Chapter 34: The chapter where nothing happens
At the same time, with the defeated ponies:
Twilight appeared the same way as her friends and was received with a big hug from her assistant and a few not as big hugs from her friends and a quick explanation to what had happened. Then, she was quickly informed of the plan Rarity had came up with. She wasn’t fond of the idea of breaking rules (after all, she had read over ten books on theory about why rules must not be broken lest there will be chaos), but in the end she agreed to go along with the plan.
“Let’s see. I can’t send a magical signal because we’re too far away, and I’m pretty sure Discord has already ways to counter any sort of teleportation. Also we don’t have parchment to send a letter eith-”
“Ehem!” Spike interrupted her in the middle of her sentence. Almost instantly, he was in front of her with a piece of parchment and a quill ready to write. “Who said that I didn’t have parchment?” How was he able to make parchment appear out of thin air was a mystery that Twilight had researched many times, but that always left her on a dead end without answers.
“Right, I forgot you could do that.” Twilight wouldn’t deal with this at the moment, so she continued. “Just let me check if there’s something that would stop the letter.”
Her horn glowed for a few seconds until she was stopped by a sudden headache.
“Are you alright, Twilight?” asked Fluttershy in worry.
“Yeah, it’s only that suddenly I feel as if I don’t have as much magic as before,” Twilight was intrigued by this, and tried again.
Meanwhile, Pinkie had returned her attention to the screen with the game and she found something odd about it.
“Uh, Twilight?” she asked, but was ignored by the unicorn, who was struggling to maintain her magic spell. “Twilight, how are you-”
“Pinkie, not now,” interrupted Rarity, who was doing shushing motions with her hoof. “She must concentrate.”
“But how can she be in two places at the same time?” Pinkie said as she pointed to the screen. “She should really teach us how to do that.”
Rarity was perplexed by Pinkie’s question. Sure, she was used to strange questions, but usually they were sudden questions that just came to her head, but this time she was questioning something that she was seeing, and this was something that Rarity would see for herself too.
What she saw in the screen was, indeed, Twilight still in Las Pegasus. Along with her were Fernando and Discord, but for some reason no one was moving one muscle. They were just standing there without doing anything.
“Well…” She wasn’t sure what to say. “This is unexpected, to say the least.”
A pained gasp made them look back at Twilight, who was sweating now because of the effort she was putting into casting that spell.
“Good news is that I know what Discord did to keep Las Pegasus away from the rest of Equestria.” Twilight was talking between breaths, so she paused a little until she was able to talk normally again. “He stopped time, but only all around Las Pegasus, keeping anypony from entering it. However, the bad news is that right now I can’t stop it, and unless we find a way to keep it normal for a while, the letter won’t reach the princess.”
Everypony nodded, and Rarity was the first one to speak.
“Twilight, you might want to come and see this,” She pointed to the screen. Twilight directed her sight to the screen, noticing it for the first time, and there she saw herself.
“I… What… How is this possible?” she asked, her mind trying to wrap itself to this situation that had only presented itself the time she travelled back in time and talked to herself, but right now the circumstances were quite different and she was just as confused as the first time. “This is not scientifically possible.”
“If you don’t know, darling,” Rarity was the first to answer her question, “I don’t think anypony else will be able to tell.”
It was a surprise for everypony (and dragon) when Fluttershy decided to speak again.
“I might have an idea,” she said quietly, and then proceeded to hide behind her mane when all the sets of eyes (except for Lyra’s, who was still obsessing over her map) turned to look at her.
“Can you elaborate, please?” Twilight was as curious as everypony else, but she was the most eager to know.
“Well… Um… While I was chasing Fernando in that labyrinth, I could hear a whisper in the back of my mind.” She shivered a little. She didn’t like thinking about those recent events. “It was dark… And it urged me to catch Fernando and… Well… Kill him.”
Everypony gasped and covered their mouths with their hooves to show dramatic emphasis to the situation. “I think that… Maybe, that was the monster behind my appearance, and I could feel that it was trying to gain control over my body and, I guess Twilight’s monster took control of her body when she lost consciousness.”
This new information was registered by Twilight’s mind and it made the gears in her head turn at an amazing speed. It was a good thing that her mind was a perfectly organized machine, because otherwise you would see smoke coming out of her ears (of course this is figurative speaking. Who would think about something as silly as a robot impersonating a pony?).
“That’s a pretty good theory, Fluttershy, and it would explain my lack of magic,” she said while smiling with relief. “That means that I’m still me, only that I’m just half of me and my other half is there,” and then she started to lose her calm again and ended throwing her front hooves to the air, “but that only raises more questions!!”
While Twilight continued to be as much of a drama queen as Rarity, nopony noticed that Applejack was approaching the group in the screen, and that she suddenly stopped too when she was about to pounce on Fernando.
Back to the game:
Fernando slowly awoke from his unwanted slumber. His head ached and for the first moments all he could see were stars in front of his eyes.
“Ugh… My head…” he whispered as he rubbed the aching spot a little and felt a warm liquid there. “Great… I think this mean I’m alive.”
“You sure are.”
The human froze in place. Looking a little to the right he saw that Applejack, still with Pyramid Head’s helmet, was resting against the wall. “At first I thought I might have kind of killed you, but since you still had some red stuff on your life bar, that weight was lifted off of my shoulders.”
Fernando directed his sight to his Health bar, and sure enough he was still alive, though for some reason he had exactly the same amount of life in it, even after a hit to the head. “I must thank you for showing concern, but if you excuse me,” he stood up pretty fast and was about to run, but... “I have to- woah!” he got dizzy from the lack of blood and fell down again.
“Hey, calm down will ya? It’s already a miracle that you’re still alive. Besides, don’t you think that if I wanted to catch you, I would have you tied down by now?”
Fernando looked back to Applejack from his spot on the ground. She did have a point, but there was still something wrong with this.
“But, aren’t you supposed to catch me or something?”
“Well, I already did, but nothing happened. I don’t even know if I should be trusting Discord with this little game of his,” she was frowning under the helmet, trying to make sure that Fernando wouldn’t try anything funny. “He didn’t even mention you being able to talk. You aren’t one of his darn tricks, are ya?”
“No, no!” Fernando stood up again, this time slower, and held his arms in a defensive manner. “I’m the real one. It’s just that Discord took away my voice ever since we were in Canterlot!”
Applejack kept on staring at him. She decided that she didn’t trust him, but to play along to see how much he actually knew and maybe, but that was just a little maybe, she could give him a chance.
“I’ll give you this one chance to explain what are you doing here, since the beginning, so you better start storytelling.”
Fernando took a deep breath and began to tell Applejack everything that had happened ever since he mysteriously appeared under the city of Canterlot. He couldn’t see Applejack’s face, so he could only wonder how she was reacting or if she was believing him at all.
As for Applejack, she couldn’t tell if he was a very good liar, or if he was some sort of joke made by some sort of creature that wanted to laugh at the crazy shenanigans he would create. Either way, when he got to the part where Discord tells him about his reward for winning she interrupted him.
“Wait just an apple bucking second. Didn’t Discord tell you that he would give you his powers if you won?”
Fernando didn’t understand what Applejack meant by that.
“No, he said that if I win he would give you back your memories and everything would be like the moment just before I was sent back home.”
Pyramid pony, also known as Applejack (well, only in this story), connected the dots as quickly as somebody would be kicked if he tried to connect her freckles. “Well, that no good creature just fooled all of us and the worst part is that he only did that to get a giggle or two!” Kicking a hole in the wall to unwind a little, Applejack then continued. “Ok, lookie here. You don’t like Discord. We don’t like Discord. You see where I’m going?”
Fernando’s eyes shined with realization. “If we make an agreement and we don’t follow Discord’s game, he’ll get bored and leave us alone?”
“Well…” Applejack looked away for a moment, though nobody noticed, “I was thinking more on the classic flank kicking, but I guess your idea works too.” She looked back at him. “By the way, if Discord took your voice- I mean, made it inaudible for us, how come you’re talking just fine right now?”
“Oh, that happened not too long ago, just before I started to run away from psycho Twilight.”
Just as he was saying that, Twilight’s body with Alma’s mind appeared from the top of one building and began to descend the wall; walking on it as if it was the floor, but with spasmodic movements. Since it was the wall opposite from where Applejack had just kicked a hole into, she was the first to notice.
“Umm… By any chance, did Twilight started acting really, really creepy and… And all strange?”
Fernando didn’t know what Applejack was staring at, because he didn’t even know she was staring at something, so he was still as nonchalant as before. “Well, yeah. It’s because the character she was given took control over her because of some sort of effect her magic had on it, and that girl usually went on killing rampages and did supernatural stuff.”
Applejack made an audible gulp.
“Even if that isn’t really important stuff to say, it still would have been good to know a little earlier,” she said with trembling voice.
“Why?” Fernando asked.
“Oh, just saying. By the way, you should take a look just above you.”
Fernando did that and then he died a little inside. The sight that greeted him was that of normal Twilight at first, but then her eyes disappeared, leaving dark and deep holes in her face that seemed to be able to suck away anybody’s soul, along with a creepy and twisted smile that whoever had ever seen her having a breakdown would remember, but luckily it didn’t stay like that, and it changed back to Twilight’s normal and serious expression. After he got over the initial shock, the clever human got a sudden realization
“Wait, in the games… You usually get inside people’s minds… I’ve always be able to talk in my mind… Discord’s magic affects mostly the reality… That’s IT! I’m in my mind, Applejack! I’m just imagining all of this thanks to Twilight’s powers!”
“But I’m no figment of somepony’s imagination! I’m the real me!”
“I know!” Fernando was overrun by joy. “I don’t know you good enough to be able to think up this kind of conversation, and that’s good too, because all this talk wasn’t for nothing. This also means that we can make up a plan to get out of this whole mess!”
While the other two chatted away as if she wasn’t there, Twilight with Alma’s mind got really insulted. At first she was only planning on quickly killing everyone in the vicinity, but now she was starting to consider playing around with these two, particularly the human since she was more familiarized with their species.
With a single spark from Twilight’s horn, Fernando suddenly found himself in the middle of a ring of fire that was closing in on him slowly.
In his panic, Fernando searched for a way out, but there was nothing he could use to safely get out of there, so he turned to his only hope, who happened to be Applejack.
“Applejack!” he exclaimed while motioning with his arms to emphasize the problem. “Don’t just stand there. Do something!
“What do I do?” asked Applejack who wasn’t exactly calm either.
“Hit Twilight or something! She’s not herself right now so it won’t really matter!”
Even if Applejack was willingly going to cooperate with Fernando to go against Discord’s twisted game, she wasn’t one to actually knock sense into one of her friends. Fernando didn’t notice her hesitation because her face was covered by her helmet, but a quick glance to his health bar confirmed that this time he was starting to receive damage. “Hurry up! Please!”
“If this doesn’t work,” Applejack started as she grabbed the oversized knife that came with her character. “and that Twilight is our normal Twilight, you’ll really get it, ya hear me?”. She held the weapon as if it was a baseball bat and swung it, hitting Twilight with the blunt side. Normally, she would have made a hole through the wall, but she disappeared as soon as she touched the stone wall, as did the ring of fire that no longer was around Fernando.
At that moment, Fernando, Applejack and, quite far away, Discord caught a glimpse of the real life, the illusion weakening a little with the hit Applejack delivered, but, it wasn’t enough to break it.
That moment didn’t last long, and after that everything went back to its normal flow. Twilight’s body stopped Applejack’s swing and since the purple unicorn was slightly over Fernando at the moment, it fell on him, with the edge pointing down and burying itself into Fernando’s head.
Applejack went wide eyed when she noticed what happened and started to freak out. “OHMYCELESTIAI’MSOSORRY!!”
Fernando tried to calm her down, showing that he was in no pain at all.
“Applejack, it’s okay. See?” He pointed to his health bar. “It stopped when the fire disappeared. I’m not even feeling it, just calm down and pull it out.” This was partially true. He wasn’t feeling it, at the moment, and getting it out before the shock settled in was his top priority at the moment.
“How in tarnation do you expect me to calm down?! I think I just took a piece of your mind!” Applejack wasn’t as calm, to say the least.
“Just take out the freaking butcher knife!!”
Fernando’s frantic order was enough to get to Applejack’s head and she finally reacted. She took a deep breath. She turned around, and with one mighty buck, she flying the knife, out of Fernando’s head.
Now, let’s take a moment and look into our memories. Have you ever accidentally cut yourself with a pointy object, and only felt it until a few minutes or hours later, when you finally notice the cut? Well, let’s say that this time Fernando had quite the ‘head-splitting’ headache.
A few minutes later, after calming down the pain and both of their nerves, Fernando and Applejack finally had a moment of peace and quiet silence while sitting down on the ground.
“You sure you’re okay, partner?” she asked in honest worry
“I already told you, I’m fine” Fernando reassured her. “I have the theory that since this is Twilight’s magic and illusions, only she and whatever she creates can harm us. Anything else that our own minds made should be harmless, at least for us.”
“And how do we get out of our imaginations? We can’t really do nothing unless we’re awake.”
“You already saw what we need to do.”
Applejack knew, and she didn’t like it one bit, because to wake up she’s gonna have to hit Twilight. Hard. She sighed and stood up, stretching her legs.
“Well, we won’t get anything done if we lay here. Let’s get this over with so all of us can return home.”
Before she could take even one step, she was violently thrown aside and crashed head first into the wall by a very mad Twilight, who decided to just show up without flashy effects for once.
“I’m okay!” she said, her helmet actually being useful, but was ignored by the other two.
Alma in Twilight’s body didn’t even try to freak out Fernando either. This time, she just held him in place with Twilight’s magic and advanced slowly towards him and, for the first time, talked to him.
“Nothing personal, but normally I don’t have this much of a problem just to kill, so it’ll be a quick but painful death instead of a long and painful one.”
Once again, and he was sure he would need therapy if he continued to do this, Fernando started to fear for his life.
“Wait! We… Um… We aren’t so different!” he mentally facepalmed at his lame response and frantically tried to remember everything he knew about Alma Wade and prayed for his life.
Alma stopped and looked curiously at Fernando.
“What do you mean, kid?”
“I know loneliness… And… Torment too?” he was praying that his prayer was heard.
With an evil glare that pierced his mind, Alma stared into Fernando’s eyes, thinking that he was just making fun of her
“You think you know loneliness? To be treated as a freak? To be sought only because they think you’re dangerous?”
Fernando saw his chance and he took it, thanking every god he prayed to for letting him live.
“Actually I do. If you don’t believe me, read my memories!”
Alma glared one last time inside Fernando, but this time, she did it only with curiosity. She began to go through his life, and started to get angered when she only found happy and normal memories. Fernando could feel her killing intent and pleaded for her to continue “You have to see it all! Everything!”
She was about to stop when she reached the part where he mysteriously appeared in Equestria, and all her anger was gradually turning into understanding. She saw how he would be locked away, how there was a special team dedicated to hunt him down, how an entire nation was put against him, how alone he felt for weeks, how he faced many dangers, and then she saw how Discord took away his chance at getting back and then continuously pestered him.
Even if it wasn’t even close to what she had to go through, she could understand him, and she felt that he could understand her too.
“You’re right, we aren’t so different...”
Fernando sighed in relief when Alma changed the angered and bloodlusty expression on Twilight’s face for a neutral one, but he got confused when she started to give him bedroom eyes.
There was a thought that kept on nagging him on the back of his mind, and it wasn’t until Alma in Twilight’s body began to advance again that it finally clicked.
“Wait… In one of the games, Alma rapes the main character… Screw my life...” he stopped his line of thought and then added, “Not literally, please.”
When Alma reached Fernando, she jumped to hug him and now she was clinging from his shoulders, which was a little awkward considering that she was using Twilight’s body, and she whispered.
“We’ll see how alike we really are.”
“OHDEERGODIFYOU’RETHEREPLEASESENDHELP!!”
It seemed that a deer high in the sky actually heard him, because before Twilight could do anything, a hard blow was delivered to her head with the blunt side of a giant knife, courtesy of Applejack, knocking her out cold.
Before the illusion could end, Applejack smirked though it couldn’t be seen.
“You really owe me big time now and you know it, right?” she commented.
“Please,” Fernando’s mind was getting recovered from the near molestation, so he was barely whispering, “let’s just not talk about this ever again.”
And then Twilight’s combination of special power and magic finally ended.
Back in the real Las Pegasus, Discord, Fernando, Twilight and now Applejack too, who originally planned on sneaking up on Fernando, lay on the floor.
Before anybody could wake up, Twilight’s body disappeared.
The other three woke up a few minutes later at the same time. Discord tried his magic and he was happy to know that he was able to use it again. Fernando checked his health bar and, with a grateful sigh, he saw that he had the same health as earlier, and Applejack, for a lack of actions she could manifest to make herself relevant to this description, just stood there, and it was as if nothing had happened at all.