Dreamwalker's Tale: Project Greenwood

There was this saying about how the world resembled a carousel. And sometimes, it spun so hard and so fast that ponies got dizzy and sick. Who would not want to slow down from time to time? Who could honestly claim that never in their life did they wish for the carousel to stop, so that they might get off for a while, walk around a little, center themselves again?

But that was not how this ride worked. It started, it went at its own pace without ever asking consent or permission, and it stopped randomly.

Life… was a pretty shitty ‘fun ride’.

The days after my conversation with Dawn blurred into each other. Mostly due to the rampant sleep deprivation I suffered. And I was enough of a snowflake that something as simple as a bad night’s sleep would derail my entire day. I zombie-shuffled my way across the village, fulfilled some minor tasks in an unthinking stupor and sometimes looked up and wondered how my beloved’s sun had already moved so much. Time was in a strange place, somewhere between sand in my hooves and molasses sticking to my coat.

Still. I got by. Somehow.

That said, I was in no shape to make any profound and meaningful decisions. And the others knew that. So I was not too surprised when Spike informed me that I had a visitor, only to then stick around within earshot almost the entire time. Maybe that should have irked me. Maybe I should have been grumpy, and stomped up to him to give him an earful. But no. All I could see was my buddy looking out for me. And it helped. A little.

That left me with said visitor.

“Hey Pristine! It’s so nice to see you!” I greeted her and then proceeded to rather clumsily hug her. As usual, she smelled really nice. A faint, flowery bouquet. Like a meadow full of flowers in spring. Probably one of those very pricy perfumes they sold in Canterlot. And her alabaster coat was so smooth, brushed to perfection.

It was around midday, the sun was high up in the sky and various noises of working ponies could be heard from different directions. She did not seem to mind much. Neither the construction noises, nor the ambient forest noises. Or the muck she walked through, for that matter. In that regard, she was less like her mother. Rarity did not mind getting dirty when it was absolutely necessary, but she tried to shy away from it if possible. Pristine was more pragmatic. Maybe something she inherited from Fleur? Or maybe Fancy? I knew neither of them well enough to even attempt an educated guess.

Pristine reciprocated the embrace, but as soon as we pulled apart, she kept me close and inspected me rigorously. I tried to pull free, but she simply would not let me. And her grip proved surprisingly strong. Or I was weaker than I thought. “You look dreadful. Nice to see me, you say. Are you sure you only see one of me? Because your eyes are unfocused and those bags under them could probably fit Spike in them.”

I grimaced and pulled myself free with a little more force. This time, she let go of me. “It’s not that bad,” I disagreed.

“Sure, whatever you say, darling.” I grimaced even more, but Pristine only smiled.

She clearly waited for some kind of explanation to my apparently terrible state, but I was rather unwilling to give one. “So, uhm… not that I mind you visiting. Quite the contrary, you’re always welcome,” I started with a wry smile. “But what brings you all the way out here, of all places? Aren’t you supposed to rub shoulders with the high society up in Canterlot?”

Pristine kept her expression perfectly in check. That smile never wavered, not even a little. “I traveled out here to ensure that Carousel Boutique’s investment is spent wisely.”

Her tone immediately conjured up images in my head, of ponies with disapproving glares staring over my shoulder. And I knew that was her intention, because just like Rarity, she was a master manipulator. A social engineer. So I concentrated on the facts instead.

Right now, somepony else led the Canterlot boutique. Finding a decent replacement was easy enough if one had no expectations, but that was just the thing: Both Rarity and Pristine had rather high ones. So it could not be just anypony filling that position. And finding somepony suitable for it would have taken time. And effort.

Then there was the train ticket. Those things cost bits. Not a lot, really, but still — it was another potentially unnecessary expense. And traveling by train was boring. Sure, everypony found their routines to cope with that boredom eventually. Some, like Rainbow, took extended naps. Others, like Twilight, enjoyed a good book. Applejack preferred to stare at the landscape, Pinkie brought party games along, Rarity gossiped like there was no tomorrow. I had no idea what Pristines preferred travel distraction was. And that did not matter as much as the fact that a travel distraction was required.

Then came Ponyville station. The closest point to Greenwood the railway could spit her out at. So she had to walk across town. Probably dodge her mom, maybe some conversations with local friends. Or she would have to account for even more time spent trying to get here.

Then she walked through the Everfree Forest. Along a secured path, sure — but as far as I was aware, the news of said security had yet to spread wide and far. But apparently, she had come here alone. Maybe she went to Twilight and asked about the situation. Maybe she used Rarity's techniques to learn about the enchanted torches. I did not know.

What I did know was that all this sounded like a hassle. A lot of effort for very, very little reward. She came here to make sure we did not mismanage her funds? What did she expect us to spend them on? Blackjack and hookers?

No. This was a façade. It had to be.

Which then begged the question: Why was she really here?

And honestly, after being close friends with Rarity for fifty years, I had some suspicions. Sure, maybe something happened in Canterlot. Maybe she modeled the wrong dress and needed to lay low for a while for things to cool off. Maybe she stepped on the wrong hooves and a couple of clients were pissed now. It could be. But usually, the most mundane things were the likeliest. And Rarity could be terribly nosy. Especially when her own daughter was concerned, of course. So I simply assumed that she was fed up with her mom again. It would not have been the first time. And I was perfectly willing to give her a break, a little hidey-hole to relax in and breathe. I just wondered why she had such a hard time saying it.

To be fair, even that was perfectly in line. Neither Rarity nor Pristine had an easy time outright telling ponies what they wanted, needed, felt. They left clues. They gave hints. They wanted to teach their surroundings an entirely different language to understand them.

But I was just awful with languages.

“Right. Investment. Sooo~, let me give you the tour then?” I offered and Pristine’s smile widened as she nodded. I stepped close to her side, put a hoof around her withers and slowly turned us. “There we have the well. I know, I know, it looks like a hole in the ground. Because it is. Currently. We’re working on it. And that house over there is almost finished. They’re laying the foundations for the next one in a few days, I’ve been told. There we have the carpentry where Hefty and Honey live and work, with the warehouse behind it. We store… well, just about everything in there, for now. It’s a huge building and we don’t have a lot to tug away for now, so it’s doing a perfect job and then some. Those are the houses we already built for all the current inhabitants. The wall surrounds the entire village, as you can see, and the mounted torches help keep the place safe at night. The blue ones you probably recognize from your way over here, they line the road to Ponyville and emit a passive magical field that keeps predators at bay. It’s not perfect, but they have served us well so far. Ehrm, what else? That’s my smithy. They built it for me so I could become less useless. A nice touch, isn’t it? I’m forging hinges and really simple keys and such. It would be an insult to my smithing skills any other day, but with the rather tight means we have out here, limited resources, huge need to improvise, and my head recently being all over the place, well… it suits me just fine. Oh, right, and back there we have the backdoor gate and the castle ruins beyond it. One day, when the village is stable and all that, I hope the castle gets rebuilt. It would be nice to see it up and running again.”

A full three-hundred and sixty degrees later, we stopped where we started. “Sight-seeing in Greenwood is currently really worth it, you get so much in such a short time! Everything is very accessible.” Pristine giggled. It was such a lovely sound that it actually pierced through the haze of my befuddled mind and made me smile. I was in a rough spot. A couple of awful days in a row. But I was still able to entertain those dear to me and bring a smile to their faces. That was worth a lot to me. “As you might have guessed by now, everything is still a smidge rough around the edges, but we’re working on it. So maybe looking after your investment isn’t something you should already be doing. You could of course always come back later for that.”

I would have gladly admitted that my attempt to coax the truth out of her was clumsy. And I was under no illusions that she saw right through that. Therefore, it came as no surprise that she shook her head, still smiling. “No, that is fine. This will do.”

I watched her for a moment. And I was surprised to find the usual bastion of self-confidence less sparkly than usual. Less imposing. Less intimidating. “That bad, huh?” Maybe they had gotten into an argument? A bad one? Even that would not have been a first, of course. Though in that case, I would be curious why she came to me of all ponies. Usually when things went south with her parents, Pristine fled to Fluttershy, Rainbow or Whisper, as far as I knew.

It was this point when Pristine looked up at me and with her shoulders sagging a little, she sighed quietly. “Whatever theory you have in your head about why I am here is most likely wrong.”

I chuckled and nuzzled her mane. “Well, you could always just, you know, tell me. Then I wouldn’t have to spin false yarns.”

Pristine looked around to see if we had any unwelcome witnesses listening in. And she obviously noticed Spike who still hung around nearby. There was some kind of exchange of messages between the two as their eyes met, and after a brief moment, Pristine quietly cleared her throat. “Let us take a little walk, shall we?” I nodded and followed her along, while Spike remained behind and turned his attention back to the others. “Some elements of the circles I move in have recently managed to gather information about a private part of my life,” she started. I could already tell how personal and unfortunate this was for her, as her entire body language changed. Her ears splayed back against her head and her confidence drained out of her. “This information was leaked to the public with ill-intent and several elements of those circles, who don’t have the mental capacities to form opinions of their own and merely accept whatever those who crow the loudest say, disapprove of said information.”

There was a buildup of anger in her voice. Or frustration, at least. But in my current mental state, I had difficulties following her excessive linguistic flourishes. “… what?” I saw how her determination wavered and threatened to falter. It clearly had cost her some willpower to open up about it to begin with. And my failure to comprehend was not making it any easier. “I-I’m sorry. I’m really trying, Pristine. It’s just… it’s been a couple of rough days recently. I didn’t get as much sleep as I would have liked, my concentration is kinda crappy, I’m more functioning than living right now. It’s just bad timing. That said, I still care a lot and I would love to help if I can, just… I fear you need do dumb it down a little, if that’s alright with you.”

She grimaced once more. I could not tell why exactly. But after maybe half a minute of us walking a large circle within the confines of the village, she spoke again. “They learned that I’m a raging lesbian and despite how much society changed in the past decades, some still disapprove of such ‘tastes’. Unfortunately for me, some of those old-fashioned, narrow-minded parrots are customers of Carousel Boutique and where Rarity suggested I navigate this minefield with diplomacy and grace, I honestly find myself lacking either when it comes to that. If they cannot accept me for who I am, then they simply don’t deserve me. Thus, here I am. Ready to supervise the new boutique and bring a little chic and charm to this desolate place.”

I chuckled. It might not have been the kind of reaction she wanted or even expected. But I was lucky enough that the good nature of my intentions shone through and after a brief moment, Pristine chimed in with a light giggle. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?” I asked, still a little light-headed. “You know I don’t judge. You’re always welcome with me.”

Pristines own amusement ended in a soft snicker. “And my ‘raging lesbianism’?” She sighed and shook her head. “Sweet Celestia, I do have inherited my mothers flair for dramatics, have I not?”

“Well to be fair, it’s not just your mom,” I objected. “Fleur isn’t much better, is she? I think Fancy is the most grounded out of the three of them, so I fear the deck was always stacked against you.” I smiled and bumped my shoulder against hers. “That said, it’s fine. I endured your moms theatrics and I am not embarrassed at all to reveal that I might even have enjoyed them on occasion. Both you and your raging lesbianism are more than welcome here anytime.” My eyes lazily trailed along the wall, over buildings and treetops. I worked down a mental checklist of our current staff and no name of those stuck out. “I don’t expect anypony here to disapprove. But if they do, just come talk to me, okay?”

I was surprised when Pristine suddenly hugged me. She clung to me like there was no tomorrow and for a few fractions of a second, I struggled to find my balance again. After half of a heart attack survived, I gladly embraced her as well. “Thank you,” she mumbled into my mane. We pulled apart again and she was fully back. Her confident smile on full display, her ego ready to fill any room, but in her eyes I could still see that echo of vulnerability. And gratefulness. “Well, time to spruce up the accommodations.”

I blinked and chuckled. “I fear we don’t have much in terms of shops. Or furniture. Or even pretty flowers.”

Pristine slowly walked away with a ‘here I come’-sway in her hips. She giggled and looked back at the silly pony that was me, apparently. “Oh puhlease!” she uttered in such a similar tone to her moms that it was almost eerie. “A lady always finds ways to pretty things up a little, one simply has to… improvise.”

Sometimes, those similarities between her and her mom were just astonishing.

I watched Pristine walk over to the carpentry. She briefly talked to Honey, and next thing I knew, she hooked herself up with the harness and pulled the cart out the front gate, in the direction of Ponyville. I outright laughed at that point. We had no shops, no furniture, no flowers. True enough, all of it. Ponyville did, however.

It took hours after that encounter for me to realize that she apparently actually intended to move here. That we would have another inhabitant of Greenwood around. That we would have a seamstress in our midst now.

My head really was not up to par.

I was drowning.

A current tried to drag me under, but I struggled against it. However, no matter how much I struggled, I could not get away, could not get free. It never felt like I actually moved somewhere. I could not see in this pitch-black void, could not even see what I was struggling against. Water, surely. Water, I told myself as it clung to my coat. Just water.

Then the moment came when I could no longer hold my breath. I tried to resist the urge, but the burning sensation grew stronger with each second until it simply overwhelmed me. I drew the liquid into my lungs, felt my limbs twitch and twist as my body failed to gather any usable air. But I tasted it. I tasted the heavy metallic nature of what I was drowning in. I tasted blood.

My panic increased manifold. Somehow, I could still panic more than I already did. I struggled harder, tried to swim up, wherever up might be. And I believed in miracles as my head broke the surface. I coughed up blood, spit and spewed it while my legs frantically trod more blood to keep me afloat, to keep me at the surface. I would grow tired eventually, my mind realized. My muscles would tense and cramp and I would drown again and again.

Then they came.

As I struggled against the water, just water, only water, hooves grabbed my back legs. They pulled me under, tried to anyway. I blindly kicked whatever was grasping at me. I felt my hooves make contact with muzzles, I heard sickening crunches as skin broke.

No. Not skin.

Carapaces. Exoskeletons. Chitin.

Changelings!

And all of a sudden, I was a lot less hesitant to kick downwards. The crunching sound was still sickening, but there was a nauseating satisfaction alongside it. And without actual voices, I heard them in my head.

“Monster!” they screamed in a choir of many voices.

“Why did you do this to us?”

“How many have you killed?”

“What did we ever do to you?”

“Murderer!”

I kicked harder. I kicked in panic and anger alike. I had answers, oh boy did I have answers! Images flashed before my eyes. Dark castle hallways. Distant screams echoed in high ceilings. My foals, charmed into sleep with foul green magic, held afloat by the very same color, carried off into the dark of the night by invaders. What you ever did to me? I kicked harder. And harder. Faster, too. I would break them. Every single one of them! They would never, ever hurt or even so much as touch my family again!

I would raze their nest. I would destroy what they held dear. I would cripple their entire hive and subjugate them, I would teach them to leave us alone!

Suddenly my hooves connected with something squishy. A face not shielded by chitin plates. Instead soft muscle tissue under skin and coat. A grumpy groan. And a voice, deep and commanding. “How dare you, you insignificant—“

I did not wait for Tirek to finish. I kicked again. Right in his stupid face. I heard him grunt. Then his hand suddenly grabbed my leg. “I will make you regret that!”

I screamed. He dragged me under with such little effort. I tasted blood again. Their carapaces were everywhere. All around me. Their hooves grabbed at mine. Tried to tear me apart, limb to limb. And Tirek dragged me deeper and deeper down.

And suddenly he stopped. He pulled me to his height, face to face. An eerie green glow illuminated the dark. A single, crooked horn, wreathed in magic. In this faint light, I could see Tirek grin, his face shredded by shards of metal and glass. His left eye was gone, his right one damaged. Stripes of skin and flesh hung loosely here and there, torn from their bones by the onslaught of my assault.

He leaned forward. I knew that the worst was yet to come. We were surrounded by my enemies. I could see it. More and more horns lit up with green magic. They were everywhere. As was their blood. But he, he was the true danger. He was the end-bringer. I could not tear my gaze away from him.

He smiled. His hand, splinters and all, caressed my cheek. “We’re alike, you and I. Can’t you see?”

My face hurt from all the shards stuck in it. My eyes were almost unusable. I was in such incredible pain. Every movement hurt. Breathing hurt. Every heartbeat hurt. But I stared into Dreamwalkers face. A smug smile on his lips. A heartless coldness in his eyes. “We’re alike,” he said in that bland, unassuming voice.

I tried to pull away. Tried to rip myself free. Dreamwalker started to cackle. He pushed me away, waved at me. With a strong kick to my stomach, ripped open as it already was, he pushed me back. Into the waiting flood of changelings. To be torn apart.

And as they dug into my sliced skin, I saw him grin. “We’re the same,” he claimed.

I shot up in my bed with a scream.

My throat was sore. The third nightmare. This night. The… what… was it? What was it? Eighth night? Ninth? Tenth? I lost count. I lost track of time. How long, I wondered. How long could a pony endure something like this?

Cold sweat clung to my coat. My sheets were drenched. My pillow was damp. My hooves shook. I knew the drill by now. I stared out the window. Focused my gaze on the night sky. Searched for solace in that beauty. But the longer this went on, the more nights I had to scramble back to her night sky, the less enjoyment I managed to squeeze out of it. The less it helped.

My door was flung open. “Dad?”

“I-I’m fine,” I lied.

It mattered little how many days it had been. They knew. Everyone in Greenwood knew. They were just… nice enough not to mention it. But I kept them awake at night, I assumed. Aurora especially. Or maybe that spell she cast over my room every evening was a sound dampener. I had never bothered to ask. I just knew that she came in here every time I woke up screaming.

Every.

Single.

Time.

“You are not fine, dad,” she insisted and came over to the bed.

I knew the drill by now. She would try to comfort me. She desperately wanted to help me. And I hated myself so much for it. I was her father. I was supposed to be stronger than this. I was supposed to comfort her in her times of need. Not the other way around. “Just… go. Please.”

“Dad, no, I—“

“Please,” I begged her. Because if I was degrading myself anyway, why not go all out.

She fell quiet for a couple of seconds, then slowly retreated. “I am right next door if you need me.”

I nodded. I know, sunshine. I loved my little princess. And it killed me to see her sad and worried. But I knew of no way she could help me. I would have gladly accepted her help. Any help. I had tried everything my muddled mind managed to come up with. Spike had prevented me from getting black-out drunk. I was not allowed to take any pills either. Probably because they did not trust me with the dosage. And I had given up on the idea of distracting myself with my dreamwalking. I was not even allowed to throw myself into my work. I had this cool butt-sticker that told everypony that dreamwalking was my gosh-darn destiny, and I was denied entrance.

Well, not entrance per se. I had snuck into the dreamscape a couple of times. I only stopped after Luna caught me for the third time. At that point, she actually got cross with me. She raised her voice. She knew. Everypony close to me knew how much I hated it when anyone raised their voice. How I reacted to it.

I froze up. I cowered. I complied.

I was not allowed to dreamwalk.

So I woke up every night with screams of terror. Sometimes two, sometimes three times. Luna refused to tell me how my dream sphere looked in the dreamscape. I imagined this little soap bubble, just swarmed by dozens upon dozens of nightmares, like sharks in a blood frenzy.

And it was not getting any better. It certainly did not feel like it. Quite the contrary, actually. It felt like it got worse. Like I was getting less and less sleep each and every night. I started to make mistakes when working the smithy. Dumb, stupid mistakes. Unnecessary ones. How long until they forbade me from using the smithy? For my own good, for my own health and safety. And what would I do then?

I still met up with Dawn every afternoon. Our roles had switched. I was unable to read. It was a shame, really. He had enjoyed my voices and how I got into the roles. It reminded me of Ogres and Oubliettes. I missed my table, my players. Now more than ever.

Now he was the one who read those books to me.

I told myself that it was fine. Even though I knew better. I despised how useless I had become once more. How everyone tried to look out for me now. How I dragged down production and progress. Because they had to keep an eye on me. So they were distracted in turn.

I had become a liability.

I tore my eyes away from the moon. I found no solace in it at all. Not tonight. I flopped back down into my damp bed. It was uncomfortable, but I had quickly given up on the idea of changing sheets every single time the bed was a mess. Because I could not be bothered to wash my sheets that often. I suspected Aurora snuck in my room every day to cast some cleaning magic on them or something.

Just another insult to injury, somehow.

The one positive about all this? Falling asleep, even under such dire circumstances, had become really easy. I was so out of juice that the moment the environmental light level was low enough and my head hit anything soft, I was just gone. Instantly.

I dreamt.

It was such a simple, yet utterly profound revelation. And for a split second, the only sound I could hear was my own, mangled sob of relief. I had experienced lucid dreams before. Maybe three or four times. In fifty years.

They were there, of course. The sea of blood, the changelings, Tirek’s mangled face. But with me in control, with me knowing that this was a dream, it was less scary. I could just erase them. And I did. I replaced the lightless sea of blood with a nice scenery. A small pond nearby Ponyville. A favorite spot of Applejack. She loved to come here in the summer, preferably with Rainbow or her family. A single tree near the edge of the tiny beach spent some well-needed shadow, as the warm summer sun baked the ground everywhere else. The water was comfortably warm. A few white tufts of clouds lazily drifted along the sky overhead. Some crickets and birds provided a relaxing background music.

I swallowed hard. It was… nice. We had not been to this place in over three years. We should totally do that again soon. And with a mere thought, I corrected the only thing that ever bothered me about this place. I pushed the tree even closer to the water, so that its shadow fell far enough. Then I walked over, settled down on the beach and with my front legs in the water, I did something I had desperately needed for the last two weeks.

I relaxed.

“Mind if I join you?”

My muscles instantly tensed up again when I heard his voice. But instead of jumping to my hooves and readying myself for battle, I remained where I was and just turned my head to look at him.

Voidwalker stood maybe five feet away, in the sun. It was an eerie sight. He looked just like me, just…

“Less you. Like something’s just… off,” he offered.

I nodded. “So I don’t get privacy, hm? Not even here?”

He shrugged with a dry, humorless chuckle. “Guess not.”

I sighed and patted the spot beside me. I knew that we had a lot in common, despite several fundamental differences. We both loved Sunny dearly, but we were both night owls at heart. We shied away from heat and bright light, we died slow, painful deaths in summer and he would most certainly prefer to have a spot in the shadow. And just as predicted, he quickly trotted around me and sat down with a relieved sigh.

“How are you even here?” I asked. He never showed up in the other lucid dreams. But it was hard to tell if that had been his choice or if this dream was somehow different.

To my dismay, he just shrugged. He did not know either. “You’re the one constantly overthinking things.”

“Yeah. Sure. You’d never do that,” I shot back. Maybe a little snarkier than I should have.

He inhaled deeply, held his breath for a second or two and exhaled slowly and purposefully. “Listen. I’m not here as your enemy.”

I crossed my front legs and put my head down on them. “I know,” I mumbled with a sigh. “You never are. Even when we fight each other. We just…”

“We disagree,” he offered. “A lot.”

“A lot,” I agreed.

We both fell silent for half a minute. I closed my eyes. Listened to our surroundings. Manipulated the sounds to my liking. I mostly drew from fond memories of past visits to this place. Then he spoke up again. “I have a suggestion.”

My first instinct was to tell him to go buck himself. His ‘suggestions’ usually were of a nature that made me feel sick. But despite my disagreements with his methods and opinions, he did usually have our best interests at heart. Our survival, at least. Because my survival meant his survival, and that made sense to me. “Fine.”

“I might be able to get us operational again.”

It was such a simple thing to say. But the implications…

I cracked one eye open again to look at him. He gave no further clues as to the nature of his proposal. Or his ulterior motives. “How? And why?”

Void mimicked my position. He crossed his front legs and laid his head atop, albeit turned to the side so he could look at me. “We’ve never been a fearsome warrior to begin with, I think that we can agree on, yes? But right now, we’re a mess. And we fail to notice obvious changes. And I do mean ‘we’, as in: Both you and me. I don’t like that. And I think I can phase that memory out over, say, a week or so.”

“That memory?” I asked for clarification.

“Tireks death,” he replied with an enviable nonchalance. “Yes, yes, we have deeper-seated issues, spare me the monologue. His death is the current trigger. I have high hopes that if we remove the trigger, the rest will sort itself out quickly and go back to its dormant state.”

It was a tempting offer. He knew that. At this point, I would have done a lot to go back. Maybe not quite as much as Twilight when she missed that assignment and jumped to the obvious and very rational decision to use time travel, but I was not too far off either. “And how would you do that?” Before he got a chance to answer, I concluded the simple mathematical formula. One plus one equals two. “By pulling it to yourself.”

He simply nodded. As expected.

I cracked the other eye open as well. Somehow, this lovely little pond seemed a little lackluster now. The sun less warm, the water less enticing. There had been times when I wished so much pain and suffering upon him. Times when we struggled for control over this body. My body. When our survival was at stake, he took over. And sometimes, I let him. His reflexes were better. His mind was sharper. He was more perceptive and had a better intuition. But he was ruthless too. And we did not always agree if our survival was at stake to begin with. And in those edge-cases, we fought.

His attempts to take over control had endangered my loved ones more than once. And that was something I could neither forgive, nor forget. However, I knew so little about him. Since we rarely saw eye to eye and we had a rather skewered power dynamic, we did not exactly chitchat that often. After five decades of living a good and prosperous life, I knew almost next to nothing about the other me that lived inside of my own head.

“That place you come from, where you reside in,” I murmured in thought. “What is it like?”

While he did not open up to me, he had talked to Sunny and Luna on one or two occasions. Because at the end of the day, we somehow still were the same pony. We loved the same, despised the same, got angry at the same.

“You don’t want to know,” he briskly decided for me.

“Why?”

Void groaned quietly. “Because you’re the one with the empathy-issue here. Even right now, it’s running rampant. You would befriend every single creature under the sun if you could. If only your time and dedication and standards and whatnot would allow for it. You would mend every fissure between creatures, heal every wound. If only it were possible. But you fail to properly look after yourself. However, somepony has to do that. So this task falls to me. And honestly, this is a boomerang-situation and I cannot afford to burden you any further.”

I fell quiet. Mostly to not irritate him more than I already had. Yet despite this, I watched him. I watched how his eyes trailed the horizon. How he appreciated the sky’s blue. The sun’s warmth. The splash of warm water against his hooves. The sand under his belly. How his eyelids fluttered when a soft breeze swished by and carried the scent of grass and dirt. How deeply he inhaled and how content he seemed in that moment.

“You don’t get that often, do you? Sunshine, trees, grass?”

His gaze fell onto the water's surface. He stirred his hoof in it and watched the waves. And our contorted reflections. “I don’t.”

This was a lucid dream. My dream. I could change any detail at any time. I could construct any scenario, no matter how complex. I could even grant semblances of life and sentience to creatures I dreamt up. The only limit was my imagination. “Would you… like to spend some time with somepony?”

Maybe that was a weird question. Probably. And I did feel a little strange immediately after asking. However, Void took no offense and dismissed the atmosphere with a mere hoof wave. “Don’t dangle that in front of my muzzle. It’s painful to resist that temptation.”

It got me curious though. I knew he was there. Maybe not always. I had no idea how the specifics worked. But he could choose to be there at any given moment as far as I knew. “So you… you never watch?” It was a strange thought after all these years. Maybe I did have some semblance of privacy.

“Not constantly. Not anymore,” he replied, with his expression suddenly guarded. “I’m not sure if you remember, but there was a moment many years ago when you were busy with Twilight and I… I wanted to experience that so badly at that moment. I tried to take over. It wouldn’t have mattered much, I thought. You were half-gone anyway. I have no idea how, but she looked me in the eyes and noticed the change immediately. She freaked out and threw us off with a shield spell her brother had taught her a couple of weeks earlier.”

I grimaced as I remembered the incident, and I blushed as well. How could I not be embarrassed? “I-I… vaguely remember that, yes. That was a long time ago.”

Void nodded absentmindedly. “Well, I remember it as if it was yesterday. Bruised spine, two weeks.” He sighed. “I share your love for her. But all I can have is rewatching your memories.”

I tried to imagine that. I had been in love in other lifetimes and it had not worked out. I distinctly remembered one cycle where I had married Derpy. It was a wild ride. But I also remembered these tucked-away feelings for Celestia. She was a less central part of my life in that cycle. The ruler above me, supposedly. But even then, I saw a beautiful mare instead. One who always seemed just a little bit sad somehow. And I wanted to see her happy instead. I wanted to make her happy.

It had not been meant to be. I watched her from afar, and I loved her from afar. And it hurt, sometimes.

And now I tried to imagine that, but closer. So. Much. Closer. Because I lived with Twilight. Year after year, we lived together. Laughed together. Had sex together. A family. And he was there. Always there, right behind my eyes and ears. Like a prisoner, with everything he desired just out of reach. It was a cruelty of unfathomable design.

To me, that was torture.

“I’m sorry.” It was a lame answer. It did not make up for what had happened. For what he was still trapped in.

But Void just sighed and then chuckled. The same dry chuckle he had employed earlier. “See? You prove my point for me. Rampant empathy issues.”

And as usual when the two of us got into an actual conversation that did not just consist of the back and forth of exchanging insults, he found all the wrong buttons to push. Accidentally or otherwise. “Well, somepony should care!” I blurted out in a raised voice as my temper flared.

“But you’re terrible at drawing the line!” he objected and raised his voice as well. “You cannot decide what to care about, so you just try to care about everything and that’s exhausting and I’m trying to keep us from falling apart, with bandaids and spit on most days.”

A well-familiar silence fell over the pond as we both tried to bite down on our tongues and keep ourselves from further losing control. He was basically me, just slightly different. A part of me wondered why it was so difficult for me to get along with, well, me. Another part however simply nodded and accepted that this was perfectly reasonable and nothing else should have been expected to begin with. It was irritating.

After a moment, the grimace on my face slowly relaxed and a chuckle actually bubbled up in my throat. I imagined a crystal pony — like literally made out of crystal — held together with bandaids. And spit. Ew. As my chuckle grew in strength, I shook my head. “Thanks.” He deserved at least that much for his efforts.

At the end there, he even chimed in. We eventually both fell silent again and he sighed. “You’re welcome.”

And of course he said it with his typical ‘buck you too’-tone. I contemplated strangling him, but decided against it. That was my way of accepting his proposal. “Shut up and enjoy the pond.”

And so we did.

I was not entirely sure what to expect. All Voidwalker had told me was that he would ‘phase out’ a memory. But what did that even mean? What would that look like? What exactly was he doing?

Clearly this mistake was entirely on me. I should have asked and I failed to do so. There were certain implications with this procedure as well. Even if I assumed that he removed a single recent memory with surgical precision, it would still affect my very being, would it not? After all, our memories were a massive part of what made us us.

Yet despite this, I could hardly complain. Over the course of one week, he had predicted. And true to his word, it took about two days before I noticed any changes at all, four days until the first improvements showed and after six days, I was… well, not exactly ‘back to my old self’, but the situation had certainly improved a lot.

I did not wake up screaming each and every night, multiple times. In fact, after just a couple of days, I did not wake up at all and barely remembered anything from any dreams I might have had. And what little I could remember gave no indication of any horrifying nightmares.

With my sleep schedule back on track, my concentration and perceptiveness improved steadily. I still felt groggy for a while. Like I could sleep for days. And I tried that, but whatever he had done, it was not that good.

I never reached the point where they disallowed me to continue my work in the smithy. As such, I picked up where I left off and managed to get the output back to where it was prior to this whole disaster. Even if it was still just the output of hinges and door knobs.

Pristine proved herself to be quite a resourceful designer in those days. She made multiple trips to Ponyville and returned with crafting materials she stored in her house — plus some odd bits and pieces others had asked her to fetch. She worked from home, so to speak, until a proper building for another Carousel Boutique could be erected. And she almost immediately made several suggestions for proper work clothing and improved gear, such as tool belts and hard helmets.

Something told me she would fit in quite well with our little ragtag bunch. Maybe there really was a pioneer deep within her.

And after a couple of days of restored normalcy, I even dared to approach Dawn about our reading habits again.

“I think it’s time,” I said with a wry smile.

The stallion beside me answered in kind. “I am more than relieved to see you make such a quick and thorough recovery!”

“Well, I did have a lot of help,” I replied with a chuckle. “I would still be stuck in that ditch without you and the others. I don’t know how many times Spike tried to encourage me to eat something. I probably turned him off of the idea of having kids anytime soon.”

Dawn accepted my attempt at humor with a gracious smile and levitated the book over to me. “We all merely did our part to help you, as surely as you would have done the same, were our roles reversed.”

He made it sound like a platitude. Like a mere ‘bless you’ after somepony sneezed or an obligatory ‘good’ following the question ‘how are you?’ I did not like that, not one bit. So I gently laid a hoof on his shoulder to get his attention. He looked up, mildly surprised about the touch. I usually respected his private space enough to not touch him without any kind of hint or warning. “I mean it,” I insisted. “When I say: Yes, I would do all I can if you needed my help… I mean that.”

He suddenly looked so disarmed. And it was rare that I actually managed to catch him speechless. But for a couple of precious seconds, he attempted and failed to utter any response. He eventually regathered his bearings and quietly cleared his throat. “Well, yes, that is… I appreciate the thought, Dreamwalker. Now, I believe we stopped last time at chapter twenty-nine.”

I opened the book and read the first few lines. Dawn probably noticed how I grimaced. I recognized barely anything about the context. For over a week, maybe even three weeks, we had read through a book and I could recall almost nothing. “It is fine,” he softly assured me.

I sighed. “I miss Cunning Can,” I admitted. “Twilight said the fourth installment in the series should be published in a couple of months, but judging by the author's speed, it will be three to five years for the fifth one after that. If there is a fifth one.” I tapped the book in front of me. “These are fine, but… it’s just not the same?”

Dawn chuckled. “Well of course not. We may discuss the intricacies of the differences after we finish it to see if it has any merit of its own.”

That would be an interesting discussion with me barely recalling anything. “Alright, alright,” I replied after some more stalling and sighed. “I’m sure I Cunning Can read this book.” Dawn snorted. He snorted. The moment I heard that, I started to snicker. He saw me snicker, blushed slightly, but still started to snicker as well. And a brief moment later, we both quietly laughed. I loved these moments. I always loved to share some quality time with any of my friends. And that was exactly the point. Dawn was my friend. And I was decently confident that by now, he saw me as a friend as well.

“Right, right, starting now. For realsies this time,” I tried again.

Dawn held his breath and nodded. I watched him in bewilderment. Why did he hold his breath? I leaned slightly over and he leaned back. I narrowed my eyebrows and his crawled up.

A moment later, we laughed again.

No, we probably would not get anything done this afternoon. But that was fine too. It was a strange phenomenon, an incredibly rare one, to see Dawn be silly. To hear him laugh. That was certainly worth a lot more than finishing chapter twenty-nine of… goodness gracious, I didn't even remember this book’s title.

The important part was — beside sharing a good laugh with a friend — that I had made my intentions clear of reading again. When I left the balcony a couple of hours later, my sneaking suspicion had been confirmed. Not a single page had been read. Well, it won’t flee either, I told myself.

As I made my way across the village towards my home, I noticed Spike flying in my direction. “Hey buddy,” I greeted him as he landed.

“Huh. Somepony’s in a good mood! That’s great!” He grinned from ear to ear and hugged me. I had no objections. Spike rarely was one to initiate hugs, so I quite cherished this moment as well. Once he gave me free again, he stepped back and pointed towards the front gate. “Seems like Greenwood is really taking off now, we have another visitor.”

I followed his hint and saw a familiar pegasus near the gate, but already inside the village. Her sunflower-yellow mane was tied in a braid, which struck me as rather unusual for her. But her hot pink coat gave her away immediately anyway. That and the fact that she looked lost. Whisper was not as shy as her mom, but she still struggled at times, especially when confronted with new ponies or thrust into a new environment. And for her, Greenwood was both.

“I’ll greet our guest. You have everything else under control?” I asked Spike.

“You know it,” he replied with a confident smirk and lifted off again.

I watched him spiral higher until he turned left and flew off towards the quarry. And with that, I made my way over to our newest arrival. “Hey Whisper! Want me to give you the tour?” I already asked with a slightly increased volume when I was still a bit away.

She winced a little, stared in my direction in surprise and then immediately relaxed and smiled. And honestly, that reaction alone was worth her weight in gold. To know that she felt comfortable enough to relax with me. Once I was close enough, I raised a hoof and gestured for her to make a first step. A greeting hug later, I inspected her closer. And immediately noticed the bulging saddlebags.

“Hi!” I could almost hear that ‘uncle Dreamwalker’, but she bit her tongue and held it back. “I, uhm, sure. I would love to have a tour.”

I remembered vaguely how I had trolled Pristine by just turning us around in a circle once. But that was not the kind of humor Whisper would appreciate much. Or even get to begin with. So instead I gave her a proper tour. We left for the outskirts of the village so I could show her where the golems and Hefty retrieved all the wood from. I showed her the carpentry where Honey seemed busy cobbling chairs together. She admired the craftsmanship on display, the enticing scent of freshly cut wood and especially the flower beds with roses once we went over who was living where. I also showed her our hole, as we collectively referred to the incomplete well by now and explained Dawn's presence in the ruins to her, but I decided it would be smarter to introduce them to each other in the evening, if Whisper would stick around for that long. But those saddlebags told me that I would not have to worry about that.

In between my explanations and hints, we had a bit of small talk. But I could already tell that there was an elephant in the room she tiptoed around, despite the fact that she should know better. And she did. Because every time I asked what was going on with her — and I made no additional fuss about it and asked that very same question again and again — she got quiet and averted her gaze.

Something was up.

So I decided to give us some privacy and ended my tour… in my bedroom. Maybe not the best choice in retrospect, but Aurora was busy downstairs and I could hardly drag Whisper into my daughter's bedroom either. Lucky for me, Whisper was nopony to read too much into situations. Plus, she still saw me as her ‘favorite uncle’ who carried her around on his back when she was little. Somehow she never lost that naivety and innocence. And it was precious. It made her precious.

We sat down on our haunches by the now opened window. She unclasped her saddlebags and put them on the ground, off to the side. And we both just stared out the window for a minute or two. The forest was never quiet. Strangely enough, even I had grown accustomed to it. The constant chitchat of birds and crickets, the nightly hoots of owls and distant howls of timberwolves, it did not bother me as much as it initially did.

My second floor window was not high enough up to be above the treetops. But it allowed for a nice view over the village wall, at least. And in the direction of the castle no less, so we had historically important ruins and twisted old trees to look at. All the excitement one pony could ask for.

It was nice though. Fluttershy would have loved it. And so did Whisper, I presumed. Judging by her content smile. “So, I think it’s time. Spill it,” I gently asked with a warm smile.

She still hesitated though. “I… I don’t understand?”

I sighed, but kept my smile. “Sure you do, Whisper. Come on, butterfly. Why are you here? With packed bags no less?”

The use of her old nickname made her smile in fond nostalgia. She freed herself from its grip after a while and tried to answer. “I am not sure if you remember, but when I was little, you promised me something.” I nodded and made a gesture with my hoof for her to go on. “You promised to never leave me hanging.” I nodded. Yes, I remembered that. Of course I did, it was not exactly hard to forget — I promised that to each and every one of our children at some point, both mine and those of my friends. And then, for just a brief moment, her eyes displayed something different. A flash of disappointment. “You left me hanging!” she accused me.

I furrowed my brow. Had I broken any promises? Had I not shown up at some point? I racked my brains for the moment I had failed her, but came up short. “Okay, I need you to elaborate,” I asked her. And at this point, I took this seriously. Because it was. I had a bad memory, I knew that. But when I gave my word, I meant it. I intended to keep it. Something went wrong here, obviously.

“A few days ago,” Whisper explained, “you came by moms house and I asked for your help because she interrogated me. And you just left me there!”

I was decently sure that for a moment there, I looked like a goldfish. I stared at her and my mouth just opened and closed as if I was breathing. I remembered that, yes. Obviously. At the time, things were light-hearted. Had they not been light-hearted? Just a bit of banter, a bit of prodding? It was a parents job to annoy their children and constantly ask about their lives, was it not? I vaguely remembered even saying something to that extent. But here we were now, with Whisper apparently hurt and me being the responsible party.

“Shoot. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you were serio—“ I cut myself off when I heard a whistling. The whistling itself was not the reason though, it was Whisper's reaction to it.

Quite a few of the creatures here whistled. Derpy loved to whistle when she flew around and kicked a couple of feisty clouds out of their lane. Hefty whistled when he chopped down another tree, though that was harder to hear due to the palisade. And our newest inhabitant, Pristine — she whistled whenever she made her way from our warehouse to her house, usually with a bunch of new fabric and dye and whatnot in her levitation, mentally preparing her new work.

And this tune was indeed Pristines. I had recognized that in an instant. Whisper however seemed to have recognized it even faster. Her head whipped around and her eyes scrutinized every inch until she concluded that the backside window did not allow her to see Pristine. She still smiled though. Not the kind of passive smile one had when generally being happy, no. I had been friends with Pinkie for long enough to know a thing or two about smiles. This was what the expert called an ‘active smile’. Whisper was actively happy right now, because she heard Pristine whistle.

And my gut told me that it was not about the tune.

In fact, my intuition told me something I had not been told in a long, long time: Make it happen. It was the reemergence of a very old impulse. To meddle in other ponies’ private affairs and love lives. I had felt such an insistent urge in those early days after my arrival to ‘fix things’, to ‘make the obvious happen’. Applejack belonged to Rainbow Dash. Fluttershy belonged to Pinkie Pie. I had seen other constellations work out. I had seen Rarity and Twilight become very happy with each other as a monogamous couple. I had seen Fluttershy become happy with a griffon whose name I could not remember for the life of me. But immediately after my arrival, with that chaotic soup of very few memories in my head, certain couples seemed like the obvious choices and I worked my rump off to make them happen.

And I felt it again. Here. Now. With Whisper of all ponies. And Pristine, apparently. Maybe Luna was right. Maybe I had been connected to Cadance’s domain in another cycle, the same way I was connected to hers this time around. Maybe I had not always been Dreamwalker. A scary thought.

One I decidedly shoved out of my head, or at least to the back. There were more important matters right now. “Tell you what,” I addressed Whisper with a sly grin.

She winced and turned her attention back to me. “Huh?”

“You’re right, I do owe you,” I admitted graciously. “That was horrible behavior of me. So let me offer you this: a contract. You work for me as part of the Greenwood project, you get a house here in the village as your own and a solid, regular income. I wanted to recruit a wildlife negotiator anyway, it would add another layer of protection from the Everfree Forest. How does that sound?”

She positively beamed at me. “It sounds lovely! Thank yo-I mean, that will do!”

I chuckled and gave a curt nod. “And if you need any important gear for your task by any chance, say a neckerchief or a hat or other essentials like that, I can gladly redirect you to our resident seamstress. She’s new in town as well, wouldn’t you know?” A lovely, deeper shade of red rose to her cheeks. “You know, the funny thing is, I remember Pristine telling me a couple of days ago how some private information of hers was leaked. So strange she never mentioned you would come as well, just a bit later.”

Whisper's eyes went wide. And with that, I already had all I needed to know. “No. No, they can’t know that! We have always been—“

“Gotcha,” I cut in, just to make sure that she would not rile herself up further or spill something that I really did not need to hear.

She shut her mouth and pressed her lips to a thin, fine line. Her cheeks puffed, she regarded me with disappointment yet again. It took her a while to calm down, mostly from her fears of what might have been leaked, I assumed. “That wasn’t very nice,” she chided me.

I sighed, leaned over and nuzzled her mane. “I know. And I’m sorry for the trickery. But you guys can be quite a hoofful at times and… by coming here, you kind of made it into my problem as well. Now I know what I’m working with, which will help me help you. And I promise you, nopony shall ever know if you don’t want them to.”

She still seemed a little miffed. Or at least she wanted to stay angry a little longer, but she could not. Being resentful was so far removed from her kind and gentle nature that I could count the seconds before she sighed in defeat and nodded. “You promise?” she asked.

I grinned from ear to ear as I went through the motions. “Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye!” My oath at least seemed to mollify her completely. And with us still sitting comfortably by the window, I deemed it appropriate to get back into a bit of small talk. To ease out any remaining tension. It also allowed me to mentally prepare new checklists. One for the contract I would need to write up for Whisper. Another one for the ‘welcome’-party we would throw this evening to properly, well, welcome her in our midst. And maybe one to snoop around and gather information about the current state of their relationship. Pristine’s poker face was a lot better than Whisper’s. I had not noticed anything, heard anything, not even from Rarity who I presumed would be thrilled to learn of this news.

Oh, maybe that’s the reason Pristine fled from Canterlot. Huh. Maybe I had spent too much time with Rarity. My romance-sense was tingling. I needed to know. And I had their best interests at heart, of course. I just wanted to help. Nudge a little, if required. And be happy to see them happy.

Really, just like Rares.

Rarity would rip my head off if she found out that I knew and had not told her. But she would respect a Pinkie Promise, of course.

Head would still come off though…