Mirror: Book I - Mind

Black leaves and shadowy vines whipped by like razors in the wind, it was all the same as before. The boy pumped his legs and barreled through what slivers and openings he could find, searching for his companion with fervent, open senses, his alertness level cranked past nine.

Any sign of the light was a good sign, he told himself over and over, and in this very moment the unicorn left in the woods could very well be searching for her companion, just as he was for her now. David was confident the pony was still alive. She was Starlight Glimmer, prized student and profound sorceress, what part about her wasn’t capable of surviving the unknown terrors of the Everfree?

In the midst of an opening he came to a screeching halt, and a familiar sticky substance matted his feet once more, part of the red liquid staining his new bandage. The blood and rabbit carcass told him he was right back from where he left off, and with that the woods fell deathly quiet once again. This, he came to understand, was the den. Whatever this beast was and wherever it had came from, it had quickly acclimated itself to this distant, mysterious world. The darkness was its haven, the sinister aura it beheld its home.

And with that, the stench returned. It attacked the boy’s nostrils with ten times the effort from before, threatening to choke his breath, almost causing him to gag from the smell alone.

With great effort he blinked the tears away and wiped his eyes clean, and the boy knew what to do. He stood his ground, planted both feet firmly to the earth and opened his senses to the world around him. Predators like targets, and targets run. He told himself. Do not run.

Predators loved backs, because that is where the eyes were not. When a predator was faced with eyes, it almost always recognized it as a challenge, and only some would face such challenges. Sometimes, they were just looking to pick a fight. Other times, it depended upon how hungry they were. All in all, regardless of their own strength and size, predators always chose the easiest of their prey. Do not become the path of least resistance. David told himself.

He stood there then for a seemingly endless sum of seconds, the ill presence drawing nearer and the stench growing stronger. His heart beat in rhythm with the increasing steps of the monster hidden beneath the shadow. Breath quickening, legs trembling and pupils dancing wildly. Had he made a mistake? Was this the way he would finally go? Was this the bargain that would set him free?

From a great distance a wandering, lime-green light could be seen dancing about the trees and drawing in quickly and closely. The presence of the predator faded just as quickly, the pounding of hooves against the dirt could be heard, and a new figure shot out of the brush and leapt over the boy with tremendous effort. The character in question skidded to a halt on the other side of the human, two bright, green lanterns hanging on either side of her saddle. She turned and delivered a knowing grin.

“Greetings, rafiki.” She clicked her tongue. “You are the bipedal in need, I see.”

David stared on in disbelief. Come dragon, pony, unicorn or pegasus, he realized he had yet to see them all. The rescuer in question wore five rings around her neck, coiled from collar to jaw. Her left front hoof mimicked the gold about her neck, her earrings of the same ilk, and the black and white trade of stripes all about her body told the boy that this was no pony, but undoubtedly a zebra.

“Swahibu mimi, mwema wewe?” She jabbered.

Jaw agape, still staring, he uttered no response.

“Have you no words to say? You still bear a voice, I pray.”

“So you do rhyme after all.” The boy breathed.

“Indeed, I do.” She approached him calmly and turned to unlatch one of the lanterns from her side, its bright, iridescent glow enveloping the two whole. “And this, I give to you.”

“Why, thank-”

“But before I lay it into your sticky paws, might I say how foolish you are, to return without a worthy cause?”

And he was shut up once more without a word to return.

“Your friend, Miss Glimmer, has searched for you all about. It seems that only you had carried a shadow of a doubt.” The zebra went on. “The beasts of the Everfree shun away to the light, especially the one that has kept you in its sight. Keep this lantern by your side, unless you wish to greet your demise.”

Taking the lantern into his grasp, the boy held it to his eyes and studied the features within. Large, transparent lenses resembling an insect’s abdomen were lodged into several slots cut out from a hollowed out oak branch, housing several small firefly’s within. Deep inside there could be seen a multitude of plants and other, smaller insects, providing for an entire ecosystem held inside. “Cool…” The boy shook the lantern like a dollar store toy, to which the zebra simply rested a hoof over his arm and slowly shook her head.

Only seconds later did another light come upon the scene, the familiar cyan glow sending waves of relief through them both, and David’s barrel was immediately strangled by a pair of lilac hooves.

“I thought I’d find your corpse out here, you slippery little bastard!” Starlight nuzzled his stomach.

“Good to see you too…” David chocked the words, patting the mare’s head.

“Don’t you ever do that again.” The unicorn finally broke free, allowing her partner some room to breathe. Starlight turned to the zebra and delivered one gratuitous bow of her head after another. “Thank you, Zecora. I don’t think we would’ve found him in time without you.”

“Zecora, huh?” David tapped his chin, a familiar glint in his eyes.

“She’s the zebra who lives here in the Everfree.” Starlight explained. “You won’t find a single pony who knows their herbs any better. Isn’t that right?”

“Indeed, the realm of greenery is where I exceed. But enough of me.” Zecora digressed. “It is within my upmost concern that I ask thee, what has impelled you to embark on this perilous journey?”

The boy and the unicorn shared respective glances of uncertainty before finally settling upon giving a truthful answer, and with that the mare cleared her throat. “Well, our friend here isn’t from Equestria, as you can clearly tell, but we’re going to find out why.”

“We’re headed to the ruins. Y’know, the old castle here in the Everfree?” David searched. “You think you might be able to tell us where to go?”

A confident grin crossed the zebra’s lips. “Though the forest may be a maze, your answers do not lie afar.” She waved a hoof above her head, pointing to the skies. “You need only follow the brightest star, and soon in the ruins, there you are.”

“So, could you say that again but without sounding like an underground railroad riddle?”

“Just head south.” Zecora groaned. “Trout-mouth…”

“What?” David blinked irritably.

“I think she means follow the river.” Starlight exaggerated a laugh, pushing the boy ahead. “Thanks again, Zecora. I’ll be sure to visit you sometime soon!”

With a ha-rumph and a whip of her tail the zebra left, finding no more rhymes to express her distress. David clutched the lantern in his hand and held it in front of his torso, illuminating the forest around them at a vast range, so much so that the trees a good twenty yards away could be seen clear as day. He nodded to his pony friend with newfound confidence and trailed on into the night, Starlight providing her own light in tow. The two looked up, and found their mark in the sky, following the brightest star as it named their path to the ancient Castle of the Royal Sisters.

A forest of faces, a roaring river, and one rickety old bridge later, the front portals of the ancient ruins stood idly before the two in a foggy, mysterious moonlit light.

Streaks of white fell upon the rickety, wooden doors, threatening to fall apart at any moment. Vines crawled up the stone-gray sides and channeled their way into the castle, a network of greenery lying within every crack, nook and crevice. A calm, quiet breeze blew by. David looked to Starlight, and Starlight to David. The two nodded to each other ceremoniously, and pushed their way past the doors.

A great, broken chunk of the ceiling laid in the center of the main hall, a forgotten testimony to the short lived battle that had taken place only weeks ago. The snarls of the timber wolves and the sound of an Alicorn casting beams echoed upon the boy’s ears, all quelled by his feeble, helpless cries. Though it felt strange, he regarded the setting as many would an old monument or a memorial to one of the many, many wars. This castle was, after all, an ancient site to the ponies of Equestria. David glanced to his friend with a sliver of wonder. Then, something metallic collided with his foot. He looked down, and in the dust found his helmet, and his spear.

Starlight took her glances to the torches and décor of days of old, quietly regarding the amount of dedication and time it took to pull off such feats of architecture even with a means of sorcery, of which she was undoubtedly familiar with. Her eyes traveled to the human, whom was currently attempting to blow the dust off of an old, pony-guard helm, and fix the metal casing onto his head. The mare quietly chuckled to herself before approaching him and nudging his side.

“C’mon, Prancelot.” Starlight trotted ahead. “We’re not here to play dress-up.”

David rested the helm to the boulder, kept the spear, and walked along with her.

Books erupted from the ground up in staggering heights and intimidating lengths, threatening to put even the greatest libraries combined to shame. Starlight gazed upon the rows of tomes like a child gawking in the toy isle, and her friend towing behind might as well have been the child who rather wished he were in that toy isle at this very moment. The sight alone nonetheless stole a wonder-filled glance or two from the boy as he reminisced on his first time wandering these ruins. He had all the time in the world now to search each and every book he desired, the white crescent in the sky above delivering tell that there was still a moment to spare in the halls of knowledge. It was irredeemably one of Starlight’s havens.

“It’s like one of Twilight’s wet dreams.” Starlight joked. “Or dust dreams. Get it?” And busied herself by cackling at her own joke, stumbling in front of a nearby torch stand. The long, metal rod tipped and slammed against the bookshelf, bringing a supply of old, worn out pages along with it. The binding tore away like thin, wet straw wrapping, the covers flaked away in the non-existent breeze. Even the words themselves were using canes and walkers.

“Something tells me finding our answers is gonna take a bit of…renovation.” Starlight deemed.

“I don’t think any of these books will give us what we’re looking for.” David surmised. “But, it never hurts to look. Knock yourself out.”

“What were you going to do?”

“Well, I did say I was going home…”

The dark, shaded halls of the forgotten castle revealed nothing particularly new on his return trip. As the pony stayed behind to thoroughly search the athenaeum, David marched alone among the frayed banners and rusted suits of armor, reaching into the far recencies of his mind to attempt a bread-crumb trail back to the place where he had started. Back to where it all began.

Some had called their beginning a home, others had called it the day they were born, a fond memory, or simply passing beneath an arch or doorway to the beginning steps of a simple story. In this world, David called it a cold, dark room. Forgotten to people, forgotten to history, forgotten to time. A hopeless beginning bared only a hopeless end. Bringing his lantern down a lightless corridor and to the foot of a cracked, wooden door, he pressed his palm upon its surface and ventured to find the pieces left behind.

The door slowly creaked open. Twilight lifted her tired, heavy head from her desk with a quick jolt. Her eyes were wet and bleary from the run of tears, and her muzzle stuffed to the point of obnoxious, drizzling sniffles. She blinked and pinched her sockets between her hooves, shaking away the haziness to get a better register of her surroundings. Tomes and scrolls lay strewn across the desk’s surface, ink splotched and scribbled in several spaces as though done hastily and with unkempt irks of emotion. Her chambers were the same as ever, crystal blue walls and velvet curtains hovered in a dim, gloomy orange provided by the single candle set beside her paperwork. The pages below were stained wet with only what Twilight could imagine, drool and sorrows. Her expression fell to a low, depressing gloom, and her eyes danced aimlessly about the sorry state of her desk.

Another spell…failed. She thought to herself.

Her horn flared alive and the magic brushed against the knob of the left drawer. Searching its contents, she set aside a stack of notebooks and a bundle of parchments, hiding the single item stored at the bottom of the drawer. A single, blue, pill-shaped object hovered in her field. The Princess regarded it carefully, eyeing the small glass of water at her bedside table.

“Twilight?”

The mare jolted again, and her sights spun around to the door. There he was, her dragon, her friend, her number one assistant. Spike stood hesitantly at the open door, one claw on the knob while the other held a freshly lit candle. The pony could clearly see the unnerved look in the little dragon’s eyes as the candle flame danced between the stark black and pulsing green of his gaze. Pupils slit, staring upon the blue pill in sight.

“What is that?” He asked cautiously.

“Nothing, Spike…” Twilight quietly placed the pill back inside the drawer. “It’s nothing.” And closed it shut with her wing.

The dragon clenched his jaw and took a heavy step forward, placing the candle tray onto a nearby dresser while making his way towards Twilight’s desk. The Alicorn did not let him get far.

“What are you doing up at this hour?” She asked, a bit more sternly than she would have liked.

“You’ve been up all night.” Spike locked eyes with her. “I brought you candles but you never said a word.”

The mare’s eyes wandered away. Had she really been so absorbed in her work?

“Please, Twilight, don’t be a stranger to me.” His slitted sights grew larger, glossing over in the candle’s low light. “Just tell me what’s going on.”

“I’m sorry, Spike, you’re…” Twilight’s eyes glazed over his figure. “You’re just too young to understand. You should go back to bed now, get some rest.”

“And if I were old enough,” the dragon looked down, shaking his clenched claws. “Would that mean you wouldn’t need me anymore?”

Her ears dropped, her wings fell, and the expression she delivered to her number one assistant was that of fear.

Books laid strewn across the cracked, stone floor in heaps of undisturbed dust, save for the markings left behind by the boy himself. The lantern had provided all the illumination that was needed, and unto him the mysterious contents of the cold, dark room were revealed one article after the other. For one reason or another, his mind was drawn to providing a sense of tidiness about the place in tandem with his desire to search for answers, whatever shape or form they might take. It was clear to David then that despite his hopes, answers of any kind would not come so easily no matter how hard or diligently he searched. He wondered then if the trip was even worth it. It was, in his eyes, a step forward, even though it had brought him right back to where he had started. Right back to where it had all began.

There lied a podium in the center of the room, fit upon a fine carpet surrounded by luxurious pillows and lounging couches of old, yet torn and tattered to time’s tampering. Stain glass windows and shelves of the previously mentioned tomes lined the walls, circling in a rotundus shape back to the door, and eventually to a peculiar piece the boy had not noticed until now. It was a mirror, oval in shape, several cracks branching out from the torso and upwards where the broken pieces fell below, exempting the viewer’s face. There was a presence about this mirror, something the boy could not quite place, though he felt he should know just what it was. Where his heart lay in the reflection, was the space where the mirror had been damaged the most.

“Never. I would never trade you away.” Twilight pleaded with her young dragon. “I would never leave you.”

“Then why don’t you talk to me anymore?” Spike stroked at her coat aimlessly. “Why don’t you listen to me?”

“I-I do, it’s just…” Her words fell away.

“It’s because you’re a Princess, isn’t it?” The dragon sniffed. “I get it now, you don’t have time for me anymore, you don’t have time for anypony.”

“That’s not true.”

“Then show me what you’re hiding.” Spike rubbed his eyes, looking up at the pony. “Show me what’s in that drawer.”

The contents had long been spilled, the secrets already unveiled. Twilight stared helplessly down at the little reptile knowing now that any further notions of protest were simply a means of denial and pushing her youngest yet oldest friend further and further away. Then again, wouldn’t this matter estrange him as well? It was the dueling weights of both decisions that made the mare fear upon either outcome, a matter of picking her poison at her very hooves, and this time the door was locked. The young, energy drained Alicorn let forth a long, weary sigh, looked pleadingly into her dragon’s eyes once more, and slowly opened up the drawer.

The sound of hooves stumbling down the long, dark corridors clicked the boy back to reality, and he lifted his head to turn to the door in wonder of his companion’s whereabouts. He took the cautionary time to equip his lantern and slowly edge his way over to the door, creaking the old portal apart and looking down one path and the other in search of the mysterious sound. From his blind side a bright white and blue flash of light splashed against the dimly illuminated walls, the sound of a magical phenomenon pounding against the stone.

The boy turned quickly to the source and stared on carefully, lantern bright and close to his side. The hall was only a dead end, and all that remained was the smell of soot and an outlining of ash on the cold, cobbled floor.

“Ye olde Incantations.” Starlight scoffed, rolling her eyes in boredom. “I guess even back in the day these old scripts were a millennium too late.”

The hollowed reverberations of the forgotten palace and the weight of Starlight’s mumbling monologue were all that bounced off the old walls of the aged library. She trotted through the lengthy corridors at a steady pace scanning over one book title after another. The search for answers had at this point become reminiscent of a window shopping spree for a mare who didn’t even have a bit on her to spend. In all honesty, Starlight wasn’t quite sure what she was looking for anymore, and was fairly confident that neither did her bipedal friend, wandering somewhere else in the castle, had any clue what he was searching for either. Leafing through at least a dozen books had surprisingly taken a toll on her mental fatigue, the moss growing on the walls becoming far more interesting at this point in her research.

“Who knows?” Starlight snickered to herself. “Maybe the answer was hidden between the moss and the cracks all along?” And came to an abrupt halt, eyeing her surroundings cautiously. “Or, maybe I should stop talking to myself? I mean, it’s not like anypony could be listening to me right now-” She jolted at the sound of pebbles rolling down a broken wall, and whipped her head in frustration. “Get it together, Starlight, you’re a grown mare for crying out loud! And this grown mare just agreed only moments ago to go on some crazy expedition with a two-legged alien from outer space.” She giggled with herself nervously, pacing back and forth. “Honestly, what were we thinking?! It’s not like if we just look between the cracks, woe and behold, there the answer-”

The unicorn stopped at another dead halt, reversing her steps to peer down the shelf she had just passed. Amongst the rows of tattered, dust ridden and dirtied book covers, one bedazzled her eyes so and stood among the rest. “There the answer…lies?” She finished, and with a new surge of curiosity, levitated the fine and finished book from the shelf above.

The make of the tome was that of hard cover, hard leather, with a deep burgundy finish. There were no words on the spine, nor the front or back, only an oddly shaped, golden symbol in the top right corner. A chalice harboring a grape vine and laurel leaves. Carefully and quietly, Starlight flipped the cover aside and opened to the first page. The strange symbols and markings were all but alien to her. Headers, sections and paragraphs appeared to be divided unevenly, yet organized in their way of telling, nearly each and every sentence or line of dialogue holding a strange marker or placer of some sort. Naturally, the pony’s mind referred to that of an instruction book, a tome of direction, one that might after all contain answers. It wasn’t until one phrase in particular stood out to her, a name to be precise, and that was her companion’s name.

David. She read, wide-eyed and wondering. What is this…?

It was the one and only scribble in the book that she could recognize, the one and only word she knew she had seen written before. When the boy had signed his name onto the Royal Equerry forms, he had written it in his language. Why then, of all places, would the name appear again here?!

Suddenly, Starlight snapped the book shut and tucked it back into the corner whence she found it. A nearby magical surge had almost instinctively impelled her to go on the defensive, and thus she dropped all her thought and carefully scanned the environment before her. Her ears perked in the direction of a darkened corridor, and out of the corner of her eye that familiar, two-legged figure walked into the light.

“Easy, now.” David approached, raising both palms. “No one’s taking them from you.”

“Was that you?” She asked fervently.

“Yes, I am me.”

“No, I meant-” Starlight reconsidered, remembering the boy’s vulnerability to the arcane. She assumed a sideways glance to the shaded hallways. “We might not be alone here.”

David’s gaze shrunk with alert and his spear was hoisted to both hands, taking on a defensive stance as he turned about and surveyed the area with a deeply exaggerated combat protocol gig. Starlight watched the boy go on for a moment before stifling a fit of laughter. The boy’s head perked over in annoyance.

“What?” He raised both arms.

“For a local from a whole other planet you sure do get worked up over the slightest of things.” She chortled on.

“I think the presence of a potential intruder is plenty reason to get worked up.” He gripped his spear again.

“Relax, this place was abandoned ages ago.” Starlight kicked the dust about and surveyed the decay of the castle. “If anything, anypony who dares come here is but a simple visitor of intrigue.”

“So then, we only came here for shits and giggles?” His arms dropped. “That’s it?”

Starlight tilted her head left and right, pursing her lips. “Pretty much.” She shrugged. “Disappointed?”

“Why should I be?” The boy sighed and leveled his spear down upon the nearby table, crouching low to seat himself before the old, pony-sized furniture. “I suppose you could say it’s exactly what I expected. After all, I do tend to disappoint myself.”

“What do you mean?”

“Would you believe me if I said this isn’t the first time this has happened?” He asked her.

Starlight looked on at the boy with a hint of interest, drawing closer.

“Not in this setting, of course.” He eyed the walls.

“We all have our stories to tell.” Starlight provided, sitting opposite of him. “I don’t think you would have survived those woods if it weren’t for a bit of experience prior, am I wrong?”

“No, you’re not.” David obliged, eyeing the walls once more and taking a deep breath. “You remember what I said at the lake? All of that ranting and self-scrutinizing, deep down I know I didn’t truly mean what I said, but at the same time it’s the truth. Only the most honest and down-to-earth confessions could be that long and brutal, not even any of the local priests would ever hear something like that.”

“Priests?” The mare inquired.

David chuckled and shook his head. “It was just a part of my growing up. Back on Earth, I mean.” He explained further. “Whenever we did something we weren’t supposed to, priests were the ones who would hear out our sins when we confessed them.”

“Something you weren’t supposed to do?” The mare mimicked, cocking her head. “You mean to tell me you committed a crime?”

“Well, no. I mean, it could have been a crime. Mostly it was considered something that went against mannerisms or just being a dick to your fellow man.” David nodded nonchalantly. “We would call these acts sins, and these sins would supposedly taint our souls, hence for the need of confession.”

“I don’t get it, your planet is weird.” Starlight’s face scrunched with irritation. “Either that, or you’re just leaving out a lot of key details.”

“I suppose I am, it’s a little hard to explain.” He slowly rubbed his hands together, as though pondering and preparing for a lengthy elaboration. “You see, back on my planet there’s a number of belief systems that people would call religion, and they would follow these religions for whatever reasons might have impelled them to do so. Sometimes people were given a choice, others were…not so fortunate.”

“And where did you land?”

“On the fence, I suppose.” His hands rested to the table’s surface, fingers interlocked. “I was raised what they call Catholic, along with my family. Our practices were…derived so to speak.”

“What was the purpose of this system?” Starlight prodded. “You said it was a belief, over what?”

“Hope, I guess.” The boy appeared unsure, shoulders shrugged. “Hope that maybe one day if we kept true to our word and remained as good people then the veil of death would never overcome us. Of course, this is only what I was told, and we’re talking about hundreds if not thousands of years of reiterations. What people believed back then is almost alien to what they believe now.”

“But they were beliefs nonetheless, right?” The pony surmised. “Why would this belief system you speak of have any say in what an individual on your planet might have truly believed, regardless of the times?”

“Like I said about choices, some people were given the time to decide while others were forced into these ways, whether it be by society, the government, or even their own parents. Sometimes even, regardless of what their superiors might have ordered, the sheer amount of emotion alone that some religions would provoke would be enough to draw them in.”

“Alright, so what’re you hiding here?” She side-eyed him.

“I’m sorry?”

“You’ve spoken enough about the followers of these systems being wrangled up for the sole purpose of being a member of such a belief, like it’s some marketing tactic trying to rack up some numbers, but something tells me that was never the original intention here.”

“No, it wasn’t.” He nodded knowingly. “You’re onto something.”

“Does that mean you’re just going to keep me in suspense?”

“If I knew the answer then I wouldn’t, but that’s just it.” He started again. “As I said before, the way people practice their faith now is completely different from the way they did it hundreds of thousands of years ago. In the mess of all these miscommunications and mistranslations, we may never know what the founding followers’ true intentions were.” He paused for a moment before given a silent chuckle. “I suppose that’s what it means to have faith?”

Starlight quietly folded her hooves and looked down at the hard wood of the table, blinking blearily as a wave of memories coursed their way through her mind. She recalled weeks ago where she beheld her conversation with Spike in the library, and what she had said. They’ll only accept what they feel is right or wrong, she reminisced. Even if you know the truth, who’s going to believe you? There were however, as Starlight knew, ways that a pony could influence their system of beliefs so that others might believe such things as well. Not out of emotion, not out of some primal instinct of fear, but to uphold such beliefs to such an extreme that they might as well have been ready to die for it. The unicorn quickly blinked her thoughts away, reassessed her surroundings, and stared back up at David.

“And you said you grew up like this?” She asked subtly. “Your parents, did they ever y’know…?”

“My dad was pretty adamant on raising our family the way the church wanted us to. So, when I hit that rebellious phase and decided to go my own way…oh boy.” He took a pause. “It wasn’t the angriest I’d ever seen him, but it was the longest, most tiring talk of my life. He barely even let me get a single word out.” There was another pause, longer than the last. Starlight’s eyes remained intently on the boy’s face as he peered down at his hands in thought, and finally began to speak again. “I find it kind of funny, a little strange really, I had a sibling before me who was already well on the other side of the fence. When it was my turn I was confused as to why my dad was acting up so much. Hadn’t he been there before? He wasn’t even that angry afterward, it was like when he lost me…he was just heartbroken.”

Suddenly, his face fell forward and his eyes darkened, the pony now unable to look him in the eye and read his emotions, and she felt that the boy hid his face for good reason. “My mother was so upset with me…” He mumbled on. “Hey, you think that…?”

Silence reigned over, the unicorn waited patiently.

“No, never mind.” He muttered back, sank into his seat and lifted his head.

Although he did not look at Starlight, the mare could feel the swelling of his emotions beginning to die down and settle where they perhaps should have been dealt with. A solemn gaze overtook the ponies eyes as she shared the sights with her friend looking over the old castle’s interior, and soon enough the words couldn’t be held back any longer.

“I always wanted to impress my dad.” Starlight admitted, taking a breath. “I thought that maybe if I could be the first one in my class to get my cutie mark, maybe then I could show him my worth, maybe then he would respect me. But, well…I guess things didn’t quite turn out like that.”

“Life always has other plans.” David shrugged numbly.

“I just never thought it would bring me here, but that’s only because I finally decided to accept the help when it was hoofed to me on a silver platter.” Starlight heaved a sigh, her eyes rather disappointed. “Twilight and her friends, we never always got along with each other. In fact, we hated each other. I hated her.”

David sat up, leaning intently. “What happened?”

“So many things…” Starlight’s eyes wandered towards the massive gap in the ceiling, her sights spanning across the hundreds of thousands of speckled, white dots glimmering upon the black-blue sky. Her thoughts swirled and bubbled into reality like a paint splattered onto a canvas, and little by little she painted the picture of her life. A memoir and testimony to her tales in Equestria.

A bright, happy, lilac little filly with pigtails trotted her way up the green, grassy hill and overlooked her home, all a simple village in the valley. It wasn’t a bumbling maze of shacks on the country side, nor a den of huts hidden away in the woods. It was the right kind of town for the right kind of people, and these people were the ponies of Sire’s Hollow.

The little, lilac unicorn peered down the path and looked upon her favorite tree, and beneath this tree sat a lone, unicorn boy. His hues were bright orange, his mane a dirty, rusty red, and the milky white of his fetlocks always gave the lilac unicorn a warm, swell feeling within. She bounded down the path, and her friend immediately perked up to her presence. They embraced, played together, learned together, laughed together, loved…like a pair of inseparable siblings. There they laid side by side upon the same grassy hill, the brilliant blue sky above housed little to no clouds, and the sun shone brightly with warmth, mirth and a little bit of hope. The little filly looked to her friend, and the colt was fast asleep. She began to pick flowers, laying them in his mane, and then she stopped. She looked upon the unicorn, and saw the most beautiful person she could ever know, a true true friend. She dropped a flower, and the petals were sucked into the colt’s lungs. He sputtered and jolted awake, coughing up the floral bits and looked to his friend in wonder. The filly flared her horn and fixed the little colt’s glasses, and soon enough the two laughed together.

The lilac unicorn trotted home with a happy, more than content look upon her face. Then, the sound of glass smashing and ponies yelling filled her ears. Though she felt afraid to go inside, the filly bravely pushed past her front door and trotted into the kitchen moments after. Her mother sat upon the floor scooping up bits to a broken platter, and her father stood watching, staring. The old stallion turned with a cold, dead eye at his daughter, and that happy look about the unicorn’s face was long gone. He peeked down at his daughter’s flank. Still no cutie mark. Despite her mother’s pleas, the child was given very little to eat that night.

The next morning everything was but a hazy, unfiltered blur. Her dear friend had talked on and on about traveling all the way to the capitol to enroll in a school for unicorns. One day he would attend and become a fine apprentice, he would study the arcane and roam all of Equestria through field trips and expeditions. He too would become an important and powerful wizard, he too would one day achieve the likes of the fabled Starswirl the Bearded. She prayed that day would never come. Slowly, the days went on with cloudy, sunless skies, and the nights brought nothing but strife and turmoil. Her father had told her again and again that there was nothing more important in life than earning one’s cutie mark. It is what ponykind had always strived for, fought for, and lived for. Every night she came home without a cutie mark, a punishment was always in line, whether it be a lack of meals or a stern talking to. Every night more the little filly resented her own father, and wished violent and sickening things upon him as she lay in bed, sobbing softly into her pillow.

It was bright and sunny as could be that day, and the filly feared she knew why. There was not a child to be seen within that house, not a friend to call nor a little unicorn boy to find beneath her favorite tree. She sat beneath the shade, having nothing better to do but look solemnly at the ground. She knew he had gone now, to move on with his life and achieve his dreams, and in the midst of it all he hadn’t even realized that he had left his one and only friend behind. Everypony else had reveled in the warmth and happiness of that day, all except for Starlight Glimmer. That day, her warmth, her happiness and her light, had been taken away… One day, she vowed. I will make them all see the light.

“So you see, Spike, all these really do for me is to help calm my nerves whenever I’m feeling stressed or anxious.” Twilight explained to her little dragon. “I’m not sick and I’m not dying. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

Spike’s thought process seemed to take him a hundred different places at once as his eyes hovered over the strange packaging with uncertainty. “I still don’t understand.” He mumbled. “If you’re always that stressed then why not talk to Fluttershy, or Rarity, or Applejack? They’re your friends. You know they’d be willing to listen to your problems.”

“I wish it were that easy, but you’ve got to remember that just like how I have my responsibilities to look after, so do they.” Twilight calculated in her head. “Rainbow Dash is a Wonderbolt now, Fluttershy has all of her woodland creatures to look after, Rarity has three different shops across Equestria to manage, Applejack will always be tending to her orchard, and Pinkie Pie…well, no promises on that one, I guess. But you understand what I’m saying, don’t you?”

“Are you saying…” Spike paused, looking up at the pony. “Are you saying you don’t want to spend time with them anymore?”

“That’s not true.” Twilight almost felt a migraine coming on. “I would never abandon them, you know that.”

“Then if that’s true, why don’t you see them more often like we always used to? Don’t you remember the good old days?”

“The ‘good old days’…” She shook her head. “It hasn’t been that long, has it?”

“No, it hasn’t, but everything has changed so much in so little time and now they all feel so far away.” Spike began to curl in on himself, clutching his tail and gripping it tightly. “I miss those days, Twilight. I miss the old library. I miss the smell of all those books, even if they did smell like, well, dusty old books.” The dragon chuckled softly. “It’s kinda funny now, that I miss the things I liked the least, isn’t it?”

“Oh, Spike…” Twilight cooed and curled the dragon up in her wings. “I miss those days, too. They were fun while they lasted, but we can’t just hold on to the past.”

“Yeah, the past…” Spike repeated, yawning loudly and stretching his limbs. “If only there were some way…to bring the past back to here…” He shuffled and turned over in the Alicorn’s wings, bending his tail up to his belly and holding on to it, his fangs hovering over the end as though threatening to suck on it like a pacifier.

Twilight’s gaze fell upon her number one assistant as she struggled to suppress her tears and admiration of just how adorable this dragon could be, despite how much he had grown. His scales were still just as soft, and the green glow of his spines as young and bright as ever. Spike was still a child, and Twilight undoubtedly considered herself his mother. She carefully levitated the prescription packaging back over to her study and turned to her bed, lifting the covers and laying the dragon down upon the sheets. She fixed the blanket with her magic and draped the warm, fuzzy cover over the slumbering little lizard, his breath as calm, content, and steady as ever. With a heartfelt calling Twilight leaned in closer and planted a warm, subtle kiss upon the dragon’s forehead.

Minutes, hours, even days felt like they were passing by as the lone Alicorn slowly wandered the halls of her very own castle. The echo, as she had come to call it, had returned in full. Slowly, day by day it gnawed at the void in her heart and shuddered her soul, filling her sights and her mind with nothing but a soundless, sightless, hopeless future.

She took one look upon David’s door, hesitated to lift her hoof, but slowly turned and walked further down the hall. To the foot of the main chamber she came upon, the map room as they had called it. The hanging roots of Golden Oaks Library seemed the bleakest and dullest they had ever been since her settlement in the castle. Each and every orb of memory that hung from the branches twinkled and sparkled with fleeting signs of hope. One orb in particular housed an old yet simple picture, one of her and her friends. Before she had become an Alicorn, before everything had changed. It was only when the tears threatened to well up in her eyes again that Twilight realized deep down, she missed the old days.

She missed those days more than anything.