Opaline looked up. Somewhere, she had heard a hole being punched through a mountain—but she did not in particular care.

“Stupid mountain,” she said, to herself. “Probably deserved it. MISTY!” She looked around, confused. “MISTY! Where am I?”

No response came, and Opaline did not know why. She looked around further and realized that she was in her throne room. “Oh,” she said. “The same place I’ve been mostly trapped for...longer than I can remember. Stupid Misty. If she was competent I’d be able to conquer the world and actually go outside. Whenever I want. Without getting lost.” She turned to the staircase. “MISTY! Get down here NOW! I’m...so very alone...”

She jumped as the door to her wizard tower was throne open. Misty collapsed through, a pale and sickly pony falling off her back and flopping onto the ground.

“MISTY! You’re tracking mud!” She pointed at the pale, non-moving body. “And what is that? Did you steal a body or something?”

Misty—herself largely soaked from the cold rain—looked up. “That’s Blank.”

“Who?”

“The...you know, you’re other minion?”

“Oh. Yes. The one I like better than you. You should really do better, Misty. Stop being a dissapointment.” She gently kicked Blank. Blank did not move. “Although at least you’re not deceased like this one.”

“She’s not dead,” groaned Misty, struggling to stand. “But I think she’s hurt.”

“Well that’s good. I did not wake up this morning wanting to beat a dead horse. Wake her up.”

“I can’t. She was fine at first, but...”

“So you’re telling me you failed? Again? AND you injured the one who I actually like? Ugh. Misty, you’re as hopeless as you are ugly.”

Misty took a deep breath. “Opaline. Can you help her?”

“What makes you think I would be able to do that?”

“Because you’re a master of the arcane?”

“I am. But mostly relating to fire and burning things.”

“So you can’t do a healing spell? At all?”

“Misty, please close your speech-orifice, your voice is so annoying. Of course I know healing spells. You would too, if you were good enough for me to give you a cutie mark. So you can use magic.” She pointed with her hoof. “But this isn’t physical damage.”

“It isn’t?”

“No. And you would be able to see that if you were not, in fact, stupid.”

She kicked Blank into the pool in the center pool of the throneroom. Blank struggled slightly, trying to swim, but quickly gave up and floated face-down.

“Opaline!”

“Ugh, must you be so dramatic?”

She charged her horn and muttered words in a strange language, leaning forward and casting a spell upon the water. It burst into blue flame, surrounding and coiling around Blank as she was lifted into the air. The water arrived with it, burning into fire and condensing back upon it. Steam, fire, and liquid, fused into a single element, bound by their intrinsic magic. Opaline then parted them, swirling them into a roaring vortex that silenced at her command. Frozen, and waiting.

“What...what did you do?”

Opaline groaned and rolled her eyes. “Magic, Misty. Obviously. Now go in there and fix her.”

“M...me?”

“You broke her, didn’t you? Get—in—THERE!”

Misty squeaked as she was picked up by magical force—and then tossed into the vortex.

Misty, at this point, was almost fully depleted of both power and physical strength. She was wet, cold, tired, and had used almost all of her magical power—but despite this, she found herself descending through what she recognized as a type of illusion spell. She gathered what focus she could retain and tried to bring order to the spell. It moved at her grasp, although not from her magic. Her mind itself impinged upon the chaos within—chaos that she realized was some semblance of Blank’s mind.

Her hooves touched ground. Or what she forced the world to present to her as ground. The world around her was incorrect. Foggy and poorly rendered, like a broken screen or a faded page in a soggy book. From the context—and from a deeper inkling—she understood herself to be in a church. A church that, as time had passed, had become a vessel meant to hold not just religion but ponies as well. Or, rather, in both cases, to close out the void. It was meant to spread outward in the name of hope.

She took a step. Between the dull images of racks filled with parts and components she almost remembered, over systems buried beneath stones that she halfway understood. Approaching a device in the center of it all. She paused, staring at the interference—and realized that it stared back at her.

It was circular. Her mind conceived it as a compass, but it was far larger than the small tool she was used to. It was more like a dias, a huge table containing modules, wires and tubes. Centered around a single container. Forged from a single enriched diamond, a case—a case containing, linked to all the machines, forming their nexus, a single artifact. A black skull, integrated into the ship itself. Into its every system. To what end, Misty did not know—because Blank could no longer remember.

Blank herself stood before it. She wore the black clothing she had worn that day, the thin space-suit with its odd religious iconography and extended, robe-like frills. Like a cross between a spacemare and a monk, wearing a symbol of a world-tree holding six colored spheres.

She looked up. She was wearing the dark makeup she had worn that day, appropriate for her role in her society—but her form was broken. Devoid of her wings, or her horn, or even the knowledge that she had held neither. Her body was incorrect. It was pale and empty. This was the last memory it had retained. Of the black skull that now watched them both—and continued to watch. Beyond it, and beyond Misty’s vision, the same face—black, and smiling. Unseen due to an inconstancy.

Misty paid it no attention. She instead turned to Blank, who looked away. Her makeup had run. She was crying.

“I...can’t,” she said.

“Blank—”

“—was never my name.”

“I know. But you’re also wrong.” Misty looked around. “It wasn’t your name here. Was this...your home?”

“No. My ship. It was...my mission. To take...this. This. Retrieve...something. A path. That we lost so long ago...”

“Then this was the last place you were you. But the you you are...she didn’t exist yet.”

Blank paused, confused. “Misty, I...”

“I don’t know if you’ll ever get it back. Who you were. But you’re still here, aren’t you? I never knew you before. And I think we’re friends now. So...it’s not all lost. Right?”

“Friends. Even after I put you in danger.”

“We tried. And we saved my friends. Thank you.”

“I cannot use my technostruct. Not against...it. I don’t know why.”

Misty held out her hoof. “Do you want to figure that out together? Because I know we can. The both of us.”

“You do not trust me.”

“I don’t trust Opaline. And you probably shouldn’t either. But you seem pretty okay.”

Blank smiled, and took Misty’s hoof.

The pair of them immediately collapsed into Opaline’s pool.

“Gah!” cried Misty. “Now I’m even wetter!”

“I...am likewise dampened,” groaned Blank, trying to stand, only for her to falter and for Misty to support her. Blank, supported by Misty, turned to Opaline. “Empress. I have arrived to report.”

Opaline smiled. “Empress? I do like that. I like that a lot. That said, get out of my magic water, you’re dirtying it.” She pulled both of them out with magic. “Now. As I tried to explain to Misty, I did attempt some level of restorative magic. The worst kind, frankly. A disgusting, pointless school of thought. Really a waste of my time and precious magical energy, for which you both ought to be grateful.”

“So she’s healed?”

“Hardly,” said Opaline. “I made some changes, a few edits, moved some things around...but to put it briefly, her body is a mess. Like soup pretending to be a pony. I doubt it will remain stable for long.”

“Yes,” agreed Blank, putting her hoof to her chest as she stepped out of the water. “My awareness of such deepens. Likewise your repairs are acknowledge, and thanks from myself are presented.”

“You will thank me by explaining why neither of you have brought back my monster. I am very hungry. For magic, not gross monster meat. I have never once met a pony who appeared appetizing, let alone some manner of...thing.” She paused, considering if that was a lie.

“An error presented itself,” explained Blank. “The technostruct control implants ingrained upon my form represent aberrations. They are not...mine.” She paused. “This body may not be...mine.”

“You stole it? How devious. MISTY. Take notes. You should steal a body too.”

“But you just told me not to rob graves—”

“A living one, Misty. We’re evil, not ghouls. Generally.”

“That ship. In your memory,” said Misty, again ignoring Opaline. “Is it still...working?”

“Operational, no. Extant, probably. It impacted a rocky outcrop proximal to a city of the fluffy-winged.”

“Zephyr Heights!”

“Terrible place,” groaned Opaline. “Honestly. Nothing but tech giants and ‘influencers’, whatever that is. And that false queen is so much less attractive than me, the real queen. Of everything. Also I very much want to kick her stupid dog. Hard.”

“But what were you doing with the skull?” asked Misty.

Blank shook her head. “Not identified as such, at least so-remembered. Unsure. It is identified as...a prototype. I was...thus the pilot. Memory. A memory core.” She faced Opaline. “Dearest Empress, I have failed. My technostruct capacity is compromised. Thus, proposal of alternative: recapture my ship. Examination is required.”

“Why?”

“Behavior analysis.”

Misty paused, her eyes widening.

“She’s right,” she said, suddenly. “It was attracted to Sunny Starscout and her friends, but it didn’t attack them. It didn’t try to take their magic, or touch the Unity Gems, or even go after Sunny’s lantern—it just sort of chased them around and talked at them. What if it wasn’t even after them at all?”

“Then it’s clearly stupid," moanted Opaline. "Like you are. Because what does a boat in a mountain have to do with any of this?”

“Because what if it’s not after them, but the skull!”

“What skull?” asked Opaline.

“It’s a magical artifact that they found in the woods. That was apparently on Blank’s ship.”

“And you didn’t think to tell me about this until now!? MISTY. Magical artifacts are my thing. They’re really the only thing that makes me happy apart from brushy-brushy time. And when you cry. I don’t care what you have to do. Get it to me. Whatever it is. Then figure out a way to also get me my monster. Ideally after it eats at least two of Sunny Starscout’s stupid, smelly friends.”

“But they...don’t smell.”

Opaline leaned forward. “That sounds like something a smelly pony would say, doesn’t it?"

“It...” Misty’s eyes widened. “It does.”

“Abusing Misty is not productive,” snapped Blank. “Furthermore, I deem her contributions to be adequate for my purposes.”

“Of course she’s adequate. That’s why I keep her around. But if she would just try, she could be even better than adequate. As such, I’m putting you in charge of making sure she does something useful.”

“She requires rest.”

“Not with you she doesn’t. You can stay in the East Wing. Next to the spider room. Do try to avoid listening to their whispering. That always ends poorly for everypony involved.”

“This is acknowledged,” replied Blank, bowing before departing.

Opaline was left alone with Misty.

“Just...do better, Misty,” sighed Opaline, turning away to walk to her throne. “This is all so unorthodox. I don’t like being in a situation where I’m not the one making the plans. And I can’t leave the castle to help you.”

“You...would help me?”

Opaline sighed. “I would like to go on a magical adventure myself.” She sat down on the throne. “But the best I can do is offer reconnaissance from here. This isn’t a matter of stealing baby dragons or perturbing Sunny Starscout. This is high-level minion work.” She sighed. “And to be honest, that other one creeps me out.”

“Oh,” said Misty. “Wow. It’s just that?”

“What, Misty? Spit it out already.”

“You’ve never really said anything nice to me like that.”

Opaline groaned and rolled her eyes. “Misty, everything I say to you is nice. You’re just too much of a simpleton to realize that I—and only I—really do mean the best for you. Now go to sleep. Or whatever it is you teenagers do in bed.”

Misty nodded, bowing, before limping her way upstairs. She doubted the situation would improve much—but she was at least mildly content that it was progressing. To where, though, she had no idea.

Author's Note

I really do enjoy writing this version of Opaline. She is a mixture of constantly mean, but terrified of her own encroaching senility.

That said, this is roughly the point where the focus of the story begins to shift. Rather than coming to a conclusion to the stated world, I instead shifted it 180 degrees. Whether this works, I am still unsure.