In a small town in a small country on a small planet known as Earth, the sun was setting. The warm orange glow of the sky fell over the buildings below, draping the rooftops with a patchwork of amber shades and causing the streetlights to cast long shadows on the roads. In parks, pavements, playgrounds and back gardens, friends and families gathered together, each one trying to make the most of every second of daylight.
Not every resident had been lured outside by the evening sun though. Hidden away in a house on the edge of town, a seventeen year old girl sat huddled alone at her kitchen table, nursing a mug of hot chocolate. Her face was partially obscured by her brown hair, which stretched back into long shoulder length tresses and fell forwards into a long wavy fringe, but her blue eyes, and the sadness contained within them, remained visible.
The sunlight shone through the back window, trying to tempt her outside, but the girl wasn’t interested. Instead, she took a deep breath, inhaling the comforting smell of cocoa before slumping back into the chair. This time something stronger would be needed to cheer her up.
Almost instinctively, her hand moved to the locket draped around her neck. She didn’t grab it though, instead simply pushing it around before letting it fall between her fingers. As she took a sip from her drink, the girl tried to sort out the chaotic thoughts erupting in her head. It had gone so well at the beginning - she’d been so careful - and then…
She heard the keys in the front door lock, but didn’t move from the table, remaining perfectly still as footsteps entered the house and made their way towards through the hallway, accompanied by a male voice.
“Dawn? You here?”
The girl sighed. “I’m here, Dad.”
“Excellent.” She heard a bump in the hallway as her father dropped his bag. “Sorry I’m so late - traffic in the city was terrible. Let me just get in the door and I’ll get started on dinner.”
Dawn murmured an vague acknowledgement, before taking another gulp from her drink and slumping forward onto the table. It wasn’t that she didn’t love her dad, it was just that right now, when she was feeling miserable and confused and worried, she just wanted to imagine a situation where it had all gone perfectly, everything had worked out, and she hadn’t messed up by being a complete-
“Bad day, huh?”
Dawn jerked upwards in shock, almost spilling her drink. Looking upwards, she saw her father standing on the other side of the table. Despite his considerable height, the lack of muscle and his unkempt black hair meant he looked rather unimposing, a fact emphasised by his ill fitting shirt and trousers, and by the cheap name badge around his neck. Dawn however, immediately recognised the look of worry on his face, and inwardly cringed.
Slowly, he sat down in the chair opposite. “Want to talk about it?”
Dawn shuffled backwards. “It’s nothing Dad, really.”
He raised an eyebrow, and her resistance faltered. “I… screwed up again, Dad.”
Her father shifted slightly, but remained silent as Dawn continued, rambling slightly as her resolve began to give way. “I met this girl on the way back home. She said her name was Rani, and she’d just moved into the neighbourhood and was a little bit lost, so she asked me if I knew the way back to her house, and I said I was going in that direction, so she said we should probably stick together then, and I said OK, and…”
Dawn came to a halt as she ran out of air. She looked back at her father, waiting patiently for her to continue, and despite everything she felt just a little bit calmer. After a few deep breaths, she began to speak again.
“She asked me what it was like living here, so I told her that I lived near the forest and she seemed really interested - there hadn’t really been anything like that where she lived before. Then she was talking about moving and how weird it was trying to make new friends, and I said I kinda knew what she meant. Then we got to her house, and I was about to head home, but she stopped me and said that her parents were planning to invite the neighbours round for a housewarming once everything was unpacked, and since I lived nearby I should come along as her friend, and I…”
She was struggling to go on, and when she spoke again her voice quivered with emotion. “I wanted to say yes, Dad. I really did, but … I…”
Her father reached out and clasped her hands, which were still clutching the mug of hot chocolate. Dawn didn’t want to cry, but she couldn’t stop her eyes from watering up completely. For a few moments, father and daughter sat together in silence, until Dawn found her voice again.
“I know I have to be braver, Dad,” she began, still sniffling. “I want to make friends and go to parties and meet people - but why does it have to be so hard?”
She didn’t expect an answer from her father - this wasn’t the first time this conversation had taken place, and both she and he knew that there was nothing that could be said that would just give her whatever it was that seemed to come naturally to everyone else. In her head, she could imagine all the standard talks he could have given about confidence, but Dad wasn’t like that, and in that moment Dawn felt a sudden appreciation of how lucky she was that was true.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” she said, pulling away. “I’m being pathetic.”
“Oh sweetheart, don’t say that.”
Dawn didn’t reply, and her father leaned forward onto the table.
“Listen,” he began slowly. ’I know that it’s not easy, and I know that there’s not much I can say that will make it easier." He paused briefly, trying to find the right words. “But it won’t always be this hard, I promise.”
“I… I dunno, Dad. I did my best today, and…” - Dawn looked away, unable to keep eye contact - “…and I still couldn’t get it right.”
She slunk back into her chair, tilting her head forwards and staring at the ground. She’d wanted to say that she knew it wouldn’t always be like this, like she said the last time, and the time before, but she didn’t really believe it any more. It was one thing trying to approach strangers and trying to be friendly - she could understand things not going right there - but today was different. Today somebody had offered her exactly what she’d always wanted, and she hadn’t been able to take it. Perhaps she’d never be able to…
“Come with me.”
She looked up, startled. “What?”
“Come on.” repeated her father, standing up from the table. “I’ve got something to show you.”
Dawn stared up into his eyes, and the momentary thoughts of protest faded away. She stood up and moved around the table. “What is it?”
He gave a small smile. “You’ll see. It’s in the back room.”
He turned around, making his way into the hallway and out of sight. Dawn followed almost automatically, still trying to work out what her dad was up to. As she moved into the living room, she saw her father unlocking the wooden door at the far end, before looking back at her with that same thin smile still etched onto his face. The door slowly swung open, and he made his way inside - a second later, Dawn was behind him.
She entered the room, slowly making her way around the mess - the back room was where her father kept his ’projects’, as Dawn had come to refer them as. Every so often he would suddenly announce that he’d had some new idea, whether it was attempting to write a novel, or starting a stamp collection, or researching an ancient Chinese dynasty, or something else entirely. Usually, this interest would fade after a few weeks, but Dad wasn’t the sort of person to throw anything away - hence the back room. The place was completely covered with loose scraps of paper, along with several unusual objects which her father had acquired from assorted flea markets, junk sales and online auctions, and all of it was scattered haphazardly around the woefully undersized room. Perhaps this was why most of the time the door remained firmly locked, and why most of the time Dawn kept her distance. That didn’t mean that she didn’t enjoy the rare times she did get to enter, though. She’d never tell him this, but in spite of the mess and the disorder she loved getting involved in her dad’s schemes.
In the right-hand corner of the room, she saw him pulling down a dusty box from an overstuffed set of shelves. It wasn’t exactly enormous compared to some of the others dotted around, but it still required both hands to bring down. Once it was under control, he brought the box towards her, and placed it down with an audible thump on the cluttered desk between her and him. Slowly and carefully, he flipped the top of the box open, placed his hands inside, and after a small amount of fumbling, pulled out an emerald-green stone.
Dawn let out a small gasp. The stone was completely spherical, with no hint of dents, chips or imperfections anywhere to be seen. Looking closer, she could see the colour pattern on the outside, the lighter green shades contrasting with the darker hues to the extents that she felt she was looking at storm clouds beating down on a chaotic green ocean, the colours weaving and crashing into each other and creating bizarre shapes all over the stone. It looked too chaotic to be natural, and yet too perfect to be random.
She looked back at her father. “Dad, where did you find this?”
“Junk sale,” he replied. “Apparently the owner thought it looked tacky, so I was able to get it cheap. Want to take a look?”
He passed the stone forward, and Dawn reached out to take it - as she held it she realised just how heavy it was. “What is it? I mean, what’s it made of?”
Her father shrugged. “Marble, I think. If it was anything more precious I doubt it would have ended up at a junk sale. I meant to try and take it to an expert at some point,” he added, brightly, “but I never got round to it.”
“It’s like a gemstone,” replied Dawn, absent-mindedly. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Her father leaned leaned forward, and Dawn could see the excited glint in his eyes. “Interesting, isn’t it?”
“It’s amazing…” she echoed, awestruck. “But I don’t understand. What’s it got to with me?”
Her father grinned. Placing his hands on the stone, he slowly twisted it around in Dawn’s grip. For a moment, she was confused, until she noticed the engravings etched on the other side of the stone.
As the stone turned in her hands, she could see the image in front of her. It appeared to be three horses, although she’d never seen horses with those proportions, and certainly not ones that wore smiles on their faces. Each one had their eyes closed in an expression of tranquility, and their hooves joined together to form some kind of equine trifecta. It was now that she realised that the horses were not identical - while one seemed to be a regular horse, another appeared to have pegasus wings, while the other was quite clearly a unicorn.
Still uncomprehending, she turned back to her father. “What are these supposed to mean?”
“I couldn’t say for sure,” he replied, the uncertainty evident in his voice. “But, if I had to guess, I’d say this was supposed to be a commemoration piece.”
Dawn looked sceptical. “With horses?”
“Ponies,” he replied automatically, then spotted Dawn’s confused expression. “Too small to be horses,” he added hastily.
Dawn sighed. “But then what was it commemorating?”
“I don’t know. But I’ve got a idea.” He waited for a moment before continuing. “You have a unicorn, a pegasus, and a standard pony. Three different groups, coming together. I wouldn't be surprised is this was supposed to represent some sort of treaty between three tribes.”
“And why ponies?”
“I’ve seen stranger things,” replied her father offhandedly. “Maybe it was symbolic of something, or maybe the ponies were part of the treaty somehow. Or maybe…” - he paused for dramatic effect - “whoever created it really liked ponies.”
Dawn sniggered in spite of herself - Dad somehow could make her laugh no matter how bad she was feeling about herself. He still hadn’t answered her first question though, and by now she was more confused than ever.
She placed the stone down on the desk. “Dad. What’s this got to do with me making friends? Why did you need to show me this?”
“Because…” began her father, taking great care to say the right thing. “…because I wanted to show you that friendship is worth it.”
He pointed at the stone again, and when he spoke this time it was quieter and more contemplative than Dawn had ever heard her father before. “This stone was made because a long time ago someone made two very good friends. Perhaps even with someone they weren’t expecting to make friends with.”
He paused again, his hand moving between the three ponies. “I can’t say that it will be easy for you to make friends, because I know that it isn’t. But I can show you that it’s worth the hardship if it means something as special as this.”
Dawn looked at the stone again, and at the image of the three ponies, together in harmony. Her dad was right - this was a memorial to friendship, and it was beautiful.
Her eyes were watering again as she glanced back up. “Do you think…”
She didn’t finish, but her father understood. “I know.”
He opened his arms, and in an instant Dawn was around the other side of the desk hugging him, because she loved him and he loved her, and right now that was enough.
By dinner time, Dawn was beginning to feel a bit more relaxed. Her father had decided to try out a new pasta recipe, and experience told her that this was likely to become her father’s next project for a couple of months. She smiled inwardly - that wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe she could learn a few recipes herself.
Across the table, her father noticed a small smirk. “Feeling better?”
The question threw up some unwelcome memories, and she stumbled over her reply. “Sort of… I think.” She stopped, gathering herself, then continued. “I think I just need a bit more time.”
“Fair enough,” he replied, understandingly, before glancing at her pasta bowl. “You about finished?”
She popped the last bite into her mouth, swallowed, and nodded. Her father leaned over and grabbed both bowls, before taking them into the kitchen. Dawn remained seated, taking advantage of the moment of solitude.
She tried to process exactly how she felt - she wasn’t upset anymore, but neither did she feel completely settled either. The only word she could come up with to describe it was stuffed, as if her head was full of so many thoughts and feelings and she was experiencing them all at once. She needed to sort her head out, and none of the usual methods were working.
A green flash suddenly caught her eye, and as she looked down she found herself staring at her father’s mysterious stone. She gazed at the patterns on the surface, which somehow looked different every time she saw it. Before, she’d seen a storm on the ocean, but now as she examined the collisions between the dark and light swirls of green, it looked more like an infinitely overgrown forest.
Suddenly, Dawn glanced up, looking through the kitchen into the back garden as something clicked in her head. She stood up, ran into the hallway, and grabbed her coat off the coat rack, putting it on as quickly as she could before bounding back into the dining room. As she moved past the table, she caught sight of the stone again.
Dawn didn’t know what made her do it. Maybe the conversation with her dad had convinced her that it was necessary, or maybe she was just feeling so befuddled that she wasn’t thinking straight. All she really knew was that within seconds she’d grabbed the stone and placed it in her right coat pocket. It bulged outwards conspicuously, and its weight left her feeling slightly lopsided, but by that point she wasn’t really concerned. After taking a moment to gather her bearings, she proceeded into the kitchen, and headed towards towards the glass screen door at the far end.
As she looked through the door, she could see her destination. Just beyond the stone wall at the back of the garden was a shadowy looking collection of trees and plant life. There was an official name given to the place, but most of the locals simply referred to it as the forest. Most people never had much reason to talk about the place, and virtually no reason to go wandering around inside it.
Dawn, despite living a literal stone’s throw away, had only been there a few times before. She couldn’t say she enjoyed it, but occasionally, when she’d felt lost and confused, it was somewhere she could escape to, a place of solitude where she could sort out every conflicting emotion in her head before coming back into the real world outside.
She stared out at the forest again - the last vestiges of sunlight were disappearing behind the tree-line, and she knew that if she didn’t go now she may not be able to go at all. She placed her hands on the door handle - and froze. Suddenly all her confidence had faded away, leaving behind an all too familiar feeling of doubt.
“Heading out?”
Dawn didn’t jump this time - instead, she slowly made her way around to face her father, who was stood by the sink, and sighed.
“No, Dad,” she started. “I mean I was, but… it doesn’t matter.”
Her father began to approach slowly. “Doesn’t it?”
He made his way past her, grabbed the handle, and slowly pulled open the screen door. As he looked back at the stunned expression on his daughter’s face, he shrugged. “I’m surprised you didn’t think of this before.”
Dawn fidgeted. “I don’t have to go there, Dad. Not if you don’t want me to.”
“Dawn,” her father began, raising his hand. “What I want, more than anything, is for you to be happy. And you’re the only person who can work out how to do that.”
He looked out into the garden briefly, slowly inhaling the air, before turning back to his daughter. “Just be careful. And don’t stay out for too long.” With that, he stepped aside, leaving the way clear.
Hesitantly, Dawn made her way forward. As she made her way through the door, she halted, and glanced back over her shoulder. “Dad?”
“Yes?”
She paused for a moment. “Thanks, Dad.”
“No problem, sweetie.” He smiled, and Dawn couldn’t help joining him. “See you later.”
Dawn nodded, and then turned away towards the forest. The doubt remained in her mind, but a small spark of confidence had managed to break through, and she began to move forwards. As she reached the wall separating her from the dense woodland, she halted, before placing her hands on top of the stone structure and vaulting her way up.
As she successfully landed on top of the wall, she looked back and saw her father, still standing in the doorway. She lingered for a moment, before pushing herself down to the other side, stumbling slightly as she landed but just about keeping her balance. With some apprehension, she began moving forward, making her way into the forest.
After a few minutes of walking, she noticed just how palpable the silence was. Aside from the occasional scurrying of some identified woodland animal and the snapping of twigs underfoot, there was no sound whatsoever, and the unsettling atmosphere only intensified the further she proceeded into the forest. Exacerbating the creepy feeling was the fact that the overgrown foliage blocked out all but the tiniest amount of light - the last smatterings of sunlight had disappeared, and it was only the dim twilight of the moon and stars that allowed her to make out the gaps between the trees. Any newcomers to the forest would be lost in a matter of minutes in these conditions, which was another reason the forest was so rarely visited.
Dawn, however, was not completely ignorant of the forest’s geography. She knew that approximately five minutes walk from the forest boundary was a small clearing where a tree had fallen, and that’s where she knew she needed to go. She had discovered the area on her very first visit to the forest, and although her memories of that night were hazy for several reasons, she had been able to remember the location for every successive visit since.
She made her way up a slope, taking care to avoid the numerous exposed roots on the ground below. As she reached the top, she found the tiny clearing a few feet in front of her, illuminated by the moonlight and standing in sharp contrast to the pitch black darkness of the rest of the forest. As she moved forward into the light she could see the fallen tree, looking just as she remembered it from last time. It appeared to shimmer slightly as the moonlight reflected off the moist patches in the wood.
Just as she’d done at her back wall, Dawn vaulted onto the top of the log. This time, however, she remained on top, her legs dangling over the side. For the first time that evening, she allowed herself to relax, letting her mind drift in and out of conscious thought in the silence and stillness of the night.
As she sat, she unconsciously began to pick apart every emotion she was feeling. Sadness from the potential loss of a friend mixed with frustration at her inability to follow through on what she knew she had to do - what she could have done - to make that friendship work. She recognised the streak of self-pity creeping into her mind and tried to counter it, succeeding briefly but knowing that it wasn’t truly beaten.
She thought about her dad - what he’d said to her when she was doubting herself, and what he’d meant when he said things weren’t always going to be so bad. He had seemed so confident when he said it, and she knew he thought she’d be able to get right someday. That didn’t take away the numb feeling in her heart, however, as visions of past failures reemerged from her memories to taunt her.
These visions, however, were being overwrought by a much more recent memory. As they faded, they were replaced with a patchwork of light and dark green blobs meshing and marbling with each other, while in the foreground three ponies circled each other and smiled happily. Realising what it meant immediately, she reached into her coat pocket and removed the stone.
It remained just as mysterious as had been a few hours before, and Dawn could see what had drawn her father to it. As she stared at it, she remembered what he’d told her about it, and sighed as she realised the irony. The stone was incredible, but she couldn’t even begin to understand it, and if the stone was supposed to represent friendship, then maybe that’s why she had so much trouble understanding that as well.
The trees rustled slightly as a small wind picked up, but Dawn didn’t notice. She turned the stone over in her hands, her mind quickly coming up with numerous theories as to the stones origin, in the vain hope that finding an answer to that problem might provide one to her other issues as well.
After a few moments of speculation, however, she was ready to give up. She wasn’t anywhere near qualified enough to identify where the stone came from, and even if she was, she couldn’t see how that would make her better at making friends. Somehow, she managed to get the two problems mixed up in her own head - exactly the opposite of why she’d come here in the first place.
She looked up at the sky, and saw the moon hanging directly overhead. It was getting late now, and Dad would be getting worried. She moved to place the stone back into her pocket, when a sudden gust of wind pummelled her from the right hand side, knocking her off balance.
On instinct, Dawn’s hands moved to cushion her fall. As they came down onto the tree the stone was pushed out of her grip, and she could only look on helplessly as it fell through the air before hitting the ground and rolling into the centre of the clearing.
Her heart racing, Dawn pushed herself back up of the the log. It was only then she noticed the whistling sound of the wind through the trees, shattering the peaceful silence and throwing her into a mild panic. It was getting louder every second, and as it continued it moved from a low moan up to a high screech, forcing her to cover her ears to block out the noise.
As she slid forward, trying to make her way of the log, a second pulse of wind flew around the clearing. This time, it was much stronger, and Dawn found herself thrown off the tree towards the ground below, landing face first with a heavy thud. Shivering with fear on the ground, she felt the cyclone of wind above her, as the screeching noise continued to grow louder and louder.
Anxiously, she lifted her head up, her hands clamped over her ears, and stared in shock. Black storm clouds were forming in the cyclone above, the swirling wind stretching them into long wisps. They circled around the centre of the clearing, and right in the middle, caught in a cluster of leaves and tree bark, she could see something rise up off the ground, something that reflected the dimming moonlight in a shade of emerald green.
With horror, Dawn realised what it was. She tried to stand up, but the cyclone was pushing her down the ground, and with nothing else she could do she began to crawl forward towards the stone. Above her, the storm clouds were closing in on the centre, and the wind was becoming more and more furious with each passing second.
She was now an arms length away from the stone, but before she could reach out and grab it it lifted up out her grasp. The storm swirls were now practically touching the stone now, smothering it in a cocoon of dark cloud. Only the smallest portion remained visible on the underside directly above her, and for a moment Dawn thought she could see the carving of the three ponies in the gap. With a burst of effort from reserves she didn’t know she had, she made a last gasp leap into the air from the ground, pushed her arms in front of her, and grabbed hold of the hovering stone.
Suddenly, the world turned white, and she clenched her eyes shut. The sensation was unbearable, like a million volts coursing through her body. She couldn’t feel the stone in her hands or the ground beneath her feet anymore - it was if she had been suspended in thin air, and all she could do was take in was the screeching and roaring and crashing noise of the cyclone. And then, just as suddenly as she was floating, she was falling - she plunged into the ground in an instant, sliding forward before coming to a stop.
The noise had stopped, but her eyes remained closed. For about five minutes, she lay on the ground in silence, until finally she managed to force them open again.
As she looked around, still unable to bring her body up of the ground, she realised she couldn’t recognise where she was. The trees in front of her bent at the wrong angles and were far too tall to be the ones in the clearing. It wasn’t until she saw at the sky, however, that she realised something was very, very wrong. Dawn wasn’t an expert in astronomy, but she knew what the Earth constellations were, and she knew that what she saw above was impossible in an Earth sky. She threw her head back to the ground in horror, trying to convince herself that she couldn’t have seen what she’d just seen.
‘It’s not real.’ she whispered to herself in a shuddery voice. ‘It can’t be real. You’re panicking and imagining things and you need to get home.’
She threw her head around anxiously, looking for something that would lead back to the house while at the same time trying and failing to ignore the possibility that she may not be able to. She couldn’t make out a thing in the darkness, and was about to give up when in the distance she saw a tiny flash of purple light.
She had no idea what the light was, but it was the only thing in the forest that had given her any hope at all of getting back, and before she could even think about what she was doing Dawn was on her feet and sprinting towards the light, fuelled by a surge of both adrenaline and desperation. She threw herself into the blackness of the forest, her eyes never moving from the single pinprick of light. The trees shot up into the air in front of her, but despite a few close calls she somehow managed to avoid a collision. She could see the light getting closer - she’d be there any second now.
A log suddenly appeared in front of her, and instinct taking over, Dawn jumped. She flew over head first, only just making it over, and milliseconds later her back leg nicked the top of the barrier. She stumbled slightly on the landing, but didn’t stop running - she was almost there now, and she couldn’t stop simply because she stubbed a back hoof.
A second later, she realised that had just injured a part of her body that she wasn’t supposed to have.
A second after that, she realised that she’d just run for the last minute on four legs.
A second after that, she realised that she had stumbled over both her front and back legs, which were now completely out of her control. As she lost contact with the ground, she flew towards the source of the light, time seeming to move in slow motion, and her eyes widened as she saw a lavender unicorn, its horn glowing a bright shade of purple. As it turned its head slowly towards her, she was unable to stop herself from plowing into it.
She rolled over in the air and smashed into the ground, and this time she was unable to hold back the tears. She huddled on the ground, shivering, and tried to convince herself that it was all a nightmare, that she was five minutes walk away from her house, that the sky was normal, that unicorns didn’t exist, and that even if they did she certainly wasn’t one.
“Hello?”
Dawn remained silent as she felt something move on top of her head, something that definitely was not her pointed and independently moving ears.
“My name is Twilight. I’m going to pull you back up, but I’ll need your help.”
She moved her not-front legs in front of her, and waited for the stranger to grab hold of her hands which she could no longer feel. She didn’t worry when the the stranger instead wrapped something that felt like a hoof around where her wrists still were, or when she was lifted up into a crawling position as opposed to being stood up on her only two legs.
“Can you open your eyes for me?”
As she opened her eyes, and saw Twilight’s face for the first time, she could ignore her lavender coat, her spiralled horn, and her purple and pink striped mane. But as she stared into her large purple eyes, with their long individual eyelashes, she couldn’t pretend any longer. The emotion in the unicorn’s eyes was undeniable, and suddenly Dawn realised everything she’d seen was real, and that she was really trapped on another world and in another body, and that she was more scared now than she’d ever been in her entire life. In the grip of pure terror, she barely managed to respond to Twilight’s queries, and as she glimpsed her hooves and her tail for the first time she descended into blind panic.
In the future, she wouldn’t remember exactly what happened in that next minute - that she had begged Twilight to explain what was going on, or that she tried to run away and almost fallen down a cliff. All she would remember is that in her last seconds of consciousness, all she wanted was to go back home.