Dreamwalker's Tale: Project Greenwood

The party had been over for the past half an hour or so. All the guests who did not take a guest room in the castle — so basically everypony except Aurora — were escorted to the doors, farewells were exchanged, alongside wishes of a calm night, a good way home, the usual. Aurora went to bed with little to no fanfare, remarking that we would have a decent chunk of time before she needed to return home. Highlights of the party swam in my mind like precious little islands in a shallow sea of wine. Fluttershy’s disheveled mane after Pinkie teased her relentlessly while playing Twister. Aurora becoming more clingy the more she drank. Derpy enthusiastically recounting the tales from our Ogres & Oubliettes-campaigns for the umpteenth time to her daughter and granddaughter. Laughing with Gabby about Spikes continued awkwardness when she really flirted with him.

It still took us half an hour to finish up for the day. Because no matter how much Pinkie insisted, this was my party and I would not let her clean up the next day. I preferred order. I was not as neurotic about it as Twilight, I liked to believe, but I wholeheartedly agreed that everything had its proper place and every room had a should-be state. Cleaning up properly would involve more than what we did, though. That was the compromise I had been willing to go along with, at Pinkie’s… well, it was not begging, per se. Just repeatedly asking in a voice that jumped up one octave every time she did it.

I had conscripted Spike to help me out. And I could not stop Twilight from doing the same, even if I had tried. I was glad that the former bid his goodnight a little earlier and I hoped, hoped that Gabby and him ended up in their very soundproof room this time and not in the kitchen or a broom closet. Again.

And all of that amusing nonsense formed just another little island in the sea. It led to me following Twilight along. It would have been easy to trot up to her side and walk alongside her. But I did not mind walking behind her. Not when she put on such a display. She walked slowly. Deliberately. Her hips swayed ever so slightly. Her tail swished from side to side in a shocking display of shamelessness and willingness to tease. I wished I could claim that the years had tempered my desires, yet here I was, utterly transfixed onto her rump and oh so willing to pounce.

Yet the bedroom was more or less in sight. The door at the far end of the corridor. We closed in on it at agonizingly low speed, but we did close in on it. I needed something to distract myself just a little bit further, and Twilight was surprisingly helpful with that. “—didn’t exactly expect her to put her… her flank in my face like that, but, I mean, I did not mind much either, you know?” she slurred her way through another little anecdote about the party. She babbled and I did not mind. I loved hearing her voice, and I occasionally listened in. It always gave me a reason to smile.

But right now, hearing her drag out the words and seeing her focus on pronunciation gave me a decent excuse to play the mature-card. “Peanut, give me the bottle, you’re drunk.”

The floating bottle of wine made its way considerably closer to her head while she fixed me with a death glare that would have been fearsome, were it not for her constant blushing and goofy smile. “No I’m not!” she immediately insisted. A moment later, her face lit up with a thought that apparently made her feel incredibly smart. “I’m tipsy!”

She giggled, and I could not help but giggle with her. A moment later, I shook my head and tried again. “Fine. Peanut, give me the bottle, you’re tipsy!”

Her horn illuminated the path for us. A little brighter than the lanterns hanging from the hallways ceiling. It brightened further for a brief moment and a quiet pop signaled the vanishing of the bottle. I had no idea where she had teleported it to. Usually, I would chide her for casting while being drunk. But it did not even cross my mind as she blew a raspberry at me, accompanied by such an irresistibly smug grin. “What bottle?” she asked innocently.

And with that, she opened the bedroom door and vanished out of sight. I heard another pop and chuckled. I followed her in, closed the door and half-expected to see the bottle returned to her side when I turned around. Instead, Twilight demonstrated her sense of responsibility. The bathroom door was open, aggressive white light flooded into the bedroom, and I could hear the rhythmic noise of her brushing her teeth.

We had tried using the bathroom at the same time, but quickly learned that we did not like it much. Not just because we constantly got into each other's way, but that was a major contributing factor. So instead of cramming myself in there as well, I walked over to the bed, reared up on my hindlegs and let myself fall backwards. I landed with a soft thud on my back on the bed and stared up at the beautiful night sky ceiling. It was a… how did she call it? A reimagining of the ceiling in Luna's bedroom. We all loved her pretty nightly displays. We all loved the stars, the moon, the night as a whole. Each for different reasons, maybe. But that shared appreciation had contributed to our bedroom.

Well, technically her bedroom. I still had my own. Somewhere. But whenever I was in Ponyville, I slept here, with her. If Luna came over and they wanted to be just the two of them, I would be in Canterlot. And much to my dismay, Sunny rarely made it out here. I could understand why, obviously. It was quite a hassle for her. So many strings attached. But on the occasional night, I still regretted it. Maybe I could lure her over here more often were I to paint a pretty dawn on my ceiling? But that would still fail to address how notoriously swamped with work she constantly was.

My slowly sinking thoughts were drawn back to the surface when Twilight crawled up beside me. She nudged me ever so slightly, but I understood well enough. It probably looked awkward as I shuffled myself up higher on the bed, away from the edge.

Once I came to a halt again, she cuddled up to me. I sighed in contentment. This was the life. A good life. I tilted my head and kissed her forehead. Her coat on mine. Her primaries lazily drew little circles on my stomach. Her warm breath tickled my neck. This is heaven.

“Do you remember the first time we shared a bed?” she asked innocently. Or maybe not-so-innocently.

Her voice was small. Quiet. And a little soberer than I remembered. “How could I not? It feels like it’s barely been a year ago.” My hoof found its way into her mane and I lazily played around with it. She sighed happily, a fond smile gracing her lips. Her eyes were closed and her muzzle rested on my chest. Before my mind's eye, scenarios played out. Replayed. Memories. What ifs. Dreams. With very blurry lines between them, sometimes. “I was so nervous to do something wrong,” I added belatedly. It was silly, in retrospect. But at the same time, I could not say with certainty that I would feel different today. The fear of failing, of ‘doing something wrong’, had stayed with me throughout my entire life so far. Sometimes, on good days, I was willing to call this something good. It kept me on the edge of my hooves, and my hooves planted on the ground. It kept me cautious. On other days, I recognized that it kept me from doing many things. Sometimes including those I would like to try. Because of course, everything had to be double-edged, always.

“Me too,” Twilight replied. She giggled so quietly that I could feel it more than I heard it. “And we did not even have anything naughty in mind.”

Speak for yourself, peanut. I smirked. A part of me was glad she did not see, while another bemoaned exactly that. “Oh? Pray tell, do we have something naughty in mind now?” I cautiously angled my head a little down to get a better look at her. And just as expected, she had that telltale smile.

“What makes you say that?” she asked, unaware that I already caught her. Her smile only widened. Maybe she felt that I observed her. Maybe she realized that I knew.

“You have that adorkable grin you always get when something lewd enters your mind,” I answered.

She did not even try to hide her grin. “I might?” she teased. Her horn lit up dimly, with just enough magic to grab something very light close nearby. I looked around curiously and spotted a traitorous raspberry glow beneath the pillows. From where she retrieved a set of silken scarves a moment later.

When I looked back at her again, her eyes were open. And she gave me such a teasing, promising, alluring bedroom stare that I felt like melting and agreeing to whatever right then and there. I sometimes forgot that Twilight was a quick learner, always eager to better herself. And she had been learning from Luna for years. We both regularly agreed that she therefore had been learning from the best tease there was.

That did not mean I was willing to accept defeat so easily, though. “Are those for you, or for me?” I asked.

She placed a first, tender kiss on my shoulder. And another a little higher. And another higher yet. A small trail formed, up to my jaw, sparing my waiting lips, and past my cheek to my ear. “It is your arrival day, so you may choose. Welcome to the afterparty!”

Another dichotomy. A part of me wanted to agree to anything and everything. Another had to be reigned in, because I did not want to chuckle. But gosh darn, that line was so corny. I loved it. The side that tried to put up a little bit of resistance, that insisted on a little bit of fighting, eventually won out. “You have a book with instructions ready somewhere, don’t you?” I teased her. Blindfolds, scarves, collars, even gags had been toys that were a decently regular stable in Luna's bedroom. I knew she used them with Twilight, because Luna could sometimes not be stopped to boast about it. And rarely did I even try to stop her these days. And Twilight probably knew the same the other way around. She had been eager to try this with me for a while. We had talked about it at length. But somehow, it just had not worked out yet. We therefore had no idea how our own dynamic would work best. With Luna, it was easy. Nopony was dominant with Luna around. And as far as I was concerned, that was fine. But I suspected that the same held true for Twilight and that maybe, just maybe, she was eager to find out what being the leading part was like. After all, curiosity was an integral part of her.

After mulling over her options for a moment, Twilight sighed and looked at me in a way that quickly told me to tread carefully with what came next. “Do. Not. Laugh.” Despite the force she tried and failed to pack into those words, I recognized the plea behind them. And I nodded in earnest. It did seem to put her mind at ease a little.

Her horn lit up again and I heard the drawer on the bedside table being opened. Out came a book. Of course. It was a modern one, with a flashy cover and bright colors. Bondage for Dummies.

I had to work hard not to chuckle as I read the title. I stifled it just enough that no noise was made, even though I suspected she felt the tremor go through my body. I kissed her nose in an effort to reassure her further. Even if I had laughed, I would not laugh at her.

There was fire in her eyes. A familiar sight, really. And I could not deny that I was eager to get into this afterparty she apparently had planned. Had she drunk the wine just to get a boost of confidence? To make things a little easier on herself?

It took me a moment to understand what kind of fire I saw. She was eager, positively itching to start. She wanted this. Badly. She finally wanted to try, to not waste another opportunity, to get a grip on something new and exciting.

Her eagerness really was what drew out my playful side. She was not the only one who had taken a lesson or two from a certain blue-coated minx. If she wanted to be in control, I would make her work for it. By tiring her out as best as I could. And if she still had the energy afterwards, well, then I would grant her free reign.

With my decision made and the gist of it communicated via a daring grin, I pressed my lips to hers. My hoof retreated from her mane and grabbed hold of her neck to further pull her in. I wrestled control from her, shifted myself on top of her and felt all the smugness in the world when her wings extended a little and she sighed deeply into the kiss. It was a good start.

A part of me obviously knew that I would have failed had she not played along. Physically overpowering an alicorn was almost impossible. It certainly was for me. But this was about the illusion that it was possible. And with my hooves and lips eagerly exploring familiar terrain, it was easier to forget as my focus drifted to the task before me. Her joy would be my joy. And I wanted to raise her to the heavens.

We lay cuddled up together again a while later. For as much as I liked cleanliness, I felt sweaty and hot and sticky in all the right ways. It almost made me want to purr. And judging by Twilight's occasional sighs, she seemed quite satisfied as well.

Not that this would stop me, of course. I knew my little peanut well enough. I knew that alicorn physique was a marvel and that she could take lots more than she had. And as long as I could still move, this afterparty was not over.

Now, admittedly, sex was not a physical examination. It was not about—

Well. Actually.

Sex was about whatever the involved ponies — or other creatures — made it about. For me, it was about sharing myself. About trust. About intimacy. About letting my partner see me and hear me and feel me in a way I would never allow anyone else to. And that trust would be repaid in kind. And thus, we would share something exclusive. Something only meant for us.

It was not about actually exhausting her, or myself. That said, I was not exactly the sporty type, but having my way with her — or the other way around — for as long as possible or at least as long as either of us was still willing was a philosophy I could get behind. Literally, sometimes.

It was therefore quite cute how she made herself comfortable, as if we were done. Maybe we were — she would tell me. I simply took this opportunity as a breather.

Much to my dismay however, my mind started to play tricks on me again as soon as I had a calm minute. It grabbed me by the mane and dragged me back a couple of hours and placed me in a memory I had managed to bury beneath layers of joy and fun and smiles. My conversation with Roseluck.

It’s fine, really. Time ticks on relentlessly, doesn’t it? We will both have to make that experience a couple more times before we might get used to it.

Her words repeated themselves in my head like a broken record. To put a more positive spin on it, I tried to reimagine the entire scene. She smiled warmly, instead of that dour, pained smile she actually wore. Her tone was just a smidge more chipper than it actually had been. And the lesson to be learned here, instead of: Everypony dear to us will die and we will eventually become so desensitized that we will barely feel the pain anymore; was this: The time you have with your loved ones is precious. Use it wisely.

My desire to continue the afterparty dimmed further and further the more this chain of thought took root and spun out of control. I eventually landed on an observation I had made when Pinkie dragged me into the library. And it elicited a sigh of a different kind. It was just my luck that Twilight picked up on it immediately. “What’s wrong?” she asked, almost alarmed.

“Just… thinking,” I tried to stall for time. I did not know what exactly I expected to change though. What good would it do me to get more time?

“Let me in,” she asked quietly.

I sighed again and kissed her. To convey a simple, yet important message. She was in. She would always be. While I might sometimes need to take time to sort my thoughts and put them into words, it was never about closing myself off or shutting her out. “They weren’t there,” I finally started. Maybe it was unfair to play the pronoun game. But Twilight was smart. She understood quickly.

“Rainbow and Applejack.”

I nodded. Even in my own mind, I referred to them as ‘they’. As if the act of thinking their names would hurt. Not to mention speaking them aloud. And to be fair, it had stung a little hearing their names from her lips. “I miss them.”

Twilight sighed as well, very much in tune with my earlier display. “I miss them too.”

We all miss them.

The situation was… complicated. As so many things in life were. But then again: Getting involved with Sunny despite my gravitation towards Twilight was complicated. Building this entire weird relationship constellation we had going on was complicated. Guarding dreamers against a nightly onslaught of nightmares and dreamscape creatures with barely a dozen ponies was complicated. Understanding the internal dynamic of the Cutie Mark Crusaders was complicated. Leading a life constantly burdened by fractured memories and a callous voice in the back of my head was complicated.

Had any of that ever stopped me?

I failed. Time and time again, I failed.

And each and every time, somehow, I got back up. Usually with help. On rare occasions, I managed it alone. But once I was back on my hooves again, what did I do? There were so many voices in my head. Telling me to stop. Telling me to back away. Telling me to learn. Telling me the ‘price’ was not worth the pain of failure. Telling me of the embarrassment and the shame. And I did feel ashamed each and every time I failed. And I was embarrassed.

And yet I tried again and again. I ran my head in on a wall, until the freaking wall gave up.

I had no idea how I did this.

I was decently sure I would not be able to do it without all the ponies in my life, carrying me, aiding me, lifting me up, pulling me up again and again as I stumbled and failed my way through life.

Things being complicated should not stop me.

And if things went sideways, well. I could always try again. I did that a lot, after all.

“I’m going to take the train tomorrow. I will try to talk some sense into them.” And just like that, my decision was made. It had been so hard for years. But here it was. The moment where I gave the rope a solid tug and somehow, the knot came undone.

“We tried that,” Twilight remarked. “Pinkie tried. Fluttershy tried. You tried. I tried. We tried as a group. You know how she is, she… she will not listen.”

There was a noticeable tone of hope in her voice, though. It was enough to keep me going. “I remember you making her listen a couple of times,” I argued with a smile.

“Yes, but… I could not reach her this time.” It was heartbreaking to hear the sadness in her voice. The regret. And probably no small amount of self-condemnation. If only she had tried harder. If only she had found the right words. Or the right time. If only.

I knew phrases like these with intimate familiarity. They were poison to the mind. I sometimes struggled with them to this very day. “Of all the things you could have learned from me, why this?” I tried to lighten the mood a little.

She tried to play along and jabbed my shoulder with her hoof. “You do not own self-deprecation,” she insisted.

“Says you,” I retorted and before she could argue further, I sealed her lips with mine. “We all tried for a long time,” I restarted more seriously. “I like to think that none of us ever gave up. But trying takes energy. And eventually, we all ran low. We needed a breather. It was a long one, admittedly. But I can’t let it end like this. Neither can you. It isn’t right.”

“Shall I accompany you?” she asked. Her voice was soft. Quiet. And it carried an obvious, unspoken plea. Please let me come with you.

I tried to imagine it. I would certainly appreciate her company on the train ride. It would help me keep my nerves in check. But once we reached our destination, what then? A few scenarios played out in my head and as per usual, they got nasty quickly. I grimaced accordingly. “I don’t know. If we both show up, she might feel cornered. Last time more than one tried to talk her out of this nonsense, she got defensive immediately and it devolved into yelling within minutes. I’m keen on not repeating that. I don’t particularly deal well with being yelled at, and Applejack can get loud. I mean… I’m pretty sure the frames on the walls rattled.” It was a measly attempt to lighten the mood, and it failed. I shook my head and dismissed the notion. “I need to see what we are working with first. This is more of a recon-mission to prepare a better offense, I think. She had time to cool down. To settle in. Or not. While we recuperated, she did… something, I’m sure. Stew in her own misery, maybe. I don’t know. We’ll see. But I don’t think you coming in with me is a good idea. That said, if you’re up for it… I’d still like your company on the way there? And back?”

I looked down and saw a soft smile tug at her lips as her cheek brushed against the coat of my chest. “Sounds good,” she answered and squeezed me a little. “Just remember to blow the horn if you need reinforcements.”

She meant well. She tried to bolster my confidence. She was being serious. Yet despite this, a coltish part of my mind snickered gleefully. And just like that, a heavy weight was lifted. I could breathe easily, the clouds on the horizon deigned to stay there for a while longer and a light-hearted playfulness returned to my core. “Isn’t ‘blowing the horn’ your thing?”

She froze for a second. Just a second. Before she grimaced slightly and giggled. “That was awful!” she chided while her giggle only picked up strength.

I raised my forehooves. “I know, I know, it was pretty bad.”

“Painfully bad!” she insisted and tried to stifle her laughter.

I took the opportunity and slipped out of her embrace. I wormed my way a little bit lower, to be muzzle to muzzle with her. “Yeah, I’m sorry. Here, let me make it up to you.”

“You don’t have t—ahhh~!”

I smirked at her when I withdrew my teeth and tenderly licked over the sensitive spot on her neck. In my mind, I had a map of her body. How the layout of her favorite spots changed, both over the years and according to mood. I loved little demonstrations such as this one. They screamed: I know you.

Her eyes were half-lidded and inviting when she managed to focus again. “Careful, I’m still a little sensitive…”

I know, I tested it.

I know, and I love it.

I know, you showed me.

All the various thoughts popping up in my mind had one thing in common. I sported a smug grin and simply uttered: “I know.” I went for another spot on her collarbone, intent to work my way down again. And I loved every single thing about this. I loved the taste of her coat and skin. The scent of her body. The subtle display of muscles working. How she clenched her eyes shut when my warm breath tickled her teat, and how she sighed deeply when the tip of my tongue followed suit and traced over it. I loved how her back arched when I finally stopped teasing and licking agonizingly slow circles around her entrance and instead went all in.

I loved her. And despite the feeling that I would never properly be able to convey that, I loved trying to show her.

I let myself fall back and once again landed on my back. With my eyes closed, I still traced her taste on my lips, licking them with my tongue. “You know,” I started after a moment, “I think married life gets a bad rep.” I grinned from ear to ear as I looked over.

Twilight slowly came down. Like a feather, tenderly carried by the wind. She had her eyes closed. Her right wing, still fully extended, gave the occasional flap in accordance with her right hindleg, which still kicked slightly sometimes. Her forehooves pawed. The right one at the bedsheets, the left one at my chest. It took a solid half minute until my words went through the haze in her mind. I doubted she understood any of them. She opened her eyes, still unfocused and wide, and simply rolled over onto her side. Against me. She buried her nose in my mane, nipped tenderly at my neck and nuzzled me as if her life depended on it.

And it made me so incredibly happy. I felt like I could just burst out of sheer joy.

“Why?” she lazily, drowsily asked. Then a goofy grin sprang up and she added: “Because you can live out all your fantasies now?”

I snorted in amusement and pulled her in further. I held her with one forehoof and used the other to stroke along her primaries on her right wing. Within less than a minute, I calmed it down and helped it relax. Enough so that she could properly refold it onto her back. “Because I couldn’t do that already without that?” She grinned and nosed along my neck once again. A soft, pleasant shiver ran down my spine. “No, it’s about trust.”

“Hmmm~” What an eloquent answer. Truly, it could have been one of mine. “How so?”

I smiled. “I can lay bare everything I have, everything I am, before you… and trust that you do not laugh at me, but embrace me and maybe even understand me.”

“Well I am pretty good at understanding weirdness,” Twilight replied with a confident smirk.

I placed a kiss on her nose and enjoyed seeing how she wrinkled it in turn. “Every time I said ‘yes’ in front of an altar, I solidified and reinforced something I knew to be true in my heart already. But that reassurance still helps whenever I struggle. Which I still do a lot. Point is: I’m eternally grateful for you. And I love you.”

She raised her head just enough to share a kiss with me. “You expect to have a bad day tomorrow?”

I sighed and smiled wryly. “It probably will be.”

“And you are fortifying yourself?” she continued.

I shrugged. “A little. I still need to be open for it to work. I would very much prefer if she were reasonable and listened. But I don’t expect that. And if she hits and I don’t stagger, she knows I went in prepared for a fight. I don’t want this to be a fight. A fight implies opponents, and victors, and losers. So I go in unarmed and as unarmored as I dare.”

Twilight sighed and hugged me that little bit tighter. “I will be there with you. Right there beside you in spirit, at least. We all will be.”

A few seconds trickled by and the silence stretched. It was not unpleasant by any means. But the moon was high up in the sky, the room temperature seemed comparatively cold and licked the excess warmth from our bodies and the exhaustion started to settle in. This had been one heck of an afterparty, with more rounds than I cared to count. I felt spent. And happy. And both of these things were plenty enough to keep the dread and foreboding at bay for now. Tomorrow was a tomorrow-Dreamwalker-problem.

We decided in unison that it was time and pulled the blanket up over us. Tightly entangled as we were, accustomed to the other's body warmth and closeness, standing up and cleaning up and all the rest was out of the question. We settled in for the night.

Due to our nightly activities, our day started considerably later than I had expected. A late morning sun stood high in the sky, it might even have been early midday. My tongue felt furry, the entire room reeked of too much fun and I found it hard to care, seeing as I was still entangled with such a beauty. A quietly snoring beauty that threatened to drool onto the pillow. She was perfect.

My plans had been simple, really. But following the conversation, they had undergone several iterations of changes. Initially, I wanted to quietly slip out. Not an easy task, but possible. A quick stop in the bathroom to get the essentials in, and then off to the train station, skipping breakfast entirely. The late hour was an issue in that regard, because if Spike caught me sneaking around — sneaking towards the door especially — he would unleash Tartarus upon me for trying to skip the most important meal of the day. According to him.

Then it became apparent that Twilight would accompany me and that meant sneaking her past Spike as well and maybe getting in more than just the bare necessities when it came to my morning bathroom stop.

And then Twilight actually woke up and just by her groggily murmured “G’morning” I could already tell that she needed something solid in her stomach and at least two mugs of coffee alongside it.

I chuckled a little as I kissed her nose. “Morning.”

I was not a morning pony. For as much as I loved Sunny’s pretty dawns and watching the delight in her eyes, those early hours could usually go to Tartarus for all I cared. But I felt refreshed. Invigorated. And most importantly: Awake. While Twilight looked very much the way I felt on most other mornings.

She wrinkled her muzzle in mild disgust as I kissed her nose and then mumbled something unintelligible. It only served to make me chuckle. Seeing how she tried to flee from the sun’s merciless light by crawling deeper underneath the blanket and half into me gave me an idea. “I’ll be right back,” I announced and disentangled myself from her. She fought back a little bit, but ultimately deemed it not worth her effort and instead curled in on herself, completely obscured from sight as a bundle of pony beneath the cover. Not even strands of her mane poked out, it was quite impressive.

First things first, I really needed to get the smell out. I levitated a second and third blanket out of the closet in the corner and put it on top of Twilight and then opened the window. Fresh, cold air streamed into the room and instantly made me shiver.

I went into the bathroom, stuck to the essentials and then made my way down to the kitchen. It was quite a surprise that I did not run into Spike along the way. I threw together a breakfast for the two of us and made a pot of coffee. The sink showed no signs of recent use either, which led me to believe that Spike had not woken up either. Or maybe they were awake, but had not left his room just yet. I decided not to dwell on the mental images that that conjured up. After all, he was a dragon, with dragon teeth and fire breath and a long, long, split tongue and she had a beak and…

Nope.

And then I thought I remembered that both dragons and griffins laid eggs, did they not?

I said: Nope!

I shook my head a little more violently and decided against preparing breakfast for them. I knew a bit about what Gabby liked. The list of what she did not like was considerably shorter. But maybe Spike wanted to go for breakfast in bed as well. Or maybe he had other ideas of his own. Preparing something only for it to go to waste or worse still, to instill a bad conscience in him, was not the aim here.

I could not resist leaving a little note on the kitchen counter, though. Running late, eh, buddy? I hope you do your chores as thoroughly as you do her!

A little too crass and uncouth for my tastes, but the aim was to embarrass and tease him a little and I knew that would get to him, straight past all defenses. I chuckled a little as I imagined him reading this and his scales turning shades of violet.

I grabbed the breakfast platter I had prepared and went back to our room. Nothing had changed, of course.

There was a little bit of movement when I audibly closed the door. And more still when I put the platter down on the bedside table and the stench of her favorite morning brew wafted over to her.

“That is all kinds of wrong,” came her muffled voice from within the blanket cocoon.

“What’s wrong?” I asked as I crawled back into bed. I was cautious not to disturb her blanket fortress however, seeing as I had been up and about for a while and my body was likely considerably colder than hers now.

“It was your party, yet I get to have breakfast in bed?” she both asked and explained.

I chuckled and shrugged, even though she obviously could not see that. “Well, my party was yesterday. It’s a brand new day~”

I patiently waited for a couple of seconds. And I was rewarded for it. “And the sun is high~” she answered from within the blankets.

I grinned and patted the bundle. “Ain’t going to be much of a breakfast in bed if you don’t come out to get it, though.”

The bundle shifted. Then it shifted some more. Then it hobbled a little. And started to crawl towards me. It was such a weird sight that I started laughing. A shrill, albeit quiet shriek escaped my throat amidst the laughter when the incredibly slowly advancing blanket-snail reared up and swallowed me whole. Now I had reason to keep laughing because I was ticklish and Twilight, in her single-minded aim to get coffee into her system, crawled right on top of me. And half over me.

I was granted a brief respite when she stopped to peek outside of her blanket-shell. My muzzle was pressed against her stomach. Her coat was matted. The smell I had successfully banished from the room by opening the window had been preserved under here. And although I grimaced a little due to the pungent note, I could not help but smile at the same time. I kissed her belly and ignored the faint acrid taste. I enjoyed the gesture, because it made her giggle and chide me. “Stop it!” she demanded. I kissed her again. “Dream, stop! I am going to spill coffee on you!”

I chuckled and kissed her once more. “Nah. I’m way too far down for it to reach me.” That’s an idea. I shuffled a little further down and grabbed her haunches.

“Oh don’t you dare!” she warned me and a soft kick against my shoulder told me to actually stop.

I still chuckled, though. It was always funny to tease such reactions out of her. I could understand why Luna had such fun doing it. To her or me, really.

As a sign that I relented, I wiggled my way up again and came out the other side, poking my head up from under the blankets. I had not noticed how warm it was beneath them until the room's cold air hit me in the muzzle. “Oof.”

Twilight blushed slightly. “Thanks for the additional blankets.”

“Could you get a bit more sleep in?” I asked, but she shook her head.

“Not really, no. But this allowed me to wake up slowly and be less cranky about it.” She leaned down and nuzzled me. No kisses. Because coffee was a vile concoction and almost any poison was preferable to it. Both Twilight and Luna disagreed passionately, while Sunny was my only reinforcement on that front.

A good portion of scrambled eggs and a few slices of toasted bread with jam later, Twilight vanished into the bathroom and I extricated myself from the shell she left behind. I stuffed the sheets into the laundry, fixed the bed — with some new sheets, of course — and carried the plate, pot, mug and cutlery back to the kitchen to clean it up.

In all that time, I neither saw nor heard scale or fin from Spike. Or Gabby, for that matter.

I shrugged it off and went along with Twilight when we met at the castle door. It was a nice walk through town. A few clouds were overheard, sure, but these white mountains had yet to grow into the harbingers of rain they were meant to be. It would take another couple of days for that to happen. We were therefore granted a nice, warm sun baking our coats as a counterpart to the occasional chilly gust of wind. Walking in the shadows was still too cold, so for the sun to offset this was perfect.

Strolling through town never got old. I still recognized most of the faces we encountered, even though Ponyville had grown a good deal and even though some of the old faces were, well, truly old.

We waited at the train station in companionable silence. I sometimes closed my eyes and focused on my sense of smell when a gust of wind blew past and carried the scent of blooming life. Flowers and trees and grass and fertile dirt. I sometimes wondered what my life would have looked like if I had been born as an earth pony. I sometimes felt connected to the land in a way I found hard to put to words. But then again, I sometimes felt connected to the wind and the sky in a similar fashion. Even though I was a unicorn and according to my memories, never had been anything else.

I had told Twilight about it once. She immediately proceeded to tease me about it. How it surely meant that there was potential for another alicorn there. That thought was as scary as it was absurd. If Shining Armor had not managed to ascend, neither would I. And truly, that was for the better.

What would I even be the prince of? Prince of the shut-ins? Prince of the morose?

I shook my head and dismissed the direction my thoughts threatened to drift off to. And instead took half a step closer to Twilight, until our coats lay against each other. I was glad she only took a satchel with her instead of her usual saddlebags. The satchel did not get in the way.

Twilight did not ask what was wrong, or if anything was wrong to begin with. She simply extended a wing over my back. I nuzzled her mane as a silent thank you. And a few minutes later, our train arrived and we took our seats.

Once we left Ponyville Station, things slowly started to change. The constant, rhythmic rattling along the tracks. Her proximity. The sun still baking my coat through the window, now without the chilly wind to counter it. I did not overheat as much as it lulled me back into a certain state of drowsiness. Eventually, I felt her magic on my cheek. It failed to startle me. I looked up and saw her smile. A warm, kind, fond smile. She repositioned herself a little and her magic gave my cheek a soft push.

I felt a lazy, goofy grin spread on my lips as I followed her invitation and laid my head on her back as if it were a pillow. Silver Shoals was a few hours off. We had time. No rush.

I closed my eyes and felt whole.

I opened my eyes and felt fear.

For all the disorientation that I felt, it mattered little. A violent, gruesome panic had dug its talons into my heart and held it in a tight grip. Too tight. It dug the razor-sharp tips into it.

Twilight and I held on. For now. But how much longer would we be able to?

She had grabbed that ledge up above. And I clung to her back hooves. And the yawning abyss beneath us simply waited. We would lose this fight eventually. There was no rush. Twilight would not be able to pull herself up. Not with my added weight. Not without dislodging me.

And I feared.

I was consumed by it.

It was all I knew.

All I could think of.

The fear of falling. Of what might be down there. Of losing myself to that bottomless, lightless, hopeless void. The fear of losing her. The fear of holding her back. Of costing her dearly. Her life. A chance. Whatever it would be that I would take from her. The fear of rejection. The fear of not being rejected. I feared myself as much as her. I feared that ledge, and what might be up on top there. I could not see anything up there. I could not hear anything up there. But did that mean that there was nothing? No. No, certainly not. And I feared what might be up there.

Twilight turned to me. Her voice echoed in this wall-less void, somehow. It was a quiet voice. Pleading. Maybe even afraid? Afraid of what?

“If you love me… you let me go,” she said.

I let go.

And I fell.

I closed my eyes.

And I fell.

Forever.

“Wake up!”

I sat up with a gasp as if I had been drowning. My ears swiveled about, my eyes shot wide open, my head snapped around as I tried to discern where I was, who I was, when I was, why I was. My senses scanned for enemies, for dangers, but all they found were the worried glances of other passengers and Twilight beside me. It was cold. Rime covered our seats. Just ours. How odd.

She grabbed my cheeks with her hooves and forced me to look at her. I involuntarily tried to resist, but alicorn strength meant I could do little about it. It helped. It forced me to focus.

I eventually managed to close my eyes without being frightened by flashes of my dream. I managed to take a calming, steadying breath.

“Thanks,” I whispered ashamedly. “I-I’m fine.”

That stutter did not escape her notice. Of course it did not. That would have been too much of a mercy. “What is wrong?”

Nothing!, a voice yelled in the back of my head. I had difficulties discerning if it was mine, or his. “I-I…” Damn stutter. I took another deep breath. “It was just a nightmare.”

“You look haunted,” she replied. I knew what would come next. “Tell me about it.”

A not so insignificant part of me wanted to play it down with a joke. About how I ‘looked haunted’ half the time anyway and that it should not make much of a difference. But that would have been in poor taste. I had had too many breakdowns and crises over the years to joke about it like that. “I’m just shaken,” I tried to worm my way out of explaining it. “I’ll be fine in a sec.”

Her grip on my face tightened ever so slightly. It was obvious. I would not get out of it this easily. “Don’t.”

It was a word with meaning. Between the two of us, especially. A simple, single word I always reacted to in a strong way. As if my mind was hardwired to look out for it.

Don’t let go.

Don’t you dare.

Don’t lie to me.

Don’t leave me.

Don’t hurt her.

Don'ts were important. This one was easily demystified. Don’t shut me out. I sighed deeply and nodded. I would not. I had given my word that I never would.

Only after I nodded did she release me from her grip. “Hadn’t had that one in years,” I meekly admitted. She waited patiently. Another sigh. “It’s the ledge. I… we… you cling to the ledge, and I cling to you. You tell me that… if I love you, I would let you go. The dream takes one of two routes at this point. Either I let go immediately, or I hesitate before I let go. The difference is so small, but feels so incredibly significant. What is making me hesitate? What’s going on in my own mind? Both routes end with me falling. I close my eyes. And I imagine you smile at me. And… a-and it’s just… incredibly painful,” I recounted the dream up until the point when my throat grew tight enough to strangle me. I tried to push past the feeling of dread and breathlessness, but to no avail. Only when I decided to force myself to take a breath did my throat loosen up a bit. “It’s painful because deep down in my heart, I know that I will never see you smile at me like that. A… a part of me expects to feel your magic softly embracing me shortly after I let go. But it never does. You never catch me. And because my eyes are closed, I don’t… I-I don’t know if you even t-tried. Fuck.” I grimaced. I did not like cursing. It always felt alien to me. Unnecessary. But as far as pathetic displays went, I was giving one already anyway. Those other travelers were kind enough not to comment. Kind enough to pretend that they did not notice the show I was giving. But I knew better. And I hated it. I hated myself, once again. For this perceived weakness. For how little self-control I had. For the tightness in my throat. I managed to keep those tears welling in my eyes from spilling, but goodness me, did I hate them even being there.

I shook my head and soldiered on. “There’s a part of me that feels… disconnected. There is no anger. No disappointment. No jealousy. But no joy either, no trust or love or happiness. Just a vast, cold emptiness. A void.”

“I remember now,” Twilight whispered. She repositioned herself so we could sit side by side and her wing extended over my back like a security blanket. I hated how much I loved it. For just a second, I did. Then I slowly relaxed and melted into the familiarity of it all. Back then, she had tried to console me with all kinds of reassurances. How she would never ask such a thing of me. How she would not let me fall. But that was not the point. And even if it were — ‘never’ is a dangerous word. “You sometimes wondered if that was him,” she added belatedly.

I nodded. It was a possibility, after all. He constantly saw through my eyes, heard through my ears, sometimes even spoke through my voice when I failed to notice his subtle influence on my thoughts. For better or worse, he was always with me, always there. And if he could influence me, why should it not be possible that I had nightmares about what was going on with him?

But he never struck me as the type to be afraid much. To be scared of anything, really. I knew better though. Yet even then, it was hard imagining him being so utterly panicked. Even when scared, he chose to lash out. He always went with aggression over cowardice. He went full on offense when cornered. It did not quite fit what I felt in that dream.

Another sigh escaped my throat. At least it was a steady one. No tremors audible. “I got so incredibly clingy for a while back then. I’m still so, so sorry about that.”

Twilight smiled. “It is fine. We managed.”

“There were times where I was too scared to ask myself: Do I truly love you? Do I even know what that means? What love is? What it feels like to love? Or is it maybe just dedication? A decision I made and stuck with?” Another shaky breath. I despised it. Yet it only served to make apparent that these questions sometimes still haunted me.

Haunted. Funny. She had said I looked haunted.

Her voice cut through the rising haze. “I cannot tell you what you felt back then, or what you might feel now,” she admitted before quickly moving on. “But I can tell you that I love you, and that I felt loved each and every day we shared.”

Maybe that has to be enough. A part of me knew that it would not get much better than this. Could not, really. So I leaned against her, closed my eyes and listened to the train rattling over the tracks. Listened to the faint background noise of other conversations taking place. Listened to her steady and calm breathing. And it was the latter that managed to help me sort out the mess I had once again become before we arrived at our destination.

Few ponies were lucky enough to know upfront what battles in their lives were important enough to set the course and stick in their memory. Successfully getting a degree might certainly be important. But once it becomes a success in a long line of strong successes, it somewhat loses its splendor and shine a little, because it gets less unique and remarkable and becomes more expected.

Twilight and I stood beside a hedge. The hedge. It was the hedge that surrounded the Silver Stable Retirement Community in Silver Shoals. The grounds were sprawling and massive, with loads of buildings and courts and even their own little section of the harbor. It was, for all intents and purposes, a village within a village.

I took another deep breath to psych myself up some more.

I was no hero. I did not go out of my way to fight some nasty villain intent on destroying Equestria. I left those jobs for the professionals. True enough, Twilight started out as a socially awkward bookworm, not a hero. Rainbow started out as a weather team pony in a rural earth pony town. Fluttershy started out as a recluse veterinarian. But they grew into their roles with each encounter. Their life's stories formed them into what they were today.

My life had been a calm breeze in comparison to the hurricane they had to endure for quite some time.

Nevertheless, I was here to battle a mighty foe. While it had been bested before, those who won had been formidable in their own rights. If I wished to stand my ground, I would need to have my wits about me. Because I could certainly not match it in sheer force.

The Apples, they say, have the same stubbornness as mountains do. You can cry and beg and shout and kick, you can get your pickaxe and buckets and spells. They won’t budge.

Honestly, after spending so many years in the company of Apples — including but not limited to Apple Bloom, Big Macintosh, Ambrosia, Braeburn, Granny Smith and many more — I came to the simply conclusion that this ‘stubbornness of the mountains’-shtick was more an Applejack-thing than a general Apple-thing.

“I’m ready.”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “You do not look ready.”

I snorted and shot her a lopsided grin. “Let’s be real, I’ll never ‘look’ ready. I’m as ready as I’ll ever get.”

“Are you sure you—“ —don’t want me to come with you?

“I am,” I cut in. This moment was critical. If I hesitated too long, my confidence would waver. I could already feel the doubting thoughts claw their way through. If Pinkie had failed to get through, what hope was there for me? If Fluttershy, Rarity, even Twilight had failed, what did I hope to accomplish what they could not? And more importantly: How?

Twilight gave me a nod and I forced my hooves to move. One step at a time, until I reached the entrance. I shot one last look back. Twilight tried to smile for me. Reassuringly. She would be here once I got out again. I could count on that. But I couldn't help but feel the weight of her hopes settle on my shoulders. They all had tried before. We had tried. Many, many times. And Applejack had refused to see reason, time and time again.

Somehow, Twilight's hopes felt less like a burdening weight and more like a protective layer. An additional force driving me forward.

“Time to get you home,” I whispered to myself, steeled my nerves and moved on.

As I passed along the gravelly road, I looked around. They had a really pretty fountain halfway to the main building. It looked like the statue spewing the water was made by the residents. A depiction of a local fish of legend, I vaguely remembered. There were little gardens to each side. Most of them were marked with cutie marks, but a couple larger ones were unmarked. Community gardening. Nice touch.

And flowerbeds. Goodness gracious, so many flowers. It was still early in the year, so I had not expected this much greenery to already be in bloom. I was no expert in botany. I knew a rose when I saw one. Hopefully. And I could recognize daisies, because Twilight loved those on her sandwiches. But everything else went straight past my head. Whatever those flowers were, they were pretty. And plentiful. White petals with yellow stems, or little red dots in the middle.

Careful, or you might exhaust your vocabulary!

I ignored the spiteful voice as best as I could and instead focused my attention on some details that stuck out. The hedge was perfectly trimmed on the outside. On the inside however, less discipline seemed to have been applied. And it grew unevenly in some places, being higher or lower and almost forming like a wave-pattern. I wondered if that was intentional or not.

And the community gardens were full, of course. Vegetables of all kinds and sizes hung on bushed, stuck out of the dirt or were currently collected by some friendly elder mares and stallions with baskets. I trained my ears on them and listened in as I walked by. The snippets I managed to scrounge together were perfect.

They had too many potatoes. And too many tomatoes. And too many cucumbers. They basically had too much of everything. It was an interesting detail to be sure, but it got so much more spicy once Applejack's name fell. As the one responsible for the plentiful harvest. Issue being: Neither of these elderly ponies seemed all that thrilled about it. They were not angry by any means, either. But the additional labor required seemed to annoy them. And some commented how unnecessary this all was.

“You don’t belong here,” I muttered to myself as I continued. These comments did make me wonder, though. Applejack had a thing for making plants grow. My eyes drifted towards the hedge again. A wave-pattern. A wild growth inside. Maybe that was her doing as well?

A few of the hobby-farmers waved friendly greetings in my direction and I was lucid enough to wave back.

A couple of minutes later and the sturdy double doors of the main building were only a couple dozen feet away. I stopped as I saw who sat in front of them, right on the probably very cold wooden ramp leading up to them. It was hard to decide on what I should feel as my heart was torn and tugged into different directions. It was nice, great even, to finally see Rainbow again. It filled me with joy and happiness for I had not seen her in years. Too many for my liking. This had been way overdue. But at the same time, seeing her state nearly broke me.

She looked miserable.

Her wings were in pristine condition, obviously, but her coat was ruffled and messed up. Her mane limply clung to her neck. She wore a persistent scowl on her wrinkled muzzle. She had her legs tucked under herself like a cat, and true to form, I would not have been surprised had she hissed at me or clawed in my direction. But it was not just her immediately apparent state that hurt so much. I could see it in her eyes. Those cerise-colored eyes that, once upon a time, burned with fire and passion, with unbridled energy and enthusiasm. Nothing could ever stop The Rainbow Dash, loudmouth extraordinaire and awesomest flier in all of Equestria.

That pony over there? That was not Rainbow Dash. That was a shadow of Rainbow. A poor imitation. A pony so utterly unhappy that it kept her grounded.

And that truly hurt.

I slowly walked closer again until I was right up with my forehooves on the ramp. Rainbow barely took notice of my existence. She certainly did not look at me and instead preferred to stare out into the open. Not into the sky, no. Just… ahead. I followed her gaze and came to the depressing conclusion that she probably stared at nothing in particular. She was not observing anypony, not making out the details of any faraway building or landscape feature. She just stared to stare.

“Hey Rainbow,” I greeted her. The movement of her ears were the only thing indicating any reaction. They swiveled in my direction and for a fraction of a second, her eyes followed. Only to revert back immediately.

She stayed quiet for a while. The moment seemed to stretch. I waited for a response, any response. And I got one. Her brow furrowed as she probably finally remembered me.

“Buck off.”

And with that, she rose to her hooves. I could see her bite back a groan. Who knew how long she had been sitting there. Her wings rustled a little and she walked off into the garden area, off the path and into the first corner that would carry her out of sight.

I watched her go with a painful numbness in my chest. “Nice to see you too,” I whispered and took a deep breath to steady myself. If this was throwing me for a loop, I was so not ready to face Applejack. Still, I had hoped for a warmer welcome. Maybe she was angry because we had not shown our faces for a while. Maybe she had all but forgotten about that and she was angry because of some incident she had remembered. Celestia knew I had bucked up enough times in my life to give her a nice little collection of ‘why I should kick Dreamwalker’-memories. It was just unfortunate that they went to the forefront of her mind before all the ‘why I should not kick Dreamwalker’-memories.

“Lady Luck, smile upon me,” I uttered in quiet prayer. “Please, Luna, I could really use some luck here.”

I looked up to the sky in an attempt to get some divine backing down here, but instead managed to see the distorted face of a familiar pony peek past the drawn curtains. As soon as she noticed that I had seen her, she vanished from the window. I sighed.

And with that, I dared to push the doors open.

The inside of the retirement home was and was not what I expected. I had been here a couple of times already, so I was decently familiar with the layout and interior design. They stuck to pastel colors, bright and friendly. Open spaces. Large windows to allow for as much light in as possible. Many of the elderly residents were up and about somewhere on the retirement home grounds, tending to the gardens, playing polo or golf or whatever, taking little sailing trips. Stuff like that.

The few stuck inside due to bad health or other conditions usually stuck to the common areas where they could play chess or cards or draw. Last time I visited, they had this new stallion here. His mostly gray mane still offered a few streaks of dark brown, his coat was as red as wine and hoo boy, could that guy draw. With actual canvases and oil paints. While the others argued with Applejack, which quickly devolved into shouting matches, I watched that guy paint. It was so strangely calming to watch him.

I wondered if he was still around.

That was the familiar part. The entrance hall. The little reception to the side, where a nurse welcomed me with her warm smile as well as a friendly voice. “I’m just here to visit Applejack,” I told her.

What was unexpected was the smell. It had been here last time as well, but I would never grow accustomed to it. A retirement home meant old ponies, lots of them. Some were less in control of their bodily functions. That, praise Celestia, was always quickly cared for. However, others needed medicine. Balms and tinctures and whatnot. It smelled of medicine. Like a hospital. Bitter pills and disinfectant. It was a necessity, I knew that, and there was little to be done about it. They could simply not hang hundreds of these air fresheners up. Not just because it would cost a fortune to keep that going, but because it would only replace one intrusive scent with another. And while I did not like the hospital-smell, those air fresheners always made me sick.

“I remember you now,” the nurse said with a sigh. “You’re one of her friends, right? It’s been a while.”

I would have loved to duck for cover. Instead I felt the shame heat my cheeks up as I gave a curt nod. “We, uhm… last time didn’t… went so well.”

She sighed and nodded. “I remember that part, too. One of the loudest days in years. And we had a rock concert next door a few weeks later.”

“Sorry,” I half-mumbled.

Despite this, she smiled and shook her head. “It’s alright. We survived, didn’t we? I’m sure she will be… well… let’s just not repeat the yelling, yes?”

I swallowed and forced a smile on my face. “I… I’ll try?”

She nodded. Good enough for her, it seemed. “Oh and one more thing. I know she can be difficult, but if it is possible, would you mind bringing up that we really don’t need more vegetables? Her help with the gardens has been greatly appreciated, but at this point, I fear us selling the produce at the local market might aggravate the other farmers in the region.”

Oh boy, that bad, eh? I strangled that laughter that bubbled in my throat and nodded like the good little stallion I was. “Uh-huh. I’ll see what I can do.” And she seemed grateful. So this was probably just another thing they already brought up with her, and in typical AJ-fashion, they failed to move the mountain.

Well, time for the main event.

I moved past the reception, went up the stairs into the upper floor and down the hallway to the first door on the right. I knocked, and there was no response. Because of course she would not make it easy. “Sis, I’m coming in,” I warned her before I opened the door. I heard the second half of a snarky snort and deflected that painful sting by telling myself that I simply had misheard that.

I entered a room that could have been part of the Apple family house. Rustic interior, most of it probably in some way either crafted by her or cared for by her. A large bed for two. An entire wall was dedicated to trophies and medals. Rainbows trophies and medals. Applejack had hers in a couple of drawers in the closed over on the other side of the room. She did not care much for displaying them these days. She knew what she had done and she knew what she could do. That was enough.

Applejack herself sat in a rocking chair near the window. I closed the door and watched her. The chair did not move. Nevertheless, she reminded me of Granny Smith for a moment. That is, until her steel-hard gaze turned and she regarded me with wary caution.

“Is she mad again? Should I knock some sense into her?” she asked and nodded towards the window.

I sighed. Time for battle. I walked over to her and sat down on my haunches, right beside her chair. She looked at me. Truly looked at me. At my face, free from wrinkles. At my muscles, what little I had, untouched by age.

“Jus’ uncanny,” she mumbled and patiently waited for my response.

I shook my head. “Don’t use me as an excuse to argue with her, please,” I started.

“Don’t you be so uppity with me! I don’t need excuses for that, you least of y’all!” she shot back.

It was easy to get caught up. Easy to let her goad me. A part of me wanted to argue with her. She had said some nasty things in an effort to make us go away last time. And I remembered them, if I cared to let myself. I instead took a deep breath. “How are you holding up?”

Seeing me skip her barb took some wind out of her. “We’re fine,” she grumbled.

Silence fell for a couple of minutes. Applejack avoided looking at me and instead stared out of the window. The angle was good, she could see the retirement home’s grounds. Maybe even wherever Rainbow had run off to. “I’ve seen the community gardens outside,” I tried a different approach. It actually made me smile. It was so incredibly Applejack to come here and make these simple gardens produce the same output as a true and honored Apple-farm.

“So I gave ‘em some pointers, so?” She huffed. Though it lacked the usual bite, and maybe that was a good sign. And she did study my face again. Looking for betrayal and fake smiles, I assume? She did not find whatever she searched for.

I even allowed myself to chuckle softly. “Applejack, that hedge reminds me of the Forbidden Jungle!”

She shrugged. “I might’ve talked to the gardener, so what? Is this an interrogation?”

I could have sworn the former question was accompanied by a ghost of a smile. Yet I could just as easily have misread that. A trick of the mind as I so desperately wished for my old friend and sister to return to me. Because the latter question already informed me that her patience was running thin again. She knew I had come here with a point in mind. But here I was, trying to avoid spilling it. I took another deep breath and tried to bridge across that chasm of fear. “Applejack. Sis. You don’t belong here. You must know that. Neither of you two belongs here. We talked with Apple Bloom, Big Mac, Marble and Graphite. They would welcome you back with open hooves. Let me rephrase that, they want you back. We all do. And… you know that, too.”

Now it was Applejack's turn to utter a deep sigh. She looked at me with sorrow in her eyes, but the hardness did not leave them. “This again,” she grumbled. “It doesn’t work that way. I would try to help out ‘round the farm. Harvestin’ and repairin’ and carin’ for the animals. They’d need to constantly tie me down. And even if they manage to wrangle me, what about RD?” Applejack remained silent for a while, staring out of the window again. When she spoke up next, her voice was quiet. And vulnerable. “She’s become so forgetful, Dream. Jus’… she’d try to nap in the trees again. You know how much she loved ‘em. And with her sense of balance being this awful these days…” When her voice started to quaver, she cleared her throat. “Did you know that it’s not uncommon for pegasus bones to become brittle at higher ages? She could fall down and just… jus’ lay there… in pain… for hours, before anypony would notice…” While clearing her throat had worked well enough to get the rest out, it could only help so long. Like a bandaid on a deep gash. I saw the faint sheen in her eyes. Applejack did not tear up. Applejack did not cry. Applejack cried on the inside, Pinkie had famously said on occasions. And right now, I could see how hurt she was, how she was wailing in the confines of her own mind. Because her mind conjured all those awful images for her. Of Rainbow lying beneath one of her beloved apple trees, limbs twisted, wings at unnatural angles, crying out in pain, crying out for help with nopony around to answer.

Minutes could easily feel like hours when one was in great pain. How would hours feel, then? Half a day?

“I can’t lose her,” Applejack added with the same hardness in her voice.

I dared to cross a line. Once upon a time, she had accepted me as part of the family. It took years for her to feel comfortable enough to allow me to call her my sister once more. I did so sparingly. Because it was something important to me. I wanted it to stay special. But as my sister, my family, I dared. I reached over and I hugged her. It was a simple gesture. I pulled her into an embrace. And I could feel the tremors running up and down her body as she fought a high-stakes internal battle for control. “If Bloom or Ambrosia can tie you down — and I have full confidence in their capabilities —, then they can tie her down as well. Just… think about it. Please. None of you is getting any happier here. For all the great things this place does and offers, you don’t belong here. You can get her meds in Ponyville. They can deliver to your doorstep, even a few weeks in advance. You would never risk running out. The hospital staff is pretty good as well. They always have ponies ready to go. Just… think about it, will you?”

I let go of her and knew I had failed. Not just because she had not hugged me back. But because I could see that same hardness in her eyes when she stifled a sniffle and nodded. “I will.”

LIAR!, an indignant voice in the back of my head roared in anger.

I could understand his outrage. I felt it too. Or maybe it was his and it was just so much that it spilled over.

Applejack had been my idol. A paragon of goodness. A role model. My teacher. Friend. Sister. She was the one I felt closest to after Twilight. And here she sat, betraying everything she taught me by lying straight into my face. Worse still, she lied knowingly.

What could I do?

What was I supposed to do now? Just give up? Go home? Live with the knowledge that in this important battle in my life, I surrendered? Because of what? Her stubbornness? Her blatant disregard of—

Fear.

Right. It felt like this was an enemy I always encountered again and again, no matter how many times I managed to flee or defeat it. This time though, it was not even my fear. It was hers.

She was so afraid of losing Rainbow that it managed to scare her away from her farm. That crash a couple of years ago had been awful, true. We all had been scared beyond belief. Rainbow had crashed dozens of times in the span of her career. Sometimes badly. Never this badly. But she still recovered. Her wing was lame for a while. She could fly, but every doctor highly advised against any stunts. No whoop-de-loops. No barrel rolls. Just regular old flying. It was obviously still better than nothing. And she had the discipline to make a full recovery to the point where even stunt flying was on the menu again.

But none of us ever forgot that scare.

Applejack least of all.

I sighed and rubbed the bridge of my muzzle. Applejack was old. But I had seen Granny Smith, Celestia bless her, jump around when the zap apple harvest was coming up. I had seen Granny Smith maul a timberwolf with her rocking chair when they got feisty and followed a screaming Apple Bloom right back home to the house. It was a good reminder to never, ever forget that even at her high age, she was an earth pony. She had been capable of impressive feats of strength and speed and even agility when necessary. And Applejack was not even close to Grannys age.

She would be able to make one last adventure.

This is wrong, I told myself even as I prepared to spill my suggestion anyway. But I could understand her fear. More than she might give me credit for. “There is a way to make sure that she… stays. It’s a long and involved process, it takes a lot of guts, there’s all kinds of trials involved, but it… it might help. It might even help with her memory.”

Applejack chuckled.

It was the kind of dark and twisted chuckle that made my skin crawl. I had not known that she was capable of producing such sounds. “And now you’re tellin’ me all about this Aqua Vitae-thing, right? Don’t bother. Twilight showed up two years ago, spillin’ the beans drunk as a skunk. Now do both of us a favor and git out of here.”

I staggered to my hooves and stared at her. She knew. She knew and she was here. And Rainbow was here, out there, barely remembering me. So she had decided against it? On second thought, that would fit very well with Applejack. When I asked myself: Who would reject immortality? She was the one immediately stepping up in my head. And funnily enough, I would probably have been right beside her, had that decision not been taken from me.

Maybe it’s for the better.

Maybe.

I stared at Applejack. At her hard eyes. At the pain beneath that. At her aged form, sitting in that dreadful chair by the window. I backed away, slowly, until my rump hit the door. I considered turning around. Opening it. Stepping outside and closing it. I would take a breath. A deep breath. Because I was out of that room. Out from under her piercing, merciless, hard gaze. I would take that breath and inhale that scent of old ponies and hospital and I would remember where I was. I would hastily retreat further. Down the stairs. Out the door. Take another breath outside. Free at last.

What kind of cruel freedom would that be?

Could I really do that? Just like that, turn my back on her? On her, of all ponies? Would she have done this years ago? Lifetimes ago?

No surrender.

You’re damn right I won’t. I gritted my teeth and forced my hooves. I had to take each step consciously. Forward, not backwards. Another one. Under her gaze, I wanted to do nothing more than cower and flee. But I remembered better times. When she was ‘less grumpy’. When we were friends. True, true friends. Family, even. I conjured those memories before my mind's eye and used the resolve I could draw from them to take another step, and another.

When I reached her dreadful chair again, I put a hoof to her shoulder. She stared at me expectantly, confused.

“Die on the farm.”

“… what?”

I cleared my throat and scraped together whatever courage I had left. “Die on the farm,” I asked her again. “You’ve poured your entire life into that soil. Every drop of sweat, blood and tears. All your love and hard work. And so did she. Every waking moment she wasn’t flying about, being a Wonderbolt, she was right down there in the dirt with you, pushing carts and collecting fruit.”

“I already told you, I can’t!” Applejack's temper flared a little and her voice raised ever so slightly.

My ears wanted to splay back against my skull, but I forced them to stand their ground. “Many, many years ago, somepony I love dearly helped me. She recognized just how much my fears ruled over me. How they alone dictated my every move and thought and decision. And she spent way too much time teaching me the same lesson over and over and over again: Try and win. Because if you don’t try, you already lost.” I put my second hoof on her other shoulder and grabbed her tightly as if I had to cling to her for dear life. “Tell me, sis. Do you even talk to Rainbow these days? Or does she sneak in after she thinks you’ve fallen asleep and quietly slips under the cover? Maybe the other way around?” Applejack averted her gaze. Gotcha. Not that there was anything worth celebrating about that particular revelation. It was just another painful barb. “Does she seem happy to you? Are you happy here? Does she still fly? At all? Does getting more tomatoes than the retirement home staff know what to do with really help you?” She did not answer. I let the questions linger for a moment, but when she remained silent, I continued. I could feel it. I had an opening. I had to cease it. “There was a time when I had to psych myself up to leave the castle. To leave my room, even. Out of fear. I did not dare to dance, ever. Out of fear. I scrutinized everything I said or did, which made me slow to react and deliberate in every movement. Out of fear. We all have our baggage. We all have to learn how to deal with it. Twilight helped me a lot, because she understood me quite well. But it was usually you who made the final pushes. Or the first ones. You taught me that no matter how much I feared messing up somepony’s day or opinion of me — if I don’t step out there and get to know them again, I would never get to laugh with them either. You taught me that if I ever wanted to have my picture-perfect vision of a wedding realized, I would have to dance and deal with looking silly. And I did, and it was part of the best moments of my life. You taught me that I don’t have to wield kitchen knives with the same caution as a flask of acid—“

“And you cut yourself,” Applejack cut in with a subdued, quiet chuckle. “One time so badly we had to get you to the hospital. Five stitches?”

I chuckled. That was my Applejack. “Six. And me fainting because I can’t see blood was more of an issue than the actual cut. I had no idea concussions were such serious business.”

“Gave me a heart attack and a half when you hit your noggin!”

I had her wide open. Ready and primed. Time for the finisher. “You belong on that farm, AJ. Both of you. Don’t try to keep her safe. It hurts her as much as it hurts you. You try to keep her safe and away from danger, but… back then, when you said ‘yes’ in front of that altar, you accepted her for who she is. And Rainbow loves danger. She lives for the thrill. That is the mare you fell in love with. Don’t… take that away from her. Shift that perspective back to where it truly belongs. Try to make her happy instead. Make each other happy again. Things might go wrong, yes. I cannot deny that. You know I won’t, because you know that all those awful scenarios you have in your head are twice as many and just as bad in mine. Remember how we had a serious discussion about the probabilities of me stepping out of the shower, slipping on the wet floor and breaking my neck? You said it’s incredibly unlikely. I agreed. Yet you could not claim that it was impossible. You taught me to never stop trying. For Celestia’s sake, Applejack.” I squeezed her shoulders as my tears started to spill. “I have been living one life after the other, cycle after cycle after cycle, and you taught me to never stop trying! I have taken that to heart! So much that it comes with me. Every time. Do you have any clue how many times I tell myself: Well, I failed. But I get up and try again. Because that’s what I do. I try a lot. That stupid phrase is because of you. Please, please, please, I beg you. Heed your own advice. I cannot stand seeing you two so miserable and grumpy and utterly unhappy. I want your smile back. And hers. I want my friends back. I-I miss you guys so much, damn it!”

Applejack's eyes were filled to the brim with tears. I could see it despite my own blurry vision. She never spilled a single one. Because Applejack. But I had seen tears in her eyes. And more importantly, I had seen the tiniest of nods. I had broken through.

It was finally over.

We were both still standing.

No enemies.

No victors.

No losers.

Just friends.

Finally, at last.

Friends.