know how to feel about that.
Celestia looked into the infinity mirror.
The issue was exactly what she had said to Twilight all those years ago. A little bit of light escaped each time. The reflections got smaller, the Celestias stretched off into the distance. She couldn’t see clearly.
She leaned her head forward, and all that happened was the her in the mirror got closer and obscured her vision.
The possibilities were endless, but she couldn’t see them
She didn’t know whether they were past or future. She couldn’t find the pieces of the puzzle. What realities were stretching off into the distance?
She saw flashes of colour, which ponies might they be? Was that Twilight, or someone in a lavender dress. Was that Luna, was that Cadance? Was that blinding light herself? Had she brought the sun down on Equestria and scorched the life from everyone, laughing in near-orgasmic joy at the suffering she had caused?
Of course not, she would never do that? But would she?
Had she?
Had she done it and forgotten?
What had she forgotten?
She stared, trying to find visions of the times she’d hurt those she loved.
Had she done it on purpose, had she enjoyed their pain?
Were all those wrong thoughts and misdeeds that no-one knew about or that had caused no lasting pain significant? Surely they had to be somewhere in the mirrors, in the infinite reflections?
There had to be an answer.
Surely she couldn’t just move on? What if the answers of the past held the key to the terrible futures she saw?
What if they could be stopped? What if they couldn’t? What if the past were the future, what if all her visions had already come to pass.
Celestia closed her eyes, and tried to stop herself having a panic attack.
Behind the closed lids, it was like she was in that void again. That blissful moment of perfect presence. No feelings, nothing but the feel of her own body.
Celestia opened her eyes as she had in her dream, and in front of her the infinity mirrors remained.
There were no answers.
Celestia had to know.
Her eye twitched.
The princess shrieked a wail of abject agony and shame and pain and confusion and guilt and rage and reached forward and smashed the glass with her hooves.
It fractured around the impact and cascaded into spider webs, making more mirrors and more reflections and more visions.
Celestia saw to that quickly.
She screamed until her throat turned to tatters and leaned forward and smashed the mirrors with her own FUCKING FACE AND HORN AND RIPPED CHUNKS OF GLASS OFF THE WALL WITH HER TEETH AND CELESTIA CHEWED BROKEN GLASS NOT CARING FOR HOW IT CRACKED HER ENAMEL AND BORE ROOT AND NICKED HER GUMS AND THEN SHE PRESSED DOWN ON RIPPED AND SLIT AND BROKEN FORELEGS AND KICKED AS HARD AS SHE COULD AT THE MIRROR BEHIND HER AND SMASHED GLASS INTO POWDER THAT GOT INTO HER WOUNDS AND LACED HER BLOOD OPENING MICROCUTS AND ABRASIVE AGAINST NERVE ENDINGS THAT FELT LIKE FIRE WAS TEARING THROUGH HER WHOLE BODY AND CELESTIA STAMPED UNTIL SHARDS RIPPED HER HOOVES INTO RIBBONS AND UNTIL EVERY SINGLE REFLECTIVE SURFACE WAS RENDERED INTO NOTHING BUT DUST AND ATOMS AND QUARKS AND MEANINGLESS POINT PARTICLES OF CHARGE AND BARELY SUBSTANCE ONLY SUBJECTIVE AND FLUCTUANTING AND FLUID AND CAUGHT IN CEREBRAL WINDS LIKE THE FLIGHTY NOTHINGNESS THAT WAS EVERYTHING THAT WAS YOUR WHOLE LIFE THAT WAS MEMORY AND CELESTIA’S HORN LIT UP WITH THE FURY OF THE WHOLE SUN AND STARS AND SHE BLASTED AND SCREAMED AND DIDN’T STOP UNTIL SHE OBLITERATED EVERY NOTION OF INFINITY AND REFLECTION AND VISION AND PAST AND FUTURE AND SHE DIDN’T WANT TO STOP UNTIL THE WHOLE CASTLE WAS NOTHING AND THE WHOLE CITY WAS NOTHING AND THE WHOLE WORLD WAS NOTHING BUT OBLIVION AND BLACKNESS AND DRIFTING THROUGH A TIME WITHOUT TIME WITHOUT LIFE WITHOUT EQUINITY BECAUSE NOTHING WAS WORTH THIS AND CELESTIA’S RIPPED THROAT COULDN’T MAKE SOUNDS SAVE FOR PAINED GURGLING AND GRUNTING LIKE WINDCHIMES MADE OF FLESH LIKE THE CRACKING OF BONE AND SHE DIDN’T STOP UNTIL THE WHOLE CORRIDOR WAS SIMPLY A MEMORY WITHOUT MEMORY WITHOUT TIME WITHOUT THE BURDEN OF PAST SIGHT OR FORESIGHT SIMPLY A FORGOTTEN DREAM FILTERED THROUGH A DYING MIND TOO TIRED TO REMEMBER OR PREDICT ANY OF IT AT ALL………………………………………… ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
When Celestia opened her eyes, the walls were simply rubble, and the sunlight was filtering in. She slumped to her shattered, ruined legs, and spat blood. There were no mirrors to be seen.
The floor was covered in a perfect sanguine pool, shiny and stinking of copper and speckled and sparkling with motes of glass powder and masonry and illustrious in the summer sun.
Celestia looked down at it, and noted for a moment that she could see her reflection.
Her face felt wet, she didn’t know whether it was tears or more of her lifeforce.
She was sure someone would be up soon to check what all the commotion was. She wondered what they’d think when they found her.
The Celestia she saw in the pool of blood offered no answer, but it wasn’t her that was attracting Celestia’s attention. For a moment, her eyes drifted, and she wondered what visions she might see behind the her, giving her a look that pleaded with her to stop.
Because Celestia had to know.
And yet she really only knew one thing.
Even through it all, she knew she could never know.
And she had to know.
And she could never know.
And she had to know.
And she could never know.
And
And
And
And
And
Though it was harder than anything, and though her face felt wetter and wetter, Celestia managed to tear her eyes away from the pool, and stare into the sky for a moment.
And she forced herself to leave her eyes there. Even though just beneath her, was the chance to know. Even though she never could. Even though she had to.
Frantic voices from the castle got closer and closer, the blood she was sat in felt more and more clingy, but Celestia tried to pay neither of them any mind.
The sky didn’t have a cloud in there, it was simply a perfect, immaculate, unbroken blue.
Celestia forced herself to keep staring into it.
It was perfect blue, close to a void.
It wasn’t black.
It wasn’t nothing at all.
There was a something tainting the nothing.
Voids didn’t exist in this world.
Celestia thought it would have to do.
But things were rarely that simple.
